Blogs > Cliopatria > What does it mean?

Aug 11, 2004

What does it mean?


by Cliopatria


I'm sure others around the blogosphere will pick up on this shortly, but it is now possible to bid on a piece of paper soaked with Alan Keyes' post-nomination acceptance statement sweat, and simultaneously support the Keyes campaign [thanks, Mom]. Bidding was at $520 at time of posting, but there's eight days left. [UPDATE: It appears that eBay has pulled the item, as the link no longer works and the item does not appear in searches. I suspect that they pulled it under the 'no body parts' rule by which they pulled the auction for a used Schwarzenegger tissue a while back. However, all other Keyes memorabilia now carry"No Sweat" notices....]

Here's a request: Would one of our blogging cultural historians please look at the Republican Memorabilia and Democratic Memorabilia sections of eBay? For example, the Democratic section includes twice as many entries, currently. What does it mean?

Because I can't stand the thought of noting just that, here's a few other things from around the net. Erin O'Connor is continuing her meditations on family history: I'd note the ease with which she found a lot of her information is a sign of things to come in geneaological and historical research. Cliopatriarch Tim Burke summarizes the results of a study of an al Qaeda laptop which shows that the problem is as bad as the Administration thinks, but that the Administration is responding as badly as its critics think. Far Outlier Joel has a wonderful piece on the original Godzilla, which was very much a Japanese monster movie with serious political insight. And Anne Zook got particularly Peevish when she read Ivin's Bushwhacked and provided a wonderful rant summarizing some of the main points of the book.


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Oscar Chamberlain - 8/10/2004

I've never had a chance to see the original Godzilla, but I've always had a fondness for the American version.

I've alwatys been able to tell that buried under the ham and the bad dialogue ("Look at the size of those footprints" has got to knock "It was a dark and stormy night" out of the ring) there was something better trying to break free.

In part it was the music; the score is highly evocative, particularly as a backdrop to the devastated aftermath of the attack. And while I have always felt sorry when almost any monster was dying (well, maybe not the giant ants in "Them") there was clearly something different about Godzilla's death. Even with the altered ending, and even as a child, I knew that in some odd way it was his death that was mourned.

PS to Richard: do you think that a child feeling sorry for the monster is a sign of a future Democrat?

Richard Henry Morgan - 8/10/2004

However one phrases it (let's leave religion out, then), don't you think that Democrats, on average, have more faith (I almost said 'religious enthusiasm', but I backed off even 'religious faith') in the possibility of politics? Seems to me that one could, with some exaggeration, label the one side more sanguine, and the other more cynical -- if only to magnify the differences and make them more apparent. When I see a bunch of Republicans gather, I normally don't see a fellowship of true believers, though there must of necessity be some, I imagine. That thing about minimizing the damage -- you're a closet Popperian!!

Ralph E. Luker - 8/10/2004

Richard, If you think that Democrats are peculiarly prone to eschatological politics, you haven't looked around at the folks who are voting your way. Have a closer look at the neighborhood. I happen to think that politics is not a redemptive enterprise, but it does have the _possibility_ of minimizing damage or of preserving the remnants.

Richard Henry Morgan - 8/10/2004

I think, and just barely, that it might mean there is (on average) more of a feeling among Democrats that politics can be an exercise in eschatology -- that the purposes of politics, or at least one of its highest purposes, is to make immanent the exchaton, the end where universal justice reigns. That's a hell of a leap, I know, but there it is -- it certainly ain't susceptible to proof, and its not immune from refutation.