Tag: totalitarian

The Catastrophe of Canada | Rex Murphy and Jordan B Peterson

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This is an important conversation.

What is happening in Canada is dreadful, not least because should Justin Trudeau remain in power it will show Canadians are not who they thought they were, do not have the institutions they thought they did, and are uninterested in recovering either their culture or representative democracy.

Is there some flaw in the British parliamentary system that has been exposed by the pandemic and changes wrought by social media? I wonder because, while serious authoritarian overreach can be alleged in most neoliberal democracies, Australia and New Zealand seem more up front about it than most. This most certainly includes the United States.

An hour. If you need an incentive to watch the whole thing, Here is a 5 minute summary. What goes before explores why it’s true.

Directors of Hatcheries and Conditioning

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‘Mother’ and ‘father’ are obscenities fit only for adolescents to giggle over!”

Virginia Dad Takes On the School Board (paywall, possible alternate source)

All this has transformed once-dull school board meetings into increasingly raucous encounters between parents and officials. On so many of the hot-button issues of the day—from mask mandates and lockdowns to critical race theory, transgender policy and racial preferences for admissions—the public schools have become the vanguard for today’s progressive agenda. But parents such as Mr. Jackson aren’t taking it any more, and they show no sign of relenting.

And they shouldn’t.

Cover-Up? Media Blames Anti-CRT Parents for Meeting Chaos, But Startling Video Exposes What Really Happened

“In short, the media appeared to cover up for a local Democratic official, editing video footage to make anti-CRT parents look like a crowd of uncontrollable protesters.”

The “believe all women” cadre, the trans-activists, and the “parents can’t tell us what to teach” Brave New Worlders*, all want the FBI to be dragging parents out of school board meetings. If the charge is going to be domestic terrorism, you need more than a local gendarmerie to make the arrests.

Horror: Father accuses Loudoun school board of covering up sexual assault
“Believe all women!” was always hypocrisy.

The police did investigate and the perp was charged, but that didn’t stop the school district and the school from lying about it to parents. They sent out a communique offering counseling over the trauma of Smith’s heated exchanges with the school administrators and repeatedly refused to acknowledge the sexual assault. After the incident at the school board meeting, progressive activists targeted him for social-media ridicule, to the point of having to erect fencing around his house to keep the media off his property.

Right. Heretical dissenters must be burned.

After we cover up the rape of their daughters. A rape which can plausibly be blamed on our transgender policy bias.

This school board arrogance, MSM collusion, cross-bred with the trans insanity, and once again showing that #METOO only applies when you aren’t a Prog is evidence of panic. Keep the pressure on.

Your school board should make Brave New World required reading. If any readers conclude Huxley was writing a utopian novel, thay can be given remedial spines. And there are those who will see a society in which everyone is happy with their existence because they do not know of any other, and cannot conceive of choosing for themselves. Free will and the ability to choose at all have been programmed out of them; this is all they know so this is all they want. Our universities are full of them, huddling in their safe spaces.

The older dictators fell because they could never supply their subjects with enough bread, enough cir­cuses, enough miracles and mysteries. Nor did they possess a really effective system of mind-manipulation. In the past, free-thinkers and revolutionaries were often the products of the most piously orthodox educa­tion. This is not surprising. The methods employed by orthodox educators were and still are extremely inefficient. Under a scientific dictator education will really work – with the result that most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution. There seems to be no good reason why a thoroughly scientific dictatorship should ever be overthrown.
-Aldous Huxley

* If you don’t recall your Huxley here’s a brief reminder.

Cognitive dissonance vaccine

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Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.
– George Orwell

Doublethink is not cognitive dissonance. People experiencing cognitive dissonance are uncomfortable with it, Critical Theory removes the discomfort. It’s how SJWs are able to function.

The Doublethinkers – Tablet Magazine

In assessing my own liberation, I recall a conformity that feels terrifyingly familiar today
NATAN SHARANSKY WITH GIL TROY

…Over the last three decades in freedom, I have noticed that—with apologies to Tolstoy—every dictatorship is oppressive in its own way, but the doublethinkers’ mental gymnastics are all alike. The feeling of release from the fear and giddy relief when crossing the line from doublethink to democratic dissent is also universal across cultures. This understanding prompted the Town Square Test I use to distinguish between free societies and fear societies: Can you express your individual views loudly, in public, without fear of being punished legally, formally, in any way? If yes, you live in a free society; if not, you’re in a fear society…

To preserve our integrity and our souls, the quality of our political debate and the creativity so essential to our cultural life, we need a Twitter Test challenging bottom-up cultural totalitarianism that is spreading throughout free societies. That test asks: In the democratic society in which you live, can you express your individual views loudly, in public and in private, on social media and at rallies, without fear of being shamed, excommunicated, or cancelled? Ultimately, whether you will live as a democratic doublethinker doesn’t depend on the authorities or on the corporations that run social media platforms: it depends on you. Each of us individually decides whether we want to submit to the crippling indignity of doublethink, or break the chains that keep us from expressing our own thoughts, and becoming whole.

