Author Topic: On The Brink  (Read 3016 times)

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Offline franksolich

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On The Brink
« on: December 20, 2010, 08:36:15 AM »
On The Brink, Jay Winik, (Simon & Schuster, 1996).

I bought this book, new, when it first came out fourteen years ago, but never got around to reading it because I was usually otherwise preoccupied, and besides, it's a formidable book, almost 700 pages, and no colored pictures in it, and lots of big words......hence a book the primitives aren't ever going to read, but should.

It was written by someone with impressive liberal credentials, by the way.

Having spent the last two days reading it--I could rarely put it down--I regret not having read it long before.

The book deals with U.S.-Soviet relations during the Reagan administration (1981-1989), most but not all with the various arms-control negotiations and summit meetings.  It also covers things such as the struggle for the soul of the Democrat party during the 1970s all through the 1980s (as we all know, the good guys lost there), the collapse of any real purpose for the United Nations, and the competition between one of the best Secretaries of State we've ever had, George Shultz, and one of the best Secretaries of Defense we've ever had, Caspar Weinberger.

It focuses mostly upon four people, all these other people and events swirling around them--Richard Perle, Jeane Kirkpatrick, Max Kampelman, and Elliot Abrams, all of them Democrats who had become considerably disillusioned with James Carter (1977-1981), who was giving away the farm.....and almost succeeded.

In 1980, one would have had to be some years past 60 years of age, to remember a time when the west, and America specifically, were not in decline and retreat.   It's true the United States was instrumental in winning two world wars, but the history of the 60 years 1920-1980 was that of a lack of will, decay and erosion, as western democratic institutions and influence servilely acquiesced to the emergence of the socialist alternatives.

I grew up in this era; seeing large parts of the global map turn socialist grey (or red, for blood).

I grew up believing that the good guys were going to lose, in the end.  But one hoped the end would take a long time coming, and that we democrats (small "d" here) would acquit ourselves valiantly in our inevitable demise, so as to serve as an example for generations hundreds, thousands, of years later.

I was very pessimistic.  It was inevitable; the bad guys were going to win, in the end.

As a college student, I hailed Alexander Solzhenitsyn's speech at Harvard during the late 1970s, despite that no one else did.  What he said was exactly true--the west had lost its will to survive.

Remember, this was also during the massive "nuclear freeze" demonstrations; demonstrations "demanding" that the United States rein in its weaponry, while demanding no such thing of the socialist empires, during the increasingly acrimonious Democrat partisanship in Congress, during various humiliations of the United States on both the battlefields and the forum of public opinion.

We weren't going to make it; we were going down.

Very fortunately, franksolich had nothing to do with the conduct of foreign affairs during the Reagan administration

Up until the advent of people such as Richard Perle, Jeane Kirkpatrick, Max Kampelman, and Elliot Abrams, I was not ever aware that such people existed any more, public officials with great responsibilities who actually believed in winning rather than giving way.   

Damn, I was a negative kid.

When we were still at our old home, one time I commented that December 25, 1989 had been perhaps the most momentous day in my life.  That morning, when I arose, I glanced at the screen of the television set, and watched as the bodies of Nicolai and Elena Cecesceau were dragged through the streets of Bucharest.

I stopped breathing, and had to sit down to watch.

My God, I thought; rather than the socialists killing the people, the people are killing the socialists.

The world had turned upside down.

Anyway, it's a good book, maybe a little long for most, but a good book.
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Offline Eupher

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Re: On The Brink
« Reply #1 on: December 20, 2010, 09:28:53 AM »
Yeah, good ol' Nickie and Elena. One of the few remaining hardliners who didn't wake up to realize that his ass was soon going to be sucking buttermilk.

There was a trial of sorts, a kangaroo court, that personified the word "mock".

He and his wife died while many hundreds of thousands were clambering over the defeated Berlin Wall in search of that thing called "freedom" which we, as a people, take entirely for granted.
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Offline franksolich

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Re: On The Brink
« Reply #2 on: December 20, 2010, 04:51:16 PM »
Yeah, good ol' Nickie and Elena. One of the few remaining hardliners who didn't wake up to realize that his ass was soon going to be sucking buttermilk.

