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That is why you have to play the game until you get tenure. There are plenty of flakes in academia that everybody thought was normal until they got tenure, why shouldnt it work the other way around?
I would vilify both, while individually they did not perpetrate the outrages of Marxism, the death and misery of the Communist regimes of the twentieth century is a result of the intellectual heritage they bequeathed the western world. Without them, Lenin, Stalin, Mao and innumerable others would not have had the intellectual capacity to commit such monstrous acts in the name of the PEOPLE. So yes, Hegel and Marx are indirectly responsible for the legacy of their intellectual endeavours.
It looks like it could have served as a millstone in a primitive grain mill. I saw a mill once where the stone was dragged in a circle and not rolled because the mill was animal driven, much like the machine that Conan has to push when he is growing up in the first movie. A pestle seems plausible to me as well, though it would have been huge and unwieldy to handle.
Henry VIII jumps immediately to mind although Henry II did quite a bit to lose the English possessions in France, so did the Lionheart through his neglect of his royal duties while on Crusade and on his way back.
I seem to remember reading about this same kind of phenomenon in the 19th Century. It was fashionable in late 19th century New York for opposition candidates to paint themselves as untouched by Tammany Hall and therefor in tune with the people.
I would have to say History Professor in a tenured chair. Not only do you teach, you can also pursue your research interests and widen the field of historical knowledge.
If I remember correctly Islam was spread by the sword and through political coercion. Other religions were allowed in Islamic lands but their practitioners were considered second class citizens and had to pay taxes that Muslims did not have to pay. When I was in the Balkans in the mid 90's the major argument the Serbs had with the Bosniaks is that their ancestors had converted to obtain preferential treatment at the hands of the Turks through their conversion. This was the main reason the Serbs and Croats hated the Bosnian Muslims, they considered them traitors to their race and religion.
I have to agree with you that the Red Army that defeated the Germans had its roots as far back as Khalkin Ghol and Finland. I disagree to the extent that the Russian recovery began then, I think it began after the summer disasters of 1941. My big point is that the Russians did not fully grasp the lessons needed to effectively wage modern Warfare until they received a very graphic lesson at the hands of the Wehrmacht in 1941. It is also well to remember that the Red Army was almost completely destroyed in the summer of '41 to include much of the leadership. It was not strategic direction that hurt the Russians so much as tactical incompetence. The almost completely new army that emerged after 1941 was a blank slate, if you will, and therefore ready to absorb the lessons the Red Army had learned at such cost in Finland as well as the opening months of the war against Germany.
Didn't he eventually get the military budget he asked for though?
Yes but only by cowing the Parliament rather than listening to them. The Reichstag approved his budget in order to stay relevant because he had sidelined them and in many ways turned it into nothing more than a debating society. The Reichstag was neither liked nor wanted by the King, it was an outgrowth of the 1848 revolutions.
It is my opinion that Islam was infused with the same dynamism as all young ideologies and this is what led to its rapid growth. This is the same dynamism that fed the Bolsheviks in the early 20th century. What is even more amazing is the way in which the Christian nations of Europe were able to revitalize themselves and combat the threat that this new creed represented.This is not a slam on Islam, but rather, it is my take on why they spread so far, so fast, but did not go farther. If you think about it, by the 9th or 10th century, Christianity was in some ways on the wane as a faith. The appearance of Islam did much to revitalize the Christian world and faith by providing an enemy to point at. This is something that still happens today. The dogma of Christianity and Islam are in many ways diametrically opposed to each other although I would not hazard to guess as to whether this is by design or purely accidental.
You are talking about the guy who ran the government extralegally for 5 years because the Reichstag wouldn't give the king the budget he asked for right? One of the biggest things Bismarck did was ignore parliament and do everything in the name of the King and later Emperor. Bismarck lost the presidency because he was not sufficiently willing to be as risky in diplomacy as Wilhelm II was. Do not forget that one of the treaty's that was key in igniting WWI was the Franco-Russian Entente, which, if Germany had renewed the re-insurance treaty with Russia would never have been signed. Bismarck kept Germany out of war and actively worked to ensure that potential threats were neutralized diplomatically while still allowing Germany to grow her economy. It was the dismantling of Bismarcks diplomacy that that led to the tangled web of alliances which, in concert with the recklessness of Wilhelm II, led to WWI
They were completely effective. Bismarck got what he wanted nearly ALL the time. There's a fine line between politeness and firmness. He could have still stood his ground and not used personal insults to achieve what he wanted. He lost a lot of popularity when he started doing that.
Popularity with whom? He was catering to the king not the public. That is one of the biggest differences between democracies and other forms of government, public servants in Monarchies or other autocratic governments are only beholden to the executive and not the man on the street. I have my doubts about the man on the street's ability to make realistic judgments on what's best for a country anyway.
Soviet recovery from their demonstrated incompetence began in January 1940, was demonstrated in February in Finland, and was formalized in April 1940. If it hadn't begun until after Barbarossa had begun, I believe that the counter-offensive outside Moscow would have been unlikely.
Vulture,I disagree that the Soviet recovery began in 1940. Their performance against Finland was pitiful, as was their performance in the summer of 41. The success of the winter counter-offensive outside Moscow can be entirely attributed to the Soviets throwing their last fully trained reserves at a German army that had been attrited by almost six-months of combat and was also ill-equipped for dealing with the Russian winter. The amazing thing is not that the Soviets managed to stop them outside Moscow, they bled rivers of blood to accomplish this, the amazing thing is that the Germans only gave up 50 miles given the state of their equipment and combat formations at the time the Soviet counter-offensive began.Soviet military incompetence was also demonstrated in their 1939 occupation of Poland. The saving grace for them their was the fact that the German Army had taken care of the majority of the Polish army by the time the Russians crossed the border. Even so, the Soviets still had severe logistical problems in supplying their troops in Poland when they did eventually cross the border and move to the new border they had agreed with Hitler when they signed the secret protocol to the non-agression pact.
Isn't the effectiveness of his policies telling though? I have never thought that being polite was a necessity in diplomacy. Politeness is a tactic just like everything else, the job of the statesman or diplomat is to look out for the interests of his own nation and if that means some nations get insulted that is just the nature of the beast. The game must be played whether we like it or not and diplomacy is the world's best game after war.
After further reflection, I have to agree with Don on this one. Just ban him and get it over with. He is impossible to reason with, you can all see that I have at least tried, and his rambling detracts from the topics under discussion. It seems that any topic he posts to dies because nobody wants to put up with his mindless drivel if they post after him. He reminds me of my ex-wife, he always has to have the last word.I have to wonder which drugs he is on, whatever they are they must be really blowing his mind, he sounds almost like Timothy Leary when he gets on a role.If I have a vote, and I am not sure if I do, I would have to say ban him.
