OK, so what happened? Why didn’t the Red Wave materialize?
Actually, it did. Overall, the Republicans got 6 million more votes than the Democrat Party. Like the pollsters predicted, that’s a R+4 win by any stretch of the imagination.
Not that anyone can trust the polls. The popularity of the GOP is often underestimated as we saw in the 2016. It’s also true that the Dems who are thinking of jumping parties might be hesitant to acknowledge their intentions, even to themselves.
In Red States, the typical Republican office-seeker won –handily–anywhere from five to 20 percent.
In Blue States (frankly, “there are no Blue States, only Blue cities”), the Democrats had to spend millions of dollars just to hold on to previously safe districts. The Dems who ran in Red States, got shellacked. Formerly purplish states such as Iowa, Ohio, Florida and Missouri are now deep red. The once solid Blue State of West Virginia is now ruby red.
Of the 6 million votes, too many were more than what was necessary to carry the state. They were essentially “over-votes,” much like the 3 million surplus votes Hillary received in 2016. Not particularly helpful, as they didn’t go where they were needed.
Overall, the Red States got redder while the Blue States got bluer. The latter will become even bluer as the productive classes continue to move out of them. An interesting case for a Blue State on the other hand is New York State: the four congressional seats of Long Island are now Republican. This means that Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens are the last redoubt that the Democrats have in that state. (Keep your eye on that trend.)
Here’s some more inside baseball for you: In Oklahoma, massive amounts of “dark money” were thrown against Governor Kevin Stitt. This was reflected in negative ad buys where he was called every name in the book. Electronic billboards all over the metro areas proclaimed him “America’s Worst Governor” and “America’s Most Corrupt Governor.” Even former GOP Congressman and OU stalwart, J C Watts, came out against him, decrying his “lack of decency.”
Yet he carried 74 of the 77 counties. Very handily I might add, by over 14%. This is in spite of the fact that there were lawn signs all over Tulsa for his opponent, even in GOP neighborhoods. I saw maybe a dozen signs for Stitt and yet despite all the negative publicity, he lost Tulsa County by only 1 percentage point.
Stitt is by no means a popular governor. He’s made some mistakes. Though he’s an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, he provoked the Indian Nations by trying to renegotiate the pacts with their casinos. This could have been handled more adroitly and it certainly didn’t do him any good.
He also teed off the local educational establishment as well. Joy Hoffmeister, his Secretary of Education, resigned from his cabinet (and the GOP), and then threw her hat into the ring. (To great acclaim I should say.)
In addition, he signed the nation’s most restrictive abortion ban, defining it as the removal of a fertilized egg, without regard for whether or not the pregnancy was viable. Physicians were forbidden to intervene when women with tubal pregnancies came into the ER bleeding out, leaving other women terrified of getting pregnant thinking the same thing could happen to them. (The law was later changed.)
As to why the good people of OK did not throw him out, I can give one answer right off the bat: COVID. He wisely –and courageously–decided that he was not going to accept all of the CDC’s protocols and reopened Oklahoma as soon as humanly possible –and keeping it open, too. Last year, when the nannies that make up the City Council of Tulsa wanted to revisit the mask ban, he let it be known that he would override them. They backed down. They knew the general public wouldn’t comply. If a worse plague befell the City of Tulsa, they wouldn’t be able to mandate it again. Or at least that’s the answer they gave.
Also in Stitt’s favor, he signed an executive order which made it easy for doctors to prescribe Hydroxychloroquine and made it legal for pharmacies to dispense it. This is at a time when Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan was prosecuting doctors for prescribing it and pharmacists for dispensing it —and being hailed for it.
Another reason is that our local economy is on fire. People are flocking here from other states like there was no tomorrow. Construction and traffic are incessant. Aggravating to be sure but good problems to have all things being equal.
So why didn’t the Red Wave overtake Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota and the other Blue States? Especially if they’re hurting even worse than the Red States? What caused the Red Wave to crash on their shoals?
Several reasons:
- Student debt relief
- Abortion
- Economic differentials
All of the above were mainly the emotional drivers for the younger generations, particularly Millennials and GenZ.
