"Meritocracy"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Meritocracy”

July 25, 2020

“They should all live together on an equal footing; merit to be their only road to eminence,

and the disgrace of evil and credit of worthy acts their one measure of difference between man and man.”

                                                                                                Plutarch (c.47AD – c.119AD)

                                                                                                Plutarch’s Lives: Volume 1, c.100AD

“I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone

 directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University”

                                                                                                            William Buckley (1925-2008)

                                                                                                            As quoted by Alvin Felzenberg

                                                                                                            Wall Street Journal, Feb. 26, 2018

The word meritocracy has Latin and Greek roots. It is a system where economic goods and political power are vested in individuals on the basis of talent, effort and achievement, rather than on wealth or social class. The word was popularized in 1958 by Michael Young, a British sociologist and politician in a book The Rise of Meritocracy, which satirized the tripartite school system in England that put children, at age eleven, onto one of three paths toward future education opportunities: Grammar schools for those heading to university; technical training for those with mechanical skills, and secondary schooling for all others. Forty-three years later, Mr. Young wrote an article for The Guardian in which he said his satire had been stripped of its meaning and had been embraced by an elite to justify their status.

Meritocracy is under attack. In a piece for The New Yorker last September, “Is Meritocracy Making Everyone Miserable?”, Louis Menand, author of The Metaphysical Club, wrote: “In recent years, we have been focused on two problems, social mobility and income inequality…” Mr. Menand cited Daniel Markovits, author of The Meritocracy Trap who concluded “that the whole system is a Frankenstein’s monster. We created meritocracy with good intentions, and now we are its victims.” Meritocracy, it is true and like free-market capitalism, does create inequalities – a natural process. Victor Davis Hanson of Stanford’s Hoover Institute went further. “Merit,” he wrote earlier this month, “will soon become a dirty, counterrevolutionary word.” When it no longer works to the advantage of elites, it is renounced.

Ross Douthat, in an op-ed in last Sunday’s New York Times, “The Real White Fragility,” wrote that if white privilege is a result of meritocracy then “good” liberals will abandon it. Doing so, Mr. Douthat noted, will fit with stresses in their lives, like expensive housing and fewer well-paying jobs. Competition is fierce and rewards less. We have, he wrote, “a surplus of smart young Americans pursuing admission to a narrow list of elite colleges whose enrollment does not expand with population.”  Visiting students near his home in Hamden, Connecticut, he noted a “disappearance of serenity, the evaporation of contentment and the spread of anxiety,” which he had experienced in his years at Harvard twenty years earlier. The discarding of SAT requirements and with some charter schools de-emphasizing hard work, discipline and “being nice” meshes with “woke” liberals’ perceptions and created Mr. Markovits’ Frankenstein-like meritocracy.  

Through the mid 1950s elite eastern colleges depended on a small number of private “feeder” schools, populated with sons and daughters of wealthy, white and mostly Protestant families. Jewish students were discriminated against then, just as Asian students are today. Affirmative action, in the mid 1960s was an attempt at meritocracy, in that it helped underrepresented minorities, especially blacks and women. In his New Yorker piece, Mr. Menand wrote: “In 1965, the student population in American colleges was ninety-four percent white and sixty-one percent male…Today, fifty-six percent of students are classified as non-Hispanic whites and forty-two percent of students are male.” Where meritocracy does exist in universities is in the field of sports. A college that denies acceptance to the most qualified history student because he or she is Asian or white will seek the best athlete regardless of race, especially when abilities enhance sports that bring in the most money – football and basketball.  Diversity helps as long as it does not interfere with success on the gridiron or the basketball court.

Merit, from the Latin, is the quality of excellence and “cracy,” from the Greek, means strength and power. A meritocracy, then, is a system where the best lead. Over time, however, meritocrats learn to work the system for personal benefit; so, meritocracy develops flaws from within. As well, power breeds elitism and contempt. Like George Orwell’s ‘Napoleon,’ yesterday’s beneficiaries of meritocracy become tomorrow’s dictators. As William Buckley suggested in the rubric quoted above, meritocracy breeds its own demise through a supercilious intolerance on the part of leaders for those who oppose them. Position and power make them enemies of policies they once supported.

