Time for the national Dems to go the way of the once-national Whig Party. Only national politicians can make this start to happen.

I have reached the conclusion that national progressive Dems in Congress need to strongly consider, and then do, what then-progressive Whigs did in the early 1850s, which is to form a new national political party. Just as the then-new Republican Party rose quickly out of the morass of the hopelessly divided Whig Party, this new party will find so much support across the nation, starting in places where the Dems are already toxic. The primary platform should revolve around economic policies of a social democratic form to directly challenge corporate power and the Empire. It will also acknowledge cultural issues, but strongly support "live the way you want to live" on LGBTQ and abortion issues, and promote gun safety regulation more than outright confiscation.

I realize the main difference in the 1850s was the Republican Party was able to unite people outside the enslavement institutional South through one issue, the Scourge of Slavery. However, we face an existential threat of corporate domination and a climate crisis that needs to ensure people can be employed in a New Deal of people-helping jobs and green-oriented infrastructure redevelopment, and not continue to be tied to fossil fuel production.

Structurally, the national Democratic Party resembles nothing more than an equivalent to Communist-front organizations where, once the New Deal liberals left in the wake of the Stalin-Hitler deal of 1939, they became hollow shells. Sadly, the national Democratic Party remains controlled by major corporate donors and major consultant companies which have largely destroyed the Democratic Party's ties to working people and New Deal values.

However, all the activists across labor, environmental, and antiwar movements continue to be unable to create a new political party. What it is going to take is leadership from already known politicians, as with William Seward, Salmon Chase, and Charles Sumner, and even a Lincoln, who was very well known in Illinois, contrary to the usual way we think of Lincoln coming out of nowhere for the 1860 presidential nomination.

I am also confident that states with decent Democratic Party leadership, such as New Mexico, will quickly find their way to a new party, and eventually gain more political power in areas now dominated by right-wing Republicans.

 
It is time. Past time. So, Congressional politicians who supported Bernie Sanders' values and/or Bernie, #DitchtheDems.

Echoes of the fall of Paris and France

Chuck Schumer has become the domestic US version of Neville Chamberlain. His argument was that things will get worse if he and other Dems did not capitulate to the Republicans, and that capitulating to Trump now would be more effective later on. This argument collapses on its own intended idea of logic. Trump has now clearly won. This is why Trump humiliated Schumer further in Trump's "tweet" "thanking" Schumer. The other eight Democratic Party senators and independent Angus King of Maine deserve equal blame.

As this has unfolded, I have been reading the Soviet-Russian novelist Ilya Ehrenburg's 1942 novel, "The Fall of Paris." I am just past the halfway point. The parallel of his description of French life from 1935 forward is compelling. Each step Hitler took, from supporting Franco in Spain against the Spanish Republic, to taking the Sudtenland in Czechoslovakia and then the latter itself, was greeted with alarm across the French political spectrum. However, the same political elites (except the Communists, who the political elites from the far right to the Socialists reviled) ultimately decided peace was more important than standing up to Hitler. In this set of decisions from the French elites, it was believed by all the so-called smart people that giving in would sate Hitler and standing up for Spain and Czechoslovakia meant war.

Reading this insightful and literarily well-crafted narrative has provided me with a powerful understanding of how this unfolded day-to-day. It is uncanny to me how I see echoes of this in the discourse I have read and sometimes seen at my folks house on MSNBC and CNN. Except, in our time, our nation's Fascist threat is a call from inside the house.

What is surprising to me in reading this novel is Erhenburg was a dedicated Stalinist during the period of the 1930s through Stalin's death. Yet, this novel is deeply sympathetic with respect to business people, conservative and right wing people, and the politically indifferent people who simply wish people would stop with obsessive political arguments, and leave each other in peace. Ehrenburg has been careful to not show how wrongheaded these people were, as he almost tenderly describes their best motives and arguments. Ehrenburg knew he could write the novel in this fashion, as, of course, he wrote his novel after the fall of France. Readers would therefore themselves be able to judge the thinking of these people.

The reason I am still inclined to be negative in my judgment regarding Ehrenburg the person is based upon my reading Victor Serge's most important work, "Memoirs of a Revolutionary," which Serge wrote in his last years before his early death in Mexico in 1947 for what he called the "dresser drawer," and which was not published until after his death. In Serge's magisterial work, he took great care to be as objective as he could about his enemies and opponents. It is what makes the work so powerful, as Serge, a revolutionary, is, in this way, most liberal in that old 19th-Century sense. But he is not willing to be that way with Ehrenburg. In the memoirs, Serge harshly described Ehrenburg as a "hack agitator-novelist" (Serge, 318).

