Our civilization is a the throes of a conflict between two ideas as to how to go forward, Globalism or Economic Nationalism.
These ideologies have similarities. The problem lies with well meaning people on both sides advocating good ideas that turn out to be not so good, because of the way they are put into practice.
Those in power, attempting to gain support for the implementation of their policies, leverage the differences between these ideologies in a ‘divide and conquer’ strategy that pits one side against the other. The media, both main stream and independent, compound this problem. They exploit differences of opinion by polarizing and distorting them in order to gain ratings, traffic and monetization. The big money is made when there’s “Blood in the streets”. “If it bleed it leads”.
Somewhere there has to be a middle ground, the Middle Way spoken of in Buddhism, or the Golden Mean of Greek philosophy.
For example, Shareholder Capitalists have cherrypicked portions of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations to justify unbridled self interest, and to demonize Stakeholder Capitalism as communist propaganda. But Adam Smith, arguably the founder of Capitalism, “in his concern for the poor, and for the shepherding of institutions dealing with health, education & infrastructure, believed there must be a healthy, balancing public sector. He also emphasised the importance of thriving community structures, regulatory institutions, and the role that values must play in our lives.” HR’s moral mission – Danah Zohar
“From 1945-1982 the capitalism that created America as the dominant nation in the world, economically and militarily, was pure stakeholder capitalism. It also created the largest economic market in the world, which was America’s middle class.” Stakeholder Capitalism Works Because It Has A Conscience – Peter Georgescu
How can consensus be reached in a climate of vigorous censorship, in the demonizing or cancelling of another as an extremist? Wouldn’t that make the narrative that prevails little more than propaganda, and the adherents just as extreme? On the other hand, the dissemination of deceptive, misleading information – deliberately designed to misdirect people – leads to confusion, radicalism and possible violence.
Serious consideration begins by researching the arguments of both sides, and trying to reach a consensus. The more we default to an extreme position, at either end of the spectrum, the less likely we are to find a solution to world problems. Ignoring or automatically discounting another’s point of view is a step towards tyranny.
Politics has degenerated into the Art of War, an amoral striving for ideological supremacy and control of resources. Power is the horrible star by which many technocrats, oligarchs and political parties, mired in corruption, bribery and coercion, now guide their ship.
How do we get to a better State? What we need are fewer politicians and more statesmen. “What is the purpose of a statesman? It is to state, in the name of Man, the government that is in residence with the discovery of Truth!” – Change Your Standpoint, Change Your World: Kenneth G. Mills
Just a short note prior to you reading this article. Of all of the hundreds of articles written about Donald J. Trump this one is by far the most authentic. No matter your politics you will have a better understanding of our President and our politics after reading this.
Very interesting theory on Trump’s success.
The mayor of Livermore California explains Trump’s popularity and success. This is perhaps the best explanation for Trump’s popularity.
Marshall Kamena is a registered Democrat and was elected mayor of Livermore, CA.. He ran on the democratic ticket as he knew a Bay Area city would never vote for a Republican. He is as conservative as they come. He wrote the following:
Trump’s ‘Lack of Decorum, Dignity, and Statesmanship’ By Marshall Kamena, Mayor of Livermore, CA.
My Leftist friends (as well as many ardent #NeverTrumpers) constantly ask me if I’m not bothered by Donald Trump’s lack of decorum. They ask if I don’t think his tweets are “beneath the dignity of the office.”
Here’s my answer:
We Right-thinking people have tried dignity. There could not have been a man of more quiet dignity than George W. Bush as he suffered the outrageous lies and politically motivated hatreds that undermined his presidency.
We tried statesmanship.
Could there be another human being on this earth who so desperately prized “collegiality” as John McCain?
We tried propriety – has there been a nicer human being ever than Mitt Romney?
And the results were always the same. This is because, while we were playing by the rules of dignity, collegiality and propriety, the Left has been, for the past 60 years, engaged in a knife fight where the only rules are those of Saul Alinsky and the Chicago mob.
I don’t find anything “dignified,” “collegial” or “proper” about Barack Obama’s lying about what went down on the streets of Ferguson in order to ramp up racial hatreds because racial hatreds serve the Democratic Party.
