My friend Glenn Reynolds, who also has an excellent Substack you may want to subscribe to, just released a piece called Civilizational Jenga. The main focus of it was the Colorado Supreme Court’s foolish decision to pull Trump’s access to the ballot in Colorado over his supposed “insurrection” on January 6, 2021.
GK Chesterton's allegory of the fence across the road. The traveling newcomer says, "this fence is in my way, tear it down." He states this imperative without knowing why the fence was erected in the first place. It made sense to someone in the past and the rationale for the fence across the road may still be applicable. But without an examination/evaluation of that rationale under the current conditions, one should not destroy the fence.
As a retired Army officer, I understand (but don't necessarily agree with) the drive to rename forts and posts that were named for Confederates -- we erased all traces of Nazi/Wehrmacht insignia on the posts and facilities we took over after WWII. What I do not understand is the drive to erase those monuments that are specifically dedicated to reconciliation after the Civil War, specifically the one in Arlington and the one that's the class gift from the Class of 1961 (the Civil War Centennial class) at West Point. If the opposing side is erased, then with whom exactly did the victorious Union forces reconcile? Stupid overreach. I watch other political, social, and economic foundations of my country being trashed for no reason other than they are "old" and the "products of the white patriarchy" despite their necessity to continue to grow and refine our country through goals and processes that are just.
The United States is an idea, different than a nationality, ethnicity, sectarian territory, which had been the basis for countries prior to the US. We are now bringing in large numbers of people who do not subscribe to that idea (along with their domestic enablers) -- they only want what the idea produces and they think the country will continue to produce those desired items in the absence of the idea.
Good essay, John, thanks for writing this. I try to look at things logically, but I feel like it's futile in today's political environment. Everything the Left demands is based on how they feel about it. Whether it will work or not seems to be irrelevant. "At least we tried- I support that"- and worst of all, "we didn't try hard enough, that's why it didn't work." (The corollary to that being, lets make sure those MAGA republicans don't have a say.) I just read that MN has passed a law to "close the equity gap in pay." Absurd on its face, but this bill is supposedly needed to fix the race and gender pay gap, which was set up to favor those nefarious white men. It doesn't matter what studies (about the alleged pay gap) have shown, it's their political wedge issue. For years I've said; "America is like this big, complicated machine, and all the time we see someone on the Left trying to strip a piece off, and just blithely assume that it will continue to work without that piece." Like a load bearing wall, it will trigger a breakdown / collapse, and while those fools deserve to suffer the consequences, in our system of government, the wise will suffer, too. The weirdest thing is, the Left acts like you don't know what you're talking about, John. Yet it's so blatantly obvious to me, it leaves me bewildered. Is it stupidity, or obtuseness, or power madness, or a witch's brew of all of that?
What made this nation work, was the secret sauce of all human advancement: the responsible exercise of individual initiative; unencumbered by others who think they Know Better™ and have the means to impose their thinking as the One True Way. Not only the innovators with the confidence to ask "Why not?", when others ask "why should you?", but ordinary people facing mundane problems that combined common sense, their own insights, and that initiative to simply better their lot and "brighten the corner where they are", as the old hymn put it,
That is what most of this nation has forgotten. Instead, we have centralized decision-making by that elite few who think they Know Better™, who believe that faceless, industrial approaches and economies of scale can be applied to solve problems with up to 330 million living, breathing INDIVIDUAL variables in this nation alone. That's akin to trying to text on your smartphone with a sledgehammer.
That elite few has impressive CV's and resumes - but what they don't have, is the proximity- and consequence-informed insight of the individual as to what works for themselves. Yet the elite press on, with the end result usually helping some at the expense of others ... the rights of those others be damned.
And all of us, to at least some degree, have fallen right in line with this hierarchy.
Why have we done that? For decades, we have diminished the value of individual insight. unless it is coming from someone who is assumed to Know Better™ because they have the right credentials, held respected positions, has achieved a measure of cultural popularity, and/or are skilled at presenting a case, merits optional.
This attitude was inculcated in us from our earliest school days, when we were told by Teacher to just trust him/her, and cooperate. And it has been reinforced all our lives, by our elevation of education and SCIENCE! to the equivalent of Yang holy words, that are considered to be beyond the ability of ordinary people to add to and/or challenge them.
We have come to consider the consensus of such authorities as conclusively-proven fact. And we have subordinated the freedom to exercise one's initiative to "the common good" as deemed by this Pedestaled Elite. But we have forgotten that they are as human, as limited in perception, as prone to error/greed/lies/delusions as the rest of us - and therefore should not be in a position to impose their thinking upon us.
Not only have we elevated them, we have sold our own abilities short as though they are shares of GameStop, and don't even make the effort to even just protect ourselves from their failures - let alone fully apply that secret sauce to the best of our ability. We instead wait around, in Flounderian trust, for that Pedestaled Elite - in business, in unions, in academia, in the media, in government - to solve our problems FOR us ... as they misallocate our resources and paint us into corners in their myopic attempts to help us.