I get Serge's anger. In 1935, Ehrenberg, originally born in Kyvv (!), was then living in France. At an international left writers' conference held in Paris he attended, there was a proposal on behalf of various oppressed writers around the world. One of the speakers mentioned Serge, who was suffering his second internal exile due to Serge being a Left Oppositionist to Stalin and affiliated with Trotsky. Ehrenburg and other pro-Soviet writers denounced Serge as a counterrevolutionary and justified Stalin's treatment of him.

 
Not long after the conference, Andre Gide and Romain Rolland respectively implored the Soviet ambassador to France and Stalin to let Serge leave, and Stalin relented (Serge, 318-319). This proved to be miraculous as Serge eventually left the Soviet Union not long before the "Great Purges" of mostly Bolsheviks began. As Serge remains my Soviet dissident hero, I hesitated to read Ehrenburg's book as I expected it to be hack work. I was stunned from the start with Ehrenburg's brilliant writing, and, as I have reached the halfway point, have found it remarkably prescient in its insights. The only nod to Stalinism I see is his missing the manner in which the Communists in Spain were behaving and a very brief, indirect, unnamed but positive, nod to the Lysenko agricultural methods. The latter led me to laugh and that nod has thankfully not been repeated. The novel won the Stalin Prize for best novel, which also makes me deeply wince, but damn it, it is really great despite that hackish award.

Again, I find it sadly strange to be reading this novel of France in the late 1930s and seeing how it echoes into today's political environment. Heck, I didn't even need to re-read Sinclair Lewis' "It Can't Happen Here" (1935). Lewis' novel is not focused so much on the day-to-day that led to the election of Buzz Windrip. Its focus is on the aftereffects. Ehrenburg's novel takes readers step by step into the abyss in a story with a variety of characters from various parts of life, whose lives overlap with, break apart, or carry on romantic affairs with each other. It is a remarkably insightful and compelling work.

Trump's humiliation of Zelenskyy was an American insult to America's injuring Ukraine all these years

I POSTED THIS TO FB ON SATTURDAY MARCH 1, 2025. I THOUGHT I'D SAVE IT HERE. I DID SOME GRAMMAR EDITS, BUT IT IS ESSENTIALLY THE SAME AS THE FB POST. I MAY AS WELL SEE HOW THIS STANDS UP WHEN HISTORIANS IN 2060 LOOK AT BLOGGER POSTS IF THEY CAN. LOL. ANYWAY... 

What Trump and Vance did to Zelenskyy yesterday was petty, cruel, nasty, and dumb. What these two terrible leaders did also revealed to me that, for all the arguments from the anti-anti-Trump left that "Russiagate" was a "hoax," this is one more example of Trump being potentially compromised by Putin's Russia--with now Vance going along.

 

I feel so badly for the Ukrainians. The evidence is clear to me that the US, for decades, led enough Ukrainians near or in power that NATO membership was likely at some point and that promise was somehow worth fighting for. The US' goals have not primarily been about helping Ukrainian people as much as using Ukraine as a proxy to bloody up post-Communist, kleptocracy Russia, which, incidentally, our nation initially and ironically helped create in the 1990s. Our actions in the mid to late 1990s and, in the early 2000s, to expand NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, remember?) shocked the now deceased major Cold War advisers Chalmers Johnson and George Kennan, who had spent their adult lives studying Russia and its nationalist impulses. They knew expanding NATO betrayed what was implied and sometimes said to Russian leaders. The actions exposed the fallacy in their own assumptions about US good faith and revealed to them that Soviet/Russian fears of "capitalist encirclement" were not cynical delusions. These two men at least had the integrity to go public with their mea culpas and warnings, which warnings continue to be prescient.

Worse, Ukrainian diplomats have already gone on record that a reasonable settlement with Putin was at hand in the spring of 2022, within weeks of Putin's February 2022 invasion. They have publicly stated how, during those negotiations, they were shocked that Putin kept saying "No NATO membership," which for these diplomats proved Putin's nationalistic concerns in that regard were real, not feigned. The US's and UK's deliberate--and threatening--scuttling of that potential deal has only led to far more devastation, and what could be a million deaths on both the Russian and Ukrainian sides. The big counteroffensive the Biden administration pushed has failed, and, while there is an uneasy stalemate, the Russians may be said to be in better shape militarily than they were a year or so ago. I shudder when I look at Ukraine's current position, the Ukrainian public's loss of confidence in Zelenskyy, and the continued hostilities between Russian-Ukrainians and those Ukrainians whose heritages go back a millennium.

This brings me to this reminder amidst the noise: We must never forget that, before February 2022, 22% of Ukrainians identified as Russian, speak Russian, and are favorably disposed to Russia. Ukraine's history and Russia's history have been intertwined since at least the thirteenth century, with initially for centuries, Ukrainian leaders ruling over a then-fledgling Russia.

I am so appalled at the way Trump has behaved against Zelenskyy and Trump's cruel and disrespectful denigration of Ukraine's sovereignty. This is truly a moment where I now desperately hope China and Germany may enter negotiations as relative neutrals, sorta how Teddy Roosevelt acted to help end the Japan-Russian War of the dawn of the 20th Century.