Consider the first issue. Biden announced he would “forgive” the student loans of graduates who were trying to make ends meet while working at Starbucks. This was very appealing to those who struggled to make those payments even when faced with not having a job. Inflating their expectations, however, was massively unfair. It was also unconstitutional. And now because a (Trump-appointed) federal judge in Texas said so, Biden’s executive order was shut down. The worst of it is he knew he couldn’t forgive student loans by fiat. This issue had surfaced before. And with the House now in GOP hands, those so burdened will have no recourse to a legislative remedy. They were played. They gave their vote to protect Democrat districts and have nothing to show for it.
Same thing with abortion. The younger generation is more open to abortion than older generations. Because so many men aren’t financially secure enough to take on a wife and kids, many young women believe Roe v Wade was their only “safety-net” should an unwanted pregnancy occur. For some, abortion is preferable to birth control.
In addition, the over-educated, hyper-feminist, single white female demographic felt enraged because abortion is essentially a religious sacrament for them; an inalienable right in the pursuit of happiness. Regardless, the younger, pro-abortion demographic coalesced to try and save the Democrat Party.
But they failed. Worse, like those who sought relief from student debts they, too, will have no recourse to a legal remedy. There’s no way that the Republican House will take on these issues: 2022 was the high point of extreme leftism on the national level and they were dealt a serious blow.
I’d say the sting is even worse for the feminazis. They had fifty years to get the Congress to codify abortion into law and they failed miserably. Some would say this is because the Democrats did not want the issue resolved for electoral reasons. Personally, I believe it was because of pro-abortion overreach. They wanted nothing less than to be able to kill their babies right up to the moment of birth, something which the overwhelming majority of Americans could not stomach (not just pro-lifers).
This brings us now to plank #3: economic differentials, or more correctly, pain differentials.
Middle-aged couples who are employed, have mortgages to pay off and are concerned about rising levels of crime are hurting thanks to the worst inflation in 4o years. Their children are either in or approaching college, which will eat up their savings. Their retirement has to be put on hold as they trudge back and forth to their jobs another 5 years, when they hoped to be traveling. For them, rising inflation means paying more for groceries, utilities and gas, and this hurts. It hurts a lot.
For those who are elderly and on a fixed income, it’s even worse. It means having to decide whether to buy medication or food.
But what about young adults? First of all, most don’t have mortgages. In fact, the prospect of them ever buying a house is seemingly out of reach and getting remoter by the day. So they rent; usually in an urban neighborhood. This means they don’t necessarily feel the pinch of utility bills, as they are often included in the monthly rent. Of course, there are cell phones, and TV, with access to Netflix they still have to worry about. But because they rent, they can live pretty much where they want, avoiding the long commute to their places of work so the price at the pump is not nearly as painful as it is for those who have to drive 20 miles to work (make that 45 in CA). In many cities, you will see hordes of Millennials riding on those scooters hither and yon. You know they’re commuting to work if they have that backpack strapped to their back.
In other words, there are two different classes in America: Middle aged homeowners and youngish renters. The irony is that the former is actually hurting more than the latter, as they are approaching an age where they may no longer be able to work. But the bills keep on coming. Completely paying off the mortgage is a pipe dream now. Just trying to keep up is like bailing water in a sinking boat.
As to whether Trump had any negative effect on these elections, I will let J D Vance, Senator-elect from Ohio, and a person far better placed than myself, answer that question: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dont-blame-trump/
In other words, he didn’t. In fact, if it weren’t for Trump, Vance wouldn’t have won and the massive amounts of Republican office-seekers and holders running in the Red States might have had a harder time than they had.
As to why the Red Wave didn’t turn out the same way in the Senate, the blame rests squarely on the shoulders of one turtlesque figure: Mitch McConnell. He wasted $9 million dollars on a Senate race in Alaska (between two Republicans!) that could have been better spent in Pennsylvania, Nevada, Arizona, New Hampshire, and Georgia; Mehmet Oz, Adam Laxalt, Blake Masters, Don Bolduc, and Herschel Walker, respectively could all have been elected with some of that moolah. That would have made the Senate 55 GOP at best and 53 at worst.
Instead, his hatred of the MAGA movement is so overriding he chose to emulate Satan in Paradise Lost, who famously said, “I would rather rule in hell than serve in heaven!”
