Last July I was invited to lunch at the Middle Temple by a friend of mine, a slightly eccentric QC who is also a brilliant raconteur. The temple was originally the headquarters of the Knights Templar and after their disestablishment in 1312 it became the haven for lawyers it still is. The panelling in the dining hall is covered with the painted coats of arms of, I think, the original noble families although as my friend said, with a straight face, that it had been “redecorated” about 1600 pointing out half a dozen suits of Spanish armor, trophies from the armada, hanging under the high window sills. We talked about his favourite subject – Brexit then the subject of violent political controversy, including murder, such as America is now experiencing.
The discussion ranged to the survival of society in such situations and my friend offered the following intelligence confided to him by a scion of a very old English family; when violent controversy arose in Britain, from the time before the Tudors, to the present day, the family rule was that the eldest son was always required to side with and support the opposing party while the family continued to support the conservative side. That way, as history proved, the family had its interests somewhat protected, no matter who won. I would therefore like to suggest, in that same spirit if you like, for the benefit of our blood pressure and mental health, that SST should consider the possibility, remote if you like, that the Democrats, BLM, Tlaib, Ocasio-cortez, Sanders and even Antifa supporters may have some valid points, however vile their expression. In my opinion, such an understanding may lead to a way forward to the benefit of the country.
On a warning note, I fail to see how America can maintain its current economic and military dominance in the long term if the tensions now on display are not resolved. I suspect that maybe Gen. Milleys memo was an admission that such tensions already exist in parts of the armed services and if unchecked they will have a negative effect on effectiveness. There is no existential threat to bind us together in common defence at present.
Yes, I know the Democrats are vile scum sucking communists, so what? There are major issues that need to be addressed if America is going to continue to thrive. https://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2020/08/the-en-banc-court-of-appeals-switches-and-denies-a-mandamus-in-the-michael-flynn-case.html and under the pressure of the pandemic these tensions are surfacing now. As a local nobel laureate has pointed out, these communities no longer have the energy and resilience to bootstrap themselves into a better life so parables about the American dream don’t help. They now have very little to lose and what’s worse they see the Amazon’s, Googles, Facebooks, AI, robots and other new technologies and their super rich overlords preparing to permanently suppress them as China is now doing to its citizens.
Make no mistake, the very rich lead a very scared existence and they will make use of their political power to protect themselves. The days when labourers – the vast portion of the population, were valuable enough to be listened to and paid a living wage are long gone. Left to themselves, our politicians and their rich and powerful backers are going to turn the majority of the population into serfs again, with credit cards and mobile phones if you will. I say again, look at China. Our overlords are looking too – with envy!
I think whoever is in power needs to focus on decent jobs, education, healthcare, infrastructure and of course good public administration. If we focus on buzz words, identity politics, political phobias like “fascism “ and “socialism” we are doomed. I also believe that despite his weaknesses, President Trump has a good understanding of what is required, a least better than his Democrat opponents, mired as they are in identity politics.
Walrus,
I agree with your premise that identity politics and nonsensical attention to it should take a back seat and allow common sense arise from the ashes of today’s mindless hatred and politicized despair.
To be honest, I blame ‘democratist’ intellectuals of the 60s and 70s for today’s problems who put identity politics at the forefront of every social malady in the world and don’t value common sense and pragmatism at all.
Enjoyed this article.
Well spoken and clear eyed opinion on American maladies.
American congressional leadership looks remarkably like CCCP politburo in the early 80s.
America will do the right thing after they have tried everything else.
$860 billion dollar June budget deficit is not sustainable.
There will be a correction regardless of political nonsense.
Walrus,
I was a young man in the 60s. The social discord then is nothing compared to what we see today.
I’ve been at a loss to explain why the political and media establishment hate Trump so much that they do everything in their power to vilify him. Including an attempted coup by the national security apparatus. He’s done nothing to curb their influence and financial gains. He’s been even more profligate with future generations money that has mostly gone to the Party of Davos. Why are they so upset and petulant? None of the coup plotters have been indicted.
The problems with American governance have been building for decades. None of the issues are new. From the offshoring of the industrial base and the decimation of the working class to massive transfers of wealth to the Wall St financial elites under the guise of economic sophistry are all fundamental issues that have been supported by both political parties and the media-governmental and big business complex.
The American voter keeps voting for the same guys and expect different outcomes. Isn’t that reportedly Einstein’s definition of insanity?
Walrus,
“Last July I was invited to lunch at the Middle Temple….”
I am heartned to hear a solid middle class Australian knows just how Americans should kneel in submission. It certainly looks like a solid half century or more of shit getting rubbed in thier faces is finally causing red blooded Americans to take action, thus creating a bit of trouble for the utopian nobility of the pro-globalist order. So good of you to take notice.
