Victor Navasky (1932-2023)

The Los Angeles Times provides a great capsule bio of the now late Victor Navasky.  As editor and later publisher of The Nation, Navasky was not perfect nor even the greatest editor, but definitely in the top three or four.  Navasky was a genial person and very much an open book. But, the strange thing for me is his (and Eric Alterman's) strong dislike of Freda Kirchwhey, The Nation's first female editor (Katrina vanden Heuvel would be the second) during the tumultuous left period of the 1930s through mid 1950s. Freda did end badly, wanting to sue various people for libel, but I tended to agree with Alexander Cockburn that Freda was no Stalinist, and penned one of the greatest short editorials of the 20th Century, Red Totalitarianism in May 1939.  She allowed Stalinists some space in The Nation pages, to be sure, but she was very clear where the disagreement was, and where the absurdities and murder were in the Stalin era of the Soviet Union--something the late Susan Sontag seemed to have missed in her admittedly off-handed praise of Readers' Digest while dissing The Nation. 

For me, I adored Navasky's book, Kennedy Justice, about a 35 year old RFK taking over the Justice Department, and learning from his staff as much as leading it through the heart of the African-American Civil Rights era. His book on the blacklist suffered from his ironically liberal's view of the Red Scare, and one recalls with some wincing, after Allen Weinstein's book was released, his attempt to deny Alger Hiss was a Communist Party member or affiliate, instead of hitting the main question head on: Was Hiss really a spy for the Soviet Union any more than Allen or John Foster Dulles were in the latter brothers' footsie relationships with various and leading Nazis? Navasky was unable to properly articulate how American foreign policy, within the DC power corridors, is really about leverage, maneuvering, and power relations--and how American domestic politics drives American foreign policy politics in nearly any particular time or era.  One thinks back even to the 1790s and how Jeffersonians and Hamiltonians accused each other of treason. The anti-New Deal right, in the immediate post-FDR period, successfully used the mass corporate media to push an anti-Communist hysteria, and its initial focus was to purge from government the New Deal Internationalists, meaning those who sought what was ironically a premature detente with the Soviet Union. Thus, it was necessary to make the usual diplomatic relationships various people in the FDR orbit maintained with Soviet officials from the late 1930s through World War II into something far more nefarious than any sober analysis would have revealed.  I once met Navasky at the Los Angeles Times Book Festival in the early aughts, and sought a chance to explore this point as part of a defense of Hiss and certainly Harry Dexter White. I don't blame him for a lack of interest as I remain a nobody. :). Still, he could have used the insight, if I may be so bold and perhaps arrogant to say. LOL.

Navasky's brilliance was to brand The Nation, something which his immediate successor, Katrina vanden Heuvel, even more fully embraced and developed. I used to proudly wear my black baseball cap of The Nation logo and t-shirt of the same style till they could not be worn anymore.  Over the years, though, The Nation faded as a place where I learned all that much--too many other outlets arose on the Internet--so that it is only the NYRB where I find I learn something profound in every issue.  I don't know if that speaks as much to my activist side or my antiquarian side as I myself age.  I hope Navasky's legacy in his works will burn bright, and his leadership of a political magazine continue to inspire. 

Another high point in progressive and classic rock/fusion jazz: 1973

 We are now beginning fifty years from 1973. Here is a nice post from the Lawyers Guns & Money blog about music, film, and literature which enters the public domain in this year, 2023.  

However, I am here to list great albums released in 1973--and even some not so great albums from people and bands who were and remain well known.  I am too lazy today to list the albums in monthly order, and will just list the bands and individuals off top of me 'ead, as The Who would have sang in slang for their great 1973 double album, Quadrophenia.  But, despite some clunker albums, 1973 is a definitely a high water mark for progressive rock and for classic rock.  I may have forgotten some obvious and not so obvious albums, but I hope this is comprehensive. :)

The Who, Quadrophenia.  I consider this The Who's best album, even better than 1967's clever The Who Sell Out, 1969's brilliant Tommy, and 1971's definitely remarkable and wonderful Who's Next, which I consider a perfect single album.  Quadophenia, though, flows right through two whole album disks, and is continually remarkable again for two albums.

Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon. Any questions? Really? Any? I didn't think so.

Led Zeppelin, Houses of the Holy. Zep at its most aggressive and adventurous. It is a classic. Bar none.

Gentle Giant, Octopus (American release was in March 1973; British release was December 1972). Amazing album. Sublime all the way through.

Gentle Giant, In a Glass House (an import only album at the time of its release in the fall of 1973). Super amazing album.  Doubly sublime all the way through.

Gryphon. Self-titled. Amazing first album.

Jethro Tull, A Passion Play. I consider this perhaps the greatest single prog rock album of all time.  I recently listened to it again and was struck that I could call this a concerto that is deeper and richer than Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. It is just a powerfully brilliant album, which one may analyze the music even more than the lyrics, which themselves are Ian Anderson's final set of critiques of the way in which human beings distort theology and operate religions as institutions. 

