There are still about 48 days or so before Trump Is inaugurated and for all that time Biden is president. As he demonstrated by his decision to release missiles to the Ukrainians, his actions are not limited by the fact that he is a lame-duck. Apparently Americans owe somewhat more than one trillion dollars on their credit cards. .Does Biden have the authority to transfer any significant amount of that debt to federal agencies with much lower fees? No doubt Trump could cancel that act as soon as he comes to office, but that would be the whole point. Americans would experience a month and a half of debt relief and then perhaps blame Trump for its reestablishment.
For those of you who like myself obsessively watch television news, it is useful to recall that nobody has yet been appointed to anything because Trump is not yet inaugurated.
253 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 253 of 253Sooner or later, hopefully sooner, Professor Wolff's sons are going to have to close this blog.
So I'd like to pay a last tribute to Professor Wolff.
The most important lesson I learned from him is not his Marxism, which doesn't convince me much, but his insistence that one decides "which side one is on" and then supports that side.
The left isn't perfect, it's often dogmatic or full of bullshit or just naive, but I'm on the left.
The other day I was conversing with a longtime friend, feminist academic, and she was talking about a fellow academic, male, guilty of egregious misogynous conduct and how she and her fellow feminists don't want him to continue teaching in their university.
Being critical and contrarian, I first saw the nuances of the situation and as I was about to voice them, I thought of Professor Wolff and "which side are you on" and I began to try to give her helpful advice to achieve her feminist goals. I'm on the side of the feminists and that's that.
Great post s.w. I'll miss your posts when this closes. It's been good chatting with you these last few years.
Thank you very much for your kind words, David. I'll miss the interaction with you too.
Echoing DP 100%. Lovely comment, and thanks for nudging the conversation in a nicer and more appropriate direction.
My thoughts on Prof. Wolff:
I don't know his work in and out, but I've seen enough (and only a fraction of the total, at that) to be sure that he's what I think of as education (including educating) at its best.
Philosophy is so good, but it also has SO much baggage. It's easier to say - and to exemplify oneself - what's bad about it (the elitism, the vain posing and sparring, the obscurantism, the pedantry, the pretentiousness, the dullness/triviality/'silliness', and on and on...) than it is to surmount these obstacles and say what's good about it. But there is good to philosophy - you just 'know' when it graces you somehow, even if you call it something else entirely, even when its source looks nothing like a philosophy course or text. Just an occasional whiff of the stuff (probably all that's available to even the pros) is something you'd wish for everyone to experience; it grabs you like hardly anything else.
But easier said than done. As far as I've been able to find, philosophers and philosophy enthusiasts - just by the nature of the subject - tend to sound like dorks and aliens and worse, often overwhelmingly, despite their best efforts to avoid this. But a good educator - like Prof. Wolff - will know this and yet struggle and struggle against this in order to share as many whiffs of the good stuff as circumstances allow. Much/most philosophical writing is nearly impossible to do this with, and I think Prof. Wolff would be thrilled to know that his efforts succeeded at times! (The "at times" is not a dig - I think it's the most an educator can realistically hope for!)
I don't know the 'formula' for a well-lived life, but in the vaguest, most vacuous-sounding outline (all I've got), it seems to go like: Seek what's good, hope to find it, and - what's probably inseparable from the task itself - try to share it. This seems to sum up Prof. Wolff's life as an educator.
And thanks BTW for letting us commenters do our little thing for all this time.
The most important lesson I learned from him is not his Marxism, which doesn't convince me much, but his insistence that one decides "which side one is on" and then supports that side.
I found S. Wallerstein's last (latest?) comment extremely sad. And if that is what he learned from Prof. Wolff's efforts, I believe the Prof. would have been saddened too.
I once heard an American, otherwise aware of the American crimes perpetrated against third world peoples, defend America with these words: whether right or wrong, I am with America. He sure knew which side he was on.
Unconditional solidarity may sound good, like unconditional love, but it's how we got to the situation we're now. We don't see our side's failings.
Who gives a shit; the good endures.
