I suppose that the Trump victory in the fall of 2016 always came with a question mark. Is this what Americans really want? In the last year it has been easy to believe that the liberals and the Democratic Party of Obama's conceit, the Clintons' corruption, and the faith in government force, were a busted flush.
Of course they aren't busted. Not at all. That's because liberalism is a genuine movement of the People of the Creative Self that want, as part of their creative project, to create a new society. And that's because the Democratic Party is a genuinely modern political party that trades votes for plunder, in the good old way that goes back to the Vikings plundering up the rivers of Britain and the young lads of hunter-gatherer tribes launching regular dawn raids on the neighboring village.
When you combine the two, the creative project of the People of the Creative Self and the offer of regular, profitable plunder to people not yet acculturated to the modern city economy, the folk I call the People of the Subordinate Self, you have a great political coalition. And this coalition naturally lines up against the other great coalition of the modern era, the bourgeois People of the Responsible Self that live by going to work, obeying the law, and following the rules of the market economy.
Under President Obama, the coalition of the creative and the subordinate became a little lazy, believing its own bullshit that the arc of history was going to bend towards justice, just because. But instead we got a Republican Congress and, the shock of the ages, in President Trump, a man who had never run for political office before, and roundly beat all the usual suspects for the presidential nomination of the Republican Party.
With the results of this November's off-off-year elections, particularly in Virginia, it is clear that the Democrats are serious again. Perhaps that's because they have purged all their Obama and Clinton people and are are now getting back to basics and concentrating on getting elected again. And certainly their revival must be because their base supporters are energized again, genuinely hating the deplorable presidency of Trump and everything he stands for.
Some people say that both political parties are in trouble, but I doubt it. I suspect that the parties are merely adjusting their fighting stance and are recruiting new coalitions with which to wage the eternal politics of division.
What is clear is that the old Republican Party didn't really have enough support to form a ruling class in its post-Reagan Bush era. It could govern from time to time, but the ruling class was still the left-leaning People of the Creative Self that believed in their right and destiny to build a just society that would be a comfortable place for creative people to create, and in which the workers and peasants would gratefully accept the plunder acquired by the creative class in their permanent war on the market economy.
Only, of course, the workers and peasants were now the women and minorities of the welfare state.
So all Donald Trump has done is revive the old Reagan coalition, that successfully hijacked the "Reagan Democrats" from the Democratic Party following the tumultuous Sixties in which the working class followers of the Democrats felt abandoned by the party that used to love and adore the working stiff. It is not exactly brain surgery.
The received wisdom about the Trump campaign and the Trump presidency is that it is almost an accident, that Trump is a lightweight that barged his way into the presidency with a volley of insults. But this is always the line on the latest Republican leader: he's an idiot, a B-movie actor, an amiable dunce.
Suppose Trump knows what he is doing? Suppose that the attack on the GOP establishment is based on a strategic appreciation that its globalist, minimal state philosophy just cannot assemble a lasting, ruling coalition? Suppose the appeal to the white working class is based on deep, serious political analysis? Suppose the brashness of the Trump persona is based on a deep understanding that the People of the Responsible Self and the white working class need to feel that they have someone in their corner, defending their culture of working hard, following the rules, and obeying the law?
Suppose that the plan was all along that Steve Bannon would spend six months in the White House planning the next campaign, and would exit at just the right time to launch a party-wide effort to recruit candidates aligned with the new Republican coalition that would include the small-government Republicans and the white working class that wanted a party that fought their corner?
Suppose that the Trump general staff assumed all along that once Trump got elected the Democrats would reenergize their base and fan the hatred of Trump and his deplorables to white heat?
Well, then, there is only one thing to say: let the battle begin.
But, as Andrew Breitbart said, politics is downstream from culture, and the culture war is just as important as the political war. In my view the culture war must be based on my Perfect Plan of culture war.
