Paul Craig Roberts: Good-Bye

[Hammer of Los]

Perhaps Paul Craig Roberts and similar folk represent a real danger, that being a new alliance of Old Right and New Left, brought together by anti war, 911 sceptical, anti corporate, pro environment, pro devolution, pro proportional representation, anti militarist, anti police state, pro liberty sentiment. A new majority, in fact. Perhaps such a large lobby could be a real force for peaceful change.

Of course, such a movement would need leader(s). I hope someone is brave enough.

Just posting my thoughts on these forums takes all the bravery I've got.



I'm not really bashing anyone bashing PCR. Well, I don't mean to. I mean, I kinda started it myself elsewhere. In fact, that elsewhere was the thread JackRiddler started about the very article Joe has linked to above. Here's the thread for Joe;

http://rigorousintuition.ca/board2/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=27437

[23]

1) It's not haiku. It doesn't meet the technical construction requirements of haiku.

2) Re. sparring you from anything, I'm not built to act paternalistically on your behalf.
Instead, I have full confidence in your ability to learn how to be handle undesirable
situations without asking to be spared them.

3) I alluded to shared experience being a common prerequisite for empathy, in many cases.
No problemo if you didn't get the drift.

4) Don't spare me anything; continue as you are. You are where you are, until you'll find a
reason to be someplace else.

Atonement
is a rare commodity
these days.

How exactly do you know that? Have you got some magical calculator that allows you to quantify levels of atonement throughout history versus "these days"?

Unless you've had a reason
to practice it,
it's unlikely that
you will appreciate
someone who does.

Why exactly do you think that? Because, on the contrary, I should think that atonement would be most appreciated by those against whom the crimes were committed which must be atoned for. The innocent, in other words. Please spare me your pompous haikus.

[Joe Hillshoist]

Perhaps Paul Craig Roberts and similar folk represent a real danger, that being a new alliance of Old Right and New Left, brought together by anti war, 911 sceptical, anti corporate, pro environment, pro devolution, pro proportional representation, anti militarist, anti police state, pro liberty sentiment. A new majority, in fact. Perhaps such a large lobby could be a real force for peaceful change.

Of course, such a movement would need leader(s). I hope someone is brave enough.

Just posting my thoughts on these forums takes all the bravery I've got.



I'm not really bashing anyone bashing PCR. Well, I don't mean to. I mean, I kinda started it myself elsewhere. In fact, that elsewhere was the thread JackRiddler started about the very article Joe has linked to above. Here's the thread for Joe;

http://rigorousintuition.ca/board2/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=27437

Thanks for that, missed that thread.

Interesting about his radio appearance.

I couldn't believe it when he became a darling of the left, considering how responsible he is for so much of what its sposed to be against.

I dunno, I have never liked him. It doesn't surprise me at all that he'd have appeared on a white nationalist radio show, tho to be fair it'd be nice to know the context (was he a favourable guest or did he give them some criticism?)

Much of what he writes I agree with, but he's not the only one saying it, and his refusal to acknowledge his past really gets me. And I have always had this uneasy feeling about what he writes. He criticises current US policy on Pakistan for instance, but what about what happened when he was actually involved with an admin? Does he think we are stupid enough not to know about Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq?

Whats the fucking difference?

Where is the atonement?

He is still trying to justify the fascist war on latin american workers and indigenous people.

if he actually said "I was wrong and my actions inflicted pain on millions and supported the US foreign policy that butchered people then, as it does now. A fair bit of the mess we are in at home and abroad came from governments that I took part in, based on policies I helped develop. I was wrong and this is the ugly mess I helped create."

Then he might have some real cred.

He doesn't now.

Anyway I'm pretty sure we have been bashing PCR on this board since before I joined.

[nathan28]

Is there a two-for-deal going on with RT, which, not to look a gift horse in the mouth, gives me the creeps? Because I sure as shit would love for PCR's Mini-Me, Pat Buchanan to STFU, too.

[barracuda]

I'm sitting here wondering how many interviews he's going to give about the fact that he isn't going to talk any more.

Oh, and +1 on the Buchanan thing.

[82_28]

I'm sitting here wondering how many interviews he's going to give about the fact that he isn't going to talk any more.

Oh, and +1 on the Buchanan thing.

Good point. I found myself agreeing with everything that motherfucker said 5,6,7 years ago. I always wondered what was wrong with me. What was wrong with everything in order for me to "see eye to eye" with the likes of Buchanan. Many a yokel made fun of me for saying "this is the best anti-war voice we have". Indeed. What a fiasco.

[AlicetheKurious]

I'm sitting here wondering how many interviews he's going to give about the fact that he isn't going to talk any more.

Oh, and +1 on the Buchanan thing.

