Brad, here in Hungary we are dealing with exactly the same problem. Viktor Orbán, a friend of Donald Trump, still speaks about the “national side” even after an electoral defeat, and members of his party claim that “the nation cannot be in opposition.” This is an extremely exclusionary and bad-tasting statement, because every Hungarian belongs to the nation.
I think Hungary is actually one of the parts of the EU that more deeply understands what it can feel like to live under Trump, since we have experienced 16 years of this kind of politics ourselves.
This political side truly takes language away from people; it appropriates national symbols and culture. I am ashamed that Viktor Orbán has led my country, but I am proud of my Hungarian identity because I grew up on the music of Béla Bartók and the writings of Péter Esterházy, Péter Nádas, and László Krasznahorkai. To me, that is the nation.
Fundamentally, I believe everyone has the right to define what “nation” means to them. What is clearly wrong, however, is when someone like Orbán invokes patriotism while stealing billions from the state.
Finally: this is a great piece. It raises extremely important and thought-provoking questions that Europeans, Americans, and really people in general should reflect on. Thank you for writing it—it matters that artists of your stature speak up about these issues. It only deepens my respect.
Phew. My sentiments indeed. Jon Stewart said the Presidency should age the president, not the citizens. I’m wondering here what soundtrack could accompany this essay.
This was an interesting read and out some things in perspective for me, particularly the distinction between a nation and a country, which I wholly agree with.
We got Trump, the AfD, etc because people were tired of a disconnected neoliberal politicians diverting resources to everyone but the rank and file who help elect them. Of course now we have a different group of disconnected neoliberal politicians ignoring everyone but the ones who pay fealty to them. And I have to disagree RE the EU. It's an anti-democratic body of unelected bureaucrats who strip sovereignty from the citizens of the countries under them. It's always rich to hear some European prattling on about how we're not doing anything to save "democracy" here in the US while stumping for the EU.
Wow! Thank you Brad. That bit about the guy in the pink scarf reading Der Spiegel in the Lufthansa lounge and approaching you with utter solicitude about the most recent unfortunate news emerging from your native land. Only to be followed up - inevitably- with a patronising and supercilious rant topped off with a fiery “we Europeans” peroration which you capture perfectly. This is not a caricature! Sheesh, it has been my life experience in fifty-five years travelling and working in Europe. (No knock on Der Spiegel or Die Zeit, BTW, which I have been reading every one of those fifty-five years.)
Exactly!! Thanks Jack. That guy is a joke, but based on pure reality. And same with me - I’m reading Der Spiegel in the lounge with him. Really strong journalism and political analysis.
I’m very glad you wrote this, Brad. I’m immensely tired of the folks (mostly on the right) who keep telling artists, regardless of their discipline, to shut up about world events because they are “just” an actor/musician/whatever, as though you are obligated to turn off your personal opinions the moment you achieve any kind of success in the arts. It is the arts, in all its forms, and artists who have not only led people through turbulent times with their work, but also provided us with the respite, the succour, the comfort and inspiration that their work offers. That makes it possible for the warriors to keep on fighting, in their way. Having spent my life in the arts and culture sector, I know the importance of artists speaking out clearly and firmly. So, thanks again for your thoughtfulness.
Hi ! First off, your music means a lot to me and have also found a lot of inspiration in your writing - I am very grateful for that.
Not one for writing comments, but wanted to share my thoughts on one point: I feel that your characterization of the EU as hyper-neoliberal and somehow against the people is too simple. Two things that come to mind for me:
- pro democracy/freedom/rule of law protestors in EU countries and especially in countries that will still join it often wave and carry EU flags. At great personal risk sometimes (as in the Maidan protests in Kyiv in 2014). This is often in response to the vandalism of Europe’s own cynical autocrats that are on the rise, as you point out so rightly. As you said as well though, the flag represents the nation and its values. It tells me something positive about what the EU means to people (and not only to those of the scarf-wearing, Spiegel-reading kind) that they use it as a symbol in this context. It’s not only about money, it’s about values too.
