StephenKMackSD's Blog

One is uncomfortably and forcefully reminded of Hegel in the Phenomenology of the Spirit( #178-196) of the sections on Lordship and Bondage and even the interminable examination/analysis by Alexandre Kojeve of the slave/master dialectic, while reading Mr. Will’s column of January 9th. Although Mr. Will’s brief precise of the human aspiration to explanation, of the seemingly inexplicable, random, extreme human behavior, in his column, ‘The charlatans response to the tragedy in Tucson’ is intellectually foreshortened: deformative at the least, a vulgar burlesque, a version of the human search for ‘explanations’ pitched to his readers philosophical prejudices, if not their pretensions to an intellectual sophistication; that is non-existent in both his reader and he as writer . But that merely acts as rhetorical frame to his rationalization of his own parties self-indulgent and careless employment of eliminationist rhetoric; thinking not one moment, of its consequences, but merely an example of a careless political opportunism. Certainly this is absolutely in line with the post World  War ll trajectory of the Republican Party, engaging at every opportunity in hysteria mongering: Nixon, Mundt, McCarthy and their fellow travelers were active and effective; to deny or ignore this political actuality is to ignore history. But most assuredly the political climate of Tucson is the most salient issue here, and that being the toxic confluence of Tea Party, Minute Men and Neo-Nazi’s: without that location in political time and space the incident remains inert,inexplicable. So it might be best to avoid mention of that very real meeting of these politically volatile forces, and focus on the more diffuse national manifestations of this rhetoric, therefore rendering a rational sounding defensibility within the realm of the possible.

The Great Will opens his latest column with its provocative   title , ‘The charlatan’s response to the Tucson tragedy’ followed by his characterization of critics as indulging in ‘sociology’. Sociology being at its root Marxist with its main intellectual thrust a criticism of  Capitalism and therefore not worthy of being taken seriously ,by  thinkers such as Mr. Will and his readers.  This all being an effort to place the critique of  the  eliminationists  language of the No-Nothing wing of the Republican Party under a through going  conservative analysis, and most importantly a sub rosa defense . He speaks: ‘  But respites from half-baked explanations, often serving political opportunism, are impossible because of a timeless human craving and characteristic of many modern minds. The craving is for banishing randomness and the inexplicable from human experience. Time was, the gods were useful. What is thunder? The gods are angry. Polytheism was explanatory. People postulated causations. ’ Continue reading →