It is the … building of a new collective consciousness by attacking, through ideological-cultural struggle and political action, all of the ‘intellectual-moral’ foundations of bourgeois society. This means … a thoroughgoing cultural revolution….
Carl Boggs
Gramsci’s Marxism, pp. 121-123
According to a history of the Soviet State Security “organs,” published in 1977, politically “unstable” Soviet citizens were kept track of and “managed” by the KGB. As it happened, such management required a special kind of “prophylactic” work. The key was to persuade the Soviet citizen in question to recognize the “political harm” of “indiscretions committed … [so they could] get back on the right path.” If this “persuasion” was successful, it would prevent criminal breaches of the Soviet security system and social structure.
A similar process of “prophylactic” correction has been set up today, in the United States. Only it has been done without reference to state security organs or the police. If you are a professional in almost any field, you have probably been compelled to accept politically correct dogmas or programs. For example, your employment or career might suffer if you were overheard saying marriage is the union of man and woman. Or your grades might suffer in a college course if you questioned the “settled science” of anthropogenic global warming. Worse yet, you could be attacked and beaten in the street for saying, “All lives matter.”
Our emerging system of cultural control anticipates a future system of police control. Anti-socialist elements are routinely identified and demonized (as seen in the case of President Donald Trump or his followers). A vast indoctrination, utilizing peer group pressure and career incentives, has long been under construction in America. Citizens in all walks of life are judged as “responsible” or “irresponsible,” based on their willingness to cooperate with the agitation-propaganda of the socialist camp. Those who oppose socialism are deemed “reactionary.” Those who waver, and attempt to adopt independent thinking, are labeled “immature.” It is not a matter of being arrested. The system works by propagating social and administrative consequences — enforced by managers, teachers and colleagues. It has progressed slowly, imperceptible, using code words that avoid direct socialist declarations. Always, in this process, the socialist camp advances under cover, using environmentalism, anti-racism and concern for the poor.
The whole thing is a cynical swindle. Those who see through it are targeted for ostracism. This is especially true for those attempting to expose the subversive activities of the socialist camp. Such people are denigrated. They are made to feel like kooks, driven from respectable society into the fringes; fired from their academic or government jobs, forced into retirement or worse.
This process has had many victims. Naturally, in a free society, those who are pushed out of jobs in teaching or government or the media can try a new profession. They can find employment as dishwashers, baristas or night janitors. They do not get thrown in prison or executed, as would happen in China, Cuba or North Korea; so one might ask why there should be any talk of victims at all. The soft tyranny of the American left thinks of itself as humane. Yet a society that believes a lie and muzzles truth-tellers will not stay humane for long.
What has been happening in America, for many years, is a cultural revolution which prepares the way for a more violent kind of uprising. As Carl Boggs explained in his book on Gramsci’s Marxism, we are talking about “a thoroughgoing cultural revolution that sets out to transform all dimensions of everyday life and establish the social psychological underpinnings of socialism before the question of organized state power is resolved.”
Here is an approach advocated by the Italian communist, Antonio Gramsci. It is an amendment to Lenin’s revolutionary theory, offering the prospect of cultural changes that will facilitate the revolutionary seizure of power in an advanced capitalist country (like the United States).
To understand Gramsci’s contribution to Leninist theory, it is worth examining the Leninist concept of the “dictatorship of the proletariat [i.e., the working class].” According to Marx the state is a machine of class oppression. Therefore, the present form of government in the United States is called by Marxists “the Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie [i.e., the dictatorship of those who own businesses].” It is, according to the Marxists, a form of government in which the rich employ democracy and the free market to rob the poor. The objective of the Marxist-Leninist revolution is to overthrow the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie in favor of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
What, then, is the dictatorship of the proletariat? First, it is “the instrument of the proletariat revolution.” Second, it signifies “rule over the bourgeoisie.” As such, it is concerned with political power. But the seizure of power is not the final objective. According to J.V. Stalin, in his Foundations of Leninism, “The seizure of power is only the beginning.” Why? Because the power of the bourgeoisie is not broken by taking over the government. In many cases, the bourgeoisie can take the government back. The question is how to prevent this. According to Stalin, “the whole point is to retain power, to consolidate it, to make it invincible.”
The consolidation of power in a federal system, subjected to checks and balances, with state governments and a national government operating separately, is not easy. It requires decades of painstaking work. (Here is why Gramsci is so useful!) We see how the Marxists in the United States have always sought the centralization of power in a way that no mechanism of law — no checks and balances — could effectively oppose. Their control of the bureaucratic levers is the essence of the “deep state.” It refuses to obey checks and balances, legal procedures and legal orders from elected magistrates. It will only obey when a president of the socialist camp enters the White House.
To attain invincibility in the consolidation of power, noted Stalin, three main tasks must be carried out. First, to break the resistance of landlords and capitalists, “to liquidate every attempt on their part to restore the power of capital.” Second, to prepare the elimination of the middle and upper classes. Third, “to arm the revolution, to organize the army of the revolution….”
Resistance can be broken, for example, by defunding the police, by widespread looting, by collapsing the currency. At the same time, Marxist infiltration of big business can be used to stage provocations which underscore the wickedness of the capitalists. It is important, from the point of view of the revolution, that the capitalists are always blamed.
Psychologically, the expropriation of the rich needs to happen suddenly. It must be ruthless and thorough. It is facilitated by the fact that the rich are numerically insignificant and the government can be turned against them. If, at the same time, the masses are rioting and looting, the rich will find themselves in a hopeless position.
In terms of establishing a socialist society, the hardest thing to accomplish, in all of this, is the expropriation of the small business owners. These people are quite numerous. They are independent in their thinking. Wherever they exist, capitalism continues. To make the new dictatorship secure, according to Lenin, “the abolition of classes means not only driving out the landlords and capitalists” which is accomplished with comparative ease. It means “abolishing the small commodity producers….”
Yes, it means that all small businesses must go. They cannot be allowed to exist. Naturally, their resistance may become violent. Thus, Lenin explained, “The dictatorship of the proletariat is a … ruthless war waged … against a more powerful enemy, the bourgeoisie, whose resistance is increased tenfold by its overthrow.”
Revolutionary theory anticipates a very violent bourgeois reaction. The counterrevolution which follows the establishment of “the dictatorship of the proletariat” will require the Marxists to use bloody and bloodless forms of struggle. It will involve violent and peaceful means of persuasion. It will rely on educational, economic and administrative weapons to smash “the forces and traditions of the old society,” noted Lenin.
About this process, Karl Marx said to the workers: “You will have to go through fifteen, twenty, fifty years of civil wars and international conflicts … not only to change existing conditions, but also to change yourselves and to make yourselves capable of wielding political power….”
Lenin wrote: “It will be necessary under the dictatorship of the proletariat to re-educate millions of … small proprietors, hundreds of thousands of office employees, officials and bourgeois intellectuals, to subordinate them all to the proletarian state and to proletarian leadership, to overcome their bourgeois habits and traditions….”
Lenin joked that the workers would not easily give up their “bourgeois prejudices at one stroke, by a miracle, at the bidding of the Virgin Mary….” It would only happen, he said, “in the course of a long and difficult mass struggle against the mass petty-bourgeois influences” of tradition.
The struggle that Lenin described will involve slogans and stratagems; but it will also involve the violent breakup of the old order in all its particulars. The dictatorship of the proletariat, as a new form of government, said Stalin, “is a revolutionary power based on the use of force against the bourgeoisie.”
Perhaps the most important note that Stalin attaches to his summary of Leninist teachings on the dictatorship of the proletariat, is that this dictatorship “cannot arise as the result of the peaceful development of bourgeois society and of bourgeois democracy….” This dictatorship, which the communists seek to establish at all costs, “can arise only as the result of the smashing of the bourgeois state machine, the bourgeois army, the bourgeois bureaucratic apparatus, the bourgeois police.”
One shudders to imagine the “smashing” of so many institutions, the destruction of the capitalist system itself, and the advent of a full-blown socialist dictatorship. Ask yourself: Would America’s nuclear deterrent survive such a process? Surely, Beijing would applaud the advent of a communist regime in Washington, if only because Chinese world dominance would be assured.
