Notes and asides:
Someone in the FPR camp is going to have to respond to James’s inquiries, brilliantly rendered, in his Saturday post, Deconstructing Lifestyle. The response will do much to lay the argument open for examination. And, Ralph Hancock has weighed in with some rather pithy observations in his post, A Modest Meditation…, that also requires a response.
Carl Scott has rather bluntly probed the soft underbelly of the FPR position, though we should keep in mind that all philosophical positions have certain intrinsic weaknesses and not make too much of Carl’s successes while acknowledging that he has drawn blood.
The left wing of the FPR camp, e.g. Fox, Medaille, and Daly, though Daly has been absent from the fight so far, may be FPR’s weakness given the recent legislative activity in Washington where the radical Democrats have passed cap and trade which threatens our entire economic system. It is yet to be determined if PoMoCons intend to tie the socialist element of FPR to the radical Obama/Democrat regime. If they do, look for another round of blood letting, with sharp words, the occasional derisive comment, and high snark!
While the FPRs and the PoMoCons have legitimate criticism to level at each other the reality is that both sides represent respectable elements of the traditional conservative movement. Lawler, Poulos, et al need to detail their position regarding the Bush regime, (the 800lb. Gorilla in the room) both historically and politically, in order to clear the air and establish the ground. What we will fine, I think, is just how close both sides actually are. The unification of both the FPR and PoMoCons represent our best hope at presenting a substantive resistance to the Obama Democrats, considering the utter collapse of the Republican coalition.
Neither side has commented on the possibility that we are coming to the natural (historical) end of the originating system, the constitutional democracy (republic), where its strength was interpreted as “the eschatological tension left over from the Puritan Revolution.” The very great advantage to this “system” was that society was organized on a classical and Christian tradition that understood the tension of human existence, in right order, as a function of Plato’s metaxy, e.g. the movement of consciousness between immanence and transcendence. The need to recapture the moral and ethical high ground has never been so urgent in American history and no groups are more qualified and capable of achieving that goal then the FPRs and PoMoCons.
A successful conclusion to this debate may result in a substantive resistance to the Obama/Democrat regime, which is working tirelessly to render the United States a third world country operating under an authoritarian government.
June 28th, 2009 | 3:41 pm
Since you bring it up, I’d submit that the constitutional democracy or republic as conceived in the 18th century came to an end a long time ago. It wasn’t quite stillborn. But it would be hard to argue that it survived the 19th century. What we’ve got, which might be called postmodern democracy is something very different. And in my view, this new kind of regime (contra everybody, the Bush and Obama administrations are governments, NOT regimes) remains so little understood, partly because we’re in thrall to the old categories, that it’s hard to get a handle on the advantages and disadvantages. But one feature, I’m pretty confident, is that it becomes extremely difficult to talk about right order in an substantive way. What would it even mean to recover the ethical high-ground?
June 28th, 2009 | 8:41 pm
I quite agree re: the loss of he “constitutional” republic; perhaps beginning at the convention itself but surely by Marbury vs. Madison, which should have triggered a war of secession; that it didn’t make tell us a great deal about that generation of Americans.
I am intrigued by your comment, ” And in my view, this new kind of regime (contra everybody, the Bush and Obama administrations are governments, NOT regimes) remains so little understood, partly because we’re in thrall to the old categories, that it’s hard to get a handle on the advantages and disadvantages.”
I believe you’ve hit on an important point and I am by no means aware of the latest materials, so anything you have to say on the subject would be of interest.
Re: your objection to ‘regime,’ my dictionary tells me it is “A gov’t that is in power,” however, I believe your point is that the word “regime” carries certain baggage, and of course in re: the Bush/Obama gov’ts that’s how I meant it, e.g. a negative connotation, snark. And finally, your comment, “What would it even mean to recover the ethical high-ground?” negates the quest for a life of reason, the primary constituent of a “good society,” where reason is defined as noetic reason (as opposed to pragmatism), defined as all rational action in science, society, and history “both in the formation of the order of the psyche and of society.”
I don’t think it is difficult at all for two interlocutors who believe man’s consciousness exists in the tension described by the poles of immanence and transcendence to “talk about right order in a substantive way.” However, it is not possible to debate with people who hold the immanenist position, and thus the need to “recover the ethical high-ground.”