And it isn't changing, regardless of who is in power, unless ordinary people regain the confidence to question the world around them, then build trust in their own insights and NOT delegate their decisions to the Pedestaled Elite - even if that looks like more risk and effort for them.
There might be two comments relevant here: (1) The deep state, or whatever one wants to term that self-ordained mob, is international to its roots. The mob's membership extends deeply into Europe, at the least, even though some holding United States Citizenship are active in that collection also. (2) Their actions, as a group, reflect the power of the European members, once again self-validated as more cultural, more civilized than we in the colonies (and our "new money insecurities are vulnerable to the European look-down the nose implications). The euros' behavior is a form of penis envy of the USA, because we saved their bacon twice and that cannot stand in their world. The goal is to bring the USA down to their collective level as aged and infirm societies. They well-know how to do that and have been busy at it for decades now.
Trump was a member of the Uniparty in his real estate developer days but he had to flip the party the bird in order to run as an ersatz outsider. I made two predictions during the 2020 primary season that ended up coming true: Trump would lose the general election and the Uniparty would throw everything they could at him in trying to get him on some sort of legal technicality.
I take no pleasure in having been right, but here we are.
What if the government is already illegitimate? Is it possible that the jenga tower has already fallen, and the pundits just keep on going like there's still a game to win?
Both parties have gone insane, just on different issues.
Democrats believe in open borders that destroy cities (says the mayor of NYC) and working class wages, that people can change their biological sex that destroys the rights of women to privacy and fair sports competition and encourage the sterilization of children as "gender affirming care". They encourage homelessness, crime, and endless deficits. They discriminate against Asians and poor whites seeking education. Their leadership consists of an addled old man and a vacuous, word salad spouting, DEI selected idiot.
Republicans deny the climate change that threatens humanity, denounce the vaccines that reduce deaths from disease, believe that this ( . ) is a 👶 which destroys women's futures, and support a sociopath for president.
The destruction is intentional. 9/11/01 can be chosen as the exactl moment the arson fire began. Then came the fraud of Covid enabling the coup of Biden. Congress is a castrati and the public Hamilton's great beast. Civil War is more likely than not if elections are permitted to go forward under fraudulent circumstances. And this in turn is necessary for the North American Union. As we go down in Yugoslav style civil war China waits and is ready to help the Coup. NATO waits and is ready to help the Coup. And the WEF cheers.
GK Chesterton's allegory of the fence across the road. The traveling newcomer says, "this fence is in my way, tear it down." He states this imperative without knowing why the fence was erected in the first place. It made sense to someone in the past and the rationale for the fence across the road may still be applicable. But without an examination/evaluation of that rationale under the current conditions, one should not destroy the fence.
As a retired Army officer, I understand (but don't necessarily agree with) the drive to rename forts and posts that were named for Confederates -- we erased all traces of Nazi/Wehrmacht insignia on the posts and facilities we took over after WWII. What I do not understand is the drive to erase those monuments that are specifically dedicated to reconciliation after the Civil War, specifically the one in Arlington and the one that's the class gift from the Class of 1961 (the Civil War Centennial class) at West Point. If the opposing side is erased, then with whom exactly did the victorious Union forces reconcile? Stupid overreach. I watch other political, social, and economic foundations of my country being trashed for no reason other than they are "old" and the "products of the white patriarchy" despite their necessity to continue to grow and refine our country through goals and processes that are just.
The United States is an idea, different than a nationality, ethnicity, sectarian territory, which had been the basis for countries prior to the US. We are now bringing in large numbers of people who do not subscribe to that idea (along with their domestic enablers) -- they only want what the idea produces and they think the country will continue to produce those desired items in the absence of the idea.
Good essay, John, thanks for writing this. I try to look at things logically, but I feel like it's futile in today's political environment. Everything the Left demands is based on how they feel about it. Whether it will work or not seems to be irrelevant. "At least we tried- I support that"- and worst of all, "we didn't try hard enough, that's why it didn't work." (The corollary to that being, lets make sure those MAGA republicans don't have a say.) I just read that MN has passed a law to "close the equity gap in pay." Absurd on its face, but this bill is supposedly needed to fix the race and gender pay gap, which was set up to favor those nefarious white men. It doesn't matter what studies (about the alleged pay gap) have shown, it's their political wedge issue. For years I've said; "America is like this big, complicated machine, and all the time we see someone on the Left trying to strip a piece off, and just blithely assume that it will continue to work without that piece." Like a load bearing wall, it will trigger a breakdown / collapse, and while those fools deserve to suffer the consequences, in our system of government, the wise will suffer, too. The weirdest thing is, the Left acts like you don't know what you're talking about, John. Yet it's so blatantly obvious to me, it leaves me bewildered. Is it stupidity, or obtuseness, or power madness, or a witch's brew of all of that?
