S P E C I A L - N O T I C E S . . .
'Nil desperandum. That is a Motto for you and me. All are not dead; and where there is a Spark of patriotick fire, we will enkindle it.'
—Samuel Adams, Letter to James Warren, 09 December 1772
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'We fight, get beat, rise, and fight again'.
—General Nathanael Greene
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'Never, ever give up on hope, never doubt, never tire, and never become discouraged. Be not afraid.'
—St. John Paul The Great
#WUHAN – On The Natives Getting Restless And On Virtue Signalling
The Natives are getting Restless.
By ‘Natives’ I mean those who are True Americans, who Instinctively Rebel at governmental Interference in their lives, not the Sheeple who have Abandoned their Duties and Responsibilities as citizens of a Constitutional Republic. The latter are happy to leave important decision-making to Elected Officials [who they may have voted for, if they could tear themselves away from their Luxuries] and Bureaucrats.
The former, for a good chunk of them, have been so Damaged by Leftist Thinking that they feel Helpless.
It is the more Vibrant of the former that are starting to rise-up against the Authoritarian measures that have been, and will continue to be, put in place by governments at all levels.
Many of the Damaged former and the Feckless latter are giving-in to Panic and Hysteria. As I described this consition in my last post, #WUHAN Wig-Out – Hysteria Pandemic:
Panic and Hysteria often do not occur suddenly.
They often build slowly, starting as faint murmurs in the Soul — in the gut — that grows louder and more Frenzied as they are fed by both outside sources and from one’s own Nature.
It’s very easy to get caught-up in them if you do not use the Right Reason in your brain to Suppress them. This type of Reason must always be employed in such situations because we Naturally possess a Flight Response, as it were, as a form of Protection. It is an Instinct that, especially in this situation, must be overcome or our Society will Degenerate…and we will become more open to the White Knight on the Leftist Horse.
However and finally, we are seeing people publically questioning the Restrictive Measures that have been taken.
One of the more Vibrant among us is Auguste Meyrat, who has written a fine piece over at American Greatness on this matter.
Some highlights…
By now, the Wuhan virus has hit home for everyone. Stores ransacked; schools closed; all large gatherings and events canceled; long-distance travel prohibited; pork-filled stimulus bills written and debated; some major cities enforcing mandatory quarantines. People everywhere now remain anxious in their homes and plan to stay there for at least another month, rationing precious toilet paper and keeping updated on the situation.
While the experts claim that little is known about the Wuhan virus, enough is known to suggest that the response has been excessive. While there is a worrying possibility that the Wuhan virus will make a sizable impact on public health (along with the possibility that it probably won’t), the hype surrounding it has already created a huge imposition on daily life and cost the global economy trillions of dollars. Everyone must “do their part” to confront the pandemic or face the wrath of their conscientious peers.
The word ‘conscientious’ should be put in quotes. You cannot be labeled with that word unless what you are is truly, actually Principled and not the acting in a Pavlovian Response to a chance to engage in Virtue Signalling. For that is what this is for many, many of your peers: a chance to be seen putting stuffed animals and candles and notes and other trinkets at a deadly crash or shooting site on a much grander scale.
Combined with Panic and Hysteria, this Vile Virtue Signalling is Pathetic and will not help the Community.
Instead: it will make you more Compliant to having the jackboot stomping your face.
Mr. Meyrat sees these present reactions as part of a long train of giving in to one’s Fears and Ignoring Right Reason:
This kind of hype and the subsequent reaction to it seems to grow worse with each year. Right before the Wuhan virus, there was President Trump’s “historic” impeachment. And before that, there was the death of General Qasem Soleimani and the possibility of World War III. And before that, in no particular order, there was the imminent climate catastrophe, Russian collusion and the Mueller report, the Amazon rainforest burning down, and periodic nuclear threats from North Korea.
People should know better by now, yet they seem to fall for the hype every time — including many conservatives. The promise of the tech age and the ubiquity of smartphones and the internet was that it would arm people with relevant information and rational courses of action. Rather, it has done the opposite — magnifying doubts and fears about everything and everyone.
In most cases, the only thing that information technology has done is cause people to become less tethered to reality. Screens now replace people’s senses, and the algorithms embedded in social media do people’s thinking for them.
As such, most people spend more time in the virtual world and less time in the real one, making them ever more vulnerable to exaggerated doomsday narratives. In particular, this retreat from reality takes a toll on a person’s memory, imagination, and common sense.
Quite.
I can feel The Fear in The Western World — a Self-Generated Fear, based on Pure Emotion, covered in a thin and crackable layer of Social Respectability.
I can also feel the drooling of those with The Totalitarian Impulse, smacking their Bile-coated lips in Anticipation.
More from AM:
This then leads to a lack of context. Everything seems new and unprecedented, and therefore unknown and scary—except that this isn’t true. Pandemics have always existed, and there are proven ways to deal with them that don’t involve shutting down the economy and putting everyone under house arrest.
There are so many people running around in an Internal Frenzy shouting ‘The sky is FALLING!’ that, if we Americans do not pull ourselves together, we will find that we’ve Lost much more than we think.
Mr. Meyrat:
…for those who claim that enduring inconveniences for the sake of saving lives is worth it, the current lockdown is not a mere inconvenience. It is a profound disruption that has already uprooted many people’s lives. Small businesses are closing; people are losing jobs or seeing their hours cut, schools everywhere are canceled for the next month; universities have let out two months early; countless employees need to work from home while watching their children; hospitals are overrun; families are rationing necessities; and churches won’t even be able to hold services for Easter. A nationwide shutdown to wait out the virus is simply not worth all of this.
As I keep saying: There is a Price To Pay for living in a Constitutional Republic. And one Price is Living At Risk to Preserve Freedom, Ordered Liberty, and Property — to Resist the Totalitarian Impulse.
The passage of Obamacare was a Savage knife to the Heart of The Republic. Will we allow The Constitution to have it’s flesh Desecrated, as well?
I know not what course others may take, but as for me:
I will not be a slave; I will either Live Free Or Die.
OUTLAW.
#WUHAN Wig-Out – Hysteria Pandemic
I highly recommend a blog post from Michael Fumento over at The New Criterion on the Sweet Hysteria and ‘morbid projections’ surrounding the Wuhan Virus.
Please read it all by clicking here [tip of the fedora to Bruce Hanify].
I will just post this one quote:
When the coronavirus epidemic ends and the public-health zealots inevitably slap themselves on the back for having prevented the nightmare scenarios they themselves cooked up, don’t buy it. This isn’t to say that thorough hand-washing several times a day and not sneezing and coughing in others’ faces won’t help: It will. But the authoritarian and economically devastating measures taken by the United States and other countries are wrecking the world economy. Any feared apocalypse would happen on their account, not the disease’s. Coronavirus has not emptied our streets; government dictates have.
I will be commenting on this in the coming days.
Panic and Hysteria often do not occur suddenly.
They often build slowly, starting as faint murmurs in the Soul — in the gut — that gros louder and more Frenzied as they are fed by both outside sources and from one’s own Nature.
It’s very easy to get caught-up in them if you do not use the Right Reason in your brain to Suppress them. This type of Reason must always be employed in such situations because we Naturally possess a Flight Response, as it were, as a form of Protection. It is an Instinct that, especially in this situation, must be overcome or our Society will Degenerate…and we will become more open to the White Knight on the Leftist Horse.
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#WUHAN – Addendum To ‘Wuhan-Corona Virus Info’ Post
As an addendum to my sticky post above on The Best Reporting And Commentary on Wuhan, let me sing the praises of once-a-week guest columnist over at SteynOnline, Laura Rosen Cohen.
Every Tuesday, she provides a large set of informative links that tell you things you may not know and steers you to top-notch and in-depth analysis on what you have read and heard.