I don’t see anything “dignified” in lying about the deaths of four Americans in Benghazi and imprisoning an innocent filmmaker to cover your tracks.
I don’t see anything “statesman-like” in weaponizing the IRS to be used to destroy your political opponents and any dissent.
Yes, Obama was “articulate” and “polished” but in no way was he in the least bit “dignified,” “collegial” or “proper.”
The Left has been engaged in a war against America since the rise of the Children of the ‘60s. To them, it has been an all-out war where nothing is held sacred and nothing is seen as beyond the pale.. It has been a war they’ve fought with violence, the threat of violence, demagoguery and lies from day one – the violent take-over of the universities – ’till today.
The problem is that, through these years, the Left has been the only side fighting this war. While the Left has been taking a knife to anyone who stands in their way, the Right has continued to act with dignity, collegiality and propriety.
With Donald Trump, this all has come to an end. Donald Trump is America ’s first wartime president in the Culture War.
During wartime, things like “dignity” and “collegiality” simply aren’t the most essential qualities one looks for in their warriors. Ulysses Grant was a drunk whose behavior in peacetime might well have seen him drummed out of the Army for conduct unbecoming.
Had Abraham Lincoln applied the peacetime rules of propriety and booted Grant, the Democrats might well still be holding their slaves today. Lincoln rightly recognized that, “I cannot spare this man. He fights.”
General George Patton was a vulgar-talking.. In peacetime, this might have seen him stripped of rank. But, had Franklin Roosevelt applied the normal rules of decorum then, Hitler and the Socialists would barely be five decades into their thousand-year Reich.
Trump is fighting. And what’s particularly delicious is that, like Patton standing over the battlefield as his tanks obliterated Rommel’s, he’s shouting, “You magnificent bastards, I read your book!”
That is just the icing on the cake, but it’s wonderful to see that not only is Trump fighting, he’s defeating the Left using their own tactics. That book is Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals – a book so essential to the Liberals’ war against America that it is and was the playbook for the entire Obama administration and the subject of Hillary Clinton’s senior thesis.
It is a book of such pure evil, that, just as the rest of us would dedicate our book to those we most love or those to whom we are most indebted, Alinsky dedicated his book to Lucifer.
Trump’s tweets may seem rash and unconsidered but, in reality, he is doing exactly what Alinsky suggested his followers do. First, instead of going after “the fake media” — and they are so fake that they have literally gotten every single significant story of the past 60 years not just wrong, but diametrically opposed to the truth, from the Tet Offensive to Benghazi, to what really happened on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri — Trump isolated CNN.. He made it personal.
Then, just as Alinsky suggests, he employs ridicule which Alinsky described as “the most powerful weapon of all.”… Most importantly, Trump’s tweets have put CNN in an untenable and unwinnable position. They need to respond.
This leaves them with only two choices. They can either “go high” (as Hillary would disingenuously declare of herself and the fake news would disingenuously report as the truth) and begin to honestly and accurately report the news or they can double-down on their usual tactics and hope to defeat Trump with twice their usual hysteria and demagoguery.
The problem for CNN (et al.) with the former is that, if they were to start honestly reporting the news, that would be the end of the Democratic Party they serve. It is nothing but the incessant use of fake news (read: propaganda) that keeps the Left alive.
Imagine, for example, if CNN had honestly and accurately reported then-candidate Barack Obama’s close ties to foreign terrorists (Rashid Khalidi), domestic terrorists (William Ayers & Bernardine Dohrn), the mafia (Tony Rezko) or the true evils of his spiritual mentor, Jeremiah Wright’s church.
Imagine if they had honestly and accurately conveyed the evils of the Obama administration’s weaponizing of the IRS to be used against their political opponents or his running of guns to the Mexican cartels or the truth about the murder of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and the Obama administration’s cover-up.
So, to my friends on the Left — and the #NeverTrumpers as well — do I wish we lived in a time when our president could be “collegial” and “dignified” and “proper”? Of course I do.
These aren’t those times. This is war. And it’s a war that the Left has been fighting without opposition for the past 50 years.
So, say anything you want about this president – I get it – he can be vulgar, he can be crude, he can be undignified at times. I don’t care. I can’t spare this man. He fights for America!