“The deck is stacked against the poor, the blacks and perhaps other minorities and under the pressure of the pandemic these tensions are surfacing now. ”
I agree that many have been betrayed by Barack and the Change We Can Believe In. He was enabled in this betrayal by:
Biden, 44 years in office: Schumer, 38 years in office: Pelsoi, 32 years in office. At the state level there are current Governors Cuomo, Murphy, Whitmer, Walz, Brown, Inslee, Newsom. There are Mayor de Blasio, Lightfoot, Frey, Wheeler, Durkan, Garcetti; just to name a few.
“the very rich lead a very scared existence and they will make use of their political power to protect themselves. ”
Really? What have victim of American oppression, Ophrah, JZ, Kapernick, the NBA players,the NFL players, the team owners, been doing all those years they were getting rich? Opposing immigration so that “The days when labourers – the vast portion of the population, were valuable enough to be listened to and paid a living wage are long gone.” would not be gone due to devaluation of labor due to a massive influx of people willing to supply labor at lower wages? How about the UAW, Teamsters, SEIU, AFL-CIO, AFSME? Where o where were they and who, whom, were they supporting.
I sure hope someone with a better degree from a better school that modest ole me with an MBA from an elite school – the University of Florida – could chime in and let us know who got all those donations. Maybe they could enlighten us on what teachers were teaching as budgets and federal aid increased from, say 1980, to 2016? Anyone have an inkling of how many black studies/womens studies/gender studies degrees student visa recipients from China were awarded during those decades? How about the quality of American schools as english as second language students were mainstreamed into classes – for their benefit, of course? Anyone? Perhaps one of you from a proletarean school like Yale could chime in? Maybe a PHD economist could tell us why 10,000+ colleges and universities in America can’t turn out enough trained talent so that US firms would not need a million plus H1B visa’s for foreign nationals who are going to get the jobs American’s just aren’t getting the ‘edumacation’ to obtain?
“If we focus on buzz words”
You mean like “decent jobs, education, healthcare, infrastructure”? (Biden’s campaign buzz words for 44 years) Which politicians promoted NAFTA and the TPP agreements? Yes, I know, I left out McCain, Flake and Romney, along with a few other never-Trumpers who left office rather than go down in flames in 2018, and of course, the US Chamber of Commerce.
“I say again, look at China. Our overlords are looking too – with envy!”
China, source of the Wuhan flu and a great deal of seditious interference in America, and hundreds of thousands of deaths due to Chinese fentynol; to that I say: China delenda Est.
“Overlords” No. They are our enemies.
Maybe the problem goes much deeper than politics. The physical fact of polarity is that it is two sides of the same dynamic and that applies to liberalism and conservatism. One could go to any society in the world, or in history and there will be those pushing the existing order and those subscribing to it. What drives society is the energy bubbling up through it, while the civil and cultural forms it evolves give it structure and direction. Too much energy and it’s anarchy. Too much structure and it’s tyranny.
It’s like the cycles of the seasons, expansion and consolidation, youth and age.
We have this consumer culture, where all our desires and impulses are promoted in order to sell things, so there isn’t much cultural appreciation for asceticism, from the top to the bottom. If a little is good, more must be better, yet nature is cyclical. What goes round, comes round.
How does that conversation get started when we are linear, goal oriented creatures, who think it’s all about the pot of gold at the end of the narrative arc? Nature is so profuse and dense, because it isn’t a monoculture. We better get some sense of the processes by which nature works, because imposing ours on it is reaching its limits. The future we have been borrowing against has arrived.
Jack and Fred, Yes. What are we going to do about it short of civil war?
Fred, UF MBA #67, Mine is #28.
I would like to share this link to the latest post from the Zman blog, a post entitled “Irreconcilable Differences”.
He lays out the Founders apprehensions about “factionalism” and the measures that they settled on to limit its dangers, Federalism. Well, it didn’t last long, as the railroad lawyer, Lincoln (the 19th century’s version of a member of the Borg), and his Yankee Exceptionalists crushed Federalism into the dust in the War of Northern Aggression. Since then, the ratchet has turned only in one way, toward the aggrandizement of central government against functional state/local independence. An interesting post, one worthy of consideration by the members of this Committee of Correspondance in my estimation.
https://thezman.com/wordpress/?p=21159
Regards to all of good will, and sound character,
JJ
There’s a certain type of European Oligarchy, especially British, who consider some misty version of the Middle Ages as the platonic ideal of human political economy. What’s needed, as echoed in your post, is some version of the Treaty of Westphalia. Doesn’t seem like we (and I mean the whole of humanity), have a political class that is serious or intelligent enough to complete such a fraught and Herculean task.
With all due respect Mr Walrus, do you know anything about our nationwide, open enrollment, public community college system in the US? I don’t believe anything like this exists in the UK.
This system is why we remain a Land of Opportunity for all. Any continuing “class divisions” in the US melt in its face, since anyone can, and many do, get a college education and/or vocational training certificates regardless of color, background financial status or origins for minimal or no cost.
