The last 4T was in part an intelligence operation by the CIA

[Einzige]

Per 'Who Paid The Piper? The CIA and the Cultural Cold War' by Francis Stoner Saunders.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w...qA_mjXDh3L

 It chronicles how the CIA, via the Congress for Cultural Freedom, lavishly funded academics, writers, art exhibitions, and journals(including dozens of socialist journals).This program began in 1951 and continued throughout the Cold War. It intentionally nurtured and fed a 'left' that was fixated on personal identity, rejected class struggle, stopped focusing on economic issues and moved the 'left's' focus to questions of racial and gender issues exclusively. In addition, it was also a left that was relentlessly hostile to the Soviet Union, Cuba, or anything that actually threatened capitalism and imperialism. Leftism in the West(and to a lesser degree in other places) stopped being a working class project aimed at actually taking power and became an individualist, petit bourgeois hobby aimed at fulfilling 'personal freedom' within capitalist consumer society.

The FBI in the 1950's and 60's were hardline, reactionary, racist Republican Neandrathals who believed in crude anti communism, reactionary cultural and social values and an opposition to even the mildest democratic reforms(including the Civil Rights movement). The CIA was far more culturally liberal, cosmopolitan and were of the mind that American capitalism had to present itself as the more open minded, "enlightened" option if it was to win 'hearts and minds' in the Cold War. The US had to expand civil rights and gender equality(or at least appear to) in order to stop the USSR from making an embarrassing propaganda weapon out of Jim Crow and other obvious forms of inegalitarianism in the 'world's greatest democracy'. The crude anti Communism of Hoover, McCarthy and the like was counter-productive for international propaganda purposes because many writers and intellectuals even in Europe, never mind the Third World, were sympathetic to socialism.

[David Horn]

(02-28-2021, 07:42 AM)Einzige Wrote: Per 'Who Paid The Piper? The CIA and the Cultural Cold War' by Francis Stoner Saunders.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w...qA_mjXDh3L

 It chronicles how the CIA, via the Congress for Cultural Freedom, lavishly funded academics, writers, art exhibitions, and journals(including dozens of socialist journals).This program began in 1951 and continued throughout the Cold War. It intentionally nurtured and fed a 'left' that was fixated on personal identity, rejected class struggle, stopped focusing on economic issues and moved the 'left's' focus to questions of racial and gender issues exclusively. In addition, it was also a left that was relentlessly hostile to the Soviet Union, Cuba, or anything that actually threatened capitalism and imperialism. Leftism in the West(and to a lesser degree in other places) stopped being a working class project aimed at actually taking power and became an individualist, petit bourgeois hobby aimed at fulfilling 'personal freedom' within capitalist consumer society.

The FBI in the 1950's and 60's were hardline, reactionary, racist Republican Neandrathals who believed in crude anti communism, reactionary cultural and social values and an opposition to even the mildest democratic reforms(including the Civil Rights movement). The CIA was far more culturally liberal, cosmopolitan and were of the mind that American capitalism had to present itself as the more open minded, "enlightened" option if it was to win 'hearts and minds' in the Cold War. The US had to expand civil rights and gender equality(or at least appear to) in order to stop the USSR from making an embarrassing propaganda weapon out of Jim Crow and other obvious forms of inegalitarianism in the 'world's greatest democracy'. The crude anti Communism of Hoover, McCarthy and the like was counter-productive for international propaganda purposes because many writers and intellectuals even in Europe, never mind the Third World, were sympathetic to socialism.

Good post.  The CIA ended several regimes, not the least being the democratically elected Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran -- clearly the height of stupidity and arrogance in foreign policy.

[pbrower2a]

As a parallel, the KGB knew as few in the old Soviet Union knew that the system was a mess. Some reforms would humanize the system and make it seem less ominous. It knew that few people in the West wanted to roll back Communism in the Operation Barbarossa style -- even among Western reactionaries. It had more to fear from Iran or even Iraq with their criminal regimes devoid of any human virtue. Maybe if either regime did something inexcusable even NATO would be useful.

