Quotations

"Though they like to fancy themselves independent thinkers, the intellectuals are (allowing for individual exceptions) the most oversocialized, the most conformist, the tamest and most domesticated, the most pampered, dependent, and spineless group in America today. As a result, their impulse to rebel is particularly strong. But, because they are incapable of independent thought, real rebellion is impossible for them. Consequently they are suckers for the System's trick, which allows them to irritate people and enjoy the illusion of rebelling without ever having to challenge the System's basic values.

"Because they are the teachers of young people, the university intellectuals are in a position to help the System play its trick on the young, which they do by steering young people's rebellious impulses toward the standard, stereotyped targets: racism, colonialism, women's issues, etc. Young people who are not college students learn through the media, or through personal contact, of the "social justice" issues for which students rebel, and they imitate the students. Thus a youth culture develops in which there is a stereotyped mode of rebellion that spreads through imitation of peers—just as hairstyles, clothing styles, and other fads spread through imitation."
Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, the American anarchist who killed three people and injured 23 others in a bombing campaign between 1978 and 1995.

"It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit."
Sir Noel Coward

"What to expect in Ukraine now that Russia has all but secured the Donbas? A bloodbath. Today is the anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. There are lessons to be drawn from it. More remarkable than the battle itself is its aftermath.
"....A recurring theme in the history of war is that most of the killing typically occurs long after rational calculation would call for the surrender of the losing side.
".....For all the wasteful slaughter of the last 18 months of the war, Southern commander Lee barely could persuade his men to surrender in April 1865. The Confederate president, Jefferson Davis, called for guerrilla war to continue, and Lee’s staff wanted to keep fighting. Lee barely avoided a drawn-out irregular war."
David Goldman yesterday. This is important if true and more and more people are saying Russia is winning. (The Confederate cause was just but because of slavery people now think it wasn't, though slavery is irrelevant to the legality of secession. The way Sherman behaved is appalling. He not Lee was the Nazi. Were the KKK just Confederate soldiers carrying on the war by other means? Their founder General Forest was.)

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Thrasymachus

@mauricevachon12

· Jul 4

Replying to @davidpgoldman

Smart money says it stops now. Russia = Not strong enough to cross Southern Bug River. (Ukrainians will blow up Mikolaiv bridge). Most likely scenario = Forget Odessa + Armistice + tables set for a Cold War 2.0. Both sides feed MI complexes for decades. Only minor kinetics.

(I hope so, but think Russia will continue slowly to grind on.)

A week after the Brexit referendum result 6 years ago feelings on the losing side were running very high.

“No man needs a vacation so much as the man who has just had one.” Elbert Hubbard