I guess that 238 years wasn't all that bad a run. Going to COSTCO to stock up on maple syrup and avocados.
I hadn't planned on adding any more comments, except when I come across references to or discussions of the professor's writings, but this bit by Raymond Geuss from the foreward to his forthcoming translation of his former student the French theatrical director Gérald Garruti's book Watch Your Words (it looks to be outstandingly interesting) seems sufficiently pointed and relevant: "The diagnostic portion of this manifesto begins by pointing to a series of disagreeable and destructive phenomena, many of which, individually, will be familiar, in one way or another, to people who live in a contemporary Western society. The loss of basic civility in public discourse and the consequent coarsening of public debate has often been noted and is much discussed. To take one particularly egregious example, think of the campaign speeches of Donald Trump, which often amount to little more than the repetition of strings of insulting nicknames for his political opponents and vulgar abuse. The absence of graciousness and common courtesy might seem a very minor vice, if it were not for the fact that experience shows us that this form of behaviour is always on the verge of spilling over into threats of and calls for direct violence. No public discussion was, perhaps, ever completely rational (whatever that means), but one has crossed an important frontier and entered a significantly darker world when a British minister can say that people ‘have had enough of experts’ and can glory in this fact. We are in danger of losing the very idea that political actors could be expected to give reasoned, empirically based arguments for the positions they adopt. This degradation of public discourse seems to go hand in hand with the increasing isolation of individuals, with the intensification of feelings of impotence and lack of agency, with loss of a wider sense of purpose in our actions, including our very sense of self, that require regular nourishment from sociability."
DZ, And it's not just me, either. I trust that others can see the cruel irony in advertisers functioning as moths in a dead Marxist's blog. God bless America!
And it's not just trolls, DZ. I can't be the only reader of Philosopher's Stone-cum-Dead Leftist Punching Bag who sees cruel irony in a vacant Marxist blog becoming moth-eaten due to advertisers.
Breaking news, NPI: McConnell pulls an RPW, falling down stairs in Capitol Bldg., only days after once again falsely accusing President Trump of insurrection. God is good.
Via Brian Leiter, and pace Sinclair Lewis, It Can Happen Here: https://www.doomsdayscenario.co/p/musk-s-junta-establishes-him-as-head-of-government
Here is something amusing (and perhaps apt) from Locke’s Second Treatise (para. 94), about absolute sovereigns—and those who advocate for them:
“Betwixt subject and subject, they will grant, there must be measures, laws and judges, for their mutual peace and security: but as for the ruler, he ought to be absolute, and is above all such circumstances; because he has power to do more hurt and wrong, it is right when he does it. To ask how you may be guarded from harm, or injury, on that side where the strongest hand is to do it, is presently the voice of faction and rebellion: as if when men quitting the state of nature entered into society, they agreed that all of them but one, should be under the restraint of laws, but that he should still retain all the liberty of the state of nature, increased with power, and made licentious by impunity. This is to think, that men are so foolish, that they take care to avoid what mischiefs may be done them by pole-cats, or foxes; but are content, nay, think it safety, to be devoured by lions.”
That "anonymous" comment about Locke was from me. I have long thought that Locke's literary abilities are underappreciated.
You are either a liar or politically tone-deaf, Rapko. President Trump's speeches are philosophically and rhetorically intelligent and well-written. They obviously resonate with his audience, the American people/MAGA nation. (I predicted he would win in 2016 as soon as I heard his RNC acceptance speech: I know my beloved countrymen.) His delivery thereof is also engaging and witty. The McDonalds and Garbage Man stunts were strokes of comic genius, which put the nail in his risible opponent's electoral coffin.
Meanwhile, your hero is running roughshod over the US Constitution and destroying US institutions....
President Trump, God bless him, hews to our Constitution: and you have given no reason to think otherwise. The 'institutions' you refer to are only the corrupt leftist ones, like DEI controlled college administrations, ruining our great country. Again, you provide no evidence to the contrary. Your refusal to see that our President's policies benefit America's working class, whom you claim to care for, is not only seditious, but violates Popper's Falsifiabilty Principle: what would it take for anti-American people like you to concede that you are wrong about DJT and MAGA? Moreover, your withering and implacable contempt for our leader and movement, chalking up everything we do to 'racism and sexism,' is incompatible with compassion for working people.
