New Year's Day 2012

Sunday Night Journal — January 1, 2012

I've seen a couple of cartoons in the past few days making fun of the arbitrary designation of one day in the year as its beginning, and a moment for new starts and second chances. I normally think such spoilsport demystifying is petty, but I'm a little more sympathetic to it this year than I would ordinarily be, because I've had to work much of this week in spite of the fact that my place of employment is officially closed from December 23 through January 2. Not only that, I'm leaving ten days of 2011 vacation unused and therefore lost, as we aren't allowed to carry unused vacation into the next year. So apart from Christmas Eve, Christmas itself, and the day after Christmas, when we had some family over for a big seafood feast, I haven't had much time off, and almost none to relax, or to get done any of the things I'd hoped to do over the break. Moreover, the work situation is a complicated and very visible project with a pretty firm deadline, so just knowing that it's there has been producing a lot of stress even when I wasn't actually working on it. 

So I'm not in much of a Happy New Year! mood. However, my wife cooked the traditional New Year's dinner of ham, hoppin' john (black-eyed peas and rice), and turnip greens, and it was tasty and heartening, so maybe the year will actually get off to a better start than it seemed to be doing earlier today. 

***

David Bentley Hart has written what strikes me as the best thing I've ever read about religion in America: "America & the angels of Sacré-Cœur." I read it once, and thought it was very good. A couple of weeks later I read it again, and thought it was great. It's in the December issue of The New Criterion, and it seems to be available to non-subscribers. However, in case you don't want to read the whole thing, I'm going to quote some of the passages that struck me most:

There may not be a distinctive American civilization in the fullest sense, but there definitely is a distinctly American Christianity. It is something protean, scattered, fragmentary, and fissile, often either mildly or exorbitantly heretical, and sometimes only vestigially Christian, but it can nevertheless justly be called the American religion—and it is a powerful religion. It is, however, a style of faith remarkably lacking in beautiful material forms or coherent institutional structures, not by accident, but essentially. Its civic inexpressiveness is a consequence not simply of cultural privation, or of frontier simplicity, or of modern utilitarianism, or even of some lingering Puritan reserve towards ecclesial rank and architectural ostentation, but also of a profound and radical resistance to outward forms.... What America shares with, say, France is the general Western heritage of Christian belief, with all its confessional variations; what it has never had any real part in, however, is Christendom....

America may have arisen out of the end of Christendom, and as the first fully constituted political alternative to Christendom, but it somehow avoided the religious and cultural fate of the rest of the modern West. Far from blazing a trail into the post-Christian future that awaited other nations, America went quite a different way, down paths that no other Western society would ever tread, or even know how to find. Whereas European society—moving with varying speed but in a fairly uniform direction—experienced the end of Christendom simultaneously as the decline of faith, in America just the opposite happened.... [R]ather than the exhaustion of religious longing, its revival; rather than a long nocturnal descent into disenchantment, a new dawning of early Christianity’s elated expectation of the Kingdom....

Just about every living religion has found some kind of home here, bringing along whatever institutional supports it could fit into its luggage. Many such creeds have even managed to preserve the better part of their integrity. Still, I would argue (maybe with a little temerity), such communities exist here as displaced fragments of other spiritual worlds, embassies from more homogeneous religious cultures, and it is from those cultures that they derive whatever cogency they possess....

I regard American Evangelicalism in all its varieties—fundamentalist, Pentecostal, blandly therapeutic—as the most pristine expression of [the American religious] temper.... [I]t is a form of spiritual life that no other nation could have produced, and the one most perfectly in accord with the special genius and idiocy, virtue and vice, of American culture....

Whatever one’s view of Evangelicalism, only bigotry could prevent one from recognizing its many admirable features: the dignity, decency, and probity it inspires in individuals, families, and communities; the moral seriousness it nourishes in countless consciences; its frequent and generous commitment to alleviating the sufferings of the indigent and ill; its capacity for binding diverse peoples together in a shared spiritual resolve; its power to alter character profoundly for the better; the joy it confers. But, conversely, only a deep ignorance of Christian history could blind one to its equally numerous eccentricities....

