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Condemned to repeat it? — 7 Comments

  1. At the American Thinker site, one of the articles was about Chile voting on creating a new constitution.

    https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/05/chile_votes_itself_a_oneway_ticket_to_communist_hell.html

    Most of the people don’t remember the days under Allende and despise the name of Pinochet so the have to remake “Pinochet’s constitution.”

    The writer believes this will destroy Chile’s freedoms and economy as most look to Castro and Cuba to emulate.

    Certainly a concern for one of the few free-market economies in South America and their citizens.

  2. Perhaps the worst part of the current dire and dismal situation in our moribund republic is that it is nearly impossible to imagine how, with an educational system encouraging, among the young, an intense hatred of the country and a demographic transformation underway which is likely to ensure permanent one-party (mis)rule, the proverbial ship of state might be set on a sensible course. Only a conservative “long march through the institutions” against leftist domination of the “commanding heights” of the culture (winning an election or two will not suffice) might be able to accomplish this, but who can believe that such a counter-revolution is truly within the realm of possibility?

  3. “That’s true of the younger people, but it shouldn’t be true of the people in charge right now, who are older (and in some cases old). I submit that it’s not true of them, and that they remember the past but have a different interpretation of it and a different goal for the future. Their interpretation of the past is that all the bad things that happened were the result of the right or of bad luck, and their goal for the future is that the left will be in power forever.”

    This can’t be pointed out enough. I’ve always felt that adages like “those who forget the past…” and Hanlon’s Razor are far too forgiving or overly generous with the benefit of the doubt.

    How many evils have been set loose in our world by people who were convinced they were doing the right thing? In modern times, how many times has this happened from people who had All The Right Degrees or consider themselves the Smart Set™? Intellectual justifications abound from Malthusianism (and its various re-brandings) to current-day neo-segregationism.

    They are making conscious, educated choices. It’s just that their education is fundamentally different, as you astutely point out.

  4. j e,

    “…but who can believe that such a counter-revolution is truly within the realm of possibility?”

    I keep hearing rumblings of an undercurrent of one forming, but see precious little in the way of anything organized or coherent. It’s theoretically possible, but I’ll believe it when I see it. To say that the Left’s infrastructure for activism dwarfs the Right’s is to astronomically understate the comparison.

    My resources are limited, but I know that I’m not the only one on the Right with the energy and motivation to contribute. So far, I’ve seen an e-mail list…

  5. “To even have a chance of learning from experience one must have more experiences and more knowledge than most young people have today.” neo

    In facilitating and enabling the fashioning of the chains of their future enslavement, the young people of today will gain the most painful of experiences.

    But in their all too often contemptuous dismissal of the reasoned, logical and common sense objections from conservatives, they will fully deserve their future experiences.

    But their innocent grandchildren will not and in that, today’s adults will be cursed by future generations.

    “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we lose our freedoms, it will be because we have destroyed ourselves from within” – Abraham Lincoln

  6. Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850) was a French economist and he explained that socilism is thieft. The socialists take your stuff and give it to somebody else. I noticed that when Bernnie was campaining he would promise the audience free stuff and they were cheering.

  7. “(3) Leftists are dedicated True Believers, and whether their belief is sincere or just a way to get power, the result is that they are relentless in pursuing their goals.” [Neo]

    I think you have touched upon the fundamental reason socialism continues to be promulgated. On the one hand, if you look at socialism’s less knowledgeable proponents (Lenin’s “useful idiots”), they see it as a pathway to a “better” world where inequities cease to exist. They fail to understand that, as Thomas Sowell has noted, socialism is a great theory but a poor reality. IMO, this is too often the basis for seeing socialists as well intentioned even though they are wrong.

    On the other hand, there are those at the top of the power pyramid who promote socialism as a modern day system akin to Louis XIV coalescing the French nobility at Versailles. All in one place, the nobility was easier to monitor and easier to control. Likewise, central government control becomes a bureaucratic Versailles and to Neo’s point: “[those in control] remember the past but have a different interpretation of it and a different goal for the future.”

    And for those who doubt the fundamental mean-spiritedness and lust for power of the people in charge, we need only remember the quote from Marthe Kent, OSHA director of the safety standards program (June 26th, 2000):

    I like having a very direct and very powerful impact on worker safety and health. If you put out a reg[ulation] it matters. I think that’s really where the thrill comes form. And it is a thrill; it’s a high . . . I love it; I absolutely love it. I was born to regulate. I don’t know why, but that’s very true. So as long as I’m regulating, I’m happy.

    So long as she’s happy, but she does not suffer the effects of the regulations she imposes. In the direct language of the street: “Hooray for me and to Hell with you!” If her attitude doesn’t send chills up our spines, then we are not paying attention either!

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