The ticket to at least the middle class is found through our community college system, across the nation. Even “hands up” Michael Brown was due to start a community college auto tech program the day after he decided to get high and stupid the night before. Right in the exact same neighborhood where he lost his life attacking and threatening a police officer., after roughing up a shot keeper and stealing from that store.
Drugs, are the problem in 99% of these police confrontation issues. Much like the induced addiction the UK had during the Opium Wars with China. Perhaps you can share your knowledge how to also end our own induced addiction issues in this country. What did China have to do to get the UK pushers out of their neighborhoods?
Walrus
A remarkably supercilious and condescending bag of hot air. The notion pushed by the Democrats and our overseas Anglo betters that Blacks, Latinos, and other minorities are held down by deliberate or even non-deliberate discriminations is just wrong. These populations need to get up off their haunches and take advantages of all the opportunities available here. A lot have done that ,but a sizable portion of the population including a lot of White kids from privileged background would rather take up a vicious Marxist street fight to simply take what is not theirs.
Example, we have a remarkably good public high school in this town, TC Williams (the Titans) Its population is mostly minority since Black and White middle class people send their kids to private schools which are excellent. The school has a large and well funded trade school department for; construction arts, commercial electrician, commercial cooking, automotive skills plumbing ,etc., etc. I have made it a practice to take one course a year from the trade school department. As a result I can do a lot of things around the house or could. The teachers all tell ne the same thing. Their classes are very thinly taken by minority student who say that what they want is real opportunity to study for jobs that will pay 100k+/year. That opportunity is there for them if they can do the work, and some do.
I must correct you. I am already tolerating a large number of people who I think to be sentimental, romantic, fools. I tolerate them because they are suitable foils.
Will I accede to the idea that an earthly paradise can be created in which hard work is not necessary and milk and honey flow freely without application. No, I will not.
Jack:
The media and establishment (swamp) hates Trump for a variety of reasons – boorish, “outsider” – but the real reason can be boiled down to that Trump actually likes America and believes in US interests first.
The swamp is NOT pro-America and generally has nothing but contempt and dislike for the American citizenry.
Col. Lang:
There are many successful Iranians in US: in business, in the academe, in medicine and from different religions; Jewish, Sabean, Shia Muslim, Sunni Muslim, Christian, Baha’i, Zoroastrian.
In US, the White people were evidently not very successful at keeping them down; very many, on othe other hand, would have gone nowhere real fast in Iran, there being a mass of Beige people trying to keep them down.
Col. Lang,
Thank you for putting up with my posts. So I take it that you believe there is not a scintilla of common ground between Democrat supporters and Trump supporters? I had to ask the question because to an outside observer from a western background the polarisation looks extreme.
I have no love for scum sucking Democrat politicians, BLM looters, halfwits, thieves, rioters, chiselers, anarchists, communists and white over educated kids acting out. Neither do I profess to make condescending criticism of the “In civilised Europe, we do it this way….” type. I am simply asking SST folk to consider if you are absolutely sure that not one of the matters raised by the Portlandians and their ilk has any merit. To my way of thinking, you have to separate what is being said from the vile creeps that are saying it.
After that I support opposing this insurrection, if that is what it is, with the full force of Government.
walrus
“has any merit.” None at all. BTW I have an ancestor who was a term Templar. Not all were in perpetual vows. He served a couple of years in Palestine and then went home to France and got married. His name was Fulk.
I am also reminded of the deadly years of the Northern Ireland “Troubles”- we viewed this from outside and wondered how and when will this stop and how could such “civilized” people of similar extraction resort to urban terrorism for so long. I am also sorry the British brought slaves to our shores allegedly in 1619. Even sorrier we did not tell the Brits no thank you. UK and the IRA solved their “troubles”. We at least fought and died to end slavery in the US. There is hope.
But honestly, don’t over look most of the current “troubles” in the US are backed by the big government employee unions who do hate Trump with their very souls and front most of the Trump “resistance” and are currently in turf wars with each other over shrinking tax dollars.
They are the sole group where TDS drives the existential choice because they see Trump, not one of their own union cronies, is an existential threat to their own jobs and livelihood.
That is what brings out the meanness in all of this. Lucre. Who hands out the government pie and now in what size slices. Democrat party politics has brazenly driven TDS for four years – nothing else explains their total and consistent goofiness than surrendering to their public sector union crony base.
Labor unions run deep in the UK, but are they as embedded within the UK government too?
Not sure I have too much to add but I wanted to add a little tidbit. Today was the last day at work for a colleague of mine, a Vietnamese woman in her late 50s. She was one of the boat refugees, her father had to stay in Vietnam i order to trick the authorities, she never saw him again. Once on the boat they were raided by pirates, my colleague, then about 12 years of age, was smeared in oil and kept in the bottom of the boat in order to save her from rape. Eventually she made it to the States and got an engineering degree and a good work in Silicon Valley, first in semiconductor manufacturing and then in R&D support. Her job is shipped to India, which due to time difference, accents and inexperience makes my job worse. My new boss is a brahmin as is his boss, so I’m not exactly getting very far with my complaints. Our delays are an intangible, the salary saving is measurable.