Long. Highly recommended.

Happy Thanksgiving

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I’m thankful the Pilgrims’ realization that collectivism causes misery and creates poverty still resonates enough 400 years later that most of us continue to respect the ideas of freedom of conscience, individual liberty, and free markets.

Despite over 100 years of accelerating totalitarian attempts to destroy them from within.

In

“Of Plymouth Plantation, … the colony’s longtime governor, William Bradford. … details how the Pilgrims “languish[ed] in misery” sharing their labor and its fruits. The collectivism “was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment.” Two years into the experiment ironically forced upon them by their capitalist underwriters, Bradford parceled common land out to individual families to exploit for their own selfish benefit.

“This had very good success,” Bradford explained, “for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better content. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.” The Pilgrim Father’s two-paragraph rejection of collectivism is among the most enduring and persuasive arguments for private property in the English language.”

For a another treatment of this, see How Private Property Saved the Pilgrims.

Keep Wretched out of the White House

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Never mind that a Joe Biden Presidency would significantly raise middle class taxes. Don’t worry about a return to the living conditions of 1850 because Joe’s puppeteers embrace the Green Ordeal and intend to socialize health care. Ignore the fact that the DOJ, FBI, CIA, certain senior members of the House and Senate, and Obama White House insiders will never face consequences for their seditious collusion. Forget said collusion was enabled by Democrat Party opposition research leaked by the FBI in order to install a Special Counsel whose multi year investigation of Donald Trump turned up nothing. Overlook the fact that the Democrats still push the Russiagate story.

Be sanguine about erasure of the Second Amendment and demolition of the First. Celebrate the prospect of a 15 member Supreme Court. Be happy for the prospect of national holidays celebrating Statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington D.C. Revel in the abolition of the Electoral College. Accept the idea of federal abortion funding, up to the day of birth. Welcome 11 million new voters who entered the country illegally.

Pay no mind to the idea that Antifa is just an idea. Or that Biden’s mental capacity is a glass half full. Don’t think about the fact that you’d really be voting for a President Harris.

Discount the effect of reimposing the regulatory statism Trump has rolled back.

Never mind eyewitness evidence of Hunter Biden’s footsie playing with the ChiComs, Ukrainians and Kazakhs. Take at face value Hunter’s father’s denial of those activities, and his denial he ever discussed them with his son at all; despite the FBI’s ongoing investigation into Hunter over money laundering. Brush off the documentation that Joe, while he was Vice President, ignored State Department concerns over Hunter’s activities, and reject the first party account of Joe Biden meeting with Tony Bobulinski for high level discussions of a deal with the ChiComs.

Worry not that the “right” for men to compete in womens’ sports will be solidified, or that vilification of Israel by the likes of Rashida Tlaib, AOC, and Ilhan Omar will wriggle its way into foreign policy planning – that Trump’s so far successful Middle East Peace successes will be nullified. Serenely prepare for an apology to Iran.

Forget all that, and more.

The foremost reason to vote against Joe Biden is to ensure he can’t appoint Gretchen Whitmer to ANY cabinet position. Particularly the Department of Health and Human Services, to which the CDC reports.

Biden’s already threatened a national mask mandate, and Gretchen is just the martinet to impose it. She already has experience with ignoring Michigan Supreme Court decisions, by shifting her unconstitutional executive orders to unelected bureaucrats.

Emperors undressed

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The Rise of the Ungovernables

2019 marks the thirtieth anniversary of Francis Fukuyama’s seminal essay for the National Interest “The End of History?” Its central hypothesis was that we were witnessing “the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.” That looked plausible in 1989, particularly when the Berlin Wall fell just months after the essay’s release. Thirty years later—not so much.

To be fair to Fukuyama, he never suggested that the world had seen the end of geopolitical conflict or that democracies would experience no more of Macmillan’s “events.” Today, he continues to view liberal democracy as the best form of government, but he is less optimistic about its robustness. It’s hard to disagree with him. The Brexit chaos, the Trump presidency, the collapse of support for centrist parties across Europe, and the pervasive rise of populism and nationalism, all point to the growing fragility of liberal democracy.

Why is this happening now? The usual response is to blame it all on the politicians. Leaders like Orban and Trump are subverting the institutions at the heart of liberal democracy. Political parties like Alternative für Deutschland and the National Rally are promoting illiberal and xenophobic policies. If only we had better leaders, democracy would flourish—so goes the argument.

