My friends, it’s been an exciting couple of months for me. My new job at Pajamas TV came hot on the heels of being invited (!) to write for freakin’ NATIONAL REVIEW, and both of these amazing opportunities have simply blown my mind.
But here’s a thought for you: I’ve been hinting for a long time that something big was in the works… and neither Pajamas nor National Review is what I meant! Both of those fell into my lap, and I am very grateful for both of them. But there are even bigger things in the works. The Secret Item will have to stay under wraps for a little while longer, but there are a few things I can talk about that will happen in the near future.
First, I hope to have the next book, SEEING THE UNSEEN, finished to have for sale by Christmas. No advance sales this time; I’ve been burned (and burned you) with that in the past.
I want to get that book finished, because there is a third book I need to write. Whatever happens on November 4th, this election has left me absolutely appalled – appalled -- at the breadth and depth of bias in the media, movies, music, on late night television, in the schools and universities – all of that. Turning that around is an enormous undertaking, a generational undertaking, and that is the subject of my third book, which will not be a collection of essays but rather a complete work with a specific goal.
That means I need to clear the decks regarding essays I’ve had floating around, so that I can start with a clean sheet of paper regarding the Herculean task we will face recovering the message and the mythology of this great experiment in liberty and human potential we call America.
So here’s the plan: two new essays into the book on critical thinking, called SEEING THE UNSEEN: one is WINDOW, a long-threatened account of what actually happens on a flight from LA to New York. There’s a million unseen people and systems and procedures that keep you safe as you hurtle through the stratosphere at the speed of a musket ball. That will probably close the book. The other one is the even-more-awaited THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT, which will be the global warming essay. Please don’t expect me to actually solve an issue that remains so deeply contested. What interests me is the intersection of politics and science, and that is something I feel I might be able to shed a little light on, having been paid to do both.
Now there have been some other topics I have been thinking about, that more properly belong in the next book (which I intend to finish in a few months, rather than years).
I plan to call the third book TWO REPUBLICS. In debate, you attempt to win an argument first by making the CASE: showing what is wrong, and defending your position with facts, reason and historical precedent. The second part is the PLAN: what you mean to do about it, and how.
TWO REPUBLICS will first present the case: THE REPUBLIC OF EMOTION. That will consist of several chapters showing where we have gone off the rails regarding the kind of place the Founders had in mind. Then, in part two, I’ll try to look at specific examples of how we can get back there and present a cohesive plan in THE REPUBLIC OF REASON.
The kinds of things I am talking about are not the kinds of things that will bear fruit in four years. They are the kinds of issues that will bear fruit in forty years; and I will be delighted if I live long enough to see them begin to come to pass.
I’ll tease you with this: the Left, coming out of the Frankfurt School, have been able to absolutely control both the heart (Hollywood) and the brain (Universities) of this country by slowly – over the course of forty years – infiltrating these institutions and gradually turning them from pro-American cultures into loudspeakers for the kind of socialist thinking that, when implemented, have left us with 100 million bodies in various unmarked graves and a heritage of misery, poverty and despair wherever they have been tried. America has always been their enemy, and now they have convinced half the country that America has to change.
What started as a handful of dedicated radicals have accomplished this through relentless and disciplined action. That’s the bad news. The good news is we’re not starting with a handful of people and an ideology of repression and failure. We are starting with 150 million free and successful people, who have history and logic and human nature on our side.
The message is sound. In point of fact, the message is the most profoundly transformational miracle in human history. What we need are messengers worthy of that message, and a medium that delivers the message untainted.
All of this is coming. Be of good cheer! One way or another, we are about to turn a corner.
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Now let's see some distributed intelligence and basic human decency! Don't make me come down there every five minutes!
Comments
...for the kind of socialist thinking that, when implemented, have left us with 100 million bodies in various unmarked graves...
Sadly, I think your body count is WAY low.
Collectivist thinking has killed more people than all the plagues combined. Because it's a plague of the mind and those are so much harder to cure.
Ad Astra!
Posted by: daddyquatro | October 26, 2008 10:17 PM
Let's have at it then. I'm in. Chips on the table and go for broke. As long as the basic principle is fully about LIBERTY, you can count on my support. I don't care much for current trends. I want to be around when the first child of Earth is born on Mars. Only liberty offers that possibility. Fantasy? The only thing that has ever rendered science fiction irrelevant is science fact. Ad Astra!
