Tag Archives: liberalism

(Political Stress Test) American Liberal Jewish Double Down (After Pittsburgh & Trump)

Posted on November 4, 2018 by zjb

There’s been some comment about “deep splits” in the American Jewish community after Pittsburgh and in reaction to Trump. I don’t see it that way. Sure there are outliers, about which I will comment below, and the Jewish right has … Continue reading →

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(Political Icon of Northern Aggression) November 2018 Feels Like the Civil War (William Tecumseh Sherman)

Posted on October 4, 2018 by zjb

I’ll confess that during these days of rage what brings out the worst in me are the stories about Trump, the GOP, and rightwing radio jocks revving up the base with vicious attacks against Blasey-Ford and Ramirez because they think/know … Continue reading →

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(Wicked) Radical Affects (Spinoza)

Posted on June 25, 2017 by zjb

“Everyone knows how it goes–a disgust with the present, a craving to make fundamental changes, uncontrolled anger, a scorn for poverty–these affects lead men to wickedness.” (Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise, Chapter XVII) (thank you, Julie Klein for posting this on FB)

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(Reckless Mind) Philosophers & Politics (Mark Lilla)

Posted on June 23, 2017 by zjb

The distinctly unkind pleasure reading through Mark Lilla’s The Reckless Mind: Intellectuals in Politics belongs to liberal skeptics who would concur with Lilla that the combination of philosophy and politics would seem, at least in the twentieth century, to be … Continue reading →

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(Shipwrecked Minds) Religion & Political Reaction (Mark Lilla)

Posted on June 21, 2017 by zjb

Not a knockout intellectual blow, Mark Lilla’s The Shipwrecked Mind: On Political Reaction packs a tough little liberal punch nevertheless. But to what effect? Meant for a broad readership, The Shipwrecked Mind appeared in 2016 as a New York Review … Continue reading →

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Loose Texture and Bovine Sympathy (Isaiah Berlin)

Posted on June 16, 2017 by zjb

I picked a fight on FB with Jewish philosophy friends, something having to do, I asked, with why so many of them devote themselves with such gusto to historical relics, moral creeps, and political reactionaries. It should be said that … Continue reading →

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Anti Neoliberal Brexit

Posted on June 24, 2016 by zjb

I think I’m getting it. Along with racism and xenophobia, Brexit is a vote against the very “neoliberal” economic order that we are supposed to despise with such rigor. As it turns out, Brexit would not have been won without voters … Continue reading →

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A Public Mills about the Modern Art

Posted on March 16, 2016 by zjb

Instead of static shots,  I took some digital snapshots of people milling about a few of the many familiar modern masterpieces at the Museum of Modern Art. I’d highlight three things: [1] the way in which that public physically frames … Continue reading →

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(Don’t Be Like Moses) Politics & Compromise in the Talmud (Judah b. Korha)

Posted on March 13, 2016 by zjb

In the current political climate, these words made a lot of sense the other day in the synagogue. Instead of righteous prophetic truth telling, instead of Moses and the law of strict justice that “cuts through mountains,” there’s Aaron, the … Continue reading →

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Racist Norms in Israel’s Religiously Divided Society (Reading The Pew Study)

Posted on March 10, 2016 by zjb

How does one uphold liberal norms in the face of illiberal social and political realities? For those of us concerned about democracy in a viable Jewish majority state, there is no good news in the Pew report about religion and … Continue reading →

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