Is America Coming Apart?
Flying home from London, where the subject of formal debate on the 70th anniversary of World War II had been whether Winston Churchill was a liability or asset to the Free World, one arrives in the middle of a far more acrimonious national debate right here in the United States.
At issue: Should Barack Obama be allowed to address tens of millions of American children, inside their classrooms, during school hours?
Conservative talk-show hosts saw a White House scheme to turn public schools into indoctrination centers where the socialist ideology of Obama would be spoon-fed to captive audiences of children forced to listen to Big Brother—and then do assignments on his sermon.
The liberal commentariat raged about right-wing paranoia.
Yet Byron York of The Washington Examiner dug back to 1991 to discover that, when George H.W. Bush went to Alice Deal Junior High to speak to America's school kids, the left lost it.
"The White House turned a Northwest Washington junior high classroom into a television studio and its students into props," railed The Washington Post. Education Secretary Lamar Alexander was called before a House committee. The National Education Association denounced Bush. And Congress ordered the General Accounting Office to investigate.
Obama's actual speech proved about as controversial as a Nancy Reagan appeal to eighth-graders to "Just say no!" to drugs.
Yet, the episode reveals the poisoned character of our politics.
We saw it earlier on display in August, when the crowds that came out for town hall meetings to oppose Obama's health care plans were called "thugs," "fascists," "racists" and "evil-mongers" by national Democrats.
We see it as Rep. Joe Wilson shouts, "You lie!" at the president during his address to a joint session of Congress.
We seem not only to disagree with each other more than ever, but to have come almost to detest one another. Politically, culturally, racially, we seem ever ready to go for each others' throats.
One half of America sees abortion as the annual slaughter of a million unborn. The other half regards the right-to-life movement as tyrannical and sexist.
Proponents of gay marriage see its adversaries as homophobic bigots. Opponents see its champions as seeking to elevate unnatural and immoral relationships to the sacred state of traditional marriage.
The question invites itself. In what sense are we one nation and one people anymore? For what is a nation if not a people of a common ancestry, faith, culture and language, who worship the same God, revere the same heroes, cherish the same history, celebrate the same holidays, and share the same music, poetry, art and literature?
Yet, today, Mexican-Americans celebrate Cinco de Mayo, a skirmish in a French-Mexican war about which most Americans know nothing, which took place the same year as two of the bloodiest battles of our own Civil War: Antietam and Fredericksburg.
Christmas and Easter, the great holidays of Christendom, once united Americans in joy. Now we fight over whether they should even be mentioned, let alone celebrated, in our public schools.
Where we used to have classical, pop, country & Western and jazz music, now we have varieties tailored to specific generations, races and ethnic groups. Even our music seems designed to subdivide us.
One part of America loves her history, another reviles it as racist, imperialist and genocidal. Old heroes like Columbus, Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee are replaced by Dr. King and Cesar Chavez.
But the old holidays, heroes and icons endure, as the new have yet to put down roots in a recalcitrant Middle America.
We are not only more divided than ever on politics, faith and morality, but along the lines of class and ethnicity. Those who opposed Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court and stood by Sgt. Crowley in the face-off with Harvard's Henry Louis Gates were called racists. But this time they did not back down. They threw the same vile word right back in the face of their accusers, and Barack Obama.
Consider but a few issues on which Americans have lately been bitterly divided: school prayer, the Ten Commandments, evolution, the death penalty, abortion, homosexuality, assisted suicide, affirmative action, busing, the Confederate battle flag, the Duke rape case, Terri Schiavo, Iraq, amnesty, torture.
Now it is death panels, global warming, "birthers" and socialism. If a married couple disagreed as broadly and deeply as Americans do on such basic issues, they would have divorced and gone their separate ways long ago. What is it that still holds us together?
The European-Christian core of the country that once defined us is shrinking, as Christianity fades, the birth rate falls and Third World immigration surges. Globalism dissolves the economic bonds, while the cacophony of multiculturalism displaces the old American culture.
"E pluribus unum"—out of many, one—was the national motto the men of '76 settled upon. One sees the pluribus. But where is the unum? One sees the diversity. But where is the unity?
Is America, too, breaking up?
