From Global Pillage to Global Village

 

The perennial debate when it comes to “empire” is: Who benefits? But before we deal with that question we have to distinguish between the two major types of empire, what I will call the expansion type vs. the overseas type. The expansion type is as old as human history – in fact, in a way it is human history, in that so much of what we know of ancient civilizations consists of their wars of conquest. (No one ever writes about, or memorializes, peace – too boring! The ancient inscriptions, steles, obelisks, etc. were overwhelmingly devoted to military campaigns – victories – conquests. (I have yet to hear of one commemorating a defeat.)) And this was all about expansion – enlarging an area of control (by a given race, ethnic group, tribe, etc.) beyond its current borders. And the motivation? Sometimes it was all about simply winning – conquest for its own sake. What king or emperor wouldn't want to expand his area of control? But it could also be about resources – arable land, timber, access to waterways, acquisition of slaves (conquered peoples), trade routes, minerals – even the need for a “buffer zone” between one empire and another, i.e. take over a given piece of territory but not make it an “official” part of the empire, just maintain it as a protectorate and a first line of defense against whatever's on the other side. (Ukraine, anyone? This is exactly what Putin is up to.)

And, of course, there is just plain old glory – being famous and celebrated far and wide – having a large chapter in the history books, etc. “The Sun never sets on the British Empire” – remember that? It was actually true within living memory. If we can “plant our flag” far and wide (and even on the Moon!) that makes us conquerors – winners – superior in every way.

But this introduces the second type of empire, which is relatively recent and which can be traced to the discovery of America. And that is the overseas empire, which is, to a significant degree, based on, and energized by, trade. But “trade” is a relatively peaceful enterprise, so it has to be backed up by strength – military certainly, but economic and diplomatic as well. I mean, think about it, what's the first thing that happened when the European powers started to colonize the Americas? Trade – followed fairly closely (in some cases) by missionaries. And then the powers had to get together and agree to keep their hands off each other's stuff, i.e. colonies (which pretty much worked most of the time, except when the colonies became spoils of war).

And what is trade? It's trading something of less value (to one party) for something of more value (to the same party) – and ideally, both sides of the trade realize a benefit, or profit. “Free trade” – the ideal of all good libertarians – is a deal from which both profit. Another way of putting it is that if a given trade raises the standard of living, or quality of life, for each party then it was a good trade.

But how much of the “trade” between the European powers and their colonies can be described as “free”? In other words, what did the colonies get out of it? In the worst cases, no material benefits but plenty of exploitation and slavery. In the more moderate cases, certain benefits, but you can be sure that the colonizers always came out better, bottom line-wise, than the colonized.

But here we have to make a distinction. When we say “colonizers” whom are we speaking of? The on-the-ground traders? The ship owners? The merchants back in the home country? The governments or rulters of said home country? It kind of depends on whom, or what, we're referring to. To oversimplify a bit, if it doesn't pay, it won't be done – which means that if someone back home isn't making a bundle from the colonial trade, said trade will come to an end (or never be initiated).

As usual, follow the money. Who got rich from the colonial trade – from, let's say, the conquest of America right up to World War II? The merchants, certainly – and the privileged few who managed to get their products sent back in the other direction. And if we say “the merchants” we are also saying the politicians, and even the ruling class, because they are dependent, to a greater or lesser extent, on the largesse of the merchant class, who – among other things – help them to remain in power.

But how about “the people” – the “man on the street” – the ordinary Joe? Were they better off living in a country that was a colonial power than in one that wasn't? One could make a “trickle-down” argument here – or, the crumbs from a rich man's table are better than nothing. But that would be to ignore the costs (both hidden and obvious) of empire. Number one, as I've said – trade is all well and good, but it's always backed up by military might. And who, pray tell, is in the military? The sons of the ruling elite? Very seldom. More likely, the average Joe who is either drafted into the military or who sees it as preferable to his other prospects (if any). So his blood may very well be shed in order to expand, consolidate, and maintain the empire – with very little in return except, as always, for a few memories of valor and heroism – a few “rusty medals”, if you will.

And is it worth it, to him? Well, the “common folk” of any country or empire are typically much more patriotic, if in a somewhat naive way, than the ruling elite, who tend to be self-serving and cynical. When Joe Snuffy shows off his medals to the folks back home, he's expressing a deep feeling of pride and patriotism, even if the jaded politicians who sent him over to some hell-hole on the other side of the world couldn't care less. Was he exploited? Hell, yes. Was he “cannon fodder”? Ditto. But as a “rite of passage”, military service in time of war has no peer. The guys who come home in body bags don't vote. And this is, sadly, the lot of fallen mankind and his various societies from time immemorial. The rulers have one set of values, and the common people have another, and ne'er the twain shall meet. And all of the “consciousness raising” on the part of antiwar activists is of no avail, as long as the people insist on clinging to their images and delusions (which are, of course, programmed into their brains by the ruling elite).

(When things eventually boil down to human nature, which is intractable, it may be time to turn around and walk away. But I would like to expand on the topic a bit more.)

So – the second type of empire – the “overseas empire” – really began in earnest with the discovery, and conquest, of the Americas. All of a sudden a European nation could flex its muscles without having to challenge, or even offend, its neighbors – and, by the way, sustain little or no damage or even inconvenience on the home front. Just take over a huge chunk of North, Central, or South America! Nothing to it! But at the same time, note, much the same was happening in Africa, Southern Asia, and East Asia. The European powers had become empire-happy, and any place that offered the least resistance found itself forcibly colonized (if not conquered in the strict sense). And again, it was about trade, first and foremost – but also about glory, and power, and being a major player on the world stage. And the point is that it was always a profit-making enterprise, at least for the ruling elite – and a net loss in blood and treasure (think increased taxation to support the whole thing) for the common folk.

And this, by the way, continues right up to the present day! There is nothing ancient, or merely “historical” about this. It's going on even as we speak.

Of course, there is a certain feeling of quaintness about some overseas empires of old. The Germans had one, right up to World War I. The Italians... the Portuguese... the Belgians... the Dutch... and so on. Eventually, it boiled down to the British and French, and that's when things started to change. All of a sudden the benefits of the traditional-style empire came under scrutiny – not only who profits (we always knew that), but do they even profit any longer? And then you had the curious phenomenon of what's called “self-determination”, and it started to catch on, big time, after World War II. Countries that had been consigned to abject slavery and servitude – especially in sub-Saharan Africa – started getting funny ideas about independence. And a lot of the “credit”, if you will, for this, goes to the international communist movement, and their agents from Soviet Russia and Maoist China (throw in Cuba if you like). They talked a lot about “freedom”, “liberation”, and self-determination, all of which was designed to conceal the actual agenda, which was simply a new and different kind of slavery – slavery not to another nation but to an idea. And, I might add, to create a new ruling elite (“Meet the new boss, same as the old boss”). But to people who had been under the boot of one or more European powers for, in many cases, centuries, this was music to their ears. So we had uprisings in India, Algeria, the Congo, Vietnam, and so on – not to mention uprisings against the ruling elite in Latin America, where liberation had already arrived once with Simon Bolivar. (Time for another revolution! Latin America became notorious for this after World War II – almost as if it were a national pastime.)

But what was it, really? Throwing off the colonial yoke, or boot – certainly. Rebelling against exploitation and the racism which usually accompanied it? Absolutely. Assertion of politcial ideas, and ideals which had no precedent in the “primitive” tribal culture? That too. (It was always the “intellectuals” of any given country – typically products of the Sorbonne – who spearheaded these movements.)

But... why was it always communism and never capitalism? Why was the red flag always being waved? Because they saw capitalism as part of the problem – as the economic model of their oppressors (“Yankee go home!”). Communism, on the other hand, was a new, fresh breath of freedom – never mind what it meant to the hapless citizens of the Soviet Union. (And quite frankly, maybe the lot of the average citizen of the USSR looked pretty good compared to the lot of the average “coolie” in one of the European colonies.) (The hackneyed term “it's all relative” comes into play here, and in this case it really is all relative.)

