The Cusp of Collapse
Read widely. Think carefully. And sift everything through your experience, common sense and conscience. This is the best way to arrive at the truth.
JVF
A friend told me that several highly “educated” millennial coworkers did not know who Hamas was. And others in his lunch group thought that it was Pakistanis who drove across the Pakistan border with Israel to commit unspeakable acts of terrorism on October 7, 2023.
One wonders about “education” that does not teach enough geography to know that Pakistan is 2,000 miles from Israel. And one wonders about citizens who are clueless about the perpetrators of the newest “day of infamy” (FDR).
Recently, a reader suggested that I not mention Democrats so often. Perhaps he’s right. My passion for our country and my opposition to those who are destroying it may appear shrill at times. But we are at war and Americanism is under attack all across the country and the world (Drinking the Kool-Aid column 10/9/23).
Philosopher George Santayana said, “Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it.” I wonder if the techy “young millennials” were even taught the history of the Beer Hall Putsch and the origin of the “big lie.”
In 1923 Adolf Hitler led a failed coup d’état of the post-World War I Weimar Republic. He was imprisoned but used the time to write his autobiographical book, “Mein Kampf” (my struggle). Amidst his vitriolic screed and rant against Jews, communists, gypsies, etc., he conceived of the “big lie.” Simply put, if you tell a big enough lie, often enough, people will begin to accept the lie because they have trouble believing anyone could be so dishonest and treacherous.
Propaganda has always been used, even by Egyptian rulers thousands of years before Christ. However, today we live in a world of overt manipulation. I have no foolproof method to find the truth amidst the waves of propaganda. However, you will come closer to the truth if you follow the quoted paradigm above.
I keep asking myself, when will people wake up? Are we on the cusp of collapse from bankruptcy, nuclear war or moral degradation? Our country and the world are undeniably a mess and have become far more dangerous with the progressive left’s shill in the White House. There were no wars in Ukraine and the Middle East under President Trump. Inflation was low. The GDP was the best in a decade. We had energy independence rather than buying energy from terrorist-supporting Middle Eastern and communist states. We had border security and the respect of our enemies/adversaries. To me, these accomplishments were worth “mean tweets.”
On October 7, Hamas terrorists streamed out of Gaza and slaughtered upwards of fourteen hundred Jewish men, women, elderly and children. Babies were murdered, women were raped and other unspeakable atrocities were committed by Hamas and by residents of Gaza who followed the jihadis into Israel. And yet the new holocaust deniers around the world, in universities like Harvard, George Washington, and Stanford and cities like NYC and London raced to deny the evidence and defend the Hamas savages. And the corrupt media, the New York Times and others printed and broadcast lies about bombing hospitals in Gaza. Even members of Congress, like the odious Rashida Talib of AOC’s squad, rushed to accept the lies of Hamas. The despicable Talib was even called out by The View, but continues to spout the “big lie.” She apparently is unaware of Proverbs 26:11. Even the vacuous and ridiculous Greta Thunberg “stands with Hamas.” Do these fools think the Hamas devils will spare them? And where are the parents of these college idiots who have apparently surrendered their younglings to the anti-Semites of academia?
Thunberg is the epitome of naivete. However, she unknowingly demonstrates the more sinister notion of intersectionality. This is a concept that claims that oppression is pervasive through “interlocking systems” of discrimination. As a result, climate warriors, BLM, ANTIFA, LGBT+, leftist anti-Americans, jihadists, etc. can find commonality in overcoming any majority, patriarchy, cultural norm, or, as they say in the counter-culture, “The Man.”
I admire scholar Thomas Sowell who, like Clarence Thomas, is a conservative, Black intellectual who refuses to reside on the Democrat party’s plantation. In his “A Conflict of Visions,” Sowell posits an explanation for differing politics. He says the disagreement stems from the competing visions of human nature. Some have an “unconstrained vision” where people are perfectible. Similar positions were voiced by Enlightenment thinkers like Jean Jacque Rousseau. To those with unrestrained vision, Utopia can be achieved with the right policies, such as feeding and educating the masses. This is the position of progressives. It has never worked.
Professor Sowell describes the alternative worldview as a “constrained vision,” where human nature is a universal constant and social engineering cannot change human self-interest. Daniel Defoe once said, “All men would be tyrants if they were able.” As a result, social problems can only be managed rather than solved. Utopia will not happen despite enlightened thought, appeals to decency or throwing money at problems like hatred. This is the perspective of social conservatism.
While I am a conservative and agree in principle with Dr. Sowell, I am also a Christian who believes man can be made better with the principles of Jesus Christ. Jesus said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:37-38). If we could follow Jesus’ commands, we would not need the other 630 rules in the Bible, The Constitution, speed limits nor the useless and corrupt United Nations. Man’s nature gets in the way of Jesus’ commands.
Man may not be perfectible, but he can be made better. It is like the notion of calculus; we may not be able to achieve perfection in this reality, but perhaps we can move closer, if not close enough, to be happy and successful human beings.
The important concepts are man is imperfect and is lost without a relationship with God. In fact, we are created with “A God shaped vacuum in the heart of every person” (Blaise Pascal). We are incomplete and lost without recognizing, seeing, and seeking the Ultimate Reality.
