For the past two decades, I’ve been watching the world wake up to the obvious. As Orwell said, nothing is so difficult as noticing the nose in front of your face. A few people, me among them, were seeing that the whole story of reality that we lived in was as false and narcissistic—at least!—as the Soviet Union’s narrative of itself.

Yet none of us could accept the darkest aspect of that truth. We all had the idea that we could stand up and speak the truth and, if it was true enough, it would flash around the world like lightning. Nothing could prevail against the truth. The Father of Lies could not stand against the Lord of Hosts. That this fantasy itself was part of the lie—that truth has no army, that no angels will ride to our rescue—was too much. Perhaps if I had known it, I never would have said anything.

This truth is only available to the most advanced atheists and the most advanced Christians. The advanced atheist has purged himself of all traces of folk religion, and understands the world as it is—an infinitely cold universe of protons and electrons, whose fundamental rules are a few lines of mathematics with no concept of humanity. Our galaxy is not even special, let alone our planet. To the advanced Christian, God’s will is just as cold and his justice is just as inexorable, and evil is sent to punish evil. Maistre read the French Revolution as God’s punishment of the decadent liberals who brought it about, and the weak conservatives who failed in their duty to oppose it. Was he wrong? I love my protons and electrons, but I can’t see how he was wrong.

The second Trump revolution, like the first, is failing. It is failing because it deserves to fail. It is failing because it spends all its time patting itself on the back. It is failing because its true mission, which neither it nor (still less) its supporters understand, is still as far beyond its reach as algebra is beyond a cat. Because the vengeance meted out after its failure will dwarf the vengeance after 2020—because the successes of the second revolution are so much greater than the first—I feel that I personally have to start thinking realistically about how to flee the country. Everyone else in a similar position should have a 2029 plan as well. And it is not even clear that it will wait until 2029: losing the Congress will instantly put the administration on the defensive.

Here is a Twitter exchange that captures the situation perfectly. First, Stephen Miller of Homeland Security:

This country has a problem with a monkey. The monkey keeps biting people. And it is shielded by the organ-grinder. The only remedy is to punish the monkey. Logic!

Ian Bremmer, a sort of latter-day Kissinger mini-me, whose NPR show I actually went on, has the perfect response:

Indeed. (Note the subtly contemptuous mockery of “Democrat”—Democrats use “Democratic” as an adjective, Republicans use “Democrat.” Unclear when this little quirk originated.)

Except that it is in public, almost the same thing happened in 1953, when the House Republicans had a rare 2-year window of power and used it to do the unthinkable: investigate the great foundations. Norman Dodd, chief investigator of the Reece Committee, visited the Ford Foundation to interview its head, Rowan Gaither.

According to an interview Dodd gave shortly before his death, Gaither asked him, off the record, if he knew the purpose of the Ford Foundation. Dodd was indeed curious. “We shall use our grantmaking power,” said Gaither, “so as to alter life in the United States so that it can be comfortably merged with the Soviet Union.”

Imagine this in 1953. During the Korean War! “I nearly fell off my chair,” said Dodd, who did not fall of his chair, and managed to ask Gaither if he would say the same to the American people. “We would not think of doing any such thing,” replied Gaither.

He knew perfectly well that Dodd would tell the American people what he had heard—and no one would believe him. Indeed, “McCarthyism” was then at its high point and would shortly recede, thanks to the brilliant, hilariously obvious stratagem (used also in 1940) of running a Democrat on the Republican ticket. (This was made easy by the fact that the Republicans were America’s original left-wing party, a 19th-century alignment still barely visible in the Deep South and upper Northeast.)

From 1917 to 1989, at the highest levels of policy, convergence with the USSR was the goal of the US foreign policy establishment. Indeed, “Cold War Studies” today does not study the origins of the USSR or the roots of the convergence policy. It studies why the convergence failed and the alliance broke apart in 1945. Yet almost everyone in America, even 35 years after the fall of the USSR, sees only the theatrical hostility. No one has, or had, any inkling of the basic structure of their own historical reality.

That’s why a Rowan Gaither or an Ian Bremmer can just tell the truth. The truth is: we can’t handle the truth. Stephen Miller can’t even handle the truth. The public of 1953 might even have known what to do with the truth, if they could handle it.