- at a more practical/policy level: there is so much more the EU does than the free movement of capital (which is anyhow very limited compared to that of people and goods). More to the point, bundling some of their sovereignty has allowed EU countries to more effectively protect their citizens from the behavior of large cooperations. Regulations on social media platforms, AI, pesticides, product safety, chemicals and car emissions protect people in their daily lives. And this is not just some elitist interest, it affects the safety if what your children eat and play with, the air they breath and what they encounter online. Confirming their effectiveness, such rules regularly draw the ire of crypto oligarchs like Musk, whose open hostility to the EU is clearly not out of some democratic or social conviction. The EU also funds art, science and education, and is the biggest donor of development aid in the world. And much more besides…
I also recognize the EU is not perfect, and could do more towards social protection. But hyper-neoliberal doesn’t capture its complexity, and I think these points at least nuance that picture of it.
To be fair, I also have my own bias in all this, as I benefited a lot from the freedoms the EU offers. Still, wanted to share my perspective here.
Big thanks for all that you create!
As a coda, as you also referred to the democratic deficit: the EU is too often cast as this sort of free-floating evil entity that decides things without legitimacy (the ‘unelected bureaucrats’ trope), which is largely a hangover from decades of fact-free scaremongering in mainly British tabloids (controlled by another oligarch… - ‘aan de tegenliggers kan men de weg herkennen’ !). But all its policies are adopted and controlled by a directly elected parliament and a council of the governments of the constituent countries, themselves also elected. Lots can still be improved, ofc. The parliament election would get more attention if there would be a truly European demos, but Europeans don’t read the same newspaper or watch the same tv channels, making hard for people to feel part of a larger European public debate. And the council should be thoroughly reformed - right now it’s as though instead of the Senate, US state governments would meet in DC to vote on federal policies without any public debate. Stopping these kind of reforms in not ‘the EU’, but the nations benefiting from this lack of transparency.
Thanks for your input Casper! It’s good to be reminded of the good things the European Union has achieved, from the perspective of a European. U bent Nederlander neem Ik aan, van die uitdrukking in Nederlands!
Your assessment is just what I needed - a balanced response to my rather unbalanced post! I’ll read it again, I’m sure. Groeten en nogmaals dank
Met heel veel plezier 😊Ik ben inderdaad Nederlander, en ook Amerikaan. Dus je oproep voor Europeanen en Amerikanen om vrienden te blijven spreekt me persoonlijk erg aan. Ik denk dat die vriendschap zo’n rijke historie heeft dat hij veel onbegrip en kwade wil kan doorstaan, van welke kant het ook komt. Zelf denk ik altijd aan al die helden uit het Amerikaanse pantheon die in een thuis vonden in Europa (Ben Webster in Amsterdam, Bud Powell in Parijs, Dexter Gordon in Copenhagen), en vice versa (Thomas Mann, Hannah Arendt). We hebben elkaar gevormd, en dat is moeilijk te ontrafelen.
Really appreciate this interaction, thank you sir.
…geopolitics, a vomitous word really and distasteful as a subject, is cumbersome enough without adding considerations of other systemic expressions i.e. culture and the like, and their stratified impact, even epigenetically. It’s 2026. This falling into, more manipulated into, left-right, well, mostly fake stuff…is disheartening. Or would be. That crap has become much less prevalent in ’the kids’ who correctly identify it as, well, mostly crap. An up-down, if one must create a…hmmm. What word? Any that come to mind remain in two dimensions. So it can be left as… argumentative model. A phrase - is more present and utterly more determinant, even in defining nations, countries, syndicates, self(s). Though it's unlikely this will be read still I will barge in with too many words on another, this, self-affirming circle jerk - so critical of others many of who, well, are betters - regarding the world or nations - of at least some of the jerkers. Quite. Because my personal nation, in BM’s terms, in turn obliges me to.
