From a Reader: “Thoughts to Share”
I spent 81/2 years on active duty. I was stationed at Ft Bragg for most of that time. I vacationed in Pineland and I’m thoroughly familiar with Smoke Bomb Hill. I’ve been out for many years, and am now officially a F.O.G. That said, I remember much of what I was taught and Ive made a study of revolution/counter-revolution since I got out.
My observation: We are staring down the barrel of some very hard times and, because of a general lack of direction and organization, we are screwed. The Left has organization and organizations, they have captured societal institutions, they have money and a gigantic footprint. But more importantly, they have a set of strategic objectives, a strategy and operational planning to achieve those goals and, at the most basic level, they have a philosophy. We have none of that.
I have spent some time on your site and have read many of your articles. I also listened to an episode of your Contra podcast; “I don’t have a lot of time for bigotry.” I believe that’s a quote. That’s good, because I have no time for bigotry either. I am hoping that we can agree that Nazism and Fascism are for pinheads, as are Communism, Socialism and Anarchism. Theocracy is off my list, as is Monarchy. Direct democracy is also not our way; democracy is a form of tyranny and chaos. The Republican Party stands for nothing. The Democrats are in a fight between establishment mafia and genuine Neo-Marxist revolutionaries. Liberalism has become Progressivism and devolved into genuine Regressivism. Meanwhile, Conservatives are on the ropes because, “NO!” isn’t a social, political or economic platform. Conservatives’ change resistance does not balance the Left’s obsession with change. It leaves them standing on the side of the road screaming, “NO!”, while the Left guides change. I am left politically homeless. I have a feeling that you feel much the same way. I have spent some time contemplating this problem and searching for a solution. Ive read a stack, more than one stack actually, of books over the last 4 years. What we lack is not just a political home. We lack a conceptual toolbox upon which to organize a counter-revolution. What we must do is assemble that tool box and put it in the hip pocket of about 15% of the American people just like the Communists, Socialists, Anarchists and Jihadists have their conceptual toolbox in their hip pockets (I’m thinking of, On Peoples’ War, Little Red Books and the Koran, but there are other examples).
My reading led me to a fellow named Pettit, who wrote a book on Republicanism, the philosophy of America’s founders. The central premise of Republicanism is that all human beings have a right to live their lives in immunity from domination, with no possibility of domination within the law and protected from domination outside the law. My initial response was, “Some people are so evil that they have to be dominated in order to be controlled”. The Republican answer to that assertion is that evil must be restrained. Restraint that prevents evil is not domination. The best definition of domination that I have found is that domination is a state of unequal freedom and that a person, or group of people, that are attempting to expand their freedom, or enjoying greater freedom, at the expense of another person or group are engaging in domination.
What would a government, and a nation, founded upon this central premise of, “No Domination” look like, and how would the people who lived in that nation live? Its an interesting question and Ive spent some time putting some thoughts on paper attempting come up with an answer.
The conceptual tool box is just the first among several strategic imperatives that must be accomplished if a successful revolutionary counter-revolution is to be launched. An organizational model, an avante garde group and articulate, disciplined cadres who are able to mobilize people are also essential.
Hawken
My Reply: The Left has been working on this, full steam, for decades now while most were more concerned with their normalcy bias to care. As a movement, they’ve had a long term vision and coherent end state, which has provided their guiding doctrine. It is the one component missing from the theorists’ studies on 5GW: the underlying philosophy providing a logical end state.