...speaking of the stupidity of overthrowing Mohammed Mossadegh... see also the overthrow of Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala. Those are the two black marks on the Eisenhower administration, and for that the USA has paid with Fidel Castro and Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who made no pretense of being in any way useful to American interests.

[Bob Butler 54]

(02-28-2021, 07:42 AM)Einzige Wrote: Per 'Who Paid The Piper? The CIA and the Cultural Cold War' by Francis Stoner Saunders.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w...qA_mjXDh3L

 It chronicles how the CIA, via the Congress for Cultural Freedom, lavishly funded academics, writers, art exhibitions, and journals(including dozens of socialist journals).This program began in 1951 and continued throughout the Cold War. It intentionally nurtured and fed a 'left' that was fixated on personal identity, rejected class struggle, stopped focusing on economic issues and moved the 'left's' focus to questions of racial and gender issues exclusively. In addition, it was also a left that was relentlessly hostile to the Soviet Union, Cuba, or anything that actually threatened capitalism and imperialism. Leftism in the West(and to a lesser degree in other places) stopped being a working class project aimed at actually taking power and became an individualist, petit bourgeois hobby aimed at fulfilling 'personal freedom' within capitalist consumer society.

The FBI in the 1950's and 60's were hardline, reactionary, racist Republican Neandrathals who believed in crude anti communism, reactionary cultural and social values and an opposition to even the mildest democratic reforms(including the Civil Rights movement). The CIA was far more culturally liberal, cosmopolitan and were of the mind that American capitalism had to present itself as the more open minded, "enlightened" option if it was to win 'hearts and minds' in the Cold War. The US had to expand civil rights and gender equality(or at least appear to) in order to stop the USSR from making an embarrassing propaganda weapon out of Jim Crow and other obvious forms of inegalitarianism in the 'world's greatest democracy'. The crude anti Communism of Hoover, McCarthy and the like was counter-productive for international propaganda purposes because many writers and intellectuals even in Europe, never mind the Third World, were sympathetic to socialism.

Far better than most of your posts.  Certainly, Jim Crow, the early CIA, Hoover and McCarthy are not on my list of the best aspects of America.  My only quibble is that most of those aspects were fixed due to internal concerns, not to impress foreign writers and intellectuals, not to make it harder for the communists to write propaganda.

[David Horn]

(03-03-2021, 05:15 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(02-28-2021, 07:42 AM)Einzige Wrote: Per 'Who Paid The Piper? The CIA and the Cultural Cold War' by Francis Stoner Saunders.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w...qA_mjXDh3L

 It chronicles how the CIA, via the Congress for Cultural Freedom, lavishly funded academics, writers, art exhibitions, and journals(including dozens of socialist journals).This program began in 1951 and continued throughout the Cold War. It intentionally nurtured and fed a 'left' that was fixated on personal identity, rejected class struggle, stopped focusing on economic issues and moved the 'left's' focus to questions of racial and gender issues exclusively. In addition, it was also a left that was relentlessly hostile to the Soviet Union, Cuba, or anything that actually threatened capitalism and imperialism. Leftism in the West(and to a lesser degree in other places) stopped being a working class project aimed at actually taking power and became an individualist, petit bourgeois hobby aimed at fulfilling 'personal freedom' within capitalist consumer society.

The FBI in the 1950's and 60's were hardline, reactionary, racist Republican Neandrathals who believed in crude anti communism, reactionary cultural and social values and an opposition to even the mildest democratic reforms(including the Civil Rights movement). The CIA was far more culturally liberal, cosmopolitan and were of the mind that American capitalism had to present itself as the more open minded, "enlightened" option if it was to win 'hearts and minds' in the Cold War. The US had to expand civil rights and gender equality(or at least appear to) in order to stop the USSR from making an embarrassing propaganda weapon out of Jim Crow and other obvious forms of inegalitarianism in the 'world's greatest democracy'. The crude anti Communism of Hoover, McCarthy and the like was counter-productive for international propaganda purposes because many writers and intellectuals even in Europe, never mind the Third World, were sympathetic to socialism.