Genesis, Selling England by the Pound. I have considered this album, released in November 1973, as the most beautifully produced Genesis album, and its most perfect flowing album--start to finish. It is a journey of gorgeousness, with Collins' drumming perhaps the most astonishing part of the album, despite being able to also say how great are Banks' keys and Hackett's beautiful guitar phrasing. 

King Crimson, Lark's Tongue in Aspic.  Fripp was paying homage to Ralph Vaughan William's The Lark Ascending, but with far more atonality in the title opening track. This is a perfect album to listen to, but it is not for the feint of hearts.  It is a rough album, but one Stereo Review called the most perfectly recorded album its staff had ever heard anywhere in any recorded musical work. That was high praise at a time when the attacks on progressive rock were in full force at The Village Voice, Rolling Stone, Creem, and Circus magazines, as well as the NYT and LA Times.  Only Melody Maker and Trouser Press in Great Britain were showing respect and love for progressive rock--though the technical journals, Guitar Player, Keyboard Player, and Modern Drumming, were showing respect, as well.

Yes, Tales from Topographic Oceans. A double album that simultaneously is outstanding, and yet the excess that Yes was criticized for shows up to make those critics' point.  This is a double album that would have been better broken up or cut to one disk without excess phrasings and long-winded deviations from a clear musical path.  Jon Anderson's lyrics were never more dense, unfortunately, but the first side or song of the four sides/songs remains some of the most compelling musical work from the legendary band. It still doesn't top 1972's Close to the Edge, but it comes within the distance to be compelling on its own.

Rick Wakeman, Six Wives of Henry VIII. This was an amazing album, and ironically showed up his band, Yes.  Just start to listen to these six songs on this album and you won't stop till its done.

Renaissance, Ashes Are Burning. This is the greatest pop-prog album of all time. All. Time. Why this album did not transport Renaissance into a top selling band is a crime against the arts.  This is a gorgeous album that even non-prog fans, especially females of the time (Females who came of age starting in the 1990s became far more likely to embrace progressive rock than female Baby Boomers. It was a joke that was true that, at prog rock concerts, there were no lines for the women's bathroom halfway through--but there were lines at the men's bathrooms.).

Strawbs, Bursting at the Seams.  Some of the greatest progressive folk came from The Strawbs, and this album is a continuing delight from start to finish. This album will knock you over if you've never heard The Strawbs--and even if you have. The Strawbs is another band that should have had Top 40 hits but never achieved that in the US at least.

Kayak, See See the Sun.  This is the first album by this prog pop band, which should have had multiple hits in the US, but never did. The melodies they created were so clever, and made you want to jump around. Great stuff. 

Magma, Mekanik Destruktiw Kommandoh.  Yeah, hard to pronounce, but for prog fans, fun to listen to.

Veloso, from Brazil, Araca Azul.  Wild stuff from a band I missed the first time around.

Som Imaginario, Matanca do Porto. A master work from this Brazilian prog band. Again, missed this the first time around.

Al Stewart, Past, Present, and Future. This is the greatest of Al Stewart progressive folk albums and, apart from a weak opening track, is perfect. I mean it. Perfect. It is a brilliantly conceived album, with eight tracks, one for each decade of the 20th Century (history buffs will be amazed!), and the last song called Nostradamus, which is iconic.

Cat Stevens, Foreigner. Cat's most progressive of his progressive folk albums, with side one consisting of one song (title track) for over 18 minutes. The Hurt is on side two, and that is enough for most people--but this is a great album overall.

Steeleye Span, Parcel of Rogues. I have placed the progressive folk in one section as I type, and this is a classic Steeleye Span album.  My favorite remains the 1972 release Below the Salt, but this is a close second.

Horslips, The Tain. This is an amazing progressive folk and rocking album from my favorite Irish band of all time.  This is a concept album about Irish mythology that is a knockout.

Tranquility, Silver.  Just for the title track, one must hear this album. It is a classic that the title track alone should have gone major popular. The commercial failure killed this otherwise amazingly talented band.

Paul Simon, There Goes Rhymin' Simon. This was not as strong as his debut album overall, but it contains Kodachrome and American Tune, so those are two important Simon works.

Kinks, Preservation Act 1.  This album is not as strong as Preservation Act 2, but it will more than do.

Peter Hammill, Chameleon in the Shadow of the Night. An eccentric album, to be sure, but for Hammill and Van Der Graaf Generator fans, always a pleasure.

Harry Nilsson, A Little Touch of Nilsson in the Night. An eccentric album of Nilsson doing 20th Century standards from the Great American Songbook. Out of place and time, and poignant to listen to in the early 21st Century. 

Victor Jara, Canto por travseura.  Jara's last album before his murder during the Chilean military coup, which our nation criminally supported.  The meaning of this title is Mischievous Songs.  Ironic. Or daring Fate. Sad and angering either way.  People call him the Bob Dylan of Chile. He is much more Phil Ochs, but as popular in Chile as Dylan has been here in the US.

Allman Brothers Band, Brothers and Sisters. This post-Duane Allman album contains Rambling Man and Jessica. Need one say more?  Nope.

