Israel Cracks the Whip

By now, we should all be used to the idea that no one has a chance of being nominated for president by either of the major parties without first having been vetted by Israel, and, being found worthy, received the Zionist Seal of Approval. We have become so accustomed to this historically-unprecedented situation that we just take it for granted, and nary a voice of protest is raised when the proceedings are described in grotesque detail in the mainstream media.

I describe the situation as “historically unprecedented”, but that's not quite true. If we adopt a colonial model, it fits quite well, in fact. The old European colonial powers were fond of putting up puppets and empty suits as “leaders” of their colonies – ones who would have some credibility with the natives, since they were of that extraction. But in fact, these puppets were servants of the colonial powers, and cared little or not at all for the welfare of their fellow countrymen. Even in cases where there was the semblance of an election, you can be sure that all of the “viable” candidates came from the same source, i.e. the vetting process on the part of the colonialists. And the servitude of the selected figurehead was carried out in many forms – diplomatic, political, economic, social... even spiritual.

And so it is in this case – again, if we adopt the colonial model with Israel as the colonial power and us as the colony. And are they not, in fact, our diplomatic, political, and economic masters... and do they not have a lot to say about even our society and our religious practices? I used to think the best model was that of Israel being the 51^st state, but I realized that was much too conservative – we would never devote this level of resources to any one state, to say nothing of relying on it as our main source of foreign policy.

So what is remarkable in all this is not, after all, the fact of a colonizer and a colony; these pairings have been around throughout most of recorded history. What is remarkable is the means by which the situation came about. Israel did not take us by force of arms, or even economically in the direct sense. The deed was accomplished almost entirely through diplomacy – but not without plenty of, let's say, economic and political “incentives” (including, I imagine, a good deal of bribery and blackmail). And of course there had to be plenty of what is called “softening up the battlefield” -- the primary weapon in that case being the Holocaust narrative (which I have, in previous posts, characterized as a “true myth”). Falling all over ourselves in the late 1940s to accommodate the Jews, who had been through so much, did not seem unreasonable – and the diplomatic folly that accompanied it was not recognized as folly at the time, nor is it recognized as such to this day, except by a very few. And yet when you look at the “War on Terror”, and our uneasy (at best) relations with the Islamic world, that's where it all started. So the costs of our “eternal alliance” with Israel are incalculable, and increasing with every passing day... and yet the reaction of our leaders, politicians, and major parties is to simply direct more of our national wealth toward this cause (and “cause” is the right word, since it makes absolutely no sense from a pragmatic/realistic point of view).

This is the baseline which must form the basis for any realistic discussion of Israel, the Near East, the Middle East, and terrorism – and, for that reason, is universally ignored by politicians and the media. Any “intractable” diplomatic, economic, or social problem can be traced to some form of dogmatism or rigid thinking on the part of the people involved – a failure of imagination, or of “thinking outside the box”. There are countless Gordian Knots scattered across the American landscape waiting for some Alexander to come along and cut them, ignoring the niceties of politics – but I see no such person anywhere in the political landscape outside of the paleoconservative ranks... and they aren't allowed to get anywhere near any of our real problems on the off chance that they might solve them.

So with that as background, let us consider the latest gambit on the part of our friendly enemy – the accusation that we are, somehow, secretly negotiating with Iran and promising to not get involved if Iran is attacked by Israel. Now granted, this report came out in an Israeli newspaper – but what are the chances that the Israeli press is any more independent, and any less a servant of the regime, than the American press is? Slim to none, I'd say. In other words, if it wound up in an Israeli paper it wound up there for a reason – just as any pro-government article in the New York Times or the Washington Post would. It would, at the very least, constitute a “feeler” or “trial balloon”, designed to get a reaction or to accomplish something diplomatically or in terms of public relations.

So what, then, would be the point of an accusation like this? First we have to consider alternative cases, such as: (1) It's not true, and the accusers know this; (2) It's true, and the accusers know that; or (3) The accusers aren't certain. In the first case, the point would be to, by accusing them of something that is not (yet) the case, warn Obama and his State Department, AKA Hillary's Playhouse, to not even think about negotiating, or making any sort of deal, with Iran. Which is another way of telling Obama & Co. not to wander off the reservation at this critical time (as if there was ever a non-critical time for Israel) – which reflects the chronic paranoia of the Israelis, since when has any American president or his administration ever wandered off the reservation? Never, as far as I know – but it never hurts to yank on the choke chain now and then just to remind everyone who's boss.

I think we can dismiss the second case (It's true, and the accusers know that) simply because we have not spoken a word to Iran since the hostage crisis... and, as far as I know, don't intend to. The hostage-taking was an act even more inexcusable than Cuba going communist – and we know how that served to rigidify our relations with Cuba for all these many years. Besides, what possible utility would secret negotiations with Iran have? They've been trying to provoke a war with us and Israel for years now... they have their reasons, I suppose (or, alternatively, are totally insane)... and what could we possibly tell, or promise, them that would serve to modify their behavior? Furthermore, doing anything behind Israel's back (1) is impossible, owing to the skills of their intelligence service and the fact that they have agents scattered throughout our government; and (2) would violate our repeated “BFF” pledges of eternal alliance, etc. Unconditional commitment to Israel is, possibly, the most profound and deeply-rooted element of our international and diplomatic identity and self-image, and we're simply not going to allow it to be threatened by any sort of momentary expediency, even should one be perceived to exist.

As to the third case (The accusers aren't certain) – once again, there are ample reasons for bringing us back into line now and then, even when we haven't stepped out of line. See, ultimately, the Israelis don't trust us. We may be a good and loyal servant, who never openly rebels, but... who knows what evil lurks in our goyish hearts? Even “trusties” in a prison get locked up at night. And besides, America is full of all sorts of suspicious characters, all of whom are likely to be “anti-Semitic” just below the surface, if not on it. Think about “white supremacists”, Klansmen, American Moslems, Catholics... even some black people (“After all I done for you”... etc.)! And how about those “haters”, the paleocons? And the libertarians, who might be neutral when it comes to race and religion, but who tend to be isolationist when it comes to foreign affairs? Surely we can't have that. So no, the United States can't be trusted – especially when it has a president who might be half Moslem... or something.

But let's not overlook the extent to which the story might make sense. Supposedly, we offered Iran our non-involvement in an attack by Israel in order to keep Iran from attacking our “interests” in the Gulf. Well... what are our interests in the Gulf? Oil, certainly – but mainly strategic interests centered on our alliance with Israel. So we're telling Iran that we won't join Israel in attacking them as long as they don't attack our resources that only exist in order to support Israel? I hope some wise mufti in Iran can make sense of this, 'cause I sure can't. If Iran sees – correctly – our foreign policy and Israel's as one and the same, then it can – also correctly – see Israel's military resources and ours as one and the same. So what sense would it make for them to hold off on retaliating against our “interests” when those interests are also the interests of Israel?  Presumably someone in the Obama administration – yes, even there! -- is realistic enough to realize this.

It is amusing, however, to see Israel cracking the whip at this very delicate time in our political life – i.e. that quadrennial season when we go through the motions of a “democratic process” and pretend that the American citizen actually has a voice in who our next figurehead will be. This is a drama that, for all its absurdity, is held sacred, and any threatened disturbance is greeted with great apprehension. There is always talk of an “October surprise”, for example – a dirty trick of some sort that one party plays on the other in order to insure victory. But what if the October surprise comes from outside our borders – from overseas? And from an “ally” to boot? Now surely that would be a most indelicate and etiquette-defying thing. So the very threat of something like that is enough to get our politicians' attention, regardless of content, truth value, or ultimate consequences.

There is another nuance to this business, however, that it would be wrong to overlook. An Israeli official, in response to the allegations, opined that “There would be no need to make such a promise to the Iranians because they realize the last thing they need is to attack U.S. targets and draw massive U.S. bombing raids.” But do the Iranians realize this? Seems doubtful, otherwise why would they have been provoking us for years, defying us, and practically inviting an attack? We have to remember that Islamists are not afraid of death; they glory in it, in fact. And they are not concerned with civilian casualties except as propaganda and recruiting tools (which means, the more the better). They have already seen the effect of our invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan – only a strengthening of resistance and of radical Islam. So why not join the fun? Why not provoke an attack, then once attacked use that to further energize Islamic resistance to Western invasion, occupation, meddling, and economic imperialism? We gave Iraq and Afghanistan all we had in the way of conventional weaponry, and they still fought back; what are we going to do, nuke Tehran? Even that might not work. So no, the reasoning of the Israeli official makes sense if one possesses a “Western” mind set about these things... but to the inscrutable Arab/Islamist mind it's just crazy talk. And it's this lack of comprehension, in fact, that has proven such a barrier to our success (by any normal standard) in that region – not that we were necessarily looking for success, but still...

The Lesser of Two Weevils

To give credit where credit is due, Mitt Romney's selection of Paul Ryan as his running mate is the best choice he could have made out of the field of eligibles. Ryan has proposed the least insane budget to come down the pike in many a decade... this, assuming that Job One for America is still empire-building, which it should not be, because empire-building, besides being unconstitutional, immoral, and unjust, also eats into the body politic and into our wealth and well-being more than any New Deal or Great Society program ever could. And, as has already been pointed out, Ryan is by no means a “budget conservative” -- he is, in fact, a hard-core neocon, as is Romney. But at least Romney had the sense not to choose a fanatic or a nut case, so I guess back-handed compliments are in order. What we have now is twin Mr. Cleans – both whiter than white. So yes, it's a choice, all right – but mostly an illusory one.

