Amerika

We, the theoretically enlightened peoples of the industrialized world, keep fighting the same war.

In 1789, the People rose up and murdered their aristocrats, overthrew the social order and sent France into a tailspin from which it has never recovered.

Thanks to the People overthrowing a number of aristocracies, nations began to pair up into nation-states and then empires, and this culminated in 1914 in an epic war in which one side — the Allies — decided they would fight for the right of each nation and each individual to do whatever they wanted, against the bad guys who thought there was a right way to do things.

The Revolution had finally come full circle. What, you dare tell me what I cannot do? Then I will gather together with everyone else and drag you down. The herd will have its victory.

And now, here in 2011, we are still fighting the same war — that ugly span from 1789-1914 in which the People demanded that no order be higher than the individual. Never mind that, historically speaking, such societiess (generally called anarchies) always ate it and ended up third-world hellholes.

Shortly after the first missile attacks, U.S. President Barack Obama informed the American people of the efforts by a “broad coalition.”

“The use of force is not our first choice,” the president said from Brasilia, Brazil. “It is not a choice I make lightly. But we cannot stand idly by when a tyrant tells his own people that there will be no mercy.” – CNN

Leftists tell you there is a great corporate conspiracy. To others, it is a shadowy world government operating behind closed doors. For some, it’s class war. I’m here to give you the skinny, which isn’t a “truth” so much as a description of a consistent cause of our downfall.

Our problem has two parts. First is the most obvious: the broadest section of humanity have no particular skills or talents, and they’re looking for someone to blame, so they blame those in power. They then demand “democracy” and “equality” and “freedom,” which are not goals in themselves, but anti-goals: the ability to have an absence of goal, an absence of standards, and an absence of need to prove themselves in competition against life or each other.

Benghazi and the rebellion were hanging by a thread. If Libya’s second-largest city fell back in the hands of Qaddafi loyalists, the resolve of Libya’s rebellion would probably fall with it.

“So, we’re being abandoned after all,” said one young rebel as terrified residents poured out of a checkpoint on the eastern outskirts of town.

But then came the roar of French jets, followed by 112 Tomahawk missiles fired by US and British forces crippling Qaddafi’s defenses and air capabilities – and staving off the likely execution for dozens of rebel leaders. – Christian Science Monitor

The second part are the ideologues, bored meddling rich housebound “intellectuals,” and demagogic panderers and peddlers of half-truths who see in this undifferentiated Crowd a great opportunity. “We can seize power,” they say, “and we can blame it on the common good. We’re not fighting to get rich, we’re fighting for freedom, equality and democracy!”

They call it by these fond terms — freedom, equality, democracy, and justice — but what they really mean is a simpler term: individualism, where this means the individual comes before all else regardless of consequences, sort of an intersection between doing your own thing, narcissism and solipsism.

As a result, there is one war. The war is modernity versus everyone else. Do it our way, everywhere, at all times, or we’ll bomb you flat, support whatever rabble (as in Egypt, the Libyan “rebels” are mostly Islamic fundamentalists and criminals) opposes you, and install our modern society in your place. First we put in democracy, to make your people good and selfish; then we trot in Hooters, Coca-Cola, cable TV, A2M porn and vending machines. Now we have destroyed your culture and soon you will be just like us.

As the world struggles to find a common new conception of global order, Brazil is a valuable asset: It sits firmly in the West but it is well equipped by history to engage “the rest.” It is a multiethnic, vibrant democracy and a market economy. Weaving their own narrative of exceptionalism based on stunning social achievements at home, Brazilians relate to the American Dream in ways both profound and inspiring.

Brazil will turn down any proposals to become a formal ally of Washington. But as a major beneficiary of globalization, it will not seek to overturn the existing rules of the game. Rather it will try to adapt them smoothly to a changing world. – NYT

I present to you the future! — and the distant past — in the form of Brazil. A mixed-race nation with an average IQ of 87, it is home to a relentless “forward” motion of wealth generation for a rarified elite, and underneath that, vast slums which house people who live in daily threat of crime, daily failure of public utilities and rule of law, disease, filth and kleptocracy. In short, it’s a typical third world nation with a first world ruling caste.

Since the dawn of time, human civilizations have fallen this way. Into this state they collapse when they no longer have forward direction, but decide they can’t agree on anything but being a giant open-air bazaar where people have no values except commerce and “getting along with each other.” It is the spiritual death of humanity and a downward spiral, as eventually the impoverished hordes of Brazil will rise up and murder their ruling caste.

In such third world nations, government is a failure and so raw commerce — think the worst of the apocalyptic paranoid corporate scenarios from Hollywood movies — dominates:

Private security guards are gaining limited policing powers under a Government scheme to relieve the petty crime burden on forces.

They will be legally allowed to combat under-age drinking, begging and anti-social behaviour around one of Britain’s busiest transport hubs.

Scotland Yard is accrediting 15 security guards from Ultimate Security Services with limited powers to operate around Victoria coach and train stations in central London. – Belfast Telegraph

Conditions are terrible, and people get so tired of gritting their teeth and enduring it (lie back and enjoy it) that when they do get enough money, they hire a private security force. Build a big wall. And entirely drop out of society except to earn money.

What a miserable future!

Yet it’s being sold to you, and to the Libyans, as “freedom” and “equality” and “democracy.” It would be convenient if the Devil wasn’t bright enough to always cloak his evils in positive sounding vocabulary. But most people don’t think that far; they’re too much in denial, with a twisted sick feeling in their gut.

We have a chance to change it, but it means snapping out of denial about the hard choices we have to make in life. Demagogues gain power when there’s a whole credulous audience who can’t face the real issues for social or political reasons, and thus are willing to reward anyone who invents entirely unrelated issues to distract them. With big piles of money, so they can get as fat and useless as Michael Moore.

Prospects for future coexistence, wildlife experts say, are bleak despite a host of conservation projects, from biofencing to elephant tracking via satellite telemetry.

The past is a stark indicator of the endangered creature’s future. The animal has disappeared from some 95 percent of its historical range, an elephant empire which stretched from the shores of the Mediterranean to the Yellow River in northern China. Thailand, for example, harbored some 100,000 elephants at the beginning of the 20th century, but is down to less than 6,000 today.

According to the Switzerland-based International Union for Conservation of Nature, 38,500 to 52,500 wild elephants survive in Asia with only another 15,000 in captivity, having largely lost their traditional roles as loggers, trucks, battle tanks and prestige symbols of royal courts. – AP

While we dither, good things go away and mediocre things — or nothing — takes their place. I’ll be back tomorrow to discuss how we can reclaim our souls and return to combat so that someday, we can stop fighting WWI ad infinitum and have a sane world again.