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I would say not breaking up, although I agree with all of Pat's points, but in a rapid cultural and civilization decline. The new post-Christian civilization glories in violence, death, ugliness and ignorance. Instead of a civilization in conflict it is the transformation and changing of Western civilization to something new - neo-paganistic, global (non-western) and anti-Christian. There are those of us like Pat Buchanan fighting a rear guard action against the incoming tide in this country although I imagine that Pat has seen the immediate future for the USA in the UK and Europe. Hopeless? No yet but we are only a generation away from losing any memory of a decent and honorable civilization and way of life.
We are not one people any longer. America is two violently different countries which have mutual contempt for each other. One is reminded of the America of 1860 when the North and the South hated each other with such bloody passion. The cultural chasm that exists in America today also resembles to a degree the divide in late Weimar Germany with its bands of Communists and Nazis at each others' throats. The one difference between today and 1860 America is that modern capitalism has provided the technology and well-paid police and soldiery to quell the smoldering divide, keeping the two Americas from bloodshed and violence. Unlike 1860, the power of the modern state leaves the citizenry impotent. Instead, the two sides are left to volly insults back and forth much like a political tennis match. Think of vehicles like talk radio, the Daily Kos and The McLaughlin Group as the modern American manner of letting off political steam.
The best possible outcome would be for the U.S. to break apart literally. The country is too large for republican government to work when the average House district is over 600,000 constituents. Big business is bad, big government is bad, and big countries are bad.
In a perfect world, nations the size of Luxembourg, Vermont, Wales, Brittany, Tuscany and Maryland' Eastern Shore would be the norm, Mr. Stanton. Sadly, the world is manifestly imperfect and getting worse.
The centre cannot hold. We will break apart, though perhaps more violently than the Soviet Union did. No one believes in the ideology that tries to legitimate the establishment and the current order, not even the proponents of it, with the exception of the true fanatics. Those fanatics are so out of touch with reality that they will not be able to deal with the coming shake up any better than the Communists in Russia could. The fact that they propose socialised medicine right now, as the oeconomy sinks, is proof of this.
The regime is becoming impotent, and we will most likely outlive it.
"The regime is becoming impotent, and we will most likely outlive it."
We live in hope, Mr. Wilson.
"Conservative talk-show hosts saw a White House scheme to turn public schools into indoctrination centers where the socialist ideology of Obama would be spoon-fed to captive audiences of children forced to listen to Big Brother"
Like what? Conservative talk show hosts had only just picked up that Totally Illegitimate Government Schools were catechizing the youth of America and turning them into little socialists? Perhaps we need smarter talk-show hosts. This "socialization" has been known about for over 30 years, and is the number two reason why parents who can do so are home-schooling their children. The number one reason home-schooling is the fastest growing trend in the land is that schools will never guarantee the physical safety of their charges.
@ 4 Mr Leaberry
The nations or regions you mentioned are indeed small and somewhat homogeneous. But so are Rwanda, Burundi, Guines Bissau and Sao Tome, and nobody is rushing to live in any of those small countries.
Mr. Leaberry @ 2,
Good points. However, I suspect once hyper-inflation strikes, and only the ignorant or naive would argue it won't to some degree, and unemployment hits 25 % the idol complainers may grow somewhat more active (and violent). If history may draw any conclusion on human behavior it is this: we all have a breaking point.
I do not understand how anyone can look forward to the disintegration of the United States. When Buchanan was born in 1938, Americans did not want to be anything other than Americans, despite the dismal state of the economy. America then was characterized by a strong and cohesive sense of national identity. The fact that leftist policies have succeeded in eroding that strong and cohesive is hardly a cause for celebration.
Tom,
We should look forward to it because then at least we will be free of a tyrannical government, like our ancestors were in 1781. The country has been destroyed - and it was we WASPs who let it happen, no doubt - but the damage has been done, and we Americans who are faithful to the U.S. Constitution and to the principles of freedom and liberty adhered to by the Founding Fathers should cut our losses and move on. There are those I just described, like ourselves. We ARE Americans, Mr. Piatak. Then there is the coalition of Satan - radicalized Spanish-speaking mestizos from the land to our south, radicalized black Americans who have forever declared themselves at odds with or even at war with whites (their one-time countrymen), complete with the brains behind the operation, that is, white Marxists, the very intellectual heirs of the comrade himself, some of them knowingly, some not. They are NOT Americans. They crept like the Serpent through the Garden of Eden into our government, media, schools, and entertainment industry, and now they have control, Tom. The situation is irreversible. The only solution is a war of independence. Let the people who are real Americans take up their weapons and secede from their current masters. We can congregate in the middle of the country, while the servants of the revolution to destroy the West will have their usual headquarters in the Northeast and on the Pacific coast. Let them use bombs and tanks and guns against us if they want to destroy us, rather than their precious media and schools and positions of power in the corrupt and evil central government in D.C.
