Catch 22 and the cult of loyalty

[Michael Bailey]

(Back to SLPAD tomorrow)


Don’t wanna read Matt Taibbi particularly.

I’m interested that you thought it was interesting, since you share my
enjoyment of Pynchon’s work. Was there anything in there with anywhere near
a Pynchonian level of lucidity, skill, and humor?



Imho, Taibbi is more glib than insightful, like the late, great PJ O’Rourke
(requiescat in pace) - fun to read, & not devoid of wisdom, but, still and
always and ever, he cherry picks & avoids confronting home truths.


I think these are home truths:

A) Putin’s actions are those of a kleptocrat who ordered Russian troops
into Ukraine, breaking the status quo there. There is no reasonable case
for annexation. Russia is way too big already & not administered justly.
Putin’s “leadership” is ruinous.

Not that Ukraine is a perfect democracy…but still.

Has Taibbi got anything to change one’s thinking on that?



B) By Vollmann’s criteria in RURD, Ukraine is fighting a just war. Russian
victory would mean much greater misery there. It’s reasonable to root for
Ukraine to win. US assistance is necessary and proper.

Not that US foreign policy hasn’t often manifested egregious evil, & not
that this war & many additional disgusting developments couldn’t have been
avoided with consistent even slightly more benevolent leadership by example
on the part of the USA since, say 1945…but still.

Has Taibbi got anything to overturn that conviction?



C) There are plenty of links between Trump and Russia.
Leaving aside Trump’s well-documented willingness, nay, eagerness, to lie
and break the law, there’s a panoply of context: Trump’s fawning over Putin
(et dictatorial al, including the release of 5,000 Taliban and capitulation
to Taliban, leaving the Afghanistan government out of negotiations);
Trump’s trying with partial success to overturn sanctions against even
Republican resistance; and Trump’s “matter-of-public-record” financial
beholdenness, via Deutsche Bank & oligarchs.

I also remember reading of a server in Trump Tower (for a time, till it was
noticed & probably hidden) with heavy documented traffic to I think it was
a server in the cyber war section of the Kremlin - something like that.
Ring any bells?

Hard to prove non-existence, so I won’t ask if Taibbi can do that. Hard to
imagine, though, that Taibbi has an array of facts that counters an
overwhelming impression of Trump’s impaired loyalty to the US constitution,
(and, like, basic human decency, dude!) in favor of murderous autocrats
like MBS, etc, & of course Putin.

 What I envision Taibbi offering is a plethora of assaults on Mueller
minutiae while he ignores the gist, and exaggerations of the unimpressive
Durham findings, in an effort to obscure & distract from the obvious bigger
picture.

Obviously nobody’s perfect, but I think Taibbi has forgotten - or chosen to
ignore - how much the actions of Trump & Putin suck. Straining at Biden
gnats & swallowing Trump/Putin beams.

If I’m wrong, would you be so kind as to summarize, & maybe hit the high
points?




D) Hunter Biden’s laptop’s chain of custody is ridiculous and its content
is irrelevant.

Has Taibbi anything to dispute that? How, pray tell?



E) Statistics bear out vaccine usefulness. Not that they’re never harmful,
and not that profiteering isn’t rampant, and not that vax defenders never
abuse their platforms or stretch the truth…but still, the odds favor vax.
And the behavior of anti-vaxxers further weakens their case. As do many
Covid fatalities.

I’m a guy who loves woo-woo. But I also like living.
So in between yoga, homeopathy, craniosacral therapy, sound baths & chakra
re-balancing, I will be getting flu shots, Covid boosters as they arrive,
and Shingrix (which I’ve been putting off)…and maybe double up on
supplements afterwards - there’s good data that vitamins can help avoid or
lessen any immunization side effects. A-and maybe some Sufi dance for good
measure.






On Sat, May 20, 2023 at 5:33 PM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

> Below is a link to a long intelligent and literate discussion between Matt
> Taibbi and Walter Kirin about the Durham report, a report  that concludes
> about the origins and development of russiagate mania that there were no
> Russians, no collusion dirt, no telling emails but a fair number of drinks.
> The sad part is there is also no acknowledgement by mainstream media of any
> value for this attempt at a conclusive neutral review,  no admission of
> McCarthyist witch hunting, no learning from past mistakes, and no
> renunciation of the dangers posed by over 50 well funded private and
> government operations to censor the kind of skeptics who got russiagate
> right, those doubters  who questioned the safe and effective narrative, who
> questioned WMDs in Iraq  and who  currently question the US’s headlong rush
> toward WW3?  After years of research showing no evidence supporting the
> Russiagate accusations ( I have always despised Trump and would be happy to
> see him convicted of a real crime) it is time to accept that political
> propaganda is dangerous, corrupting and expensive and that a media guided
> by political, commercial or  blind government loyalty does not serve our
> still precarious attempt at a constitutional democratically-elected
> republic.
>   The discussion in the last 3rd of the show about Catch 22,  focusing on
> the loyalty oath, is particularly relevant and illustrates the power of
> well constructed satire vs  the political arguments taking place in a world
> where everyone wants to have their own facts.
>
>
>
> https://www.racket.news/p/episode-39-america-this-week-with?utm_source=podcast-email%2Csubstack&publication_id=1042&post_id=122552662&utm_medium=email#details
> <
> https://www.racket.news/p/episode-39-america-this-week-with?utm_source=podcast-email,substack&publication_id=1042&post_id=122552662&utm_medium=email#details
> >
>
>
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>