The US behavior at this point is an insult to the initial injuries against Ukraine from Clinton's, Bush II's, Obama's provocations, and Biden's warmongering. I should note, though, that during Trump's first administration, Trump issued sanctions against Russia, in part because of brewing issues with Ukraine. For the anti-anti-Trump left, that fact proves Russiagate was a hoax. For me, it was simply Trump not having the power or confidence at the time to overcome the military-industrial complex. Remember, nearly every major foreign policy person from his first administration, and his first VP, nearly all Cold Warriors, opposed Trump in 2024's election cycle. That is not a coincidence.

In any event, at this point, the military-industrial complex's guardrails appear to be severely weakened--which would have been largely true even if there was a President Harris as she would have been feckless, and facing a mutiny among her own party, let alone plenty of cruelly cynical Republicans. For those of us opposed to the existence of the US Empire, that development may seem good. However, that weakening of guardrails is occurring in a context that threatens stability within our own society. The weakening of the military-industrial complex is not happening in the way a President Bernie Sanders would have wanted to see, with the US becoming an honest, kindlier peacemaker and only competing with China on "belts and roads" initiatives, while promoting a global response to climate change challenges. I know, it sounds so naive. But, dammit, as Martin Luther King, Jr. said, those who are often called idealistic are most often the most effective realists when provided the opportunity.

After yesterday, I remain hoping against facts that someone calms down Trump and Vance, and gets them back to some reasonable recognition that the US and UK put Ukraine into this position and that blaming them is a disgusting insult to the injuries committed against Ukrainians and their present government. It is a humiliation Ukrainians will not soon forget, with consequences that may cause anti-Russian Ukrainians to act in ways that nationalists behave--you know, like Serbian nationalists circa 1910-1914.

Right now, I don't hold much hope for anyone currently in the Trump administration getting hold of Trump's demented mind to create trust to get to a decent peace between Russia and Ukraine. But I admit I am not reading these twists and turns on this issue as deeply as I used to do. I just find the whole thing detestable, and my own views so far outside the discourse on top of having no power. I feel like Isaac Deutscher surveying Cold War America, though without his credentials. :) Anyway, I found yesterday morning I was doing more analysis-reading of the Lakers' victory over the Clippers on Friday night, where Luka appears to have gotten hot in his shooting in the second half after I had gone to bed. LOL.

1975: The last great year of the 1970s progressive rock movement

1975 was the last year in which one may say the majority of progressive rock bands released amazing music, though one may begin to see the cracks in the wall. In 1976, the fall more deeply began. While there continued to be great progressive rock albums released, they were simply not as great overall as what had occurred during the six years before. Here is my decidedly not-chronological list of the progressive rock albums released in 1975, fifty years ago this coming year, 2025:

Gentle Giant, "Free Hand." This was released in the summer of 1975--and I was in heaven when I first heard it. This album became GG's most economically successful and popular album, though it received almost no airplay from nearly any then popular FM radio stations (WNEW-FM in NYC barely played it. The others, not at all).

Renaissance, "Scheherazade." Perhaps my favorite overall album from this band. Renaissance's instrumental sound led with their keyboardist, with the ever-amazing Annie Haslam at lead vocals. The band has had a high mortality rate with the lead bassist, Jon Camp, dying last month. I think of the main members, the only survivors are Annie Haslam and the drummer, Terry Sullivan. Just start with "A Trip to the Fair" on this one, though, and let it roll.

Camel, "The Snow Goose." This is Camel's greatest album as well. It is an instrumental, with some nonword choral vocals. And it is one continuous track. The music on the album was inspired by the late, underrated author, Paul Gallico's book of the same name. Sadly, Gallico's estate successfully sued Camel for copyright infringement to grab a big portion of what would be Camel's best selling album of their entire career as a band. I have read and love several of Gallico's books, including "Snow Goose" which was a novella, not a full-on novel. But, his estate acted badly and morally wrongly in my view. I also wonder about whether the lawsuit was even proper under a Nimmer-based copyright law philosophy. For me, specifically, I thought it was odd because Camel did not do anything more than identify the characters. Most importantly, there were no quotes from the book in the recording. Anyway, this remains a wonderful album and well worth the listen.

Pink Floyd, "Wish You Were Here." Yeah, we all should know this album. Or at least know OF this album. Just. Listen.

Kansas, "Song for America" and "Masque." Kansas released two amazing albums in one year! Both are well worth the listen, too. Some criticized then and now "Masque" for being too much a likeness in sound to "Song for America." That is correct, but who gives a damn? To me, this is like a double album released with seven months of separation. Just take it, people!  Two great albums!

