Books and Justice and Making Things Worse

It has been my fate recently to have read -- or read about -- numerous books proposing to curb the monstrous injustice of the world with new government initiatives. The assumption of all the geniuses writing these books is that government programs can help mitigate injustice in the world.

Of course, this is just the moderates in the genre. There are those, who shall remain nameless, who propose that with enough bold action we can remake the world into a heaven-on-earth of justice.

I admit, right up front, that I have taught myself not to believe that government can do anything about justice, beginning with the fact that, if you are a victim of a violent act, from robbery to murder, there is no justice for you. Like the victim of rape, you are still violated however the criminal justice system disposes of your violator.

What we call "justice" is in fact legislating morality. Yes, it would be nice if everyone were equal, but that's not how the world works. And in order to make things equal you will need to use quite a lot of force. A lot of people will experience your force as injustice. Go figure.

Just yesterday I read a review of a book on justice and genetics: The Genetic Lottery: Why DNA Matters for Social Equality by academic Kathryn Paige Harden reviewed on Quillette. The good thing is that, after consigning Charles Murray to the second circle of Hell for daring to mention in The Bell Curve that groups with low IQ -- i.e. blacks -- would really struggle in a future where cognitive skills will be more and more important, nice girls like Harden are waking up to the problem.

And their solution to the problem is the moral narrative of "equity" that our lefty friends have been selling for while now.

Equity, Harden explains, is about giving disadvantaged people tailored support that puts them on a similar footing to their more advantaged peers. It is explicitly a philosophy of positive discrimination that can be extended to every conceivable dimension of disadvantage—including genetic disadvantage.

You know what. I have a bit of a problem with this. Even assuming that a ruling class and a government should ever get into a program of "positive discrimination," even assuming that a government program can execute successfully on the moral program of positive discrimination to make things fair, there is the little question of "will it work" or will it, on the contrary, Make Things Worse?

And then there is the teeny weeny problem that, supposing that the program Makes Things Worse, will the program ever get reformed? Answer: No, because the whole point of any government program is not justice but loot and plunder. But you knew that.

See, I think that the gubmint program of free education that started with our pal Horace Mann nearly 200 years ago has Made Things Worse, starting with the rather obvious fact that education has just become a loot and plunder program for women union teachers, and continuing with the rather obvious fact that education doesn't seem to be doing much for blacks, but is really cool for well-born white and Asian women.

See, I think that the gubmint program of Social Security that started with the noble FDR nearly a century ago has Made Things Worse, by taxing the incomes of ordinary workers, spending the money on gubmint programs and then handing out benefits instead of enrolling workers into a genuine savings program that might end up as capital to be willed to children.

See, I think that the gtubmint program of Medicare started by the noble LBJ over half a century ago takes a ton of money away from rich Americans -- who might be using the money to create jobs -- and spending it on insane end-of-life expenditures. Put it this way: suppose that the average middle-class American had to pay for their own end-of-life medical care, what would they be prepared to spend on it, with insurance or savings? How many of them would say: hey, let's flip the switch and let our kids have the money?

See, I think that the gubmint program of "worker rights" and wage and hour laws and the indulgence of labor unions Makes Things Worse. I think that pushing worker wages above the market actually makes workers vulnerable, as the collapse of big private sector unionism showed after the 1960s. And unfortunately for the workers, the ruling class lost interest in advocating for white union members after the 1960s civil rights era.

See I think that the gubmint program of welfare has Made Things Worse. This is most obvious for black Americans for whom 70 percent of children are born out of wedlock, and where far too many young men end up as "aspiring rappers." Do you know how welfare used to work? In 1000, you axed your lord to become his slave. In Victorian England you were a servant. Funny thing about servants. They were all single, and single young servant girls were forbidden to have "followers." Servants ended in England after World War II when poor women didn't need to "go into service" any more, because welfare.

