Relationship 101

Common Decency Is No Longer Common

-Don't bear dead weight. That is the job of casket bearers. If its dead, Let it be. Every demon inhabits their own hell.
-If someone treats you as a mistake, let reality do the heavy lifting when you know you are in the right. Only a sociopath feels no remorse or regret.
-Hate is the easy road, and carrying grudges indicative of a weaker nature unfit for survival.
-Passive abuse is still abuse. People who excuse their own actions via situations really believe in a sort of ethics that is not worthy of the term. Anyone playing the victim card is a few aces short of a full deck. Pity is a dangerous emotion in either direction
-Sometimes forgiving is the only route for a mature person. If you can't do this, good luck in life because life itself can be far harsher than anything one person can do to you
-Heuristics are useful. If someone does not fit what you know to be a rationally and healthy reaction, hit the road and refer them to a professional.
-Sharing your body with someone and then never speaking to them is generally a sick setup. Death is final. Cutting people off right and left is a great way to lock yourself in the very negative states of mind that produce personal and interpersonal problems. Self-fulfilling prophecy is a sad truth. If you talk to no one you have dated, this usually means there are two sides to the coin and perhaps you are part of the problem.
-If you throw someone away, do not be surprised when they move on. Only children at the pre-operational stage are incapable of realizing actions do not have consequences. If someone gives you their best and you give them your worst, don be surprised when they figure out they might deserve something better.
-Take care when you have someone's heart. If you lack the ability to pick up on emotional ques from someone you are sleeping with, take steps to increase emotional intellect.
-Don't mess with someone's ego or money. People are not means to an end, and if you treat someone like something that has expended its value, you will likely get a bad reaction.
- A fight is a nice dance in which two angry people prove just how bad that state of mind is
-Get an animal before you expect unconditional love
-Apologies, when issued, should be given a chance. There is no interaction between two people that will not include hurdles.
-If someone is hurt when a break up happens, it means they cared. For all you know, you were a peak experience. Be careful who you seek advice from in these situations because it could be that those you rely upon were never able to form the attachment you are severing. Do not treat an uncommonly good partner like something common.
-Time will put everything in perspective. It may take a lot of time, but if you are a functioning person with a conscience you will not forget the wrongs you have done another person. Honor promotes good sleep. Only death is final and if you seek this kind of end with someone who loves you, you will likely end up dying alone or relying on your own children to care for you when they themselves should be living which you never learned to do.
-Pulling away from another person in stress means that you are only capable of being a good person during fair weather times. People are supposed to grow together, and anyone using variations of the 'its not you, its me' approach are still stuck in the teenage years mentally. Don't be surprised when you end up with more of the same when you demolish that which was different.
-If you have been single for a long time, take care to re-develop those skills with the person you are with. Real love is a learned thing especially in regards to romance, and what one sees as a child from one's parents will set the course for what one thinks is healthy.
-feelings change. All things have impermanence. But don't expect anything genuine to go away on a whim. Common dating advice is only fit for common people.
-If genuine emotion scares someone away, or you think it might, that should scare you away from them. Fantasy and reality are very different in this regard. If you seek an endless platonic ideal in a partner you will miss out on many genuine people along the way.
-Love is different in each interaction. Do not waste time on romantic notions of the past.
-Break ups are isolating times, but only a malicious person does so in a manner which is disrespectful and takes none of the other person's needs into account. 

Historical Amnesia

How did we get here? Bad philosophy. Someone said that a long time ago (Rand). Her solution was a belief in a mythic capitalism. But why can’t America find the way out of this edge we have crossed over?

On Being Civilized

Generally speaking the first cultures who settled along river valleys did so after many generations of subsisting in a horticulture environment. Settled life gradually adopted intensive agriculture and developed a government, some say in order to enable people to do this. There is a loss of health which is apparent in a comparison between hunter-gathers and their counterparts living in cities. Historically speaking, there was always a large mass of non-settled peoples who chose not to live in this sort of arrangement: Germanic tribes to the north of Rome, Laplanders in Scandinavia, or peoples from the Central Asian Steppe. Recently, this has changed with the last hunter-gather non-settled peoples being pushed to the absolute margins.