She is a sweet woman, very elegant and refined, speaks French and also babysat my daughter… she won’t get another job.
She came to the US very poor, worked hard, had a good life and then got shafted by globalism. I have much more sympathy for her than for the thugs destroying American streets right now
Recently filling our my Medicare Satisfaction Survey, they asked at the end what “race” I was.
They listed White and then about a dozen other different ways to slice and dice everyone in the human race. I crossed out White and inserted Northern European, since what the heck is “White”.
How come everyone else gets shades of gray, and “Whites” just get only one billing? Plus I have nothing in common with the white gangsters running rampant in our cities right now. Don’t pin their idiocy on me. They are not my tribe.
And if Medicare demands to slice and dice their services among Whites and dozens of other rainbow shades, why do they make Whites into some sort of collectively normative and everyone else gets to identify as a separate minority, when we are all supposed to be Americans?
Who is selling continuing racial divisiveness against Whites in the US- now it is Medicare’s turn too.
OK, time to say farewell to SST after 14 or 15 years of deep enjoyment, education, and comradeship.
My political beliefs are Catholic and neo-platonist with some syndicalism thrown in. And I am that dirtiest of all things, a self-made, provincial Brit.
For several years now I have been asking myself, ever more desperately, how on earth God is going to haul The West out of its death spiral – especially the US. (Had I been an American voter in ’16 I’d have voted Trump).
How does God in His mercy bring a nuclear-armed-to-its-fingertips collossus like the US (and to a lesser extent Britain) down without destroying all of humanity.
In ancient times – both pre- and post-Christian – plagues were seen as the gods or God’s punishment for a wicked and out-of-control humanity.
And lo, what appears – that most antiquated of all things, a plague! Crashing the economy. Forcing humanity to rethink itself from the roots upwards. Reinstating the family at the centre of human living. Bringing neighbours and communities together in order to survive. (That, at any rate, is what is happening in provincial Britain). Forcing the goverment – through mass non-compliance to its diktats- to behave with humanity.
If you want to crash a nuclear-armed empire (as the USSR crashed) without destroying humanity, then internal collapse followed by rebuilding from within seems to me the only way.
Col Lang a few weeks ago dated the American
Empire from 1931 to the present day. Let us hope that time is now ending. And America (and The West) is going to be allowed to become itself, starting to once again live comfortably within its own skin and democratic traditions. In a multi-polar world.
(And, if the bogey men are brought out, I’d argue, with others, that contemporary China is far more neo-Confucian than neo-communist).
Dear Walrus,
while nobility (especially high nobility) in all countries had built up a skill of remarkable resilience over the centuries towards political changes they just fail to understand the new winds blowing since the French revolution.
Many aristocracts including Louis XVI’s cousin Philipe Égalité foolishly believed, that if they join the revolutionaries at least the family members can survive, if not family wealth and influence. Same with russian nobility. But they just did not grasp that the changes pursued by these radicals are completely incompatible with the whole idea of inheriting. They literally wanted to undo history and start from all over. That is why today’s revolutionaires are rightfully called marxists with diploms (university degrees).
I as a historian have studied enough revolutions to tell you they all follow the same pattern. After subduing the greater ideological enemy, revolutionaires turn on each other always starting with the imperative allies, those with different background and ideology, fighting on the same side of necessity. See moderates in Khomeini’s revoution, aristocrats and other bourgeoise in French Revolution, SRs (eser) and mensheviks in Russian Revolution and the list goes on.
If this Antifa revolution is victorious then we all must prepare for another century of oppression, cuz like you said they have the tools and the intent.
Walrus,
Thank you. Your valiant effort is admirable, and I salute you for that.
However, just read Fred’s post above and see how futile it is to reason with the extreme lefts or extreme rights (I meant no disrepect to Fred). They no longer have patience to listen to the other side. It is probably too much to ask if they would put ideology aside and doing what’s good for the country in time of crisis.
Walrus,
#28 – like a fish to bait you couldn’t resist, or, more precisely, couldn’t comprehend what was intended. In regards to the civil war the left will launch rather than let the investigations into Chinese interference within the US and Democratic politicians use of intelligence agencies against political opponents take their course, I reccomend Australia change her immigration policy to match what Argentina did in ’45.
There is a lot of doom and gloom here.I am more optimistic for america’s future.9/11 and the wars that followed had to affect American society.The chickens came home to roost and the pain,the great crying out,the anguish,the rage is being squeezed out like pus from a wound.The pandemic has been a necessary part of this healing process and when it ends this year or next healing will begin.
Trump must be allowed to stay the course and finish the job.People need to be able to look back and say.We are done.Let us move forward.I truly believe that peace in the middle east is an important part of this healing process and it will happen.God willing
mcohen
Why is an Australian so interested in evidence of our salvation?
TonyL
The problem is that what you want iS NOT good for the country. Not good at all.
