Join The Froude Society

Mencius over at Unqualified Reservations has made a call for people to join the Froude Society.

I've taken the liberty of setting up a public google books bookshelf with all the required reading here. So far I have made it through the first chapter of The English In The West Indies. Here Froude is using broad strokes to lay out the political reality of the area. The English interest in the area was forged by all manner of men seeking their fortune. Those who succeeded were praised as acting in the government's interest ex post facto. "It was not the Crown, it was not the Government, which fought that battle: it was the people of England, who fought it with their own hands and their own resources." What an alien idea.

The greatness of its individuals made the empire great. The early conquests over and the wars settled, the Victorians now had an administrative challenge the scope of which the world had never known. Here Froude opens with his punctuated observations that belie the naive' interpretation of Colonialism simply as a means of exploiting resources and enslaving natives. It is this "broad distinction between colonies and conquered countries" which is problematic for the West Indies. In some senses they are both. For Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Cape Colony there was to be self-rule. For the conquered: "The crown, therefore, as in India, rules directly by the police and the army."

This long quote below seems to set the tone for what will follow:
"Again, there are colonies like the West Indies, either occupied originally by ourselves, as Barbadoes, or taken by force from France or Spain, where the mass of the population were slaves who have been since made free, but where the extent to which the coloured people can be admitted to share in the administration is still an unsettled question. To throw countries so variously circumstanced under an identical system would be a wild experiment. Whether we ought to try such an experiment at all, or even wish to try it and prepare the way for it, depends perhaps on whether we have determined that under all circumstances the retention of them under our own flag is indispensable to our safety."

To be sure there is a ways to go here. Critiques of Froude have a long and glorious history themselves. Froude has basically used chapter one as a preface to his travelogue and without many conclusions I will refrain from more commentary. The framing of his questions here having been Froude fodder enough for one post.

I did notice that the inscription in Google books has a Goethe epigramme. So lets end with that...

Fuersten praegen so oft auf Raum versilberetes Kupfer
Ihr bedeutendes Bild: lange betriegt sich das Volk,
Schwaermer praegen des Stempel des Geists auf
Lugen und Unsinn; Wem der Probierstein fehlt,
Halt sie fur redliches Gold.

[For so long princes stamped their images on poorly silver-plated copper that the people, deprived of any touchstone of truth, now take as pure gold the lies and drivel which the fanatic stamps as genuine.] Also note that "Schwaermer" was a derogatory term used against Anabaptists.

Cool animation repost

Repost of a cool animation from you tube -

Hey Wally check out these songs!!!

This is a pretty amazing cover. It is mostly the english version, but he does the third verse in German. Which is a little weird because the verse order in english version is a little different. But - still very good take on an old new wave hit...



And this should be our new national anthem for Obama:


Also some videos:




Enjoy!!