(This first appeared on BIG HOLLYWOOD back in January. Andrew Breitbart asked if I would hold it for a week before posting it on Eject! Eject! Eject! — so I held it for three months out of love for the man. Just something for the weekend; next week, my new favorite word: Thymos. See you then.)
THE WORKSHOPS OF IDENTITY
I. The Heartbeat
Step back with me for a minute. Back out of Hollywood, out of America, out of the Western Tradition. Sit in the middle of a darkened crater at the south pole of the Moon. Sit back, look down and back into time, and watch the rise and fall of Civilizations on the Big Blue Ball.
If you could see human activity and genius, if you could watch poetry and medicine as points of golden light in the darkness of fear and superstition, you would soon detect a rhythm: a pulse, a heartbeat – the Heartbeat of Civilization.
It would begin in the Land Between the Rivers – a place known only in the last instant by the inhabitants down there as “Iraq,” but for almost the entire beating EKG before that it was called “Babylon” and then “Mesopotamia.”
That culture grew brighter, flourished and then suddenly winked out. Then, a little to the west, the Nile delta slowly blossomed, peaked, and fell. Then Greece, a brief, brilliant burst like a strobe in a dark room, blinding you long after its sudden extinction. Rome. Constantinople. Arabia. Italy. Spain. France. Britain – and with Britain, that spark of medicine and architecture and government married to science and steam literally remade the world.
And from your perch on the frozen, bone-dry lunar sand you would see the same pattern, the same pulse, the same heartbeat: a slow, steady rise, followed by a precipitous, shockingly quick fall… and then centuries, or even millennia of darkness, fear, superstition, disease and ignorance before the spark took hold again elsewhere.
One thing in common these patterns bear: the rise slow, the fall seemingly precipitous, and in every case we find the loss of nerve and strength and will comes not from the bottom, not from the common people at all, but from the rulers, the philosophers, the most affluent and educated who, in their comfort and Narcissism, abandon duty for self-absorption and self-gratification and who in boredom or self-loathing decide to fling open the gates of the city to the barbarians beyond, while the common man still stands at the walls prepared to die for the people in his charge.
And now here stands America, inheritor of that great tradition, astride that same cycle in its most dangerous and dire moment. And by any measure America is by far the most brilliant light the world has ever seen. And I can prove it, too.
Sean Penn recently wrote a piece for the Huffington Post in which he described America as a country much like any other, without any special claim to glory and indeed with an overabundance of sin to repent. Having visited Cuba and Venezuela, and having been enlightened by deep-thinking humanitarians such as Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, he implores his countrymen to give socialism a try and take its rightful place as simply one of the 200 or so other members of the great family of nations. “Viva USA!” writes Penn. Ironically, he says this unironically.
Reading his remarkable and lengthy article I was, at the close of it, reminded instantly of Lincoln, who once wrote, “He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met.” But Sean Penn is not only perhaps the most gifted actor of my generation… he also has the courage to come out and openly say what so many in Hollywood really and truly do believe.
And there’s the problem. Because like Sean Penn, almost all of this industry is composed of people whose intellectual, reasoning and analytical skills are fifty miles wide and a quarter-inch deep. Hollywood’s Chattering Classes despise their Uncle Sam, but they are deeply, deeply in love with Auntie America.
But Hollywood’s Chattering Classes are thoroughly, completely and spectacularly wrong. And therein lies the source of a looming tragedy so great it would take a thousand movies to simply sketch it out… were it not for the fact that if Hollywood as it now exists continues to do what it is doing unopposed, there will be no more movies because there will be no more electricity.
II. The Reactor
America is the greatest nation in the history of the world.
This sentence – verifiably true as we are about to see – fills me with a burning pride so great I cannot get through the National Anthem at Dodger Stadium without getting misty at the awe-inspiring scope and the terrible cost of it.
Consider this:
Militarily, the United States is not only unmatched on the world stage, but its relative strength is unmatched in history. And without question, this juggernaut is the most benign dominant military force the world has ever seen – and by a very large margin.
Consider modern history, which many consider the time since the end of World War II. At the end of 1945, the only military force of any real substance remaining in the world was that of the Soviet Union, and while they had large numbers of troops and tanks, they had no navy and no strategic air force to speak of. The United States possessed, intact, the most awe-inspiring, battle-hardened navy the world had ever seen. It possessed sky-darkening clouds of B-29 strategic bombers. And it possessed, alone, the atomic bomb and the will to use it.
The United States of America could have planted its flag anywhere it wanted and no one would have been able to do a thing about it.
And what did we do with this arsenal? We scrapped the ships, drove steel bars through the wings of the priceless bombers, and began the largest de-militarization in the history of the world.
And in all of the years since then, despite what Michael Moore may want you to believe from the comfort of his editing room, the United States has deployed in response to aggression – not to cause it. Berlin, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland – all of it Soviet — that is to say Communist – Leftist – aggression. Ask a 17 year old indoctrinated with Hollywood’s portrayal of America as a world-striding bully who started the War in Korea, or Vietnam, or Nicaragua or any of these places, and I will bet you a Xbox 360 Elite that they will not reply that it was in fact worldwide socialism, but rather America. Tell them that communists started Korea and Vietnam and pretty much everything else and they will likely ask “what is a communist?” Actually, come to think of it, they probably do not even care enough to ask.
And for those who feel that such a once-noble America is dead and gone, let’s talk about the last time we heard about “Imperialism” and “a war for oil.” In 1991, after destroying the army that Saddam Hussein sent into Kuwait to steal, rape and murder, the United States sat alone and unchallenged on top of the richest oil field on the planet. What did it do? It put out the fires and went home.