It is very much an open and troubling question whether American religiosity has the resources to help sustain a culture as a culture—whether, that is, it can create a meaningful future, or whether it can only prepare for the end times....Will its lack of any coherent institutional structure ultimately condemn it to haunting rather than vivifying its culture?....

[T]he secularist impulse can create nothing of enduring value. It corrupts the will and the imagination with the deadening boredom of an ultimate pointlessness, weakens the hunger for the good, true, and beautiful, makes the pursuit of diversion life’s most pressing need, and gives death the final word. A secular people—by which I mean not simply a people with a secular constitution, but one that really no longer believes in any reality beyond the physical realm—is a dying people, both culturally and demographically. Civilization, or even posterity, is no longer worth the effort. And, in our case, it would not even be a particularly dignified death. European Christendom has at least left a singularly presentable corpse behind. If the American religion were to evaporate tomorrow, it would leave behind little more than the brutal banality of late modernity.

Here's the link again. Really, it's worth it. Though if you're like me and find it difficult to read anything lengthy and serious on the web, you might be better off to seek out the print edition, if that's at all possible. I give my back issues of TNC to the library, for their give-away table. I hope they aren't just throwing them out.

***

In the same TNC, James Panero compares Occupy Wall Street to the Paris Commune of 1871, and puts his finger on an aspect of the movement which continues to produce the adjective "creepy" in my mind, and which was very much present in the radical movements of the 1960s. 

There is an undeniable romance in doomed idealism, even if the ends are worse than the beginnings. The deadliest form of idealism invites its own ruin, either from outside or within, so that the purity of the ideal can be measured against the severity of its destruction—cataclysm as a defense against compromise. 

Like the radicalism of the '60s, the Occupy movement is really two things: on the surface, and probably in the minds of most of its participants, it's a specific protest about specific things. In the minds of a certain core of participants, including at least some of its guiding figures, it's the old romantic dream of establishing an absolutely pure society. For these, the particular object of protest is almost irrelevant; any stick will do to beat the dog; the real point is that society is corrupt through and through, and must be replaced with something new and pure. The belief that this is possible is at best an illusion, leading those who follow it deeper into a wilderness, at worst a mania inciting a rage to destroy or be destroyed. The idealism that cannot tolerate the actual is not much different from nihilism.

***

I have two predictions for 2012. One, the world will not come to an end. Two, Barack Obama will be re-elected president of the United States. I am ambivalent about the first of these. Both are pessimistic.

Comments

[Mac]

Of course I do wish everyone a happy new year, my grumbling notwithstanding.

[Janet]

I'm afraid your two predictions contradict one another.

AMDG

[Janet]

Or maybe if the second is correct, we will be praying for the first to be incorrect.

Those quotes from the DBH article intriguing. I've never really thought about American religion from this point of view before. I'm printing out the article (It's taking forever and leaving out half of the first line on every page.), and will read it later.

I was googling images of Sacré-Cœur Basilica to see what the stone angels looked like. Google thought that perhaps I really was interested in the stone angles.

AMDG

[Mac]

I decided to just imagine those angels. He paints a pretty good picture of them.

re my predictions: as much as I don't want Obama to be president again, I don't think it will quite be the end of the world. As we know it, maybe.:-)

[ex pat]

I read it, but I found reading with half a blue background and half a white background quite off putting to thinking about what DBH was saying.

[Janet]

Now I'm really glad I printed it.

AMDG

[Craig]

I have printed it too, and I'll read it just as soon as I get a chance. Thanks for the pointer. Do you remember that there was another essay DBH did for them some years ago, also on the theme of religion in America? Ah, here it is (subscribers only). It has been several years since I read it, but I remember really enjoying it at the time.

Happy New Year!

[Art Deco]

Barack Obama will be re-elected president of the United States. I am ambivalent about the first of these. Both are pessimistic.