Please pass this on…over and over, and again and again…
Do our political leaders, bureaucrats and health officers really want to go down in history as the ones who betrayed us, who programmed our society for fear, propelling us incrementally into a tyrannical, technocratic oligarchy?
A “back-door” clause in the Charter of Rights gives provincial premiers just enough wiggle room to declare perpetual states of emergency, potentially abrogating our individual rights.
As of January 20th, 2021, the 2nd “state of emergency” in Ontario, Canada was extended until “at least” February 19th. This was made possible by Premier Doug Ford and his cabinet. They recently passed legislation that takes advantage of an equivocation in our Charter of Rights and Freedoms, a “back-door” clause which now gives provincial premiers just enough wiggle room to declare perpetual states of emergency, potentially abrogating our individual rights.
Everyone here is now under a province wide “stay-at-home” order, because apparently the previous lockdowns and mitigation measures didn’t work. This is reportedly the first time in history where the healthy have been quarantined, despite the assertion of Dr. Fauci of the CDC that there is no danger of asymptomatic contagion.
We are now headed towards a police state, justified by the mantra of “keeping us all safe” and other such bromides.
Some of us – who have repeatedly acquiesced to the incremental imposition of restrictions, “temporary” lockdowns, and states of emergency – are starting to wake up to the level of control that has been achieved over every aspect of our lives. We are now headed towards a police state, justified by the mantra of “keeping us all safe” and other such bromides.
Another alleged reason is that “the health care systems in danger of being overwhelmed” – a claim that has been contradicted by journalists with videotaped evidence of near empty hospitals.
A previous CDC update claims that individuals are more likely to survive the coronavirus after contracting it. The health agency says if you have the virus between the ages of 0 to 70, you have a 99% survival rate. And if you’re over 70, the survival rate is nearly 95% .
The “Parade of the Imagined Terribles” marches on.
The conflated “Covid related” mortality rate – conveniently decoupled from the alarming increase in case numbers and hyped by a complicit media – was reportedly in line with previous flu seasons – until a highly contagious mutant strain of the virus suddenly appeared on the scene, just in time to justify a freshet of new lockdowns and restrictions.
The science at play seems to be mainly political and psychological – the science of propaganda and the manufacture of consent, the science of organized despair.
This current crisis appears to be based on half truths – manipulated and uncontextualized data, flawed computer models, a virus that has never been isolated, a PCR “test” that returns positive results for goats and fruit and dirt – and testimony from senior health organizations and their spokespersons, who regularly contradict themselves in an effort to gaslight the public.
Their fallback position is a “science” which Bruce Lee described as the “Classical Mess” The science at play seems to be mainly political and psychological – the science of propaganda and the manufacture of consent, the science of organized despair.
Politicians, unelected bureaucrats, and myopic health officers, apparently incapable of 2nd order thinking, are now directing the minutiae of our daily lives – including such activities as ‘walking our dogs’ or ‘stretching our legs’ in a stroll around the block. Even the way we have sex is being curated by our chief public health officer, who recommends the practice mutual masturbate while wearing masks to avoid infecting our partners.
The damage they are doing to our society is incalculable.
Their staggering hypocrisy in violating their own rules is predictable, given the historical evidence we have of “elite privilege” under communist regimes. They appear to be infected with a Dunning–Kruger virus – the cognitive bias of illusory superiority. Their epic failure to consider the unintended consequences of their words and actions is astonishing. The damage they are doing to our society is incalculable.
Their arbitrary and destructive edicts are being enforced by police. For example, before even considering that you might have a legal exemption, you risk being tasered you if you skate outdoors or shop without a mask. You risk huge fines or imprisonment if you disobey or resist the many confusing restrictions, which appear to be open-ended enough to allow for the arbitrary determination of infraction – perhaps depending on where you are positioned in the progressive stack.
I suspect that many of our politicians will voted out of office once things return to normal, and the general public awaken to how they have been hoodwinked. Already there are major class action lawsuits being launched in Canada, and legal action against these despots has reportedly been successful internationally.
Politicians and bureaucrats should remember that the Nazi regime ended in the trials at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity.
