"History is like foreign travel. It broadens the mind, but it does not deepen it." Descartes Watch all three. AA blusters, but there's not much else to do when you're arguing against people who defend tautology. It's not even Burkean, it's (self-serving) fatalism as a form of morality. "I'm 10 years old." "You won't be 10 forever" "How old am I?" "You're 10 years old" "So why are you arguing against the facts?" If you treat political relations as timeless, that's your argument. Again [and again and again]: it's the press, making Alex Rosenberg's argument for objectivity and Philosophical Naturalism. But again [and again and again] Rosenberg's naturalism is an aspect, or product, of culture. You could even vulgarize it as a "meme". Timelessness, permanence, changelessness. Robert Jay Lifton referred to "revolutionary immortality" but more generally it's just the desperate search for permanence. Feb.2009 Helen Thomas: "...And, also, do you know of any country in the Middle East that has nuclear weapons?" Obama: "...With respect to nuclear weapons, you know, I don't want to speculate. What I know is this: that if we see a nuclear arms race in a region as volatile as the Middle East, everybody will be in danger."