Benefits to living in society depend on the specific nature of the society in question. But generally, they are easy access to food which you do not have to kill or grow yourself. On the other side of this coin there is a loss of agricultural and hunting knowledge which makes on dependent on the supply chain, and in the case of the modern West, Just in Time delivery. This could cause problems in a crisis, for example most Americans do not even have the relatively simple skills involved in growing a vegetable garden which got their grandfathers or great grandparents through the depression or that allowed people to supplement their diet during rationing imposed in the Second World War.

If the medieval age of faith was overthrown, it has been replaced in turn by a level of trust unknown in non-first world countries. The belief in the goodness of man has enabled some to gain absolute power over the use of force, and has led the rest to simply trust that this will be done in a just and even handed way. Justice here is meant as a sort of impartiality and respect for the rule of law which should be the guiding principle of any social contract.

The question of the sacrifice of freedoms is an old question. Thomas Hobbes viewed stateless society as that of a war of all against all. That is, every person was thought to be so self interested that he would simply do what he wanted unless held down by an authority so vast and terrorizing that he could do nothing but submit to it. Hunter-gatherers appear to have a vast amount of free time; the sort of back breaking labor that the peasant is subjected to in the first societies was unknown, as well as class distinctions. The Peasants after all only existed because there was enough food to allow them to be born and fed; the life of hunting and gathering is one that exists on the margin of starvation. Civilization gives humans the power over environment, and in a time-obsessed modern society in a post Ford/Taylor world it gives the illusion of power of the fifth dimension. Or at least, gives us the pressing sense that the time between waking and sleeping must be accounted for by socially acceptable behaviors such as work, school, approved hobbies or avocations.

Hegel

It seems the formula of any conspiracy documentary is Carmina Burana playing in the background, with a bunch of out of context quotations, and usually a reference to the Hegelian Dialectic. Well, here is a summary of what Hegel presents in his Philosophy of Right