Notes and Links
Chinese defense spending may be higher than U.S. spending in real terms — https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/chinese-and-russian-military-spending-could-actually-exceed-the-us
The most Communist literature I have ever read is posted on this website.
https://www.cpusa.org/
What I mean is, you share and likely read more communist literature than anyone I know, read, respect or talk to. The infatuation with it is yours, not the fellow Americans you label as Communists. Just because the CPUSA website looks nice and works well doesn’t mean you’re going to be disappeared. The persecution complex is raging.
What readers like Terry don’t understand is that people like Jeff, who warned [others], and like Terry himself who denies reality, in a close example like Venezuela, are no longer there. they have either been killed or are in exile. If USA falls, Terry will have no way to apologize for his blindness.
See this is exactly my point. Mr. Rodrigues here dismisses the vast majority of America, including all his neighbors and millions of others he doesn’t know, as people who would go along with such a thing. In his eyes we are already Venezuela, because he does not truly know his fellow Americans. The Grand Specter of Communism has blinded him from what’s in front of his own face, a prosperous nation that will no doubt continue to prosper through hard work, freedom, and the shared dream of something better. Communism has become his daily poison of choice.
How’s this: if Jeff is ever disappeared I will personally appeal for endless investigation until his fate is known. I’m sure I wouldn’t be the only person wondering why he had gone quiet.
Come now, Terry, you aren’t interested in this subject at all. You claim to haven’t read much about it until now, which suggests you’ve never been to college. But is that really true? And though I never wrote anything about being “disappeared,” as you put it, you propose that I have done so. That isn’t even honest. Naturally, you wouldn’t deny that people are “disappeared” in communist countries. Right? And as you know, Antifa is a communist organization. Right? And they are out there, in our streets, burning the American flag and pulling down statues. Right? And they are violent. Right? Are you going to deny any of these points? It would be amusing to see you try.
If Terry has never read communist writings before, and knows nothing about the history of communism, why is he showing up on this site? Why is he pestering me? Only someone who shares my interest in the subject would bother. Right? Therefore, I have to wonder what his interest is? Why make arguments against an anti-communist? Is Terry pro-communist? If he doesn’t care either way, why show up here and post comments? Now this is a mystery. Could it be that Terry is a very cunning fellow? Or has he been persuaded to be against me even though he doesn’t understand me and isn’t interested in my subject? If so, who persuaded him to be an anti-anti-Communist? And, paradoxically, why am I in his crosshairs?
If you are actually interested in knowing the answers to these questions I’d be happy to oblige. But you are not receptive to a viewpoint that is unwilling to demonize the entire concept of Communism outright. You have, on many occasions, mentioned being personally erased by the shadow agents of Communism. In the comment section of your own website you have mentioned it an assortment of times. Your delusions stretch far beyond the Communist cabal you think is attacking America. You are “in my crosshairs” because you epitomize the argument against utilizing necessary aspects of socialist ideology to better our country. And you write well. That’s all.
I think Jeff understood the puzzle. Terry is a communist agent who works to discourage patriots or keep them deluded that communism is harmless, inevitable or even good for America.
I’m a Communist agent now! Hysterical.
Take the compliment. It’s better than being considered a dupe.
LoL WHAT??! You claim that being seen as the enemy is better than being seen as a fellow countrymen? Do you hear yourself? You desire an enemy. You desire as strong an enemy as can be, so the ridiculous authority you claim over others you deem as “dupes” is eternally justified. In all likelihood the situations in Russia and China, however precarious, are signifiers of the last gasps of historic totalitarianism. Tyranny cannot win anymore. This is what you don’t seem to understand. People across the world are waking up to this reality, and it cannot be undone. Tyrants will try and blood will flow but these are the final desperate acts of what you consider the Great Enemy that is Government Tyranny (often in the form of Communism). I agree with you that these forces exist! But they are dying as mass populations start to believe in something better. Stop seeing everyone as your enemy and maybe you’ll begin do the same.
You are not sufficiently educated in history or philosophy to make such sweeping pronouncements. Before drawing such conclusions you should first familiarize yourself with mankind’s 2,500-year history — from Herodotus to the present — and read those thinkers who knew this history well and attempted to draw inferences from it. What these thinkers said is very different from what you have written here. These men spent their lives trying to understand how history plays out in various situations. Your simplistic Democratic optimism is shown by history to be a dangerous delusion. Who are these “people” who always defeat tyranny? These have rarely prevailed in history. Rather, the “people” under “democracy” tend to be duped by demagogues. Democracy turns out in practice to be another way of organizing oligarchy. All political systems are, in fact, oligarchical. Democratic rhetoric involves a serious self-deception. It is occasioned by a cynical flattering of the masses. The masses are always led by others. Those who credit the people with magical powers are not wise. In reality, competent abstract political thought belongs to the few (a tiny percentage of the population). When this tiny percentage is displaced from the intellectual leadership of society a crisis begins. Your naive discourse about tyranny and the inevitable victory of “the people” takes none of this into account. It shows the extent to which you have been hypnotized by today’s most dangerous demagogues (those who have displaced the accumulated political wisdom of the past with dangerous jargon, false narratives, and empty slogans). Society cannot advance or even maintain itself without honest leaders who tell the truth. What we see today, unfortunately, is the displacement of successful and time-tested abstractions with a false set of toxic ideas advanced by charlatans and revolutionaries. The new ideas of our time effectively demoralize society and gradually conquer it, with many deleterious effects. The collapse of the birthdate is one such effect. Epidemic mental illness and depression, psychopathy and disordered personalities is another. Presently, we have entered a very dangerous moment in history. Billions of people may perish as a result. Intellectual weapons, fashioned by political criminals who style themselves “revolutionaries,” have appeared in our midst. They have deployed narratives to disorder, demoralize and conquer society. You cannot see this because you have internalized some of the deployed weapons and accepted poisonous ideas as “truth.” The 95 percent of the population who cannot think abstractly are vulnerable to the demagogy of these ideas. Many of our countrymen are in the process of being intellectually dominated by the “revolutionaries,” whose narratives are carefully fashioned and persuasively argued. What gives these narratives away are the disintegrative effects they produce: the decline of the family, massive government debt, riots and looting, the paralysis of society’s defensive structures. If you read Marx, Lenin, Stalin and Gramsci, you find a rich literature on the structuring of these narratives and the fashioning of intellectual weapons for revolutionary purposes. If you know the history of tyranny you will also detect in this literature a malevolent spirit. Everything in this literature justifies, strategizes and perfects mechanisms of a scientific tyranny. It is the most perfect tyranny known to history, relying on very advanced concepts. An entire system of false ideas has been built up in order to overrule the intellectual structures on which civilization depends. The objective is to take over society on a false set of pretexts. There is no real concern for society itself. The central concern is the acquisition of unlimited political power. Once this succeeds globally, humanity will be at the mercy of the “revolutionaries” — the same types that rule in Russia, China, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran and so forth. The entire world will belong to them. When I write of “enemies” I refer to these very people, their parties and political allies around the world. If you are with them, if you are aiding and abetting them, then you are on the side of this enemy. If you are one of Lenin’s “useful idiots,” perhaps you are innocent by reason of stupidity. But if you side with the enemy’s false narratives you are in danger of helping this enemy — just like those capitalists who have invested in China, or those politicians (from either party) who are bought by Chinese-connected interests. Ignorance might be a valid excuse in your case, and you might be excused for that ignorance. But if you obstinately join the revolutionary cause, and an armed conflict breaks out, you will find yourself fighting against your country. How then, after discovering the truth, will you live with the shame and guilt of your mistake? I hope this will not be your fate. It was the fate of John Reed, who sincerely believed in communism and found he had given his life to an evil cause. Tragically, he did not forgive himself and willed himself to die — even as his wife begged him to live. This is my answer to you, and it is as complete an answer as I can give in so small a space.
This is a very thoughtful response even with the little space you have! Honestly, I appreciate your dedication to the topic and your sincerity in your views. Your perspective, if accurate, is of great concern for the safety and survival of America. If this were any other time in history your case would be made and there would be little to argue against. And if I am a “useful idiot” who somehow learned all the perfections of Communist subversion without reading a lick of it, affiliating with its fanatics, being raised by revolutionaries, or taking any of the would-be paths that lead to Marxist radicalization, then Communist subversion is simply in the air and can be caught by anyone who breathes. But it is 2020 and it seems you don’t give humanity credit for its accomplishments. In the face of a savage and brutal human history, goodness remains. Despite centuries of being held down by the very civilization they helped build, black Americans have hope. The more cruelty and injustice is exposed in this world the more good people will stand up against it. You seem to believe that power is the ultimate ruler of this universe, that power is essentially God. If power is God then only the powerful should expect to thrive in this world, and maybe John Reed became convinced of that. If your answer to tyranny is tyranny then why is suicide so terrible? Are those who would rather die than fight really that bad?
