Unsolved Mysteries
I have always been amazed at the sub-intellectual process by which liberals all know at almost the same time and in the same form what they are supposed to think. It is amazing. Of course, it has nothing to do with ideas or learning—it has to do entirely with attitude, fashion, and presenting oneself as belonging to the rare company of those who are truly wise and good. Fashions in dress move fast but never as fast as liberal attitudes, which seem to be communicated globally almost iunstantaneously. I will swear that almost the same day, certainly within the same week, my one-time professorial colleagues stopped saying “African-American” and began saying “People of Color.” How do they do it? I suppose if one is an elite person surrounded by stupid peasants, one has to be up-to-date on the signs of one's superiority.
Once I was present at a talk by a venerable and quite celebrated historian, who made a few remarks about the undesirable changes being made in our country by the flood of immigrants. It was not two minutes into the talk before the assembled professors, including those on the platform behind the speaker, began to murmur disapproval, which grew until the speaker had to stop. This was a not particularly radical group. Of course, few of them knew enough about their supposed field of study to recognise the scholarly stature of the speaker since it was not recent and fashionable.
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I frequently get phone calls, sometimes live and sometimes canned, tempting me into a dialogue that leads to buying some candidate or other dubious product. Why do these people who want South Carolinians to vote for them hire phone solicitors who speak in a rapid, almost unintelligible Valley speak, sometimes prissy sounding males? Or even worse, Hindoo singsong? I am surely not the only person who is immediately repulsed.
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How do politicians, judges, corporate moguls, media talking heads, generals, and college presidents manage to be completely free of any sense of shame? Surely some of them had mothers who taught them that lying, stealing, perversion, and dirty tricks on other people were not good.
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It was recently stated in my favourite journal that official Catholic charities receive three-fourths of their funds, a billion dollars per year, from the U.S. government. When and where did this kind of thing become routine? (Probably under that great statesman Bush Minor.) In a regime in which a little prayer in a schoolroom or at a ballgame is a violation of church/state separation? I venture that the very same people support both the government's absorption of the church and the government's suppression of Christianity.
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Every time an election nears, the Republicans begin to blast "Democratic policies" like big spending, affirmative action, abortion, open borders, needless wars, bad judges, etc—all policies fostered in some way or other by Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and the two Bushes. Bush's wars and Bush's budgetary disaster are already being treated as if Obama caused them. Why does the Republican ploy always seem to work? It is a mystery. The answer, centering on the intellectual inferiority and moral immaturity of the Republican voter, is almost too horrible to contemplate.
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Why have Americans of the last several generations lost all ability to recognise age-old truths? Like the richer the government, the poorer the people? In this case, I think it has something to do with the fact that people of hereditary wealth now make the decisions about government spending, and they like to be generous—with other people's money. They have no idea that acting an unwilling Lord Bountiful to the taxpayer may actually be a sacrifice for most people.
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Why was a presidential wannabe recently attacked for saying that the black family is less sound today than it was under slavery, a demonstrably true statement, and praised for saying that the Founding Fathers "worked tirelessly" to end slavery, a demonstrably false statement? What does this tell us about the state of public discourse in the U.S.?
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Why do European elites seem to be just as enthusiastic for limitless immigration, affirmative action, and multiculturalism as American elites? When the Europeans, unlike the American rulers, actually have a civilisation to keep?
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Why do the very same people who get in a moral dudgeon over Thomas Jefferson’s presumed sex life wink indulgently at Jack Kennedy’s and Bill Clinton’s satyriasis?
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How many books has George W. Bush read since leaving the White House? OK, let’s be fair. How many pages has George W. Bush read since he left the White House?
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If Obama had been at the Constitutional Convention, what State would he have represented?
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The GOP has managed since the time of Lincoln to wrap itself around the flag of the US despite taking positions that are not only immoral and unconstitutional but also treasonous. A recent case in point is globalization and the elder Bush's proclamation of a NWO. What has been the result over the last 20 years? Tens of millions of jobs shipped to a communist and atheistic state, a state that is horrendous with regards to human rights and dignity, and the emergence of a genuine threat to national security accomplished with our nation's wealth transfer. Benedict Arnold was willing to give the keys to West Point to the British but the GOP has been more than willing to transfer wealth and jobs to an avowed enemy of the USA. The Dems are not much better but are more concerned about stirring up class warfare as their #1 issue and thinking of how to accelerate affirmative action into every sphere of American life. You will never hear Sean Hannity talk about his beloved party in this way but one of the major issues of the next election will be abortion.....once again.....and all the simplistic will pull the GOP lever never realizing that they are signing their own death warrant.
