Tag: Civic Nationalism

Civic Nationalism 2025

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In the second quarter of the twenty first century in America, nationalism is the dominant ideology that we hear about.  Sometimes it’s equated with populism.  Sometimes it’s broken down into identity nationalism (white nationalism, black nationalism, La Raza, etc.), there’s even religious nationalism out there.

But where does that leave us civic nationalists?  And is it just one thing?  Or are there multiple definitions and multiple groups using the term differently?  Well, there probably are.  And I’ve never done a deep dive of exactly what I believe the definition of an American is.  And that’s probably because other than finding it by accident and naming it after one of us, Italians aren’t really the primary architects of Americanism.

The Brits started this show.  They came over at Jamestown and Plymouth Rock and they fought the Indians and fought the French and finally fought the British to make it America.  And they fought some more Brits and the Spanish and the Mexicans and even the Canadians(!) to make this a world power.

Eventually they brought in the Irish and the Germans and the Scandinavians to work in the steel works and the coal mines and build the railroads.  And to fight the Civil War.  And since they look closely enough like Brits no one cared after a couple of generations.

But when the Italians and the other Southern and Eastern Europeans showed up, they were different enough that everyone could spot them and grumble about “those durn foreigners.”  So, it took them four generations to be accepted in the club.  Well, what can you do?  People are suspicious of what they don’t recognize as their own.

Well, okay, so now I guess, I’m kind of, part of, the club (sorta kinda).  Maybe not to everybody’s liking but at this late state in the American Empire most of the people who have been here for only a couple of generations would think I’m as American as the Fourth of July.  And I am.  The descendants of the Brits in New England don’t believe in this thing called nationalism.  They’re globalists.  They think loading up America with people who don’t speak English and don’t want to be American is okay.  In fact, better than okay.  They want to eliminate the idea of America because they’re ashamed of their history and want to destroy the country they live in.  So here I am a fifth generation Italian American stuck with trying to wave the flag for the people who still believe in this project.

Of course, I’m also hemmed in on the other side by the real descendants of the Brits who haven’t turned globalist.  The good old boys consider anyone whose people haven’t been here for three hundred plus years to be Johnny-come-latelies.  And maybe they’re right.  But honestly, I don’t imagine it makes any difference.  Unsorting the ethnic grab bag that this country has become doesn’t seem to be a realistic project.

But what then is civic nationalism to me?  Well, part of it is having an identity tied to the American project as it has emerged over the long history of this country.  That means embracing Jamestown and Plymouth Rock.  It also means embracing the expansion westward with all the cruelty and pain that meant for the settlers and the Indians.  It means embracing all those people who built the country and fought its wars and allowing for their descendants to have a claim to being called Americans as long as they agree to become Americans.  They have to stand up during the Star-Spangled Banner at baseball games and put their hands over their hearts and sing the song.  They have to have cookouts on the Fourth of July and watch the fireworks.  And they can’t ally themselves with the globalists who bad-mouth George Washington and Thomas Jefferson (and especially not Christopher Columbus!) and say that America is a racist country and all that other jazz that the leftists are always spouting.  And it means respecting the laws and especially the laws we have for coming here.  Specifically, we have to abolish the notion that just being a human being gives anyone the automatic right to come to America and be an American.  We get to invite or not invite who we want or don’t want.  It’s an exclusive club and it should be thought of as a great honor to be allowed in.

So that’s my idea of civic nationalism.  Americans respect their heritage and respect the laws and customs of this land and don’t trample on the rights of other Americans.  And we give our allegiance to this country and not the places that our ancestors came from.  That’s it.

The ZMan’s Take on JD Vance

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This is a pretty measured evaluation to what it means that Trump has selected Vance for his running mate and presumptive successor.

“Another angle to this is that this subculture has attracted the interest and limited support from members of the oligarchy. Peter Thiel and Elon Musk are two examples of billionaires who seem to support this project.

…

Trump tapping into this space and thus getting support from members of the oligarchy bodes well for him and the subculture that produced Vance. No reform effort can survive without elite support. This not only bodes well for the project, but it means Trump has a chance to not only win the election but get something done. Proof that the universe has a sense of humor is that this is the real Flight 93 election, a last attempt by reform minded oligarchs to save the system.”