June 28th, 2009 | 10:13 pm
On the regime: I’m Straussian enough to think of regime as something more fundamental than the government in power. I mean the substratum of normative principles, customs, and power relations within which any government is embedded. One thing that’s surprised a lot of commentators is the significant continuity between the Bush and Obama administrations. It doesn’t surprise me, because the regime, and the President’s place in it, aren’t changed by anything so insignificant as the replacement of one party by another in a normal election. Now the changes from the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution, and from the pre- to post-Civil War Constitutions, those were something different. Those were changes of regime.
As for ethical reasoning, your response basically articulates my point in a more negative way: I’m suggesting precisely it’s no longer clear what it means to seek the good society. Of course, if one understands reason as you describe, it’s not hard to have a discussion about right order. Hopefully, that’s one of the things we can do around here. But that understandingn is no longer constitutive of public discourse, and maybe never will be again. This is the condition I’d like to try to understand–especially as I see no reason to think the “crisis of natural limits” that FPRs warn of us is going to happen any time soon.
June 28th, 2009 | 10:44 pm
Sam, thanks for this, and my apolgies re: ‘regime.” You must consider that I’m an autodidact and not university trained so my understanding of the word was inappropriate for the discussion, and thanks for the Straussian def.
I do agree with your comments re: the ‘continuity’ of the transition of power from Bush to Obama. I do wonder if you have any thoughts/comments on what appears to be some structural alterations of the American governance paradigm (woefully inadequate prose here) being instituted by the Obamacons?
“Now the changes from the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution, and from the pre- to post-Civil War Constitutions, those were something different. Those were changes of regime.”
Actually, I’m inclined, as an Anti-Federalist/John Randolph Tertium Quid, to refer to them as an act of treason.
Your final paragraph opens a can of worms in terms of understanding in the noetic ’sense of reason’ previously discussed and the inclusion of the pneumatic element e.g. the great queries of philosophy and theology which is essential at this point of the conversation. Which is to say that, I think, man as long as he exists will, if he chooses, have some hope in his seeking, questing, and searching for order, wisdom, and purpose. And it was never the purpose of the ‘public’ to engage in this quest, it was the philosopher and only the philosopher.
That’s why Re: the FPR discussion I would really like to see you involved in defining the bases of the dialectical conversation with the intent of finding some common ground and establishing some semblance of a political resistance to the derailed Obamacons.
June 29th, 2009 | 8:50 am
No reason to apologize. Pretty much everyone uses regime in the more limited way you did. Oartly thanks to a public relations campaign promoted by neocons who wanted to convince us that we had to get rid of Saddam.
On the more important issue, if the question of the right society is only for the philosopher, then there isn’t much to worry about. Contrary to what Strauss claims, nobody much cares about his bizarre hobby. On the other hand, there’s the question of how a society that is no longer able to conceive itself as the right society can remain basically stable (again, I tend to doubt, unlike the Porchers, that we face any great crisis). That’s a bit of a riddle, isn’t it?
Re Obama: What structural changes do you see in offing? So far as I can tell, the President is just a mainstream liberal, who wants to spend money on the kinds of things mainstream liberals want to spend money on. As it happens, I don’t think a national health system is such a bad idea, although I’m not happy about the bailouts. And he’s been rather good on foreign policy. What all this amounts to is a confession that I’m probably the most postmodern and least conservative (in the conventional sense) contributor to this blog. But you probably figured that out a while a go.
June 29th, 2009 | 9:04 am
Where was it I suggested that it’s Aristotle’s best man, not Plato’s, who attracts the envy of the many? There’s something very telling about that I think. One therapy for this problem is to say that Aristotle’s best man is really only choosing a certain lifestyle. That points — as you hint, Sam — toward a society that’s not “basically stable”. But I would hint in return that we’re willing to trade away stability so long as we feel like we’re getting it back in durability. The Porchers are right to think this is a dangerous game, but probably you and I agree that they are less right to expect society is on the brink of catastrophe. That’s not to say, of course, that our REGIME isn’t in danger of losing its character as the product of political liberty. And ironically, many of our neoconservative friends seem at their worst only to be able to conceive of the US as the right society in foreign-relations terms.
June 29th, 2009 | 10:16 am
I think the ‘true’ philosopher is the rare bird indeed. A man/woman who seeks/quests for the truth/order and is willing to reject years of work based on the materials rather than wealth, popularity, or social position comes along maybe once a generation. Plus you’ve got the problem that in many instances these heros are required to ride the tumbril, here I am thinking of Edith Stein, which indicates the close proximity of saint to philosopher.
My view of Obama is less optimistic and rather dark, where I expect to hear his call for a Marxist chiliasm, although I hope you’re right and I’m wrong.