Yet a true meritocracy is what flushes the swamps filled with administrators and bureaucrats found in the halls of universities and in the corridors of Washington, D.C. True meritocracy means fresh blood, individuals with independent ideas, something impossible when the elites that lead our universities and run government bureaucracies come from the same schools, the same socio-economic backgrounds and bear the same political philosophies. Yet, with all its faults, what system is better than a meritocracy? It allows the able and tenacious to succeed, no matter their race, creed or sex. Today, critics of meritocracy blame it for social and economic inequalities, yet it champions a fundamental aspect of democracy – regardless of background, anyone with effort and talent can succeed. It is not meritocracy; it is abuse of power that is the problem.

Are the best qualified students deprived of the best education because a university administrator fears his or her job is at risk if an incoming class does not reflect the country’s population? Are publicly held companies held hostage to political correctness and concerns about “social justice?” These are questions that deserve consideration. Meritocracy is nature’s process of natural selection in its rawest form. Ironically, one of the few meritocratic businesses is professional sports – where minorities represent the largest percentage of the successful. Survival goes to the quickest, the strongest, the smartest, the fittest. It seems unlikely that the NFL, NBA, NHL or major league baseball will ever prioritize egalitarianism when filling their rosters. Why should they? Would fans prefer to watch the most diverse baseball team or the best?

From my own experience, a true meritocracy in business is rare. One exception was the Wall Street trading desk. In those tense, high-pressure rooms ability was valued higher than any other trait – old school ties or family connections made no difference. What counted was one’s skill in executing a profitable trade. I once sat next to Letitia Baldridge at dinner at the ‘21’ Club. Without asking where I worked, she told me the worse business manners in America were on the trading floor at Salomon Brothers, which was where I then worked as a salesman – not as a trader, I hasten to add. Amused by her comment, I explained that on the trading floor, civility and manners were suspended, at least until the market closed.

  

"Fear and COVID-19"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Fear and COVID-19”

July 21, 2020

“Fears are educated into us, and can, if we wish, be educated out.”

                                                                                                Karl Menninger (1893-1990)

                                                                                                American psychiatrist

Fear is an elemental emotion. It can have positive attributes. In combat, fear is a governor on impulse. Fear of wild animals and other tribes was a factor in early man’s forming of communities. It is ubiquitous. We have fears of darkness and loneliness, of failure or rejection, of making wrong decisions. We fear becoming ill or being a burden to loved ones. Fear, we were told by Bertrand Russell, is the main source of superstition. Fear of sorcery was behind the Salem Witch Trials of 1692, which saw fourteen women and five men hung. It descends from ignorance, which wrote Herman Melville in Moby Dick, “is the parent of fear.” Unwarranted fear prevents us from expanding our horizons and improving our lives.  

Unscrupulous politicians use fear to seek and hold power. Tyrant-like, they tell us what cannot be done. Classical liberals, like the Founding Fathers, tell us what rights we have – what can be done. With COVID-19, fear has been used for political gain. By the end of 2019, President Trump’s policies had accelerated economic growth. They had provided the lowest unemployment on record, including Black unemployment. Increases in wages for low-income workers outpaced pay rises for upper-income workers. Amir Taheri, the Iranian-born, Europe-based author, wrote: “Prior to the coronavirus crisis, his [Trump’s] administration had one of the best records in job creation and the reduction of poverty among black Americans.” Since the economy is the single most important aspect in a Presidential election, Mr. Trump’s glidepath to re-election, while by no means assured, appeared to have few – and manageable – obstacles.

The arrival of COVID-19 and the resulting shut-down of schools, colleges and the economy changed election dynamics. There is no question that COVID-19 was (and is) a serious health concern, particularly for the elderly and especially for those with comorbidities. Nevertheless, fear was the instrument employed by politicians of both parties. While younger people could (and do) contact the disease, and potentially contaminate riskier segments of the population, the risk to their health was not much worse than that of a bad case of the flu. We will never know what death counts would have been had there been no early shutdowns, but we do know the death tolls from the flu pandemics of 1917-19, 1957-58 and 1968, when there was no shuttering of the economy or schools. Adjusted for changes in population, death rates, with the exception of 1917-1919, were worse during the previous pandemics. In fact, in speaking to friends with whom I was at school in 1957-58 not one had any memory of the flu that year. Yet it killed 116,000 Americans when the population was about one half of what it is today.