TonyL,
I have listened extensively to “the other side”. I have engaged in discussion with them on social media for several years. I actually watch/read their media to try to understand. My conclusion is that there is no compromise with them. Give a little and they push for more. What they want is demonstrably very bad for the country and very bad for the individual soul. History and current events prove that socialism destroys, eliminating manufacturing type jobs destroys and coal miners aren’t going to become coders, anthropomorphic global warming, like covid, is a farce and a shake down scam, race based revolution destroys (e.g. S. Africa) and no matter how many times you say it’s true, a man in a dress is just a freak and not a woman.
I guess I’m lucky that no one has yet cast me as Chamberlain or Halifax to Col. Lang’s Churchill because that would be untrue. The entire blm/antifa revolt needs to be stopped in its tracks. On that we are agreed. . What you seem to have told me is that this is a winner take all contest and no compromise is possible.
My fondest hope is that the swamp, including the IC/DoJ, FBI, etc. will get with the program and cleanse itself before a re-elected President Trump does it for them. That would be one less thing he has to do in what would be a memorable second term. .
Fred, yes, I bit. I’m 70 years old and have done enough and seen enough not to care. I won’t live forever and I don’t see the point of either engaging in a length measuring contest or hiding what limited experience I have been lucky enough to have had, although air know it pulls into insignificance compared to some here.. All the best.
I think we need to form another “coalition of the willing” to effect regime change in both Australia and New Zealand.
TonyL,
Thank you for your label. It is proof I have some minor amount of influence. What it is not, however, is a refuation of any of the facts I brought up.
Walrus, I understand you’ve got yours and I am happy for you in that regard. As you said once before, me and mine have 40 years of life ahead of us in which to fix what you are bequeathing to us.
Walrus,
“…focus on decent jobs”
If the elites could create “decent jobs”, they would have done it a long time ago. But they cannot. There is no “degrees of freedom” in the system for more “decent jobs”. Whether for IQ, temperament, mental health, the debt-trap-economy, regulations, culture, etc. They cannot create those decent jobs.
So the Center Will Not Hold. And everything will crash down in time. As has been foretold, and as will happen again.
The defining characteristic of BLM, antifa, AOC, and others you mentioned is that they cannot be reasoned with. If we assume they have good points, then why don’t you list of those points and illustrate how they can apply to the other side? I think that you didn’t do that is very telling. The crutch is that their “points” aren’t valid, in fact they are dishonest actors with hidden motives who are using real grievances to advance their own agenda. For example, for the Democrats, the riots are a win-win. No, I don’t think Pelosi or any of the rich congresscritters is in favor of communist reform that would dismantle the wealth they have built or are in the process of building. The only genuine threat the Dems face (aside from their sedition leading to indictments) is from the Sanders wing of the democratic party. I believe this is known as the Iron Law of Institutions, that for bureaucrats their position inside the organization is far more important than organization outside performance. So, better for Trump to win than for Pelosi to face primary challengers from a left wing resurgence.
If the American people identify the rioters’ destruction and death with Sanders socialism they (establishment) will have removed that threat for at least a generation if not more.
The Democrats aren’t weak when it comes to protecting their power (ask Seth Rich). Fueling nationwide riots along with other interested parties will result in a back lash, I think it is designed to lead to a backlash so that the intelligence community and establishment politicians reap the benefits. If the unrest reflects poorly on Trump and he loses the election its a win for them. No more questions about russiagate or sedition. If Trump wins, but the American people are fed up with the rioters, the establishment wins. Big Tech and intelligence win when we naturally turn toward totalitarian measures to combat the domestic terrorists they’ve spent months grooming for their role. Pelosi and gang keep their positions as the “moderate” face of La Resistance after a few apologies for being so meek as to cave to their “constituents” demands. All the Democrats who have enabled this destruction will plead incompetence or revive Russiagate or somesuch. Financial interests will benefit from the literal “fire” sales in some of these communities and then to rebuild and maintain business there while the Mom and Pop’s get nothing.
No, I don’t think there are legitimate actors here that we could all get along if we just put ourselves in their shoes. Antifa doesn’t care about racism or communism or any ism, they are there to advance the cause of destruction for the profit of outside groups. The ‘isms” is just what they tell the rubes to get them to dress in black and act like brown shirts, fascists with no sense of irony. If your adversaries overriding purpose is to be adversaries they will not compromise and can only be regarded as enemies.
I think deep down we all know this and that’s why you didn’t list some real grievances. The actors in this kabuki aren’t backing up their words with their actions because its all a thin fascade. Their grievances aren’t real, and they have no intention of helping out the unfortunate. You know the minute you bring up racism you’ll get inundated with statistics that show if there is racism, the aggrieved group is the majority. If you bring up class or wealth, someone will ask how the BLM speakers fee’s can top 6 figures while they pretend to be “disadvantaged” or how our congresscritters quickly turn millionaires, are those the people you expect to bring back the middle class?
The only genuine people I see in this sick play are staring dumbstruck while their homes and livelihoods burn.
