Garet Garrett - The Driver

Take a moment from the idiocy that is about to descend upon us in the form the DNC convention this week and read about a novel published in 1922 with implications for Ayn Rand's later novels as well as the business cycle that plagued the American economy throughout the 20th (and into the 21st) century.

The War of the World; Niall Ferguson; PBS; The 100 years war.

The PBS documentary "The War of the World: A New History of the 20th Century" has generated some controversy this week, as conservatives have been critical that the documentary has attacked American war efforts in WWII. The documentary has been criticized for attacking America's alliance with Stalin.

I saw the first part of this series last night. Part I did not include most of World War II. Part I takes the viewer from the beginning of the 20th century through the beginning of WWII.

So far, the documentary has been somewhat instructive. The documentary was critical of the Bolshevik revolution, especially the brutality of Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin. The documentary pointed out that the Bolsheviks did not control the territory outside of the Russian cities for some time after the Bolshevik revolution. The narrator indicated that opposition forces were on the verge of deposing the Bolsheviks when the Bolsheviks reversed the course of the war by using "terrorist" tactics on their own people, including soldiers and farmers.

This harsh treatment of the Bolshevik revolution would never have been allowed in the western MSM/DNC when the Soviets still controlled Russia. I had heard of some of these facts, but never in a television documentary.

The documentary also spent a great deal of time on the Turkish persecution of Armenians and Greeks in the immediate aftermath of World War I. While the documentary did not explicitly point out that this persecution constituted muslim persecution of Christians, the existence of this story on PBS is new and significant.

The main point of Part I was the length of the wars of the 20th century. "The War of the World" views the 20th century wars as a 100 year war. The narrator deals with these wars as a continuation of the same war. For too long, we have tried to analyze these wars separately. In doing so, we miss the real causes of the wars. Authors analyze the pros and cons of World War II in a vacuum, thereby missing the real culprits, such as the rise of totalitarianism worldwide over a 20+ year period prior to the War and continuing well beyond the War's official "end." I have always believed that World War II was the hottest part of the Cold War, during which (and immediately afterward) the Soviets made their biggest territorial gains. We will see how the documentary treats that subject in Parts II and III.

The documentary analyzes the 20th century wars as part of a continuing battle between East and West. Will Durant's eleven volume series on the history of civilization does the same thing - and even traces the East vs. West conflict back to the Trojan War (circa 1100 B.C.). By using the East vs. West analysis, the currect conflict involving Islam (as well as issues relating to China) make more sense. The Cold War makes more sense when we see that its roots go back to World War I - instead of merely to the Berlin Wall or Korea.

Part I was deficient in that the author appeared to be too rooted in socialism, including fawning attention to H.G Wells. But this is to be expected on PBS (and almost all television in general).

The author also could have easily tied WWI to the financial crises of the 1920's and 1930's. The connections definitely exist and would prove the author's point even more strongly. The timeline runs basically as follows: (1) World War I and the financial bubble that paid for it led utlimately to the financial collapse in the West that we refer to as the Great Depression (1929 - ?) (the collapse began earlier in Europe). (2) The economic upheaval of the 1920's and 1930's in Europe and the West led to the rise of Hitler and Japanese expansion, which the remaining powers did not have the will to resist (due to the economic upheaval) until it was too late to avert another war. When combined with the rise of Soviet Russia (a direct result of WWI), the perfect storm was created.

For more on the effect of the bubble and its roots in WWI and its consequences in the Great Depression, see Garet Garrett's "The Bubble that Broke the World."



See "America's Great Depression" for a detailed discussion of how the bubble led to our own depression.



Both of these books hold implications for our current economic situation.

While the PBS documentary misses that point, the pros outweigh the cons thus far. "The War of the World" can be a beginning point for a greater understanding of the past 100 years.
----------------------------------------
visit counter added July 1, 2008
----------------------------------------



-------------------------------------------------
Part II of War of the World

William F. Buckley, 1925-2008

National Review founder William Buckley died today.

Buckley was a throwback to the era when the MSM/DNC enjoyed a virtual monopoly on information. I first discovered Buckley in the early 1980's. At that time, I was treated to an almost non-stop barrage of twisted news presentations, distorted facts, repeats of Democrat talking points, etc. from the nightly news and the pages of newspapers. Once a week, William Buckley (and a very few others) would have one chance to rebut the entire MSM/DNC in the confined space of an opinion column on the editorial page of some newspapers. Even though it was hardly a fair fight, Buckley's (and others') few inches of weekly space was more than a match for the daily rants of the NYT, AP, WaPo, John Chancellor, Walter Cronkite, etc. Buckley kept the conservative light glowing until the New Media could begin fanning the flames at the end of the 1980's.

