Fish don't know they're underwater: the origins of America's culture wars

[Balog]

An intriguing look at how we got where we are.

http://www.popehat.com/2014/10/10/strange-seeds-on-distant-shores/#more-22920

Title references http://sivers.org/fish and http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB122178211966454607

A couple examples to whet your interest, but do RTWT including the links.

I once asked a coworker who had grown up in the Soviet Union "What was the most surprising thing about coming to the West?" I was assuming it was going to be something physical and mundane: the shape of traffic lights, or the fact that you can't find Vodka for sale in bus stops – something like that.

His answer, though, made me realize that I'd accidentally asked a really interesting question. "Growing up under communism, things didn't make perfect sense. Facts didn't quite fit together. But because everything – schools, newspapers, radio – was all from the same people, you never knew what was wrong…but you could tell that something wasn't right. It was like boxing while you're blind folded. You keep getting hit in the face, but you don't know why. Only after I got out did I see how the real world really was, and how everything we'd been told was lies and distortions."

If we look at the text of the Declaration of Independence , we see two different types of complaints about the English government. The document is, quite frankly, schizophrenic, complaining simultaneously that the dish of the king's governance had both too much salt and too little.

On the one hand, the king meddled in the freedoms of the common people by having too many laws and too much taxation (you can find all of these complaints in any Republican party platform of the last fifty years):

"He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. "
"For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent"
"For abolishing the free System of English Laws"
"He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death" (black helicopters! NAFTA highway!)
Yet on the other hand, the king meddled – not in the freedoms of the common people – but in the freedoms of the Harvard elites to rule the common people:

"He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good."
"He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance"
"He has refused to pass other Laws"
"He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws "
"For suspending our own Legislatures"
The first is a list of red state complaints: "the government is too big!". The second is a list of blue state complaints: "the government is too small!".

This is a compromise document, and an incoherent one, where Massachusetts Roundheads are complaining that the king won't let Harvard Light Bringers such as themselves lay the pain on nonconformists, dissenters, and Climate Deniers, and the Southern Scots Irish are complaining that high taxes and black helicopters make it impossible to buy as many Jet Skis and as much Everclear as they'd like.

[Perd Hapley]

If we look at the text of the Declaration of Independence , we see two different types of complaints about the English government. The document is, quite frankly, schizophrenic, complaining simultaneously that the dish of the king's governance had both too much salt and too little.

On the one hand, the king meddled in the freedoms of the common people by having too many laws and too much taxation (you can find all of these complaints in any Republican party platform of the last fifty years):

"He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. "
"For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent"
"For abolishing the free System of English Laws"
"He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death" (black helicopters! NAFTA highway!)
Yet on the other hand, the king meddled – not in the freedoms of the common people – but in the freedoms of the Harvard elites to rule the common people:

"He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good."
"He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance"
"He has refused to pass other Laws"
"He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws "
"For suspending our own Legislatures"
The first is a list of red state complaints: "the government is too big!". The second is a list of blue state complaints: "the government is too small!".

This is a compromise document, and an incoherent one, where Massachusetts Roundheads are complaining that the king won't let Harvard Light Bringers such as themselves lay the pain on nonconformists, dissenters, and Climate Deniers, and the Southern Scots Irish are complaining that high taxes and black helicopters make it impossible to buy as many Jet Skis and as much Everclear as they'd like.

Now that's just a very stupid take on the subject. This person appears to have forgotten something that's very important to understanding the Declaration, and the Patriot movement of the 13 colonies. He sees the conflict as one of policy, and completely forgets that the real argument was over who would set policy. The king, in the Declaration, is imposing government from above, while preventing government of or by the people.

 

[Balog]

Now that's just a very stupid take on the subject. This person appears to have forgotten something that's very important to understanding the Declaration, and the Patriot movement of the 13 colonies. He sees the conflict as one of policy, and completely forgets that the real argument was over who would set policy. The king, in the Declaration, is imposing government from above, while preventing government of or by the people.

 

I think you're missing his point. "The people" today are imposing government from above far worse than George III ever did.

Did you actually read the article or just a single quoted paragraph?

[Perd Hapley]

I think you're missing his point. "The people" today are imposing government from above far worse than George III ever did.

Did you actually read the article or just a single quoted paragraph?

I'm not disputing the entire article; I'm talking about the specific point he tried to make, via the Declaration. He claims that those passages from the Declaration show something that they just don't show. He's putting the Declaration in something other than its actual context. So whatever he may wish to say in the larger article, he's not supporting it in the single paragraph chunk of text you quoted.

I didn't read all of the three articles you posted, no. Or all of any one of them.

Did he read all of the American Revolution, or just that single document?