Unlike today’s screenwriters who credit themselves as intellectual and creative giants, some of us remain humble enough to not only read history, but to actually understand it on some fundamental level. And those of us who actually know people in the military, who research weapons and tactics, supply and strategy, can tell you that a war for oil consists of placing an armored cordon around the remote oil fields, providing overwhelming air cover for armed convoys direct to port facilities, and then shipment via US tankers escorted by naval assets until out of the region.
None of this is happening, of course. What has happened is that we have spent 4000 and more lives building schools and hospitals and protecting a people against fellow Muslims who show day in and day out that they will kill as many children as they need to in order to terrorize their own people into submission.
That story, apparently, holds no interest for today’s Hollywood.
Economically, the United States is – and remains – the engine of the world. Much has been made of the recent meltdown, but any impartial look at the rest of the world shows their economies took a proportionally greater hit than we did, and if history is any guide – and it’s the only guide we have – we will recover faster, too. In the last twenty years almost half of the world’s population – India and China – have been lifted from the darkness of stone-age, grinding poverty into almost the same sort of light taken for granted by those who live in Malibu and Pacific Palisades. This was not the result of massive government programs; on the contrary – those had and continue to keep entire populations in a state of mental slavery and dependence. No, this most remarkable advance in the quality of human life on earth was simply due to America channeling some of its stunning wealth into phone banks in India and factories in China.
Much is made on the left about how five percent of the population consumes twenty-five percent of the world’s resources. But that same five percent has produced almost fifty percent of the world’s wealth and prosperity in the years after World War II, and the decline in that percentage is simply a reflection of the economic growth and prosperity of our former enemies and allies, who can now afford a few decades of socialism because they do not have to pay for their own defense.
And yet it is businessmen, and “corporations,” that are endlessly cast as villains and murderers when all they have done is transformed the world from poverty to relative health and prosperity. You don’t have to take my word for this. Statistics on life expectancy, death by disease, and infant mortality do not lie. Free Trade and Free Enterprise – championed by the United States – has brought to billions some small and growing taste of the kind of life enjoyed by Hollywood liberals so blinded by mental cataracts that in the remake of The Manchurian Candidate the villain was remade from being Chinese Communists into The Manchurian Corporation. How unimaginative. How pathetic. How deep in denial.
Scientifically, technologically and medically the remarkable ownership of world-changing ideas produced by the United States is simply astonishing. That five percent of the world population could produce such staggering advances in knowledge, medicine, agriculture, instrumentation and basic research simply boggles any mind open enough to read a page.
Which narrows down the numbers of minds quite a bit.
Each year, scientists all around the world write research papers. These papers produce scientific citations. It’s fair to call these citations “units” of science, that is, a measure of how much ground-breaking science is being performed.
Listed by countries, China comes in sixth, preceeded by France, England, Germany and Japan, which produced, at number 2 on the list, 6,612,826 citations in a ten year period.
During that time the United States produced 39,027,838 – more than six times as many as the runner up.
All of those images of the deep structure of galaxies and nebulae are provided to the world at the expense of the American taxpayer and through the American genius that produced the Hubble and Chandra space telescopes. Every image of the moons of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune was sent to the world by American grad students at Cal Tech. The American university system is the envy of the world. Nowhere is there better science being done, and no where is there anything like the numbers of people receiving advanced scientific and engineering degrees.
But that is not all they are receiving. They are also receiving lethal doses of anti-Americanism and anti-Capitalism, main-lined directly and administered by morally blind charlatans like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky – men who repeatedly acknowledge the “relativity of truth” and who distort and select facts so frequently and shamelessly that I will paraphrase Mark Twain by saying that the omission of the works of Chomsky and Zinn would make a fairly good library out of a library that hadn’t a book in it.
And finally, Culturally it is America that the world watches, that the world listens to, that the world emulates and copies to the degree that suicide bombers wear Lakers t-shirts and the most virulent anti-American Euro kids look and dress and act and talk like kids from Compton or Detroit.
There was a time when America broadcast its virtues to the world. Films like It’s a Wonderful Life and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, even Star Wars and Spider-man, were films about common, decent people – Americans, obviously, for we all know that even Luke Skywalker was an Iowa farm boy – who find themselves in dangerous and evil places and whose fundamental decency corrected this wrong in the world and restored a sense of hope and optimism, a sense that we are masters of our own destiny. It is an idea so powerful that even French intellectuals, who seemed then and seem today to be incapable of a single positive or upbeat thought, could watch in wonder and contempt as legions of their countrymen flocked to see them.
Those days have gone. No longer does Hollywood broadcast America’s mythic virtues to the world. No, the flow is reversed now. Now the great creative driving force of Hollywood is to present to America the anti-American hatred of the intellectuals watching in impotent fury out in the rest of the world.
Of the six or seven war movies made during the last few years, all – save one – were spectacular failures. Many were the reasons given for this, but perhaps, someday, while sitting in a hammock in the Cayman Islands, even a studio executive might be just intellectually aware enough to catch a flash of what is obvious to a pharmacist in Des Moines: that maybe, just perhaps, these films failed not because of war weariness or denial or rank stupidity on the part of the American people, but rather – are you sitting down? – that most of the country, unlike Hollywood, has sons and daughters and fathers and brothers in the military and know for first-hand fact that they are not rapists or murderers, hicks, dullards, losers, or broken and victimized children but rather the bravest, the most capable, the most decent and honorable and just plain competent people we have.