Conservatives born after 1975 cannot fully appreciate what it was like to live in the era before the New Media existed. Buckley was one voice that helped make that era bearable.
















Ann Coulter posts some anecdotes and quotes here, including Buckley's references to Gore Vidal as a "queer" and a "fag."

Michelle Malkin posts more detail.

Joe Sobran shared his memories in May, 2006, when Buckley's emphysema was announced:

Over the years I came to know another side of Bill. When I had serious troubles, he was a generous friend who did everything he could to help me without being asked. And I wasn’t the only one. I gradually learned of many others he’d quietly rescued from adversity. He’d supported a once-noted libertarian in his destitute old age, when others had forgotten him. He’d helped two pals of mine out of financial difficulties. And on and on. Everyone seemed to have a story of Bill’s solicitude. When you told your own story to a friend, you’d hear one from him. It was as if we were all Bill Buckley’s children.

It went far beyond sharing his money. One of Bill’s best friends was Hugh Kenner, the great critic who died two years ago. Hugh was hard of hearing, and once, after a 1964 dinner with Hugh and Charlie Chaplin, Bill scolded Hugh for being too stubborn to use a hearing aid. Here were the greatest comedian of the age and the greatest student of comedy, and Hugh had missed much of the conversation! Later Hugh’s wife told me how grateful Hugh had been for that scolding. Nobody else would have dared speak to her husband that way. Only a true friend would. If Bill saw you needed a little hard truth, he’d tell you, even if it pained him to say it.

I once spent a long evening with one of Bill’s old friends from Yale, whose name I won’t mention. He told me movingly how Bill stayed with him to comfort him when his little girl died of brain cancer. If Bill was your friend, he’d share your suffering when others just couldn’t bear to. What a great heart — eager to spread joy, and ready to share grief!

In another recent column, Sobran compared the careers of Buckley and Ayn Rand (and even Garet Garrett). While I disagree with much of what Sobran has written in recent years (especially about the war), his comparison in that article is interesting to every student of the history of the conservative and libertarian movements:

When Soviet Communism finally collapsed in 1991,
NATIONAL REVIEW felt that its mission was accomplished.
It didn't notice that the America it had set out to save
from Communism no longer existed. Say what you will about
Ayn Rand, I can't imagine her making such a mistake.

This Sobran column contains more details on Buckleys disputes with other conservatives in later years.

I have read several Buckley books over the years, the following of which I endorse:



Ann Coulter has written that this book "proved that normal people didn't have to wait for the Venona Papers to be declassified to see that the Democratic Party was collaborating with fascists. The book -- and the left's reaction thereto -- demonstrated that liberals could tolerate a communist sympathizer, but never a Joe McCarthy sympathizer."



I read "God and Man at Yale" while in college, before I could run to the New Media as a refuge from campus leftism. This book probably provided generations of pre-New Media students with the reinforcement they needed to withstand the barrage of leftism from their college professors.



Many conservatives await a new Reagan to rescue the Republican party from the moderates that now ignore and do not understand capitalism, history, freedom, the rule of law, etc. Before a new Reagan can emerge, I believe we will need a new Buckley - one who will be willing to maintain conservative principles in the absence of access to power and who can energize a new generation of intellectuals to resist the pressure of the modern leftward movement in all major institutions.

The William Buckley that wrote books and published NR in the wilderness in the years before the election of Ronald Reagan provided empowerment is the example that I fear modern conservatives will have to follow in the coming decades.

Garet Garrett; Blue Wound;

In August, I commented that I was beginning a discussion of Garet Garrett's "Blue Wound" at my other blog. I finished most of that discussion in September and completed my last post last week.

The discussion now includes everything from (1) how I found my copy of that rare book to (2) where it can be found online to (3) a chapter-by-chapter journey through the book's contents (without revealing plot spoilers) to (4) the strange predictions Garrett made in 1921 for the remainder of the 20th century (including which ones are only now coming true).


1921

Classics of Conservatism - part XXI - Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand

Click here for a previous "Classic of Conservatism."

According to the New York Times, today is the 50th anniversary of the publication of Atlas Shrugged.