Hegel
    Hegel wrote during a period of romantic thinking following the Napoleonic wars. His chief view is that of upholding the status quo. Like all thinkers, we went through a period of development. His writings form a trinity, with the philosophy of right being the political part with a corresponding logic and ethics. He ends up defending the system of his day while upholding a pseudo-metaphysical view that mankind must develop into a spiritual being through education, take his place in society, become a political being by living in a state, and then act out the force of god in history which he sees as the thesis/anti-thesis duality for which he is best known, and most misunderstood.
    The Philosophy of Right (as it is usually called) begins with a discussion of the concept of the will exercising itself though social relation. A person is only truly free in society which is opposed to the ideal of freedom which in its platonic idea is seen as a state of nature. Hegel then discusses the ethical life. Ethical life encompasses all and he discusses all of this in relation to the state. One is at a disadvantage when reading Hegel and not having command of German. He is not a first rather author, like a Nietzsche or Schopenhauer and seems to cloak in language in academic verbosity, while not crossing the line of an Immanuel Kant and inventing words out of thin air. It is useful to define some terms while discussing his work. There is the concept of Einzelheit, the immediate individuality which confronts that which is before it in nature. Dasein is the phrase for existence, later used by Heidegger to define 'being'. Aktionen means the right of action, which is part of what Hegel means by rights. His discussion of freedom follows. Hegel is an Idealist philosopher in the most literal sense. He goes so far as to resurrect the Ideas of Plato. He says freedom is usually wanted in the abstract. That is, people want the Idea of Freedom rather than its actuality. He thinks that institutions are made up of individuals and hated by those who desire for freedom because they do not want actual freedom and see these agencies with their distinctive characteristics as made  up of individuals. He thinks that the state is the end of all humans, and serves the force of god in history. His discussion of contracts is the discussion of wills in relation to ownership. People are assumed to be persons even if they do not act like them. Law presupposes that all those governed by the laws to be persons. Hegel defines this as such. Hegel uses the term geist to denote mind, but it can also mean spirit. Personality contains in general the capacity for right. Sachen is the right of persons and things. Sitte means custom. He sees custom as a natural part of society. 'Custom is what law and morality have not reached, namely, spirit'.
Personality is that which acts to overcome. Right is primarily that immediate existence which freedom gives itself in an immediate way. There is a difference between his concept of will and the general will of Rousseau. In relation to property ones will becomes external to another will. Each will is distinctive.
Social institutions have their own character but are made up of individual wills. Rationality consists in general in the unity and interpenetration of universality and individuality. Hegel opposes general will. This means he has issues with the common social contract paradigm. Property is part of a persons self-concept. Property is the “embodiment of personality,” says Hegel. Contract and exchange define individuals. Institutions arise from competing wills, do not have a will of their own, but manage to find their personalities as institutions. Habit, is learned, but appears 2nd nature. Education is the art of making human beings ethical according to Hegel. This is where his view of Right comes into confluences with his views of Spirit. Ethical sphere- includes everything. The person is to be transformed from a natural one into a second spiritual nature and this becomes habitual. This is his goal of education. His idea of the dialectic is that of opposing forces acting on each other to produce synthesis. This is misunderstood in common times to be a sort of strategy by political elites. But in reality Hegel views this as happening on all levels- from the person all the way up to the society.
    In his Master versus slave dialectic, Hegel basically says  a person should have a consciousness based on life for itself rather than being confined in its own mind. This is the meaning of the master and slave dialectic. This makes sense. But Hegel creates a few problems in his philosophical career. The first would be his legacy. The Right  and Left Hegelians confused the Hegelian legacy in the extreme by literally being on opposing sides during the revolutions of 1848. His attribution to the Marxist camp is highly doubtful and even more so with the Fabian socialism that characterized the intellectual class in England for the reminder of its history until the present day. Hegel's influences and influence on Prussia is complicated. He appears to have simply formulated a theory and seen to it that it fit the powers that be. Prussia was highly centralized, full of censorship and practiced conscription on a mass scale even before it became common in the Napoleonic Wars. Hegel speaks of international law in the closing and seems to predict some of the 20th century developments in that area. The main area where Hegal errors is that he preached a metaphysics which elevated collectivism to the extreme. The state is the actuality of freedom. It is upheld by the state being the destiny of individuals. He does not put violence into the equation and believes people should be. 'Union is the destiny of individuals'. Hegel makes many dangerous collectivist assumptions. He thinks that humanity should be taught to reach its highest potential, which for him is to be a citizen of a state. Why is it human destiny to live in a state? It is clear that 90% of human history was lived without a state, so it is unclear why this would be the case. Fundamental Hegelian error is in assuming that the state is the actuality of the Idea of Ethics. He seems to criticize idealism in regards to freedom, but does not turn this criticism against his own idealism. The problem with Hegel is that he is an idealistic philosopher. God is the logic of History. Why is history intertwined with the notion of god? Again, God is not really defined but is simply used as a sort of stock phrase. He is attempting to say that history has a grand rationality. He is defending the idea of progress. In the end, Hegel is saddled with bad translators on top of unclear and bad prose. It is doubtful the English-speaking world ever would have been able to appreciate even the literary greatness of a Nietzsche without Walter Kaufmann's translations.

The Bush Years: Why You Can't Just Blame The Black Guy

THE BURNING BUSH: GB 2

“Some of the biggest men in the US and in commerce and manufacturing know that there is a power so organized, so subtle, so complete, so pervasive that they had better not speak above their breath when condemning it.”

