Leo Strauss

[Frank Newgent]

Yeah, I know. This is over a week old. But I hadn't seen it covered here.

http://www.foreignpolicy-infocus.org/commentary/2003/0305strauss_body.html

"The Weimar Republic (in Germany) was his model of liberal democracy for which he had huge contempt," added Drury. Liberalism in Weimar, in Strauss's view, led ultimately to the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews. Like Plato, Strauss taught that within societies, "some are fit to lead, and others to be led," according to Drury. But, unlike Plato, who believed that leaders had to be people with such high moral standards that they could resist the temptations of power, Strauss thought that "those who are fit to rule are those who realize there is no morality and that there is only one natural right, the right of the superior to rule over the inferior." For Strauss, "religion is the glue that holds society together," said Drury, who added that Irving Kristol, among other neoconservatives, has argued that separating church and state was the biggest mistake made by the founders of the U.S. republic.

"Secular society in their view is the worst possible thing," because it leads to individualism, liberalism, and relativism, precisely those traits that might encourage dissent, which in turn could dangerously weaken society's ability to cope with external threats. "You want a crowd that you can manipulate like putty," according to Drury.

Strauss was also strongly influenced by Thomas Hobbes. Like Hobbes, he thought the fundamental aggressiveness of human nature could be restrained only through a powerful state based on nationalism. "Because mankind is intrinsically wicked, he has to be governed," he once wrote. "Such governance can only be established, however, when men are united--and they can only be united against other people."

"Strauss thinks that a political order can be stable only if it is united by an external threat," Drury wrote in her book. "Following Machiavelli, he maintains that if no external threat exists, then one has to be manufactured. Had he lived to see the collapse of the Soviet Union, he would have been deeply troubled because the collapse of the 'evil empire' poses a threat to America's inner stability."

Seymour Hersh's article is here (http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0506-06.htm).

[Cleopatra]

Funny, I was discussing about Leo Strauss with another member of this forum via PMs only a couple of days ago...

What's wrong with Leo Strauss lately? I have been doing nothing but reading various articles regarding Leo Strauss and his political views.I would be more accurate if I'd say that I was reading about Strausseans... something that is completely different of course.

Me wonders... Is anybody in this forum ( or even on this very planet) able to point me TWO people to agree on what Leo Strauss actually meant in hiw writings? I doubt it...

I particularly like this phrase that it is common in every article I read..."Following Machiavelli, he maintains that if no external threat exists, then one has to be manufactured."

Well, either his PhD or his first book ( I write using my Royal memory now...) was about Machiavelli... His political thoughts, as expressed by his books of maturity and especially in his essays about Plato and Aristophanes( he connects politically those two) had nothing to do with Machiavelism... but you know our days epidemic: journalism...

[Frank Newgent]

A site on Leo Strauss's Platonism: http://www.mun.ca/animus/1999vol4/roberts4.htm

The city, the natural community of humans, is sustained by the engagement of its citizens. This engagement is premised upon a belief that the laws of the city are legitimate. For cities that have come to question their foundation and tradition, this legitimacy is premised on notions of justice and right, ultimately grounded in nature. But, for Strauss, no actual city can be just or be in accord with nature. Every city must be conventional, structured by determinate opinions, and thus not open to "the whole."(43) Each city must have decided among the various alternatives and in order to retain the engagement of its citizens must by force and persuasion (even to the point of a noble lie), instill the engagement of its citizenry.

It seems this observation is what has some bowels in an uproar.

[Cleopatra]

I printed this article on Strauss's Platonism and I read it carefully, it's more an account than a critical approach but useful to those that want to learn the basic parameters of Strauss's work.

To my understanding though, the uproar was caused by the fact that some circles ( I don't know how to name them without sounding stupid) "accuse" Strauss for being the Pope of Neoconservatism. The fact that P.Wolfowitz, was one of his students in Chicago University put Leo Strauss on the top of the list of the personae non gratae of the leftist Intelligentia...

I am too small to judge the work of one of the most important minds of our century but I can't help thinking though... Leo Strauss is qualified to fit in many consiracy theories: He is Jew, and his firsts books where on Jewish mysticism, also Leo Strauss was persuaded that the Intellectuals , even in Antiquity, they didn't feel free to express what they really thought , so in their writings, their REAL thoughts are codified... I know it sounds strange but this is what he tried to do with Plato's writings;he tried to decode Plato.

Also, I don't consider the Neoconservatives so smart people ( Hey!I am trying to be polite here!) If they twist Strauss, a dead man who can't defend his ideas, it's not his fault...

For example his critical analysis on the Platonic Symposium is one of the most inspired and wise books that have ever been composed. Also the fact that he was the only one who dared to question the monster called Martin Heidegger is enough reason for me to put Strauss to the Pantheon of Modern Philosophers.

I wish that journalists and stupid politicans were more careful when they approached such giants.

[Frank Newgent]

Cleopatra,

That a critical look at Leo Strauss is proportionate to anti-Jewish conspiracy theory seems to me the flip side of denying six million people really visited the Holocaust Museum since it opened.

Silly jokes aside I will sit down and think about all this some more when time permits. Do you recommend any reading?

[headscratcher4]

I know it sounds strange but this is what he tried to do with Plato's writings;he tried to decode Plato.

Cleo:

Serious question: sort of "neo-con" (as opposed to Marxist) deconstructionist?

[Malachi151]

These things always boil down to difference of opinion.

The views of the neo-cons are correct. The views of the Marxists are correct.

It all depends on what you want.

Yes, what Strauss says is 100% true.

Yes, I disagree with him 100%.

Its not a matter of truth its a matter of want.

What do we want, a solid structured society that is competative, going down the road of social human evolution into the direction of the Borg? That is certianly a viable option.

Do we want a Marxist soceity built on honesty, truth, and equality? (I vote yes :) )

Do we want a postmodernist anarchy of subjective truths and disarray?

Ultimately, IMO, I think that Strauss was correct. The Postermodernst liberalism of Germany and the weakness of the Comitern gave way to fascism. If only Leon Trotsky had been more powerful, that Jew could have put this Jew and his ilk in his place and the Bolsheviks could have actually been a productive force on earth. Unfortunately Stalin's little backstab and the opposition of Zionism destroyed Boshevism, making it open to attack from the Anglos and fascists that rule the world today. (and yes I am an Anglo)

So, yes, postermodernism, deconstructionism, etc, is quite useless, which is why Marxism, or I should say "neo-Marxism", is still the greatest hope for a liberal society today.

Edit: Oh, and I agree with Strauss that many writers have codified their work, liberal writers that is. I think that this process has broken down over the years though and that it happens less now. I wrote my piece on the war and America, which is on my website, without codifying anything, because I believe that honesty is essential. Look at Marxism in America today, its all codified in popular culture. People can't openly say Marxist things, so they codify it in their writings, both fiction and non-fiction. The internet is helping to break that down some I think.

[headscratcher4]

Do we want a Marxist soceity built on honesty, truth, and equality?

Serious question, again, which Marxist, Post-Marxist, asperationally Marxist, revolutionary Marxist society has been built on Honesty, Truth and Equality? Idealism aside -- and maybe it is all Lenin's fault -- but vangarud of the people's parties taking power all seem to quickly toss aside honesty, truth and equality...to say nothing of "justice" (people's or otherwise). History doesn't favor Marxism, because no one has figured out how to make it work without murder, secret police, secret files, spying, political oppresion, denile of freedom of speech, concience, ideas, education, etc. IMO.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by headscratcher4


Cleo:

Serious question: sort of "neo-con" (as opposed to Marxist) deconstructionist?

I thought that Strauss himself has denied it...but I will have to check it with people they know better...

Frank Newgent

That a critical look at Leo Strauss is proportionate to anti-Jewish conspiracy theory seems to me the flip side of denying six million people really visited the Holocaust Museum since it opened.

True, in fact it took me a couple of minutes to decide if I would post this comment but with all seriousness I did. The rest of my posts in this forum show clearly how much I detest conspiracy theories so I din't have any problem to post such things and receive the proportionate criticism.

But are we talking here about a critical look at L.Strauss or about a critical approach at the so-called Strausseans? Big difference, in my opinion.

On a different tone... I find it extremely ridiculous when I read comments for philosophers in forums like : " Marx was an idiot" ( I happen to dissagree strongly with Marxists but how can anybody call Marx an idiot?!!!) " Chomsky is a moron" ( Yeah right , people that can barely write their name, have an opinion on Chomsky...) "Leo Strauss is evil" ( was he drinking blood too? )

You know what I mean. Who are we to make such comments for such personalities? They were philosophers,this means lovers of wisdom, who searched ways to make our everyday lives better and worth living. I approach them as such.

Do you recommend any reading?

I have read three books of Leo Strauss and I was amazed by the three of them maybe because they were about subjects that I am terribly interested in.

The first one was " Philosophy and Law: Contribution to the understanding of Maimonides and his predessecors"

It's about the conflict betweem skepticism and religion. It's exactly about what we were discussing in other forums...

I wanted to suggest that Col. Bidlack's commentary had traces of Straussean thought but I didn't want the man to be accused of neo-conservatism...:p

The other two are about ancient Greek Philosophy: " Leo Strauss on Plato's Symposium"
"The Symposium" and I have an "open vendetta" since my early youth...I consider this book amazing!

And the other one I have read is " Socrates and Aristophanes" is not just about the relation between poetry and philosophy it goes much deeper since Strauss thinks that Plato's Symposium was inspired by the comedies of Aristophanes' !!

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Malachi151
[
Edit: Oh, and I agree with Strauss that many writers have codified their work, liberal writers that is. I think that this process has broken down over the years though and that it happens less now. I wrote my piece on the war and America, which is on my website, without codifying anything, because I believe that honesty is essential. Look at Marxism in America today, its all codified in popular culture. People can't openly say Marxist things, so they codify it in their writings, both fiction and non-fiction. The internet is helping to break that down some I think. [/B]


Well to be honest I think this part of his thinking is a bit funny. In a city like Athens where Gorgias was free to speak, Plato wouldn't codify anything. Plato invented very powerful myths ( the myth of Atlantis, the visit of heron to the Other World etc etc etc) and used them as metaphors indeed but I don't really think that he has codified anything....

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by headscratcher4


Serious question, again, which Marxist, Post-Marxist, asperationally Marxist, revolutionary Marxist society has been built on Honesty, Truth and Equality? Idealism aside -- and maybe it is all Lenin's fault -- but vangarud of the people's parties taking power all seem to quickly toss aside honesty, truth and equality...to say nothing of "justice" (people's or otherwise). History doesn't favor Marxism, because no one has figured out how to make it work without murder, secret police, secret files, spying, political oppresion, denile of freedom of speech, concience, ideas, education, etc. IMO.

What we have in history is many people who were not Marxists abusing the name of Socialism and Marxism in order to get support from the population to rise to power. They were never Marxists though. Well, Lenin was Marxist, but then Stalin took over...

Trotsky is still of course considered by many to be one of the greatest Marxists of all time, but he lost out to Stalin. Trotsky could have changed the world I believe.

