A faded passion? Estes Kefauver and the senate subcommittee on antitrust and monopoly

In this paper I examine the U.S. Senate subcommittee on antitrust and monopoly (1957-1963), chaired by Tennessee Senator Estes Kefauver. I assess the persistence into the postwar years of the antimonopoly critique of bigness that had animated the politics of reform in the pre–New Deal era, arguing that Richard Hofstadter correctly described antitrust as one of the “faded passions” of postwar reform. However, Kefauver’s antimonopoly crusade was significant in bridging the antimonopoly tradition rooted in the politics of the pre–New Deal era and the new antimonopoly politics of the 1970s and beyond, particularly as manifested in the “third wave” consumer movement. Tracing this connection between antimonopoly and consumer politics, I pay particular attention to the formulation and passage of the Kefauver-Harris Drug Act, the consumer safety legislation from the subcommittee, and to Kefauver’s determined but forlorn efforts in the late 1950s and early 1960s to persuade the federal government to establish a new Department of Consumers

A Tale of Two Paranoids: A Critical Analysis of the Use of the Paranoid Style and Public Secrecy by Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán

Within the last decade, a rising tide of right-wing populism across the globe has inspired a renewed push toward nationalism. Capitalizing on an increasingly chaotic public sphere, leaders are stoking fear in their constituents such that their radical ideologies and hardline policy decisions may be enacted. This article offers a comparative study of two leaders exploiting the vulnerabilities of their respective citizenries: United States President Donald Trump and Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbán. Drawing from and reimagining Richard Hofstadter’s germane essay, “The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” we argue that both represent a new manifestation of the paranoid style as it enables (and is enabled by) “public secrecy.” By controlling the media and redirecting collective attention by way of rhetorical sleight of hand, the two are able to sow disorder and confusion such that their secrecy may persist out in the open. Despite using similar issues to promulgate fear and paranoia, most prominently the refugee and immigration crises, and their similar end goals, the two must nonetheless engage in different discursive strategies that reflect the distinct cultures and histories of their respective countries

The anti-chain store movement and the politics of consumption

This essay examines the anti-chain store movement of the 1920s and 1930s in order to contribute to debates about the origins and nature of modern US consumer politics. It argues that this movement of independent merchants and their followers is best understood as an expression of populist antimonopolism. Opponents of the chains saw themselves as speaking for ‘the people’ and were virulently hostile to large aggregations of economic and political power. Concerned about the likely impact of chain stores on their communities, merchants lobbied their trade associations, wrote to their congressmen, and launched local grassroots campaigns. They also worked through the courts, securing anti-chain tax legislation in most states, and attracting the support of Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis. The essay has a comparative dimension, comparing the anti-chain crusades of the 1920s and 1930s with the protests against ‘big-box’ retail which have proliferated in the US and elsewhere since the 1980s. Reflecting on the recurrence in the age of globalization of a form of protest historians once thought dead, the essay questions the assumption—deep-rooted in US historiography—that antimonopoly ceased to be a significant feature of the US politics of reform after the New Deal. Accordingly the final part of the essay traces connections between pre-New Deal anti-chain campaigners and post-New Deal consumer activists, noting the centrality of antimonopoly to the careers of leading consumer politicians of the post-war era, Estes Kefauver and Ralph Nader. Arguing that the anti-chain store movement of the 1920s and 1930s was constitutive of the modern US politics of consumption, the study concludes by considering the implications of the persistence of the antimonopoly tradition for current and future scholarship. It suggests that the study of the politics of consumption is still in its infancy, and that given the important role antimonopoly thought has played in the US politics of reform, the temptation to dismiss out of hand as necessarily futile and reactionary anti-chain store movements past and present should be resisted

Dad jokes, D.A.D. jokes, and the GHoST test for artificial consciousness

The ability of a computer to have a sense of humor, that is, to generate authentically funny jokes, has been taken by some theorists to be a sufficient condition for artificial consciousness. Creativity, the argument goes, is indicative of consciousness and the ability to be funny indicates creativity. While this line fails to offer a legitimate test for artificial consciousness, it does point in a possibly correct direction. There is a relation between consciousness and humor, but it relies on a different sense of “sense of humor,” that is, it requires the getting of jokes, not the generating of jokes. The question, then, becomes how to tell when an artificial system enjoys a joke. We propose a mechanism, the GHoST test, which may be useful for such a task and can begin to establish whether a system possesses artificial consciousness

I am a Cliché

I am a writer. Being comfortable saying this is taking me a long time. While I wait for that day to arrive I revisit some of my old work. I find it full of clichés and feel embarrassed by its naivety and simplicity. This is the story of my development as a writer. This is the story of my increasing ambivalence towards academic writing

