Editorial I
Jr, R. Emmett Tyrrell
Editorial I Superstitions and the Stuff of History T HE RECENTLY published monograph of a relatively unknown Hoosier historian, Mr....
...For when we discuss relative deprivation -- which is what American poverty amounts to -- we are not only talking about income levels...
...Some of the superstitions are admittedly entertaining and provide hours of amusement for civilized men...
...We all know that public figures -- regardless of their sagacity -- are only rarely secure from that ambience of dubiety and buncombe which seeps throughout society in general, and the superstitions of yesteryear are but amusing prefaces to the nonsensical notions of today...
...Nixon's.Administration when there raised in the land a children's chorus promising that if the Vietnam War would end, some twenty billion dollars would be available to care for more pressing domestic problems -namely, them...
...it dears with national issues and personalities and offers insightful, original and sometimes Offbeat reviews of current books...
...Many Arabs have taken America's opposition to these heinotl.~ ~nals tn be a sign of an "anti-Arab" bias...
...For example, after the 1956 Middle Eastern war, the United States joined with the Soviet Union in compelling Israel to withdraw its army from the Sinai Peninsula and accept a fragile set of security arrangements, arrangements which Egypt would wreck in May 1967...
...Certainly a great number of American peasants in the early part of our own century believed that "thunder sours milk and kills the chicks in sittin' eggs," and undoubtedly many New Yorkers believe it to this very day...
...R. Emmett TyrreU, Jr...
...Fairness is not equivalent to justice, but without fairness, there can he no justice...
...Nixon...
...Nixon is actually expanding hostilities in Vietnam...
...You can take it for a certitude that many American politicians, social planners, professors, disc jockeys and elevator operators devoured this passage with approbation and edification, though for the thoughtful few it is as incomprehensible as Chinese cuisine...
...We already have a Department of Peace...
...In our cities even the poorest people can, through welfare, provide themselves with life's essential needs...
...The New Republic and the Nation are convinced that Mr...
...The blacks and the poor didn't make that society...
...Not surprisingly, Mr...
...We are talking about aspiration levels, and men's aspirations for the good things of this world forever transcend resources...
...A "fair" judge does not sentence a convicted criminal and his victim to jail...
...II --William f. guckley, Jr...
...Ill Probably the most creative activity going on in America today involves political and academic pronunciamentos on national defense and foreign relations...
...One senator, a son of the famous Hoosier State, seriously suggests establishing a Department of Peace...
...That they do not is not because the income is not available...
...We should continue to urge moral principle in international relations...
...they did not, however, offer to Mrs...
...Jackson's venerable image...
...And if one were ever so foolhardy as to cut his hair in the dark, the grim truth was that it "might cause baldness...
...And the best way to persuade nations not to use their horrid offensive weaponry is to develop invulnerable defensive weaponry...
...And m/my of these superstitions have sent fumes dangerously close to national policy...
...Harry Emerick, has moved me to productive meditations on the nature of America's present distemper, for he writes about American superstitions...
...Emerick's book, Recipes, Remedies, and R e f l e c t i o n s - 1770.1807 (advertised elsewhere in this issue), chronicles some of the gorgeous and idiotic superstitions which our oafish antecedents held as Gospel...
...No one wants to wake up tq a commissar, though he might break fortune cooXies with a War Lord...
...Through transfer payments they can even avoid persistent inconvenience and discomfort...
...Other statesmen believe that the most persuasive tactic for encouraging the inscrutable , . . . _ . . _ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - , :The Alternative" A Chic Discussion Piece I I e I THE dLTERNdTIVE v e . a ~ s i m ~ , ~ y ~ irlnd~ ~41der IM L d~+a.~ ..Pq~ I z The Alternative is an insipid journal of polarizing iconoclasm whose style is intellectual, argumentative and satiric or so they say...
...Though Mr...
...Or, according to a more recent variation, Vietnam abounds in limitless oil deposits...
