Actually, he's quite right on a lot on things. Just because Mankark is evil, and is trying to bring "paradise" when Mehrunes Dagon really just want to completely annihilate Nirn so he can go back to being the Leper Demon, doesn't mean a really big helping of truth sprinkles have been showered all over the ice cream cone that is the Commentaries.

The TES series isn't just a simple good and evil thing. It's all shades of gray, not black and white and he might actually have the right idea, I haven't heard his speech in a while.

I find that he was close to the right idea, he had it going in the beginning and middle, but dropped the ball completely at the end when he revealed his merrish politics. Stupid mer and their obsession with going back and no forward :facepalm:

Eh? Mankar was going farther forward than anyone else at the time. His worldview and goals were merish only in their distaste for the Mundus.

But his interpretations on the gods is very mannish, which is interesting.

What most confuses me about Camoran's philosophy is that he's barking up an interesting tree with the Lorkhan is the Daedra of broken Heroes/Gods or some such and that Nirn was Lorkhan's domain and such and such, but I don't understand how that suddenly becomes Mehrunes Dagon's right to 'liberate' occupied lands. Because I know that Camoran doesn't have any illusions about what happens after Dawn is re-established; he rules as the mortal representative to the ruling Daedra who rule in Dagon's name. There is not going to be any remanifesting Lorkhan. Just ruling Tamriel under a four-armed grasp. And how worshipping Dagon (and only Dagon) will free our souls from such limiting constraints as existence.

Give a close read to http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/aldudagga.shtml#1.

It's denial.

The whole idea of the invasion might have been Mankar's idea; without the Mythic Dawn, then the Oblivion Gates would not have opened, and there is evidence that Mankar is the commander of the Daedric forces, with the Mythic Dawn acting as officers. If it was his idea, then why would there be an invasion of other continents?

Mankar wanted to put the Mythic Era and the Dawn Era together as part of his vision for Tamriel. The Mythic Era was only dominated by elves in Tamriel, so only there is it relevant to Mankar.

Only partially, it has since been reduced to a chain of islands.

Which makes me wonder, if was indeed due to the destruction/depowering of Oricalc Tower, is it possible that it was originally a group of islands before the Tower was built?

We're never specifically told in-game that gates didn't open on other continents...as others have said, there aren't exactly pen pals between Akavir and Cyrodill. The news would not have reached the shores of the Empire as of the events of the game. For all we know the home territories of the Akaviri people were overrun with Dremora invaders, and maybe they have their own tales to tell about how they fought them off.

Perhaps Tosh Raka used his divine blood to close the gates and destroy the Daedric war machines single handedly. Perhaps he fought an identical Avatar of Mehrunes Dagon in the exact fashion as Martin did. These types of mirror mythologies are very much a part of the mythos.