I'm reading "In a World of Pete Hegseths, Be a Maya Angelou."
I don't know if Kristol knows what he's telling us we need to "be," but he's upset that "pursuant to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s order to purge so-called DEI content from military libraries and classrooms, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings was removed, along with 380 other books, from the U.S. Naval Academy’s Nimitz Library."
Kristol asserts, despite not having read the book, that "'I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings' is not 'DEI content.' It’s a quintessentially American autobiography—a popular and important one. It’s a book a student at the Academy might want to read for his or her education, or for pleasure."
Kristol asserts, despite not having read the book, that "'I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings' is not 'DEI content.' It’s a quintessentially American autobiography—a popular and important one. It’s a book a student at the Academy might want to read for his or her education, or for pleasure."
Why would the story of a particular individual represent the promotion of the DEI agenda? I looked up the Naval Academy's mission statement: "To develop Midshipmen morally, mentally and physically and to imbue them with the highest ideals of duty, honor and loyalty...." I think I see a path to making the argument against the book — race consciousness may not be one of the "highest ideals" — but let Hegseth, et al., put a clear explanation in words.
By the way, I have read "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." Kristol still isn't committing to reading it. He just went back to the Angelou opus that was foisted on everyone who watched the Bill Clinton inauguration in 1993, "On the Pulse of Morning." I don't know what he thought of that poem at the time, but now he's stirred by lines that make him think about that lout Trump: "Do not be wedded forever/To fear, yoked eternally/To brutishness" and "Give birth again/To the dream."
IN THE COMMENTS: NorthOfTheOneOhOne posits that the Angelou book "was pulled because there are some Milley-era holdovers who are engaging in malicious compliance."
Posts
136 comments:
There are other libraries.
Why would the story of a particular individual represent the promotion of the DEI agenda?
It wouldn't necessarily, it was pulled because there are some Milley-era holdovers who are engaging in malicious compliance.
celebrate a thug like kwame nkrumah, nah I won't do that,
I watched 3 episodes when they re-ran Roots back in 1978. Am I cool, too?
For better or for worse, we don't live in a world of Pete Hegseths.
"In a world of _______s, be a _________" is sort of a cliche, isn't it? Not quite as bad as the movie previews', "In a world where ..." though.
let Hegseth, et al., put a clear explanation in words.
I don't think that's necessary. There was no public debate about putting such non-military books on the shelf and I see no reason for one now.
I haven't read the book either but I'm going to guess that it is as hollow as that dreadful poem that "Doctor" Maya Angelou - the Rigoberta Menchú of American arts and letters - recited at the '93 Inauguration. And that might possibly be the reason it was removed from the library. Again, just guessing.
I don't know who removed it, but the virtue signaling of the first clinton inaugural was that the Reagan era, was some wretched time to overcome,
There is no better representative for the dems/left/LLR-dems opinion on how to make the US military competent and lethal than soft pudgy boy Bill Kristol.
Which makes sense when you recall how all the usual lefty and LLR suspects went ga-ga over jazzy spirit fingers Stolen ValorWalz.
I'm in a progressive neighborhood in a red precinct. I pass several wee libraries on my morning walk and I wouldn't be surprised to find a copy in one.
Kristol's made a long career of being a caged bird, singing whatever his paymasters have asked him to sing. Of course he recommends it.
narciso: "I don't know who removed it, but the virtue signaling of the first clinton inaugural was that the Reagan era, was some wretched time to overcome,"
Never forget the role establishment/GOPe-er HW Bush played in advancing the very same idea that theReagan years was something to be embarrassed about and moved on from.
Remember "compassionate conservatism"? Ugh. Nothing more Bush-y and GOPe cringe than that.
I thought at first that this was Billy Crystal, and I was disappointed that a great comic felt the need to cheapen himself.
But it's the other guy. I see no reason to take anything that Trump-deranged sellout says seriously.
Bill Kristol is one of the biggest losers of the Trump era. Both sides hate him now.
Know Your Enemy is an important part of miitary education. If you're going to make a career out of defending the Constitution, it helps to read the things that inform the people who want to tear it down. Das Kapital. Mein Kampf. Confederate writings (yeah, that's what a great job we did of suppressing their ideology - I can't think of a single secessionist writer, but I'm sure they existed. What a racist country we are). The America that I Have Seen by Sayyid Qutb. Quotations from Chairman Mao. And unfortunately a lot of AA literature, which as a minimum is often misused, and in some cases was written specifically for the purpose of subverting the Constitution.
Won't help you drive a ship, but might help you remember that many the people around you in a given place would love to see your ship sink.
JSM
Yesterday I learned from my cousin that cal state college students must take not one but a number of DEI required courses, often from professors who are bugfuck crazy.
And boy, is her intelligent, talented son redpilled..
books that are SO IMPORTANT..
that people don't read them, they just complain if they're not available for free in libraries that they've Never been in
OMG. A book was removed! The horrors! What was it? I don’t remember, but it wasn’t “The Art of War.”
You want women writers autobiography worth reading, try a real writer like Eudora Welty "One Writer's Beginnings." Note the absence of pathos.