Now, Ho Chin Minh was probably one of the better Marxists that had real potential to do good, but of course America saw to it to screw that up.

Also look at Cuba, Fidel is reactionary to Americans force. The only way America will let Cuba do their own thing is if they don't follow a Marxist society, and so, that pressure on Cuba from America is what is screwing Cuba up. If not for America I doubt Fidel would be in power right now in Cuba, they would have had democratic elections long ago.

There is no historical example of a Marxist Socialist society.

Blaming the ideas of Marx for the state of Communism is like blaming Jesus for the state of the Christinaity in the Dark Ages. (or now for that matter)

Modern liberalism is weak in America today because it is postmodernist liberalism built on deconstructionism. So the same thing is happening in America today that happened in Germany after WWI.

Postmodernist liberlaism is doomed to failure because it is inherently weak. Despite being more honest then then neo-con views, it causes a condition in society that makes society succeptable to fascism, because of what Strauss said.

This is why Marxism is essential, because Marxism has the power and structure needed to keep the neo-cons at bay. It is the lack of Marxist liberalism in America that lets people like George Bush and his crew get into office.

Postmodernism perscribes individualism.
Marxism perscribes social structure.
The fascism perscribes social structure.

The choice is between which type of social structure we want, because individualism is inhenrtly weak and will always result in counter revolution and the reformation of social structure. No matter how much we may want individualism it will bever happen because people are social animals, and society is what created civilization, and we all want civilization.

So, the choice is Marxism, however the natural tendacy is fascism. See, the fascists are correct in their accessment of humanity and society. Its just that what is natural is not what I would call good. The natural tendancy is lies, deception, manipulation, a confused public that looks to leadership for direction, and competition and the law of the jungle. Religion facilitates all of this.

Yes, that is the true nature of the human animal, but the goal of Marxism is to break the chains of nature and achive a truely humain soceity. What is the alternative? To continue to be subjected to lies and manipulation forever and become the Borg? Yes, that is an alternative, but not one I like.

The truth is that there is no freedom in individuality because in individuality we are subject to the laws of nature, its a pseudo freedom. Is a squirrel really free? It would seem so, but no, he is not. His life is governed purely by nature, he has no control over his life actually.

The same is the case with human individuality, and from individuality springs fascism because fascism is just the codification of the laws of nature.

Socilaism of course opposes all of this, and it is why it is difficult for people to understand and for us to undestand how to impliment, because it is going against the laws of nature.

But we see that the natural state for humanity is not to be in control but to be controlled, so if we want to be in control then we have to go against the laws of nature and reform our own. No one said it was easy. However, the natural state is what Strauss describes, so what do we want?

Strauss' accessment is correct, so what do we do about it?

The neo-cons say "go with it". I say fight it.

Human individuality is as much a pipe dream as ant or bee individuality. Both the fascists and the communists know this. The fascists take the easy road and go with nature, the communsits oppose and go with humanity. The communists have a much harder road to travel. The fascists just maintain status quo and continue the natural order of things, which is manipulation of the masses.

The problem is that modern civilization is ultimately a product of fascism in one degree or another, and then you have to get into the whole discussion of Social Darwinism, social evolution, materialism, and then ultimately determinism, which kind of makes it all pointless anyway.

Of course the postmodernists reject materialism and determinism, but they are wrong.

[Cleopatra]

If you told me that macedonean salad is your favourite dish, I wouldn't be surprised at all...


You start your post by criticizing Marxism in the context of actually existing socialism, somewhere in between you made me think that you would approach the subject of the conversation- at last -by comparing the School of marxism with the political thought of Leo Strauss and at the end what?

Why don't you try using your own words?

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
If you told me that macedonean salad is your favourite dish, I wouldn't be surprised at all...


You start your post by criticizing Marxism in the context of actually existing socialism, somewhere in between you made me think that you would approach the subject of the conversation- at last -by comparing the School of marxism with the political thought of Leo Strauss and at the end what?

Why don't you try using your own words?

I don't get it. What were you trying to say here?

[headscratcher4]

Malachi151: Ah, you write the words of a true believer...that's ok, I just don't think many will buy it...My point is that your basic conclusion is: don't blame Marxism, it has never been practiced.

To an atheist/agnostic like myself (depending on which day of the week ;) ), that doesn't sound much different than a Christian saying: don't blame the church/Christianity, it has never been realized.

Sadly, I am old fashioned in this, the cost of trying to obtain that idealism has been a high body count for Christianity. The cruelties of religion and the desire to build an ideal society has resulted in torture, death and injustice of every stripe.

This, it seems to me, is true also of Marxism. You suggest its major historical proponents were never true practictioners. I would agree, and yet they are the standard barers for the cause...and the victems are in the hundred of millions in the last century alone. Alas, would that Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Castro, Kim (pater and Jr.), Pol Pot and the rest had your ability to see clearly what real Marxism is and to put it in practice.

I also love the way that Marxist excuse Trotsky, and seemingly because he lost out to Stalin...ah, if only Trotsky had won that battle than he'd have built the humane, humanist Marxism we all strive for...

Sorry, don't buy it. Little in Trotsky's resume while in Power in the emerging USSR, would suggest anything of the sort. He did not stand up to Lenin. He did not question the "excesses" of the people's justice (until, of course, it was turned on him). He was comfortable with hostage taking and murder. He was there when economic and policies on peasents and land use that lead to mass starvation was implemented. He was there when the "people" robbed the peasents, stole their food for the proletarian urban masses and destroyed the means of agricultural production...prior to NEP.

His hands are as bloody and Lenin's ... and Lenin's are plenty bloody.


Maybe he learned from how Stalin turned the tables on him...but there is little to suggest that while he could have made a difference that he did...

To me, the pining for Trotsky is a bit like pining for a softer facism...if only it had been Mussolini as the standard for facism not Hitler.

Marxism doesn't have the "power" to keep Neo-cons at bay, because somewhere Marxist stop reading history. Marxists, the world over, ultimately -- and like the neo-Cons -- have concerned themselves with "power". Castro, as you write, is a reactionary to US policy, but ultimately he is only concerned with power...not justice, not ideas, not humanity (save in that vauge sort of way where it is ok to sacrifice the innocent on the alter of some undefined mass good). And, as one only concerned with power, all ideas that run contrary to his own view are to be crushed. You can blame the US for this, but nothing in Castro's history suggests that sans-US policy he would be any more "democratic". But, I do think he is, a true believer in Marxism...not "the real" Marxism...the one you understand, but that all the leading global practitioners have failed to implement.

Yes, ultimately your analogy to christianity is correct. Marxism is a religion. It is idealized, and ultimately that makes it deadly to the masses it strives to save...whether they want it, understand it or not.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Malachi151


I don't get it. What were you trying to say here?

I tried to say that unlike headscratcher I failed to see what your conclusion was and how you connect Marxism with Strauss.

Believe me I don't want to sound rude but I am sick of hearing this :"There is no historical example of a Marxist Socialist society" because the "absence" of such a society should have told you something...

[Malachi151]

headscratcher4

Good reply :)

don't blame Marxism, it has never been practiced.

Pretty much. But, I will agree that "Socialism" and "Communism" are two systems that are products of Marxist ideology which are flawed.

Marxism, and I will admit that this is my fault for the way I stated things, is really more of a philosophy, system of thinking and analyzing. Marxist methods can be used to construct a system of government. And I myself readily admit that classical Marxism is outdated as Darwinism. The Origin of Species, which it produced the way of thinking and the ideas that have led to modern ideas on evolution, it is a horribly flawed book with many things in it that are incorrect. The same with Marxist writings.

Russia screwed Marxism by making it dogmatic, and the West screwed it by dismissing it.

It can't be approached dogmatically, it has to be understood and brought into the modern era with fresh thought and a fresh approach, just like "Darwinism" has been.

don't blame the church/Christianity, it has never been realized

Well, as an atheist myself I can say that its not fair to blame the so called teachings of Jesus for the way people act in the name of Jesus. If he says love thy neighbor, and then someone goes to their neighbor and puts a flaming cross in their yard in the name of Jesus, is that he fault of the ideology?

His hands are as bloody and Lenin's ... and Lenin's are plenty bloody.

Yes, quite so, and that tends to happen when the entire world invades your country to try and destroy you :p

Let's face it, the Socialist Revolution would not have been able to happen by asking the Czars to please step away.

I also love how people excuse George Washington and the Americans for what they did. Its all a matter of perspective. I'm not saying that the American Revolution was wrong, I'm saying that we view the American Revolution in a purely good light because its ours. We then look at the Bolshevik Revolution and the Civil War between the Red and the Whites as an atrocity and proof that the government was not viable because people had to die to create it. ********, people died to create America too.

The Bolsheviks didn't want to deal with civil war, they wanted to get down to a peaceful existence, but Russia was invaded by 22 countries including America who sided with the Czars who had an even worse record of humanity then the Bolsheviks in order to put an oppressive dictatorship back in power. The Bolsheviks fought back to preserve themselves and in protection of social revolution and the emancipation of the toiling masses :p (I gotta throw a little Marxist lingo in there you know ;) )

People like to also complain about the starvation in Russia, well, first of all Russia had like 150 million people in it at the time of the revolution, America had 2 million and much more bountiful region. In addition it just so happened that one of the worst droughts in history hit Russia at the same time, that's not their fault.

The position of war was pushed on them by the invaders, they had to defend. Had the invaders not invaded then there would have been none of that theft of food and goods from the peasants in the first place.

You can't have a Revolution and also bow to authority, obviously.

Why did the world invade Russia when the Bolsheviks took control? At that point they had done nothing that said that they were worse then the Czars. They were proclaiming and creating democracy. We all know why. The wealthy elite of the world were in fear that Communism might actually be proven to work, which they don't want. The wealthy don't want communism to work, and even before it had a chance to be demonstrated they were already against it, because it obviously calls for global social revolution and a restructuring of society in such a way that its success would undermine the current positions of the globally wealthy. So, there is no real desire for the worlds leaders to see that communism can work.

I myself don't believe that it can work, the issue is that at the time of the counter-revolution no one knew, and they didn't want to find out.

To me, the pining for Trotsky is a bit like pining for a softer fascism...if only it had been Mussolini as the standard for fascism not Hitler.

Trotsky was a product of his times and of the reaction to Revolutionary Socialism. He was initially a pacifist, but when attacked he responded in kind. I believe that he was a Washington of sorts, maybe not quite as good as Washington, but if he had been able to assume a peaceful control of the country he would have preserved democracy and worked toward and open and liberal society I think, hell who knows, but he would have been better then Stalin for sure.

Russia was in a position that made it have to act more hostile and aggressive, America was pretty much isolate from any great threat with Britain and France and Spain all busy all over the world with other things to do. Americas relative stability is a product of geography as much as anything else.

Marxists, the world over, ultimately -- and like the neo-Cons -- have concerned themselves with "power".

Well, that is just reality. What do you suggest, powerlessness? There is an element of evolution, biology and human sociology to all of this which can't be ignored. People WILL BE led. There is no way around it, some guiding force will lead society. Even in apparent anarchy and individuality it is inescapable and humans can't exist in anarchy IMO, so as society fragments and the fabric dissolves it always ends up being brought back under control by a strong force, typically fascism, fundamentalism, whatever. As man made structure weakens the role of natural social evolution strengthens in a way that always favors the reformation of a controlled society, because a strong society is selected for my evolutionary mechanisms.