Every one of your stated beliefs — from unilateral American disarmament to the racism, sexism, homophobia mantra — is integral to the present-day communist teaching. An American, like me, who believes in liberty and limited government, and who wants the country safe from attack, is not the one advocating tyranny. I oppose communism because it is a movement that murdered 100 million people in the twentieth century. Antifa and BLM are part of that movement. Marxists run those organizations, and they share the same ideas advanced by the criminal rulers in Beijing. Mass killing and repression is what Marxists do. For you to reproach me as an advocate of oppression and tyranny is not honest — because that’s exactly what I stand against. You are the one in this discussion who has taken up the rhetoric of scientific tyranny. You evidently believe in it — out of ignorance or malice. It is remarkable that you accuse me of not believing in people’s goodness. Which people? Certainly I do not believe in the goodness of the communists, while you do not credit their wickedness. And that is the difference between us. I do not call evil good as you have attempted to do. I call them evil, and the record is unambiguous regarding communism. Haven’t you read The Black Book of Communism? If you are ignorant of this, it is a terrible ignorance. It is inexcusable; for you ought to know what you are talking about when pronouncing on such momentous things. But you either do not care about the truth, or you cynically pronounce against it.
I’ve said this before: repeating the atrocities of Communism is a waste of time in my eyes, because we are in agreement that they are terrible and frequent. I am more concerned with objectively looking at the atrocities of America and reconciling those, so that the country may heal and move forward no longer bogged down by domestic dysfunction. You insist on regurgitating every Communist massacre because it frightens people, which makes them easier to control. You will blab all day about the looming danger of Communism completely ignoring the real life consequences of unchecked Capitalism run amok right in your home town. Because ultimately, America works for people like you. You own things already. You have status. Your generation and demographic had opportunities abound. I don’t need to read commie literature to see how ridiculous the last 40 years have been in this country, and to diagnose the ailment. Traditional Communism is antiquated knowledge, no longer relevant to modern society. No matter how big BLM rallies get, America knows this. Stop equating every social movement that makes you uncomfortable with Communism. If you spend five minutes engaging in the movement, it’s obviously not the truth. Reparations are not Communism. Universal health care is not Communism. Rational government policy is not Communism.
Oh! It’s a waste of time to recount the 100 million plus victims of communism, eh? Of course, you know better than to argue with historical fact. The best attack, for a Marxist, is to focus on the imperfections of America. That’s how you justify a revolution, after all. And you are a revolutionary, aren’t you? No harm in being honest now. Your red frills are showing, Terry. Unlike you, I don’t want to control people; that’s your thing. — The dangers of unchecked capitalism, Terry? Like nice stores and good jobs? Yes, Terry, I own things already because I’m 62 years old and have been working since I was 16. Do you really think the communist movement of today is different than it was 40 years ago? I guess you’re going to do it right this time, and not use violence on the rest of us. But really, Terry — you’re as red as a fire truck!
The dangers of unchecked Capitalism, Jeff. Lifetime passive income, labor wages one can’t survive on, bankruptcy from health care, for-profit prisons, hereditary wealth, purchased elections, not to mention the widespread corporate economic waste/tax abuse that never gets punished. Sure, let’s once again recap all the Communist massacres of the past so that we can ignore all these things of the present! Every day we can dismiss these real life atrocities that slowly sink America, and instead paint normal Americans as Communist traitors to keep people afraid. These are the tactics you employ, and it is sad.
Investment income is an atrocity?
In it’s current form? Yes it is. Generating excessive wealth from existing wealth is not a sustainable model. When people can grow wealth without working, money ultimately becomes worthless. If the dollar crashes this will be why.
You are ignorant of economics, then.
Again with the high horse. Why not educate me then? Please explain your theory on how wealth that’s not tied to tangible resources or labor can multiply infinitely without collapsing.
You paying me tuition now?
*eye roll emoji*
The standard of living we enjoy was made possible by a process of capital accumulation. No accumulation, no investment; no investment, no technological progress; no progress, no decent standard of living. People who are good at saving money have to invest it, or it is destroyed by inflation. But they have to be smart about their investment. All our material progress is based on this. If you take away investment income and smart investors, there is no incentive to invest. All material progress stops cold.
Why do I have to be a philosophical scholar to have worthwhile personal beliefs?
I never said you have to be a philosophical scholar. But if you come to my site and say I am crazy or wrong, then you’d better have real arguments instead of your usual communist claptrap. Either say something interesting or wave goodbye to all the nice people.
If I’m so disinteresting and ridiculous why am I one of the few people on this site you will dedicate long paragraphs to? Should I go screenshot the lengths to which you will counter my viewpoint? I can’t really be all that uninteresting to you, we have had extensive communications.
Your ideas are uninteresting and ridiculous. But everyone is on pins and needles puzzling over your motives and allegiances….
Pfft! Why am I important? Because I’m the lone dissenting voice here? Did I stick my head into an echo chamber here? I didn’t think so, because you seem intelligent. But the more I have read the less rooted in reality you seem. So perhaps I don’t belong here…
Ask yourself why a lone dissenting voice makes you suspicious. Are you trying to avoid them?
Lone dissenting voice? Of the two of us, I’m the lone dissenting voice. You try to intimidate me by calling me a bigot and a warmonger while sounding every theme of the communist movement’s mass line, in country where that line has prevailed in universities, the media and government; — and you have the temerity to call yourself a dissenter?! You wouldn’t have the guts to step out from the ruling leftist mob and express an idea of your own if your life depended on it. All your ideas were given to you by the hive collective.
Ahh ok, I see how you can see it that way. For the past 20 years the Conservative voice has found it harder to be heard, so now you feel like the dissenting voice. I get it. My immediate response is to compare the frustration you’ve felt in recently becoming a minority voice with the frustration of the Native American community, the African American community, and the LGBTQ community, which have faced overwhelmingly more sever oppression than you have. Do you think if generations of your ancestors trudged through the miseries of that type of state sanctioned oppression, that you might have an interest in challenging and dismantling the authorities which allowed that to happen? Do you think a justified conviction might live inside you? To fight against the system that works this way?
Oppression? Everybody’s ancestors suffered from hardships. The current spoiled generation — of all races — has no idea of how lucky they are. Try living a year without running water, electricity or automobiles. Yes. That’s how everyone used to live. Oh, and guess what. Capitalism made all those innovations possible.
Right, I’m sure we never would have figured those things out without bosses getting rich. What an absurd stance. And when I talk about oppression I mean literal ownership of a person, annihilation of one’s culture and past, theft of all wealth and opportunity. Not everyone’s ancestors have been through these things, guy. Some have had it far better than others, and the current “spoiled” generation are the only ones who have ever been free enough to confront it on a societal level. It’s no surprise the fear mongers and tyrants are mobilizing to take them down.
You are certainly for annihilating my culture, Terry. Perhaps you don’t know this, but: Slavery was universal in pre-modern cultures. American Indians even had slaves. Capitalism here in America got rid of people owning people. So that should not be one of your complaints. And yes, everybody’s ancestors were at one time conquered or enslaved by somebody or other. I’m Swedish and we were once oppressed by the Danes. Should I set to whining and ask for reparations? The people who have it better are living right now. You live better than Medieval King’s — who were bitten by fleas, plagued by rats, and died from dysentery and typhus just like their subjects.
Did Danish oppression drastically reduce you and your family’s opportunities and chances at success in modern day America? If not then they should not be compared. Slavery of black people by whites in America was happening 3 generations ago. Why are you constantly downplaying the impact that has had on blacks in America today? Why are you always trying to dismiss it like it’s not significant?
None of my ancestors had black slaves. Me and mine had no part in it. The world is full of injustices and many injustices are suffered in this world without reference to race. Are we supposed to retroactively fix those, too? We address what is here and now. There is no way to adjudicate this. Senator Kamala Harris is black, but she had slave holding ancestors as well as slaves in her ancestry. Maybe she can fix it by apologizing to herself.
I’m not sure how she can contribute to the solution but hopefully we will have a chance to see. The opinion that “you and yours have no part in it” is not honest. This country’s success is directly tied to the blood of slaves and Native Americans, but somehow you have detached yourself from that. We all have a part in this, and the fact that you don’t feel that way is indicative of your preferential stance towards justice.