And perhaps, just perhaps, it might enter that navel-gazing, self-centered, dim little brain to reflect that the one war movie that did out-of-the-park business was the one that showed the Marines as the good guys, winning on the battlefield, defending their people and their culture against long odds and full of the heroism and sacrifice that used to be so commonplace in this city… even if the Marines in question wore loincloths and funny helmets and advanced with spears and round shields.
If America simply led the world military to the degree that it does today, well, that would simply be historical. That it should have both economic and military might, and use them so much more often for good than for ill, would unique and awe-inspiring. That it could couple military and economic strength with such leadership in science and medicine is simply unheard of in the annals of history, and for it to be the military, economic, scientific and cultural beacon that is is not only unheard of, it simply almost defies imagining – would, in fact, defy imagining to anyone who had not grown up in it, as we have, and seen it with their own eyes.
Why is this so? Well, it is because America is not just a cauldron, but a reactor. From all over the earth, men and women have risked their lived to immerse themselves in this great experiment in freedom and individuality, and the results, by any measure, have produced more goodness, more security, more prosperity and more raw happiness than society or combination of societies in history.
Stars, like our sun, are reactors too: the tremendous, monumental energies and pressures they generate would blow them to pieces in a millisecond, but for one thing… the immense gravity that holds these fiery atoms together and strikes the balance of force and pressure that creates all the light and life in the universe.
The American reactor of individuality and freedom of expression would also fly apart too, but for one thing: the deep love of country that has bound it together and liberated the best of the human spirit. Destroy that love of country and the idea of America – for that is what she is, in the end… simply an idea of freedom and the pursuit of happiness – eliminate that binding love and the reactor will explode. And when it does, there will be no more light – no more medicine, no more art and poetry, no more iPhones and MRI scanners and jet travel, no more Fifth and First Amendment rights, no more security and peace… in fact, no more hot running water.
Cut those cords of love of and pride in country – as the elites have cut them in every civilization before us – and from your seat on the moon you will see the brightest light in history wink out. The rest of the world will soon follow.
How long will the next darkness last? A few centuries? All of the readily available tools to build a new civilization – the ores, the coal and oil – all these are gone. Monks in stone cloisters cannot build photovoltaic cells. If this civilization falls, as have all others – from a lack of belief in itself – then civilization and medicine and science may very well never return.
Those are the stakes.
And how – pardon the profanity – how ironic is it that those libertines, those most determined to be able to do whatever they want, whenever they want, and at no cost to themselves… how ironic, how pathetic, how tragic, how infuriating and indeed, how insane is it that they – they alone – now control the mythology and the message of the workshop of our identity?
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46 Comments
1. John Galt:Wow Bill, new posts coming fast and furious. Just when we need you most, you come answer the bell. Well done.
Apr 10, 2009 - 1:19 pm 2. Walter:Brilliant – It never occurred to me that the U.S. could have pretty much done what we wanted after WW II, and perhaps because it didn’t – we didn’t. That’s not what we beleive in.
The allure of Euro centric nihilistic “philosophy” has been poisonous to a stunning number of our most intelligent citizens, as they, in their syncophantic “Uriah Heep” mode ape their European “betters”. They are smart enough, if not self confident or read enough to know better.
I fervently hope that one they will learn that “as they sow – so shall they reap”. But I don’t think they will ever read that book!
Apr 10, 2009 - 1:20 pm 3. Sgt K:Just as good as it was back in January. Maybe more. Thanks.
Apr 10, 2009 - 1:52 pm 4. Captain Ramen:This needs to be front paged at PJM.
They sewed the wind, and now they shall reap the whirlwind.
Apr 10, 2009 - 5:42 pm 5. johnny virgil:After I read this, I forwarded it to everyone I know. Thank you, once again.
Apr 10, 2009 - 8:13 pm 6. Hale Adams:Bill,
It may be that “those libertines….now control the mythology and the message of the workshop of our identity”, but what good is that control if no one watches their movies? As you noted, most of the war-movies (and movies with an anti-American message) that Hollywood has made recently have bombed here at home. And if they do well abroad… well, the effect may be paradoxical.
I remember reading a book (“MIG Pilot”, by John Barron, I think it was) about Victor Belenko, the Soviet Air Force pilot who flew his MiG-25 Foxbat to Japan back in ‘76. Belenko received the usual dose of propaganda growing up and as a junior officer in the Soviet Air Force, but the propaganda had an unintended effect on him– he began asking himself questions like: If the average city dweller was reduced to eating hotdogs from sidewalk vendors in New York City street scenes (as the propaganda film would have one believe), just who was driving all those cars seen in the background? Just how repressive could the United States be if it allowed the Communist Party to exist there? Why, that would be like the Soviet Union allowing a Capitalist Party! And so on and so forth.
Some of Hollywood’s output, as seen by foreigners, might have a similar boomerang effect– foreigners watching them might “read between the lines” and get a message the producers of that dreck never intended to transmit.
My two cents’ worth…..
Hale Adams
Apr 10, 2009 - 8:21 pm 7. dsm:Pikesville, People’s Democratic Republic of Maryland
I love your writing.
Your line about “no more hot water” reminded me of a passage in one of Churchill’s histories. I’m going off memory, so I’m sure I’m misquoting it slightly… “between 400 and 1400AD there was no indoor plumbing or central heating anywhere on the British Isles.”
Apr 10, 2009 - 9:27 pm 8. airfoil:It would be unusual if the American experiment lasted into its fourth century. However, nothing like what’s happening currently has happened before, either. I continue to be surprised by the lack of surprise evidenced in public reaction to events. This too, is not accurate however; the “media” is a bizarre conflation of what a minority want to say.