Good point. I found myself agreeing with everything that motherfucker said 5,6,7 years ago. I always wondered what was wrong with me. What was wrong with everything in order for me to "see eye to eye" with the likes of Buchanan. Many a yokel made fun of me for saying "this is the best anti-war voice we have". Indeed. What a fiasco.

You being sarcastic, 82_28? I can't tell, because I haven't read anything by Buchanan in oh, 6 or 7 years. But like you, I also agreed with everything I read then. Did something change?

[Joe Hillshoist]

I always find myself wanting to make that remark about the door hitting them on the way out, but rarely do because I am a polite, considerate fellow.

I promise you I missed that on my first reading of this thread...

[barracuda]

I don't think there was ever a time when I saw eye to eye with Pat Buchanan.

"The agenda Clinton & Clinton would impose on America — abortion on demand, a litmus test for the Supreme Court, homosexual rights, discrimination against religious schools, women in combat units — that's change, all right. But it is not the kind of change America needs. It is not the kind of change America wants. And it is not the kind of change we can abide in a nation we still call God's country."

-Patrick J. Buchanan

[nathan28]

Did you hear that both Paul Craig Roberts's and Pat Buchanan's parents died in the Holocaust?






They fell out of guard towers.

[barracuda]

Somewhere in hell, Ronald Reagan just fired off a rim shot.

[Hammer of Los]

Joe, Barracuda and Annie all piling in eh? You are very unkind, you know.

We need PCR to continue writing for the sake of our informational diversity.

Unless you think his writings might lead to political extremism.

I mean, that might undermine democracy. Or something.

I'm not sure I appreciate your muttered equivocal insinuations, though I'm certain your lack of forthrightness doesn't concern me too much.

I've been meaning to reply to this for ages, but haven't been quite sure what to say.

I'm not insinuating anything. Nor am I being less than forthright.

Some folk are getting a little too paranoid, I think. I understand.

My own feelings about PCR veer wildly between being supportive of him, because he has written articles with which I have strongly agreed, and being suspicious of him because of his political background and seeming evidence of right wing or even racist prejudices in his writings.

When quite a few posted negatively, my natural instincts to defend the underdog kicked in, that's all. I'm not seeking to champion PCR, nor do I want a fight with any who have posted information critical of the Reagan era official. I thought I had made my uncertainty about him clear.

The remark about political extremism was a reference to his piece I commented on elsewhere;

Ok, so I read the article. It seems a clarion call for unity, not so much by muslims, but by the populations of countries that find themselves under attack by American and allied forces. He suggests they join together to expel the invaders. He'd get in trouble saying that if he were a muslim. And brown. Fortunately he's white and writes for American Free Press. Yes, he does rather blame the victim. I just figure the black ops crew are too good at their divide and conquer games. But its quite reasonable to advise the victims of these games to wise up, if they want to resist the imperial power. Maybe they don't. Maybe the imperial power will help their country. I mean, its possible. But what Paul Crag Roberts is advocating is the whole population uniting to fight the foreign enemy. It's almost treasonable. I wouldn't want to publish an article like that. I guess Counterpunch can get away with it though.

I'm still a little sceptical of PCR. Is he a little like that Ramsey Clarke fellow? I think advising your country's enemies to join together to fight your country's armed forces, does sound a little like political extremism. I wouldn't advise any such thing. I also thought the frankly rather racist piece we discussed earlier was an example of very poor writing.

I appreciate everyone's comments here, including those I noted as being negative about PCR. I don't blame anyone for criticising him.

Furthermore, I'm not being at all ironic when I champion informational diversity. I really do try and read all sorts of stuff, and then make my mind up. It's all grist for the mill of my sovereign reason. No source should be out of bounds;

C'mon - he was an associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. That right there is a war crime.

But you've got a very good point there. Perhaps the WSJ should be out of bounds.

Or if not that, what about the Financial Times?

[barracuda]

When quite a few posted negatively, my natural instincts to defend the underdog kicked in, that's all.

The underdog, huh? If you check the first page, i was the fourteenth post, and the first one on the thread critical of Roberts. In other words, my natural instinct was essentially the miror image of your own, going against the grain of the thread as it then stood, and continued to stand, and essentially still stands, as three posters (four, when nathan arrived later) offered a minority opinion regarding the OP. So I'm sitting here trying to figure out to which underdog you might be referring.

But you've got a very good point there. Perhaps the WSJ should be out of bounds.

Or if not that, what about the Financial Times?

No "information", so called, is out of bounds - it's the interpretation and the use it's put to that matters, I think.

[The Consul]

PCR is ne of those guys if you listen to him for 5 minutes and you catch him on your preconceived groove it's like, hey, yo! But you listen on another twenty minutes you begin to think...yo...he's crazy...then if you listen on another 20 minutes it's like...woah, I think I'm crazy...another twenty minutes after that yo get to start all over again only instead of PCR it is someone else.