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RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:03 pm
by Cuchulainn
QuoteOriginally posted by: rmaxQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteOriginally posted by: QuantCentralShe was perhaps the greatest female politician in the last century. Who will step into her shoes this century? Mrs Clinton? Mrs Obama? Anyone?No she was not: these wereGolda MeirMrs. Gandhiwere towering figures.She split England in two.None of them people that I would have over for scones and tea. All pretty loathsome in someway. However I do give them credit for doing what they think is right. The problem Hitler was doing what he thought was right as well...Ah, Godwin's Law again Likening Hitler with these women means you lose the plot. Anyway, you gave a good answer, but not to OP's question!!

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:12 pm
by rmax
QuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteOriginally posted by: rmaxQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteOriginally posted by: QuantCentralShe was perhaps the greatest female politician in the last century. Who will step into her shoes this century? Mrs Clinton? Mrs Obama? Anyone?No she was not: these wereGolda MeirMrs. Gandhiwere towering figures.She split England in two.None of them people that I would have over for scones and tea. All pretty loathsome in someway. However I do give them credit for doing what they think is right. The problem Hitler was doing what he thought was right as well...Ah, Godwin's Law again Anyway, you gave a good answer, but not to OP's question!!That is a fair!I would go with Mrs Bill Clinton. She run the place whilst Bill was smoking cigars or something.The greatest female politician of all time? Cleopatra.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:16 pm
by Cuchulainn
QuoteOriginally posted by: rmaxQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteOriginally posted by: rmaxQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteOriginally posted by: QuantCentralShe was perhaps the greatest female politician in the last century. Who will step into her shoes this century? Mrs Clinton? Mrs Obama? Anyone?No she was not: these wereGolda MeirMrs. Gandhiwere towering figures.She split England in two.None of them people that I would have over for scones and tea. All pretty loathsome in someway. However I do give them credit for doing what they think is right. The problem Hitler was doing what he thought was right as well...Ah, Godwin's Law again Anyway, you gave a good answer, but not to OP's question!!That is a fair!I would go with Mrs Bill Clinton. She run the place whilst Bill was smoking cigars or something.The greatest female politician of all time? Cleopatra.Possibly; give me Salome.But that was centuries ago...

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:32 pm
by Polter
QuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteThe cult of Ernesto Che Guevara is an episode in the moral callousness of our time. This first sentence bodes no good for the rest, what can only be waffle. Awful writing style. It does not convince an educated public. It's a form of preaching and it's cobblers.Rule #1; don't start with the conclusion. I reckon these articles have a US bias, so it's not unexpected I suppose.Let's have a deeper discussion on this if need be ... It reminds me of this style It's just awful non-nuanced, really.Yeah, I'm not buying it.The first sentence reminds me of nothing else but a simple statement akin to QuoteNazi Germany bears moral responsibility for Holocaust and your reply reminds me of those who always hurried to add "ah, but that's so unnuanced, before criticizing those in Gestapo, SS, etc., we have to remember that they were simply following orders"--not uncommonly followed by anti-Semitic conspiracy theories as the supposedly "nuanced" versions "justifying" what was done by the Nazis.Un-educated public is precisely prone to espousing the naive, simpleton views of Che Guevara fans, quite analogous to today's neo-Nazi movement in Germany ("but Hitler just wanted to make our country great!"). I hold both in similar "regard."

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:38 pm
by trackstar
You are grinding a strange axe today. Perhaps you are not pointing it at me, but be it known to all men present here, that I am not a member of the un-educated public, American or otherwise. Nor did I make claims about Che G., aside from the fact that he was a medical student, is reported to have been brave in facing death, and that my grandfather had a picture of him in his library.Even I cannot extrapolate clearly on the latter point, but I will say that grandpa passed away long before Wikileaks, or indeed you Polter, came into being.So you can tussle with other people if you like and fine on the Slate and NYT and Mother Jones quotes. (I'd be careful about the Huffy Post). But do not render unto trackstar what trackstar has not rendered unto you.A good day to you, sir.PS: You cited The New Yorker, but there was no quote from that esteemed magazine. I will await it with interest.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:44 pm
by Cuchulainn
QuoteOriginally posted by: PolterQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteThe cult of Ernesto Che Guevara is an episode in the moral callousness of our time. This first sentence bodes no good for the rest, what can only be waffle. Awful writing style. It does not convince an educated public. It's a form of preaching and it's cobblers.Rule #1; don't start with the conclusion. I reckon these articles have a US bias, so it's not unexpected I suppose.Let's have a deeper discussion on this if need be ... It reminds me of this style It's just awful non-nuanced, really.Yeah, I'm not buying it.The first sentence reminds me of nothing else but a simple statement akin to QuoteNazi Germany bears moral responsibility for Holocaust and your reply reminds me of those who always hurried to add "ah, but that's so unnuanced, before criticizing those in Gestapo, SS, etc., we have to remember that they were simply following orders"--not uncommonly followed by anti-Semitic conspiracy theories as the supposedly "nuanced" versions "justifying" what was done by the Nazis.Un-educated public is precisely prone to espousing the naive, simpleton views of Che Guevara fans, quite analogous to today's neo-Nazi movement in Germany ("but Hitler just wanted to make our country great!"). I hold both in similar "regard."It's OK, it's not an X factor competition.Two issues:1. Godwin's law; mann, give it a break.2. The use of emotive adjectives, e.g. callousness. For the record, I don't have many idols, and Che is probably not there.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:45 pm
by Cuchulainn
QuoteNazi Germany bears moral responsibility for HolocaustI understand this text.QuoteThe cult of Ernesto Che Guevara is an episode in the moral callousness of our time. I don't understand this text. It is gobblydegook. It means nothing. The dangerous part is that it contains a number of 'implicit assumptions' (for want of a better word).

