What's Most Important To Americans

 During the 2024 Presidential campaign, the #1 issue for American voters was money. It was inflation, grocery prices, and money spent on immigrants. The second issue for many conservatives was the culture wars. And the culture wars revolved around the equal rights for the LGBT community.

Now what is the #1 issue of conservative Americans? The polls tell us that. We could say that the #1 issue is the same for Americans in general; it is money. But that is not entirely accurate. The #1 issue for conservative Americans is oneself. How are conservative Americans concerned about themselves? They are concerned about themselves in terms of money issues including jobs, taxes, and prices. They are concerned about themselves in terms of whom they will share society with. They want the LGBT community to be put back into the margins of society. They are concerned about non-Christian influences on the lives of their families. They see themselves as being victims of  illegal immigration. In general they see themselves as being victims because their leader, Donald Trump, tells them so. And because they are victims by so many people and even countries, remember the Trade Wars, they could care less if Trump does not follow the rules to save them. And in thinking that way, they not only ignore history.

How America got to be this way must be told so that others might avoid our plight. It starts by thinking that one's own group is above all others. Because of America's great wealth, it starts by leaning toward finding more significance in what one consumes more than in what one contributes to others and society.

And though I am no longer a conservative American, I am not innocent of these charges. As I was talking with my best friend, she was talking about how her husband has always been a very hard worker. I had to tell her that I wasn't raised that way. I was raised to be a consumer and so hard work and how it contributed to others was, to me, the price of admission for consuming rather than a reward in and of itself. And so I didn't always work as hard and with the right attitudes as I should. I still struggle with having a good work ethic for the right reasons.

We Americans, especially conservative Americans, want two things in life. The first thing we want is to believe that we are special in a way that makes us and our nation superior to all others. Listen to conservative talk radio if you doubt that part of my analysis here.

And because we are special, or perhaps when we doubt ourselves, we want to consume as much as possible. So we make consumption the center of our lives. That is because, for us, consuming  is both a reward for being so special and an assurance that we are.

In an article (click here and use Google Translate if necessary) written by Richard Martineau for Le Journal de Montréal, Trump is described as the leader whom we all deserve because of our obsession with entertainment--something which we consume in great quantities. And so our consumption of entertainment results in our entertainment replacing culture. Our consumption of entertainment means that we eventually  become attracted to the spectacle and no one makes more of a spectacle of himself than Trump.

Read the comments on capitalism made by Martin Luther King Jr in his book, Stride Toward Freedom (click here and read pg 94-95). When describing what Marx saw as the danger when the profit motive becomes the 'sole basis for an economic system,' King said that Capitalism 'inspires' people to focus more on 'making a living' than on 'making a life.' That capitalism causes us to 'judge ourselves' more by our income and possessions than by what we contribute to others.

If we want to get Biblical about it, note what the prophet wrote in Ezekiel 16:48-50):

48 As I live,” declares the Lord God, “Sodom, your sister and her daughters have not done as you and your daughters have done! 49 Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had arrogance, plenty of food, and carefree ease, but she did not help the poor and needy. 50 So they were haughty and committed abominations before Me. Therefore I removed them when I saw it.

Paul wrote, in his letter to the Galatians, that the desires of the flesh oppose the desires of the Spirit . I believe that a secular parallel to that conflict can be found in the conflict between consumerism and Democracy with equality. Certainly not all consuming is bad; a certain amount of consuming  is necessary for both individuals and society. But when consuming becomes a main way of defining oneself, then we start caring less and less about Democracy with equality. When our own possessions and consumption of material and immaterial goods becomes too important to us, we start to care less and less about the injustices and inequities that those outside of our own tribes suffer. And the more we love to consume, the more we will see those outside of our own tribes as threats to our way of life. And so the more we care about consuming, the more we are likely to fall prey to authoritarian leaders who promise us pie in the sky while warning us, or using fear mongering, that those outside of our tribe are threatening to steal our slice of the pie from us. And the thing about authoritarian leaders who tell us what we want to hear is that they don't have to be rational, they just have to stroke our fears and egos to be persuasive.