As you would expect from someone who is very good at what she does, Laura this week has posted some great links under the banner Murderous Barbarian Chinese Communist Wuhan Coronavirus.
Laura’s commentary that accompanies these links is spot-on and deadly sharp.
She’s a Canadian-Jewish Boudica.
Please do take the time to click here and read her latest post.
#WUHAN – Americans And The Price You Pay, Part II
Continuing on the theme I expressed in Part I…
From the New York Post, Julia Marsh and Kenneth Garger reporting, we learn [tip of the fedora to Stacy McCain]:
New Yorkers who flee to Florida during the coronavirus outbreak will have to self quarantine for two weeks when they arrive — or risk facing criminal charges, the Sunshine State’s governor said Monday.
Gov. Ron DeSantis [R] said he was issuing the executive order that would apply to all travelers from New York City, which, as of Monday, has recorded 12,305 cases of the virus. By comparison, Florida so far has 1,100 cases.
The order also applies to areas surrounding the Big Apple, but DeSantis didn’t specify the exact perimeter.
The Florida governor said about 100 flights from New York City and the surrounding area arrive to his state daily. He said he believes at least one person aboard each flight is infected with the illness.
DeSantis at an earlier Monday press conference said, “We are getting huge amounts of people flying in. We are looking at how to address those flights.”
“In New York (City), when they did the stay-at-home order, what did people do? A lot of people fled the city and they are going to stay with their parents or fly (out),” DeSantis said.
Further, from the report, we learn:
Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Friday issued a statewide lockdown, which went into effect Sunday night, that closed all non-essential businesses and requires all nonessential government and private-sector employees to work from home.
In The Commonwealth Of Massachusetts, GOP Governor Charlie Baker, while not issuing a Shelter-In-Place Order, has issued a ‘Stay-At-Home’ advisory that strongly urges the citizens of The Bay State to act as if an order has been issued [in other words: we will send the Police to Harass you. From WCVB-TV, we learn:
Baker also ordered the closure of nonessential businesses, starting at noon Tuesday. This order will also expire on April 7….
Baker also ordered the closure of nonessential businesses, starting at noon Tuesday. This order will also expire on April 7….
Well…that’s something, I suppose.
In California, their Leftist Governor is issuing Executive Orders left and right Curtailing personal freedoms.
From Warner Todd Huston, we learn:
The governors of states including Illinois, New York, and Pennsylvania have warned citizens that if they dare break state quarantine orders, they will be confronted or even arrested.
It is probably no surprise that the loudest governors are Democrats.
In Pennsylvania, Gov. Tom Wolf insisted that he is prepared to sic the police on those thinking they have freedom in his state.
“We will use the state police to enforce the rules we put into place,” he said according to ABC 27.
Pennsylvania is not alone. According to the New York Post, police in New York City are being given the green light to arrest people who dare to break New York City’s orders to self-quarantine.
Gov. Cuomo’s office also warned people that police will be empowered to approach people to force them to observe the state’s “social distancing” orders.
On Friday, the morbidly obese Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker also issued a state-wide self-quarantine order. Police there have been given greater powers to confront people going about their daily lives.
The City of Chicago insisted that disobeying the quarantine orders could result in serious legal action.
…
On the other hand, police across the nation are also putting a halt to arresting actual criminals. Police departments in Fort Worth, Texas, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for instance, have both stopped arrest “low-level” criminals.
So, to put a fine point on this, police across the nation are putting an end to arresting actual criminals and shifting instead to arresting or persecuting normal Americans who dare to break some government’s overwrought orders to self-quarantine.
Do we still live in America?
Damn Good question, WTH.
There’s a spirit here that’s floating around like…well like a Virus of Overreaction, but, more importantly, the virus that afflicts elected officials and Bureaucrats all the time: the Virus Of Using Power Corruptly, going beyond Right Reason, setting Precedents for future use.
The Freedom Of Movement for citizens and the Right to Peacefully Assemble are being Halted in Violation of the Spirit that Animates a Constitutional Republic.
‘He has…sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.’
Living in such a Republic and enjoying the Freedom And Ordered Liberty it brings, means we will face risks that no Authoritarian or Totalitarian Government has to concern itself with. This is The Price We Pay.
The refusal off so many Americans to Accept those Risks is more Harmful to us and Our Posterity than any real Virus.
Powers once ceded during a crisis are very hard — almost impossible — to get back.
Are we going to Meekly accept such a situation?
If the answer is ‘Yes’ then the Self-Enslavement of American Citizens will abide.
Is that a country you want to live in?
OUTLAW.
#WUHAN – Americans And The Price You Pay
Driving on through the night, unable to break away
From the restless pull of the price you pay
That seems to apply to most Americans, who are asleep at the wheel.
Prudence should guide us.] here. We’re Americans — we should be able to exercise the Discernment needed to see us through this Crisis without allowing the further Restricting of our Freedoms, without allowing the turning of our Ordered Liberty into Authoritarian Liberty.
…Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed…
What we’re seeing happening in America is an effort to acclimatize us to such Anti-Constitutional actions, such as Shelter-In-Place and the forced closing of smaller businesses that cannot withstand such orders for long.
‘Ah!’, says the government, ‘We will bail you businessmen out [along, of course, with the Crony Big Businesses — aka: the Corporatists] and, therefore, we will be your Saviors!!!‘ This will come with a heavy price: a Precedent will have been set, further and Mightily Strengthening what began in 2008 under Bush II and, most especially, under Barackus Obamacus Nero [GM — more Government Motors, anyone?]. That smell in the air is Fascism Unleashed.
I spent the past weeks witnessing a vast, vast majority of Americans ‘disposed to suffer’ under Edicts being Promulgated be governments at all levels. While come involved in these actions maybe doing so out of the best of intentions, they will soon fined they set in motion Dangerous Precedents.
‘…a fearful people is a people easily subjugated.’ —Francis Porretto via Gerard Van der Leun
There’s a price we pay for living in a Society with Freedom And Ordered Liberty. I say this as someone who has a Compromised Immune System: our governments are, in a sense, enjoying this crisis too much and I’ll take my chances being Free.
The Power and Control being used on us now is Repugnant, is Despotic. It is further wearing-down our Resistance to Tyranny. Slumbering now is not an option.
I’m gladdened by the fact that, in the past day or so, I’m hearing more and more voices standing athwart The Pandemic Governmental Complex yelling ‘STOP!’
The coronavirus isn’t Communism, but it has created social, political, and economic conditions similar to that of Communism, with an authoritarian state, a frightened populace, and resource shortages.
The ‘play-up’ by the governments and their allies in The Media is, and has been, slowly injecting the American People with the Fear/Panic Virus.
Get people used to a situation and soon they will not notice it. This is a variant of The Big Lie.
This Softening makes one more Susceptible to Meekly Accepting Despotism.
A Very Good Friend-In-The-Ether wrote this:
I am seeing posts about what movies or shows to watch and what games to play; that is nice, but this “lockdown” is not a staycation. It is a devastating economic situation. Individuals, families, and small businesses did not save for years to be forced out of business or into the unemployment line (if they can even collect unemployment) due to a virus.
For those that draw a salary from a government or corporate entity please know that this is a devastating blow for entrepreneurs, self-employed, and small businesses. Small businesses plans for hard times, but the hard times usually are visible over time, not in the matter of two weeks with no way to control the destiny or make adjustments for the hard time.
I have been a small business owner for 22 years in a seasonal area. This has taught me a lot about seasonal downturn and planning. I can completely understand that businesses will be devastated by being blind-sided by this. Some may not recover and that is very sad. It is extremely hard to make up a month of losses quickly, and many with employees may have to train new people so getting back to work will be a challenge.
Most Americans want to work, be productive, and to socialize. This lockdown is devastating.
My personal cleaning person of ten years is a perfect example; she is self-employed and hustles to work. She went from full capacity to 10% capacity scrambling to figure out how to financially manage the crisis.