See, I think that the gubmint program of Climate Change is Making Things Worse. We see this happening right now in Europe where an unexpected calm in the North Sea meant that there was no power from offshore wind turbines so they had to fire up natural gas electric generation. But that put natural gas prices into the stratosphere. And energy prices hit middle and lower-class people the hardest. All of a sudden the British government has decided to start a program of small nuclear plants. I've been reading Doughnut Economics by woman Brit economist Kate Raworth that proposes, among other follies, pedal to the metal "renewable energy." Yes, but suppose "renewable energy" Make Things Worse? How would we know, and how would we reverse gubmint green energy programs, knowing that all gubmint programs are loot and plunder dressed up with lipstick on a pig and the shortest time interval known to the economists' union is the time between an economist getting a research grant and deciding she deserves it -- for evermore?

See, I think that all these activists, that "want to make a difference" because that is what they have been carefully taught, have No Idea that almost all Good Ideas don't turn out quite so well in practice. That goes for business startups, marriage startups, gubmint programs, religious groups and cults, political parties, everything. They almost all fail. But gubmint programs are forever. Until the next revolution.

Meanwhile Our Nance is busy trying to negotiate a mere $2.2 trillion program -- still stuffed to the gills with loot-and-plunder handouts and activist "make a difference" conceits -- to pass in a reconciliation package in Congress.

I tell you, Nancy Pelosi, when you have gone to your reward some poor schmuck of a President and a fool of a House Speaker are going to have to figure out how to undo trillions of dollars of handouts without sparking a mostly peaceful protest from the beneficiaries of said handouts. I don't envy them their job, not one whit.

Karl Popper Defines "Rationality"

Everyone is all in favor of "reason" and contemptuous of the other guys that substitute "feelings" or "faith" or "bigotry" for reason.

What we really mean is that "our" account of the meaning of "life, the universe, and everything" is the correct one, the rational one, but the other guy... Well, he's probably living in Cloud Cuckoo Land.

Karl Popper is famous for the idea of "falsification." He argues that unless it is possible to test your theory against real-life data then it's not a theory but just a narrative.

By the way, he has nothing against narrative. Man "can invent stories, fairy tales, myths." But when a myth can't be tested...

Not that there's anything wrong with narratives. It's just that a narrative isn't science.

In Knowledge and the Body-Mind Problem: In defence of interaction, adapted from a series of lectures given by Popper at Emory University in 1969 and published by M.A. Notturno, Popper develops his ideas. 

He has two Big Ideas to present. The first is the process of scientific discovery. It goes like this:

1. A theory has a problem.
2. Propose a tentative revised theory.
3. Test the theory.
4. Wait for the next problem.

The second Big Idea is his "Three Worlds" notion. It goes like this

World 3: the products of our human minds.
World 2: our mental states or processes.
World 1: physical states or processes.

When he says World 3 he means both scientific theories and actual physical products of the human mind such as windmills and temples and jet airplanes.

But at the end of the book, in the last lecture, titled "The Self, Rationality, and Freedom," he defines "rationality."

I mean by "rationality" simply a critical attitude towards problems -- the readiness to learn from our mistakes, and the attitude of consciously searching for our mistakes and for our prejudices. Thus, I mean by "rationality" the attitude of conscious, critical, error elimination.

Simplified, I would say that Popper sees reason and rationality as a process rather than a framework.

And, he says, we humans can only deal with one or two mistakes at a time. We cannot sweep the whole of knowledge-so-far in the trash and start with a blank sheet. So, "our criticism cannot tackle more than one or two problems or theories at a time". But, "there is no problem or theory... that is immune to being made  the object of our critical consideration."

Then, he attacks what he calls "the myth of the framework," the idea that two people cannot have a fruitful discussion unless their world-views are pretty much in alignment. On the contrary, he writes, dealing with someone with a significantly different "framework" can be really productive and interesting. But it does require both sides to admit to themselves that they might be wrong.

Finally he critiques the notion of "self-expression," that

the quality of the work we do depends on how good we are. It depends only on our talents, on our psychological, and, perhaps, on our physiological states.

Popper regards this as sick and wrong. That's because he regards all successful theory and knowledge as "objective knowledge" in his World 3. The point is that all scientific knowledge is a public thing. It is a monument that is pushed out into the public world. Then either you, or someone else, critiques it and tries to improve it. I suppose that the point is that if you make a scientific discovery it might be because of your astonishing talent. Or it might be because you got lucky and "noticed" something that nobody else did.