Anyway, the Midterms are what they are. And they don’t speak well for the future other than to say that the fracturing of the American Republic continues unabated. A “soft divorce” so to speak. I can feel (and indeed, have felt for quite awhile now) the Red States getting more emboldened in their defiance of the Federal government. Governor Abbott of Texas has taken it upon himself to secure the southern border for instance. All in all, not a bad prospect given that such an outcome would be better than an actual civil war.
Does this mean that the outflow from the Blue States will tilt the Red States into a more pinkish color? Will these Blue State refugees “California my Texas or New York my Florida”? Not at all. There was a fear of that five or ten years ago. No longer. The present and future outflow of people from those struggling Blue States are no longer only economic refugees but political ones as well. There are only so many hipsters that can inundate Austin. At one time, Elon Musk may have been a hipster with a lot of money but he’s now a savage culture warrior. So is Dave Rubin (a gay man who relocated to Florida) and Joe Rogan.
It is these people –the productive classes–who are going to make the Red States redder.
____________________________________________________________________________
For a humorous take on elections, please watch this short vignette from Monty Python:
The young ones are also the ones who have been indoctrinated to believe that issues like abortion reign supreme. Young voters are deemed to be the ones that saved the Democrats bacon for this election. While it may take time for them to see the light, our nation is in peril unless they do.
I don’t understand the game of make believe. Many are making believe that the reported vote totals actually reflect the votes cast and thus are speculating that this, that or the other caused the voters to behave otherwise than expected. There is a much simpler explanation that explains why even Democrat favoring polls conducted by Democrats predicted a red tidal wave, not to mention Democratic internal polling which must have been horrific given their apprehension.
Treason never prospers . . .
I’m going to content myself with taking the long view, Misha.
For one thing, the cheating was confined to the Blue States (or purple [AZ, PA]) this time around. This means that the jig is almost up. Still, you gotta admire the tenacity of the Dems.
Second, it’s now clear that their cheating wouldn’t have succeeded had the FTX operation not been in play. It worked, but only “just in time.” The FTX scandal is going to blow wide open; the sweeping under the rug that happened with Hunter’s laptop can’t always succeed. And then, what we find out will be detrimental to the Uniparty.
Third, it’s easy to speculate that the correlation of RINO forces coalescing against Trump will succeed. I’m not so sure. “Neocon” is now a hated word, as is “RINO.” Liz Cheney and her ilk greatly overestimate their allure. Even Breitbart, which tries to thread the needle between MAGA America-firstism and neoconservatism is throwing Cocaine Mitch under the bus.
Fourth –and this is key–look to see which of the GOP establishment breaks (if at all) for Trump. So far Elise Stefanik who is #3 in the House GOP hierarchy came out for Trump, both guns blazing. Miss Lindsey Graham over in the Senate is making Trumpian noises. Sen Josh Hawley of MO was the first to castigate Mitch; Rick Scott of FLA quickly followed.
Gov Greg Abbott of Texas essentially declared independence by signing an executive order and taking control of the southern border. He’s even been constructing a wall, picking up where Trump left off.
Personally, I’m going to keep my eye on DeSantis. Word on the street is that he’s going to endorse Trump sooner or later.
Regrettably, Kevin McCarthy, 1/3 of the RINO triumvirate (together with McConnell and Rona McDaniel) was voted as Speaker of the House. He too, was a saboteur of MAGA candidates. I may be engaging in hopium here but I think it’s possible that the Trumpian movement will give him the cojones needed to burnish his political career.
I for one, fully believe that the days of Ryan cuckservatism are over and done with. Mind you, not because of the man himself but because of events. They have a way of driving forces in unforeseen trajectories.
Regardless, I agree with Milo Yiannopoulos, Trump has an “it” factor that transcends ideological matrices all the while appealing to the middle and working classes. If not Trump, the the GOP has no future. Period. This is not because of a self-created cult of personality but because everyone agrees that events are spiraling out of control and that there is no one on the horizon other than Trump who could get a grip on them.
McCarthy has been nominated by the GOP but it is not final until January and he does not yet have the votes, so there is still hope there. But, like Graham, he’s pliable and if the wind is blowing strongly enough in the Trumpian direction, he will go with the flow.
