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3 more days until we can stop bickering over which elite millionaire jerk-off is going to ruin our country (or is that run.... works either way I guess). Well at least after that we can start planning the first presidential funeral since Kennedy (no matter which one wins).

Ouch..never heard it put quite so eloquently.

Or in such an inflammatory manner; kudos on making a statement offensive to both sides of the election.

Personally, I'm counting the days until Cheney's pace-maker has a malfunction. That man has not made many friends in his lifetime. At home or abroad.

Not that I really expect, or desire, his death. I'm just amused that his Cold War relic paranoia made him request Secret Service protection after the change of leadership.

lord_sutekh wrote:Or in such an inflammatory manner; kudos on making a statement offensive to both sides of the election.

That's what you get for picking sides. I'm proud to be an apathetic anarchist. (I'm too lazy to actually destroy anything, but I'm thrilled that I have a pit pass to the decline of western civilization.)

Western civilization is on the decline? More to the point, do you think it's still possible to make a case for the 'West' and 'East' monikers of the past?

dogma wrote:Western civilization is on the decline? More to the point, do you think it's still possible to make a case for the 'West' and 'East' monikers of the past?

I'm not sure there has been a sharper division of power between east and west than at any time since the late renaissance (the decline of the ottomans, to be precise.

Not to be horribly culurally elitist, but the West (Europe, Europeans, and those European colonies that most thoroughly wiped out the natives) have basically driven history since about 1500. World Politics was a question of "which western power will take it all home", as the Americas, asia, and finally africa were divided up. Even now, the strongest Eastern powers (China, Japan, Korea, Iran, and India) are those that either were not colonized (Japan and sort of China), were colonized by another eastern power (Korea and sort of Japan), or took the best bits of western Civ (rule of law, secular government, liberal democracy, splashy musicals) firmly to heart (India, of course).

At it's heart, the East/west divide is the same it was at thermopylae: the dilemma over whether a person is more or less important than people. The west idealizes the individual, the east values collective action. It runs through the culture, the government, and the religion. Islam, of course, is fundamentally western in it's outlook, but Iran is about as classically eastern as you can get, so there are many factors at work here.

lord_sutekh wrote:Or in such an inflammatory manner; kudos on making a statement offensive to both sides of the election.

Yeah, he should have made it just about McCain being the cryptkeeper. That would've recieved a "OMGLIEKURSORIGHT"...right?

dogma wrote:More to the point, do you think it's still possible to make a case for the 'West' and 'East' monikers of the past?

Last time I checked there is an East and a West. Do you practice at being pretentious or does it just come this naturally to you?

On a lighter note I thought the OP was funny.

PanamaG wrote:

Last time I checked there is an East and a West. Do you practice at being pretentious or does it just come this naturally to you?

I don't know, do you practice being ignorant?

East and west are cardinal directions given relative to a center point. There can only be an East and a West (note the capitalization) if you somehow believe there is one part of the globe which deserves primacy over the others. There are hundreds of books written on this exact topic.

But of course you wouldn't be concerned with the knowledge of others. That would require you to demean your, clearly superior, intellect.

Polonius wrote:
I'm not sure there has been a sharper division of power between east and west than at any time since the late renaissance (the decline of the ottomans, to be precise.

I'd approach this from a different angle and posit that the East/West divide is a relatively recent (in the last 500 years) historical development. More a byproduct of success than an indicator of real, fundamental differences in civilizational practice. After all, Zhang He might have reversed the entire order of the world if his voyages had been regarded in a more positive light by the Ming Emperor. Who was himself lacking in ambition due to the unchallenged state of his authority.

Polonius wrote:
At it's heart, the East/west divide is the same it was at thermopylae: the dilemma over whether a person is more or less important than people. The west idealizes the individual, the east values collective action. It runs through the culture, the government, and the religion.

Maybe. But I feel as though individualism and collectivism are highly correlated to the nearest historical precedent. Basically, the West is individualist because its 'mythic past' was dominated by multiple forces cultivated in a state of high parity. The East, on the other hand, experienced the weight of Hobbes' Leviathan through both Western dominance and long-lived social orders. As such, individual action was difficult to credit as a force for change. Obviously this still leads one to a distinct East/West dichotomy, but that dichotomy is less rigid as the traditional view. The essential prediction being that, as global parity rises, there will be a distinct shift towards Eastern individualism as they experience a reality laced with possibility. The West, of course, will see an oppositional shift being faced with unprecedented constraints.

I'm so excited. On the day of the election Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart are going to host an hour long special on Comedy Central.

Either way I'm supporting Obama.

dogma wrote:

Not that I really expect, or desire, his death. I'm just amused that his Cold War relic paranoia made him request Secret Service protection after the change of leadership.

That's actually standard practice for ex-presidents, haven't met any ex-VPs but would imagine it's on offer.

dogma wrote:Western civilization is on the decline? More to the point, do you think it's still possible to make a case for the 'West' and 'East' monikers of the past?

Probably because the 'East' used to mean the Soviet Union. I really haven't heard 'East' vs 'West' very much in the context of East Asia/South Asia vs the US and Europe.

It's a fair enough term but when I hear East/West I still think of the Cold War.

Now if we could just Occidental/Oriental back into fashion and away from PC scholars who worry way too much about connotations.

PanamaG wrote:

lord_sutekh wrote:Or in such an inflammatory manner; kudos on making a statement offensive to both sides of the election.

Yeah, he should have made it just about McCain being the cryptkeeper. That would've recieved a "OMGLIEKURSORIGHT"...right?

See, where you fall short is assuming I'm a hyper-partisan nut like you. Personally, I think it's bad manners to wish ill upon anyone, and uncivilized to boot. John McCain is a robust person, and could go on for years; he's certainly not got one foot in the grave as the OP seemed to intimate. Just like it's pretty classless to even joke about the assassination of any official, be he (or she) president, vice-president, judge, or what-have-you.

Clthomps wrote:3 more days until we can stop bickering over which elite millionaire jerk-off is going to ruin our country (or is that run.... works either way I guess). Well at least after that we can start planning the first presidential funeral since Kennedy (no matter which one wins).

It's easy to slip into ultra cynicism. I think people can often develop this after discovering that things are complicated, that no person or group is a shining paragon of light, at which it can be easiest to dismiss everyone. Not that one shouldn't be cynical, there's plenty to be cynical about, but cynicism as an automatic reaction; 'who cares they're all terrible' doesn't really achieve much beyond pretending to claim some kind of world weary wisdom. Problem is, it generally prevents actually gaining wisdom, and after highschool it generally isn't fooling anyone.


Then again, it's often also a temporary thing, that idealogues will slip into when it looks like their candidate is about to lose.

Kid_Kyoto wrote:
Now if we could just Occidental/Oriental back into fashion and away from PC scholars who worry way too much about connotations.

Yea, far too much is made of the academic insight of Edward Said.

Wow, Dog, you get the Smarty McKnowitall award! Bwaaaah!

This thread is brilliantly closed. Lord Sutekh is correct. Hoping for the deaths of others is not acceptable posting on Dakka: Dogma / Clthomps in particular.