Jethro Tull, "Minstrel in the Gallery." This remains an under-appreciated album, and one where Tull or more precisely Ian  Anderson was closest to his British folk tradition to date. He would return to that strong British folk in "Song from the Wood" (1977), which I consider Tull's last truly great album. This album, "Minstrel," has some great tracks, including the title track, and "One White Duck on the Wall."

Van der Graaf Generator, "Godbluff." I was more happy that VDGG had gotten back together than in love with this album when it was released. It is amusing to me that this album has grown tremendously on me, and I find myself returning more and more to it over the years. I mean, "Sleepwalkers" alone makes it a keeper in one's collection. It is an album more commercially-oriented, but not enough for FM radio program directors. Somehow Johnny Rotten aka John Lydon found it and loved it. There is a punk element to the sound, I will admit.

Kayak, "Royal Bed Bouncer." This band, from the Netherlands, was the essence of prog-power-pop. This was perhaps their most complete album, starting with the wild, funny title track which opens the album. How this didn't break through, I can never understand. Ton Sherpenzeel remains for me one of the most interesting pop oriented composers of the era. 

Hatfield and the North, "Rotter's Club." This is an awesome album, the second from this famed Canterbury band. The band would later change its name, and restore most of the lineup except for vocalist/bassist Richard Sinclair, as National Health, which produced three amazing albums. One can hear the development of this jazz-tinged, classically-oriented, progressive rock sound in "Rotter's Club," and of course the British-oriented humor throughout, including the names of the mostly instrumental songs on the album. A must hear for those who have studied the language and sound we call "music." It is not for the regular non-musically inclined. 

Soft Machine, "Bundles." Another Canterbury band, with a most underrated and wonderful album to listen to over the years.

Goblin, "Profundo Rosso." An album I did not hear until years and years later, and I went, "Oh, wow! This is really great!" An Italian band. In 1975, the only Italian band I had ever been able to hear in those pre-YouTube and pre-Internet days was PFM. See next listing...

Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM), "Chocolate Kings." This is an awesome album, especially lyrically on the title track. It is the band's thanks to the United States, and wondering just what the hell was already starting to go wrong in our nation. The entire album is worth a listen, though I don't know why the band allowed for such a muddy recording. It lacked the crispness of the previous recordings from the band, and I just don't get it. But, the music remains compelling and is still great to listen. 

Chris Squire, "Fish Out of Water." I was not interested in this album from Yes' founding bassist when it was released. I recently started hearing different tracks in rotation on Pandora and kept saying to myself, "My God! This is great!" My son has long said, "Dad, how did you not like this album? This is a great album!" And it is. I apologize to the late Chris Squire.

Rick Wakeman, "....King Arthur." I think I was put off to not really listen to Squire's record because I found Wakeman's album so awful. I had such hope for Wakeman's second solo effort because his "Six Wives of Henry the Eighth" remains simply amazing. It holds up so well from its 1973 release. But, this album could stand in for what too many anti-progressive rock music writers call the "excesses of progressive rock."

Another Yes member, Steve Howe, released his solo effort in 1975, "Beginnings," and I was surprised at how dull I found the album. It has not improved in age, I must admit. 

Steve Hackett, "Voyage of the Acolyte." This is another album I did not appreciate upon its release. It is from Genesis' guitarist during their heyday of progressive rock love, from 1970 through 1977. Hackett released this out of growing anger at not having his songs included in Genesis albums, and in the wake of Peter Gabriel leaving the band. It is well worth the listen in its entirety from progressive rock fans who were not born during this period.

Frank Zappa, "One Size Fits All." This is not a favorite Zappa/Mothers album, particularly after the two great albums from 1974, "Apostrophe" and "Roxy and Elsewehere". Even though it has essentially the same lineup from 1974, I just didn't find the album's melodies all that enticing. Yes, there is "Inca Roads," and "Sofa No. 2," but even those pale in comparison to the songs/compositions on the previous two albums. Again, this is where progressive rock as a genre begins to fall off in terms of the main bands.

Esperanto, with members from the UK, Europe, and Australia, had largely a dud album in 1975, "Last Tango." However, the band's wild version of "Eleanor Rigby" remains a must-hear for the musically-inclined. If not, stay away. Very much away! LOL. But, I love it! Here it is, and note one will not hear the Beatles' melody until nearly the 2:45 minute mark.   

Brian Eno, "Another Green World," "Discreet Music," and with Robert Fripp of then recently ended King Crimson, "Evening Star". None of these albums appealed then or now to me. Too much getting into John Cage territory, which reads well as an idea, but I find, well, dull.  

Led Zeppelin, "Kashmir." Zep was never really a prog band, but this album was certainly, in the parlance, "proggy," particularly the title track. It may be my favorite single song Zep ever recorded, except for "Stairway to Heaven," but I have never been a big Zep fan. Sorry. It is just a matter of taste, not a lack of respect for what is inarguably one of the most iconic bands, post-Beatles. I definitely recognize and respect that singular fact.