Reform California has been experimenting with ballot harvesting, evidently with some success, according to Dr. Steve. I’m trying to dive into that now, but if Republicans can lose their apprehension over “cheating”, which is our old word for the new rules of the game, then we may be back in business.
Great write-up, George.
Agreed:
I live in GA but am originally from TX. I’ve been telling all of my Red family/friends for years that the Cali’s moving to TX aren’t going to flip the state, because most of those people are republicans fleeing California. Not to mention the growing Hispanic voter base the Republicans have. Just look at Bexar County where San Antonio is, it’s a heavily Hispanic county that has been moving more to the right the last few years, same with the RGV counties.
Make sure not to lump all millennials in the pro-abortion, avocado-toast-eating category lol. Myself, and other millennials I know, are not like that at all. But maybe I’ve surrounded myself with a solid group of friends (both secular and religious) who are Conservative. I’ll add one non-related item that plagues those of us millennials who are conservative: dating is a nightmare. That single, over-educated, white female demographic is VERY pervasive. I just broke up with one of them….we got in an argument about what constitutes life (i.e. Abortion is wrong).
All in all, it will be interesting come 2024. Republicans AFAIK hold a majority in the House and Trump just announced his run for presidency so interesting times ahead.
On a religious note, I’ve heard rumblings from the Antiochians that a more conservative version of Met. Joseph will be the new Archbishop (not sure how this person found that out), and, all of the front-runners for the new Archbishop of Cyprus are Orthodox stalwarts. In the case of Cyprus, all Orthodox over the age of 18 can vote, and there’s something like 50,000-60,000 Orthodox Russians on the island. I have a Cypriot friend that said the next Archbishop will more than likely overturn the decision that recognized the OCU as that decision was very unpopular on the island, not just with the clergy but with the laity.
The seemingly “new crew” continues to move ahead.
Petro, I have two sons, a daughter-in-law and a step-daughter who are Millennials. They all have their heads screwed on straight.
That said, I’m only going by what the exit polls said about Millennials/GenZers. It’s broad brush and somewhat unfair but there you go.
As for my ;parish, the under-40 crowd are what keeps me young and on-the-ball. There is hope for the future but only from the likes of them. The soyboys who hang out at Starbucks and the purple-haired baristas with fishing tackle on their faces are by and large, not inspiring to me.
The fact that their vote cancels out ours is dismaying to be sure but not a reason to reach for the bottle of black pills in my medicine cabinet.
They sounds like they were all raised right! I was fortunate to be raised by conservative parents in a conservative state so I never went through a “liberal phase”
It’s not much of a broad brush unfortunately, most of them have drank the Kool-Aid. But, those of us millennials (I don’t know many GenZ’s) who are conservative and religious take it seriously, for the most part. So I think the lines are just more clearly defined than they were before.
100%. Especially in the Church, we have the Brotherhood of St. Paisios, and various online male and female Orthodox who are forming online and in-person communities.
Also, very much 100%. The black pill implies defeat and there is never defeat with Christ, no matter how bleak
The last NYT/Siena poll was pretty dang close to the actual results in the big races. When you look at the House results, an R+4 shift really didn’t land in the districts they needed most. Biden 0-5% districts had the least swing to the GOP, and as a consequence of redistricting there weren’t that many of them.
While Gen Z definitely broke hard for the Dems, I haven’t yet seen enough detail to make me think they were a definitive factor in a broad sense. We’ll see as people continue to crunch the data.
There is still a whole lot of purple out there, versus strictly red and blue. And generally speaking purple rejected MAGA GOP candidates. The GOP has not repaired the electoral damage Trump wrought in the suburbs yet. GOP primary voters lost a lot of winnable races for the party. Those voters should probably learn a lesson from Lake and races like WA-03, but they probably won’t.
Consider the missing Trump voters were all killed by Trump:
“Overall, the excess death rate for Republicans was 5.4 percentage points (pp), or 76%, higher than the excess death rate for Democrats. Post- vaccines, the excess death rate gap between Republicans and Democrats widened from 1.6 pp (22% of the Democrat excess death rate) to 10.4 pp (153% of the Democrat excess death rate). The gap in excess death rates between Republicans and Democrats is concentrated in counties with low vaccination rates and only materializes after vaccines became widely available.”
https://www.nber.org/papers/w30512
I haven’t read the attachment yet, but I would expect the Republican death rate would be higher as Republicans are generally much older.
