The Way We Are Now—Sigh!
"For he cometh in with vanity, and departeth with darkness, and his name shall be covered with darkness."
—Ecclesiastes 6:4
"Where the word of a king is, there is power: and who may say unto him, What doest thou?"
—Ecclesiastes 8:4
"Our" President says that those of us who blame Islam for terrorism are as bad as terrorists. Thanks, Mr. President. Is this what you mean by "Born Again"?
He also says that anyone who blames Islam rather than "extremists" for "terrism" is unAmerican.
The Massachusetts Kennedys beat the Connecticut Bushes in at least one way. They did not make their very dumbest boy President.
The Wall Street Journal has declared that, historically, Islam has been better for business than Christianity.
Sorrows of Empire. A HIGH RANKING Afghan police official, in my town for a course, committed a rape. He could not be persuaded that he had done anything wrong. Also in the heart of Old Carolina: Parents of children in an elementary school class, comparing notes, became concerned about their children's lack of progress. Inquiry revealed that the teacher was spending most of her time coping with two Mexicans.
My Scalawag Senator Lindsey Graham not too long ago told the Mexicans that those of us who oppose the Bush/Kennedy illegal alien benefits bill are “bigots” who will be made to shut up. This statesman now presents himself as the patron of the putative wall on the southern border. Does this make him a bigot? Does this mean that he should be shut up?
Sanctuary City Mayor Guiliani came to town recently. He declared strongly for the border wall and other tough immigration measures and is making immigration control the sole theme of his pre-primary media ads. Does this make him a bigot? Does this mean that he should be shut up?
The only relevant question here is how many lies will the public gulp down?
Watch out for politicians who have just discovered how desirable is the wall. It would seem that they have settled on this talk as a way to quiet down the plebs until they can bring the amnesty back.
"If only Longstreet had . . . " (O. Henry)
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Bush is a damn traitor. I can see that, and I'm not even American.
Ecclesiastes 8:2 Obey the King's command for you took an oath before God to be loyal to him.
...sometimes one person dominates other people to their harm. Ecclesiastes 8:9b.
I voted for Bush. I didn't want Gore. Then I voted for Bush again. I didn't want Kerry. Now I'm wondering if either would have been any worse. I remember when he was trying to sell the W.M.D. to America as a prerequisit for war. I said during his first telecast on that issue that "this was going to come around to bite him in the 'afterparts' ". Now 'We the people', especially those good men and women in the military are paying the price.
The 1/10th of 1% of the american population who comprise the short-term/sure-thing 'investor' class are terrorists par excellance.
The 100Billions of Dollars annually pet investment business, the pharmaceutical industry (especially, and the richest in profits) has knowingly and willfully orchestrated over the past 60 years the largest fraud in human history. It's the biggest by far, ever. And perhaps it is the most deadly.
For decades the pharmaceutical industry has strategically expanded its influence on medical education with devastating results. But REMEMBER the staple of this business is Disease itself its sine qua non, or i.e. without disease the business deflates. SO Pharmaceutical drugs are Designed merely to cover 'disease symptoms', if - devastating side-effects allowing. The drugs are not designed (of course) to cure or to eradicate disease, such as cardiovascular, cancer, diabetes, or ANY other which kills a population the size SanFancisco every year in America. But that's not bad enough for them, the pharmaceutical industry does not want anything to penetrate significantly into their 'business' that can cure or prevent, and they're pro-active about 'preventing' that.
Americans are yet decent enough they can't even fathom this. 'You might say like the troops they die for goodness who have lived for crime.' Sadly.
Still not enough, the epidemic of dangerous side effects caused by pharmaceutical drugs such as Vioxx, Celbrex, Liptor, and Prozac are NOT even the exceptions. Due to their synthetic nature most pharmaceutical drugs all concocted in labs are TOXIC to our organic bodies. Of the Over 1 MILLION Americans who have already sufferred disabilities from taking pharmaceutical drugs 100Thousand of those die every year in America the AMA has acknowledged. They're fed cheap crap in other words at astronomical prices, designed NOT to cure, and which often actually kills... because those in 'authority' are allowed to tell them it's "medicine."
Take your medicine johnny, it's NOT supposed to taste good...OR for that matter cure you? We're lucky johnny if you're not autistic afterward, or well, dead. [If this sounds funny then the truth is funny because it is NOT an exaggeration.]
The medical liability 'reform' constantly being pushed by George W. Bush and his administration is NOT about protecting M.D.s from medical liability lawsuits. Rather to prevent punative damage awards and lawsuits by injured patients against these drug companies. This pharmaceutical industry was the largest single (investor) corporate sponsor of the Bush Administration. But Presidents and federal agencies and the cost of t.v. advertising come cheap compared to the hundreds of billions of dollars in profits every year to the pharmaceutical coporations and their stockholders (of not that many people really at all). Last year gross revenues reached $550 BILLION or over 1/2 trillion. America is a very big place, larger than all the European Union nations combined, and Ms. Liberty though big as She is is still handled and run by only a handfull of people or 'investors.' Ms. Liberty doesn't yet realize it's not really for Her own 'good.'
And so you see-?-This need to protect the biggest investor in His administration is the WHY (of why) George W. Bush ordered his hatchet man attorney general Al G. to fire those justice department attorneys prosecuting suits against Bush corporate sponsors MOST NOTABLY a suit(s) against the pharmaceutical industry. And the one I have in mind was even only for a piddling $600million. George W. Bush is a terrorist par excellance, not only in attacking and destroying a third world country, Iraq - but MOST NOTABLY at home against his own people. We really need to LOOK AT exactly how we 'define' terrorist, don't we. I mean if our nation is so stupid as to declare a 'war on terrorism' shouldn't step one numero uno - be to define 'terrorist'?
AND YET none in Congress will lift a finger to impeach Bush precisely BECAUSE they are ALL on the same gravy train including the 'proud' Pelosi. THEY are terrorists, no? Or are we yet awaiting the 'definition'? How about 'instinctually', do we Feel like they're terrorists? Hmmm.
Effective, safe NON-PATENTABLE natural therapies and remedies are a direct threat to the pharmaceutical INVESTMENT business. These target and correct underlying deficiences at the all-important cellular level preventing and even eradicating today's most common diseases. That's very BAD business for the drug industrialists and their fraud of inexpensively by throwing together PATENTABLE, garbage in their drug labs. Get it? Doctors and patients alike have become the Actual victims of the pharmaceutical industry and its investment community's efforts at monopolizing human health. They ARE terrorists, no? They proactively pay-off and seek to outlaw non-patentable natural therapies at the national and international levels. At first in places like Indonesia and India etc. these filthy global corporate-terrorists attempted to actually PATENT herbs, natural remedies, natural therapies that the indigenous populations have made healthful and propitious use of for time in memorial. Even these peasants knew enough to rebel when they no longer could use what they always used unless it was 'approved' by some bought and paid for government agency, just like our FDA.