Poco, Crazy Eyes. A surprisingly powerful album where its lead guy, Richie Furay, had just left.

Tom Waits, Closing Time. The Waits sound begins here. It is important.

The Stooges (Iggy Pop), Raw Power. Yeah. Just listen.

Queen, self-titled album. This is worth listening to if only to hear the beginning of a sound that resonates through today.

10cc, self-titled album. Same as with Queen. Hear the etiology of the sound that became well known, though not anywhere near as known as Queen.

Hatfield and the North, self-titled first album. This is an album one has to listen to at least twice to realize how brilliant it is--and how powerful it is.  It is powerful. It is wonderful. It is as perfect example of Canterbury progressive rock as one may hear.

Caravan, Girls Who Go Plump in the Night. One thing about Canterbury bands of the early 1970s were their sexist sort of humor, and naughty lyrics--not obscene in the crass way, but sorta Eton British-public-school sort of way.  A sort of Pythonesque approach to lyrics.  The music, though, was and remains very serious, and more fusion jazz than anything pop oriented.  It is powerful stuff. 

Henry Cow, Legend. Another Canterbury fan of which I was not so enamored, but respectful of. This is a classic Henry Cow album, and as good an album to try.  Henry Cow was not as enamored with the usual Canterbury band humor, and I think this is because there was a female vocalist, which kept the guys from being, well, sexist in their orientation. 

Soft Machine, Six and Seven, two very serious instrumental oriented jazz oriented rock from the Canterbury scene. Soft Machine was perhaps the original Canterbury rock band.

Frank Zappa, Over Nite Sensation.  I don't like this album as much as most Zappa fans. It has Dinah-Mo-Hum, Montana, and Zomby Woof, but those songs never moved me as much.  Still, it is a classic album and deserves the notoriety and fame it has among Zappa fans.

Nektar, Remember the Future. The true prog album from this band, which went more in a pop direction and gained some fame that Renaissance never could achieve. 

Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Brain Salad Surgery. This is an album that is not as consistent as Tarkus (1971) or Trilogy (1972), but its highs are the highest highs in the ELP repertoire.  The strongest tracks are Karn Evil no. 9 (both parts) and Jerusalem. 

Mike Oldfield, Tubular Bells.  This was an event, which even the progressive oriented rock stations in NY and LA had to cover, even though this was essentially one song on two sides of an album. It became an unlikely hit because, unbeknownst to Oldfield, Virgin Records sold the rights to Hollywood to use in the horror film, The Exorcist, which pissed off Oldfield to no end--at least until the big royalty checks came rolling in. He was still righteously angry, but how could he not cash the checks? :)

Premiata Forneria Marconi, Photos of Ghosts (the English version of 1972's Per un Amico).  You just start with the song, Celebration, and it is a joyous ride throughout this album.

Banco del Mutuo Soccorso, Lo Sono Nato Libero. Another brilliant gem from this Italian rock band (as was and is PFM).

Le Orme, Felona e Sorona. An extraordinary album from a band that would continue well into our unfolding century, again from Italy.  It has been called one of the finest examples of Italian prog rock, which is saying something pretty strong.

Argent, In Deep. This is a highly unappreciated album, which contains God Gave Rock & Roll to You, but a great many others. This is an album one can simply drive through and say, "How did I miss THIS album?!"--right down to one of the greatest power ballad songs of all time, which closes the album (the song is Losing Hold).

Mahavisnu Orchestra, Birds of Fire. This may be the most complete album of the orchestra, right from the opening track, which is in 7/8 time.  This is four musicians who are at the top of their respective games, but still not done.

Return to Forever, Light as a Feather. This is a perfect album that is far more jazz than even fusion, with the beautiful vocal work from Flora Purim, and as cool a sound as ever produced in this era for any jazz album. Chick Corea and Stanley Clarke reshape the band the same year and produce a second album....

Return to Forever, Hymn to the Seventh Galaxy, which turns the band into a space age, psych-prog rock instrumental band that is the true rendition of jazz-rock fusion. The opening track is worth the price of admission to the rest of the album, even as it falls off.  It is just that hard driving to hear fifty years later.

Electric Light Orchestra, ELO 2, which contains the greatest version of Roll Over Beethoven, but has some outstanding progressive rock tracks, culminating with Kuiama, an anti-war song that is 11 minutes of compelling, hard-driving bliss.  This was the album Jeff Lynne took over the band and reshaped it from The Move--Roy Wood's band--to The Idle Race, Lynne's band before Lynne joined The Move as it was transitioning to what became ELO.  The first ELO album, No Answer, was more of a Roy Wood affair, with Lynne following Wood's lead. In ELO 2, it was now Lynne's vision. This second album was released early in 1973. Then, later in 1973, a third album from the band was released, which was both prog oriented but pop starting to assert itself....

Electric Light Orchestra, On the Third Day. This has some juicy prog-pop tracks throughout, and one can again just let the needle start and you will find yourself never picking up that needle until you turn the other side, and then start over again.  It is a flowing album.

