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I Ask for 9 Minutes of Your Time
A few days ago I appeared on Ricochet’s Land of Confusion podcast (link below). We had a good time talking about all sorts of stuff. About halfway through the show, Don asked me about political yard signs in my area, which for some reason elicited from me a nine-minute discussion of the evolution of leftist movements in America over the past 100 years.
Don liked it and suggested that we transcribe it. Because it was off the cuff, it wasn’t as well organized as I would have liked, so I sat down today to write an article based on my answer to Don’s question.
I talked about sort of a lot of stuff, and it would be a pretty big job to pull all that together in a concise and well-organized essay. To heck with it. But I would be very interested in your opinion on my assertions, which are:
- This election is not as important as we think.
- Democrats are not being vicious because they don’t like Donald Trump.
- Biden is irrelevant in this election, but to a certain degree, so is Donald Trump.
- Regardless of how this election turns out, there have been structural changes in our society and our government that make ‘saving the American republic’ impossible.
- The left recognized that leftism didn’t fit with American government or culture, so they sought out to remake both. And they have done so successfully.
- We need to focus on what comes next, because America has been irreversibly changed into something different than what it once was.
So I ask for nine minutes of your time. Go to the link below, and go to just before the 30-minute mark. Watch the next nine minutes, and see if you agree with me. I hope you don’t, and I hope your disagreements make sense because my conclusions are concerning to me. As I often say, I really hope I’m wrong about this.
Thanks in advance for your input.
.
Published in General
I think somebody needs a Snickers bar.
Golly.
Ok, first of all, if you disagree with my analysis, please tell me why. Because as I said, I want to be wrong about this.
But I think you agree with me, and you dislike my conclusions as much as I do. Although I’m not sure.
Regardless, let me emphasize a few points that I made in my discussion (although I apparently made them poorly).
There are a lot of things that could happen here. I mentioned a foreign war, or a major restructuring of the American educational system. But there are many many other possible events that could play a big role in how all this works out. Look through history. Things happen. It’s hard to say what those things will be. And harder to say what their impact will be. My point in that section was that while re-electing Trump will help, a lot of other things have to happen to restore America to something like it once was.
Next, the “what comes next” that I kept referring to may be really good. A large group of Americans, faced with losing the country they love, could endeavor to build something even better than we have now. And that has the potential to be really, really good. How will all that happen? Hard to say. It could be really simple. Just a return to federalism and Constitutional law would fix most of our problems. That would not be so easy in this environment, of course. But possible.
But I think there will be many people like you and me who will not simply wander off when things get bad. I REALLY HOPE that that is a peaceful process, not a “kill a lot of Antifa” type of event. And I expect that it will be peaceful. But tumultuous times are dangerous, of course.
* Continued on next comment *
Most importantly, I don’t feel that Ricochet (or any other form of discussion) is a waste of time. The point I was trying to make is that we have a lot to do, and electing Trump is helpful, but it’s not as important as it seems. There have been structural changes made to our society and our government that will require more than a vote to fix. We need to decide on a course of action, and get busy.
But in order to do that, I think we need to understand what we’re up against. My discussion was an (admittedly poorly organized) effort to understand that. As you can tell from my wandering thoughts, I’m not sure exactly what we’re up against.
But it’s not Joe Biden.
And Donald Trump can’t fix it all after this election.
We have work to do.
You know; the thing.
C’mon Henry. You know religion is important to some of us. Why be intentionally insulting?
I tend to disagree with part 2. Trump is significant in that he has demonstrated what it takes for Republicans to actually get things done in spite of having a tidal wave of garbage thrown in the way. He has also demonstrated being liked is nowhere near as important as being effective, and being effective means not listening to the elites and following through on your promises.
You make a good point.
I’m more trying to make fun of myself. The idea of faith is peculiar to me. I am always surprised that people actually believe in religions as faith feels so utterly alien and bizarre to me. I still don’t quite get how people believe and are moved by faith. It’s a strange thingy to me. Sorry if the humor was poorly expressed.
In short, I would like to read more on the points you bulleted. your 9 minute rant or whatever you choose to call it(I call it very interesting and I would like to see more!). The sound on the podcast was off and made it difficult to hear at times but it was well worth listening to…
Just my two cents but I would really like to see you expand on the time after about the 30 minute mark. The sound is not as good as it could be on the recording and I really liked what I heard…but am WAY too lazy to actually attempt to transcribe it or even to take good notes. Strong points that deserve a little discussion, so go for it!
Not every joke is an insult Dr. Bastiat.