So if there is a mass movement in post-WWII history, it's the breaking free of the former colonies from the former colonial powers. And with the exception of France with Algeria and Vietnam, said powers were, by and large, remarkably docile and accepting of the situation, as if they could see that the time had come. There were struggles, of course – quite violent at times (India being an example, and the Congo) -- but the handwriting was on the wall. Suddenly the satisfying status quo had turned into a burden. The colonial empires were turning out to be more trouble than they were worth, so they were broken up – sometimes peacefully, sometimes not – but broken up nonetheless, with very few pieces remaining.

And too, on the home front, people started to question not only the wisdom but the moral validity of overseas empires – of coercing people of a wide range of races, ethnicities, religions, etc. into fitting into the “colony” mode. We speak – to this day – of the “Third World”, but are they truly inferior? Second-class citizens at best? Perhaps this is what the “diversity” movement is all about – not only on the domestic front, but the global front as well.

Of course part of this has to do with the admission – a tough pill to swallow! – that our “values” are not only not shared by much of the world, but that they aren't even interested – and in some cases, despise our “values”, and consider us fools for adhering to them. (This attitude seems especially prevalent in the Muslim world.) And doesn't this fly right in the face of our most basic, founding ideas – that the “American way” is not only good for us, but is good (or should be) for the world at large? One of the basic – I'll call it myths – of the American founding is that our values, as expressed in our founding documents, are universal, i.e. that they are valid above and beyond any accidental considerations of race, ethnicity, religion, etc. Any speech by any politician from 1776 on has this as its conceptual underpinning.

But what if it's not true? What if it really is “all relative” – to what I call the eternal verities, i.e. race, ethnicity, and religion? (And gender as well, for that matter.) What if religion, for example, is a more basic, deeper, and profound aspect of a given people's world view than what's in our founding documents? I don't think we have, yet, fully come to terms with this possibility. We're still convinced that “the American way of life”, and “democracy”, are universal values, and there are none higher. And note that our foreign policy is ultimately based on this – and backed up by military might whenever and wherever needed. Yes – all our blood and treasure is spent trying to convince the rest of the world of this one simple idea – so obvious to us, but so foreign and even perplexing to most of the rest of the world. And we find this highly offensive, and spare no expense to convince them (by persuasion or otherwise) that we're right and they're wrong. (And George W. Bush asks “Why do they hate us?”)

But is that the end of the story? Hardly. The colonial model is alive and well, but it has morphed into a new, different – more efficient – form in our time. It's no longer about large numbers of troops stationed in the colony – that pretty much ended with Vietnam. So it's not about overt brute force as much as economic and political colonization – and for this to work we have to, basically, bribe the rulers of any given country in order to secure their cooperation, while at the same time overtly “respecting” the “independence” of the country in question. And at the same time we have to coordinate with international organizations like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, because they have their own agendas – their own empires, if you will (I leave out the U.N. because it's basically become the court eunuch of the planet). And the goals? Basically the same as always --”trade”, which means exploitation to a greater or lesser degree, and political cooperation, i.e. don't get too friendly with any communists who might be lurking about, and keep any rebels and insurrectionists at bay (with the help of our military, if needed – but usually on a covert basis).

So the plunder continues – and it appears that sub-Saharan Africa is the most prominent example. How does the man on the street in Africa benefit from his government's “cooperation” with America (you know, the dictator who used to stash his bribes in Swiss banks, although maybe the Cayman Islands are the hiding place of choice now)? In many cases, enslavement on the same level, or nearly so, as in days of old when the colonial powers were issuing stamps with the name of his country on them. Or, at the very least, questionable benefits or a break-even situation where they're neither better off nor worse off for our involvement. And behind it all is – shocking, I admit – a kind of newly-minted racism on the international scale – as if to say, well, technically these people aren't inferior to the white race (PC check-off), but they really aren't ready for full self-determination (AKA “democracy”) as yet, so we're going to help them along. Help them in the usual way, that is – by supporting home-grown tyrants and doing battle with insurgents and rebels (who may be closer to “the people” than the tyrants are). (Any wonder why we actually have troops stationed in places like the Central African Republic, that most Americans don't even know exist? Here's your answer.)

So yes, the more colorful and stylish colonial era is long gone – as are the glories of the British, French, Spanish, etc. empires. The King of England is no longer the King of India. And so forth. But the Third World is still there, and it is still among the “done-to” as opposed to the “doers-to” (that would be us, sorry to say), although some countries are struggling, with mixed success, to overcome their Third World status – India comes to mind.

But wait! There's more. (And I'm not talking about steak knives.) A funny thing happened, just in the last few years. The denizens of the Third, AKA exploited, done-to, World started catching on – not to their sorry lot, which they've been aware of for generations, but to the fact that they could escape. Escape, that is, on foot or by boat or airplane (or surfboard, for all I know) from their ill-starred native land to – guess where? Yes! To the very land of their oppressors, their exploiters – the gold mountain, the promised land. Irony much? And yet it's happening before our very eyes on a daily basis. And all it took, really, was a bit of consciousness raising – perhaps not intentional so much as the overwhelming influence of news and entertainment media. These folks didn't all of a sudden acquire the resources with which to buy plane tickets, or boat tickets, or to pay smugglers – all they did was realize that it was possible. So now the world (literally) is pouring across our southern border and there's no political will to stop it – because... well, maybe it's some kind of guilt. Maybe it's the feeling that our karma is catching up with us. Maybe we genuinely feel that letting the world in the door will improve our lives in some way, or at least give us more respect. At any rate, it's happening, and all the quibbling about costs vs. benefits won't stem the tide. It is, arguably, one of the most significant human migrations in modern times (excepting war refugees, even though some of the current migrants are in that category as well as the economic one).

And what about the people who are paying the price for all this – in violence, competition for jobs, clashes of cultures, “no-go” zones in large cities, infrastructure costs, social programs, opportunity costs (dealing with refugees vs. improving or even maintaining the standard of living), etc.? Well, they don't count, as our politicians and their media facilitators tell us on a daily basis. Much better to be “compassionate” and “welcoming”, and so on, than to try and preserve what's left of the culture most of us grew up with and always assumed would last indefinitely. Because, after all, anyone with those outmoded ideas is, by definition, a racist/fascist/you name it. There is no more comfortable “majority”; what we have is a majority of minorities. Diversity is not a goal or ideal, but a fact.

But again – as always – who pays the price? The ruling elite in their gated communities and Martha's Vineyard mansions? The corporations in their blue-tinted towers? Surely you jest. It's the average Joe, the man on the street – the “deplorables” – who are seeing their way of life crumbling, their world view challenged, their welfare threatened, their prospects narrowing or vanishing. But how many of them connect the dots, i.e. from this to the politicians who they persist in voting into, or keeping in, office? Very few – because, again, the propaganda machine is permanently set on “anyone who questions any of this is a racist, fascist, etc. and deserves to be shunned”.

The world is being remade before our eyes, and it's – oddly enough – the “little people” from elsewhere on the planet who are doing it – the residents of the Global Village. The formerly dispossessed, done-to, exploited, bottom-rung people have become, in the aggregate, our “influencers” and tastemakers. They are voting, and have already taken over in many parts of the country. They own the streets, and are taking over the airwaves as well. (To become a stranger in a strange land – the one I was born in – is a bit disorienting. Now it appears that if I ever belonged somewhere, now I belong nowhere, and am only in the way.)

But is this truly something new under the Sun? Well, mass human migrations are as old as human history, and in fact older. When it comes to world history, instability seems to be the rule – which is why it's kind of hilarious when those in charge try to impose arbitrary borders on, basically, borderless groups of people, as happened in the Middle East, Africa, and elsewhere. There are no more “no man's lands” – everything is on Google Maps, as if to say “This is the way the world is, and this is the way it's going to stay, and if you don't like it you can just leave.” But human nature, especially as expressed in societies, races, large numbers – has no interest in that sort of ossification. We are migratory creatures, after all. If we didn't come from somewhere else, we had an ancestor who did. So yes, this concept of “Native American”, or “native” anything, misses the point. Does anyone have a “right” to be where they are? I think the most we can say in this regard is that there is a “right of conquest”. If someone, at some point, took possession of a given piece of land, and is able to defend it, and their descendants are able to defend it, then that comes as close as anything to being a “right”, and being entitled to protection by the government. But if that government, or regime, should change, or if waves of “aliens” descend on that place, then all bets are off. Then we are back in a more primitive time, a Mad Max world, where everything has to be defended at all times, and nothing can be taken for granted. And this is where our so-called “leaders” seem to be taking us – into an age which is anarchistic in some respects but totalitarian in others. Property rights are in jeopardy, but the rules for proper behavior – and proper thinking – are more stringent than ever. In this sense, we come to resemble, more and more each day, those “Third World” peoples from whom we had always thought we were maintaining a comfortable distance – except that they are now here, and we are becoming them.