Wouldn’t it be a surprise if under all the misinformation, blatant propaganda and cheek licking there was a fundamental resilience in our beloved country. Bill Whittle is not alone with his misty eyes at our Anthem’s performance. I need to believe this, the people I meet and talk to sound like America to me.
AF
Apr 11, 2009 - 6:40 am 9. Fritz:I am struck by the different nuggets readers glean from this piece (and others). The comments are testament to the depth of your post(s), Bill, and to the breadth of your audience.
It strikes me also that the Internet and the expansion of ‘inde’ movies in our beloved country could be a natural, market-driven correction of the Leftist bias and misinformation. I am hopeful for and have faith in the common American people. But I fear our situation will worsen before it improves.
Blogs like yours, Bill (and, hopefully, one I’m contemplating), can help stem the tide before we hit bottom. Thank you for your vigilance, and for sharing your gifts. May you be justly rewarded.
Apr 11, 2009 - 8:28 am 10. Gordon DeSpain:Bill,
A very astute article, and, I agree with everything you’ve said.
There is a reason for the rise and fall of civilizations, and, it was delineated and defined in Volume 20 of the Time/Life Series, “Civilization,” now banned from all Libraries in America…because Volume 20 was woefully, politically incorrect.
This series was written sometime in the 1960’s, and, I was lucky enough to find a set in a private Library (my Sister-in-Laws), while working on a project in Del Valle, Texas.
I began reading it with no preconceptions, from Volume 1, straight through to Volume 20, “The End of Golden Ages,” which contained a list of 20 Markers of the end of an age. These 20 Markers were said to be arbitrary in occurence, with the exception of Marker #1, and, Marker #20.
Marker #1 was the most politically incorrect indictment of a class of people that one could imagine, and, infuriates women: about 150 to 200 years into the life of a civilization, women begin rising to positions of great power. Brandishing their weapons of Genderbat, they begin pushing their primal, biological imperative to build safe, SECURE, healthy, WEALTHY, SERENE Nests in which to raise children who will be sheltered from all violence, in luschious, exotic, IMPORTED luxury.
The Ladies behind, and beside, the Throne engender a rising Tsunami of (Marker #2)Rules, Regulations, Policies, Procedures, Edicts, Decrees, Taxes, Permits, Licenses, etc, flowing from a burgeoning, plethora of Agencies, Bureaus, Departments, Offices, and, lone agents of Tyranny (generally members of the ruling body…Congress, Parliament, Royal Council, etc). All of the foregoing are desiged to increase the income of the Great Ladies so they can build gorgeous Palaces, Castles, Compounds, and, even Fortresses decorated with exotic things that others can’t afford.
In between we have: Imbalance of Trade; denigration of Crafts, Skill, Trades, Artisans, etc; Flight of Capital and Industry to foreign ports to escape the above; Flight of Crafts, Skills, Trades, Artisans etc, to those same foreign ports; Denigration and pushing away of the Citizen Soldier, many of whom are their Bodyguards; Hiring of Mercenaries as Bodyguards and a Professional Military; importation of cheap Labor in the form of wage slaves, or, slaves in fact (it’s preferable if they import themselves); and, more.
Marker #20 is actually one of the first things that the Great and Noble Ladies demand: the disarming of the common citizen, but, it’s generally the last thing accomplished. No Civilization in history has survived more than one generation born after the general population is disarmed reaches adulthood, before vanishing into footnotes in dusty Tomes nobody reads.
When Chief Cathy Lanier of the DC Police, gave her speech in a Press Conference following “DC vs Heller,” I was stunned, it appeared to have been copied, chapter and verse from Volume #20, “The End of Golden Ages”: “Not everybody needs Guns. We have enough weapons to protect the citizens of DC…” and, named the Police, every Alphabet Agency, the Military…and, among them, “Armed Security Guards in almost every public building in DC”…like Dick Heller.
Apr 11, 2009 - 8:55 am 11. Tim:Concise, yet brilliant. Bravo Bill. I have often found it ironic that those who most promote our fall are those who would suffer the most if it were to happen (Gays for Palestine comes to mind rather quickly).
Sadly, some of our fellow countrymen are too busy enriching themselves from the public treasury to care about much else. Hopefully that changes, and soon, or else our fall might come sooner than expected. After all, if they have no skin in the game (as they think), why should they care?
Apr 11, 2009 - 9:20 am 12. Howard Roark:Bill,
The majesty, the Glory, and the Terrible Beauty. How DO you do that?
Hale, the control of cultural output isn’t so important for what it allows, but for what it forbids. The same intellectual flypaper that produces truly epic fails like ‘redacted’ makes it very difficult for something like ‘Mr Roberts’ or ‘Toko-Ri’ to see daylight. Now. There are few healthy values on offer to balance the flypaper scrapings.
I think you understated the stakes, Bill. Fred Hoyle said in the 60’s that industrial civilization, for any star system, is a one-shot deal. His argument was built around resources, energy, and their availability. His point was that if Man didn’t make a go of it here, no other species would be able to. There simply wouldn’t be enough resources accessible to support the climb towards the light. There would be one chance, and one chance only, to achieve independence from nonreplaceable resources (including energy generation).
One thing is obvious to me in that march of civilizations. The amplitude of that cycle is growing. Each successor reached higher than the last, and each crash had broader effects. The crash of Rome took down Europe for a millenium, and the crash of the post-Roman West would be worse. Much worse.
I don’t see a cultural unit on the planet that is both forward-looking enough, and well-resourced enough to continue forward from where the West is now.
Europe, Japan, and Russia are a demographic death-cult. The Dar Al Islam hasn’t generated anything new since the 7th century. China and India have serious population and resource problems. Africa is an abattoir and has been for generations. Australia? South America? I would love to be wrong, but I don’t see it.