Twice I remember asking my mother, `Why are operas always sad?' She tried no answer, but she was someone to whom I could direct such a perplexity. I would come to give myself various answers to the question - based on questions having to do, for example, with what occasions people to sing, and what plots best allow for such occasions, questions which I would later come to feel assumed the question, not answered it. I do not know that it is the most searching question one might ask of opera, but the most interesting directions for an answer I have been given to it come from another woman, Catherine Clément in her book _Opera, or the Undoing of Women_, published in 1979, translated into English some ten years later, when I came across it. Her answer is, in effect, that opera is about the death of women, and about the singing of women, and can be seen to be about the fact that women die because they sing.
Stanley Cavell A Pitch of Philosophy, p.132
Bill Kristol is a slime-stain.
Bill Kristol has always been such a Goddamn fake. So now, he's Mr. DEI liberal/leftist after pretending to be Mr. True Conservative for 25 years. Because he hates Trump because....what? I still don't really know. Bad character? Or some BS.
I skimmed through the book and wasn't impressed. Its not bad, its not good. Sorta like her poetry. Its affirmative action literature. Whether or not its DEI is an open question. In any case, this isn't about "is the book good" or "should the book be banned?" its about "Is this book a good fit for a Naval Academy library?" I'd say no. I'd rather have my future admirals reading "Run silent, Run deep".
sayyed qutb, mao yes, but hank roger di angelo decidedly not,
The autobiographical Angelou novel, IKWTCBS, is set in the 1930s and 40s, mostly in Arkansas, before the protaganist moves to San Francisco. It tells of many things, including broken families, lovelessness, ignorance, racial hatred, the KKK, and the harm done by a lack of sex education.
The typical midshipman was born in 2005 or so, more than 40 years after the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and 2 or 3 years before the commencement of the Obama presidency. Wallowing in racial guilt from generations past is not a great way to make a cohesive fighting force.
Listen to Jasmine Crockett. She feels she has permission to hate, and she wants others to know that they have that permission, too. Nobody should have permission to hate.
There's a genre "Blackity Black" by black authors about the experience of being black that is almost universal with blacks.. That's the sort of crap to ban, as being crap. Michelle Obama's Master's thesis to Glenn Loury "Late Admissions: Confessions of a Black Conservative."
Exceptions very rare. Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams being two, writing for a general audience instead of a pathetic one.
mezzrow said...
I'm in a progressive neighborhood in a red precinct. I pass several wee libraries on my morning walk and I wouldn't be surprised to find a copy in one.
------
lol, you say that like it's a bad thing...
I found a first edition penguin paperback (75c original price) in my library-library, on the donation/goodwill price shelves of InSearch of Bisco by Erskine Caldwell. Also A House in the Uplands (50cents). Wealthy educated people, some likely passing away now, live in my town. I feel like I am giving the books a good home, and educating myself.
As to the Air Force/military academies? The bigger than man's library, the better. Don't tell me you can't find all these things online either. Put a small book in a man's hand, and watch him grow...
My personal library is very big, btw. Make of that what you will. ('uge, even. Bigger than yours, for sure... Nobody has to read to me, either.)
There is a long-running historical trope that military men are unimaginative brutes somehow seriously lacking in creativity and the capacity for abstract thought. This pisses me off no end. This stereotype needs to die. In my personal experience it is precisely the opposite. Granted, many soldiers don't grasp their personal creativity until they've matured or experienced trauma, but that in no way lessens the quality or the volume of their output. I have two full books of GWOT poetry I'm waiting for the right time to publish and I'm currently filling a third. One of my friends I served with is a very well-known illustrator and tattoo artist. Tons are amazingly talented songwriters and musicians.
There isn't one reason a person can't be both a Pete Hegseth AND a Maya Angelou. Zero. None.
When was the last time the book was checked out at that library?
wild chicken said...
" Yesterday I learned from my cousin that cal state college students must take not one but a number of DEI required courses"
way back at the turn of the century; when gilbar was FINALLY completing his BS degree (in Com Sci);
he had to take (i think) 8 credit hours of what we would now call DEI.
I'd already taken Anthro I and Sociology I which counted some..
But i HAD to take either a "women's studies" class or a "black history" class. I chose:
WS 380 HIST WOMEN SCI,TECH, and Medicine
where, among other things; we 'learned' that THE TRUE HEROES of World War Two, were the fearless WAC pilots that bravely flew brand new bombers from Long Beach to Long Island.
These women had to fly the planes, because ALL the men were off on holiday in Europe.. Stirring Ice cream into their coffee or something.
Also took had to take:
ENV S 303 GREAT ENVIRONMENTAL WRITING
where we were supposed to read Leopold's Sand County Almanac and the The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey..
but instead; had to listen to some Professor "explain", that:
we could eliminate ALL hydro dams AND coal plants, if we JUST CONSERVED ELECTRICITY!
those classes were actually kinda fun!
Bill Kristol wants you to know that his testicles still haven't descended.
Seems like a good book to pair with Hillbilly Elegy.