Once that PATENTING route did not work for the globalists they sought and seek to make illegal these same natural cures they attempted to PATENT. It's ALL ALWAYS with these people - ONLY about the MONEY. Get it?
But that's not enough for them. Now they've helped to destroy via their hack George W. Bush the 'justice' department. But that's not nearly enough for them either, are you kidding... Over 100 medical researchers who announced or were on the brink of announcing a cure for various diseases with non-drug & non-surgical methods ALL mysteriously found their deaths in very bizarre circumstances days prior. And it ALL began with Royal Raymond Rife's work and life being destroyed 50 years ago. When the writing was on the wall what kind of a profitable investor business (with the right payoffs and advertising) this institutionalized snake-oil (would that it were as harmless as snake oil) legal drug business could and would be. Aren't these people, like yourself terrorists, Mr. President? No? 'Huh,' says Mr. President, 'I can't even speak English. Huh?'
Where is the FTC, another one of those fed agencies that aids and abets the homegrown terrorists, no? Why doesn't it take action, its raison d'etre or reason for being, AGAINST drug companies for producing flase and misleading advertising, yet it does NOTHING. People say 'oh it's the revolving-door these people after their stint at the FTC all get multi-million dollar board positions on pharmaceutical, or 'Food' companies... They get to join the 1/10th of 1% of the american population who are certified (and certifiable) members of the investor class. ... They get to be 'legitimate', protected terrorists themselves, no? Yes. But most of them don't even wait until after the stint selling-out the american public. People inside of both the FDA and the FTC through various dodges and covers and shells are already making millions of dollars trading stocks in pharmaceutical and food companies on insider information. But even at the hightest eschelons of the 'justice' department they are protected by attorney general al speedy gonzales and his boss the terrorist in chief george w. bush.
And they know they are protected by the u.s. congress & all manner of other federal agenencies at their disposal, as well. It's a party of course of animals.
If you're not fond of this send an e-mail or fax complaining about the pharmaceutical industry and complaining about the FTC themselves (also being on the payroll) TO the FTC, and if a million or so float in in the coArse of a day - will they even notice? Don't they already float in? Go to http://www.ftc.gov and click on "File Complaint" or fax the lovelies at the ftc - at: (202) 326-2012 Yes, OF COURSE they're on the gravy train...but give'em a little indigestion - and suggest an antacid. They're probably not stupid they know all they need is a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. SHHH... that may soon be 'illegal.' Can't patent it...no real opportunity for insider trading.
They'll leave a light on for'ya, there at the FTC & FDA, in case'ya want to stop by to lay down and die. Who are the terrorists again?????
It may be perspective: to the fed govt. and its microscopic investor community it's whoever, primarily in america, is talking back to them like me John Q. Public. This may "seem" terrifying to them - but is this 'terrorism' compared to what they DO? I hope they don't now consider chronicles website a 'terrorist'. It's why I'm in favor of chronicles editing or deleting posts, especially my own if it gets them into too much trouble. Sorry, in advance. So how do we define the word 'terrorist'? If we don't know that - ?
Don't know if this "John Q Public" is a bigot, but perhaps he could be persuaded to shut up?
Dr. Wilson,
The fact that conservatives (including conservative Southerners) joined themselves at the hip with the GOP has clearly not worked to our advantage. However, do you forgive those of us who are working hard for Ron Paul?
Do you think working within the Democrat Party, a third party (America First Party, Constitution Party, an entirely regional party, etc.), or Richard Viguerie's independent "third force" is a better option? Or just concentrate on culture first?
An interesting fact - the head of the Constitution Party here in Georgia is working hard for Ron Paul.
"Inquiry revealed that the teacher was spending most of her time coping with two Mexicans."
No doubt the poor woman will be shortly fired for being a racist.
Mexicans in high school quickly find out that they can utter the most graphic sexual insults at their teachers and either the teacher will do nothing or if she sends them to the office, the administrator will tell them that the teacher is nuts.
On the other hand, white students who do something minor such as talking at the wrong time, will be made an example of. Punishing whites severely tells everyone that the school is not "racist."
I think it was Bob Whitaker of Columbia, SC, who says that "anti-racist" is just a code word for "anti-white."
The greatest political achievement would be a change in consciousness from continental to provincial. Think local, act local.
It's not a matter of getting good men into the White House or onto Supreme Court, but rather of getting Americans to realize that neither contest should be that important -- not as important, say, as who runs the school that their kids attend.
If people want to get worked up over politics they should get worked up over mayoral & city council elections, or state representatives -- not federal offices.
The only reason we want wise men in either the U.S. Presidency or on the U.S. Supreme Court is not because we want men wise enough to wield godlike power -- but because we want men wise enough to know that they are *not* fit to wield godlike power, and who recognize that "godlike power" is found nowhere in the constitutional description of either the federal judiciary or federal executive.
And who know that the appetite for "godlike power" is something both the Greek tragedians & Hebrew prophets warn against.
I.e., the biggest benefit of a Paul presidency is not all the great things the executive office would do *for* us, but rather all the mischiefs it would stop doing *to* us.
I think the most worthwhile thing about Paul's candidacy is that it might nudge a few people into re-thinking what the role of the president actually should be.
Somewhere along the line it's been redefined as "Fuerher" -- or more subtly as "Leader of the Free World" vice "chief executive of the United States".
This false definition needs to be eroded in the collective psyche, however long it takes.
Speaking of change-in-consciousness, how was *Invasion*?
Red Phillips
Your question is pretty much amswered by GS. If Ron Paul was ever elected his adminstration would sabotaged by Wall Street,the Military Industrial complex and Bill Gates.
The revolt has to begin at the bottom. It is going to take highly concious and vigilant ordinary White Americans locally organized networked for support with other local grassroots groups.
Ron Paul is also going to have to contetnd with well financed asian and muslim political organizations that have a very strong racial/ethnic conciousness.
I just think it is delusional to think that if we just elect the right guy every thing will work out just fine. If America had a population that was ninety percent White like it was before the passage of the 1965 immigration refrom act, the voting for the right guy strategy would be viable.
America in 2007 is a joke nation in so many ways. Yet the problems facing America are life-threatening. President Paul can not save America. We may very well have reached the point of no return.
The American Southwest is running out of water. To sustain their large nonwhite populations-over one million Iranians living in Southern California at last count- Californian and Arizona must steal water from the Whiter Western States. Depspite this, thanks to non-white LEGAL IMMIGRATION and illegal immigration, the population of the California and Arizona continues to grow, grow and grow, no end in sight.
Euro-America will either politically organize their legitimate racial interests just as like the hispanics,muslims ,blacks and asians do or Euro-America will be reduced to racial minority within the borders of the US. If this happens, Euro-Americans should expect the worst. Ron Pauls libertarian free market nonesense-its not all nonsense-will not hold the US together.