-Woodrow Wilson

George W Bush:

This guy did more coke than Lenny Bruce and got away with it. This guy served in the National Guard, probably went AWOL, all while men of courage fought a fruitless war in Vietnam. This guy got a DWI, and walked away without real penalty.

What follows is a brief family tree, because it is important to know where we come from, whether we be Presidents appointed by the Supreme Court or an actual man on the street-

His family is establishment east coast. He is not a Texan in any sense. Bush's grandfather made his money trading with the Nazis among other things while working for Brown Brothers Harriman. Bush One made his money in oil, and has been implicated in Reagan's October surprise involving trading arms with Iran for holding the hostages until after the election. Bush Uno served as an ambassador to the Communist Chinese after America opened China, and the results of some of his work can be seen in your latest economic predictions projecting China's rise to economic hegemon over the United States in short order, and your latest job loss numbers in manufacturing and textiles, as well as whatever Chinese made electronic device you last used which broke as soon as you opened the package. Quality control in these factories must simply consist of checking for worker's body parts on or in the finished product. Daddy Bush also ran the CIA for about a year, helping it appear to keep its proverbial nose clean after the Church Committee Hearings. It would speculation to blame him for the involvement with Islamic Extremists in Afghanistan, though it is clear the U.S. Was supporting various factions there prior to the Soviet invasion with the goal of destabilizing the Communist Kabul government in typical cold war fashion. Some have also said that Bush 1 worked for the CIA long before running it, but like all things properly secret, this cannot be proven. GWB's father presided over the original Iraq war after building up Saddam through the 80s. This war was properly commanded, but it remains to be answered why the American diplomatic corps told Saddam that we would not interfere if he invaded Kuwait, or why a member of the Kuwaiti Royal Family was paraded into Congress to spread false stories involving babies being thrown out of incubators that the small Arab state did not have. This is the family tree of the 43^rd President, and represents his pedigree. George Walker Bush was uneventful and rather normal, except that he chose Yale as his party school instead of lets say LBJ going to Southwest Texas. His fraternal choice, one picked by many in his income bracket, was a society deep in black magic, satanic iconography, and homoerotic hazing practices known as the Skull and Bones. The 'Skulls' by Anthony Sutton is a good account of its origins. If a British Scholar is too conspiratorial for you, you can try the Secrets of the Tomb. Needless to say, allegations of the future anointed president involves cocaine, and large amounts of alcohol by his own admission. His later career included running businesses into the ground by running them as well as any future federal official would and spending business funds like a sober congressman. The election in 2000 was hotly contested, with the ultimate decision going to the Supreme Court, where he was given the Presidency. It was an uneventful start of his term, as uneventful a Presidency as was his Governorship of Texas- that is until 9/11. On this day, three thousand individuals were murdered by a shadowy network of Islamic radicals who spent their time going to strip clubs, drinking and buying round trip tickets for a kamikaze mission.

Dusting off existing pentagon plans for overthrowing the Taliban, the United States military made short work of that government. The culmination of the campaign was the assault on Tora Bora. Using poorly trained militia as proxies, the escape routes were not cut off, and it was said that bin Laden slipped into Pakistan. Then something curious happened in regards to the Taliban, the so-called Airlift of Evil. In short this was a Pakistani airlift of these Taliban fighters out of Afghanistan, also known as the Kunduz airlift, saw many escape the American assault. The planes were chartered by Pakistan, and it is said, officially sanctioned by Cheney who wished for Pakistan to have its way. Musharraf, on his end, made dubious arguments regarding the act. In some diabolical deal, the populations of both nations were sold out by elected leaders who then turned about-face and in Hitler-style proceeded to destroy their respective constitutions. One could speculate that the public relations methods of both leaders were similar. Since foreign policy was the main focus of the Bush Years, more has to be said of this subject before moving on to just how Bush destroyed the American constitution as if the American people were some third world populace with a federal constabulary force occupying it.

This action in Afghanistan was wrought by problems from the beginning. A question to ask of this war would be: Is this response proportional to the deaths inflicted by terrorism?