Alice Cooper Band, Billion Dollar Babies. This is the last of the great Alice Cooper Band albums, before Alice Cooper went solo--and for me at least stopped producing compelling music. The run of albums going back to Love it to Death (1971), Killer (1971), and School's Out (1972) remain some of the most underrated albums in the annals of rock. These albums, including BDB, contain sophisticated rock tracks that make you stand at attention to listen to over and over.

Black Sabbath, Sunday Bloody Sabbath. This is where Black Sabbath went into its full metal mode, even more than Black Sabbath Vol. 4 (1972). It is an iconic album that defines the genre for the next several decades, it is that outstanding.

Todd Rundgren, Wizard: A True Star.  Rundgren's great progressive solo album, from start to finish. It is a continual joy ride where, despite the album cover saying there are separate tracks, this is akin to Tull's A Passion Play in being one album long song.  It is so much fun to listen to, and hear the overdub power, with beautiful melodies, throughout. One of the last lines of the album is "Wait another year/Utopia is here/But there's more..." which I had no idea meant a Rundgren band, Utopia, was coming in 1974--with a deeply progressive rock sound. That album is a knock out, too!

Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come, Journey.  This is an album, which, when I heard it the first time in 1974, I said to a then-semi-girlfriend (who hated it), "This is so great an album that, when kids in the year 2000 hear this album, they will be amazed and awed!"  She just said this album stunk. It is still almost scary to listen to this album. I strongly advise keeping the lights on when listening.  But this album can't beat Kingdom Come's Galactic Zoo Dossier from 1971. That is one of the truly greatest progressive rock albums of all time.  All. Time.

Darryl Way's Wolf released two albums in 1973 that may as well have been one album. They are Canis Lupus and Saturation Point. The musicianship is as great as Mahavishnu Orchestra, and the songs often even more compelling. It is a tragedy this band did not get airplay in the US, as it should have. Really. It should have. 

Beach Boys, Holland. This is a great album, not even remotely appreciated as a very different sort of album from the classic Beach Boy albums. It is more Eagles oriented, but I loved this album more than the Eagles' work--which says more about my taste than most others.  Still, those who hear this album are nearly always more than pleasantly surprised and wonder why they did not hear more than Sail on Sailor on most commercial radio stations.

Billy Joel, Piano Man. This is the album that put Billy Joel into permanent stardom. It is a much recognized album and I don't have to say a word one way or the other. For me, it was an initial disappointment, because I knew Joel from Attila, the great progpsych album from 1971. But, for most Americans, this is a classic.  I enjoy it, I admit. 

Stevie Wonder, Innervisions. This is Wonder at his most prog oriented while maintaining a funk pop sound that makes him a visionary and well, wonder.  For Living for the City alone, this is an iconic album.

Spoken word/Comic albums:

George Carlin had an album, Operation: Foole, which I don't find all that important. However, Robert Klein released a comedy album, Child of the 50s, which is must listening. It is so damned funny fifty years later. I mean it.  It is fantastically funny!

More politically incorrect in various parts in 2023, but still laugh-out-loud and pee your pants funny, was the late Chris Rush's first album, First Rush, released in 1973. Rush was a cultural leftist of the time, and likely political and economic leftist, too. He never went right wing as far as I could tell, though he essentially stopped producing albums, with one in 1981 and one in 1997, both a decline from the first album--though the 1981 album had some high moments. Rush would show up at NYC clubs from time to time, but I never got to see him.

What were the individual Beatles up to in 1973?

John Lennon, Mind Games. I did not appreciate this album at the time of its release. However, by the 1980s, with the demise of prog rock from any radio stations and pre-Internet, I found this album and was shocked at myself for not seeing its brilliance, starting with its title track.

George Harrison, Living in the Material World. Another album that grew on me as the years went by.

Wings (Paul McCartney), Red Rose Speedway. I leave the weight of this double album to others, but respect Sir Paul too much to put in the clunker album pile below.

Ringo Starr, Ringo.  Oh My My, You're Sixteen (ew), and I'm the Greatest.  For me, this is awful and frankly embarrassing, but it's an album from a Beatle.  These songs remain popular on commercial radio, which I don't get at all.  Beatle or no Beatle. 

Bands who put out albums that were not my cuppa tea, but others adore:

Rolling Stones, Goats Head Soup. Angie is on this album, but, for me, nothing else is compelling. This was already in what I see as the Stones' decline into mediocrity and branding. But, YMMV.

Bob Dylan, Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid. Soundtrack album. I am not sure what to say here, as it is not my cuppa tea, but I blow mostly cold on Dylan after 1972, meaning after Tangled Up in Blue.

Eagles, Desperado. An iconic West Coast sound album. Simple, direct. Not my cuppa tea, but I know that is just my elitist taste. :)

Jackson Browne, For Everyman. Another classic West Coast sound album I am admittedly not inclined to be listened to in my meh-ness for it. :)

Nazareth, Razamanaz and Loud N Proud. Another band, this one from Scotland, I was not into, but others swore by.