But you go ahead and try to reforge a new "national identity" with them. That should go well.
Why should anyone look forward to the disintegration of the US? I live not in a small town but in a medium sized city (Corpus Christi - population about 300,000). If I have a problem with local government, I can personally meet with someone in a position to solve that problem. While not all of my gripes have been 100% satisfied, some of them have and on the remainder, I have received at least some concessions. When I have a gripe at the national level, I get a canned response from some college age intern or a form letter at best - more often no response at all and certainly no satisfaction. And the national government works relentlessly against my interests and values while taking most of my tax money. The US has become a bloated monstrosity, a global evil empire. It's long overdue for some downsizing.
Why we should look forward to the disentigration of the United States:
1: There was a time, during the early 20th century, when Southerners could be loyal to the U.S., but that time is gone. The United States is an occupying force in the South, an invasive, foreign government. That's the 'neo-confederate' reason, and it is valid.
2: The national cohesion that existed in the early 20th century was the result of war and conquest of the South and the use of government 'schools' to shape and mould (brainwash) young Southerners into being 'Americans'. Therefore it was a false cohesion.
3: The same could be said of the catholic immigrants of the northeast, who had an 'American' identity imposed on them instead of it being allowed to develop naturally, while national cohesiveness was at the same time being eroded by the sheer numbers of immigrants. Therefore this 'cohesion' was also false, even though the immigrants generally were patriotic. That was way back then, when the immigrants were white, Christian, and European, therefore compatible with the natives.
4: Third world colonisation of the land, cultural Marxism, northern colonisation and cultural genocide against Dixie, the destruction of Midwestern farms and Pennsylvania steel towns by big business double dealing, NAFTA, GATT, gay pride parades, Roe vs Wade, Obama, gun control, Afghanisan, Iraq, income taxes, corruption of your children, the evil of corporate pop-'culture', ad infinitum......
What is there to miss? The standard of living that is disappearing anyway?
I recently watched a You Tube video about East Germany. It showed many of the nostalgic things about a 'nation' that is no more, and at the end, it said, 'the DDR: I dont miss it'.
Allen,
Y'ain't just whistlin' Dixie. Mostly because doing so is a hate crime, or at least will be soon (ha ha).
The notion that something better would rise from the ruins of the United States is wishful thinking. Most likely, we would see not only an utterly ruined economy--the likely precipitant of any national dissolution--but bloody, internecine strife and the annexation of much of the Southwest by Mexico. A second Confederacy is also quite unlikely--substantial numbers of people now living in the South feel no affection at all for the Confederacy, and their numbers are growing. Of course, we should continue to resist the destructive leftist policies that have so harmed our country, but that is altogether different from looking forward to the disappearance of our country.
I can't speak of the Southern experience, because I am not a Southerner. (Though I will note that Sam Francis, a Southerner, argued forcefully against any attempt to revive Southern secessionism). But I can talk about Catholic immigrants. My paternal grandparents, who were born to Ellis Island immigrants, did not have an American identity "imposed on them." They were not educated in public schools, but in parochial schools established, run, and attended, in whole or in part, by members of their own ethnic groups. My grandparents were extremely proud to be Americans, and made the conscious decision not to pass along their parents' languages to their own children. Since I have lived my life surrounded by people whose own grandparents or great-grandparents came through Ellis Island, I can attest that my grandparents' attitude was typical. And I do not believe that they were wrong to think the way they did.
"where is the unum?"
I guess it's at Walmart, Home Depot, and Applebee's.
Tom,
I am a Caucasian southern Catholic heterosexual male traditionalist married to my first wife. We homeschool our children.
I am the most despised minority on earth. I see no future for what we call these united states. The concept of the sovereign state is long past and only a fool thinks we're united. We live an illusion.
"The notion that something better would rise from the ruins of the United States is wishful thinking."
Mr. Piatak, that's just your own opinion, not a statement of fact. My view is that pining after what some people imagine once was, such as the unity and cohesion of a national identity, is wishful thinking.