Either way, once you have created a new theory, it is back to the drawing board and on to the next thing. 

Common Sense and Politics

Everybody knows that the world runs on Common Sense: even Thomas Paine knew that.

For instance, I think that President Joe Biden and my high-caste South Asian congresscritter Pramila Jayapal want us to believe that a $3.5 trillion "infrastructure" bill is just common sense with a "zero cost."

I agree. And the Democrats' current agenda of fighting climate change and systemic racism is just common sense.

Why? Because if it is just common sense that government is war plus loot and plunder -- where war can be international war, civil war, or just a routine election -- then the following is just common sense.

Common Sense: Climate Change is loot and plunder for the educated class, and Systemic Racism is loot and plunder for the rulers' underclass clients.

So shut up and eat your spinach.

Really, the marriage between climate change and systemic racism is a marriage made in heaven.

Except, that I would say, the following is common sense.

Common Sense: Build Back Better ends up Making Things Worse.

But back to Thomas Paine and his Common Sense. Of course, it wasn't common sense at all. Published in January 1776, it was, as La Wik quotes Gordon S. Wood, "the most incendiary and popular pamphlet of the entire revolutionary era." La Wik:

It was sold and distributed widely and read aloud at taverns and meeting places. In proportion to the population of the colonies at that time (2.5 million), it had the largest sale and circulation of any book published in American history.

Let's quickly rehearse Common Sense from La Wik.

The first section is on the origin and design of government.

Paine related common Enlightenment theories of the state of nature to establish a foundation for republican government. Paine began the section by making a distinction between society and government and argues that government is a "necessary evil."

Well, that wouldn't be "common sense" today. Today, everyone agrees, government by an educated and evolved elite is merely common sense, rather than a "necessary evil." If you think government is a "necessary evil" you are a deplorable, a bitter clinger, and a white oppressor to boot.

I mean, if you scan the "Economics" or the "Political Science" section at your local used book store, I'd say that 75 percent of the books are all about how "we" can use government to bend the arc of history towards justice. Common sense, darling.

I know. Who is "we," Kemosabe?

The second section is on monarchy and hereditary succession.

[Paine] considers monarchy first from a biblical perspective and then from a historical perspective. He begins by arguing that since all men are equal at creation, the distinction between kings and subjects is a false one.

To hell with the Divine Right of kings, for instance. Common sense.

In the third section Paine looks at the current conflict between Britain and the colonies.

Paine examines the hostilities between England and the American colonies and argues that the best course of action is independence. Paine proposes a Continental Charter (or Charter of the United Colonies) that would be an American Magna Carta.

Nothing here but Common Sense. Right fellas, everyone down the ages was putting together Continental Charters before breakfast. Particularly in "taverns and meeting places."

Mind you, I'd say it is amazing that this 47-page book was "read aloud in taverns and meeting places." Imagine that happening today!

So, rather than merely advocating "common sense" Thomas Paine was really proposing the most radical political change in history. But hey, when you are proposing the most radical political change in history the last thing you want to do is scare people. So you tell them that your radicalism is just "common sense." Just like Joe Biden and Pramila Jayapal.

Anyway, pace Thomas Paine, I'd say that when anyone is invoking "common sense" they are trying to put one over on us, by getting us to just accept whatever it is as natural and physical, nothing to see here, move right along.

Of course, on the other hand, you should always accept what I write here on this blog as completely unexceptional and normal, something that doesn't even need discussion, but that anyone with half a brain would accept without a second thought. Common sense, really.

But the question today is whether the "F*ck Joe Biden" movement is common sense or straight-up "hate speech."

You decide.

The Rubber Hits the Road on Capitol Hill

OK. So today Byron York reports that the Democratic cave begins on all the spending:

1. That they won't pass the $3.5 trillion "infrastructure" bill.
2. That they will pass the $1.1 trillion "infrastructure" bill.

Still to come:

1. Funding the government October 1
2. Increasing the debt limit.

Thus, York writes, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi "has now surrendered to the so-called centrists in her party".

And this moments after President Biden and my own personal high-caste South Asian Congresscritter Pramila Jayapal claimed that the $3.5 trillion was free.