"Caged" is a story of girl molestation. It's well-written, but that doesn't mean it needs a shelf at the Naval Academy.
a little fanon to understand the post colonial mindsight, now angela davis's autobiography, that is sheer agony,
It’s called malicious compliance and the entrenched officer corps — the same officer corps that gave us a disengagement in Afghanistan that turned into a full-scale rout and who cannot train junior officers to avoid having American warships collide with slow-moving merchant vessels — take simple, straightforward, directives from the civilian leadership and undercut them by taking them way past common sense in an effort to undermine that civilian leadership. Hegseth is going to have to make a few examples out of O4, O5, O7, and O8 REMFs, and all will be good.
When I was in grad school, the university had a library of science and engineering, and that library had only books on science and engineering. I would similarly expect the library at West Point (or the Naval Academy or Air Force Academy) to limit the selection to books pertinent to military strategy, military technologies, perhaps some politics, and the like. Its 2025, anyone can download a version of Angelou's book (or pretty much any other book) instantly. The military did not ban the reading of this book, they merely didn't make it available in the library.
As to Hesgeth needing to better explain himself, there was a general directive (that came from Trump, not Hesgeth) that was passed down to the heads of the academies, who made their own selection of what to keep and what to remove. Hesgeth really had nothing to do with the decision to remove this particular book (or any other one).
Finally, apparently Kristol still does not know why the caged bird sings.
There's Thylias Moss, black poet (and Oberlin grad) who since seems to have gone woke, with The Warmth of Hot Chocolate, producing an excellent analysis of the proper place of religion, just to show excellence in black writing:
I don't believe in [God]. He's just a casual acquaintance,
a comfortable associate with whom I can be myself.
To believe in Him would place Him in the center of the universe,
when He's far more secure in the fringes,
so He doesn't have to look over His shoulder to nab the backstabbers who want promotions,
but are tired of waiting for Him to die and set in motion the natural evolution.
God doesn't want to evolve.
Has been against evolution from its creation.
He doesn't figure many possibilities are open to Him.
I think He's wise to bide His time, even though He pales in the moonlight to just a glow...
just the warmth of hot chocolate spreading through the body like a subcutaneous halo.
But to trust in Him implicitly would be a mistake,
for then He would not have to maintain His worthiness to be God.
Even the thinnest flyweight modicum of doubt gives God the necessity
to prove He's worthy of the implicit trust I can never give
because I protect Him from corruption,
from the complacency that rises within Him sometimes,
a shadowy ever-descending brother.
Oh, and FWIW I personally regard Maya Angelou as being substantially overrated, both as a poet and as a human being.
Off topic, sorry: `Why are operas always sad?' Figaro? The "undoing" of women?
no that is the height of foolishness,
hegseth's job is to put us on a war footing, if it comes, why waste time with other folderall, our based adversaries do not quibble with pronouns,
"his BS degree (in Com Sci)"
My father said that a BS degree indicates not a knowledge of science but an ignorance of Latin.
Lest we forget, Bill Kristol is the reason Sarah Palin was a one-hit wonder who peaked too soon and then flamed out. If he had never brought her to McCain's attention, she would have been a successful and respected two-term governor of Alaska, and perhaps holding a Cabinet position or Senate seat right now, with a dark-horse shot at the 2028 Republican nomination.
Bill Kristol is like a barrel at a Swedish eco-retreat.
no she was sabotaged by wallace and schmitd, with the concurrence of mccain, his defense was the last noble thing he did,
Replace every copy of 'Caged Bird' with 'Once an Eagle'.
of the young conservatives, showcased in '93's Times cover, Ingraham was the last to stay sane,
I don't think many readers today know of the rich American canon. They are missing out. There is nothing new under the son. We're in a technological revolution, but if you want richness in life, the humanities are where it's at. (Not what's taught in the academy today, but don't toss the babies with the bathwater...)
how much humiliation does groveling for omidyar's coin require,
"Foisted" is right.
Here, on the pulse of this new day
You may have the grace to look up and out
And into your sister’s eyes, and into
Your brother’s face, your country
And say simply
Very simply
With hope—
WTF did I just listen to?
When I was under 5 in the south in Virginia and Maryland I was told by neighbors that the blacks (n word used) were less intelligent and sensitive and my parents from the North told me that the story of the blacks (Negroes) was a story too sad to tell a child but that I should know to never do anything to make it sadder. The blacks I met back then were rural and uneducated people who moved north to better themselves and the blacks I meet now are their grandchildren who often are city middle-class and often are not.
Back then, racism centered on the IQ lie coming out of eugenics; right now, it centers on a behavioral genetics lie, also coming out of eugenics (though eugenics is now known as biodemography and social biology.) This lie depicts the black community as dominated by a social pathology, a moral numbness embedded by now its actual DNA by sidechains attached to regular DNA. These supposed sidechains are supposedly created by the stress of racism; they supposedly alter the normal operation of the chromosomes they are attached to; they are heritable; and, voila - generation after generation, crime in cities concentrates heavily in the black community. What to do?