The Politics of Revolution (Part 2 of “How Destroyed Does America Have to Be?”)

Right off the bat, you might say “But wait, that doesn't make sense – isn't revolution what happens when politics don't work?” And that's true in a sense, but you could also say that revolution is just politics on fast forward – eliminating the fine points and the details and getting right to the heart of the matter (and breaking a few eggs along the way). And in fact, that's what seems to be happening in our time. How many times have you heard, or read, a comment like “history is speeding up”, or “the news cycle can barely keep up”? It seems that we wake up to a different world each day – and yet that is how prior revolutions were described as well. And to some extent, this disorientation is intentional – keep the citizenry off-balance and confused, and especially no longer sure who the “good guys” or the “bad guys” are, and you're halfway to the goal. All will be made clear once the revolution is complete and all the stragglers have been rounded up. Then there will be no more doubt or ambiguity, only certainty and the iron hand.

But that doesn't mean revolutions are apolitical – far from it. There has to be a, let's say, critical mass of dissatisfaction among the populace for revolutions to work – not that the isolated revolt, mutiny, whatever, can't happen, because they do and have, many times down through the ages. But for it to stick, there has to be a certain level of – even if tacit – agreement. And yes, this is true even if the result of the revolution is the oppression and exploitation of the very people on whose behalf it was supposedly staged – usually the “common man”, or “the workers”, or “labor”. The cannon fodder of every revolution over the past 200+ years has been the aggrieved – the underprivileged – the exploited – the shat-upon. And yet find me a revolution which, once successful in throwing out the Ancien Regime, does not, on some level, exploit and take advantage of the very same groups. More often than not, for all of their effort they have merely traded one form of oppression and slavery for another.

Another factor is the propaganda. Prior to the revolution, it's all about “rights”, and grievances, and getting even, and sticking it to the ruling class (royalty being especially good as targets). Post-revolution, it's more about absolute conformity for the good of the state, and stop griping because Rome wasn't built in a day, and you can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, and there's a camp just down the road for any naysayers and cranks.

What would a revolution be, in fact, without a vast army of the dissatisfied, the alienated, and the underprivileged? And what would a modern revolution be without providing them with voting rights, regardless of citizenship status? Imagine if the Roman Empire had not only welcomed the barbarians – opened the gates for them – but also instantly made them full-fledged Roman citizens with voting rights? The empire would have fallen much sooner than it did. (Now one might say, if it was inevitable it's just as well it happened sooner than later. Yeah – it's good being an armchair historian, but just try living through it.)

Which brings us to the present day, and the situation in the U.S.A. As I've observed on a number of occasions, we are a revolutionary society. We started out with a revolution, and then – never satisfied with the status quo – staged a number of mini-revolutions from that point on, right up to the present day. We had, for example, Jacksonian democracy... Reconstruction... Progressivism... the New Deal... The Great Society, along with the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts... the cultural revolution of the 1960s... the short-lived populist “revolutions” under Reagan and Trump... and now the full-blown Revolution of 2020, which not only consolidated all previous gains (those trending leftwards, of course) but set even more firmly in place all of the governmental structures, agencies, laws, and regulations required in order to make the revolution permanent – and, by the way – and most importantly of all, perhaps – secured the full cooperation and “buy-in” of the military.

And, in a sense, it matters little whether we refer to a revolution as "just starting", "under way", or "successful", since to the revolutionary mind there is no such thing as completion, i.e. satisfaction with the new status quo.  If dissatisfaction is a state of mind of a certain portion of the citizenry, then so is the desire -- the need -- for any given revolution to go on indefinitely, since there is always room for improvement, and perfection is always tantalizingly out of reach.  But isn't “permanent revolution” a contradiction in terms? Chairman Mao didn't think so. And his heirs (both in China and elsewhere on the globe) are pretty much calling the shots these days. “Permanent revolution” is no more improbable than “permanent dissatisfaction”, which is, arguably, a part of fallen human nature.

So yes, revolution is nothing new. It isn't alien to the American experience – the American “experiment” -- but is part and parcel of it. If there was ever a society that was, in its heart of hearts, anti-conservative, anti-status quo, it is our own. There is an unwritten rule, or assumption, that change is good – change for its own sake, actual results being a minor consideration. “Progress” has been an icon and a fetish almost from the start – and that has morphed into something called “change”. This was, of course, the theme of Barack Obama's campaigns in 2008 and 2012 – change! Hope and change! The great icon, the great golden calf! And simply believing in it was enough; not only do actual results not matter, but it's considered downright impolite to even bring the subject up.

But let's not get too judgmental on this point, because it should be obvious that the appeal of “change” has to be based on dissatisfaction with things as they are. Obama did not win two presidential elections because people were satisfied and content. He won because people were angry – frustrated – alienated. They felt that they had lost control of their lives, and therefore of their fate. And his campaigns were designed to verify, reinforce, and perpetuate all of that anger and frustration – and to promise that things would get better, because – well – “because change”.

Now, one could argue, what's the big deal? Most people feel this way most of the time, and Obama was just capitalizing on it. OK... but then why do people feel this way? What is it about America that seems to yield up this attitude, seemingly out of nowhere, whereas in other countries it takes a lot more effort (and in some cases, is virtually impossible – think about places like Switzerland, for example)? What it is is what I call The Promise – and that is that the Founding Fathers not only established a republic that was designed as well as it was, given their relative sophistication about human nature, but that republic held out hope for perpetual progress... perpetual improvement in the standard of living... unhindered freedoms... and that the voice of the people would always and everywhere we heard, and honored. Quite a wish list! And it actually seemed to work for a while, at least as long as people were content to allow the landed gentry to run things. But then along came populism (version 1.0) and concern for “rights” (beyond those already specified in the Constitution), and the gap between the ruling elite and the common folk was exposed, and that got the ball rolling. (And yes, Southern Secession and the establishment of the Confederacy was a high water mark of sorts.) Post-Civil War, our revolutions were a bit less violent, but no less significant. And that brings us up to the present day, when a new variation on an old theme is found, namely that the revolution is being led by the government itself – the “establishment” -- and it is aimed at the people – or at least a substantial portion thereof.

Now, one might say, but haven't all of our revolutions been, basically, at the instigation of whoever's in charge, and haven't they all been opposed by a certain percentage of the populace? Instigation, yes – in the case of the Progressive Era, the New Deal, civil rights measures of the 1960s, etc. Revolution from the top – which was, in fact, turned into an art form by Chairman Mao. But as for opposition – not so much. The Progressive Era and the New Deal were, if you will, heavy on carrot and light on stick. They promised, and they delivered – up to a point. (And what they were unable to deliver, they filled in by means of propaganda.) They were represented, at the time, and are in the history books, as being “for the people”. I'm not sure the same can be said of what's going on at present. Yes, there is plenty of carrot (entitlements, creation of new “rights” and catering to newly-discovered victim/grievance groups) but also a whole lot of stick (taxes, regulations, inflation, violation of traditional rights, and intentional alienation and persecution of large segments of the populace by means of slander, “canceling”, discrimination, etc.).

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You may have noticed that in my previous post I seemed to be expressing some degree of disapproval of current events and trends. (And I was trying so hard to be objective and “value free”!) Does that make me a “conservative”? Well... if one defines conservatism as “preferring to stick with what works, or at least with what is stable and predictable, as opposed to experimenting with the lives and fates of the citizenry based on some theories or 'models' cooked up in Ivy League faculty lounges”, then yes, I'm a conservative. But if it means “regarding the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as sacrosanct holy writ that must be set in granite and which cannot be improved upon, and America as permanently occupying the moral high ground, and being nigh unto infallible in its foreign and domestic policies” then no. In that case, I'll join the “dirty hippies” in the next protest march.

