tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post114847865218464542..comments2023-08-06T00:44:07.374-07:00Comments on Burkean Reflections: The Los Angeles Times on the Lost Art of Cursive HandwritingAmPowerBloghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18236333181889271910noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148664769261112992006-05-26T10:32:00.000-07:002006-05-26T10:32:00.000-07:00Thanks a.r. and Meatball.Thanks a.r. and Meatball.AmPowerBloghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18236333181889271910noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148663621801447692006-05-26T10:13:00.000-07:002006-05-26T10:13:00.000-07:00I liked the postI liked the postM1https://www.blogger.com/profile/05394503964463278951noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148655250154871702006-05-26T07:54:00.000-07:002006-05-26T07:54:00.000-07:00I showed what snippet was to be had of the kid's h...I showed what snippet was to be had of the kid's handwriting to a shrink trained and specializing in grafology. She's involved in the vetting process for part of the <I>community's</I> recruitment process. I asked her to imagine something similar coming from an adult applicant, ie a beautiful and flowing cursive rendered with perfect stylistic control. She got back to me yesterday and laughed. <BR/><BR/>For a kid? Very nice. <BR/><BR/>For an adult? She had another less flattering story to tell.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148595869234806712006-05-25T15:24:00.000-07:002006-05-25T15:24:00.000-07:00I do, at times like this at least.cheersI do, at times like this at least.<BR/>cheersM1https://www.blogger.com/profile/05394503964463278951noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148529742254227632006-05-24T21:02:00.000-07:002006-05-24T21:02:00.000-07:00You're reading too much into it. I'm trained in in...You're reading too much into it. I'm trained in international relations theory, and I grew up fascinated by America's role in the world, especially WWII. Realist theory, at least at the systemic level, which doesn't really take into account differences between states (democracy or autocracy), domestic politics, or the leadership or personalities of statesmen, is largely deterministic: Balance of power will form, systemic wars will erupt, and so forth. There's nothing wrong with it up to a point. We all know that domestic politics and the personalities of leaders matter though. So explanation gets more complicated as you move down from the top (structural) level of analysis to the state and individual levels. It's more complicated than that, but you get the picture.AmPowerBloghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18236333181889271910noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148525464163162312006-05-24T19:51:00.000-07:002006-05-24T19:51:00.000-07:00M1 ain't be denyin' power and its place though the...M1 ain't be denyin' power and its place though the exercise of power per se falls under no deterministic regime that I have chanced upon under my errant journies among both the very potent (and I do mean potent as in the pinnacle of potency) and the potentate of our Occidental world.<BR/><BR/>I do however, to revert, detect a marked deterministic streak in your posts at large as I do per example in this post and this doth intrigue me.<BR/><BR/>Nothing necessarily wrong with streaks pointing here or there if anywhere at all but it does once again lead me back to my original query pertaining to your personal ontology of circumstance cum perspective.<BR/><BR/>Perhaps, just perhaps and at that only in some vague shape or form, certain tangible aspects of your unique life have played a formative roll in the evolution of the tendencies I perceive to be expressed in your postings. I would like to know of such life events that you surmise to have contributed to shaping your foundational assumptions upon which your theoretical constructs are plausible related.<BR/><BR/>With fear of unduly restricting the scope of my question or your room to maneuver in responding, perhaps I perceive deterministic in this particular post to be related to a tendency to reserve critical thought and unquiry for that which is not the staus quo if now we say that Power defines what is the status quo..<BR/><BR/><BR/>(If this all is unpenetrable per idiosyncratic formulations then forget it. I can buy that. God knows that's why I don't proofread my own stuff)M1https://www.blogger.com/profile/05394503964463278951noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148525300896320432006-05-24T19:48:00.000-07:002006-05-24T19:48:00.000-07:00This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.M1https://www.blogger.com/profile/05394503964463278951noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148521630114475942006-05-24T18:47:00.000-07:002006-05-24T18:47:00.000-07:00Meatball:I think we're past the ad hominems. Now, ...Meatball:<BR/><BR/>I think we're past the ad hominems. Now, what about too much power, or what's beyond the cracks? Power's the currency of international politics. Realpolitik puts power above all else, and at times the pursuit of power becomes an end in itself. Look at U.S.-Soviet arms races during the Cold War. Talk about obscene weapons procurement programs. But justified in the name of power politics, right? When Bush took office he was blown away when the Chiefs of Staff briefed him on our nuclear SIOP vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, whereby the generals told him tens of millions could be killed in a strike on Moscow, and hundreds of millions could be killed in an all-out nuclear exchange using the full arsenal of land-sea-air weapons. Overkill? Probably, right? On the other hand, what if we didn't have the capabilities. We'd be at our enemy's mercy, liable to conquer and enslavement. History says it's so. We'd be on our knees before the great rising powers of the day. Germany in the 1930s? The Soviets during the Cold War? What happens to countries that are beaten? Vichy France? East Bloc Poland? So yeah, too much power's not good? But without it? Who defends the United States? Who're ya gonna' call? The U.N.? That horribly weak and corrupted intergovernmental body? The international realm's anarchic -- Hobbesian, you might say. We need power to manage that state of affairs, indeed to survive within it.AmPowerBloghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18236333181889271910noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27249307.post-1148519010523127752006-05-24T18:03:00.000-07:002006-05-24T18:03:00.000-07:00I do not mean to be ad hominem in any way, shape, ...I do not mean to be ad hominem in any way, shape, or seditious form so please keep that in gracious mind when I ask:<BR/><BR/>Have ye perhaps, and only perhaps, some fear of realms beyond those defined by the forms of power's conventions?<BR/><BR/>And to emphasize the coversational nature of this question and my non-patronizing <I>will to empathize</I> with positions and theses oft mine divergent, I regress to paraphrasing the Mykonos-loving Leonard Cohen who I believe said something to the effect of,<BR/><BR/><I>We all have our cracks but it's through those cracks that our light doth shine.</I>M1https://www.blogger.com/profile/05394503964463278951noreply@blogger.com