Yes, ultimately your analogy to Christianity is correct. Marxism is a religion. It is idealized, and ultimately that makes it deadly to the masses it strives to save...whether they want it, understand it or not.

Well, there is some truth to that. Which I why I made suggestions on real world solutions in my paper, which is linked in my sig :)

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


I tried to say that unlike headscratcher I failed to see what your conclusion was and how you connect Marxism with Strauss.

Believe me I don't want to sound rude but I am sick of hearing this :"There is no historical example of a Marxist Socialist society" because the "absence" of such a society should have told you something...

At any rate, this is a good write up on the issue:

http://www.socnet.net/socdem_vs_revsoc.htm

And, yes it is a pitty that we haven't be able to totally and fundamentally change the world in just 100 years, of course the US having spent trillions of dollars to maintian status quo and fight every form of socialism all around the world for the past 50 years has had nothing to do with that I am sure.

The only thing is proves is the ability of the wealthy to defend their position.

[Cleopatra]

A Marxist??? So you are a Marxist although you are not European??? Cool... we will have many things to discuss.

Although I have an allergy with "links", I will print the article you suggested and I will read it carefully.

[headscratcher4]

Originally posted by Malachi151


At any rate, this is a good write up on the issue:

http://www.socnet.net/socdem_vs_revsoc.htm

And, yes it is a pitty that we haven't be able to totally and fundamentally change the world in just 100 years, of course the US having spent trillions of dollars to maintian status quo and fight every form of socialism all around the world for the past 50 years has had nothing to do with that I am sure.

The only thing is proves is the ability of the wealthy to defend their position.

Thanks for your earlier response, I will have to give it some thought.

In the mean time, which forms of "socialism" shouldn't the US have fought?

The Soviet Union?
Maoist China?
Kim's Korea?
Castro?
Pol Pot?
E. Germany?
The whole Warsaw Pact?
the various Baathist parties...Iraq/Syria?
and the list goes on...

My point is not to excuse the US for what at times has been amazingly short-sighted foriegn policies...Clearly, the US and its policies can be and should be criticized, etc. Indeed, I am an ardent critic of US policy...

However, above, on first impression, you've essentially condemend most Marxist states as failing (often misrably) to live up to Marxist ideals...and, as I have pointed out with deaths in the hundreds of millions being the result.

So, just which Socialist powers should have been allowed to flurish? You aren't arguing that -- if but for the US -- Russia, China, Cambodia, N. Korea, Vietnam, Cuba, Syria, Iraq (and on and on) somehow wouldn't have persecuted its own people, spoiled their economies with central command, rob its people to enrich the party, etc.?

[Malachi151]

Well, I hate to keep saying this, but my paper goes over all of this.

As for how the US should not have attacked?

Its kind of an impossible question because when you know what the Socialist Revolution is you know that it's inevitable that "the US" would try to prevent it.

It's a complex issue too because many American Communists, and there were many prior to WWII, were also mislead themselves, and there is no way that it would have been possible in that time for them to understand Communism as we understand it now.

For example many Americans supported Stalin, and Henry Wallace ran for the Progressive Party after the war on a platform of cooperation with the USSR and a peaceful conversion to Socialism in America. Its because they were totally unaware of what we now know about how Stalin took power in Russia.

I take the approach of simply trying to understand and not to blame at this point.

Having said that Vietnam was a definite mistake no matter what.

Ho Chi Minh repeatedly asked for assistance from the US in the 1940s and 50s and all the US experts knew that Vietnam was not following Russian orders or ideology and had a totally different type of plan for Communism, which included democracy and low taxes and they put forward trade agreements with the US as a way to try and get assistance.

So, to me Vietnam sticks out as the worse anti-Communist thing we did.

Korea was also stupid, because, as I said in my paper Korea seems to actually have strengthened Maoist Communism in China, which was a bad thing, it was like Stalinist Communism, but really worse.

I consider Maoism the worst of all, because of the level of social manipulation that took place. Mao really robbed people of individuality, and he was quite bad IMO. The people didn't like him when he took power and counter-revolution was building in China, but then the US invaded Korea and China immediately united behind Mao in fear of American invasion.

I consider the actions taken in Indonesia wrong too, that Socialist regime that we overthrew was not as bad as what has replaced it, and over 2 million people died in that process, due to American intervention. That was done purely because Indonesia has many raw materials that America needs and is a strategic location with a lot of cheap labor.

Now, as for the Ba'aths, you have to read my paper on that. The Ba'ath were anti-Communists, anti-Marxists. The CIA helped the Ba'ath into power. And all those people that they say the Ba'ath's killed and tortured? They were all communists that the CIA requested the Ba'aths kill in return for the CIA cooperation in getting them into power.

The CIA was involved in a large scale anti-Communist effort in the Middle East in the 1950s and 1960s, that's where the Shah comes in, he was a former Nazi essentially, a Nazi cooperative anyway. He was a fascist anti-Communist and he purged Iran of the Communists, through assignations and harassment as well, just like the Ba'aths did, all at CIA request.

The reason our support of the Kurds has been dubious all along is that the Kurds have a large faction of Democratic Communists. The "problem" with the Kurds is they are Social Democrats largely and the US doesn't know what do to about that. The Kurds want a secular socialist democracy. The Turks also don't like the Kurds because they have many Kurds too, and they fear that if the Iraqi Kurds get too powerful that the Turkish and Syrian Kurds will unite and present a significant Democratic Communist movement in the region.

So, its all a complex matter. I fully expect the US leaders to do what it has done and to oppose communism, so its hard to second guess their moves. The goals of the Socialist Revolution are global and the goal is the downfall of all the existing capitalist regimes, so its expected for those regimes to defend themselves.

Not a violent revolution, but the goal when the Bolsheviks took control in Russia really was to cause a global revolution and to have communists in America overthrow the government. So I mean the American leaders weren't wrong, just on the other side of the fence then I am on. I understand their position though.

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
But are we talking here about a critical look at L.Strauss or about a critical approach at the so-called Strausseans?

I'm working on that. Have to admit that I'd never even heard of Leo Strauss before last week Thursday's Brian Lehrer radio show. So-called whachamacallits it might have to be...

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Leo Strauss was persuaded that the Intellectuals , even in Antiquity, they didn't feel free to express what they really thought , so in their writings, their REAL thoughts are codified... I know it sounds strange but this is what he tried to do with Plato's writings;he tried to decode Plato
What "real thoughts"? That Plato did not actually believe in eternal ideals as the basis of knowing?

That there are no gods, that morality is ungrounded prejudice and that society is not grounded in nature? That "the U.S. is a propositional nation" and that the Founders sold us a salutory myth, maybe an untrue concoction?

Or, on the other hand, maybe the American republic was founded on natural rights, after all. And so Strauss was not a closet nihilist and believed in moral law. So they say.

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Is anybody in this forum ( or even on this very planet) able to point me TWO people to agree on what Leo Strauss actually meant in hiw writings?
Not yet. Neither did the a: Arabs b: Israelis (choose one) sign that "Screw Peace" accord all by themselves.

"It is safer to try to understand the low in the light of the high than the high in the light of the low. In doing the latter one necessarily distorts the high, whereas in doing the former one does not deprive the low of the freedom to reveal itself fully as what it is."
From time to time I like happy endings.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Malachi151


And, yes it is a pitty that we haven't be able to totally and fundamentally change the world in just 100 years, of course the US having spent trillions of dollars to maintian status quo and fight every form of socialism all around the world for the past 50 years has had nothing to do with that I am sure.

The only thing is proves is the ability of the wealthy to defend their position.

Ok Malachi I am a simple person and rather simple minded, so what you will read below won't have many words ending in -ism... :)

Once upon a time, there was a philosophical theory composed by a great man , Karl Marx. Karl Marx tried to analyze and explain many things; from Mathematics to History and above all Society and Accumulation of Wealth.Marxist thought had a great impact on political science and theory and we must admit that it changed the way we see things.

In the mean time, another man, Lenin, tried to apply the marxist theories to a country named Russia. Russia was a poor agricultural country with an agricultural economy but -alas- marxists ideals, in order to be applied needed an industrialized country and economy of course.

So Lenin, had the "brilliant" idea to force Russians to forget their agricultural background an to built an industrialized economy.

As you can imagine, those poor people didn't have a clue on how to run factories. In fact Lenin himself had no idea about industrialized economies... so what did he do?

Well ... He hired the bad Capitalists to run the economy...those capitalists were smart, so soon they joined the Communist Party and their children after them became what was known as Nomenklatur...

:)

Do I need to continue this sad saga ?

I will be glad to, if you wish...

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


Ok Malachi I am a simple person and rather simple minded, so what you will read below won't have many words ending in -ism... :)

Once upon a time, there was a philosophical theory composed by a great man , Karl Marx. Karl Marx tried to analyze and explain many things; from Mathematics to History and above all Society and Accumulation of Wealth.Marxist thought had a great impact on political science and theory and we must admit that it changed the way we see things.

In the mean time, another man, Lenin, tried to apply the marxist theories to a country named Russia. Russia was a poor agricultural country with an agricultural economy but -alas- marxists ideals, in order to be applied needed an industrialized country and economy of course.

So Lenin, had the "brilliant" idea to force Russians to forget their agricultural background an to built an industrialized economy.

As you can imagine, those poor people didn't have a clue on how to run factories. In fact Lenin himself had no idea about industrialized economies... so what did he do?

Well ... He hired the bad Capitalists to run the economy...those capitalists were smart, so soon they joined the Communist Party and their children after them became what was known as Nomenklatur...

:)

Do I need to continue this sad saga ?

I will be glad to, if you wish...

Go right ahead, but just a note from my paper first:

Two distinct views emerged from the Russian revolutionaries.

One was that Russia was incapable of undergoing a socialist revolution and that according to Marxist theory Russia would first have to establish a capitalist system to develop its economy. During the time that Russia was developing its capitalist economy it was intended that socialist revolutionaries should attempt to promote socialist revolution in developed countries, particularly in developed Europe such as France and Germany, and America as well, which would all be supported by the Russia government.

The opposing view to this was that a socialist state should be forced upon Russia and that Russia should lead the world by example in the matter of communism. Stalin was a major supporter of this idea of National Socialism, which was contrary to the views of many of the Bolsheviks, including Lenin and Trotsky, two of the major figures in the Bolshevik Revolution.

Yes, Lenin knew that industrialization would have to take place obviously, an that capitalists were the people to do it.

[Cleopatra]

So, why you blame USA Dollars then for the failure of Marxism?

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
So, why you blame USA Dollars then for the failure of Marxism?

Well, its complicated I guess. I don't' "blame" the US.

Did "Marxism" fail? No.

Russia was a poor country to choose to try and start the Socialist Revolution. It was chosen because it was in revolution and ripe to taken control of and taken in a new direction. The Bolsheviks did not cause the revolution, they were made aware of it and then came to Russia after the fact, well some were already in Russia, but many came from Germany and other places in Europe.