When you boil it all down, the ultimate question becomes, quite simply, “Is the world a better place because America, i.e. the United States, existed?” Or, would everyone have been better off if we had just stuck with Britain and become part of Canada, or whatever? To put it another way – has America been part of the solution all these many years, or part of the problem? Has our experiment with democracy metastasized into oppression, both on the domestic front and world-wide? Or has it at least been preferable to the alternatives, whatever they may have been? When you put it this way, you soon realize that the question is impossible to answer. History is not full of dress rehearsals and trial runs – it's always the real thing, for better or worse. No rewinds, no replay, no Plan B, no “what-ifs”, no “woulda, coulda, shoulda”.

Now, one “nuanced”, if you will, answer might be that we were a good influence for a while, but then “broke bad”, went rogue, whatever. Human nature and the hunger for power took over. OK... then what was the point at which the balance shifted? The Mexican War? The Civil War? The Spanish-American War? World War I? World War II? Korea? Vietnam? Iraq/Afghanistan? Everybody has a theory as to when we “lost our innocence” – and the simplest answer is that we never had it to begin with. The Founding Fathers knew more about human nature than all the present-day Ivy League “scholars” and think-tankers combined, and yet they had hope. They figured, give flawed human nature a chance to better itself through a rationally designed form of government. Perhaps reason will conquer passion – or at least keep it at bay. And, better to fail than to despair of even trying, right? And in fact, that effort does seem to have at least altered the conversation over the years. Democracy has become, for many people in many places, something that is worth a try, or at least given lip service. (Even the most tyrannical governments on the planet pay tribute by calling themselves the “people's democratic republic of....”.) What it runs into, more often than not, is not only human nature, but national character. Contrary to our State Department's perennial delusion, there are people out there who are simply not ready for democracy, in any form. And this is not being judgmental; it's simply a fact, and is based on any number of things – tradition, custom, religion, language, world view, and so on. And it doesn't mean those cultures are “inferior”; they may have worked out a quite satisfactory system of governance – one that works better than ours, in fact (not that high a bar any longer). And then there is the natural aversion to some foreigners (especially “infidels”) trying to tell you how to run your country and live your life. (And – how many times have we put lipstick on a pig called “fledgling democracy” when it was, in fact, nothing of the sort, but just a show put on for the sake of staying on our foreign aid payroll? “Color revolutions”, ink-stained thumbs... just a side show, basically – and a cruel hoax for the people who actually fell for it.)

So yes, it's imponderable. Go back to 1776 but squelch those minor uprisings in Massachusetts, and put those treasonous wackos on house arrest before they can gather at Independence Hall, and assert that “Hail, Britannia” will remain our national anthem, and let people of good common sense remain in charge, and long live King George! Would the world have profited more by that than by what actually happened? Who knows?

But just because this issue is imponderable doesn't mean there aren't plenty of people out there who have the answer. Start with the “1619 Project” which asserts that America was founded on slavery and was therefore evil, immoral, and flawed from the beginning – and that nothing that has happened since can ever make up for that, therefore the country has to be brought to ruin and then rebuilt from scratch, with not only equal rights but also radical redistribution of property and other resources. And of course this idea has international implications as well, since any nation with such a fatal flaw cannot possibly have legitimately represented itself as an exemplar of democracy, human rights, and freedom for all these years – and certainly should never have imposed its flawed ideas on any other nation or culture, either through diplomacy or by means of physical force. So if America is suspect, so are all of its works, and the rest of world has been deceived all this time. (But they are “woke” now, and America has been "outed" as a total fraud.)

But the 1619 Project aside, many people have come to the opinion that it's high time America paid the price for its hubris and presumption – way past time, in fact. No one wants to have to live with the karma of America's past sins, in other words – and if committing political, cultural, and economic suicide is a sufficient form of reparation, it's certainly worth doing.

So yes, collective guilt is an overriding theme when it comes to both domestic and foreign policy, the only question being how to expiate that guilt. On the domestic side, when it comes to slavery, the preferred option is to nullify all economic gains that can be traced to slavery – which, in the “woke” playbook, means pretty much all. Make us not only poverty-stricken, but helpless before our enemies, because we were – as everyone knows (because that's what we're taught in public school and college) – the only nation on earth to allow slavery to persist for so long, and this in the face of all of our pretenses – oh, the hypocrisy! So we can only repay our debt to the rest of humanity be ceasing to exist as a nation, and as a culture. And if we're ever assaulted in any way – economically, militarily, culturally – by any other nation taking advantage of our sorry state, well, we've got it coming.

Plus, domestic guilt mongers aside, there are plenty of people elsewhere on the globe who totally agree with this point of view. They may not say much about slavery – that would be too blatantly hypocritical even for them! – but when it comes to America throwing its weight around, and our own hypocrisy, they are remarkably unified: It's about time for a comeuppance! We're sick of America being “the” superpower, and the world's policeman -- who do they think they are? And this is at the very same time they cheerfully accept our “foreign aid” and military assistance (and pay us occasional and grudging respect for having bailed them out in World Wars I and II, and for having held off the “Russian bear” throughout the Cold War). Only a fool wouldn't take advantage of Uncle Stupid while they have the opportunity (recalling the “beached whale” analogy...). And what they marvel at more than anything else is our naivete. They may have laughed behind Trump's back at NATO get-togethers, but do you really think they aren't laughing behind Biden's back as well – maybe more? (At least Trump scared them a bit; Biden is about as scary as a frayed sock puppet.)

Make no mistake, the “America and the world” issue is a prominent subtext of the current revolution, but it's far from the only issue, and not even the most important (although it may be to watchers beyond our borders). In view of our history, the current revolution is far from exceptional. One might almost say that it's an American tradition – that we would be all out of sorts without a revolution of some sort every few decades. Now, this doesn't mean that it's right, or desirable, or even that it won't have catastrophic consequences – only that, in the broad historical scheme of things, there's an air of inevitability about it. One could object, of course, that all of our previous revolutions have at least not meant the end of the Republic – that it has survived, in some form, through much storm and strife. And who knows, it may survive the current revolution as well – at least in superficial terms, like the form of government (even if the character of elections undergoes permanent change, including eliminating them for all intents and purposes). Will we still have a functioning system of currency, or will we be spending “Zimbabwe bucks” or trading potatoes for shoes? How about property rights? (They are under assault as it is.) How about all the other rights listed in the Bill of Rights, as well as rights that have been defined or “discovered” since? Will they exist in name only – or not at all? (Or – more likely – will all the old, traditional rights be declared null and void, and the new “rights” be declared paramount? This topsy-turvy act is also a hallmark of many prior revolutions elsewhere on the planet. What better way to remake society than to declare that what once was right, and therefore legal, is now wrong, and therefore illegal – and vice versa?)

That's on the historical side. But then we have the political side, and once again a revolution, in a sort of paradoxical way, depends on a certain modicum of support from the populace even if its ultimate goal is to suppress, or eliminate, most of the rights of said populace. Yes, people can vote themselves into tyranny – the most notable historic example being the naming of Adolf Hitler as chancellor of Germany in 1933, based on the election results in 1932. But we also have numerous other examples of the popular vote going to a communist candidate, who immediately turns around and eliminates elections. (So in that case, did the people vote, in an election, to eliminate elections? File this under either “paradox” or “irony”, your choice.)

See, people don't vote for a “system” nearly as often as they vote for an idea (right or wrong) and, even more often, for what they perceive to be in their best and most immediate interests – economically and socially.  This is human nature, and is the very thing that the Founding Fathers were attempting to rise above with their emphasis on certain ideas – rights, proper governance, etc. What resulted in the long run was a kind of hybrid – “pocketbook” issues, regional loyalties, etc. often disguised as ideas, or ideals, with ample iconography to match. “America” is a concept that suffices on Memorial Day or the Fourth of July, but when people walk into the voting booth, their jobs and bank accounts seem to carry the day. (This is assuming that they are not among the “woke” minority who take pride in voting against their own economic interests. In their case it's intentional, but most of the time it's the result of propaganda and blatant lies by politicians.)

