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I Don’t Mean to Alarm Anyone, But …
I reckon the only times in history we’ve seen this much geopolitical instability and danger were prior to the outbreaks of the First and Second World War, and it seems a goodly portion of the American electorate — of all age groups, education groups, racial groups, ethnic groups, and both genders — thinks Donald Trump is the man to navigate our Ship of State through these rocky shoals.
To me, this looks like a distinctly sub-par situation. But it hardly helps for me to run about like a headless chicken, does it?
Can anyone here think of anything I can do to improve this state of affairs? Me, personally, today?
Published in General
I don’t believe in collective punishment. Do you?
Ouch.
I would argue, though, that there’s a much better America out there. My husband says that looking at the kids who are volunteering with the Rubio campaign gives him hope for the future.
(Cute aside: They had one team of door-knockers out in South Carolina praying the rosary as they walked.)
I’d generally agree with that, but I think we’d all prefer to be in Riyadh than Aleppo right now.
I sit here in Northeastern Montana I am watching the global situation and sick in the pit of my stomach reading through the Nevada results. Luckily, I’m going back to the Appalachian mountains soon, where at least I’ll have something beautiful to look out while I consider the end of civilization in our time, instead of the Godforsaken prairie.
I’m sending Rubio my first cash donation today.
There is nothing more practical or helpful than prayer.
Do you believe in collective guilt?
If even for a moment I suggested prayer to be valueless, it wasn’t at all what I meant to suggest.
It’s not up to us Claire. Look, without sounding too melodramatic about it, this is God’s work. If people cannot see that, then that is on them. We are living in the Decline and Fall of the American Empire and there is nowhere else to pass the baton. They had Byzantium. Byzantium had Europe. Europe had the UK. The UK had us. Who do we have?
Claire, if you want advice on what you can do individually – move you and yours back to America. The time we can assure your safety and security abroad is drawing to a close. You are clearly a bright person with good situational awareness well equipped for living abroad, but as the situation deteriorates the challenges can overwhelm even your skill set.
Oh Lucy, your husband is absolutely correct. We still exist. But sadly, at least in electoral politics, we are outnumbered. Tally up the number of votes for Hildabeast, Sanders, and Trump and compare them to the numbers for Cruz, Rubio, Bush, Kasich, and Carson (arguably the finest man in this race).
Frankly, I have started to take news of this or that prominent Conservative’s passing as a sign of them being plucked up by God before things really get bad. I am happy that Nino does not have to live to see what is coming. Ditto WFB, Reagan, and my mother. I just wonder when Justice Thomas and Rush Limbaugh will be called.
Good question. Yes, I do. I think it’s a meaningful term.
Claire, not to be morbid, but I am a Crusading Catholic. The chance to kill the soldiers of Satan is what we are about.
I didn’t say the entire globe I said a portion of it. There are places that appear idyllic. Heck, much of Islam is idyllic right up until the day it isn’t. The day before terrorists carry out their attacks they are students, travelers, state employees, etc.
I second Brent. Come home Claire.
At times like these, I think that the wisdom of Senator Blutarsky is about the only thing you can do ……
My advice to you is to drink … heavily …
My apologies, it did seem that way.
I hope I didn’t just waste $25.
As a 17th century Anglican, Liberal-Calvinist, I think God is visiting his just punishment on an increasingly wicked nation that has forgotten him.
As a practical matter, when 40-50% of the electorate want the Trump/Sanders solution to our situation, we are in deep trouble, especially considering that 82% of Democrats under 30 break for Sanders.
I don’t see how Rubio or Cruz can reverse the situation now. Claire someone like Peter Robinson or anyone you know in the conservative intelligentsia needs to get someone to sit down with these four non-Trumps and beg them for the good of the Republic to come together and slay this beast by uniting on one front. If their egos won’t let them, then we are screwed.
What a Lent it’s been!
But … since the guy’s a nut, and has been on both sides of practically every single important issue, at least with him you have a 50/50 chance of him deciding an issue like you would want, correct?
With the SocialistDemocrat party nominee, the odds would be 100% that a conservative would not like their decisions.
What?? I despise The Donald as much as the next guy, but he’s infinitely preferable to Hillary. She’s already demonstrated she’s willing to sacrifice lives to protect herself politically (Benghazi) and that national security will be sacrificed as a matter of policy to her own self-interest (email server). The Donald is clownish but he’s not in the same league as far as mendacity. If Trump is the nominee, I’m voting for him.
The Stars Go Over The Lonely Ocean
Unhappy about some far off things
That are not my affair, wandering
Along the coast and up the lean ridges,
I saw in the evening
The stars go over the lonely ocean,
And a black-maned wild boar
Plowing with his snout on Mal Paso Mountain.
The old monster snuffled, “Here are sweet roots,
Fat grubs, slick beetles and sprouted acorns.
The best nation in Europe has fallen,
And that is Finland,
But the stars go over the lonely ocean,”
The old black-bristled boar,
Tearing the sod on Mal Paso Mountain.
“The world’s in a bad way, my man,
And bound to be worse before it mends;
Better lie up in the mountain here
Four or five centuries,
While the stars go over the lonely ocean,”
Said the old father of wild pigs,
Plowing the fallow on Mal Paso Mountain.