I hold no such nostalgic view of a common national identity because I never saw any evidence of it. As far back as I can remember, Americans have exhibited marked regional differences as well as ethnic cultural differences. From what I can tell, this unified American character is the illusion created by carefully edited history texts used in public schools and promoted by the entertainment media.
None of us can predict what will come of a breakup of the leviathan federal government, but it's pretty likely that those generations living today will see all or part of the breakup and the subsequent reordering that wil follow.
I certainly would not want a war of secession or independence. No sane person wants war in their own backyard. Our imperial rulers command forces more powerful than any in the history of the world and have a long record of crushing independence minded people both at home and abroad. And yet . . . No one thought the Soviet Communists would permit the disintegration of their empire, but it happened with remarkably little violence for such a great geopolitical change. We can act as independently as possible given the restrictions placed upon us and get people used to at least considering the idea of secession - and not just secession along the lines of the old north/south divide. And pray for a miracle; sometimes they happen.
I think, at least, that we should not *look forward* to dissolution. And doesn't dissolution seem less likely, far less attainable, than a return to a looser sort of federalism? I think in every way it would be easier to attain and certainly easier to sell. To tell Americans that there is no reason Massachusetts cannot have its socialist paradise while at the same time South Carolina has a Dixiecrat republic and Montana a libertarian one. The Republic is too large for effective federal government, but it is NOT too large for effective republican gov't based on the concept of subsidiarity. Wouldn't returning to the states their constitutional measure of autonomy solve the size problem? And wouldn't that be far easier to accomplish than somehow waging - and *winning* - a struggle for secession against the mightiest military in history?
I've just returned from Vermont by the way, which has a secession movement I'm sure you've heard about, so I've been thinking about the subject. What beautiful country Vermont is - lush and green, white-church steeples marking the commons of pretty towns nestled between its friendly and modest mountains. A place of town hall meetings, Socialist congressmen, libertarian individualists, small town patriots, principled localists and peaceful secessionists. If ever it did succeed in seceding I for one would be happy to emigrate there.
S.L Toddard, the mightiest military in history is currently getting whipped by a rag tag bunch of guerillas in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Higdon,
Granted that a war of bombs, guns, and bloodshed for the purpose of independence from the Yankee empire is NOT something to truly yearn for. But surely you look forward to the chance for independence, do you not? After all, how long does the empire truly have left? Numbers do mean something, even for the most powerful and corrupt and wicked empire in history. Numbers such as $10 trillion in debt to the rest of the world. Those numbers are unsustainable.
"S.L Toddard, the mightiest military in history is currently getting whipped by a rag tag bunch of guerillas in Iraq and Afghanistan."
I know, and I use that example myself when arguing for the importance of the 2nd Amendment. The difference is that the Afghanis cannot defeat America, they can only outlast America, and then America goes home.
Secessionists *in* America cannot outlast America, I think. That being said, I do not say that it is impossible, only that effecting political change would be easier than militarily winning independence.
I think folks like Tom Piatak, whos opinion I respect, nevertheless probably have a different idea of what 'America' is than those of us whos families have been here since 1775 (or before). The period of 'unity', as one poster above stated, was a post-civil war fad that sought to destroy local loyalties that were the most common in colonial times. Instead we all 'pledged allegiance' to a powerful central government, usually hostile to regular Americans' interests.
While I agree 'looking forward' to a possible civil war is no better than the neocon pre-emptive war doctrine, I dont think several states going their separate ways is something to fear.
"The period of ‘unity’, as one poster above stated, was a post-civil war fad that sought to destroy local loyalties that were the most common in colonial times. Instead we all ‘pledged allegiance’ to a powerful central government, usually hostile to regular Americans’ interests."
No doubt Southern Anti-Federalists, and their later incarnations during the Jacksonian era in such forms as John Calhoun, saw such a thing coming. I like to think they were some of the wisest men who ever lived.
I for one never said that I looked forward to a war. Even so, society is degenerating to the point that there seems to me to be no hope of regeneration. I think S.L. Toddard is right in that federalism is both possible for a country this size and preferable to war, yet with the rot in society, I dont see it coming, and I dont think the feds would ever allow it. Rather, I think that if push came to shove, the regime would destroy itself rather than give up power to federalist decentralisation. I now see dissolution as inevitable because, like the Eastern block, we have reached a stage where the system both cannot be fixed or decentralised and is unsustainable.