The solution is to prophesy on the children as to who has the bad sidechains, using "polygenic risk scores," which are a sciency scheme emanating from the penumbra of the new eugenics. (The risk scores are first based on crime statistics and then validated by crime statistics but it is claimed they sum genomic variants.) It is then proposed to start the those kids with bad risk scores on drugs early to "help." Naturally, more of the kids will be black because the black community has more crime.
I sincerely hope that RFK Jr. who is opposed to pouring drugs into people will not let HHS sign up for this policy but NIH has sponsored most of the "research" through the OBSSR (Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research) and Social and Behavioral Sciences Branch (SBSB) - NICHD, so you never know.
To me, this is the same sad story my parents would not tell me when I was five, only now they've got professors of behavior genetics rather than intelligence genetics. The caged bird sings because the blacks are too proud to bleed.
There is a long-running historical trope that military men are unimaginative brutes somehow seriously lacking in creativity and the capacity for abstract thought. This pisses me off no end. This stereotype needs to die. In my personal experience it is precisely the opposite.
The memoirs of Ulysses Grant alone should be enough to put that to rest. Some of the best material ever written by an American President or by a soldier. Lots of wry observations on human nature that will make you chuckle out loud.
It is kind of amusing, that Kristol wouldn't want anyone to think that he reads tendentious pap like Maya Angelou. "[A] significant and influential part of our literary and cultural history" means, it's affirmative action literature. A Negro wrote it, so we have to pretend it's good. Keep pretending. Don't ever, ever stop pretending! All Good People must pretend!
NorthOfTheOneOhOne is almost certainly correct. It explains how it was Kristol knew about it, too.
Why does the fucking thing sing, anyway? Did she explain that? Someone must have read it.
I think two reasons are equally possible: malicious compliance or someone previously got some real or virtual reward for classifying books as DEI (or had a DEI book quota to fill) and classified any book that vaguely could be in that category. Now all of those books are being discarded.
I too wonder when it was last checked out.
"Bill Kristol wants you to know that his testicles still haven't descended."
Oh, they have descended alright, all the way into Pierre Omidyar's back-pocket.
Kristol radiates stupidity on the Bulwark Channel. Frequent guest.
Space Mountain, ref soldier-poets: I recently read Muse of Fire by Michael Korda, about the WW1 poets. Pretty well done. We think of the public-school/Oxbridge young officers, but there were also one or two self-educated privates in the book.
And of course there's Musashi and the samurai ideal of mastering the arts as part of mastering soldier skills.
But yes, too many paychecks today depend on not understanding that a man can be both a creator and a destroyer.
And that is important to teach future officers. That they're defending a civilization, and that they will have to swing themselves and their troops between creation and destruction.
Only thing harder than getting your men to start killing is getting them to stop....
RLTW
JSM
What Groucho said; It was the first thing that occurred to me, too, recalling the incident where the Tuskegee Airmen history was erased because some twerp maliciously did so, in order to point an accusatory finger at DEI eradication. Malicious Compliance. It should always and forever be followed by a Dishonorable Discharge, because 'dishonor' is what spite's all about - like the '1 in 4' military officers that hate Trump so much they would be willing to disobey orders, because it's a Commander in Chief they don't prefer.
Kristol is the Dogberry of Baghdad Bobs…
It wouldn't necessarily, it was pulled because there are some Milley-era holdovers who are engaging in malicious compliance.
There are other notable examples of this, like NASA firing actual rocket scientists instead of closing their DEI office as directed.
Knowing your enemy is indeed important for military leaders from junior NCOs through generals. Read their doctrine. Study their weapons and tactics. Study their command structure and military history. Believe me, our enemies are doing that to us as well. The job of warriors is to protect our interests by being expert at killing people and breaking their stuff. Anything else is bullshit.
DEI says that the US is the enemy. It destroys unit cohesion, which is the biggest sin of all. Warriors don’t fight for the flag, politicians, motherhood, or apple pie. They fight for their fellow warriors, looking out for one another regardless of race or sex. DEI says that race, sex, and victimhood are the most important things.
I can't see banning Glenn Loury (or even John McWhorter despite what he said last year). I wouldn't want everyone who didn't subscribe to a narrow range of views to be censored. Seeing how someone changes their mind and their views is valuable, whether it's Loury or Sowell. Not buying into the Confederate sh_t that Walter Williams bought into is also a plus. Also, books about blackness very much are written for a white, as well as a black, audience.
I both read that book in HS (AP English, I believe, though I am beginning to doubt that memory now) AND I attended USNA. This makes me super qualified to provide my opinion on this topic.
All I remember from the book is that my teacher had us listen to the book-on-tape (read by the author) in class for the sexual assault scene, specifically. I understood the point that was being made, but didn't really see anything noteworthy come out of it. Clearly an overall forgettable book in my case.
At USNA, I did end up spending a significant amount of time just hanging out at Nimitz library and reading books. Herman Wouk, George Orwell, Ayn Rand, Eugene Fluckey ( Thunder Below!, great sea stories in that one), Patrick O'Brian, etc...classic works, modern works, works about war, works about the Academy ( fiction and non-fiction - First Class, for example). Never once did I bother picking up, or even consider re-reading, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.
