Politics as Friend vs. Enemy

or not

After learning from Regime Narrative generator ChatGPT that politics is not considered to be the friend / enemy distinction by everyone, I am more than ever determined to investigate what people assume when they write about politics.

I think, when people talk about “diverse actors” and “reasoned public discourse” and “global citizenship” and “inclusion” they are unconsciously defining the friend / enemy distinction by assuming that “diverse actors” and “reasoned public discourse” and “global citizenship” and “inclusion” are the good guys, i.e., friends. Then there are the others.

For instance, in his Weekly Dish today Andrew Sullivan begins:

One of the enduring frustrations of living in a politically polarized country is the evaporation of nuance. As the muscles of liberal democracy atrophy, and as cultural tribalism infects everyone’s consciousness, it becomes more and more difficult to say, “Yes, but …”

And it’s all Trump’s fault, because

Trump, and then the Trump Resistance, made everything worse.

What he is saying is that in the good old days of liberal democracy we didn’t really have a politics, we all just got along.

Yeah. We all just got along because, in the Obama era if you disagreed with the Thing you were a racist.

And given that Obama was a student of Saul Alinksy, whose Rules for Radicals is a training manual for radical insurrectionists — to coin a phrase — one can only ask: what planet are you living on, Andrew?

But that made me think. I wonder what ChatGPT says about “liberal democracy.”

Liberal democracy is a political system that combines the principles of liberalism and democracy. It emphasizes individual rights, civil liberties, rule of lase, and limited government. In a liberal democracy citizens participate in the decision-making process through free and fair elections, allowing for the peaceful transfer of power.

In other words, the Regime Narrative on liberal democracy completely sidesteps the question of friend and enemy; it’s all just “decision-making process.” Don’t even think about interfering, peasant!

But then, today, I read a guy who seemed to get it. “Why Are We ‘Governed’ So Thoroughly, and So Poorly?” asks Dr. David McGrogan. After quoting Proudhon on governments and their “fleecing, clubbing, choking,” he goes onto Macchiavelli, who wants to believe that the people are better governors than the “prince.” Thus

power is best dispersed as much as possible via the ‘wisdom of crowds’, and concentrated power is best avoided (although there may be exceptional circumstances, such as war, where it is necessary).

But in that case, it is not really government, not if we are relying of the wisdom of crowds. But you see what McGrogan is getting close to. We don’t need no stinkin’ government unless we are in a war. But, of course, if the population is “ignorant, stupid and incapable,” then the experts have to take charge.

And that’s the point. Governments are always looking for a war. Because that’s what justifies closing down discussion and pushback and imposing censorship. That’s what we experienced during COVID, and today Alex Berenson writes about the guy at the White House, Andrew M. Slavitt, who was beating up Facebook in 2021 to censor anyone disagreeing with vaccines and “the science” because they are “ignorant, stupid and incapable.” Of course he was, because we were at war!

I was reading a piece today about systemic racism in British cricket! They just had an independent commission come up with recommendations to put the whole cricket world under the supervision of a DEI officer. Of course they did. Because the injustice of people using racist pejoratives in the cricket pavilion! And we need equal pay for women in cricket!

I must say that one took me by surprise. World War Cricket: who knew. But by God, we’ll ferret out those racists and teach them the time of day!