In retrospect it was a bad choice to try it in Russia.

They knew they faced problems, but they tried to "force" it to work. Marxist theory states that Capitalism begets Socialism, begets Communism. It does not say that you can create Communism.

Marx intended Socialism to start in Western Europe, England, France, or Germany most likely.

Marx states that Communism is unavoidable, it is the inevitable resolution of the internal conflict inherent in Capitalism.

Is he correct? I don't think so.

I think that Marx was like Darwin, as I think I already said.

Darwin opened the door, but that was it. Same with Marx.

Since the Bolshevik Revolution Marxism has gone down hill. The Bolshevik Revolution was bad for Marxism.

Had Stalin not come to power it would have been better, but still problematic.

Russia was simply a poor choice to try to implement the ideas.

I think that America was the true hope of Marxism, and that the Bolshevik Revolution prematurely destroyed the Marxist movement in the US. There is plenty of evidence for this.

Having said that I think that without the great pressure put on Socialist and Communist countries by the Capitalist countries they would have resolved these issues in time on their own, but under the pressure, it was doomed to fail. I still think that Vietnam was the closest shot for a democratic communism, even better then Russia ever was, but Vietnam was agrarian too so it was also problematic.

Anyway, I think that Socialism and Communism are inherently flawed in the classical sense.

I think that Marxism is a good base of ideas and that dialectical materialism can be applied to social problem solving to development and better approaches to human development.

Socialism and Marxism failed due to those trying to implement the ideas being wrong in their approach and due to the pressure put on the systems by capitalism, and because the systems were inherently flawed.

So, the solution is to start analyzing Marxism again and bring it into the 21st century as an ideology, and then once we have modernized the ideas, then we can work towards a democratic implementation of them, instead of revolutionary, this is what was happening in America in the early 20th century until the Bolshevik Revolution screwed it all up. Now, I still would have sided with the Bolsheviks, but the truth is that had they not done what they did, then it would have happened naturally in America and Western Europe through democracy IMO, because the evidence is that it was in fact happening.

In that process the ideology would have been maintianed and and modernized as time went on and it was utalized, like Darwinism has been.

So it may have been one of those things where poor timing and judgement by people who meant well but were over eager screwed us all for a while, but eventually I think that socialism of some kind will happen, because of the flaws in capitalism. Hopefully that will be sooner then later, but in a way Capitalism creates socialism no matter what eventually. As world trade increases a global labor economy is developing and once a global labor market is established as a single entity then we will be on the way to socialism and there is no way to avoid it. It willnot be classical socialism, but it will be a form of socialism, maybe by a different name.

The issue is, why do it the hard way when we could just do it though cooperation and planning instead of natural system evoltuion which will be long a tedious and painful.

Marx's International was essentially forming global labor unions. That was destroyed, but eventually its will happen again on its own.

[Frank Newgent]

Find the Straussian.

http://www.claremont.org/writings/980212jaffa.html

[Cleopatra]

Oh yes, I read this and I thought to post it here but I wouldn't want to be accused of trolling...

If you subscribe to the Straussean. net you will get e-mail notifications about the articles that they are published in the Media about the Strausseans and NOT Strauss.

It's an interesting article.

I can't get used the way Americans analyze poltics. Very...inflamatory

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Oh yes, I read this and I thought to post it here but I wouldn't want to be accused of trolling...

If you subscribe to the Straussean. net you will get e-mail notifications about the articles that they are published in the Media about the Strausseans and NOT Strauss.

It's an interesting article.

I can't get used the way Americans analyze poltics. Very...inflamatory

Well I see it as three basic views to take, this can apply to any type fo government, democracy or whatever.

1. The people are to be ruled by superiors. Religion and patriotism, nationalism, etc are tools of rulers to manipulate the masses and keep society focused and controled doing what the leaders believe is best. - Strauss type thinking (fascism)

2. The people are to rule themselves. Religion, patriotism, nationalism, etc are tool that rulers use to try and dominte people so in order for people to rule themselves these things have to be cast aside and gotten rid of so that people can be free to make rational informed decisions. - Marx type thinking (socialism)

3. The people are to rule themselves. Religion, patriotism, nationalism, etc are good parts of society. God gives us our liberty so we cannot be free without religion. Our country gives us our liberty so we need patriotism. Love of these things makes us free. - "American" type thinking, which is simply a matter of believing your own lies. Its just volentary fascism, a.k.a. the Anglo way. This represents a level below options 1 and 2 which are both more enlightened.

I choose 2.

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by Malachi151
Postmodernism perscribes individualism.
Marxism perscribes social structure.
The fascism perscribes social structure.
Postmodernism certainly does not prescribe individualism; just the opposite; it deconstructs the narratives on which individual identity is based; like gender, sexuality, employment and so on and so on. What it does do though, is challenge the Marxist idea that everything can be reduced to relationships to the means of production, but that's simply because within postmodernism there's no room for individual essence or grand narratives. Which admittedly is kind of contradictory, but that is what makes life fun, eh? ;)

Quick postmodernist joke: is Leo Strauss the jeans maker or the singer with the Four Tops? Sorree! I promise not to post again 'till I read the article...

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by BillyTK

Postmodernism certainly does not prescribe individualism; just the opposite; it deconstructs the narratives on which individual identity is based; like gender, sexuality, employment and so on and so on. What it does do though, is challenge the Marxist idea that everything can be reduced to relationships to the means of production, but that's simply because within postmodernism there's no room for individual essence or grand narratives. Which admittedly is kind of contradictory, but that is what makes life fun, eh? ;)

Quick postmodernist joke: is Leo Strauss the jeans maker or the singer with the Four Tops? Sorree! I promise not to post again 'till I read the article...

Well, it does perscribe individuaism exactly by deconstructing narratives. Postermoderninsm essentialy says, and corect me if I am wrong, that the world is not knowable and everything is subjective, which leads to "to each his own". It is contradictory, exactly.

Yes, no, agree?

[c0rbin]

I am not a student of this at all, but here are my observations...

What is the difference between communism managed by the state and communism managed by a few huge corporations?

In other words, a company produces a product, hires you to build that product, and you buy the product with the money you earned from the company (along with the rest of the products that company produces).

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by c0rbin
I am not a student of this at all, but here are my observations...

What is the difference between communism managed by the state and communism managed by a few huge corporations?

In other words, a company produces a product, hires you to build that product, and you buy the product with the money you earned from the company (along with the rest of the products that company produces).

Well that's the thing. There are so few big corporations in America today really. It "looks" like there are many, but take for example that RJ Reynolds owns Kraft, and Kraft owns Nabisco, and a dozen other food companies, etc. Conglomerates have "monopolized" the markets legally.

I don't have a link to the article, but a months back I read a piece on Kraft that stated that about 80% of all processed food in American grocery stores are Kraft products. Frito-Lay is another one like that. Frito-Lay has about 90% of the junk food market.

Each of these company has subsidiaries that they do business through in order to uphold the laws on competition. Microsoft is now another example. At this point Microsoft is propping up other companies and internationally helping them so that they won't go out of business because if these few remaining companies like Borland and Sun were to go out of business then Microsoft would have to breakup due to lack of competition. So, they string these guys along that can't really compete they just kind of languish and become pawns of the big companies.

Capitalism naturally produces monopoly, so we have made laws that prevent monopoly, which really them also creates problems. Capitalism uses the process of evolution and "survival of the fittest", to select for the "best " companies, but then in nature what happens in the competition then goes extinct. We don't allow that, we make laws against that. If we do allow it then we get private dictatorship, so its really kind of a half assed broken system. Capitalism is naturally self defeating, which is why it has to be managed and have ruled in place to keep it from just falling apart. With the free-market the system destroys itself in a matter of generations, so you have buildup - crash, buildup -crash, etc.

Now, the goal of communism is to look at the entire economic system as a whole and determine what prices for labor should be. This has problems too obviously. But as you can see that prices for labor being determined by individuals who have no idea about how the labor contracts relate to the entire system can in no way determine prices that are reflective of the value of labor in relation to the system.

So, for example, let's say we have 5 workers in a system.

The GDP of the system is 20 units per year.

The communist would say that the sum of the work for all 5 people must equal 20 GDP, that's the only possibility.

The task then is to look at how each person contributed and try to determine how much of the GDP each person was responsible for. Obvioiusly you have to use projections to determine current pay.

This becomes very difficult because its subjective and because its not a straight relationship to work done. In other words the combined effects of everyone's individual labor is greater then the value of the labor in isolation.

So at any rate they will try to come up with a way to determine as best as possible and then say that okay, person A contributed 5 units, person B 2 units person C 3 units person D 7 units and person E 3 units. And that is how the people are paid, by their contribution to the overall value of the system.

Now, the capitalist way of all this is that looking at GDP doesn't even matter. How much each person contributes to the whole is not important in determining value.

The capitalist way is that we have 5 people in a system that are going to work.

Person A possesses 10 units of wealth. Person B, C, D, and E have nothing.

Person B, C, D, and E can either try to make something from nothing, which maybe they can do, or work for person A.

Person A has 4 people looking for work and only 2 jobs, so due to competition person B and C agree to take the jobs for 1 unit each.

Through their labor they add 4 units each to the GDP, but they only get paid for 1 unit because that is what they agreed to. Person A doesn't really know how much anyone added to the GDP, all he knows is that he is now 6 units richer, the 8 units minus the 2 that he paid them.

It is said now that person A contributed 6 units to the GDP by hiring two people using his wealth.

The other 2 people that were not hired, one does nothing and does not contribute to the GDP, the other does his own thing and contributes 2 units to the GDP, which he keeps himself. The two units he added to the GDP were made possible because of the work done by person B and person C. Let's say that they built roads, and person D then built bicycles. Obviously the bicycles can't be built or sold if there have been no roads, and person A, B, and C were able to buy bicycles because they had money and access to roads.

So the system produces a GDP of 20 GDP, but it's all kind of arbitrarily allotted throughout the system. Person B and C were paid less then they contributed, person A received the excess that he did not pay person B and C and person D was able to make money because of the work of person A, B, and C, though the relationship was not taken into account in how the money was allotted.

In all this, person B and C are the ones getting screwed of course, but the argument is made that person B and C should be thankful to person A that they have anything at all, which is true in a way.

You can see that Capitalism will also probably produce more progress due to competition, but the system isn't exactly fair. Its the lack of fairness that makes it progressive and drives the system.

Now, neither communism or capitalism are perfect and both have flaws. The failure is in recognizing the flaws of capitalism and assuming that it has none, which is what is done now by many people.

Its why the idea of economics that existed 100 to 50 years ago was so much different than today. Then everyone understood the unfairness and tried to compensate for it, now, with 50 years of "capitalism is perfect" and "the free-market is the holy grail" propaganda so many people believe the propaganda that they no longer understand the inherent flaws in capitalism and how wages are set. Capitalism has become a religion, not a science.

