Posts: 546
Threads: 59
Joined: Nov 2016
In their turnings theory, the authors bring up the idea of the "Generational Constellation" - all the generations together in their different phases of life, each generation bringing its collective peer personality into that phase of life, all interacting to create the social mood of the turning. In the Fourth Turning, the constellation consists of visionary elder Prophets, pragmatic mid-life Nomads, heroic young adult Heroes and suffocated child Artists.
And then there is this Fourth Turning, with its deep partisan divide and uncompromising, all or nothing politics. As we come up to what is likely to be a contested election, I recall the contested election of twenty years ago, which was around when we started hearing the terms "red zone" and "blue zone" to describe, respectively, the conservative and liberal sides of the political split. Since that divide is so entrenched now, I am led to believe that we actually have two different generational constellations - one red, and the other blue.
I'm just going to leave out the Artist generation and think about who the stereotypical people are who belong to each of the two constellations.
Red Zone Constellation
Prophets - fundamentalist leaders, Covid-denying governors, Trump supporters glued to Fox News
Nomads - paunchy militia members, anti-maskers, Karens caught on viral video
Heroes - Charlottesville marchers, Proud Boys, 4chan & r/the_donald
Blue Zone Constellation
Prophets - embattled journalists, postmodern academics, Covid-aware governors
Nomads - hipster Dads, social media Moms, pandemic managers
Heroes - wokesters, #BLM protesters, antifa
Consider that Heroes of both stripes are coming out en masse, goaded by their respective media machines, and some are dying for their side of the conflict. Two constellations at war.
I've been a little glib in my descriptions and would love to hear more ideas.
Steve Barrera
[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure
Saecular Pages
Posts: 10,013
Threads: 103
Joined: May 2016
09-21-2020, 11:05 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-21-2020, 11:17 PM by Eric the Green.)
(09-21-2020, 10:12 PM)sbarrera Wrote: In their turnings theory, the authors bring up the idea of the "Generational Constellation" - all the generations together in their different phases of life, each generation bringing its collective peer personality into that phase of life, all interacting to create the social mood of the turning. In the Fourth Turning, the constellation consists of visionary elder Prophets, pragmatic mid-life Nomads, heroic young adult Heroes and suffocated child Artists.
And then there is this Fourth Turning, with its deep partisan divide and uncompromising, all or nothing politics. As we come up to what is likely to be a contested election, I recall the contested election of twenty years ago, which was around when we started hearing the terms "red zone" and "blue zone" to describe, respectively, the conservative and liberal sides of the political split. Since that divide is so entrenched now, I am led to believe that we actually have two different generational constellations - one red, and the other blue.
I'm just going to leave out the Artist generation and think about who the stereotypical people are who belong to each of the two constellations.
Red Zone Constellation
Prophets - fundamentalist leaders, Covid-denying governors, Trump supporters glued to Fox News
Nomads - paunchy militia members, anti-maskers, Karens caught on viral video
Heroes - Charlottesville marchers, Proud Boys, 4chan & r/the_donald
Blue Zone Constellation
Prophets - embattled journalists, postmodern academics, Covid-aware governors
Nomads - hipster Dads, social media Moms, pandemic managers
Heroes - wokesters, #BLM protesters, antifa
Consider that Heroes of both stripes are coming out en masse, goaded by their respective media machines, and some are dying for their side of the conflict. Two constellations at war.
I've been a little glib in my descriptions and would love to hear more ideas.
It's a good idea to speak of two constellations, since we are in effect now two nations, just as in the 1850s and 60s.
Wokesters might be a very broad term; I don't know. But the millennial heroes also include the climate marchers, those that Marched for their Lives after Parkland, the younger group of Occupy, and the Berniebros.... they have a rough row to hoe now, as it looks like the current regressive, decaying carcas of the USA will just continue on in its useless stalemate, as conservative writer George Will calls us, "a pathetic, helpless giant." That's what we are, unless all the blue generations suddenly grow a backbone and realize that we are in a war. I don't know if they will, or what it will take to take down the other side. So far, the Democrats have just caved or been out-fought.
On the red side, don't forget QAnon and all the anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theory wackos, Alex Jones followers, etc.; probably nomads..... you mentioned 4chan as heroes.....
There are a lot of other blue prophets, but I'm not sure what to call them except activists of various stripes. Or people like me who most of the time are content just to blab on discussion boards and in facebook groups and think it means something.