In a White House speech promoting his spending plans, Biden said that “the price tag is zero… on the national debt. We’re going to pay for everything we spend. [People say] ‘It started off at six trillion, now it’s 3.5 trillion’... it’s going to be zero.”

Well, I sent an email to Rep. Jayapal telling her that "my pal Goebbels" called the "zero" price tag the Big Lie.

Oh, I get it. Government is loot and plunder and when you win an election the rubes down on the farm expect to get paid.

And every progressive activist that wants to "make a difference" has come up with some glorious way to "bend the arc of history towards justice" with other peoples' money.

And every new handout is another block of the economy that is set in concrete and can never be reformed until the government runs out of other peoples' money.

So I get that every item in every spending bill is loot and plunder, including $3 billion for "tree equity."

But I still ponder the bigger question. 

Is Nancy Pelosi just playing the lefty rubes in her party? Letting them fly up a box canyon until they crash into the rock wall at the end? Or is she running from them, afraid that they will take away her power if she doesn't dance with them?

On the other hand she seems perfectly happy to sacrifice moderate members to the Greater Cause of passing new progressive legislation, as she did in 2010 with Obamacare and then lost 64 -- that's sixty-four -- members in the 2010 midterms.

Thing is: the ruling class can get together if it wants to. Example No. 1 is the federal debt after World War II. Here:

See how our ruling class all agreed to make the debt decrease as a percent of GDP. Right up until 1980. Know what happened then? Reagan said we are cutting taxes and cutting spending. But the Dems said: forget about cutting spending. So that ramped the debt from 35 percent GDP to 60 percent GDP. Then we had the Iraq War. And then we had the Crash of 2008. And now we've had the COVID Crisis. And we are back up to 135 percent GDP, higher than at the end of World War II.

Hello Nancy? Hello Chuck? Hello Joe Biden? Anybody there?

Because you know who will be hurt most if there is a wipe-out. The underclass; minorities; BIPOCs -- "women and minorities hardest hit." Your voters. Do you care?

I guess the truth is that no elected politician cares about anything except getting re-elected. And getting elected means dangling free stuff in front of the noses of the rubes. And that means running up huge Christmas Tree bills loaded with goodies.

But I wish it weren't so.

"Nothing is Working. Or Is It?"

In a piece on the disaster we call the Biden administration, Will Alexander wonders it it's really the disaster it seems.

For instance, in the Del Rio bridge disaster with 12,000 Haitians under the border bridge, the result was that the Biden administration shipped nearly all of them into the US. So, from the left's point of view, it's working. Another 12,000 potential Democrat voters migrated into the US.

And the GOP governors sent a message to the president asking for a "open and constructive dialogue regarding border enforcement". Like that's going to work. As Alexander writes:

We’re now dealing with anti-American, Trump-hating, political psychopaths who want to use race, COVID, climate change, and chaos to outlaw political differences using arbitrary policies that look to fundamentally destroy America as we know it.

OK. So which is it? A total disaster of the incompetents? Or a cunning plot by "political psychopaths"?

I'd say both. 

First, the big government welfare state doesn't work. It Makes Things Worse. There's a good piece by Orthodox rabbi Dov Fischer about how the Democrats have wrecked blacks. All in the name of helping them. 

Second, when your glorious plan of paradise isn't working out, and instead is littered with disaster, you don't give up. Not the French Jacobins, not the Russkie Bolsheviks, not the Maoist cultural revolutionaries. That's what the whole notion of a Reign of Terror and Virtue is about. It cannot be that our glorious vision was a fantasy! The problems must be the work of "saboteurs and wreckers." We must double down and fight through to the final victory

That is a way to understand the US history of the last 50 years. It cannot be that the Great Society programs were a disaster visited on the poor. It cannot be that Keynesian economics caused the inflation of the 1970s. It cannot be that "supply-side" economics caused the revival of the 1980s. It cannot be that ordinary Americans revolted against HillaryCare. It cannot be that the Tea Party was an organic revolt against Obama's big government orgy. It cannot be that Trump represents an ordinary middle-class revolt against the conceits and the failures of educated-class big government. No: there is "systemic racism" every way you look.