I cannot do a formal analysis (and I am not sure how political scientists construct their models with so few cases), but I cannot figure the source of your confidence. No president in the post-war period has had to face an electorate after presiding over such insipid economic performance, the future trajectory of the economy is uncertain and no advance party has set off the mines sown by the progenitors of the Euro.

We also have more than sixty years of social survey research. There have been only a couple of occasions where a president contemplating another run has been held in such low regard: Mr. Truman in 1952 and Mr. Carter in 1980. Those are not the precedents you want. Mr. Truman (in 1948) and Mr. Bush (in 1992) had a rapid recovery in public approval in the latter half of the years in question. The thing is, the real economy was growing at a rate of 4.5% in 1948 and 3.4% in 1992. We will not see that. If B.O. is returned to office, it will be a tour-de-force without any recent precedent.

[Mac]

Yes, that all makes sense, and I hope you're right, but I don't see any of the Republicans having a good shot at defeating him. I'm not at all convinced that those disapproval numbers imply a strong willingness to vote against the guy, especially when he's compared to any of the Republican candidates (not counting, of course, those who voted against him the first time and would vote for almost anybody else). This is pure impression and intuition, but I just don't get the feeling that he's getting the blame, the intense and angry blame, that would normally be the lot of a president in bad economic times. And I don't think any of the Republicans is going to be able to convince a majority of people that he or she both has a better idea and is capable of implementing it.

[Mac]

I'm sure I saw that piece, Craig, but don't remember anything about it. Not surprising.

ex pat, I would think that a Major University might have TNC in the library. I don't like reading long pieces online, but their web site strikes me as better than average for readability. The magazine is quite comfortable reading.

Sorry I haven't been participating much--I am buried with work. I'm hoping things will slow down somewhat after this week.

[Art Deco]

but I just don't get the feeling that he's getting the blame, the intense and angry blame, that would normally be the lot of a president in bad economic times.

I do not recall people were particularly angry about much in 1992, either. The incumbent was ejected, nevertheless. As for the inadequacies of the Republican candidates, the majority of the public will ignore a great deal if other vectors take a particular value. We have in recent decades elected a motormouth devoid of accomplishment in his work life, a lounge lizard, and a man who had quite disconcerting lapses in cognitive function. None of these are problems manifest in Messrs. Romney, Santorum, Perry, or Huntsman.

[Janet]

I have to say that after having watched a couple of Dr. Who episodes, Blink and The Angels of Time, I'm not too sure I want to see the angels of Sacré-Cœur.

AMDG

[Mac]

The economy wasn't anything like this bad, either. No, people weren't especially angry at Bush, but he seemed to get the blame for the economy, with a whole lot of help from the media, who were much more monolithically liberal. And his opponent, louse that he was, was a very gifted politician. And there was the Perot factor, although there seems to be a lot of disagreement about what would have happened if he hadn't been in the race. This time the media apart from Fox will be an arm of the incumbent's campaign, and the opponent is likely to be lackluster at best.

I don't think the comparison of the objective personal merits of the Republican candidates to previous winners is all that relevant, unfortunately. Being an appealing candidate is a different matter.

But time will tell.

[Mac]

What's the connection, Janet?

[Louise]

I am under the impression that the USA is generally not governed at all during the electoral campaign (the length of which still continues to amaze me), given the amount of time your politicians must spend running around the country. But that assumes that the country is normally run by, say, the government and the parliament (is that "congress"?) whereas I suppose the day to day stuff is really only done by bureaucrats anyhow. I hardly ever hear the news and rarely look at it online and yet, I've already heard enough about the election to make me want to scoop my eyes out with spoons.

[Rob G]

As good as that piece by Hart is, there is an (imo) even better one on the NC website by William Gairdner called 'Getting Used to The F-word.' It's one of the better socio-political things I've read in a long time. Unfortunately it's not a free piece -- it's blocked, but it's well worth the $3.00 download cost. The F-word in question is not the one you think...

http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/Getting-used-to-the-f-word-7179

[Janet]

They're not nice.

http://www.nerdist.com/2011/04/steven-moffat-the-man-with-the-plan/doctor-who-weeping-angels-series-5-570x320/

AMDG

[Art Deco]

I suppose the day to day stuff is really only done by bureaucrats anyhow.