Though that ‘nation’ definition is more akin to culture - back again to that stratified impact, even biologically, even topologically, on behavior and illusions of choice. And its expression through individuals as well. Nation, patria, (if you must, change to or substitute ‘matria’,): where you can walk to in a day. That place, including the people within, is a nation and has less to do, once delineated, with you than with itself. (Robbi Robertson is mentioned. I have only one great-great maternal Menominee grandma, not the same weighted claim as he could have had to… take back a nation.) Countries and their flags are nearly all more auxiliary constructs of finance than fundamental human expressions. I.E.The USA became ‘great’ because it stole resources rapidly, too rapid and new to be weighted by inefficient, archaic societal, hierarchies. And replaced the ‘terrorist’ injun’ tribes with cheap, appropriate imported labor. Human resource allocation. Now that it’s reached the end of expansion, that greatness and efficiency (social mobility), as in nearly all declining empires, is rapidly withering. Italy’s creation (and UK financing) had more to do with things like… fucking Naples (stealing the kingdom of the two sicilies wealth) than bettering the lot of people on the peninsula. At least the people born there from then on did receive citizenship to an Italy. Alas, a Palestinian born in the olive orchids of his great-great-great… is defined by other invading thieves to be - stateless. Citizen of nowhere-land. With Nno-where plans. But without the world at their command. Not everyone is born into a usual bureaucratic citizenship.
To the avoided point: the Trump administration didn’t start the ‘taking’ of the US, fascist or otherwise, nor do many of those terrible conspiracy theorist MAGA’s still support him. Actually, the contrast with those terrible presumptuously hypocrite liberals' blindness to the right-ist damage done, legislated, by the various Clintons-Obamas-Bidens is in effect notable by contrast. It’s always the smaller part: most simply step into their easy group story and follow along, writing in turn other plot twists to assuage evident conflicts and glaring contradictions. But that minority… can make, on occasion, a difference. At least that’s the hope.
The world now is at war, full on. The Iran deal thing, timing, alas became predictable once Syria was eviscerated (by us mostly though israel and others played their parts) and was after all even written up, the ‘plan’ - even the sequence is the same as formulated then, decades ago. Add to that the rather mind-melting amount of missing currency (estimated something like 40 trillion. Read: slush for paying off of course western politicians, relevant judicial systems and the like but very probably also the Venezuelans, Indonesians, Chinese military, Japanese political parties, Ukrainians, ecc. ) the unforeseen impacts of technological change on military influence (ie the debacle of our jet fighters vs chinese radar in the india-pakistan shubble-bubble last year and the like,) and other factors…well, the war was going to be turned up anyway. Now or never, boys. It’s not as much to do with our country than, again, banking and monetary system. That needs collateral. Which we don't have anymore. But Russia does, a lot. And Iran as well, less but it in turn is so marvelously located geographically. So many pigeons with but a single exploding stone. (which is pretty necessary, given the west’s scarcity of stones.) Though the flavor would have been different with a different administration, the sequence would have been awfully similar even if the candidate I voted for - though I’m one of those first few thousands in US history whose vote wasn’t counted thanks to the Democratic party - had by some Douglas Adams-like plot twist been elected (West-Abdullah). And ICE, well... that can be disbanded not so long from now if we choose it. The bankrupted small famers and such besieged by both parties alas will not return.
The EU… is not flawed. It simply isn’t. Never really was though I as many if not most others bought the propaganda, even made money betting that Italy would enter from the get-go when that seemed improbable. Today…even Yakufaris has changed his idea to realize that even Greece would have been and be better off without the EU. Not well-off, simply less poor - for the median Greek person. (Of which there would be more: child mortality took such a spike.) Muddling through instead of… the mess it and we are in. Without even debt consolidation, good grief… it, the EU, isn’t a place. The relatively less inefficient, for the vast majority of people, currency instability directly migrated to bond market instability - which in turn fossilizes national policy, in context. Now the EU even applies sanctions to individuals - without any legal process. In effect a sort of death sentence like the US did to Albanese. Switzerland isn’t part of the EU. Nor Norway. (Look at the comparative graphs including eu nations.)
I would have preferred referring to two uncles, one declared ‘left’ and another ‘right’, and the real difference between their behavior (the former a perfect ‘words on the left, wallet on the right’ , physician to some famous ‘left’ popstars, actors and politicians; the later - as soon as he could afford to buy a car, a fiat 500, he would drive most weekends up to the mountain village that housed and hid him during the war to offer free medical visits and treatment to the very non-famous people there.) What we define ourselves as, where we belong and how we impact and can make the immediate world, our patria, a little more beautiful. But… this is already far too long and May first is here tomorrow. People who actually build things, play things, create, work - the non asset-owners against whom policy decisions in the west are being made ever more and who others will try to get to go elsewhere to fight and die - will gather to let shared music bring them into something hopeful. So there are things to do….
what of the empire? the ones who controls it has the power (army/police) and has control of that power (obeyance). my dilemma is how to be in a nation (nations still governed and operating under the empire, or as an individual) and not be effected by the empire. at a personal level how to be an artist (i don't consider myself one- but addressed as one) and not be a part of the empire, especially in a revolution (going on today) that will give birth to a new empire.