I have come to the conclusion (not a very optimistic one and probably not very original) that our political system (if you could even call it that) has long since degenerated into simple demagoguery. A political party pushes buttons till they push one that gets a response. They then milk it for all that they can get out of it. Of course, the issue itself is of no real importance to them, because the real issue, the one that remains always hidden, is nothing more than money and power. Perhaps no better example could be found than the slavery issue - an issue that was never for a moment about anything other than money and power. This issue, however, has proved a political gold mine. Today, 150 years after the institution’s extinction, the demagogues are still wringing power and money out of it.
Dr. Wilson,
Your reflection this morning reminded me of a poem. This time of year in the current culture there are not many like yourself left to sing. So many of the voices you have heard and loved have passed away and in their passing remind of us of more questions than even your excellent prose can describe.
The Oven Bird
THERE is a singer everyone has heard,
Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,
Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.
He says that leaves are old and that for flowers
Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten. 5
He says the early petal-fall is past
When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers
On sunny days a moment overcast;
And comes that other fall we name the fall.
He says the highway dust is over all. 10
The bird would cease and be as other birds
But that he knows in singing not to sing.
The question that he frames in all but words
Is what to make of a diminished thing.
Mr Pjmulvey,
On occassion I have heard Dr. Wilson suggest the death of the GOP as the only viable way out of the current predicament. However, the two parties have been grafted for so long, to the plutocracy,(as the current debt debacle illustrates beyond question) that one can no longer remove the cancer without killing the patient. That is to say, the duopoly has been so inbred for so long it is simply too big to fail and too stupid to know better.
What I continue to hear from friends is that, though all of this talk of both parties being culpable may be true, we'd be worse off with Democrats. To them it seems that all that is available is eternally bad compromises within this corrupt system. They are wedded to the paradigm of E Pluribus Unum, anything else being shear folly. What will it take for these folks to have their blinders removed?
How about open revolt and exile, Mr. Smith? At least the Democrats will provoke it right away. Republicans seem to think that in dragging out the impending economic default they are somehow doing the country a favor.
Mr. Nicholas:
I confess I've thought it would be far better in the long run to allow the country to go entirely left, even to the point of pulling the lever for an Obama and the rest of the execrable, blatant leftists on the ballot. After all, if you've gotta take your medicine, it's best to just go ahead and get it over with so you can get through to the other side.
Still, while I'll never settle for "the lesser of two evils" Republican again, voting for an Obama would be awfully hard!
Secession anyone?
Oh, no, I didn't say vote Obama. Let's not get carried away! We don't have the right to commit murder, even if we are certain the victim will die 10 seconds later anyway. I mean, just let it happen by not voting and refusing to play the "lesser of two evils" game.
(By the way, "Nicholas" is my first name [in France the last name is sometimes written first but is always in caps just to be sure].)
As an expat without much of a home state (is it Arizona, Florida or New York??) I must say that while I can understand secessionist sentiment I would hope they wouldn't leave the rest of us behind. But seeing as how I've chosen emigration I guess I shouldn't presume to have much of a say in the matter.
I do think default and catastrophe are imminent, one way or another, and that hard, usable goods and ammunition are more than decent investments.
I have always been amazed at the sub-intellectual process by which liberals all know at almost the same time and in the same form what they are supposed to think.
Mr. Joe Sobran identified such people as being members of "The Hive."
oops. I forgot to include as link to what "The Hive" is;
http://www.sobran.com/hive/index.shtml
"Why was a presidential wannabe recently attacked for saying that the black family is less sound today than it was under slavery, a demonstrably true statement, and praised for saying that the Founding Fathers “worked tirelessly” to end slavery, a demonstrably false statement? What does this tell us about the state of public discourse in the U.S.?"
I don't know, but I did learn from Obama that Thomas Jefferson was the first president to celebrate Ramadan in the White House.
Vermont Crank, thanks for the link. I read all the columns there.