Traveling in SEA in the 1980’s I spied an Asiaweek cover story – “Australia – Great White Hope or Great White Trash?”.
At that time Australia was known for its welfare benefits that outstripped working, and its rowdy, youthful presence in all the Asian fleshpots. Always wondered how that would work out. And then there was the uptick in trade with China, that dramatically turned things around.
People have a right to be wrong. Not just wrong, but stiff necked, ignorant idiots. If we can’t recognize that, and work with these idiots (because they’re so often our neighbors, cow orkers, and family), then we’re boned and by no hand but our own.
This isn’t a matter of “sides”; its a fact of how humans work together. Pick sides how you like based on your worldview and let reality prove who is the bigger idiots.
I, personally, definitely see one side, today, embracing “deplatforming” and thought crimes and similarly temporary and costly tools more than the other. I’m staying out in the fringes where one can still say, and hear, all manner of lunacy on an equal and open basis.
h2odragon,
Mayor Wheeler tried to work with his protesting lefty friends; very sympathetic to their cause(s).
Today they are burning down his condominium building.
jimmy W
You must be Chinese. Capitalism does not produce good jobs. Which planet are you living on? Kolob?
Sir,
Yes, I am a first-generation American of the KMT-SunYatsen heritage. And yes, Capitalism does not produce “good jobs”, which are easy, fun, and well-paying jobs, as defined by the Commie crowd.
I was referencing Walrus’s “decent jobs”, as defined in conservative circles as well-paying and hard-working jobs that the common folks can do. Such as one of those mythical factory jobs, but not one of those other programming jobs. Unfortunately, there is a mismatch between current job vacancies vs what applicants can do.
The cultural and temperamental preference away from the “Dirty Jobs”-type trade skills, is just as much a limitation in the overall economic system, as macro-economic conditions. There are many people who are willing to get into the trades, but can’t due to IQ. There are many more people with the IQ for trades, but want to hold out for something better (which jobs they can’t do, either). This mismatch escalates up the IQ ladder, all the way to Ivy-grads waitressing tables and waiting for a Hollywood/Academia job.
And so the system will have to reset.
johnf
In my opinion, the United States started the march to Empire after the War Between the States.
Until then, the Southern Civilization, slave-holding and all, was acting as a brake on the imperial impulses of the Northers – again, in my opinion.
I set the date sometime in 1870s, let us say 1871.
Balint Somkuti, PhD
The Islamic Revolution in Iran was organized and led, in the like manner to the American Revolution, by profoundly conservative men who had been forced unto a path of immodeation by the Shah’s policies.
In my opinion, any Revolution is an indictment of the previous leadership’s policies and activities.
Deap,
The Newsweek headline you saw was from a 1980 quote from Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore at his most venomous. That was before we broke up the unions, removed tariff protection and started freeing up our economy.
Your Heritage think tank ranks Australia as #4 in economic freedom behind Singapore, Hong Kong (not any more!) and New Zealand.
https://www.heritage.org/index/ranking
The Chinese uptick was icing on the cake from about 2010 to last year. The economic recovery hard work had already been done between 1990 – 2010.
The Chinese are currently making trouble for us since, among other things, we support the U. S. militarily, especially in the South China Sea. Their latest games are cutting trade in agricultural products for various reasons.
The pandemic has focussed attention on rebuilding local manufacturing capacity and reducing dependence on international trade.
My biggest wish now is that we develop our own nuclear weapons and associated delivery capability. We already have the technology as well as at least 30% of the worlds uranium.
Loved your piece, Walrus. Loved all your pieces. You’ve got a wonderful feel for all that’s best in England. The stuff that makes it a unique country rather than a place for units in the machine dutifully pursuing the tasks pre-set for them by the great and the good in our crumbling economy.
But from your patrician friend in the Middle Temple to the bloke scraping a living somehow on zero hours in a Red Wall constituency we’re sadly adrift. And not just this small island. We see it in Europe, the States, all over the West.
The ancien regime is dead, Walrus. It can go quietly (fat chance!) or it can wait for the jacquerie to come calling. What won’t bend must break and I saw and still see in Trump 2016, in spite of all the crushing disappointments, the one chance we in the West have of finding the middle way.
And when we look at the idiots ceremoniously burning their flag in the States, and see the Progs, metaphorically speaking, doing the same over here, we recognise that the old comfortable live and let live politics is dead. It takes two to preserve that style of politics and one side, as AG Barr has pointed out so cogently, sure as hell isn’t going to.
https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/attorney-general-william-p-barr-delivers-19th-annual-barbara-k-olson-memorial-lecture
The usa has the system of science and R&D to solve the mankind’s most pressing problems in energy and space travel.That is the future I see.
Secondly support of israel which is good for the Jewish people but also ties in with science and innovation.Guys like elon musk,noam eliaz,and many others are leading the way.
Simply put.Cannot allow idiot ideology to let it slide down the drain.
