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Letters from Readers Commentary March 2007 Letters from Readers Russia’s Turn has been utterly feckless, of that power to the Duma much “independent” as they marked too often by ego- or other political institu- were “anti-government”— To the editor: driven squabbling and ter- tions. Putin can be blamed but he cannot turn off mil- In “What Does Putin ribly miscalculated cam- for many things (and should lions of cell phones, com- Want” [December 2006], paign strategies. (David be), but the incompetence puters, and satellite dishes. Leon Aron once again Remnick put it perfectly of Russia’s would-be demo- Nor can he stop Russians proves himself one of our when he wrote that re- cratic leaders is not one of from boarding planes and most cogent observers of former Egor Gaidar ran for them. trains to Europe and other Russia. He was right about office as if he were running Nevertheless, I cannot destinations. The explosion positive trends there in the to become head of the math help thinking that there is of freedom after 1990 1990’s, and he is right today department.) The result at some cause for optimism means that anyone trying to about the ham-fisted sta- the polls during the 1990’s about Russia in the twin in- reimpose authoritarian or- tism that threatens to turn was electoral fratricide, with fluences of globalization der on the Russian Federa- 21st-century Russia into an the liberal parties running and technology. Perhaps I tion is facing a task (to use inefficient authoritarian as much against each other am too hopeful, but I still an old Russian expression) state where the rich and as against the various anti- believe there is only so far akin to turning fish soup poor (but mostly the poor) reform elements. Russians, that any Russian leader can back into an aquarium. all know the neo-Brezh- never comfortable with par- go in attempting to reverse The technological reali- nevite deal they must accept ties or parliaments, saw only course from the liberaliza- ty is important. Despite the in order to get by: do what disorganization and feuding tion of the 1990’s. First, darker conspiratorial theo- you like, as long as you do among liberals in the hackneyed an observation ries of Soviet nostalgists like not annoy the authorities. Duma, and concluded that though it may be, effective Stephen Cohen, the Soviet However, while I agree it was not an institution participation in the global Union was brought down, with Mr. Aron’s analysis of worth supporting. economy necessarily limits to a large extent, by a mas- Vladimir Putin’s role in tak- The subsequent expan- the amount of mischief a sive case of cognitive disso- ing Russia backward, it is sion of executive power, government can do, as the nance on the part of its own important as well to recall which began under Yeltsin Chinese have figured out. citizens, who could not rec- the role of Russia’s “liber- and which I thought at the More crucially, it will be oncile their miserable lives als” in helping to create—if time was a positive devel- almost impossible to restore with what they knew from inadvertently—an environ- opment, was a natural re- the walls that once existed their televisions, their ra- ment conducive to Putin’s sponse to this disorder, but between Russia and the dios, and (sometimes) their machinations. Despite their the Russian liberals never world. Putin can shut down own eyes. good intentions, their po- made a convincing case for television stations—which If the gray grip of Rus- litical activity over the years the eventual return of some in any case were not so sia’s statists bogs the coun- [3] Commentary March 2007 try down in the sludge of among the oligarchs them- the reader to laugh at her control of all religions and corruption, repression, and selves. Such a balance of work, as people supposedly their institutions.” This economic stagnation, it is powers encourages the pur- laughed at Joseph Klausner might not be so bad; reli- possible that Russians, once suit of consensus by way of in 1927 when he publicly gions, when left to them- again, will realize that the democratic politics. celebrated Spinoza at an selves, have a tendency to- tradeoff between security The essence of the Putin event in Jerusalem. ward fanaticism and au- and freedom is not as good restoration has been the ero- Had Mr. Nadler engaged thoritarianism. A secular a deal as it might have sion of these opposing in philosophical conversa- state works against such ex- looked. That seems to be forces, with victories of the tion, he might have been cesses while at the same time Leon Aron’s hope for the executive over the parlia- less tempted to reduce