Capital begets capital. The leverage of capital allows the wealthy to more easily get more wealthy. Given the same skills and efforts its easier for someone with a million dollars to make a million dollars then it is someone with no money to start with. So, as wealth gets more and more concentrated in the hands of the few, they gain more an more leverage, escalating the gap between rich and poor, stretching the middle class thinner and thinner.

Economic disparity increases to the point that collapse happens or else the system is changed in a way to decrease disparity. The disparity in the system will be equalized either through force or management.

We are currently at the point where we need to minimize disparity, but Bush is going in the opposite direction, his policy will make disparity greater. This is just building up to a bigger crash. Its inevitable, there isn't really anything to do about it. These tax cuts, the way he has done them, will result in increased disparity and eventual economic failure.

[Tony]

Originally posted by Malachi151




2. The people are to rule themselves. Religion, patriotism, nationalism, etc are tool that rulers use to try and dominte people so in order for people to rule themselves these things have to be cast aside and gotten rid of so that people can be free to make rational informed decisions. - Marx type thinking (socialism)


I choose 2.

Then move to Cuba.

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by Malachi151


Well, it does perscribe individuaism exactly by deconstructing narratives. Postermoderninsm essentialy says, and corect me if I am wrong, that the world is not knowable and everything is subjective, which leads to "to each his own". It is contradictory, exactly.

Yes, no, agree?

Disagree. Postmodernism as a theory is contradictory because it says there's no possibility of a single grand theory of everything, which is a grand theory kind of statement. However, postmodernism as the condition of society we live in--or as Frederic Jameson (he's a Marxist ;) ) more accurately describes it, late capitalism--means it's part of the condition that grand theories no longer work, because late capitalist society has become too fragmented. Therefore individualism is simply one of a number of competing narratives which describe the self, and as such there is no essential self--and certainly no individual of the methodological individualist variety--and even previously untouchable aspects of identity such as gender and sex are now up for grabs. People create their identities according to the available material and cultural resources in much the same way as you would walk into a clothes shop and buy a new set of clothes. So IMO postmodernism fills in a lot of the gaps between the 19th century perspective that Marx was writing from and the present day neo-liberal capitalist economy, but the reason I don't walk the whole postmodernist line is because social justice and social change is almost entirely a matter of how much cash you've got in your pocket.

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by c0rbin
I am not a student of this at all, but here are my observations...

What is the difference between communism managed by the state and communism managed by a few huge corporations?

In other words, a company produces a product, hires you to build that product, and you buy the product with the money you earned from the company (along with the rest of the products that company produces).
Well, in that the cost of the product to you as a consumer will always be greater than the cost to the company of your labour to build that product, corporate communism is highly unlikely, if not a contradiction in terms.

Btw--what's your avatar all about? I only ask 'cos I saw the logo recently on a bumper sticker (I live in the north of England).

[Frank Newgent]

The link I most recently posted was written by a follower of the so-called exoteric school of Straussian thought, which tends to interpret Strauss in terms of a conventional understanding of classical philosophy.

The esoterics seem more cynical and seem more specifically to be who Malachi151 refers to. But what do I know? Perhaps the exoterics just hide it better?

About the conversation between BillyTK and Malachi151 concerning postmodernism and individualism: sounds to me as though Billy TK might be describing the exterior and Malachi151 the interior of this confrontation.

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent
The link I most recently posted was written by a follower of the so-called exoteric school of Straussian thought, which tends to interpret Strauss in terms of a conventional understanding of classical philosophy.

The esoterics seem more cynical and seem more specifically to be who Malachi151 refers to. But what do I know? Perhaps the exoterics just hide it better?

About the conversation between BillyTK and Malachi151 concerning postmodernism and individualism: sounds to me as though Billy TK might be describing the exterior and Malachi151 the interior of this confrontation.

And you might be too clever by half ;) :D, or the following might reveal I'm not clever enough! But in postmodernism, there is no interior, even the supposedly private realm of mental activity, this activity is external in both source and direction. Individualism is simply a narrative generated by the cultural conditions of capitalism (cliff notes version: basically you have to own yourself before you can sell your labor in the marketplace).

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by BillyTK
Individualism is simply a narrative generated by the cultural conditions of capitalism
http://www.officialtomwaits.com/music/m_sc_lyr.htm#Step_Right_Up

And it steals your car
It gets rid of your gambling debts, it quits smoking
It's a friend, and it's a companion
And it's the only product you will ever need
Follow these easy assembly instructions
it never needs ironing
Well it takes weights off hips, bust
thighs, chin, midriff
Gives you dandruff, and it finds you a job
it is a job

edited to add :D

[BillyTK]

Originally posted by headscratcher4


Cleo:

Serious question: sort of "neo-con" (as opposed to Marxist) deconstructionist?

I know that Cleopatra answered this question, but afte rreading the article, and doing some background reading on Strauss, I wanted to throw in my two pen'orth; I think we can safely say he wasn't a deconstructionist of any flavour.

The basic principle of deconstructionism is that a text can only be understood in terms of either the reader's own knowledge and experience, or in terms of the culture which the author existed in. So far, so Straussian. But the ko for deconstructionism is that the text has no intrinsic meaning, whereas Strauss believed that, for instance, the classical philosophy texts had an intrinsic meaning which was deliberately hidden from any casual reading to protect the author, and which could only be revealed by using the method that Strauss developed.

Judging by Cleopatra's comments, this method seems to have some success (and considering her comments about Marx and Chomsky, I'm inclined to give Cleopatra's view some credence, for truly she is wise ;) ), however, I read a criticism of this method which suggested that he was simply inferring answers to (modern) problems which the classical philosophers didn't address, and more importantly, couldn't have addressed.

[Cleopatra]

Do you ever visit The Straussian Net (http://www.straussian.net/) ?

You should! Have a look at the comic on the first page of the news updates... :D

In that section you can find an article that will help those who refuse to understand why the left will be always at the corner to realize the obvious ; that the lack of seriousness that the left demonstrates in its criticism is a serious flaw when it comes to Politics.

Enjoy! (http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j100103.html)

THE NEO-JACOBINS
Why the neocons abhor the spotlight
by Justin Raimondo

[...]Muravchik scoffs at the idea that the neocons owe much of anything either to the cult of Leo Strauss, the philosopher of the "noble lie," or to Leon Trotsky, whose legacy informed such proto-neocons as Max Shachtman, Philip Selznick, and Irving Kristol. [...]

[...]I will pass, for the moment, on the subject of the Straussian connection, since I have never been able to read a single one of Strauss's books all the way through. I am told that he is boring on purpose, because, you see, only the dogged few will get the true – esoteric – meaning. This seems fitting for a philosophy that, from what I can tell, is founded on the primacy of deception. Clearly this methodology is tailor-made for the gang that lied us into war.[...]



The individual admits that he hasn't read anything of L.Strauss because his books are boring on purpose!

Right! I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that J.Raimondo believed in the existence of the lost Atlantis too...

[a_unique_person]

Cleopatra, I think they know we are on to them. That link doesn't work anymore.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
Cleopatra, I think they know we are on to them. That link doesn't work anymore.

Are you sure you just tried to visit the Straussian Net and not to hack it??

Well, I checked, it works for me. Awww these neo-conservative, platonists zionists! They have put your IP in the black list!

[a_unique_person]

This is the one that works for me.

http://www.straussian.org

[a_unique_person]

Strauss likes Plato? Plato was the original facist.



It is not self-forgetting and pain-loving antiquarianism nor self-forgetting and intoxicating romanticism which induces us to turn with passionate interest, with unqualified willingness to learn, toward the political thought of classical antiquity. We are impelled to do so by the crisis of our time, the crisis of the West.



Could you read a bookful of that sort of drivel? Intelligence is not just thinking wonderful things, it is being able to communicate them too.

[a_unique_person]

Strauss believes that Machiavelli was evil. However, I couldn't help feeling, when reading Machiavelli, that Bush and Co would have done well to read him before invading Iraq.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0226777022/qid=1042570804/sr=1-3/ref=sr_1_3/104-1725518-3755153?v=glance&s=books

[Cleopatra]

Strauss actually studied Plato, he didn't just like him.

Wow! The passage you quoted looks like a eurocommunist manifesto!

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
Strauss believes that Machiavelli was evil. However, I couldn't help feeling, when reading Machiavelli, that Bush and Co would have done well to read him before invading Iraq.


Exactly! I think that the problem is that Bush and Co have read very little...

Unique, you know it's quite passe to consider Machiavelli evil...

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


Exactly! I think that the problem is that Bush and Co have read very little...

Unique, you know it's quite passe to consider Machiavelli evil...

So they told me 20 years ago, but Strauss is one who stuck firmly to that belief.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by a_unique_person


So they told me 20 years ago, but Strauss is one who stuck firmly to that belief.

He wrote this book in the 60ies Unique plus the fact that for the fist time somebody ( Strauss) makes the distinction between Machiavelli and Machiavellism.

Somebody now must make the distinction between Strauss and the Straussians...

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Somebody now must make the distinction between Strauss and the Straussians...
Åóåßò ðñþôá.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent

Åóåßò ðñþôá.

many Greek speaking people frequent this forum, it is getting crowded...


Well, Frank I wish I were in the position to make this distinction but I am afraid I am not... although I have this gut feeling that Strauss wouldn't approve of this kind of use of his theories. I mean, which intelligent human being would?

[a_unique_person]

This just in, Straussians have split into the East Coast and West Coast camps. Further details as they come to hand.

http://straussian.hypermart.net/discus/messages/2/16.html?1065186407

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
... although I have this gut feeling that Strauss wouldn't approve of this kind of use of his theories. I mean, which intelligent human being would?
Cleopatra: I fake Greek. Back in Mexico and working on my Spanish though.

Wise of you to protest these consanguineous frauds. However, only the Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans has inherent worth or is good by nature. Remember that the United States of America derives its worth hiddenly, but truly, as the establishment for a Defense Intelligence Agency. Remember that the United States of America derives its worth openly, but falsely, by convincing it citizens that partial virtues, as well as preemptive wars, are intrinsically good.

[Cleopatra]

First of all, let me clarify that when I said that I am not in the position to make the distinction between Strauss and Strausseans I meant that I don't have a deep knowledge about Strauss' philosophy.

I get your point. What I find alarming is the fact that those scums are actually persuaded that they have an ideology that dates back to Athens of 5th century. I am in the position to show why they have nothing to do with Plato and very little with the long tradition of western political philosophy but this is the subject of another thread that it would require time-- [self sarcasm] After ending my involvment with the dramas of the teenagers of the forum maybe it would be a good a idea to have this discussion[/selfsarcasm].

It wouldn't be an exaggeration to suggest though that Strausseans were formed to a group by a reflex reaction to the bubblings and superficial criticism of the Left.

Don't forget that the Left gave them such a big credit by attributing to them connections and theories that have very little in common with.

It was the Left that created the conspiracy theory at the first place. The rest is marketing.

The matter stays open and I think it's interesting to observe it for as long as it will last ( I predict that it won't last long).