First, the central human need of our time is to teach people the way of the city, to create a culture that rewards and encourages people that get out of their identity ghetto and enter the full membership of the People of the Responsible Self, the city people, the bourgeoisie. And it is a crime against humanity that the left has battled for 150 years to keep the migrants to the city ghettoized in their pre-city tribes.
Second, the People of the Creative Self need to be taught to be compassionate and understanding towards the People of the Responsible Self. And it is a crime against humanity to wage a culture war on them.
Let us spend a little time explaining what I mean by cultural compassion and understanding.
I mean, on the notions of the developmental psychologists, that advanced people need to understand that less advanced people cannot grasp the wonders of their sophisticated world view, and this is natural and physical, and that it is unjust to force them into subjection to the advanced view. But what does that understanding and compassion mean for advanced people, for the People of the Creative Self in practice? It means understanding that the overwhelming number of people in America and the world do not see the point of the creative life: not at all. If they are People of the Responsible Self, they believe in following the rules, going to work, and obeying the law. If they are People of the Subordinate Self it means finding a patron, a Big Man, to protect them from the dangers of the world. On the detail level, it means understanding of the importance of the Axial Age religions that teach people the culture of the city. It means respect for marriage and family and conventional life styles. And it means pulling back from the current war to force ordinary people to kow-tow to the sexual experimentation culture of the People of the Creative Self: indeed, the creative class should accept the timeless advice of actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell: do whatever you want, but don't frighten the horses. Or, to use the line of Charles Taylor, understand that the culture of expressive individualism of the creative class is not for everyone, however compelling it may be for an up-and-coming creative, and the beginning of wisdom is to understand that.
I think that this simple Perfect Plan is the beginning of wisdom, and that any creative person should be able to get it, and understand it, and learn to live a life of true compassion and understanding. But I realize that many people get a little too enthusiastic about their culture and beliefs, and begin to believe that people that disagree with them are a problem, indeed, dangerous. So I expect that the battle of politics will be combined with a battle of culture, and that we are facing a war to the knife.
And that's a shame. If everyone would agree with me and my sensible ideas we could all live happily ever after.
Of course they aren't busted. Not at all. That's because liberalism is a genuine movement of the People of the Creative Self that want, as part of their creative project, to create a new society. And that's because the Democratic Party is a genuinely modern political party that trades votes for plunder, in the good old way that goes back to the Vikings plundering up the rivers of Britain and the young lads of hunter-gatherer tribes launching regular dawn raids on the neighboring village.
When you combine the two, the creative project of the People of the Creative Self and the offer of regular, profitable plunder to people not yet acculturated to the modern city economy, the folk I call the People of the Subordinate Self, you have a great political coalition. And this coalition naturally lines up against the other great coalition of the modern era, the bourgeois People of the Responsible Self that live by going to work, obeying the law, and following the rules of the market economy.
Under President Obama, the coalition of the creative and the subordinate became a little lazy, believing its own bullshit that the arc of history was going to bend towards justice, just because. But instead we got a Republican Congress and, the shock of the ages, in President Trump, a man who had never run for political office before, and roundly beat all the usual suspects for the presidential nomination of the Republican Party.
With the results of this November's off-off-year elections, particularly in Virginia, it is clear that the Democrats are serious again. Perhaps that's because they have purged all their Obama and Clinton people and are are now getting back to basics and concentrating on getting elected again. And certainly their revival must be because their base supporters are energized again, genuinely hating the deplorable presidency of Trump and everything he stands for.
Some people say that both political parties are in trouble, but I doubt it. I suspect that the parties are merely adjusting their fighting stance and are recruiting new coalitions with which to wage the eternal politics of division.
What is clear is that the old Republican Party didn't really have enough support to form a ruling class in its post-Reagan Bush era. It could govern from time to time, but the ruling class was still the left-leaning People of the Creative Self that believed in their right and destiny to build a just society that would be a comfortable place for creative people to create, and in which the workers and peasants would gratefully accept the plunder acquired by the creative class in their permanent war on the market economy.
Only, of course, the workers and peasants were now the women and minorities of the welfare state.