Even Pat Buchanan admits (in Wednesday's column) that the choice of Ryan is “gutsy” -- a way to “convert this dismal campaign into a stark choice of philosophies and policies”. Well... I don't know how “stark” the choice is, because, as I've pointed out before, when it comes down to actual cases a Romney/Ryan foreign policy would be identical to Obama's, and domestically it would amount to no more than tweaking at the margins. The problem is that nearly everything in the budget has become “non-discretionary”, which means that even the president can do little to stop, or even mildly divert, the juggernaut that is the national drive toward economic catastrophe. The Ryan budget, if ever enacted, would be akin to, as the expression goes, rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Again, I say that every time someone comes along promising to “throw the rascals out”, all we wind up with is a new set of rascals. I'm not going to go so far as to say this was inevitable all along – i.e. from the very beginning – but, given the structure of our government, it was the most likely result of 200+ years of gradual erosion.

A related issue, which we have already seen discussed at length, is the preservation of “capitalism”. Obama, the Democrats, and liberals in general have been trying to do away with this dreaded monstrosity for generations now, and Republicans and conservatives have been holding the line, or so they contend, or believe. My point has always been that capitalism – the pure form, or as pure as it gets – is alive, if not well, in the small business sector (i.e., what the middle class does), whereas what big business (the ruling elite) does is more like corporate socialism, AKA fascism. So Obama and crew are at least half right on that count – although it does appear that Romney has been less guilty of this offense than most. It remains the case, however, that small business and the middle class are, and have been, punished for the sins of big business and the ruling elite; and this has been true for, again, many generations. (This is even true within the halls of government, by the way. Small and “innocent” agencies are regularly punished for the sins and offenses of large, powerful, and guilty agencies, which get off scot-free. It's good to be king, in other words – as long as there are plenty of scapegoats to go around.)

And this is not to say that capitalism, and capitalists, have not contributed greatly to the overall wealth and prosperity of society. Anything one compares this system with falls woefully short. The political issue, as always, is not one of aggregate wealth or prosperity, but of that will-o-the-wisp called “fairness”. In the name of fairness, liberal/collectivist/totalitarian regimes have, for nearly 100 years now, leveled the playing field by making everyone poor – except, of course, the ruling elite. But given a choice between a two-class system (controllers and proletariat) and a three-class system (rich, middle class, and poor), liberals and “theoreticians” will choose the two-class model every time. And in fact, it seems that now, no matter which side of the usual political divide one is on, one is working toward a two-class system – as the “Great Recession” and its aftermath demonstrate. Suddenly the middle class is everyone's enemy, not just the elite's – although Romney and his ilk will never admit it, and even Obama finds it convenient to mouth words about the middle class, which he clearly despises.

So Buchanan applauds the choice while not raining on their parade by mentioning that, as he said in a previous column, a vote for the Republicans is a vote for war -- not that a vote for the Democrats isn't – but with Romney in charge we would likely get more and bigger wars sooner. I mean... gosh, people, the guy has already as much as promised to attack Iran the first day he's in office. How much more do you need to know?

But there is another angle to all this. I heard an argument over the weekend that, given the frontal attacks Obama is making on the Catholic Church, electing Romney would at least put off disaster for a while longer, and not because Ryan is Catholic ('cause so is Joe Biden, and look at all the good that has done!). As a Mormon, Romney presumably believes in the rights of religious minorities, whereas in Obama's book religion always has to defer to government in all matters. So now we're supposed to go to the polls with the question foremost in our minds, “Is it good for the Catholic Church?” -- which reminds me of the oft-cited criterion “Is it good for the Jews?” Well, yes – this is what it's come to, when the culture wars come up to our very doorstep. No one can complain about a “sharply divided electorate” when the government itself is the aggressor.

But even the argument “other things being equal”, while valid on its face (given the lack of significant policy differences between Obama and Romney), is not good enough, and I'll tell you why. While one can debate endlessly as to the constitutionality of any given domestic program or policy, the situation with regard to foreign policy, i.e. war, is quite clear. It's contained in “just war doctrine”, and according to this, none of the wars we are fighting at this point qualify – and this holds true at least as far back as World War II. So if unjust wars are immoral, then a vote to continue unjust wars, or initiate new ones, is a vote in support of an immoral act. So even if one votes for Romney based on his supposed more tolerant attitude toward the Catholic Church, one would still be voting, and supporting, immoral acts. And we also know (or should know) that it's wrong to commit sin so that some good may come of it. So this is the answer to that argument, even if said argument is – as was pointed out – much more nuanced than the usual “lesser of two evils” argument. Catholics might not be sorry if Romney won, but a vote for him would be just as wrong as a vote for Obama.

You Are a Conspiracy Theorist

Well, OK, I can't say that for certain. You might be a Buddhist monk, for instance. But, chances are, if you're even remotely like a normal American, you're a conspiracy theorist. “But! But!” -- you'll say -- “I'm not a 'truther' or a 'birther'... I still believe JFK was killed by a lone nut with a gun... I couldn't care less about contrails, alien autopsies, the CIA, the Bohemian Grove, the Council on Foreign Relations, etc. etc...”

Well, OK then – but are you also saying that you believe everything any politician says? No? OK... then, do you think it's possible that politicians get together now and then to compare notes, and to decide what particular kinds of mild deceit they're going to foist off on the American public next? Yes? Maybe? Bingo! You're a conspiracy theorist. Not a big one, perhaps... mild, low-key... but one nonetheless.

See, it isn't that hard to fall into this mindset. All you have to do is consider that those in power don't always tell the truth, and that they are not all acting as independent, free agents in this matter. So welcome to the club. But... wait... I know, you aren't about to go out and have yourself fitted for a tinfoil hat... or start hoarding gold bars... or storing up freeze-dried food. You still think that things are basically “OK” with this society, and that our leaders still have our best interests are heart, even if they show occasional signs of being fallen human beings. In other words, even if political games are being played pretty much all the time, there are no systematic conspiracies against the American people or their interests. Right? Except that the Tea Partiers, who represent a considerable chunk of the “conservative” portion of the populace, do seem to think that there are systematic, long-term conspiracies against the American people, on the part of liberals, “agents of change”, culture warriors, socialists, communists, collectivists of all stripes, Keynesians, the Fed, and so on. And the Tea Partiers are not even the most conservative or “right-wing” group among the populace; far from it. They are, in a sense, the newest addition to the political landscape – the people who have just awakened from their slumbers of many decades, called to attention by the cries of the mob for the heads of the middle class.

Then on the other side you have liberals, socialists, collectivists, etc. for whom paranoia is a way of life, since they have been, from the very cradle, engaged in a constant battle against “the man” -- against “fascism”, and big business, and law enforcement, and the military, and so on. And for every skirmish in the culture wars, there is a script that goes along with it, which is typically of the conspiracy theory type. It's always about those in power having ulterior motives... an unspoken agenda... goals that have nothing to do with their stated mission... etc.

Then we have the libertarians, who... well, basically, they agree with both sides, in terms of who is out to get them... or where the conspiracies are. Another way of putting it is, as I frequently think, the Left is correct about the Right and the Right is correct about the Left. Everything the Tea Partiers think is wrong with the country is, and everything the Occupy crowd thinks is wrong also is. Where their reality testing breaks down is in the area of insight, or self-knowledge. The Left talks about “rights” but advocates totalitarianism... and the Right talks about “small government” but advocates perpetual war. And so on. And the things each side proposes as cures for the situation are certain to lead to even greater catastrophes. For example, both sides in the current landscape of protest and debate think that government is the answer – even though, for the Tea Partiers, government is also the problem (and it is for the Left as well, but they'll never admit it). Both sides believe in some form of totalitarian oppression – the difference being in who is oppressed, and for what reason, and by whom. The option of just leaving people the hell alone never occurs to anyone – except the libertarians, who are considered beyond the pale. Believing in liberty, and individual rights, is considered “unrealistic” in this day and age – that is, if you accept the Regime's definition of what is or is not realistic.

So if all these people, according to my broad definition, are conspiracy theorists, who is left? Or, it might be of more interest to ask, if all of these people are, technically, conspiracy theorists, then what is it that differs them from the people they call conspiracy theorists? Is it a matter of degree, or of kind? If the pot is calling the kettle black, then are we, in fact, dealing with two shades of black? One variable that might shed light on the issue is the age-old question, who is really in charge? Now we know that politicians, on all levels, receive plenty of support from a great variety of individuals and organizations, all of which can be assumed to have a vested interest in the outcome of elections, and in the activities of the politicians they support. But this still assumes that it's the politicians who have the power, as supposedly granted to them by the people. They are still, ultimately, the “deciders”. But what if it turned out that the politicians were just “suits” -- just front men – sock puppets – and that the real power resided in not only their known supporters, but even more behind the scenes? There are certainly plenty of precedents for this point of view, and no, it wasn't just in the “bad old days” that things of this sort occurred. Things may have been cruder and more blatant then, but the only change between then and now is the subtlety of the process. We may not see the power behind the throne, but it's there.