And I often wonder how many people actually vote for “America”, as opposed to their state/county/village/farm/etc. It seems that most people can only “think big” up to a point, but in the long run they will make decisions – including those about their governance – based on what is more immediate, visible, and essential to their livelihood. The trick, of course – and it's one that works a remarkable portion of the time – is convincing people that their immediate concerns are synonymous with the good of the Republic, however defined – and that on some mystical, other-worldly level, fighting goatherds in Afghanistan has something to do with preserving the family farm in Iowa. Get enough people to believe this, and you can do anything you like foreign policy-wise, including starting and pursuing endless wars with no discernible relationship to the actual welfare or prosperity of any actual American citizen.

So what has been going on all this time? Well, it's about changing – through relentless propaganda, derision, and shaming -- people's natural regard for home and hearth – for family, village and town – for race, ethnicity, and religion – into a regard – nay, a prioritization – of ideas. Now, this is nothing new, since we've been an ideational society since the start. But even our most iconic idea, or image, that of “America”, is an abstraction, really, when you come to think about it. Is the “America” of a New England fisherman the same “America” as that of a Nebraska farmer, or a California fruit grower, or a Detroit factory worker? They may use the word, but what they really mean is much more here and now – my family, my home, my street, my neighborhood. (Let the rootless cosmopolitans – the globalists – play their games. We know what they've given up (or never had), and we know what really counts in life.)

But the idea of “America” has outlived its usefulness, according to the globalists (including our home-grown kind). It's... well... not just old-fashioned and out of style, but it's also “reactionary”, “isolationist” (try that out on the guys who fought in World War II and Korea), “paternalistic”, “xenophobic”, and, ultimately, “racist”, as well as the dozen or so (and counting) other kind of “isms” that could be called up. So the tables have been turned on the citizenry, who thought they had a reliable set of standards, principles, and images to rely on, and now they're all expected to embrace “globalism” with all of its myriad components, implications, and alleged blessings. They are expected to become world citizens – loyal to the planet, and nothing less.

And they are the people who have the most to lose in the current revolution. All that they value is being devalued, if not outright derided and laughed at, by the ruling elite and their street-wise acolytes. And yet – and here is the ultimate irony – they continue to vote for the people who are out to destroy them and their culture. And I attribute this not so much to their ignorance as to the utter treachery of the ruling elite and of the public officials who are their obedient servants (not to mention their facilitators in the media and on the Internet). If our previous revolutions were, in a sense, about government dragging some of the populace, kicking and screaming, into a new era (think of civil rights legislation), then the current revolution is about completely ignoring large segments of the populace – having decided that they don't count and should have no rights, and are, basically, non-persons.

When the ruling elite simply writes off a substantial portion of the population, you know that the revolution is well under way, and nearing completion. When it declares that portion of the population to be “deplorable”, and liable to engage in “conspiracy theories” and “insurrections”, you know that the revolution is over with, and all that remains is a mopping-up operation (going on right now with the January 6 hearings). Our previous revolutions at least had the merit of allowing the losers to live, if in a state of second-class citizenship (see the South, from the Civil War right up to the present day). The current attitude seems to be one of total war – defeat is not sufficient – only total subjugation will do, and, lacking that, extermination.

So yes, it is different this time, and yet – and here's the point at which all “conservatives” should engage in a rare exercise in humility – it's apparently what most people want, as evidenced by their voting patterns, which include not voting, which is the same as going along with whatever the results happen to be. (Ever wonder why “opinion polls” have such a low correlation with election results when the polls are conducted by conservative organizations, but a much higher one when the polls are conducted by liberal organizations? Think about that for a while.)

To be just a bit simplistic about it, anyone who voted for Biden in 2020 – well, OK, there were certainly plenty of anti-Trump, as opposed to pro-Biden, votes – but basically, anyone who voted for Biden voted for exactly what we have now – inflation, shortages, open borders, Critical Race Theory, racial paranoia, gender paranoia, “climate change” being Job One, globalism, “green” (no oil, no gas, no nukes), chaotic foreign policy – and so on. They voted for all of these things because they were either explicitly part of the Democratic platform, or they were completely predictable in the event Biden became president. (Or, they were things Trump was against, so they had to be for.) So... basically, they can't complain, and in fact they aren't complaining. If you look at or listen to the mainstream media and their facilitators in the “social media” and “entertainment”, you'd think everything was groovy – that we had entered an entirely new phase en route to Utopia. (And as for the White House press office, whose talent for propaganda and doublespeak ranks up there with Izvestia and Pravda, “never is heard a discouraging word, and the skies are not cloudy all day”, like the words of the old cowboy song.)

And the point is (again, memo to any and all conservatives) that the people who are with, or at least not against, the revolutionary program are, in fact, in the majority. So... if you're really a dedicated fan of “democracy”, i.e. “majority rule” regardless, you should be completely satisfied with all of this. And of course I know what the objections will be – “But it's wrong! It's un-American! It's globalism, tyranny, totalitarianism, Marxism, etc.” All true – but it's also “the will of the people”, by definition. So... how's that “democracy” thing working out for you? Is it really the best system yet devised for self-governance? The conservatives need to do some serious soul-searching on this issue.

But one can argue that this isn't the real thing – that it's degenerate, chaotic, the product of brainwashing and propaganda, etc. Very likely! But then we have to at least re-think what we mean by “democracy”, and what we want... what we expect it to produce. Because it turns out (and the Founding Fathers knew this very well) that a democracy is only as good as the citizens who make it up, and if those citizens are the demoralized product of a long – generations-long – campaign of propaganda and demoralization and guilt-tripping, starting in the universities and filtering down through the political class and the media to the ordinary citizen, then we can expect what we have now – not democracy in the classical sense, but a kind of Bizarro-democracy – a disfigured mockery of the real thing, which would scandalize the Founding Fathers and their political descendants, but which – at least as things stand – appears to be a natural, inevitable stage of devolution of America as an idea, and thus as an empire as well. The question of whose fault it is – the people's or their enemies – may not even be relevant, since if the people have allowed this state of affairs to develop, they're their own worse enemies.

                                                       -------------- o -------------

Lest I end this post on a completely negative note, let me point out that, historically, every empire eventually falls, disappears, or at least shrinks. And empires built on a delusional Utopian vision have a much lower half life than those built on plain old conquest. Do you find this ironic? Because old-style conquest, i.e. war, is supposedly out of fashion these days, which is why Russia's invasion of Ukraine is such a scandal. War is, well... unseemly... in poor taste... hurtful... and all the rest of it. And yet I will contend that it's more universal, and natural to the human condition, than Utopianism (which often involves war anyway). It's not that I'm saying “Give War a Chance” (priceless title of one of P. J. O'Rourke's hilarious books), it's just that it's so common, and so nearly universal, that it should give one pause when entertaining Rousseau-esque fancies about the nature of man and of what is possible, i.e. to what extent the human race, or any portion thereof, can pull itself up by its bootstraps.

And this is the odd thing about America, in a way. We are an ideational society, which should mean that reason prevails in most if not all circumstances. And yet we are, arguably, one of the most warlike nations, and cultures, on the planet – both now and historically. (Our “defense” budget exceeds that of most other nations combined – and yet only about 1% of it is dedicated to actual defense, i.e. of the homeland.) And what gets us into wars is, more often than not, ideas. Ideas based on the founding documents for certain, but also on the many and varied interpretations of said documents, right up to the present day – the most overriding idea being that simply being “enlightened” is not enough – staying home and sitting under our own vine and fig tree, and minding our own damn business, is way too boring, and selfish to boot. We owe it to the world to spread the gospel of “democracy” – by example, persuasion, or by force if need be (were our Founding Fathers actually students of Muhammad? Makes you wonder... ). And by the same token, we can excuse any foreign escapades – invasions, occupations, whatever – regardless of cost in “blood and treasure” – on the basis that ideas are, and should be, paramount, and that no sacrifice in their service is too great.