As a regular dining out couple, my husband I don’t dine out for just the food. We dine out for the socialization, atmosphere, and the time to relax. So the idea of just picking up a take-out meal doesn’t have much appeal to us, and I assume many others. We know many restaurant bartenders and servers by name and feel worried for them during this time because they work hard and may also be scrambling to make ends meet.
American needs to get back to business, perhaps not as usual, but with the freedom to move about the country as we want. New precautions and protocols should be in place, but we need to get back to our lives. There needs to be a discussion on how we can go about our working and social lives with the plan to keep people safe and healthy.
I don’t want to hear any hateful responses. This is not a political statement. I am a person that believes in liberty and freedom. I am not feeling either of those right now.
Dead Solid Perfect.
Forcing us into Tribal Isolation makes us more Susceptible, more Pliant.
Checks from the government will only make us loose more of our Independence.
There are other ways for these newly-created burdens to be eased.
From Susan:
When the Corona Virus finally exhausts itself and the danger is over, let’s do something good for our country.
Let’s spend our vacation in the USA, eat in local restaurants, buy american products, buy local meats and veggies and support local businesses. These businesses are going to find it very difficult to get back on their feet and survive without our help. They’re suffering badly now.
Our products are some of the best in the world. This country is one of the most beautiful.
Time to ratchet-up our Resistance.
OUTLAW.
Oh, the price you pay, oh, the price you pay
Now you can’t walk away from the price you pay
Now they’d come so far and they’d waited so long
Just to end up caught in a dream where everything goes wrong
Where the dark of night holds back the light of day
And you’ve gotta stand and fight for the price you pay
—Bruce Springsteen
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#WUHAN: A Musical Journal Of The Plague Year
— Songs For A Pandemic —
-I can feel the Fear in The Western World…
-No guarantees in The Western World…
-Welcome to The Jungle…
-In Fear every day, every evening…
-Exit light…enter night…
-The Regulator’s swinging pendulum…
-Beware the Savage Jaw…
–This one’s for the Millennials and Gen-Zers: Here we are now…entertain us…
-We can be Heroes — just for one day…
-Come on baby…Don’t fear the Reaper…Baby take my hand…
-And I feel fine…
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#Wuhan And Male Homosexuals: Yin And Wang At South Beach
[REMINDER Before We Start: The best way to keep-up with Truth-infused news about the Wuhan Virus is to take my advice here.]
Upset The Balance Of Nature and you’ll pay…
From Stacy McCain we learn that a very large gathering of Male Homosexuals at Miami’s South Beach recently was bereft of the recommended precautions to avoiding getting the Wuhan Virus.
A highlight:
At least nine men who attended the March 4-10 “Winter Party” LGBTQ festival in Miami have tested positive for Wuhan coronavirus. The annual gay festival in South Beach attracted thousands of visitors….
Please do take the time to read Stacy’s full post here.
Drug- and alcohol-fueled parties were held where no protections were to be found.
This is typical of Homosexual Men [one of whom was under consideration by Joe ‘Hill’ Biden to be his VP].
Further on in the post, Stacy remarks:
So, in addition to the racism of calling this a “Chinese virus,” I suppose I’m now guilty of homophobia for calling attention to how Miami’s “Winter Party” helped spread the disease. Also, telling the truth about a Democrat’s “meth-fueled sexy orgy” makes me a hater, I guess.
Political correctness requires us to pretend we don’t know things that we actually do know, e.g., what happens when thousands of gay men travel to a week-long festival in Miami. Even when the consequences of such behavior include spreading potentially fatal diseases, we are expected never to mention the sordid reality involved. You could lose your job — or get banned from Twitter — if you refuse to cooperate with the “progressive” agenda of this compulsory make-believe game.
…
…Most Americans never stop to think about the motives behind political correctness: Why are some categories of behavior (and some categories of people) off-limits to criticism?
Once a special-interest group aligns itself with the Democratic Party, suddenly you’re forbidden to express a negative opinion of them. The rules of political correctness are always dictated by this partisan formula. Once upon a time, Catholics were a key constituency for the Democratic Party, which meant criticism of Catholic practices was prohibited. Once the abortion lobby and the LGBTQ crowd gained ascendancy among Democrats, however, denouncing Catholicism became more or less mandatory. Likewise, anti-Semitism was forbidden until the Democrats began soliciting support from Muslims, at which point Jew-haters like Ilhan Omar became the leaders of the party’s “progressive” wing.
THIS, SQUARED.
I, for the same reasons as Stacy cites, am, it seems a HATER!!!™.
For me this is also History fairly-repeating itself. When a treatment for AIDS came about and the disease went from Fatal to Chronic [ie: treatable over a long period], Male Homosexuals threw all caution the wind and began engaging again in reckless Sexual Behavior.
Men like to take risks and here was a Heavy Risk that most had Denied themselves before the Chronic Treatments were developed. Some of the old bathhouses reopened and Discreet all-male gyms became popular meeting spots for Male Homosexual sexual activity, both Anonymous and Friendly. As Rahm ‘Twinkle Toes’ [IYKWIMAITYD] Emanuel once said: ‘Never let a good crisis go to waste’.
When sex is conducted between men, their is not present the Balance that a woman would provide [although, in this Godless Age, far too many women have become acting like men for various Stupid reasons].
Sexually, men have little Sexual Restraint; it is the women who provide the Constraint — the trait of avoiding excesses — in a Normal, Natural sexual relationship. Yin and Yang, a Natural Balance.
Of course, no ‘reputable’ government official or Leftist media person will report on any of this — only HATERS!!!™ like Stacy McCain.
Once again: Political Correctness is putting us in Danger.
RELATED: As for Lesbians: I suspect that the vast majority of them are not engaging in such behavior because they’re almost all Neurotic.
Wuhan-Related: ‘…The Right Of The People Peaceably To Assemble….’
My Dear Friend, Tom Fergus, recently published this Facebook post:
…or the right of the people peaceably to assemble…
That’s #1 of the Bill of Rights. So now we surrender our civil liberties without complaint?
I’m done with this. First restaurateur brave enough to open, I’ll come heavy.
That’s The Spirit!
I’ve had a serious problem with the ‘Shelter-In-Place!’ order when I first heard of it during the pursuit of the younger of the Tsarnaev Terrorist brothers in 2013. I was at work when it was issued and Defied it, going home after working the night shift — fully aware of the slight dangers involved. It was Obvious that the chances of him being anywhere along my route were slim and I, as I always did, kept my doors locked. No government was going to restrict my Freedom Of Movement.
Now, we face a Virus, born in Red China that is a lot less Dangerous, yet across the country Restrictions of a Free People’s movements are being implemented. I write this as someone whose Immune System has been Compromised by four bouts of Cancer: you’re not going to Intimidate me.
Kudos to The President for leaving such matters as ‘Shelter-In-Place!’ up to The Sovereign States [for now — pardon my well-earned Cynicism].
The First Amendment reads [emphasis mine]:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
As Justice Joseph Story wrote in his Magisterial Commentaries On The Constitution Of The United States:
§ 1894. This would seem unnecessary to be expressly provided for in a republican government, since it results from the very nature of its structure and institutions. It is impossible that it could be practically denied until the spirit of liberty had wholly disappeared, and the people had become so servile and debased as to be unfit to exercise any of the privileges of freemen.
Well…most Americans are Debased and have become Servile to government at all levels.
We, The Sovereign People, who are the main holders of Sovereign Power, have never Relinquished our Power officially. Sadly, out of Habit and Laziness we have ceded too much Power And Control to our governments. We’ve been too busy reveling in our Bounties and Luxuries.