True anywhere. Actually, the echelon of political appointees in the United States government is enormous in comparison with that in Britain. What happens in endless campaigns in this country is that any effort toward consequential policy initiatives ceases.

I don't think the comparison of the objective personal merits of the Republican candidates to previous winners is all that relevant, unfortunately.

Your logic escapes me. You are positing (in the first instance) something which has never verifiably occured before. You posit two reasons for this, one a deficit of public anger and one concerning the communication skills of the politicians in question. Then you admit that public anger is not a necessary condition for a politican to be ejected from office and you tell me the personal merits and demerits of the politicians in question make no difference. I think you need to go back to square one and ask yourself why you think what you do think.

[Craig]

The article Rob recommends is available in full from William Gairdner's personal site: here. (I note with modest pride that Gairdner is a Canadian.)

[Mac]

Louise, the only people who like our endless campaign are the people who more (political pr consultants and the like) or less (journalists and pundits) make a living off them. I suppose maybe the politicians do, since running for office is their particular skill. We really have gotten to a point where the presidential campaign never ends. I first remember this being noted in the Clinton administration, though I suppose it's always been a tendency. Just as big companies have tended more and more to be driven by a very short-term concern with the stock price, elected officials are driven by the next election. Those are both intrinsic tendencies of the system, but have become more exaggerated in the past 20 years or so. Anyway: I hate it, too, and don't pay very close attention until the election is much closer. Though I suspect that I pay closer attention than the majority of Americans.

[Mac]

I read that, Rob (I pretty much read TNC cover-to-cover), but it didn't make that much of an impression. I'll take another look.

[Mac]

So those are the actual angels in the actual church that DBH is talking about, Janet? Definitely scary, at least in that photo.

[Janet]

No, those aren't the same ones, but basically any stone angel might be one. They can't move when you're looking at them, but if you blink, they can get you.

AMDG

[Mac]

Well, Art, you're approaching this with rather more rigor than is really applicable to something that is intrinsically not much more than a guess, especially at this stage. As I said, this is impression.

That said, the fact that a victory for the incumbent under conditions like the present ones has never happened before certainly does not establish definitively that it won't happen.

About the objective personal merits of the Republican candidates: you seemed to be saying that none of the candidates have the defects of various others who have won in the past, and that this makes it more likely that the eventual nominee will win. My point was that the objective personal merits of any candidate are often less important than other things (for instance, a perception, which certainly doesn't have to be accurate, that he or she is a menace to Social Security). After all, as you said, we have elected the various defectives you mentioned.

[Rob G]

Thanks, Craig. That's good to know.

[Art Deco]

Those are both intrinsic tendencies of the system, but have become more exaggerated in the past 20 years or so.

No, the last 35 years or so. Many years ago Sidney Blumenthal reported that the first meetings held to plan Walter Mondale's presidential campaign occurred in November 1980. Time reported that Hamilton Jordan had some phone calls over Mr. Carter's campaign in January 1977. It appears to be a function of participation replacing deliberation and peer review in these campaigns, and that occurred in stages over the period running from 1952 through 1980

[Art Deco]

About the objective personal merits of the Republican candidates: you seemed to be saying that none of the candidates have the defects of various others who have won in the past, and that this makes it more likely that the eventual nominee will win.

No, I suggested they would have an advantage because the circumstances were in their favor and that circumstances are powerful, carrying rather more defective figures than any of these folk over the finish line (Obama, Clinton, and Reagan being prime examples). Were the nominee someone with severe issues (Dr. Paul, Dr. Gingrich, or Mrs. Bachmann), that observation would not hold.

[Mac]

That's getting down to a pretty fine distinction, possibly one without much difference. I don't take issue with the point that circumstances favor the Republican candidate, and similar circumstances have in the past carried "rather more defective figures" to victory. I'm just less confident that it will play out the same way this time.