This is a much more hopeful spin on what the Christopher Rufo/Claremont Institute nexus might achieve with the likes of Thiel and Musk as backers.

Thoughts On J. D. Vance

 

 

The World of Ideas

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I was glad to get some interesting comments from both the civic nationalist and dissident right perspectives during the last few days.  And I’m especially glad that the writers were level headed and thoughtful individuals.  I visit various sites with all kinds of commentors who don’t always react to each other with, let us say, tolerant open mindedness.  And I understand that verbal combat may be more of a feature than a bug at some of these sites but truthfully, I seldom learn anything useful from the sort of mental arm wrestling that goes on during these exchanges.  So, kudos to all involved.  We’ve raised the level of internet discussion by several orders of magnitude.  Bravo.

I’m especially glad about this situation because I’m personally located somewhere on the border between the civic nationalist and dissident right factions.  While I consider myself a civ-nat I recognize that for whatever reason my political cohort has been guilty of incredible gullibility for decades and I’m tired of being part of a conspiracy of the ignorant.  So, I’ve been listening in on what goes on at the cool kids’ table and learning their lingo.  And I’m not afraid to admit that they’ve got a lot of things figured out.  But I also know that I’ll never be cool enough to sit at their table.  I just believe too deeply in the decency of most people when they’re all treated fairly.  I feel that if we run the game fairly, we can get people, all kinds of people, from the dumbest to the smartest and from the meanest to the most naïve to at least act decent.

But that’s why I’d like to have the discussion with people whose hearts are in the right place.  If you ever see the comments section of a Fox News article it’s remarkable.  There are some thoughtful comments.  But they’re drowned out by a flood of rage-aholics.  You could say that any site that has the traffic that a large outlet like Fox gets is bound to attract a goodly number of deranged individuals but from my point of view it renders the comments almost useless as a venue for the exchange of ideas.  So that is why I’ve been trying to find people who straddle that same line on the political spectrum and set up a dialog.  Because that political border is where I think the reality of our future lies.

We need to toughen up the civic nationalists to where they won’t let themselves be rolled by the progressives, while at the same time lure the dissidents back from the fringe where things get pretty dark.  My dream would be to have a space where a guy as tough minded as the ZMan would be willing to have a good faith conversation with civ-nats like Michael Anton or Chris Rufo.

Now this might be terribly mistaken.  As I’ve said many times, people must be allowed to select their own enemies and it’s ridiculously presumptuous of me to think I can judge whose interests are served by discussion and with whom.  These are all grownups and they get to decide which playground to play in.

So, let’s not use those names.  Let’s just use regular folks who inhabit the internet and try to see if the information flow serves any purpose.  I’ve heard lots of interesting perspectives.  And all of the talk has been quite cordial, which makes my life easier.  So, keep up the good work.

Guest Contributor – ArthurinCali – 05DEC2023 – DR to CN Reply

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I took Zman’s assertion that natural or individual rights do not exist as the affirmation that these concepts originate in Western Civilization, and are not universal. Throughout my military career traveling the globe, this resonated with me as our ideas are just that – ours. One would receive blank stares from Indonesian bush folks if you began to try and explain these. This is why the dilution of Western countries by mass immigration (invasion, really) puts these abstract conceptions of natural and individual rights at risk under our supposed Democracy. For example, look to the polls of Muslims in the US and UK who overwhelmingly agree with the notion of living under Sharia law if they could. Or how varied the customs, cultures and traditions are in the Middle East compared to the West.

My biggest appeal to the DR side is seeing the world as it is and not how people ‘wish’ it were. This means that differences should be acknowledged and a sane and serious approach to societal ills should be employed in the areas of crime, immigration, and the well-being of the citizens in our nation.

Guest Contributor – Glenn W – 05DEC2023 – CN to DR Discussion

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The dissident right (DR) certainly has an appeal to anyone who has watched the disintegration of American society and culture over the last sixty years (I am currently 62 years old). I found the DR critique of many of the United States current problems to be very insightful. In the end though, I think the proposed DR solutions to our problems will cause more problems than they solve.