Now, I am an opponent of the Incorporation of The Bill Of Rights, which is, as Wikipedia describes it [emphasis mine]:
Incorporation, in United States law, is the doctrine by which portions of the Bill of Rights have been made applicable to the states. When the Bill of Rights was ratified, the courts held that its protections extended only to the actions of the federal government and that the Bill of Rights did not place limitations on the authority of the state and local governments. However, the post-Civil War era, beginning in 1865 with the Thirteenth Amendment, which declared the abolition of slavery, gave rise to the incorporation of other Amendments, applying more rights to the states and people over time. Gradually, various portions of the Bill of Rights have been held to be applicable to the state and local governments by incorporation through the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 and the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870.
Prior to the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment and the development of the incorporation doctrine, the Supreme Court in 1833 held in Barron v. Baltimore that the Bill of Rights applied only to the federal, but not any state governments. Even years after the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Supreme Court in United States v. Cruikshank (1876) still held that the First and Second Amendment did not apply to state governments. However, beginning in the 1920s, a series of United States Supreme Court decisions interpreted the Fourteenth Amendment to “incorporate” most portions of the Bill of Rights, making these portions, for the first time, enforceable against the state governments.
The Modern Supreme Court has rendered decisions that are Repugnant to The Constitution in this matter.
The Founding Fathers never intended The Bill Of Rights to apply to any state, county, or local governments. As the Tenth Amedment states:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
Nowhere, except, perhaps, in time of War, is the ‘Shelter-In-Place’ Power granted to the national government.
So, if a state constitution allows in it’s text for ‘Shelter-In-Place’ orders to be issued, then the matter is settled in said state. Those opposing such Power And Control need to Amend their individual constitutions.
If a state constitution does not allow for such Powers to be exercised by the government at that level, they we devolve down the governmental levels and, if none of them allow for such orders, then The Sovereign People have this Power.
In Tom’s case, being a resident of New Hampshire, he has to look at his state’s constitution first, but I Salute his Spirit Of Resistance To Tyranny. Never lose it, Old Friend.
We all must keep an eye on our governments at every level.
And, if Tom is arrested or fined for not ‘Sheltering-In-Place’, I will help him make bail and buy him a Bourbon.
#OUTLAW
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Wuhan-Corona Virus Info: The Best Reporting And Commentary
[NOTE: This post will be stuck up here at the top of this column for the time being. Any new posts from me will be posted below this one.]
I neither have the time time nor the strength to keep fully up-to-date on the Wuhan Virus, but there are two Exceellant sources for both Real Reporting and Truthful Analysis of it…
The Other McCain
and
Steyn Online
Both are well-worth checking into frequently.
I will continue to comment, but these two men are the Best at what they do.
UPDATE on 25 MARCH 2020:
I’ve posted an Addendum to this post here.
SIDENOTE: Information on obtaining a copy of my book, THE PRESENT CRISIS is available in the right-hand column→
A Non-Wuhan Post: Of Scoundrels And Fools
A few days back, Molratty posted a thread on Twitter after reading Kevin Williamson’s post, entitled: Joe Biden: Not a Socialist, Just a Scoundrel.
In her first Tweet, she wrote:
Brutal, but fair. He has the visage of a charming man, but is just below the surface a vicious, dishonest, scheming, lifelong machine politician.
A great summation of a Wasted Life.
In two subsequent Tweets, she continued:
If you don’t like people telling the truth about Biden because you think Trump is worse, you’re probably part of the same blind support problem you complain about re Trump.
And…
They’re all bad. Maybe in different degrees, but all bad. Grow a pair and stop complaining because people point that out.
Dead Solid Perfect.
This Blind Worshiping — because that’s what it is — is to be expected by The Left, but should not be swimming freely on the port side.
We’ve seen this happen on the Right over and over again since the 2016 Election Season began in 2015. Trump proclaims that he’s going to do A and many of his supporters cheer him loudly. Trumpicus then does B and those same Worshipers switch their cheers to B. It’s Repugnant and bespeaks of Caesarism. It is Self-Delegitimizing for those who call themselves ‘conservative’. Independence of Mind and Soul is the keystone of the Conservative Philosophy. One could easily say that these Trumpites are Abandoning their God-Given Free Will.
This Self-Blinding has made me lose Faith in much of The American Right. Read History, Dammit! Read about Sulla.
The Murdering of our Constitutional Republic, which has been accelerating since 2006 thanks to The Left In America, is now being Aided And Abetted by this contingent of supporters of Trumpicus Pompey Maximus Sulla.
Question everything a politician does; look at his motives. As Mol said ‘They’re all bad’.
Lional Mandrake [@LMandrakeJr] posed a question to Mol:
The question that hasn’t been adequately addressed is why our politics is now attracting the worst of the population. The stereotypical used car salespeople are a better class
Because people get on their team and can brook no criticism of these politicians, regardless of their flaws. We’d be a lot better off if voters viewed politicians with a more robust level of contempt, even when they’re voting for them.
Further:
You’re not required to own every shitty thing the guy you voted for does. You’re not required to defend it. They aren’t kings and queens and you’re not their subjects.
Exactly: STOP thinking like Vassals…like Sheep.
Summon that ‘more robust level of contempt‘.
The Future of this already-damaged Republic is at stake. We cannot afford Sullaism or Caesarism, if we are to have any Hope of Restoring Freedom And Ordered Liberty.
#OUTLAW
On Ideologues As Children
Oh, ho, ho!
It’s magic!
You kno-oo-ow
Never believe it’s not so….
Over at The Other McCain, Stacy offers some Dead Solid Perfect analysis on The Left In America:
One symptom of mental illness is magical thinking, “the belief that one’s own thoughts, wishes, or desires can influence the external world. . . . People with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) engage in a type of magical thinking. . . . People diagnosed with schizophrenia and delusional disorders may also experience bouts of magical thinking.”
What drives the schizophrenic mad is a sense of helplessness, a lack of agency, the feeling that external forces are controlling their lives. In this condition, they resort to child-like fantasies of omnipotence, where they have the power to fulfill their desires simply by wishing the desired outcome into existence. Such delusional thinking is evident in the behaviors of those afflicted with Trump Derangement Syndrome.
The disappointment of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 defeat had a traumatic psychological impact on Trump’s enemies, particularly in the media, who experienced the election result as a loss of power. Immediately, the anti-Trump media began seizing on anything — a scandal, a poll result, Russian “collusion,” etc. — that might rid them of this demonized figure whose political success symbolized to them their own failure. Thus was born the “walls are closing in” meme of liberal media fantasy, where the latest “bombshell” was always “the beginning of the end” for Trump.
Magical Thinking is a requirement for all who are Leftists: it’s woven into the fabric of any Ideology.¹
As I wrote in my recent book, On The Causes And Effects Of THE PRESENT CRISIS In America [only $8.00 per book]:
Have you ever met a Leftist who is truly, deeply happy?
Have you ever met a Leftist who, if you probed down deep enough, was really contented?
No.
They’re all, to varying extents, unsatisfied with Life As lt Is and hate their lot in it. Instead of looking into their own Souls, seeking out the reasons for their Nihilism, and, then, working to change their outlook on Life, the Leftists turn outward and blame Society — and then brand themselves ‘victims!’.
The next step for them is to adopt one of the many flavors of Leftist Thinking that provide them with what they believe is the best path to Utopia, where they can ‘teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, grow apple trees and honey bees and snow-white turtledoves’.
Ever notice that every Leftist you meet seems to believe they have been maltreated in some way, be it by ‘Society’ or by the ‘Patriarchy’ or by ‘Capitalists’ or by ‘Religious Nuts’ or by [fill-in-the-blank]?
They have been wronged!
The Dealer known as Life has cheated and dealt them a bad hand.
‘Life is UNFAIR!’– they whine.
Such thinking betrays a Rampant Immaturity that eventually metastasizes into a psychotic obsession with getting Revenge on the architects of their ‘misery’.
Paranoia governs their plans and actions. Leftists are all members of the Tin-Foil Hat Brigade.