But where, then, is the evidence? Well, where would you expect it to be – mainly in the sorts of programs, policies, and legislation sponsored and supported by the politicians in question. Are they in the interests of the American people, or of special interest groups, or in no one's interest, as far as can be determined? There is plenty of unexplained and senseless legislation and regulation out there, and the question in those cases is our old favorite, “cui bono?” -- who benefits? If we consider the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan – arguably a fairly large chunk of our national budget – do they confer any discernible benefit on the American people? Not that I can tell. So then, we have to look to financial and political benefit to special interest groups – or to other nations. But what makes an elected official act in a way that is systematically against the interests of his own constituents? Clearly, a desire to remain in office and to increase in power and wealth... or, on the other side of the coin, good, old-fashioned fear. Fear of what? Disgrace, loss of reputation... things determined by the media (and who do they work for, by the way?)... even, in extreme cases, assassination (including “making it look like an accident” -- and there is a whole subset of conspiracy theory on this topic). Our politicians – our leaders – live in a bizarro world where all the promises they made on the way to the top have to be not only broken, but actually turned into their opposites. And there is nothing new about this. (Remember Woodrow Wilson, who was re-elected in 1916 because “he kept us out of war”?)

Another way of putting this is that all politicians, when seeking office, claim to be working for “the will of the people”. Once in office, they wind up working for the will of some of the people – usually those with power and influence. And the day may come when they don't seem to be working for the will of any of the people. This is the point at which one would think they would be removed from office, except few ever are. Sometimes we have to dig deep to answer the question, “cui bono?” -- but the answer always comes up eventually. And it's not always about money! And it's not always about overt power – given that money and power are fungible to a great extent. It may actually be about ideas – but not ones that the average person subscribes to, or even thinks about. And it may be about religion, despite our reverenced “wall of separation”. What is adds up to is that “the people” are deceived – chronically, profoundly, and repeatedly. The political world is kept alive for them by the use of word magic, superficial ideas, memes, promises of a better tomorrow, etc. And no amount of evidence that politicians are master deceivers and exploiters can sway the ignorant masses. Even the ones who don't vote are living according to the ideas that some politician, at some point, implanted in their skulls – either directly or via the media, public schools, or churches.

Now, the enlightened among our ruling elite – the subscribers to the Leviathan theory of government, if you will... or the Machiavellian theory – will say (in private) that it's actually better for the people if they are deceived, if they believe in anything rather than nothing, even if it's totally false. Because they are like so many sheep, and they need guidance lest they plunge headlong off a cliff. And besides, they are consumers, and sources of cheap labor, and where would our military be without them? This is, of course, an elitist and anti-democratic point of view, and yet I daresay that it lies at the heart of nearly all politicians' actions, and even more so at the heart of the actions of those who control our politicians. Everyone wants to consider themselves part of the elite – part of the 1% -- and our politicians are more deceived than most in this matter. They can be wined and dined at the tables of the ruling elite for a season, but when their time in the sun is over with, they are easily discarded – and deservedly so. The only thing they have of value, to offer their masters, is their face – their curb appeal. Once that is tarnished, they are of no further use and are treated as such.

But hold on – we were talking about conspiracy theories here, and now we're talking about deception. But isn't it the same thing? Don't we see, basically, a united front among our politicians and the media when it comes to most of the really important issues? For every question that is permitted to be asked, there are ten that are not – ten that are “begged”. Budget “debates” are typically about no more than 2% or 3% of the total – or (even more trivially) about minuscule “rates of increase”. Contrast the discussion of the defense budget, for instance, with Ron Paul's recommendations. Contrast just about anything with Ron Paul's recommendations, and you'll see what I mean – it's twiddling at the margins versus real change. And so the twiddlers exert themselves, and turn beet-red, and shout and rave on the floors of Congress... over, basically, nothing. But they have to keep up appearances, because one of the core memes of our society is that we have a “two-party system” and that those parties actually mean something.

So far, I've just been laying the groundwork – a baseline of competing conspiracy theories – the top layer, if you will -- that roughly correspond with political parties, “visions” of America, race, social class, etc. -- the everyday stuff of politics, in other words. We are, you might say, at the top of the bell curve – the “fat” part, where most of the data are located. At the low end are those Candide-esque oddballs who persist in believing that the government has our best interests at heart, and that politicians are engaged in an honest effort to actualize those interests. (I don't know who those people are – I've never met any myself – but I assume they exist.) But now we must take a long, slow slide – with great fear and trembling – down the other side, and try, along the way, to define the major bumps in the road.

On the “who's in charge” dimension, for example, we can pause to acknowledge the respective theories of Right and Left. The Right thinks that, any time there is a Democratic president, he (or she, theoretically) represents the forces of collectivism, totalitarianism, socialism, and the remnants, newly-shape-shifted, of communism. Which means, in turn, that that president answers not to the American people but to an international globalist, socialist, collectivist cabal that is the modern-day successor to the international communist conspiracy of old. Far-fetched? Well, isn't that what many people think about Obama? I mean, they may not always say it, but it's inherent in what they do say. And isn't that what most critiques of the U.N. were about, at least up until the “War on Terror”?

The Left, on the other hand, ever eager to burnish their paranoid armor, blames it all (whatever “it” is) on Big Business, and Wall Street, and racism/sexism/homophobia, and “hate”, and religion in general, and on the South, and on Chick-fil-A... and so on. Their theory typically doesn't extend to the international level, since they believe (a legacy of communism) that “if only we could be more like other countries” in terms of health care, tolerance, culture, wine and cheese, etc. Their answer to everything that is wrong with America is that America should be less like itself and more like other places – which explains their reverence for the U.N. and other international groups. The only way for the U.S. to vindicate itself for all past sins and offenses is to throw itself on some kind of cosmic funeral pyre and be reabsorbed into the great Nothingness that is global politics and the global economy. For this reason, we should go around the world “supporting” things – just about anything you can name – up to the point where we'll collapse from all this “supporting”. (And isn't this exactly what we see in our foreign policy, which is a creation, by and large, of liberals, even though it winds up being exploited by the Right as well?)

So the first major conceptual, or metaphysical, bump in the road is the notion that Americans are no longer (assuming they ever were) masters of their own fate – economically, militarily, culturally, and in every other way. And there is, in fact, plenty of evidence for this view. We are, militarily, at the beck and call of any other country we have a “mutual defense agreement” with – which is another way of saying that we'll defend them, but if someone ever attacks us they won't answer the phone. Economically, consider that we are on the hook to bail out Europe, not vice-versa. Consider also that many “domestic” banks are not domestic at all; if you get high enough up in the chain of command you find yourself in Europe. The top of many American pyramids (if not pyramid schemes), corporate and financial, is in Europe these days, which means that we are becoming more and more of a colony and less self-governing.

Now, you might say, but isn't the European economy in deep trouble? And isn't the euro on the ropes? And how about all those “PIIGS” that are leeching resources away from the productive, solvent countries? Well... frankly, I think a lot of that is just play-acting... a hoax, in fact, to draw us in and get us to commit resources (more “support”). I mean, look at the scam they played on us to get us into World War I. If it worked nearly 100 years ago, why can't it work now, when we are much more severely entangled in the European economy and when our own banks and other businesses so often answer to European masters?

Plus, frankly, we have troubles the Europeans don't have – have never dreamed of, in fact. Foremost is our insane military commitments and involvements. We have a race problem, and they have an immigrant problem which we also have. We're exhausting ourselves fighting a War on Drugs and a War on Terror, and wars on just about everything else you can imagine, while they just sit back and enjoy the show. What they are waiting for, basically, is for us to collapse of our own weight and our own folly, at which point they will move in and deal the final blow to our sovereignty. We have been good and faithful servants for, again, 100-odd years, and now it's time to put us out to pasture. The American experiment, about which they were always skeptical, has run aground... and more realistic, cynical minds are waiting to install their vision in its place. I see this as just another example of the cycles of history – you can hate it, you can regret it, but you really can't do anything about it; it seems to be the product of unwritten laws. The Europeans too will have their comeuppance – perhaps sooner than they would like. After all, China is near.

OK, so that's one bump in the road. The average American persists in believing that we remain masters of our own fate, but the conspiracy theorist knows better. Whether the true masters are nonetheless American, or European, matters little since they answer only to their own globalist agenda and priorities, and national ties mean little or nothing... and forget about “patriotism” in any real sense.

Another question is “what is behind certain key events” -- especially the “history-changing” kind? The most recent example is, of course, 9/11... but there is also the Gulf of Tonkin incident, the JFK assassination, Pearl Harbor, and so on. We like to put events like these on a kind of pedestal, and declare them extra-historical... i.e., unique and “defining”, and, in a sense, pure. It seems to sully things if we start speculating that these events are simply highlights in the same old endless, dreary tale that we have – note! -- already agreed on. If government is truly as corrupt as we think it is, and if our fate has long since not been in our own hands, than what makes us think that these events are not also part of that narrative? We believe in dark and unseen forces when we're talking about organized crime, for instance – but seem willing to let government, or international cartels, off the hook, especially when it comes to major catastrophes. Again, it's that sentimental thing: Foreign governments and entities may wish us harm, or be indifferent to our welfare, but our own government must – simply must! -- ultimately be acting in our interests, or at least not blatantly against them. But we've already talked about unwinnable wars... and what about all the economic manipulations that we see going on daily among the Fed, the Treasury Department, Wall Street, big business, and international finance? Are you going to tell me that that's all intended to benefit the average American? Pass me that joint, dude.