I agree that Heritage Americans have been reviled and treated with a hatred that has surprised me. The question is: is that hatred solely an ethnic hatred? I would say that it isn’t. “White people” are strongly associated with being Christian. I don’t think that’s particularly true anymore but that is the stereotype and lefties love them some stereotypes. The BLM website at onetime listed both stable marriage between a man and a woman and deferred gratification as being examples of white privilege. No, those are examples of Christian morality. Of course ethnic differences are used as a wedge to fracture our society and it has been wildly effective.

Can different ethnicities live side by side peaceably? I don’t see why not in theory but in practice it may no longer be possible. The well has been poisoned and there may be no way back to what we were, the old culture looks to be gone. What is the DR solution then? After giving it a lot of thought I think the DR has settled on some type of ethnic caste system. One set of laws for thee and one for me. Anyone who believes in objective standards of right and wrong (that apply to all people) will find that to be a real problem. I know I do.

I would also like to ask: how should ethnicity be defined? Even in the founding of the United States the English weren’t as homogeneous as we’d like to imagine (see Albion’s Seed). Add in all the immigration that has already happened and can’t be reversed, it’s a hopeless mess. Lines will have to be drawn in the new system but no one will say how this will happen.

The thing that finally tore it for me is when Zman declared that there is no such thing as “rights.” Declaring rights to be an abstract concept that don’t actually exist, he dismissed them out of hand. If there is no such thing as individual rights then there is no such thing as personal liberty. Everyone nowadays seems to want to put a leash on me. Zman’s statement reminded me of a quote by communitarian Alasdair MacIntyre:

“From this it does not of course follow that there are no natural or human rights; it only follows that no one could have known that there were. And this at least raises certain questions. But we do not need to be distracted into answering them, for the truth is plain: there are no such rights, and belief in them is one with belief in witches and in unicorns.”

― Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory

I am not familiar with the work of Professor Özkırımlı but the title of his book seems to indicate that his is a “critical theory.” This country is dying from too much Hegelian theory, do we really need more?

Guest Contributor – ArthurinCali – 04DEC2023 – Civic Nationalist to Dissident

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I used to believe in civic nationalism and the idea of the global populace buying a ticket to the (American) story and ideals. Funnily enough, around the time I held these beliefs was 30+ years ago in an America that had a firmly entrenched demographic majority of Heritage Americans. (Roughly 80% IIRC)

See, that’s kinda of the paradox of the idea of a successful nation operating under civic nationalism in that you still need a majority ethnic population who puts their full faith in the mythos of said nation’s founding, institutions, and ideals. Once it hits a certain fracturing of population and becomes majority-minority, with no one group asserting dominance – this gives rise to overt tribal tendencies. Diversity is not a strength. If it were, nations like Japan and China would be importing as many diverse groups as possible to get an edge on the global economic competition.

Still, if we lived in a reality based sane and serious nation that spoke the truth on differences a la Lee Kuan Yew’s Singapore, it could have worked. This would require media, academia and gov’t to cease the relentless attack on the historical figures actions and events that led to the creation of the USA. No, not celebrate outright the dark corners of a nation’s history (that all nations have, Western and non-Western), but understand that each apology, every condescending remark merely removes another brick of the foundation of American mythos and her founding.

This is part of how I found myself admitting more and more that I am a part of the Dissident Right. I will vote for Trump-not as a faithful belief that he will be our Red Caesar but more as a wrench into the leviathan machine that hates me and my people.

“Since all nations lay claim to a unique place in history and to certain boundaries, all national identities are exclusionary. In that sense, all nations are ethnic nations […] Brubaker elaborates on this, claiming that there are two different ways of mapping culture onto the ethnic-civic distinction. Ethnic nationalism may be interpreted narrowly, as involving an emphasis on descent. In this case, Brubaker argues, there is very little ethnic nationalism around, since on this view an emphasis on common culture has to be coded as a species of civic nationalism. If, however, ethnic nationalism is interpreted broadly, as ethnocultural, while civic nationalism is interpreted narrowly, as involving a cultural conception of citizenship, the problem is the opposite: ‘civic nationalism gets defined out of existence, and virtually all nationalisms would be coded as ethnic or cultural’. Even the paradigmatic cases of civic nationalism, France and America, would cease to count as civic nationalism, since they have a crucial cultural component.”