Oeconomic collapse is now inevitable, so there's no point in pointing out that a secessionist war would cause such a collapse. Nor is there any need to say that collapse would lead to Mexican annexation, since that's already practically accomplished, with the full collusion of the current regime.
Can anyone deny that modern Russia is better than the U.S.S.R.? That modern eastern Germany is better than the DDR? Like those two entities, the U.S. is not and never has been more than a political construct, and such things never last forever. Why wouldn't something better come out of the collapse of the empire that has brought all this upon us? Oeconomic collapse will lead to secession, federalism, or combinations of them. That now seems to be inevitable. We may as well accept it, or we'll one day be as irrelevant as Russian Communists posting You-tube videos about the glories of the Soviet Union.
I believe that the Capitalist-Socialist West is about to follow much the same path to collapse and re-organisation as did the Communist East, and there's nothing we can do about it. I dont look forward to that, but I do indeed look forward to being free of the empire at long last. We'll have to deal with the problems, which will surely come, as they arise.
I'm in agreement with Mr. Wilson on the likely course of events. As I may have mentioned before, I said to my kids (then teenagers) when the Soviet Union collapsed, "Some day this will happen to the United States - probably not in my lifetime, but almost certainly in yours." Depending on how much longer I live (I'm now 66), I think it might even happen in my lifetime.
"To tell Americans that there is no reason Massachusetts cannot have its socialist paradise while at the same time South Carolina has a Dixiecrat republic and Montana a libertarian one. The Republic is too large for effective federal government, but it is NOT too large for effective republican gov’t based on the concept of subsidiarity. Wouldn’t returning to the states their constitutional measure of autonomy solve the size problem?"
I think so. I do not have the solid grasp of history that so many here do, but it seems that we have more in contrast with the USSR than in common. At the very least, our people are not quite as dead spiritually, and we are richer in land and resources. I think some of this was covered in a recent issue of Chronicles. We can and should learn some lessons, sure.
"Subsidiarity" is still a concept I'm trying to learn. Until I feel like I could explain it to someone else, I don't think I know it.
Talk of dissolution seems odd to me both in apparent desire and likelihood, but maybe I'm misunderstanding how that's being used. If the system at the top completely falls apart, as in our currency becomes worth even less and we start defaulting on national debt payments, we would not unfold neatly into some republic or family of separate states, we would be attacked by the Chinese. They hold what, over $1 trillion of our debt plus have a population imbalance of 20-30 million surplus men in their late 20's?
But this is all speculation guided by shortcut thinking. The real hard work is in getting politcians into office who are honest and who are driven to trim the hedges of the federal government. Plenty of Americans will unify around that.
"But this is all speculation guided by shortcut thinking. The real hard work is in getting politcians into office who are honest and who are driven to trim the hedges of the federal government. Plenty of Americans will unify around that."
The plan of getting better politicians into office is something that plenty of Americans have been deluded into wasting their energy on for the past 100+ years. If that was a sound plan, it would have produced some result by now, don't you think?
Unity is a vastly overrated concept. It goes under other names as well: group think and collectivism. Collectivism always fails when attempted by human society. We humans are individuals. Collectivism only works well for some kinds of insects. Men made in the image of God require autonomy in order to exercise the free will granted to us by our Creator.
We owe it to ourselves, to our ancestors, to our posterity, and to mankind to dismember the evil Yankee Empire. The only question is whether there is enough remnant of the instinct for self-government left among the people in the bounds of the Homeland Insecurity to accomplish it.
I had a feeling this topic would grab Clyde Wilson's interest. Dr. Wilson, what do you see as the likely outcome?
For some reason, I am reminded of these lines from Robert Frost's poem, "A Case for Jefferson:"
With him the love of country means
Blowing it all to smithereens
And having it all made over new.
Ed, I'm not sure whether we have different interpretations of individualism and collectivism, but human beings are most definitely collectivist, in the sense that we need to work together in communities to survive and prosper.
Has not individuality as a concept been fostered on us in order to minimise the chance that we might act together against the powers that be?
Mr. Maxwell @ 24:
Actually, my first ancestor to arrive in America came to Massachusetts, on the Anne, in 1623, and a great-great-great-great-great-grandfather fought in the Revolution and was the first white settler in Allegany County, New York. The Daughters of the American Revolution have a plaque on his grave. But I did not detect any discernable difference in their attitudes toward America between my grandfather with colonial ancestry and my grandfather whose parents had been born and were married in a small village in Slovakia. Certainly, neither of them wanted to see the United States come apart.