And this is what the rest of the world, and especially the globalists – Utopians all – are having to cope with when dealing with the United States. We have trouble falling into line behind the E.U. or the World Economic Forum because we have long since written off Europe, and especially Western Europe, as a hotbed of world-weary cynicism – a place not of ideas but of lukewarmness and decadence. And yet here we are faced with the prospect of, basically, submitting to their world view and their wishes, and leaving traditional American values (whether honorable or wrong-headed) behind.

And is this because we've run out of ideas – our most cherished possession as a society, in a way? Or have we grown world-weary as well? Or has our pursuit of ideas been rebuffed, brought low, and humiliated with increasing frequency (one only has to consider Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan)? Or is it as simple as demographic change (the replacement of traditionally-minded Americans with people who simply don't share our ideas and our vision, and who show no interest in “assimilating”)? In other words, does the America that conservatives are trying “save” even exist any longer (especially if one clings to the notion of “majority rule” at all costs)?

And this may, in fact, be why the globalists and Utopians – especially of the European variety – have found it so easy to infiltrate into our culture, economics, politics, and even values. If nature abhors a vacuum, so do political and social activists; they see a weakness – a gap – and waste no time filling it. And it matters little what they fill it with – what counts is that they've replaced nothing with something. And when conservatives object, and protest – it's foreign, decadent, un-American, etc. – one response (call it mean-spirited triumphalism) might be “Well, then why didn't you defend your traditions and values more energetically, rather than acting like sheep before the shearer?” A valid point, I'm afraid. But it doesn't matter how energetically a minority group defends its values and way of life, a sufficiently determined majority will roll over them with ease – as is happening now, and the popular culture is, if you will, the vanguard, followed closely by public education and the rest of the armies of “agents of change”. Another way of putting it is that when the long march through the institutions was taking place, the “average American” was fixated on 9-to-5 jobs, car payments, TV, and sports. Now we wake up to a different world, and the cry goes out “What happened? And who betrayed us? Who opened the gates and let the Trojan Horse in?” Well, um... how about the people you've been voting into office all this time? Bet you thought they were on your side; sorry about that. They were, in fact, enemy agents – every bit as despicable as the “atomic spies” of old, but much less picturesque.

But this is the way of things in human history – and it's, ultimately, always about power – not necessarily overt power, i.e. armies, wealth, territory, etc. – but about, once again, the power of ideas, and by that I don't mean good vs. bad ideas, but ideas that are backed by sheer force and determination. A true believer in just about anything is what is called, in the military, a “force multiplier”. History is brimming over with examples of small but determined groups emerging victorious after a struggle with a (supposedly) “great” power; our own Revolution (the first one) is an example. And one reason ideas have such power is that the other side has no answers. We were confronted with fundamentalist Islam in Afghanistan (as were the Russians), and could not answer in kind, or anything close to it. So a “primitive” society with “crude” weapons, a fanatical religious outlook, and – gasp! – no uniforms succeeded, after 20 long years, in forcing us to give up and go home. (See also Vietnam, for both us and the French.)

What America is confronted with now is, in a way, new and different. We're used to revolutions, as I've said, but those are basically internal matters, at least for us. Our revolutions have always been home-grown and tailored to our tastes, in a sense. And we've always had the oceans protecting us from traditional military attacks and invasions from overseas. But our Achilles heel, as it turns out, was in being apathetic and naive about foreign influences in other areas -- economics being prime, but also politics/diplomacy, values, culture, and even philosophy and “political science” (areas in which “invaders” from Europe have done some of the most severe damage). We (OK, some of us) take great pride in our European “heritage” – problem is, that heritage is pretty much extinct in the Old Country, and what replaced it is at our doorstep (or maybe a “home invasion” is a better metaphor). America is, in many ways, the last holdout for many of the traditions our ancestors brought with them across the ocean. The Old World has moved far beyond all of that and considers our “clinging” behavior to be somewhat laughable and pathetic – especially when it comes to religion. (Note the similarity to the attitudes of our home-grown elites.) Western Europe in particular takes great, and quite explicit, pride in being religion-free – in being completely secular and materialistic, and they find this quite satisfying and wonder what's wrong with us that we don't follow suit (but they have ways of dealing with this and are doing so).

So the “good news”, in a way, is that empires do eventually end, in some manner or other. The American Empire is on its last legs – not because of conclusive defeats overseas or economic meltdown on the home front, but because of lack of political will – not lack of ideas per se, but lack of any way of implementing those ideas that does not immediately turn into a catastrophe. As a nation and as a society, we're falling apart in nearly every way. But we're not alone, as it turns out! The “international community” is here to help us – and to absorb us into a global, or near-global, empire, albeit in a subordinate role, since we still have to pay for our sins, which are great and many. So – again, like the beached whale – we will be “mined”, if you will, for any usable resources, and assigned a kind of bizarre “emeritus” status on the world stage, but someone else will be calling the shots. (And don't think our own elites aren't polishing their resumes, hoping that they will be welcomed into (or allowed to remain in) the inner circle once we're over the hump. No one wants to be like those Russian officials who thought all was well until they were photoshopped out of the May Day parade photos – the first step to either the gulag or an unmarked grave.)

And yet – and yet! – this empire – this new, squeaky-clean, humanistic, “diverse”, you-name-it, empire will also pass, eventually – and it may take decades, or even centuries. No one now alive will be around to see it. But in the scheme of things, it's inevitable – and that very flaw, or weakness, means that a revival of the human spirit is possible.

And when's the last time you heard that term – “human spirit”? Just try “Googling” it, as opposed to things like “rights”. I imagine you'll wind up with a 1-to-a million ratio. And yet the human spirit, by which I mean the desire to live free, as opposed to being in a state of slavery – and conscious, as opposed to brainwashed – this cannot be suppressed forever. The urge to live free is always there, perhaps buried deep in the subconscious, but never totally extinguished, because it is, after all, a vital part of human nature. African slaves that were brought to the U.S. considered freedom to be their ultimate vision, and that which they hoped and prayed for (and sang about) for generations. Freedom burst forth from the Baltic States and the Caucasus – basically forgotten parts of the world – when the Soviet Union broke up. People rediscovered their national identities, traditions, and customs – and, in many cases, their faith. And it's not always a matter of “remembering” what freedom is, and what it's like; it's deeper than that. It's what happens when people start comparing their situation to what they instinctively feel is proper and just. (We are seeing the glimmerings of this here in the U.S., even as the forces of totalitarianism gain strength.)

So if there's any hope to be had, it is along these lines. This generation may see nothing other than not only the road to serfdom, but serfdom itself. And yet, there may be pockets of resistance, as there have been in all other revolutions world-wide. If a greater portion of humanity prefers bogus “rights”, and even more bogus “security”, and is willing to give up everything else to obtain them, there will always be a remnant that will prefer independence and freedom of choice, with all of its risks – and they are the people on whom we must rely for a rebirth, no matter how long it takes.