Was it removed as a gimmick here? Probably. But it is probably also available as an intra-library loan, so my outrage meter on this is pegged low.
RideSpaceMountain said "I have two full books of GWOT poetry I'm waiting for the right time to publish and I'm currently filling a third."
Excellent! A lady I pick up for our Thursday Quilters night lives with her daughter and devoted son-in-law, who is a veteran of this century's wars, both Afghanistan and Iraq, and is on his third book of published poetry.
May All our American Warriors write the rhythms of their minds and hearts.
Huzzah.
The Commandant of the Marine Corps published a list of recommended professional reading some years ago. I think we discussed it here at the time. It has 100 or so books ranging from military novels to heavy duty strategy. Not, sadly, Griffins' "The Corps" series.
It has books for everyone from new recruit to career senior officers.
It gets updated and revised every year. Here is the current list:
https://www.mca-marines.org/resource/commandants-professional-reading-list/
Lots of interesting recommendations.
I think this may have been the list we discussed years ago
https://www.usmcofficer.com/commandants-reading-list
even more interesting choices.
John Henry
Ice Nine wrote:
I haven't read the book either but I'm going to guess that it is as hollow as that dreadful poem that "Doctor" Maya Angelou - the Rigoberta Menchú of American arts and letters - recited at the '93 Inauguration.
The last time I voted for a Democratic president was Clinton's first run, and his was the only inauguration I attended (not VIP, down on the Mall with the masses). I was favorably disposed to see what Angelou was going to do, Lord what a letdown. I checked it just now, it hasn't improved with age.
It's mommy issues IMO. Bill's mother Gertrude Himmelfarb was a truly great writer and came to conservatism after being raised a liberal. He's still "rebelling" at the ripe old age of 70ish. Time to make peace Bill.
Filed under: "Censorship we like" and "Free speech has limitations"
I believe that the article alluded to above claims that 1 in 4 are willing to disobey illegal orders. If true, then I wonder about the 3 in 4.
Lady Chatterly's Lover. Of course I've never read it, but I believe it has something to do with women being encouraged to seek their own sexual satisfaction, and their partners being encouraged to make an effort. Something a Boy Scout might get a badge for, kind of thing. Let's face it, people in uniform will fraternize--men with women, men with men, women with women. Why not help everyone achieve their maximum sexual satisfaction in a consensual setting?
BDSM? A different book.
Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn. Almost implies (from what I've heard) that a woman exists to serve the pleasure of one or more men, which seems kind of retrograde (see above). But: military personnel ought to be open to the idea that more sex is always better.
Herland: here I have to admit I'm guessing. No biological males at all, no sexual intercourse between any two human beings. Women whose offspring are expected to be prime kind of will themselves pregnant; sketchier women, striving to be Girl Scouts, will themselves to stay unpregnant. Apparently no female orgasms, even from masturbation. After all, social justice is what counts. Now maybe that is a message for military personnel of all ranks. Mind you, there are some contradictions with the other entries. How about an endless book club? Alternating with DEI struggle sessions?
The book was pulled from the library because it shows pictures of pee-pees and wee-wees in it. Maybe that’s how you get your kicks, Bill Kristol? You and you good time buddies. Well, I got a flash for you, Joy Boy! Party time is over.
Whereas diversity is of individuals, minority of one, Diversity is color judgment, class bigotry. DEI is institutional, systemic Diversity is antithetical to individual dignity and conscience. #HateLovesAbortion
This gives you some idea of what Hegseth faces: https://instapundit.com/713206/
There are A LOT of the Obama/Biden-era senior officers in our military that constitute a grave threat to our war-fighting ability, many of them in our military academies, but many also in the operational commands.
I pray most are removed in time for us to make final preparations to respond to Chinese/Russian/Iranian aggression around the world.
DEI is a bloc act, a caged convention, but the audience does not sing, they bray with prideful intention.
Hey, thailor Bill! When does the next cruise ship out?
One of the greatest difficulties about writing poetry from the uniformed side of society is, generally speaking, the lows outnumber the highs. It's very difficult not to focus on the negative, and people generally dislike reading something that makes them feel like shit. It takes additional creativity to weave an emotional tapestry for the reader that makes them feel what you felt, but in a humorous or clever way that doesn't bath them in a bottomless bowl of seriousness, cliches, loss, angst, or pure unfiltered rage.
I joke with other veterans all the time that Writing Space Mountain changed my life, and if you know someone that's struggling encourage them to write about it. The world needs more perspective, not less.
jim: "I believe that the article alluded to above claims that 1 in 4 are willing to disobey illegal orders. If true, then I wonder about the 3 in 4."
Most of the "3 in 4" worked in the DOJ/FBI/NSA/CIA/FISA courts etc as obama and then biden's autopen fully weaponized the entire federal government against domestic political opponents.
I concur with the above commenters suggesting malicious compliance, and would add that along with that we should consider the phrase, "Don't ascribe to malice that which can be explained by stupidity."