The siutuation is way beyond Ron Paul.
I don't want to be governed by Kings, Queens-George W Bush-and men of means anymore.
PcH, without disputing your experience or Dr. Wilson's, my classroom experience with Hispanics, from 5 years ago:
1. polite to the teacher
2. respected the educated
3. had no interesti either in becoming well educated themselves or in the intellectual life.
#3 proves they are on their way to becoming average, typical Americans. One wonders if ## 1 & 2 will soon be abandoned, and they'll be the 100% Yankee Yahoos that Italian-Americans, Anglo-Americans, Celtic Americans, and German-Americans, and others have become.
Asian (Far East and South) are ##1 & 2 AND are very interested in becoming well educated. Ditto Jewish. Something is to be said for a sapiential religion.
Sid Coniff
White Christian Americans were much better off when the asian population was much smaller. How did these "dumb" Protestants and Catholics ever mange to do it.
If there is one thing we can be certain of it is this:Asians will continue to colonize Silicon Valley and other areas of the US and in the process drive White Christian Americans out of these areas.
China and India wins. White Christian Americans experience economic and racial dispossession. I have no confidence that Ron Paul will reverse this.
I believe Ron Paul is a very worthy man who is doing a great service by raising viewpoints that will otherwise go unheard---that may lead to some healthy movement within the Republican party---though the Powers-That-Be have unlimited resources to corral and control whatever uprisings happen at the grassroots.
(I sense Paul is getting stronger than expected grassroots support where I live.)
Yet the recent immigration business indicates that the people can still do something---at least in terms of a (perhaps temporary)veto---if they are numerous and determined enough.
My plan, which has received resounding lack of interest for the last 15 years, is taking over the House of Representatives, the body most influencable by the people. Taking over the Presidency is impossible and useless. A coalition of anti-imperialists needs to take over the House of representatives. In every possible district, an anti-imperial candidate (with whatever inclination works best in the district) needs to challenge the Democrat and Republican. It would be tough going but an attractive, bold, hard-working, articulate candidate could tap some real grassroots strength and maybe win a three-way race, or at least scare the duopoly into paying attention. If we can get enough independent anti-imperialists into the House to prevent either party from having a majority---then the whole federal government can be brought to a halt. We wont let them spend any money until they agree to drastic reforms. The platform is simple and ought to unify many elements. 1) No foreign war without deliberation and declaration. 2) cut spending and bring down the debt/ tax relief.
3) vast scaleback of fed bureaucracy and regulation, 4) prevent the federal courts from legislating.
I am expecting some of you young ladies and gentlemen to get busy on your campaigns.
G.S.,
"Speaking of change-in-consciousness, how was *Invasion*?"
Not too good actually, and it did poorly at the box office. Based partially on bad reviews I suspect. It felt like a film that was meant to be about 3 hours long that got edited to 1.5. Some of the editing was cleverly done, but overall it felt disjointed. Skipping ahead in time with little explanation. Maybe the DVD "Director's Cut" will be better.
The moral point was brushed over and easily missed. As the pod people took over, peace broke out. The point being that War is the result of our humanity. But it was a bit ham handed.
Anyway, no offense to you or Mr. Wheeler, but I think sometimes paleos romantically describe the world they want to live in vs. the world as it is. Who is the Mayor actually affects my life very little, whereas who is President affects it a lot. (Whether the Pres is Bush or Kerry probably matters little, but the President affects my daily life more than the Mayor. esp. if you judge by what percent of my income each gets.) Clearly a change from continental to local is desirable, but how do you get there from here.
Mr. Wheeler says that change/revolt happens from the bottom up, but that is an at least somewhat verifiable hypothesis, and I am not sure that history suggests it is true. One could argue that change actually happens at the top (in other words requires leaders) and the bottom follows. Not as romantic, but perhaps true.
The groundswell that is the "Ron Paul phenomenon" coalesced a leaderless, amorphous group of dissidents but it first required a cause/leader, Ron Paul. Without Ron Paul there is none of the rebellion we are seeing.
So changing the conversation/assumptions/etc. is a first step back toward what we all seek.
I guess the alternative point of view would be that we should all just stake a local claim first and hope others do the same. You could even argue that working at the national level feeds the beast.
On the acting locally issue. It is all to the good for Americans to develop strong non-government community institutions for their comfort and protection. Involvement in local politics (except specific issues of protection) is useless. It is even less important who is mayor than it is who is President. There is no local power. We live in an Empire. All orders come from the top. No local government or school board may act except as approved by the federal bureaucracy and courts. Every single public school superintendent in the U.S. follows the same plan. The change of power has to happen at the top: the federal government has to be broken up so that the self-government of real citizens can flourish.
"The change of power has to happen at the top: the federal government has to be broken up so that the self-government of real citizens can flourish."
I think we are posting past each other, but I agree. This is part of what I was trying to say.
Of necessity in the current Empire, change must happen at the top before we will be allowed to change at the bottom. But I was also making the point that historically change usually (?) happens at the top, not from the grassroots as is often asserted. Unfortunately, the grassroots often follow like sheep.
"vast scaleback of fed bureaucracy and regulation"
Or just a restructuring. No reasonable true-blue conservative can seriously argue that the power of big-interest groups needs to be SERIOUSLY held in check, not merely the power of big government. A good government should protect its citizens from all threats, foreign and domestic, and global corporatism is no less a threat right now than al-Qaeda or unchecked immigration from the Third World.
Mr. L, you wrote "Ecclesiastes 8:2 Obey the King’s command for you took an oath before God to be loyal to him.
…sometimes one person dominates other people to their harm. Ecclesiastes 8:9b.
I voted for Bush. I didn’t want Gore. Then I voted for Bush again. I didn’t want Kerry. Now I’m wondering if either would have been any worse. I remember when he was trying to sell the W.M.D. to America as a prerequisit for war. I said during his first telecast on that issue that “this was going to come around to bite him in the ‘afterparts’ “. Now ‘We the people’, especially those good men and women in the military are paying the price."
Whatever you meant by quoting the Bible, it's possible that you rely too much on TV news for your political ideas. I can understand someone who, given the limited leisure time most of us have, could have been fooled into voting for Bush the first time. I can neither understand nor sympathize with anyone who voted for Bush the second time, however.
Watch your TV carefully. Bush will never be bitten in the afterparts or anywhere else. He is protected by his privileged existence as a member of our ruling class. He will be protected by a personal detail of federal agents from the SS for the rest of his life. You will vote for Giuliani because you don't want Hillary. That's what too much TV viewing does to a person's mind.
In 1389 there was a peasant revolt in England triggered by a pole tax. The serfs slaughtered every lord and noble they could lay there hands. It was a very spontaneous event. Nobody saw it comming. But ther hatred had been building up for several years. They made the mistake of trusting the Black Prince.