I am not a country. I am an individual. I am responsible for my actions and you for yours. Collective guilt and responsibility partakes of the error of attributing individual characteristics to collectives. Crimes are committed by individuals. My hands and my brain — my responsibility.
But accountability is not uniform. White people have killed black people for centuries without getting justice, whereas justice against black people is doled out in disproportionate ways. The country as a whole has condoned this forever, which is why there is now a call for it to stop. I don’t understand how you feel separate from the history of your country.
Terry, people of all colors have killed people of other colors for centuries. People of the same color have killed each other too. That is human nature all around the world. You want to assign blame? I am responsible for what I do. I have no responsibility to bend the knee because my skin is white. Your call for me to do that is racism, Terry. Plain and simple. It is a scam invented by Marxists to turn our country inside-out, to pit blacks against whites. By what logic do you make me responsible for what other people — with similar skin color — did in the distant past? You are assigning guilt by skin color. I have never harmed a black person. I judge people as individuals. I am a person, Terry. I am responsible for my own actions. Do you understand this concept? It is basic to civilization. If collective accountability were reasonable, Terry, then why don’t you go to Dresden, Germany, and volunteer to help elderly people who lost limbs or close relatives to American bombs in 1945? Why do you only have to help people who were hurt by past events when their skin is a different color? This is nonsense, Terry. I cannot be responsible for the past — nor should I be.
You think?
Should stating the current socialist /communist threats to America and the world be fear mongering, no harm will be done; however, not stating these threats plainly and openly should they prove true could be quite perilous.
Winston Churchill stated these threats clearly to FDR, and America has paid a heavy price for ignoring WC’s fear mongering.
Those of us who have studied history closely and do see how very precarious the situation is are not being duplicit, but anxiously positing the danger we see clearly. I’d love to ignore it all and party on. Although not to the extend of many, especially JR Nyquist, I have given a great deal of my time and funds to these studies. Greyhaired wisdom has been shoved aside for the shallow anarchy of the most vocal of today’s youth. This I say from experience. And the rest? Maybe they are too busy to attend to what is going on and are willing to accept promises from the smooth-tongued snake oil salesmen.
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens
WCW
Dear Jeff. Your recent writings are the most important of our time. These should be front page NY Times/ WaPo and would have been up untill the 90s. Maybe that’s why Clinton’s victory so disturbed traditional conservative Americans- they saw it as the beginning of the end game?
As a young man at the time I was too busy the distractions of life and besides- there would always be brave vigilant Americans to prevent what we are seeing now.. How could there not be?
The fact that the majority is blind to this convinces me more than ever of the spiritual component to this..
Spiritual blindness is the kind where a person doesn’t want to see.
Dear Terry. Please come to South Africa and see where looking through rose-tinted spectacles and self delusion brought all the people who thought that the things that Jeff warns about here is nonsense.
The consequences to real people are tragic, frightening, and completely ignored by our mainstream media.
No country plagued by racism is safe from destruction. Has South Africa taken the appropriate steps to reconcile with the victims of its racist past? If I was to try and learn about the struggles South Africans currently face, that’s where I would start.
I like reading these first hand quotes from Lenin and Stalin, finding it quite instructive. A couple in particular stand out to me: “The whole point is to retain power, to consolidate it, to make it invincible,” and, “whose resistance is increased tenfold by its overthrow.”
Both of these point out that socialists gaining state power isn’t the end of the Revolution but merely the beginning of their “smashing.” I kind of knew this but hadn’t realized how they talk about it themselves and that this is the ideological justification they give themselves. In their mind, they have to “smash” us harder than ever when they get power merely in self-defense.
It is best to acknowledge how dangerous people are when they see you are going to take everything from them. Lenin and Stalin were Machiavellian realists in this matter.
A little off-topic, but I just read that thousands in Wuhan, China, gathered for a massive pool party on Saturday. No masks, no social distancing. I couldn’t help but wonder what new virus was released/spread at that gathering? Picture at the link:
https://www.foxnews.com/world/wuhan-water-park-china-coronavirus
Today’s world news are Nyquist’s predictions for decades. A friend who lived through the Rhodeisa revolution and then re-experienced in in S. Africa said recently…..”Americans were to led believe “it will never happen here” It took them by surprise-just as planned. This is why it is being so successful. Americans don’t recognize it for what is”
Wonder what Jeff makes of the unrest in Belarus and Russia’s assurances of “help” if required under a joint defence treaty… Could it be an excuse to pre-position Russian forces in Belarus in advance of a wider global action to come in the near future? Given the role Belarus played in the Zapad 2017 exercises carried out 3 years ago, where Russia rehearsed an invasion of the Baltic states (for “access denial” or something) and a general assault on Poland and possibly Scandinavia. It concerns me as a British expat living in Latvia.
The Belarus military movements could be maskirovka preliminaries to aggressive moves in your region. There was a Russian military convey spotted and videoed moving into Belarus along the Smolensk to Minsk highway a few days ago. I would watch for tensions between Russia and Ukraine as well. To be honest, I would expect trouble in the Middle East and Far East before any actions are taken by Russia in Europe. I could be wrong, but Russia will be watching for the activation of those fronts before moving on the Baltic States. Russia has certain vulnerabilities and this means Iran, China and North Korea would probably have to take the lead in committing aggressive actions. Iran, according to my information, is likely to start the process off. So watch Hezbollah in the coming weeks. In my opinion, you are relatively safe as long as these other fronts are quiet. Once the others become active, make a bug-out plan.
Jeff, many thanks for taking the time to reply and for the intel on that convoy. I intend to keep a tight eye on those flashpoints, especially the Ukrainian one, but in any case really feel a strong urge to dash back to the UK as soon as possible. Every time NATO fighters fly overhead to intercept Russian incursions along the Baltic coast, it serves as a salient reminder of the fact that a militarily formidable and still quintessentially communist Russia is very nearby. My house is a 5 hour drive from Suwalki in Poland, and from there I can make Warsaw in 3 hours. I would hate to have to attempt that escape in winter with my wife and kids in the car, so for me, the sooner we get out the better.
The “Suwalki gap” is the main attack path for Russian troops into Poland. You might consider another way out? A boat ride to Stockholm?
I always made the (admittedly idealised) assumption that I would have enough of a warning to have time to dash through the Suwalki Gap, but I know it would be naive to count on it. Having driven through that area several times, I can say there are many low, gently rolling hills with slow, winding roads that are usually choked with freight trucks. I even got caught in a blizzard there in early May back in 2017, driving home to the UK for a short visit… From Riga there is a regular ferry crossing to Stockholm and another one from Liepaja to Travemunde in northern Germany, but again, I would need to not leave it until the last minute. The pandemic lockdown this year showed how quickly things can change… we were discussing whether we should stay or go when it was announced that the borders would be shut within something like 36 hours. This is why I think it’s vital to have clearly defined evacuation flags in one’s mind, such as those flashpoints you mentioned flaring up, although ideally I’d like to leave before it gets to that stage.
There are no easy answers here. If I were you (though I am by no means an infallible guide in such perilous circumstances), I would return home to UK if war breaks out in the Far East, using the Stockholm route. This method of determining your departure is not foolproof, as war could begin differently than I suppose; but this approach is based on something tangible on which you can form a rule of thumb. War in another part of the world fundamentally changes the safety dynamic everywhere. Any departure from the international order on that level should be a reliable guide.
To Terry George:
“Gentlemen, comrades, do not be concerned about all you hear about Glasnost and Perestroika and democracy in the coming years. They are primarily for outward consumption. There will be no significant internal changes in the Soviet Union, other than for cosmetic purposes. Our purpose is to disarm the Americans and let them fall asleep.” -Mikhail Gorbachev, speech to the Soviet Politburo, November 1987
You got a lot of s’plainin’ to do Terry (Lucy)…
Because something was spoken 40 years ago makes it so? The Russian people have nothing to say in this matter? Even with a despot like Putin in control, you think Russians who want freedom are silently allowing a 40 year old agenda play out in front of them uncontested? Throughout history people have shown their unending resolve to crush tyrants, yet you still fear them? As people across the world become more acquainted and understand each other better, as has been happening exponentially over the past 20 years, the power of tyrants will fade away. Some day fear mongers like you will realize this, and take your hand off America’s throat.
LOL!!!!
