Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Buck Up, Chicken Little
Rachel Lu has a great piece up at National Review Online in which she argues that things aren’t nearly as bad as they seem for the nation. Some conservatives see the imminent end of the republic as we know it and are willing to take extreme measures not to right the horribly listing ship of state but to perpetuate the premature rumor of our demise. None of this is really necessary if one takes a better accounting of our actual situation. As she writes:
Why is America in such a gloom right now? Where’s the fire (or famine, or plague, or enemy invader)? Stagnant wages and mediocre job prospects have generated frustration in many segments of society, but these alone are not enough to explain the sense of impending doom that has fueled populist movements on both sides of the line. Changing demographics, geopolitical weakness, a growing fear of foreign enemies, and a series of government scandals (which have lingered, mostly unresolved, like the stink of old cigarettes) have all added to the despair. Obamacare is still with us, and still bad.
Perhaps the most under-discussed source of disillusionment is the loss of the marriage fight. To many, this most recent chapter in our culture wars stands as a stunning lesson in the absolute futility of fighting fair. Neither millennia of human tradition, nor overwhelming popular numbers, nor reams of sociological evidence seemed to count for anything once the progressive elite had spoken. It was scarring and embittering. It’s unsurprising that a populist backlash would follow in its wake.
Indeed there are things to be gravely concerned about. Between external unrest and the internal drift away from our founding these United States are threatened on many fronts. But, we’re farther from the edge of the precipice than many proclaim.
To be sure, our cultural and moral challenges are significant, but it’s time to face a hard truth. The sky isn’t falling. Our doomsday rhetoric is becoming self-indulgent. And it’s a shame to be wasting all this energy on a collective panic attack, when we’ve got miles to go before we sleep.
Rather than focus on the negative surrounding us, we should instead look inside at the great strengths of our nation and our people. In fact, we’re so unique in history that the current dissatisfaction with the present situation is an indication of health rather than the death throes of a once great people.
The din of our bellicose public square persuades us that the situation is desperate, when really that’s a sign of comparative health. Recent events have reminded us that our nation is not invincible to the decadence, corruption, and decline that have consumed other, once-great societies. That is sobering, indeed. We forget, though, that a modest rise in temperature is not just a symptom of illness. It’s a sign that the body is fighting off the infection.
In this line of reasoning I can find no fault. Our nation born of struggle survives — even thrives — when difficulty rears its ugly head. Our people crossed uncharted oceans to settle unknown lands. Americans fought off nature itself to carve out a bit of unique human experience. Our forefathers clung desperately to the last shreds of life and asked disease, starvation, and the bitter cold of winter if that’s all they had. We wrested life from the ravenous maw of death time and time again.
With that same tenacity they formed this great nation, founded on the interdependent ideals of liberty and equality. They passed down to us a heritage of opportunity, industry, justice, and fidelity to those blessed concepts that are the bedrock on which we as a people stand. This is what we fight to conserve. This is why we care enough to get overly emotional about candidates and policies. It’s why we should channel our restless energy to better ends.
We could call down heaven’s fire to burn this all to the ground, micturate on the the ashes, and shamble off to the refuse pit of history to lay deceased along side the less worthy who came before us. But that’s simply not who we are as a nation or a people, and it’s surely not who we are as conservatives, libertarians, or even as Republicans.
We face challenges, but that’s what we’re made for. In these times the very best can be called forth from us. There’s no reason to expect it not to be in our present crises. There’s no rational argument not to demand it of ourselves.
Published in Culture, General
A stirring call to [figurative] arms, sir! I salute you!
I’m on her side. It’s so tiring to listen to many pundits, radio personalities, politicians, and even many Ricochet posts. For those of us who have been around a few decades, the Republic is on the brink, has been a constant refrain,
Wow! To a hammer everything really is a nail.
Amen, Rachel.
I have to disagree. It’s not that our problems are intractable, but there is no political will to solve them. Even the most modest suggestions of fiscal restrain and reform are met with cries of “Extremist!” and “Whackobird!”
Our country is 51% Idiocracy and 47% Atlas Shrugged. Rachel Lu must be part of the 2% that’s lucky enough not to care.
I think it usually just has to get bad enough for the political will to show itself. We had plenty of will to form the nation, get through a civil war, the great depression (kind of shanked part of that one), WWII, Carter, 9/11 — we tend to rise to the occasion.
I find Stanly Curtz’ article on how Dubuque Iowa is part of Chicago proof of Idiocracy.
(I’ve made the drive from Dubuque to Chicago, and Fort Wayne is closer to Chicago. But we are probably part of the Indianapolis group)
P.S. I normally do not read National Review except when someone links to it.
There are a few writers I go there to read (Goldberg, Williamson, Cooke, etc.) and just stumbled upon Rachel’s article. I linked it in the R> facebook group to congratulate her, and it generated some discussion, so I thought I’d put something up here.
Whenever I read a things are fine , or not so bad article, I always wonder on the motivation of the author. Given that certain parts of the “conservatives” need to tamp down the anger to retain power , I sense a less than pure perspective behind it.
To win, we do not need calm, we need to fight. The other side is not calling for calm. And yes, I have been around for more than a few decades.