The military is the military.
The woke and DEI stuff do not belong in the US Military.
If a book pushes racial hatred - it does not belong.
A fighting force should not be hung-up on leftist grievances.
Bill Kristol pretended be a conservative for decades and now he pretends to give a rip about Maya Angelou books. What a phony and a loser. No one of significance listens to him anymore.
Zero fucks given about Bill Kristol.
No issue, no challenge is as important today, facing us all, than the inability to checkout Angelou books from the military academy library. Thank you Mr Bill, we needed this wakeup.
Oh noessss!!! Let''s see what other titles were removed and the purchase history by the librarians.
That photo Kristol uses of himself all the time (pointing his finger at his cranium) is the perfection of supercilious condescension. He would think a "world of Pete Hegseths" would be beneath him. He can have Maya Angelou. I am glad to live in this world where one Pete Hegseth is where he is, and one Bill Kristol now is where he is. https://www.google.com/save/list/PXC2The1LEz_jwX7k5l7qdpyH-2cTw?hl=en
A fair number of people here have actually read the book. It's got a good title, and I'm sure it's a worthy book. Still, it looks like the kind of book that is more often assigned than voluntarily read--at least among naval cadets and other seafaring peoples.......There are a lot of worthy books that I'm going to get around to reading. I'd really like to read all the novels of Dickens and Tolstoy before I die, but it's not going to happen.
I don't know if it relates, but Get Smart had a double episode on The Tequila Mockingbird.
This whole episode is strange; the removal of the book and the implication that it’s unavailable because it’s not in the physical library. There was no good reason to remove it and for those who are now interested in reading it, it’s easily available in the online digital libraries.
They didn't remmove the Maya Angelou novel.
They removed this collection of essays about the book.
Here is the full list.
Crap. See below for the full list.
https://media.defense.gov/2025/Apr/04/2003683009/-1/-1/0/250404-LIST%20OF%20REMOVED%20BOOKS%20FROM%20NIMITZ%20LIBRARY.PDF
Bob Boyd said...
Bill Kristol is like a barrel at a Swedish eco-retreat.
**********
heh
Soldier-poets go right back to Archilocus (7th C BC).
It's on page 18.
"I pray most are removed in time for us to make final preparations to respond to Chinese/Russian/Iranian aggression around the world."
Fortunately, before the Chinese, the Russians, and the Iranians can attack us, here in our spacious country between two vast oceans, they will have to fight their way through all the non-aggressive military bases we have ringed their countries with. That should take a while.
Unless, that is, they attack us with the Intercontinental Ballistic Missles we invented to safeguard our national security.
Kristol’s turn in Teh Barrel…
"I don't know if it relates, but Get Smart had a double episode on The Tequila Mockingbird."
That pun went over my head when I saw this as kid. Is this one where smart is a Bogart like character?
Tuskegee airmen, with all due respect can we stop blowing up this minor accomplishment in WW II by a few black airmen? I'm sure there were many more black pilots in Korea and Vietnam who did things just as - if not more - significant. Why don't we hear about them? Where's their movie? Where are their books?
The US Army Air Force lost 52,000 men in combat in WW II. I doubt more than 100 were black. The percentage was probably much higher in Korea/Vietnam/Gulf war etc.
@RCOCEAN II:
During World War II, approximately 145,000 African Americans served in the U.S. Army Air Forces (AAF), which was the predecessor to the modern U.S. Air Force. This number includes both enlisted personnel and officers. Notably, the AAF was one of the branches where African Americans made significant strides, despite initial resistance to their inclusion in aviation roles. (Grok)
I know why the uncaged neo-con emotes.
@RCOCEAN II: Sorry, you were specifically talking about deaths.
According to Grok:
“Without precise, race-specific casualty records for the AAF, the exact number remains uncertain, but based on the data, a figure in the hundreds—likely 500 to 1,000—reflects a reasonable inference for African American deaths in the Army Air Forces during World War II.”
Ok. Nice to know there were 145,000 ground crew personnel in WW II that were African American.
The service academies award legitimate baccalaureate degrees and there's no reason--inherently--why courses in American literature, for example, shouldn't include works like Caged Bird.
OTOH, a lot of the students probably encountered it in HS or their independent readings already.
Kids do read books, don't they?
It’s amazing to me that there not only were so many African Americans, but that American men in general went to fight. Really extraordinary.
Approx 12% of the white population of the US served in the military and 9% of the African Americans served in the military during WW2. (Grok) Very similar percentages. Amazing.
TBH is a troll who’s roots go back to althouse and goldstein year ago. also he is a piece of sh!t
Tuskegee airmen, with all due respect can we stop blowing up this minor accomplishment in WW II by a few black airmen?
The story of the Airmen is pretty cool and it is the kind of diversity we could use more of. Not wallowing in victimhood and demanding handouts and special privileges, but working hard for a common goal and the good of the entire society and proving oneself and one's people capable and patriotic and worthy of full inclusion in American life. Likewise the story of Booker T. Washington too.
