From 2004 to 2021, CANNONFIRE kept finding ways to irk nearly everyone on nearly every side of nearly every issue. Last year, Google shut down the site.
Why? Dunno.
The banishment occurred without warning. Despite numerous inquiries, Google refused to explain or to rescind its edict.
The shutdown may have some connection to the compromising of my email. (Damn hackers!) Or maybe it has some connection to my history as a surly, unclassifiable oddball.
But now the site is back. Don't ask me why or how. Resurrection is a mysterious business and this one is particularly confounding. Revival came only when a reader calling herself Faust -- I'm not making this up -- employed incantations and conjurations unknown to mere mortals. Somehow, she compelled the gods of Google to raise the dead. I owe this female Faust a massive debt. As a notable 18th century highway commissioner once said: Das ewig weibliche zieht uns hinan.
The site may migrate to another platform in the future. Google's capriciousness has injured my trust.
For the sake of newcomers, a few words of introduction are in order.
My name is Joseph Cannon. That's the name I've used professionally throughout this century; feel free to call me Joseph or Joe. I've decided to use my former name -- my 20th century name, if you will -- when writing about true crime and other non-political topics. Why? Reasons. If Google can be mysterious and capricious, so can I.
Righties will always hate me because I'm a die-hard Keynesian, a
confirmed anti-Randroid, a big fan of FDR and JFK, a defender of Social Security and an advocate of universal health insurance. In short, I love alla that there
Big Gummint stuff. Always have. Always will.
Above and beyond all partisan policy considerations, I think that the fight against fascism is the battle of our time. Frankly, at this stage of life I'd rather write about other topics -- heavy stuff, fun stuff, any stuff other than political stuff. But as long as the acolytes of Adolf threaten democracy and Enlightenment values, we are compelled to do battle. Even if all you have is a slingshot, load your weapon and join the fight.
Lefties of a certain stripe -- far lefties, young lefties -- will always hate me because I seek to cancel "cancel culture." I despise postmodernism and all of its misshapen offspring. I think that Critical Race Theory is itself racist to the core. I think that Identity politics is -- and I speak literally -- a synonym for fascism.
(Did you know that the term "Identity" originated on the racist right? Topic for a future post...)
I lived in West Hollywood for a while and always got along fine with gays and trans folks, but the current po-mo pissants who pretend to speak for those communities have left me well and truly repulsed. My pronouns are "go," "fuck," and "yourself." I stopped calling myself a feminist when the Me Tooers took Al Franken's scalp. I now call myself an equalist.
Wokeness has pissed off a whole lotta good people: Bill Maher, Helen Pluckrose, John McWhorter, Stephen Fry, J.K. Rowling, a massive number of Latinos, a growing number of blacks, and almost the entire American working class -- the class that used to be the backbone of the Democratic party. Modern feminism has alienated Margaret freakin' Atwood, fer chrissakes. Woke comic books have destroyed an American art form at a time when it should be more popular than ever.
It's time to admit that the the critics of Woke-ism are not imagining things or over-reacting or falling for a right-wing propaganda ploy. Wokeness is a cultural disaster. It has done nothing to aid those it claims to champion. It serves only to aid the fascist assault on the Enlightenment. Woke idiots make liberals seem unelectable and toxic.
This piece by Sarah Hepola does much to explain why the Dems will be slaughtered in November, and why the fascists will rebound in 2024.
Every day, I scrolled the endless river of outrage and all-caps, watching people express similar views to mine only to be pounced upon. Once-celebrated writers were being publicly rebranded as ghoulish, pieces of trash, red-pilled. The unwritten rule of elite media tribes seemed to be this: You spout the company line, or you shut up. And that’s why, midway through a career built on speaking out, I shut up.
One last thing. For some reason, many folks are talking about Karl Marx these days, although nobody quotes his writings. Guess I had better make my own position clear.
While I
do not advocate Marxism -- the labor theory of value never persuaded me -- I do have fond memories of the days when folks
calling themselves "Marxists" would occasionally show evidence that
they had read Capital. Everyone seems to have forgotten that Uncle Karl was an economist.
He didn't write about race or gender or any of that Identity shit. Whether you love or loathe the man, a "Marxism" without Marx is surrealism, not socialism.
Here's a cute mnemonic device to help you discern real Marxism from the
fake stuff: Marx means money. If it ain't about
money, it ain't Marxism.
Yes, it really is that simple.
Unfortunately, both the po-mo pseudolefties and the disingenuous libertarians (I'm looking at you, James Lindsay and Jordan Peterson) are united in a conspiracy to mislead and deceive. These right/left conspirators want you to believe that Uncle Karl wrote "Whites should wallow in self-loathing," not "Workers of the world, unite." Both the left-wing misleaders and the right-wing deceivers are funded, or at least applauded, by high-tech corporatists, by Dark Enlightenment neo-monarchists, by Putin's hacks, by Bannon-esque "Traditionalists," by all the oligarchs who dislike democracy and profit from ever-worsening income inequality.
These manipulators want a working class oblivious to class. A working class at war with itself. Divide and rule.
Yes, it really is that simple.
13 comments:
Welcome Back Joseph!
What a wonderful surprise.
Maybe there is some hope for the world after all.
D-Jay, I can't tell you how much I owe you. You kept this site alive.