Your troll monkey canned responses are quite amusing…not really. Tell your handlers that they need to come up with better material, but then Dhimmicrats (read Marxist/Communists) have never been known for their sense of humor.
You obviously have no sense of history either.
You have probably never read any Sun Tzu or Clausewitz, just Che, BOBS, Mao, Castro, Stalin, Lenin, etc., etc…the same old tired and worn out Communist insanity.
Concern about tyranny is not fear-mongering, and your efforts to depict it as such are misguided.
But what you do is more than concern. It’s projection, suspicion, investigation into a self-fulfilling end that, when woven into other suspicious minds threatens to destroy society for the rest of us. You stoke fear first and foremost in a disproportionate way, regurgitating the hopelessness of America’s degradation (because of transexualism, hedonism, feminism, BLM), yet you claim you want peace? You and your cronies ostracize historically marginalized communities and act like you’re doing them a favor. Where is the courage in that? You claim state authority is the only way to bring peace to America. “Crack down on these anarchists!”, you say. “Name America’s enemies: China, Russia, ANTIFA, Feminists! These toxic adversaries must be controlled! Build more nukes!” Do you not recognize your own hypocrisy? As if there could ever be a more potent nuclear deterrent than the most powerful country in the world destroying their own arsenal in the pursuit of peace. For a supposedly spiritual man you don’t seem to feel any spirit of goodness in your fellow human beings. Unless, of course, they are also terrified of Communism.
You are following a script, Terry. Nothing you write is genuinely thoughtful. Now you twist my words, so you can pigeonhole me as a racist, sexist, classist, homophobe, warmonger. That list of ostensible crimes comes directly from the communist lexicon. It is, apparently, all you know. You never write anything original, do you? It’s just a repetition of the same old themes. I’ve heard these accusations so often over the last three decades, I feel like yawning. No departure from the Marxist script, eh Terry? — just stock themes from revolutionary publications? None of us know who or what you are. Given your constant presence here, and your behavior, and your repetition of the mass line, we are left wondering. Why, in this context, do you speak of my “cronies”? I am a writer as far as you know. What do you supposedly know about me? Of course, you won’t share. And why don’t you ever quote exactly what I say (instead of inventing quotes)? I never wrote those sentences you put in quotation marks. You made those quotes up. In fact, you don’t have the knowledge or skill to debate me on anything. You just call me the favored bad names that are always used by communists to malign anti-communists. That’s all you’ve got. Come to think of it, maybe you’re just a bot — an electronic parrot, an echo. If I sounded you, would you ring hollow? Of course, I hear your hollow ring, even now.
Again, your suspicions cloud your mind from thinking objectively. By “cronies” I mean readers who leave comments, of which you don’t counter-argue their seething bigotry or specious scripture references. I don’t quote you directly because there is too much dialogue to go sifting through to find the exact collection of points you make that accurately outline your views on the subjects of Antifa and BLM. You see them as Communist terrorists, correct? You want them arrested for rioting, correct? “You don’t have the knowledge or skill to debate me” is the epitome of your opinion. You believe you are the end all authority on strategic Communist subversion in America and I am telling you directly to your face: whatever sort of dedicated Marxist extremist you think I am, you’re wrong. So if you can paint me so incorrectly yet stand behind it so assuredly, at the very least I know that you’re off your rocker. Maybe that’s what keeps me coming back? The consistency with which you prove yourself wrong? By nature I am a person who was born to challenge authority, and the confidence behind your absolute delusion frightens me, because it no doubt spreads to your readers and beyond.
This is not even honest, Terry. You compel me to take you at face value. You espouse communist ideas and you misrepresent my ideas. Thus, you are not honest. You are on the side of my country’s enemies. I cannot see see inside your head, but how can I trust anything you say. You act as though it’s okay to make up false quotes and attribute them to me. This, more than anything, identifies you as my enemy. No honest neutral person would do this. Very tricky, in the end, is not credible. If I misread you it’s your own fault.
You constantly tell me I’m not honest. What is not honest about my previous statements? I’m not a Marxist. I’m not a Communist. I’m an American who wants to see his country thrive just as you do. When I tell you your overall vibe paints me and every other person like me as “the enemy”, despite us agreeing on many things, I’m not lying. You create enemies where there previously were none. This is not my doing.
Your misrepresentations of what I’ve written indicts you. Anyone can see it. Now you feign obliviousness, and throw it back in my face when everything you say is exactly what a communist troll would say. Why should anyone believe you? Someone who twists my words and invents quotes! Such cavalier excuses you make! How dodgy you are!
Jeff, whilei wait for your next articles with anticipation, I appreciate your responses to specific topics in the comments. It’s as if you hone your aim with a target.
Terry would be sad if it wasn’t such a pathetic attempt. But your articulations actually allow him the opportunity of recognizing good folly and preparing for that which is not yet fully outside his door. Thankfully I don’t have to try and talk to him about faith because if he can’t even see a communist threat, how in any world could be exercise even a mustard seed level of faith to know Yahweh. Oh well.
You comments to Jay show what you’re all about, and why you keep doing this despite the unfounded antagonism and ignorance that accompanies many articles you write.
The godless revolution has to now be fully confronted. There’s no more weeds for any to lay low in… it’s time for all of us to take what we read here and activate it in our communications and sphere.
Thanks Jeff
Jeff, do you think Alexei Navalny was poisoned by Putin?
Praying in OK
This is sort of thing we have come to expect from Putin.
I’m finding the debate here between Terry and the rest of us interesting and helpful. Terry believes the same things my sister and best friend from college believe. Neither of them are bad-intentioned people, but both of them are Marxist in their thinking, even though they don’t realize that and vehemently deny it. Yes, Terry, Communist ideology IS almost, as you put it, “in the air and can be caught by anyone who breathes.” But while you say that sarcastically, I say it seriously: the media, the universities, our celebrities, our TV shows, cultivate Marxist sentiment, whether or not we know to call it that. When you hear something often enough, over and over again, with no voice to refute it, you come to believe it.
I suspect that Terry sincerely believes the things he is saying. I’m glad that Jeff does not delete his posts, because he vocalizes what the people dear to me think but refuse to say to my face, being afraid of fracturing the relationship. It’s good to hear these emotions and thoughts steaming beneath the surface finally put into words. In reading a blog discussion like this one, I can remove myself personally from the hurt and anger that surround the topics and think about them more dispassionately. And by reading Terry’s arguments and opinions, and others’ rebuttal, I’m helped to sort out my own thoughts and develop my own arguments.
Terry, a person can believe in the ultimate goodness of the human spirit, and can believe that goodness will eventually win out, while still acknowledging the serious evil that today threatens that goodness. What troubles me most is that it’s mostly good people who believe as you do: people who, like the mesmerized children in the Pied Piper tale, innocently follow the piper into the gaping hole in the mountain. I don’t know how to get through the Pollyanna attitude, when the Pollyanna’s I love and want to dialog with refuse to talk with me because they’ve been taught that my beliefs are racist and a sacrilege even to discuss. When people stop talking, the divide can only grow wider, and the divine is now so wide society is nearly crumbling.
I don’t know how to breach the chasm, what to say to be heard. But I do know that until we find that way — until we can argue in a way that shows the Terry’s of the world that their faith in leftist dogmas leads to disaster – the chasm can only grow wider. And we must find a way to close it, if we are to defeat the evil that threatens to consume us. If we cannot bring our brothers and sisters back from the brink, we ALL are doomed.
Great reply, thank you. Your sincerity is a rope across the chasm, and it’s all any of us can do. I’m constantly throwing ropes and trying to build bridges with my staunchly Christian family. The dilemma we face is in how we each view authority. I view it as something to be challenged and the credentials laid bare, so together we as a community can rebuild authorities that we all respect and follow. My family views it as something to blindly concede to. The existing authorities are the best we can do, so we can’t question them. We have to cut them endless slack out of fear of the unknown – what would happen if we did approach policing and incarceration differently? Because my family is comfortable and safe (largely because of their inherited privileges), they genuinely see a dutiful questioning of any existing authority as “Evil”. Any waves are bad waves, and the people who make them are terrorists. In my opinion, their stubborn viewpoint is equally “Evil”, because it stops them from truly empathizing with their fellow human beings who have different personal experiences in America than they do.
When faith and politics are intertwined, as they are with my family (and this country), it’s impossible for them to think objectively without compromising their beliefs. This is a problem, and it is why I believe the divorcing of Christianity from American politics is necessary if this country has a future. But that viewpoint alone they would likely call treasonous, and Jeff would likely call deleterious.
