The Resilience Of America

     This might strike my Gentle Readers as something of a “one-off,” a piece deliberately set at odds with most of what I write. I must admit, it’s come upon me all unawares, and from what source I cannot be certain. I can tell you only a few things about the context in which it’s being generated:

• I’ve been in contact with a fellow blogger of equal lineage, about subjects of great import.
• I’ve been listening to Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds.
• My essential defiance has confronted the naysayers, raised its head, and bellowed “No! It shall not be!”
• And yes, I’ve been drinking.

     If you proceed hence, what you read might confuse you. I make no apology for that. Much of what I write requires more concentration than the typical reader is willing to give it and more erudition than the typical reader possesses...though in neither case does that apply to the Gentle Readers of Liberty’s Torch. What I’ll say in my own defense is that for the first time in decades I am hopeful. Even optimistic.

     And I shall tell you why.

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     There’s a lot of political commentary here. That’s most of the reason for this site: I like to write about politics. But politics is not a primary of life. It’s very much a secondary consequence, something that arises and acquires importance from more fundamental sources. The primary considerations often demand that we ignore politics – that if we were to grant it the importance that the politicos demand, we would soon find that a decent life had become unavailable.

     Americans have long cherished a view of political institutions as servants: agents charged with providing us certain services, rather than masters to which we are obligated regardless of any contrary inclination. The Left, of course, and much of the Establishment Right dislike that premise; they would prefer that we concede our subjugation to the State, that we might be more efficiently “managed.”

     The 2016 election makes plain that a substantial fraction – probably a majority – of the people of this nation are unwilling to be managed. We defied the luminaries, the pundits, the bien-pensants, and in many cases our friends, relatives, and colleagues to elevate a Queens real-estate mogul to the highest executive office in the land...and it’s driving those aforementioned luminaries, pundits, bien-pensants, friends, relatives, and colleagues completely batshit.

     “How could they have done this?” they wail. “We thought they understood!”

     That’s their problem, you see. We did understand. We grasped, in sufficient numbers adequately distributed, what was being done to us. We decided we didn’t like it, wouldn’t have it, and reached for the sole available alternative. That alternative will be inaugurated this coming Friday.

     The thunderous denunciations that have followed our clearly declared choice have only intensified our resolve.

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     I’ve said it before: I was dubious about the suitability of Donald Trump as president. Events subsequent to the election have greatly improved my peace of mind. But that’s the most superficial aspect of our current condition.

     I’m here to tell you a thing you might not be willing to believe. It’s pretty grandiose. Many members of the elite would piss on it from a great height. “Who is he to say such things?” they might write. I’ll tell them who I am: I’m brighter, more knowledgeable, and above all more moral and ethical than the lot of them. And I intend to jam their presumptions right up their supercilious asses.

     We are the inheritors of the Founding Fathers. We are the conservators of freedom.

     And we will defy the self-nominated “better sort” as it pleases us.

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     We’ve endured quite a lot of chastisement – verbal, of course – from the “better sort.” They didn’t expect us to wave them aside. After all, we’d kowtowed to them regularly, even reliably, for decades. Their reaction to having been disregarded gives new meaning to the neologism butthurt.

     Their consternation is equaled by our glee. We were uncertain, you see. We feared that they would find some way to punish us for “going off the reservation.” But it hasn’t happened. All they’ve ever had is their supercilious attitude and their words, and that has at last been made plain.

     “You think politicians are important because the papers tell you so.” – Sir Fred Hoyle, The Black Cloud.

     That goes doubly for the hangers-on that have supported them with their oraculations.

     I sometimes wonder why anyone has ever heeded them. I wonder twice as intensely why I should have granted them the least amount of respect, when I could give the highest of them cards and spades and still make them look ridiculous.

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     The rebellion has begun. The bien-pensants have lost all traction. The Punditocracy is paralyzed with fear, its future having been made uncertain beyond all prognostications. The politicians themselves? They have no idea what’s coming. But of one thing we may be certain:

     Their fate will be ours to determine.

     The Europeans have accepted their yokes and fetters meekly. They’re accustomed to thinking of themselves as subjects unworthy of the privilege of self-governance. Americans are of a different breed.

     Fisher Ames, of the Founding Fathers the most disdainful of the common men of America, coined the phrase “The people are a great beast.” That has been reversed: We, the “beasts” whom Fisher Ames and his inheritors despised, have remembered that we are a great people – and we shall not forget it.

     We have endured a century of creeping totalitarianism...and have opted to throw it off. We have been told that the process is irreversible...and have elected to reverse it. Our intellect and our sensibilities have been derided by the whole of the elite...and we have chosen to disregard them.

     We mean to take this country back, to make it once again the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave...and we will.

     Do your part.