Written by Ayn Rand, the novel explores the philosophies of objectivism and liberty. It has been twenty years since I read my copy, but I remember what attracted me to it. Rand did not defend capitalism on the same grounds as modern day conservatives. She did not claim that capitalism was better for the poor or less evil than its critics claimed or acceptable only if properly regulated. Instead, Rand advocated man's happiness and success as values and virtues in and of themselves. Rand was among the first to say that profit is a virtue, while altruism is harmful and wrong. She correctly identified the totalitarian movements of the 20th century, at home and abroad, with the altruistic side of the philosophical ledger. Altruism is the philosophy that one's life is at the disposal and service of others. She draws the logical conclusion between altruism, theft and slavery.

The attack on altruism may shock and offend the average reader at first, but it stands to reason that there must be more to the story about this word [altruism] that we have taken for granted for so long and have repeated without comprehension so many times. Those who want to think will enjoy Rand's books, including Atlas Shrugged, for this reason alone.








Atlas Shrugged is the climax of the Randian novels. In previous years, she had written several novels, plays, short stories, etc. Atlas Shrugged was her masterpiece. The book contains the story of a railroad executive who struggles against the philosophy of not only altruism, but government enforced altruism. But the plot is about more than politics or business. The plot is also a great mystery story, as the reader gradually learns who is responsible for turning out the lights of world.

Paperback (Signet) edition from the 1980's





The story is broad in scope, as it takes the reader from one end of the country to other over the course of three years (with numerous flashbacks to the previous decade and beyond).

Ayn Rand always believed that "plot" was the most important element in any story. The plot of Atlas Shrugged was relatively complex and undoubtedly took much editing [and many years] to make it complete, consistent and integrated. The basic story involved a conflict between the main characters, all of whom are the "good guys." This theme of "good vs. good" was a recurring feature of Randian fiction, as she believed that evil was impotent to do harm in this world unless aided by the good. So she focused on the good and the way that good unknowingly helps evil. Another benefit of this plot style is that the end is much less predictable.

The basic story in this novel can be traced back through numerous novels of Ayn Rand, all the way to a short story named "Red Pawn" in the early 1930's. In the previous works, the plot may be almost unrecognizable as a precursor to Atlas Shrugged, but the similarity exists once the reader understands the "good vs. good" technique and how to match the characters in the early works with those in Atlas Shrugged.







The Times article focuses on the long term influence of Atlas Shrugged:

One of the most influential business books ever written is a 1,200-page novel published 50 years ago, on Oct. 12, 1957. It is still drawing readers; it ranks 388th on Amazon.com’s best-seller list.

. . . . .

But the book attracted a coterie of fans, some of them top corporate executives, who dared not speak of its impact except in private. When they read the book, often as college students, they now say, it gave form and substance to their inchoate thoughts, showing there is no conflict between private ambition and public benefit.

“I know from talking to a lot of Fortune 500 C.E.O.’s that ‘Atlas Shrugged’ has had a significant effect on their business decisions, even if they don’t agree with all of Ayn Rand’s ideas,” said John A. Allison, the chief executive of BB&T, one of the largest banks in the United States.

“It offers something other books don’t: the principles that apply to business and to life in general. I would call it complete,” he said.

The following that the book has attracted is often watered down with such references as "public benefit" etc.

I have often lamented that Rand did not write more books. But my reading has lead me to an author whose writings in the 1920's often foreshadowed the Randian works in haunting ways. Garet Garrett's novels have sufficient similarity with some of the storylines in Atlas Shrugged to make those novels almost equally enjoyable. Rand not only has left a great impression on future generations, but enjoys deep roots in prior literature.



Previous - Philosophy: Who Needs It

Garet Garrett - Blue Wound

After months of idleness, I have begun contributing again to my other blog - The Garet Garrett Blog. I am reviewing Garrett's first novel - The Blue Wound.

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett - Blue Wound

A city is like a giant hanging by the umbilical cord. Its belly is outside of itself, at a distance, in the keeping of others. Cut it off from its belly and it surrenders or dies. As the first city was so the last one is. No city endures.

Garet Garrett - The Blue Wound.

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett

"Americans now are of three kinds, namely: those who are very unhappy about what has happened in one lifetime to their world - to its morals, principles and ways of thinking - and have intuitions of a dire sequel; those who only now begin to read the signs and are seized with premonitions of disaster; and three, those who like it."

Garet Garrett People's Pottage (p. 91)




Click here to vote for the Garet Garrett blog in the Weblog Awards. Today is the last day for voting.

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett

We have crossed the boundary that lies between Republic and Empire. If you ask when, the answer is that you cannot make a single stroke between day and night: the precise moment does not matter. There was no painted sign to say: 'You are now entering Imperium.' Yet it was a very old road and the voice of history was saying: 'Whether you know it or not, the act of crossing may be irreversible.' And now, not far ahead, is a sign that reads: 'No U-turns.'