Leftists, no matter what year they arc born into, are always members of The Me Generation. Refusing to take any Responsibility for their own actions and Miserable in their Irrational Selfishness, they lash-out at the rest of the World, especially those who reject Nihilism and the belief that Heaven On Earth can be achieved.
To put it succinctly: Leftists are mentally unstable. [Chapter 3: Leftism]
What in an actual child we would describe as Childishness is Manifest in these Adults-In-Name-Only. It’s as if those who adopt an Ideology have decided to Retard their individual brain’s development.
Avoid arguing with such people — Life is too short. To varying degrees they are Deranged.
The Magical Thinkers cannot be reasoned with because they don’t want to be reasoned with.
I Refuse to be a Slave to Children and their Tantrums.
_____________________________________________________________
¹ This includes Libertarians who believe a Randian Galt’s Gulch is possible
SIDENOTE: I haven’t been as active writing posts because I’ve been struck by my Regular-Change-Of-The-Season Severe Allergy Attack. No Wuhan, No Influenza — just something that hits me hard when Winter goes into Spring, Spring into Summer, etc. and used to keep me out of work for a few days before I retired. It seems I’m allergic to climate changes [well…air pressure, anyways].
La Cosa Obama: Return Of The Living Dead?
…But, the Truth is: it was never dead.
Many thought Bernie Sanders was a Bolshevik — tough, unrelenting, no-holds-barred — but he is and was not.
Mark Steyn provides us with a very telling example:
~To modify T S Eliot in “The Hollow Men” (whose theme seems not inappropriate), this is the way the world ends, not with a Bern but a whimper. As I said on Rush the morning after Super Tuesday, Senator Sanders blew the 2016 election with a single line — his crotchetty insistence to Mrs Clinton that he was “sick and tired of hearing about your damn emails”. That told Hillary that he wouldn’t go after her on the subject of her corruption and lawlessness. Which in turn told Hillary that Bernie wasn’t serious.
And so it proved.
Four years later, he was now, I said on the radio, making the same mistake again – in a pitiful Super Tuesday speech too gutless to mention Joe Biden by name. If he didn’t butch up before Michigan, he’d be over. That means not oblique references to unspecified candidates whose positions on Social Security and 2008 bailouts he disagrees with, but clobbering Biden by name on a) his decades-long corruption; and b) his more recent but increasingly obvious cognitive impairment. Only if a Democrat makes either an issue will the court eunuchs of the American media be obliged to cover it. Absent that, in the post-Iowa/New Hampshire avalanche of primaries, people vote on a vague recollection of Joe Biden from fifteen years back, when, by comparison with a Castroite crank flapping his arms around, he seemed “likeable” — or, in the dreary clichés of presidential politics, the candidate you’d enjoy sharing a beer with — even if Joe had no idea he was sharing a beer with you and was convinced he was sharing a margarita with Esther Williams and Mikhail Gorbachev.
Bernie blew it. The closest he got was tiptoeing up to the issue by noting that, while he himself was out there giving hour-long speeches, Biden’s were now down to seven minutes. If you’re paying attention, you kinda sorta know what he’s hinting at, even if trumpeting the charms of a stump speech eight times longer than your opponent isn’t the most persuasive way to sell it.
But again he needed to say it, and he didn’t. America’s Castro turns out to be not a real revolutionary, just a Vermont weekending flatlander of a revolutionary, a Ben & Jerry’s novelty ice-cream flavor of the real thing — Stalinist Swirl, Beria Blast, The Choctober Revolution, Hammer & Brickle…
What a joke.
Indeed.
I am reminded of the situation in Russia in 1917-1918 when the Mensheviks seized power. They were overthrown by the more Determined and Committed Bolsheviks, who were Bold and Brazen.
Bernard likes to think he is emulating the latter, but, as Mark shows, he is nothing but a Feckless former [as the Mensheviks all were].
Like the Failed Mensheviks, he is a Blowhard, who talks the talk, but needs a walker to walk the walk, but refuses to use one.
As for Joe ‘Hill’ Biden: he has been raised from The Political Dead by, I think, New New Leftists [pronounced ‘Nu Nu’; see Teletubbies, The] who fear, and they are quite justified, that a Sanders Nomination would Doom their chances of regaining full Power And Control [they never gave it up all the way because the Deep State was working for them since Trumpicus took Office].
So, it appears that the La Cosa Obama Crime Family has been working behind the scenes to push for whatever candidate will sweep them back in. With the other Dems gone, they’re left with Joe ‘Hill’, but they see this as merely a bump in the Road To Regain Power And Control.
The way things have been going since 2015-2016, I wouldn’t be surprised if La Cosa Obama is not already planning this and how their administration will run.
As Mark Steyn Club member, Kathryn Maxwell, remarks in the Comments section of Mark’s post:
I fear that the Dems will insert Mrs. Obama into the VP slot to capture the Bern youth and the black voters. They will also choose the cabinet members. Shortly following his inauguration (God forbid,) the cabinet will meet and solemnly declare that they unanimously deem him to be incompetent. Voila! President Obama II. 12 years.
I agree with KM about the first part, but I don’t think they will move on Invoking the Twenty-Fifth Amendment clause as long as they can control Biden. As long as he Dutifully serves as the New New Left’s Mad King Joe, they’ll keep him as President so that he can take the shite and they can proceed with furthering The Revolution.
I think it very likely that Michelle will be his VP running mate. Like Hillaria Tiberius, she wants to Shine on her own.
However, as Club member, Segnes Schonken, comments:
I guess we should engage in a little politely subdued rejoicing while we can. It should be qualified, at any rate. The notion of socialism now has a legitimate place in American political discourse….
If and when Joe ‘Hill’ Biden gets The Nod and if he chooses Barack’s Klingon Wife, Trumpicus Pompey Maximus Sulla will have a harder time winning.
Caveat: I’m just trying to make sense of it all — have been since 2015-2016. I freely admit that I sometimes forget that ‘all of the conventional political wisdom went out the window in 2015/2016‘.
On Encouraging Entry Into The Trades But Keeping A Constitutional Perspective
Sunday instant, I reposted a Facebook post from a website called Grown & Flown entitled: Parents Need to End the Stigma Surrounding Trade School.
I had been struck by that title because I agree with it.
The author, Katie Bingham-Smith, relates:
…When I attended high school in the ‘90s, if you were a student who took vocational classes, everyone thought it meant you couldn’t cut it in regular school.
The cool thing to do was to graduate high school the traditional way and if you didn’t, you were treated as though you were less than.
Maybe this wasn’t the case in all schools, but it certainly was in mine. I admit that I bought into this paradigm. The stigma which came from the adults in our lives trickled down to the students. These days, as a mom to three teens, I’ve seen that kind of stigma not only persist but get even worse and that’s sad.
I was one of those who, back in the 1970’s when I attended high school, felt the same way. I was part of that White Collar Snobbery that pervaded our age group and our parents. The latter desired that we outdo themselves and believed only attending collage would achieve that end. They instilled in many of us that, as Mrs. Smith says, only the dumb kids went to what we called The Voke…and we were too Naive to see that this was wrong.
This attitude in my Blue Collar city was one of the reasons I believe The Voke was eventually shut down. That Foolish Stigma depleted the ranks of students.
Fortunately, that attitude started to change in the Early Aughts in scattered cities and towns and Regional High Schools, now given the adjective ‘Technical’ started appearing. Sadly, if Mrs. Smith is correct at least a part of that Foolish Stigma abides [not at all surprising in America given our reach-for-the-better philosophy].
I disagree, however, with the author that the Attitude is worse.
Thanks to people like Mike Rowe, the guys on This Old House [especially Norm Abram], and Mike Holmes, the understanding that The Trades are Respectable has grown significantly. Granted: part of this change has been driven by the fact that more and more parents understand the financial rewards found by becoming a Tradesman, coupled with the Massive unemployment of those with such Useless degrees in things like ‘Gender Studies’.