Don’t know about the fat, but for the rest – pretty much. Medicare/Medicaid/SNAP/AFDC/PHAs/unemployment “insurance”/ yada yada yada how many are, in truth, willing to give it all up? How many “Christians” are glad to shrug their shoulders, glad that somebody else is taking care of all that stuff. How many are prepared to prove their rejection of the tax and spend foolishness with their vote?
How many are prepared for the consequences when the house of cards collapses?
No problem from me. I didn’t see it, that’s okay. But since you did self-reference, let me just say that I put my faith ultimately in God, such as I have come to know Him, and to a lesser degree empirical science as it has been passed down to me. Empirical science is natural. And I believe that Christianity is mostly supernatural; in that there is more, and a more important aspect, to reality than that which we easily see and handle and empirically prove.
And you put your faith in the sciences; empirical science and speculative science. Speculative science is non-empirical; or theoretical or philosophical, and just as unproveable as the supernatural. Nonetheless you do believe in something supernatural; but you have reasons to doubt the goodness of God, or the goodness of His original creation, and His intentions for it.
If you seek Him diligently and honestly you will find Him, and see for yourself that He is Good.
Folks with strong families. Probably when we run out of money, we will be comfortable letting all the old people and homeless die off.
Not in the way you mean. Speculative is unverifiable but it is still evidence based. I can’t verify that the Ukraine suffered a famine because of Communism because I can’t redo the history of the Ukraine under the Holodomor with free market economics. However, I can observe famines throughout the world and notice patterns between Communist systems and famines. Economics is sometimes referred to as being a “science of single instances” so it’s not really a science. Astrophysics is also largely based off of observation but it can predict things fairly well.
So’s Christianity. And there are many Christians who would say it’s verifiable.
Agreed, in full.
The only solution, barring some kind of commitment to re-localizing politics, may be a combination of secession and mass migration — something akin to the ethnic sorting that occurred in Europe in the twentieth century. (Chicago may become Kendia, just as Königsberg became Kaliningrad.) It’s happening already, but I expect the next decade to accelerate the process.
All this is made more difficult, though, by our country’s strange political geography: blue blobs sprinkled over a red substrate. There’s no easy way to separate the blue and the red. Worse, political differences are often a matter of personality or psychology, and they run directly through many families, who’d balk at the idea of a permanent separation. Still worse, in a digital world, there’s no way to keep one nation’s ideals from infecting the other’s citizens. Blue America will generate a few red weirdos, and red America vice versa.
So, I don’t know. I suppose we’re just doomed. Doomed to kill each other.
For a while, conservatives have been saying, “We need a new Great Awakening.” Well, we’re living through one now. It’s called “wokeness.”
I understand that perspective, but I disagree. I hope that whatever comes next may be really good. I’m not sure what it will be, although I agree with you that some sort of fragmentation of our country may occur. But again, this may be a really good process.
Imagine Texas says, “We’re leaving. Anybody who wants to live in a free country is welcome to join us.”
How many states would join them? Maybe forty? I’m not sure, but it would be a lot.
My point is that while America has certainly been changed, there are a lot of people who don’t like it, and may choose to build something better.
At least, I hope so.
The best case scenario is certainly a miraculous cultural renewal like the supposed Great Awakening. The next good scenario is Democrats agreeing to more federalism as opposed to central government after concluding that a cultural/political takeover of America generally is impossible. The latter scenario is helpful only if each exodus from a Democrat stronghold does not result in ideological infection of Republican areas. Neither scenario is likely, but we are always called to hope, pray, and work toward the good.
With the COVID disruption of society as a whole, there is tremendous opportunity for Democrats to reshape America if they gain power in this election. There has not been such opportunity since WWII. That’s the main reason this is not just another election. Look at how much FDR changed American government the last time citizens were united by perception of a looming threat and boundless economic disruption.
Another imminent danger is the combination of portraying President Trump like a brutal tyrant, portraying “climate change” as an imminent worldwide cataclysm, the popular fantasy among the young of revolution, the overt dream of socialism, publicly accepted expressions of tribal hate, and the increasing lawlessness of leading Democrats. Saner Democrats seem fearful or beholden to the most destructive and delusional elements in their party. These forces seem held back by lack of power more than principles of tolerance; and they don’t lack much power.
At a deeper level, the United States are disintegrating culturally. We don’t agree on basic facts of reality anymore. The Left demands agreement and compliance, not toleration and discussion. We can’t even agree on who is a man or a woman. We can’t agree on the most basic rights of free expression and self-defense. We can’t agree on God and the spiritual nature of humanity. If we share nothing at all of values — and even trivial passtimes are overcome with overt propaganda — in what sense are we one people?