There have been many serf/slave /working class revolts throughout history. Life did get much better ordinary people in Europe and America. Life didn't didn't get better because of generosity at the top. It has taken the threat of violence to make things better for ordinary people.
Why should we assume that Republican/Democratic goverments in the US will always have a minimal level legitmacy-a level necessary to keep the racket going- among the American population. The day Republican/Democratic goverments lose legitmacy, all bets are off. It is not to difficult to come up with credible scenarios how this could happen. In his book "Peak Oil" James Kunstler comes up with one. Read the last chapter. There are many others that one can come up with.
It is one thing to say that there isn't local. But that doesn't mean that a revolt couldn't erupt from the bottom that changes the order of things. Don't assume that because it hasn't happened -in recent history-that it is a low probability event.
The problem is that for some time now, all revolts have drawn their energy from Marxist ideology. We need a popular uprising untainted by the Lefties, somehow...
It is one thing to say that there isn’t local. But that doesn’t mean that a revolt couldn’t erupt from the bottom that changes the order of things. Don’t assume that because it hasn’t happened -in recent history-that it is a low probability event.
The revolt in and of itself is not unlikely, it is the possibility of success which is unlikely. You would need at a minimum 1/3rd of this nation to rise up in order to displace the ruling elites, blow up the three credit bureaus and the Federal Reserve. Small movements, even in the hundreds of thousands, have little chance of being effective with weapons and being what they are, satellites which can see into our back yard, cell phones, etc. If even a fraction of the tech shown in the tv show 24 is accurate, a movement to topple the government would be next to impossible.
Dr Wilson,
You have on this the eve of 21 August 2007 set before us a very hard discussion.
This empire will and must pass. Such is the nature of all things from slugs, to men, to empires. The concern is how the empire will pass and what will come after it. Will the twilight of this age be the dawn of a new and better time, or will the darkness merely deepen, fraught with terrors and fears more chilling and destructive than the empire which they replace.
For my part, I am ready to run the risk and see the leviathan pass away. Perhaps men with honor and courage will seize the moment and leverage the awful moment into something good for a future generation. Perhaps not, but we must await the moment and at least try!
As to Islam, I agree with the late C.S. Lewis: it is the last great Christian heresy, the Unitarians, Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses not withstanding. Jesus is reduced to a mere prophet with an eschatological bit part rather than being God having written Himself into history as our Kinsman Redeemer. Protestant though I am, I must admit that Islam was made presentable at the intellectual and theological courts by the Protestant/Deist anti-Catholic rhetoric of the Enlightenment. It would seem that a newly spun version of this very revisionism is what Bush and the current pack of "moderate Islamic" apologist are putting out.
Gentlemen, I should make it clear that I have said nothing about violent revolt, which is dangerous and useless speculation. The problem is not one of institutions to be overthrown, in my view, but of national character to be recovered. If Americans recover their capacity to act as free men worthy of self-government and understanding their own traditions, we already have the legal and peaceful means of devolution --- the States. The right is there and the latent power is there. What is needed is the will and political genius to use it. The federal government needs to be broken up, not a change of masters.
Dr. Wilson,
The leverage of which I spoke but on which I did not elaborate was the people in their sovereign capacity meeting in convention in their respective states - those that do not disintegrate along with the empire - building something new, whether in a new commonwealth of states or individually. For that to happen, however, there must be, at that awful moment, men of honor and courage who step up to lead but who have that meekness (nothing to do with weakness) spoken of in the Sermon on the Mount (see George Washington and Robert E. Lee for examples of that sort of meekness) lest they themselves become the Napoleons and the Hitlers of the post-empire era. (That would be the deeper darkness of which I spoke.)
I think both sides of the provincial/national debate are in error. Politicians can and almost always do make life a little more uncomfortable, but they almost never make it better. Politics in postmodern America is an annoying and certainly fatal illness, but the more one concentrates on the symptoms, the less time and energy one has for anything more important. As subjects of an empire, we are required to do our duty, but as Christians or even as decent human beings, we should not confuse that public duty with our real life. I get letters, frequently, from young men who are so depressed about the state of our country that they are afraid to marry or have children or complete their studies. They are like the king of Gondor who stared so long into the palantir that he became a mental prisoner of the enemy.
On a far more important subject raised here, "The Invasion" is a perfect metaphor for the past 50 years. I do not intend to see it. I made the mistake of seeing the first remake, a dreadful film, while the second, apparently, was an extended allegory on AIDS (my source for this interpretation is the reviewers). Don Siegel's original film is an understated masterpiece. The horror is not the pod-born aliens but ourselves in danger of losing our humanity. Though widely regarded as an anti-Stalinist film, Invasion of the Bodysnatchers is more like Ionesco's "Rhinocerus," a serious meditation on a dehumanizing civilization. Who could make such a film today? Who would watch it? Certainly not any of the 200+ million zombies who are the citizens of this great republic.
The steady, perhaps inexorable decline from the world of Don Siegel (1956) to our own world should warn self-described conservatives against their naif political ambitions. As Murray Rothbard and I once agreed, only a dictator could drive this people toward liberty.
Re #11 supra:
Long live the Wilson Plan! – CLYDE Wilson’s, that is. I cheer it on, just as I do Washington’s foreign policy – GEORGE Washington’s. To take over the House will require that Gringos develop the skill of organizing and maintaining a new political party, a skill that Europeans have – at least CONTINENTAL Europeans – , and Americans had up thorough 1912 – though even in that election the “3rd party” was more the effort of a charismatic personality than a party _Program_/platform and manifesto. Yet from 1798 until Lincoln’s War, we had a number of “ideological” parties. So: Let 21 August 2007 be the founding date of the new Washington-Jeffersonian-Burkean Party!
By the way, let this new party support also Washington’s ethnic and “multicultural” policies – GEORGE Washington’s. Cf. his address To the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, 18 August 1790; his letters to Lawrence Lewis, 4 August 1797 and Robert Lewis, 18 August 1799; and the terms of his Will.
By the way of the way: Which Washington biography is better: Freeman’s or Flexner’s (both multi-volumed)?
I am nearly as lacking in optimism as Dr. Fleming and share his opinion, in general, of the uselessness of politics. History does have, however, a few examples of at least a partial recovery of civilization after a dark perioid.