There were two albums from Rush in 1975, which band I admit I have never enjoyed (Heavens! LOL). These are Rush's classic albums, "Fly By Night" and "Caress of Steel." I feel the same with the band, Triumvarat, which in 1975 released "Spartacus," arguably their best album--though one I don't find compelling in any event. 

There were also releases from progressive rock bands beyond the UK and US, which I didn't know at the time, but heard through my son, and really like a lot. These are bands such as Germany's Eloy ("Power and the Passion"), Chile's Los Jaivas ("El Indio"), another Italian band, Area ("Crac!"), Brazil's O Terco ("Criaturas de Noite") and Casa das Maquinas ("Lar da Maravihas"), among others. It remains a deep cultural tragedy that in those days, it was nigh impossible for progressive rock fans in the US to hear these amazing bands from other continents. 

The great Italian progressive rock band, Banco del Mutuo Soccoso, also had an English-oriented release in 1975, mostly their previous albums' tracks but in English. I didn't hear it then, and hearing it now, I say stick with the original Italian versions. Banco was outstanding! 

THE SEMI-PROGRESSIVE ROCK ALBUMS OF 1975

1975 saw a flowering of the semi-progressive rock bands. It is weird to think how reviled progressive rock was in the pages of the Village Voice, Rolling Stone, etc. and, when not ignored by most mainstream newspapers, reviled by Robert Hilburn in the LA Times and John Rockwell in the NYT. Yet these semi-prog bands appeared, as if to say maybe there was a larger audience for music with a sense of musical theory and composition.  It is funny that I had thought Foreigner would be included in this list of bands releasing albums in 1975. However, Foreigner formed in 1976, and the band initially included Ian MacDonald of the original King Crimson. This gave the band a more progressive edge than most of the bands which follow on this list, though certainly not enough progressive structures for me, I admit.:) Anyway, here are the semi-prog bands releasing major albums in 1975: 

Queen, "Bohemian Rhapsody." Yup, that album. I place this in the progressive-oriented category, as it was. What was always deeply frustrating to me is that this album got into regular airplay, but the other progressive bands, whether that is Camel, Gentle Giant, Renaissance, etc. never could. But, the title track remains one of the most iconic tracks/songs of the 1970s classic rock era.

Journey, "Journey." Yes, Journey began life as a progressive-oriented pop band.  I heard a track from this album recently, and it was decent to good. I remember when they arrived on the scene, and, how, by the next year, they went fully into the ersatz-prog category with Styx and Boston--and eventually Toto. I think, though, Journey became even more associated with pop rock of the period than any of those bands. This means, too, that non-musically interested female Boomers began to love Journey in a way that still alienated me, musically-speaking, from most women my age over the decades. LOL.

Nektar, "Recycled." Their most progressive-oriented album, but still in that Styx and Boston mode. Not sure it is worth the listen in 2025 unless one listens first to the rest of the albums listed here.

Ambrosia, "Ambrosia." Another band, as with Nektar, which tried but failed to effectively combine progressive elements with pop music. I don't think Ambrosia pleases most progressive rock fans, and normie folks still think, "This is too weird for me."  

Billy Joel, "Turnstiles." Yes, this has several progressive-oriented tracks. Just listen to "Prelude/Angry Young Man" and "Summer, Highland Falls." If one knows and says the latter song is not progressive in orientation, then listen to this acoustic version Joel did of the latter song at the National Press Club back in 2008. It is definitely progressive-oriented, akin to a King Crimson soft-ballad type of song (examples of Crimson soft songs include "I Talk to the Wind", "Book of Saturday" and "Matte Kudasai")  Joel had progressive credentials before going pop. In 1970, he, along with the extraordinary drummer Jonathan Small, made an album under the band name, "Attila". It is an album Joel has continually disparaged for what may be personal reasons, as I think Joel ran off with Small's wife, or vice-versa. Hard to recall right now. In any event, "Atilla" remains a great progressive-blues album much neglected in our musical oriented world. As I like to say to people, listen to this final or last track from the album. Very progressive. Various songs on "Turnstiles" and then Joel's later "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" from "The Stranger" in 1977 are definitely progressive-oriented, and more so than most of the bands listed in this section. 

ELO SELLS OUT TO PURE POP AND BECOMES A SUPERSTAR BAND SPANNING DECADES:

Electric Light Orchestra, "Face the Music." Man, I had to face the music that ELO had completely left progressive rock which defined its first three albums. The band's 1974's "Eldorado" was the beginning of the trend that would send ELO into regular folks' orbits, not music for us weird music freaks--or as I liked to write during that decade, music "phreaks." I will always remember a high school friend in our first year at Rutgers who, seeing my face, after I had brought the album I just purchased to another friend's dorm so I could hear what I purchased, kept laughing, pointing at me, and taunting: "Freedman's band sold out! Ha-ha!" That last part is what was to become a Nelson Munz "har-har" if one knows the Simpsons show that would not appear for another 13 years or so. It is very funny to recall that moment! 