The conservative silent majority is alive and well. I sat around a table with some of them this afternoon, planning a Tea Party Event. How do we engage them? If the conservative body gives leadership over to the ‘Dinner-Party’ conservatives and pulls back to wait for a better day, we’re screwed.
-HR
Apr 11, 2009 - 11:20 pm 13. Joan O'Connor:I am 79 years old and may I say, I love you for writing the truth about this wonderful, amazing country and the threat from the enemies within. Your article brought tears to my eyes and fury in my soul for the likes of Sean Penn and his ilk. Thank you for all your hard work. God Bless America!
Apr 12, 2009 - 8:26 am 14. cfbleachers:Bill, may I come sit beside you on the bottom of the moon? How do we not fall off? Why do we not leap?
America, …this brilliant, shining, bright and beautiful land of ours has been wrested from the hands of its patriots, pioneers and promoters who love and admire her and has been kidnapped by those who see her as an ugly crone.
Pride replaced by shame. Kudos replaced by apologies. Justification replaced by guilt.
Leftists wish now nothing more than to put a bag over her head, having enjoyed their freedoms to trash her behind her back for the last three or four decades. They painted her as ugly, on a thin canvas of stolen linen and with unclean hands. Hands soiled by colorings and shadings of truth, bending light and creating shadows of deception.
Paint by numbers socialism, the McArt of political systems…foisted upon a landscape of townspeople weary of being slandered and wanting nothing more than to be “liked” for a while…by the “cool kids” sitting at their peer pressuring lunch table.
Marginalized, isolated, demonized and ridiculed…the heartland stopped beating for a moment to glance in the mirror and wonder if they were as ugly and uncool as those arrogant mental bullies were painting them out to be.
In that moment, America was stolen. The broken heartland, hurt and hesitant…let the bullying and peer pressuring make them want to be cool more than they wanted to be true to themselves. It happens every day, in every lunch room…and has for as long as I have been alive. Perhaps before, I’m pretty sure.
Bill, I appreciate this chance to sit beside you on the bottom of the moon. I know nothing else to do but to climb off now, go down and grab her 400 year old hand and walk through my future with the most wonderful, beautiful, land ever created. She’s mine today and always will be. And I will never, ever apologize for loving her.
Apr 13, 2009 - 12:46 am 15. JJS:Bill:
Well done. I think it was Eric Hofer who said “intellectuals hate America so much because they had nothing to do with making her great”. I think you captured it.
Apr 13, 2009 - 4:14 am 16. airfoil:cfbleachers….. Brilliant, Thank you.
AF
Apr 13, 2009 - 6:14 am 17. airfoil:In many ways, it is that simple. Those who see themselves through the Narcissists’ fog embellish their “image” by dissing the strong, the good, and the gracious as “uncool”. It was that way when I grew up in California, and I chose to reject that ethic and go off on my own, to teach myself, as it were, since the educational institutions I encountered were stamped from the same die. My peers are autodidacts, like me, the sceptical, the “unpopular”, the out crowd. The ideal in public ed these days is the foul-mouthed, the “cool”, the pierced, the “rebel” who fancies himself “bitchin Bob”, like all the other bitchin Bob’s and Betties I knew back when.
Liberals are joiners, Conservatives are individuals. In a democratic society, which holds sway??
Bill, at least half the people in our land hated high school and are passionate about the terrible state of PubEd. Your thoughts?? It may be the source of most of our ills.
Apr 13, 2009 - 6:42 am 18. physics geek:Well, it’s a treat that I hope will become commonplace, but not common: reading a new Bill Whittle post on a regular basis.
Thanks for the post. I work with a bunch of engineers. As a group, they are almost invariably conservatives or libertarians, dealing as they do with facts and such on a daily basis. We do employ some coops and interns who, while certain to be fine engineers one day, still have their brains muddied by thoughts of the socialist utopia that this country could become, and what a grand thing that would be. Most of them, to be sure, will eventually run squarely into the brick wall of reality and wake up. Unfortunately, that day gets pushed back further every day with each bit of Hope! Change! claptrap espoused as gospel by Hollywood and the MSM. And most the mush-headed younguns still believe that there IS such a thing as a free lunch, so all that gobbledygook sounds fabulous. What’s unfortunate is that they don’t realize that is gobbledygook.
I plan to introduce them to your writing. The ideas will be as foreign to their way of thinking as calculus is to that of an ape. However, being exposed to the truth at a relatively young age should reduce the shock when they find out just how horrifically wrong they were about everything.
Apr 13, 2009 - 9:00 am 19. Francis Hopkinson:Bill, you are a national treasure! There is truly nothing that I enjoy more than one of your essays. You logic is impeccable! Your style, unmatched!
I have used the pharaoh in the 7/11 bit to introduce many to your writings. Once they read that, they all want more. Your matter-of-fact and disarming style really helps prepare the “soil” of the mind for these most-important ideas.
I pray for your long and prolific career, and only with their were one of you in every classroom.
God bless you and keep you.
Apr 13, 2009 - 7:52 pm 20. Nina:Gordon,
Do you have the ISBN number for that book?
Apr 14, 2009 - 6:57 am 21. Gordon DeSpain:20. Nina,
Unfortunately, no. When I read those books, it never dawned on me that books ‘could’ be banned from Libraries, especially reference books.
A friend of mine, Jim Blue, has been looking for the Set for almost a year, and, has not found a single volume, let alone, Volume 20, “The End of Golden Ages.” I contacted my Sister-In-Law and offered her what she paid for the entire set, for that one volume, unfortunately, after her husband passed away she had to sell virtually everything, including the walls of the house, just to survive.