— Umut Özkırımlı, Contemporary Debates on Nationalism: A Critical Introduction, pp.24-5

All Men Are Created Unequal. Does That Make America Impossible?

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In the comments section that followed Michael Anton’s recent post about natural rights (“Farewell to Z-Man!

Once More on the Question of Natural Right”), a commentor said,

“Z-man is anonymous because he writes about biological differences, which is a capital offense in our society. Anton is a colorblind civic nationalist, so he doesn’t have to fear having his life destroyed for his views.

I agree that Anton and Z-man would better spend their time fighting the Left, but the schism between those on the Right who believe that there are biological differences among the various peoples of the Earth and those who don’t believe that is fundamental.

That is at the core of the debate between Anton and Z-man. Anton says that natural rights are universal and ever-present. That implies are all peoples are the same at all times. Anton rejects biological differences. Z-man says that the rights put forth by the Founding Fathers were based on their nature. The rights grew out of the particular biology of that people, Anglo-Americans.

For Z-man, culture is downstream from biology. For Anton, biology doesn’t matter at all. That is a fundamental difference.

Anton is a colorblind civic nationalist. He doesn’t believe that culture stems from biology.

His issue with the refugees is that they come from a culture that despises American values. That makes complete sense. However, for Anton, it’s about the culture, not the people. It’s why people like Anton has such a hard time arguing with the Left about immigration.

The Left says we should have open borders or, at least, very large immigration, especially, refugees because we’re all the same so why keep people out. Anton tries to refute this by arguing that we can only let in so many so that they can absorb our culture and truly accept American values. The Left calls him cold-hearted.

Anton has no response other (than) technical arguments because he accepts the Left’s morality: that all people are (literally) created equal so the burden of proof is on him to show why some people shouldn’t be allowed in.

Z-man doesn’t accept the Left’s morality. His argument for why we should reject the Afghani refugees is that they are a different people who will never accept our culture because their biology is different.

And before you start acting like the Left and call Z-man (or me) a racist, just remember that Z-man’s beliefs are pretty much the same as most people around the world, including Israelis and Japanese.

If this was Israel or Japan, their version of Anton would simply say, “No. We will not let in these refugees because they aren’t Jewish or Japanese.”

Anton disagrees with the Israelis and Japanese. He and the Left believe in the Blank Slate, that we are all lumps of clay that can be molded into any form if you just get the culture right.

Ironically, Anton rejects nature’s role in culture.”

Much of what is said here is essentially an accurate description of the difference of positions between the Dissident Right (e.g., the Z-Man) and the Civic Nationalists (e.g., Michael Anton, me).  But there are some subtle differences that I think need to be addressed.  I won’t speak for all Civic Nationalists but I will say for myself that I categorically deny that all human beings are equal in their abilities and have the same temperaments.  In fact, I’ll go as far as saying that human beings are heterogeneous at almost every level.  Even within the same nuclear family there will be remarkable differences of intellect, physique, personality and appearance among siblings.  And between different ethnicities and races the differences will be even larger.  You don’t have to leave the same continent to find the pygmies and the Tutsi.  The first group are hunter gatherers who average less than 4’ 10” in height while the latter are pastoralists that average 6’ but are not uncommonly over 7’ in height.  As far as differences of intelligence and temperament between groups of people there are all kinds of scientific studies and popular descriptions to provide speculation for these differences.

But the basic question isn’t whether these differences exist.  The question is do these differences prevent us from living together in a meritocracy?  In other words, if I’m stupider than my neighbor Bob will that mean we can’t live in the same society without eventually being at each other’s throats?  My belief is we can live together.

The Dissident Right does not believe this.  And as proof they point to the present nightmare we’re living through with “Black Lives Matter,” George Floyd and the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion racket being run against white people.