...year(s) subscription to The m Alternative (nine issues per year), n Name | Address n i City, & State Zip II College I or Univ II Please enter a II [ ] New Subscription ~-~ Renewal II as checked below...
...So abundant and varied are the superstitions regarding these subjects that it is only a matter of time before they are incorporated into a nationally recognized religion replete with rituals, scriptures, mullahs and horse hairs...
...Consider the following from the pen of " Tom Wicker, resident wit of the York Timesi...
...n --Louisville Courier Journal | "1 predict for The Alternative a leading role in philosophical and political battles to come...
...But now the futility of our undertaking becomes obvious, for there simply are not enough funds available in America the Bountiful to raise all incomes to the national median, or even to Fuchs' figure (consider that corporate profits in 1970 amounted to only fifty billion dollars...
...Of course this mysterious knowledge never elevated their ruses de la politique, but it certainly created boom times for peddlers of tongue cosmetics, and many a rising young Van Buren saw his swindle sink into the deep because of what was really little more than the primitive state of oral hygiene...
...Fuchs claims that the elimination of continued on page 17 The Alternative February, 1972 17 EDITORIAL I continued from page 3 poverty as experienced in America merely means bringing every family to an income of half the mean...
...That is to say, rather than cut back defensive outlays for research and development, we should probably increase them...
...I cannot see how they differ essentially from the superstitions of our own day, save that they might have been less mischievous to the common wealth...
...The Administration seems to use "evenhandedness" as a synonym for "fairness," and it is possible to infer from the Administration's actions, including official statements, that the Administration conceives of "fairness" as "similar or even identical treatment for all parties in the same situation...
...The nature of American society would not allow it...
...it put them in their present p/ace" (italics added...
...Meir "assurances" that Israel soon will be permitted to purchase the Phantom jets and other military equipment which it has been asking to buy for months...
...But imagine that politicians were to demur from magnifying our sense of relative depravation...
...In domestic matters Americans turn out only a few new superstitions a year, but in foreign affairs their prolificacy has been truly monumental...
...Some of this marvelous guidance could only counsel a man on sound personal hygiene or on invincible strategies in amour, but other more cosmic injunctions, I am sure, benefited national polity, and so formed our incomparable heritage...
...By such ruminations I do not mean to smudge Mr...
...And undoubtedly President Wilson relied heavily on tongue surveillance at the German Embassy and the State Department to expose Zimmerman's infamous note...
...Their influence on polity could be catastrophic...
...V/hile the misconception underlying the Nixon Administration's Middle Eastern policy is that "evenhandedness" or "fairness" means "similar or even identical treatment for all parties in the same situation," the false assumption of this policy is that similar treatment of the parties in the Middle Eastern situation, particularly Egypt and Israel, will promote a "just and lasting peace" because Egypt and...
...Of course, all this was superstition triumphant, but it is flesh and blood to today's tommyrot about "establishing dialogue" -- a contemporary superstition which snags practicaly every politician in the land and threatens the very ecology with rubbish heaps of foolish verbiage every time some sort of social difficulty is revealed...
...Superstition has molded the contours of all history...
...If men are going to fight, the scarcity of modern conveniences is not going to dissuade them...
...What would be the state of our national distemper if, say, Senator McGovern moved on to newer, less cosmic, superstitions...
...Were McCarthy ever to stumble into a position where he had to face the consequences of his brassy chatter, he would become a soaring hawk overnight...
...Emerick, a forester by vocation and a grammar school dropout, has managed to preserve an admirable lucidity and fundamental intelligence which distinguishes him from more celebrated historians, such as Dr...
...If we are going to attempt to eliminate the feeling of being poor it seems more realistic to go full boat and raise incomes to the erstwhile median income...
...I cannot believe that this would eliminate one's sense of being poor, for the inflation would be considerable and social planners just have not been very good in predicting men's feelings...