Posted by: ~Paules | October 26, 2008 10:28 PM
This (re)battle of ideas was inevitable anyway. If McCain wins (and I still very much hope he does), we're still moving towards socialism, but it'll be more stealth - and the failures of Big Government will be blamed on "Republican policies."
In a way, the idea of just getting right too it and fighting head on with a overt lefty is a happy one.
I'm proud to join you in the fight either way, Bill.
Posted by: Orrin Johnson | October 26, 2008 10:51 PM
Bring it on lad. I'll be there right beside you. Un pour tous, tous pour un.
Posted by: Oh Captain, My Captain | October 27, 2008 12:14 AM
> but it'll be more stealth - and the failures of Big Government will be blamed on "Republican policies."
I disagree. And if that is leading you towards an Obama vote because you think the blame will be redirected towards him, you are largely mistaken. The MSMs will not let the people know enough about the events in question until long after the damage is done. They will not ask the questions, nor will they present the answers in the event anyone does, unless they can somehow twist and distort them until they say whatever leftist crap they want.
McCain may well be far more socialist RINO than I like, but
a) He DOES love this country, and will NOT do anything which blatantly harms it
b) He does grasp the value of "talk softly and carry a big stick", unlike Obama's "talk softly, and keep talking softly. Then talk softly some more" technique.
c) McCaim will, at the least, LISTEN to what conservatives will tell him, and take that into account. Obama will listen to conservatives when they are a lynch mob who have taken out his Secret Service guards and are leading him to the tar and feathers -- not a moment before will he give them ANY shrift.
d) Obama's potential for damage -- the reestablishment of the so-called "Fairness Doctrine", the elimination of "secret ballots" in unions, the destruction of the energy generation infrastructure, the vast array of socialist entitlement programs, the abolition of 401k plans -- all these things will take more than a decade to fix -- from the time people finally grasp that they are the problem -- which we all know the MSMs will hide from the people for as long as possible -- so we are looking at 15-20 years of damage **at the minimum**
e) McCain is only one step. People like Sarah Palin -- the conservative Gen-Xers who will take over as the boomers die off -- are the future of the GOP. And that is where things are going to go, because McCain is not going to screw things up in the next 2-4 years.
f) I also predict that, if McCain is PotUS, that there will be a substantial effort to address the overall entitlements problem which is looming on the horizon. Social Security should be fixed NOW, not later. And the GOP hopefully will begin to introduce pressure on that pointing out what happened when the much smaller issue of FMs was ignored until too late. I will also guarantee you that, if Obama is elected, the Dems will continue to insist that there is no problem with SS and no need to "fix" it, just as they did the FM problems.
Posted by: Obloodyhell | October 27, 2008 9:42 PM
Hello, Give something to help those hungry people from Africa or India,
I added this blog about that subject:
on http://tinyurl.com/6bz6t7
Posted by: cheritycall | October 27, 2008 11:35 PM
I am with you, Bill. I have been working on philosophical and psychological research to find out precisely what these mofo's think and feel since I heard that the New Left was active, not dead, in Seattle in 2000. 9/11 has only made it more urgent.
I think I have made some significant discoveries in these arenas and perhaps we could even work together. I went to one of your Pasaden meetings years ago and look forward to meeting you again.
Yours in liberty,
Johnnie Garner
Posted by: Johnnie Garner | October 28, 2008 3:57 PM
"And if that is leading you towards an Obama vote because you think the blame will be redirected towards him..."
Doooooode - I've knocked on WAY too many doors for John McCain this year to vote for Obama. I'm vehemently opposed to a "let them win so they can fail so we can win" mentality - country first!
It's just frustrating. it will be up to us to combat the spin, and if Obama wins (heaven forbid) to expose the ACTUAL cause and effect of it all.
Posted by: Orrin Johnson | October 28, 2008 5:14 PM
Bill, sign me up. I want an autographed copy of you forthcoming publications. Should you find yourself in the Great State of North Carolina, I will personally treat you to a steak dinner (or whatever Californians like to eat) at the famous Angus Barn out by RDU airport in exchange for the autograph. (Of course, I will pay cash for the books, too. I am a conservative, and pay my own way!)
In your essays, you say much of what I think, only you are much more articulate and generally cut out the salty language that I am prone to use when I get wound up about something that I feel passionately about.
