Category Archives: The State

Jonathan Meades Is Ever So Convincing; Much More Than Brutalism

Aesthetics, Art, Britain, Intellectualism, Socialism, The State

The little I know about Brutalist architecture is enough to make me skeptical of Jonathan Meades’ brilliantly spoken claims for it. This school of architecture seems to have been wedded to The State and, as such, to have taken on its foreboding austerity (expensive and ugly). “Governmentally sanctioned Brutalims” is indeed “the architecture of “cultural welfarism.” But a government-spawned “novelty”? Please!

However, Meades, a Briton of course, is a magnificent advocate for anything, really. His polemics are astounding in both beauty and internal logic. “… a prose style so pugnaciously cultivated, so unpredictably informative, and, enviably often, so extremely funny. …” Meades is indeed a strange experience: You might not agree with his assessment, but you love every moment of it and follow in delight.

On the 1960s cultural output: “A kaleidoscope of polychromatic vacuity.” “Enjoyably witless hedonism.” “A gluppy soap of mysticism …” “New universities busily inventing new disciplines.” Vatican Two decreeing that new churches should be churches in the round, like theaters in the round.”

Bunkers Brutalism and Bloodymindedness Concrete Poetry – Two from MeadesShrine on Vimeo.

*Image courtesy By Aurelien Guichard from London, United Kingdom – National Theatre Uploaded by BaldBoris, CC BY-SA 2.0

UPDATE II: Big-Game Plunderer (& Progressive) Theodore Roosevelt

Environmentalism & Animal Rights, Ethics, History, Republicans, The State

The reverence for authority and status, especially presidential, obscures the ability to distill the actions of The Revered One to their ethical essence. Last night, Fox News’ Sean Hannity’s moral assessment of the “sport” of hunting Africa’s big game amounted to: The [Progressive] Theodore Roosevelt (TR) did it. Do you condemn him, too?

You bet we do (and not only for plundering Africa’s wild life with cruel abandon).

Back from safari in Africa, the TR procession “through New York in June 1910,” featured “a fourteen-carriage parade from Battery to 59th Street, with luggage containing horns, heads, and skins from 13,000 specimens, ranging from elephant and rhinos to the rare dikdik, and antelope smaller than a jack-rabbit.”

(A History of The American People by Paul Johnson, p. 623.)

More about Teddy’s other proclivities.
https://www.ilanamercer.com/2011/12/who-s-it-to-be-teddy-no-1-or-teddy-no-2/

UPDATE I: To be clear, I am here making a moral argument, not a legal one. It’s true that big- game hunting is often a boon to the parks in these poor, backward countries. It’s true, too, that Zimbabwe has zero animal-conservation ethos; those are all western; as is it true that their leader is chief poacher of man and animal alike—and it’s still true that big-game hunters who derive pleasure from the rigged canned killing of an animal are MOTHER F-CKERS.
https://www.ilanamercer.com/2013/11/just-girl-gun-not-gratuitous-killer/ (Correct link)

UPDATE II: Via Myron Pauli:

Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to Sir Edward Grey, 22 January 1915

UPDATED: How Will Kelly Excuse Sandra Bland’s Arrest?!

Justice, Law, Natural Law, Rights, The State

It’ll be interesting to see how Megyn Kelly excuses the inexcusable and justifies the unjustifiable chain of events that culminated in Sandra Bland’s death, in a Waller County holding cell, in Texas. It’s probably futile to remind Ms. Kelly that what is permitted in law is often naturally illicit—in other words, wrong in natural law. Here follows the story of the demise of a young, innocent woman, via CNN:

Anger over Sandra Bland’s death in a Texas jail has boiled over after newly released video showed what happened at the traffic stop that led to her arrest.

Now, many question whether she should have been arrested at all.

The dashcam video shows Texas state Trooper Brian Encinia pulling Bland over July 10 for allegedly failing to use her turn signal. What started as normal conversation gets testy after Encinia asks her to put out her cigarette.

“I am in my car. I don’t have to put out my cigarette,” Bland says.

“You can step on out now,” Encinia replies.

Bland refuses to get out of her car, and the trooper opens her door and starts trying to pull her out of the vehicle.

What happens after that has ignited a debate about what the officer could have done versus what he should have done. …

MORE.

UPDATE: Kelly covered the arrest of Ms. Bland predictably. The less said, the better. This New York Times headline confuses matters:

“Dispute Over Sandra Bland’s Mental State Follows Death in a Texas Jail.”

The issue is Ms. Bland’s harassment and subsequent incarceration for no good reason; actions without which she would almost surely be alive today.

UPDATED: War Party Inc. Welcomes WikiLeaks Trade/Treason Revelations

Barack Obama, Conservatism, Neoconservatism, Regulation, Technology, The State, Trade

The War Party Inc. is forever raging against WikiLeaks and its heroic founder Julian Assange. Lo and behold, I heard Mark Levin approvingly mention the “secretive Obamatrade documents” uncovered by Wikileaks. Hmmm.

So, the liberty to scrutinize what tyranny is up to is not so bad after all?

Via Breitbart.com:

Discovered inside the huge tranche of secretive Obamatrade documents released by Wikileaks are key details on how technically any Republican voting for Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) that would fast-track trade deals like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal would technically also be voting to massively expand President Obama’s executive authority when it comes to immigration matters.

The mainstream media covered the Wikileaks document dump extensively, but did not mention the immigration chapter contained within it, so Breitbart News took the documents to immigration experts to get their take on it. Nobody has figured how big a deal the documents uncovered by Wikileaks are until now. (See below)

The president’s Trade in Services Act (TiSA) documents, which is one of the three different close-to-completely-negotiated deals that would be fast-tracked making up the president’s trade agreement, show Obamatrade in fact unilaterally alters current U.S. immigration law. TiSA, like TPP or the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP) deals, are international trade agreements that President Obama is trying to force through to final approval. The way he can do so is by getting Congress to give him fast-track authority through TPA.

TiSA is even more secretive than TPP. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill can review the text of TPP in a secret, secured room inside the Capitol—and in some cases can bring staffers who have high enough security clearances—but with TiSA, no such draft text is available.

Voting for TPA, of course, would essentially ensure the final passage of each TPP, T-TIP, and TiSA by Congress, since in the history of fast-track any deal that’s ever started on fast-track has been approved. …

MORE (if you can unstick this website.)

TiSA Annex on Movement of Natural Persons.

TiSA Annex on Movement of Natural Persons by breitbartnews

UPDATED (6/15): “The secretive wheeling and dealing on the massive 29-chapter draft [of the Trans-Pacific Partnership] (kept under classified lock-and-key and only a tiny portion of which have been publicly disclosed through WikiLeaks) make the backroom Obamacare negotiations look like a gigantic solar flare of openness and public deliberation. Fast-track Republicans, who rightfully made a stink when Nancy Pelosi declared that ‘we have to pass the [Obamacare] bill so that you can find out what is in it,’ now have no transparency legs to stand on. …”

Michell Malkin On “Why America Hates the GOP-Obamatrade Deal.”

And if “America” doesn’t yet hate the TPP, it certainly should.

My position: all legislation is bad unless it is legislation to repeal legislation.