She contacted the friend that bought the complete set, but, they were not interested in selling a now rare set of books, especially not ‘just’ Volume 20, and break the set.
Apr 15, 2009 - 4:38 am 22. ninjafetus:Gordon, are you sure you have the correct name of the series and volume? I’ve been doing some searching online, and the only results I have that match your titles are in comments on blogs like this. I don’t find the books listed on ebay, Wikipedia, websites devoted to compiling information about Time-Life series, etc. Is there any chance it wasn’t Time-Life, or had a different title? I understand you say it was banned from libraries (every library everywhere?), but I find it hard to believe that, if you have the correct title, it would simply not exist anywhere online. I would assume that someone would be selling it, or talking about it, or listing it in a compendium.
Apr 15, 2009 - 6:53 am 23. Mark:Gordon, was it this series? http://www.moonsbooksonline.com/si/07311.html
Apr 15, 2009 - 11:51 am 24. Leland Sheppard:That is probably one of the best, if not the best, articles I have read in my lifetime. And I am 70 years old. Thank you, Mr. Whittle.
Apr 15, 2009 - 8:41 pm 25. Gordon DeSpain:Mark,
It very well may be that this 1967 set of Books superseded the series that I read (released in early ’60’s), but, they’ve changed the Title, and, there is one Volume glaringly missing in this 20 Volume collection of a 21 Volume Set, “The End of Golden Ages.” I wonder why?
The Set that I read did not have these very attractive Covers, just plain library Red, and, the Volume Titles are similar, but, more in keeping the the Title of the Set.
I’ll get in touch with Nelda, and, confirm the name of the Set, but, the only one that really intereste me was the 20th and final volume, “The End of Golden Ages.”
I’ve walked the Banks of the Al Furat (the Euphrates) on both sides for several hundred Kilometers in Syria, stood on top of untouched City Mounds that have no names, and, I’m in Baghdad, now: Civilization and its travails are my keenest concern.
Walking out of Dhahran University Medical Center (having given my requisite pint of Blood to get my Drivers license, I stopped to light a Cigarette, glanced up while thinking about an article I read in a Archaeology Magazine the night before, and froze with startled recognition.
The article was about a dig on the North/West tip of Bahrane, where the Causeway from Saudi goes ashore. The archaeologists were digging up a small, 6000 year old Port, and, discovered a Shipping Agents Library with over 3,000 Shipping Records. The little Scribe, had written one whimsicle thought on a Tablet, out of all those thousands. He said, “From this site at night, you can see the lights of ancient, shining Dilmun”…and, I was standing exactly where he would have been looking: on the Portico of a University that sits in a ‘cutout’ on top of a huge City Mound.
Strangely, Archaeologists claim that Dilmun was located in the Sinai, but, I’m willing to bet that a Shipping Agents Scribe knew where every Port in the world was located, where he was, and, what he could see at night.
The Sumerians immigrated to the Fertile Crescent from Dilmun. It was called by the “King of Dilmun,” in a library linked to Nebucadnezer, “…the Land of your Ancient Ancestors.”
Civilizations interest me, especially their fall: when an Alexander crosses the Bosphorus, or, an Obama climbs the Hill. The ultimate causes are the same, and, all markers are now in play, except the last, the disarming of the common man (who will not fight for a leader that cast them to wolves, at both extremes of society).
Apr 16, 2009 - 10:23 am 26. Gordon DeSpain:Sorry about the missing and misspelled words, but, I wrote quickly, and, had to send without checking or editing. It staggers a bit, too.
Apr 16, 2009 - 10:32 am 27. Liz Le Mond:HMMMM…The plot DEFINITELY thickens…
As a librarian, I have access to a database that has records for library collections around the world – as far as I know, the most complete there is.
I searched this database, using every trick I could think of (not to boast, but I’m pretty good at this – I once won the compliment of “favorite mole” from a congressional candidte whom I was working for), and could find NO entries for “The End of Golden Ages” and NO reference to any volume by that title in the records for the series “Civilization” or “Great Ages of Man.”
How totally and completely ODD…
So now I’m dealing with a dose of frustrated curiosity. I would LOVE to get my hands on a copy of that book!!!…
Apr 16, 2009 - 10:51 am 28. Daniel:I have to say…I am a senior in college and I had spent all day around campus. Walking around, I saw more and more of this arrogant liberal mindset through student papers, the media, and casual conversation. As the day went on, I become more and more upset. I doubted the future of individualism, conservatism, and our country itself. As a budding scientist, I am always concerned about the future, since research is expensive and is only pursued by the most advanced civilization. The idea of lights going out worries me.
But reading this article gave me hope again. What we have here is something special. I believe that there are people who want to cure diseases and shoot rockets into space, and a great deal of them live and work here. But no matter what, there will always be people who stand in the way and (try to) ruin it. I say: these obstacles were there yesterday, and they will be there tommorow. And no matter what their “fresh” angle of anti-Americanism is, whether they assault us from outside or within, I remember that this country has a tremendous amount of thoughtful, faithful, hardworking patriots who will fight back. After seeing this article, I have found new energy, and am eager to get my gloves on tommorow and get to work.
God Bless
Apr 16, 2009 - 8:42 pm 29. Gordon DeSpain:Liz,
In the list of Volumes for each of those Series, are they all broken sets? Say 19 of 20, or, 20 of 21?
I have to say that if anyone would scream to burn a book, it would be Feminist Librarians (present company excepted), because that Volume seriously indicts the “Great Ladies” as being almost totally responsible for the fall of Civilizations. That may be why the last Volume is missing.