There was a trial of sorts, a kangaroo court, that personified the word "mock".

He and his wife died while many hundreds of thousands were clambering over the defeated Berlin Wall in search of that thing called "freedom" which we, as a people, take entirely for granted.

I can't really describe what a profound effect that had on me, sir, seeing that.

When growing up, from maybe when I was still in grade school, watching the antics of the hippies, the pacifists, the Democrats in Congress, the news media, I developed this unshakeable belief that we were going to lose in the end; that socialist domination was inevitable.

It wasn't a good thing, and I wasn't for it, but inevitably it was going to happen; America and the west were going to cave, going to go down.

This was probably when I developed my still-current feeling well, okay, but the next world, the Eternal one, is more important than this world.  At least I had that solace, in my thinking.

When I was in college, I had a professor (a professor from Yale, incidentally) who once complained to the class that franksolich, a confirmed and dedicated and thorough Republican, the only one in all his classes at the University of Nebraska, had one of the best understandings, and appreciation, of the Marxist philosophy of history he had seen, and he wondered why that was.

(I was not present; I was told later he had said this, and I did get one of only two As in his class; as you already know, I avoided classes as much as possible [when allowed] and submitted paperwork instead.)

Damn.  Talk about a wasted youth, always believing the good guys were destined to lose, in the end.  This contaminated every area of my thinking; for example, I always believed Oklahoma was going to defeat Nebraska, in the end.  It was important to put up a good fight, but inevitably we were doomed.

Seeing that sight on the television screen the morning of December 25, 1989, shook the foundations of my thinking.

And as mentioned, it was a good thing America was graced with people who actually believed the good guys could win, and those people were in positions of power to ensure that we did.

I was however still somewhat--although only somewhat--a skeptic until that day in May 1995, when on the isolated steppes of southern Russia, I learned to my great shock and astonishment that the Republicans had won control of Congress the previous November, for the first time in my life.

(And that Nebraska had won the national championship in football the previous January.)

Damn.

It's been a long time now, but I still get sort of euphoric when recalling either event, the collapse of the bad guys.
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Offline Eupher

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Re: On The Brink
« Reply #3 on: December 21, 2010, 08:34:01 AM »
Well, Frank, from a completely self-protectionist point of view, it's far better to expect the worst thing to happen, irrespective what that "thing" is. That way one isn't disappointment when, indeed, the worst thing does happen.

The pain of disappointment is keen and acute in most of us, I suspect, and is not something relished.

It flat out hurts when our favorite team is beaten or the good guys take it in the shorts. It hurts to see the bad guys employing evil, unfair tactics, lying and cheating and stealing in all that they do, and come out on top.

Mrs E is an incurable optimist and she looks for all the sweetness and gold in life. She creates most of that simply by looking for it. While I'm a much darker personality than hers, she often finds the joys by refusing to acknowledge much beyond a narrow spectrum of light.

There is a great deal to say for that type of attitude. It's not one that is natural for me, only because I've been on the planet for a few years and have made tons and tons of mistakes. I tend to learn from those mistakes and I have learned to watch for tripping points and signals in systems and people that indicate a pending catastrophe.

I'm generally a pretty good guy to have around when things go south, because I'm already hard-wired to be more than a little prepared for it. I think that's why Mrs E married me - because we're so different we complement each other.

My point is, it's perfectly fine to expect the worst in things. Whether you expect to burn that pizza in the oven because you're gonna sit down and capture a few thoughts rattling around in your noggin on paper or expect to see your favorite football team get steamrollered on the gridiron, it's all part of the deal.

We ain't so naive any more, Frank. We're grizzled and we're seasoned. Kinda hard to see all that sweetness and light when you know that light you see at the end of the tunnel is the approaching train.
Adams E2 Euphonium, built in 2017
Boosey & Co. Imperial Euphonium, built in 1941
Edwards B454 bass trombone, built 2012
Bach Stradivarius 42OG tenor trombone, built 1992
Kanstul 33-T BBb tuba, built 2011
Fender Precision Bass Guitar, built ?
Mouthpiece data provided on request.