I had a good friend who died a few years ago. He was about ten years older than I was and had served in the Green Berets during Vietnam, was a chemist, became an engineer as a second career, raised a family, was a musician and late in life took up sailing. He was also universally acclaimed an honest, hard-working, friendly and just Christian man. He kept me around, I think, as a mascot and probably, by comparison, as a cautionary tale for the young. One day after he retired he called me up and asked me if I wanting to go sailing with him on Narragansett Bay. He was in remission from cancer and I hadn’t seen him in a while so I said sure. After all I was in relatively good health and younger than him so I figured I’d go along and enjoy a peaceful and restful morning sail. Well, by the time we came back I was sun-burned, wind-burned, and aching in bones and muscles I had never known I had. Suffice it to say my knowledge of boats can be written in billboard sized letters on the narrower face of a grain of rice. I did learn that starboard probably means right. So, there’s that.
Now this is what we call foundation material for a call back later. So, hold on to the nautical theme.
There exists a range of opinions of how things will unfold in the future. The Alt-Right has claimed that the hypocrisy about race that prevails today precludes the possibility of honest relations in a multicultural society. But they go well beyond that idea. Their claim is that different ethnic and racial groups cannot coexist in harmony. They contend that the open immigration of the last fifty years has drowned out the former nation that existed in America before and that the new population shall produce a third world society closer to Brazil or South Africa than to the former United States with respect to culture, stability, prosperity and quality of life. Their draconian solution is partition of the country. The Establishment Republicans on the other hand, contend that all that’s needed to restore America is a good illegal alien amnesty bill and some inspired After School Specials.
Over the course of the last few years I have concluded that the Establishment Republicans are worse than useless. They have ignored or abetted in the steadily increasing damage done to the native population by off-shoring of whole industries along with wholesale destruction of jobs through competition from illegal aliens. In addition, they ignore the ceaseless and ever worsening assaults on the foundational institutions of a healthy society by the Leftists. In fact, they continuously adopt the latest assault as if it were a cornerstone of traditional society. You only have to watch the NeverTrumpers embrace gay marriage or transgender identity rights to see how far they’ve travelled down the road to nihilism.
At the same time, although I readily concede that the Alt-Right was correct about many critical issues, I don’t concede that it is impossible for significantly different groups of people to coexist in a society that follows the founding precepts of the United States of America. While I grant that it will differ from the nation existing at the Founding and even the country that existed fifty years ago I have not surrendered all hope that it could maintain the traditions and institutions that have existed here. And as a practical matter I even think I can outline a program that will answer the most pressing issues afflicting the American people while allowing a fair test as to whether something short of apartheid will preserve the character of the country as it was two generation ago. This is my olive branch, such as it is, to the Alt-Right. Having been right about so many things that everyone else got wrong, I feel they deserve it. Here is my modest proposal.
And so, I unveil the Allegory of the Sinking Ship. Plato eat your heart out. See how I came back to the sailing theme?
Let’s compare our present situation to an ocean-going ship striking a reef. What are the steps needed to save the ship? Let’s enumerate them.
Step One – Plug the hole.
Step Two – Pump out the water.
Step Three – Repair the damage.
Step Four – Review cause of crash and take measures to prevent recurrence.
Now let’s identify the analogous steps to save our “Ship of State.”
- Plug the Hole. – In our case that would be shutting down replacement immigration. And that means reducing legal immigration to just about zero.
- Pump Out the Water. – That equates to deporting the illegal immigrants that are here or that continue to “leak through.” This also includes legal immigrants and naturalized Americans who break immigration law or otherwise show themselves to be criminals.
- Repair the Damage. – In our situation this means restoring the life of the country to what it was like fifty years ago.
- Prevent Recurrence. – In our case that means figuring out how we got into this mess and changing the Constitution to prevent a repeat of this existential threat.
The first two steps are self-explanatory and for the most part only require normal executive and legislative actions to proceed. President Trump has taken the first baby steps toward these actions. Much more is needed but part of that process is his moving of the Overton Window on what can and what needs to be done on illegal immigration. Hopefully some gains in the midterms and possible improvement of the conservative leaning of the Supreme Court will accelerate the actions being taken by the President and Congress.
The third step is an enormous task. So much needs to be repaired that it’s hard to believe it wouldn’t be easier to start from scratch. But I’ll throw some things out here for consideration. One of the requirements is the re-establishment of the freedom of association. Basically, the government has to get out of the business of telling people who they associate with. And that means eliminating affirmative action and all of the protected groups that have been created. This is an enormous change. And basically, it will decriminalize being a straight white man. It is the cornerstone of getting back to a functional America. Another requirement is reducing the overreach of the federal government and stifle its impulse to redistribute wealth. And finally, we must restore Constitutional authority. This means the Supreme Court is going to have to strike down all the unconstitutional over-reach that has occurred in the last fifty years (and in some cases more). This overlaps the first requirement because a number of the anti-free association rules were court mandated. But there are many more that impinge on the rights of the various states to follow the will of the people in their states.
The fourth step is completely unknown territory. How do you protect the United States from nihilists? Perhaps a number of Constitutional Amendments can be put in place to protect us from the Marxist ploys we’ve run up against but it seems that you can’t legislate common sense. This step will require a lot of thought.
So that’s the outline. And throwing in one last analogy to the sinking ship is my point about it being a way to test the possibility of restoring the country. If at any point along these steps the ship starts to sink you can always resort to life boats and escape. In our situation that equates to the situation where we fail to stop illegal immigration and the Democrats achieve a permanent majority and immediately institute the full Marxist program including functional elimination of the First and Second Amendments. At that point it will be obvious that I was wrong and the Alt-Right civil war can commence. See, no fuss no muss. My plan is just an interim step if you’re convinced of Armageddon.
The way I see it, following a plan like mine is no worse than waiting for the apocalypse and depending on outcome could be a whole lot better. Now as I alluded to earlier, my maritime knowledge is less than comprehensive but anyone who has dealt with a busted pipe knows that the first order of business is shutting off the supply. After that comes the cleanup. But we need to start at the beginning.
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