January 21st, 2011
This is a syndicated post, originally from Paleofuture Blog.
This chilling image from the height of World War I appeared on the February, 1917 cover of Hugo Gernsback's The Electrical Experimenter. The excerpt below is from Yesterday's Tomorrows: Past Visions of the American Future by Joseph Corn and Brian Horrigan.
The design of this mobile dreadnaught, with its steel-tired, spoked wheels, suggests that its inventor may have been influenced by agricultural tractors or perhaps an amusement park Ferris wheel. The trench destroyer also embodies the common goal of military visionaries: maximum offensive power with total defensive security.
Previously on Paleo-Future:
[Read the original at Paleofuture Blog (2011-01-21)...]
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off
Tagged: 1910s, brian horrigan, electrical experimenter, hugo gernsback, joseph j. corn, magazines, war, WWI, yesterday's tomorrows
January 21st, 2011
This is a syndicated post, originally from Paleofuture Blog.
This chilling image from the height of World War I appeared on the February, 1917 cover of Hugo Gernsback's The Electrical Experimenter. The excerpt below is from Yesterday's Tomorrows: Past Visions of the American Future by Joseph Corn and Brian Horrigan.
The design of this mobile dreadnaught, with its steel-tired, spoked wheels, suggests that its inventor may have been influenced by agricultural tractors or perhaps an amusement park Ferris wheel. The trench destroyer also embodies the common goal of military visionaries: maximum offensive power with total defensive security.
Previously on Paleo-Future:
[Read the original at Paleofuture Blog ()...]
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off
Tagged: 1910s, brian horrigan, electrical experimenter, hugo gernsback, joseph j. corn, magazines, war, WWI, yesterday's tomorrows
January 13th, 2011
This is a syndicated post, originally from Jesse Walker: Reason.com articles and blog posts..
You know all those articles that purport to say what George
Orwell would believe if he were alive today, in which Orwell turns
out to have had a change of heart on every significant subject
where the author disagrees with him? You can do that to
Martin Luther King too:
If Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
were alive today, would he understand why the United States is at
war?
Jeh C. Johnson, the Defense Department's general counsel, posed
that question at today's Pentagon commemoration of King's
legacy.
In the final year of his life, King became an outspoken opponent of
the Vietnam War, Johnson told a packed auditorium. However, he
added, today's wars are not out of line with the iconic Nobel Peace
Prize winner's teachings.
"I believe that if Dr. King were alive today, he would recognize
that we live in a complicated world, and that our nation's military
should not and cannot lay down its arms and leave the American
people vulnerable to terrorist attack," he said....
Johnson said today's service members might wonder whether the
mission they serve is consistent with King's message and beliefs.
In King's last speech in Memphis, Tenn., on April 3, 1968 -- the
night before he died -- King evoked the biblical parable of the
Good Samaritan, Johnson noted....King drew a parallel between those
who passed by the man on the road and those in Memphis who at the
time hesitated to help striking sanitation workers because they
feared for their own jobs.
Johnson said King criticized those who are compassionate by proxy,
noting the civil rights leader told the audience in Memphis that
night, "The question is not, 'If I stop to help this man in need,
what will happen to me?' The question is, 'If I do not stop to help
the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?'"
Johnson compared today's troops to the Samaritan, who chose to help
instead of taking an easier path.
"I draw the parallel to our own servicemen and women deployed in
Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, away from the comfort of
conventional jobs, their families and their homes," Johnson
said.
Yes, he's referring to the same Martin Luther King who once said
this:
If we assume that life is worth living and that man has
a right to survive, then we must find an alternative to war. In a
day when vehicles hurtle through outer space and guided ballistic
missiles carve highways of death through the stratosphere, no
nation can claim victory in war. A so-called limited war will leave
little more than a calamitous legacy of human suffering, political
turmoil, and spiritual disillusionment. A world war - God forbid! -
will leave only smoldering ashes as a mute testimony of a human
race whose folly led inexorably to ultimate death.
Now, I suppose it is theoretically possible that if
Martin Luther King were alive today he would support Washington's
wars, in the same sense that it is theoretically possible
that Ronald Reagan would be a celebrity spokesman for the Workers
World Party. People change! It could happen! Maybe he'd have a
personality-changing concussion or something! And hey, Reagan
probably told
a parable at some point that a socialist could use for his own
ends...
Come on, people. You want to argue for the merits of a
war, either argue forthrightly against King's clear views on the
subject or have the good taste to leave him out of the discussion
altogether.
Bonus video: King on Vietnam:
[Read the original at Jesse Walker: Reason.com articles and blog posts. (2011-01-13)...]
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off
January 13th, 2011
This is a syndicated post, originally from Jesse Walker: Reason.com articles and blog posts..
You know all those articles that purport to say what George
Orwell would believe if he were alive today, in which Orwell turns
out to have had a change of heart on every significant subject
where the author disagrees with him? You can do that to
Martin Luther King too:
If Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
were alive today, would he understand why the United States is at
war?
Jeh C. Johnson, the Defense Department's general counsel, posed
that question at today's Pentagon commemoration of King's
legacy.
In the final year of his life, King became an outspoken opponent of
the Vietnam War, Johnson told a packed auditorium. However, he
added, today's wars are not out of line with the iconic Nobel Peace
Prize winner's teachings.
"I believe that if Dr. King were alive today, he would recognize
that we live in a complicated world, and that our nation's military
should not and cannot lay down its arms and leave the American
people vulnerable to terrorist attack," he said....
Johnson said today's service members might wonder whether the
mission they serve is consistent with King's message and beliefs.
In King's last speech in Memphis, Tenn., on April 3, 1968 -- the
night before he died -- King evoked the biblical parable of the
Good Samaritan, Johnson noted....King drew a parallel between those
who passed by the man on the road and those in Memphis who at the
time hesitated to help striking sanitation workers because they
feared for their own jobs.
Johnson said King criticized those who are compassionate by proxy,
noting the civil rights leader told the audience in Memphis that
night, "The question is not, 'If I stop to help this man in need,
what will happen to me?' The question is, 'If I do not stop to help
the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?'"
Johnson compared today's troops to the Samaritan, who chose to help
instead of taking an easier path.
"I draw the parallel to our own servicemen and women deployed in
Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, away from the comfort of
conventional jobs, their families and their homes," Johnson
said.
Yes, he's referring to the same Martin Luther King who once said
this:
If we assume that life is worth living and that man has
a right to survive, then we must find an alternative to war. In a
day when vehicles hurtle through outer space and guided ballistic
missiles carve highways of death through the stratosphere, no
nation can claim victory in war. A so-called limited war will leave
little more than a calamitous legacy of human suffering, political
turmoil, and spiritual disillusionment. A world war - God forbid! -
will leave only smoldering ashes as a mute testimony of a human
race whose folly led inexorably to ultimate death.
Now, I suppose it is theoretically possible that if
Martin Luther King were alive today he would support Washington's
wars, in the same sense that it is theoretically possible
that Ronald Reagan would be a celebrity spokesman for the Workers
World Party. People change! It could happen! Maybe he'd have a
personality-changing concussion or something! And hey, Reagan
probably told
a parable at some point that a socialist could use for his own
ends...
Come on, people. You want to argue for the merits of a
war, either argue forthrightly against King's clear views on the
subject or have the good taste to leave him out of the discussion
altogether.
Bonus video: King on Vietnam:
[Read the original at Jesse Walker: Reason.com articles and blog posts. ()...]
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off