In an on-line lecture for Hillsdale College, Heather MacDonald of the Manhattan Institute said that the spread of coronavirus infections “…require what Japan calls the three Cs: confined spaces, crowded places and close contact.” The job of public health officials and politicians should be to limit those venues, to protect the vulnerable, and to urge the public to rely on common sensical behavior as it pertains to personal hygiene, distancing and mask-wearing. Masks, as we all know, should be worn indoors when around others. But, as we also know, they reduce the available oxygen and increase the amount of carbon dioxide we inhale. Edward Cline, in a recent essay for his Rule of Reason blog, noted that the “Occupational Safety and Health Agencies around the world confirm the minimum level of oxygen in the air we breathe should be 19.5%, while carbon dioxide should be around 400 parts per million.” Masks lower the first number and raise the second, so care should be taken when wearing one. Healthcare workers must wear them, and there is no question that they help slow the spread of the virus when one is in close contact with other people. Yet fear has made them pervasive in outdoor settings, to the extent that friends tell me they wear masks while driving alone in their cars, for the virtue-signaling message that doing so sends to others, the less virtuous (like me).

While epidemiologists have responsibility for risks from the virus, politicians have responsibility for both the health and economic well-being of the people, and the media has a responsibility to accurately report news, both that which supports their biases and that which does not. Politicians and media types, none of whom had jobs at risk, placed priority on stopping the pandemic above concerns for the economy. Yet a survey last year conducted by the National Foundation for Credit Counseling found that 45% of U.S. households (fifty-one million) have no savings and 70% have less than a $1000.00. Shutting down the economy caused 40 million Americans, a quarter of the workforce, to lose their jobs, at least temporarily. Congress alleviated economic fears by passing expensive relief packages – a necessary measure – but in doing so raised fears among those who worry about a build-up of debt that must be repaid. No government can survive long on printing presses. All governments tax the productivity of workers. A growing economy, and a concomitant expansion of government services, requires rule of law, protection of private property and an environment that encourages capital investment, all necessary for economic growth.

That fear has become pervasive in this election year can be seen in a media hellbent on defeating President Trump. One example: In last Sunday’s New York Times, a top-right two-column headline, with undisguised bias: “Passing Off Virus Burden, White House Fueled Crisis.” Just below the fold, another editorialized front-page headline covering four columns: “Rising Mistrust of ‘Warp-Speed’ Vaccine May Prolong Pandemic.” If that weren’t enough, and to ensure that readers remain comatose, the front page of The New York Times Magazine: “Why We’re Losing the Battle With COVID-19.” There is no question that the Times deliberately scares people about the virus – I am sure they would say it is for their own good – but the corollary is that economic fear is the progeny of fear of COVID-19. Thus, things worsen.

“The enemy is fear,” said Gandhi. “We think it is hate, but it is fear.” In George Lucas’ movie “Star Wars,” the Jedi master Yoda says, “Fear is the path to darkness. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” While fear has been used by tyrants forever, its use by democracies is rarer and thus more insidious. Governors have used fear of COVID-19 to rule by executive decree rather than relying on the legislative process. What they don’t acknowledge is that that fear creates psychological problems – anxiety and depression, especially for the elderly living alone. It damages our ability to control our emotions. No matter how serious has been COVID-19 as a pandemic, fear has made the problem worse.

"The Duke's Children," by Anthony Trollope

Sydney M. Williams

Burrowing into Books

“The Duke’s Children,” Anthony Trollope

July 18, 2020

“He had already been driven to acknowledge that these children of his –

thoughtless, reckless, though they seemed to be – still had a will of

their own. In all which, how like they were to their mother.”