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:45 pm
by trackstar
Careful with that Axe, Polter, I mean EugenePink Floyd Live at Pompeii, 1972

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:52 pm
by trackstar
QuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteNazi Germany bears moral responsibility for HolocaustI understand this text.QuoteThe cult of Ernesto Che Guevara is an episode in the moral callousness of our time. I don't understand this text. It is gobblydegook. It means nothing.Somebody needed a good strong editor here, with a sense of direction and purpose.However, "episode" resides completely within greater frame of events "of our time" characterized, at least in part, by "moral callousness".There is a Venn Diagram here!

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:56 pm
by Cuchulainn
QuoteOriginally posted by: trackstarQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnQuoteNazi Germany bears moral responsibility for HolocaustI understand this text.QuoteThe cult of Ernesto Che Guevara is an episode in the moral callousness of our time. I don't understand this text. It is gobblydegook. It means nothing.Somebody needed a good strong editor here, with a sense of direction and purpose.However, episode" resides completely within greater frame of events "of our time" characterized, at least in part, by moral callousness.There is a Venn Diagram here!Changing the syntax will not solve the problem.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 5:58 pm
by trackstar
QuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnChanging the syntax will not solve the problem.I am just poking sticks through the cage bars to see what the creature growling within will do.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 6:01 pm
by Cuchulainn
QuoteOriginally posted by: trackstarQuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnChanging the syntax will not solve the problem.I am just poking sticks through the cage bars to see what the creature growling within will do. What can be done here? It is too denseQuoteChe was a totalitarian. He achieved nothing but disaster. Many of the early leaders of the Cuban Revolution favored a democratic or democratic-socialist direction for the new Cuba. But Che was a mainstay of the hardline pro-Soviet faction, and his faction won. Che presided over the Cuban Revolution's first firing squads. He founded Cuba's "labor camp" system?the system that was eventually employed to incarcerate gays, dissidents, and AIDS victims. To get himself killed, and to get a lot of other people killed, was central to Che's imaginationI had the impression from Fermion that Che hated CCCP?And at the time I was in my twenties, so I experienced it as it happened, and thus avoided revision. My memory does not work prior to the Belgian Congo and Lamumba. But from 1960 on.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 6:02 pm
by Polter
TS, no, a direct reply to Cuch., not much of an axe to grind with your grandfather, really (I wouldn't exactly describe hanging a picture of a dictator as in good taste, Hitler or not, but that's quite an individual matter, I suppose--and, possibly quite unlike some, I'm a strong supporter of the First Amendment).Incidentally, the last quote was MoJo requoting a fragment: QuoteFor Cuban exiles, Castro's takeover, in 1959, is a wound that just won't heal. In the current New Yorker, William Finnegan describes the Miami's "wormholes in time" . . .Cuch, if thisQuoteChe presided over the Cuban Revolution's first firing squads. He founded Cuba's "labor camp" system--the system that was eventually employed to incarcerate gays, dissidents, and AIDS victims.or thisQuoteothers remember the ruthless man that executed between 156 and 550 prisoners in Cuba without trialor thisQuoteThe new biographies also make clear that Guevara played a central role in establishing Cuba's new secret police, which set about the usual task of the revolution's devouring its own children. Mr. Castaneda reports that it was Guevara who set up Cuba's first labor camp, thereby ''establishing one of the most heinous precedents of the Cuban revolution: the confinement of dissidents, homosexuals and, later, AIDS victims.''is "gobblydegook" or too ambiguous (if not too nuanced) for you, then I'm afraid I can't be of much help.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 6:03 pm
by trackstar
QuoteOriginally posted by: CuchulainnWhat can be done here? It is too denseQuoteChe was a totalitarian. He achieved nothing but disaster. Many of the early leaders of the Cuban Revolution favored a democratic or democratic-socialist direction for the new Cuba. But Che was a mainstay of the hardline pro-Soviet faction, and his faction won. Che presided over the Cuban Revolution's first firing squads. He founded Cuba's "labor camp" system?the system that was eventually employed to incarcerate gays, dissidents, and AIDS victims. To get himself killed, and to get a lot of other people killed, was central to Che's imaginationI had the impression from Fermion that Che hated CCCP?This is a serious mess and it would take more time than I have this afternoon to sort it all out.Check declassified CIA documents if you like, but then how accurate is that information? - Think of the audience for the original documents and the political motivations in US in the mid-1960s.a place to start - National Security Archives at George Washington University - CG entry**In my grandfather's era, Che would have been understood as a revolutionary Marxist, not a dictator.In any case, he had his reasons for putting the portrait in his library and he was a man with a good sense of irony and excellent taste.

RIP Margaret Thatcher

Posted: April 11th, 2013, 6:11 pm
by trackstar
I guess I have to check The New Yorker myself. Here is what I found:Che's Way - review of the Steven Soderbergh film, Che, Jan 19, 2009Other New Yorker entries are just some blogs: "Burial Lessons" and "Picturing the Dead".The circumstances of Che's death and photos in the context of O bin L and Saddam Hussein.Interesting, but you can get the links for yourselves - just search "New Yorker Che Guevara"