More from Mrs. Smith:
No one stops to think that perhaps certain students are exploring other options because having a corporate job just doesn’t suit them. No one considers that these students may not want to spend their life doing something they hate simply because others said it was the right path to take.
My son wants to attend vocational school during his senior year of high school and I’m all for it. He has a mad passion for cars and wants to learn as much as he can, as fast as he can. Learning to repair cars makes him happy in a way that writing papers and chemistry class do not. That’s what enhances his life and makes him feel fulfilled.
Who am I to strip him of his passions, simply because I’m afraid of what others will think? He has an opportunity to start learning about something that excites him now and I think it’s wonderful that he has that choice.
I couldn’t care less about what others think about my son’s school choice, career choice, or the way he styles his hair. I care that he is happy, and that he chooses what he loves regardless of what it looks like to others.
And if he feels self conscious about his choices, even for a second, it’s my job to set him straight and remind him that his life is his.
If he barters his happiness to appear more prestigious or to impress others, he’s the one who suffers, not the people on the outside judging the future he is building for himself.
You, Mrs. Smith, are there to ‘strip him of his passions’ if you believe they are harmful for him in the long-run. Non-Natural hair colors are not acceptable and bespeak of an Unserious Person. Certain Standards must be maintained, just as in the White Collar World, a suit and tie and not dressing like a whore must be Enforced.
In the Comments section of my Facebook post, two dear friends of mine point out that they ‘made it’ without a college degree and, I can attest, they have. I know of many others who have, with a few rising in the White Collar World when their bosses are smart, in possession of Common Sense [I was one of those who rose and, when I became a boss, I discarded degrees when considering who to employ — successful work experience mattered more].
America was built on Ingenuity and Hard Work, White and Blue Collar.
SIDENOTE: Another commentator, one of my new Friends-In-The-Ether, Bill Hebden, informed us that: ‘Trump Just announced he wants vocational training in all high schools’.
This is not a good thing.
Nowhere in The Constitution is the national government given the Power And Control over Education.
As I wrote back in December regarding another action of Trumpicus Pompey Maximus Sulla and our Roman Empire-style Congress:
Where in The Constitution does it say the Chief Executive can do this? Where does that Sacred Document say that the Congress can pass such a law?
The answer is that The Constitution does not Delegate such a Power to the national government.
But that doesn’t stop our elected officials from passing such laws every Session.
The First Question that must ALWAYS be asked when passing a Law or promulgating a Regulation is: Is this Constitutional?
If not, than this is a matter that should be left to The Several States [see: Tenth Amendment, The].
And, if their Constitutions do not Delegate such Powers to them, then we next go to County and Local level governments to see if their Charters allow them to impose such Laws and Regulations.
When we do not ask this First Question, we show our Contempt for The Constitutions and Charters of our govenments. Passing such Laws and Regulations and Executive Orders is Repugnant…
Yes, I want to see Vocational Training encouraged and more Trade Schools opened, but not at the cost of Delegitimizing and Destroying further The Sovereignty Of The People.
Elections 2020: And The Plot Twisted From Side To Side
We may not have seen the last plot twist in this story.
ITEM #1:
In previous posts, i offered the theory that the New New Left people in positions of Power And Control over at the DNC — in conjunction with the Radical Young Left — were going to do to Joe ‘Hill’ Biden what they’ve been doing to the Old Left and the New Left.
The only thing that kept him Viable is that Joe ‘Hill’ Biden was chosen by Obama to be his Vice President. Otherwise, he would have faded from The Political Scene.
The New New Left never really liked him and the Radical Young Left despise him.
…
What I see going on here is what I’ve noticed in a more subtle form since, at least, 2008: the New New Left, in an uneasy alliance with the Radical Young Left that will not last, is slowly and quietly ‘taking-out’, whacking politically, as it were, the now Old Timers of the Old Left and New Left. They’re going after state and local pols, along with DA’s, etc. It is a Slow Massacre of those not exhibiting enough Radicalism [ie: those suffering from ‘False Consciousness’]. The New New Left and the Radical Young Left are not coordinating their activities: the latter is always ready to shoot at the former.
Joe ‘Hill’ Biden is just the latest, albeit the most well-known, ‘Old Timer’ to get caught in the Crossfire.
That was at the end of last August.
Just a month ago, after the Iowa mish-mash, I wrote:
The Biden ‘No-Malarkey! You Young Whipper Snappers’ Campaign may well be, at the very least, Terminal after the Iowa Caucuses.
…
Joe ‘Hill’ was Doomed, eventually, from the start.
I refused to listen to that voice in my head that reminded me that all of the conventional political wisdom went out the window in 2015/2016.
For some reason only known to Baal, the DNC has decided the perhaps-Dementia-ridden Joe ‘Hill’ is the one to carry their torch. I thought it would be Warren or Buttigeig — wrong again, Bobby Bel.
ITEM #2:
The trouncing of Squaw Elizabeth Warren [aka: Dances Badly In Pantsuits] in her home state of The People’s Republic Of Massachusetts surprised the Hell out of me.
It also made me laugh at her and those who foisted her upon The Bay State and then nationally, thinking that she was The Great White Hope of Modern Times.
She was only ever an Apparatchik…and a Dull and Depleted one at that.
Warren is still probably a contender for VP, but who knows?
ITEM #3:
If he is anointed, the Democratic Party’s choice for a VP for Biden is now taken-on a higher importance. Can you say 25th Amendment?…or death in office?
ITEM #4:
How will the Radical Young Left and the Feministas react? They Despise Joe.
For some valuable insights on this and other connected matters, please take the time to click here and read Stacy McCain’s analysis.
ITEM #5:
One more thing about Joe ‘Hill’ Biden: I forgot how the song, The Ballad Of Joe Hill ends [emphasis mine]:
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night
Alive as you or me
Says I, But Joe, you’re ten years dead
I never died, says he
I never died, says he
I was wrong.
–
Coronavirus Update: 2020-03-01 (featuring @steynonline)
With apologies to Robert Service…
I’m one of these cynical chaps
Who sit in my office drinking;
A most improper taste, perhaps,
Yet conducive to my thinking…
I don’t place any Trust in any government to take the Proper actions regarding the Coronavirus [although the verdict is still out on The United State Of America].
Mark Steyn is just as Cynical as I am…and he has provided an update on COVID-19 [sounds like a top-secret, super-duper operation of the SAS] that I will quote the newest part in full, as it represents what I would have written if I had his talent.
It is titled: When the System Infects You:
As we were saying…
China officials knew of coronavirus in December, ordered cover-up, report says
Shame on the halfwit faux-conservative suck-ups who over the last third of a century mortgaged the global supply chain (including basic medicines) to a totalitarian dictatorship. And nuts to the technocrat Napoleon and Politburo shill Bloomberg who presumes to save America from a future he helped arrange.
In other developments:
Coronavirus: 2 dozen first responders quarantined in Washington state
In China over three thousand health workers have been infected by COVID-19, and have thus helped spread the virus and infect many others, including those already weakened by other ailments who made the mistake of going to hospital. I hope startling carelessness in America and Italy and elsewhere will not result in similar outcomes throughout the west. We have been here before. What ought to have been one of the most disturbing aspects of the SARS outbreak is that in Canada the disease was spread by the medical system itself. Here’s what I had to say in The National Post on April 24th 2003….
Mark then goes on to reprint a column, which is a True Must-Read [please click here].
Will the Deadly Bungles happen again?
One of the reasons I’m especially, intensely Cynical is because I know how Bureaucracies work, having been inside one since the late 1970’s at the state level and having dealt with Local and Federal ones on a regular basis during those years.
SteynOnline commentator Diane Guy remarks:¹
…A good majority of the world unquestionably accepts whatever panacea their ‘betters’ dish up. Unbridled bureaucracy not subject to common sense oversight will be the death of us all.