For exactly the reasons that Miller describes, it is not possible to handle the “large and growing movement of leftwing terrorism in this country” like the Islamist terrorism of 2001, let alone the genuine political opposition of January 6.

January 6 was a normal antigovernment demonstration in a normal country: instigated by provocateurs, never a genuine threat to the state, and handled with years of detention without trial and brutal prison sentences in isolation. Even after 9/11, the Cold War Mutt-and-Jeff act kicked off instantly, as we searched for “moderate Muslims” to love on.

Imagine responding to radical racist terrorism by seeking a new generation of moderate racists. Mr. Al-Alwaki soon became the leading imam of the jihad. When the good cop becomes the bad cop, what do? It’s okay. We needed a bad cop anyway, and there are always more good cops. The Cold War was exactly the same thing.

When you see clips of masked DHS goons hauling off some equally masked anarchist, you may be tempted to cheer. Don’t. Yes, charges will be filed. No, it will not harm the anarchist—it will make his day, his year, and maybe his life. All the money and power in the world will be at his defense. He will not even need to lift a finger to organize his own lawyers, much less pay them. In the end, as with many of the BLM rioters, he will probably be well compensated, with taxpayer funds, for his trouble. Not to mention all the pussy and/or dick s/he will, as a martyr, be entitled to! For the Islamist, this reward is only in heaven. But for the leftist it comes on earth.

The reward for Stephen Miller and his ilk is also on earth. They look tough. They’re doing something. That they are not even doing 0.01% of what it would take to solve the problem—that, at much more risk to themselves, the most they could probably do is 0.05%—matters not. They can milk it as far as it goes. They, too, will sell books.

Of course Bremmer is absolutely right, but some corrections are in order. One: there is no risk of a Republican one-party state, because there is no actual Republican party. It is a label, not a party. To the extent that the Republicans are organized, it is only for election theater. There is not even a remote, nascent equivalent of the venerable and gigantic progressive institutions which have been running our country for a century.

Some people have some money, but would rather spend it on actually fun stuff. If you keep listening to the Dodd interview, he describes exactly how the Carnegie people took over the country in the first half of the 20th century. The playbook may work better on an innocent, defenseless nation, but it is still basically solid. By far the closest right-wing version this is the Koch machine. But the Kochs, like most right-wing Americans, are fundamentally interested in liberty, not power—and live in the thrall of centuries of bogus political science which has taught them that government can be “limited,” and power is not a zero-sum game. Unfortunately, though, it is.

Two: it is not possible to remove the “Democrat judges,” etc, because there is no label sufficient to the purpose. Every time the Republicans attack a disposable label, I want to grind my teeth to powder and spit them out my nose. This is pure grift.

All that happens if you attack “woke,” “communist,” “politically correct,” etc, is that they stop saying these words. Then they label you as a rube who says these words. In biology, this is called “antigenic escape.” If you want to attack a word, take on a “conserved antigen,” like “progressive.” They have a lot of trouble not saying “progressive”—but they would probably manage.

Politics is fundamentally about power. In power, large things are easier than small things. Except for actual assassins, who do have to be thrown off the bus, but at least will not be executed, and will spend the rest of their lives in a safe comfortable place, answering huge stacks of perfumed notes from fans of the appropriate sex, their foot soldiers (who are of course disposable anyway) will be well taken care of. For the Trump administration to use its tiny, marginal power to try to punish its enemies, one by one, is so futile as to be barely worth trying—though it would certainly help if they prioritized this over “bread-and-butter governance.”

Getting rid of all the liberal judges is easier than getting rid of all one liberal judge. Getting rid of all the judges is easier than getting rid of all the liberal judges. Getting rid of the whole legal system is easier than getting rid of all the judges. Getting rid of the whole machine of government is easier than getting rid of the whole legal system. Getting rid of the whole philosophy of government is easier than getting rid of the whole machine of government.