Black culture has fallen a long, long way since those days and it would be salutary if they rediscovered it, instead of calling them Uncle Toms and coons.
Eva Marie: “ It’s amazing to me that there not only were so many African Americans, but that American men in general went to fight. Really extraordinary.”
Blacks wanted to serve to show they were full citizens, capable of the burdens as well as the benefits of citizenship. Twenty years later, Ali really upset the old-line black leadership with his draft refusal. The black leaders probably hated him more than the KKK did at that point.
Of course, nowadays the concept of responsibilities of citizenship is for suckas and people tryna act white….
JSM
Hag - I think The Handmaid's Tale is on. +MSNBC psychotic lie-filled chaser for dessert. mmmmmm
Why do we have to keep pretending about African Americans in WW 2. Look, it was a segregated society. Almost all the fighting and dying was done by white men. Blacks did their part, but they weren't allowed, even assuming they wanted, in most combat units. Probably 99 percent of the men killed in WW II were white.
They served honorably in the units they were assigned to. It reminds me of idiot Spike Lee complaining about the lack of Black Marines in Eastwood's iwo jima film. Facts are facts, and reality is reality. Focus on the stuff since 1945, where African Americans were given a true chance to be in combat.
RCOCEAN II said...
"Tuskegee airmen, with all due respect can we stop blowing up this minor accomplishment in WW II by a few black airmen? I'm sure there were many more black pilots in Korea and Vietnam who did things just as - if not more - significant. Why don't we hear about them? Where's their movie? Where are their books?"
***************
You miss the point entirely. Roughly 1,000 African Americans served as pilots in the FIRST African-American military aviators in the U.S. Armed Forces, serving at a time when the military was still segregated. They were supported by about 14,000 ground personnel .
Thing is, many Americans back then thought blacks were incapable of flying airplanes, let alone being effective in air combat in the then-advanced P-51s, which---because of their vastly superior range---could protect bombers all the way to their targets.
You can bet your ass the crews on those bombers were grateful for the protection they got against German fighters, and the fact that their protectors were black changed a lot of racist attitudes.
Their heriosm, plus that of tens of thousands of blacks serving in WWII, led Truman to desegregate the armed forces in 1948.
So we might consider the Tuskeegee airmen as pioneers and catalysts for getting blacks their civil rights. Hardly a "minor accomplishment".
In fact THAT's why they are still remembered and celebrated today.
And btw: Benjamin O. Davis Jr. was a Tuskegee Airman who continued serving after WWII and became the first Black general in the U.S. Air Force.
Daniel "Chappie" James Jr. was a Tuskeegee instructor who flew 78 combat missions over Korea, and rose to become the first 4-star in the US Air Force.
Source: AI Claude
p.s. the fact that you are annoyed by the attention the Tuskeegee airmen get reflects a lingering racial bias.
Not a good look.
The book is NOT Maya Angelou's book. It's actually a collection of "critical essays" on Maya Angelou's book, edited by Mildred Mickle. Look at the list, then look up Mildred Mickle. I suspect a little "malicious compliance" by whomever typed the list. They make it SEEM like it's Maya Angelou's book.
In this day and age of EASY access to information, it never ceases to amaze me how little people actually bother to LOOK THINGS UP.
TBH is a known troll. banished by the good professor under previous names. when confronted lashes out. he is a known anti semite, and in addition he is a piece of sh!t.
99.9% of Bill's "audience" at the Bulwark probably blamed him for the Iraq War and protested Bush.
TB Haggis… the stench is making me clench.
when confronted with his ass holiness, TBH reverts to invective and anti semitism. he is a worthless piece of sh!t.
A bit off topic but the death rate for US military in WW2 and Vietnam war was about the same - in the 2.5% range (Grok)
"Please discuss how Elon was just giving his heart to the audience....."
There's nothing to discuss, one just has to watch enough of the video to comprehend the context of the moment and see the *actual* gesture, rather than just watch the 2 seconds of video designed to condition imbeciles to see a 'Nazi Salute' and start on their hating.
It's the same thing as that famous 'Charlottesville Fine People' smear, or the COVID-19 'Bleach' stupidness. All one has to do is spend 5 minutes looking into the matter with an intent to get to the bottom of it and actually understand and the willingness to deploy intellectual capacity, rather than the lazy, passive act of absorbing the programming. But: Stupid people are prone to believe stupid things. Thanks for the reminder.
Hag - No one cares about bratty leftist nonsense.
TBH: "Stupid people believing stupid things."
Followed immediately by:
TBH: "Thats EXACTLY how rational humans explain the people that poo pooed the sieg heil gesture that Elon employed….twice."
LOL....perfect.
Only paid Dem operatives push that.
DEI (i.e. institutional, systemic Diversity), including racism, sexism, etc is real. This story is a handmade tale brayed by Diversitists manufacturing leverage. DEI is a liberal artifact from a progressive era that is no longer viable. Abort, sequester, cancel. #HateLovesAbortion
TBH, you do realize those are the same?