I am unsure about Mr. Sobran's proposal that people who want to usurp the Constitution (radical socialists and communists) have the same agenda as people who want to make a dubious interpretation of the Constitution (progressive Democrats and progressive Republicans).
It is plausible, and yet, because we can not read minds, we can never be truly sure that deep inside, say, Earl Warren's brain were the same thoughts and goals that were there inside, say, Alger Hiss' brain. And where we can never be truly sure - the discussion ends prematurely right there.
At face value, the socialist is a socialist, and an activist Supreme Court judge is just a mere activist Supreme Court judge. Bold evidence is needed before we can say the two are the same.
Dear Dr. Wilson.. The July/August "Culture Wars," quotes you - favorably of course.
In "Life under the Potomacracy," (p 45) we read; "Southern historian Clyde Wilson put it well when he wrote that Lincoln's metamorphosis from CEO to Caesar required the establishment of American history as salvation drama
Amen to that, Dr.
Dr. Wilson,
Your words:
"The answer, centering on the intellectual inferiority and moral immaturity of the Republican voter, is almost too horrible to contemplate."
I struggle with my own kith and kin and fellow parishioners even now as they advocate and contemplate "voting Republican," as if the "vote" in a Hobbesian state gives a person effective "ownership" of the government as in the mantra "the people are the government" and as if the Republican Party has ever been the friend of the South or the Christian faith. The Party of Lincoln has not changed. At its core were and remain the bankers, the stock jobbers, and the paper aristocracy. Coverning its flanks in the 1860's were the abolitionists (anti-Southerners) in New England and the Free Soilers (anti-African) in the emerging western territories, with, of course, a mixture of Centeral European, predominately German, nationalists and internationalists. Today, the literal, intellectual and fiscal descendants of the original bankers, stock jobbers and paper aristocracy still control the party and cover their flanks with their enemies: Southerners and Christians. We Southerners and Christians are fools, for even as our enemy, the GOP, panders for our vote with "social conservativism," they, along with their fellow elites in the Democratic Party, airbrush our traditions, customs and habits, that which makes us "us" from history and from participation in political life. Yet, we willing support with our Southern and Christian blood and treasure the imperial wars which they unleash.
I must contemplate in my kith and kin and fellow parishioners this horror almost every day.
Shoot, I am totally contemplating not voting at all in 2012. I might, but I am going to vote 3rd party just to say NO to the bums we are stuck voting for? Better yet, maybe I can emigrate out ofthe US, but I have to pick a natioin and fast!!!!!!
Robert, I don't think you have to emigrate. Why shut the door behind you, when you can always leave it open?
In your shoes, I'd probably provision to stay in a village in France or Guatemuala or any other part of the world for a month, in case the local environment gets on my nerves, and then return. Or probably work very hard for a while, earn a paid sabbatical from the boss for a year, and spend that year residing elsewhere - living and working like the locals there.
I am not sure, but emigration sounds like too much of a hassle.
Dr. Wilson makes a good point about Catholic Charities. It is consistent with Pope John Paul II's warnings about the dangers of the "Social Assistance State," the welfare system that proliferates upon the ruins of subsidiarity. By "intervening directly" and robbing "society of its responsibility," the pope warns in a 1991 encyclical, the Social Assistance State "leads to a loss of human energies" and multiplies public agencies that treat people like numbers and squander money to no good end.
Some traditionalist Catholics say this all started when the Father of lies took John Kennedy to Houston to request a denial of God before becoming leader of the Free World. I don't believe it. It is of course as painful for practicing Catholics to watch this sort of groveling as it must be for Dr. Wilson to listen to poor old Lindsey Grahme talk like a Yankee dandy with Southern accent. There are exceptions of course like the Tulsa Diocese that doesn't take a dime in fear of failing the current tests of charity.
Such as this one that was given to a New York priest:
The clinic supervisor of Catholic Charities tested him on three hypothetical counselling situations: a depressed pregnant woman who wants to abort her child, two homosexuals seeking advice on their relationship, and a divorcing couple asking for counselling. In keeping with Catholic teachings, the priest advised against the abortion, refused to endorse homosexual unions, and encouraged the divorcing couple to save their marriage. He failed the test. His supervisor explained: "We get government funds, so we are not Catholic."