The Platonic Socrates would find it ridiculous sans doute

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
It wouldn't be an exaggeration to suggest though that Strausseans were formed to a group by a reflex reaction to the bubblings and superficial criticism of the Left.
I refer to a more specific gang of thimblewits, specifically Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, Weekly Standard Chief Editor William Kristol, Gary Schmitt of the Project for the New American Century, Richard Perle, the undersecretary of defense for intelligence Stephen Cambone and the Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans director Abram Shulsky. God damn them all.

[Cleopatra]

From the site of Open Democracy:

Noble lies and perpetual war: Leo Strauss, the neo-cons, and Iraq (http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-3-77-1542.jsp)


By contrast, Shadia Drury, professor of political theory at the University of Regina in Saskatchewan, argues that the use of deception and manipulation in current US policy flow directly from the doctrines of the political philosopher Leo Strauss (1899-1973). His disciples include Paul Wolfowitz and other neo-conservatives who have driven much of the political agenda of the Bush administration.

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

First of all, let me clarify that when I said that I am not in the position to make the distinction between Strauss and Strausseans I meant that I don't have a deep knowledge about Strauss' philosophy.

I am certainly no authority either. But I've not defended Strauss.

From your link: Noble lies and perpetual war: Leo Strauss, the neo-cons, and Iraq (http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-3-77-1542.jsp)
Strauss thinks that the superiority of the ruling philosophers is an intellectual superiority and not a moral one (Natural Right and History, p. 151). For many commentators who (like Karl Popper) have read Plato as a totalitarian, the logical consequence is to doubt that philosophers can be trusted with political power. Those who read him this way invariably reject him. Strauss is the only interpreter who gives a sinister reading to Plato, and then celebrates him.
Shadia Drury, this scholarly critic of Strauss who presumably does possess deep knowlege of Strauss's philosophy, ain't no fan. Why this link? Have to admit I've been trying to think of a positive way in which Strauss could be interpreted. Maybe I'll ask Huzington.

[Cleopatra]

What do you mean " Why this link?"

I do not post sources that support my ideas only. I try to be fair.

I found the interview interesting and since I trust this source exactly because most of the times the articles I read in Open Democracy contradict my opinions and make me think, I thought to share it.

[Frank Newgent]

Oops. Thanks for posting it.

[Cleopatra]

To tell you the truth I was quite disappointed with what I read because Plato is a quite a Humanist.

If only he knew that people like Wolfowitz use his philosophy to manipulate ( and not govern) the world, he would commit suicide...

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

To tell you the truth I was quite disappointed with what I read because Plato is a quite a Humanist.

If only he knew that people like Wolfowitz use his philosophy to manipulate ( and not govern) the world, he would commit suicide...
Vicariously? (http://plato.evansville.edu/texts/jowett/phaedo15.htm )

[Frank Newgent]

Lest you find me untoward, I thank you again for posting this link: http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-3-77-1542.jsp

There are indeed three types of men: the wise, the gentlemen, and the vulgar. The wise are the lovers of the harsh, unadulterated truth. They are capable of looking into the abyss without fear and trembling. They recognise neither God nor moral imperatives. They are devoted above all else to their own pursuit of the “higher” pleasures, which amount to consorting with their “puppies” or young initiates.

The second type, the gentlemen, are lovers of honour and glory. They are the most ingratiating towards the conventions of their society – that is, the illusions of the cave. They are true believers in God, honour, and moral imperatives. They are ready and willing to embark on acts of great courage and self-sacrifice at a moment’s notice.

The third type, the vulgar many, are lovers of wealth and pleasure. They are selfish, slothful, and indolent. They can be inspired to rise above their brutish existence only by fear of impending death or catastrophe.

Like Plato, Strauss believed that the supreme political ideal is the rule of the wise. But the rule of the wise is unattainable in the real world. Now, according to the conventional wisdom, Plato realised this, and settled for the rule of law. But Strauss did not endorse this solution entirely. Nor did he think that it was Plato’s real solution – Strauss pointed to the “nocturnal council” in Plato’s Laws to illustrate his point.

The real Platonic solution as understood by Strauss is the covert rule of the wise (see Strauss’s – The Argument and the Action of Plato’s Laws). This covert rule is facilitated by the overwhelming stupidity of the gentlemen. The more gullible and unperceptive they are, the easier it is for the wise to control and manipulate them. Supposedly, Xenophon makes that clear to us.

For Strauss, the rule of the wise is not about classic conservative values like order, stability, justice, or respect for authority. The rule of the wise is intended as an antidote to modernity. Modernity is the age in which the vulgar many have triumphed. It is the age in which they have come closest to having exactly what their hearts desire – wealth, pleasure, and endless entertainment. But in getting just what they desire, they have unwittingly been reduced to beasts.

Nowhere is this state of affairs more advanced than in America. And the global reach of American culture threatens to trivialise life and turn it into entertainment. This was as terrifying a spectre for Strauss as it was for Alexandre Kojève and Carl Schmitt.

This is made clear in Strauss’s exchange with Kojève (reprinted in Strauss’s On Tyranny), and in his commentary on Schmitt’s The Concept of the Political (reprinted in Heinrich Meier, Carl Schmitt and Leo Strauss: The Hidden Dialogue). Kojève lamented the animalisation of man and Schmitt worried about the trivialisation of life. All three of them were convinced that liberal economics would turn life into entertainment and destroy politics; all three understood politics as a conflict between mutually hostile groups willing to fight each other to the death. In short, they all thought that man’s humanity depended on his willingness to rush naked into battle and headlong to his death. Only perpetual war can overturn the modern project, with its emphasis on self-preservation and “creature comforts.” Life can be politicised once more, and man’s humanity can be restored.

This terrifying vision fits perfectly well with the desire for honour and glory that the neo-conservative gentlemen covet. It also fits very well with the religious sensibilities of gentlemen. The combination of religion and nationalism is the elixir that Strauss advocates as the way to turn natural, relaxed, hedonistic men into devout nationalists willing to fight and die for their God and country.

I never imagined when I wrote my first book on Strauss that the unscrupulous elite that he elevates would ever come so close to political power, nor that the ominous tyranny of the wise would ever come so close to being realised in the political life of a great nation like the United States.

Might Strauss have found this line of thought vulgar? Though I was kidding when I suggested Huzington (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/member.php?s=&action=getinfo&userid=4567) may have a way to interpret Strauss more buoyantly, I'm at a loss to do the same on my own.

Any suggestions?

[Cleopatra]

I might be really wrong about what I will say.

I have this strange feeling that some people were just looking for it. They started searching the resumes of " the gang" and when they discovered that a couple of them were students of Leo Strauss, they started building the plot.

Like Plato, Strauss believed that the supreme political ideal is the rule of the wise. But the rule of the wise is unattainable in the real world. Now, according to the conventional wisdom, Plato realised this, and settled for the rule of law. But Strauss did not endorse this solution entirely. Nor did he think that it was Plato’s real solution – Strauss pointed to the “nocturnal council” in Plato’s Laws to illustrate his point.


There was no way for Plato to accept that the rule of the wise can be accomplished in the real world for in the Platonic Philosophy the perfection is living in the world of ideas ( I have written a couple of things in the thread about Atlantis).

I think that it's unfair to compare Plato to Strauss.

Plato wasn't addressing hoi polloi... Modern Philosophers I don't know ... let's say since Adam Smith ( this is wrong somebody must correct me) look to address issues that concern the majority. Plato wasn't interested in the majority.

It's not fair to make the comparison. Strauss was only based on Plato's philosophy.

A friend of mine who follows the forum ( my business associate to be exact) told me today that he gets the idea that I try to defend Strauss because his critics imply a Jewish conspiracy around him.

Maybe this is true, of course in another thread I mentioned Isaiah Berlin and "I forgot" to mention that he was a Jew but it bothers me when many of his critics stress his Jewish studies when the question is about actual politics.

But of course I might be biased so, I will have to think about it :)

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent

Vicariously? (http://plato.evansville.edu/texts/jowett/phaedo15.htm )

Ha!! And we were having this discussion to another thread the other day.

Nice link BTW for the texts I use the TLG program but it seems that Internet is always faster...

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

I have this strange feeling that some people were just looking for it. They started searching the resumes of " the gang" and when they discovered that a couple of them were students of Leo Strauss, they started building the plot.


They? Seymour M. Hersh (http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0506-06.htm) has a turd in his pocket?

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent

They? Seymour M. Hersh (http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0506-06.htm) has a turd in his pocket?

If I am not mistaken this is the article that "started everything" . Right?

Let's see I think these are the excerpts that are related to our discussion:

The director of the Special Plans operation is Abram Shulsky, a scholarly expert in the works of the political philosopher Leo Strauss. Shulsky has been quietly working on intelligence and foreign-policy issues for three decades; he was on the staff of the Senate Intelligence Com-mittee in the early nineteen-eighties and served in the Pentagon under Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle during the Reagan Administration, after which he joined the Rand Corporation.

[...]

How Strauss’s views might be applied to the intelligence-gathering process is less immediately obvious. As it happens, Shulsky himself explored that question in a 1999 essay, written with Gary Schmitt, entitled “Leo Strauss and the World of Intelligence (By Which We Do Not Mean Nous)”—in Greek philosophy the term nous denotes the highest form of rationality. In the essay, Shulsky and Schmitt write that Strauss’s “gentleness, his ability to concentrate on detail, his consequent success in looking below the surface and reading between the lines, and his seeming unworldliness . . . may even be said to resemble, however faintly, the George Smiley of John le Carré’s novels.” Echoing one of Strauss’s major themes, Shulsky and Schmitt criticize America’s intelligence community for its failure to appreciate the duplicitous nature of the regimes it deals with, its susceptibility to social-science notions of proof, and its inability to cope with deliberate concealment.

So, since the bad guys attempt an analysis on Strauss this makes Strauss a bad guy?

To this question we have the following replies:
1.

Robert Pippin, the chairman of the Committee on Social Thought at Chicago and a critic of Strauss, told me, “Strauss believed that good statesmen have powers of judgment and must rely on an inner circle. The person who whispers in the ear of the King is more important than the King. If you have that talent, what you do or say in public cannot be held accountable in the same way.”


2.
Another Strauss critic, Stephen Holmes, a law professor at New York University, put the Straussians’ position this way: “They believe that your enemy is deceiving you, and you have to pretend to agree, but secretly you follow your own views.” Holmes added, “The whole story is complicated by Strauss’s idea—actually Plato’s—that philosophers need to tell noble lies not only to the people at large but also to powerful politicians.”


I wonder what he mean with Plato's noble lies? His myths?

But seriously who disagrees about the need of use of "noble lies" from the part of those that excercise power, even when they are elected?

Let's see what a defendant says:
When I asked one of Strauss’s staunchest defenders, Joseph Cropsey, professor emeritus of political science at Chicago, about the use of Strauss’s views in the area of policymaking, he told me that common sense alone suggested that a certain amount of deception is essential in government. “That people in government have to be discreet in what they say publicly is so obvious—‘If I tell you the truth I can’t but help the enemy.’” But there is nothing in Strauss’s work, he added, that “favors preëmptive action. What it favors is prudence and sound judgment. If you could have got rid of Hitler in the nineteen-thirties, who’s not going to be in favor of that? You don’t need Strauss to reach that conclusion.”