America has already been caught in consumerism's vortex because of what we believe about ourselves. How we can escape alive I do not know. But perhaps our example can serve as a warning to our dearest neighbor to the North and our former allies to the East and to the rest of the free world.

America As A Nation Is Much Older Than America Is As A Democracy

Europe and North America are facing a battle between Democracy with equality vs authoritarianism with hierarchy. Today's conservative populous groups favor the latter. 

The more groups that are recognized as having equal rights in society in a given nation, the more that nation is leaning toward Democracy with equality. The more that a nation operates by giving preferential treatment to a given set of group(s) based on ethnicity, economic class, and/or ideology, the more that country embraces authoritarianism with hierarchy. What muddies the waters here is how groups that promote authoritarianism with hierarchy are treated.

Why is equality a requirement for a democracy? Jeff Halper explains on pg 74 of his book An Israeli In Palestine: Resisting Dispossession, Redeeming Israel when comparing ethnocracy with democracy

'An ethnocracy is the opposite of a democracy, although it might incorporate some elements of democracy such as universal citizenship and elections. It arises when one particular group—the Jews in Israel, the Russians in Russia, the Protestants in pre-1972 Northern Ireland,  the whites in apartheid South Africa,  the Shi’ite Muslims of Iran, the Malay of Malaysia and, if they had their way, the white Christian fundamentalist in the US—seizes control of the government and the armed forces in order to enforce a regime of exclusive privilege over other groups in what is in fact a multi-ethic or multi-religious society. Ethnocracy, or ethno-nationalism, privileges ethnos over demos. whereby one’s ethnic affiliation, be it defined by race, descent, religion, language or national origin, takes precedence over citizenship in determining to whom a country actually “belongs.” Israel is referred to explicitly by its political leaders as a “Jewish Democracy.”

Thomas Jefferson put it a little bit differently by saying what a democracy becomes when the majority does not respect the equal rights of the minority in his 1801 Inaugural Address

'All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression'

In other words, unless minority groups are recognized and treated as having equal rights, you have groups that do not have an equal share of the nation as well as oppression.

The more consistently we apply the inclusion of equality with democracy, the more we are compelled to relabel what the U.S has been for most of its existence. Until lately, America has been a nation that is not a democracy. And the more that political conservatives answer back that we were created to be a republic, the more they show that they do not understand the different forms that a democracy can take and that they are in favor of hierarchy provided that they are the ones with the power over all others. So considering that, should we be surprised at the support that my fellow politically conservative evangelicals have shown Trump and how they will be reluctant to withdraw that support even though they feel a building tension inside? 

Could we say that America was a democracy from 1787 to 1865? Blacks, Native Americans, and women could better answer that question. Could we say that America was a democracy from the start of  Reconstruction  to the 1920s? Blacks, Women, and Native Americans could better answer that question. Could we say that America was a democracy from the 1920s through the rest of Jim Crow? Blacks and women could better answer that question. Has America become a democracy since the days of the Civil Rights Movement? Blacks and the LGBT community could better answer that question--btw the LGBT community could answer all of the previous questions too. If you don't count the dominance that the wealthy have had over our government, we have been, ethnically speaking, coming closer to becoming a democracy than we ever had in the history of our nation. And that is because more and more groups were having their equal rights recognized by their governments and by more and more people in society.

And so America's transition to Democracy with equality has been very slow and long journey as it has been in much of the rest of the world. Before that, authoritarianism with hierarchy has ruled the day. And so perhaps we should not be surprised when we see groups throughout Europe and North America vying to reestablish authority with hierarchy. Once that has been reestablished, it is goodbye to democracy.

One of the keys to Trump's populism was the Obergefell Decision. Why? It is because it was after that SCOTUS decision when many of my fellow religiously conservative Christians were galvanized in fighting with their backs against the wall a culture war of their own making. The final spark that sustained the religiously conservative Christian initiated culture war was the emergence of the Trans community from the margins of society. And so the expansion of LGBT rights energized religiously conservative Christian to continue the culture wars. Without equal rights being recognized for the LGBT community, Trump might not have had enough ammunition to fan the flames and exploit the culture wars.

