Re Coordinated Occupy Bigfoot Crackdowns

[Ian Livingston]

Prophets do not really foretell the future, they foretell the
present--or, more precisely, they describe trends they see emerging.
So, yes, Mark, in that respect, Mister P is prophetic. These trends
and activities are old as the colonies. Jay Feldman's book
Manufacturing Hysteria documents the emergence of the FBI and the
fear-mongering of American politicians over the past 100 years, and
Howard Zinn describes the same behavior among the Founding Fathers and
those who brought us the genocide of the American Indians in A
People's History of the United States. There is nothing new about what
is happening now, it is the re-staging of an old struggle. The only
really new thing about all this is that, as with the Vietnam war, the
government does not have control of the media that reports these
actions because the web, in this case, really has the potential to set
the world on its ear. We are now seeing, though, the outcome of the
attempt to break the Egyptian military grasp on things there even
after a popular revolt. What frightens me most is the possibility that
the movement afoot in the US might result in a military takeover here,
and all that implies. Could Pynchon have seen some of that coming with
the advent of the ARPANet and all? With the secret hiways and so
forth? I still cringe a bit at inferring authorial intent, but, well,
some things just make a fella wonder is all.

On Sun, Nov 20, 2011 at 9:25 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
> From a UC Davis Prof on Huff Post....
>
> Last week, former Seattle Police Chief Norm Stamper published an essay arguing that the current epidemic of police brutality is a reflection of the militarization (his word, not mine) of our urban police forces, the result of years of the "war on drugs" and the "war on terror. Stamper was chief of police during the World Trade Organization protests in Seattle in 1999, and is not a voice that can be easily dismissed.
> Yesterday, the militarization of policing in the U.S. arrived on my own campus.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com>
> To: Robert Mahnke <rpmahnke at gmail.com>
> Cc: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Sent: Monday, November 21, 2011 12:12 AM
> Subject: Re: Re Coordinated Occupy Bigfoot Crackdowns
>
> Yes, and with deeper intertwining, I guess.....prophetic there or just "realistically true"?
>
> The future is a boot in the face forever---1984
>
> And when I read of some Occupy places haveing to deal with 'infiltrators' who bring/want drugs, steal,
> are internally violent or 'beyond' the General Assembly's wishes, I think of the inherent vice of some
> that clogs the beach freedoms.......
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Robert Mahnke <rpmahnke at gmail.com>
> To: Mark Kohut markekohut at yahoo.com
>
>
>
>
> Cc: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Sent: Sunday, November 20, 2011 8:16 PM
> Subject: Re: Re Coordinated Occupy Bigfoot Crackdowns
>
> Much of what you say here is true of Vineland as well, no?
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
> On Nov 20, 2011, at 4:14 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> A longtime plister, not posting for awhile lately, insightfully noted that
>> one difference between Inherent Vice and much earlier Pynchon
>> was that TRP was prophetic earlier but IV looked back (by setting and placing in time of
>> thematic meanings).........
>>
>> i keep thinkign of that, thanks Tore Rye, but as is the first thing many critics, readers say
>> about an "historical fiction", it is written by a person seeing the past thru the present.........
>>
>> The militarization of our police forces, revealed as if in bas relief, often in the bas(of)night....
>> is so clearly emphasized in Inherent Vice as to be a shout (as from a sound cannon, used on Occupyers).....
>>
>> Re: Occupyers presence as Occupiers. Melville has a wonderful image of a drummond light---
>> circular intense flashlight-like light....which he offers as something we can be like if we can be
>> nothing else.............
>>
>> Occupyers are, at least. I hold my little keychain light up to Laura--who was more---and all ot them.
>>
>> The rest is pettiness. Imho.
>



-- 
"Less than any man have I  excuse for prejudice; and I feel for all
creeds the warm sympathy of one who has come to learn that even the
trust in reason is a precarious faith, and that we are all fragments
of darkness groping for the sun. I know no more about the ultimates
than the simplest urchin in the streets." -- Will Durant