Intellectuals for Trump?

Kelefa Sanneh
Google Images

The cultural critic Kelefa Sanneh attempts to make sense of pro-Trump intellectuals who attempt to make sense of Trump, who won't make sense of himself, in "Intellectuals for Trump" (The New Yorker, January 9, 2017):

The most cogent argument for electing Donald Trump was made not by Trump, or by his campaign, but by a writer who, unlike Trump, betrayed no eagerness to attach his name to his creations. He called himself Publius Decius Mus, after the Roman consul known for sacrificing himself in battle, although the author used a pseudonym precisely because he hoped not to suffer any repercussions. In September, on the Web site of the Claremont Review of Books, Decius published "The Flight 93 Election," which likened the country to a hijacked airplane, and argued that voting for Trump was like charging the cockpit: the consequences were possibly dire, but the consequences of inaction were surely so. Decius sought to be clear-eyed about the candidate he was endorsing. "Only in a corrupt republic, in corrupt times, could a Trump rise," he wrote. But he argued that this corruption was also evidence of a national crisis, one that could be addressed only by a politician untethered to political piety. The author hailed Trump for his willingness to defend American workers and America's borders. "Trump," he wrote, "alone among candidates for high office in this or in the last seven (at least) cycles, has stood up to say: I want to live. I want my party to live. I want my country to live." By holding the line on unauthorized immigration and rethinking free trade, Decius argued, Trump could help foster "solidarity among the working, lower-middle, and middle classes of all races and ethnicities." Decius identified himself as a conservative, but he saved much of his criticism for "house-broken conservatives," who warned of the perils of progressivism while doing nothing in particular to stop it. Electing Trump was a way to take a stand against both ambitious liberalism and insufficiently ambitious conservatism.

That's the introduction. Go and read more if more interests you. It should. Incidentally, I thought the writer familiar, as I remarked in a comment on Malcolm Pollack's website:

I thought I recognized the name "Sanneh." Kelefa Sanneh is the son of Lamin Sanneh, an intellectual and a convert to Christianity from Islam and a practicing Roman Catholic.

Lots of ironies all around . . .

A Near Miss . . .

Here's Looking at You, Kid!

Google Images

My cyber-friend Malcolm Pollack, who blogs at Waka Waka Waka, landed in Seoul last Friday morning at 4:00 a.m. and was delayed at the airport until 4:00 p.m. for his flight on to China:

We are here now. Our flight from JFK touched down at Incheon at about 4 a.m. (as I write, it's about 6 a.m. local time).

Our 9:40 flight to Guangzhou has now been delayed until 4 p.m. due to bad weather in Guangzhou. We will be weary travelers indeed by the time we get there . . .

Friday being a very busy day for me, I had no freedom to drop by the airport, so I wish his time in the airport had been on a Saturday:

Sorry to hear of the delay . . . though if today were Saturday, I'd come meet you at the airport for a drink.

Have a good trip!

In response to that, I received an email:

Thanks Jeff!

This flight on Korean Air, and visit to the airport, has made me more curious than ever about Korea, and I'm sure we'll be back. (As long as Kim Young 'Un) doesn't do anything too insane.

Speaking of which, what's the mood like in the South about all this saber-rattling? Are people seriously concerned about the possibility of an attack?

I replied to the full extent of my ignorance:

Noticeable about the rhetoric emanating from the North this time are its specificity and its dire character, so people have certainly taken note. But we are reassured -- and I agree -- that the North has no desire for a war that would bring down its system. Moreover, the North has continued to welcome Chinese tourists and has emphasized [to them] that there will be no war. The North is probably aiming much of its rhetoric at its domestic audience, trying to make the 'Young'un' look like a tough leader. The only danger is the possibility of a miscalculation.

Malcolm had flown on to China by then, so I heard no more. A near miss. Meanwhile, Kim Jong-un's war rhetoric waxes ever more weird, but I'm hoping for nothing worse than a "near miss" there, too . . .

Nearly an 'It Boy'

Hankuk University of Foreign Studies Subway Station

On a railway crossing near here...

(Image from Wikipedia)

Martin Buber wrote of I and Thou. Yesterday afternoon, I nearly became an 'it'.

I was riding the 273 Bus from Kyung Hee University at around 3:15, on my way to pick up my son, En-Uk, from his piano lesson, and the driver proved himself one of those 'Drivers from Hell' -- as my kids and I like to call them.

In short, a typical bus driver in Seoul -- the Polar Express engineer has nothing on these Korean Big City Drivers!

Yet . . . I no longer really notice the abrupt stops, the sudden accelerations, the unpredictable lane changes. I just brace myself, knee against the seat in front of me, and read my International Herald Tribune, experienced enough in my Han-Kookily urbanized life to ignore my surroundings and still avoid being thrown unceremoniously from my seat.

At some point, however, I became aware that we were backing up . . . s l o w l y. I looked up from my paper just as the bus's retrograde motion halted. A uniformed man was rushing across an open space toward the front of my bus, his head twisting quickly first right, then left, as he ran. Another man, also in uniform, stood beside the bus, to my right, frantically waving a red flashlight and ordering traffic behind the bus to back up.

At that moment, my eyes focused on a railway crossing's half-barrier bar, which was leaning fixed against the bus's front door. Red lights were flashing, bells were clanging, and the bus's engine portion was thrust across the subway tracks.

I'll say this for the driver -- he didn't abandon his passengers (unlike the subway train driver in the Daegu Subway Fire) but sat firmly in his seat and waited for the cars behind to back up, upon which, he did the same. Our bus had just slipped back behind the half-barrier bar, allowing it to descend completely, as the train rushed past.

My newspaper forgotten, neglected on my lap, I sat there staring at the driver's reflection in his rearview mirror, wondering if he had tried to beat the train, or if the half-barrier, flashing lights, and clanging bell had all simultaneously, if temporarily, malfunctioned.

The former seemed more likely, for after the train had safely passed, then another had rushed in the opposite direction, the bus lunged forward as the 'Driver from Hell' hurried on to meet what I took to be his urgent, pressing, schedule . . . having, apparently, learned absolutely nothing from his close encounter with nothingness.

I rode home thinking of Malcolm Pollack's own close encounter with mortality and had a cold beer to celebrate my continued subjectivity...