You honestly compare the behavior of people in the modern age to the behavior of people in the 4th century? You don’t think things have changed?
People are people.
Sorry but it’s a little more complicated than that. Maybe this is why you only find your opinions on the fringes now?
Read some history, Terry. Human nature has not changed since Herodotus wrote his histories 2,500 years ago.
This is a ridiculous statement.
You are amusing, Terry. Please tell me about these changes in human nature you have discovered. I thought you hadn’t read any history and had no familiarity with accounts of life in Ancient Greece, Egypt and Persia. Do tell! How has our nature changed?
Well the first thing that comes to mind is people are beginning to question the inherent value of patriarchal governance. Is that not a change in nature? The undeniable equity women are coming into globally, as societies challenge the status quo of male dominated family. Is that enough of a change for you to recognize? People as a whole are becoming less violent. Do you not realize this?
Those are not changes in human nature, Terry. Those are cultural changes. As such, they are not even remotely sustainable.
So at what point do perpetual cultural changes become a change in nature? How many years?
The basic outlines of human nature cannot be changed by institutions, political slogans or culture. This was the error of the communists in Russia. They tried to create a new man. They called him Soviet man. All they did was to reduce the existing human population to cringing subservience — to slogans everyone stopped believing in — even as they paid lip service to them. Human nature, to flourish, requires freedom — and that means the freedom to buy and sell. Economic freedom. Without it, you cannot be fully human. Without it you are a slave. Socialism is opposed to this most basic freedom. Another aspect of human nature is that humans are unequal in their bodily strength, Intelligence and willingness to work. This, too, must be accounted for.
And acknowledging that the amount of waste and abuse in even a single industry of need, such as health care, is depleting this country of its ability to thrive equates to full fledged Communism? Why can’t economic freedom exist in a country that provides care for its citizens?
You have adopted communist ideas without understanding any of the subjects on which you are discoursing. This is sad, Terry. Where did you learn this nonsense?
Terry, that’s interesting, because it’s the reverse in my family. My sister, the liberal, is Catholic, while I, the conservative, am not religious. Like you, my sister believes white people are all racist by birth, and many of the other things you’e saying. In my experience, the difference between left and right isn’t exactly in how we view authority. There are lots of authority-hating conservatives — just look at all the conservatives running around without masks because they think it impinges on their freedom. Perhaps the difference is who we trust, who we listen to, who we get our information from. Conservatives get theirs from Fox News, liberals from the mainstream media, which means each are fed with totally different world views — even with a contradictory set of “facts.”
When we attempt to talk about our differences, the conversation stops short, cut off by our judgments of each other. The liberal calls the conservative a racist, and the conservative calls the liberal a snowflake or a libtard. Both parties feel offended and start to hurl more names and insults at each other. To achieve any sort of dialog, to persuade one another of anything, it seems to me we have to get past judging one another as evil, and listen to what the other person has to say. I think this is harder for conservatives than liberals, because we are more on the receiving end of the judgmentalness. It hurts to be called racist, or to get beat up for wearing a MAGA hat.
Last week a guy named Wade Queen posted an outstanding, thoughtful article in the comment section of this blog. It talks about the “white systemic racism” you mention and gives a good rebuttal. No name-calling, just sharing of ideas. I think you would find the article thought-provoking and interesting. I’m re-posting the link to it here: https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/abe-greenwald/yes-this-is-a-revolution/
Again, I appreciate your candor. Obviously each family is different, and the dynamics between members are personal and complex. I agree with much of what you’ve said, and the difficulties you see in your family I once faced in mine. With therapy we’re working towards maintaining a positive relationship with healthy boundaries, but there is a lot to unpack. What I’m finding is that there is no logic behind how Conservatives handle different authority. While despising every government mandated tax and regulation (which pay for public services they use every day) they also applaud excessive militarization of local police forces (which largely serve to protect private property they have no stake in). While demanding absolute control of health care for themselves, they simultaneously demand strict rules surrounding birth control and abortion for others (mostly because of their religious beliefs). They don’t take the threat of climate change seriously but they’re always worried about the threat of Communism (both invisible enemies with significant evidence for which to make a case). The way I see it, Conservatives cave to their worst fears and that’s what guides them. The fear that legal abortion will bring God’s wrath. The fear that climate change is a hoax used to grab political control. The fear that Russia and China aren’t intimidated by America’s strength and freedom, so we had better arm up. It’s all fear based. And while fear has always served humans well in their survival, in the modern world it has become a plague Conservatives let grow in themselves. All these liberals and leftists and “Communists” as Jeff would put it, are simply people who are not afraid to speak to the truths they see in front of them. Black people can still be murdered in the streets without penalty, by both police and regular citizens. Without video evidence 2 cases from this year alone would not even be headlines in the news (Ahmaud Arbury, George Floyd). The families of either of these men would be lucky to have their murderers convicted, but even with the videos the chances are almost nill. Jeff wants to deny this reality that black people live every day. He wants to compare it to Native American slavery. To his Danish oppression. Anything that will make the problem go away. In my opinion, these are the tactics of evil, if there ever were any.
I will read the story you linked to. Thanks for the replies.
My biggest issue with the essay comes from this passage, “We have our own Gavrilo Princip in the person of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who might prove over time to have been the most consequential figure of the 21st century thus far. Chauvin became one of history’s epochal nobodies when he was captured by video leaning on the neck of, and likely killing, George Floyd during an arrest for suspicion of passing a counterfeit $20 bill. The monstrous conduct of this one man lit a match in a country where the crooked timber of humanity had broken down into kindling. For three months prior, Americans had watched as their jobs, loved ones, plans, security, and very sense of self were swallowed up by the pandemic and subsequent lockdown. They no longer knew much about the world they lived in, but they knew that what took place in Minneapolis was evil. Chauvin’s action became a stand-in for all that was wrong with the United States. His brutality was the nation’s, as meted out by a racist police force on a campaign of black genocide. And so the unraveling began.”
This statement implies that all the previous unjust killings of black people at the hands of established authorities did not contribute to the current climate. This couldn’t be further from the truth. The people of America have had decades upon decades to reconcile its racist history. It has simply refused to do so.
Terry, Did you know that everything you expose here, your mentality, is exactly what the Soviet manuals predicted? His mindset is the end result of Soviet engineering to end America. Those like you who discovered this, have become dedicated conservatives and patriots who never tire of trying to wake up others from this zombie hypnosis that communists apply in all countries during the process of cultural domination that precedes the definitive installation of communism.
Right, because other countries largely influenced by Communism are also pushing for racial equality? Female autonomy? LGBTQ rights? If these things are so prevalent in the Communist agenda why are Russia and China not bastions for these freedoms you feel are so perverse? Your logic is just so simply backwards.
Countries like Russia and China have given lip service to racial equality and female autonomy, to be sure. But they do not have serious regard for anyone’s rights. This is a game they play. Many of the “rights” you refer to (if seriously enforced) are designed to disrupt our society and create economic, legal and political entanglements that objectively harm military morale, damage the birth rate, burden the courts, hurt families, etc. Some of these “causes” were created with the idea of criminalizing Christians, who form a solid block favoring national defense and oppose socialism. Other causes, like global warming, can cause economic damage and contribute to national indebtedness. Other causes are used to subvert, undermine and divide by race, sex, class — in a divide and conquer game. They would not use such weapons against themselves, as their countries are already conquered by socialism. Therefore, these “causes” are not taken up in Russia or China or “progressive” socialist countries like Cuba or Venezuela because the socialist countries do not want to hurt or divide themselves. These causes are meant to subvert the free world.
And you think these causes will be dropped the moment America adopts a single socialist policy? This is where you don’t understand your countrymen. These causes will not be dropped until these injustices are far fewer. White people are also executed by police for no reason, and believe it or not, BLM is fighting for justice for them too. As America sheds its majority denial of the modern consequences of our history, things you’re afraid of (disrupted society, economic entanglements, drop in military morale, birth rate, etc.) will be far less likely. Soldiers will have pride in fighting for the country that truly champions justice for its least fortunate. Citizens won’t fear the future and can procreate enthusiastically. For some reason you can’t even imagine the benefits of a compassionate nation.
