Month: December 2023

09DEC2023 – Quote of the Day

photog Quote of the Day ,

Faith and patriotism are the two great thaumaturges of this world. Both are divine; all their actions are prodigies. Do not go to them talking of examination, choice, or discussion; they will say that you blaspheme. They know only two words: submission and belief; with these two levers they raise the world. Even their errors are sublime. These two children of Heaven prove their origin to all eyes by creating and conserving; but if they unite, join their forces, and together take possession of a nation, they exalt it, they divinize it, and they increase its forces a hundred-fold.

Joseph de Maistre

Policy Foreign

photog Current Events ,

Our foreign policy is run by people whose plan seems to be destabilizing the whole world.  They have simultaneously provoked crises in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Far East and now South America.  That is impressive by any standard.  They haven’t managed to piss off the Pope but only because he happens to be an atheistic pedo-protecting commie like them.

Maybe the most interesting thing about this situation is that they don’t seem at all alarmed that a lot of it is going badly for the sides they allegedly support.  Ukraine seems to be failing in its war with Russia.  The West African nations that revolted against the Western approved leaders have seemingly triumphed over the response from France and the United States.  The United States has given such mixed signals in the Gaza war that both the Israelis and the Arabs are angry at Dementia Joe.  China has basically shrugged its shoulders and walked away from any negotiations about Taiwan.  And now Venezuela has sized up the United States’ depleted military condition and decided to annex the oil-rich two thirds of its neighbor Guyana.

Venezuela is most probably causing trouble at the suggestion of Russia.  Putin is looking to punish the United States for forcing the Ukraine war.  While Donald Trump was in office the world mostly got a break from the color revolution Neo-Con skullduggery that was the order of the day during the Obama years.  Relations with our adversaries was respectful and quiet.  But now that Biden has allowed the Kagans and their allies to once again destabilize an unsuspecting world, we can expect all our enemies like Iran, North Korea, Syria, Yemen, Venezuela, Cuba and the rest of them to align with Russia and China and cause us grief wherever they can.  And they are.

But worse, the actions of this administration have even driven India, Turkey and Saudi Arabia into the Russians’ arms too.  Now this takes a very special kind of stupid.  The only thing they haven’t done yet is radicalize the Canadians.  But the year isn’t quite over yet so who knows.

You know, it’s hard to understand if there is some method to this madness.  They legitimately seem more interested in the public relations victories around LGBTQ inclusion in places like Afghanistan than in the legitimate priorities of the American people.  The only thread that seems to connect all of the radical foreign policy adventures is that the Neo-Cons assume that the United States is still the unipolar hegemon over the whole planet and no other power can resist any of our actions at all.  So, Russia and China are playthings for us to swat around with no consequences to fear.  And smaller countries like Iran and Venezuela don’t even merit military consideration and can be controlled by economic sanctions.

Of course, the fact that we’ve just finished with twenty years of failed nation building in the Middle East and no longer can get enough recruits to keep our armed forces at full strength doesn’t even register with the adventurers in the State Department and the CIA.  They’re raring to go at other borders of the Russian sphere of influence in Central Asia and beyond.  It’s hard to imagine that these people are really as blind as they seem to be.  They don’t seem to care that they may unleash a war that will have very serious consequences for the citizens of this country.  Even a major nuclear exchange is hardly an impossibility in the brinksmanship environment that they’ve created.

Now, I understand that this is a dangerous world and the United States must play hardball with countries that are ideologically committed to destroying us.  Iran has been such a state for over forty years and China and Russia are major global adversaries of ours for many reasons.

But I almost feel that the Neo-Cons that have been in charge of our foreign policy for the last couple of decades are more dangerous to this country than all of the rest of the world put together.  I don’t know if it’s practical or even possible to clean house at the CIA and the State Department but if I were Donald Trump, I’d clean out those two viper’s nests as one of the first orders of business.  Well maybe right after the FBI.  But definitely pretty soon after.

08DEC2023 – Quote of the Day

photog Quote of the Day ,

But the author of nature has put limits to the abuse of power: he has willed that it destroys itself once it exceeds its natural limits. He has engraved this law everywhere, and in the physical world as in the moral world, it surrounds us and speaks to us at every moment. Look at this firearm: up to a certain point, the more you lengthen it, the more you will increase its effect. But if you pass a certain limit, you will see the effect diminish. Look at this telescope: up to a certain point, the more you increase its dimensions, the more it will produce its effect; but beyond that, invincible nature will turn against you the efforts you make to improve the instrument. This is a natural image of power. To conserve itself it must restrain itself, and it must always avoid the point where its ultimate effort leads to its last moment.

Joseph de Maistre

Chris Rufo Talks About the Anticipated Rioting for Election Season 2024

photog Current Events , ,

After the 2020 Summer of George Floyd color revolution I guess it makes sense to anticipate a return performance in 2024.  Chris Rufo has written an article to discuss the prospects and possibly the solution to a repeat performance next summer:

“Progressives are restless and ready. Left-wing activists have established a constellation of institutions to support public demonstrations. Protest NGOs, media entities, research centers, black-bloc networks, and bail funds are all finely tuned to mobilize mass movements.”