Posts: 546
Threads: 59
Joined: Nov 2016
I had "anti-maskers" which could be an umbrella term for conspiracy theorists. But yes, Qanon deserves a mention.
Calling 4chan'ers Heroes simply acknowledges that they are from the Millennial generation. And from the red zone's perspectievs, they are Heroes. So are the kids showing up armed at protests to fight against antifa, as tragic as the outcomes end up being.
Steve Barrera
[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure
Saecular Pages
Posts: 10,465
Threads: 197
Joined: May 2016
Conspiracy theorists have a wide range of follies from the harmless (Moon landing hoax) to the offensive (Holocaust denial) to the harmful (anti-vaccination). All depend on some denial of rational thought, especially the core value that establishes the most likely truth (the simplest explanation consistent with truth almost certainly -- in essence, you can bet your life on it) is the truth.
We can place the blame on many things, including people in the business of creating and selling pure bunkum (flat earth, recent collisions in the solar system, ancient astronauts, young-earth creationism, William Shakespeare couldn't have written all that is ascribed to him), bigotry (Holocaust denial, slavery was good for blacks), extremism ("providential" theory of American history, Marxism-Leninism, "scientific" racism, Afrocentrism*, the gun cult), medical quackery, or monetary hustles (Buy gold! Buy gold! Buy gold!). Add to this, I see the decline in the teaching and learning of the classic liberal arts that allow people to learn a wide, if not deep, knowledge in favor of deeper knowledge in fewer things (the Multiversity that has transformed undergraduate education into a watered-down grad school). People need some means of discerning truth, but even that is not enough. Breadth rightly comes before depth unless one can succeed at depth in one area (such as the performing and creative arts) early. Even with this said, the messed-up lives of many child stars of music and acting suggests that we need more breadth of experience to avoid the perils of the "Hollywood lifestyle".
If you are thinking about K-12 education, then I suggest that K-12 teachers be better versed in the liberal arts than they are. Many students do not go on to college or simply end up with some vocational curriculum intended to allow them to function in a commercial society, so their last possible encounter with the liberal arts is often K-12 education. Because life cannot be all work in a social order of high productivity and technological prowess (unless a few greedy swine have designed the political and economic order so that it funnels everything possible to some Master Class while giving others nothing more than the physical means of an animal-like existence, mind-rotting mass culture as an anodyne, and mind-denying religion as moral instruction).
*The achievements of African-Americans are adequate to establish the capability of Africans, and there were isolated but distinguished civilizations (Egypt is connected to Europe and the Near East, and is a special case for having more influence upon Europe and the Near East than upon sub-Saharan Africa, so it does not fully count as an African civilization) in sub-Saharan Africa. Beethoven was not black, as if that has any relevance. There is no "Whites Only" label on Plato, Michelangelo, J S Bach, or Leo Tolstoy. I can appreciate Hokusai without being Japanese and I can appreciate Duke Ellington without being black.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
Posts: 10,013
Threads: 103
Joined: May 2016
So we have a red vs. blue generational constellation. How does a 4T play out if the new Supreme Court is poised to throw out every legislative advance or solution? How can the people fight the Supreme Court, if Democrats are too timid to pack the Court, remove the filibuster, and take the other measures that will be needed to defeat it? What is left except a secession movement, leading to possible invasion if Trump or a Trumpist is in power, or a revolution crushed by a public and its state opposed to "anarchists"? If the Democrats run Harris in 2024, which will guarantee a Republican return to power in the White House, and a Court ready to OK almost any unconstitutional or abnormal decree or behavior by the Republican president, and remove anything Biden may have accomplished by whatever means, what do blue activists do then?
The task for the blue constellation looks daunting indeed now.
Posts: 546
Threads: 59
Joined: Nov 2016
I'm trying to evaluate who has the advantage, red or blue. The red zone has this crazy energy and these kind of scary shock troops, but the blue zone is the one managing the pandemic, and I think they are slightly in the majority as well.