FINAL THOUGHTS:

As one may see by my commentaries next to the band names and album releases, 1975 was, for me at least, a mixed year. I may have missed some bands, such as Curved Air or Caravan. However, I admit the 1975 released albums from Curved Air or Caravan have not grown on me, either since their releases or through the present. Still, when one considers the output of progressive rock music from 1969 through 1975, and even through the rest of the decade, one should remain amazed at how brilliant the music was, and how often, lyrically, these bands do not get the credit they deserve. Not always of course, with Yes leading the caveats. But, certainly, Gentle Giant, Genesis, Jethro Tull, and PFM leading the way, along with Renaissance, in writing intelligent and creative lyrics. 

Sigh. Fifty years: 1975-2025. I am not sure I could even imagine 2025 back in 1975.

Assessing the political life of Jimmy Carter

I think we have to ensure we don't overstate Carter's presidency in light of what followed. Erik Loomis, who got his PhD in History at University of New Mexico, where I am currently seeking my Master's in History, and is a respected historian back east, wrote a great political-historical obit on Carter immediately after Carter's death at the ripe age of 100. I also appreciated this essay from a man who was a major player at the Carter Center, who loudly and unfairly resigned after Carter published his prescient and prophetic book, "Peace, Not Apartheid" in November 2006. Yeah, Steve Berman, you definitely needed to apologize to Carter, and I am glad you did so while he was alive.

However, the following need to be recalled about Carter's presidency:

1. In retrospect, Carter may be best described as the first post-New Deal Democratic Party president or first modern Democratic neoliberal president. Carter never understood the importance of labor unions, first off. He helped kill what was the last moment for the rest of the century and through now to pass important labor law reform legislation. He refused to intervene and speak publicly and strongly for the deeply labor law reform bill, and let right-wing Republicans in the Senate win a filibuster by one vote short of cloture to end the debate. The labor law reform had already passed the House. At one point, Carter's staff threatened to veto the bill if it came to his desk. I know that last one because I was a congressional intern in that summer of 1978 and was listening in to meetings of what were called The Irish Mafia led by Tip O'Neill and Ted Kennedy and their staffs (they would appear at meetings, but not stay for long). I worked for a lower level congress member of that group, Eddie Pattern (D-NJ). There is a reason why Teddy Kennedy finally decided to primary him, and this refusal to push for labor law reform was a major factor in that decision. There is also now reason to understand machinist union leader, Bill Wimpisinger's acid comment. When asked, "What can President Carter do to restore union people's faith in the Democratic Party," Wimply responded, "Die."

2. Carter appointed Paul Volcker to head the Fed to crush the economy with high interest rates. Carter strangely thought that would help him in his re-election campaign for 1980. Carter didn't really believe in New Deal type of legislation and instead supported tax cuts. This leads to number three...

3. Carter, the same summer he said the Congress should not take up the labor law reform bill because he was pushing for the Panama Canal Treaty, pushed for and got the first capital gains tax cuts, beating Reagan out on the topic by three years. Again, I was there, and was shocked at what I saw, because I was a Jimmy Carter fan, especially after reading Hunter Thompson's famous essay in Rolling Stone.

4. Carter's administration had released his proposed military budgets for a second term of 1981-1985. If one reads it, one sees the Reagan military build up would have occurred anyway. Carter's defense chief, Harold Brown, was a major war hawk (meaning war criminal for the rest of us).

5. Carter dithered while the oil companies reaped tremendous profits in the last two years of his term. He simply accepted the oligopoly in oil as capitalism, and, like another one term engineer, Herbert Hoover, believed there was little he could do.

6. Despite placing human rights at the center of his rhetoric, Carter presided over the rise in Central American death squads, and funneled money to Guatemala through Israel, when the Guatemalan death squads became too hot a topic in the US Congress. One needs to at least skim the late journalist Penny Lernoux's "Cry of the People" (1980 edition), which shows the continuities from Nixon through Carter in this regard. I will give him props for Robert White, his El Salvador ambassador, who saw how horrible the death squads were and how the El Salvadoran government was ultimately behind those squads, no matter their denials. And with regard to Iran, he had no business listening to David Rockefeller and the Cold War Establishment in having the Shah return to the US for medical treatment--which was true this time, but which Iranians believed was the same lie told in 1953 when the US was plotting its infamous coup against Mossedegh to reinstall the Shah. Carter brought on himself what became the Iranian hostage crisis--though it is now fairly clear Reagan's people interfered with the hostages' return in 1980 to ensure Reagan could make Carter look weak.