...The people would r~ot allow it...
...S.00 ! Regular subscribers: n | gex360'llbemb"jlton'lndiua47401'CcmtinentalU'S'A" ~-71 yr.$4 [~2yrs.$7 [-'J3yr~$10 | I ilmmnl nmm Nun mim mmn mm m m m nmnlm m m m , m m m m m m m m m m m m m n m m m m n mm m m m m ~ 18 The Alternative February, 1972 Russians to disarm is to heat them to it...
...Remember the hopeful early days of Mr...
...Their influence on the citizenry is unfortunate...
...I have never been able to take them seriously, though I have always dreamed of taking them on in a game of poker...
...Those who hold the view that America had best dismantle its military because it already possesses enough weaponry to puff this globe into dust are victims of a dangerous delusion...
...Then Mr...
...I should not want to live in this world if we did not have them around to delight us, but others are proving to be a nuisance to a wide variety of innocent persons...
...Whenever he picked up his quill he journeyed through time to consort with poets, philosophers, and even an archangel or two...
...Spiro T. Agnew | "...stands almost alone among a welter of New Left, radical and revolutionary publications...
...It is caled the Department of Defense, and if the pawky senator is implying that the Department of Defense truly intends to promote war, well then a cursory look at recent history reveals that it has been about as successful at bringing war to America as another large Federal agency has been at providing health, education and welfare...
...Stanton Evans | "...one of the most amusing and outrageous and interesting student journals in America...
...And the way the New York Review of Books sees it, Washington is up to no good in Latin America, Africa, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Western Europe, South Asia, Amchitka and Berkeley, California, to name only a few...
...Another superstition ascended in popularity...
...for...
...Besides giving some people an inaccurate and misleading impression of the policies of preceding adminislrations, the Nixon Adminislration has based its own "evenhanded" policy on a misconception and a false assumption...
...It is difficult to predict the status of America's crisis if the frantic superstitions of the left liberals should fade before the triumph of a new, more enlightened, set of spurious beliefs...
...II Hardly a man runs for high office these days without earnestly assuring the populace that he will elminate poverty...
...The nonsense about blistered tongues and sweet apples are just two examples of twaddle which Mr...
...it is because of an excrutiating intractable syndrome, designated by Oscar Lewis as the culture of poverty and designated by Banfield as the lower class...
...Daniel Moynihan explained that this twenty billion dollar windfall would be utterly dissipated by things such as a) military and civilian pay increases, b) cost escalation, c) cost overruns on weapons systems already under development but not yet deployed, d) future expenditure consequences of already approved weapons systems and e) wider research and development...
...We should continue to argue against war...
...it is all too tremendous to contemplate...
...This conception of "fairness" is peculiar and even wrong because it means the party that is trying to be "fair" acts without taking into account or making judgments on the different attitudes toward it of the parties in the situation and the different circumstances, resources, actions and ends of these parties...
...Whether the United States should have given so much economic and military aid to the Arab states and worked so hard to achieve friendly relations with them is questionable, but what is unquestionable is that the United States has not had Middle Eastern policies which can be characteriC_,ed simpl~" as "anti-Arab" and "pro-Israel...
...Through government programs they can provide themselves with adequate health care and sufficiently nutritious diets...
...Social scientists as different as Edward Banfield and Victor Fuchs agree with this definition...
...The leaders of a nation at war would not consider it "fair" - - indeed they would consider it "mad" - - to give their hattie plans to their allies and their enemies...
...But assuredly autumn will soon be upon them, and then the civlized few will have a new batch of palmists to enjoy...
...If it were true it would not be beautiful...
...This may cause you to go crazy...
...IV It is manifest then that in this great nation --the hope of all Christendom and the home of Leonard Bernstein - - there still flourish as many superstitions as ever...
...I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I To subscribe, just clip this unique order form and, with the appropriate amount of money (two dollars for students and faculty members, four dollars for others), mail to The Altematke, eJo The Establishment, R,R...