“Keep clear of the dupes that talk democracy
And the dogs that talk revolution,
Drunk with talk, liars and believers.
I believe in my tusks.
Long live freedom and damn the ideologies,”
Said the gamey black-maned boar
Tusking the turf on Mal Paso Mountain.
Robinson Jeffers
My advice? Better lie up in the mountain here four or five centuries. Long live freedom and damn the ideologies.
Seawriter
I don’t get it. The Democratic party has started a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, put out a welcome mat for the Russians and the Chinese, increased debt beyond counting and much more and you’re panicking over Trump? You actually would consider more of the Democrats because of the risk that Trump might be worse? Sure Trump could be worse but I’d vote for Alfred E. Neuman to replace the current administration.
Claire,
This article by Matthew D. Wright ties together this thread – with your why we can’t have nice speeches thread. Reviewing Swaim’s new book on being a speechwriter for former SC governor, Mark Sanford.
I thought it had a weak ending, but some interesting insights.
The problem with HRC is that while she seemed “only another liberal” 8 years ago, her and Bill’s actions since she became Sec of State demonstrate something else entirely. She is not the devil she was – she has metastasized into something far worse.
Couple the sleazy details of the book Clinton Cash with the home brew server and instead of it being “only another liberal” like Uncle Joe Biden we have moved into someone who knowingly auctioned off her influence and cavalierly avoided US Government security protocols for personal/professional gain. Anyone else would be in jail – she is running for President.
Sure, being President might be enough for HRC. But if not, what else is she capable of once she can tick the box of first woman President? Regardless, and harkening back to the shoals imagery, the superrich will always have a lifeboat. And HRC has aptly demonstrated she could care less about anyone else as long as she gets hers.
I was busy typing my screed while you published this, although I am not as sure I could vote for Trump. I just know I can’t vote for HRC.
One thing we can count on is that people play the way they practice. Obama as President was essentially Community Organizer in Chief. Hillary will act as President the same way she has always acted – entirely out of self-interest and with no regard for the larger interest or even the cost in lives. Trump will be Trump – loud, bombastic but also clever and with a sharp eye for chances. There is also no evidence in his history that Trump is a criminal (I mean at the Hillary level – I’m sure he’s cut corners here and there) or not patriotic. I’ll be relieved at President Trump rather than President Hillary.
I would not worry too much about Trump. This thing has been set up for HRC win since the very beginning. Trump is just the distraction, the bread and circuses for the masses.
Yeah, but literally?
There’s this kind of mean youtube spoof – clearly heavily edited, but what struck me is that there were people who bought the premise of the interviews and responded, however decently or bizarrely.
Capture him, the way the Catolica economists captured Pinochet who was also an empty vessel. They were there, they had a plan and he didn’t know what else to do. Unfortunately your focus here is foreign policy so there are no fixes like a tax regulatory or monetary overhaul. It’s putting together the team that advises him including on how to rebuild the military. However it’s not over. Do not despair.
I don’t see it. Russia is a demographic disaster and the most Put in can do is over extend himself. China has its own problems and with the advent of fracking to ease energy prices China has no need to expand to secure energy. South America and sub Sahara Africa is more stable now than at any time. That leaves southwestern central and south Asia. Basically the Muslim world. The danger is that Europe will be over run by Muslims not Russia. That’s what I mean by the difference of being in the US vs. Land adjacent to the mideast.
I don’t want Trump to win the GOP nomination. That said, my fears about a Trump presidency do not center around he blowing up the world. Those predictions were made about Reagan and did not happen. I don’t think they will with Trump either, war is fundamentally bad for most businesses, and Trump is a businessman centered in Real Estate and entertainment (Hotels and Casinos), which do not do well in wars. Where I fear his effect will be the worst, is any hope for a small Federal government will be completely dashed, as Trump is the prototypical crony capitalist. His entire life, he has been closest to a moderate democrat, happy for socialist programs everywhere except business and defense.
His positions and speeches on various topics leave nothing to think this has changed. While he talks about appointing judges in the mold of Scalia, his history would suggest judges closer to Souter, or at best Kennedy. We would likely see censorship of political speech become the norm, and the second amendment would be reduced to a right to join the National Gard, and maybe have a shotgun kept in a locked safe at your local gun club. Hand guns likely restricted to active duty police and military officers.
Unfortunately, his positions on big government programs are likely supported by majorities. Most people want a smaller Federal government right up until you start to identify the necessary spending cuts, then we tend to say OK cut those programs, but don’t gore my ox.
So nothing is cut, except to shout about huge budget cuts, but only against projected spending, never a reduction in absolute dollars allocated.
Heck, I can cut the budget by 50% if you first let me set the projected spending levels, and this is a game Washington pols have been playing for a century and the are good at it. Both parties use it, and perhaps spending increases a bit slower under a republican president, but in the longer term all that happens is government gets larger.
Trump will be a disaster, but I think in ways other than your central fears.
The sense of loss and disorientation came for me when Obama was elected. And things have indeed gotten worse under him. I’m not a Trump supporter, but I will never vote for HRC. With Justice Scalia gone, I’m already afraid the 1st Amendment died with him. If HRC is elected, I’m convinced it has. Freedom of Speech, Free Exercise of Religion are at stake. I don’t know if Trump will protect them. I definitely know HRC will assault them.
Trump before Hillary.