"America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

[BuckarooBanzai]

Really a fascinating read. Hits the nail on the head, over and over again. Long, but worth the time.

"As over-leveraged investment houses began to fail in September 2008, the leaders of the Republican and Democratic parties, of major corporations, and opinion leaders stretching from the National Review magazine (and the Wall Street Journal) on the right to the Nation magazine on the left, agreed that spending some $700 billion to buy the investors' "toxic assets" was the only alternative to the U.S. economy's "systemic collapse." In this, President George W. Bush and his would-be Republican successor John McCain agreed with the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama. Many, if not most, people around them also agreed upon the eventual commitment of some 10 trillion nonexistent dollars in ways unprecedented in America. They explained neither the difference between the assets' nominal and real values, nor precisely why letting the market find the latter would collapse America. The public objected immediately, by margins of three or four to one.

When this majority discovered that virtually no one in a position of power in either party or with a national voice would take their objections seriously, that decisions about their money were being made in bipartisan backroom deals with interested parties, and that the laws on these matters were being voted by people who had not read them, the term "political class" came into use. Then, after those in power changed their plans from buying toxic assets to buying up equity in banks and major industries but refused to explain why, when they reasserted their right to decide ad hoc on these and so many other matters, supposing them to be beyond the general public's understanding, the American people started referring to those in and around government as the "ruling class." And in fact Republican and Democratic office holders and their retinues show a similar presumption to dominate and fewer differences in tastes, habits, opinions, and sources of income among one another than between both and the rest of the country. They think, look, and act as a class."

continues here: http://spectator.org/archives/2010/0...-and-the/print

[Rajiv]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

Also something about the author should be mentioned - Angelo M. Codevilla

Angelo M. Codevilla is professor of international relations at Boston University and Vice Chairman of the U.S. Army War College Board of Visitors. His most recent book is Advice for War Presidents, published by Basic Books.

He received his B.A. from Rutgers University, an M.A. from Notre Dame University, and his Ph.D. in Security Studies, U.S. Foreign Policy, and Political Theory from the Claremont Graduate School.

At Boston University since 1995, Professor Codevilla has been a U.S. Naval Officer, an Assistant Professor at the Grove City College and North Dakota State College, a U.S. Foreign Service Officer, and a member of President-Elect Reagan's Transition Teams within the U.S. Department of State. He dealt with Western Europe and with matters affecting the U.S. Intelligence Community. He served as a U.S. Senate Staff member dealing with oversight of the intelligence services, a professorial lecturer at Georgetown University and a Senior Research Fellow for the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

[BigBagel]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

The elites in this country used to have more skin in the game. The Kennedy's lost a son in WW2 and almost lost a second. Bush the Elder was shot out of the sky. Cabinet members like Henry Morgenthau had sons in combat. With rare exceptions the elites now use only other people's children as cannon fodder. To make matters worse, they now look down their noses at the military while paying lip service to their sacrifices.
In finance they have socialized losses and preserved their profits.
When resentment flares up, as it will more and more, the resentful are mocked.
It's dangerous to be a member of an elite class that is looked upon as useless and foolish. Being out of touch, they don't perceive the potential danger.

[KGW]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

I'm not a fan of the ruling class, but this guy is a flop! He gussies up old, discredited ideas of the John Birch Society and attempts (!) to pass them off as analytical criticism.

"The ruling class's manifold efforts to discredit and drive worship of God out of public life -- not even the Soviet Union arrested students for wearing crosses or praying, or reading the Bible on school property, as some U.S. localities have done in response to Supreme Court rulings -- convinced many among the vast majority of Americans who believe and pray that today's regime is hostile to the most important things of all. Every December, they are reminded that the ruling class deems the very word "Christmas" to be offensive. Every time they try to manifest their religious identity in public affairs, they are deluged by accusations of being "American Taliban" trying to set up a "theocracy." Let members of the country class object to anything the ruling class says or does, and likely as not their objection will be characterized as "religious," that is to say irrational, that is to say not to be considered on a par with the "science" of which the ruling class is the sole legitimate interpreter. Because aggressive, intolerant secularism is the moral and intellectual basis of the ruling class's claim to rule, resistance to that rule, whether to the immorality of economic subsidies and privileges, or to the violation of the principle of equal treatment under equal law, or to its seizure of children's education, must deal with secularism's intellectual and moral core. This lies beyond the boundaries of politics as the term is commonly understood."

