March 19, 2008
Various Essays
The (semi) complete list of Spengler's writings can be found at this fan's web site.
Spengler is one of the most amazing writers that I have started reading in the last two years. Truly a remarkable mind.
Many arguments in favor of legalization of "the oldest trade" found here: How Whorable is Prostitution?
Try this statement on:
Again, it bears emphasizing that absolutely every form of labor involves renting out your body. The language of “selling your body” is generally intended to elicit a “wisdom of repugnance” disgust response, but it just doesn’t when you consider that folks like Ross and me get paid for things we do with our bodies — thinking, typing. Surgeons rent out their brains, and steady hands, to meet people’s health needs. Construction workers rent out their arms, legs, backs, brains. Etc. I sell my body for a living. So do you.
I read (and listened to) Barack Obama's speech on March 18 about race in the United States (for the general article see here). I thought it was a good speech, not perfect. However this analysis by Shelby Steele (put online by the Wall Street Journal on the day of the speech) was quite fascinating.
How does one "transcend" race in this church? The fact is that Barack Obama has fellow-traveled with a hate-filled, anti-American black nationalism all his adult life, failing to stand and challenge an ideology that would have no place for his own mother. And what portent of presidential judgment is it to have exposed his two daughters for their entire lives to what is, at the very least, a subtext of anti-white vitriol?What could he have been thinking? Of course he wasn't thinking. He was driven by insecurity, by a need to "be black" despite his biracial background. And so fellow-traveling with a little race hatred seemed a small price to pay for a more secure racial identity. And anyway, wasn't this hatred more rhetorical than real?
That seems pretty accurate to me.
Posted by rakhier at 12:44 PM | Comments (0)
June 27, 2005
Three Music CDs
I recently bought a new CD which I have enjoyed. Its titled Indian Summer by Carbon Leaf.
It fits into a category of American versions of late Beatles music. This new record by Carbon Leaf is very, very good. Its the best new popular music I've heard in years.
Another CDs which this reminds me of is: Everything You Want (released in 1999) by the group Vertical Horizon. Everything You want is a great record full of angry guitars and some very pretty accoustic guitars.
The last (and oldest) CD in the same musical mode is Fear (released in 1991) by the (now defunct) Toad the Wet Sprocket. Fear is another great record which has only improved with repeated listening. The later Toad records were not as good though Dulcinea came close.
Posted by rakhier at 01:37 PM | Comments (0)
June 15, 2005
18 Years Ago...
18 years ago I married. After the marriage we had a diner and I was asked to give a speech. I hadn't thought about it beforehand and I didn't come up with anything worthwhile on the spot.
Thinking about it now I wish I could have said said the following:
- I choose to marry because I believe in love. My marriage partner is not someone my parents would have picked. Nor is it a person society would have expected. But I'm optimistic about the future. I want to have children and I want to raise them with my partner. Our marriage is not about family connections, nor is it about wealth. Our marriage is neither one of convience nor is it a political statement.
Our marriage is about love. About the belief that a person can find love, marry love, and have it endure. Despite obstacles, despite diffences in language, culture, background, experience, despite all these things. We are marrying because we love each other. Nothing more, and nothing less.
I don't know anything about marriage except what I learned from my parents. But I have confidence that the lesson's I've absorbed are good ones and that I can handle a marriage like my parents have handled theirs.
I don't even know much about love but I do know this: my partner is, for me, the most desireable person in the world. This choice of mine, of ours, to marry, is perhaps the single most important decision either of us will ever make. We don't know what we are doing. We don't know if we are right or wrong. All we have is hope and love. It is enough for me.
Looking back on the last 18 years I wish I had been able to make that speech then. I couldn't really express what my motivations were back then. It seemed so obvious at the time while now it seems so fraught with danger and potential disaster.
18 years later, the marriage worked. I think I can explain why but I'm not sure I want to. Can't get too comfortable. Life keeps changing. But I will close with this: everything I saw in my partner was true. I didn't see everything but what I saw, it was real.
Posted by rakhier at 12:21 PM | Comments (0)
February 14, 2005
I'm back...
Well, I'm back online. My old hosting company died without telling me. I had to switch but now I'm back.
Posted by rakhier at 06:32 PM | Comments (0)