Several reasons:
4. Voting machines
5. Mail-in ballots
Exactly. Here is how the MSM is reporting the context of the McConnell v. Scott rift in the Senate:
“Underlying the dispute is a worse-than-expected Republican performance in the midterm elections. Republicans appeared to have momentum heading into Election Day on Nov. 8, but a “red wave” never materialized, as some voters put aside their worries about inflation and gave priority to concerns about the continued influence of former President Donald Trump and his false claims of election fraud, as well as abortion access.”
That is a lie. That’s simply not what happened. Substituting abortion concerns and Trump fatigue for the fact that in blue controlled areas the election was stolen fraudulently is the Big Lie the MSM will perpetuate as a result of all this. We should not fall for it or parrot it.
They cheated/stole it/it was rigged – period. They could only manage it in areas where they controlled the election apparatus (it matters who counts the votes), but they did manage it.
Time to fight fire with napalm.
Here’s the link to that quote which I accidentally omitted.
Now this may be promising. Part of Turley’s video on Trump and the Republican House was a note about the California Republican Ballot Harvesting Strategy that won them some seats in Cali. Like I said before, if this is the new normal, Republicans have to bring a gun to the gunfight. Just setting up our own apparatus will inspire some number of enthusiastic souls to engage in Republican “affirmative action”, so to speak. What can the other side say? Either each side gets to do it, even the cheating, or the practice gets shut down across the board. Either way is fine, though the latter is preferable.
McCarthy has been nominated by the GOP but it is not final until January and he does not yet have the votes, so there is still hope there. But, like Graham, he’s pliable and if the wind is blowing strongly enough in the Trumpian direction, he will go with the flow.
Reform California has been experimenting with ballot harvesting, evidently with some success, according to Dr. Steve. I’m trying to dive into that now, but if Republicans can lose their apprehension over “cheating”, which is our old word for the new rules of the game, then we may be back in business.
“For one thing, the cheating was confined to the Blue States (or purple [AZ, PA]) this time around. This means that the jig is almost up. Still, you gotta admire the tenacity of the Dems.”
Yes, but it did considerable damage. The House Republicans may not be as bold as they would have been and Schumer still controls the Senate, confirming commie judges. Legislatively, it’s a cluster f. The joy will be in the investigations combined with Trump’s campaign. Afghanistan, FBI, Hunter, the Border, Ukraine . . .
Misha, in regards to Russia-Ukraine and how the Wests proxy war there is playing out (presuming a Russian victory), wanted to get your opinion on Orthodoxy from a geopolitical POV.
If/when Russia wins in Ukraine, and with Turkey seemingly moving further to the Russian sphere, do you think this will effect who becomes the future EP?
Since Turkey has a hand in choosing the EP I have to wonder if the next EP will be pro-Russian.
Bartholomew is a holdover from when Turkey wanted to align more with the West/NATO and yes outlived his usefulness as a link between Turkey and the West.
Just an observation.
I don’t think the Ecumenical Patriarchate is long for this world and if it continues, it will always be threatened by Russia because it’s wants to be “first without equal”. It’s like the weakest member of a team wanting to be the captain.
Breaking: Mitch McConell
https://en-volve.com/2022/11/15/mitch-mcconnell-busted-taking-zelenskys-stolen-ftx-money-according-to-new-fec-docs/
At this point, are we surprised?
I predict Hofmeister will flip parties again, but only when she’s given enough money and has an easy shot at being that party’s nominee. As a transplant from Northern California and the scion of two Okies migrants from the dustbowl, the moment Gov. Stitt held a BBQ under an ad hominem billboard paid for by PETA, I knew I liked this guy. Then when I found out he had the tokhmeh morges to take on “Indian gaming” AND support a voucher system, I would ballot harvest for this guy any day of the week. George knows my cardinal and gold blood bleeds for the restoration of God’s holy anointed basileious, but I can and did get behind Stitt and the state level is where we must focus our efforts and man the walls against the barbaric hordes outside waiting to plunder all we hold dear.