Steve Barrera
[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure
Saecular Pages
Posts: 10,465
Threads: 197
Joined: May 2016
(09-22-2020, 01:11 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: So we have a red vs. blue generational constellation. How does a 4T play out if the new Supreme Court is poised to throw out every legislative advance or solution? How can the people fight the Supreme Court, if Democrats are too timid to pack the Court, remove the filibuster, and take the other measures that will be needed to defeat it? What is left except a secession movement, leading to possible invasion if Trump or a Trumpist is in power, or a revolution crushed by a public and its state opposed to "anarchists"? If the Democrats run Harris in 2024, which will guarantee a Republican return to power in the White House, and a Court ready to OK almost any unconstitutional or abnormal decree or behavior by the Republican president, and remove anything Biden may have accomplished by whatever means, what do blue activists do then?
The task for the blue constellation looks daunting indeed now.
Trump cannot win a free and fair election. He can cheat if he pulls the right levers, and in view of his bad position in the event of electoral defeat I expect him to have fixers trying to pull those levers for him. I have no desire to give anyone any hints on what those levers would be. Most obvious would be nullifying the votes that he dislikes. Maybe he would selectively choose that state legislatures (or at lest the chamber in his favor) decide which way their state applies its electoral votes, or that the Governor make the decision. Should he do this, then we might have a series of secessions.
I would rather have a passport that says "Republic of Michigan" than one that connects me to a dictatorship.
I can imagine how much appeal the President has within the Armed Services.
Will it be appropriate to nullify his dubious achievements? Obviously we cannot nullify the deaths of over 200,000 people as the result of his bungled response to COVID-19. If we are to do so, then such would be limited to his biggest achievements -- if you want to call those achievements: his tax cuts and his judicial appointments. We would be obliged to show that he exercised power unlawfully, perhaps as a consequence of electoral fraud. Donald Trump did collude with a foreign power hostile to democracy in general.
Judicial appointments are for life, so appointments of Neil Gorsuch and "Barf" Kavanaugh would have to be transformed into sinecures. I would drink to that, although obviously not as much as Bart "I like beer" Kavanaugh used to.
Such was not done against Obama in 2012. Mitt Romney has far more integrity than Donald Trump does.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
Posts: 4,336
Threads: 7
Joined: Jul 2016
(09-23-2020, 02:18 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: Trump cannot win a free and fair election...
Actually, he can. Why? Trump and his followers are charged up and Biden has the intensity level of Calm Radio.
If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Intelligence is not knowledge and knowledge is not wisdom, but they all play well together.
Posts: 1,970
Threads: 6
Joined: Sep 2016
(09-22-2020, 11:14 PM)sbarrera Wrote: I'm trying to evaluate who has the advantage, red or blue.
Tough to do that in an accurate way when you have such a leftist viewpoint. The truth is, Karens tend to be leftists, and while mommy bloggers also tend to be leftist, social media moms include all Gen X moms on both sides. Your other errors are more egregious.
(09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Even if Biden wins, there won't be another centrist Democrat any time soon. Neoliberalism has run out of steam and a President Biden would merely preside over its final collapse.
Posts: 546
Threads: 59
Joined: Nov 2016
09-24-2020, 01:25 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-24-2020, 01:26 PM by sbarrera.)
(09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-22-2020, 11:14 PM)sbarrera Wrote: I'm trying to evaluate who has the advantage, red or blue.
Tough to do that in an accurate way when you have such a leftist viewpoint. The truth is, Karens tend to be leftists, and while mommy bloggers also tend to be leftist, social media moms include all Gen X moms on both sides. Your other errors are more egregious.
Can you be more specific, re: "other errors" ?
I am curious if you have your own version of the red and blue generational constellations.
Steve Barrera
[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure
Saecular Pages
Posts: 4,336
Threads: 7
Joined: Jul 2016
(09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Even if Biden wins, there won't be another centrist Democrat any time soon. Neoliberalism has run out of steam and a President Biden would merely preside over its final collapse.
Good point, though the bitterness will be much less if he wins.
Intelligence is not knowledge and knowledge is not wisdom, but they all play well together.
Posts: 1,970
Threads: 6
Joined: Sep 2016
09-24-2020, 09:08 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-24-2020, 09:09 PM by Warren Dew.)
(09-24-2020, 01:25 PM)sbarrera Wrote: Can you be more specific, re: "other errors" ?
I am curious if you have your own version of the red and blue generational constellations.
I'd rather not waste a lot of time on a political argument, and your original post is way too deep in the blue koolaid to answer briefly, so I won't go into specifics.
I don't think there are separate constellations. You can divide people by Red or Blue, which is merely party labeling, or you can divide them between the outgoing neoliberal regime and the incoming regime, which we don't know the details of yet.