Drivel, by any other name, is still drivel.

[Master Shake]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

Also something about the author should be mentioned - Angelo M. Codevilla

You're too funny (and predictable), Rajiv!

[thriftyandboringinohio]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

I'm not a fan of the ruling class, but this guy is a flop! He gussies up old, discredited ideas of the John Birch Society and attempts (!) to pass them off as analytical criticism.

...
Drivel, by any other name, is still drivel.

Bingo. I took the time to read every word of Mr. Codevilla's inane screed.
I want my hour back.
It's an episode of Glen Beck written in mild, beguiling prose.

[Gnosis]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

There is so much good in this article. I hope many read it whether or not there is consensus of opinion. It stirs the blood to put a face on secular humanist intolerance, who self righteously guide, but blind, carry their fellows into predictable and perverse paths.

[Slimprofits]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

Thanks for the link BB.

I don't think you guys have watched or listened to enough Beck if you think this author mimics Beck.

Surely Beck says a few of the same things. I mean, even a broken clock is correct twice a day. But he also from time to time nakedly defends the GOP and ruling class corporate entities. Beck is a phony populist.

[Kcim67]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

You're too funny (and predictable), Rajiv!

Usually bang on the Money though! Keep it up Rajiv

[BuckarooBanzai]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

It took you an HOUR to read it?

I have no further comment.

[don]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

Recognize anybody....

[Serge_Tomiko]

Re: "America's Ruling Class -- And the Perils of Revolution"

I'm not a fan of the ruling class, but this guy is a flop! He gussies up old, discredited ideas of the John Birch Society and attempts (!) to pass them off as analytical criticism.

"The ruling class's manifold efforts to discredit and drive worship of God out of public life -- not even the Soviet Union arrested students for wearing crosses or praying, or reading the Bible on school property, as some U.S. localities have done in response to Supreme Court rulings -- convinced many among the vast majority of Americans who believe and pray that today's regime is hostile to the most important things of all. Every December, they are reminded that the ruling class deems the very word "Christmas" to be offensive. Every time they try to manifest their religious identity in public affairs, they are deluged by accusations of being "American Taliban" trying to set up a "theocracy." Let members of the country class object to anything the ruling class says or does, and likely as not their objection will be characterized as "religious," that is to say irrational, that is to say not to be considered on a par with the "science" of which the ruling class is the sole legitimate interpreter. Because aggressive, intolerant secularism is the moral and intellectual basis of the ruling class's claim to rule, resistance to that rule, whether to the immorality of economic subsidies and privileges, or to the violation of the principle of equal treatment under equal law, or to its seizure of children's education, must deal with secularism's intellectual and moral core. This lies beyond the boundaries of politics as the term is commonly understood."

Drivel, by any other name, is still drivel.

I think you fail to grasp how the disillusioned masses will quickly and eagerly welcome whoever is able to rally the strength to cleanse this land of the decadence and filth that has overcome it. I travel in many social circles with the very scum he describes, and they are like roaches who scatter when the brilliant light of virtue descends upon them. The severity of modern propaganda today is demonstrative of their fear that their future is almost certainly a bleak one.

Liberalism is dead as even the left-wing adoption of political correctness, tolerance, and diversity attests. The so-called right-wing controlled by the financial oligarchy, i.e. the New York City crowd of Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, and the National Review, is religiously focused on these insane liberal notions of individualism.

Both however are against nature and are incompatible with the social structure human nature demands. This is why the peasantry of this nation has become a decadent morass with nothing but hedonism to define their lives. Perhaps religion is not the answer, but the point is people require transcendental values. The liberal dream of the elimination of values has not made life better. It has deprived the masses of purpose and culture, which has created a culture and people incapable of thriving into the future.

This author is not a particularly good writer and does not under the complexity of radical, that is to say root, traditionalism of which religion is one part. But the point is that imposing the liberal dream has not worked and will not work. The rise of the usurious class was dependent upon stripping the productive European man from his culture whereby materialism became his new god. That game is over, and it will not return.