[Art Deco]

I'm just less confident that it will play out the same way this time.

If you are 'less confident', why did you make the prediction in the penultimate sentence of your original post?

[Mac]

?? I mean I'm less confident than you.

[ex pat]

I just wish I had bet money when in September 2011 the editor of a conservative magazine brushed off my remark that Obama looked set to win a 2nd term. Not that I have made much money out of betting on elections, except for the last conclave.

[Mac]

I'm curious, what magazine was that? Sept is not very far in the past, and I think I would have said the same then. I would not bet a lot on Obama winning, but if I were going to bet that's the way I would bet. Here are two conservatives (one quoting another) who think the Republicans are in trouble:
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/287309/simple-arithmetic-michael-walsh

"Romney is unquestionably the weakest party front-runner in contemporary political history", "if Romney is the nominee, he will lose", plus the fact that he seems very likely to be the nominee = 2nd term for Obama.

But a whole lot can change between now and November.

[Janet]

The only thing that would make me think differently is that my sister, who is very liberal, told me that she would never vote for another Democrat or Republican again after the way this presidency has gone. I'm wondering if a lot of the people who voted for Obama might not stay home.

AMDG

[ex pat]

Some on the left of the Democrat party won't vote for him. Have you seen that poster, 'Hope not to be indefinitely detained' - a parody of the original 'Hope' poster? Even when he was just beginning, the academics I know were saying they would have preferred Mrs Clinton. But I still would bet a small sum on his winning.

[Mac]

"...wondering if a lot of the people who voted for Obama might not stay home."

Yep, that might be the Republican's big hope.

"Some on the left of the Democrat party won't vote for him." Yes, I've heard that several times from lefty acquaintances, but I have my doubts as to whether they'll stick with it, once they're confronted with the prospect of an imminent Nazi takeover. There were also at least some feminists who were so incensed by the party's treatment of Mrs. C that they made a similar vow. They're probably more likely to stick to it, but they aren't that numerous.

The conventional wisdom is always that whoever wins the independent voters wins the election. The Republicans ought to have an advantage with them because of the economy, but it doesn't seem to me that any of the potential nominees is likely to impress them very much.

[ex pat]

"...wondering if a lot of the people who voted for Obama might not stay home."

Yep, that might be the Republican's big hope.

Their only hope!

[Marianne]

I’m pretty much pessimistic about the chances of unseating Obama in November, primarily because the mostly liberal media folks are in his corner and will fight hard (and dirty) for him. But I do think if Romney is the Republican candidate that the election will be very close because he projects a calm reasonableness, much like Obama did when he faced McCain.

[ex pat]

Deccers, bet me $10.

[Mac]

Deccers?

The media that are not explicitly right-wing aren't really even seriously pretending anymore that they aren't advocating. I'm pretty sure they could have found stuff to sink Obama in 2008 if they'd wanted to. Instead, their investigative energies are usually turned on the critics of their favorites. It will be very dirty--no sooner did Santorum's candidacy show signs of life than the effort to paint him as a crazed Taliban type began.

I suppose I'd agree that Romney is the one most likely to give Obama a run for the money. Everybody else can be portrayed as a nut. Romney's Mormonism makes him vulnerable to that, too, but they have to be careful about attacking someone directly for any religion other than Christian (alleged) fundamentalism.

[Mac]

For instance. I looked in on Facebook for the first time in several days yesterday, and found a string of hysterical denunciations of Santorum from some of my leftwing acquaintances.

[Louise]

I just want to be clear that I was only complaining about the incessant (and completely unavoidable) news coverage of the election campaign there. Apart from that, I have nothing much to say about American politics or the system itself. I also did not necessarily assume that y'all would be enjoying the campaign yourselves!

I do find it pretty disturbing that of the recent vote in Iowa, I recognised the names of most or all of the candidates. Even allowing for the fact that these guys have been around for quite some time, given that I can't actually vote in your election just makes that unwanted knowledge more irksome. Like the "stars" we've heard of, but would rather we hadn't.