7. Despite the above, as with Clinton, Obama, and Biden, there are bright spots to be sure. They start with judicial appointments, and a few brave souls who Carter appointed to administrative roles who tried, in good faith, to do good business regulatory work. There were increases in the minimum wage, but those were hard-fought with a Carter White House which gave the rhetoric but wondered, in the meetings with Congressional leaders, why increases were necessary. Again, as stated at the start, Carter did not really understand the New Deal or the utility of labor unions.

So, please. It is more than appropriate to mourn the end of Carter's long life, and describe him as the greatest ex-president since John Quincy Adams. One may state in that regard how he was so often a force for peace, post-presidency, and his gallant work with getting Israel and Egypt to peace (mostly pushing Israel, one must add). But, please do not overstate what was a failed presidency. He was not hampered by a bad faith Congress the way John Quincy Adams was, for example, which opposed Adams even on things they agreed with him about in order to make him a failed president. Carter had much more ability to make good things happen, and his micromanagement and his inability to get beyond neolib nostrums that opposed New Deal politics ultimately did him in.

After the Ordeal, but Out of Season: A post-mortem from my FB page-post. For posterity?

 I wrote all this on my FB page. And I now repeat it here, with slight edits, for blogging posterity. :)

My daughter called around 1:30 am my time in New Mexico when I had been sleeping. My initial thoughts in response to her disbelief (she was shocked, but not surprised) were as follows:

1. Harris put Israel above the Republic. Her strategy to get white women Republican voters failed. Arab- and Muslim-Americans in Michigan appear to be deciding to put themselves at risk rather than even tacitly support genocide of their relatives. College kids in Michigan decided risking real fascism was better than supporting genocide, too. Just as I feared across the board. And it looks like this had an effect in Wisconsin and the now largely pro-union, but minority-led union, Nevada (where "none of the above"--a Nevada innovation--won 1.3%).

2. This is the angry male election, including Gen-Z men and high school diploma working-class men. And these men wonder why women in their statuses won't fuck them anymore. Also, for black and Latino men who supported Trump, your families need to have an intervention with you. Seriously.

3. The late poll in Iowa? Dead wrong. Waaay wrong.

4. Harris won NM by five points and the Greens didn't even make 1%. RFK, Jr. got twice as many votes. Cryptobros rejoice at 1% My vote didn't cause Harris to lose, but Stein votes will cause Trump to win Michigan. But, see #1. This is on you, Kamala. On. You.

I'm going back to sleep. I have class tomorrow (later this morning?). Oh well.

UPDATE AT 4:25 AM AFTER A FITFUL SLEEP:

May I offer the macroeconomic analysis here? Inflation was generally higher in other economically advanced nations than in the US. Most voters in most of these nations didn't know about inflation except in their own nation. Since 2022, most incumbent executive leaders lost their spots. The Dems were always going to have a hard time in 2024 because the US marginal or swing voters don't know about inflation in Europe or elsewhere. And they never really understood how much corporate oligopolistic practices drove inflation, starting with the oligopolistic oil companies.

Therefore, to overcome that structural and economic based political disadvantage, this was a get-out-the-base-vote election. And true to form, the Republicans leaned into their smaller base and picked up the marginal swing voters they needed in enough states under our Electoral College system. The Dems? Well, the Dems pissed on their larger coalition or base. This was ultimately proving once and for all, David Frum's formulation: The Republican Party leadership fears its base. The Democratic Party leadership hates its base.

The biggest constitutional irony is Harris may still likely prevail in the popular vote, though we would need to count "none of the above" and "Green" votes, I think. But, right now, Trump may win 51% per the NYT. Still, our Founders, if they could be brought back, would be appalled at what just occurred. The reason they compromised on the Electoral College was not only to please enslavement states, but because they did not trust even their white male (and minute black male numbered) property owners to get things right for president. We know they would not have supported Trump because, in the 1800 election, the elite people ensured that Burr would not win. We know that because we must remember how Hamilton, Jefferson's nemesis through the 1790s, switched to Jefferson rather than let Burr win. Burr was seen by most of the influential people and elites as too ethically-challenged. And Burr looks like a saint compared to Trump in that department. Oh, a sad irony for our still-brilliant, though flawed, Founders.

(UPDATE: November 7, 2024: Man, was I wrong on this last part! Harris lost the popular vote by about four million. More startling, she underperformed Biden from 2020 by over 10 million. Trump also lost around 2 million from 2020. I think one has to count COVID deaths in small part. However, I do believe Harris' tamping down enthusiasm from various parts of the Democratic Party base had its effects for Harris, and not just the sexism and racism people often have. What I also have read is the economy did push those marginal-can't decide voters Trump's way, which is, again, what I am talking about further above and why the Dems' larger base needed to be far more excited.)