These injustices you refer to have been exaggerated for political propaganda purposes, to justify violence against business owners and citizens. The riots and breakdown of order have caused far more death and loss of property than the 8 or 9 black citizens shot by police last year (with only one or two of these shootings legally unjustified). Over 1500 buildings were burned or damaged in Twin Cities alone. Countless people are dying in our cities from the mayhem now unleashed. But you do not reckon this death — unleashed by your socialist heroes. Your “justice” is a toxic lie. Last year the number of blacks unjustly shot by police can be counted on the fingers of one hand. In a nation of 320 million, this number reflects an accomplishment rather than an occasion for condemnation. No country is ever going to be perfect. If you have hundreds of thousands of police across the country, and you have only a handful of bad apples, that speaks to real tolerance — not racism. You talk about believing in the goodness of people. Where is this belief now? The communists would pull the speck out of our eye when there is a beam in their own. As for compassion, you have none for all those innocent people who were beaten, whose businesses were vandalized or burned.
Whatever man. You talk about history all the time and then dismiss the last 200 years in your own country, chalking up racial injustice to “8 or 9 black citizens shot by police”. How about Ahmaud Arbury who was profiled and chased down by racists 5 months ago? His killers wouldn’t have even been arrested if it wasn’t caught on video. Additionally, George Floyd wasn’t even gunned down! He was choked to death in broad daylight while bystanders pleaded for compassion. These 2 events don’t even mention the dozens upon dozens of other cases I’ve watched unfold in just the last 10 years of my life. Stop distorting reality to make yourself feel right. It’s extremely unbecoming.
Even if all those shootings you listed were unjustified, we are talking about racism at the level of one in one hundred thousand. As with the case of George Floyd, we should allow the autopsy and the legal system to determine what happened — according to due process of law, and not burn businesses, loot stores and leave neighborhoods stripped of police protection. Look at the analysis of racism and its history by scholars like Thomas Sowell if you want more thoughtful answers. He has looked at these questions carefully, dispassionately, and we can draw many understandings about how to handle these problems without destroying innocent people’s businesses or turning our society over to a socialist authoritarian state. In these matters I am not distorting reality. I am putting things into perspective with the view of protecting people’s lives and safeguarding their livelihoods. All our tax revenue depends on the successful development of businesses. If these are not protected, there will be fewer jobs in those black neighborhoods that need them most. You argue like a dedicated social justice warrior, yet you never consider the harm that your ideals promise to unleash. If you really care about people, then you should rethink your positions. Society is fragile and imperfect. It is easily broken and not easy to fix. It took us more than a thousand years to get here from the dark ages. We emerged out of total barbarism and illiteracy. This craze to destroy society because it cannot attain an impossible degree of perfection is madness.
For my 40 year lifetime, businesses have been protected very well. In the instances where the criminal justice system has outright failed black people specifically, and cities have burned in response, nothing can protect those businesses. The solution to that is to not give people a justified reason to riot in the first place. I am 40 years old and I am exhausted at hearing the same old denials and condemnations of people like you when looting happens. You focus immediately on the looting and ignore the entire reason the looting is happening, making people facing these injustices even more desperate. You create this problem and then chastise people for trying to solve it. You’re delirious or in denial. Probably both.
The denials are all yours. The looting of innocent business-people is never justified. But you won’t condemn it. Why? The reasons you give are mere pretexts. You pretend to be open-minded and reasonable. But you have not deviated from the revolutionary script in these threads. Like Khrushchev, you admit Stalins crimes. Then you pretend that this history bores you. It has no meaning. You have followed the Marxist line faithfully, like a good soldier. But tell me. Who benefits from your rhetoric? The very people you pretend to champion are harmed as businesses leave black neighborhoods — as police protection is withdrawn. Who wins? Thugs win. Have you no eyes? Of course you do. We all can see the criminal nature of the forces coming to power in the cities. But are you really clueless? At age 40? And you are bothered that I have condescended to you? But isn’t that intrinsic to our exchange of views? You and I live in different conceptual universes. Are these universes equal in what they offer? Are they equally well-reasoned, equally thoughtful, equally concerned with truth and justice? Are they equal in sincerity? People who think in a self-deceptive way, or who front for the lies of others, are not really sincere — contrary to appearances. Why? Because sincerity demands that we treat all claims and slogans with skepticism; it demands that we don’t believe things that aren’t so. Sincerity means due diligence in the realm of ideas and fact. It means admitting when we are wrong. Repeating party slogans and believing in the latest ideological fads cannot partake of this kind of sincerity. Rather, it requires cynicism to adopt and reiterate Marxist slogans; for those slogans were invented by cynical and insincere people. And that’s who you’ve sided with. The corruption of speech and thought which your political pronouncements require ought to make you blush. Your dismissal of my many points and facts are also cynical. I write a thoughtful reply and you respond with a cynical “so what” or “whatever.” You will not understand what I’m saying, of course, and regard it as an unfair insult. But as I’ve said before: you are not innocent in your thinking. John Reed, when he realized socialism was wicked, was so ashamed that he willed himself to die. Why? Because there was something decent in him; and it was awakened. He should have known good from evil before he went around the world serving a cause he did not fully understand. He was that rare human type — sincere and filled with a genuine repentance. Perhaps these qualities will awaken in you. Hopefully.
I have compassion for property loss. But not more than for the theft of human lives in front of my own eyes over my 40 year lifetime.
Cut the puppet strings tying you to the revolution. You are a unique soul with a unique destiny. Don’t diminish yourself. Don’t live life as if you were a walking political slogan.
Ugh you’re so condescending. I’m done reading you.
You never really read my words. You were never interested in my arguments. Your purpose in coming here was not to exchange ideas or ask honest questions. Your purpose was to hurl socialist slogans at me — to embarrass me with the “crimes” of my country. The present crisis is not what you allege. It is a communist power-grab which coincides with a communist-inspired pandemic. Everyone is going to catch on, Mr. George. The truth will out.
Jeff, not sure if you can comment, in regards to the Grand Solar Minimum, snow has hit China again in summer, this time in Yunnan Province in Southern China:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qlas-wuFPAc
https://electroverse.net/rare-summer-snow-hits-southwest-yunnan-china/
There are discussions where scientists who disagree with Global Warming are warning that the Jet Stream in the Northern and Southern Hemisphere has changed. According to John L. Casey, the author of Dark Winter, Cold Sun and Upheaval, he has also warned about changes to the Jet Stream during Grand Solar Minimums.
Terry appears to be genuinely stupid. We have leaders of the BLM calling themselves Marxists on TV, and the moron Terry complains that Nyquist is the only one reading Lenin.
Terry is deceptive in his self-depiction (which means he isn’t admitting certain things to himself). He knows exactly what he is espousing, that it originates from the far left, and he knows what side this puts him on. His pretense of being a normal American may sound persuasive to those who have no direct experience with Marxists; but I see the structure of his narrative, and he deploys the usual communist talking points. I am supposedly a dangerous crazy person for wanting the country defended and the laws upheld; also, capital accumulation through investment is “evil” — he calls it an “atrocity.” That’s pure Marxism. At the same time he wants to eliminate all of our nuclear weapons. Nothing here is naïveté. He wants the country disarmed so that communism can prevail everywhere and all at once. Then there won’t be a war, of course — just a surrender followed by mass repressions in which tens or hundreds of millions of people are murdered. He mocks the idea that anyone is going to be harmed, which he ought to know isn’t true. That makes him the dangerous crazy person. Nietzsche once wrote, “If you stare too deeply into the abyss, the abyss will stare into you.”
Terry, I agree that much of what we conservatives believe has some basis in fear, but sometimes it’s smart to be afraid. If the threat is real, the fear is justified.
Just because fear is involved doesn’t make a reaction or a belief invalid. For that matter, we could argue that liberals’ beliefs also come from fear: fear of not being in step with what’s politically correct, fear of being seen as a racist if they don’t bend their mind to think a certain way, fear of not being seen as a good person. The most sincere liberals aren’t afraid so much of what others think, as they’re afraid they might not measure up to a certain moral code, where compassion, helping others, and humility are paramount virtues (more important than liberty or self-preservation — which is crazy, because if you aren’t free and able to take care of yourself, how can you help anyone else?) But iin any case, fear is involved, whichever side of the aisle you are on.
The big question becomes: are our fears realistic? And in the case of our liberal friends: is their fear of not being good enough being manipulated by outside forces that wish to see them lose their self-confidence, their self-respect, their right to their possessions, their right to safety, their right to pride in their own culture? In short, by Marxist influences that aim to create a classless society ruled by the self-appointed anointed ones who know better than everyone else?
