Conservatism, Complexity, and Code

The definition of conservatism is not as straightforward as one might imagine. There is much writing about socialism, communism, liberalism, and progressivism, but there is comparatively little on or about conservatism. There are three reasons for this. First, conservatism is based on complexity, and complexity is confusing and complex to write about. It may be true, but that doesn’t make it convincing. Second, being based on complexity about which there has been much work and many recent discoveries, but it takes a while for the consequences and implication of these discoveries to be understood. Third, the institutional incentives work against supporting writing about such topics. Look at the big tech companies, which are extensions of the elite schools — they are overwhelmingly left leaning.

Looking to John Caius, the benefactor of Gonville and Caius, he was described as a “progressive reactionary.” This term is by itself problematic because it presupposes a dichotomy between “progress” which is assumed to be good and “reactionism” which is assumed to be bad, which should be rejected directly. Not all proposed political or policy changes are correct, benign, or appropriately motivated. First, proposed policy changes cannot be assumed to be correct. They must instead, if it is being done scientifically, be tested in some sense to see if they are correct. Second, the consequences of these changes cannot be assumed to be beneficial or benign, especially if the consequences are not those that were envisioned, which is often the case. In complex systems, there are both costs and benefits as well as long-term and short-term tradeoffs, which are seldom discussed. Third, policies are often proposed on behalf of the “greatest good for the greatest number,” to borrow a phrase from Jeremy Bentham, but one would be wise to carefully examine how the proposer’s career might benefit more than society.

A better dichotomy might be “socialism” and “conservatism,” in which socialism is tied to communism — a political system that has failed many societies but tends to benefit those proposing it — and conservatism is tied to arrangements and systems that have been demonstrated as workable and beneficial. There is always the assumption that scientific or scientistic proposals are going to be awesome and correct, but mostly they are not. This can be explained away as part of the process, but this is usually not the case, as even the most cursory testing or internal consistency checks are rejected, which means that the so-called scientific proposal is actually a work of partisan activism.

The logical proof of this is actually pretty straightforward for those who have programmed at an advanced level, which is inherently limiting, but let’s push forward. In software, every low-level step such as a variable declaration, if-then-else relationship, or function is pretty simple and understandable. However, when building large software composed of hundreds, thousands, or more relationships, the behavior becomes increasingly difficult to comprehend and predict. This limit comes up faster than you think, and all programmers have had the experience of trying to figure out what they did months ago. The solution to this is to save copies of the software in a configuration management system, make small changes, test extensively, and save frequently so that one can go back to a workable state is the proposed changes don’t work, which they frequently do not. However, political systems are far more complex and opaque than software systems, and so-called progressives to the exact opposite — propose large changes, never test, and demonize going back to a workable state as “reactionism.”

Graduate schools are incubators of socialism, communism, liberalism, and progressivism where change is celebrated and seldom questioned but any hint of being a conservative is identified and excised. The way this occurs is that large mistakes of progressives are easily forgiven but small mistakes by conservatives are amplified beyond all reasonable bounds. Moreover, there were always lots of copies of the Marx-Engels Reader floating around the department — both the blue first edition and the red second edition — but there was no corresponding conservative book. Communism and socialism are the apogee of politics, and just because the consequences are poor doesn’t mean that political scientists are any less emotionally attached to the concepts. Tocqueville’s Democracy in America might be suggested, but that’s by no means as ubiquitous as the Marx-Engels Reader. Strauss and Cropsey’s History of Political Philosophy — aka, the “purple bible” — is probably a better example. Its commitment to exegesis and hermeneutics merits further discussion, especially as it relates to conservatism and traditionalism. Finally, Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France is probably worth reviewing, but it was never assigned for a class.

This was written to show that the mathematical proof for conservatism, traditionalism, and workability falls out of computational theory fairly easily, but for reasons of comprehensibility, recentness, and institutional incentives, makes it correct but not convincing. Finally, please forgive the typos, but working through some writer’s block.

