Insufferable, untouchable, and smug.

These monopolists, those untouchable Deep Staters, that is.

If we look at the economy as a whole, we find it is dominated by monopolies and cartels, public and private. No wonder overall productivity is declining: there are no feedback loops or mechanisms to enforce transparency, accountability or pressures to improve efficiency and productivity gains on these neofeudal, extortionist structures.^[1]

Mr. Smith means “feudal” above. It’s all the rage now to add “neo” to the front of some word as though a new and different version of the non-neo phenomenon is working its magic, its invariably bad, bad magic. “Liberal,” “Nazi,” “classical,” and “feudal” are favorites for this, though “fascism” seems to have no need of modification. But “Nazi” does. We hear plenty about it but never much about “communism” as in “neo-communism.” In fact, actual communism gets no mention at all. Forget “neo” or the original article. Ain’t there.

If “neo” doesn’t git ‘er done then “post” rides to the rescue, as in “post-modern,” for example. I’m not even all that clear what makes now or the recent past “modern” and as for “post-modern” I struggle to get a grip on this phenomenon as there seem to be functioning sewage and water treatment plants, power plants, hospitals, planes, phones, computers, antibiotics, ED remedies, and a host of other technological marvels.

Wonderful machines hardly are the whole story on modernism, of course. Devotion to liberty, the search for truth, limited government, specific laws judiciously adopted, an independent judiciary, rulers not too far out of reach of the ordinary citizen, free markets, and hostility to superstition and privilege seem to be more like it. Modernism seems to be a superior state of mind ruled by rationality and eternal principles of working human groupings extracted from experience and the holy books. Savages can pull the trigger on marvelous weapons but have little individual ability to craft a weapon much better than a club or a spear.

Well, there it is. Some partisans of the “post-modern” persuasion think there’s a new “something” out and about. But I see a fanatical devotion to superstition and pure fantasy, whether climate change, female combat prowess, white male evil, white privilege, institutional racism, multiculturalism, socialist efficiency, American rottenness, a living Constitution, social justice, sexual stupidity, and totalitarian politics. The academy is not longer a bulwark of rationality but a prime mover in the destruction of freedom and white civilization. Rationality has flown that coop some time ago and the press exists not to reveal excess, corruption, and crime but to conceal or gild it. The "post-modern" world is racing past mere feudalism into simple primitivism. Our ways are crap; import real crap!

That's in in a nutshell. What’s new in our time is this strange passion for primitivism and determined regression to it. Zuckerberg looks like a mole person in a B scifi movie but he and his like in the upper reaches of Google and Twitter can effortlessly shut down those engaging in crimespeak with no consequences whatsoever, which is Mr. Smith’s point, of course. New lords of the manor, don't you know.

Post-modernism isn’t anything pretty but an entirely new phenomenon that's recreating the feudalism we thought we had escaped – (1) rule by unaccountable elites according to an unexplained or unjustified divine right to dictate to others what they will read, say, and do with their resources and (2) elite power to enrich themselves ad inf. by manipulating financial, technical, legal, and informational resources unattainable by plain folk.

And, as I say, we want to go even further back than that. We'll see how much savagery the West can stand, fondly though we do embrace its beginnings.

Notes
^[1] "Why Is Productivity Dead in the Water? ." By Charles Hugh Smith, Of Two Minds, 8/30/18 (emphasis added).

H/t: Yer Old Woodpile Report.