When I was in high school back in the sixties, our daily local newspaper ran a little quotation every day on the front page. It was captioned: “Lest We Forget,” and beneath those words would be a different quote each day from Nikita Khrushchev. I was just starting to read the newspaper back then, and those quotes left an impression on me. I still recall a few of them:
“We will buy you.”
“We do not have to invade the United States. We will destroy you from within.”
“You Americans are so gullible. No, you won’t accept Communism outright, but we’ll keep feeding you small doses of socialism until you finally wake up and find you already have Communism. We won’t have to fight you. We’ll so weaken your economy until you’ll fall like an overripe fruit into our hands.”
“The United States will eventually fly the Communist red flag. The American people will hoist it themselves.”
Back then the John Birch Society was just getting started, its passionate founder sounding the alarm that Communists were afoot in our institutions, that the goal of Soviet Russia was to subversively indoctrinate in order to achieve world dominion. The Birchers were then demonized, by the very Marxist players they were denouncing, and the public bought the propaganda. In time, the message that Communism was a threat got trivialized, pushed further and further into the background of American awareness.
I was a proud young liberal back then, having been indoctrinated into the philosophy by my very cool tenth grade English teacher. I remember how much this disturbed my dad. He would try to help me see the signs around us: “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck,” he would say. I would counter with, “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and talks like a duck, it’s a Communist, disguised as a duck.” Oh, I was so clever, so on the side of smartness and goodness and progress. But as the saying goes, if you’re 20 and you’re not a liberal, you haven’t got a heart. If you’re 40 and not a conservative, you haven’t got a brain.
Today, I remember Khrushchev’s boasts. I remember the newspaper’s warnings. I see it all in a very different light, as everything they predicted now is coming to pass. Our country’s values have eroded from within. We no longer are the same America. And naïve, do-gooder liberals (like I once was) can be blamed for what we’ve become.
Jeff, did you already read the book “Revolution and Counter-Revolution” by Prof. Plinio Correa de Oliveira?
No.
Since you talked about the role of religious decline in the social collapse that the West is experiencing, I thought it was a good opportunity to suggest this work to you.
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Revolution and Counter-Revolution (1959) is a historical, philosophical, sociological and, above all, spiritual treatise on the crisis if the West from the advent of Humanism, the Renaissance and Protestantism to our day. This work demonstrates the cause-and-effect relationship between these movements and the French Revolution of 1789, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the transformations in the Soviet empire and in the West in the last century (a third part was added in 1976 and then some comments about it in 1992).
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About the author: Prof. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira (1908 – 1995) was a man of faith, though and action. He founded the Brazilian TFP in 1960 and inspired autonomous, sister TFPs in 25 countries, forming the world’s largest network of anti-communist organizations of Catholic inspiration. He played a decisive role in the fight against communism in Brazil, especially against the marxist infiltration that took place in the Church’s hierarchy. His life and teachings also inspired the foundation of a religious order that seeks to restore what years of communist subversion have destroyed.
I will look for his book.
Nietzsche once wrote, “If you stare too deeply into the abyss, the abyss will stare into you.”
Jeff, this has always concerned me. And not just for myself. Once, I told a very successful analytically minded friend with a beautiful family “You need to decide how deep you want to get into this.” He actually thanked me later for the warning, I actually shared the above quote with him.
Any thoughts there?
Any serious involvement this subject matter may get you unwanted attention. People will approach you. Invitations to places in Russia will follow. There will be flatterers who really have not read your material, whose interest may not be genuine and who are simply trying to take your time, mislead or divert you. Attempts can be made to compromise you with money or women, or to divert you into other activities. As with Anna Politkovskaya and Alexander Litvinenko, you could be targeted for assassination. Litvinenko wanted to meet with me before his death. Communism is a movement that has killed a lot of people. No man, no problem, said Stalin. Meditating on Terry’s words, you can see how he is led to certain conclusions; namely, that anticommunism is poisonous fear-mongering; that this could infect others and block the path to a beautiful future of love and social harmony. Disagreeing with them can harm your career and even get you killed. Before his death, Audie Murphy — the war hero and actor — was becoming a serious anticommunist. He thought something had to be done. Then he died in a plane crash. We’ll never know what he might have accomplished.
Nietzsche’s comment is actually wrong. The abyss is always looking at us, waiting for us to realize that it is there, and when we do, it is usually too late.
A reply to Gretchen’s comment that starts with, “Terry, I agree that much of what we conservatives believe has some basis in fear, but sometimes it’s smart to be afraid. If the threat is real, the fear is justified.”
Below is from a research study done by a psychiatrist on anti-gun beliefs and behaviors. The information actually pertains to many beliefs and behaviors, some of which may very well be seen in Terry’s comments and responses to others comments. It does help explain a lot about human behaviors that apply to a wide range of how we deal with the world.
Reaction formation is yet another defense mechanism common among the anti–gun folks. Reaction formation occurs when a person’s mind turns an unacceptable feeling or desire into its complete opposite. For example, a child who is jealous of a sibling may exhibit excessive love and devotion for the hated brother or sister.
A person who harbors murderous rage toward his fellow humans may claim to be a devoted pacifist and refuse to eat meat or even kill a cockroach. Often such people take refuge in various spiritual disciplines and believe that they are “superior” to “less civilized” folks who engage in “violent behavior” such as hunting, or even target shooting. They may devote themselves to “animal welfare” organizations that proclaim that the rights of animals take precedence over the rights of people. This not only allows the angry person to avoid dealing with his rage, it allows him actually to harm the people he hates without having to know he hates them.
This is not meant to disparage the many wonderful people who are pacifists, spiritually inclined, vegetarian, or who support animal welfare. The key issue is not the belief itself, but rather the way in which the person experiences and lives his beliefs.
Projection is a particularly insidious defense mechanism, because it not only prevents a person from dealing with his own feelings, it also creates a world where he perceives everyone else as directing his own hostile feelings back at him.
All people have violent, and even homicidal, impulses. For example, it’s common to hear people say “I’d like to kill my boss”, or “If you do that one more time I’m going to kill you.” They don’t actually mean that they’re going to, or even would, kill anyone; they’re simply acknowledging anger and frustration. All of us suffer from fear and feelings of helplessness and vulnerability. Most people can acknowledge feelings of rage, fear, frustration, jealousy, etc. without having to act on them in inappropriate and destructive ways.
Some people, however, are unable consciously to admit that they have such “unacceptable” emotions. They may have higher than average levels of rage, frustration, or fear. perhaps they fear that if they acknowledge the hostile feelings, they will lose control and really will hurt someone. They may believe that “good people” never have such feelings, when in fact all people have them.
Another defense mechanism commonly utilized by supporters of gun control is denial. Denial is simply refusing to accept the reality of a given situation. For example, consider a woman whose husband starts coming home late, has strange perfume on his clothes, and starts charging flowers and jewelry on his credit card. She may get extremely angry at a well–meaning friend who suggests that her husband is having an affair. The reality is obvious, but the wronged wife is so threatened by her husband’s infidelity that she is unable to accept it, and so denies its existence.
Anti–gun people do the same thing. It’s obvious that we live in a dangerous society, where criminals attack innocent people. Just about everyone has been, or knows someone who has been, victimized. It’s equally obvious that law enforcement can’t protect everyone everywhere 24 hours a day. Extensive scholarly research demonstrates that the police have no legal duty to protect you and that firearm ownership is the most effective way to protect yourself and your family. There is irrefutable evidence that victim disarmament nearly always precedes genocide. Nonetheless, the anti–gun folks insist, despite all evidence to the contrary, that “the police will protect you”, “this is a safe neighborhood” and “it can’t happen here”, where “it” is everything from mugging to mass murder.
“cringing subservience-to slogans everyone stopped believing in even as they paid lip service”
Soviet man arrived in USA 2020 at the grocery store and at schools. Childrens are now muzzled and suffocated in masks and mantra “social distancing” ad nauseam . The masses still believe in the slogans….strange the hospitals are laying off staff. Lockdown the nursing home in Seattle to start it and then it worked so good do it to EVERYONE. Yeah we fell for it by imbibing the Marxism for 30 years plus.
Jeff, I am in awe of your brilliance, your patience, and your calm analysis. It is quite marvelous!
It will pass as soon as I stub my toe, lose my temper or turn all gooey with emotion.