John Caius, M.D.

John Caius became known to me through the College of Gonville and Caius at Cambridge University, which was prominently featured in the film, Chariots of Fire. However that’s just background and advertising. Caius originally studied theology at Gonville Hall, studied medicine in Italy at the University of Padua, and then returned to England where he practiced medicine including at the royal court for Edward VI, Queen Mary, and Elizabeth I, where he earned enough money to give back to his alma mater, which was renamed from Gonville Hall to Gonville and Caius. It also denotes a certain level of political acumen to survive and thrive during these politically and religiously perilous times.

There is a very nice thesis entitled Progressive Reactionary: The life and work of John Caius by Dannielle Marie Cagliuso at the University of Pittsburgh (2015). Caius lived from 1510 to 1573, and by way of comparison Machiavilli lived from 1469 to 1527, Michelangelo from 1475 to 1564, and Da Vinci from 1452 to 1519, so the Renaissance was very much a force as society transitioned from humanism to the scientific revolution.

Caius experienced the intellectual Renaissance trough through the lens of medicine, which Cagliuso frames as progressives versus reactionary. In this framework, progressives rely on empirical evidence, intelligence, and science while reactionaries instead rely on tradition, received wisdom, history. This perspective, beginning with the label choices, prejudges the discourse, tilting the discussion in favor of the progressives and against the reactionaries straight from the outset.

Medicine has progressed a great deal from the 16th century, and Caius was a student the anatomy of Galen, who lived from 129 to c. 200, which was interpreted by some as reactionary. Some of the criticism was clearly anachronistic and judged Caius by standards and innovations that occurred later and about which hid could clearly not anticipate or know. Cagliuso analyzes and clarifies these intellectual forces and factors and makes the point that Caius was much more intelligent and nuanced than the so-called progressives portrayed him.

To begin, the very terms “progressive” and “reactionary” are problematic. First, not all “progressive” thought is correct and leads to progress, and not all “reactionary” though is problematic and wrong — in fact, much of it is correct. A better word for “progressive” might be “innovative,” but a better for “reactionary” is “conservative” in that sense that is conserves the received wisdom and worldly objects that are good, valuable, and beautiful. Renaissance-era medicine a great many incorrect thoughts and treatments that indeed were improved through the scientific method, but acknowledging the necessary incrementalism of learning and progress is both more honest and beneficial than demonizing those who learn and value traditional methods.

While society transitioned from religion to science in the Renaissance, society is currently transitioning from science to complexity as society now faces a range of complex, long-term problems that don’t lend themselves to the methods of science that have produced centuries of discoveries and benefits. In fact, Christian Complexity argues that traditional wisdom contains encoded information and insights of great value that science cannot produce and that society should not think it can produce.

The Decree of Pope Caius

Pope Caius was the Bishop of Rome in the 3rd century, from 283 to 296 AD. He was born in the Dalmatian city of Salona in present-day Croatia and was buried in the Catacomb of Callixtus in Rome after being martyred, a claim that is somewhat in doubt. But he is perhaps best known for the decree that before a person could become bishop, they must first be porter, lector, exorcist, acolyte, subdeacon, deacon, and priest. While this decree appears straightforward and controversial, its consequences are actually profound and far-reaching.

First, Caius’s decree helped establish the foundation for a strong church because its leaders would have a deep knowledge of its workings. Moreover, relationships would have been established while performing these many jobs, and the individual’s strengths, weaknesses, gifts, and talents would become known to the church. In this manner, the church would help develop people who would in turn strengthen the church.

Second, the power and impact of the decree can be fully appreciated by comparing and contrasting it to modern trends that operate in a contrary fashion, such as the modern academy, which privileges classroom study over firsthand experience. While this is an expansive dynamic, perhaps it is best captured by the MBA programs that teach two years of graduate education prepares on to lead a corporation in any industry. After many decades of poor leadership and bankrupt businesses, this belief has subsided and technical, practical knowledge of an industry has increasingly been recognized as important. In fact, recent articles have envisioned the demise of the full time MBA. The point is, two years of graduate school is no substitute for years of practical experience.