Now, for some albums released in 1973 that were very weak for these bands. However, as stated above, 1973 remains such an amazing year for music that even these relatively weak albums do not tarnish 1973 for its greatness:

Grateful Dead, Wake of the Flood. This is the first Dead album without Pigpen, its keyboardist who had died. Pigpen's replacement was a keyboardist with more jazz tastes, and, with the new keys player's wife in backing vocals, produced a different sort of Dead album that Dead fans may claim to love, but I personally did not find listenable at all. Maybe if I listened again?  Not sure. 

The Band, Moondog Matinee. Sadly, not a memorable album at all from this legendary band--at least in this not-humble guy's opinion. YMVV.

David Bowie, Aladdin Sane and Pin Ups. Other than The Jean Genie and perhaps a couple of other songs from Aladdin Sane, these two albums are in-betweeners for Bowie. Diamond Dogs is coming in 1974, which is sublime and iconic.

Santana, Welcome. A weak album from the legendary band. The previous three albums were the key albums, as even Classic Rock stations will show by what they play. 

Camel. Not a memorable first album (self-titled), but watch out for the next several albums that begin in 1974.

Uriah Heep, Sweet Freedom. A weak follow up the powerful 1972 album, The Magician's Birthday. 

Van Morrison, Hard Nose the Highway. A weak album, with nothing much one can begin to say.

Bee Gees, Life in a Tin Can. A forgettable album, in between The Bee Gees as a Beatleseque progressive folk act to a disco act. 

Flash, Out of Our Hands. Yup. Too bad, though.

Esperanto, Esperanto Rock Orchestra. A weak opening album, but its next album in 1974, Danse Macabre, is one of the greatest progressive rock albums of all time.

Charlene Mitchell (1930-2022): Justice seeker

One reads this obituary and sees the pattern. A nice then young person who recognized the rot and racism inside the American Dream joined the only political party in the late 1940s which was foursquare for African-American civil rights--the Communist Party. She came from a family which escaped the white southern American terror against African-Americans, and had a dad in what was one of the greatest unions of its time, the porter union. She then rose in the Communist Party ranks just as the Party was decimated--but note the article said at its height there were only 75,000 Communist Party members, so one wonders what the massive fear ever was. As those who know me know, Bill Buckley let the cat out of the political bag when he wrote (with his brother in law Brent Bozell) that the true purpose of the Red Scare was to defeat liberalism overall (see page 333 of "McCarthy and his Enemies" 1954).

 

But, despite all the challenges she faced as a leftist black woman in the 1950s and 1960s, Ms. Mitchell became fairly expert in organizing defenses of black women who were caught up in the criminal (in)justice system. She eventually split from the Party, as she obviously realized the Party was, again, too decimated--and also demonized to be of any continuing value.

If anyone wanted to say her life is ultimately a failure, that would be using the wrong historical lens. Her failure to be more politically successful is in the context of the triumph of fascist, reactionary, neoliberal, and general corporate elements in our politics. Charlene Mitchell represented a meaningful grass roots type of politics that, due to the structures of our political system, mostly only achieves success in the margins. Too many of us are either ignorant of how to recognize and see reforms of systems that repress regular folks, or are complicit in that system.

Thoughts about Gordon Wood's historiography

I was in a local ABQ used bookstore today (Organic Books) and found a book of book reviews from Gordon Wood entitled, The Purpose of the Past: Reflections on the Uses of History (2008). I have read a couple of essays already, and found them fascinating and brilliant--but also beginning to notice Wood's frustration with various modern historians, which has left Wood open to what I still see as harsh judgments against Wood. What I found interesting is several reviews in the book first appeared in the New York Review of Books. When checking with the NYRB archive on line, though, I found instances of historians whose books he reviewed who failed to respond in the NYRB letters section. For me, I have said failing to respond to a negative or critical review in the NYRB is a sign of intellectual cowardice, though I would hesitate to make an overall judgment of those historians for that failure to respond. 

Be that as it may, while doing a wider online search of Wood and the historians whose books he was reviewing, I came across a critical review of Wood's recent book on Jefferson and Adams in Law & Liberty magazine, a culturally conservative, yet pro-capitalist libertarian magazine. The review was from a former doctoral student of Wood's, C. Bradley Thompson, himself is known as a cultural conservative and libertarian of the hard line capitalist persuasion.

I post here to say Thompson's criticism of Wood's book is one I strongly support and agree with. As with Thompson, I have long believed Wood has remained too devoted (though he does not downplay Jefferson on slavery issues) to the late 19th through much of the 20th Century historians' over-veneration of Jefferson, and, simultaneously, dismissal of John Adams. Thompson makes the type of case I would hope to have been able to make on behalf of Adams, while revealing Jefferson's limitations as being a man devoted to "democracy" and being a "man of the people." The essay (more than a review) is an excellent and compelling read--though I am surprised Thompson did not cite Adams' remarks concerning his fear of a commercial aristocracy, though that link is from a book written nearly seven years after the review.  I don't think Thompson chose the title of his essay-review, which I believe is more dismissive of Wood than Thompson likely intended.