I confess that the Trump years made me want to retch every time I thought about politics. I wanted an escape. We all did. After Biden won, I decided it was time to read about philosophy, art, religion, science, Bigfoot -- ANYTHING but current politics.
Alas, the world made other plans.
(Although I've traveled in low company and have read many silly volumes, I've yet to read an entire book about Bigfoot. Ya think there might actually be something worthwhile there? Probably not...)
Welcome Back!
I have missed your writing and thought-provoking posts. Your words regarding Karl Marx are exactly right. Though some of his analysis was wrong, he was a competent economist who knew the importance of keeping the focus on the money.
I’m looking forward to reading you again. D-Jay, too.
Tom
Guys, Joe is crankier than ever, and we should listen. He has been my rock and sanity in the previous uncertain days, He is serious when he said he avoid most things political. We used to revel in clips from Seth Meyers, John Oliver, and Stephen Colbert. But we spent nearly a year without them.
The Crank-o-sauraus is back, and I hope he is allowed to vent on his blog and spare me a little, for I had to hear it all when his blog was persona non grata.
P.S. Just call me Schrodinger's Student (instead of the Student on the Sofa) - I am waiting to hear if I have been accepted to grad school.
Joe - Not that I always agreed with you, but glad to have you back. Preach!
so very very good to have you back; so very very good to have the pleasure of the perusal of your opinions. you were missed.
this fine blog has been able, lo these many years, to play well with others & abide by the increasingly adhesive terms of its social contract. it should never have been silenced. this is no small matter, & is very concerning.
that being said, your description of the means by which it came to be un-effed is flattering, to put it mildly.
you are most welcome.
just the very sort of perhaps odd, sometime archaic, flagrantly intellectual style of which i, coincidentally, happen to be quite fond: flaunting the sweetness of a rare wit openly, but salted, just slightly less often than frequently, with the well chosen anti-intellectual idiom, so as to be sure not to lose your fit-though-few audience even as you manage to pass for American.
as for the content of those incantations, to quote a certain fictional member of the intelligence community -- ex-member, to hear him tell it -- "That would be telling."
be all of that as it may, i must correct two small details:
one: you owe me nothing, for whatever effectiveness i may or may not have had bringing about such a well deserved miracle. i am grateful to have been able to repay you, for all you have given, continue to give, me, us.
two: i too am mortal; i am all too mortal. allzumenschliches, like you; which was i think why i had to question, & protest, the absence of a voice such as yours.
i will say, at the risk of pontificating (little late for this perhaps):
so should we all.
What is destructible
Is but a parable;
Here is perceived
The unattainable;
That without words
Here becomes action:
The Eternal Feminine
Lures to Perfection.
original translation from Goethe by a female Faust,
performed by IAO Core & A.T.O.I.
recorded live at the Cow Palace 12/31/1995
remixed by Seofon
The Eternal Feminine, or, A Feast Of Fire
(file under shameless self promotion, or, how could i resist)
A good translation! I've toyed with a singable translation of that passage for decades, but I have never made much progress.
Wish I could have been there for the performance. Very eerie and otherworldly.
I would have hesitated to set THOSE words to music, if only because one places oneself in competition with the finale of Mahler's Eighth, my all-time favorite thing in the world. As you surely know, most of the symphony is a setting of the final scene. Good ol' Gus practically worshiped the former highway commissioner.
Perhaps you're the person to ask a question that has nagged at me for a while now. How did that symphony -- how did the final scene of Goethe's work -- become so bloody CATHOLIC?
Mahler was Jewish. Goethe was born into a Lutheran family and spent his life as a spiritual seeker, a Freemason and an esotericist. He was literally a friend to the Illuminati, someone who viewed traditional Christianity (especially Catholicism) with mistrust bordering on disdain.
Yet the text and the symphony are a mystic ceremony exalting the Virgin Mary. It's the most Mary-centric work ever created.
Goethe goes way over-the-top: "Jungfrau, Mutter, Königin, Göttin, bleibe gnädig!" You almost never see an accurate translation of those words. Even those mondo-bizarro RCs who can't stop yapping about Fatima and Medjugorge would find this passage a bit cringe-y.
So how did this happen? How did a Jew and a ex-Lutheran Illuminatus join forces to create the ultimate expression of Mariolatry?
I've long since given up on recommending classical music to others -- many doors have slammed in my face -- but just in case, I highly recommend this performance led by Cristoph Eschenbach:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYVMzfWnXMk&t=4730s
The Virgin Mary herself shows up at around 1 hours and 12 minutes into the video. She takes the form of soprano Marisol Montalvo, and she is indeed sublime. Can't watch it without tears running down my cheeks. Start there, let it run through to the end. You know the words.
And now I'd like to see how the Ambient Temple of Imagination would interpret the "Mater Gloriosa" passage. I bet it'd be weird and amazing.
OH...
and THANK YOU.
I owe you.
I mean, no matter what you say. I owe you.
Bout damn time :)
Welcome back, Joseph. I was concerned as to what happened to you.
Wow, I had thought you were not coming back! Very late comment but now I have to go through all the posts I've missed because I had stopped checking to see if you were back. I kept wondering what your thoughts would be about things the past year or so, and now I can at least see what some of them were. Glad you are back and I will be checking regularly once again.
Gus
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