Third, in a more political perspective, socialism teaches that it should control, “the commanding heights.” That is, a central tenet of socialism is that like an MBA, its adherents should seek to lead the high-status, high-value institutions such as academia, government, and the economy. This perspective does not directly align with Caius’ notion of deep understanding gained through experience. Instead, there is an implicit assumption that being a socialist naturally prepares one for leadership, control, wealth, and the status that goes along with it.

Although Christian Complexity argues against leadership shortcuts like the MBA and socialism, what is the modern corollary to Caius’ degree? After all, if it is a timeless truism, then something similar must be present in the modern day. Although there are many possible examples, Jim Collins’ Good to Great proves the point well. Collins argues that the best leaders aren’t ambitious for themselves but are instead ambitious for the organization after having grown up in the organization and being promoted from within. This curiously is not as common as one might think and when it does occur almost does so by accident. However, when people with this type of experience are promoted, the results can be quite profound.

Christian Complexity

When first starting this blog a while ago, I thought that I would read the Biblegateway.com “Verse of the Day” and comment and interpret it according to my interpretation of complex Christianity. This would be done not that I expected anybody to read it, but it would be a useful daily Bible Study. While that is true, and this is an activity to which I plan to return, there is some intellectual ground work that needs to be done first. There are many details that need attention, so let us start with the big muscle movements. The big one, in my opinion, concerns religion’s relationship with science. I was reading some Anglican theology recently from around 1911, and the author spent a lot of time and thought reconciling religion with science. It seems that this question was too hard to solve then. Now however the math has progressed to the point that the relationship between religion and science is addressable in new and revealing ways. so let us break the discussion into three parts: 1) intellectual history, 2) professional incentives, and 3) implications.

First, there is an intellectual history regarding the relationship between science and religion that has three separate parts: religion, science, and complexity. That is, human intellectual history starts off with trying to make sense of the natural world in which we find ourselves and surrounds us. This is done initially through a series of stories that over time cohere together to form a religion. The Christian religion is founded on the Holy Bible, but there are many creation stories. Eventually the shortcomings of the religious approach became apparent as compared with science. The accomplishments of Galileo, Newton, Descartes, Einstein, Hawking, etc. were impossible to overlook, especially insofar as they concerned the creation of the universe. However, recently significant cracks have appeared in the perceived omnipotence of science in the form of complexity. These cracks started with the 3-body problem, which showed that the perfection of Newton’s interplanetary motion was not quite as perfect as originally portrayed. While these cracks initially appeared to an edge case, something that was usually of little concern, these cracks have been getting larger and their consequences more prevalent. Chaos is pervasive in the complex universe, and science — which is built around and based on low-dimensionality, short-timeframe experiments — fails in the presence of the more complex, high-dimensionality, long-timeframe real world. A post-modern movement emerged that attempted to address this new, less certain reality, but it was eventually overwhelmed by large academic egos and became played out. There is a nascent post-post-modern movement that, while confusingly named, appears to have more potential. The thesis of Christian Complexity is traditional Christian writings are filled with timeless insights and wisdom regarding long-term, complex social systems that should not be discarded in favor of science, which is being applied inappropriately.

Second, while this is a reasonable and innovative thesis, there are problems with professional incentives that hinder its progress. That is, scientists see themselves as smart and selected people — and they are — but they still human and are bounded in their rationality, and they may not even have figured out problems that they’ve already placed into the “solved” category. After all, the major problems happen not from what you don’t know, but from what you know that isn’t so. Phrased another way, there are no professional rewards associated with reconciling science and religion, at least in a fashion that supports the fundamental tenets of Christianity. There are however significant rewards for using science as a cudgel against Christianity, as Sam Harris can attest. The problem goes much deeper however as purportedly scientific and materialistic Marxism is explicitly anti-Christian, and many American universities now have significant pro-science, pro-Marxist, and anti-Christian faculty.