Nasty hypothesis: What if Strauss didn't exist, still the gang would have a solid source of "inspiration" from the work of Plato. Would that make Plato evil?

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

Plato wasn't addressing hoi polloi... Modern Philosophers I don't know ... let's say since Adam Smith ( this is wrong somebody must correct me) look to address issues that concern the majority. Plato wasn't interested in the majority.

Just muddling my way through, but do you mean John Locke?

[Frank Newgent]

If I am not mistaken this is the article that "started everything" . Right?
The correct answer would be: "Yes, your Highness" (Or would it?) (http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2003/3019lar_expose_strauss.html) My descent into the vernacular was in response to your statement:

I have this strange feeling that some people were just looking for it. They started searching the resumes of " the gang" and when they discovered that a couple of them were students of Leo Strauss, they started building the plot.
To jump to your most recent observation:

Nasty hypothesis: What if Strauss didn't exist, still the gang would have a solid source of "inspiration" from the work of Plato. Would that make Plato evil?
I've read that Strauss (whether Hobbesian or non-Hobbesian natual right) (http://www.phil-books.com/Natural_Right_and_History_0226776948.html) may be better understood as a thinker in his own right rather than as an interpreter of Plato. You tell me. Did Strauss believe Thrasymachus or Socrates? (http://www.unnu.com/newhome/attractions/philosophy/Thrasymaschusonthenatureofmorality.htm)


Concerning the noble lie...

Another Strauss critic, Stephen Holmes, a law professor at New York University, put the Straussians’ position this way: “They believe that your enemy is deceiving you, and you have to pretend to agree, but secretly you follow your own views.” Holmes added, “The whole story is complicated by Strauss’s idea-actually Plato’s-that philosophers need to tell noble lies not only to the people at large but also to powerful politicians.”
From the link (http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-3-77-1542.jsp) you generously provided:

The effect of Strauss’s teaching is to convince his acolytes that they are the natural ruling elite and the persecuted few. And it does not take much intelligence for them to surmise that they are in a situation of great danger, especially in a world devoted to the modern ideas of equal rights and freedoms. Now more than ever, the wise few must proceed cautiously and with circumspection. So, they come to the conclusion that they have a moral justification to lie in order to avoid persecution. Strauss goes so far as to say that dissembling and deception - in effect, a culture of lies - is the peculiar justice of the wise.

Strauss justifies his position by an appeal to Plato’s concept of the noble lie. But in truth, Strauss has a very impoverished conception of Plato’s noble lie. Plato thought that the noble lie is a story whose details are fictitious; but at the heart of it is a profound truth.

In the myth of metals, for example, some people have golden souls - meaning that they are more capable of resisting the temptations of power. And these morally trustworthy types are the ones who are most fit to rule. The details are fictitious, but the moral of the story is that not all human beings are morally equal.
I'd rather this gang instead had gone to Louisiana State University and become confused studying Gnosticism under Eric Voegelin.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent

Just muddling my way through, but do you mean John Locke?

Nope. It's Smith I was having in my mind. It's not my fault but Heilbroner's :p Joking. In his classic "Worldly Philosophers" Heilbroner starts with A.Smith...

I think that when it comes to Political Sciences, Modernity is introduced by Machiavelli.

[a_unique_person]

When you two are finished, can you put a summary at the end in clear English for all us idiots here who have no idea what you are talking about.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by a_unique_person
When you two are finished, can you put a summary at the end in clear English for all us idiots here who have no idea what you are talking about.

Nope because we are talking about Strauss. The conversation must be encrypted.... :p

[Cleopatra]

AUP

We try to decide whether Strauss was as evil as the Strausseans.

I think that I have lost my case since I am unable to prove that Strauss had nothing to do with them and he is not a victim of those who see a conspiracy behind every Jew...that would be convenient... *sigh*

The discussion came to an interesting issue that I think that deserves a thread of its own; are lies necessary in governing a state? Plato says yes, Wolfowitz agrees but I am sure that Plato didn't have such lies in mind when he was talking about the morality of "noble lies".

[a_unique_person]

I don't know if I would ever call lies "noble". Necessary, perhaps. The classic one is in a war. A huge defeat has happened, and people are told it was just a minor one.

Morality is knowing when a lie is permissible or not. Lying to start a war could never be right, to me.

In a democracy, there is an obligation for a government to tell the truth. When it comes to election time, a government that has been caught out lying is often punished. A minister who has 'misled the house' is, by convention, obliged to resign. In practice, they usually get out of being caught by conjuring up an implausible story as to why the didn't lie.

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by a_unique_person

When you two are finished, can you put a summary at the end in clear English for all us idiots here who have no idea what you are talking about.
Sure. Layered with questioning and potential symbolism, possible contradiction, and a significant measure of allusion? Only $19.95 (http://www.directessays.com/viewpaper.php?request=10965)

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent

Only $19.95

:nope:

I did my best to be incomprehensible( mysteriously I didn't have to try hard), I even started posted innuendos about Jewish haters and you come to sell all this for $19.95?

I am telling you....we can't conquer the world with such prices...

Seriously, I need to have a look at my books before continuing the conversation and I seriously propose that we move the discussion about the morality of "noble lies" to a different thread.

Frank will you do that?

[Frank Newgent]

Anything for you, Cleopatra. I'll bring a basket of figs.

[hammegk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

I think that when it comes to Political Sciences, Modernity is introduced by Machiavelli.

And PolySci has generally deteriorated ever since. ;)



We try to decide whether Strauss was as evil as the Strausseans.


What did you conclude? (Er, only The Shadow knows?) :p

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by hammegk

What did you conclude? (Er, only The Shadow knows?) :p

The concept of evil is useless if you don't place it in a timeframe. What is considered as evil today, it was totally acceptable yesterday.

Leo Strauss lived in a significantly different political climate than ours that gave birth to the Strausseans.

What distinguishes Philosophers by Historians is the fact that the later think that they have seen everything and that in their Era they have reached the bottom of the abyss whilst the former are persuaded that humans can always do worse :)

Strauss was a philosopher.

Having said that I think that Strauss wasn't evil the way we put it and he wasn't dangerous either.

[hammegk]

Originally posted by Cleopatra


Having said that I think that Strauss wasn't evil the way we put it and he wasn't dangerous either.

And I think he could not be characterized as evil under any rational definition.

But dangerous? You bet! ;)

[Frank Newgent]

The concept of evil is useless if you don't place it in a timeframe. What is considered as evil today, it was totally acceptable yesterday.
Cleopatra, forgive me for saying so but if this is somehow a defense of Strauss it would rank as an irony of the highest order.

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent

Cleopatra, forgive me for saying so but if this is somehow a defense of Strauss it would rank as an irony of the highest order.

Wwwwwell...in defense... I don't know.

But why do you think so?

[Frank Newgent]

From what I've been able to figure out that was the whole point with Strauss. The problem he thought we all faced was a lack of rational guidance ordering our lives. That ideas of the past were bound by the historical limitations of that time was the historicism he was always arguing against. He argued for a return to permanent moral and ethical principles to guide us intelleigibly. That's how he came up with the idea that we had to see through or decode the ancient's concessions to their norms to discern the universal truth. So one should never try to understand the thinker in the context of his own time as if everything were relative to only that.

[Cleopatra]

From what I have understood Strauss believed that the great philosophical texts--as the works of Plato for example- were coded because the author didn't feel free to express his ideas for fear that he'd be procecuted for them.

So, was it from their timeframe that he wanted to liberate the ideas or just to decipher them and study them?

FWIT I always thought that his obsession with the coded truths was at least strange.


Anyway, you must have given Wolfowitz the evil eye....

[Cleopatra]

AUP we must have this discussion about the noble lies once although what do you expect to hear from a conservative like me?

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by Frank Newgent
From what I've been able to figure out that was the whole point with Strauss. The problem he thought we all faced was a lack of rational guidance ordering our lives. That ideas of the past were bound by the historical limitations of that time was the historicism he was always arguing against. He argued for a return to permanent moral and ethical principles to guide us intelleigibly. That's how he came up with the idea that we had to see through or decode the ancient's concessions to their norms to discern the universal truth. So one should never try to understand the thinker in the context of his own time as if everything were relative to only that.

He is starting to sound like Von Daniken or that idiot who wrote the Celestine Prohpecies.

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by a_unique_person

He is starting to sound like Von Daniken or that idiot who wrote the Celestine Prohpecies.
http://www.goodstuffcards.com/images/spaceships/spaceships_forbidden_planet.jpg

Major Tom to Ground Control. Surveying
Australia. No sign of intelligent life. Over.

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

From what I have understood Strauss believed that the great philosophical texts--as the works of Plato for example- were coded because the author didn't feel free to express his ideas for fear that he'd be procecuted for them.

So, was it from their timeframe that he wanted to liberate the ideas or just to decipher them and study them?

I don't know. Don't think I understand your question. But I'm not a Straussean. From what I understand Strauss might have thought (as you said) that not only would our political philosopher wish to protect him or herself from persecution from a society unable to handle what he or she had to say but, additionally, may wish to protect that same society from the disruption dealing with the truth might bring upon them.

If pre-modern believers in universal truth are kept from disclosing what they know by contemporary agendas which deny the usefulness of timeless historical norms and focus on overcoming chance and manipulating passions rather then teaching virtue, then these believers must try simply to undertand the arguments of the great philosphers as he or she themself understood them when they wrote them. To do so means you'd have to interpret that writer's technique. And without reducing your understanding of that technique (whatever that may be) to some conceived notion of what circumstances guided them. So you just take them at their word I suppose. Doing what they're doing not because of their circumstances, but in spite of them.

It all sounds good to me. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be working...

[Cleopatra]

Ok Frank this is for you , I have just received it :).

edited to add: I haven't read anything yet-apart from the interview I mean.

Dear openDemocracy member

2 weeks ago http://www.openDemocracy.net published 'Noble lies and perpetual
war', Danny Postel's interview with professor Shadia Drury. The article dissects
the political philosophy of Leo Strauss: a key influence on George Bush's
neo-con advisors.

Drury has been tracking the rise of Strauss' ideas and disciples for many years,
from obscure seminar rooms all the way to the White House. She argues that there
is a current of deception and manipulation in US policy that flows directly from
Strauss' doctrines - including his adaptation of Plato's idea that the 'noble
lie' is a legitimate tool of government.

Straussians in the Bush administration include deputy secretary of defence, Paul
Wolfowitz, who recently acknowledged that the evidence used to justify the Iraq
war was “murky”.

If you haven't had a chance to read the article - take a look

http://www.opendemocracy.net/entry_points/Noble_lies_and_perpetual_war.jsp

This explosive interview has created a flurry of activity, debate and critique
across cyberspace. From the Straussians own website - which unsurprisingly
castigates Drury - to august institutions like Harvard, radical magazines like
Mother Jones, high quality web aggregators like Arts and Letters Daily and
dozens of weblogs, debate over this article, and the wider issues it raises has
been colourful and intense.