Fred,
“Thank you for your label. It is proof I have some minor amount of influence. What it is not, however, is a refuation of any of the facts I brought up.”
Sorry about using your comment as an example. I did not mean to say you are on the extreme right (I’ve read a lot of your posts here). There are a lot of truth in what you said, and I agreed with many of your premises. However, you’re exagerating the issues and also demeaning your opponents on the left too much. That’s what I meant by “it is a futile effort” to get the rights and the lefts to talk to each other. Each side has been going farther and farther to the opposites of the political spectrum in the last few decades. And the arguments are no longer in good faith (from both sides).
mcohen
Yes, the Democrat ideologues are recidivists who are constructing a medieval cult.
mcohen Elon Musk is a Jew?
Turcopolier
No musk is American and eliaz Israeli
That’s the point.Israeli tech pays the bills.
TonyL,
Thank you for the clarification. I believe the election of Trump put a stake into the heart of the ‘traditional right’, at least in respect to those not working in good faith – meaning those who were ‘conservative’ come election time but were doing so for electability, not doing so in faith with their constituents. They couldn’t even conserve single sex access to a girls bathroom in a high school, to paraphrase a friend. While there was certainly a ‘right wing’ as a polically powerful force in the 40s through the 60s, we don’t really have one now, David Duke and such notwithstanding. Even he was not much of a polical power, only a figurehead elected to a state office, and that was a three decades ago.
EO,
AG Barr talks a good game like many up there high up on the totem pole. But he ain’t done shit to date on making the “rule of law” apply to all, especially those that wield the law as a stick to beat the little guy!
The Trump DOJ moved with speed to indict and prosecute alleged Trump acolytes. But not so fast or more like at all those inside the government and Congress and other muckety mucks for the same charges.
SST;
I hope David Habakkuk will comment on this topic.
Ishmael Zechariah
Through federal laws and agencies the US have been trying to lift Blacks as a group up from their low status with mixed results.Equal access to education, jobs and housing has helped those intelligent and hardworking enough to live middle-class and even elitist lives. Blacks have even been given special benefits to increase their access to those things leading to the American Dream, such as 250 points added to SAT scores, preference in hiring, but quotas have not raised the bulk from their miserable lives.
The new liberal idea is to bring America down to the level of the street ghetto. K-12 have in places like California and Oregon eliminated detention and expulsion as punishment because of Black over representation. The solution to Black violent and disruptive behavior is to ignore it. The adult version, once again because of Black over representation, is getting rid of bail, reducing police department’s budgets, downgrading felonies to misdomeaners and letting criminals out of jail.
California and other states have made it illegal to give intelligence tests for admittance to school or jobs. Some colleges quit using ASAT and SAT scores to judge admittance. What are schools going to use, street cred? Our dumbed down future doesn’t look bright.
This politician thinks there are too many Asians and not enough Blacks and Latinos in NY advanced schools. She admits the Asians have a value system conducive to academic success Blacks lack, but no thought is given to encouraging them to study or work harder.
https://www.bitchute.com/video/qtLpEoAsDLwb/
The leaders of BLM practice vodoo and see their duty is to lead an occult war. The leaders have jobs in academia and in one of their leaders own word:
https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/life-examined/religion-slavery-black-lives-matter/black-lives-matter-blm-melina-abdullah-hebab-ferrag-interview
Maybe that’s why in Portland so many White Zombies riot for their cause.
You can’t talk to Antifa, someone screaming “NAZI” in your face listens only to force.
mcohen
Oh, bullshit. You are just trying to make yourself feel superior. You do know that is racist, don’t you? Having worked on any number of US/Israeli projects I actually know that they are always the junior partner.
Turco
Not bullshit.Israeli tech pays the bills for the many religious scholars etc who are supported by the government.Some say 20% of Israeli’s support the remaining 80%
What part of iron dome was israel a junior partner.If I want to feel superior I will light a Dunhill.Remember them when you visited london
Walrus,
Your post and the collective thinking of the comments deserves a long and careful think and then a long and careful response. For the immediate now, I will reply to a small thing that smacked me in the eye.
When you write that . . . “The days when labourers – the vast portion of the population, were valuable enough to be listened to and paid a living wage are long gone.” . . . . it seems that you are regarding that present fact as being due to the playing out of natural forces in the political-economic realm.
I don’t see any such natural forces having lead labourers to their current situation. I see carefully engineered manipulation of economic processes. Free Trade Agreements were very carefully crafted on purpose to render thing-making and think-servicing/maintaining artificially unprofitable within the United States . . . . setting the stage for mass runaway investment to overseas and its attendant mass jobicide here in America.
American rejection of all the Free Trade Agreements and self-rescue from membership in all the Free Trade Organizations could buy time for America to restore, if it so chooses, all that was destroyed under the World Free Trade Order. It took Forcey Free-Trade several decades to destroy the American industrial ecosystem, and it would take several decades of Forcey Fair-Trade to permit the restoration of some portion of the industrial ecosystem which was destroyed. But it could be done. And as part of the doing, perhaps we could restore the ” ordered Capitalism under Law” we attained during the New Deal-Fair Deal period and managed to keep all through the Eisenhower Administration period.
mcohen
Yes, the Israelis played a leading role in Iron Dome but they still can’t pay for it.