And that is exactly what has happened since The Bureaucracy [aka: The Administrative State] began it’s Morbid Obesely Bloat under FDR. They have become, at all levels, a separate branch of government, especially in their promulgation of Regulations that have the Force Of Law, even though The Sovereign People’s Representatives have never voted on them — this is just one of their Unconstitutional Sins.
The World War II Generation put their faith in FDR and his ‘Brain Trust’ and subsequent Generations have accepted The Bureaucracy they and their minions created. At one point during my tenure in that Enemy Territory, I came-up with a simple summation of them, a unofficial motto, a guiding philosophy if you will of these Vultures who feed-off the carcass of America: If it makes Sense, DON’T do it.
We have no idea the course the spread of the Coronavirus will take.
I’m just advising that you be very Cynical of what Governments tell you.
Take precautions for your Family and keep your friends in the loop…and, if you’re the praying-type, Pray.
SIDENOTE: The N95 Respirator Mask is the mask to buy.
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¹ I urge you to join The Mark Steyn Club and help support Mark in his efforts to Expose threats to American Freedom And Ordered Liberty and threats to the Survival of The West. If you are unable then I would urge you to make frequent stops at SteynOnline.
On Gramsci, Father And Son Buttigieg
Angelo Codevilla has written another Magnificent analysis of the current state of affairs [tip of the fedora to Smitty].
He warns that Pete Buttigieg [SIDENOTE: What self-respecting Man runs for any elected office using his nickname?] is not so much a Leninist or Stalinist or Maoist, but a Faithful Studeent of Gramsci, and Evil Man, who I would contend is, perhaps, the creator of one of the worst of the Leftist Viruses — The Black Plague and Ebola rolled into one.
In the first part of his essay, Mr. Codevilla explains who Antonio Gramsci was.
Some highlights…
Gramsci’s critique of what he judged to be Lenin and Stalin’s insufficiently thorough totalitarianism followed from his Machiavellian dissent from Karl Marx’s doctrine that human thought is “superstructural,” that is, a mere reflection of people’s relationship to the means of production. Machiavelli had realized the overwhelming power of ideas, expressed in language, especially religious language. Orthodox Marxists—like Lenin and Stalin, down to Fidel Castro and, yes, Bernie Sanders—believe that seizing control of people’s livelihoods, secured by police forces, confers ultimate power.
Machiavelli, however, recognized that no amount of physical coercion could erase memories of lost freedoms. As circumstances changed, these memories could always overthrow the regime. Ultimate control requires erasing memories of former ways from human minds. Only by changing the meaning of words can the regime make it impossible even to think of alternatives to its power.
Hence, Gramsci and his followers have stressed that laying the foundations of ultimate, unshakable Communist power requires establishing absolute “hegemony” over culture, and especially over religion.
As the late and very much missed Andrew Breitbart said: Politics is downstream from Culture. Control The Culture, Corrupt it from within to suit Leftist Philosophy, Overturn the meanings of words, and what you get is a Gramscian Tyranny [maybe George Orwell read Gramsci and it influenced his development of Newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-Four?]
More:
Lenin and Stalin destroyed church buildings and murdered priests. That did nothing to make people forget Christianity. Gramsci thought that Mussolini’s approach—paying the priests, helping to choose bishops who talked of less of Christ than of patriotic duty, and of Christ in Fascist-friendly terms—was likelier to kill Christianity by co-opting it.
In short, Gramscian Communists want to attack the whole civilization by seizing the culture’s commanding heights, and changing the meaning of cultural icons—as well as backing that up with police power over livelihoods.
You see, Buttigieg is not simply a follower of Gramsci: he and his Father have been deeply immersed in that Italian’s thinking for quite some time:
…young Pete assisted his father, Notre Dame English professor Joseph Buttigieg, president of the International Gramsci Society, in editing the English translation of Gramsci’s works—writings about which it is impossible to be neutral.
Far from neutral, the elder Buttigieg was among the world’s biggest fans of that most totalitarian of totalitarian theorists….
In the second part of the essay, Mr. Codevilla shows how Buttigeig is quite the A+ student of Gramsci. ]The same theory was put forward by Insightful people about ‘Barack Hussein Obama’, but he was actually a mixture of Lenin, Mao, and Gramsci.]
From AC:
A few political commentators have noted the incongruity in Mayor Pete’s self-proclaimed moderation. Loudly, he vows fidelity to all manner of American cultural icons: Religion above all, family, the military, capitalism, and so on. But the not so fine print of what he says about each and all of these is at variance with how most Americans understand them.
If these commentators had read Gramsci — whom Pete has read as an editor reads — they would not merely say that he has one foot in the moderate camp and another in the radical one. No. From a Gramscian standpoint, Pete’s views make perfect Communist sense.
Mr. Codevilla then cites some examples…
Religion:
Start with Creation. “Male and female created He them,” says Genesis, so that they may “be fruitful and multiply.” But the party says that sex is a social construct. Jewish law prescribes death to punish homosexuality. Pete and the party don’t object to calling Jesus homosexual and insist that opposition to homosexuality is un-Christian. Their Christianity also requires no control of immigration.
“He who does not work, neither shall he eat?” By their Christianity, St. Paul is un-Christian. So is anybody who stands in the way of killing babies who survive abortions. For the party approved version of Christianity, the Decalogue’s protection of innocent human life is anti-woman.
Is there any doubt that adherence to this version of Christianity is all about making Christianity anathema to Christians in a way that Lenin and Stalin could never manage?
No doubt about it.
The Family [emphasis mine]:
Family? Mayor Pete, who has counseled a 9-year-old boy to “come out” as a homosexual, touts that he is “a happily married man” who looks forward to having and raising children. To describe a homosexual couple taking adopting children generated by someone else and raising them in their own image remains repugnant to most people. Americans will not vote to place a pair of homosexuals into the White House as paragons of family life. Lenin and Stalin and Mao tried to abolish families by making life difficult for them. Gramsci would have done more by transforming family life into an off-putting parody.
My fear is, though it seems Trumpius Sulla is likely to be Re-Elected, what will happen in 2024?
The majority of Americans seem to have accepted this Fantasy known as ‘Gay Marriage’ and will probably not hold Buttigeig’s Perversions against him in five years.
Those are just two examples.
In the third part of Mr. Codevilla’s essay he looks at what he rightly calls The Tightening Gramscian Grip:
…were Antonio Gramsci to survey today’s America, he would be hopeful.
Thanks to our dumbed-down, politically correct educational system, more and more Americans are susceptible to identifying religion, economics, and morality in the way our corrupt ruling class embodies them. Because our ruling class—religious leaders, politicians, professors, corporate officials, Hollywood, the media—are redefining the icons of American life in their own corrupt images, people increasingly are willing to turn their backs on them.
Gramsci would have reason to hope that, soon, Americans will no longer remember who they once were, and that, not wanting anything to do with what they now misunderstand that older America to have been, will be unable to resist the party.
Too many of us are slowly coming to Love Big Brother Antonio.
____________________________________________
…Listen, I’ve summed them all up: the teacher who laughs with the children at their God and at their cradle is ours already. …Schoolboys who kill a peasant for the sake of a thrill are ours. The juries who acquit all criminals without distinction are ours. A public prosecutor, who trembles in court because he is not sufficiently progressive, is ours, ours. Administrators, authors — oh, there are lots and lots of us, and they don’t know it themselves.
On the other hand, the docility of schoolboys and fools has reached the highest pitch; the schoolmasters are full of bile; everywhere we see vanity reaching inordinate proportions, enormous bestial appetites. [pause] Do you realize how many converts we shall make by trite and ready-made ideas?… [re-paragraphing mine]
–Peter Verkhovensky, The Devils by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Ancient Freedoms And Ordered Liberty: Restoring The Balance
From The Washington Sentinel, Warner Todd Huston reporting, we learn:
Every single Democrat in Virginia’s state senate voted against pay raises for the cops because so many police officers opposed the Democrat attack on the pro-Second Amendment.