Anyone who doesn't read Alinsky with horror is himself a devil worshipper. Only an evil spirit fails to hate cop-killers. MAGA
Yeah, but it's also worth remembering that we're two days away from Puppy Bowl 2025. Maybe put the MAGA crusade on hold for a moment and, like, smile about something...? Be a human being?
https://www.discovery.com/shows/puppy-bowl
Anon, how do you feel about folks who merely assault cops with bear spray and flagpoles?
s.w., did you have a chance to view the recent comet that traveled over SA?
aaall, That's a good point you make about rightwing violence against police during the January 6 insurrection. It's Trump, not the Black Lives Matter people, who now want to destroy the FBI.
No, I didn't see the comet. I live in the downtown surrounded by apartment buildings and I confess that I never look at the sky. If I'm walking at night, I watch out for cell-phone thieves on motorcycles. I haven't been away from city lights for years.
'Anon, how do you feel about folks who merely assault cops with bear spray and flagpoles?' I'll your answer evasive rhetorical question, you insolent piece of leftist garbage, when you concede my point that those who fail to condemn cop-killers are evil.
I say with regret: It is time for The Philosophers Stone to be shut down. The trolls are violating Professor Wolff's memory.
I say this with regret: It is time for The philosophers Stone to be shut down. The trolls are violating Professor Wolff's memory.
I say this with regret: It is time for The Philosophers Stone to be shut down: The trolls are violating Professor Wolff's memory.
Sorry for the triplicate postings... The message did not appear right away.
Make Gaza Great Again.
I am so sorry to hear of the passing. Thank you for your brightness.
"Insolent"? What a hilariously revealing word to use. You're craving respect but can't find it, right? Go fuck yourself, you Christofascist mutt. While you're at it, visit a bathhouse and fuck some men. You're obviously gay. Own it. You'll despise yourself much less if you do.
Dude, you doth protest too much. Feel free to jerk off to gay porn all you want. Even better, have sex with men. You know you want to. Nobody who's not a repressed homosexual talks the way you do. That ship has sailed. Even the major religions, save Islam maybe, don't talk that way anymore.
Worth remembering that there are various Anon-amici here. I will come clean. The Anonymous who suggested John Rapko think about Proverbs 26:4 was me.
Seeing that Michael fingered RFGA PhD as the likely author of at least some of these posts (January 19, 2025 at 11:28 PM), I just spent (wasted) more time than I wish to admit trying to figure out who this figure could be. I found the answer, only to discover that Michael & Anonymous had already done the background work--5 years ago to the day! I wish Michael had cited that thread instead of the one he cited here a few weeks ago and saved me the bother.
In the comments to this RPW post
https://robertpaulwolff.blogspot.com/2020/02/all-right-now.html
RFGA appears to be Dr. Robert Allen, who taught for years at Wayne County (Michigan) Community College. Not sure whether he is still affiliated with that institution. Like Marc Susselman and myself, he is an alum of the University of Michigan; he apparently earned his PhD in philosophy from Wayne State U, with a dissertation on Wittgenstein. From a skimming of his published articles and presentations, it appears that he has had a particular interest in the subject of free will.
Prof Allen has commented several times on Brian Leiter's blog, and I think it would be reasonable to assume that it was Leiter's mentions of RPW's blog that led to Allen finding his way here.
I am not convinced that he originally intended to be disruptive here when he started posting in 2020. It looks to me that he just wanted to offer a different political and social perspective than that favored by RPW and most of the commenters, with a bit of tongue-in-cheek with some of his comments about the MAGA movement and the Rust-Belt American working class. But the negative reception here of his comments back then seems to have triggered a darker turn.