As soon as two things go in a society, I would venture to say there's no 'hope', until they get changed back. If they can't get changed back - there's no hope. So then just concentrate on religion emphasizing in the instruction its sapiential side... In other words in new testament speak more toward James (who wanted christianity to emphasize all of judaism's many laws sent down from the LAW or Lord above, the transcendant God, which God himself declared - you could never meet anyway but try, try, try so as not to too terribly displease me...even better to fake me out via this process than to incur my wrath...eXcept James said the good news is the messiah has finally arrived, God incarnate, which He said would be necessary to save us swine, and that's JESUS. So now we can be Hid, as it were WITH God in Christ and through His blood...but it's NO panacea and there still are no utopias in this world, only in the next for his kingdom he said is NOT of this world = James. So Christianity had James his druthers would have emphasized judaism and those impossible LAWS to live up to and try, try, try to meet as a prerequisite to being permitted the fall back position of also obeying first and foremost Jesus the Christ or Messiah, and thus being allowed to participate in the salvation in the next world God has now allowed.) This is in contrast of course to the direction Christianity did go in which can really be understood best via Paul & his book ROMANS. I.e. all of Judaism's nitpicking or sapiential aspects of constantly starting with the (LAW/s from God, to make up for the inevitable limitations of human reason) and so starting with a sincere, earnest effort at the impossible task of picking ALL the fly-doo as it were out of the pepper, according to Paul is no more. We have Christ and Christ crucified and are bathed in His blood. There is nothing more for us to do because HE did it all. We just need in effect to accept the ticket he purchased For us with his sacrifice, and accept that and HIM. If you need a further guide the golden rule of 'turn the other cheek', and the 10 commandments cover it. That in my opinion isn't enough - the direction christianity went in...or perhaps it went in the correct direction for the timebeing...and now on the journey it's time once again to go back to James or the judaic form of christianity so that people are imprinted, stamped with how to be prior to their even meriting the fact that there is also the good news of salvation too unlike in judaism where's there's no messiah (and the ones that came in the past Failed)...or if one is coming it's only to defeat all of the "enemies" of the jews i.e. the 'other' Nations. That stamp or imprint itself, to my way of perceiving the history of the last thousand or 15 hundred years is not only inimical to christianity and inevitably subversive of christianity. The liberal value of accepting religions like judaism and islam which are outright opposed and subversive of christianity in their very teachings is untenable obviously. In my opinion dropping two ideologies like those two religions as they are - into the mix of christianity and its multiplicity of sects and flavors - is like dropping termites into the wood, and expecting the wood to win. Sid, is that sapiential enough for you...or too much so? But I would agree with you christianity in terms of the Pauline direction it took, rather than as James wished it would go, does tend subsequently to either produce or at least not dissuade those leaning in the YAHOO direction... and that's Not good in terms of either imprinting a people so that they ARE a people or in terms of making a person (just like a horse) understand that the group comes first if you want to be a part of civilization, and if you wish to be no longer roaming (just like a horse) on the open prairies.
But back to those two things once they go in a society secularly speaking there's no hope until they are changed back is : given it is no longer a barter society and the symbol/Fact of "money" is deemed preferable. Then once there's money it has to be OFFICIALLY based upon something else, like sugar or tobacco or precious metals so that the symbol is a Fact and redeemable for that which it symbolizes. Otherwise the few, as they have done today, can print it at will - and that is subsequently the only que or line that forms where power is concerned. So EVERYTHING else but the consideration of money goes. Then 'growth' becomes symbiotic with prosperity because inflation is the given when you print money. Growth has nothing per se to do with prosperity except in terms of its 'thinning' OUT the effects of inflation or the inevitable declining value of the paper printed.
And the second thing in a society if it goes is when a people 'believe' that there is a secular 'authority' i.e. the secularly 'Liberal' (which is blasphemy in religious terms) that can be appealed to outside of one's own group for redress of their grievances. ... There's in reality no such animal. As G.S. has stated there is only think locally act locally, in reality... All the rest of it is like a 'time out' ... or suspended animation [or now watching t.v.] while those still playing or acting have their way. So to have this fantasy of what is beyond the group in the here and now, to believe that there is for example a mystical golden calf, etc. or a flying pig is not real and a betrayal of one's group, and so in Fact a betrayal of one's own sense of discipline and oneself, under God. God is in Fact the ONLY flying Oinker which/who works in the world in groups no matter how small and even in individuals. It's the old story of as I like to put it, if we don't know our limitations we have one more, of course. (ok, don't say that's me. ?)
Does Ron Paul accept any campaign contributions from corporations? Which ones?
I mentioned previously that California and Arizona are running out of water-relative to the growth generated by LEGAL IMMIGRATS and illegal immigrats.
Something else to think about. They are building housing in the suburbs of Charlotte for White American refugees from the non-white immigrant infested areas of the US. Right up to the border of South Carolina(Waxhal area). Toss in endangered animal and plant species, protection of the amenities-forests,recreational space and open space -protection of farmland and watershed land and its very clear that something has to give. There is a catastrophe in the making.
I drove past Rockford Illinois on my way to my uncles funeral in Janesville Wisconsin. The Mcmansions-for displaced White American refugess from non-white immigrant infested areas of the nation-seem to be sprouting up before my eyes in the cornfields I drove past.
Meanwhile, thousands of adult White Men, in addition to risking bed sores from sitting hours watching way too many hours watching their favorite sports team-I think this may be a fetish for them-have achieved an even greater level of brain rot as they participate in a higher level fetish called fantasy football. It is truly freightening.
I strongly believe that a major reason that this nonesense continues apace is because there is a just large enough of a population of White Americans who have a profound disconnection from ecological processess. If they weren't so massively disconnected from fundamental ecological processess they would experience stark raving fear several times a week as there brians are zapped thought about their children, grandchildren and beyond competing for the scarce resources of America with post-1965 non-white immigrants and their progeny. A spontaneous grassroots revolt against the beast-mulato yuppie Obamma, Clinton dreck and the Old Queen dynasty-Bush geneline-would occur.
I also believe that a reconncetion with ecological processess would bring about a reconncetion with traditional American culture.
You are not required to agree with any of this. But at least give it some thought
I think it's Waxal. Clyde Wilson would know the proper spelling.
What the hell is a mexican museum doing only a few miles from Andrew Jacksons birthplace?
"Waxhaw" -- old, extinct Indian tribe. There's an irony in that.
Pessimism or optimism?
Once I and a friend of mine in Rome stood in the Forum, at the Temple of the Divine Julius Caesar, and look westward over the Forum Romanum to the Capitoline. My friend is a good old boy and a professional historian at a small college in Michigan. I proceeded to point out to him that surely no spot of earth offered so much history. Look to the right, the Church of Cosmos and Damian from AD 532, a brief period of peace under Theodoric before the last Gothic War. Next to it, the Temple of Antonius Pius and Faustina from the AD 2nd C, the church of San Lorenzo in Miranda in the Temple’s womb.