 

Ideas Whose Time Has Come. Part II: China Rising, the Death of Democracy, the New Nationalism, Corona, and Catholic Wisdom

A bit less than a year ago, I put up a blog post (Ideas Whose Time Has Come. Part I: The Middle Kingdom, Democracy, Globalism, and Islam) dealing with ideas and their impact on history -- especially on current events, which, after all, are history in the making.  Here's a brief summary with a few comments added:    

• China has, historically, generally minded its own business. The same can't be said for Europe or the U.S.
• The European powers have given up on traditional empires (the ones sustained by military might) but we have not as yet.
• Empires are becoming more primarily economic in character, and China is showing great skill in this area.
• Accusations against Trump for treason may signal the replacement of democracy by what amounts to gang warfare. (Politics has totally replaced principles.)
• Attempts to “spread democracy” inevitably run up against national character.
• Communism has evolved into globalism as the political “theory of everything”. Whereas communism has been shown to morph based on national character, globalism has yet to show any signs of doing this (or of being capable of doing so). (One could say that communism, at least in theory, chose to ignore national character, whereas globalism is actively opposed to it, i.e. to the idea that such a thing even exists and that it's important.)
• America had the (alleged) good fortune to start out as a more or less cultural blank slate, which made it an ideal experimental laboratory for secular humanism, AKA “democracy”. But human nature nonetheless got in the way. (Where flesh-and-blood people are concerned, there are no blank slates. Those only exist for ideologues and Utopian “thinkers”, who invariably become tyrants when they are given any power, because “the people” simply refuse to cooperate.)
• Democracy is already fragile enough (as the Founding Fathers realized). Trying to “spread” it is doomed to failure in the long run (and sometimes in the short run). (A good question for debate is whether democracy is, or approximates, the “natural political state” of mankind. If one looks at history, it's clear that democracy in any real sense is a rare bird – seldom found anywhere, and never found in most places even unto the present day. It's more likely that monarchy (either explicit or implicit) is a more natural state; it's certainly the most common historically.)
• We are, in effect, living in a post-democratic society where power has the upper hand. (What this implies is that “voting” is, more often than not, a cruel hoax. As Joseph Sobran once said, if it were important they wouldn't let you vote on it.) (Elections don't need to be rigged at the point of voting; they are rigged way before that point in terms of who is allowed to campaign for the nomination and who gets nominated. The actual election merely provides an imprimatur by the captive citizenry on something that the ruling elite have already decided.)
• Islam is the grass-roots movement of our time, and is directly opposed to both democracy and globalism. Its weapons include mass migration, fertility, militancy, and faith. (Note that Islam is not opposed to empire, but the empire they seek is strictly theocratic.)
• The sources of energy for militant Islam include economic colonialism (by the West), memories of traditional colonialism (by Europe), and the existence of Israel (which was established by the West in Muslim territory).
• “If there's a new Cold War being fought, it's between two international movements – 'democracy', which means globalism, and Islam. And, by the way, between secularism and religion.”

So, just based on the above points, let's think about what has changed and what hasn't in 11 short months:

• China has upped the ante not only in direct economic terms, but in having unleashed (accidentally or otherwise) a world-wide pandemic that, among other things, has mesmerized our leadership into, basically, shutting down what had been a booming economy (and China's main competitor economically). In other words, they (China) have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. But a note of caution here – as I said to someone the other day, China has tremendous investments in the U.S. and holds the lion's share of our national debt, so all of that goes into the dumpster if our economy fails to recover from this attack. Either they've pushed this thing too far, or they're willing, for whatever reason, to take the hit. Time will tell. In any case, it has put China into the global driver's seat for the first time ever, and they must be feeling kind of giddy about that. (So much for being satisfied with being the Middle Kingdom.)
• We haven't heard the word “treason” much lately out of the Gang of Four, i.e. Pelosi, Schumer, Schiff, and Nadler – and Impeachment 2.0 has been put on hold, apparently for the duration of the pandemic. But worry not, they're gathering “evidence”, and building up a head of steam, and when the time is right they'll be back for another round. Thus, the “gang war” model is alive and well.
• “Spreading democracy” is on hold right now, even though bombing the Third World back to the Stone Age isn't. These are the throes of a dying empire, and it's sadly typical. Let's just say that the rest of the world won't miss us when we're gone.
• The globalists, on the other hand, have a new lease on life, and this applies whether we're talking about the domestic or foreign (European) variety. They are not letting this crisis go to waste by any means. They are increasing the powers of central government by many quanta. Prohibitions, dictated shutdowns, arrests of those deemed uncooperative, martial law (or its equivalent) are the order of the day. And the economic consequences, interestingly enough, don't seem to even be on radar. We have only to remember that totalitarianism inevitably leaves poverty in its wake, and that is, in fact, part of the program. An impoverished people is a dependent people – dependent on government largess and willing to submit, and grovel, and do just about anything to merely stay alive. I would say that this pandemic ranks right up there with the Great Depression and World War II as a means for the ruling elite to consolidate the gains they've been working so hard to achieve all these years. And this holds true whether the pandemic was their idea or not. If it was, then OK... if not, then it was serendipity. The end result is the same.
• And, to the extent that the globalist agenda includes reducing the U.S. to a vassal state at best – as a source of raw materials and military manpower – this process is also well underway. (One can argue that the European model of their military being our military was formulated when we agreed to jump into World War I. When they found out how easily seduced we were, that became a permanent piece of their long-term planning. So it's not a new idea; it's a bit over 100 years old, in fact.) And, we have turned into a technocracy, i.e. a system where the “experts” – the people with all the models, all the data, and the coveted scientific imprimatur – have the final say on everything. (This is also nothing new; it began with FDR's “Brain Trust” and re-emerged as JFK's “best and brightest”.) But what should not be overlooked in all of this is that those experts are all, without exception, employees of the ruling elite; they are not free, independent, and objective agents, but are at the service of whoever is really in charge, i.e. not politicians, who are more tools than initiators. They do serve a purpose, however, as the “face” of science, objectivity, reason, data, statistics, models, etc., and they provide ammunition for those who contend that “politics” has to make way, and hopefully disappear from the scene. (This is certainly true in that once we have a dictatorship of the elite, politics is no longer needed. There are many people who will celebrate this fact; I wouldn't be totally against it myself, I have to admit. If democracy is an illusion, then politics is unnecessary and so are politicians.)
• Militant Islam continues to make trouble and cause indigestion for the globalists. If the globalists are playing the long game, then Islam is playing an even longer game (possibly exceeded only by China). The question of who the last man standing will be has become more relevant than ever in these times. The globalists have the wealth... we have the military (which is at the service of the globalists)... China has the economic clout that comes from being the most populous country in world history... but Islam has what none of the others has, namely the dream of a caliphate... an empire, but of a theocratic sort, subject only to God. The globalists believe in no higher power than money, we mouth words about faith but on any given day couldn't care less... and China is explicitly and militantly godless. It would be highly ironic if a ragtag but very large group of people whose only distinctive attribute is belief in a higher power managed to subdue not only the U.S. but also the globalists, and – at some time in the future – meet China on equal terms. We don't normally think of the Muslims as experts in the long game, but notice how often they refer back to the Crusades – they even refer to us as “Franks”. That's 1000 years, folks. So, if you want to talk about long memories, they aren't doing too badly.

But hold on. Lest we get too carried away with this model, it bears mentioning that nationalistic impulses are also alive and well in Eastern Europe, Latin America, and certain segments of the U.S. population (highly correlated with support for Donald Trump, no surprise). And by nationalism I don't mean militant nationalism, AKA imperialism or empire building, AKA neoconservatism. This is more akin to good, old-fashioned patriotism – belief in and loyalty to one's family, tribe, ethnic group, race, religion, language, and culture, as well as a tendency to want to mind our own business and escape foreign entanglements. It is a true grass-roots movement for the simple reason that it opposes virtually all forms of cultural warfare on the part of the elite, which means that it opposes the agenda of the vast bulk of what are termed the “media”, as well as “entertainment”, anti-traditional art forms, soulless architecture, musical anarchy, gender chaos, economic exploitation, and any other form of reducing the individual to a number, a unit, or a statistic – the slouch toward dystopia, if you will. In other words, they oppose forced conformity in the name of “diversity” as well as discrimination against any form of true diversity. They oppose being ruled by committees... by bureaucrats... by officials... by people who are, in truth, much less human than they are. They're against “programs” whose main goal is to exterminate all that makes individuals and small groups interesting and worth honoring and preserving. They're also opposed to imposition of deadening uniformity in areas such as culture and education, and prefer, rather, to celebrate all of the many and variegated fruits of human life, and to allow each demographic to celebrate its identity and express pride without being shamed and harassed by social enforcers. And they are, as a result, engaged in an existential struggle with the globalists, international business and finance, all of the various forms of cultural leveling (and cultural genocide), and especially with the propaganda apparatus that seeks to shame and condemn people whose values differ from the approved ones (or, some would say, people who have any values at all – blind conformity, submission, and slavery hardly qualifying to be termed “values”).