There is another dimension to this problem.
What made this nation work, was the secret sauce of all human advancement: the responsible exercise of individual initiative; unencumbered by others who think they Know Better™ and have the means to impose their thinking as the One True Way. Not only the innovators with the confidence to ask "Why not?", when others ask "why should you?", but ordinary people facing mundane problems that combined common sense, their own insights, and that initiative to simply better their lot and "brighten the corner where they are", as the old hymn put it,
That is what most of this nation has forgotten. Instead, we have centralized decision-making by that elite few who think they Know Better™, who believe that faceless, industrial approaches and economies of scale can be applied to solve problems with up to 330 million living, breathing INDIVIDUAL variables in this nation alone. That's akin to trying to text on your smartphone with a sledgehammer.
That elite few has impressive CV's and resumes - but what they don't have, is the proximity- and consequence-informed insight of the individual as to what works for themselves. Yet the elite press on, with the end result usually helping some at the expense of others ... the rights of those others be damned.
And all of us, to at least some degree, have fallen right in line with this hierarchy.
Why have we done that? For decades, we have diminished the value of individual insight. unless it is coming from someone who is assumed to Know Better™ because they have the right credentials, held respected positions, has achieved a measure of cultural popularity, and/or are skilled at presenting a case, merits optional.
This attitude was inculcated in us from our earliest school days, when we were told by Teacher to just trust him/her, and cooperate. And it has been reinforced all our lives, by our elevation of education and SCIENCE! to the equivalent of Yang holy words, that are considered to be beyond the ability of ordinary people to add to and/or challenge them.
We have come to consider the consensus of such authorities as conclusively-proven fact. And we have subordinated the freedom to exercise one's initiative to "the common good" as deemed by this Pedestaled Elite. But we have forgotten that they are as human, as limited in perception, as prone to error/greed/lies/delusions as the rest of us - and therefore should not be in a position to impose their thinking upon us.
Not only have we elevated them, we have sold our own abilities short as though they are shares of GameStop, and don't even make the effort to even just protect ourselves from their failures - let alone fully apply that secret sauce to the best of our ability. We instead wait around, in Flounderian trust, for that Pedestaled Elite - in business, in unions, in academia, in the media, in government - to solve our problems FOR us ... as they misallocate our resources and paint us into corners in their myopic attempts to help us.
And it isn't changing, regardless of who is in power, unless ordinary people regain the confidence to question the world around them, then build trust in their own insights and NOT delegate their decisions to the Pedestaled Elite - even if that looks like more risk and effort for them.
There might be two comments relevant here: (1) The deep state, or whatever one wants to term that self-ordained mob, is international to its roots. The mob's membership extends deeply into Europe, at the least, even though some holding United States Citizenship are active in that collection also. (2) Their actions, as a group, reflect the power of the European members, once again self-validated as more cultural, more civilized than we in the colonies (and our "new money insecurities are vulnerable to the European look-down the nose implications). The euros' behavior is a form of penis envy of the USA, because we saved their bacon twice and that cannot stand in their world. The goal is to bring the USA down to their collective level as aged and infirm societies. They well-know how to do that and have been busy at it for decades now.
Trump was a member of the Uniparty in his real estate developer days but he had to flip the party the bird in order to run as an ersatz outsider. I made two predictions during the 2020 primary season that ended up coming true: Trump would lose the general election and the Uniparty would throw everything they could at him in trying to get him on some sort of legal technicality.
I take no pleasure in having been right, but here we are.
What if the government is already illegitimate? Is it possible that the jenga tower has already fallen, and the pundits just keep on going like there's still a game to win?
Both parties have gone insane, just on different issues.
Democrats believe in open borders that destroy cities (says the mayor of NYC) and working class wages, that people can change their biological sex that destroys the rights of women to privacy and fair sports competition and encourage the sterilization of children as "gender affirming care". They encourage homelessness, crime, and endless deficits. They discriminate against Asians and poor whites seeking education. Their leadership consists of an addled old man and a vacuous, word salad spouting, DEI selected idiot.
Republicans deny the climate change that threatens humanity, denounce the vaccines that reduce deaths from disease, believe that this ( . ) is a 👶 which destroys women's futures, and support a sociopath for president.
A pox on both their houses.
The destruction is intentional. 9/11/01 can be chosen as the exactl moment the arson fire began. Then came the fraud of Covid enabling the coup of Biden. Congress is a castrati and the public Hamilton's great beast. Civil War is more likely than not if elections are permitted to go forward under fraudulent circumstances. And this in turn is necessary for the North American Union. As we go down in Yugoslav style civil war China waits and is ready to help the Coup. NATO waits and is ready to help the Coup. And the WEF cheers.