February 5th, 1995

Walt talks about “desacralizing the sacred” over history….the role of Islamic scholars in the transformation of European society in part by challenging the previously sacred… the Bible is steeped in nonviolence but the church is based on violence and power… work was not alienating until the advent of Taylorism, when workers were kept from realizing the “end product” of their labor… but even though you may be alienated from your work, you are not physically destroyed by your job… work was “the sacred”—“you are what you do”… work is the worst place in the world to exercise freedom. George talks about what Walt is talking about resonates with Derek Bell’s book “Faces at the Bottom of the Well”… Walt says that you can have Section 8 housing and food stamps and health insurance but if you have to sell your soul it is not revolutionary… Our sacredness of progress is destroying us as human beings. Walt ended by saying that when he went to college (on the GI bill after the war) he felt like a confused 90-year old and 16-year old in one body—he has no idea how he got through.

February 5th, 1995

George and Walt start by discussing a speech just given at the University by Derek Bell (one of the original founders of Critical Race Theory), with a particular focus on the impact of work (an area that they say that they want to discuss in more depth over the next months)... Walt talks about his conception of “revolution” which is very different from what is being put forward by both the left and the right… both rely on maintaining the dominance of the state… Real revolution requires understanding that society is growing more and more rigid… He discusses the tension between the growth of the church’s, and all religions’, adherence to the state and conformity and his interpretation of what faith means to him (“the meek shall inherit the earth”)... He delineates the difference to him between faith and religion… We are being programmed by the state and by the church to conform to certain norms and not to question anything… Happiness is promised if there is no questioning—but that is not true happiness. Walt talks about how he has tried to write much of his thinking and history but it is mostly “incoherent.”

January 29th, 1995

Walt continues to discuss his childhood, including the trauma of his near fatal illness. He also alludes to the impact of his father leaving the family in the early years of the depression on his childhood. His high school years were heavily impacted by both extreme poverty and the fact that he had been pushed ahead nearly two years in elementary school. He relates his connection to a local minister with whom he starts having regular discussions about theology and talks about work after high school before he enlists to fight in World War II, something he saw as a way of “getting out”.

January 29th, 1995

Walt starts this session by discussing the changing nature of the proletariat in a technological society. There are two proletariats-one of affluence and one of misery-that are being generated. This is a topic which Walt and George agree that they will come back to. The bulk of the episode is spent discussing Walt’s childhood, significant events that shaped his life going forward—relationships with family, approach to academics and work, core connection to faith- and, most notably, the centrality of the concept of “freedom.”

January 22nd, 1995

Walt starts discussing his own history in this session. The impact of “work” is something that was a key part of his life (grandfather, brothers, shipyards, etc) and the subject of conversation with George. Many stories are shared  related to his childhood including… the fact that his mother’s family (Mugge) were aristocratic of German heritage (mother sent to Europe to study) and created the city of Tampa Florida…. his father was a German intellectual who wrote for the Kaiser but gave him no credit so he came to the US… Walt was born in 1923 and family was totally wiped out by the time he was six or seven due to The Great Depression… because his father had no ability to do physical work, he left the family and went to Chicago where he worked as a hotel desk clerk for many years… his mother took in two other families and became responsible for all cooking and cleaning for thirteen people… total poverty… he and two older brothers had to work in addition to going to school… heritage meant that they were destined to go to college but there was no way that was economically possible… work from mowing lawns at seven to working in shipyards at seventeen dominate stories here.

January 22nd, 1995

George and Walt kick off this conversation that started in 1995 and would continue over the next four years. This first episode starts with the two trying to figure out how to accomplish two things—create a chronology of Walt’s life and also answer the question “Why do you do what you do?” Walt jumps into the second question first and discusses… The starting point for everything for him is faith… choosing to focus on living versus survival (which is necessary but not enough) is the moral imperative and the only revolution that makes sense to him and his faith calls him to be a revolutionary… His conversations with college students has convinced him that there are no reference points today and there is little ability to be human beings who say yes and no… people in power today understand that to control people they must be more than fed—they must be loved… spirituality is the new pacifier (the right is nothing without evangelical Christians)… we aren’t examining our history and what we learn from it (most notably the collapse of socialism across the world in the blink of an eye) and people have no reference points…“the university is the culprit,” which doesn’t allow any real discussion—"you will not be successful unless you study more and more about less and less.” Walt asks George to provide topics for these conversations and he will intersperse lessons from his own history.