It is not about “dismantling political opposition.” Politics is this establishment’s outer line of defense. It is not their source of power or money. Winning elections does not create liberal power. It protects liberal power. If they lose elections, it is fine, so long as their money and power is protected. While their power is feeling slightly annoyed, it is generally safe. Their money is completely safe—no one is even starting to talk about defunding the endowments, foundations, etc. In any case, even if these funds were taken, their billionaires would just refill them. Personal expropriation or even proscription/attainder is needed. Obviously, a violation of Our Vital Property Rights.

Would all these people, institutions and ideas need replacing? Of course they would. But that’s easy! At least, it’s far easier than impeaching one liberal judge. When the USSR fell, Yeltsin banned the Communist Party. He literally made it illegal as an organization. And, good democratic libertarian that I was, I disapproved. I was like: sadly, this is not getting off on the right track. It wasn’t—but not for that reason.

No: the only danger to this bipartisan kabuki, which has gotten much, much realer in the last 20 years and especially the last 1, is that everyone realizes how fake it is. This is starting to happen—but only starting to happen.

I find myself in suburban North Carolina this weekend, about to head up to Yale for events with Jed Rubenfeld (on the 7th) and Garett Jones (on the 8th). (If you’re at Yale, give me a holler!) When I drive around the gated communities of the New South (if you’re in St. James Plantation today, give me a holler lol), I feel like I’m a doctor listening to the heart of a cancer patient.

All these million-dollar mansions, with perfect lawns maintained by illegal helots, with no visible children, with no one at all visible but a few old people on bicycles. How could there be any problems with the governance of this place? Of this country? In St. James, you don’t have to close your eyes or your ears to see and hear no evil. It’s fine. Everything is fine.

Yes, there is the cancer. A horrid black blotch. Growing. Everyone can see it now. Fox News will tell you all about the black blotch. But it’s superficial. Stephen Miller will get it off with a belt sander, then Pam Bondi will dig into her makeup bag and find some concealer. It’s fine. We’re winning.

My brothers in Christ: you cannot even imagine what winning looks like. This is literal. You literally can’t picture it. You can picture winning on this, winning on that, winning on the other thing. But winning overall? You can’t picture it, because you can’t handle the truth. Try anyway—then put yourself in that headspace, and look back at the things the Trump administration is trying to do today. Unfortunately, I rather expect you’ll laugh.

When Jews get targeted in what should be safe liberal democracies, it doesn't quite see the same response as when Muslims or targeted or even the general populace. We all recall that, by and large, the Christchurch mosque attack saw universal outrage and condemnation. Muslims targeted for who they are.  Utterly innocent, and nobody would utter that they had some fault because they hadn't condemned say the Taliban, ISIS, Iran or any of the multitude of Islamofascist terror or totalitarian regimes.  Certainly had anyone wanted to protest against the actions of any such groups the very next day, it would have been frowned upon and scorned.  However, when it comes to Jews, targeted by association with Israel and therefore the actions of the Israeli Government in Gaza, there is no thought around taste and sensitivity.  The "pro-Palestinian" protestors (who range from people expressing concern over humanitarian conditions, to those wanting to wipe out Israel and "globalise the Intifada" (!) don't give a damn, after all it wasn't THEM doing it. Besides, "genocide". If you think that there is a deliberate campaign to wipe out an entire people, then a few Jews being killed by a jihadist are a mere detail. 

Jews, you see, have a tryptych of groups who hate them.  Traditionally their chief enemies were the (self-styled) Christian-aligned far-right, which of course inspired the Nazis, and are seen today in the actual far-right (you know, the Holocaust denying, "wrong side won the war", white power, big state type - not the current trend to call free-market liberal or traditionalist conservatives fascists).  Their attacks on Jews are rare, thankfully.

The bigger problems are Islamists, often motivated by wanting to wipe out Israel, but also buying into pretty much the whole panoply of neo-Nazi conspiratorial Jew hate, and the far-left. The far-left, who also tout the anti-concept "whiteness" see Jews as "ultra-white". Jews are rich, successful in many industries and in politics, and of course are seen as "colonists" wherever they go. In the far-left's endless desire to categorise people under critical theory as "oppressed" vs. "oppressors", Jews get placed in the latter, so they don't count... again.  They don't count.