Our return back to the past, to authoritarianism with hierarchy, was well marketed by the Trump campaign. That kind of authoritarianism was sold as being ethnically based by demonizing DEI--religion is an ethnicity. And though the concerns of those who hated DEI have been initially based on religion, our actual return to authoritarianism is primarily economic class based--as the Trump Presidency has shown. In other words, what we are seeing is further cementing of a classocracy, Oligarchy in our case, wearing ethnocratic clothing. In other words we just experienced a partial bait and switch. And so we have begun our journey to become like Russia. Today's Russia is an oligarchy with a strongman leader and has a religious façade.

And so as we lose our democracy, let's remember that democracy was never really entrenched in America. And that is because, just as it is in the world, America's base has always been looking to dominate whether that pertains to dominating domestically or globally. What we are seeing today is tragic. It is like seeing a child die and so we are now robbed from seeing what that child would become if they were given an opportunity to fully mature.

Where The World Stands Now

Monsters Among Us

Apparently under beds are not the only places where monsters reside. Some monsters have managed to become heads of state. Others have become gangs. Of course it is easy to point to Putin, Jinping, and Hamas as being monsters. But what about Netanyahu and those who are aiding him? Is what Netanyahu doing in Gaza and the West Bank any less evil than what Putin doing in Ukraine or what Jinping has done in Uyghur? And what about Islamic Jihad and ISIS? They cannot be left off the list. I am sure that there are others missing from this very brief list. In fact, with the way that the US has replaced left leaning democracies with brutal tyrants, we could add both those tyrants and the U.S. Presidents who supported them to the list. 

The Current Battle

Authoritarianism has reigned for what seems like all of human history. It wasn't until the 20th century that we really began to see the emergence of democracy. Some would remind me that America became a democracy after the Revolutionary War. But what is essential to democracy is equality and that is where America fell far short. America began to approach democracy as women gained the right to vote and Native Americans could become citizens. But those events occurred in the 1920s. The Civil Rights Movement and the Sexual Revolution, without the right to an elective abortion, elevated more groups out of marginalization. And now we are facing a counterrevolution to the emergence of the LGBT community out of the margins.

Currently, America is approaching democracy as more groups are recognized as having equal rights. But it appears that there is a western  counterrevolution to democracy with equality. And so democracy with equality is being challenged by authoritarianism with hierarchy. The current form of authoritarianism in Europe and America is authoritarian ethnocratic movements where the ethnocracies in Western European nations are based on national identity and race while the ethnocracies in America and Eastern Europe tend to be based on religion.

However, seeing that if the authoritarian ethonocratic movement in America takes control, America will resemble what Russia is today. And if we look at what Russia is today, perhaps the ethnocratic movements are mere disguises meant to usher in the kind of authoritarian government that Russia has.

The Russell-Einstein Manifesto

Published in 1955 in response to the development of thermonuclear weapons by the U.S. and the then U.S.S.R., British philosopher Bertrand Russell wrote the Russell-Einstein Manifesto and it was endorsed by Albert Einstein. Other famous scientists added their signatures to the document.

The understanding these men had of the results of an all out nuclear war were not as well understood then as they are today. Then, they understood such a war made the practical extinction of mankind possible. From what we understand now, such a result is a certainty.

Back then, only the U.S. and the then U.S.S.R. were the only nations that possessed thermonuclear weapons. Today more nations possess such weapons including India and Pakistan who, btw, almost went to war with each other in 2001. And so the threat of nuclear war is currently greater today than back in 1955.

And when we consider that advancements in technology make the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and other WMDs, inevitable, the warning issued by the Russell-Einstein Manifesto needs to be heeded now more than ever. Below is part of that Manifesto (click here for the source and the full document ):

Here, then, is the problem which we present to you, stark and dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race; or shall mankind renounce war? People will not face this alternative because it is so difficult to abolish war.

The abolition of war will demand distasteful limitations of national sovereignty. But what perhaps impedes understanding of the situation more than anything else is that the term “mankind” feels vague and abstract... They can scarcely bring themselves to grasp that they, individually, and those whom they love are in imminent danger of perishing agonizingly. And so they hope that perhaps war may be allowed to continue provided modern weapons are prohibited. 