...The problem is that before eliminating what we in America call poverty we shall have to eliminate politicians who use poverty as political catnip, and, in the absence of a more enlightened legal code, this will continue to be criminal...
...They are genuine superstitions...
...that Mr...
...How does this essentially differ from the moonshine of the last century when many wise men of affairs solemnly believed that blisters on the tongue were caused "by tellin' lies...
...Everyone from the first Adams to the renowned Harding realized that "'a dirty sock worn roundthe neck on going to bed will cure a sore throat...
...It is just another of the multitude of high-toned superstitions which influential people merchant these days...
...The children moved on...
...But, since 1948, the United States also has given generous amounts of economic and military aid to the Arab states and it has strived to achieve friendly relations with these states, even when some of them have been hostile to our country and even when friendly relations were achieved at Israel's expense...
...They are just not that serious about he business of government...
...Inflation would not allow it...
...Joseph Lash...
...Some of these superstitions concern poverty and national defense...
...To be fair does not mean to lack discrimination or to systematically avoid judgment...
...to be fair means to treat the parties in a situation consistently in accordance with certain rules or standards...
...Consider old Tom Jefferson dreaming away down in Monticello...
...11, I "The Alternative is a welcome addition to the ranks of American | opinion journalism...
...II _9 -M...
...But we should never yield to our dreams before assuring that they become realities...
...Considering the kind of poverty legislation urged by such groups as the National Welfare Rights Organization, and by politicians such as Senator Edward (Teddy) Kennedy, it becomes obvious that the superstitions surrounding poverty are more dangerous than superstitions about swollen tongues or dirty socks...
...No one is going to forget...
...The blessed McCarthy has been engagingly poetic in his foreign policy statements but all good poetry is palpably untrue...
...All these notions are of course untrue and irrational...
...Editorial II The Results of 'Evenhandness' I N KEEPING with the Administration's "evenhanded" Middle Eastern policy, President Nixon and Secretary of State William Rogers offered to Israeli Premier Golda Meir, during her recent visit to Washington, "assurances" that the United States is committed to Israel's security...
...Supposedly vast fortunes were accruing for American tycoons as they carried off the fabled treasures of Vietnam...
...By characterizing its Middle Eastern policy as "evenhanded," the Nixon Administration may give some Americans the inaccurate and misleading impression that the Middle Eastern policies of preceding administrations were not "evenhanded," that they were, in fact, biased in favor of Israel and against the Arab states, Since 1948, when Israel won its independence from British colonial rule, proclaimed its statehood, and defended itse!f against Arab armies intent on its destruction, the United States has given some economic and military aid to Israel and it has had friendly relations with Israel...
...have taken it to be a sign of a bias in favor of decency and good sense...
...The Alternative would be a fine magazine if you'd cut the | cursing and name-calling...
...For instance the early superstition that "'a live snake put in a barrel of cider will keep it from spoilin', and keep it sweet" might strike modern bacteriologists as improbable, and it probably never influenced President Jackson's thoughts on, say, the Bank of the United States, but who believes that Mr...
...About twelve billion dollars of income separated the poor from the poverty line, but the inefficiency of government is so costly that it would take about thirty billion dollars to close this gap...
...II Student and faculty members: [ ] 1 yr...
...How lon~ it can continue I do not know...
...The cost of bureaucracy would not allow it...
...But as soon as he stepped into the White House he swore off the thing, began dictating his thoughts and gave manifest destiny its most vigorous shove So it has been with the sainted Kennedy, the second Johnson and now Mr...
...The A l t e r n a t i v e F e b r u a r y , 1972 3 Editorial I Superstitions and the Stuff of History T HE RECENTLY published monograph of a relatively unknown Hoosier historian, Mr...
...And finally, I suspect the nature of the problem is just not amenable to such a solution...
...2 [ ] 2 yrs...
