Q: What Is the ‘Golden Rule’?
A: Whoever Has the Gold Makes the Rules!
Mistrust of those around you, envisioning of enemies and evil doers behind every door, corner and mask, cowering under your congressional auditorium seats, well, we’ve all seen the pictures and the videos.
It’s scary out there!
Beyond the images of regular people sitting, boots on desk, in the Speaker of the House’s office, and beyond the lethal shooting of an unarmed protester by a Capitol policeman “defending” the already breached and swarmed capitol, there is a lot we can observe and learn about this relatively unusual event.
It wasn’t insurrection, despite endless repetitions to that effect by mainstream and left wing media. Insurrection means, “an act or instance of rising in revolt, rebellion, or resistance against civil authority or an established government.” What we saw was not a revolt – marchers intended to influence an upcoming actions and decisions by the Congress and the Vice President. It was not a rebellion – marchers went to the accepted headquarters of the legislature to influence them, not to replace or destroy them, or steal their stuff. With the possible exception of the unarmed physical breaching of the facility by a tiny portion of the far larger crowd of demonstrators, there was no resistance to any civil authority or any established government.
If this action had taken place with force of arms, after the Senate and House had accepted the disputed electoral votes submitted by the state legislatures, in an attempt to reverse the decision or take over government, we could call it an insurrection. For those of us watching from the safety of our living rooms, the show of strength of so many Trump supporters, people who more importantly do not trust government, whether it be made up of Republicans or Democrats, was impressive. One imagines that such energy and civil disobedience could be effective in coming years, and one day we could see actual popular insurrections occurring all over the country. But that didn’t happen on January 6th.
There is another key point that mainstream media, and the Democratic thought guardians, have wholly missed, or misconstrued, and that is the idea that the Trump phenomenon going on five years now, is remotely right wing. It is structurally anti-empire, and emotionally populist, a kind of greater Appalachian/Rustbelt/Cowboy populism. It is given to common sense, a strange combination of old time religion and no religion at all, simultaneously cynical and yet holding vivid imaginings about the greatness and glory of the idea of America. While the Q aspect (overwrought by the media) touched only a small portion of Trump populists, there is no doubt a widely shared desire among Trump supporters to “believe” in the government we have, and hope beyond all evidence that a person, or a party, can save the system.
That Trump kept many of his promises, and was relatively consistent in his energetic contempt for elites, at home and abroad, who “run” the world, was enough to keep the faith of the 74 million voters who wanted four more years. But even these people, deep down, recognize that four, or eight years, would be little more than a stopgap. Too much damage has been done, and the republic is today, as it was a decade ago, a dusty artifact
Unlike what any self-respecting “right wing” would be after, Trump populism (and his army of 74 million) sought to expand power to the people, and disrupt elitist, politicized, administrative tyranny of the state. There is a reason Trump successfully expanded his base, year after year, with immigrants, Black and Hispanic voters, as well as young, old, men, and women of all religions, races, and occupations. These actual trends belie any accusations by mainstream media talking heads – funded by big defense and big pharma – that his supporters, or the man himself, was “right wing.”
What can we learn from this particular misuse of language? To skip to the punchline, it’s truly delightful! We are learning that the deep state, with its real right and left wings, the status quo, the tax- and power-enriched bureaucratic government class, is beyond frightened of the cynical populist population it seeks to control, to rule, to surveil, and to eventually consume. We are learning that they know that their quiver is empty, their knives are dull, and they are bereft of leadership, and without heroes. They are running out of words and phrases.
Half the country probably has some economic sense and yet they also cashed their Covid checks, and will continue to do so! In fact, they may demand more of them – and my goodness, how could things have gotten this out of whack, and out of control? The End the Fed movement, started by Ron Paul so long ago, and even once espoused by Trump himself, is being accelerated as the next administration seeks to pay back and solidify their “half” of the country, all of their elite supporters, and the Trump crowd too. “Buying the vote” no longer works – everyone is getting “free money” now, thanks to the those mating porcupines known as Trump and Anti-Trump. We like it, we expect it, and Biden-Harris not only promised more, much more, they had absolutely no choice in the matter. Imagine, Biden wakes up on January 20th (I know, right?) and decides all this money printing is going to be the death of the United States, and we need to bite the bullet. Instead, government central banks will collapse this country, and others, and in due course, themselves. The instability of this situation will dog the next administration every day, and create impossible situations. With half the voters so distrustful of Washington that they pulled a “January 6th” and another 30% of the population refusing to participate in the electoral scam at all, it won’t be pretty. We are becoming hard to “govern,” and impossible to pay off.
The elite fear is palpable. The tools the state uses, so far anyway, have been education, propaganda, and political division along lines they imagine they can control – generational, cultural, occupational, and political. Yet the generations are more diverse than ever, with interesting and confusing alliances. American culture is largely consolidated, while we (whether we are three or 93) pick and choose what we will consume informationally, and every other way. Occupational skill sets are converging and evolving, and no longer lend themselves to unions or the idea of “being spoken for.” Political parties are being held together by duct tape and slogans no one believes anymore. The vast majority of people in this country hold their government in contempt, and have done so for an entire generation, if not two.
At this point, the governing elites need new tools. They have a full range on electronic surveillance, sophisticated opinion-conforming and -tracking social media, vehicle GPS and cell phones to monitor, track and record our locations and movements, and of course, they might have the police and military. That darned second amendment, and all those hillbillies and cowboys in 2,000 counties across the land make it a tall order to use police and military force. Fear (like of Covid) and any similar manipulated crisis that attempts to convert contempt for government into dependency – these are also excellent and proven tools, but it’s just not as easy as it used to be for the elites. Maybe our modern elites just aren’t up to the task. They are worried, and they should be.
Elite panic is all we are hearing and seeing on mainstream media. The logarithmic explosion of memes, articles, audio and video all questioning, challenging, ridiculing, and laughing at the government as a class is our new politics. It’s shallow, it’s reactive, and it produces cynical angry men and women, not statesmen. Thanks to the wonderful world we live in, that anger leads some of those cynical and angry people into the territory of new ideas, and builds a new awareness of both history and future possibilities. For every misunderstood marxist, we also get one agorist, a constitutionalist, a future member of the Leave Me Be Party, and a couple of people whose profiles say “loves chickens, gardening and making my own bread.” There is very little room in the future for parasitic elites telling us to sit down, shut up and do what we are told.