This leads me to say the following: It continues to be both sad and amusing for me to see how Wood, who in 2007, was the subject of criticism from Stephen F. Hayward for being too "anti-capitalist" and the "liberals'" favorite historian, is now too often viewed as a conservative, even reactionary historian--particularly as a result of Wood's essentially correct critique of the "1619 Project." 

In the last four or five decades, Wood has really not fundamentally changed his essential view of American history. Wood has definitely deepened, and made room for modifications of, his views, yes. But has he fundamentally changed his essential view of US History? No. I say that, however, not as a criticism, but as a testament to Wood's greatness as an overall scholar from the time he began as a professional historian--particularly with books such as Radicalism of the American Revolution, The Creation of the American Republic, and Empire of Liberty. Yet, the world of historians and political commentators have gone from viewing Wood as a liberal anti-capitalist, devoted to New Deal values, to a pro-Establishment and even conservative historian--all without Wood moving much in any particular direction from where he has nearly always been. Wood himself, at age 89, must be scratching his head over this perception with the same elements of sadness and amusement.

Other than his conclusions about Jefferson and Adams, what I most admire about Wood is his consistent recognition of ironies in history. This recognition has kept Wood from falling into historical trends that turn into fads. For example, Wood recognized our Founders were mercantilists, not capitalists, which caused Wood to be less enamored with Charles Beard's historiography than other historians of Beard's time. Wood came of age in the 1950s, and was definitely influenced by consensus-historians, which has its virtues and limitations. Wood has certainly never been a Marxian sort of historian, even as Wood again recognized and wrote reasonably positively about anti-capitalist tendencies in American ideals and society during the 18th and 19th Centuries. Recently, Wood's same sense of ironies in history has led him to avoid becoming attached to modern historians who appear to seek to turn American history into a continuing cultural war, which even Marxian oriented historians, such as the outstanding Adolph Reed, have been critical of such historians for either misunderstanding or obscuring diverse and countervailing economic and political patterns within US History.  It is of a moment to note the first major attack on the "1619 Project" came from the Worldwide Socialist Web.

Nonetheless, as I hinted near the start of this blog post, I can sense, in reading the last and another essay in the book of essay-book reviews, there is an element of "old guy" frustration (crankiness?) embedded in some of Wood's criticisms of younger historians' (and, most amusingly, the late Theodore Draper, who was older than Wood by nearly two decades!) focus away from the role of ideas in US History. Too many critiques of Wood are now insinuating Wood was and is against women's history, African-American history, etc. However, Wood has been clear these newer histories have enhanced the study of history, and made our nation's history vibrant for modern readers. Where the critiques against Wood then tend to go is to question Wood's integrity as to whether he believes what he claims--which, in my view, is unfair to Wood as an individual person. 

Also, Wood is not a presentist type of historian, but it is wrong to deny, in any way, that Wood wants us to learn from our history. He most certainly does want us to learn from history. What Wood the historian wants, however, is for readers and citizens to remember, not obscure or forget, context when discussing historical figures and making judgments regarding such figures. The irony of his former doctoral student's, Thompson's, review from Law & Liberty is how Thompson revealed where Wood has been still, in both our views, wrongly clinging to the earlier historian consensus regarding Adams and Jefferson, a "tradition" which goes back to Claude Bowers and even to George Bancroft. My criticism of Bowers and Bancroft, and now Wood, is they often failed or fail to provide sufficient context in the worlds in which Adams and Jefferson were operating, and, worse, not adequately recognizing Jefferson's cynical political maneuvers compared to Adams' stubborn, though, also naive, belief that statesmen and leaders of the then-new Republic should remain above partisan politics.  Those of us who admire Adams, though, cannot get around the Alien & Sedition Acts of 1798, and Jefferson's strong, fairly consistent, and ultimately correct, opposition to those heinous acts.  It is where Thompson and I must yield space and merit to those critical of Adams. 

The ultimate irony for me is Thompson's criticism of Wood in Law & Liberty magazine may just as easily be seen as a left-oriented critique of Wood as much as a libertarian, and possibly a culturally conservative critique--all at the same time. This is why I find myself frustrated at the way in which modern historians and commentators are tossing Wood from one political persuasion to another, without giving Wood his due as an historian and scholar, and not evaluating Wood in a good faith manner. Thompson clearly reveres his former doctoral adviser, and is willing to debate Wood in good faith.  Would (pun intended?) that be the case in the way I am seeing Wood portrayed, particularly from those I otherwise find myself in political agreement.  I find myself in a strange place, but I persevere. :)

Zionism in the ruins

This post may well be a follow up to my post from February 14, 2020, "Zionism and its Discontents." But, I don't have the strength this morning to put in links to what I am saying. I am just saying, Trust me on this as I am either right or essentially right, anyway. 