“The initial funding and development of the Iron Dome system was provided and undertaken by Israel.[28] This allowed for the deployment of the first two Iron Dome systems.[29] Subsequently, funding for an additional eight Iron Dome systems—along with funding for a supply of interception missiles—is currently being provided by the United States, with two of these additional systems having been delivered by 2012.[29] Funding for the production and deployment of these additional Iron Dome batteries and interceptor missiles was approved by the United States Congress, after being requested by President Obama in 2010.”
wiki on Iron Dome
mcohen
It is true that Israeli society supports a large class of “religious scholars” at government expense for life. This luxury is made possible by US injection of cash into the Israeli tech industries that you like so much as well as the availability of Palestinian helot labor at cheap rates.
optimax:
Even in professional schools – medical, dental, pharmacy, there is as much as a 30% set-aside for those applicants that can tell a convincing story of “hard-ship & adversity”.
Many schools in US discriminate against Asian-Americans in pursuit of their racialist Nirvana.
One WASP woman explained it to me thus: “They had the benefit of good parents…” and thus, clearly, must be discriminated against.
I mean, let’s cripple Abebe Bikila so that someone else who has never run a marathon, can never win in a marathon could win – oh, wait, Abeb is Ethiopian and not White….can’t cripple him –
In East Germany, for many years, if either of one’s parents had university degrees, the offspring was not admitted to a university program.
Primary Candidate, then President Trump reached Washington with a mantra of “bring the jobs home” which exposed both Democrat and Republican DC barons as a Uni-Party on the globalist payroll. Since 2016, we have also learned that most DC bureaucrats enjoy cosy relationships with the industries these supposedly regulate. In short, President Trump represents an existential threat to DC swamp creatures — though Republican swamp creatures cannot be as overt as the Democrats.
Walrus does not understand that the visceral anger in evidence here has nothing to do with legacy Democrat-versus-Republican sparring. Then again, the reaction of working Americans to job offshoring differs only in the remedy. Left wing Socialists — mobilized by the Democrats — would solve the job issue by nationalizing business, Trump supporters by tariffing imports. In either case, Globalists are the foundational enemy.
Much like eighteenth century Aristos in France, or twentieth century Aristos in Russia, our foolish Globalist enablers of revolution will be the first killed when the revolution really begins.
Time’s up.Great blogata
mcohen
We will miss you, some of us. Ever been to Israel?
Fred,
“While there was certainly a ‘right wing’ as a polically powerful force in the 40s through the 60s, we don’t really have one now,”
I disagree with that assessment. My political point of view did not change too much since the days of Ronald Reagan. I was called a Reagan Democrat by my friends (I have never been a Republican or Democrat). The conservatives in this country have moved so far to the right that now I’m called a Leftie 🙂
I blamed people like Rush Limbaugh, Bill Clinton, and also Frank Luntz for their contributions in fulfilling Orwell’s 1984 phophesy.
My own heterodox views:
1: The US will decline until its current elites are either replaced or receive a considerable change in terms of ability.
This is not neccessarily good. It is possible, that a weakened US will lash out, and that some of the particular sociopathic elite factions will attempt to drag those they perceive as main adversaries down with them.
2: Once Elite replacement happens, the US will rapidly resurge. The main fundamental of American power, being surrounded by lots of fish and 2 weak nations persists. US recovery post an elite replacement will probably make Putin Russian recovery look very average by comparison.
TonyL
It was the Godfather movies….which exercised an ideological hegemony (a.k.a intellectual tyranny) on the minds of men.
Walrus,
“My biggest wish now is that we develop our own nuclear weapons and associated delivery capability. We already have the technology as well as at least 30% of the worlds uranium.”
Now why on Earth would a man who contributed so much to the changes that made Australia what it is today think you would need nuclear weapons to defend your island and just who do you think is going to sail over and take it away from you and your posterity?
Fred, the Chinese or India. Nobody wants the East coast, but the North and West are full of inexhaustible deposits of iron ore and coal. They are the nearest ones to both of them.
We
Fred:
The answer to your question: there was a real fear of Japan invading Australia in 1930s – later to be replaced by Indonesia, and I suppose China at the present time.
There was a series of young adult books on the subject of “Brown soldiers” having taken over Australia.
@Walrus,
If China or India or both take and burn or buy and burn all the coal in Australia till the inexhaustible coal has all been exhausted ( as O=C=O into the sky above and all around), then the effects of that much more skycarbon will be felt first and worst among China, India and Australia.
If “Chindia” just TAKE the coal, then the joke will be on “Chindia”. If Australia freely SELLS the coal which “Chindia” freely BUY, then the joke will be on Australia.
Either way, NONE of y’all will be laughing.