Then moving leftward, the Basilica Aemilia from the Republic with its colonnade, all now marble stumps. Then the putative site of the Temple of Janus, whose doors the Augustan peace closed for the first time. Then the Senate House; what we see is an Imperial construction, but modeled on the building and placed on the site from the early Republic – at least after the marsh was drained and the Forum established. In front, the oldest assemblies of the Roman people met, and also the very ancient Lapis Niger, perhaps from the 7th C BC. Then comes the Rostrum, the holes where the ships’s “beaks” once stood still visible; and behind it the Umbilicus, ground zero of the Roman world. Beside the Senate House is Cortona’s magnificent Baroque Church of Saints Luca and Martina, with its undulating theatrical facade. Behind it, the Carcer from the Regal period, maybe dating from the 8th C BC, with another church over it. Up the hill, the High Medieval Church of Saint Mary Altar of Heaven, built over the site of the Temple of Juno the Warner, when the geese saved Rome from the Celts in 390 BC.
And behind the church, the Victor Emanuel Memorial, finished in 1909, but very much an expression both of A.D. 19 C Italian nationalism and that period’s aesthetic of “high seriousness”. The finishing touches were added in the Fascist Period. Looking directly westward over the arch of Septimius Severus, from the AD 3rd C, to the middle of the Capitoline, we see the ancient Roman Tabularium, where Horace worked, and build over it by Michelangelo the Roman city hall, the image of the High Renaissance. Turning further left, the summit of the hill, where the Temple of Jupiter the Greatest and Best stood. Further to the south, the Tarpeian Rock; then the Palazzo Caffarelli, the Prussian Embassy in the early 19th C, then the German Empire’s.
Back down on the south side of the Forum, the Basilica Julia of Caesar, with the row of honorary columns in front, the last from Phocas in AD 608. Through the trees, the AD 20th C’s Belgium Embassy. Further left the church of Santa Maria Antiqua, build after the Gothic Wars for the Byzantine officials’ worship. Closer, the Temple of Vesta, founded by Romulus, now in its imperial form. Nearby the Regia, where the Pontifex Maximus had his residence. His office is the only one from the Roman world that survives. Up the Velian Hill, the Arch of Titus, commemorating the destruction of Jerusalem AD 70, a city to be retaken by Jews first 19 centuries later. The Arch is shadowed by the higher Palatine Hill, where the first city was, and where iron age excavations and graves have been found from the 10 C BC. Then the church of Saint Frances of Rome, the Patron of auto drivers, the Church graced with one of Rome’s splendid Romanesque campaniles from the AD 12th C., facing the Basilica of Maxentius.
“Where” I asked my friend, “can one in a single 360 degree turn see so much history? And what do you feel, optimism or pessimism?”
“Pessimism”, he replied at once. “We historians, one and all, are pessimists. Human achievements just don’t last. AND, we historians have no nostalgia for any past time, and we laugh at the idea of a Golden Age; we know too much.”
“Very Augustinian”, I said.
“Indeed” he answered. “I love St. Augustine. Only the City of God, boy.......”
I told him that even if he had not been obliged to combat Pelagianism, St. Augustine would have been pessimistic. For his personal struggle with concupiscence gave him a rather dark view of human beings. Then I told my friend, that my feeling on this spot was actually one of optimism.
“After Troy, after Turnus, Aeneas’ Lavinium. After Amulius and Alba Longa, Romulus and Rome. After the rape of the Sabines, a harmonious multi-tribal city. After a tyrannical king, the Republic. After the struggle of the orders, the splendid Roman constitution. After the Celtic invasion, Camillus and the conquest of Italy. After Hannibal, the victory over Carthage. After Marius and Sulla, Cicero and Catullus. After the various civil wars, the Augustan Age. After Nero, The Flavians. After Domitian, the good emperors. After the crisis of the AD 3rd C, Diocletian and Constantine. After Alaric’s sack, St. Mary Major. After Odoacer, St. Benedict and the church of Santa Sabina. After the Gothic Wars, Gregory the Great. After the Lombards, Charlemagne. After the Saracens, the Byzantine revival under Pope Pascal and Otto. After Robert Guiscard, the 12th C Romanesque, Innocent III, St. Francis and St. Dominic. After the Babylonian Captivity, the Renaissance. After Charles the V and the Reformation, the Counter-Reformation and the glory of the Baroque. After the French Revolution, Blessed Pius IX. After 1870 and the end of papal power, Leo XIII. And after the Fascists ......
“After winter, spring.”
So what lesson does Rome teach?
Lessons? Well, the Spainards did finely manage to boot the muslims the hell out of Spain. If there is a will, there is a way. If there is a will to reclaim post-1965 non-white immigrant infested areas of the US, there is a way. We can start with booting the Chinese and Indians out of Silicon Valley.
"I strongly believe that a major reason that this nonesense continues apace is because there is a just large enough of a population of White Americans who have a profound disconnection from ecological processess." -Brian Wheeler
TECHNOLOGY partly to 'blame'... as well as rightly or wrongly belief in a transcendant God and thus emphasis or perhaps Imblance in the direction of the a supernatural dimension; rather than believing on the other hand, [the divine is only in "the sky above, the tall grass & the ones we love, etc." i.e. within the natural totality inclusive of contemplation.] Could also be to 'blame'? However it may be a matter only of decadence or imbalance or spiritual pride leaning toward the 'beyond' too much in our premature 'ambitions' in that regard. After all didn't Jesus himself say somewhere in the NT 'if we cannot love what we see, how can we love what we do not see?' Do we only love the transcendant...if so, do we really?
There is nothing more ridiculous than a man or a person who though standing within mother Nature is nonetheless de-Natured...not that it's possible, but at least in their own 'mind's' eye? Who said it, Henry Fielding-?-"The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to me) is affectation."
The judaic and thus to some extent the christian does tend though to produce the imbalance toward that which is or may be transcendant (that 'ambition' usually prematurely, as it were) at the expense of the natural... In the christian format it tends to be called the puritanical. Or in that regard Jerusalem vs. Athens, wherein there's no balance, just a jerusalem victory.
That can be a great sponsor of red and black humor.
And also perhaps on the patently feminine side of it a sponsor of 'the torrents of spring.' Of course that's not affected really in (sweet) women who have to be reminded why it's worth giving birth.
Though in fact there are more men-for different psychological and emotional reasons-under bridges for having been jilted by her, than there are in the reverse. She tends to cry it out. And then never forget the one who got away. ... All of this as you suggest pales once we're out of Water.
Real Conservative Christians shouldn't let the morally degenerate Greens to steal the enviromental issue.
I may have forgotten green humor? Sorry Bri?
When I was in my senior year in high school 6 years ago my textbook for government/economics said that 1/3 of local and state government revenues come from the Federal Government. The reason why both federal and state/township governments are broke is that the feds are giving the locals money that they then have to match, meaning that one half to 2/3 of non federal budgets are dictated by the feds. If our states and counties would stop accepting this money they could then control their own affairs and produce better results on less money. It would also help the feds get control of their finances.
Also, many federal mandates are imposed not on regular fed authority, but on the threat of withdrawing funds.
That would be a first step toward local independence.