Far better than most of your posts.  Certainly, Jim Crow, the early CIA, Hoover and McCarthy are not on my list of the best aspects of America.  My only quibble is that most of those aspects were fixed due to internal concerns, not to impress foreign writers and intellectuals, not to make it harder for the communists to write propaganda.

4Ts and 1Ts are not the best time to preach tolerance and acceptance of "foreign" ideas.  The Great Power saeculum had more than its share of built-in injustices, and the extent of the threats under both the GP and WW-II guaranteed a zero-tolerance environment once the war ended.  That may apply this time too.  It's too soon to know.

[Bob Butler 54]

(03-03-2021, 05:56 PM)David Horn Wrote: 4Ts and 1Ts are not the best time to preach tolerance and acceptance of "foreign" ideas.  The Great Power saeculum had more than its share of built-in injustices, and the extent of the threats under both the GP and WW-II guaranteed a zero-tolerance environment once the war ended.  That may apply this time too.  It's too soon to know.

I have long predicted that the crisis and high would cause the conservative values to collapse. It is part of the cycles. The lessons learned in the crisis are driven home in the high. The old way of doing things - kings, slaves, depressions, isolationism - are rejected and become un American in the high.

This time?

Rachel Maddow earlier this week broke into her normal presentation to make a few announcements. In January, hers became the #1 cable TV show, eclipsing even the entertainment programs. Then, she did it again in February, and MSNBC became the #1 cable network for the first time ever.

It might possibly be soon enough. We'll see how it plays out.

[pbrower2a]

(02-28-2021, 07:42 AM)Einzige Wrote: Per 'Who Paid The Piper? The CIA and the Cultural Cold War' by Francis Stoner Saunders.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w...qA_mjXDh3L

 It chronicles how the CIA, via the Congress for Cultural Freedom, lavishly funded academics, writers, art exhibitions, and journals(including dozens of socialist journals).This program began in 1951 and continued throughout the Cold War. It intentionally nurtured and fed a 'left' that was fixated on personal identity, rejected class struggle, stopped focusing on economic issues and moved the 'left's' focus to questions of racial and gender issues exclusively. In addition, it was also a left that was relentlessly hostile to the Soviet Union, Cuba, or anything that actually threatened capitalism and imperialism. Leftism in the West(and to a lesser degree in other places) stopped being a working class project aimed at actually taking power and became an individualist, petit bourgeois hobby aimed at fulfilling 'personal freedom' within capitalist consumer society.

Over time the Soviet Union and its satellites became the one thing that Marxist supporters never thought those countries would become: conservative. Communist regimes invariably became inflexible and conformist, as one would expect when the revolutionary fervor gives way to more practical considerations such as social cohesion and economic growth. In the case of the Soviet Union it would naturally adopt the same Russian character as the tsarist regime, and with that culture (if without the feudal hierarchy of tsarist rule) the Soviet Union would be even more nationalist in character than the current British or the ancient Roman empires. Marxism has economic growth as an objective of its interpretation of Socialism, and this has an obvious appeal in countries in which people get the harshness of early capitalism with few positive results for themselves. People want faster economic growth, the fruits of which are more justly distributed, and Communist Parties offer that where economic injustice and economic brutality are the norm. 

Obviously over time the Soviet Union and its satellites would become objectionable not only to the economic elites that they overthrew but also to leftists who believe in cultural pluralism, political competition, rule of law, non-violence, and a rejection of military-style regimentation. Stalin became a despot without even holding a position in the government; he was the Party boss, and as such he could order anything because the Communist Party was everything. He had powers similar to those of Hitler without being a President, Chancellor, Prime Minister, or reigning monarch. Obviously having the power of life and death over people gives one unimaginable power over anyone who might be compelled, if necessary, to die in a particularly hideous way. As with the Nazis that was frequently working someone to exhaustion on starvation rations, which is more effective than damnatio ad bestias in a Roman spectacle. After all, the lions might be too well fed, and might even have some pity upon the Christians. (Lions do their man-eating at night, ideally without a full moon to interfere).