...Nowadays our political messiahs are rejected as hypocrites and scoundrels, unworthy of high office, if they do not wink at the truth and proclaim their deep solicitude for Chicanos, Indians, students, homosexuals, tomboys or whatever the next object of American iconography is to be...
...3.50 [ ] 3 yrs...
...Emerick never mentions it, I imagine the secret service maintained elaborate files concerning the tongues of every suspicious politician and editor in the Grand Republic...
...Imagine...
...Finally, imagine trmt we stop hoping for a magic act from every agency of the federal government and start yawning at the moral exhibitionism of our demagogues while elevating personal standards...
...William Appleman Williams and Prolessor Gabriel Kolko, who do not seem to realize that they too write about superstitions...
...A Reader | I Enclosed is...
...American poverty is the lack, at least in the cities, of enough income to prevent one from feeling poor...
...Imagine, if you will, that the government could raise that money and bring every American's income to the poverty line...
...The birth of a new era merely indicates the triumph of less familiar, more beguiling superstitions...
...A certain set of wunder guidelines once instructed a President on preserving his apples...
...The last two are vividly illustrative of the deficiencies afflicting the nitwits who hold these views...
...In America, when a politician proclaims his intention to eliminate poverty, he inflates the expectations of the citizens, he intensifies the poor's felling of poverty and, as fate would have it, he actually creates American poverty...
...Finally, the doleful truth is that limiting arms has very little to do with limiting war...
...Yet only twentyfour billion dollars ever reached those living under the poverty line drawn by the Social Security Administration ($3,335 for a "non-garm" family of four in 1967) and, though it raised their income forty-two per cent, only one half the families below the poverty line ever received any transfer payments...
...For instance, Mr...
...Does anyone actually believe that a family of four living on an income of just over three thousand dollars would not feel wretchedly poor in a nation whose median income is over nine thousand dollars...
...most Americar...
...This one wondrous recommendation does much to explain the circumstances surrounding Eleanor Roosevelt's torturously reliable throat and marital discomfort -- a troubling historical puzzle cracked only recently by Mr...
...Every few weeks a new bugaboo is revealed, a new savant steps forward and an old superstition expires from overexposure, while a dozen replacements elbow their way to center stage~ This process has been going on since the rise of Kennedy...
...Twenty-four carat balderdash indubitably, but for the believing minds it is packed with dynamite, and for many policy makers it is irresistible...
...Emerick notes that many Americans of the last century dutifully believed that one should never "sleep in the moonlight...
...Nixon's sensible doctrine of a low profile abroad should continue while a sound defensive superioritv is maintained...
...Neither has it had policies which can be characterized simply us "pro-Arab" and "anti-Israel...
...Assuredly these are all preposterous, if juicy, notions, but as I say, they have moved me to reflect on our own time, for their modern equivalents differ significantly in that today's superstitions are held by more influential minds...
...The problem with those who flatter themselves with the peace prefix is that they rarely think matters through...
...Nations already know how to blow up the world...
...Emerick has dredged from the past...
...There were other superstitions equally preposterous and surely as potent and none is without its equivalent in our ow n enlightened age...
...A "fair" teacher does not give A's to students who always attend class and turn in superior work and to students who rarely attend class and turn in inferior work...
...Further, the Republic is chopping through high seas, and from all quarters there are grave fears for America's future...
...a later equally silly set inspires a President's dealings with Oriental thugs...
...A philanthropist who wants to he "fair" does not give assistance to anyone who asks for it, whether he needs it or not...
...Jackson ever turned down the sheets without first enjoining Major Lewis to "check the snakes...
...Such policies would have entailed support for the deslruction of Israel and the annihilation of its people...
...At the end of the last decade, social policy allotted some forty billion dollars in transfer payments...
...there is, in fact, no place t o hide from the kind of society we have created, or allowed to develoo...
Vol. 5 • February 1972 • No. 5