We need more conservatives to put their money where their mouths are. I am running for an NC House seat against the MOST liberal member of either house of the legislature. Until I decided to jump in, nobody conservative had run for this seat since 2002. Why? Because it is a gerrymandered to help the lefties.
But just because it is an uphill climb, why did nobody want to run? It is this defeatist attitude that is infuriating to me. We thoughtful conservatives ought to fight like hell at every turn.
Now, prudence dictates that we need to conserve the lion's share of our material resources for the best opportunities that present themselves. But we still need to fight for EVERY seat. For EVERY office. For EVERY point that can be made in the conversations that occur in the public sphere. At EVERY time that the people we know repeat stupid or untrue things they pick up from the media.
We do not need to concede ANY point. We are right, and need to have the courage of our convictions. This attitude does not always take money. More often, all it takes is time and a winner's attitude.
Partial Conservative Victory Declared:
The reason that Obama and Company don't want to be painted as "socialists" is because we have we have won that ideological war. Not against socialism, mind you. The commies and socialists are still out there in the weeds, coloring themselves with "spreading the wealth" or other phraseological camouflage.
But we have already won the war in the hearts and minds of the American people, who at their core understand that "socialism" is a bad thing. Now, nobody on the left is a "socialist." And they are all "pro-miliatry," no matter how they disparage our troops or try to cut funding for them. Nobody is "pro-abortion," no matter how much they promote such practices. Nobody admits that their terrorist pals are "terrorists," no matter that the evidence strongly suggests otherwise.
So Bill, even if I become the proverbial buck private peeling potatoes in the KP unit of the movement, count me in to do my part. As General George Patton said, "Americans love to fight, traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle." He was right. Let those of us who believe in the liberty and opportunity that America represents throw our hat in the ring. Let's become part of this important fight, and a long, hard fight it will be, for the future of The United States.
And I echo the "Be of good cheer" sentiment. We need to step it up, and redouble our efforts, but we are winning more than most people think. As soon as Obama or one of his fellow socialist travellers admits to being a "socialist," then, and only then, you can convince me otherwise.
And Bill, thanks again for your work. Please keep it up!
Posted by: Eric Weaver | October 28, 2008 5:33 PM
Count me in. This crap started 40 years ago (more or less} and the time to wake up and react is NOW.
Posted by: Radar | November 1, 2008 8:45 PM
Looks like it is past time for "Two Republics". Conservatives can not go on losing or barely squeaking by with 500 vote victories. We have to actually change hearts and minds. And I think we are going to have to adopt the methods of the Marxists and retake our educational institutions and cultural outlets. Only by changing the minds of the next generation will we ever see this country thoroughly embrace capitalism and reject the emotionalism that has run so rampant in recent years.
I think we ought to be able to start with a movement for reintroducting civics classes in our schools where students would actually get to read the Constitution and selected excerpts from the Federalist Papers. Then perhaps follow with trying to tweak the content of American and World History courses so that students could trace the development of our form of government through the millenia. At some point we could actually throw in some Locke and Adam Smith and we might end up with kids that actually appreciated our country.
Posted by: Drury Woodson | November 5, 2008 12:07 PM
Man I love the idea of synchronicity. Your themes about the Republic of Emotion versus the Republic of Reason interestingly coincide with a message I sent today to Melanie Phillips in response to her article, "Preventing National Suicide," specifically her comment that “They don’t realize that the first duty of a conservative is to conserve that which is precious and protect it against attack.”
I responded to Ms. Phillips that ". . .you obviously grasp the fact that we may be the only remaining keepers of the flame. We are the monks preserving the culture; and we must continue to do so even if we should be literally or figuratively reduced to hand-copying the likes of Homer and Plato in our cells in the hope that future generations will recognize their intrinsic value far better than the present, so-called progressives. . . . Rampant, radicalized Romanticism is reducing us to the savages Rousseau so admired and we’ll be the ones picking through the ruins to salvage what we didn’t have the foresight to save. The irony is that it is the purportedly erudite who are leading the masses into the jungle."
BTW: Your writing is often a reverberation of my own internal thoughts and sensibilities, particularly such pieces as "The Undefended City." I think your references to history are what really strike the chord. Perhaps you are a timely messenger of Kipling's "Gods of the Copybook Headings."
Thank you for being part of the solution and using your voice to reseed this barren soil once again.
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