And as far as getting us into war, were the Gulf of Tonkin or Pearl Harbor any worse than the mythological WMDs that got us to attack Iraq? We now know that those in power at the time knew that there were no WMDs, and that the whole thing was a hoax. At least the Japanese really did attack Pearl Harbor, even if we knew it was coming and intentionally did nothing about it.

It's all about consciousness-raising, really. It's not just about getting people to hate or distrust the government; it's about getting them to realize what the government has become. It is, at most times and in most cases, the enemy of the people – or at least of their best interests. And this too may be part of a historical cycle, as depressing as that idea is. Things that are “too big to fail” will eventually fail anyway – but the failure will be more painful and destructive because they weren't allowed to fail at the appropriate time. How do we get our own government to “fail” -- in the areas where it should, i.e. that are corrupt or unconstitutional? One idea – simply vote against all incumbents. Get rid of seniority, and of career politicians. Enforce term limits in the voting booth. Another idea – vote against war... consistently and without fail. Vote against follies like the War on Drugs. Vote against foreign aid – period. “Vote” our military home from all of its overseas adventures. “Vote” the intelligence community down to... oh, let's say, 1/10 the size it is now. Vote against subsidies – period. And so on.

Yeah, I know, I'm asking people to try and turn this country into what it's not, and never was. And what I suspect is that if people started taking these things seriously, our politicians would figure out a way around it, as they have so many times. If your vote doesn't count now, the day may come when we'll do away with the electoral process altogether, as just being too much trouble. (And the half of the populace that doesn't vote won't care a bit.)

But here's the point. If Iraqi WMDs were a scam, and the Gulf of Tonkin was a scam – not too hard to accept in either case – then Pearl Harbor could have been a scam as well. “But oh, in that case, we had a demigod on the throne in the form of FDR, and a man of that stature and vision could never have...” you know the rest. But then what about 9/11? -- the real litmus test of conspiracy theories in our time. We had George W. Bush, a known blockhead, surrounded by evil men, and an attack that played right into their hands and the hands of their supporters and cronies, both foreign and domestic. “But oh my, they couldn't possibly have had anything to do with it, because... well... because it's just too horrible to contemplate. Besides, they seem so normal in other respects – well-dressed, well-groomed... no, it's simply impossible.” Uh huh. Well, the Nazis were well-dressed and well-groomed too... and family men, by and large... and nice to their household pets... See, as much as we talk about “the banality of evil” we still don't accept it. Evil men have to be blood-red, with horns, and spouting sulfuric smoke from their nostrils – or at least have a tall hat and a pencil-thin mustache like Snidely Whipsnade. These pink, balding guys in the power suits... well, they aren't exactly warm and fuzzy, but... to stoop to this level of pure evil? Unthinkable. But that's precisely the point. That's the point at which we are all made to suspend disbelief and become unquestioning, shuffling serfs. Confronted with the Big Lie, the event that is outside of history, our brains turn to mush and we run for the nearest comfort station. But the powers that be know this, and use it, because their lust for power is greater than all of their other motivations – both good and bad – combined. It's greater than anything the average person can imagine. So no price is too great – but it's the average schmo who has to pay that price.

Prior to 9/11 there was, of course, the JFK assassination – that other litmus test. And there the divide was even more sharply defined – by the government itself and its media servants. It had to be “a lone nut with a gun”, period. Nothing else was possible, or permissible – because once any other idea entered your head, all was lost. Then it became a conspiracy, and the government became, at least, part of a cover-up, or perhaps an actual part of the conspiracy. Oswald did it, he got killed, case closed. It seldom gets cleaner than that. Except that it wasn't. There were hundreds, thousands, of contradictions, loose ends... witnesses of all sorts... revelations... Sound familiar? Yeah – 9/11 is turning out the same way. The best, most air-tight conspiracies in the world are still devised and implemented by imperfect people, and sooner or later it starts to show. But again, if you don't accept the government's version of events, than all is lost. Start asking questions... even just one question... and you're challenging all of the most treasured and fervently-held-to scripts and memes of our time. The government may not be perfect, and it may be full of crooks and incompetents, but gosh, surely.... etc. Again, they've got you, and it's because of what you value (and they don't) that you're unwilling to consider the alternatives. People down through the ages have known darn well that there's a difference between them and their rulers... but we seem to have lost sight of the fact. For us, because we're Americans living in a “democracy”, there is no gulf, no divide, between the rulers and the ruled; in fact, we rule ourselves! So any threat against the government, and against the popular myths it promotes, is a threat against ourselves, and therefore can't be tolerated.

So yeah, I would say that JFK and 9/11 are the major bumps in the road in our lifetime – the twin acid tests when it comes to conspiracy theories, and the “great divide” when it comes to our most deeply-held ideas about ourselves and the government. Everyone has to decide where they will stand along this continuum, and I guess it's based on pre-existing attitudes as well as on what information they are willing to attend to, and accept. Am I any more “objective” or “reality-based” than the chucklehead who saunters down to the polls every two (or four) years and thinks he's really “making a difference” -- who, basically, believes everything the government and the media tell him? I'd like to think so, but how to prove it? Is it just his belief system against mine? Surely he doesn't have access to one world of facts and I to another – that's just plain metaphysical anarchy (the kind Bill Clinton embraced when he talked about “which truth” one adheres to). And even if one is an unabashed “conspiracy theorist”, one doesn't have to believe every one that comes down the pike. Lines can still be drawn, but then the question is, what are the criteria for drawing those lines, and how valid are they? All anyone can do is establish a value system, choose a place to stand, but remain open to, or at least tolerant of, other possibilities.

Why Your Vote Means Nothing -- But Go Ahead, It Couldn't Hurt

As the election season goes into “full swing”... well, we tend to forget that there is always a campaign going on, the same way there are always wars going on. Perpetual campaigns and perpetual wars – that's America in our era, and we have become so inured to it that no one seems to mind, or to remember when it was any other way. In fact, it would seem strange if it were any other way. So, Obama's 2012 campaign began, roughly, on Inauguration Day of 2009, with barely a beat having been missed between the 2008 election and that fateful day.

We are being treated to what are referred to as widely differing “visions” of America – what it is and what it should be. And these differences, while in some cases genuine (in terms of rhetoric), will be of little consequence no matter who gets elected. (Think "discretionary" vs. "non-discretionary" budget items -- all the big and important stuff is "non-discretionary".)  But the most prominent, and consequential, vision of all – namely that of the U.S. as the world's policeman – is never questioned, and never debated. It is axiomatic – an assumption requiring no proof... a meme, if you will. It can, in fact, be said to be the one vision that completely unites the two candidates... and the one that will not be altered in the slightest by the outcome of the election. Oh, sure – there are murmurings now and then about Obama being less than enthusiastic about asserting America's world dominance, but actions speak louder than words, and when we have troops stationed in nearly every country on earth, private armies at work in nearly as many places, and are fighting a “war on terror” that is, in fact, a war on Islam... well, it seems to be stretching it a bit to call Obama weak in any way military.

Besides, we are treated, on a regular basis, to the spectacle of both Obama and Romney going over to Israel to prostrate themselves before the throne of Zionism, kiss the feet of Netanyahu and his cronies, and declare our “eternal” bond with Israel and our willingness – nay, zeal – to pay any price, and make any sacrifice, in order to fight the various “existential threats” that Israel claims are directed at it daily. (And BTW, why is it that our politicians never use the word “eternal” in any other context but this? Think about it.) It seems that just declaring war on Islam isn't enough – our politicians also have to report in to the head office to reassure our overseers that we aren't about to wander off the reservation. (Now, why this sort of thing doesn't result in an instant, and violent, rebellion on the part of the taxpayers and voters... well, that's another question.)

The recent campaign stop in Jerusalem on the part of Mitt Romney is illustrative. He did the usual kowtowing, and donned the yarmulke, and did that thing where you stick a little piece of paper into a crack in the Wailing Wall (I suspect that at least half of them are Chinese fortune cookie fortunes)... and then proceeded to suggest that, compared to the Palestinians, the Israelis have “a superior culture” and enjoy “the hand of providence”. Well... at least he's honest. I mean, in the sense that this has always been the neoconservative position and Romney is nothing if not a neocon. The Evangelicals, in fact, seem to believe that Israel is superior to the United States, and that Judaism is a superior belief system to Christianity, and that the Jews are – dare I use the term in this context? -- the master race. And, that it is the ordained task of the United States to be on Israel's side through thick and thin, so that we will be found worthy as the end times approach and the final judgment is laid down. In other words, America is fated to be the servant of Israel, and Americans are... not fated, but privileged, to be the slaves of Israel. So what Romney said is perfectly consistent with all of this, and I have to admire his – perhaps naïve – honesty on the matter. I'm not sure Obama would have been quite this open and unabashed about it, although he certainly acts as though he agrees with it all when it comes to policy.

And lest you think I exaggerate about these issues, there are scores of books on the subject that support this model... and all you have to do is look at our electoral process and our foreign policy to see that there is absolutely no doubt. And when it comes to our politicians, the Republicans are, almost to a man, completely dedicated to this world view, and the Democrats... well, again, they are not as blatant about expressing it, but they never do anything to contradict it. The only bind Obama is in – if it even is a bind – is that slight awkwardness of having had a Moslem father, and having a Moslem middle name, and having Moslems among his black constituency. But these things are easily smoothed over, as he has done with signal success so far.