                                                                                                Anthony Trollope (1815-1882)

                                                                                                The Duke’s Children, 1880

                                                                                                Chapter 61

The story begins with the Duchess of Omnium, Lady Glencora, having just died. She has left her husband the Duke, Plantagenet Palliser, a widow with three children: Lord Silverbridge, Lady Mary and Gerald. They are young people on the verge of adulthood – wealthy, aristocratic, impetuous and independent. We follow the gambling, horses and love affair of the oldest son, the romance of the daughter and the college pranks and sporting adventures of the youngest. Thrown into the mix is a hail of characters, scenes from fox hunting – a favorite sport of the author – and observations on politics and society

Anthony Trollope was prolific. In all, he wrote forty-seven novels. The Duke’s Children completes the sixth volume of the Palliser series. In this, Trollope provides a perspective on mid-late Nineteenth Century life among Britain’s upper classes. “He never wearied,” Henry James wrote in 1888, in a not-very-flattering essay on Anthony Trollope in Partial Portraits, “of the pre-established round of English customs…”

Plantagenet Palliser, now a Duke and former Prime Minister and “not yet fifty,” is one of the wealthiest men in England. He had inherited his title when his uncle, the former Duke of Omnium, died. Palliser has mixed feelings about Britain’s caste system. He is a traditionalist: “To the Duke’s thinking the maintenance of the aristocracy of the country was second only in importance to the maintenance of the Crown.” Tradition affected his attitude toward Silverbridge’s and Mary’s choices of marriage partners. But he is a man of contradictions: He tells the American Isabel Boncassen, Silverbridge’s intended: “There is no greater mistake than to suppose that inferiority of birth is a barrier to success in our country.” This he says while urging his son to seek a marriage partner from among Britain’s nobility.

Trollope describes the Duke as a parent: “A more loving father there was not in England, but nature had made him so undemonstrative that as yet they had hardly known his love.” Silverbridge, when we meet him, is a young man out of Oxford and into gambling “who imagined himself to be anything but extravagant, [so] wondered how the figures could mount up so rapidly.” After a flirtation with Lady Mabel Grex, Silverbridge meets Isabel, daughter of Ezekiel Boncassen a self-made American millionaire and scholar. He falls in love. Eighteen-year-old Lady Mary had fallen in love with Francis Oliphant Tregear while she was on vacation in Switzerland with her parents and while Tregear was traveling in the region. Frank was the son of a gentleman of no financial means. He had been a classmate of Silverbridge’s at Eton and Oxford. It was a romance known to Lady Glencora but not to her husband who, when he hears of it after his wife’s death, disapproves. Lady Mary, however, is a young woman of determination, with a clear understanding of her rights: “Being the child of rich parents she had the right to money. Being a woman, she had a right to a husband. Having been born free she had a right to choose one for herself. Having had a man’s love given to her she had a right to keep it.”

We read of the ups and downs of the two romances, of Silverbridge coming to terms with his turf buddies and Lady Mary’s handling of her father-imposed seclusion. Along the way, we pick up bits of Trollope’s wisdom: On life: “It is so much easier to think of the past than of the future – to remember what has been than to resolve what shall be.” On politics: “The statesman who falls is he who does much, and thus injures many. The statesman who stands the longest is he who does nothing and injures no one.” On diligence: “But for the feeling of self-contentment, which creates happiness – hard work, and hard work alone, can give it to you.” On finances: “Money is the reward of labour.” And on communication: “You have first to realize in your mind the thing to be said, and then the words in which you should say it…” Amen to that.

In the end, the Duke becomes reconciled to the inevitable. Silverbridge marries the beautiful Isabel, and Mary weds her beloved Frank. Left undetermined is the fate of Gerald, who having been tossed out of Cambridge for violating curfew, is now at Oxford.

Anthony Trollope wrote knowingly of his time and environment. The love affair between Silverbridge and Isabel was representative of a then popular trend – daughters of American millionaires marrying titled, but impoverished, Englishmen. Six years before this book was published American Jenny Jerome married Lord Randolph Churchill, the third son of the Marquess of Blandford. To read Trollope, and his vignettes on everything – from shooting in Scotland, horse racing at Doncaster, fox hunting near Trumpington Woods to parlors in Mayfair – is to better understand the social history of the time. Turning the last page is to say farewell to friends. 

