Bill Whittle: The Workshops of Identity [brilliant! - tribute to America and scorn of Hollywood]

pajamasmedia.com/ejectejecteject ^ | April 10, 2009 | Bill Whittle

[Tolik]

Bill Whittle is a MUST READ: http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/billwhittle/index

His Page: http://pajamasmedia.com/ejectejecteject/

Recent Entries:

• THE WORKSHOPS OF IDENTITY
• A MESSAGE TO THE RICH
• TONE DEAF 2: DEAF AND DEAFERER
• TONE DEAF
• ASSIMILATED!

 

 

[Tolik]

Nailed It!
Moral Clarity BUMP !

This ping list is not author-specific for articles I'd like to share. Some for the perfect moral clarity, some for provocative thoughts; or simply interesting articles I'd hate to miss myself. (I don't have to agree with the author all 100% to feel the need to share an article.)

I will try not to abuse the ping list and not to annoy you too much, but on some days there is more of the good stuff that is worthy of attention.

You are welcome to browse the list of truly exceptional articles I pinged to lately. Updated on March 19, 2009.  on  my page.
You are welcome in or out, just freepmail me (and note which PING list you are talking about).

Besides this one, I keep 2 separate PING lists for my favorite authors Victor Davis Hanson and Orson Scott Card.  

[ElayneJ]

Excellent!

[Bahbah]

Wonderful writing.

[Earthdweller]

Hollywood "cleansed it's bowel" of one form of extremism only to adopt another...

They are no more enlightened than before Paris was ruled by another form of tyrants.

[Tolik]

Must be repeated: How long will the next darkness last? A few centuries? All of the readily available tools to build a new civilization – the ores, the coal and oil – all these are gone

Our industrial civilization used up a lot (most?) of easier accessible natural resources. The reason that the dire predictions of the end of oil, etc were not proved right is that at our level of technology we are able to discover and use many of the less accessible resources. If technology ever goes down to the lower levels - we WILL BE OUT of oil and everything else.

[Citizen Tom Paine]

I recommend that you peruse “ The Challenge of Man's Future’ by Harrison Brown who was a geophysicists. He wrote the book in 1956 and discusses in part possible scenarios when a technical civilization collapses. But note one of the causes is loss of will by our leaders,i.e., they become wimps. And also note that a large portion of the people keep the faith.

[Tolik]

You guys might like it Ping.

[FlameThrower]

One thing in common these patterns bear: the rise slow, the fall seemingly precipitous, and in every case we find the loss of nerve and strength and will comes not from the bottom, not from the common people at all, but from the rulers, the philosophers, the most affluent and educated who, in their comfort and Narcissism, abandon duty for self-absorption and self-gratification and who in boredom or self-loathing decide to fling open the gates of the city to the barbarians beyond, while the common man still stands at the walls prepared to die for the people in his charge.

True as far as it goes. But, eventually, the rot reaches the people, too. As it has in this country. We cannot perpetuate the myth that we are still an heroic people betrayed by corrupt and weak leaders. We, too, have become weak and corrupt. We elect those leaders. We listen to the lies and choose to believe. It may start with treason of the clerisy. But by the time it all collapses, as it is now doing, the entire structure is rotten through and through. America the exceptional is virtually gone. Little flashes -- like the rescue of the sea captain from the pirates -- will counter the general corruption. But these are just momentary ripples in the stream of history.

[Matchett-PI]

He’s one of my favorites!

[GOPJ]

Thanks for the ping.

[GOPJ]

One thing in common these patterns bear: the rise slow, the fall seemingly precipitous, and in every case we find the loss of nerve and strength and will comes not from the bottom, not from the common people at all, but from the rulers, the philosophers, the most affluent...

The waterfall effect - everything seems fine up until the last few seconds.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Nice post!

[GOPJ]

Reading his remarkable and lengthy article I was, at the close of it, reminded instantly of Lincoln, who once wrote, “He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met.”

New tag! Thanks.

[marron]

Thank you.

Excellent.

[tarheelswamprat]

Thanks for posting this. Whittle is one of the best.

Unfortunately, he and those like him will be received about as well as the Trojans did Cassandra...

[ReleaseTheHounds]

"You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children's children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done."

[happygrl]

http://www.city-journal.org/2008/18_1_urb-war.html

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Tolik!

[ValerieTexas]

I do like this article and have passed it on to many friends .... however, the contrarian within me wants to add another dimension to the perspective.

I’m gonna work on it.