Red Idealists include Gingrich and Trump, and also some younger people like Romney and Baker. Of these examples, all but Trump are stuck in the neoliberal mindset, though Gingrich might be able to adjust. Pence is also Idealist, and if Trump is so successful that Pence wins a term in 2024-2028, it remains to be seen whether he will build on Trump's movement toward a nationalist workers' future, or if he'll be the final exponent of neoliberalism.
Blue Idealists include the Clintons, and Sanders and Obama act a lot like Idealists though they are on the edges of the generation at best. The Clintons are neoliberalism personified. Sanders and Obama could be exponents of a different future, one where workers are marginalized but neoliberalism is replaced by an oligarchy of economic elites legitimized by votes from the government dependent welfare masses. Or rather, that's what their vision of socialism will become once it's implemented by Blue Reactives.
Red Reactives are dominant in the active Republican party - almost all Republican Senators of note are Reactives, along with the Republican House leadership. These are the guys doing the detailed planning to finish the transition of the Republican party into a workers' party - one that champions people who work for a living over people who don't, where the latter includes both people on long term welfare and ridiculously rich owners and investors.
Blue Reactives dominate the ranks of those ridiculously rich owners and investors - Bezos, Pichai, etc. These are the people who wouldn't mind transitioning from being oligopolists to being oligarchs, and wouldn't mind replacing pesky workers with machines and an expanded welfare vote plantation, at least until they can get rid of democracy entirely.
Civics I think are tougher to get a handle on, mostly because they parrot memes from Idealists, thinking they are their own ideas, without actually having independent ideas of their own. You can argue that the Charlottesville marchers and the BLM and Antifa rioters - not the protesters, the rioters - are examples, but these aren't their own causes; they're the causes of the Idealists who brainwash them. To the extent that Civics have an interest of their own, it's to get back a share of the increasing productivity that has since 1970 been going entirely to employers and investors. Some would prefer to work and get back some of the increasing share that has been going to welfare recipients over that time; others would prefer to become welfare recipients as long as they can get a share of the increasing productivity; many are neutral as to which happens, but they want what they perceive to be their share. None of this is conscious, but it drives the Idealist ideas they are willing to embrace, and their rejection of the ideas they don't support.
(09-24-2020, 02:56 PM)David Horn Wrote: (09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Even if Biden wins, there won't be another centrist Democrat any time soon. Neoliberalism has run out of steam and a President Biden would merely preside over its final collapse.
Good point, though the bitterness will be much less if he wins.
The bitterness of the neoliberals?
George Friedman thinks the last neoliberal term will be 2024-2028, which he thinks will have a Democratic President. I agree that 2024 is a little early for the final nail in the coffin of neoliberalism. It's also possible that a Red neoliberal like Romney or Baker will wrest back control of the Republican party and be President then, but that doesn't seem the way to bet right now.
Posts: 3,956
Threads: 11
Joined: May 2016
sbarrera Wrote: (09-24-2020, 02:56 PM)David Horn Wrote: (09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Even if Biden wins, there won't be another centrist Democrat any time soon. Neoliberalism has run out of steam and a President Biden would merely preside over its final collapse.
Good point, though the bitterness will be much less if he wins.
The bitterness of the neoliberals?
George Friedman thinks the last neoliberal term will be 2024-2028, which he thinks will have a Democratic President. I agree that 2024 is a little early for the final nail in the coffin of neoliberalism. It's also possible that a Red neoliberal like Romney or Baker will wrest back control of the Republican party and be President then, but that doesn't seem the way to bet right now.
While Biden has a reputation as establishment, he is selling himself this election cycle as a man of the people. The tale he is telling is of losing his first wife, of the friends he made on the daily train to Washington DC, of his son being in the military, of the need for affordable health care. That isn’t the guy who is eager to serve the elites, ship jobs overseas and increase the division of wealth. In the heart of the unraveling it was fashionable to seek ‘campaign contributions’ rather than work for the people. Both selfishness and neoliberalism ran rampant. Nowadays Biden had adapted the more progressive course from people like Sander and Warren. He is at least talking a good game.
We could see a new progressive era, the government working for the people rather than the elites. Let’s see if that is how they go.
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.
Posts: 10,465
Threads: 197
Joined: May 2016
(09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: (09-23-2020, 02:18 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: Trump cannot win a free and fair election...
