The Captive Mind
IX: The lesson of the Baltics
When someone is honestly 55% right, that's very good and there's no wrangling. And if someone is 60% right it's wonderful, it's great luck, and let him thank God. But what's to be said about 75% right? Wise people say this is suspicious. Well, and what about 100% right? Whoever says he's 100% right is a fanatic, a thug, and the worst kind of rascal. - an old Jew of Galacia
The parable to the preface of The Captive Mind by Czesław Miłosz.
It reminds me of Z, who told us last week that he had no doubt that an explosion that killed two people in Poland was not caused by a Ukrainian missile and said Ukraine is corruption free.
The last chapter, IX, is about my room mate from Riga in Moscow, Edik, who enjoyed fighting with his elbows, energized by The Origins of Totalitarianism.
Which brings me to this paragraph of an op-ed by David in The Washington Post, titled “The U.S. seeks to support Ukraine, but contain the war.”
Brave, charismatic? Maybe desperate? What does “direct conflict” mean? And no, sorry, William is not fluent in Russian. He knows the alphabet and dozens of words. His pronunciation is lousy.
Looking on the positive side, Lloyd in Hallifax says Team USA is meeting the urgent, historic security challenge Russia’s tyranny poses to the rules-based international order.
Wonderful. Let’s just hope we aren’t irradiated and freeze to death during the process.