In The New York Times this morning, news that William Kristol is among those planning for an “‘independent Republican’ ticket” if Donald Trump gets the Republican nomination. Such a ticket would, in Kristol’s words, “allow voters to correct the temporary mistake (if they make it) of nominating Trump.”
So the prospect of President Trump is too crazy for William Kristol — the same William Kristol largely responsible for Sarah Palin’s presence on the 2008 Republican ticket. William Kristol knows best! But Palin 2008 helped to make Trump 2016 possible: he’s another example of a colorfully packaged know-nothingism. The chickens have come home to roost, and now they’re running amok, all over William Kristol’s house. The carpets are ruined.
Is know-nothingism ever anything but amok?
[Merriam-Webster defines know-nothingism : often capitalized K&N : a mid-20th century political attitude characterized by anti-intellectualism, exaggerated patriotism, and fear of foreign subversive influences.” The original Know Nothings were a nineteenth-century phenomenon.]
Thursday, March 3, 2016
Kristol, Palin, Trump
Resignation and courage
Joseph Joubert:
Resignation is a hundred times easier than courage, for it has a motive outside of us and courage does not. If both diminish evils, let us use the one that diminishes it the most. (Outside us, that is to say beyond our will.)Also from Joseph Joubert: Thinking and writing.
The Notebooks of Joseph Joubert: A Selection , trans. Paul Auster (New York: New York Review Books, 2005).
[It helped to look up motive : “That within the individual, rather than without, which incites him to action; any idea, need, emotion, or organic state that prompts to an action.” But also: “That which moves; a mover; instigator.” And: “A cause.” Definitions from Webster’s Second .]
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
A as in Dante
Another visit to the chain bookstore, another visit leaving empty-handed. One sad touch that makes a visit to a Barnes and Noble a little sadder still: in the small poetry section, Dante appears under A , as in Alighieri .
Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled.
Bob Dylan’s spiral-bound notebooks
Spiral-bound notebooks full of lyrics are among the treasures in what The New York Times calls “Bob Dylan’s secret archive.” The Times calls the notebooks “tiny.” If they are 3" × 5", as I think they are (fifteen ruled lines per page), then Bob Dylan has been capable of tinier than tiny handwriting.
Related reading
All OCA notebook posts (Pinboard)
A Kerouac notebook page
[Orange Crate Art is a notebook-friendly zone.]
Robert Walser: the railway (2)
[Robert Walser, “Something About the Railway,” in Berlin Stories , trans. Susan Bernofsky (New York: New York Review Books, 2012).]
Related reading
All OCA Robert Walser posts (Pinboard)
Robert Walser: the railway (1)
[Robert Walser, “Something About the Railway,” in Berlin Stories , trans. Susan Bernofsky (New York: New York Review Books, 2012).]
Related reading
All OCA Robert Walser posts (Pinboard)
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
NPR guesstimates
NPR, within the last hour or so:
“Voting took place in around twelve states today . . .”Related reading
“. . . about twelve states . . .”
“. . . in thirteen states . . .”
All OCA NPR posts (Pinboard)
[I count twelve states.]
Another Henry gum machine
[Henry , March 1, 2016.]
This fellow (Henry’s father?) wondered how he’d look with a mustache. Henry used the man’s bowtie and a gum machine to answer the question.
Related reading
All OCA Henry posts (Pinboard)
And more gum machines
Henry : Henry : Henry : Perry Mason : Henry : Henry : Henry : Henry : Henry : Henry
[Now they’ll be off in search of a tie cleaner.]
Tie cleaning in New York
In New York: A Serendipiter’s Journey (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1961), Gay Talese describes New York as a city in which “a former adman, Stuart Bart, has made a fortune by cleaning only ties.”
Stuart Bart was the subject of “Expressing the Id,” a New Yorker “Talk of the Town” piece (April 10, 1954). In 1954, Bart was the vice-president of Stuart Bart Advertising (founded 1939) and the president of Tiecrafters, Inc. (founded 1952). In 1954, Tiecrafters, located on East 57th Street, was cleaning 7500 ties a month, at fifty cents a tie. A 1961 New York Times article reported that the company had five Manhattan locations. Today Tiecrafters is still in business on West 29th Street, cleaning ties and scarves and doing alterations. “Tie slimming” is a real thing, though it sounds like a premise for a Bob and Ray sketch.
The “Talk of the Town” item has some choice observations from Bart. For instance:
“A tie represents not only your personality but your mood. What I call the Visible V — the triangular area between coat lapels — offers a modern businessman his only means of expressing his id sartorially.”And:
“You should place your tie under your collar before getting into your shirt.”So I’ve been going about it all wrong. Not only do I wait to put tie under collar; I don’t even get into my shirts. I put them on.
Also from New York: A Serendipiter’s Journey
Chestnuts, pigeons, statues
“Fo-wer, fi-yiv, sev-ven, ni-yen”
Klenosky!
Leeches, catnip oil, strange potions
