I'm as isolationist as the next non-interventionist but it is out-there to think the US will ever not be a dominant international force. The *nations* of Europe should absolutely return to their role but I think they'd have to flush their administrative super-structures.

Getting emotionally invested in potential discourse flashpoints is fun and I'm tired of pretending it's not.

One thing that strikes about these things. The professional and wholly diverse circles I travel in would never have their 14 daughters interact with anything resembling this man. We would not have our daughters so much as pick up the dry cleaning if the store were run by

The present - unattached from past and future - is emptied of all value. One could not make sense of a sentence or respond to a melody in such a "present." Lesson of tradition -- literally handing forward -- is the ways that it makes the moment meaningful.

One trap for countries, especially smaller ones, is being plied into putting their honor/face on the line, of having a stake where they didn't need to. Country X doing thing (e.g., invading Ukraine) may have no consequence to country Y, but if a stance is taken actions

The psyche of it: Leftists got over their reflection in the (literal) mirror at an early stage. They can believe people like them b/c it was at that moment they consciously became irrelevant. Liberals actively want to be liked, which makes them neurotic about whether they are.

The folks like Derrida who would be clubbed to death in a proper human community (for good and arguably for some ill too) didn't even have the decency to affirm the liberal order that kept them around. It was a laughing and sometimes sneering, yes, I am a nihilist and by your own

No Mandela effect but my wife said the only reason I ask her to get this brand of underwear is because I like saying "fruit of the loom". Exposing my soul in this way was deeply unnerving.

This really already happened furtively. The right side of the IQ chart is dominated by men. Combined with male risk-taking, this group has dominated the tech giant elite. Part of the surge of leftism among women has been in reaction to that. They've been kicking out high IQs from

It's the irrecoverable ruin 2 millimeters past the line that's not appreciated. The Guggenheim ought to be a sacred temple of the spirit, designed for 50 people at a time. You can barely find a time when then aren't 500 tourists, and yet someone will be touting the vibrancy.

My most authoritarian and leftist take: everyone should live in a house like this. Perhaps even taking turns as servants / masters of.

One future-forward thing I have is that amputation / reattachment will become fairly routine medical procedure. Then, in lieu of bail, you take the perps hands off and they have the option of running stub-armed or showing up.

Okay, weird take along elite-pleb axis. All spiritually worthwhile people use the phone the same way: 10 seconds at a time, exchange info, put phone away, return to one's thoughts and endeavors. Constant conversation is a symptom of internal barrenness.

It should go without saying that the primary objective of no one's life is a "fairer, better society". It is the achievement of high social status to secure propagation of genes with attractive mates. The thorough self-delusion of this kind of striver shares similarities with

Yeah, and for all of us sticking up for Western Civ. against its deliberate destruction, the question is why so many feel no love for, have no self-recognition in, its traditions, artistic heritage, customs, that they want to see them flushed away? It's not material privation.

The idea that taste is subjective is the downfall of Mankind and, while no Kantian, even Immanuel could see that liberalism would dig a hole to bury itself and drag the rest of us through the hell of poor aesthetics.

Be funny if Aristotle really just found a way to wrap a meeting early and be done with people for the day.

I think of this in conjunction with the passage in Plato's Republic where, discussing the tragic, he says "And about those who were only just born and lived a short time, he said other things not worth mentioning." Plato is also going to argue for taking life lightly because

Worth noting as well, Chesterton was another of the childless cohort of philosophes.

The casual sexualization of culture is pushing a polarization that liberals aren't even aware of. Those who will value and protect their sexuality - while showing a tolerant face to those who display and make transactional - will have the return in the form of happy, healthy love