I think we basically share our worldviews and politics. Speaking as a Dane I grew up with American heroes. I always loved the Indians when watching westerns, and the cartoon series Lieutenant Blueberry taught me about Apache history, which I was fascinated by. The TV series Roots taught me about black history, and it always felt to me that America was such a bigger, wilder, more fascinating world than Denmark (which it is). All my heroes became American, whether it was Roberto De Niro or Al Pacino, Bird, Miles Davis, Muhammed Ali - all of them had such incredible charisma, seemed like they could do anything with such posture, vigor and style. So I wanted to come live in the US. And I did and loved it…for a while. Until I started understanding the downside better. Similarly, I had some early and formative experiences in Israel. When I first went there when I was 19 I immediately felt this “can do” mentality there. At the time there I felt a cohesiveness and an energy & zest for life there that was very different from Denmark, which felt sleepy, boring and lacking in energy by comparison. Then again, after I got married, we started spending a lot of time in Hong Kong and generally traveling the world, and I started seeing myself neither as Danish or American but more as the (more snooty) “cosmopolitan”. I had spend enough time in enough places to understand that I could function in these quite different environments, and that I loved them for their differences, and in fact loved circulating among them because each offered me a different facet - including of myself - to lean into. All of which is a long way to say that I don’t really identify with nationalism as such. I lean into some very Danish values I know I carry, which is I believe giving people healthcare and access to a college degree without bankrupting them is the stuff that lifts all boats in society. I’m not even gonna debate that with a right wing American. I consider any other opinion of that…stupid. To me it’s just 101 for a nation which could afford it. But I also sort of hate the self congratulatory way that Scandinavia tries to act as if they are going to teach Israel and Palestinians to be “grown ups” and about “peace”. As if they had any clue about what it’s truly like to live in these societies. Which is partly the same thing you rebel against when a snooty European talks down to you as an American. I read a book called “Orbital” which looks at our world from the perspective of being stationed on the ISS (International Space Station). From there all human problems look so small and insignificant. Yet we know we can’t learn from history and are condemned to keep making the same primate mistakes that Chimpanzees make, basically. Which has brought me to Jane Goodall’s philosophy at the end. When a talk show host said to her “of course Chimpanzees are your favorite animals but…” she stopped him and said: “No, DOGS are my favorite animals. Chimpanzees…they are much too much like people”. So, as you said, find your tribe, they aren’t defined by national borders, languages or geography. Read books from places you don’t know about but which fascinate you…or scare you. Listen to music from those places. When we do this we always learn beauty and misery live in those places too. And that we are all the same.
Transparency is the way. Thank you for showing us what it looks like. This is refreshing, vindicating, encouraging. I've suffered for my efforts to reach my MAGA childhood household members. When I read pieces like yours I know I am not alone. 🕊️
There is much truth in this, especially your insistence that a nation is not merely a flag or a bureaucracy, but a living inheritance of language, art, memory, and moral aspiration. If the word *nation* is left entirely to the thugs, they will not merely misuse it; they will redefine it. Better to reclaim what is noble in it than surrender it whole cloth.
What especially heartened me is your refusal to let yourself off easy. You keep questioning, doubting, and testing your own conclusions. On a subject so inflamed by cant and tribal vanity, that kind of self-scrutiny feels not like weakness, but honor.
Brad, here in Hungary we are dealing with exactly the same problem. Viktor Orbán, a friend of Donald Trump, still speaks about the “national side” even after an electoral defeat, and members of his party claim that “the nation cannot be in opposition.” This is an extremely exclusionary and bad-tasting statement, because every Hungarian belongs to the nation.