What is needed is to double-down on more government, with pitiless ideological domination and elimination of "hate" speech. That should do it!

The lesson, of course, is that all Reigns of Terror and Great Purges eventually end, and normal life resumes, sort of. But the butcher's bill!

By the way, both Putin and Xi have been selling the glories of Russian civilization and Chinese civilization lately. What's that all about? Are they, like Trump, extolling the virtues of the Russian nation and the Chinese nation? Any mean tweets from the Kremlin or the Gate of Heavenly Peace lately?

Or are they just realists, understanding that any people wants a history, a narrative that extols its past, and experiences itself as the culmination of its story, its narrative of How We Got Here. You know, like when Trump did a speech right in front of the US presidents engraved into the Black Hills of South Dakota.

Actually, I think the decisive moment will occur when women give up on the Democratic message. See, the whole point of the welfare state is that it "protects" us. And "women expect to be protected."

But what happens when things fall apart and women discover that the folk that promised to protect them have, in fact, abandoned them to the wolves?

The answer, spelled out in A Woman in Berlin by Anonymous, is that they find new protectors. So the German women in May 1945 sought out Soviet officers to be their protectors. And many other German women became GI war brides. Of course they did.

When the women of America make this switch, there won't be trumpets and banners and glorious speeches. Things will suddenly change and nobody will really know why.

A trial run on this is the whole COVID vaccine thing. Right now American women all think that vaccination protects them and their loved ones. However, some women -- nurses -- close to the firing line seem to be telling us that vaccination is not what it is cracked up to be. I predict that some time in the next 12 months, American women will decide that the whole COVID response has not protected them. And so they will seek out new protectors.

Let's put it this way. President Trump campaigned in a manner that really appealed to men. Starting with his mental pugilistic antics at the 2016 Republican debates, he showed that he would "fight for you." But women hated his "mean tweets." They want to be told how our national leaders will protect us. There's a reason why Democrats tend to use memes like "our community" and "our democracy" that appeals to the woman's need for protection. But a lot of Americans hate their use of the racist-sexist-pejoratives. Did you know that "pejorative" comes from the Latin pejorare meaning "making things worse?"

One fine day, a Republican presidential candidate will discover how to appeal to the woman's need for protection.

Then, look out, Wokies.

Angelo Codevilla RIP: Nuggets from "America's Ruling Class"

As we all know, Angelo Codevilla died this week after being hit by a drunk driver. You and I know him as the author of an epochal article written in 2010 in The American Spectator titled "America's Ruling Class."

In the article he described America as divided between the Ruling Class, "supported by no more than one-third of Americans — and a country class comprising two-thirds of the country."

Let me say that this is the one thing where I disagree with Codevilla. I don't believe in the binary Ruling Class and Country Class. That's because I believe in a Three Layer understanding of society. Codevilla hints at this when he writes of entertainment that

since the 1970s most of Hollywood’s products have appealed more to the mores of the ruling class and its underclass clients than to those of large percentages of Americans.

So in my "Three Layers in Brief" I adapt his two layers into three: Ruling Class, Country Class, and "underclass clients." 

But I agree that only the Ruling Class and the Country Class are involved in politics. The "underclass clients" are just serfs of their Ruling Class lords.

But here are a couple of really important takeaways from "America's Ruling Class" that I got from re-reading it yesterday. I express them as questions that I have for a while about today's America.

"Why are Social Media and Big Tech and Big Business in the tank for the Ruling Class?" Because they have to be.

Health care:

[T]he health care bill of 2010 takes more than 2,700 pages to make sure not just that some states will be treated differently from others because their senators offered key political support, but more importantly to codify bargains between the government and various parts of the health care industry, state governments, and large employers about who would receive what benefits (e.g., public employee unions and auto workers) and who would pass what indirect taxes onto the general public. 

This is what I call sharing out the "loot and plunder" with regime supporters.

Finance:

The financial regulation bill of 2010, far from setting univocal rules for the entire financial industry in few words, spends some 3,000 pages (at this writing) tilting the field exquisitely toward some and away from others.

Again: can you spell l-o-o-t-a-n-d-p-l-u-n-d-e-r? 