Mr Piatak @34
No offense was meant by my previous comment. My only point was that the wave of immigrants coming after the 1890s were a good percentage from Eastern Europe, where they were quite used to a strong central government being a firm foundation for their nations.
Mr Piatak,
I googled your Robert Frost quote to find out more about it. This led to a website called 'The Heritage American', which has an article called 'What a Difference a Half Century Makes'. That article sums up the problem we are both grappling with from our own angles. I'm not sure who it vindicates, you or we who disagree with you. In fact, it seems to vindicate both sides to a degree.
The question for us, in a nut shell, is whether or not it's possible or desirable to try to revive an American identity which has already vanished. I dont think it's possible now, nor desirable. If it could have been done, then it should have been done at least thirty years ago. It's a little late now, with all the changes which should never have happened. The social revolutions of the sixties were the beginning of the end, and it rapidly disappeared from that time onward.
During the eighties, many commentators would speak about the continuing disappearance of the South, which they saw as becoming more 'American' (what an insult), yet now we speak of the loss of American identity as if it's already an accomplished fact. America seems to be disappearing faster than Dixie now.
Several years ago, when large numbers of Mexicans were marching in Ft Smith, Arkansas, demanding taxpayer funded largesse, and nothing was done about that invasion of aliens marching through the streets of one of our cities as conquerors rubbing it in the face of a subject people, my non-political brother in law commented, 'this country is already finished'.
not just america, friends.
but why suffer the gnawing uncertainty when one can see the future from the comforts of your own sofa. make some popcorn and rent a dvd of mel gibson in road warrior.
@29, Mr. Roberts, I don't think anyone is advocating a sci-fi version of mindless unity, collectivism or group-think. What I am warning against is some quick "solution" to what is really a large problem that has accumulated over the years. Secession or dissolution are not only unlikely but will solve next to nothing.
No, I don't believe that the last 100+ years of national cultural and governmental existence are interchangeable. We are still a fairly young country and a solution might simply be to shrink back the cancerous growth of the government. The gains of socialism have been countered by the fallacies of individualism which has led us to this socialist-capitalist hybrid that is accelerating the demise of our nation.
If we do not fight for solutions now, then we may pass a tipping point where we become permanently disabled. The importance of acting now has increased due to these fundamental socialist/capitalist shifts in the past 50 years (2 generations) that make this time unique. Cultural cohesion will grow naturally when the federal government stops choking it to death.
re #33 by Chris:
"human beings are most definitely collectivist, in the sense that we need to work together in communities to survive and prosper."
Sir, you're describing cooperation, not collectivism. Collectivism is contrary to human nature in that it requires people to consistently subsume their own responsibility to family and self in order to promote some ephemeral concept known as "the good of all". Collectivism benefits only a very tiny elite who receive benefits far in excess of what the mass of the population is allowed.
"Has not individuality as a concept been fostered on us in order to minimise the chance that we might act together against the powers that be?"
No, sir. I don't believe that this is the case. Individuality is a characteristic of free will, in my view, and is an innate part of our human nature in God's design. If we were all driven by instinct instead of by free will, salvation would not be a gift which we may accept or reject. There would be no need for salvation, as there would be no sin and no propensity to do evil. humankind could have been designed to operate like a beehive or an ant colony, but we were not.
re # 38:
Mr. Mccabe, it isn't necessary to advocate "sci-fi version of mindless unity, collectivism or group-think." in order to suggest the use of a failed political system based upon the principles of mindless unity, collectivism and groupthink.
That condition already exists and is readily observable at every election. There's no science fiction involved in observing how the party faithful are given to mindless professions of unity. See how the "conservative" GOP hive rallied behind an outspoken socialist like McCain.
"No, I don’t believe that the last 100+ years of national cultural and governmental existence are interchangeable."
That isn't what I said. I said that the idea of getting better charlatans into office has failed to produce the result you believe it will produce. Political activism simply produces a more activist political class.
It may be time to try simply withdrawing our consent by refusing to participate in the rigged game of electoral politics. Fighting for control over a bloated and monstrous system will do nothing to make the system less bloated or monstrous.
You can't kill a snake by living in its belly.
