So much e-mail from last night’s discussion of the Dalai Lama and Caddyshack. This one captures the tone of most:

Dear Jonah:
Carl Spackler actually saide that he caddied for the Dali Lama, who was the “12th son of the Lama.” With this in mind, perhaps Spackler caddied for the 13th Lama. However, are lamas, as a rule, triskaidekaphobic? If so, they may not have named a 13th Lama, and skipped over that number. So, Spackler may have caddied for the 14th Lama.
Clearly more research is required.
All the best,

And how cool is this?

I belong to the same club where the Murray Brothers (and I) caddied at as youngsters…
We’ve got the whole shootin’ match, including Nellie – who manages the entire place now, was the “Tanks For Nuttin’” girl in the film – the Haverkamps, who yes, really exist, and the Caddyshack which still stands, but is now the paddle tennis hut.
Don’t believe me? Ask the Wall Street Journal’s own Steven Moore, as his parents are also members.
So, next time you’re in Chicago, and you want to play golf at the club that gave the world Caddyshack, just let me know and I’ll hook you up.
Gunga la gunga…

And of course we need some substance too. So this came in from my Voegelin Guy (I thought of calling him my Immanentize the Eschaton Guy but that’s not quite right or fair).

Dear Mr. Goldberg,
You have touched on something that requires much more attention. The problem is that most political commentary on the right is focused on individual rights, and not theology, and since theology is the basis of modern politics (mostly bad theology), it is one explanation as to why we seem to always be on defense. The number one rule in warfare is to first understand your enemy, and unless and until we understand that leftism is really a type of mysticism, we are always going to be caught off guard.
It is quite striking that many Americans (especially people who like to think of themselves as progressives) are attracted to Eastern mysticism. But they would have nothing to do with it if they were required to embrace its traditional forms. True Buddhism requires extremes of asceticism, as do all traditions really, as well as a belief in sin, the influence of demons and the need for exorcisms. Also, Tibetan Buddhism reputedly also has all kinds of secret aspects to it known only to the initiates.
In general, the modern left sees itself as a spiritual movement intending to transform mankind spiritually into a virtually new species, with an “immanentist” vision of salvation. Modern politics is all about salvation by other means — through political action.
My theory is that when the Christian Church (i.e. the Roman Catholic Church) in the West suppressed mysticism, mystical practices, mystical theology, it then broke out in the political realm. And, of course, American Protestantism has a very deep seated skepticism toward anything mystical. Traditionally, one might argue that Judaism, or at least post-Exilic Judaism (the first one I mean) has been anti-mystical, but Hassidic Judaism is deeply mystical, and then you have the fringe movement of Kabballa which Madonna seems to like very much (but one must scoff at her dilletantism in the matter). Which might be an explanation as to why so many secularised Jews are attracted to leftism. There is something fundamentally mystical about human consciousness, and it is something that cannot be controlled, only guided.
As for miracles per se, it really would be a miracle for socialism to produce its magical promises! Secularism could be said to be a form of sympathetic magic.
As a convert to Orthodoxy, I see it as quite unfortunate that our very powerful mystical traditions and writings, which are now quite extensively available in good English translations, are still relatively unknown beyond a fairly small subset of Christian believers. The CIA used to sneak Bibles into the USSR, not for sincere reasons but in order to foment dissent. Perhaps we should try to sneak the Philokalia into every liberal household!