Thanks to Amanda, I recently found James Lileks’ new hobby, Patriotica, a loving collection of genial homefront propaganda from World War II. Lileks’ tone is jokey and sometimes downright satiric. But he makes it clear enough that that’s just his usual campy, self-deprecating schtick, applied at the level of his nation-state; part of the point here is that he’s collecting WWII propaganda because, deep down, he believes in it, and he thinks we have something to learn from it. And it’s clear enough that his audience on the Right is getting the message. (As he comments in the Daily Bleat: New update to Patriotica here, a sad reminder of the days when nearly everyone agreed there was actually a war on, and it had to be won. As a fan at the Independent Women’s Forum puts it, Those were the days when our media supported our troops! Pro-Victory writer Dadmanly wistfully remarks: For all those who think that the current administration is over-hyping the Global War on Terror, a little reminder of how they REALLY knew how to whip up the masses in WW II.)

Let’s everyone get in on the campy collecting fun! Here’s some submissions I’d like to see Lileks put in Patriotica. I’m sure you can soon find these collectibles from the Last Good War on loving display in Lileks’ collection.

We begin with Private Joe Louis clearing it all up for us. We’re going to win because we are acting as the Sword of God:

Next, there’s nothing quite so genially amusing — especially for conservatives — as absolute government command over the economy. Obey the price controls, and make sure you get your meat ration, citizen! (We’ll be taking the rest of it.)

On a similar theme, we have the following adorable bit of naked attempts at intimidation, in order to whip the masses into line:

Here’s some more choice bits for Lileks, also on the topic of intimidation. Specifically, a genial reminder from the government to shut the fuck up, citizen.

That last image is actually pretty famous. This one isn’t quite so famous, in spite of being a classic combination of two great themes of American World War II propaganda: overbearing commands for silence, and violent racist caricature.

Speaking of which, here’s several more I just can’t wait to see in Lileks’ gallery. Submitted for his approval, without further comment.

… Yeah.

I really fucking hate World War II propaganda.

I have some material coming down the pipe that I’ve been chewing on for a while — a little bit on philosophy, some stuff on copyrights and contracts, and some stuff on the nature of law. Plus some announcements about various things of varying interest. But my aching feet are going to keep me from getting to it today. So, in the meantime, here’s some things that I’ve had going on elsewhere:

Bloviating elsewhere

• Tonight at No Treason, I dispute Stefan’s claim that tyrants and murderers often have satisfying lives (in any sense of the word satisfying that matters), and argue (with Plato) that being a tyrant is actually the most miserable kind of life. (The point is related, somewhat, to some similar remarks I made against some utilitarian arguments over at Philosophy, et cetera.)

• Over at Kevin Carson’s Mutualist Blog, Kevin discusses land theft against farmers in modern history, and I follow up in comments by debating with P. M. Lawrence over land ownership, homesteading, and slavery. I defend the radical notion that the Southern plantations should have been expropriated from the slave-drivers’ illegitimate control, and distributed amongst the former slaves, after Emancipation. (It should have been distributed not as reparations for slavery — although the former slaves also deserved those — but rather because freed Blacks were the rightful owners of the land that they had lived and worked on all their lives.) Lawrence objects on several fronts; I defend.

• At Project for the New Anarchist Century, I object to Jeremy Sapienza making shit up about the civil rights movement and Rosa Parks in particular. We go on to debate the historical significance of the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

• At Alas, A Blog, I object to several commentators saying, over and over again, that society causes any number of conditions that make rape and other forms of violence against women, as if society were some looming presence outside of us. In fact it just is us. And refusing to recognize this snuffs out any questions we might have about just who, among the men and women that make up society, does most of the things that constitute a rape culture. (Here’s a hint: it is not, for the most part, women.)

Howard Dully and My Lobotomy on NPR

Meanwhile, NPR recently broadcast a riveting and heartbreaking audio documentary, My Lobotomy by Howard Dully. At age 12, diagnosed with nothing worse than being a difficult child, Dully was one of the youngest victims of Walter Freeman’s ice-pick lobotomy. It turns out that the complaints were nothing but a pack of lies, but even if they weren’t, the senseless mutilation of his brain would have still have been an atrocity. In any case, Dully somehow survived with his faculties mostly intact, and is able — unlike so many of Freeman’s other victims — to search for answers about his suffering and to tell his own story. Dully also talked about his experiences some more on Thursday’s Talk of the Nation. It’s not stuff you can enjoy listening too, really, but it is stuff that you should listen to. And listening to it is not a burden; while not pleasant, the tale is compelling, chilling, and, sadly, real.