Consider, for example, this post from a few months back by a Robert Allen at Leiter's blog (the context was that Leiter had linked to an article by David Schmidtz called "My Dinner with Nozick," in which Schmidtz contrasted the personal styles of Rawls and Nozick, and Leiter asked what readers thought of the article):
"How about my Nosh with Noam? I was stunned to see Professor Chomsky walk into the faculty lounge at Henry Ford CC in Dearborn MI, back in the early 1990s. I walked across the room to verify that unlikely impression and was graciously invited by his host to sit down for lunch. It turned out that he was there to give two lectures, on corporate media and American foreign policy. He also ended up gently disabusing me, over the course of the next two WONDERFUL hours, of my inchoate Lockeanism on language acquisition (a philosophical lesson subsequently buttressed by the ease with which my own children came to speak). I then ran home to get my copy of Aspects of a Theory of Syntax, for his autograph. It has recently earned me 'cred' among my youngest daughter's philosophically-minded friends. How could I not be the man's disciple?"
Assuming it is the same Robert Allen, would someone who honestly felt about leftists the way that some of RFGA's posts suggests he seems to, say that about Noam Chomsky of all people?
https://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2024/09/my-dinner-with-nozick.html
I suspect Allen is a Roman Catholic, or at least grew up with that background (a John Paul II Catholic, to be more precise--definitely not a Francis Catholic!). The middle name "Francis" and his having a second middle name, as suggested by RFGA as his initials, would fit--some Catholics of his generation took a confirmation name (as with the fantasy author George R. R. Martin)--as would, perhaps, his academic interests in Anselm and Augustine.
And so we have a bit of insight into some of his comments on topics related to gay people. But what he honestly believes as opposed to what he says for the sake of argument (and to provoke) isn't entirely clear.
In a long discussion at Leiter's Blog from 2009 on the subject of how the American Philosophical Association's journal should handle requests to place job ads by colleges with policies against same-sex relationships, Allen's comments led several commenters to question his sincerity and accuse him of being a Poe.
(You can find the definition of a Poe at Urban Dictionary.)
Here is the post & comments thread at Leiter's Blog:
https://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2009/04/final-version-of-murphy-letter-to-apa-opposing-action-against-schools-that-discriminate-against-gay-.html
Now, I wondered why such a person would have such a strong animus against RPW. Before finding out all that I have just posted here, I had thought RFGA/Anonymous might just be Susselman trying to get revenge. But for all his faults, Susselman never struck me as someone who would be so cruel, especially not to someone he knew personally.
I think the most likely answer is that Allen is just very bitter that RPW was not impressed by his brilliant (lol) commentary and removed some of his posts here. That, and the fact that Allen seems to like the attention generated by his provocative comments.
One other, minor point--while there may not have been Black Panther Party members per se in Detroit with rooftop snipers in 1966, there were activist African Americans and there was a uprising (called a riot by the police and press). Several police officers were reportedly injured.
https://policing.umhistorylabs.lsa.umich.edu/s/detroitunderfire/page/kercheval
It's also possible that whoever posted that comment about the Panthers above was misremembering the year.
In short, he's an embittered, self-loathing, small-minded, attention-seeking man-child who had a temper tantrum because he was told to leave the room. The Robert Allen of the Leiter thread has all the intellectual perspicacity of a gnat, so if that's our guy, he's also a singular moron.
Eric, It's definitely not Marc S. Marc is progressive and would never say anything in favor of Trump or against gay people, not even in revenge. Those progressive beliefs are an integral part of his core identity.
:-D
Nice work! That Leiter thread was a fun read.
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After the WH set-up today (02/28/2025), any doubt now that both Trump and Vance are Russian assets?
None whatsoever....
DZ et al.: You may like this prescient 29 March 2017 New Yorker cartoon by Pat Byrnes. (One has to be familiar with the 1960s TV show, Rocky and Bullwinkle, to appreciate the (I guess) allusion.): https://www.newyorker.com/cartoons/daily-cartoon/wednesday-march-29th-natasha-boris-fake-news
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TRUMP: "I think it's globalists that see how rich our country's gonna be and they don't like it."
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Here’s hoping that Trump announces he’s inviting Putin to address a joint session of Congress.
what's the word, then?
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