Garet Garrett (1952), [from The People's Pottage]



Please vote for the Garet Garrett blog at the Weblog Awards.

Weblog Awards - three more days.

There are three more days of voting for the Weblog Awards.

To repeat my previous posts, my favorites are as follows:

My other blog, Garet Garrett, is nominated in the Best of the Rest category.

I think I will achieve my goal of not finishing last. I currently stand as number 13. Numbers 14 and 15 are way behind. I am within three votes of catching number 12.

I endorse a number of other blogs in different categories:

Scrappleface is the best in the humor category. Scrappleface is more than simply a humor site. The Scrappleface posts reveal the MSM/DNC's actual positions/opinions stripped of their hypocrisy. It is that simple. If the MSM/DNC were honest about its goals and beliefs, MSM/DNC statements, arguments and news items would be indistinguishable from Scrappleface posts.

I endorse Right Wing Sparkle in the 1001 - 1750 category.










Please vote for Confederate Yankee in the 251-500 category.

In the Best Conservative Blog category, I support Debbie Schlussel. Debbie's posts provide valuable updates on how the U.S. government coddles and ignores those who pose domestic terror threats.





[Honorable mention to Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiller and LaShawn Barber in the same category.]

Samantha Burns is nominated as the Best Canadian Blog.







[I know I am including photos only of the girls, but can you blame me?]



And finally, please vote for Pamela at Atlas Shrugs for Best New Blog. She is as witty and insightful as she is uncompromising.











Vote for all of these blogs once a day through Thursday. And thanks to Kathleen, Debbie, Samantha and Pamela for giving my readers a reason to linger at my blog.

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett

There are those who still think they are holding the pass against a revolution that may be coming up the road. But they are gazing in the wrong direction. The revolution is behind them. It went by in the Night of Depression, singing songs to freedom.

Garet Garrett, [from The People's Pottage]



Please vote for the Garet Garrett blog at the Weblog Awards.

Quote of the day - Absalom Weaver

Today's quote is a repost from February 16, 2005.

One of the main characters, Absalom Weaver, sits listening to a sales pitch for the local farmers to join a marketing cooperative. At the end of the sales pitch, the farmers persuade Weaver to rise and give his opinion:

. . . He had not yet begun to speak, but he was peering about in the grass, stooping here and there to pluck a bit of vegetation. He walked as far as the fence for a bramble leaf. Returning he snapped a twig from the elm above his head and faced them.

"This towering elm," he began, with an admiring look at the tree, "was once a tiny thing. A sheep might have eaten it at one bite. Every living thing around it was hostile and injurious. And it survived. It grew. It took its profit. It became tall and powerful beyond the reach of its enemies. What preserved it - cooperative marketing? What gave it power - a law from Congress? What gave it fullness - the Golden Rule? On what was its strength founded - a fraternal spirit? You know better. Your instincts tell you no. It saved itself. It found its own greatness. How? By fighting. Did you know that plants fight? If you could only see the deadly, ceaseless warfare among plants this lovely landscape would terrify you. It would make you think man's struggles tame."

"I hold up this leaf from the elm. The reason it is flat and thin is that the peaceable work of its life is to gather nourishment for the tree from the air. Therefore it must have as much surface as possible to touch the air with. But it has another work to do. A grisly work. A natural work, all the same. It must fight. For that use it is pointed at the end as you see and has teeth around the edge - these. The first thing the elm plant does is to grow straight up out of the ground with a spear thrust, its leaves rolled tightly together. Its enemies do not notice it. Then suddenly each leaf spreads itself out and with its teeth attacks other plants; it overturns them, holds them out of the sunlight and drowns them. Marvelous, isn't it? Do you wonder why the elm does not overrun the earth? Because other plants fight back, each in its own way. I show you a blade of grass. It has no teeth. How can it fight? Perhaps it lives by love and sweetness. It does not. It grows very fast by stealth, taking up so little room that nothing else minds, until all at once it is tall and strong enough to throw out blades in every direction and fall upon other plants. It smothers them to death. Then the bramble. I care not for the bramble. Not because it fights. For another reason. Here is its weapon. Besides the spear point and the teeth the bramble leaf you see is in five parts, like one's hand. It is a hand in fact, and one very hard to cast off. When it cannot overthrow and kill an enemy as the elm does, it climbs up his back to light and air, and in fact prefers that opportunity, gaining its profit not in natural combat but in shrewd advantage, like the middleman. Another plant I would like to show you. There is one nearby. Unfortunately it would be inconvenient to exhibit him in these circumstances. His familiar name is honeysuckle. He is sleek, suave, brilliantly arrayed, and you would not suspect his nature, which is that of the preying speculator. Once you are in his toils it is hopeless. The way of this plant is to twist itself round and round another and strangle it."