[Louise]

Again, I mean our local news coverage of the campaign over there.

[Louise]

Y'all may, or may not, be pleased to know that I no longer consider Obama to be the Antichrist. :)

[Mac]

That's good. Now you think it's Newt Ginrich? :-)

As I read that first comment of yours (first in the last three), I was thinking exactly of that "unwanted stars" phenomenon. As for the irksomeness, don't worry, we're irked, too.

[Art Deco]

I’m pretty much pessimistic about the chances of unseating Obama in November, primarily because the mostly liberal media folks are in his corner and will fight hard (and dirty) for him.

The national press corps has been a preserve of the Democratic Party since about 1955, the exceptions being radio networks which emerged around 1989 and Fox News, which emerged around 1996. They used to be a good deal more respected than they are now. Democratic presidential candidates still lost repeatedly.

I'm pretty sure they could have found stuff to sink Obama in 2008 if they'd wanted to. Instead, their investigative energies are usually turned on the critics of their favorites.

I disagree. The dirt on the Obamas was public knowledge, though not persistently disseminated. The person whose dirty past (a lucrative run of years as an 'investment banker' at a firm called Wasserstein, Perella) was assiduously ignored was Rahm Emmanuel. I think it very strange that the Republicans did not rake him over the coals.

What the Obama campaign indicated is that not only had institutions of peer review broken down in the Democratic Party, but that certain substitutes for it among the voters and contributors had as well. Here was a man who might have made a plausible candidate for corporation counsel running for president. All the while, partisan Democrats and snob Republicans were running their mouths about the inadequacies of the Republican vice presidential candidate. Mrs. Palin had been a public executive for 11 years (mayor, state bureau chief, and governor); B.O. had run the Chicago Annenberg Challenge into the ground. It was all very weird, but participants in that song-and-dance went well beyond the press corps.

[ex pat]

So AD, will you bet me 10 dollars?

[Mac]

Oh, now I get "Deccers".

Certainly the NRWM don't have the power to determine elections. But just as certainly they/it still have/has a very significant influence.

"The dirt on the Obamas was public knowledge, though not persistently disseminated." Right, that's sort of what I mean. It was out there, and the non-right-wing media just ignored it. The effect of that is to marginalize anyone who mentions it, because the NRWM still have enough influence that the average not especially informed person tends to absorb the "narrative" of the conventional media.

I agree about the disparate treatment of Palin vs Obama & Co. The reaction to her was often bizarre--not just dislike and opposition but a visceral disgust. I have a relative who could be described as more or less centrist--I wouldn't call her conservative, but she voted for Bush II. But she's upper middle class, and she loathed Palin beyond anything justified by the latter's actual politics.

[Art Deco]

No bets.

What people respond to and what they do not baffles. One of the more recent Governors of Massachusetts was ruined (as in approval ratings in single digits) when it came to light she had taken some personal trips on a state helicopter and that patronage employees in her office had occasionally watched her children. On the other hand, a credible charge of rape against one of our more recent chief executives was ignored by the public. The only explanation I have for this is that about 3/4 of the adult population are low-information voters and tend to form unassailable impressions based on bits and pieces which resonate with them because these bits resemble features of their mundane life.

The media are likely less influential now than they have been at any time since the Depression, so I would not give to much thought to that. The last three years have seen the highest mean unemployment rates in 70 years and just about the most persistently wan figures on the growth in production in nearly 80 years, and that is without incorporating possible knock-on effects from the imploding real estate markets in China or from the sovereign debt crisis in the Eurozone. I do not think the next year will be a happy one - for the President or for most of the rest of us.

[Louise on the iPod]

The anti-Palin hysteria was and is just beyond the beyond.

Can you do bets by paypal?

[Mac]

I don't see why you couldn't, although I don't know what's involved in allowing someone to put money in one's PP account rather than take it out. Nothing, maybe, apart from the account info.