Third, the implications of complexity are relatively recent from an intellectual history perspective. Complex mathematical equations that have been known for centuries have only come to life with the arrival of fast and cheap computers, which have only been available since the 1980s. So while the mathematics have been around for a while, scientists, engineers, and mathematicians have only recently begun to build their intuitions regarding them and complexity, and applying them to something as intellectually difficult — both conceptually and politically — as religion would be considered professionally problematic. However, there appear to be a lot to think about on the matter, so this blog will seek to tease out these threads. More later.

Miami Vice, Machiavelli, and Modernity

Just finished the book Miami Vice by philosopher Steven Sanders (2010, Wayne State U Press), and it was quite a read. He makes several points, some of which I suspected, and some of which I did not know. First, Sanders says, as I’ve long thought, that MV features both substance and style. Much was made of the show’s visuals — the cars, the clothes, and the city — but its stories featured significant themes and content, which the visuals supported. Specifically, Sanders discusses the “film noir” background of crime thrillers that are strange, erotic, ambivalent, cruel, and dream-like. MV exhibits these qualities, but it does so in a modern, visually bright way through the beauty and beaches of Miami in what Sanders calls, “Sunshine Noir.”

Second, MV uses its protagonists, undercover Miami vice detectives Sonny Crockett and Rico Tubbs, to explore themes of disassociation, confusion, and anomie associated with, if not a breakdown of society, the significant social changes of the 1980s. Working undercover is part of the job of being a vice detective — the show uses the names Burnett and Cooper for their alternate egos — but there is more going on there. The vice detectives are constantly being exposed to temptation in the form of money, drugs, and women, but they are also exposed to risk, danger, and exposure. Their existence is an unnerving double world at the line between law enforcement and criminality, and sometimes that line gets blurred, resulting in personal fear and confusion. Sanders explores these themes through authenticity and redemption — what is real, and what is good? The confusion comes in doing things that don’t come naturally to a regular person — leading a double life, which requires lying, and associating with criminals to enforce the law and protect society.

Here, the crime thriller genre of film noir starts to edge into more espionage territory, which also features undercover operations for the good in the form of international intrigue, but the mental stresses are similar. Le Carre’s The Spy Who Came In From the Cold is a related noir genre that concludes with moral ambiguity — the Soviets and the Eastern Block are essentially the same as the British and Americans. This was seen as perhaps an insightful conclusion in the 1960s, but in hindsight it seems too facile, and here’s where modernity and Machiavelli comes into play. Machiavelli represents the verge of modernity in which the traditional moral precepts were seen as, in some ways, unworkable and that to be an effective leader, and the achieve a successful and moral society, the guardians of that society may have to engage in behaviors that are not, strictly, moral. This seems to be what Crockett and Tubbs are trying to do — go undercover and be exposed to criminality for the greater good. The problem is that the systems being manipulated — criminal Miami and the Cold War — are both complex and the time lines are long, so activities, operations, and missions undertaken for the greater good may remain unknown to the protagonist or actor. The costs however, are immediate, significant, and sometimes fatal. Even though the efficacy of actions undertaken in Machiavelli’s modern world are uncertain, the fact we are living in his modern world are far more certain.

Julia

Juliet was quite the Polish girl. She was from Poland and head a full scholarship to get her PhD from either Chicago or MIT. She chose MIT because she could take classes at Harvard and, let’s be honest, Cambridge, Mass. is more fun than South Chicago. Julia however was not really about having fun. She was on a mission, an anti-communist mission. For me, as an American, post-war communism in eastern Europe was a something I read about in the history books and Solidarity was something in the news. For Juliette though, WWII was far more immediate. She didn’t have one family member killed, entire swaths of her family were wiped out. War killed some of them, but many were killed in the concentration camps, many of which were in Poland. In fact, Auschwitz-Birkenau was only a few kilometers from her hometown of Krakow. While the Nazis were bad, she thought that the communist Soviets were even worse. She felt they had enslaved and debased Poland, which had just broken free from the Soviet and had its first elections. Like so many countries in eastern Europe, the historical one-two punch of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union spanning decades had been beyond traumatic.