The statistics are as follows:

1600 a year average casualties in 8 years of the Patterns of Global Terrorism study, most of these non-American, with the big mac clearly coming in first as a weapon of mass destruction ahead of Jihadis following a 7^th century 'prophet's' dictums that many in the Islamic world have chosen to no longer take literally. This against the numbers in the Lancet report, and let us accept the official numbers for civilian death in Afghanistan. This hovers at 17-21 thousand. Then factor in soldiers deaths and the dislocation that this causes for the families at home, and the psychological state of those returning from deployment from the longest war in American history with the longest stretches of continuous combat. Clearly, then, the reaction to terrorism is entirely out of bounds of proportionality, and America would do better to drop Joint Direct Attack Munitions on your food service chain than it would brown people who more often than not are in the wrong place at the wrong time. But Afghanistan was not the end. Osama, free to escape into Pakistan, had failed to launch another large attack. Iraq was next. Clearly, the intelligence failure leading to the Iraq War could be excused as complete stupidity. This conflict has been a great way for professional liars in the CIA to continue collecting government salaries, and creeps in the NSA to continue collecting the largest child pornography cache in the world at tax payer expense. A sane society would ask itself if it would be better off printing money onto toilet paper along with copies of the Constitution onto baby-wipes, and the Declaration on paper towels for use in Federal facilities; since the America Intelligence services are the best funded in the world, and are supposed to have missed both the coming of 9-11 and the Non-existence of the Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction. The idea that Bush lied is simplistic. However, he is a politician, so it should be assumed that when he engages in the act of speech the contents of his language will be in direct variance to objective truth at all times. The idea that it was all a big mistake, the 2^nd Big Mistake following the fact that 9/11 was not prevented, is also simplistic. But this much we know: the Bush administration paid columnists to put out false stories slanting the lead-up to the war to fit their view of what would happen. This view would cost thousands of people their lives and trillions in funds to wage the war. In hindsight, we know that Saddam was interrogated by an FBI Agent and admitted that he had to create the impression that he still had the weapons in order to deter the Iranians from coming in his country, and creating the very Shia-Crescent which now runs from Iran to Lebanon.

The invasion itself was simple and quick, with Baghdad taken in short order. The second rate third world army which had once been the 4^th Largest in the world now simply melted away, and whatever industry was left after a decade of sanctions was devastated by the near invincible air force of the U.S.

The Saddam Statue came down, it seemed in according to the near Sun Tzu like strategically sage advice given by Dick Cheney. There is a problem with this iconic symbol of victory: The toppling of the Saddam statue by members of the iraqi expat community was staged under the direction of army psychological operations. The occupation that was not supposed to be then ensued with a requisite guerrilla war. What is clear is that low intensity conflicts include a high amount of civilian deaths. This was reflected in the Lancet Report, who estimated the ultimate death toll in Iraq reaching the hundreds of thousands. Of course war is total, and one could argue that the amount of deaths in this conflict was far lower than those previously in sheer numbers if not percentage of combatant to non-combatant. But really- it is hard not to have a moral high ground when the historical antecedents are area bombing, genocide, and nuclear assaults. The fact is that these people died as a result of an invasion which was launched by the United States. The war for oil raised oil prices, and ended with foreign companies making the lion's share of profits.

But this was not the end of the wars during these years. Iran was clearly next-it stirred the pot in Iraq, funding Sadr to fight the Americans, and exporting radical clerics. This led to the next cooperation between America and Sunni Salafist Al-Qaeda elements. Not wanting to risk an all-out war, and perhaps learning from its mistakes, or perhaps under the auspices of local agents who kept their superiors in the dark for the purposes of plausible deniability, a covert War against Iran began and the funding of Al Qaeda in Khuzestan began in order to try to destabilize the Iranian province richest in oil, and the very area in which Saddam and Khomeni fought their most brutal battles.

So much for the foreign policy.