Further reading

• GT 2002-08-20: Brain Mutilation for Fun and Profit: the Story of Walter Freeman
• Psychosurgery.org: Remembering the Tragedy of Lobotomy

It seems like everybody is coming up with an exit strategy from Iraq now. Rox (2005-11-17) tells me that John Murtha is now a man with a plan. Even Tony Blair is trying to work something out. According to the fashion of the times, I’ve got an exit strategy for the U.S. and U.K. forces to consider too. The best part about it is that it doesn’t set an arbitrary time-table and it only imposes three simple conditions to fulfill in order to get us out of Iraq with honor. Here’s the plan:

Map of metropolitan Baghdad thanks to GlobalSecurity.org.

My plan calls for:

1. Getting to here as quickly as you can while flying or driving safely.
2. Then, driving down this highway.
3. Then, flying home, preferably on a large jet, from here.

You might complain that this exit strategy sets a time-table. Well, not really, unless immediately counts as a schedule. But in any case it’s not an arbitrary time-table. The war was never justified to begin with and the occupation continues to make things worse the longer it continues. You might complain that this exit strategy doesn’t solve all of Iraq’s problems, doesn’t give us the opportunity to Iraqitize (sic) or internationalize or train more police officers or root out more insurgents or guide Iraq further down the primrose path to liberal democracy. I agree that it doesn’t, but I consider its simplicity a virtue, not a defect. What have we been trying to do for the past 2 1/2 years, if not all that? How’s that been working out for us?

US forces yesterday made their clearest admission yet that white phosphorus was used as a weapon against insurgents in Iraq. A Pentagon spokesman told the BBC last night that it had been used as an incendiary weapon during the assault last year on Falluja in 2004.

— The Guardian 2005-11-16: US admits using white phosphorous in Falluja

But it’s not, technically speaking, a chemical weapon. And it doesn’t violate any international treaties. That the U.S. has ratified, anyway.

WASHINGTON, Nov 16 (Reuters) — The Pentagon on Wednesday acknowledged using incendiary white-phosphorus munitions in a 2004 offensive against insurgents in the Iraqi city of Falluja and defended their use as legal, amid concerns by arms control advocates.

…

It’s part of our conventional-weapons inventory and we use it like we use any other conventional weapon, added Bryan Whitman, another Pentagon spokesman.

— Reuters 2005-11-16: US defends use of white phosphorus weapons in Iraq

Emphasis is mine.

Here are some legal uses of conventional weapons.

Napalm. Tokyo, 10 March 1945.

Napalm and white phosphorus. Trang Bang, Vietnam, 8 June 1972.

White phosphorus. Fallujah, November 2004.

White phosphorus firebombing of Fallujah

This is conventional aerial warfare using conventional weapons adhering to the letter of all the treaties that the goverment of the United States is a party to. This is imperial power in its fullest glory, restrained by all the civilized restraints that it deems necessary and proper for itself. This is its morality. This is its justice. This is its law.

1. My post from a couple weeks ago, Goodbye To All That. Again. is featured in the most recent Carnival of Feminists (#3), which is full of pieces much better than mine. I was particularly pleased to see that Melinda (of Sour Duck) had chosen 1970s feminist thought, and its applicability today, as a theme. (See, for example, Elayne Riggs’ memories of c.r., Clancy’s comparison of deoderant ads from 1973 and today, and midlife mama’s remarks on teaching The Second Sex and the memory-hole fate of recent feminist history.) Anyway, as they say, read the whole thing.

2. Apparently the Rad Geek People’s Daily is one of the candidates this year for Liberty and Power’s award for Best Libertarian/Classical Liberal Individual Academic Blog. I think that Roderick or Alina or Chris should probably win. But I can promise that if I win I will not put any badges on my sidebar to mark the occasion. And if I lose, I can promise to petulantly blame it all on the lack of Condorcet voting. In any case, as they say, it’s an honor just to be nominated.

3. In case you are an avid reader of the Southwest Philosophy Review, keep your eyes out for the upcoming winter issue, which will feature a version of my essay on paradoxes of self-reference, Sentences That Can’t Be Said: or, How to Semanticize with a Hammer. If you’re interested in finding out how I dispatch the Liar Paradox, save Marco Polo’s Travels, from philosophical mauling, and develop an irrefutable new proof for the existence of God in the process, drop me a line and I’ll send you a xerox when it arrives.