Awatmath.2010 net.space utcsrgv!utzoo!decvax!watmath!pcmcgeer Mon Mar 15 19:10:32 1982 Breaking Ranks For the more politically - minded of you all out there, I recommend Norman Podhoretz' new book, Breaking Ranks - A Political Memoir. Podhoretz is a man who, in the period 1955 - 1980 as editor of Commentary magazine went the full circle from Kennedy - style liberal to leftist radical ( he was one of the founders of the New Left ) back to what is now called the "neoconservative" position - that is, interventionist in foreign affairs, and a capitalist - cum - welfare - state policy at home (pretty much the Kennedy policy). The interesting thing about this book from the perspective of those of us who are interested in technology as a means to shape the future for the better is his view of the neo-Luddite movements of the 70s and 80s. Podhoretz claims that these movements (which are the principal anti-space movements) grew out of the Movement that he founded and later came "to hate and to fear". His essential claim is that Nader et al are afraid of technology, not because it will fail to bring new equity and wealth, but because it will succeed - and thus will perpetuate the hated "system" (a primarily capitalist economy in a liberal-democratic society with a comprehensive welfare state) that they view as the root of all evil. His further point is that the ecological movement is essentially another symptom of the self-loathing that he sees as the dominant cultural strain of the counter-culture movement of the 60s (he further claims that gay lib and "certain aspects of the women's movement" are other symptoms of this disease). I've gone on too long about this. Pick the book up. For once a non-sf writer has something interesting to say. Rick McGeer ----------------------------------------------------------------- gopher://quux.org/ conversion by John Goerzen of http://communication.ucsd.edu/A-News/ This Usenet Oldnews Archive article may be copied and distributed freely, provided: 1. There is no money collected for the text(s) of the articles. 2. The following notice remains appended to each copy: The Usenet Oldnews Archive: Compilation Copyright (C) 1981, 1996 Bruce Jones, Henry Spencer, David Wiseman.