I had a conversation like this with a coworker yesterday. Every time the stock market dips, he has visions of depression, street warfare, and tyranny. Another coworker is apparently concerned that Islamic terrorists are going to invade his home in rural Minnesota. Apparently there is a human need to believe that we’re living in the end times.
Yup. People disagreeing with us doesn’t mean we are destined to fail, though. If this country survived The New Deal, we can survive these times. It won’t be easy, but I’m not going to give up and put a gun to my head. At least not until after the November elections. ; )
You don’t merely question the motives of the author but assign negative ones. That’s the least effective method of having a rational, productive conversation.
Yes, we need to fight, but more importantly we need to fight for something rather than just against something, we must do it effectively, and we must do it according to our character and ideals.
Also, read problem statements. Rachel doesn’t say everything is fine. Rather, she says there are terrible things going on, but that they are not insurmountable problems. We do not have a terminal illness as a nation.
The endless, puerile efforts to convince the rubes to return to the bitter failure of the Republican party are quite tiresome.
Give it up.
I spent about thirty years arguing in favor of the GOP at various places, including at the unionized non-GOP friendly steel mill where I once worked, and I’m done.
There was absolutely nothing to prevent the party from taking up the issues that Trump has raised- and presumably in a much better, less offensive manner- but the party never did.
My thoughts about about the present regime are well-described by a speech given long ago, by Oliver Cromwell when he dismissed the Long Parliament.
Just, go, GOP, in the name of God go.
I live under one party rule in Washington. It ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.
I don’t think anyone is saying we have insurmountable problems.
People are just saying that present people in charge aren’t up to solving them, and need to be replaced.
The rise of Donald Trump- and Bernie Sanders as well- is sign that the public has grown weary of the endless failure, and is rising to the challenge of replacing the regime and finding new people to lead us to a better future.
Too bad for Jeb! and his good friend Hillary.
The bold part is debatable. I think we can (and should) do a lot better.
We all live under one party rule, thanks to Washington. DC, that is.
That’s what’s ending, right now.
Wow! What a devastating takedown of Rachel’s point.
I don’t see Trump as really representing that. He seems more no party than anything because he’s such a grab bag of ideology.
We’re all living under one-party rule. That’s the problem. The Republicans have a majority in Congress, but the Democrats are still in charge.
Then you want to rewrite the constitution.
Well, I’m waiting to be impressed.
Aside from Trump, I haven’t been.
Alas, because I remember staying up late to watch the GOP convention that gave us Bob Dole.
For example, having lived through the entire Clinton era, I’m amazed to watch Trump completely shut down the Clintons, merely by bringing up the infamous scandals, plus winning open support from Clinton victims like Juanita Broderick.
That’s what success looks like, GOP.
If the party can do better than that, it should have done so circa 1996.
It failed. I’m done.
I’m all for this, but I’m also (and more so) all for real conservative/libertarian policies. I’m kind of big on the process as detailed in the constitution as well. That’s where I part ways with Trump.
I could be proven completely wrong. Trump might be the medicine we need to cure what ails us. I’m not putting any money on it though.
This is, I think, the crux of the problem. Futility of fighting fair? We’re not even fighting. The Left sees this as an all out war. We poo-poo that there is anything more than a mild disagreement going on, here.
And that is whence the seemingly rabid frustration and anger spring.
If we fight, will we lose? Maybe not. Maybe even probably not.
If we fight fair, will we lose? Probably.
If we don’t fight at all (like what “we’re” doing right now), will we lose? Definitely.
Don’t waggle a finger at me for my proclivity to cry “Havoc!” until you give me other options, and show me that victory is as important for the leadership of the right as it is for me.
That’s a bit of a non-sequitur, but actually, yeah… a few amendments would help. Giving Congress and the states the power to overturn Supreme Court decisions. Requirements for Congressional approval of executive agency regulations. Term Limits. Make it illegal for Congress to exempt themselves from their own laws (e.g. Insider Trading).
This is preposterous. All of Obama’s policy victories occurred when he controlled the house and had a 60 seat majority in the senate. If you think Obama care is the worst the democrats would do with absolute power, you are very mistaken.
15 years ago you would have said that the republicans will never have the stomach to take on entitlement reform. Today, nearly every elected republican supports the Ryan plan, which privatizes medicare. Rubio supports the plan(you know, that guy who you keep telling us isn’t a conservative). Elect a Republican president and hold the senate and we achieve a major rollback of big government.
Pretend that there is no difference between the parties and learn the hard way that there are.
No, we want to defeat the democrats. In detail.
They are called elections. Notice that the democrats don’t achieve significant policy victories unless they are winning elections.
1996 was also the last time any major conservative legislation was passed into law at the Federal Level: Welfare Reform.
Since then, nada. A Republican President and a Republican President passed Sarbanes-Oxley (crushing regulations), doubled the national debt, created a prescription drug entitlement, passed McCain-Feingold, tried to pass Amnesty twice, created a giant “Homeland Security” bureaucracy, bailed out Wall Street (TARP), outlawed incandescent lightbulbs, federalized education (No Child Left Behind)…
So, the Democrats won big in 2014 and that’s why their entire agenda has been fully funded and implemented without opposition?