I think Hungary is actually one of the parts of the EU that more deeply understands what it can feel like to live under Trump, since we have experienced 16 years of this kind of politics ourselves.
This political side truly takes language away from people; it appropriates national symbols and culture. I am ashamed that Viktor Orbán has led my country, but I am proud of my Hungarian identity because I grew up on the music of Béla Bartók and the writings of Péter Esterházy, Péter Nádas, and László Krasznahorkai. To me, that is the nation.
Fundamentally, I believe everyone has the right to define what “nation” means to them. What is clearly wrong, however, is when someone like Orbán invokes patriotism while stealing billions from the state.
Finally: this is a great piece. It raises extremely important and thought-provoking questions that Europeans, Americans, and really people in general should reflect on. Thank you for writing it—it matters that artists of your stature speak up about these issues. It only deepens my respect.
Thank you for reading Barnabás, and your comments! Are you optimistic with the new prime minister, Péter Magyar?
I’m really trying to be, I hope that they can turn things a bit better. We’ll see.
Phew. My sentiments indeed. Jon Stewart said the Presidency should age the president, not the citizens. I’m wondering here what soundtrack could accompany this essay.
This was an interesting read and out some things in perspective for me, particularly the distinction between a nation and a country, which I wholly agree with.
We got Trump, the AfD, etc because people were tired of a disconnected neoliberal politicians diverting resources to everyone but the rank and file who help elect them. Of course now we have a different group of disconnected neoliberal politicians ignoring everyone but the ones who pay fealty to them. And I have to disagree RE the EU. It's an anti-democratic body of unelected bureaucrats who strip sovereignty from the citizens of the countries under them. It's always rich to hear some European prattling on about how we're not doing anything to save "democracy" here in the US while stumping for the EU.
WORD AJDeiboldt. Thanks for sharp feedback
Thank YOU for a well nuanced take, those seem to be in short supply these days. Also thanks for subscribing to me, I really appreciate that!
Wow! Thank you Brad. That bit about the guy in the pink scarf reading Der Spiegel in the Lufthansa lounge and approaching you with utter solicitude about the most recent unfortunate news emerging from your native land. Only to be followed up - inevitably- with a patronising and supercilious rant topped off with a fiery “we Europeans” peroration which you capture perfectly. This is not a caricature! Sheesh, it has been my life experience in fifty-five years travelling and working in Europe. (No knock on Der Spiegel or Die Zeit, BTW, which I have been reading every one of those fifty-five years.)
Exactly!! Thanks Jack. That guy is a joke, but based on pure reality. And same with me - I’m reading Der Spiegel in the lounge with him. Really strong journalism and political analysis.
I’m very glad you wrote this, Brad. I’m immensely tired of the folks (mostly on the right) who keep telling artists, regardless of their discipline, to shut up about world events because they are “just” an actor/musician/whatever, as though you are obligated to turn off your personal opinions the moment you achieve any kind of success in the arts. It is the arts, in all its forms, and artists who have not only led people through turbulent times with their work, but also provided us with the respite, the succour, the comfort and inspiration that their work offers. That makes it possible for the warriors to keep on fighting, in their way. Having spent my life in the arts and culture sector, I know the importance of artists speaking out clearly and firmly. So, thanks again for your thoughtfulness.
By sheer coincidence, I am listening to Nearness with Joshua Redman and Brad Mehldau. Good times. 🎶
Hi ! First off, your music means a lot to me and have also found a lot of inspiration in your writing - I am very grateful for that.
Not one for writing comments, but wanted to share my thoughts on one point: I feel that your characterization of the EU as hyper-neoliberal and somehow against the people is too simple. Two things that come to mind for me:
- pro democracy/freedom/rule of law protestors in EU countries and especially in countries that will still join it often wave and carry EU flags. At great personal risk sometimes (as in the Maidan protests in Kyiv in 2014). This is often in response to the vandalism of Europe’s own cynical autocrats that are on the rise, as you point out so rightly. As you said as well though, the flag represents the nation and its values. It tells me something positive about what the EU means to people (and not only to those of the scarf-wearing, Spiegel-reading kind) that they use it as a symbol in this context. It’s not only about money, it’s about values too.