The best summary of the domestic policy of George Bush junior is this: George W Bush was a socialist. This is not surprising given the middle of the road policies of his father, and his grandfathers support for the National Socialist Workers Party even when the United States was at war with that government.

The domestic agenda of George Bush began with No Child Left Behind. This was a national mandate for education. He then passed Medicare Part D, otherwise known as the prescription drug benefit. These policies were both heavily socialistic. His faith based initiatives simple provided Federal Welfare funds to churches and expanded them. His tax cuts were well known an controversial. The battle of the death tax was framed in a way that most people assumed the tax effected the them when it only affected the super rich. But clearly, he rolled back taxes while skyrocketing the deficit.

Defecations on the Constitution became a part of the Bush Years. First, random Muslims were rounded up without due process in response to 9/11 following the PATRIOT Act. This act was already on the shelf, and had been something that the Federal Government was itching for. It was the exact type of legislation sought after Oklahoma City and was not written after the fact to respond to 9/11. The idea of 'free speech zones' became common, with the first amendment being only a variable thing rather than a natural right of free beings. Domestic spying, long practiced by-proxy through ECHELON was instead directly practiced. The 4^th Amendment was destroyed, with many erroneously pointing out there was no right laid out in the constitution for privacy, which clearly ignores the whole point of the 4^th Amendment and the existence of the 9^th Amendment. Posse Commitaus was allowed to die on the vine, and the first stirrings of a North Com were made, establishing a command for the continental US. Drones began to be used for targeted killings abroad with late implications. Homeland Security was established, along with a TSA to screen passengers at airports. No change was made to immigration policy. Lt Col Anthony Schaffer was ignored as he tried to point out that he had identified the hijackers and was providing information to his superiors regarding them before the attacks. Sibel Edmonds, who claimed to have evidence of both traitors within the government and direct links between elements in the U.S. Intelligence community with bin Laden up to 9/10 was put under indictment. No one was fired for the debacle of 6 jets scrambling to intercept the planes. Instead average Americans would be expected to pay for the mistakes via inflation of the currency through massive over-reach overseas and the destruction of their natural rights at home. But Bush, the Socialist, was not done.

The North American Union was a common name given to the plan to merge the security forces of both the United States, Mexico and Canada, three countries already joined by NAFTA in matters of trade. Now, Bush appeared to be setting up NAFTA to be the North American equivalent of the European Community which preceded the actual EU. The name of the agreement was the Security and Prosperity Partnership and would merge the three counties security apparatuses. The Law of the Sea Treaty came next: While on the surface, a good treaty supporting the environment and equal access among nations, it in fact gave the UN permit power and taxing power. It was supported by Bush and later, by Clinton and Obama. Bush favored this. The borders remained open, while Mexico rapidly descended into an undeclared civil war that would costs more lives than America lost in Vietnam. Thus the President who was said to have disregarded the international community to the chagrin of liberals and to the 'Merica chants of NASCAR fans everywhere was actually working to reduce American sovereignty and give defacto amnesty to immigrants who came to America illegally, all while posing as a reincarnation of the near mythical Reagan-Messiah figure the Republican Party pointed to for its claim to be conservative.

George Bush destroyed the Constitution via the Patriot Act. The military was committed in two countries cleaning up messes made by British map makers post Sykes-Picot in the first official chicken-hawk administration where the president was a known deserter and the VP could not even be trusted to aim a shotgun correctly. Two The economy was left on the vine to die by a fed chairman who once championed a gold standard, but promptly forgot his 'Randian Principles' at the first grasp of power. Socialism marched under the banner of the elephant, an animal of native intelligent which is surely insulted by its association with the Republican party. The Jackass still carried its burdens of centrist corporate sponsored fools who mouthed populist motifs while signing bills they never read written by the bipartisan K-Street vipers otherwise known as lobbyists. 'Wall Street Got Drunk'- such were the Bush Years, a bender from which America still struggles to kick the hangover. Despite the claims of hope and change, it was clear from early campaign speeches in 2008 that this would be a hangover that would last for a bit. On the one side was a PTSD case only nationally known because he happened to not know how to fly aircraft, and a man on the other side who was a literal unknown. It was a one party system now- not the Elephant or the Donkey- it was the time of the internationalist-militaristic-march-to the bottom party. It was the time of the new politicians, sweet in speech, acting like marionettes their part of mutual rancorous worldviews but pragmatic every day common ground. This new Republicrat party could best be symbolized by the jackal, or the parasites running in his intestines.