But none of these trivial differences between the candidates has stopped the captive media from favoring Obama at every turn. You'll notice, for instance, that every other word coming out of Romney's mouth is termed a “gaffe” -- and the pathetic thing is that the Romney campaign doesn't argue! They as much as admit that it was a gaffe by either retracting or “clarifying” -- which means that, basically, they are admitting that the Democrats have made up all the rules and are in charge of enforcing them.

Obama, on the other hand, is never allowed to mis-speak by the media. And whenever he's accused of having said something controversial, the media rush to his defense, claiming that he was “misunderstood”, or that “paranoid, right-wing haters” are twisting his words. And again, no one argues.  And he never has to take anything back, or explain, or apologize.   

This is another reason why Romney's campaign is doomed, in my opinion – and watch him pick someone for his running mate who is either a fanatic, a nut, or an airhead. The Republicans remain the “stupid party”, even as they have pretty much caught up with the Democrats in the “evil” category. 

But let's get back to the real issues. If Israel is the “driver” for our foreign policy – which it is – and our foreign policy, including military interventions, wars, covert operations, etc., is the biggest single piece of our economy, then it can be said that Israel is the driver for our economy (aside from any links they may have to banks and international financial markets). So any economic woes we suffer can, to some degree, be traced back to Israel. I know, this seems simplistic... not to mention “paranoid” and “anti-Semitic” and all that crap... but I challenge you to show me an exception, the way I challenged anyone, a while back, to show me a single government program that is not, at heart, a jobs program.

Look at it another way. What if we were not stuck on Israel the way Br'er Rabbit was stuck on the Tar-Baby? Well, it would have saved us billions in direct foreign aid, for one thing – and I don't mean just to Israel, but to all the countries surrounding it, as bribes to keep them from attacking Israel. And if we hadn't been meddling in the Middle East all these many decades, we would not have suffered the “blowback” that came in the form of 9-11 (regardless of which model you adopt as to what really happened that day). As Ron Paul memorably said, “They're over here because we're over there” -- and the fact that Rudy Giuliani nearly had a stoke upon hearing that proved that Paul was right on target.

So... take us out of the Middle East (military, if not in terms of trade), and you avoid 9-11, which, in turn, avoids the “War on Terror” and the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. It also avoids abominations like the Patriot Act, the TSA, and all the other totalitarian measures that have been enthusiastically adopted by the regime since 9-11.

The bottom line is that the “Israel bill” for us amounts to... well, not just billions, but trillions... and the rate of expenditure simply continues to accelerate. (I say “expenditure” but I should really say “borrowing”, since that's what's necessary to keep the whole enterprise afloat.) And yet, in the long run, has it made Israel's future secure (even as it has threatened our own future in nearly every respect)? Can even the most hardened, fanatical “Christian Zionists” turn their gaze toward the Promised Land and pronounce it a place of peace? No – and my personal feeling is that this is at least partly because Israel, i.e. the State of Israel, is a gigantic mistake – the biggest political mistake of the 20^th Century, in fact. (And there are, by the way, Jewish groups that agree with this, so it's not just about race or ethnicity or religion.)

Setting aside the suicidal folly of establishing a Jewish state smack in the middle of its age-old enemies... and the folly of the U.S. promising to provide any and every kind of support in perpetuity... is the State of Israel really what the Bible is referring to in the various end-times prophesies? The Evangelicals seem to think so... but pardon me, I'm skeptical. For one thing, the State of Israel is secular. It may be Jewish in the racial/ethnic sense, but it's not any more religious than the U.S., and probably less so. Not only that, but Christians are treated as second-class citizens in Israel, because they happen to also be Arabs... and they are treated as downright non-persons or subhumans in the West Bank and Gaza. How do the Evangelicals come around to thinking that this sort of thing is consistent with New Testament prophesy and teachings? Well... I won't attempt to analyze what's going through their heads; that has already been done quite competently by any number of writers. But it's a bit ironic to see American politicians – nearly all at least nominal Christians -- repeatedly going over to the Middle East and embracing people who think their messiah was a fraud and their religion an abomination. Do I detect a hint of masochism and a lack of self-worth and self-esteem on the part of the Evangelicals in this matter? Um... yeah. Do I detect a desire to wind up on the winning side of world history, even if that side represents materialism as opposed to core Christian beliefs? Yes again. It seems to me that real faith would want to reject the glamor and superficial success of the powers of this world, in favor of the eternal verities... but that doesn't seem to have occurred to the Evangelicals... or to the Mormons either, if Romney is any example. They still cling, if you will, to shopworn and failed notions of manifest destiny, American exceptionalism, and all the rest. We will unite and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Israel to smite the filthy Arabs, Islamists, and “terrorists”... and once they are conquered, the new age – heaven on Earth – will commence. This is their core vision. The core vision of the Zionists, on the other hand, is to restore the kingdom, which includes much of what is now the Islamic Middle East. (Don't believe me? Look at their maps some time.) And as far as the Zionists are concerned, if all the Christians on earth dry up and blow away, so much the better – as long as they have served as cannon fodder and a source of raw materials in the meantime. And I suppose the Evangelicals believe that, by that time, they will have been welcomed into the Jewish/Zionist world as full-fledged members, and thus be immune from any chastisement. But – as Mr. T would say – I pity the fools. I think they are the object of the greatest con game of all time. Unfortunately, the rest of us are all caught up in the same con game. The America we thought we knew has turned out to be something strange, and alien, and rare, if not unique, in history – but for all the wrong reasons.

But it would also a mistake to claim that our politicians are all sociopaths and fanatics who spend all their time preying on innocent citizens. Even given the relative meaninglessness of our elections, it remains true that we are the ones who put these clowns into office. We're the facilitators; we're the ones who support them in their delusions (or their cold cynicism). We could do better, but we won't, and it's because we are prey to the same delusions. Either that, or we are so fear-ridden and hobbled by political correctness and the propaganda apparatus that we don't dare do otherwise. Even during the primaries, there were people who said they agreed with what Ron Paul was saying, but they wouldn't vote for him because... um... well, they weren't sure. That's fear talking, folks. That's a cowed, fearful, cowardly populace made up of “free” Americans, and it's what we've become. The few who stand up and speak the truth are mocked and ridiculed, and pronounced beyond the pale by the media (including the so-called “conservative” media).

So... if we have a country ruled by people who are committing what amounts to treason, then aren't the people who vote for them also traitors, or at least delusional and brainwashed? So it would seem... and we have only to seek precedents in history to see how this works. The Germans did not all of a sudden become insane, as an entire people, the minute Hitler took office... and they didn't all turn sane again the day he died by his own hand. Things are seldom that simple. Yes, there has to be a core of insanity, and it has to be powerful. And it also has to be able to control, or at least influence, the thinking of everyone else through the propaganda apparatus, AKA the media. Or failing that, it has to be able to exert absolute control, through intimidation and brute force; this is the time-honored formula of all totalitarian regimes past and present.

And then there are the outliers, who rebel either openly (a risky business) or in secret. I suppose it's like the ubiquitous bell curve, with the fat middle consisting of people with no absolute principles, who are generally good-intended, but who can be influenced by an unending barrage of propaganda. On the other end is the fanatical core – the SS in the case of Germany – opposite the people of principle who won't budge no matter how much pressure they feel, or how unpopular their views are. The wishy-washy middle can be convinced, on one day, that it's perfectly OK to haul Jews off to the crematoria... and then on another day, that killing babies in the womb is just jolly... or even that having some consideration for others – some non-Darwinian feelings of charity – is a good thing. They can be made, in other words, to think, and do, the right thing for the right reasons... or for the wrong reasons. And they can be made to think, and do, the wrong thing for... any reason at all, or no reason. They are, in other words, political. They subscribe to what Ayn Rand called “social metaphysics” -- that the will, and the “mind”, of the group – the collective – is the source of all truth. Those on the fanatical end of the curve at least believe in something, even if they're badly mistaken. In this they are the true flip side of those on the other end who cling to the truth. I can't get too perturbed at “true believers” in other religions, for example, because I understand their mind set. They believe in absolutes, as do I. There is a point beyond which politics and relativism fade away, and what remains is, for the philosopher, pure ideas, and for the believer, articles of faith. I have no problem with anyone's faith – i.e. with the phenomenon; it's how they act on it that can become problematic. I'm not against the “terrorists” because of their faith (the way the Evangelicals and the U.S. military would be), but because of their implementation of it – and I can't even object to that on all counts. Since when, for example, is defense of one's homeland considered “terrorism”? And yet that is the term we are fed, day after day, by the propaganda apparatus. We invade a country, the natives fight back, and that makes them “terrorists”. Seems like we've regressed a bit in our thinking over the last couple of centuries. At least at one time we accepted that other peoples' nationalism, and loyalty, and love of homeland, were mirror images of our own, and thus had innate validity, even if we wound up in conflict. Nowadays, anyone who believes or adheres to anything but the American “script” is considered deluded, crazy, or a “terrorist”.