As one of the real, original Urban Cowboys, I think everyone can understand that we developed an entire personna dedicated to “chasin’ Ladies.” The first thing I learned to do was project the ‘image’ of a dumb ole Cowboy, with one thing on his mind…Ladies, and, I was not surprised by the indictment in “The End of Golden Ages.” Ladiea are almost universally convinced we’re dumb.
Ladies, master foragers all, have historically been the Spymasters of the Great and Noble Houses, and, they’re universally adept at manipulating the men around them (I think the knowledge is handed down through Mothers Milk).
When a man balks at something a woman desires, it’s only one step from there to the deployment of “Weapons of Genderbat”…a ‘win win’ tool that few men can resist. I’d rather fight an African Honey Badger, than argue with a woman, I lose with the first pout (re: “The Honey Badger,” by Robert Ruark), I don’t wait for th’ Claws…”Yes, dear.”
So goes Congress, and, so went every Civilization in History: taken down by Women rising to “Positions of Great Power,” pushing their primal, biological imperative to build safe, serene Nests (Chief Cathy Lanier of the DC Police, is a classic example)…”We have to ban Guns (Swords, Spears, etc, depending on ‘the Age’). We can’t ‘allow’ the common citizen to have Weapons, they’ll be fighting amongst themselves, killing each other…it’ll cause sedition and rebellion (which is what they really fear…rebellion against a racially, civilizationally suicidal Tyranny)”
Apr 17, 2009 - 8:34 am 30. ninjafetus:I don’t know… I wasn’t trying to stir up trouble (I was interested in reading the books myself), but it seems extremely statistically unlikely that a book written relatively recently (the 60s) and published by a major corporation (Time-Life) would cease to exist from every list, library, and database available to us today, feminist librarians or not.
Apr 17, 2009 - 8:57 am 31. Liz Le Mond:Hi, Gordon -
I checked the records for that “Great Ages of Man” series.
One record just says it has 22 volumes, published between 1965 & 1968, but doesn’t list the volume titles.
The other record says it has 19 volumes published between 1965 and 1979, and lists all the titles. “The End of Golden Ages” isn’t among them.
Another factoid is that there is a record for a volume 20 in the series, “The Age of Progree,” covering Europe from 1850-1914.
The final volume listed in the record that lists 19 volumes is “The 20th Century.”
I’m going to check a couple of final details.
Apr 17, 2009 - 10:37 am 32. Liz Le Mond:Back in a moment…
I’m back again, with no additional information.
This LOOKS like the kind of thing that happens all the time when a series is revised or reprinted, and it’s the sort of thing that can drive librarians NUTS.
The only way to see if there are any copies of that mysterious volume 20 out there is to ask for it specifically via interlibrary loan from each library that owns the 22 volume series….
Unified conspiracy? Unlikely. Individual “Mini Hissy Fits” leading to copies of vol. 20 vanishing from collections? Entirely possible, since those decisions can be influenced by emotions, and “Sexism” IS one (or is that 2?) of the 7 deadly sins in this PC age.
As to that first marker, my first impulse is to say it could be a factor in some cases, but the way it’s stated seems to make it a large, sweeping generalization. I have to admit, though, that it does remind me of mothers who try to wrap their precious offspring in “smother love”…
Apr 17, 2009 - 11:02 am 33. Gordon DeSpain:Ninjafetus,
You didn’t stir anything up, and, I would recommend that book to everyone, if it can be located. But, here again, we discover the possibility that the List in that volume is an opinion rather than fact. But, I can look at the state of the Nation, who weilds the real power everywhere, and, I can’t discount the destruction of society, and, the resulting turmoil I see at all levels, that match every marker listed.
The only one that ‘I’ believe is standing between us and a footnote in a dusty Tome nobody reads, is the disarming of the common man. If they pull that off, the whole world will collapse. When the Elite has no fear of the People, they will treat them as Serfs, and, Slaves.
In a Constitutional Society all Citizens, Male or Female…White, Black, Brown, Yellow or Green, are equal. You make of your life such as you can, and, no-one can deny that 9th Amendment Right (unwritten Common Law), as long as you do not abuse the Right.
Socialism denies that there are Individual Rights, only Community Rights…that conveniently morph into privileges of Serfs who will be treated as Slaves.
Apr 18, 2009 - 8:29 am 34. Gordon DeSpain:Liz,
I would add one thing to the post above: Remember the past, it is the future.
Apr 18, 2009 - 8:44 am 35. TomJoe:Terrific entry!
Apr 18, 2009 - 9:33 am 36. ChomFa:AS an Australian who has a more than passing knowledge of American history and achievement, I’d just like to add my 2 cents worth and heartily endorse every sentiment expressed in this article.
Apr 20, 2009 - 6:43 pm 37. Gordon DeSpain:I grew up in an era where anti-Americanism was the de facto “angry young man’s” position, but I could never get a sensible, reasoned explanation from others as to why they despised America.
I furthered my knowledge and understanding and, as a result, have been convinced for many decades that, truely, America is the pinnacle of Western cultural achievement. Certainly, man may reach higher, in some unimaginable future, but any fall of America would leave the world in dire straits and make the darkness of previous centuries appear tolerable.
I pray America regains a sense of itself, of it’s intrinsic goodness. The world DOES need a strong America but that strength must come with conviction and moral certainty. At the moment you look, to concerned outsiders, like indecisive rabbits caught in a spotlight.
Sharpen up, Yanks….get a dose of “Love it or leave it” back into your core. Your good far outweighs the critics barbs.