So, in general, "By making economic rules dependent on discretion, our bipartisan ruling class teaches that prosperity is to be bought with the coin of political support." As in the classic line: "nice little business you got here; pity if something should happen to it."

Now whatabout the professions? 

"Why are the professions in the tank with the Ruling Class?"

What about the doctors, and the American Medical Association (AMA)?

Those who run the AMA, however, have a government contract as exclusive providers of the codes by which physicians and hospitals bill the government for their services.

Oh. So now I understand why various professional organizations have issued threats to their members that they will lose accreditation if they, e.g., don't support mandatory COVID vaccination. The professional association gets a government grant, and so is now in the pocket of the Ruling Class, and anyway has to keep good relations with the regulatory authorities. 

In other words any high profile institution in America needs to maintain good relations with the Ruling Class. Or else. And that will continue, until it doesn't.

Now, I notice, after reading "America's Ruling Class" all over again, that my maxims about government apply in spades.

Government is an armed minority, occupying territory, and taxing the inhabitants thereof to reward its supporters.

Government is force plus loot and plunder.

All government is unjust, because government leaders reward their supporters before the rest of the people.

And, I would say, that the $3.5 trillion "infrastructure bill" is an indication that the Ruling Class feels it needs to amp up the provision of loot and plunder to its supporters. Seems like the natives are restless on the loot and plunder front.

Why is that, you may ask? I think it is because when you distribute loot and plunder to your supporters they don't say: "wow, thanks a million" for ever after. Next election cycle they take the previous handout for granted and expect to get more. So once you start handing out loot and plunder you have to keep on keeping on, scraping up new loot and plunder to distribute. Otherwise your supporters will drift away. 

Obviously, Stein's Law applies here. "If something cannot go on forever, it will stop."

And the problem with loot and plunder is that it represents a part of the economy that is cast in concrete. And as the Ruling Class extends the concrete -- or if you prefer, continues paving over the nation -- there comes a point at which there is no fertile land left. What happens then? Nothing good. 

You many not like the price system, but the price system forces people to face reality, first gently, and then not so gently. But with the loot-and-plunder system things are different. The loot-and-plunder system allows people to ignore reality. Until that day when the whole system collapses.

So, if you are a wise Ruling Class, you keep the loot and plunder down to a very dull murmur. Because you want the economy -- upon which your sacred taxes rest -- to look after itself, as an "emergent phenomenon" that all-unknowing, responds to changes in the firmament and corrects itself before you and I have a clue what is going on.

Our Ruling Class has not kept the loot and plunder down to a dull murmur. That means that it has a problem. That means that it has to back up its loot and plunder with threats and force. That means that our Ruling Class is headed for the waterfall.

But so are you and I.

Looking back at "America's Ruling Class" it is interesting to review the Trump Era. We may call Trump an idiot. We may say that his first mistake was not to fire all the insiders in the government and replace them with his own people. And so on.

But I would say that the Trump Era gave us a vital and important thing. It prompted the Ruling Class to show its claws. Or, if you like, we got to see into its subterranean "intelligence community" depths. And it let the rest of us see how corrupt and clueless it is.

For that, we Americans will be grateful to Donald Trump for ever more.

And to the searing analysis of the late Angelo Codevilla.

The Tell: It's Just a Waste of Time to Talk to Those Guys

Remember back in the day when "all good people" were concerned about The Workers? The general tone was that, even though the workers were rather over-inclined to use violence, they had a point. Life was rough for factory workers, and they were often treated like virtual slaves, or as economic and disposable commodities. Their "rage" was understandable. So all good people were open to acceding to the just demands of the workers. Even if they were a bit rude and crude.

Now, I get the feeling, these days, that "all good people" don't give a damn about the just demands of ordinary middle class people. The current violence in southern Australia over COVID vaccination is a case in point.

As I understand it, the government of Victoria, capital Melbourne, is planning a strict COVID regimen.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has announced that anyone who does not “take the jab” will not be permitted to work, shop, attend any venue or participate in the Melbourne economy.  Vaccination passports and identification will be required for all functions of life. 

And then Andrews paused the construction industry for two weeks to flatten the curve of a upsurge in COVID cases.