Texas History, Post-7th Grade

Anglos described by one Spanish official:

'Nomadic like Arabs....distinguished only from savages in their color, language and cunning'

New Spain had a five million population with half being Indians. Interesting fact for someone claiming a low number for the native inhabitants of North America.

The Texas Revolution

There was not much that was done in Texas that was revolutionary, though people use the words revolution, rebellion, and separatism to mean the same thing. It was an attempt to break away from a national government, not to remake society.

The myth of the Texas revolution has about as much in common with the reality of the events in 1836 as the movie 300 would with the events described by Herodotus. It event has its basic racial stereotypes (The Persians are black for some reason in the movie; the depiction of Mexicans is decidedly negative in the 'Texas Revolution myth' even though they too rebelled against Santa Anna), Davy Crockett was the subject of several 'dime-novels'(comics can be considered to be descended from these). The idea of an actual race war is implicit in the accounts of the Texas Revolution. There are wider issues of an American populace used to federalism and a legal-system based on common law. But these following quotes will help illuminate the attitudes that led both sides to the conflict.

“A war of barbarism and of despotic principles, waged by the Mongrel Spanish-Indian and negro race against the anglo-american race”

Stephen Austin, quoted pg 134

David Weber Refighting the Alamo: Mythmaking and the Texas Revolution

Major Problems in Texas History

“I looked upon the Mexicans as scarce more than apes”

-Noah Smithwich, pg 135

David Weber Refighting the Alamo: Mythmaking and the Texas Revolution

Major Problems in Texas History

But to be fair the racism stream ran had two banks.

“Just as the Goths, Ostrogoths, Alans and other tribes devastated Rome.....”

-Report of a Mexican Committee on Foreign Relations, pg 135

David Weber Refighting the Alamo: Mythmaking and the Texas Revolution

Major Problems in Texas History

So clearly, during his own life Crockett was a subject of myth. So any battle involving him will be easier to deal with than the complex figure of Sam Houston. The defeat is celebrated because the example of heroic sacrifice is for some reason more powerful. There is a monument at Thermopylae which to paraphrase its actual content says 'O Stranger passing by, Tell Sparta that obedient to her laws here we lie'. The monument at Plataea is just a melted down column made of Persian weapons. It is more entertaining and grand a subject to speak of a battle involving the Persian King himself in a small mountain pass against an outnumbered Greek force than it is to discuss a battle involving more equal numbers being led by Mardonius, a mere general. Romans talked more about Cannae than Zama; more about Teutoberg Wald than Germanicus recovering the standards. Single events like battles, especially ones that involve last stands, are easier to focus on. So in that vein, the Alamo is an oversimplified example of the Texas revolution which lends itself to myth-making due to the self-sacrifice of the defenders involved. San Jacinto was a battle which was chosen by Houston after he had followed a Fabian strategy. Historians generally do not pay attention to battles fought in this manner, not even those of Fabius himself. Historians all wish they were poets; and they speak most eloquently about that which lends itself to myth and couplets more so than prose.

The myth will change with the racial composition of Texas. It will never be an inversion of the White supremacy inherent in its older forms , but it will change to focus on a state rebelling against a tyrannical central government, especially with the emerging crises of the next decade appearing to be controversies over federalism on such issues as Obamacare, Gay Rights, the 2^nd Amendment, Marijuana legalization and such.