But now we have to dial back the argument a bit, because there is a great hue and cry, especially among libertarians, that the United States has, through some subversive, gradual process, “become” what it is today, through the machinations of cynical politicians and other people of ill will. The notion is that “the real America” actually did exist at some time in the past – and you have to choose the point at which things began to slide. Some will say as recently as 9-11... others will say Vietnam... still others the New Deal, or World War I, or the Progressive Era, or the Civil War... right back to the point when the ink was not yet dry on the Declaration of Independence. And if only we could “return” to those halcyon days, before FDR, before Wilson, before Teddy Roosevelt... to those sepia-toned times when America really meant something, e.g. rugged individualism, independence, freedom, etc. (The implication also is that there was a time when this was truly a “Christian nation”, untroubled by the egalitarian politics of minorities, victim groups, religious and cultural “sensitivities”, etc.) However, an argument can, and has, been made that our very founding was the work of not only humanists and Deists, but also people who would today be called “Christian Zionists”. The American experiment, in other words, was not so much about “rights” and “freedoms” as it was about a political program with a strong eschatological component. The very energy that fueled colonization, and westward expansion, and manifest destiny, and America-as-cop, had, as its source, an overarching religious, or pseudo-religious, vision... and what we are seeing now is the reductio ad absurdum of that vision – perhaps the final stage. Because, after all, if we take on hopeless debt in the interest of “ideas” as manifested in foreign policy and military adventures... and if we are forced to become what we behold elsewhere in the world – i.e. collectivists and totalitarians – in order to fight against it... then doesn't that pretty much spell the end of the American experiment? Doesn't it, in fact, indicate that there were fatal flaws from the beginning that are only now fully manifesting themselves?

Now granted, this experiment, if you will, has had a good, long run of it – longer than any comparable experiment in philosophically-based government. Compare the French, for example, who killed a king then wound up with an emperor a few short years later... or the Soviet Republic and all of its clones... or Nazi Germany. The landscape is littered with the broken, rusted remains of failed utopias. So whatever we did, and whatever our reasons were, it did work... not for a while, but for many generations. Not as long as Rome, certainly, or the Chinese Empire, but long enough by modern standards, when all historical processes seem to operate in fast forward. Nikita Khrushchev promised that the Soviets would “bury” us – i.e. that the day would come when we would fall and they would remain standing. Well, it didn't work out quite that way, and I suppose that the survivability of any modern system is a direct function of the degree to which it's totalitarian – i.e., the more totalitarian the lower the life expectancy. (Extreme cases like Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, or Afghanistan under the Taliban, certainly add to the accumulated evidence, even if they are not conclusive.) Of course, the standard liberal argument is that the Soviet system would have held on longer “if only we'd given it a chance”. Yeah, right. The fact is, we did give it a chance – all the way from the Russian Revolution up to the early 1950s. No, their destruction was of their own making, and the fatal flaws in their system were much more fatal – more virulent – than the fatal flaws in ours have proven to be. But fatal they are, nonetheless... and I don't think the process could have been altered, turned back, or reversed by any trivial machinations of political parties, or even by charismatic leaders. It is, in that sense, an inexorable part of the repeated cycles of history – of human fallibility and concupiscence being projected onto the political system. No political system can alter or “fix” human nature, as the Soviets found out; all a political system can do is provide us with more or less protection against each other – i.e. against human nature in all of its less-desirable aspects. A system that brings out the worst in people – again, as all totalitarian systems have done – is, it seems to me, less desirable than one that serves to ameliorate things and lessen the pain... and our system, to give credit where credit is due, succeeded in that better than most others. And yet, eventually human nature will catch up with political programs, and we see evidence for this each day. The politicians of old might have been gentleman farmers who spent a season in office, then returned to their real occupations... whereas today, we have the spectacle of politicians who know no other way of life, and would, in fact, be incompetent in any other. If “those who can't do, teach” (a bit cynical even for me), then those who can't earn an honest living go into politics. Well, it's not hard to imagine the eroding effect this is going to have in the long run – and it's not at all hard to see it in action in our time. Romney is, in this sense, a throwback, since he has had considerable success on the “outside” -- in the (so-called) free market... whereas Obama was, apparently, born with a campaign button in his mouth, as was Clinton and so many others. What can we expect, then, from lifetime politicians other than more politics? And if politics has become totally corrupt, as I believe it has, then what can we expect other than more corruption, and the moral and spiritual decay that goes along with it?

So, one might ask, what is to be done? Put up with it? Accept that we are living in a fading, failing empire which will eventually be overrun by – who knows? Hispanic hordes from south of the border? The Chinese? I mean, who is in the batter's box now, even as we strike out? Who will inherit our mantle as “the” superpower? Or will it be more a matter of warring states, with no one totally dominating, far into the future? Or – is the age of nations, and nationhood, coming to a close, to be followed by an age of financial powers that have no use for borders, race, ethnicity, language, or any of the other traditional sources of cohesiveness, pride, and self-esteem? But won't that system be just as contrary to human nature as the communist systems were, and thus lead to the same result? I fear that we will not see the answer in our time. All we can see, and that vaguely, are trends – and they do not look at all promising. It seems we are regressing to a new dark age, “where ignorant armies clash by night”, and all is overseen by evil men in dark, brooding castles. If so, our only hope is in the human spirit – not flawed human nature in its entirety, but that faint glimmer of hope that was placed in all of us by an unseen hand.

The People's Republic of Us

Once again – and as always – the presidential candidates from the major parties are claiming to represent “the people” -- and not just any people, but those they have selected out of the citizenry (or non-citizenry) as being the real people... those worthy of the name. In Romney's case, this would include the Tea Partiers, the besieged middle class, small businessmen, churchgoers, and conservatives in general (but not libertarians – heaven forbid!). In Obama's case, it would include the Occupy crowd, minorities of any and all stripes, the “disenfranchised” (like illegal aliens, for instance), and liberals in general (but not libertarians – heaven forbid!). Neither wants to embrace the anti-war contingent, you'll notice; that option has been left off the table... permanently, I fear. And they of course both embrace Wall Street – or are embraced by it – but it would hardly do to admit that. And as for the “rich”, well... then it becomes a matter of semantics. Romney would defend the rich's right to be rich – and to stay that way. Obama, on the other hand, is all about “sharing” -- not him sharing his own wealth, but him forcing others to share theirs. But a fine distinction is made here: What Obama means by “the rich” is, basically, anyone who has enough money to pay taxes and not be on welfare; this is pretty much the same definition Clinton used. But if you take a closer look, you'll find that all of Obama's important supporters and boosters are really rich, I mean like... “rich”, OK? Not just middle class or even upper middle class, but “filthy rich”. So his attitude toward the “rich” is not so much ambivalent as requiring fine parsing. It would never do to bite the hand that feeds him... and he doesn't, merely providing occasional lip service to the notion of keeping big business and Wall Street under control. And they let him get away with it, the way a dog owner will tolerate the occasional playful nip from his prize pooch.

But in any case, the theme is always “the people”, however defined... however that idea is constructed (or deconstructed) in order to leave some actual people out, and let others in. Every politician in our time claims to be a man (or woman) of “the people”; can you think of any exceptions? I can't. Even in foreign lands, the worst sorts of tyrants will always claim that they have the full support of the citizenry. Saddam Hussein did... the Kims of North Korea did, and do... Bashar al-Assad does... Mao certainly did... Pol Pot did... and so on. So what winds up happening is that every war, every insurrection, every revolution, you name it, is fought between "people" (type A) and "people" (type B). Even Adolf Hitler, tireless promoter of the “master race” concept, claimed that he was doing it all for the sake of the German people – not for himself, or the party, or the regime. It's just that some of the people – as Orwell said – were more equal than others. And after all, hasn't every communist dictatorship from the Soviet Union on down called itself a “people's republic”, or something to that effect?

I'm trying to think, if fact, of the last time someone stood up and claimed that they had a right to rule because of their own superiority, and through sheer force. I suppose it still happens in Africa and in some parts of Asia, but Europe and the Western Hemisphere have long been characterized by “republics”, in name at least, regardless of how dictatorial or oligarchic they may have been. It's been said that “hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue” -- and there is certainly nothing more hypocritical, historically or in the present day, than the pretenses of “republics” and “democracies”, and of anything in the political realm being done on behalf of “the people” as opposed to the further accumulation of raw power and wealth by the ruling elite. And one might say, cynically, isn't it at least better to live with this sort of hypocrisy than to live under a regime like that of Genghis Khan, or the Ottomans, or the emperors of China or Japan? I'm not sure. The problem with comforting words like “democracy”, “republic”, “representative government”, “rights”, and so on, is that they blind and anesthetize us to what is really going on.  They also serve as hooks, in order to achieve "buy-in" on the part of the hapless electorate -- which means that we become committed, because of our naivete, to the regime and to the government, no matter how oppressive or totalitarian it becomes.  If "the truth shall set you free", then distortions of the truth, AKA "ideas", can enslave.   