The ideas of Thomas Jefferson in The Declaration of Independence

ABSTRACT 2009. This minor thesis discussed about the ideas of Thomas Jefferson as included in The Declaration of Independence. This research took the form of library research utilizing the descriptive technique. The primary data are the words, phrases, and interpreted statement which in the Declaration of Independence text. The secondary data are collected from books, magazines, journals, and internet websites about Jefferson’s background, the Declaration of Independence, and articles. The purpose of this research is to find out the ideas of Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence text. To achieve the goal, the researcher employees historical approach, biographical approach and philosophical approach. Those approaches were related to me each other in order to find out the ideas of Thomas Jefferson as described in the text of Declaration of Independence. Historical approach was applied to explain the event at that time. Biographical approach was applied to understand more about how the author’s intention in the work is related to his background. While philosophical approach was used to know how the philosophy expressed in the one of Thomas Jefferson works. The analysis of this research lead that there were three ideas reflected in the Declaration of Independence values: that all men are created equal, all men have natural rights, and government is used to secure these rights with democracy and freedom

Spark and Sparkle – „Iskra i gra”. O tłumaczeniu poezji absurdalnej na przykładzie wiersza Ogdena Nasha

The article is a short presentation of a translation concept created by an American cognitivist and physicist Douglas Hofstadter included in his book Le Ton beau de Marot. The principles of the concept are presented by means of a metaphor. Translation is a game of, only partially conscious, participation in an infinite loop: words evoke images and images – words. The contact with the original text creates images in the translator’s mind that he or she translates by means of language structures into sentences/verses of the target language. This cognitive intuition is paired with a structural category of Stanisław Barańczak’s semantic dominant. This methodological, structural-cognitive pair is a starting point for the analysis of Barańczak’s translation of Ogden Nash’s The Dog. The stylistic and formal solutions (especially rhymes) used by the translator are analysed, but the main goal of the text is to capture the elusive, i.e. the analysis of the interlinguistic and‘inter-mental’ translation of the absurd sense of humour.The article is a short presentation of a translation concept created by an American cognitivist and physicist Douglas Hofstadter included in his book Le Ton beau de Marot. The principles of the concept are presented by means of a metaphor. Translation is a game of, only partially conscious, participation in an infinite loop: words evoke images and images – words. The contact with the original text creates images in the translator’s mind that he or she translates by means of language structures into sentences/verses of the target language. This cognitive intuition is paired with a structural category of Stanisław Barańczak’s semantic dominant. This methodological, structural-cognitive pair is a starting point for the analysis of Barańczak’s translation of Ogden Nash’s The Dog. The stylistic and formal solutions (especially rhymes) used by the translator are analysed, but the main goal of the text is to capture the elusive, i.e. the analysis of the interlinguistic and‘inter-mental’ translation of the absurd sense of humour

Lisp, Jazz, Aikido -- Three Expressions of a Single Essence

The relation between Science (what we can explain) and Art (what we can't) has long been acknowledged and while every science contains an artistic part, every art form also needs a bit of science. Among all scientific disciplines, programming holds a special place for two reasons. First, the artistic part is not only undeniable but also essential. Second, and much like in a purely artistic discipline, the act of programming is driven partly by the notion of aesthetics: the pleasure we have in creating beautiful things. Even though the importance of aesthetics in the act of programming is now unquestioned, more could still be written on the subject. The field called "psychology of programming" focuses on the cognitive aspects of the activity, with the goal of improving the productivity of programmers. While many scientists have emphasized their concern for aesthetics and the impact it has on their activity, few computer scientists have actually written about their thought process while programming. What makes us like or dislike such and such language or paradigm? Why do we shape our programs the way we do? By answering these questions from the angle of aesthetics, we may be able to shed some new light on the art of programming. Starting from the assumption that aesthetics is an inherently transversal dimension, it should be possible for every programmer to find the same aesthetic driving force in every creative activity they undertake, not just programming, and in doing so, get deeper insight on why and how they do things the way they do. On the other hand, because our aesthetic sensitivities are so personal, all we can really do is relate our own experiences and share it with others, in the hope that it will inspire them to do the same. My personal life has been revolving around three major creative activities, of equal importance: programming in Lisp, playing Jazz music, and practicing Aikido. But why so many of them, why so different ones, and why these specifically? By introspecting my personal aesthetic sensitivities, I eventually realized that my tastes in the scientific, artistic, and physical domains are all motivated by the same driving forces, hence unifying Lisp, Jazz, and Aikido as three expressions of a single essence, not so different after all. Lisp, Jazz, and Aikido are governed by a limited set of rules which remain simple and unobtrusive. Conforming to them is a pleasure. Because Lisp, Jazz, and Aikido are inherently introspective disciplines, they also invite you to transgress the rules in order to find your own. Breaking the rules is fun. Finally, if Lisp, Jazz, and Aikido unify so many paradigms, styles, or techniques, it is not by mere accumulation but because they live at the meta-level and let you reinvent them. Working at the meta-level is an enlightening experience. Understand your aesthetic sensitivities and you may gain considerable insight on your own psychology of programming. Mine is perhaps common to most lispers. Perhaps also common to other programming communities, but that, is for the reader to decide..