Stupid Lasts Forever

Youth ages, immaturity is outgrown, ignorance can be educated, and drunkenness sobered, but stupid lasts forever.

— Aristophanes

A Tennessee Republican this week held up Hitler as the paradigm of self-improvement.

State Senator Frank Niceley defended a bill to ban the homeless from public parks by invoking Hitler's time as a tramp in Vienna:

"I wanna give you a little history lesson on homelessness," Niceley told his colleagues. 

"In 1910, Hitler decided to live on the streets for a while. 

"So for two years, Hitler lived on the streets and practiced his oratory and his body language and how to connect with the masses. And then went on to lead a life that got him in the history books. 

"So, a lot of these people, it’s not a dead end. They can come out of these homeless camps and have a productive life, or in Hitler’s case, a very unproductive life. I support this bill."

If Niceley wanted to live up to his name, he'd also sponsor a bill to provide Tennessee's homeless with free toothbrush mustaches.

Propaganda

If there is such a thing as "woke propaganda," this meme is it. The meme's creator, intent on convincing you the Founding Fathers embraced diversity, counted on readers' ignorance of Latin.

E Pluribus Unum means, of course, "Out of many, one," not "Out of one, many."

The motto, proposed by Adams, Franklin and Jefferson in 1776, referred to the 13 colonies' determination to form a single, new nation independent from England.

It hardly promoted diversity—especially as that word is most often used today.

Propagandists count on the holes in our education.

Propaganda, from the Latin propagare, meaning to "spread," entered English in the 18th century. 

It was the shortened name of a Roman Catholic organization, the Congregatio de propaganda fide, the "Congregation for Propagation of the Faith."

Propaganda only acquired its modern sense ("the spreading of information") in the early 20th century.

The Congregatio de propaganda fide was housed in Rome in a baroque building on the Via di Propaganda named the Palazzo di Propaganda Fide, the "Palace for the Propagation of the Faith." 

The Propaganda, instituted by the Pope in 1622, comprised a committee of cardinals tasked with spreading Catholicism, particularly in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

The Propaganda's mission derived from a command by Jesus (in fact, his last) reported in the Gospel of Matthew: Euntes ergo docete omnes gentes, "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations."

The cardinals hoped to spread the Catholic faith, but it was a follower of Marx, Georgy Plekhanov, who popularized the use of the word propaganda to mean the "spreading of information" (or as we now say, "misinformation"). 

During the late 19th century, Plekhanov wrote essays that called for the tandem use of agitation (speeches) and propaganda (pamphlets) to sway public opinion.

His one-two punch formula was shortened to agitprop by another follower of Marx, Vladimir Lenin.

Lenin argued that while agitation uses slogans to sway public opinion, propaganda uses arguments.

Agitation targets the uneducated; propaganda, the educated.

In either case, the truth gets shortchanged.

"Truth is the most precious thing," Lenin said. "That's why we should ration it."

Hurry, Wisdom

We are at a moment in time where we desperately need to accelerate wisdom.

— Elise Loehnen

With so many things so out of control—inflation, the virus, domestic terror, foreign enemies, and global warming—we are perfectly poised to elect a strongman as president in two years.

That's what fear-filled idiots do.

We need wisdom to steer us, but wisdom's in short supply right now (like a lot of things).

Amazon won't deliver it overnight.

Then again, maybe it will.

Emerson said, "If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads."

We should make that the first, perhaps the only, question we ask of a candidate.

Books may not be the only source of wisdom (there's the "school of hard knocks," too); but they're a primary source—and a ready one.

Ezra Pound said a book is a "ball of light in one's hands."

Hurry, wisdom.

Let there be light.

What's Wrong with America

Against one who denies the principles, there can be no debate.

— Aristotle

Breaking my pledge to ignore reactionary loudmouths, I recently reacted to a Facebook post by just such a loudmouth.

He posted a meme blaming the high price of gas on Canada.

Yes, Canada.

When I challenged his unsubstantiated claim, citing the consensus of oil-industry analysts—namely, that Canada is doing its best—he responded by calling me "snarky" and insisting that analysts are all just "spin doctors."

"Facts shmacks," he wrote.

(ICYMI: Canada already supplies the US over 4 million barrels of oil every day, according to oil-industry analysts, who agree the country's oil exports are maxed out because investors refused last year to expand Canada's production facilities.)

Contra principia negantem non est disputandum.

"Against one who denies the principles, there can be no debate."

In America today, we can't agree on facts. 

We can't even agree on that there are such things as facts.

Norman Mailer predicted 50 years ago that America would wind up in this place when he coined the word factoid.

Conservatives dwell in a world of factoids. Trump won. Covid-19 is a flu. Blacks are just immigrants. Disney grooms queers. Canada is denying us oil... and we should nuke them.

Aristotle saw 2,500 years ago that parties who cannot agree on the facts of a case simply cannot reasonably discuss it.

The best the parties can do is name-call.

The 20th-century philosopher Karl Popper believed mankind's greatest enemy was irrational relativism, which prevents our mutual acceptance of facts.

By caving into irrational relativism, "one cannot rationally discuss anything that is fundamental," Popper lamented.

The only way out of the impasse, he said, "lies in the realization that all of us may and often do err, singly and collectively, but that this very idea of error and human fallibility involves another one—the idea of objective truth."

Alas, until every conservative is willing to let go of fear, we're stuck with irrational relativism.

But there is a quick exit from our impasse.

It's the solution to relativism known to philosophers as the argumentum ad baculum ("appeal to the stick"), first suggested by the 11th-century Aristotelian, Avicenna.

Its forcefulness derives from force.

"Those who deny a first principle," Avicenna said, "should be beaten or exposed to fire until they concede that to burn and not to burn, or to be beaten and not to be beaten, are not identical."

I like that solution!

Mouse Trap

Conservative clerics, right-wing pols and greedy fundraisers are whipping their followers into a full-blown frenzy over an alleged, decades-long effort by Disney to "groom" kids to be homosexuals.

"Disney has officially declared itself a woke leader while advancing the rainbow agenda," says Catholic homeschooler Mary Cuff.

Setting aside the whole notion that gays are “groomed” by other gays, I find it strange that, while the Bible devotes only 6 of its 31,102 verses to homosexuality—three in the Old Testament and three in the New—right-wingers spend so much time obsessing over the topic.

What's up with that?

What about the other 31,096 verses? 

Like all the ones that champion love, charity, tolerance, and peacemaking?

And why target Mickey Mouse?

Why not target this creepy guy—a groomer if I ever saw one?