"This awful strife is universal in plant life. There are no exemptions. Among animals it is not so fierce. They can run from one another. Plants must fight it out where they stand. They must live or die on the spot. Among plants of one kind there is rivalry. The weak fall out and die; the better survive. But all plants of one kind fight alike against plants of all other kinds. That is the law of their strength. A race of plants that had wasted its time waiting for Congress to give it light and air, or for a state bureau with hired agents to organize it by the Golden Rule, or had been persuaded that its interests were in common with those of the consumer, would have disappeared from the earth.

"The farmer is like a plant. He cannot run. He is rooted. He shall live or die on the spot. But there is no plant like a farmer. There are nobles, ruffians, drudges, drones, harlots, speculators, bankers, thieves and scalawags, all these among plants, but no idiots, saying 'How much will you give?' and 'What will you take?' Until you fight as the elm fights, take as the elm takes, think as the elm thinks, you will never be powerful and cannot be wise."

Absalom Weaver - as written in Garet Garrett's Satan's Bushel.

Please vote for the Garet Garrett blog at the Weblog Awards.

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett

He [the intellectual] was neither creative nor inventive; therefore there was no profit for him in the capitalist scheme, and his revenge was to embrace Old World socialism.

Garet Garrett

[Click here to vote for the Garet Garrett blog in Weblog Awards.]

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett

About 1900 began the flowering of that alien graft upon our tree of sapience called the intellectual. He was the precious product of our free, academic world - a social theorist who knew more than anybody else about everything and all about nothing, except how to subvert the traditions and invert the laws.

Garet Garrett

[Click here to vote for the Garet Garrett blog in Weblog Awards.]

Quote of the day - Garet Garrett

Why do we suffer the censorious opinions of the world to be as sackcloth on our skin and ashes on our forehead? Why must we accept the expectations of other people as the measure of our obligation to them?

Garet Garrett, p. 85, "People's Pottage"

[Click here to vote for the Garet Garrett blog in Weblog Awards.]

Classics of Conservatism - part XIII - Garet Garrett - Salvos Against the New Deal

Click here for previous editions of Classics of Conservatism.

This month's Classic book recommendation has been featured on the sidebar since the early days of this blog. "Salvos Against the New Deal" is one of several books featuring compilations of the writings of Garet Garrett. [I first recomended one of Garrett's books in December of 2004.]

[Click here for my Garet Garrett blog.]









"Salvos Against the New Deal" features a compilation of Garrett's articles from the Saturday Evening Post from 1932 through 1940. This compilation was edited in 2002 by Bruce Ramsey, today's leading expert on Garet Garrett. As I wrote at the Garet Garrett blog:

Garrett was an early to mid 20th century conservative writer whose books and articles challenged the New Deal policies of Franklin Roosevelt. He also did much more than that. As a novelist, essayist and editor for the Saturday Evening Post, Garrett provided a remarkable advocacy of capitalism and freedom.

"Salvos" is important for many reasons, not the least of which is that the rediscovery of Garrett's works signals possibly the end of a long retreat, during which conservatives have refused to challenge the basic assumptions underlying the New Deal. Conservatives have tried to challenge leftist policies on the basis that they were not "practical" or that today's policies go beyond the original intentions of the New Deal creators (e.g. the Social Security debate).

But Garrett challenges the original New Deal policies themselves. He gives conservatives reasons to be proud of their conservatism, especially when it comes to domestic policy.



"Salvos" provides a clear picture of how our government came to be ruled by bureaucrats and how Congress surrendered its constitutional authority to these unelected rulers.

Almost as importantly, Garrett provides descriptions of some of the labor battles of the 1930's. We can see the roots of how unionization eventually brought down the American automobile industry and the steel industry. The fruits of these battles loom large over our lives today.

Garrett prophetically discusses the New Deal's exercise of pharoah-like powers in building the pyramids of our time.

Most importantly, Garrett describes what the government did to our money. No domestic policy can be rationally discussed without understanding what money is and how government manipulates and destroys its value. [And the best part is, the discussion is written in layman's terms and is quite gripping.]

Once I discovered Garrett's writings, I discovered that any attempt to discuss modern economics, government, spending, taxing, regulating, business, etc. is useless without the background that Garrett gives us.

Garet Garrett, Satan's Bushel

I finally did it. After several months, I have finally updated my other blog, Garet Garrett.