After the Bolshevik Revolution led to the entrenchment of the Communist regime, the Soviet system started to become objectionable to many socialists who insisted upon democracy, consumer choice, rule of law, pacifism, cultural pluralism, academic freedom, or religious values. Yes, there is a religious Left that hold that God and His Prophets demand economic justice because such is personal justice, too. For an analogy, just think of what the arch -reactionary Sir Winston Churchill thought of Hitler. Or more recently, take note of how many conservatives despise Donald Trump for cronyism, corruption, despotism, demagoguery, immorality, and disdain for legal norms.

The CIA has known that there is an anti-Communist Left and willingly uses it for its objectives in foreign policy. If the optimum is a Pinochet-like right-winger who establishes a pure plutocracy amenable to the economic interests of American corporations and the Public be damned in that dictator's regime, that might not be possible, let alone wise. Such regimes often end up creating a hotbed for anti-American, Marxist insurrections, and it is only a matter of time before "American (corporate) interests abroad" be at risk of expropriation.        
  

Quote:The FBI in the 1950's and 60's were hardline, reactionary, racist Republican Neandrathals who believed in crude anti communism, reactionary cultural and social values and an opposition to even the mildest democratic reforms (including the Civil Rights movement). The CIA was far more culturally liberal, cosmopolitan and were of the mind that American capitalism had to present itself as the more open minded, "enlightened" option if it was to win 'hearts and minds' in the Cold War. The US had to expand civil rights and gender equality (or at least appear to) in order to stop the USSR from making an embarrassing propaganda weapon out of Jim Crow and other obvious forms of inegalitarianism in the 'world's greatest democracy'. The crude anti Communism of Hoover, McCarthy and the like was counter-productive for international propaganda purposes because many writers and intellectuals even in Europe, never mind the Third World, were sympathetic to socialism.

Much of the FBI was recruited from the South, from among police forces who saw any "uppity" Negro as a criminal, and who thought that a young black man who looked longingly upon a pretty white girl as a rapist waiting for the moment to defile 'precious White Womanhood', which to a racist is slightly worse than outright murder. Some of those were good cops except for their racism, which is about like saying that many drunk drivers are unobjectionable drivers except that they drink before driving. Eventually the FBI came under pressure to squelch KKK terrorism, and regionally-integrated FBI field offices started appearing in "Kukluxistan" to investigate bombings and disappearances. So Boston or Chicago-raised FBI agents go to Mississippi, start asking polite questions to innocent people or encourage those hurt by Klan activity to talk, and start piecing together some patterns. Then some people who have had a bit too much to drink at the local Klavern (basically a racist parody of a Knights of Columbus, except for being more exclusive and less admirable in membership) starts accusing the FBI as the "Federal Bureau of Integration"... the FBI's most powerful tool comes into play. 

J. Edgar Hoover once said that if he had a boy to raise, the most important thing that he would teach him is to tell the truth. In his experience all the criminals that he had ever met or heard of had one thing in common: they are all liars. Let's put it this way: if you did not commit the crime you have no cause to lie about not committing it. If you did not do the crime you have nothing to hide, although you might be able to incriminate someone... oh, my loser cousin was having money problems, and after that date he went on a spending spree. Your cousin might be asked the same question you heard, and because he looks much like you it is easy for you to be confused with him. He might struggle with that question. Find the lie, and find the perpetrator. The FBI never has to beat a confession out of someone, but the effect can be much the same except for the absence of a beating. 