That last sentence is exactly the same excuse Socialists and Communists use for state failures in the Soviet Union, Cuba, Venezuela, Cambodia, North Korea, et. al.. A majority of voters in this country agree with it, even as they are split on policy.

That last sentence describes the danger of the Imperial Presidency – something that connects Obama and Trump (they’re hardly alone, but it became an art form under their tender care).

That last sentence describes voters’ aspirations.  It explains Bernie Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez, and Donald Trump.  Not that they all share policy ideas, but that a sufficient number of voters see them as saviors.  This is a terrible way to think about public employees.

The Obamaists and the Trumpists both revere the Man, not the Law.  Their Emperor’s ideas are fully clothed in their own narcissism.

Read the whole article, it presents some good ideas about cultural changes contributing to the problem and the related role of social media.

Which clueless totalitarian are you?

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We need a Facebook quiz to find out which Atlas Shrugged character Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is like.

There might not be a match. Ayn Rand’s fiction has been criticized for unidimensional characterization, but even she would find AOC unbelievable.

Here Are The Most Shocking Proposals From Ocasio-Cortez’ “Green New Deal”

Ocasio-Cortez doesn’t provide any insight into how the trillions of dollars in spending will be paid for other than claiming, “The Federal Reserve can extend credit to power these projects and investments and new public banks can be created to extend credit”. But as Ocasio-Cortez says, “the question isn’t how will we pay for it, but what will we do with our new shared prosperity”.

Provide free, mandatory classes for every citizen in speaking ‘Venezuelan?’

(Update, 12:48PM here‘s one estimate of the cost.)

Here’s a snippet from an FAQ document, published by proponents, describing the wonders of the ‘Green New Deal:’

Yes, we are calling for a full transition off fossil fuels and zero greenhouse gases. Anyone who has read the resolution sees that we spell this out through a plan that calls for eliminating greenhouse gas emissions from every sector of the economy. Simply banning fossil fuels immediately won’t build the new economy to replace it – this is the plan to build that new economy and spells out how to do it technically. We do this through a huge mobilization to create the renewable energy economy as fast as possible. We set a goal to get to net-zero, rather than zero emissions, in 10 years because we aren’t sure that we’ll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes that fast, but we think we can ramp up renewable manufacturing and power production, retrofit every building in America, build the smart grid, overhaul transportation and agriculture, plant lots of trees and restore our ecosystem to get to net-zero.

Maybe “our new shared prosperity” will pay for little solar-powered methane suction devices attached to the rear of every cow.  “Methane Disposal,” you ask?  Well, we just inject it into the natural gas supply lines…  Oh wait, natural gas will be banned.

OK.  More likely, the cow problem solves itself when meat and milk are banned.

This manifesto attracted so much ridicule that they tried to disappear it from the internet. They forgot the internet is forever. It is humorous reading.

This great leap forward is on top of universal free college education and medicare for all. So, they desperately need the tooth fairy, Santa Claus, King Midas, and the Pope (for divine intervention).

What they’ve got is Modern Monetary Theory:

MMT Sounds Great In Theory, But…

If you haven’t heard about Modern Monetary Theory your IQ is higher than it would have been if you had. It is really neither modern, nor a theory (it’s not actually testable*); and it misapprehends the meaning of the word ‘monetary.’ However, it could be in your future as a general government policy.

This theory of infinite currency printing does not admit to being limited by inflation. Any excess currency is simply taxed back. Inflation is something that cannot happen with a proper implementation of MMT.

Proper. Implementation. By the ‘best and brightest.’ Like Ms. Ocasio-Cortez.

MMT has an obvious attraction for politicians. We’ve been playing at the edges of it for quite some time.

Let’s close with a last word from Ocasio-Cortez on the “Green New Deal”:

“I think one way that the right does try to mischaracterize what we’re doing as though it’s like some kind of massive government takeover. Obviously it’s not that because what we’re trying to do is release the investments from the federal government to mobilize those resources across the country.”

Obviously! Release! Investments! Mobilize! That explains the whole thing: She’s hired a fluent Newspeak expert. ‘Obviously’ means, “If you don’t understand, it’s because you’re stupid.” ‘Release’ means, oh, I don’t know, “the vast Federal budget surplus being held hostage by Trump’s wall proposal?” ‘Investments’ means, “Impossible government spending.” ‘Mobilize’ means, “At gunpoint.”

*Proponents will say, “It is testable, but it’s never been tried.” Well, that’s what they say about Communism, too. But, let’s even ignore the actual workings of an economy and admit that MMT depends on the refined judgment of virtuous politicians zealously balancing currency flow. And if you imagine that can be accomplished, you run into an even bigger problem: To do their job, these paragons also have to possess instant, encyclopedic, perfectly accurate information about every aspect of that economy.