This hope is illusory. Whatever agreements not to use H-bombs had been reached in time of peace, they would no longer be considered binding in time of war, and both sides would set to work to manufacture H-bombs as soon as war broke out

Though some would point to history and say that the warning of the Manifesto is not realistic because we have always had war. The Manifesto points us to other realities at play here. And those realities include what will follow the continued reliance on war to settle our disputes as well as the results of a full scale nuclear war. For those results tell us that such a war is a death sentence not just for the warring nations, but for all of mankind throughout the whole world.

Where do we stand in the 21st century having been warned in 1955 by such an esteemed collection of scientists? First, we should note that some nations already have stockpiles of thermonuclear weapons and so there would be no need to produce new ones. Second, Israel and the Palestinian terrorists are still at war with each other. The U.S. has attacked either directly or through proxies multiple nations. And Russia once invaded part of Georgia to its south and has been invading Ukraine. NATO is providing Ukraine with weapons and ammunition so it can defend itself. And the Russian leader, Vlad² Putin, has threatened to use nuclear weapons on those who would go too far in aiding Ukraine. 

And should Russia succeed in conquering Ukraine, it is unclear as to whether it would be satisfied with that conquest or it would invade other nations. And should Russia attack a NATO member, then we have a world war. But then again, NATO's expansion eastward not only reminds Russia of some horrific parts of its past, it went against the understanding that President George H. W. Bush had with then General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev when they agreed on Germany being reunited.

Have we learned enough from our scientists, both past and present, on how to survive the 21st century? If we look at the U.S., the answer appears to be 'NO!' For just as too many of us Americans scoffed at the pandemic warnings and thus incurred one of the highest, if not the highest, death rate from Covid among the 1st world nations, too many of us also scoff at climate change. The latter reaction is due to the unwillingness to change our lifestyles. And that unwillingness puts future generations at risk.

Evolution tells us that survival can depend on a species' ability to adapt to its environment. Yet, human history tells us that we humans are highly resistant not just to change, but to even recognize the need to change. And that is especially true for those who live the good life.

Our prospects do not look good.

The Rule of Law vs The Rule of Force

In trying to distinguish Israel from its enemies, Ben Netanyahu claimed that Israel follows the Rule of Law while his Palestinian enemies do not. What Ben, and I can call him Ben because he went to a neighboring high school of mine and he is somewhat close to my age, did not understand is that the Rule of Law is not about being strong enough to make the rules for others to follow--that also seems to be the American version of the Rule of Law. Rather, the Rule of Law refers to the set of laws which all nations, including those nations that make rules for others, are to follow. Here, the Rule of Law refers to international law. And when it comes to violating international law, Israel is as guilty as those Palestinian terrorists who are its enemies.

Are the major powers any different here from Israel and its enemies in terms of not following the Rule of Law? The U.S. certainly isn't and neither is Russia, nor are the major players in NATO. And that brings us back to the Russell-EInstein Manifesto and ominous clouds that seem to be advancing toward us from the horizon.

Conclusion

History and the book of James tells us that we fight wars because we don't have what we want. In fact, sometimes we go to war because others won't share with us what is rightfully theirs. And since the continued reliance on war will eventually trigger the use of WMDs, such as thermonuclear weapons, as it stands now our demise will be the result of our refusal to share power and wealth with others. Such a conclusion does not bode well in the current political climate where many nations are seeing movements that demand to have absolute power over their own nations. And they demand to have such power because they feel exclusively entitled to it due to their own delusions of grandeur.

And the above is where this blog's 2024 emphasis comes into play. For that emphasis revolves around what Martin Luther King Jr. said about the need for a world revolution that calls on us to change from being a thing-orient society to being a person-oriented society(click here for the source):

I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

That revolution can start at home and with how we treat our own neighbors. And then it can spread to the nation and how it treats its neighbors, especially those who are seeking to escape poverty and violence. And perhaps, then we can see that revolution change into a world revolution.