Another insightful article by Mr.Buchanon.This country is more divided than anytime since prior to the War of Northern Aggression.With the triumph of Yankeedom and the Banks,that is the start of the "American empire".The Tension between factions is palpable,as the communists(excuse me-Democrats)push their Socialist aganda on the masses regardless of their wishes.The Overarching Christian European Culture that built and united the nation is under continuous assault.We're so PC we can't even agree if there shuold be Christmas Decorations or visible 10 commandments.Diversity is wonderful in a petri dish or bag of peanuts,but when it comes to acting as glue to hold a nation together,its worthless.I feel absolutely NOTHING in common with all the 3rd world scum that try to pass themselves off as "American".
You have to feel and have some things in common with your neighbors,and larger community to be a "nation".There are MANY "americans" who when the time comes will happily shoot you stupid "koombaya" gringos in the head and rape your daughters in front before they cap you."Oh i hope it doesn't happen" i hear many whine,NEWSFLASH!ITS COMING!ITS ON ITS WAY!The chosen Monkey is creating a backlash that will fill the streets with blood,those of you who don't want to face this transition like men should just off yourselves now,and save some groid the trouble.All over the Country,Whites are being assaulted by groups,by roving gangs of blacks,and lots of Whites are already getting "the SouthAfrican treatment" here.Ever hear of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsome?.Want to know what direction this POS is Headed?Look at whats happening in South Africa.While the mainstream controlled press doesn't talk about it,THOUSANDS are raped and/or mutilated and killed.The Negroes have a special place in their dark hearts for torturing and killing Boer farmers.
If the Revolution DOESN'T happen,and free us from the tyranny of the FED now,then a slow slide into a South African Style Black Run Tyranny is inevitable here.I rejoice and look forward to the War.It is the only thing that will free the People to return to the Original View of the Founders.Lets Face it Like Men-Not Lemmings.
I do not want to see the country "blown to smithereens," but I do think it is imperative that the centralized leviathan state we ironically term the "federal government" needs to be drastically altered. Real federalism is called for. I believe there is still enough in common amongst us to keep the "unum," but it most certainly is drastically weakened from what it once was and so long as leftist ideology is in the saddle it will get worse. It may be time for the states to start thinking about reorganizing into provinces or regions to gain strength for resisting the centralization juggernaut. I recommend Donald Davidson's article on "Regionalism" in the book "Who Owns America?" Of course, as Dr. Wilson pointed out, there remains the question of whether there are enough people out there who retain enough of the concept of local self government to make it work. Or who even care.
In 'Hard Times' it is always important to remember:
"That what we need is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but
Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out
everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals on Facts:
nothing else will ever be of service to them. This is the principle on which economist bring up their own children, and this is the principle by which we were taught and on which the schools bring up our children today. Stick to Facts, sir! --the economic facts! Everything else-- politics,culture,philosophy, music,poetry, religion is subjective (except when a war is needed or desired and those 'evil people raise their ugly hand against the facts)---- stick to the hard facts and all of you (even those who don't read) can some day read again, 'Hard Times"
Mr. Piatak @34
I, like you, am from a family with one branch from Eastern Europe and another from English colonists. There may have been some mild pulling of rank involved when my mother, the descendent of colonists, would confront my father, the immigrant, with some transgression of his against the English language - she was especially pained by his "dem" and "dose" and his love of double negatives - but she never seemed to think of him as any less American than herself. As I suspect was the case with your grandparents, there was more to unite them in their mutual love for America than what might have divided them in their differing interpretations of it.
I have often wondered, however, just how American my dad felt. Put another way, how successful did he consider himself in the project of becoming an American? I'm pretty sure, given the enormity of the events and changes he lived through, that he was at least bemused, if not thoroughly bewildered, as to what, exactly, America was, and what being an American entailed.
What I wouldn't give to have seen my grandfather, the Old World patriarch, and my grandfather, the last of a long line of New England woodsmen, sit and talk! Alas, they never met, so I don't even have it as a family story. Which brings me to my aim in this post, which was to ask you to write more about your heritage, especially those grandparents, or to direct me to anything you have already written on this.
Mr. Jacobi,
Thanks for sharing your story. I don't have any interesting family stories along the lines you suggest, but I have given thought before to writing about the attitude of my Eastern European relatives toward assimiliation. With your encouragement, I may finally do that.