The Morning Rant: Minimalist Edition

The two great evils of the 20th century have faired quite differently in current popular culture. Fascism has been discredited as a political philosophy, even though its most famous acolyte -- Adolph Hitler -- was in reality a socialist who used nationalism to attract the masses. Communism, otherwise known as "international socialism," has never been discredited among the bien-pensants in academia, labor, and the disaffected youth that provides the foot soldiers for the Democrat/progressive movement.

And that is a fantastic feat, because the death toll of communism in the 20th century is at the top of the list by a very wide margin. Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, and a host of lesser but still dedicated monsters conspired to murder more than 100,000,000 people.

Yet we romanticize communism, or its more civilized (bowdlerized) term: socialism. I watched "Oppenheimer" last night, and the ridiculousness of its presentation of communism was embarrassing. The fixation on the ultimate evil of atomic weapons and the arms race and the cold war was equally ridiculous, and carefully linked to the non-communists! I have written in the past that the atomic weapons used against Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of 1945 was the greatest humanitarian act in history. Their use saved possibly 1,000,000 Allied military lives and probably millions of Japanese, yet their use was presented as at best a murky ethical issue, and at worst the beginning of the end of humanity.

Antonio Gramsci's long march through our institutions is mostly complete, so the defense of communism and the vilification of freedom and free markets is embedded in our educational system. And of course the half-wits who become our "journalists" are particularly susceptible to the allure of the romantic version of communism, so the ranks of useful idiots in media are endemic.

But reality always intrudes upon the savagery and misery that is the ultimate result of every communist experiment. The Soviet Union fell in spite of 70 years of support from the West's left. China is a brutal regime frantically spinning to keep their economy from imploding (one child policy anyone?). Venezuela, Cuba, a bunch of African countries...all failing. And look to the North! Canada, in spite of abundant natural resources and a western work ethic has tumbled into the socialist sewer, courtesy of Castro's spawn, otherwise known as Justin Trudeau.

The evidence is clear that the grand experiment in perfecting Man has failed. All humanity got for it was misery, poverty, and death. All we have to do is teach history, and communism will be firmly planted in the dustbin of history. So why can't we do that?

Power. Communism is a tool to achieve power, not an end in itself. So discrediting it isn't enough...we must build a wall between the power inherent in government and its use for all but the most basic things. The founders of this great country understood that very well, but the desire for power among some overwhelmed even their prescience. They will never stop, so we cannot be complacent and assume that logic and reality will carry the day.

We had a great victory in November, and it may very well be an indication of a fundamental change in the American political and cultural psyche.

Now is the exactly perfect time to solidify those gains and build into our institutions a defense against the insanity that the Left uses to consolidate power. And to that end, the era of collegiality and accommodation and compromise is past. We see that attitude in Donald Trump's cabinet appointments, and we see it in his various pronouncements about Greenland and Panama and Gaza.

It is a return to American Exceptionalism, which is anathema to the communist experiment. And that is a very good thing!

[Crossposted at CutJibNewsletter]

posted by CBD at 11:00 AM

| Access Comments