Fighting The Fourth Reich

[Bob Butler 54]

(08-26-2017, 02:06 PM)Kinser79 Wrote: Bob...when it comes to history I find we often don't dispute what happened.  Where we dispute over is why what happened happened in the way it did.  You can call that "alternative" like that is some sort of insult, but I've been "alternative" my whole life.  It is practically a requirement when being in the mainstream practically requires one to be mentally ill.

I do not expect that the left forces will continue your Whiggish path.  They are too far gone, given to authoritarianism, political "correctness", socialism and so forth.  Indeed for them to win would result in a massive step backwards.  Rather, the right will win and a new birth of freedom will likely occur sometime after a massive physical removal of the parasites of the body politic.

It is only after that physical removal that it will be determined which side was the side of progress.

I don't see it that way. For example, immediately after World War II, many western nations thought it necessary to contain the Soviet Union and other powers. Thus, there was no real peace dividend then. That came to a greater extent after the Berlin Wall fell. This resulted in a claim that Stalin didn't invade or occupy until after the war was over. Really? What were all those tanks doing as they headed west? You can change definitions of words and twist the facts, but the borders were drawn essentially where the armies stopped. Not that it mattered. No matter when the invasions and occupations started and stopped, there was a need for containment recognized and a peace dividend delayed.

And this is sort of what I expect from you... doublespeak and creative alternate history. You have a perspective you have to defend, and do not see how ridiculous you are being at times.

As for the future, I see crises as addressing the most serious problems a culture is facing. You can clear up a number of items, but you can never get everything, and if you do changing technology will create new problems. Whig tendencies will not manifest and triumph until these new problems are clear and unavoidable. Until they do become critical, the elites and status quo will dominate. Part of the reason we have had no triumphant regeneracy is the lack of such problems. Bush 43 had a new foreign policy that failed. Obama was at best a decent caretaker, up to undoing the damage Bush 43 did to the economy, but he did not champion new values to the extent that justifies a high and awakening. Neither sorta almost crisis succeeded in creating the need and the mood for a high. Thus, we're still in see saw mode.

S&H saw a valid pattern, but they misunderstood what caused the pattern and the forces that shape it.

Technology is destroying good jobs. Energy and global warming together look to create a significant problem. This could create a post scarcity economy with a new awareness of ecology and sustainability. There are elites who profit from the status quo. I expect that they drag their feet, try to extend their profitable old pattern, but will they drag their feet enough for a true regeneracy and crisis pattern?

For decades I've suggested that the next generation of prophets will be called the Green Generation, that the issues suggested above will be at the core of the next awakening or crisis. So far, no. Nothing has happened cycle wise. We're in the see saw. As badly as I want to break the see saw pattern, reality speaks. The see saw is still there.

And as long as the see saw is still there, so long as the elites can milk money and power from the old pattern, the Whig values are on hold, suspended by the cycles. No regeneracy. No new transformed culture. No victors. No new history books. I do see the above problems as coming to a head eventually however, with immigration / migration waiting to join them. Depending on economics and climate, folks will want to move.

Oddly, I have always seen you siding with factions I perceive as the dominant elites, what Marx would call the owners of the means of production. You started with the Marxist ruling class, and shifted to Trump. In many ways it is a good bet to ally with the elites for three turnings out of four. You'll do well for a while with the attitudes you displayed above.

We'll just see if said elites will see enough of the potential coming storm to manage a soft landing. I'm a bit dubious. They generally don't. If the brick and mortar stores collapse, if the restaurant industry follows, if the climate change deniers lose their propaganda war with reality... We may yet see a true crisis. That's a lot of ifs. When you go to the future, there is no choice but guess at alternate history. Sill, should problems come to a head, bet with the Whigs. Until then, ride with the elites if you must.