Julia’s inner story  was not known to most people who instead focused on the fact that she was — photogenic. She had taken a few modeling jobs, but she found the work sometimes creepy but more frequently boring and instead chose to focus on her intellectual passion, fighting communism. She had achieved her dream of being educated in the United States and had the fervor of a new convert. Her hope and dream of coming to America after communism died in Poland seemed to be a dream come true.

January at MIT was taken up with Independent Activities Period (IAP), basically a break between the high-pressure semesters. I sat in on a few classes, went on a trip to Woods Hole, and even gave a course on speed reading. After that though, it was time to shop for classes. I signed up for classes in American politics, computer simulation, and international relations with Prof. Oscar — in fact, Julia and I were both Oscar students — but I still needed a political philosophy course. I went to the first class taught by one of Kilo’s colleagues, and it was all about Marxist unionization and social movements. Julia was there, and she argued fiercely and frequently with the professor. I said nothing, but I knew I didn’t want to take that class, and I was running out of options.

Julia and I walked out of the classroom together, and I asked if she was going to take that class since she obviously knew a great deal about the topic. “Oh no,” she said. “I just went to argue with that professor. He knows nothing.”

“So what classes are you taking?” I asked, “I need another philosophy class and am running out of options.”

“I’m taking Tocqueville with Professor Fox at Harvard,” she said. “We can cross-register — it’s easy!”

I was already in trouble with Prof. Kilo, and it was looking increasingly likely that I would not be continuing at MIT having alienated such an important professor, so why not?

I said, “I’ll think about it.”

Messenger of Truth

Last night I watched Messenger of Truth (MoT), the tragic but inspiring documentary about the martyrdom of Father Jerzy Popiełuszko at the hands of Polish communists. I watched it to gain perspective on the ongoing attacks against the United States (US). These attacks have badly injured many Americans who, belatedly, are realizing that they are in a serious fight with an opposition who doesn’t fight fair in the marketplace of ideas. What does this mean exactly? MoT is worth watching not only to remember the bravery and sacrifice of Father Jerzy but also to see the recycled tricks of communism that are being seen for the first time, unfiltered and full strength, in America.

Father Jerzy gave sermons on the Bible as well as Polish nationalism, and nationalism is a good thing as compared with communism and its cousins, socialism and globalism. The communists however described these sermons as, “seances of hate,” which should sound familiar to those paying attention to the rhetoric of today’s Democrats. His sermons were re-broadcast by US-funded Radio Free Europe back into Poland where they found a large audience that, in turn, generated massive crowds at Father Jerzy’s church in Warsaw.

These crowds unnerved both Polish and Soviet communists who sent criminals to attack Polish Christians, and when that didn’t work the communists attacked them with armored vehicles with water cannons to prevent Poles from attending  Catholic mass. When none of that worked, the communists resorted to physical threats. First, they murdered the teenage son of one of the women who worked with Father Jerzy, and convicted the man who drove him to the doctor while he was still alive for the murder, which is a revealing communist touch. Father Jerzy knew they were coming for him, but he wouldn’t back down – he  couldn’t back down. In seminary, the communists forced him to perform military service, which was basically a lengthy punishment to get him to quit studying the word of God, but he wouldn’t. Finally, because Father Jerzy wouldn’t back down, the Polish communists murdered the Catholic priest by beating him to death. Pope John Paul II was the leader who helped spur the Polish nationalism that eventually ended communism in Poland. 21st century communists realized their error and have placed a communist as pope.