Well, that’s a pretty powerful argument.  Add that to the fifty years of affirmative action and forced integration and you have a pretty bleak picture.

But the Left has been using this equality of outcome scam for decades as a proof that white people are discriminating against blacks.  And for whatever reason we’ve been letting them get away with it.  I no longer think it’s a convincing argument.  America is a multi-ethnic, multi-racial society and there is every combination of races and capacities on display.  And what is clearest is that trying to hire people according to their skin color is a recipe for disaster.  Everyone has probably seen or heard of people who were hired under affirmative action quotas and were completely unqualified for the job.  And what is also extremely clear is that African Americans are not the object of systemic racism.  Currently heterosexual white men are the ones being discriminated against and openly.  It seems clear that demanding the end of affirmative action and other anti-white policies and a return to a meritocratic system is the correct way to put all this racialist nonsense behind us.

To do this it will require places like Florida that have a Republican government to refuse to allow anti-white, affirmative action programs to continue.  And the very color-blind approach that the above commentor seems to disparage is the correct approach.  The United States need to get out of the race business.  In fact, I don’t think we should even list it on birth certificates or other government documents at all.  You might as well list my blood type and what kind of belly button I have too.  Instead, we should be concentrating more on things like SAT scores and which computer languages have been mastered.

Now of course maybe the Z-Man is right and the Republicans are hopelessly unable to fend off accusations of racism and they will always be the losers when the Left plays this racket.  If this is so we’ll see this play out.  But I’d like to believe someone like Ron DeSantis is the future.  He recently rejected the High School Advanced Placement curriculum for African American Studies because it was filled with lies.  This is the way to change things.  Just say no and then make it stick.  It’s not easy.  It’s a slog and a fight.  But if we choose fighters to represent us, we will get results.  If we choose squishes like Jeb! Bush, we get what we have now.

So sure, things are bad but I’m not ready to start the race war.  I think we can have a first world country without a civil war.  But it remains to be seen whether the people who claim to be our leaders are willing to fight to save it.  If they’re not then the Dissident Right will be correct.

Michael Anton, Paul Gottfried and the Z-Man – A Fractured Spectrum on the Right

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I have been an advocate of dialog on the Right.  And recently there has been quite a bit of it.  And now I think I can see the present limits of what can be achieved by dialog.  Based on what I have seen I would say that at the point on the Dissident Right where Civic Nationalism starts to be viewed as anathema, then from there on, common ground can no longer exist with the more mainstream right.  The level of hostility is too extreme to allow for civility or even meaningful communication.

So be it.  But that still leaves plenty of latitude for dialog.  After all, the Z-Man and Paul Gottfried have several times shared the stage on various podcasts and they have been extremely cordial.  And Gottfried and Anton have debated on the pages of various right-wing publications with clearly evident collegial respect and politeness.  So, there is a bridge across the chasm but it is more of a shuttle that on its own can visit the two sides.

I can see the point of view of both these sides.  But I will say I have more sympathy for Anton because he has extended himself to try to communicate across the divide in a friendly manner.  The Z-Man was far from friendly.  In fact, he was pointedly hostile and rude.  And maybe that’s the requirement of the position he has staked out.  He has readers who exceed him in their anger toward any moderate figure or group in America.  Maybe politeness toward someone like Anton is a disqualifying act.  But maybe I’m wrong about that.  Maybe he truly feels that Anton is part of the enemy he faces.  And that is every man’s prerogative; to select his own friends and enemies.  But I give the moral high ground to Anton.  He wasn’t demanding any concessions, only extending an olive branch or a flag of truce for a parley.

Almost equally I think I know why the Dissident Right resents the Civic Nationalists.  They see them as the descendants of the mainstream conservatives who allowed themselves to be led along by the Buckleyites and the Neo-Conservatives and never did anything to prevent the takeover of the country by the Left.  They see the egalitarianism of the Civic Nationalists as the stepping stone to all the evils we see today; the LGBTQ madness and the destruction of personal freedoms in the name of diversity, equity and inclusion.  And there’s some truth in that.  In fact, I feel I was one of the pawns who believed in men like George Bush Jr. and his endless wars that accomplished nothing but killing Americans.