"Roughly 1,000 African Americans served as pilots in the FIRST African-American military aviators in the U.S. Armed Forces, serving at a time when the military was still segregated. They were supported by about 14,000 ground personnel ."
No, there weren't 1000 pilots who saw combat. There may have been 1000 pilots of all kinds. The only black pilots who saw combat were in the handful of black fighter squadrons in the Med. 335 of them went overseas. How many were KIA, or missing in action? 80? You had 52,000 KIA/Missing in action in the Army Air Force in WW II.
How many black pilots and crewman were killed or Missing in Korea or Vietnam? I'm sure it was more than 100.
While they're at it, they should abort, sequester, cancel the use of albinophobic symbols and rhetoric, an ancient parade of hate and fear imported? From Africa, a cultural appropriation in pride parades. Also, the off-color Rainbow. Homosexuals are an impure form of bisexuals are in the transgender spectrum. Why the Diversity, equivocation and indoctrination (DEI)?
<a href="https://x.com/FourGMedia/status/1907488608782541146</a> found the hag.</a>
shouldn't you be building your democratic party inspired domestic terrorist Molotov cocktails?
Hag found here
Bill Kristol is a caged bird, singing whatever tune his keepers reward him for. Reading the book would be pointless.
What has Kristol ever done other than diminish the family name? Nothing positive that I can see in his wikipedia page, the first sentence of which is "Not to be confused with Billy Crystal"
Since DOGE cut the funding to USAID, DEMS can’t afford anyone better that TBH. They need to up their game.
No, there weren't 1000 pilots who saw combat.
************
Where did I say they did? So why the gratuitous "NO"?
How many of them who died in combat would it take before you showed the group some respect.
And, as usual, I note for the record that you utterly IGNORE the role those airman played in ending segregating in the US, which is WHY they are venerated?
For those of us who visit here, we can now add to your hatred of Israel and the Jews your racial animus toward African-Americans.
p.s. How many combat missions have YOU ever flown to dismiss those who did?
The military - and the John Birch Society -- led the country in desegregation. I would have to know a lot more about the fiction and non-military biography sections of such a specialized military academy, and also whether a leftover DEI librarian staged this, and also whether the book was just catagorized in some special DEI collection and not targeted directly, to draw any conclusion about this.
There are much better books and essays written by black authors for military readers to contemplate slavery and segregation, from Frederick Douglass, to Zora Neal Hurston's output, and especially black JBS writer George Schuyler, who was a veteran, the best-known columnist in black newspapers in their heyday, an observer of communist infiltration in black movements, and then lost his only child, a daughter, in the Vietnam war, where she was shot down while working as a journalist. His journey from segregation to socialism to disillusion to anti-communism is of real value.
That is some suppressed history from which military students could learn. Maya Angelou was a D-rated writer whose inauguration poem included lines linking America to Dinosaur feces. Her autobiography is better, but it's high-school fare. Removing books from libraries, or simply not purchasing them, is very common and usually driven by leftist bia.
I Haven't read it either
But then, I don't have a strong opinion about whether or not it should be in the Naval Academy Library.
William Kristol, on the other hand, can’t be bothered to read it, but is certain that it’s gold and not just gold—It’s the kind of gold that’s essential for, checking notes: Future Navy officers to have. Pundits; people who get paid for sharing their opinions don’t need to read it, they can muster opinions about things based on sticking their pinkie into the tepid waters of public opinion.
Maybe nobody’s read it. Everybody thinks it’s great because everyone says it’s great.
I looked at the list. Nearly all of it is the sort of lazy race/gender academic deconstruction that projects feminism or gayness back in time onto canonical fiction and poetry, or books by radicals including murderers Angela Davis and Mumia Abu Jamal, or modern transgender and DEI "self-hate" manuals for whites. I can see the value in critically acquainting students with radical movements in the U.S., but do they need to explore discredited lit crit fads about gayness in the Brontes or feminism in John Dunne? There are several books by DNC operatives like Stacey Abrams about regaining political dominance: do they have similar titles from the Right? I've unfortunately read several of these books, and they're almost all poor scholarship, agitprop, or outright racist towards whites, police, and America. Lenny Ziskind? Please. There are credible American histories and analysis of international cultures that surely deserve the shelf-space being wasted here.
In the mid 1970s my Charlotte, North Carolina high school principal, was a tall, thin, elderly black man known as "Pop" among students and called "Mr. Miller" in person. He was in the WWII segregated Army. I learned quite accidentally that he cleared the Normandy beaches of bodies and body parts starting 3 days after the invasion. He was called "Pop" for two reasons, first his avuncular nature to us kids, and second for the sound his open hand made when it hit the face of a misbehaving or disrespectful student. For educational purposes only, of course. WWII vets didn't mess around, even 30+ years later.
Post a Comment
Please use the comments forum to respond to the post. Don't fight with each other. Be substantive... or interesting... or funny. Comments should go up immediately... unless you're commenting on a post older than 2 days. Then you have to wait for us to moderate you through. It's also possible to get shunted into spam by the machine. We try to keep an eye on that and release the miscaught good stuff. We do delete some comments, but not for viewpoint... for bad faith.