So all Donald Trump has done is revive the old Reagan coalition, that successfully hijacked the "Reagan Democrats" from the Democratic Party following the tumultuous Sixties in which the working class followers of the Democrats felt abandoned by the party that used to love and adore the working stiff. It is not exactly brain surgery.
The received wisdom about the Trump campaign and the Trump presidency is that it is almost an accident, that Trump is a lightweight that barged his way into the presidency with a volley of insults. But this is always the line on the latest Republican leader: he's an idiot, a B-movie actor, an amiable dunce.
Suppose Trump knows what he is doing? Suppose that the attack on the GOP establishment is based on a strategic appreciation that its globalist, minimal state philosophy just cannot assemble a lasting, ruling coalition? Suppose the appeal to the white working class is based on deep, serious political analysis? Suppose the brashness of the Trump persona is based on a deep understanding that the People of the Responsible Self and the white working class need to feel that they have someone in their corner, defending their culture of working hard, following the rules, and obeying the law?
Suppose that the plan was all along that Steve Bannon would spend six months in the White House planning the next campaign, and would exit at just the right time to launch a party-wide effort to recruit candidates aligned with the new Republican coalition that would include the small-government Republicans and the white working class that wanted a party that fought their corner?
Suppose that the Trump general staff assumed all along that once Trump got elected the Democrats would reenergize their base and fan the hatred of Trump and his deplorables to white heat?
Well, then, there is only one thing to say: let the battle begin.
But, as Andrew Breitbart said, politics is downstream from culture, and the culture war is just as important as the political war. In my view the culture war must be based on my Perfect Plan of culture war.
First, the central human need of our time is to teach people the way of the city, to create a culture that rewards and encourages people that get out of their identity ghetto and enter the full membership of the People of the Responsible Self, the city people, the bourgeoisie. And it is a crime against humanity that the left has battled for 150 years to keep the migrants to the city ghettoized in their pre-city tribes.
Second, the People of the Creative Self need to be taught to be compassionate and understanding towards the People of the Responsible Self. And it is a crime against humanity to wage a culture war on them.
Let us spend a little time explaining what I mean by cultural compassion and understanding.
I mean, on the notions of the developmental psychologists, that advanced people need to understand that less advanced people cannot grasp the wonders of their sophisticated world view, and this is natural and physical, and that it is unjust to force them into subjection to the advanced view. But what does that understanding and compassion mean for advanced people, for the People of the Creative Self in practice? It means understanding that the overwhelming number of people in America and the world do not see the point of the creative life: not at all. If they are People of the Responsible Self, they believe in following the rules, going to work, and obeying the law. If they are People of the Subordinate Self it means finding a patron, a Big Man, to protect them from the dangers of the world. On the detail level, it means understanding of the importance of the Axial Age religions that teach people the culture of the city. It means respect for marriage and family and conventional life styles. And it means pulling back from the current war to force ordinary people to kow-tow to the sexual experimentation culture of the People of the Creative Self: indeed, the creative class should accept the timeless advice of actress Mrs. Patrick Campbell: do whatever you want, but don't frighten the horses. Or, to use the line of Charles Taylor, understand that the culture of expressive individualism of the creative class is not for everyone, however compelling it may be for an up-and-coming creative, and the beginning of wisdom is to understand that.
I think that this simple Perfect Plan is the beginning of wisdom, and that any creative person should be able to get it, and understand it, and learn to live a life of true compassion and understanding. But I realize that many people get a little too enthusiastic about their culture and beliefs, and begin to believe that people that disagree with them are a problem, indeed, dangerous. So I expect that the battle of politics will be combined with a battle of culture, and that we are facing a war to the knife.
And that's a shame. If everyone would agree with me and my sensible ideas we could all live happily ever after.
Appreciated you're article.
ReplyDeleteWhile occasionally I think your statements might sweep too broadly, mostly on the mark.
Not familiar with your three peoples construct.
Likely if one reads more examples of its application it would become more intuitive/illustrative.
I've seen your work elsewhere. Seems like American Thinker. But - dunno.