Construction union workers went to their union leader to protest this attack on their livelihood, but the union leaders refused to advocate for the workers. The leaders were not down with the workers and their demands; they were pals of the rulers and the rulers' agenda. So the workers took to the street.

Hello, union leaders! The whole point of legitimating unions, which are in fact a conspiracy against the consumers, is that they moderate the "rage" of the workers into legitimate channels. So if you tell your members to get lost, what is the point of you?

And then the government of Victoria. Sending in the police and using aggressive tactics:

Thousands of heavily outfitted and well-armed jackboots -with armor plated MRAP vehicles in support- confronted the protest groups throughout the Melbourne metro area.  The police deployments forced the groups to assemble at Melbourne’s Shrine of Remembrance where a stand-off took place between the protestors and thousands of police units surrounding them.  Once they had the protestors surrounded, the police began tightening the perimeter, until they eventually opened fire with tear gas and rubber bullets.

Now, I am one week away from reading Carl Schmitt and his notion of the political as a "friend-enemy" distinction in which conflict -- killing -- is always the final possibility.

So when a government soft-pedals BLM protests, when e.g., "Melbourne police units who took a knee during last years Black Lives Matter protests in Melbourne," the rulers are saying that BLM activists are on the "friend" end of the "friend-enemy" axis. 

When a government cracks down on construction worker protests, when e.g., "Once they had the protestors surrounded, the police began tightening the perimeter, until they eventually opened fire with tear gas and rubber bullets" the rulers are saying that construction worker protesters are on the "enemy" end of the "friend-enemy"axis.

Obviously, we had the same thing here in the US. BLM and AntiFa protests are regarded by the rulers as understandable and are accommodated. BLM and AntiFa protesters are typically released from custody the day after an arrest.

Compare that with the reaction to the January 6 Capitol riots. Our Democratic friends called it an "armed insurrection" and many of those arrested are still in jail in solitary confinement. 

Using Schmitt's analysis, the situation is obvious. BLM and AntiFa protesters are regarded as "friends" by the ruling class. Trump voters are regarded as "enemies."

Our liberal friends are very sensitive to issues related to nuclear power. They think it is way too dangerous to allow the use of nuclear power to generate electricity.

But I would say, after reading, learning, and inwardly digesting Cart Schmitt's Concept of the Political, that all politics is nuclear. And the point of electoral politics is to institutionalize the conflicts of politics into safe channels, to turn civil war into the sham fight of an election; to turn the looting and plundering of a village into the routine taxation of workers so that the politicians can use the proceeds to reward their supporters.

So, liberal friends. You are all in a tizzy about the dangers of nuclear power, but are perfectly happy with the nuclear nature of politics.

I use my reductive Three Peoples theory to understand and to throw further light upon this. You might call it the Three Peoples Approach to Politics.

I would say that the People of the Subordinate Self band together under a leader that promises to deal with the rulers on their behalf.

I would say that the People of the Responsible Self organize organically among themselves when dealing with the rulers.

I would say that the People of the Creative Self see themselves as the wise and evolved priestly class called by God or Gaia to impose their wisdom on the heathens.

I think that our present ruling class really has No Clue about the dangers and follies of its present war upon the ordinary middle class. It seems to me that on issue after issue, the ruling class thinks that it is just a waste of time trying to reason with the deplorables. So they don't. So they lie and cheat and issue lockdowns and vaccination mandates and masking orders. As though the ordinary American people are just peasants and serfs.

I think that our rulers are making a gigantic mistake. I think that the one thing that every scion of the ruling class should be doing is making a genuine attempt to understand where the ordinary middle-class Trump voter is coming from.

Instead, it seems, the moderates in the Democratic party are allowing themselves to be bullied into moving left by the current generation of progressive activists, for whom politics is a religion. And they find themselves forbidden to talk and negotiate with the leaders of the ordinary American middle class. Indeed, I suggest that the story of Donald Trump is the story of the ruling class and educated America doing "whatever it took" to get rid of Trump. Trump, clearly, is the "enemy."

But Trump is merely the leader of ordinary middle-class America. If you make war on Donald Trump you are making war on ordinary middle-class America.

Is that really what you want, dear liberal friends?