Again, there is always hope. But the foundations are within a generation of upheaval.
Remember the rules: Wokeness is slumber.
Brilliant point.
America is united by a set of ideals. And nothing else.
We don’t share the same race like Japanese, or the same history like Russians, or the same culture like Sweden, or anything else. We share only our set of ideals.
And once we abandon those ideals, there’s nothing left to hold us together.
There is a thoughtful youtube video about how culture is so important in our communication and how conservatives are so bad at it.
Have you read any of Kurt Schlicter’s books about the loss of the election? The first one was written when he assumed Hillary would win. It’s called, “Peoples Republic.” Another good one is called “Indian Country.” I just hope they stay fiction.
All youtube videos have a way to transcribe them. So its a matter of search and copy and paste.
It’s a nice idea, but what will the four million Texans who cast their votes for Hillary Clinton in 2016 think? Will the hipsters in Austin be content to live under President Cruz’s leadership in the second Republic of Texas? I don’t think so.
I take his point, but I’m not a fan of “Conservatives should get with the times!” arguments, since they usually descend into “Conservatives shouldn’t conserve anything!” arguments.
There’s nothing wrong with finding clever ways to reach new audiences. (Arguably, conservative-ish people are already doing this, if the success of figures like Jordan Peterson is any indication.) But I’m a conservative, in part, because I don’t like the subcultures my generation has invented. I don’t want to hang around with the pierced cat-eared people who put pronouns in their Twitter biographies. We curmudgeons need a political voice, too.
Big Tent Kepha. Big Tent.
I disagree, mostly because I don’t think anything is inevitable as long as free actors are willing to take risks. The trend lines are as you state them, but we are now in a period with significant White Swan events which do not seem to be diminishing. That means predicting the future is even harder than usual.
Every election is the most important as we do not live in the past or the future. 1860 or 1864 maybe, but most of them were not that. Maybe 1952 where Eisenhower broke a 5-election Republican losing streak? Losing 1984 by 49 states instead of winning it by 49 states would have altered this country, but elections generally have to follow some economic logic.
Uh, yes and no. You have to analyze the Never Trumpers to get at the real heart of that.
Uh, yeah. That happened a long time ago with the FDR-era supreme court and his 12-year administration and regarding states rights for bad and some good after the Civil War. Woodrow Wilson, Lyndon Johnson, and even Richard Nixon didn’t help things out either.
It’s a whiny, scared, angry college-educated, post-Christian culture that replaced the confident, freedom-loving muscular culture that built this country.
The left has successfully diminished self-reliance as an important value across the entire western world. That is the essential transformation.
The moral basis for owning firearms, for example, is that one has a moral obligation to defend, family, property, neighbors and community and that responsibility is replaced by the state only when the threat is in the form of an invasion that requires a formal military response and even then then could be a role for militia. Taking away guns to mandate complete dependence on government is not just a transfer of power but a moral diminishment.
That moral diminishment from similar encroachments to provide security is the fundamental ongoing change.
The old paradigms of self-reliance were intertwined with family. A woman dependent on her husband’s protection and provision was invested in his well-being and that of the community and had a moral claim his personal loyalty.
When I hear young women talk about “self-reliance” is it more about (a) spending power to construct a lifestyle and acquire whatever was required to effect it and (b) a relationship in which neither party is highly dependent on the other materially. She envisions a government that should be like the staff at her condo. In addition to security, utilities and dealing with problems beyond her ken or interest (clogged sink, bad wiring, roaches) government should provide guarantees of income, lifestyle and health. Her education should also provide a secure status. The idea that any of this diminishes her freedom simply does not compute (even though many condo boards are Exhibit A for Government by Karens.)
She will only vote against the party that speaks in terms of guarantees when they betray her trust—hurt her economically, tax too high to allow her buy a better car or a better vacation package, or let crime and decay invade her neighborhood. Otherwise, she is theirs.
Conservatives are hampered by the fact that the market does everything better except security. East Germans looked forward to a higher standard of living after German reunification but were horrified to learn that they could actually be fired from a job. Private health delivers higher quality faster but does not guarantee universal access and access can be lost. Economic freedom in an unfettered market economy is better for capable, motivated people who don’t mind disk but a land of terror for those who fear risk of any kind even though that market economy always provides widespread benefits.
Whether and how liberty survives depends on whether there is an answer for or substantial reduction in the appetite for guarantees. Whether the presumption of property rights, freedom of contract and limited government can survive depends on whether there can be a viable public-private solution to healthcare and income security otherwise a lot of highly ‘educated’ young women and the men who think like them will soon turn us into New Zealand only worse.