Actually, he can. Why? Trump and his followers are charged up and Biden has the intensity level of Calm Radio.
Trump's Base is as fervent as ever. But for it to succeed, it must convince people not in that Base to go along. What many saw as charming roguishness is a cover for doing bad things to people. He is entertaining in a way -- but so were such types as Nero and Idi Amin. At some point the harm is not worth the entertainment, as when the Leader casts Christians to the lions or political opponents to the crocodiles. Trump may not be that bad, but he is taking America in a bad direction. "One and done" and never again.
It is not up to our politicians to entertain us. It is far better that we have the means, as solid income, to go to the movie theater, the horse track, the concert hall, or the club... whatever. (Whoops! With SARS-2 viruses out and about, maybe we have to rely upon books, recorded music and video, and hobbies for the duration). Politics works best when it is dull because there is then no drama of those in power doing unto others before others get a chance to do unto them.
Quote:If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Donald Trump is a huge blunder by the electorate, someone who slipped through the system. I see him much like Peter Ustinov hamming it up as Nero in the cinematic Quo Vadis, which holds up well almost seventy years later... and that I see germane to current events in America.
Of course in a culture that has devolved to tribal divisions even in sources of news, with the accusation that opposing sides simply choose what fits the narrative that best fits their core beliefs, some people will be find the results of the 2020 election a horrible shock.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
Posts: 546
Threads: 59
Joined: Nov 2016
(09-24-2020, 09:08 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-24-2020, 01:25 PM)sbarrera Wrote: Can you be more specific, re: "other errors" ?
I am curious if you have your own version of the red and blue generational constellations.
I'd rather not waste a lot of time on a political argument, and your original post is way too deep in the blue koolaid to answer briefly, so I won't go into specifics.
I don't think there are separate constellations. You can divide people by Red or Blue, which is merely party labeling, or you can divide them between the outgoing neoliberal regime and the incoming regime, which we don't know the details of yet.
Red Idealists include Gingrich and Trump, and also some younger people like Romney and Baker. Of these examples, all but Trump are stuck in the neoliberal mindset, though Gingrich might be able to adjust. Pence is also Idealist, and if Trump is so successful that Pence wins a term in 2024-2028, it remains to be seen whether he will build on Trump's movement toward a nationalist workers' future, or if he'll be the final exponent of neoliberalism.
Blue Idealists include the Clintons, and Sanders and Obama act a lot like Idealists though they are on the edges of the generation at best. The Clintons are neoliberalism personified. Sanders and Obama could be exponents of a different future, one where workers are marginalized but neoliberalism is replaced by an oligarchy of economic elites legitimized by votes from the government dependent welfare masses. Or rather, that's what their vision of socialism will become once it's implemented by Blue Reactives.
Red Reactives are dominant in the active Republican party - almost all Republican Senators of note are Reactives, along with the Republican House leadership. These are the guys doing the detailed planning to finish the transition of the Republican party into a workers' party - one that champions people who work for a living over people who don't, where the latter includes both people on long term welfare and ridiculously rich owners and investors.
Blue Reactives dominate the ranks of those ridiculously rich owners and investors - Bezos, Pichai, etc. These are the people who wouldn't mind transitioning from being oligopolists to being oligarchs, and wouldn't mind replacing pesky workers with machines and an expanded welfare vote plantation, at least until they can get rid of democracy entirely.
I'm just not seeing how the Republicans are champions of workers; nationalists I can see, but pro-labor I cannot. They seem to be fighting for the last vestiges of their side of the culture wars - hence the focus on judicial appointments as the main accomplishment of this time. "detailed planning to finish the transition of the Republican party into a workers' party" is new to me; maybe you can give some insights into these details? Share some of that red koolaid with us! 
I do like the idea of the Blue Reactives as the emerging oligarchs of the tech industry, an industry which is almost completely unscathed by the Covid pandemic. Jeff Bezos is the Henry F. Potter of our time, and the whole country is his Potterville.
Steve Barrera
[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure
Saecular Pages
Posts: 546
Threads: 59
Joined: Nov 2016
09-25-2020, 10:48 AM
(This post was last modified: 09-25-2020, 10:57 AM by sbarrera.)
(09-24-2020, 09:08 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-24-2020, 01:25 PM)sbarrera Wrote: Can you be more specific, re: "other errors" ?
I am curious if you have your own version of the red and blue generational constellations.
...