As Nick Cohen said in the Spectator:

If they were from any other minority, no one on the left would have the slightest trouble denouncing the deaths of 53-year-old Adrian Daulby and 66-year-old Melvin Cravitz as the result of a lethal racist attack. A terrorist with the resonant name of Jihad Al-Shamie – talk about nominative determinism – went for them because they were Jews.

He continues:

Last night pro-Palestinian demonstrators couldn’t give it a rest – not even for 24 hours. They were outside Downing Street and Manchester’s Piccadilly station, chanting all the old slogans and ducking all the hard questions. ‘Globalise the intifada,’ they cried – does that mean killing Jews in Manchester? ‘Palestine will be free from the river to the sea’ – does that mean driving out all the Jews living between the Mediterranean and the River Jordan?

It should be the easiest thing in the world for pro-Palestinian demonstrators to reject accusations of Jew hate and dismiss these questions as smears. It’s not anti-Semitic to denounce Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli far right. Nor is it in any way racist to deplore the reduction of Gaza to a charnel house of rubble and bones.

Yet much of the British left cannot defend itself against charges of bigotry because many leftists (not all, but many) refuse to define anti-Jewish racism and declare it unacceptable. They can’t and won’t because any condemnation of anti-Semitism would imply a condemnation of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Iranian theocrats. Rather than take a stand against the very people who have led the Palestinian cause to disaster, they prefer to say nothing at all.

Remember when Phil Twyford was hounded at a "pro-Palestine" rally for condemning Hamas? 

Remember also the elation expressed by Islamist preachers protesting in Sydney just after October 7th.  

As Julie Burchill said in the Spectator last year:

Excitement is the often overlooked element when it comes to anti-Semitism – an excitement that is almost sexual. There is a sadistic feeding frenzy to this anti-Jewish crusade, as though the rape rampage of Hamas made the cause of anti-Semites more, not less, worth rallying around. The ‘Paraglider Girls’ convicted this week appeared like overgrown Girl Guides, their grim insignia a twist on badges for Kayaking or being an Emergency Helper – only evil. 

The fact that the pro-Palestinian marches started before Israel actually retaliated was a big tell; these people weren’t marching against Israel defending itself, but in favour of Israel being attacked. Unless they all had access to a big old time-travel machine, of course.

Nazis did this, the far-right does this, Maoists do this, and the Islamists do it. 

It is, of course, entirely possible to protest against the Israeli Government, to call for peace and negotiations for a two-state solution. Remember though that many of the protestors for Palestinians don't want this.  John Minto's Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa explicitly says:

PSNA aims to change public opinion and bring pressure on the New Zealand government to join the majority of the international community in requiring Israel to recognize and support the following principles: 

• A just peace in Palestine depends upon the return of Palestinian refugees to their homeland and the dismantling of the Zionist structure of the state of Israel, recognizing that the further partitioning of Palestine in order to create the so-called Two-State Solution would only lead to further injustice and suffering.
• Acceptance of the primacy of international law and United Nations resolutions as the basis for the ending of military occupation and all forms of ethnic discrimination in Israel.
• The international community's responsibility for upholding the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the urgent need for the state of Israel to be called to account for its gross abuses of Palestinian human rights.
• Justice requires the establishment of a single state in Palestine, bi-national, secular and democratic, with full and equal citizenship for all with ethnic and religious rights protected in a democratic constitution.

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“The legitimacy of altering social institutions to achieve greater equality of material condition is, though often assumed, rarely argued for. Writers note than in a given country the wealthiest n percent of the population holds more than that percentage of the wealth, and the poorest n percent hold less; that to get to the wealth of the top n percent from the poorest, one must look at the bottom p per cent (where p is greater than n) and so forth. They then proceed immediately to discuss how this might be altered. On the entitlement conception of justice in holdings, one cannot decide whether the state must do something to alter the situation merely by looking at the distributional profile or at facts such as these. It depends upon how the distribution came about.” (page 232)

– Anarchy, State, and Utopia. Robert Nozick, First published in 1974.

I wonder if any of the leaders of today’s political parties in the UK have read it, still less understood the profound way that the late Harvard professor eviscerated egalitarian “patterned” ideas of justice more incisively than arguably anyone else, before or since. Somehow, I doubt they have.  In this day and age of talk about wealth taxes and other horrors, Nozick is well worth reading again.