Eventually the FBI gets to the scummy people who do serious crimes. The pretext is often the near-technicality of interstate flight to avoid prosecution. The State usually has a more serious charge such as murder, rape, arson, drug dealing, or robbery. The CIA does deal with some foreign rogues, but it also deals with some admirable people. The FBI hones its attention on out-and-out criminals, the scum of the land. Cross a state line to commit a crime? You just became an FBI target. That's how the FBI went after the Dillinger gang and others in the 1930's, and that is how it works today.

[Einzige]

Quote: Marxism has economic growth as an objective of its interpretation of Socialism

No it doesn't.

[Einzige]

(03-04-2021, 03:58 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Rachel Maddow earlier this week broke into her normal presentation to make a few announcements.  In January, hers became the #1 cable TV show, eclipsing even the entertainment programs.  Then, she did it again in February, and MSNBC became the #1 cable network for the first time ever.

Maddow is a conservative. Lmfao. And MSDNC is just Democratic Fox.

[Eric the Green]

(03-04-2021, 03:58 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(03-03-2021, 05:56 PM)David Horn Wrote: 4Ts and 1Ts are not the best time to preach tolerance and acceptance of "foreign" ideas.  The Great Power saeculum had more than its share of built-in injustices, and the extent of the threats under both the GP and WW-II guaranteed a zero-tolerance environment once the war ended.  That may apply this time too.  It's too soon to know.

I have long predicted that the crisis and high would cause the conservative values to collapse.  It is part of the cycles.  The lessons learned in the crisis are driven home in the high.  The old way of doing things - kings, slaves, depressions, isolationism - are rejected and become un American in the high.

This time?

Rachel Maddow earlier this week broke into her normal presentation to make a few announcements.  In January, hers became the #1 cable TV show, eclipsing even the entertainment programs.  Then, she did it again in February, and MSNBC became the #1 cable network for the first time ever.

It might possibly be soon enough.  We'll see how it plays out.

That's good news. The Republicans have built a lot of walls to hold off the collapse of conservative values, however. They still have the gerrymandered state legislatures, with voter-suppression activities, the filibuster in a 50-50 senate with 1 unreliable red-state Democratic senator, and the supreme court. The Republican Party is still the Trump Cult, with its terrorists planning attacks. So, it's going to be a long slog, I think; certainly taking up the remainder of the 4T until 2028-29, and even beyond. We'll see.....

[pbrower2a]

(03-05-2021, 05:14 AM)Einzige Wrote:

(03-04-2021, 03:58 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: Rachel Maddow earlier this week broke into her normal presentation to make a few announcements.  In January, hers became the #1 cable TV show, eclipsing even the entertainment programs.  Then, she did it again in February, and MSNBC became the #1 cable network for the first time ever.

Maddow is a conservative. Lmfao. And MSDNC is just Democratic Fox.

Rachel Maddow once describer herself as an Eisenhower Republican... which refers to a time in which the Republican party actually had a liberal wing.  Ike would not now recognize "his" Party  as a Party of fiscal responsibility, ethnic and religious inclusion, traditional content in education, and rule of law. Those have tended to go Democratic. Yes, some old conservative values have become part of the Democratic agenda. Surely you have seen my map in which I overlay Eisenhower and Obama results. 

  When all is said and done, I think that the Obama and Eisenhower Presidencies are going to look like good analogues. Both Presidents are chilly rationalists. Both are practically scandal-free administrations. Both started with a troublesome war that both found their way out of. Neither did much to 'grow' the strength of their Parties in either House of Congress. To compare ISIS to Fidel Castro is completely unfair to Fidel Castro, a gentleman by contrast to ISIS. 

Eisenhower and Obama

The definitive moderate Republican may have been Dwight Eisenhower, and I have heard plenty of Democrats praise the Eisenhower Presidency. He went along with Supreme Court rulings that outlawed segregationist practices, stayed clear of the McCarthy bandwagon, and let McCarthy implode.


 
gray -- did not vote in 1952 or 1956
white -- Eisenhower twice, Obama twice
deep blue -- Republican all four elections
light blue -- Republican all but 2012 (I assume that greater Omaha went for Ike twice)
light green -- Eisenhower once, Stevenson once, Obama never
dark green -- Stevenson twice, Obama never
pink -- Stevenson twice, Obama once 

No state voted Democratic all four times, so no state is in deep red. 

