What Book Are You Reading at the Moment?

[GloryofGreece]

Our Southern Nation
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/09963248 ... 0DER&psc=1

Plain Folk
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/08071106 ... 0DER&psc=1

[Martin Hash]

Loserthink.jpg

So far, so good...

p.s. Scott Adams always verges on the edge of what I think of as a Meta. I have moved him on and off the list several times. He is definitely wise though.

This book has a section on how it's "loserthink" to read too much into coincidences, and Scott goes into some lame personal examples. I had my own coincidence, and it was WITH this book. Scott had been promoting the book on his channel, and I intended to buy it but I just hadn't gotten around to it; Gwynne & I were traveling a lot. Coming home from the Caribbean, before departure time while we were walking through the Orlando airport for exercise, I was simultaneously listening through my earphones to Scott Adams' Periscope. He was blabbering about his book, and just as he said the word "loserthink," I happened to be looking at a rack of books in front of one of the little shops in the concourse, and the bright orange title I was reading exactly when Scott said "loserthink," was "Loserthink." Of course I bought it. Sometimes you do have to respond proactively to coincidences.

[Calculus Man]

Ape and Essence by Aldous Huxley.

cover.jpg

[Hastur]

Is this the whole Kultur vs. Zivilization (might be spelled wrong I forget) idea? I thought bildung came from Schiller. Like wasn't bildung and that idea kind of anti enlightenment? The French just had their revolution and it horrified the proto Germans so they felt like you had to have some kind of strongly bound national character (kultur) before you could build complicated and cosmopolitan ideas upon it (zivilization).They felt that you can't build a globalized hodgepodge of cafe homo ideas without having a mature culture.

It makes sense. I hate French society passionately. Always been a nasty effete culture. But that Kultur stuff took Germany down a meandering path to Totalitarianism. I wouldn't say it was Schiller or whoevers fault, but you can kind of see where it leads if one isn't careful.

I think it's more Hegel than Schiller. Bildung is the same word as Building. It's about self cultivating the individual by a balance of heart and mind. Culture and civilization hand in hand.

And you are right about the Franch.

What took down the Germans was the false phallic vision of the Nazis. A perfect example of an abject vision. Kill all the Jews and commies. Behind the pretty flags was just a simple doomsday cult, a collective suicide pact

When you keep saying Phallus or phallic is that Freudian for penis/masculine? A father figure?

Here is a better answer: viewtopic.php?f=61&t=4749&p=298418#p298418

[heydaralon]

I think it's more Hegel than Schiller. Bildung is the same word as Building. It's about self cultivating the individual by a balance of heart and mind. Culture and civilization hand in hand.

And you are right about the Franch.

What took down the Germans was the false phallic vision of the Nazis. A perfect example of an abject vision. Kill all the Jews and commies. Behind the pretty flags was just a simple doomsday cult, a collective suicide pact

When you keep saying Phallus or phallic is that Freudian for penis/masculine? A father figure?

Here is a better answer: viewtopic.php?f=61&t=4749&p=298418#p298418

Thank you for the link! Right now I am reading about the Korean War. John Toland's book on it is great, and I am reading Max Hastings' book as well. Check them out dude. You might enjoy them.

Max Hastings' Vietnam book is also great.

[Smitty-48]

Max Hastings' Vietnam book is also great.

Rly?

I found it to be a pedestrian rehashing of the same old same old tropes, Imperialist French, Arrogant Americans, Stalinist North, Corrupt South, oh what a tragedy, blah, blah, blah.

Boilerplate liberal media narrative 101

[heydaralon]

Max Hastings' Vietnam book is also great.

Rly?

I found it to be a pedestrian rehashing of the same old same old tropes, Imperialist French, Arrogant Americans, Stalinist North, Corrupt South, oh what a tragedy, blah, blah, blah.

I enjoyed it. Then again, you have pretty much read every book on that war ever written. I only read one other book, the Stanley Karnow book on it. I liked Hastings' personal accounts of the war. A lot of individual American soldiers, VC, and NVA's were interviewed. What I enjoyed was the fact that he did not ignore commie atrocities. He talked a lot about VC terror tactics such as burying villagers alive, the Tet Hue massacres etc. Dan Fonda and his ilk like to white wash these things and just discuss My Lai or "war crime" bombings. The Hastings book discussed a lot the bombing raids, what it was like to be a pilot, and the casualties which I did not realize. Again, this stuff is probably old news for you, but to a novice like me it was a really entertaining book.

[heydaralon]

Smitty: Have you ever heard of Frederick Longeval's Embers of War? I haven't read it yet, but I purchased it used on amazon not too long ago. It covers the French war experience in Vietnam. It looks very interesting.


As an aside, I am on a Korea war binge. What is your favorite book on the Korean War?

[Smitty-48]

Max Hastings' Vietnam book is also great.

Rly?

I found it to be a pedestrian rehashing of the same old same old tropes, Imperialist French, Arrogant Americans, Stalinist North, Corrupt South, oh what a tragedy, blah, blah, blah.

I enjoyed it. Then again, you have pretty much read every book on that war ever written.

Most of the books were the same though, they all fall within the boilerplate narrative, some are slightly more of this or that, but for the majority of it, the analysis is boilerplate, the accepted liberal media narrative, to include Hastings.

It's not so much that I know more because I've read more, because I didn't learn more by reading more books which all basically said the same thing.

What happens is that after awhile you start to see that the liberal media narrative is a simplistic template which they impose on the war, like a Greek Tragedy, there's an Overton Window and they don't deviate from it.

[Smitty-48]

Smitty: Have you ever heard of Frederick Longeval's Embers of War? I haven't read it yet, but I purchased it used on amazon not too long ago. It covers the French war experience in Vietnam. It looks very interesting.


As an aside, I am on a Korea war binge. What is your favorite book on the Korean War?

I haven't read Embers of War, but I have watched Logevall's seminar on the book, sounds like it could be worth a read, just because he focuses on the French

"The French" is the answer to every question about Vietnam

My favorite book on the Korean War is Korea : The War Before Vietnam by Callum A MacDonald