Category: Access

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The Authoritarian Personality Today

IV  It’s 2017, and the Rechstaffens have moved from the crazy Bay Area to the crazier Portland, where Fritz IV (J.J.) is doing well as head of an immigrants’ rights organization and Democratic Party activist.  He had worked hard for Bernie, but, when his candidate lost, he cheerfully rolled up his sleeves to work for the first woman that would be elected President of the Free World, the human race, and the entire universe.   He makes no bones about his loathing of all things Trump, and that is the one subject on which he and his former son, Fritz...

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Al Franken His Own Punchline on Alleged Russian Collusion (Free to Registered Subscribers)

Comedian Al Franken is back in the headlines with accusations the Russians colluded with Donald Trump to make sure the Democrats nominated the worst candidate in their party’s history so she would lose. Or something like that. Reported Bloomberg, “U.S. Sen. Al Franken said ‘everything points to’ collusion between President Donald Trump’s campaign and the Russians. The Minnesota Democrat did not cite any evidence….” Franken said, “My feeling is that there was some cooperation between the Trump campaign and the Russians. They just haven’t been acting like people who have nothing to hide.” Once again, check out my Fleming Foundation post...

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Wednesday’s Child: Letter from Paris

I first visited the Shostakovich Center–Association Internationale Dimitri Chostakovitch, if you go by the name on the doorbell–last October, and wrote about it in this space. A friend, now dead, used to live across the road in the Rue des Saints-Pères. The street, which marks the border between the 6th and 7th  Paris arrondissements, dates back to the sixteenth century, with all the glories of intervening ages sucked up by it as by a sponge of sedimentary calcite. The Center is in a small courtyard, its stones overgrown with ivy and moss, and of an afternoon one can sit on...

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SPECIAL GUESTS AT SUMMER SEMINAR

Time is running out, but there is still time to sign up for our special program on the roots of the revolutionary tradition.    In addition to the lecturers we have already announced we hope to have two old friends with us:  Christopher Check, my former second-in-command, who will be speaking on the Mexican Revolution and the persecution of Christians, and Dr. Srdja Trifkovic, who will share his thoughts on recent developments in Russia.  If you are still hesitating, about coming, then read the letter below one more time.   Dear Friend and Fellow-Reader: “The lamps are going out all...

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Wednesday’s Child: A Gnostic Mixology (FREE)

It must be the time of year.  Friends and acquaintances keep sending me novels, asking for my opinion as if I were a cocktail taster in a bar with a pernickety and occasionally abusive clientele – a gay one, presumably.  Last week I nearly died after taking a swig of mendacious absurdity.  This week’s concoction is very different. The brew that has been set before me has as its base a Gnostic cosmogony.  And, since its style is tongue-in-cheek urbane, colloquial and hip, there is in the mix an equal amount of Hollywood brooding on the meaninglessness of life, as...

8

The Religion of Peace is Busting Out All Over

American bigots are always complaining about Islamic violence.  They apparently are incapable of listening to the reasonable and fact-based arguments put forth by their democratically elected monarchs.  George Bush explained to us that Islam was a “religion of peace,” and his successor gave us the  valuable lesson in American history that Muslims had been with us from the beginning.  Of course they were, doesn’t anyone remember the Terrorists who went by the name of Barbary Pirates? For all these reasons and many more, American bigots should beware of drawing conclusions from the recent attack in Manchester, England, that left 22...

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Albanian Chauvinism Is Looking for Trouble in the Balkans  (FREE)

Albanian chauvinism is looking for trouble in the Balkans.  And in the Balkans, hardcore nationalism is still the guiding force behind all socio-political developments. That’s evident in Skopje, in Kosovo, in Albania, in Serbia, in Montenegro, in Bosnia, in Croatia and in Slovenia.  In the case of the last two, the ban on the concert in Maribor (Slovenia) of Croat nationalist singer Marko Perković  triggered a new row between Zagreb and Ljubljana. This is not, however, the first time that a concert of the controversial artist is banned. But that was the least serious of the troubles that recently erupted...

3

Ridiculous Establishment Attacks on Trump

If you wonder why the American Establishment lost its grip on power, at least a little bit, look no further than its ridiculous attacks on President Trump over Russia and deposed FBI Boss James Comey. The Establishment, which I call the Rancid Ruling Elite, just isn’t serious. Maybe they still can bring down Trump, although I doubt it; but that only would mean the whole country isn’t serious – something that also seems more evident every day. What serious person even takes these allegations seriously? As I pointed out here five months ago, there’s no way the Russians could have...

2

In the Midst of Death We Are in Life

This brief but moving essay came in originally as a comment on my most recent contribution to Properties of Blood.   Each year, one on the second Saturday in May and again on the second Saturday in October, we – the genos and the phratry to use the words presented by Dr. Fleming – of the Maddens, the Jones and the Garrets hold a grave yard workin’. Up through the 60’s, we really worked; we cleaned the cemetery twice a year; now, old, living far away and disjointed, we pay to have it done monthly; yet, we still gather at...

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Wednesday’s Child: Profanation, Plagiarism, Pastiche

Several people had told me this was a novel worth reading, and one of them had it sent from Amazon, so the trap was sprung and I walked right into it. Well, not exactly.  I’ve been around the block a few times, having savaged well over a thousand new books in my day, and the reviewer’s equivalent of Oscar Wilde’s dictum to the effect that only the very shallow do not judge by appearances is consequently never far from my mind. To judge a book by its cover is not an eccentric foible, it’s as close to a human right...