"UPDATE: November 12, 2024: Well, now it looks like the missing votes were far, far less. Looks like a 2020 vs. 2024 delta of 1.5 million more in 2020, if that. And Trump may be closer to 50% than 51%. Still, that's a lot of people who couldn't vote in 2020 but got to vote in 2024, and COVID deaths and normal mortality rates on top of that may not be netting out. I remain convinced Dems pissing on their base had an adverse effect.)

And perhaps this is the long-awaited karma of Comanches, Dine, Chickasaws, Creeks, and Iroquois, among others. As my scientific son has said for months now, as he played with Tarot Cards,"The Tarot Cards say we will get what we deserve." The problem, of course, is a lot of people who don't deserve it will suffer.

As for me, in this moment, I am now more alienated from most people than I think I've ever been. I am sick of resistance liberals, and disgusted with Zionists and Republicans. Oh well. Again. ___________

I titled this post based upon two progressive rock instrumentals from the early to mid 1970s. The melodies and overall musical structures capture my mood. "After the Ordeal" is from Genesis' 1973 album, "Selling England By the Pound." The song comes right after "The Battle of Epping Forest", which is about the always-senseless gangland warfare in a British forest. The last lines of the Battle song are: "There's no one left alive/Must be a draw/So the Black Barons toss a coin to settle the score." The other song, "Out of Season," musically captures my alienation, but also my determination to move forward The song is from the legendary Canterbury prog rock band, Soft Machine, released in 1975.

The Atlantic's take on young people and reading: not as bad as its take on Israel, but not good

I guess The Atlantic wants to expand its embarrassing takes beyond Israel to now college undergraduate reading habits. William Dean Howells continues to be, well, howling.

My take on this is that the quote early in the article about professors whining "'the kids don't read' is as old as colleges" is correct. I had a seminar course as an undergaduate at Rutgers in the 1970s with an old guy, already in his early 70s, who said it every week. In those days of the mid to late 1970s, at Rutgers, most students I observed, including majors in Political Science or History, the two disciplines in which I majored, didn't read most of the books they were assigned. I hated the classes where the profs tried to lead discussions of the chapters or book students were supposed to have read because it was clear to me most of the class had not. They showed up to simply want the prof to spoon-feed them what the prof thought was important. I stopped attending many of those classes, or would leave before halftime of the class.

I admit that was not a good strategy to get As. Often, I would get Bs more than As, as, come test time, I would have a slightly different take on a reading. It was my view then that too many of my Rutgers professors were themselves fairly shallow and unable to transcend their own perspectives. However, if there was an extra credit question that was based on a footnote in the book at page 172, I would likely be the only one (or maybe one of two) to get the answer correct. I will also say I did best with the profs, like the great Cold War revisionist/US Foreign Policy History professor, Lloyd Gardner (still alive in his 90s last I checked!), who didn't do discussions. They simply assigned the eight to ten books you had to read and you were expected to read and understand. He would say, Come to office hours if a reading is too hard. In class, he lectured with supplemental information not in the books. It was one of the only times I ever took notes. I received As in each of the three classes I took from him. Yet, most History majors thought his classes were a terror. I would bet most of my fellow History majors who became teachers or profs are, to this day, probably not very bright--unless they grew up and realized you gotta read and think critically. :)

Even while I am in grad school at UNM, I continue to hear from people who attended grad school elsewhere, are currently in grad school, and even professors, that it is foolish and too much to read entire books. In my classes, there is, admittedly, A LOT of reading. For each class, most of the time, we have to read each week an entire academic book of two to three hundred pages PLUS write a paper on the book for submission before class--and then be ready to discuss in the class.

I realize The Atlantic is talking about undergrads, but I must say this: In my grad school classes, the quality of the discussions is actually better than I ever saw at Rutgers in the 1970s. I must also add I do have a two-level course this semester, meaning graduate and undergraduate students in the same class. My observation of the undergrads is there remains largely the same Bell Curve of who has read or not read the assigned readings as I saw as an undergraduate at Rutgers in the 1970s--maybe slightly better now.

The idea that today's young people are somehow deficient, when I see so many, many racist, xenophobic, transphobic, uninformed, ignorant assholes and idiots in my age level, tells me maybe this take from The Atlantic may not be correct. Really. Let's run through my ranting drill about my generation: Most Boomers are the reason the planet's oceans are starting to fry. Most Boomers happily accept being herded into the political duopoly. Most Boomers hated Bernie and would rather see fascism than somehow their taxes go up to help their children's or grandchildren's generation. Most Boomers learned long ago to support the US military-industrial complex mass murders, especially when perpetrated by the US' favorite client-state, Israel--and too many think criticizing Israel as an apartheid ethno-nationalist state is antisemitic. But, sure. The young people don't know how to read a book. Sure. For me, I start with the proposition of "Give the kids a break." And maybe hear the kids out for once. And if some of the best and brightest get angry and impatient at the challenges our society and planet face, instead of thinking they are too naive or need to grow up, apologize and ask them, "What can we do to make this better, even if it costs me more of my money?"