You can do the current math - trillions are collected each year via irs by the feds since the 16th amendment was faked (= bloodless coup d'etat.) I believe without doing the math right this second $50 - $75 Billion on average (i.e. taking the gross collected divided by 50 states) are 'voluntarily' contributed by the residents of each state each Year to the few in washington d.c. who receive it. $50 Billion X 50 = $2.5 Trillion. If more was collected this year adjust the average state 'contribution' upward. If the feds 'give' you back what they already collected From you, IF you'll match it... well, that's a wash. Why not eliminate all of your state debts and become very rich simply keeping it ALL in the first place, and returning to the Articles of Confederation. It will happen anyway...when it's no longer a 'choice'. Now, that's coherence. No? Even a little bit of prognostication is in there as well. No?
Yes, it's "Waxhaw" after the extinct Indian tribe as Rublev's dog stated. I'm from Fort Mill which is a tiny former cotton mill town near there. Fort Mill and the rural community in neighboring Lancaster county known as "Indian Land" have long been bedroom communities for Charlotteans fleeing the Charlotte city limits.
The area was known as "The Waxhaws" for several centuries and was the wild country into which Grant ordered the US cavalry during the military occupation when former Confederate cavalrymen resisting carpetbag rule became too terrifying for the carpetbaggers and their pets. Redshirts around Fort Mill used the Waxhaws as a staging area for their demonstrations against the occupiers.
It's natural, I suppose, for Southerners to use the Waxhaws, once again, as a sanctuary of sorts against an invader.
Sid Cundiff,
I hope the Western firebird won't be reborn with a Muslim soul.
Frank,
ditto - better if possible to grasp the golden thread leading back to the heavenly kingdoms...Than to reincarnate by default and return to this, the world of uncertainty... Here of course one never knows and two know less. savez? ~poof ? ... and follow in the ocean mist ... ok, ok now that's 'incoherent' ... no more from the general public muslim or otherwise
I'll let'ya go now frank - where i go ya'll cannot follow -
it's time to soar with the stars into the farthest reaches of heaven, where untold suns blaze with light - so, if you'll excuse me - ta-ta ~
National character, analogously to individual personality, is probably fixed by age twelve. We have had our current dysfunctional national character for well over that period. Overall, our national personality strongly resembles a blend of what are termed narcissistic and borderline personality disorders in an individual. Personality disorders are essentially incurable, and damage control rather than treatment is the only useful approach. To the extent one accepts this analogy as a heuristic sociopolitical assumption, one's pessimism concerning any course change away from empire and back toward republic is increased. As a consummate pessimist in this regard, and one who thinks that politics is useless at this juncture, I believe the best course now is investigate ways in which isolated nuclei of 'Western Civilization'---- 'vital remnants', if you will--- can weather the coming dark ages.
Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus,
You speak as if you were the voice of Dr. Fleming.
Young men afraid to marry and have children?! Man, I've seen a lot of those in the world of paleos. Fleming's example of the king of Gondor and the palantir is perfect.
Not quite so many of those down South, though. Our young men are too busy enjoying life and chipping away in the white collar world. They may have no clue what the palantir looks like, but they're full of republican virtue, even if they don't even know what that means. Good cultural instincts and genuinely good people. They just keep trucking along like they always have.
However the house of cards comes tumbling down, good old boys are still going to be down here, in all walks of life, and as politically incorrect as ever.
Now, I don't want a single new 'young professional' to move down here from Cleveland or New York, but why don't some of those depressed young paleos find a good home and trust it? If there's ever been a way for them to find a happy life, it's in amalgamation into Dixie. And, believe me, a high concentration of paleos in any one thing, anywhere, is always a good idea.
Red,
Late response -- but anyhow, no offense taken.
If I remember rightly my point wasn't to dismiss the value of the Paul campaign, but rather to contend that the main value of that campaign lies in the ripples it generates in the collective political consciousness rather than in Mr. Paul getting elected.
If the only value lies in the latter then perhaps we should indeed wake up and smell the coffee, speaking of viewing the world as it really is.
I have great respect for the man & intend to vote for him, and recommend him to others -- but the cold truth is that given the system as is, Mr. Paul has about as much chance of getting elected president as I do of getting konked on the head by a piece of Skylab.
But in my opinion the very campaign could change the system, a little bit. It's worth pushing a candidate supportive of liberty now, maybe, because that it may make for a few more liberty-loving leaders a generation or two down the road.
Sowing the seeds for the future, if you will.
Chaos, the butterfly effect, etc. etc....
Thanks on the tip about "Invasion". Yikes, what a disgrace.
"I get letters, frequently, from young men who are so depressed about the state of our country that they are afraid to marry or have children or complete their studies."
I did not write Dr. Fleming, but that was me, quite literally, about three years ago, and I recovered largely by forgetting about politics for a time. I'm a bit less prone now, but every so often I lapse back into that sort of despair. Even after I was mostly better, I spent a large portion of my time and energy in university fighting against a torrent most evil, dishonest, and intellectually lightweight thinking disseminated from the four corners of my school, enough that I concluded more than a year ago, as Dr. Wilson summed up eruditely, that my education was "a fraud and a waste."
There is a very real danger of becoming absorbed into and even feeding the disastrous destruction around us, and if withdrawl may not be the right answer, there is no easy solution.
Dear Mr. Cundiff,
I have heard some say that in all-Hispanic schools, the atmosphere is respectful. Students I have taught that were freshly arrived were also respectful and fun; they called me "Chespirito." I learned Spanish teaching them. I have taught for several years on both coasts, and both of these situations (all Hispanic or newly arrived) are exceptions to the rule.
On the whole, I have found Hispanics to be angry, disillusioned, unruly, violent, and racially abusive. Where there are numbers of both blacks and Hispanics, there will be fights. I student taught at the school where Welch in another world had sent his children. By the time I got there, there were race riots twice a month. They never reached the news media. We used to joke about whether there were guns or shanks this time and counted the number of police cars. When a riot broke out, the idea was to leave as quickly as possible before the police physically surrounded and locked down the school -- and perhaps kept us there all weekend.
In any case, students that require constant attention for being disruptive and behind the rest of the class are reasons to resist the ongoing invasion of these United States. And so I must agree with Dr. Wilson's statement that "the teacher was spending most of her time coping with two Mexicans."
And may no one ever call you or me a bigot for defending his people against foreign invasion.
The American South will not be a safety valve forever. Thousands of White Northeasterners,Midwesterners and
Californians are pouring in every year. They are driving up housing costs and property taxes or Southerners. In the past two and a half years,several thousand people in South Carolina have lost their homes-homes with mortgages paid off-in tax lien sales because they couldn't pay their rising property taxes.The amenities-open space and recreational space will be degraded and lost. The ugly and expensive suburbs will extend from Weddington to Asheville and from Weddington to Boone. You are delusional if you don't think this will happen.
