What Went Wrong: Politics

life is more than fighting the enemy.

As we leave behind the century of the rule of the educated class and the administrative state, and enter a new era, we need to understand What Went Wrong. It’s important to understand that, a century ago, the educated class knew it had got things right. And yet here we are, and Donald Trump has just been elected president. Again. Inconceivable! What Went Wrong?

I’ve written about how Finance and Welfare and Education and Equality went wrong. Now it’s time to talk about Politics.

We are all taught — nay, we just know from the Zeitgeist — that politics and elections and government — Democracy — are the way that society gets together to decide what to do to make a better and a juster world. For Abraham Lincoln it was about “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” Said he, at Gettysburg on November 19, 1863, in the middle of a bloody Civil War.

For our liberal friends, politics and government are more about bending the arc of history towards justice.

I went along with all that until I learned about Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt and The Concept of the Political in about 2020. Then the world changed. Because Schmitt says that politics is about Friend vs. Enemy.

The specific political distinction to which political actions and motives can be traced is the distinction between friend and enemy.

I learned about Carl Schmitt by reading “far-right” blogger Curtis Yarvin. He makes Schmitt’s idea Real Simple.

There is no politics without an enemy.

Now you understand why our liberal friends like nothing beter than playing the race card and calling their political opponent a Nazi, Literally Hitler. Because the Nazis were the Enemy in World War II, and Hitler personified Nazism, the worst political movement in all history that our GIs heroically fought and defeated in 1941-45. There is no politics without an enemy.

Our liberal friends believe that, with the right government program, they will fight injustice and end racism. And if you are opposed to that you must be an enemy. Everything is an existential fight against the enemy. Just before the election Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said

If Donald Trump is elected, the struggle against climate change is over.

Do you see the point? Climate change is not just a government program, something we do because it’s the right thing to do, what with scientists agreeing that greenhouse gases like CO2 are heating the Earth. It’s more than that. It’s a “struggle,” a war. And the “climate deniers” are the enemy that is literally allowing the Earth to burn up.

So it is that in an election the two parties line up and accuse the other guy of being the enemy. In the case of our Democratic friends, Donald Trump represented a mortal threat to “our Democracy.” In the case of Republicans, the Democrats and their woke ideology represent an existential threat against the “last best hope on Earth.” In the late election, our Democratic friends began their campaign with “vibe” and “joy.” (Campaign? What’s that all about, if not war?) But in the final weeks, as they feared that success was slipping away, they played the Nazi card, and Kamala Harris called Trump a “fascist.”

Down the decades, our Democratic friends have called Republicans “racists” and many other pejoratives. The educated class is OK with that. Back in the 1950s Sen. McCarthy said there were Communists in the State Department. McCarthyism has ever since been an outrage to all good thinking people.

That’s the enemy side of politics. What about friends? It’s simple. In politics, you defeat your enemies and you gift your friends. That is what government spending programs are all about: enticing voters to vote for you. That is why FDR announced Social Security in 1935 in the runup to the 1936 elections. That is why Democrats are always offering more health care benefits. That is why President Biden proposed to forgive college tuition loans just before the 2022 midterms. That is why President Trump proposed no tax on tips. And who should pay for all this? The Rich.

Now, back in the 19th century, the educated class started coalescing around the idea of the administrative state run by educated experts and administrators — people like them. Of course that was what was needed! All the experts agreed.

And so now, after a century and more of the rule of the educated class, we have government spending amounting to more than a third of the economy, and regulations controling much more. And we have government declaring that racism and sexism and homophobia are existential problems that must be corrected. And they send out partisan woke DEI administrators to to fight racists and sexists and homophobes to make the world safe for non-whites, for women, and for LGBTs.

That’s what politics is all about. Dishing out benefits to your supporters, and stigmatizing your opponents as the enemy.

That is what a century of the rule of the educated class has delivered to the American people? A forest of government spending programs and a swamp of pejoratives?

No wonder the American people voted for Donald Trump.

But how should we live together? I say, with the absolute minimum of politics. Politicians know how to fight the enemy and how to gift their supporters. And that is all.

Finance? Politicians know nothing about finance. They just use it to manipulate the economy.

Welfare? Politicians know nothing about welfare. They just use welfare to create a dependent class.

Education? Politicians know nothing about education. They just usse education to teach children the regime narrative.

Equality? Politicians say they are in favor of equality. But their policies tend to create inequality.

Politics? Politicians know all about that. They fight their enemies and they gift their friends. And end up Making Things Worse.

I say that the best society is the society with the least amount of politics. It’s a society where people spend all their time working togetther and helping each other rather than fighting their enemies and looting the economy to gift their friends.