Civics I think are tougher to get a handle on, mostly because they parrot memes from Idealists, thinking they are their own ideas, without actually having independent ideas of their own. You can argue that the Charlottesville marchers and the BLM and Antifa rioters - not the protesters, the rioters - are examples, but these aren't their own causes; they're the causes of the Idealists who brainwash them. To the extent that Civics have an interest of their own, it's to get back a share of the increasing productivity that has since 1970 been going entirely to employers and investors. Some would prefer to work and get back some of the increasing share that has been going to welfare recipients over that time; others would prefer to become welfare recipients as long as they can get a share of the increasing productivity; many are neutral as to which happens, but they want what they perceive to be their share. None of this is conscious, but it drives the Idealist ideas they are willing to embrace, and their rejection of the ideas they don't support.
Isn't this what is meant by the "constellation"? You put it in derisory terms - the Idealists brainwash the Civics - but it could also be described as giving them their vision (via the memes...) which they then act upon as a united front. It's just that there are two fronts and there is conflict in the streets.
Steve Barrera
[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure
Saecular Pages
Posts: 10,465
Threads: 197
Joined: May 2016
(09-24-2020, 09:08 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-24-2020, 01:25 PM)sbarrera Wrote: Can you be more specific, re: "other errors" ?
I am curious if you have your own version of the red and blue generational constellations.
I'd rather not waste a lot of time on a political argument, and your original post is way too deep in the blue koolaid to answer briefly, so I won't go into specifics.
I don't think there are separate constellations. You can divide people by Red or Blue, which is merely party labeling, or you can divide them between the outgoing neoliberal regime and the incoming regime, which we don't know the details of yet.
Red Idealists include Gingrich and Trump, and also some younger people like Romney and Baker. Of these examples, all but Trump are stuck in the neoliberal mindset, though Gingrich might be able to adjust. Pence is also Idealist, and if Trump is so successful that Pence wins a term in 2024-2028, it remains to be seen whether he will build on Trump's movement toward a nationalist workers' future, or if he'll be the final exponent of neoliberalism.
Trump has the ideology; he has simply added his style, that of the Limbaugh-style shock jock. Trump is a classic blowhard, the sort of person who gets away with noxious behavior because he can buy sympathetic supporters who tell him how wonderful he is. It is about like his treatment of sex partners, especially paid ones. The rest of Humanity is expendable and disposable to him as impossible as such is to most people. Trump is Hollywood glitz without the veneer of creativity. Some horrible people in Hollywood have been fantastically successful (John Wayne, Roman Polanski, Bill Cosby) while being horrible persons -- but they could act, direct coherently, or get us to laugh. It is hard to see what Trump does well that makes him worth his nastiness.
Oh, by the way -- Mitt Romney is old. He had his narrow opportunity in which to become President, 2012 and 2016. The new guys are like Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton, and they fully believe in capitalism with no pretense of any service by capitalists and government by the economic elites, for the economic elites, and for the economic elites in return for which we will probably get even more growth in productive capacity. (At this point, the economic objective is more appropriately doing better with what we have than in having more but having it all go to a few rapacious plutocrats and their retainers).
Quote:Blue Idealists include the Clintons, and Sanders and Obama act a lot like Idealists though they are on the edges of the generation at best. The Clintons are neoliberalism personified. Sanders and Obama could be exponents of a different future, one where workers are marginalized but neoliberalism is replaced by an oligarchy of economic elites legitimized by votes from the government dependent welfare masses. Or rather, that's what their vision of socialism will become once it's implemented by Blue Reactives.
We have been in a neoliberal time and ethos since 1980. Such is the current phase of the Skowronek cycle. Reagan initiated this era; Trump brings it to its preposterous conclusion. Basically we are being set up for a very new era. Biden may be a transition more than a leader. This said, there will be some tough decisions for him, especially what to do with his predecessor. Trump might have loved to send Barack Obama to prison; Biden may have a situation in which... well, he succeeds Milosevic with Milosevic still having fanatical supporters.
Reagan starts and defines the era. The elder Bush continues it. Bill Clinton refines it some. Dubya tries to bring it back to life, but falls clearly short. Obama gives portents of how it might transform into something better, but Trump brings it back harder and without compromise. The last is failure.