This is why I laugh at the idea of secession. Throw in a White baby boom in the South and you will find out real soon just how scarce land reaaly is in the South. This will be your hellish fututure if you listen to leftist Kirkpatrick Sale and let the hispanics,asians muslims,carribrans and africans have large parts of American territory where they can breed,breed and breed some more. And watch the non-white population explode in a cockroach- kind -of -way. Before you know the non-whites will have consumed whats left of California and several Southwestern states resources. Their eyes will be gazing towards the American South.
The only solution is repell and expell. Ron Paul will never go along with this. He is thouroughly America -is -an -idea man.
Mr. Cundiff
I much enjoyed your musings with history professor friend while in Rome. But ,,, I'm surprised by the endorsement of Augustine. I believe that the City of God is at the root of the Puritanism that is driving the neo-con rush for Empire and that was always at odds with a Jeffersonian/Paleo-con way of life.
Here's a passage from THE DECLINE OF MERRY ENGLAND by Storm Jamison (1930) : The greed and rapacity of the powerful existed long before the coming of Puritanism, but it was left to the Puritans to call them blessed. In return for the virtues of Puritanism, we have lost our most precious gifts. The exchange of the oligarchy of trade for an absolute King and an authoritative Church may have increased our possessions; it has certainly impoverished our souls. Wherever the commercial and utilitarian standard is set, something of that nation's life vanishes. In every country, where there has come to the people the single concentration upon the aquisition of wealth, there has inevitably followed the destruction of what makes for happiness. It is seen in eighteenth century England. It is reflected in Germany with the foundation of the Empire and the apotheosis of Bismarch and realpolitik. It is being repeated today in southern Italy, once the land of song as England was four centuries back, and where now no voice is raised. It is repeated in Russia, that fantastic Kakotopia of materialism. It aridifies the human spirit in every nation where willing and unquestioning homage to "the bitch goddess, success" is encouraged. The Puritan, the Junker, the Fascist and the Bolshevik have each made a virtue of efficiency and gone no further. They have conjured up a Robot state and would like to make a Robot world.
"Now, I don’t want a single new ‘young professional’ to move down here from Cleveland or New York, but why don’t some of those depressed young paleos find a good home and trust it? If there’s ever been a way for them to find a happy life, it’s in amalgamation into Dixie. And, believe me, a high concentration of paleos in any one thing, anywhere, is always a good idea."
The only thing is that paleoconservatism, inasfar as it accepts cultural differences as necessary and good, may make that an unviable option for many a northerner. Much as I appreciate the degree to which the South has retained its character and culture, I simply could never amalgamate happily into it, and I am not alone. It is a way of life that is alien to us. It is the same reason why we could not seek refuge from modern evils by relocating to Latin America. Of course, that is a far more dramatic example, but hopefully the point ought to be clear.
And perhaps sometimes exile is the wisest choice. Tradition is a problematic word precisely for its fluidity: a "conservative" is not necessarily a "Southerner-at-heart." But I'm sure there are plenty of northern-born Americans who have a taste and a temperament for Dixie or for Spanish America and they may well be happy relocating there. For some of us, the British Isles or Northern Europe may be more palatable refuges. And for those who have the stomach, staying put and fighting is always an option.
I just prefer cold weather, I suppose.
re #47.
Tom, once in my life I seriously pursued what my hero Mencken called "High and Ghostly Matters". I'm a bit rusty. But let me try.
I'd like to defend St. Augustine. I make concessions first:
True, he is often a windbag. True, in _De Trinitate_ he couldn't get a procession of the Holy Spirit, however excellent this work otherwise is; Aquinas did a better job in the _Summa Theologica's_ articles on the Trinity. True. his work on predestination and free will is hopelessly contradictory (and in this matter he's not alone). True, his reading of Livy and Virgil in The City of God is a little too negative. True, largely because of a botched Latin translation of Romans 5:12-15, he made his worst mistake: the wrong doctrine of "inherited original sin" (the Eastern Church, knowing the Greek, has a better view of original sin, and this text in Romans is probably garbled anyway). Had he a better translation, Augustine would never have advanced the inherited view, and St. Jerome tried to point this out to him.
I have already mentioned that his own personal struggle against concupiscence darked his view of humans; again the sunny reasoning of Aquinas is the better approach. In fact, if #40 is correct, our own time is much more bordering not on psychological baggage but on shear madness. In passing ,let me tell you the humorous story that our old Jesuit teacher in the class on grace told us. He went to lecture in Berkley given by a theologian every worse than Luther or Calvin or Jimmy Swaggart: Rosemary Reuther. Her title (and apologize for the vulgarity, but my teacher insisted it was true): "St. Augustine's Sexual Organ [she used a different word]: The Origin of Western Misogyny". My teacher told me that the room was filled to the rafters, and he supposed that so many people were there because they didn't know what misogyny meant and wanted to learn!
That said, St. Augustine remains for me the supreme Western Father. The Saint's polemic against Pelagianism was addressing the problem at hand. Had he to deal with Luther and Calvin, he most certainly would anathemized them as well. For Luther (at first an Augustinian monk) and Calvin went to the opposite extreme from Pelagianism: total depravity. St. Augustine would most certainly (and did) reject sola scriptura, sola gratia, and sola fides. He would have strong rejected Luther's Imputed Grace and every point of Calvin's T.U.L.I.P (these stated in the canons of the Synod of Dordrecht). Indeed the Arminian and Weslian doctrines of Prevenient Grace are taken right from Augustine. Indeed Arminius and Wesley come very close to the teaching of the 6th Session of the Council of Trent.
In short, Luther and Calvin took what they wanted from Augustine, and what they took they distorted.
Now as for your point about Puritanism, aside from my objections to its supposed Augustianism, I am in complete agreement. Puritanism infected New England from the start, and from there the contagon spread. Lincoln, Sherman, Grant, Woodrow the Worst, The Great Satan (FDR), and Cultural Marxists like Eric Foner were and are in spirit if not in culture Puritan witch hunters and sadists who like to make the sinner sweat -- and make another people's sons die for their puritanical wars. We in Dixie know this quite well.
Thanks for your contribution!
Mr. Moses et al:
What's practical or seemingly comfortable is none of my business, but third world America begins when exiting Dixie and some parts of Texas. Just think of all of the ethnicities I'll never see because I don't live to L.A. or Rockford (Puritans included).
All the while, yes, it is Southerners who live day in and day out with a drastically broader and pervasive presence of the past. Shared memory, as Mel Bradford pointed out, is an essentially paleoconservative apex. In the South, there is a shared memory of everything. Hell, the past isn't even past yet. And I'm not talking about the Civil War. Just think of the gossiping in Steel Magnolias.
What all this amounts to is an American cultural identity, something absent among the Yanks, who care nothing about each other, much less a shared past. And, no, Mexicans are not a refuge for western civilization, and definitely not an apex.