I went to graduate school at MIT with a woman from Poland, Julia, who grew up in communist Poland where they  murdered priests. In some ways I was responding to communist excesses too, having grown up in California with its never-ending parade of, “each more horrible than the last,” Democrats. My critique of communism was more philosophical, distanced, and mathematical, while hers was more historical, personal, and emotional. Like Father Jerzy, she was incredibly brave, intelligent, and passionate. And like Father Jerzy, Julia – the Polish variant of Juliet – suffered a tragic fate. She was not physically murdered, but she was intellectually murdered, which may be worse because you remain alive to relive the embarrassment of having lost and remember the potential of what might have been. The fact that she was betrayed by communists in America, the purported land of freedom that helped free Poland, was particularly painful. In contrast, I was less brave – perhaps more realistic, certainly more junior – and lived to fight another day. Now I want to tell Julia’s story not just as a testament to a friend but as a lesson to today’s too-trusting and naïve Americans about the dangers of communism.

God and Nature

One of my favorite sayings comes from the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright, in which he says,

“I believe in God, only I spell it Nature.”

I said this and a Christian immediately engaged me quoting John 14:6,

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

The implication is that taking nature — that is, the natural environment — and the stewardship of His creation seriously is not the same as worshiping nature. The relationship between has been fraught with tension, as indicated by my Christian interlocutor, with the fundamental divide being that between a human, social, or anthropomorphic and natural, environmental, or biocentric view of the world. While there’s a bit of tension and history there, the perspective will be fundamentally philosophical as the relationship here is dialectical in the Hegelian sense. That is, there is the concept of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis that is confusing in the social, verbal world but is totally normal and almost easy in the natural, mathematical world. It also goes, almost without saying, that trinitarianism isomorphically relates to dialecticalism — that is, it maps in a one-to-one fashion. Although the social and natural environments are separate, they are also related. There are some details to work through here, but I want to concentrate on one interpretation, which starts with Psalm 19.

• 1 The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies pr`oclaim the work of his hands.
• 2 Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge.
• 3 They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them.
• 4 Yet their voice[b] goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.
  In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
• 5 It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
• 6 It rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit to the other; nothing is deprived of its warmth.
• 7 The law of the Lord is perfect, refreshing the soul. The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy,
  making wise the simple.
• 8 The precepts of the Lord are right, giving joy to the heart.
  The commands of the Lord are radiant, giving light to the eyes.
• 9 The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever.
  The decrees of the Lord are firm, and all of them are righteous.
• 10 They are more precious than gold, than much pure gold;
  they are sweeter than honey, than honey from the honeycomb.
• 11 By them your servant is warned; in keeping them there is great reward.
• 12 But who can discern their own errors? Forgive my hidden faults.
• 13 Keep your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me.
  Then I will be blameless, innocent of great transgression.
• 14 May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.

God is the mysterious, complex, infinite first moving force that gave us life. However, understanding that force is much more than one person could hope to accomplish. Therefore, we count on previous generation trying in good faith to understand God in the form of religion. Also, might I proffer that as Frank Lloyd Wright said, there is a unity between the concepts of God and nature. However, I propose considering that Jesus is who teaches us about God and helps us to understand God. As it is written in John 14:6, 

“No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Nostradamus Trump

The last post was on Trump speaking at CPAC, which was posted on leap year, 29 Feb 2020, based on some notes taken before the whole COVID-19 pandemic. There were some high points — Mike Bloomberg, Socialism, and the DC Swamp — but there’s one brief segment that bears some additional analysis. After Trump makes his Bloomberg comment to big laughs, he pauses for a very long time, which is just masterful. A standup comic would say, “he’s killing it.” After that though, Trump talks about the American left, which is to say Democrats, and here’s what he says:

Far left radicals have become increasingly desperate and increasingly dangerous in their quest to transform America into a country you would not recognize. A country in which they control every aspect of American life. Just as socialist and communist movements have done all over the world. They’re cracking down on all dissent and demanding absolute conformity. They want total control. They want to: 1) massively raise your taxes, 2) bury you in regulation, 3) take over American healthcare, 4) indoctrinate our children from kindergarten to college — and you see that happening! Kids are coming home saying, “What’s going on here dad?” Kids get it! — 5) impose a fanatical code of political correctness, 6) bombard our citizens with fake news propaganda, and 7) implement policies that would very quickly turn America into a large-scale Venezuela.