- at a more practical/policy level: there is so much more the EU does than the free movement of capital (which is anyhow very limited compared to that of people and goods). More to the point, bundling some of their sovereignty has allowed EU countries to more effectively protect their citizens from the behavior of large cooperations. Regulations on social media platforms, AI, pesticides, product safety, chemicals and car emissions protect people in their daily lives. And this is not just some elitist interest, it affects the safety if what your children eat and play with, the air they breath and what they encounter online. Confirming their effectiveness, such rules regularly draw the ire of crypto oligarchs like Musk, whose open hostility to the EU is clearly not out of some democratic or social conviction. The EU also funds art, science and education, and is the biggest donor of development aid in the world. And much more besides…
I also recognize the EU is not perfect, and could do more towards social protection. But hyper-neoliberal doesn’t capture its complexity, and I think these points at least nuance that picture of it.
To be fair, I also have my own bias in all this, as I benefited a lot from the freedoms the EU offers. Still, wanted to share my perspective here.
Big thanks for all that you create!
As a coda, as you also referred to the democratic deficit: the EU is too often cast as this sort of free-floating evil entity that decides things without legitimacy (the ‘unelected bureaucrats’ trope), which is largely a hangover from decades of fact-free scaremongering in mainly British tabloids (controlled by another oligarch… - ‘aan de tegenliggers kan men de weg herkennen’ !). But all its policies are adopted and controlled by a directly elected parliament and a council of the governments of the constituent countries, themselves also elected. Lots can still be improved, ofc. The parliament election would get more attention if there would be a truly European demos, but Europeans don’t read the same newspaper or watch the same tv channels, making hard for people to feel part of a larger European public debate. And the council should be thoroughly reformed - right now it’s as though instead of the Senate, US state governments would meet in DC to vote on federal policies without any public debate. Stopping these kind of reforms in not ‘the EU’, but the nations benefiting from this lack of transparency.
Thanks for your input Casper! It’s good to be reminded of the good things the European Union has achieved, from the perspective of a European. U bent Nederlander neem Ik aan, van die uitdrukking in Nederlands!
Your assessment is just what I needed - a balanced response to my rather unbalanced post! I’ll read it again, I’m sure. Groeten en nogmaals dank
Met heel veel plezier 😊Ik ben inderdaad Nederlander, en ook Amerikaan. Dus je oproep voor Europeanen en Amerikanen om vrienden te blijven spreekt me persoonlijk erg aan. Ik denk dat die vriendschap zo’n rijke historie heeft dat hij veel onbegrip en kwade wil kan doorstaan, van welke kant het ook komt. Zelf denk ik altijd aan al die helden uit het Amerikaanse pantheon die in een thuis vonden in Europa (Ben Webster in Amsterdam, Bud Powell in Parijs, Dexter Gordon in Copenhagen), en vice versa (Thomas Mann, Hannah Arendt). We hebben elkaar gevormd, en dat is moeilijk te ontrafelen.
Really appreciate this interaction, thank you sir.
Dank je wel Caspar. Helemaal met je eens!
…geopolitics, a vomitous word really and distasteful as a subject, is cumbersome enough without adding considerations of other systemic expressions i.e. culture and the like, and their stratified impact, even epigenetically. It’s 2026. This falling into, more manipulated into, left-right, well, mostly fake stuff…is disheartening. Or would be. That crap has become much less prevalent in ’the kids’ who correctly identify it as, well, mostly crap. An up-down, if one must create a…hmmm. What word? Any that come to mind remain in two dimensions. So it can be left as… argumentative model. A phrase - is more present and utterly more determinant, even in defining nations, countries, syndicates, self(s). Though it's unlikely this will be read still I will barge in with too many words on another, this, self-affirming circle jerk - so critical of others many of who, well, are betters - regarding the world or nations - of at least some of the jerkers. Quite. Because my personal nation, in BM’s terms, in turn obliges me to.