Constantine, I forgot about that political stunt he did! I knew I liked the guy from then.
Ballot harvesting can only work if there’s a large number of complacent people just voting blue for the sake of it. The other problem is the education system indoctrinating young people with far left ideologies, most of which are explicitly anti-Christian. That so many of the youth are this way and so many aging millennials are still this way does not bode well for the country in the next decade.
There is no political solution. Apostacy and sin will continue to grow. The guy who comes along with all the answers will *not* be the one to hitch your wagon to.
Some folks have amazing faith….in the political machinery. It’s like being in a Baptist church on 4th of July weekend sometimes.
(That’s a joke. I love you all.)
😉
This is pretty good: https://amgreatness.com/2022/11/13/this-wasnt-an-election/
Adopting ballot harvesting/mail in ballots will not, in and of itself, solve the problem because that is not what has given the Dems an advantage. What has given them an advantage is combining that method with cheating through that method and with rigged machines. So, essentially, Republicans would have to cheat harder through ballot harvesting in order to make up the difference.
In the end, if Trump can overcome it, it will be by:
a. winning by a remarkable margin great enough that they cannot compensate for it by cheating (like he did in 2016; he’s the only one who ever beat the Dem cheating system),
b. engaging in prolific and fraudulent ballot harvesting, and
c. outlawing the practice wherever possible, just like DeSantis did in Florida.
So, I was reading up on the Dominion machines and they have Microsoft Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) which is an interface in C programming language that interfaces with applications to access data from a variety of database management systems (allows access to databases, services and clouds applications).
Also, I found this. Real-time clips of what’s happening in Maricopa County. These video only stay visible for about 3 seconds. Scroll down to Tabulation. – They have some black duffle bags with tags everywhere. At first I thought they were filled with ballots from ballot boxes, but they can’t be because they’re unfolded. Then I thought they were taken from the machine after it processed them at the precincts but they’re tightly stacked.
They’re supposed to be working on mail-in ballots but mail-ins are also folded in envelopes so it couldn’t be them.
Looks like fresh stacks of ballots that they have to fan out to keep them from sticking. A lot of people are milling around. At around 10:00 am (their time) there were only a few people working at the tables.
They also have something that looks like a remote junction box (View 9) which, again, could allow for communication. These machines also come with Microsoft Access which can definitely send and receive data from an outside source. Weird that a voting machine would have Access. https://recorder.maricopa.gov/elections/electionlivevideo/
EXECUTIVE ORDER
Colorado COVID-19 and Other Respiratory Illnesses
Disaster Recovery Order Amendment
https://www.colorado.gov/governor/sites/default/files/inline-files/D%202022%20044%20Colorado%20COVID-19%20and%20Other%20Respiratory%20Illnesses%20Disaster%20Recovery%20Order%20Amendment%20EO.pdf
Amending and Extending Executive Orders D 2021 122, D 2021 124, D 2021 125, D 2021
129, D 2021 132, D 2021 136, D 2021 139, D 2021 141, D 2022 003, D 2022 010,
D 2022 013, D 2022 017, D 2022 020, D 2022 028, D 2022 035, D 2022 037, D 2022 038, D
2022 040, and D 2022 043
‘ … I, Jared Polis, Governor of the State of Colorado, issue this coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) Executive Order amending and extending Executive Order D 2021 122 … which refocuses the State’s efforts on recovery and incorporates Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), influenza, and other respiratory illnesses in Colorado into the disaster declaration. ‘
It ain’t over…
Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) was discovered in 1956 and has since been recognized as one of the most common causes of childhood illness. It causes annual outbreaks of respiratory illnesses in all age groups. – So why aren’t kids able to fight it off today?
In Colorado, 62% of kids ages 12 to 17 have received two doses of a COVID vaccine. Hmmm. . . could the jump in cases be due to a compromised immune system due to the vaccines? https://co.chalkbeat.org/2022/3/18/22985735/colorado-school-level-covid-vaccine-dashboard
Where are the executive orders for that?
No idea, but expect mandates for mRNA jabs
for “Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), influenza,
and other respiratory illnesses [which have yet to be released]”.