They want to take away your money, take away your choice, take away your speech, take away your guns, take away your religion, take away your history, take away your future, and take away, ultimately, your freedom — but we will never let them do that.

Consider Trump said this less than 3 months ago, look at all the changes that have taken place in America since the COVID virus crisis — which should really be called the CCP virus crisis — and think about how Democrat governors have reacted. There’s a whole thesis that could be written on this, but as a simple exercise, consider all the well-known Democrat states and look at how they’ve implemented the types of types of controls that only a few months ago seemed completely impossible in America. Most notably, Democrats have shut down small businesses where people earn their livings, which was only supposed to be for a short time but has been extended. Moreover, dissent has been essentially banned. Whenever progressivism, socialism, or communism is criticized, then leftists immediately call their critics Nazis. Finally, there has been almost a worship of the healthcare profession, which is fine, but this can quickly edge into the Nanny state and and socialized medicine of the British National Health Service (NHS). The list could continue, but isn’t it kind of coincidence that these once-in-a-lifetime societal changes happen mere months before the far-left radicats would have lost another election? As a wise internet analyst observed, “There are trillions at stake.”

 

CPAC, Day 4: President Trump

CPAC 2020, as some may have forgotten, occurred before the outbreak of the Coronavirus. At the beginning, Infowars did some good reporting before they got thrown out and noted that the obvious popularity of the event highlighted the obvious unpopularity of socialism, leftism, populism, and 0bama-ism. This was obviously a problem for Democrats, but luckily now with social distancing, events like CPAC and Trump Rallies are no longer possible, which is why CL calls it the CCP virus.

While aware that Donald Trump was the President of the United State (POTUS), CL had never spent much time analyzing his speaking style. Reviewing the best parts of Trump CPAC speech reveals something undeniable: he’s hilarious. Trump memorably makes fun of Mike Bloomberg as he has Warren, Biden, and Sanders, which drives Democrats to distraction. In fact, he’s so funny that it’s almost standup comedy, which is not said pejoratively. Stand up is incredibly hard, and the people who do it are both brave and intelligent, so no higher praise can be given.

However, besides being funny Trump is also inspiring, especially when he says clearly, directly, and unambiguously that America will never be a socialist country. While given the corruption of socialist places like Russia, China, and Venezuela may make this statement seem obvious, it is not obvious to the denizens of the DC Swamp, which needs to be drained because is a very different place than America. It is different because its incentives are not aligned with America, they are antithetical to America because, as DC gets rich, America gets poor because DC lives on taxes. Therefore, the DC Swamp is socialist due to individual incentives — as politicians, socialism is good for them even though it destroys the very people and political system it is supposed to help.

Trump talk about them wanting to take away your freedom, which at the time seemed abstract but freedom has been taken away from many Americans now — not just economic freedom but actual physical freedom including the right to peaceably assemble. Let’s be clear who “they” is, a loose coalition of Democrats, establishment Republicans, the mainstream media, and leftist activists. The question then becomes, what motivates this coalition? Part of it is that Trump threatens the wealth, power, and status of the whole DC Swamp, and that’s a big coalition of powerful people. It has been said that Republicans think Democrats are dim, while Democrats think Republicans are evil, and that is due to their talent and status asymmetry. Talented people are confident, so they can do lots of different thing. Untalented people, in contrast, are constantly frightened that they will be, “found out.” That explains the way the DC Swamp and all socialist systems operate: they are run by untalented people who have elbowed their way to the top and this is their one shot at success. Being fundamentally untalented, they can’t do anything else, which is why they fight so hard — it’s a long way down. This is a dynamic that needs to be understood and addressed, as President Trump says, to prevent America from becoming a socialist country.