In our time, religion is not (assuming it ever was) “the opiate of the people”; the real opiate is propaganda, and the single source of that is the government, or the regime. And when I use those terms, I am assuming that political parties hardly matter, because the overall narrative never changes. With each election, we're supposed to use our freedom, and our right to vote, in order to throw out the rascals who are bound and determined to take those things away from us:  Quick, before it's too late!  "The most important election in our lifetime", and all that.  Problem is, the next election cycle will see the same arguments made from the other side, and so on ad infinitum. Every election is supposed to provide an opportunity for “the people” to regain control of their own destiny, and take it out of the hands of the power elite. It's kind of like the endless drumbeat of inner-city residents futilely trying to “take back the streets” from the gang-bangers and thugs. Well, folks... it ain't gonna happen. And no election is going to truly “empower” the citizenry more than they are already empowered – which is not at all. (Sorry about that, Tea Partiers and Occupiers; the Regime is an equal-opportunity provider of delusions and disappointments.)   Elections – at least at the national level, and on most local levels as well – are a sham. One group is played against another like Little League teams, while the grown-ups look on indulgently -- “Poor kids, they don't realize it's just a game. They don't know what the world is really like, and by gosh, we're sure not going to tell them.” We hear complaints from certain enlightened souls about “identity politics”. Hey – all politics is identity politics; that's practically the definition of politics! Isn't it always my group against all other groups, each one grasping for a bigger piece of the proverbial pie? Can you imagine a “politics of all the people”? I can't. If all fire engines are painted red, why would you say “a red fire engine”? No, it all comes down to a contest of wills, and of power, and most of all of propaganda – i.e. ideas, but in a degenerate, corrupted, pathological form. It appeals, in other words, to our lowest impulses – namely to get something for nothing. But here's where there is, if you will, a slight fork in the road.

The liberal/Democratic argument is that “the people” have long been deprived of their rightful heritage... their share in the nation's wealth. In other words – going right back to Karl Marx – they have not received sufficient compensation for their labors... or for their very existence. So “social justice” can only be attained if “the rich”, i.e. the non-preferred rich, i.e. the middle class, are made to “share” their ill-gotten gains with the less fortunate (implying, of course, that it's all a matter of luck – and the government's job is to eliminate luck as a factor in lifestyle outcomes). So it's not a matter of stealing, or confiscation, at all – it's a matter of justice, of putting things right. And the liberals/Democrats can at least claim to have the majority on their side on this issue. After all, the majority are not “rich” by any stretch of the imagination, and that fact alone, juxtaposed with the fact that a prominent minority are rich, is sufficient evidence that a gross injustice has been done, and must be remedied – not by the marketplace or by charity, but by direct action by the government.

The conservatives/Republicans, on the other hand, have this curious fixation, or fetish, on just compensation for actual labor – and creativity, innovation, business sense, etc. ... all those things that make up the heart of “capitalism”. They will nod their heads with resignation when it comes to things like welfare and the “social safety net” -- acknowledging that there are, in fact, people in this world who simply can't handle life to the extent of being self-supporting. And yes, maybe it's their own fault, but what are you going to do? -- as images of urban riots start to rise up before their eyes. But really, the race should go to the swift, shouldn't it? Why should everyone be declared a winner, and all receive a prize? This simply offends one's sense of justice.

Ah, there it is! That word again -- “justice”. We do not, to this day, know what it really means – or, let's say, we have not yet managed to plumb the depths of all of its possible meanings. It is clear, just from the present political dialogue, that one's man's “justice” is another man's tyranny... that the search for justice quickly degenerates into class warfare... and that the concept of justice is inextricably bound up with the concept of “the people”. Inside of each candidate's otherwise empty, echoing skull is an image – an image of “the people” (the ones who count, that is). And right next to it (not that there's any lack of room) is an image of “justice” -- i.e. justice for the people (by his definition). And does it ever mean true, complete equality on all dimensions? I daresay not – because, again, the conservative believes in just compensation for effort, whereas the liberal believes in compensation for all – and especially for lack of effort.  For the liberal, inability to support onself is a sign of special worth -- a form of secular grace, if you will. 

So “justice” must be, objectively, a form of inequality, no matter which side one is on. Economic justice... social justice... legal justice... they will all be influenced, swayed, and prejudiced by one's premises as to what true justice, i.e. true “equality”, entails. One example – a major one – will suffice. What is “racial justice”? Is it “equal opportunity”, as has been claimed? Clearly not. Is it even equal outcomes? No, because that would deny the need for “reparations”. So what “racial justice” really means is preferential treatment for blacks, until some kind of debt is paid. But what is that debt, and who owes it to whom? There are no living ex-slave owners, and no living ex-slaves – so we're clearly talking about collective guilt on the one hand, and collective entitlement on the other. And when is it to be satisfied? What are the “exit criteria”, as they say with regard to armed conflict? The truth is, there are none, because the ultimate state of satisfaction cannot be defined. A mortgage or other loan can be paid off... a prisoner can “pay his debt to society”... but no one can ever truly repair the damages done by slavery... or by the Holocaust, or by any other instance of genocide or persecution. So the reparation process must continue, basically, forever. This is a core liberal premise, and a pillar of any liberal/Democratic political platform or campaign... and this is what the conservatives/Republicans fight and rage against, usually to no avail. (It is funny, come to think of it, that we haven't heard too much about “reparations” of late. Maybe it would be considered bad timing, given the state of the economy. Maybe it's like all the illegal aliens who are headed back to Mexico because they can't find work here. There might be something to be said for recessions after all... )

And with the rise of “identity politics” -- its overwhelming prominence – you may be sure that these issues will become even more political “drivers” than they have been up to now. This country is degenerating into the kind of tribalism that overtook (the former) Yugoslavia, or sub-Saharan Africa after the colonial powers pulled out. Groups that more or less got along, or even formed uneasy alliances, in the past have now put up barricades and declared jihad on one another. So politics likewise has degenerated from the art of getting along, and of compromise, into how best to do class warfare.

See, once things fall into the political realm – which means out of any sense of moral absolutes, or principles – there is no end to it. It's been said that “war is the continuation of politics by other means” -- but at least wars can be won (except for the ones we're fighting right now). Class warfare, on the other hand, has no – once again – exit criteria. The only way out would be for every class but one to be eliminated, i.e. exterminated. Mao's China and Pol Pot's Cambodia did a pretty good job at that, but there are always those pesky loose ends – those bourgeois habits – that seem to persist. Plus – and this is something libertarians know but socialists never do – it takes a strong government to reduce an entire population to the same socio-economic level, and that government has to consist of people (until we get taken over by robots from outer space)... and those people will, inevitably, have to be of a different, and superior, class compared to the masses they are overseeing. So, radical egalitarianism has its built-in contradictions, as does socialism, as does liberalism, American-style. There always has to be a ruling elite in order to enforce equality. Eliminate the ruling elite and its organs, and the natural inequality that inheres to the human race will rear its ugly head. What, after all, does true anarchism amount to? An opportunity for everyone to “be all they can be”, provided they're able to fight off all the other people who are also trying to be all they can be. The inevitable result, even given heroic charity on the part of all, will be inequality: “The poor will always be with you.”

So if we mistake the liberal longing for justice as merely a desire to make a few adjustments – a bit of fine tuning or “tweaking” of the system – we greatly err. What they want, ultimately, is to change everything, and especially human nature... the human lot. Now, some of them are willing to undertake this project a step at a time, over many generations; that would characterize American liberals. But in principle they are no different from the Khmer Rouge, who killed people for wearing eyeglasses, and blew up the Phnom Penh sewer system because it was considered Western, colonialist, and “bourgeois”. American liberals at least know, or grudgingly admit, that it's hard to change any given individual... which is why they have long concentrated their efforts on “the children” (a subset of “the people”) by means of the schools, libraries, social services, media, etc. But doggone it, children are still, at least some of the time, under the influence of their parents – i.e. of all those bourgeois, racist, sexist, gun- and Bible-clinging, homophobic “haters”. So another pillar of any liberal/Democratic platform or campaign – even if not presented as such – is to draw, or force, children out from under the protection of their parents. You might say that “a fool and his children are soon parted” -- and this would certainly be the case for the majority, who go along in a bovine way cooperating with the anti-family agenda of the government (again, no matter who's nominally in charge – because no liberal program is ever terminated by conservatives).

But when it comes to “family values”... well, there's nothing like Mitt Romney, right? His crew is starting to look like the Mormon answer to the Kennedy “clan” (except, hopefully, with fewer sex addicts). And wouldn't all be well for American families if he were elected? Um... maybe, except for the small detail of sending everyone's sons off to fight and die in far-off shitholes in the name of “spreading democracy”, and “fighting terror”, and “preserving the American way of life”, etc. In this, he would not be one whit different from Bush the Second... or from Obama, for that matter, although I must admit that the sheer volume of jingoist propaganda has been toned down a bit of late. I haven't heard the term “cut and run” much lately, for instance... and Obama did at least pretend to get us out of Iraq, and is showing every sign of pretending to get us out of Afghanistan... so maybe that's one iota better than Romney, who would probably make John McCain his secretary of defense and start carpet-bombing Iran before the first inaugural ball kicked off.

So am I saying it makes no difference who you vote for in November, therefore why vote at all? Well, it's certainly true if you're under the illusion that there are only two political parties in the U.S. -- which really means there is only one. But there are alternatives, and I leave you to explore them for yourselves. When I first registered to vote in Pennsylvania, I was amazed at the sheer number of recognized political parties there are in this state – crazy stuff no one's ever heard of, like... oh, I don't know, like – well, here's a partial list: http://www.seventy.org/Resources_Other_Political_Parties_in_Pennsylvania.aspx

Wouldn't it be fun if we had a “voters' rebellion” and everyone voted for some party – any party! -- other than the Democrats and Republicans? Now that would be a “Constitutional crisis” worth having! But in the mean time, don't be fooled by all this talk about “the people” -- even if you think you're one of them. Believe me, you're not, and it wouldn't matter if you were. 