Pharma is hungry, so Pharma must be fed…
Since RSV has been around since the 50s, I’m not sure they released it but I’m sure they’re releasing other respiratory viruses which seem to be their specialty.
https://amgreatness.com/2022/11/15/midterms-made-clear-there-is-no-return-to-pre-2020/
The above is spot on. We are now revolutionaries.
Another profound “money quote”:
“Anyone who takes this proposition seriously does not understand the real character of our regime. The Left utterly dominates every institution of American political life. We are not a republic governed by a constitution but a despotism ruled by an elite class. American elections are neither secure nor legitimate. They no longer represent the rational and deliberate will of the nation’s citizens. The millions of mail-in ballots that get injected into the process now during every election cycle make such secure deliberation impossible. The massive party machinery erected by the Democrats, backed by billions of dollars in activist, corporate, and media support, can spew out desired results with little regard to the actual will of the people.”
Yes, it was a powerful piece. And mainstreaming this opinion brings the Revolution that much closer inexorably. One cannot simultaneously literally believe the reality of what is being conveyed and not seek to undermine it.
Berthold Brecht:
“Some party hack decreed that the people
had lost the government’s confidence
and could only regain it with redoubled effort.
If that is the case, would it not be be simpler,
If the government simply dissolved the people
And elected another?”
Is this not the Democrat policy on immigration…
— Bertolt Brecht
RE: “would it not be be simpler,
If the government simply dissolved the people”
I think that’s what they’re doing with the vaccines.
Indeed.
That is exactly what is happening. Definitely with immigration and also very possibly with the COVID “vaccines.”
Petros,
I can speak to how the ROC might see it, but Greeks have a greater insight into the workings of the Turkish-Greek salons and synods where these types of decisions are made.
From our perspective, I would expect the Greeks in Istanbul to be able to see the writing on the wall as it becomes manifest in real geopolitical terms. They are all in with the West at this point and until Russia decisively defeats the West economically and, by proxy, militarily, the Greeks will dance with who brung ’em.
I expect that when Europe moves (i.e., Germany), the Fanariotes will begin to awaken to the smell of Russian coffee brewing. How they will react is anyone’s guess and probably better addressed by the Greeks who frequent here.
However, I will say that it would surprise me if there were to emerge a pro-Russian Greek on the throne of St. Andrew. This is for two main reasons: 1. the locus of economic power in the Greek church lies in America, and 2. I suspect the Greeks will always guard their independence from the Russians and the Russian sphere for ethnocentric reasons. In fact, I think this sense of pride is actually a higher priority than rational, objective self interest.
Incidentally, I do not blame the Greeks for this. Identity is a very powerful interest which sometimes trumps material considerations.
Misha, this is one of the things I love about this blog: contributions from our readers.
This particular one is fantastic. I’d like to pull out what is one of its money quotes if you don’t mind (the rest of you should read it in its entirety):
“White middle-class Americans, in the rulers’ view, are subjects and not citizens. The aim of every election after 1945 and before 2016 was to give the rubes the illusion of political choice while maintaining a consensus in favor of globalist liberalism. Trump smashed that old understanding and ushered in the possibility of a new kind of politics.
“For that sin, the oligarchs banded together to destroy Trump. In February 2020, Trump was riding high. It seemed clear he was going to cruise toward an utterly crushing reelection victory. Soleimani was dead. Gas prices were under $3 a gallon nationwide. The stock market was at all time highs. Russiagate had fallen apart. The Democratic primaries were a mess: Joe Biden had lost primaries in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada.”
Yes, the illusion of choice is two acceptable policy directions – acceptable from the vantage of the elite. But it has always been professional wrestling and, fundamentally, unrepresentative. Even from before WWII.
But really only in the last decade or so has it become truly fascist and Orwellian coercive. Remember during the Obama years the black activist Dick Gregory said, “. . . ain’t gone be no election.”
It is probably good, in the long run, that the midterms went the way they did, I say this because it is incontrovertibly clear to everyone with eyes that American elections are corrupt with fraud – third world style. There were questions in many minds – independents, men on the street, skeptics, etc. – regarding Trump’s claims about 2020. The Republican base by and large was on board with Trump’s sentiments, but there were many on the fence, not talking about leftist ideologues who lie as a virtue.