As the morning media are announcing, Benjamin Netanyahu, who I have called "Nutty Yahoo" for a decade or more, has triumphantly returned to power in what I also call "apartheid Israel," with the fascist oriented Religious Zionism Party possibly coming in third.

Between Nutty Yahoo winning and that Religious Zionism Party getting enough votes, it may be nearly enough to govern. Those American Jews who think they have strong commonalities with the majority of the Jewish Israeli electorate need to really look in the mirror. As John Lennon sang, "The dream is over/What can I say?" Israel is already an apartheid state per B'Tsalem, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch (all three; a trifecta). Israel is now set to become more so. I feel awful for liberal and Left Zionists in Israel. They are outnumbered, and the structure of Israeli political discourse keeps them from speaking with Arabs and Arab Parties. It should not at this point especially. It is time for Jews and non-Jewish Arabs to come together and form a multi-ethnic/multi-religious group of people who want to live with each other, and push for a secular single state. Nutty Yahoo and his predecessors, including Nutty Yahoo a few times, have so divided up the West Bank, and keep bombing Gaza (while Gaza hauls out home made rockets that mostly miss any targets) that they destroyed the two-state solution.

These are the realities of Israeli society. It is time for American Jews of my age or near by age, and older, to step back and reassess. Young American Jews have increasingly done so. Zionism was a rejection of religious doctrine, and the Reform Movement in the US used to be staunchly anti-Zionist until the mid 1930s. Zionism only became "popular" in the face of the Holocaust and the aftermath of the Holocaust. It was a nationalism that assumed the world will always be anti-Semitic, which I will be the first to admit we are reentering such an age of anti-Semitism. But, having us all run to Israel is no answer. It is what anti-Semites want so we can be bombed there in that relatively small geographical area. 

The late Israeli novelist, AB Yehoshua, was a staunch liberal Zionist for most of his life. He would exhort people such as my wife and me (we did not know him, he spoke generally), "Come to Israel! Help us against the religious right and Zionist right!" We didn't go. More Jewish Israelis left and those who went to Israel were Jewish loons thinking about Cowboys and Indians, with Palestinians as Indians. And those Arab nation Jewish refugees to Israel often had the same "Us or Them" mindset of the Arab nations they left. So, mix well and shake. It is why, in Yehoshua's last years, he embraced the single state, secular solution because he found plenty of Arabs of non-Jewish backgrounds willing to live in peace and without mullah interference.

Another way is necessary. It is no longer accept the limits of the current time. That is feeding into more of what happens in the current time. Therefore, as a person of Jewish heritage, I say what I have said for some years now: End all aid, military and economic, to Israel. Jettison Israeli government involvement with our military and police. Stop using Israel as a rear flank of the US military-industrial complex. And don't protect Israel in the United Nations any longer. It will need to be shunned as fully as the apartheid South African governments. These particular Jewish people do not speak for the Jewish religion. In truth, they really never did. There was only a Venn Diagram overlap in the face of the European (Christian dominated) Holocaust and aftermath.

Loretta Lynn was being consistent in criticizing sexism, but not being a feminist--ONLY if we agree she was a racist and a fascist

First, please read this heartfelt, intelligent essay from Amanda Marcotte in Salon.com regarding the passing of Loretta Lynn at the ripe old age of 90.

I must admit I had no idea the often odious neoliberal (and staunch anti-Bernie Sanders booster; just do a word search for her name with Sanders--SMH) Amanda Marcotte grew up in rural Texas. Marcotte's defense of Loretta Lynn is, however, astute for what it says, but is still profoundly troubling in a way which shows why Marcotte was so against the Bernie Sanders movement. And it has to do with race, and racial justice for our nation.  For Marcotte, she merely sees the gender issues, and doesn't want to face the intersection of race and gender in American society.  It is why the minimum wage raise or trade treaties were, for Marcotte, never as important as political issues as abortion, even though fighting for higher minimum wages and fighting back against the corporate oligarchy would have disproportionately positive effects for women of color, and women of all skin colors in lower paying jobs.

Anyway, what Marcotte misses in her analysis of Lynn's political-cultural views is what Irami Osei-Frimpong​ fully understands, which is the bargain too many white married women make with patriarchy because, in various ways, the patriarchy benefits them. This is how or why married white women too often side with their race over their gender, as that privilege they get as white women is a main part of that bargain with patriarchy. This point completely eludes Marcotte as she otherwise attempts to explain why Loretta Lynn was against sexism, but was not a feminist. To miss this, though, is to miss the essence of why that is not a contradiction.*

The key line in Marcotte's essay is when she describes the ultimate point of Lynn's anti-sexism songs, which was women should, first, be "just resigned to it," meaning sexism. Then, in the same sentence (!), Marcotte explains Lynn, as with other Red State married white women, was also "profoundly skeptical of feminist claims that change is possible."  However, that is not really skepticism, nor hardened cynicism. If one understands what Irami is saying, when a married white "conservative" woman says she is "profoundly skeptical of feminist claims that change is possible," it is, instead, a fearful recognition of losing the privilege white married women receive in a racially stratified society--which they don't want to lose.  