We want to alert you to this vibrant, entertaining debate:

THE TOP FIVE

http://www.straussian.net/
http://cgi.bluesmokedesign.plus.com/smokewriting/
http://www.nationinstitute.org/tomdispatch/index.mhtml?pid=1016
http://nuke.graphictruth.com/modules.php?name=News&new_topic=12
http://www.opendemocracy.net/forums/thread.jspa?forumID=87&threadID=41851&tstart=0

SOME OTHER GOOD LINKS

http://www.motherjones.com/news/dailymojo/2003/43/we_595_01a.html
http://www.theglobalsite.ac.uk/
http://www.aldaily.com

Please join in by posting your responses here:
http://www.opendemocracy.net/forums/thread.jspa?forumID=87&threadID=41851&tstart=0




Do you you want that we meet there ( however unbelievable might seem it's a crazy forum-very noisy and I cannot stand noise) but if my friends find out that I participate in discussions in non-conservative fora they won't talk to me again :p

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Do you you want that we meet there ( however unbelievable might seem it's a crazy forum-very noisy and I cannot stand noise) but if my friends find out that I participate in discussions in non-conservative fora they won't talk to me again :p
Great links.

Skimming through them I found this especially handy: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/story.php?storyID=1381


I'd stumbled into the thread http://www.opendemocracy.net/forums/thread.jspa?forumID=87&threadID=41851&tstart=0 while researching Straussian tidbits end of last week. Not having graduated (ha) from the University of Chicago (unlike Mr. Scruton?) I steered clear of trying to post.

But to answer your question and in the interest of making a pun: "Sure, if I can be Frank to your Erin Leonard. Too.

[Frank Newgent]

Cleopatra: 'Tis merely another post (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/plato/message/1802) though with a good link (I'd seen before) and suggested reads:

Postmodern Platos by Catherine Zuckert. Leo Strauss and Nietzsche by Lawrence Lampert. Revolt Against Modernity; Leo Strauss and Eric Voegelin by Ted McAllister.

Couldn't find any actual links to these books.

I take back the Erin Leonard reference. Too.

[Frank Newgent]

a unique person: Don't give up yet. If I remember right you have some quote by Andre Breton in your sig. I've read (http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/kojeve.htm) that Breton was profoundly influenced by Alexandre Kojève, who in turn was a close friend and correspondent with Leo Strauss.

[Cleopatra]

Frank

I don't think that there is a way for me to check all these before the weekend... I have a couple of things running BUT I picked from the high shelf of my Library Platonis Operae and now they are on my desk with other books about racism, holocaust, antisemitism, history of USA, the Federalist Papers bla bla bla as hot debates are running... :)

Early this morning though I gave a quick look in OP's forum and after what I read I fantasized myself as "Diotima" and not as Cleopatra posting comments like : "The whole of the Western Philosophy is a footnote to Plato"

Nahhhh ... silly spectacle!

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

I don't think that there is a way for me to check all these before the weekend
Postmodern Platos: Nietzsche, Heidegger, Gadamer, Strauss, Derrida is available here (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0226993310/ref=ase_kamurj0b/002-3565890-7520013?v=glance&s=books) for $22.50 USD. Unfortunately, I already ordered it night before last for about $30. Got an extra $7.50?

About http://www.opendemocracy.net/forums/thread.jspa?forumID=87&threadID=41851&tstart=0 I am curious. Links recently posted there such as http://www.israeleconomy.org/strat1.htm and http://www.macalester.edu/weekly/101703/news01.html refer more to down and dirty contemporary politics than to the philosophy you and I had been exploring. Both concern neo-con belief about Israel, Syria, the United States, Hussein, "post-war" Iraq and someone named Vladimir Jabotinsky, a so-called head of Revisionist Zionism, who might have shared certain nationalist tendencies with Strauss.

Anyone here among the cast of characters you deplored as Straussian? Or am I just trolling?

[Cleopatra]

Ha!

This someone named Zabotinsky is the founder of Haganah...Official and relatively serious Israeli sites seem to suffer from amnesia when it comes to Zabotinsky...

Only Capel Dodger has referred to him in this forum so far but I didn't do him the favor to bite his flame bait....because AGAIN he made the dirty comparison to Weitzmann.

To be honest, I didn't know that Zabotinsky was considered to belong to the Straussean tradition.

Frank before you started this thread I thought I knew a couple of things about Strauss now I am in a loss...

[Cleopatra]

The constant worry of Israelis is not to let people think that Haganah had anything in common with PLO.

A Greek friend of mine who is a Jew and lives in Israel says that Israel will have to pay for these tiny lies...

Haganah resembles to PLO but it's wasn't PLO not in the structure not in the methods.

Zionism wasn't just another form of nationalism and I have the gut feeling that eminent Jewish filosophers like Strauss or Berlin felt obliged to support Zionism although it didn't fit so well in their theories.

What so ever. I have prepared a list of things I must address regarding Zionism. Strauss and Zabotinsky have just been added to Cleopatra's list.

[Cleopatra]

Ok I think that I have read almost everything the previous days.

In

another thread (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870113093&highlight=Berlin#post1870113093) I have stated that I am a hedgehog ( according to Berlin's classification) therefore I need a basic theory that explains many things in society and in politics.

I am afraid that I will have to dismiss the theory of the noble lies. Whilst it makes the oligarch that hides in me to feel chills of excitment I cannot see how it can be applied successfully for the benefit of the society ( and not for the benefit of a group of scums).

Also, as you said Frank I see a problem too when theories find application only " to dirty contemporary politics" and fail to give answers to philosophical questions that concern the everyday life of common people.

On the other hand I am feeling uncomfortable too with those that exercise criticism to the Strausseans, I think that I have mentioned this before.

Ok, they traced the evil, they exposed that the Emperor doesn't wear clothes. And?

[a_unique_person]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

Ok, they traced the evil, they exposed that the Emperor doesn't wear clothes. And?

Next we kill them.

[Frank Newgent]

This post (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870286821#post1870286821) has a link to this article (http://www.plusmedium.com/ArticleDetailContainer.asp?ArticleId=86) which invokes Strausseans. (thank you Jim Lennox)

Now, very few Americans have ever heard of the Office of Special Plans, and Fox no doubt wants to keep it that way. This was the office created last spring, after the CIA and DIA kept telling Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and his deputy Paul Wolfowitz that they just couldn't come up with any links between 9-11 and Saddam Hussein. Created in Spring 2002 and peopled by former Congressional staffers (rather than intelligence operatives), it was charged with "thinking outside the box" and rethinking information rejected by intelligence professionals in order to make a case for war. Its business was what Greg Thielmann, former proliferation expert in the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research and now a principled critic of Bushite disinformation, called "faith-based intelligence." It was headed by Straussian neocons William Luti and Abe Shulsky, who are on record as advocating the use of noble lies to create public opinion that serves the policy agendas of the warmongering Wise.


Cleopatra: Please indulge my interpretations of Strauss inspired by Catherine Zuckert's Postmodern Platos.

Common sense tell us that individuals (even those as totally unhinged as those running the Pentagon's Office of Special Planning) have the right to say to say what they think. Complete freedom of expression of divergent views should contribute not only to individual development and happiness, but also to the common good through the gradual spread of truth.

But this is not always a two way street. Some might assume differently. If (according to the Strausseans and other feudal thinkers) truth cannot be popularized and the basic fact of human nature is there will always be a gap between the wise and the common folk which cannot be bridged by the progress of popular education, then some of the most fundamental questions, philosophical or otherwise, can never be discussed openly without destroying the necessary protective atmosphere of authoritative opinion. And if the truth (concerning, say, Iraq's weapons of mass destruction) can't be directly stated, it would be irresponsible to attempt to do so.

For anything written is but an opinion. The only way anyone can discover the truth is by thinking things out for oneself. And any serious writing "is unavoidably ironic because the writer cannot directly express or communicate the truth to the reader even when he or she states it completely openly".

As an aside I have to say that Bush might someday catch the spirit: appearing not to understand while, of course, knowing perfectly well.

Although quoting Zuckert: "The philosopher ceases to be a philosopher at the moment at which the subjective certainty of a solution becomes stronger than his awareness of the problematic character of that solution."

If, as according to Socrates, all that human beings can actually know is their own ignorance, then George is a cognoscenti.

Great book. Wonderful stuff. And although my parallels have begun to break down, they do so following your original complaint. But do the Strausseans mistake their own house or the White House for Delphi?

[Cleopatra]

Without being a Straussean although I qualify,Frank, I have started to believe that no, actually we don't have the right to say whatever we think.

I need to think about your post before replying in details. All I have to say for now is that you wouldn't become a popular politician. You express your thought very clearly... :)

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
Without being a Straussean although I qualify...

Cleopatra, have you ever seen the classic movie Island of Lost Souls (http://www.celtoslavica.de/chiaroscuro/films/islandlost/isllost.html)?


What is the Law?

Not to run on all fours.
That is the law.
Are we not men?


What is the Law?

Not to eat meat.
That is the law.
Are we not men?


What is the Law?

Not to spill blood.
That is the law.
Are we not men?


His is the hand that makes.

His is the hand that heals.

His is the House of Pain!
A mad scientist, Dr. Moreau, has devoted himself to transforming animals into men, and then slaves. This reminds me of what the Stranger suggests in the Laws: that the best condition for the founding of a city would be a combination of wisdom with tyrannical power.

And that this movie even exists to begin with can be seen to argue for the idea that the truth can be popularized.



If, as according to Socrates, all that human beings can actually know is their own ignorance, then George is a cognoscenti.
What greatness may lie in songs or lines unsung now with the passing of the last once up to this sorrow lays elsewhere entirely...

[Mycroft]

Originally posted by Cleopatra
We try to decide whether Strauss was as evil as the Strausseans.

I think that I have lost my case since I am unable to prove that Strauss had nothing to do with them and he is not a victim of those who see a conspiracy behind every Jew...that would be convenient... *sigh*


If you feel you've lost your case it's very likely because you've accepted someone else's definition of what a Straussean is.

Who self-identifies as Straussean? Are these the same people who are identified by others as Straussean? Why not?

[Frank Newgent]

Originally posted by Mycroft


Who self-identifies as Straussean?
A Nietzschean who shares God's foot size?

[Cleopatra]

Originally posted by Mycroft


If you feel you've lost your case it's very likely because you've accepted someone else's definition of what a Straussean is.

Who self-identifies as Straussean? Are these the same people who are identified by others as Straussean? Why not?


Mycroft That was an obviously unsuccessful attempt from my part to display some sarcasm :)

I am Jewish, I belong to the conservatives and I have studied Plato therefore I qualify to be an evil Straussean :p

[Mycroft]

Originally posted by Cleopatra

Mycroft That was an obviously unsuccessful attempt from my part to display some sarcasm :)

I am Jewish, I belong to the conservatives and I have studied Plato therefore I qualify to be an evil Straussean :p

Sorry, I didn't recognize your sarcasm for what it was.

Still, I do think that in trying to force a distinction between Strauss and Strausseans you're accepting some definitions that could use a little scrutiny.

I haven’t been paying attention to rumblings about Neocons, PNAC and Straussians, dismissing them as vague paranoia, but I think this thread has convinced me to learn more on the subject.

As if my reading list were not already long enough!