Quote:Red Reactives are dominant in the active Republican party - almost all Republican Senators of note are Reactives, along with the Republican House leadership. These are the guys doing the detailed planning to finish the transition of the Republican party into a workers' party - one that champions people who work for a living over people who don't, where the latter includes both people on long term welfare and ridiculously rich owners and investors.
Well, there is a list of US Senators, and it can be sorted for age.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cu...s_senators
By generation (as Howe and Strauss describe them) we have nine US Senators from the Silent Generation, and two of those are retiring. All are at least 78 years old. It is amazing that we have nine US Senators who are at or above the normal life expectancy. There will not likely be any new ones from this generation.
Twenty-two are born in what one can call the first wave of the Boom Generation, as I arbitrarily cut off on December 31, 1950 and January 1, 1951. All have turned 70 or are passing 70. By most objective standards this is old, although one can fend off many of the ravages of age if one remains active intellectually and physically and otherwise avoids bad habits. Thirty-eight Senators are born between 1951 and 1960, rounding out Howe and Strauss' Boom Generation. Fully sixty US Senators are Boomers, and that is likely the peak for them in the Senate.
I must have miscounted, but I come up with 32 Senators from the Thirteenth Generation, all born between 1961 and 1981, inclusively. The youngest US Senator turns 41 this year, and it is amazing that we have no 30-something US Senator. I do not know who will be the first US Senator from the Millennial Generation, and I don't know so much ages as partisan affiliations of challengers this year. Going on seat-of-the-pants predictions I would now largely expect most turnover in the US Senate to be members of Generation X replacing Generation X if the most important change is partisan affiliation. Such will be clearer when the Senate elections of 2020 are settled.
Quote:Blue Reactives dominate the ranks of those ridiculously rich owners and investors - Bezos, Pichai, etc. These are the people who wouldn't mind transitioning from being oligopolists to being oligarchs, and wouldn't mind replacing pesky workers with machines and an expanded welfare vote plantation, at least until they can get rid of democracy entirely.
Among the Generation X Republicans I find a currency trader, an ophthalmologist, directors of non-profits, business owners, former professors and military officers, public administrators, and one farmer. There are obviously millionaires, but no billionaires that I can identify. The oligarchs and plutocrats seem perfectly happy with finding loyal supporters who believe what the most swinish people of all economic elites have predictably believed (that no human suffering can ever be in excess so long as it serves the economic elites); if they could get such from a mechanic they would choose that fellow over a Distinguished Professor of Economic History who might not be adequately obedient. The elites will find tools.
Civics I think are tougher to get a handle on, mostly because they parrot memes from Idealists, thinking they are their own ideas, without actually having independent ideas of their own. You can argue that the Charlottesville marchers and the BLM and Antifa rioters - not the protesters, the rioters - are examples, but these aren't their own causes; they're the causes of the Idealists who brainwash them. To the extent that Civics have an interest of their own, it's to get back a share of the increasing productivity that has since 1970 been going entirely to employers and investors. Some would prefer to work and get back some of the increasing share that has been going to welfare recipients over that time; others would prefer to become welfare recipients as long as they can get a share of the increasing productivity; many are neutral as to which happens, but they want what they perceive to be their share. None of this is conscious, but it drives the Idealist ideas they are willing to embrace, and their rejection of the ideas they don't support.[/quote]
As for rioters -- our system is reasonably good at keeping outright criminals from winning high public office. This said, the temptations of corrupt gain are huge. Some, like insider dealing on knowledge of how legislation was going or keeping campaign funds for oneself upon retirement, are now illegal. Illegality has not prevented bribery. Personal violence is obviously rare among people who have everything to lose if caught in the act or if huge amounts of exposure of misdeeds comes into the media... nobody has his character tested as does someone with great power.
If you want a political career, avoid a diversion as "drug dealer" or "car thief".
(09-24-2020, 02:56 PM)David Horn Wrote: (09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Even if Biden wins, there won't be another centrist Democrat any time soon. Neoliberalism has run out of steam and a President Biden would merely preside over its final collapse.
Good point, though the bitterness will be much less if he wins.
The bitterness of the neoliberals?
George Friedman thinks the last neoliberal term will be 2024-2028, which he thinks will have a Democratic President. I agree that 2024 is a little early for the final nail in the coffin of neoliberalism. It's also possible that a Red neoliberal like Romney or Baker will wrest back control of the Republican party and be President then, but that doesn't seem the way to bet right now.[/quote]
Neoliberalism has its believers. Any ideology that predominates over forty years (unless it topples in war or revolution) will have its acolytes. Millennial adults (who will soon appear in the Senate) will have often learned their college-level economics from college professors and will have read books by authors who espouse neoliberalism as the best way to get economic growth and technological progress -- by treating workers badly and taking choice from consumers. The last forty years have been a heyday for monopolization and vertical integration.