And this is a struggle that has a definite David-and-Goliath aspect to it. You have people like George Soros, globalist extraordinaire, whose strategy is to subvert and suppress all expressions of national, regional, and local pride and identity, whenever and in whatever form it may occur, and to support collaborators among our politicians. His is a grass-roots campaign as well (by design), and complements perfectly the top-down political, social, and financial strategies of the more conventional globalists. The result is that the average citizen finds himself in a kind of vice; he is oppressed and dictated to from above, but at the same time cannot trust the very ground on which he stands, because it has been contaminated by unclean, diseased, and deadly elements.

And yet there is still resistance, just as there is resistance to government dictates when it comes to the pandemic. The human spirit remains alive and well, even in the darkest hours. People see, with varying degrees of clarity, that the end of all of this is not only physical, social, and economic slavery, but also the death of the spirit, and they react.

On the home front, do we have any reason to hope? Well, Donald Trump is not the perfect nationalist by any means, and cannot be accused of any sort of doctrinaire conservatism, but he is fairly consistent in his speeches when it comes to taking more pride in being a citizen of the U.S. than in being a “world citizen”, which was Obama's trope. He is resisting the efforts of the globalists to some extent when it comes to things like trade, currency, economics, and intellectual property. But there's not much he can do about the world banking system, which is completely out of the hands of the U.S. government, which has come to play a subsidiary role. And as much as he talks about cutting back on our “contribution” to the globalist war against Islam, he's finding that it's impossible to reduce it to any significant degree without causing a riot among our “allies” (not to mention Congress). And he's also finding it impossible to reduce our military presence even in countries that we consider allies. The U.S. military is their military, in effect – and they wouldn't have it any other way.

Another way of putting it is that the subservience of the U.S. government, including its military, to the globalist ruling elite has become so established, so set in stone, that it's virtually impossible for us to extricate ourselves – to pull ourselves back up and assert our sovereignty. We can dig in our heels in a token way, but that only makes our pitiful position more obvious. This situation, I would say, is hopeless for the time being, and the current pandemic has only served to aggravate matters.

But again, the human spirit is not bound and in fetters, and in this there is at least some small hope. In an ironic kind of way, we can even take comfort in the observation that the Muslim world, which became comatose as the result of World War I, has come surging back onto the world stage in a most dramatic fashion, albeit with the help of considerable oil wealth, but also because they are believers. The part of their brain labeled “faith” has not been surgically removed or deadened by all of the blandishments, tricks, and temptations proffered by the “decadent” West. As such, Islam is the only major player on the world stage that is overtly and militantly opposed to globalism. If they can do it, why can't we? But if the key is faith, then we have a long way to go.

Plus, we have resources at our disposal which are virtually unknown in today's political and economic world, and the one that comes most readily to mind is Catholic social teaching, and the concept with perhaps the most power to oppose current trends is that of subsidiarity. This (to quote Wiki) “an organizing principle that matters ought to be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralized competent authority. Political decisions should be taken at a local level if possible, rather than by a central authority.” This is not a new concept by any means, and it has been taught by a number of popes and written about quite extensively over the years along with what I would call its sister concept, namely distributism. The relevance of this concept to the current situation should be obvious. The response to the corona virus pandemic has occurred not only at the federal level but at state and local levels as well – in many cases with greater effectiveness than the federal-level response, albeit with the same level of opposition. Governors and mayors are exercising powers no one knew they even had; in fact, they may not have known it either until someone reminded them. (Or, they may simply be assuming powers that were not granted them by the electorate, on an emergency basis.) What's good about all of this is that it has awakened people to the possibilities and options of greater self-rule – of government that is responsive not to an abstract, faceless mass of humanity but to real people on the local and regional level, with all of the needs, wants, and values that are characteristic of those regions and locales. It is actually a return to the situation which was nearly universal in pre-Progressive times, before Washington moved in with its ham-handed diktats and reduced state and local officials to mere bureaucrats and clerks. It is, one might say, a dramatic reversal of the usual rule that crises inevitably enhance the power of the central government while leaving all others impotent. This crisis has exposed literally fatal flaws in federal policy, and created a gap (of credibility and action) which state and local governments are only to happy to move in and occupy, often in direct defiance of the federal government. 

So what we have is two simultaneous trends, which – even assuming the corona crisis will recede at some point – are locked in mortal combat, and will continue to be. And there is nothing at all new about this, except that the current crisis has brought it out in a dramatic fashion, as well as having shone a very bright light on who is involved, who is on what side, and what their motivations are. We have the “usual suspects” – those who describe themselves as “liberal” and “progressive” but who have demonstrated a startling degree of authoritarianism vis-a-vis the federal government, or let's say the federal government sans Trump... and the other side, which has developed a newfound respect for state and local authorities in some cases, and a newfound contempt for them in others, all the while feeling that Trump is on their side while everyone working for him is not. 

How often do we have to break a social/economic/political phenomenon down to the molecular level in order to do any analysis? Things used to be so simple. And yet we see that there are historical precedents for all of these trends – precedents which have been established for generations in many cases, way before the corona virus was a gleam in the eye of some germ warfare developer in Wuhan. Each side understands perfectly well what their respective positions represent, and therefore why they are worth fighting for. On the one side you have the “basket” (Hillary's word) containing, to a greater or lesser degree, all of the following:

• Lockdowns, shutdowns, prohibitions, fines, arrests
• Ramped-up surveillance
• Letting the wrong people out of jail and keeping the wrong people in jail
• Open borders in complete defiance of common sense and any of the traditional rules as to how to handle epidemics
• A police state
• Authoritarianism
• Totalitarianism
• No personal privacy for the individual or for non-victim groups
• Conventional medicine (and suppressing alternatives)
• Globalism
• Economical dictatorship and top-down control (traditionally known as a “command economy”)
• Treating the public like retarded, helpless children
• Class consciousness, expressed especially in despising rural and small-town people (men of the soil in “flyover country”)
• A ruling elite and their minions in the bureaucracy
• Liberals/progressives/Democrats
• Trump haters
• Democratic socialists
• Anti-religion
• Anti-tradition
• Anti-family
• Accusations of “hate” and “fascism”
• Deference to large, international corporations
• Deference to the mainstream media
• Censorship by the mainstream media and social media
• Deference to academia, “science”, and “experts”

Quite a mixed bag, right? But if you take it point by point it seems like the Soviet Union has come back to life with a vengeance. But then there's the other basket – the one Hillary was actually talking about, and which she vowed to oppose with every ounce of her being, and annihilate if possible:

• Individual freedom
• Small business
• Alternative medicine, and alternative points of view regarding the current crisis
• Treating people as adults
• Paleoconservatives and libertarians
• Nationalism
• Churchgoers
• Pro-Trumpers
• Skepticism re: the media, “entertainment”, academia
• Skepticism re: the claims of “science” and “experts” (especially when the story keeps changing on a daily basis)
• A newfound, or increased, interest in localism, especially when it comes to food
• Grass-roots economic activity
• Community spirit and mutual aid “off the grid”, including barter
• Integrity of borders, and actual requirements for immigration and citizenship (and voting, and benefits)
• The rule of law (when the law is not arbitrary and just a way of one gang exerting dominance over another)

That sounds a bit more like America in the 19^th Century. And please note who is left out of this equation, at least for now – the mainstream Republicans, who can't seem to make up their minds which team they're on. And this, of course, is due to their chronic ambivalence regarding Donald Trump, which I won't bother to detail here. They've been dithering about this for nearly five years now, and still haven't come up with anything. 

So, the question is – as the old union organizers' song put it – which side are you on? And I don't blame anybody for being uncertain. We are being challenged in ways unique to our entire history as a nation and society. It's easy to be complacent when times are good – but now we're getting a taste of how things have been for the mass of humanity down through history, and for a considerable portion even in this day (think Third World). And yet people did find a way, and found time to sit under their own vine and fig tree, even if when they went out into the world death lurked around every corner. This may, in fact, be a kind of awakening for all of us (not to be confused with “wokeness”, which is simply the latest form of opiate foisted upon the citizenry). Other crises have offered this benefit as well, although not everyone has taken up the offer. Our search for adventure is always in conflict with our desire for peace and quiet. Right now there is no peace and no quiet – and the hallowed “rule of law” has taken on a much darker tone. But there are opportunities here to find new strengths within ourselves; let's not let them go to waste.