I am rather with the FPR in terms of the possibility of social collapse, with the added hot sauce of an apocalyptic tension, and the realization that the epiphany of the ego, in its rejection of God, is yet completed. Where the drama of humanity is, in some ways, and speaking historiogenetically, a cyclical event.
I hope to have a piece coming out in the fall issue of the Quarterly Review titled: A Critique of Atheism, which I’ll send along for your critique.
June 29th, 2009 | 12:08 pm
Exactly so, Bob. That’s why I thought this challenge was a little off to begin with.
June 29th, 2009 | 6:34 pm
I look forward to reading the piece, Bob. As for social collapse-I’ll believe it when I see it. One hates to agree with David Brooks, if only because he’s usually so banal. But he’s right to point out that, by a lot of indicators (violent crime, divorce, drug use, etc.) we’re actually in a lot better shape today than we were thirty years ago.
Over at FPR, Deneen not so subtly reproached me with failing to appreciate the gravity of the economic crisis. On that I have to confess that I just don’t know: I’m no economist. On the other hand, the economists don’t seem to know either. So I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see.
But really, I just can’t understand why you want to call Obama a Marxist. Apart from a couple of, er, ill-considered remarks, nothing he’s done even approaches the mainstream social democracy of twenty five years ago. As Peter has observed somewhere in these now interminable threads, the Red delusion is dead. What Ivan calls techno-politics is a real problem. But not the way Marxism was when it really meant something.
June 29th, 2009 | 8:35 pm
Let me answer the question of ‘collapse’ in the near future.
The problem is Obama as a Marxists: The first acknowledgment is to understand the task of the Marxist is to bring the advance of history into the consciousness of the masses, thereby advancing history. That is why Obama is teaching us of our failure as Americans and more importantly as the United States how it is we have failed, ’systemetically,’ to realize our position as endpoint in the dialectical process. Obama, if you listen carefully, you’ll detect the hints of the speech common among the post-Colonial African intellectuals who were educated in the Soviet Union, Cuba, and Soviet-block countries, where for the most part they and their coevals, as true Marxists, disallow debate; and this is important because Obama does not handle ‘any’ questions, outside prepared/submitted question very well at all.
Second, I would point to those men that influenced his life as he was growing up, as well as his mother’s political antecedents. Among the men in question is of course Bill Ayres, a familiar case, there’s also a fellow, whose name I’ve forgotten, that was involved with Obama as a youth, in the islands, I believe, who was some sort of activist in the CPUSA, though my recollection is imperfect, you may be familiar. And, I believe his step dad may have been a Marxist.
In Voegelin’s essay, Wisdom and Magic of the Extreme (CW, Vol. 12, pgs 318-21) he writes of the derailed second realities that are a product of these systemic distortions related, in this case, to Marxism: “His (the dreamer) break, not with reality but with its sense, forces the activist to elaborate a dream story that will endow his project with the appearance of action in the real world. He is forced into his story because a reality whose sense he rejects will not deliver the appearance he needs. No list, however long, of real sufferings, perhaps accompanied by a list of realistic proposals for their alleviation, will radiate by itself a promise of transfiguration….The action envisaged by the dream story must appear, therefore, to affect the center of man’s existence in such a manner that, from the center transformed, the structure of the world will be reborn in perfection….If the activist wants to avoid the fate of being shrugged aside asa a silly person, he must try to eclipse our image of reality by a counterimage that will furnish a plausible basis of the action he calls for.” and so on.
In the massive 2 trillion dollar deficit established in the first six months of Obama’s administration, in the TARP programs and the nationalization of the banks and auto manufacturers, in Cap and TRade, in his efforts to nationalize Health Care I see the dreamer who through his actions is covering the structure of reality with sufficient comphehensiveness to appear not as a “character of a dream image” but rather to appear as plausible. The horror of Obama is that he appears to see himself as the Mature Man who has overcome disorder and imperfection and either has or is on the cusp of negating any questions related to the meaning of his existence…e.g. the tyrant, writ, in this instance, rather large.
Sam, the problem is that I could do a couple thousand words on this problem but I realize that it probably has no meaning for you. That’s fine, I’m not a priest or a rabbi, merely an observer, and yes, I may be wrong. In fact I hope Obama is just a misguided, run-of-the-mill mainstream American liberal, for the sake of my children and grandchildren.
Alas, I fear we have in Obama the totalitarian, the man seeking the Superman, the man living in Second Realities, alienated from God.
July 6th, 2009 | 7:52 pm
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