Aside from Obama not getting the farm-and-ranch vote, an Obama win looks more like an Eisenhower win than like any other. It is unlikely that the political culture changed in many states unless the change is demographic (rapid growth of the Mexican-American vote that has typically been strongly Democratic) in California, Colorado, and New Mexico. I could refer you to the book Albion's Seed (David Hackett Fischer) to suggest how early settlers shaped the institutions in various parts of the country. Just because the original settlers largely abandoned an area (WASP farmers largely leaving southern New England for better land "Out West" as "Out West" steadily moved from Upstate New York through Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, and eventually the West Coast and filling in places like Nebraska and Colorado later. The Irish Catholics basically took over the institutions that the colonial-era WASPs had established and made those institutions their own. 

For obvious reasons no President will be an obvious match for Obama, but until at least Biden, Ike is the best match. It would be tempting to believe that the political parties would be deeply entrenched in states, but the map above suggests otherwise. The context in which Eisenhower could win two landslide wins for the GOP looks like an endorsement of the temperament of both. 

If it were simply a question of partisanship, then look at the contrast between Jimmy Carter's one win and Obama's two:

  If anyone has any doubt that the Presidential Election of 1976 is ancient history for all practical purposes:

Carter 1976, Obama 2008/2012    



Carter 1976, Obama twice  red
Carter 1976, Obama once pink
Carter 1976, Obama never yellow
Ford 1976, Obama twice white
Ford 1976, Obama once light blue
Ford 1976, Obama never blue

Of the states in yellow, only one (Georgia, and barely so in 2020) has gone to any Democrat since 1996. It is imaginable that Texas could go to the Democratic nominee in 2024 but unless Biden or Harris wins an Eisenhower-style or LBJ-style blowout in 2024 you can mostly count out any reasonable chance of the Democratic nominee winning anything else in yellow in 2024.  

Basically there are four quadrants in the political spectrum going clockwise: internationalists, corporate conservatives, populists, and pro-labor liberals.  The pro-labor liberals and the corporate conservatives are incompatible; the populists and internationalists are incompatible. In the 1950's the Democrats had the populists and pro-labor liberals when the populists were unusually weak; in the 1980's the Democrats were starting to lose the populists but had not yet won over the internationalists to any extent. Such allowed the unusually-strong, but surprisingly-troubled Reagan coalition. But that fell apart in the 1990's. By now, the Democrats seem to have lost the populist sector (which is very much pro-Trump now) while gaining the highly-educated internationalist sector.

Here I make no predictions for 2024.  I can show the Carter 1976/Biden 2020 map which may be an even better relevancy because both the 1976 and 2020 maps were close in electoral votes:

 If anyone has any doubt that the Presidential Election of 1976 is ancient history for all practical purposes:

Carter 1976, Biden 2020   



Carter 1976, Biden  red
Carter 1976, Trump 2020 yellow
Ford 1976, Biden white
Ford 1976, Trump 2020 blue

Only thirteen states (and of those Indiana is the largest in electoral votes) went for both Ford and Trump. Only ten states (although those include New York, Pennsylvania, and Georgia) and Dee Cee went for Carter and Biden. Predicting the result of the 2020 Presidential election from the results of 1976 would be ludicrous.

[Einzige]

Nobody cares; Eisenhower was a piece of shit too.

[pbrower2a]

(03-06-2021, 04:49 PM)Einzige Wrote: Nobody cares; Eisenhower was a piece of shit too.

So tell me who really was good. Sure, I can fault people for voting for Donald Judas Trump in view of all the warning signs. We never get "perfect" because nobody is perfect.

[Einzige]

(03-06-2021, 10:06 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(03-06-2021, 04:49 PM)Einzige Wrote: Nobody cares; Eisenhower was a piece of shit too.