I see myself as someone who sees both sides of this divide.  But even though I have sympathy for the dissidents I think Anton’s side is where there may be a chance to take constructive action.  Someone like Donald Trump or Ron DeSantis will reach out to a Michael Anton or a JD Vance because they are interested in practical steps that can actually be accomplished.  Anton has reached out to people on the fringes of the Right like Curtis Yarvin and BAP in order to try to understand their point of view.  And while his viewpoint is still quite different from any of these people he is at least engaging in dialog.  And if nothing else it allows for some measure of coordination on practical things like supporting political candidates and networking.

I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised at how this contact between two worlds ended up.  But I am a little disappointed.  I wasn’t hoping for rapprochement but some kind of dialog and détente with a little glasnost thrown in for good measure.  Oh well.

But something was learned and nowadays that’s the first step to constructive actions.  Apparently, it’s not yet time for the opposite ends of the Right to talk to each other.  Whatever coordination gets done it will not include the Dissident Right.  At least not yet.

Civic Nationalism vs. White Identitarianism

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Identity politics has enveloped our modern political world.  The Dissident Right says that the winning strategy for Normal White Men is to play the same game and build a separate identity and negotiate relationships with the other identity groups.  The alternative to this is the civic nationalist idea of a civic identity that embraces everyone who identifies with the traditional American culture and constitutional governance.

The question is which one reflects reality.  And what that hinges on is whether there are more people who believe in Old America or more people who don’t.  If the answer is more people believe then we can try to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.  But if Old America doesn’t have enough support to win back the country, then identity politics is the only way to go.

I have to confess I don’t know the answer to this.  And part of the problem is that the Democrats and their political machine stopped worrying about obeying the law.  So, it becomes difficult to know if we are the majority or the minority.  If they can steal an election then it may be too late to fix the system at all.

But for now, my world view is that what Old America stood for is a good thing that is worth upholding.  The civic national concept is a framework that provides a way for human beings to live together in harmony.  The live and let live aspect of free association and freedom of speech is an attractive and valuable concept.  If it is shown that these things are irremediably lost then America without them becomes far less attractive a proposition.  At that point I believe it would be necessary to reevaluate all the options.

America’s defining virtue was always freedom.  And freedom is an absolute.  Sure, there were plenty of cheats that occurred against the Bill of Rights.  At different times and in different places crimes against freedom of speech or the right to bear arms or the other fundamental rights were perpetrated.  But for the most part our rights were respected.  We were treated as free men.

If we aren’t free men then our citizenship becomes a lot less valuable than we thought it was.  If it turns out that freedom has been removed from the bargain then what we have left must be measured against all the locations on the globe to decide which one provides the highest quality of life.  In some places economic opportunity might be higher.  In others crime levels might be lower.  In others traditional lifestyles may be more attractive than living in a woke cesspool of dysfunction and delusion.  Maybe some of the red states may provide a successor state to Old America.  That would be a very attractive option if it becomes impossible to save the republic.  That option would include all the virtues of the old system without having to constantly battle the Left for the right to live a normal life in your own country.

So, for now I’ll cling to the hope that we will be able to resuscitate Old America and cleanse it of the lunacy that the Left is inflicting upon us.  I don’t assume that the blue states can be saved.  Places like California and New York are hopeless.  The best thing that can happen there is for systemic collapse to provide an object lesson on what happens when you legislate insanity.

But if my fellow Americans embrace anti-white identity politics then I will be shown wrong and I will have to admit my error and swim across to the Dissident Right.