Virginia State Senator Bill Stanley blasted the state’s Democrats for their “hypocrisy” after he tried to amend the state budget to include a pay raise for the state’s sheriffs.
Stanley told WTVR that he was “absolutely shocked” by the Democrats refusal to vote for the pay raise.
“I tried to amend the state budget to give all of our men and women of Virginia’s Sheriffs’ Departments a 3% raise for this year. It was defeated, with all democrats voting ‘no,’” Stanley wrote on Facebook.
…
Stanley also said that Democrat Majority Leader Dick Saslaw admitted that the “no” vote was in retaliation for the support so many sheriffs gave to the Second Amendment as the Democrats sought to undermine it as the year’s legislation began.
“Saslaw came up and said this to me, ‘Hey Stanley, you want to know why your sheriffs didn’t get a raise? Because they came to our committees and said that they weren’t going to enforce our laws.’ When I asked him which law was he talking about, he said, ‘Gun control,’” Stanley wrote in his post.
“Dick is a friend of mine. I love him dearly,” Stanley added. “He’s never lied to me, so I believe what he said was true that the reason why the sheriffs were not getting a raise is because some sheriffs dared to come up here to the people’s house and declare that they were going to support the Second Amendment of the Constitution and, I guess, that didn’t jive to well with him.”
When we talk about Restoring our Ancient Freedoms and Ordered Liberty, one of the key aspects of doing so is returning control to The Sovereign People at the lowest possible governmental level. The closer certain decisions are made to the smallest groups of them, the more Justifiable Power And Control we can exert.
There was a time in most states when county governments taxed those within their boundaries. I’m not sure if Virginia was one of those, but there’s no reason The Sovereign People of Virginia cannot Implement this practice.
Since the Age Of FDR, the national government has increasingly been gather Powers it was never given by The Constitution. It has Deprived state, county, and local governments of their Just Powers; it has made state governments nothing more than Administrative Units of the ever-encompassing national one.
This Despotic Behavior has not been restricted to the federal sphere: state governments have been sucking county and local powers into their sphere — Destroying the counties and leaving them just a shell of what they once were, entities in name only.
Another example is Welfare, which, though nominally under state control, is controlled by The Congress. At one time, welfare programs were handled by the cities and towns or by the counties.
Such grabs of Power And Control have made these programs, and others, Unanswerable to Local Concerns. And our local leaders have played along with it.
Any Plan Of Restoration must include returning certain powers as close as possible to The Sovereign People.
Most of the Big City Governments are Terminal because they have become cesspits of Utterly Corrupt Politicians, Bureaucrats, Community Organizers [ie: professional, Radical Agitators], and Tribal Interest Groups.
So deep is the seepage of the Corruption that it has spread into most of the mid- and small-sized Cities and even into many Towns and County Governments.
However, as these last types of local government mentioned are closest to us, we stand a fair chance of being able to save them by gaining Control of and over them. The Founders understood this and most of them championed putting as much Governmental Power as possible in Local hands [the term often used to describe this concept is ‘Subsidiarity’].
—THE PRESENT CRISIS, Chapter 7: Is The Patient Terminal?
Francis I: Long Marcher
Over at Moonbattery on 06 February, Dave Blount wrote an Excellent and Insightful post on The Anti-Pope Francis I.
Some highlights with my commentary…
Communism was imposed by brute force in Russia and China. In the West, where people are too used to freedom and live too well to submit to slavery without a hell of a fight, communists have settled on a different approach. German Marxist Rudi Dutschke called it the Long March Through the Institutions.
By infiltrating, subverting, and eventually commandeering major institutions, communists can brainwash large numbers of people into giving up their freedom and their standard of living of their own free will. Eventually, many will become communists themselves, and find a twisted sort of meaning by working to deny others freedom and the wealth that freedom creates.
The strategy works, or we would not find ourselves in a position where Bernie Sanders could conceivably be elected President of the United States. Key institutions with vast power to shape opinions have already fallen under the domination of leftists….
They will come to Love Big Brother. George Orwell warned us:
He gazed up at the enormous face. Forty years it had taken him to learn what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark moustache. O cruel, needless misunderstanding! O stubborn, self-willed exile from the loving breast! Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother. [Nineteen Eighty-Four, Chapter 6]
It’s worked it’s Magick on The Anti-Pope.
More from Mr. Blount:
Pope Francis is presented with a gift of a crucifix carved into a wooden hammer and sickle, the Communist symbol uniting labor and peasants, by Bolivian President Evo Morales in La Paz, Bolivia, Wednesday, July 8, 2015. (L’Osservatore Romano/Pool Photo via AP)
At a Vatican seminar, the Red Pope denounced tax havens that shelter money he thinks should be confiscated “to fund health care and education.”
“Today’s structures of sin include repeated tax cuts for the richest people, often justified in the name of investment and development,” Francis told the meeting organized by the Pontifical Academy for Social Sciences.
There was a time when violating the 8th and 10th Commandments was considered sin.
Without investment and development, there is no money to confiscate. But getting your hands on other people’s property is only a short term benefit of Marxism. The lasting advantage is control.
Power And Control.
More:
On Wednesday, Francis wept that the world per capita income will be only $12,000 this year. That number would represent an astonishing explosion of wealth compared to the recent past. But the actual income is even higher, according to World Bank data. It is three times higher than it was in 1990.
This is hardly the time to revert to a system of takers ruling makers, as we had throughout human history until recently — unless the point is not to feed the poor but to exploit them to achieve power, or to advance an ideology that allows others to achieve power.
Of course, what this Anti-Pope doesn’t Comprehend is that he will be nothing but a Lackey, a mere Apparatchik, of The Leftists who end-up wielding Power And Control, someone who will be Discarded on The Ash Heap Of Idiocy once his Usefulness is done.
Pope Francis was Anointed, not by God, but by the Evil Ones [The Superforce] inside The Roman Catholic Church who are participants in The Long March Through Our Institutions.
Losers Or Losers: Which One Shall I Be Today?
Lynn Chu, who has a Vibrant and Insightful mind, has written the following in a recent Facebook posting:
The Democrats are such a mess they really need to hire some Republicans to tell them how to run a party that isn’t systematically falling into completely insane ideological cul de sacs, can’t count votes, can’t hire decent IT people, and can’t manage its way out of a paper bag. Market opportunity for idle Republican strategists and p.r. people!
It’s kind of hilarious that they focused so intensively on manipulating the press that they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams to the point where the press is so craven and stupid that together, all of them spinning around in their circle jerk, look doubly stupid.
We need a net reduction in the entire “political operative” class.
With apologies to all of you guys who are ones.
I’m prompted to ask several related questions regarding de Sade de sac GOPe…
Who Am I?
-What have the GOPe teach the Democrats: how to lose with Grace?
-How to be Feckless Milquetoasts?
-How to be Useful Idiots for the Opposition?
-How to be Pragmatic Managers of the Status Quo?
These are the only skills possessed by the GOP and Conservative Establishment.
According to Stacy McCain’s reporting:
“Stand Up Republic” is the Evan McMullin/Mindy Finn organization funded by Democrat billionaire Pierre Omidyar. “Principles First” is an anti-Trump organization that is the brainchild of disappointed Rubio supporter Heath Mayo. Together, these two outfits are sponsoring the “Summit on Principled Conservatism” a week from Saturday.
So, if you want to learn to be a Professional Loser and no longer be an Amateur, I’d say sign-up and go! The only thing you have to lose is more of your Soul.
Go!…and learn the art of committing Treason From Within!
I’m Bob Belvedere and I approve this message.
[Bonus points if you can name the song I paraphrased in the post title]
The Camp Of The Saints 