Though that ‘nation’ definition is more akin to culture - back again to that stratified impact, even biologically, even topologically, on behavior and illusions of choice. And its expression through individuals as well. Nation, patria, (if you must, change to or substitute ‘matria’,): where you can walk to in a day. That place, including the people within, is a nation and has less to do, once delineated, with you than with itself. (Robbi Robertson is mentioned. I have only one great-great maternal Menominee grandma, not the same weighted claim as he could have had to… take back a nation.) Countries and their flags are nearly all more auxiliary constructs of finance than fundamental human expressions. I.E.The USA became ‘great’ because it stole resources rapidly, too rapid and new to be weighted by inefficient, archaic societal, hierarchies. And replaced the ‘terrorist’ injun’ tribes with cheap, appropriate imported labor. Human resource allocation. Now that it’s reached the end of expansion, that greatness and efficiency (social mobility), as in nearly all declining empires, is rapidly withering. Italy’s creation (and UK financing) had more to do with things like… fucking Naples (stealing the kingdom of the two sicilies wealth) than bettering the lot of people on the peninsula. At least the people born there from then on did receive citizenship to an Italy. Alas, a Palestinian born in the olive orchids of his great-great-great… is defined by other invading thieves to be - stateless. Citizen of nowhere-land. With Nno-where plans. But without the world at their command. Not everyone is born into a usual bureaucratic citizenship.
To the avoided point: the Trump administration didn’t start the ‘taking’ of the US, fascist or otherwise, nor do many of those terrible conspiracy theorist MAGA’s still support him. Actually, the contrast with those terrible presumptuously hypocrite liberals' blindness to the right-ist damage done, legislated, by the various Clintons-Obamas-Bidens is in effect notable by contrast. It’s always the smaller part: most simply step into their easy group story and follow along, writing in turn other plot twists to assuage evident conflicts and glaring contradictions. But that minority… can make, on occasion, a difference. At least that’s the hope.
The world now is at war, full on. The Iran deal thing, timing, alas became predictable once Syria was eviscerated (by us mostly though israel and others played their parts) and was after all even written up, the ‘plan’ - even the sequence is the same as formulated then, decades ago. Add to that the rather mind-melting amount of missing currency (estimated something like 40 trillion. Read: slush for paying off of course western politicians, relevant judicial systems and the like but very probably also the Venezuelans, Indonesians, Chinese military, Japanese political parties, Ukrainians, ecc. ) the unforeseen impacts of technological change on military influence (ie the debacle of our jet fighters vs chinese radar in the india-pakistan shubble-bubble last year and the like,) and other factors…well, the war was going to be turned up anyway. Now or never, boys. It’s not as much to do with our country than, again, banking and monetary system. That needs collateral. Which we don't have anymore. But Russia does, a lot. And Iran as well, less but it in turn is so marvelously located geographically. So many pigeons with but a single exploding stone. (which is pretty necessary, given the west’s scarcity of stones.) Though the flavor would have been different with a different administration, the sequence would have been awfully similar even if the candidate I voted for - though I’m one of those first few thousands in US history whose vote wasn’t counted thanks to the Democratic party - had by some Douglas Adams-like plot twist been elected (West-Abdullah). And ICE, well... that can be disbanded not so long from now if we choose it. The bankrupted small famers and such besieged by both parties alas will not return.
The EU… is not flawed. It simply isn’t. Never really was though I as many if not most others bought the propaganda, even made money betting that Italy would enter from the get-go when that seemed improbable. Today…even Yakufaris has changed his idea to realize that even Greece would have been and be better off without the EU. Not well-off, simply less poor - for the median Greek person. (Of which there would be more: child mortality took such a spike.) Muddling through instead of… the mess it and we are in. Without even debt consolidation, good grief… it, the EU, isn’t a place. The relatively less inefficient, for the vast majority of people, currency instability directly migrated to bond market instability - which in turn fossilizes national policy, in context. Now the EU even applies sanctions to individuals - without any legal process. In effect a sort of death sentence like the US did to Albanese. Switzerland isn’t part of the EU. Nor Norway. (Look at the comparative graphs including eu nations.)
I would have preferred referring to two uncles, one declared ‘left’ and another ‘right’, and the real difference between their behavior (the former a perfect ‘words on the left, wallet on the right’ , physician to some famous ‘left’ popstars, actors and politicians; the later - as soon as he could afford to buy a car, a fiat 500, he would drive most weekends up to the mountain village that housed and hid him during the war to offer free medical visits and treatment to the very non-famous people there.) What we define ourselves as, where we belong and how we impact and can make the immediate world, our patria, a little more beautiful. But… this is already far too long and May first is here tomorrow. People who actually build things, play things, create, work - the non asset-owners against whom policy decisions in the west are being made ever more and who others will try to get to go elsewhere to fight and die - will gather to let shared music bring them into something hopeful. So there are things to do….