In Praise of Civic Nationalism (At Least My Version Any Way)

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Among the Dissident Right, the CivNats (as they call them) are almost an epithet.  Maybe not as despised as the NeoCons or the Libertarians but close behind.  And in a way I see their point.  The Civic Nationalists have allowed themselves to be gaslit by the Uniparty for the last fifty years.  For pointing this out to me I will always be indebted to these merchants of hate.  But as incisive as their thoughts are regarding the details of how the Uniparty uses identity politics against the white people of America I can’t come around to their idea that every ethnic and racial group is bound to face off against each other over the carcass of the United States of America.  To my way of thinking, that would be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

I am not a descendant of the Mayflower pilgrims.  And my people weren’t born within a thousand miles of England.  Other than possible sentry duty on Hadrian’s Wall during the early centuries of the Christian era all of my people had spent their time in southern Italy for as far back as our family tree can show.  But I don’t think any Standishes or Bradfords were ever brought up more patriotically American than my family was.  And having grown up in New York City I met many immigrants who came to this country with the sole object of making their children as proudly American as was humanly possible.  And this was in a city where the various ethnic groups treated each other with all the fondness that the various groups in Beirut currently do (well, short of RPG fire anyway).

I once met a man on the subway who had fled from China by swimming across the bay to Hong Kong.  He and his two brothers attempted it together.  One brother was dragged back, the other brother drowned.  But this man made it.  When he found out that Hong Kong would revert to China one day he decided to come to America.  He was a lower working-class fellow but he invited me to his apartment for dinner.  When he told me how he taught his children to revere America as the greatest country in the world because of its freedom and justice he sounded like a Frank Capra movie.  I was amazed.  This was back in the mid-eighties and New York had become a crime ridden hellhole with racial animosity at the boiling point.  But here was this man who could barely speak English and struggling to make ends meet speaking with an almost religious fervor about his adopted country.  It was kind of inspiring.  To me it was a kindred spirit to how my family was raised. We believed that myth.

Now here we are in 2020.  Antifa are the children of the Mayflower descendants, the top of the heap, and they don’t believe the myth.  To them America is a hate filled racist death camp.  Then you have BLM.  They are the descendants of the black slaves, the bottom of the heap, and they believe the same thing.  So that just leaves us, the middle of the heap.  Some of us still believe.  And I know the myth can work because I’ve seen it.  But it only works for those who don’t want to destroy what’s here.  My grandparents didn’t have a dream of turning America into Naples or anywhere else in Italy.  That Chinese fellow didn’t want to resurrect Canton here.  He wanted his children to speak English and watch the Mets play baseball on channel 9.  My ancestors didn’t get here until long after the Civil War but I have no desire to pull down statues of confederate soldiers or Founding Fathers.  That’s as bad as the Nazis burning books on relativistic physics just because Einstein was Jewish.  This country has a history.  It includes acts of great bravery and acts of down right cowardice.  There has been burning hatred and great compassion.  But that history is real.  Revisionists are retelling it from one point of view and want nothing else to remain.  But I’ll have none of that.

So, here’s my version of civic nationalism.  If your idea of America is that it is a terrible place founded by evil white people who need to expiate the sins of their fathers copiously and endlessly, then you’re not an American.  Even if you are Thomas Jefferson’s multi-great-grandson, you aren’t an American.  You’re nothing.  But if you believe that with all its warts and all its mistakes that the United States of America is the single greatest experiment in human governance since Adam and Eve were given the Garden then you are an American and my brother.  I don’t particularly care if you are white, black, red, brown, yellow or even green.  As long as you stand for the Star-Spangled Banner, Pledge Allegiance with your hand over your heart and love this country for what it has always been, then you’re an American.  The main thing is you believe in the Bill of Rights and the rule of law.  Don’t try to take away our guns just because your old country didn’t have them.  Don’t try to stop people from speaking their minds just because it might hurt someone’s feelings.  Don’t expect us to suspend our immigration laws just so a few more of your cousins can jump the border.  Don’t try to erase our history or inflict guilt on us for being successful.  Speak English and bring your children up to love this country and its history.  And whatever you do don’t have anything to do with antifa, BLM or the Democrat party.  They’re all Marxists.  It would help if you like baseball instead of soccer or cricket but that is a minor thing.

So that is the coalition I want, true believers.  But I won’t include anyone in who kowtows to the thugs who hate America.  You’re either proud of this country or you’re just a freeloader looking to tear off a piece of its wealth.  I’m guessing there are still millions of us.  And having a common point of view gives us an identity and orients us politically and culturally.  And that’s the only use of the words identity and orientation I’ll ever need.