tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25624602.post7798425851014198847..comments2024-03-15T00:12:57.489-07:00Comments on Covenant Zone: Promises and Covenantstruepeershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16401984575637492845noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25624602.post-69831571886502102572007-02-23T00:33:00.000-08:002007-02-23T00:33:00.000-08:00I cheer. What a great thing to be able to have a c...I cheer. What a great thing to be able to have a conversation like this over the Internet and then to follow it up face to face at the library. Good, good. And as always I found myself having committed factual errors which came to light not from anything I thought of but from our conversations. I win all 'round.Daghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10664271893389366772noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25624602.post-29689752588223523842007-02-22T15:32:00.000-08:002007-02-22T15:32:00.000-08:00Yes, we should all pursue these questions in our o...Yes, we should all pursue these questions in our own style. But doing so, we will inevitably come into contact and conflict with others. And then the claims on authority start intervening. We have to be able to make a convincing claim that justifies our own authority as free, engaged and serious individuals without a string of professional credentials to justify our freedom. <BR/><BR/>That is why we need to have better ideas and a stronger faith about fundamental human questions than those who want us to defer to their credentials. That is why we need the true intellectual aristocracy to inspire us, those who serve the cause of the greatest freedom, who know that true thinking defers to what is sacred for all of us, or as many as possible, and that means going back to the fundamentals of human existence and faith. If we do this, then we can build the covenants or compacts that include the most freedoms and opportunities presently possible for all of us. Figuring and negotiating these not yet fully visualized, or institutionalized, compacts is something harder to grasp than an old-school way of dividing up us and them. It's difficult, unless you are free-thinking, honest, and full of faith, without undue fear of the unknown. But if we want to be free we have to take the harder road.truepeershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16401984575637492845noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25624602.post-15139591485346194962007-02-22T14:27:00.000-08:002007-02-22T14:27:00.000-08:00There is the need for popularizers in the marketpl...There is the need for popularizers in the marketplace of ideas, and it's not something to disparage. My concern, slight as it is, arises from our need to popularize what we must all take for granted,the very themes you write above, and though it does take some effort; and though Katz's work is worthwhile, in my opinion, I like to approach things, as we likely all do, in a style of my own, not at all that of Katz, and regrettably, not popular like that skunk Steyn! Ha! I'm a way better writer than he is, so it must be a flaw in the public that I'm not rich and famous like him. Yeah, that's it. I need a popularizer.<BR/><BR/>Hey, sweetheart, get me rewrite.Daghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10664271893389366772noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25624602.post-46116205685773134052007-02-22T14:15:00.000-08:002007-02-22T14:15:00.000-08:00Katz is abstract, which is somewhat inevitable in ...Katz is abstract, which is somewhat inevitable in trying to spell out something new in ethical terms - all the things that Mark Steyn intuits but can't fully spell out. But it is not theoretical gymnastics intended to separate an olympic elite from the ordinary folks. It is a genuine attempt to spell out an understanding of our humanity, the nature of society, religion, and politics, the distinctive contributions of Western history, all in order to prove the conclusion that it is only ordinary, competent, caring, engaged, people who can renew our national political covenant. <BR/><BR/>Only through the active participation of engaged amateurs, speaking in the name of anyone and everyone, can certain forms of representation necessary to freedom and democratic self-rule be renewed. There simply are things the aristocratic elites of our academies and bureaucracies cannot do for us. That, essentially, is what Katz is saying in perhaps the only way he can. He is writing in fundamental anthropological terms to show this understanding in a new light for the first time; he wants us not to be frightened or cowed by abstract ideas, but to know that our shared belief in the need for an engaged citizenry is also what our deepest self-understanding possible today says is true. I think this is right.<BR/><BR/>In time, with a little effort, people like us will be able to distill this vision and understanding in terms accessible to many more people. Then more people will feel they have both the reason and the promise to act freely again. I promise. But everything new starts with one person trying desperately to justify our seeing that he really does have something good to offer, so that we will sign on and share in something sacred again. It is not an easy business going first, but a necessary one we all need to be prepared to take, sometime somewhere.truepeershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16401984575637492845noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25624602.post-28973924424982753512007-02-22T09:00:00.000-08:002007-02-22T09:00:00.000-08:00I heard someone outside in the alley screaming: "K...I heard someone outside in the alley screaming: "Kazt can jammer, kids." Damn, I got so distracted that I took a break and read Aristotle on "The Unmoved Mover" before taking a further break by browsing through Saint Anselm's writings on ontology just for fun. <BR/><BR/>Mark Steyn you ain't, friend.<BR/><BR/>Nevertheless, for anyone who got through that and had any idea what you're on about I'm sure they'll flock to our meetings just to have someone to talk to on that level. I'll be there to do so, partly because of the level of debate possible. But I'll also be there because we can and do talk at the level of Steyn and Sowell and the average person at the library.<BR/><BR/>We do recreate the Athenean agora and the 18th century New England town square at our meetings, making democracy as it is rather than as we are told it is. Our meetings reify the very concepts you discuss above. We make democracy concrete in ways that no one else does, to my knowledge. I leave it at that for further discussion. <BR/><BR/>Who will come to our meetings? Will the average person come-- the teenaged skate board kid, the plumber, the secretary, the land developer? Not a chance. Only people with high self-confidence and a terrible urge to make more of the nation than now exists will venture into the realms of discussion as above. And few will follow them. Those timid few who might have thought of joining us will flee in terror at the idea of being made to look stupid in the eyes of the group we are now. And what a shame will that be. Ours is a group for all people regardless of their facility with theoretical pyrotechnics. No one is dazzled nor is anyone burned by our group discussions. I, for one, when not clamouring to hang people from lamp posts, tell chicken jokes; and Charles extols the beauties of Vancouver's landscapes. Others contribute various themes and insights to our collective banquet of celebratory pot-luck democracy.<BR/><BR/>Would I have quoted Chesterton? Only in negative ways. Today I learned something good and new. Tonight I expect to gain further from our meetings, things I cannot assume or expect. You can be part of that, as 'Peers can be, and Charles, and the others. <BR/><BR/>Will you join us? I have my doubts. Still, there is a place waiting for you. You have a right to join us and to be heard. Whether we'll have any idea what you're on about is a question we'll have to find out later. Give it a chance. Meet us this evening.Daghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10664271893389366772noreply@blogger.com