Excelent reflection on what is going on in/with Europe. Thank you!!!!
what of the empire? the ones who controls it has the power (army/police) and has control of that power (obeyance). my dilemma is how to be in a nation (nations still governed and operating under the empire, or as an individual) and not be effected by the empire. at a personal level how to be an artist (i don't consider myself one- but addressed as one) and not be a part of the empire, especially in a revolution (going on today) that will give birth to a new empire.
I think we basically share our worldviews and politics. Speaking as a Dane I grew up with American heroes. I always loved the Indians when watching westerns, and the cartoon series Lieutenant Blueberry taught me about Apache history, which I was fascinated by. The TV series Roots taught me about black history, and it always felt to me that America was such a bigger, wilder, more fascinating world than Denmark (which it is). All my heroes became American, whether it was Roberto De Niro or Al Pacino, Bird, Miles Davis, Muhammed Ali - all of them had such incredible charisma, seemed like they could do anything with such posture, vigor and style. So I wanted to come live in the US. And I did and loved it…for a while. Until I started understanding the downside better. Similarly, I had some early and formative experiences in Israel. When I first went there when I was 19 I immediately felt this “can do” mentality there. At the time there I felt a cohesiveness and an energy & zest for life there that was very different from Denmark, which felt sleepy, boring and lacking in energy by comparison. Then again, after I got married, we started spending a lot of time in Hong Kong and generally traveling the world, and I started seeing myself neither as Danish or American but more as the (more snooty) “cosmopolitan”. I had spend enough time in enough places to understand that I could function in these quite different environments, and that I loved them for their differences, and in fact loved circulating among them because each offered me a different facet - including of myself - to lean into. All of which is a long way to say that I don’t really identify with nationalism as such. I lean into some very Danish values I know I carry, which is I believe giving people healthcare and access to a college degree without bankrupting them is the stuff that lifts all boats in society. I’m not even gonna debate that with a right wing American. I consider any other opinion of that…stupid. To me it’s just 101 for a nation which could afford it. But I also sort of hate the self congratulatory way that Scandinavia tries to act as if they are going to teach Israel and Palestinians to be “grown ups” and about “peace”. As if they had any clue about what it’s truly like to live in these societies. Which is partly the same thing you rebel against when a snooty European talks down to you as an American. I read a book called “Orbital” which looks at our world from the perspective of being stationed on the ISS (International Space Station). From there all human problems look so small and insignificant. Yet we know we can’t learn from history and are condemned to keep making the same primate mistakes that Chimpanzees make, basically. Which has brought me to Jane Goodall’s philosophy at the end. When a talk show host said to her “of course Chimpanzees are your favorite animals but…” she stopped him and said: “No, DOGS are my favorite animals. Chimpanzees…they are much too much like people”. So, as you said, find your tribe, they aren’t defined by national borders, languages or geography. Read books from places you don’t know about but which fascinate you…or scare you. Listen to music from those places. When we do this we always learn beauty and misery live in those places too. And that we are all the same.
This resonated with me deeply. Thanks for saying it out loud.
Hear, hear!
Thank you Brad.
Transparency is the way. Thank you for showing us what it looks like. This is refreshing, vindicating, encouraging. I've suffered for my efforts to reach my MAGA childhood household members. When I read pieces like yours I know I am not alone. 🕊️
There is much truth in this, especially your insistence that a nation is not merely a flag or a bureaucracy, but a living inheritance of language, art, memory, and moral aspiration. If the word *nation* is left entirely to the thugs, they will not merely misuse it; they will redefine it. Better to reclaim what is noble in it than surrender it whole cloth.
What especially heartened me is your refusal to let yourself off easy. You keep questioning, doubting, and testing your own conclusions. On a subject so inflamed by cant and tribal vanity, that kind of self-scrutiny feels not like weakness, but honor.