{"id":55209,"date":"2024-09-22T05:54:09","date_gmt":"2024-09-22T12:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=55209"},"modified":"2024-09-21T11:04:20","modified_gmt":"2024-09-21T18:04:20","slug":"open-thread-september-22-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2024\/09\/22\/open-thread-september-22-2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread September 22 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, the radio opera was Puccini’s “Turandot.” It’s one of the most performed operas in the repertory, so I’ve almost certainly described it before. People who don’t care for opera often cite their feeling that it presents stories so improbable that it makes no sense. On this one they have a point, except that it’s supposed to be a fairy tale, so it’s not supposed to make much sense, if any. It does sweep the listeners and viewers along emotionally with great success, and maybe it’s better to just accept that and not try to make sense of it. Anyay, also yesterday, Steve Schmidt<\/a> wrote a powerful piece about Ohio. I’ll just link to it, and you can see it for yourselves. Well, off to see Virgil now, and will report my safe return when I’m back, as always.<\/p>\n

Heather Cox Richardson<\/a> starts with (the disgusting) Mark Robinson, but soon swings in to the history of the two-party system, why the founders hated it, why they ended up with it anyway. Reminds me of the quote “Democracy is the worst possible system of government – except for all the other systems.”<\/p>\n

This is certainly not news<\/a>, although the way the word “Patriotism” was defined in 1774 and thereabouts would certainly be news to a lot of Americans today who think they are patriots. I hope on a Sunday you’ll have more leisure to digest it.<\/p>\n