Disordered Afflictions

I guess someone's already writing a book about the Jerry Sandusky affair – even though the trial's only half over. There are so many layers of metaphor in it all – starting, of course, with the phenomenon of a college town where football is a religion, a fetish, an obsession... and a monolithic juggernaut that one defies only at great risk. Football becomes, in short, a law unto itself... and when you're talking about a place like Penn State, which sits in an isolated valley in Central Pennsylvania, with nothing around but trees, it starts to look like some sort of cult, with its adherents huddled together in a communal survivalist camp, brainwashed each morning before breakfast, and living in awe, and fear, of their rulers.

And it's not like this could not have happened anywhere, because it could. It's just that when it happens in a mountain fastness like State College, it starts to look like something that happened in a kind of Never-Never Land (Michael Jackson, white courtesy phone) (um... ). The area is even called Happy Valley, for gosh sakes! But things are not so happy these days, since a revered coach was accused of, and arrested for, taking sexual advantage of a number of young boys in his charge. To indulge in typical media hyperbole, the mask has been ripped off what was formerly an idyllic place and an archetypal American way of life. So in that sense, it's a modern take on “Main Street” or “Winesburg, Ohio” -- or, maybe more properly, "Peyton Place".

The sad drama will drone on for a while longer – but the outcome is already considered inevitable. “Coach” will be locked up in the perv and pedophile wing of the state pen, and life will go on. But it's interesting how typical, in a way, the trajectory has been – the cover-ups, the accommodations, the benign (or otherwise) neglect... followed by “shocking revelations”... followed by a circling of the wagons combined with great feelings of ambivalence and disillusion. If your perfect place turns out to be a hotbed of iniquity, and your idols turn out to have feet of clay, where then do you go? Is nowhere safe?

And it's odd how the pendulum swings back and forth on these matters. During the era of the child-abuse witch hunts of the 1980s, everyone believed everything any child said – or was rumored to have said, or was encouraged to say – about having been abused. But as those cases (some, not all) fell apart, we started to hear more about “false memory” than about “believing the children” (no matter how fantastic the allegations were) -- and this was, I suppose, one of the reasons for the skepticism that followed, which extended to allegations of sexual abuse by priests (and other persons in positions of power and authority over children). The mood changed from one of hysteria to one of caution – over-caution, some would say. Thus, what the statisticians call a “Type I error” -- believing in an effect which did not occur – turned into a “Type II error” -- believing that an effect which actually did occur did not. And it all reflects the overloaded emotional content of this issue... which courts, to give them a bit of credit, have seemed recently a bit more willing to work through in a search for the actual facts. It will never be an emotionally-neutral, rational, business-like affair – this is too much to ask in a society obsessed with sex – but it may be that we're at least on the right track.

But to all of this has been added a new note of... I can't call it anything but absurdity. The latest defense ploy in the Sandusky case has been to call “expert witnesses” (there's a warning signal for you) to testify that Sandusky “has a condition known as histrionic personality disorder”. Um... have you ever heard of this “disorder” up to now? I haven't. One suspects it was made up just for the purpose of this trial, the way some alien virus will appear in a sci-fi movie and start turning everyone into green slime as a plot point. It's being presented, mind you, not as an excuse but as a reason – hopefully to ameliorate, somewhat, the severity of the charges, or of the jury's image of the accused, or of the sentence... whatever. As a P.R. ploy it's about as effective as “I was just following orders”, a la Adolf Eichmann. 

But have you noticed that an ever-larger proportion of society is being diagnosed (usually at a safe distance by “experts”) with some sort of “disorder” these days? The trend is especially marked in public schools, where we, all of a sudden, are burdened with an avalanche of kids with “ADHD”... problems “adjusting”... “attitude problems”... autism... allergies, sensitivities... et cetera. I mean... you can make this stuff up; it's not hard. Take a kid who never turns his homework in on time – he's obviously a victim of “Learning Non-Cooperation Disorder” in an overly structured environment that is not sensitive to his “needs”. A kid who downs too many Cokes during school hours is clearly suffering from “Pre-Addictive Behavior Syndrome”. If he prefers to walk to school rather than riding the school bus, he's suspected of having anti-social tendencies, and falling somewhere on the Asperger's spectrum. How long is it going to be before every public-school child is “sick”, and thus needs special treatment and therapy – and we all know what big bucks there are in all that. It's all part of the drive toward nanny-statism, which is a subset of totalitarianism.

And I'm not saying that all of this is totally fictional. When I was in grade school, there was this one kid – the absolute bane of the teachers' existence – who would, by today's standards, be classified as ADHD. With a vengeance! This kid was a holy terror. I used to wonder whether the teachers drew straws before the beginning of the school year to see who would get stuck with this kid for the next 10 months. But hey – that was one kid, out of the whole class (numbering 166 by the time of graduation). And sure, we had our antisocial elements, AKA “hoods”... our bullies... and a few “special needs” kids (who were put, in those days, into “occupational education” -- I guess to be made ready to work in sheltered workshops, I don't know). But no one dropped dead from inhaling peanut fumes! I mean, good grief.

I suppose Nietzsche would call our obsession with the “other-abled” an example of degenerate Christian charity, and he would pronounce it not only wrong, but downright anti-Darwinian. Nazi Germany was an example of institutionalized social Darwinism, where the unfit had to be weeded out in order to make room for the “master race”. (And didja ever notice that all their exemplars of the “master race” were muscular blonds, while most if not all of the Nazi leaders had dark hair, and most of them were either overweight or scrawny?)

The challenge, in our time, is to try and find the middle ground between these two extremes – but the reason this has become one of the government's highest priorities is that the more traditional ideas of voluntary charity have been so seriously eroded. We don't know what to “do” with outliers, so fall all over ourselves trying to reconcile our firm belief in Darwinism with a warped, secular version of charity – which is not charity at all, since it typically involves coercion, of either the provider or the recipient, or both.

My home town had its share – some would say more than its share – of outliers. There really was a “village idiot” -- more than one, in fact. There were kids who “weren't right”... old people who were senile... drunks... bad-asses... bullies... the entire colorful panoply of small-town characters mixed in with the “normal” people (who only got drunk or committed adultery if absolutely necessary, and then behind closed doors). And yes, there were “gays” and lesbians who were quite well closeted and managed to fool just about everyone, maybe even themselves. But here's the difference. There were no labels – or very few. There was a kind of unschooled acceptance – these people were a bit odd, but they were ours, OK? They belonged there; we couldn't imagine them being anywhere else. And on those few occasions when one was sent off to a “special school” or an asylum, it was considered a loss more than a sign of progress or humanitarianism. And why? Simple loyalty? Tribal cohesion? Yes, but more than that, it might have made people think along the lines of “There but for the grace of God...”, etc. Maybe we were all a little bit sick. But in these times you have to be Sick with a capital S. You have to have a “syndrome”... a “disorder”... you have to be declared “challenged”. (Someone pointed out a while back that people who get this label aren't really “challenged” at all – it's the rest of us who are challenged by their presence in our midst.) 

So we get back to poor old Jerry Sandusky. He now has a label! Praise be! He now has an official designation, and – by implication – a place in the scheme of things. There's a slot he fits into (if that is the word...). Even if he goes trundling off to jail for life, at least he gets a ribbon, or certificate of some sort – and it's not really his fault (the objective of humanist/secular society being to remove all responsibility for one's actions).

But where is the freedom in all this – the freedom to simply be, without being labeled? Why are all the various victim groups and minorities (of all sorts) so anxious to get a socially-approved name – to be called something? To form a lobby? To stage marches and rallies?  To come up with a ribbon color that hasn't been used yet?  Why does a homosexual who has been “closeted” for 50 years all of a sudden have to “come out” and call himself “gay”? “Gay” is not a condition, it's a lifestyle – if he were “gay” we'd already have known it.

And then you have the pharmaceutical industry – oy vey! For every name, syndrome, disorder, condition, or label there is a drug at the ready – and usually more than one. And they cost plenty! But not to worry, the government, AKA the taxpayers, will pick up the tab. This is just further evidence that the whole thing is a racket. And like all rackets, it starts with something real which then metastasizes into a monstrosity. There really were, and are, autistic individuals, for example – but who profits when the diagnosis of autism multiplies ten-fold over just a few years? Is the rate really going up (no time now to argue about vaccines)? And even if so... that much? Are we really becoming a sick society? Or has diagnosis gotten out of hand? I think what it really is is a form of regimentation – everyone has to wear the uniform of the state, everyone has to have a rank and an approved specialty, and if you don't they will hunt you down. The Nazis used to brag that they were eliminating the unfit from society – and their definition of “unfit” was quite broad – broader, even, than Margaret Sanger's and all the other enlightened eugenicists'. Well, we're a bit more humane than that, I guess – we don't send them off to death camps, but we do insist on the labeling, cubbyholing process, and I, for one, see this as a threat to individuality, dignity, true diversity (vs. the political variety), and therefore freedom. There must a way to leave people alone without leaving them all alone, if you see what I mean. Why can't even institutionalized charity be combined with a little more respect? The way we “celebrate” people these days is that we do so “despite their (insert label here)”. Why can't we celebrate them just for being whoever they are, and save the labels for canned goods?