CHOMFA,
Sitting at my Desk in a foreign port, Baghdad, I’m one of the “Crafts, Skills, Trades, Artisans, etc” that joined the exodus in 1977 when I walked away from a movie and went to a job in the North Sea, on a Pipeline Platform off the Coast of England (because I knew it would be the death of Gilley’s).
From this vantage, there is little I could do to change the inevitable fall of Mr. Reagon’s “Shining City on a Hill:” we are beyond the precipice with legions of enemies digging the hole we will be buried in…most fervent, of course, our “Great Leader” in Metrosexual drag.
That I could see where this was leading, even before I found the list of the “Markers of the End of a Golden Age,” changes nothing, and, I see no way to pull back from a freefall into another dark and violent age.
I’m just a symptom of things to come, playing my part reluctantly, but, fighting with all my skills, knowledge, and, Degrees (from afar) that which would be more effective nose-to-nose with the enemy: Socialism.
I’m still married to the beautiful radical Feminist, Progressive Activist (second wife in the movie) I met in front of the Punching Bag at Gilley’s in 1976, that I consider the ‘face of the enemy.’
Neither of us will ever change, and, I would rather be an Expatriot American than fight a battle I’ve already lost (she brings me articals from newspapers, with the things she wants it to say highlighted, and, gets furious when I read the other words in the sentence that flip the meaning).
The end of this “Golden Age” will not be pretty, because, all Socialist/Marxist/Communist Societies in history have two common characteristics: War and Genocide (of the common citizen)…the “Great Ladies” of the Obamanation are ramping up to make it happen, and they’re bringing the war to America (Janet Napolitano reminds me of a Janet Reno redux…Napolireno? …is there a Waco, Arizona?).
Apr 20, 2009 - 11:26 pm 38. Topics about Rome-italy » Blog Archive » THE WORKSHOPS OF IDENTITY:[...] A Catholic Devotional placed an observative post today on THE WORKSHOPS OF IDENTITYHere’s a quick excerptRome. Constantinople. Arabia. Italy. Spain. France. Britain – and with Britain, that spark of … of truth” and who distort and select [...]
Apr 21, 2009 - 5:41 am 39. WhyamInotsurprised?:I am stunned! This view from the moon is nothing but EXCEPTIONAL. Bill, thank you for your thoughts and feelings about our country.
I like to think that I can see “the big picture” and try to put into perspective the collective situation of the world. While there are many challenges still to face, I see America’s force for good paying off in some of the strangest ways. That technology created by Americans has enabled hundreds of millions in Communist China and other harsh places to raise their standard of living is nothing short of astounding. That the advances you outline benefit the world are the fruit of investment over many decades is proof of our willingness to help others. Sure we have not conquered all problems but life on earth has improved. The fact that our Dear Leader worships Communist China as being more advanced than the US negates our contributions to their current situation, both technologically and economically.
The perceived “decline” of the US relative to other such countries is not necessarily a marker of our civilizations’ decline but rather the raising up of other countries who compete with the US. However, now with forces of domestic subversion ruining our economy, standard of living, and search for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, maybe there is a real decline and fall in our future. Maybe, just maybe our historical exceptionalism will enable us to avoid the pitfalls of other civilizations, but we will have to fight this enemy like no other seen to date.
The treatment is to get back to basics, simplify, re-dedicate and move ahead in all areas of our lives. The price may be some temporary pain but saving, getting out of debt and setting new priorities are key. Recommitting ourselves to excellence, hard work, honesty, justice, and opportunity will lead to a resurgence not redistributing wealth and stifling innovation, creativity and hard work. The biggest challenge will be in revitalizing our educational system. Otherwise, an uneducated population will simply be a boat anchor that will result in the decline and fall of the brightest light in history. God Bless America.
Thank you for such a spark of REAL hope and inspiration. We do live in the best place on earth. even if some of our fellow “citizens” cannot see or will not acknowledge that fact.
Apr 22, 2009 - 7:08 am 40. Prosaic:I think socialism is a philosopy that only exists in reaction to exploitation on a large scale. Socialism exists because businesses did not deliver basic rights, and fear drove the economies. Socialism is more an emotional philosophy than any other kind.
It seems that America’s philosophy also has its emotional aspects.
The key problem of course is that global businesses behave like sociopathic criminals enough of the time that both capitalism and american wind up being hated at the same time they are admired.
I think if you want to defend “america,” you should also defend the rule of law, and you should be attacking those who undermine the soul of your ideas. The global criminals who have economically enslaved a good part of the world. Read Perkins’ books. Those people are the ones who open the door to idiots like Sean Penn.
Apr 24, 2009 - 7:46 am 41. ◄Dave►:Awesome, Bill. I see I have been missing treats by not checking E3 for the past month or so. You are great on video; but you are still the master of the keyboard.
One typo: “From all over the earth, men and women have risked their lives to immerse themselves in this great experiment in freedom and individuality”
Thanks for the mind candy. ◄Dave►
Apr 27, 2009 - 5:15 am 42. temasparapian:birthday gift
May 3, 2009 - 2:14 pm 43. tommylexx:bill – just watched your afterburner segment on pjtv – OUTSTANDING! hope you’re getting commissions on all the subscriptions you’ve generated for the pajamas folks! -a new fan
May 3, 2009 - 11:26 pm 44. relishjos:birthday gift
May 5, 2009 - 8:42 pm 45. Eject Eject Eject » THE WORKSHOPS OF IDENTITY:[...] Bill Whittle wrote an interesting post today onEject Eject Eject » THE WORKSHOPS OF IDENTITYHere’s a quick excerpt [...]
Jun 21, 2009 - 6:54 am 46. Joel:Dude, I like you. Spot on sir.
Aug 17, 2009 - 7:39 pm