“Red-state governors should start preparing now. They should instruct state law enforcement to establish interagency task forces to monitor, infiltrate, and disrupt violent left-wing activist networks to the fullest extent permitted by law. If they uncover illegal activity, they should make arrests and prosecute offenders.”

“Republican officials must also shift incentives. Governors should pass legislation increasing penalties for rioting and train National Guard units in anti-riot tactics. After Floyd’s death, Florida governor Ron DeSantis demonstrated the effectiveness of this approach. In 2020, DeSantis activated the National Guard and declared “zero tolerance” for violence. As a result, Florida saw minimal rioting, looting, and destruction compared with many other states.”

Rufo thinks that rioting is now a standard part of the Left’s playbook for election season.  If he’s right then it’s important for red-state governors to be ready to handle violence in their blue cities when it breaks out.

A Thank You to the Guest Contributors

photog Current Events, Guest Contributors , ,

Over the last few days there have been a goodly number of essays on rights.  And it is apparent that the specific view points of the writers differ on a number of points.  And yet the debate and the tenor of the writing has been exceptional.

I want to thank all the participants for the level of the discourse and especially for the friendly and respectful nature of the discussion.  I’m sure everyone has witnessed the opposite behavior when the stakes were much, much lower in terms of the matter under discussion.

Thank you for myself and for the other readers for taking the high road.  And personally I found the discussion very enlightening.  If only the debates in the Congress of this country could be half as sincere, learned and intelligent we wouldn’t be in the sorry state in which we currently find ourselves.

Guest Contributor – War Pig – 07DEC2023 – Human Rights Continued

photog Guest Contributors, War Pig ,

Hello, Glenn. As another career military man I too have been around-the-world three or four times.

I agree with Zman that what we call human rights are an invention as we have no natural, unalienable “rights”. What we call rights are privileges and will last no longer than we can/will defend them. Our 1st and 2nd Amemdment “rights” are currently under attack. We either defend them or lose them.

Uncontrolled immigration is another tool to dilute our will to defend our Constitutional privileges. Players such as Soros, Gates, Buffet and others are spending big money on the gamble that ruining our Constitutional Republic will make them trillionaires.

Having seen the world from the vantage of its underbelly (counterintelligence) I, too realize how exceptional America truly is. I agree that if America falls, there will be nobody to come to our aid. We-Are-It. The alpha and the omega. The concept of “human rights” will go by the wayside and if we’re lucky, it will leave a footnote in history. Likely not. The UK and Canada, especially Canada, have gone quite a ways down the fascist road. Trudeau fancies himself a political Simón Bolivar. In the UK you can’t even carry a pocket knife without risking felony, yet there are no-go zones in Birmingham for non-Muslims. And Canada and the UK are among the more civilized places.

As far as “human rights” go, once America falls we’ll be right back to 1600.

As for personal liberty, yes, that too depends on our defense of our Constitutional priviliges. I make distinction between calling them rights or priviliges in the fact that they can disappear so quickly without our jealously defending them, even from our own government. Government is all about control. Our Constitution says that We, the People rule, not the government. Both government and most of the public seem to have forgotten that.

Canada made sure to invade the personal and financial liberties of the truckers when they protested. Before Brexit, the British authorities could and would harass and try to intimidate people who supported a legal UK political party, UKIP. They even frightened and abused the children to keep parents in line.

My personal liberty depends somewhat on my support of the supremacy of the People over government. Of my designated privilege to protect myself and my family from harm without asking government’s permission. I take control of my liberty. If I find the laws tolerable, I obey them. If not, I ignore them. I take full responsibility for my actions in either case. My personal liberty lies within myself, not as a fiat of outside authority.

Good to read another career GI. Hope to read more of your opinions soon.

Guest Contributor – Glenn W – 07DEC2023 – Human Rights Continued

photog Glenn W, Guest Contributors ,

It is true that rights are violated all the time but that does not mean they do not exist. Yes, rights need to be guarded and defended. The truth that the defense of those rights requires, at times, violence does not negate them.

The concept of natural rights as used in our founding set limits on what the federal government was allowed to do. It was meant to be a practical application of a moral principle for our internal governance.

The dissident right is antagonistic to the concept of a social contract, which is based on natural rights, between the government and the people. I agree that the social contract is an abstract concept but I have never heard of any political theory that isn’t full of abstractions. That includes the communitarians and the dissident right theorists.

What set John Locke’s political theory apart from the other philosophers who used the social contract (Hobbes, Rousseau, etc.) was that Locke was explicitly Christian. He based his principle that all men are created equal on the belief we are all created in the Image of God. A king has no more of that image than a peasant. As Thomas Jefferson phrased it “The mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.” I believe all of us in this country, both believer and unbeliever, have benefited tremendously from this approach to government.

It’s important to note that in Locke’s philosophy the “pursuit of happiness” was a lot more than a state of mind. There is no point in going into it here but this article provides a deep dive into the concept if you are interested.

I think I’ve said my piece on the topic, you all know where I stand on this and I’m going to let this be my last response. I hope you all have a merry Christmas.