Spin- allowing believers the free- country. It is mine as well, ment; the seat of power over oza to a prized ancestor of dom of worship. and I think there is still rea- the regions; and the state American liberalism or a All in all, Spinoza comes son to trust that it will hap- over private wealth. But as cold progenitor of secular off as a remarkably modern pen. opinion polls in Russia in- totalitarian politics. Philos- and independent thinker in Tom Nichols dicate again and again, these ophy tends to force a quick Mr. Nadler’s article, and Naval War College victories are neither com- retreat from categorical po- mankind would do itself a Newport, Rhode Island plete nor (by many mea- sitions more easily assumed service if it adhered to the sures) irreversible. In short, in the midst of harsh and former’s principles. Mr. Leon Aron writes: democracy in Russia has a unjust polemic. Nadler is right, however, in I am grateful to Tom future because it has had a Why the animus against claiming that Spinoza is not Nichols for his kind view of past—a short and highly im- Goldstein? Why is Mr. qualified to be readmitted my work. perfect past, but a real one. Nadler determined to de- into the tradition of Ortho- That Russian liberals mean those Jews—includ- dox Judaism. (read: “intelligentsia”) have ing not only Goldstein but Helge Normann been politically inept and Steven Nadler, Steven Nilsen sectarian is one of the con- Smith, and Yirmiyahu Yov- University of Trondheim stant tragedies of Russian Spinoza el—who take Spinoza the Trondheim, Norway history. Within this sad tra- Jew seriously? Is the secu- dition, however, the post- To the Editor: lar-religious dialogue among To the Editor: Soviet liberals have not fared Rebecca Goldstein’s Be- Jews dead today? I was reading Allan badly at all. Unlike the Men- traying Spinoza is a brilliant Avi Bernstein-Nahar Nadler’s essay with much sheviks, the Constitutional book, though one would Hebrew College interest, appreciating its Democrats (Kadets), and the never know it by reading Newton Centre, Massachusetts primer-like account of Spin- Socialist Revolutionaries Alan Nadler’s discussion of oza’s thought and its de- (SR’s) of 1917-18, they did it in “Romancing Spinoza” To the Editor: bunking of various “ro- not give way to a dictator- [December 2006]. Mr. In presenting Spinoza’s mantic” efforts by Jewish ship in the wake of a demo- Nadler seems unsure view of nature, Allan Nadler thinkers to reclaim him. But cratic revolution, and for ten whether to laugh or cry at makes the philosopher’s ar- then I encountered the years they kept Russia the the spectacle of a Jewish gument for him quite ef- following phrase, which freest it has ever been. writer like Goldstein cele- fectively: “[Nature] alone is stopped me in my tracks: Indeed, to add another brating a figure like Spin- self-caused, absolutely de- “Spinoza, whose most per- item to Mr. Nichols’s rea- oza; he should do neither. termined, and uncontingent nicious heresy was to deny sons for optimism, it was Goldstein’s account upon the existence of any the immortality of the hu- during the 1990’s that Rus- shines not only for its beau- other thing.” This is in fact man soul . .” sia came closest to political tiful prose but because it is how reality presents itself I reread the sentence to stalemate, which has often a philosophical book that to most people who have see if Mr. Nadler was speak- been noted as a necessary manages to be a historical ceased believing in things ing for himself—and he condition for a transition and imaginative one as well. supernatural. was. What enlightened Jew from authoritarianism to Taking Spinoza as a partner Mr. Nadler criticizes in the 21st century speaks democracy. There was a in philosophical conversa- Spinoza for holding that of Spinoza or any other Jew complex, multilevel, and al- tion, Goldstein has incisive man is no different in prin- as a heretic, much less a per- most evenly matched con- things to say about his ciple from any other exist- nicious one? test between a leftist, na- thought and even finds ing thing. Man, Mr. Nadler Itzik Basman tionalist plurality in the par- grounds for an imaginative objects, was created in God’s Toronto, Ontario liament and a liberal, inter- rendering of his life. Mr. image to “enjoy dominion nationalist executive; be- Nadler would have benefit- over all the inferior species To the Editor: tween Moscow and the ed from joining in the en- of the earth.” Spinoza also I have often wondered provinces; between the state terprise that Goldstein rep- argued, according to Nadler, about Spinoza’s inner life af- and the “oligarchs”; and resents.
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