Now, Trump is completely vindicated by the disappearance of the red wave and the massive fraud and interference in Arizona. Now, everybody knows, rather than just suspects and sympathizes.
Misha, it’s interesting that you say this. I read somewhere (from an Evangelical source) that this was indeed what needed to happen. Had the GOP completely wiped out the Dems then the Normie population (and 98% of all Republicans) would have believed that they are still in “God’s country.” In other words, they’d still be in the Matrix where the Deep State keeps on putting on the kabuki theatre known as the Duopoly.
Now we know that the system is rigged against populism. How do we know?
Here’s how:
1. The GOP got almost 6 million more votes than the GOP.
2. The RINO overlords made sure to depress MAGA candidates. (Example: Cocaine Mitch spent $9 million on making sure that Lisa Murkowski (RINO, AK) got reelected. He could have sent that money to AZ, GA, NH, PA.)
3. Their still terrified of Trump. We now know that DeSantis is beholden to them.
Kabuki theatre? More like professional wrestling.
Yes, George. The thing is that in retrospect, it’s really always been a fixed match. Recall William F. Buckley famously said that conservatives were those standing astride the train tracks of progress, hands up, yelling, “Stop!” I.e. to say, conservatives have dutifully played the role of retarding force or breaking force to what all (of the elite, that is) agreed was the spirit of progress.
Now, of course, there are those of us who believe that all of the cultural change post-WWII, and perhaps before, was not in fact progress but decay. Certainly, there has been technological progress, no doubt. But the demographic decline and multiculturalism that has emerged are clearly destructive, not “progress” toward anything other than self-destruction.
That is why we call the Republican elites that played ball (the George Will, Ann Coulter, Mitch McConnell contingent) the Uniparty. Really, they don’t want substantial change, just the right to apply the brakes from time to time on movement in the “progressive direction”. I particularly lament Coulter. She is so bright and wrote so much meticulously researched exposé on the liberals – all flushed because she got agita and turned on Trump.
The train needs to be derailed, tracks constructed in a different direction, and then “progress” can resume. How that happens is anyone’s guess. But it ought to be clear now to even the very myopic that we are on a crazy train heading toward perdition.
In retrospect, I am only disappointed in Coulter. She is (in my opinion) the “real deal.” However, the case of Trump, she has lost all perspective. Her arguments now don’t make any sense.
1. Trump didn’t “build the Wall.” Exqueeze me? He may not have finished it but you can’t say he didn’t build it.
2. He didn’t make us energy sufficient? Really?
3. He didn’t take us out of international trade-deals?
4. He didn’t remake the Federal judiciary (esp. SCOTUS)?
It’s like she’s a woman scorned.
None of this makes sense. And then I remember that she supported Romney in 2012, the governor who set up the first Obamaesque “health-care exchange” in the US.
Yes, exactly.
Her earlier books were encyclopedias of anti-liberal research, mostly using the NYT and WaPo as sources. Hope she finally gets it back together because we need that type of factual polemic.
Yes, George. The thing is that in retrospect, it’s really always been a fixed match. Recall William F. Buckley famously said that conservatives were those standing astride the train tracks of progress, hands up, yelling, “Stop!” I.e. to say, conservatives have dutifully played the role of retarding force or breaking force to what all (of the elite, that is) agreed was the spirit of progress.
Now, of course, there are those of us who believe that all of the cultural change post-WWII, and perhaps before, was not in fact progress but decay. Certainly, there has been technological progress, no doubt. But the demographic decline and multiculturalism that has emerged are clearly destructive, not “progress” toward anything other than self-destruction.
That is why we call the Republican elites that played ball (the George Will, Ann Coulter, Mitch McConnell contingent) the Uniparty. Really, they don’t want substantial change, just the right to apply the brakes from time to time on movement in the “progressive direction”. I particularly lament Coulter. She is so bright and wrote so much meticulously researched exposé on the liberals – all flushed because she got agita and turned on Trump.
The train needs to be derailed, tracks constructed in a different direction, and then “progress” can resume. How that happens is anyone’s guess. But it ought to be clear now to even the very myopic that we are on a crazy train heading toward perdition.