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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (13706)	5/18/2001 9:20:28 AM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

You are quite right, one might use such activities to suck up.(Christopher was, though, reacting to the suggestion of complete, unmitigated hypocrisy, not mixed motive). On the other hand, there are a lot of things one might use in such a way. Suppose I were AG. Someone who wanted to impress me might find out that I like modern art, and put prints by Matisse and Picasso in his office, read around the subject to have something to say, and let drop that he had seen this or that exhibition. Or he might look at my bookshelf in the office, and discern a bias towards classics. He might, then, imbed strategic quotes into conversation, like "he jests and scars who never felt a wound", or "things fall apart, the center cannot hold". Many things could provide the basis for "suck". Of course, anyone smart enough to become AG would know that, and be on guard against it. The question is, is this uniquely dangerous, or just another thing that could become a factor in office politics?

To: Lane3 who wrote (13706)	5/18/2001 11:52:57 AM
From: The Philosopher	Respond to of 82486

I don't know about "thousands of employees at justice." From the reports I hear, there tend to be between 5 and 30 people at these sessions, many of them the same people. So obviously not very many of the "thousands" of people at justice see this as golden opportunity for face time. As to the jewish attender(s), of whom there is at least one, he apparently goes because Ashcroft has some real ability to discuss intelligently those portions of the Bible which both Christians and Jews share. So it's clear that non-Christians are quite welcome there and don't feel out of place. When hundreds of the thousands of employees at justice start showing up, then maybe it will look as though this is becoming a "face time" opportunity. But where it's a fairly small and regular circle of people most of whom he probably sees a lot of anyhow, I wonder whether you aren't, as Steven seems to be, imputing bad motives where there is as yet evidence of none. Coincidentally, I've mentioned before that I have been listening to a college lecture series on American history. Have just gotten to the post-Revolutionary War period where we were forming this experimental new government, a republic. Some very interesting insights. One is that republicanism and Christianity were seen as closely intertwined, that Christianity informed the public virtue which was an essential element of (small r) republicanism. Not just religiosity, but Christianity. A second point, relevant to recent attempted discussions here is that the core belief of republicanism was in "republican virtue," the belief that the people would voluntarily put aside individual benefit for the good of the state, and that you could build a new country and new form of government in reliance on this. Classical liberalism, on the other hand, believed that people would and should act out of self interest, and that this was the best way to insure freedom. Adam Smith was one of this school of classical liberals with his belief that enlightened self interest was the driver of economic good. The prof for this set of lectures (there are three profs for the entire course) is Louis Masur, of City College of NY(an apparently Jewish prof if that matters.) I highly recommend the series, "The History of the United States." It's by the Teaching Company, and if I'm allowed to give a plug for them here, their web site is www.teachco.com.