So tell me who really was good. Sure, I can fault people for voting for Donald Judas Trump in view of all the warning signs. We never get "perfect" because nobody is perfect.

No, I mean Eienhower was an anticommunist thug.

[pbrower2a]

(03-07-2021, 03:49 AM)Einzige Wrote:

(03-06-2021, 10:06 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(03-06-2021, 04:49 PM)Einzige Wrote: Nobody cares; Eisenhower was a piece of shit too.

So tell me who really was good. Sure, I can fault people for voting for Donald Judas Trump in view of all the warning signs. We never get "perfect" because nobody is perfect.

No, I mean Eisenhower was an anticommunist thug.

In the 1950's the only people not anti-Communist were Commies themselves. If you want to excuse the Commies for the body count, then you must excuse non-Communist butchers like Idi Amin, fascist butchers like Suharto and Pinochet, and of course Satan Hussein. I'm sure that you have no desire to exculpate Pinochet, Montt, Videla, or the genocidal perpetrators of the Rwanda massacres. 

Ike was one of the least thuggish of American political leaders of the time.  OK, the Dulles brothers duped him on Mossadegh and Arbenz, mistakes for which Americans and others (obviously Iranians and Guatemalans, especially) would pay a high price. In the 1950's the CIA had its idea of who the safest people that America could back were: the sorts of people who believed in capitalism at its harshest. You know those: the sorts of people who mow down strikers who seek better pay and working conditions.

Ike was able to broker a deal to get an armistice in Korea, most likely with Soviet leadership. By the 1950's Communism had a bad reputation for the body count... Witold Pilecki in Poland, Jacob Kaiser in East Germany, Mlada Horakova in Czechoslovakia, and Nikola Petkov in Bulgaria after WWII -- and figures like Rajk, Slansky, Patrascanu, and Kostov who were murdered to get a rival out of the way. Then there were the brutal suppressions of the East German uprising of 1952 and the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. I will of course excuse the Commies for executing war criminals; non-Communists did that too. Ike had contacts from the war... and an Order of Victory.

The Rosenberg-Greenglass spy ring was real, and it did send secret information to the Soviet Union.

[Tim Randal Walker]

Somebody once mentioned that Obama acts like an aged, mature Nomad. Like a Nomad president during a 1T.

[pbrower2a]

(03-07-2021, 07:55 PM)Tim Randal Walker Wrote: Somebody once mentioned that Obama acts like an aged, mature Nomad.  Like a Nomad president during a 1T.

I think I did. The map and most of the material with it come from a site that discuss elections and not the generational theory, although elections have historical reality behind them. After 2012 I saw the comparative successes of Obama and Eisenhower and figured that similarities of temperament are more likely in people born about seventy years apart than among people born twenty years apart.  

I have looked at the electoral maps shown in David Hackett Fisher's Albion's Seed. Those maps do not go into the Obama Presidency, but mine does. Statewide cultures say much. It is amazing that Eisenhower was the first Republican to win Virginia since Hoover in his 1928 blowout... and that Obama was the first Democrat to win Virginia (aside from the LBJ blowout of 1964) since Ike won it twice. (Electoral blowouts say more about the failure of a nominee than they say about states).  I would assume that the states that showed a flip in partisan orientation did not so much change their ideologies as much as the Parties did.  

Even so, 2020 looks much like a pattern out of elections of 2008 and 2012, and Joe Biden is definitely not a Reactive/Nomad.

[Einzige]

Biden also isn't a Gray Champion.

[Eric the Green]

(03-08-2021, 08:18 AM)Einzige Wrote: Biden also isn't a Gray Champion.

He's the gray champion we got.

[David Horn]

(03-08-2021, 01:37 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(03-08-2021, 08:18 AM)Einzige Wrote: Biden also isn't a Gray Champion.

He's the gray champion we got.

It's still too early to say, but he seems to have found a way forward, and that may suffice this time.