So, sorry, Loretta Lynn fans. Lynn was not walking a tightrope between fighting sexism, while merely avoiding the label of feminism. Loretta Lynn was a walking, talking, singing racist and fascist who was telling white women, in particular, she understood their pain from Bubba, but that is still better than racial justice. 

I make no comment on Lynn's music, as I am not a fan of most C&W.  I am good with Hank Williams and Patsy Cline, but it falls pretty fast for me from there.  

* Michelle Wolf, the great comic, understands this, too. See here.  Though this book shows it is much worse than Wolf says, but Wolf gets really, really close.

What we are learning this year and what must be done

This has been some year, and we are still not done yet. First, we learned that the people who are truly holding the morality card on the abortion issue are not the Fetus Cult, but those who recognize that pregnancy is a very profound women's health issue, and why pregnant women must be the priority over the fetus they are carrying. Second, we learned this week that the essence of the conservative position on immigration is one of racial hatred and especially cruelty. 

Fascist Republican jerks, Ron DeSantis and Gregg Abbott, assumed, in sending undocumented people, including those seeking asylum from nations suffering under economic sanctions our nation has enacted, to Martha's Vineyard in New England, that these "libs" would be as hateful and cruel as the conservatives who hate immigrants. If you saw the DeSantis press conference, at some point, you observed the tittering cruelty of his wife and others on the platform behind him, and, if you knew American history, would note echoes from the 1960s, when the southern state "welfare" policies were to do the same to poor black people, i.e. sending them north to let the Yankees deal with "them." But what did we learn this week? The people on Martha's Vineyard, after getting over the shock of people suddenly showing up at their doorsteps, stepped up and have been providing material and emotional support to these desperate people. So-called "libs" across the nation have been donating to the local church there to help these people as well. 

I really think we are well past the time when our society, starting with broadcast media, begins to openly shun, delegitimize, and root out people who call themselves right wing and even "conservative." To rephrase what William Buckley and Brent Bozell, Sr. wrote in their defense of Joseph McCarthy, at page 333 of their book, McCarthy & His Enemies (1954): "Some day, the patience of America may at last be exhausted, and we will strike out against (Conservatives). Not because they are treacherous...but because...we will conclude 'that they are mistaken in their predictions, false in their analyses, wrong in their advice, and through the results of their actions injurious to the interests of the nation. That is a reason enough to strive to free the conduct of the country's affairs from the influence of them and their works.'" Except, Buckley and Bozell were talking not of "conservatives," but "liberals." 

A major part of Buckley/Bozell's defense of the Red Scare and McCarthyism was to ensure we would not only delegitimize aggressive labor union leaders, and assorted "Reds," but also ensure there would never be another New Deal. The Red Scare political strategists and warriors came first for the New Deal internationalists, who sought detente in the first years after WWII, and were treated as if they were all traitors (not all were innocent of the charge, but most were). Then, the project was to ensure no socialist or communist was part of any major corporate owned media conversation so that the liberals became the "left." Then, even after McCarthy's censure in the Senate (for daring to go after the military as Communist tinged, the way the modern right wingers say the military has gone "woke"), the project was to continue to ensure no socialist or communist was ever part of the conversation, but began to turn "liberal" into not only a sign of weakness, but an ideology designed to take "your" money to give to those "undeserving." And it is how we got to the point where Michael Dukakis, the Democratic Party's technocratic, and only culturally liberal (not a New Dealer in economics by a long shot) nominee for president in 1988, was treated as if he was foreign to American "values." 

If you ever want to understand how "liberal" became a dirty word in American politics, the Buckley/Bozell project and the Cold War should supply the answer. But, again, this has been a learning year for many Americans. Your right wing, racist aunts, uncles, parents, grandparents, and friends need to be confronted for their cruelty, their racism, their sexism, their ignorance, and told they are no longer entitled to be part of the political discourse. We don't need their opinions, even when they may be reasonable, because others who are not cruel, racist, sexist, and ignorant may have positions such as (a) don't spend too much taxpayer money; (b) maintain a strong military presence or police; and (c) the importance of religion in our lives as we search for meaningful relationships and communities.

Again, it is now past time to recognize that voting for most Republicans as a general proposition--I, too, have a single exception where I am voting Republican this year, believe it or not--is to undermine America's best values, and they are no longer fit for being part of a civilized discourse. They should be treated as traitors and shunned until they renounce their delusions, recognize their views have been injurious to our nation, and have been wrong in their advice for what ails our communities, our nation, and our planet. When we treat the modern Republican Party as anything other than an organization designed to undermine our way of life, we are undermining ourselves. Again, you want to tell us we shouldn't spend too much taxpayer money on various programs, for the common defense or welfare, to quote our Constitution? Fine. You want to tell us we need to maintain a strong military or police force? Fine. You want to tell us about the importance of religion in our lives? Fine. But, first make sure you are no longer supporting the Republican Party as an institution, renounce Trump, and his minion political figures running for office this year, and begin, and I mean, begin to prove your loyalty to what has truly made America great.