Replacing even a rotten order with a new one is never so easy as it looks. It is easy to suggest change, but implementing it is never easy. Any system creates its dependencies and plenty of helpless people. Few have a coherent idea for what can supplant neoliberal politics and economics. Reversion to small business? The people who have the ability to make a go of it either have some other way to fare sort-of-OK in the economic order or have little-to-no access to capital from financial sources other than loan sharks. In theory it would be possible to subdivide all the vacant husks that used to be Sears stores into little mom-and-pop operations or to revitalize old shops downtown, but I have yet to see that happening.
Economic elites typically distrust outsiders, and usually seek to pass down power, wealth, and even opportunity in a hereditary manner (the aristocratic "principle" of slave-owning planters and the Soviet-era nomenklatura alike despite diametric positions on economics and social organization).
It will take an economic calamity of the sort of 1929-1932, and not the 'wimpy' meltdown of 2007-2009, to break the over-leveraged, politically-connected corporate behemoths, cast corporate employees out into the cold, and give people few alternatives to starting family businesses with the usual hardships that one associates with such in the 1930's. Such, should it happen, would be by the design of nobody; it would result from blunders that expose institutional shakiness.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
Posts: 4,336
Threads: 7
Joined: Jul 2016
09-26-2020, 09:49 AM
(This post was last modified: 09-27-2020, 06:48 AM by David Horn.)
(09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-24-2020, 02:56 PM)David Horn Wrote: (09-23-2020, 05:14 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (09-23-2020, 04:01 PM)David Horn Wrote: If the Democratic centrists lose this one, after losing under Hillary, there will be no centrist Democratic candidate again anytime soon -- nor should there be.
Even if Biden wins, there won't be another centrist Democrat any time soon. Neoliberalism has run out of steam and a President Biden would merely preside over its final collapse.
Good point, though the bitterness will be much less if he wins.
The bitterness of the neoliberals?
George Friedman thinks the last neoliberal term will be 2024-2028, which he thinks will have a Democratic President. I agree that 2024 is a little early for the final nail in the coffin of neoliberalism. It's also possible that a Red neoliberal like Romney or Baker will wrest back control of the Republican party and be President then, but that doesn't seem the way to bet right now.
There is an obvious majority bias against the old model of economic overlords with carte blanche to continue being who they are. How Trump, an overlord if there ever was one, managed to sell himself as a populist is a bit baffling, but he did. If he wins, there will be a reactionary return to old norms that can't work, and everyone not fully into the Kool-Aid will be hurt enough to react. How it goes from there is the only question, but don't bet on non-violence.
Intelligence is not knowledge and knowledge is not wisdom, but they all play well together.
Posts: 3,956
Threads: 11
Joined: May 2016
(09-26-2020, 09:49 AM)David Horn Wrote: There is an obvious majority bias against the old model of economic overlords with carte blanche to continue being who they are. How Trump, an overlord if there was one, managed to sell himself as a populist is a bit baffling, but he did. If he wins, there will be a reactionary return to old norms that can't work, and everyone not fully into the Kool-Aid will be hurt enough to react. How it goes from there is the only question, but don't bet on non-violence.
Unfortunately, there will be quite enough people who will be hurt, but that the solution is more Kool-Aid.
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.
Posts: 1,970
Threads: 6
Joined: Sep 2016
09-26-2020, 02:33 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-26-2020, 04:22 PM by Warren Dew.)
(09-25-2020, 10:48 AM)sbarrera Wrote: Isn't this what is meant by the "constellation"? You put it in derisory terms - the Idealists brainwash the Civics - but it could also be described as giving them their vision (via the memes...) which they then act upon as a united front. It's just that there are two fronts and there is conflict in the streets.
I'm not disagreeing that there is a constellation; that's basic to generational theories discussed here. I'm disagreeing with the idea that there are two separate constellations, one Red and one Blue. The fundamental grievances of the Millenials have nothing to do with the Red v Blue arguments. Of course, that makes it difficult for the Millenials to express them, since Boomers are all about Red v Blue arguments.
|