                                                                                               

"Risk"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Risk”

July 15, 2020

“Only those who will risk going too far

can possibly find out how far one can go.”

                                                                                    T.S. Eliot (1888-1965)

                                                                                    Preface

Transit to Venus by Harry Crosby, 1931

Risk is confrontation with fear. Seventy years ago, my wife, as a young girl, would put on her roller skates and, with her older brother, sail down paths in New York’s Central Park. They went unaccompanied. At the same time, on a rocky farm in southern New Hampshire, I would get on my horse, along with a brother and/or sister, and gallop off along trails through the woods, also unaccompanied by an adult. Any concern our parents may have had, they kept to themselves. They loved us as much as we love our children. We were told to be careful; we respected their advice. Nevertheless, we took risks.

Immigrants, from the early 17^th Century to today’s migrants, did and do take risks. The earliest immigrants had no idea what they would find when they set sail across an unmapped sea, yet they were willing to take a chance that a better and freer life could be had than the one left behind. Social media, communications and government largesse have mitigated those risks, but emigration is still a leap into the unknown.

Success is impossible without risk. Entrepreneurs take risks, as do writers, musicians and artists. However, in all societies, risk-taking is never ubiquitous. Success comes to the talented and the aspirant – and those willing to take risks. The result is a society unequal in outcomes, but a fair one. What makes for a fair society are equal opportunities and the willingness to take risks, to grab the ladder’s rungs and make one’s way up, step by step. Consider the obstacles overcome by Americans like Abraham Lincoln and Clarence Thomas. At birth, neither had material advantage. Both were born in rural poverty. What they had was diligence, a desire for self-improvement and a willingness to take risks. They both recognized that victimhood was not the answer. While they were endowed with aspiration, dedication and intellectual talent, they knew they had to take risks and work harder than their peers.

Risks associated with COVID-19 have caused businesses to shutter and jobs to be lost. Yet the risk of COVID-19 is not unitary. The risk of serious illness or death varies depending on age and comorbidities. When we avoid the risk of infection, we risk financial and mental health well-being. Fear of contacting the disease has caused authorities to re-think the opening schools, as they balance the risk of the virus spreading against the risk of limited learning, social isolation and unemployed parents. In Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal, John Hasnas, an ethics professor at Georgetown wrote about his decision to return to the classroom this fall: “There is no alternative to learning to live with the risk of infection as generations before us lived with similar dangers. COVID-19 is part of life.” COVID-19 does represent a risk, but we must either live with it or hide from it.

Risk and opportunity are ever-present. My youth preceded the concept of “helicoptering” parents. Hand-held electronic devices have now replaced daydreams we once lived. Identity politics have swept the nation, dividing people into myriad categories, including victims and oppressors. But in the world when I grew up, being a victim was unacceptable. In school, bullies picked on the vulnerable. That happened to me until one day I took a risk and fought back. Being a “victim” removes the opportunity for improving one’s self. We should take chances and challenge the status quo. Eleanor Roosevelt once told us: “Do one thing every day that scares you.” Mark Zuckerberg said, “The biggest risk is not taking any risk.”

A diminution of risk is fueled by a culture of fear, a concept used by tyrannical types to achieve and hold power, whether in sports, business the military or government. It was a tactic used by Nazis to gain support for a regime that few dared confront.  In college, academic risk expands one’s mind. The provision of safe spaces by universities attenuates risk in that it spares students hearing or reading “harmful” words. As a consequence, students learn less and universities have become more authoritarian and less diverse, as have media and entertainment businesses.

General George Patton spoke of “calculated risks,” where the odds of success are measured, but where consequences can be deadly. Risk, definitionally, is risky. On March 23, 1775 Patrick Henry spoke at St. John’s Church in Richmond, Virginia, ending with his most famous words: “Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!” A little more than a year later, fifty-six men signed the Declaration of Independence. The document ends “...we mutually pledge to each other our lives our fortunes and our sacred honor.” The United States would never have been born without the willingness of those men to take risks, which would have cost them their lives and their fortunes had the Revolution failed. Today, are we willing to assume the same risks to assure that liberty survives?

The question is more than rhetorical. Risk is more than a child galloping his horse down New Hampshire’s dirt roads or roller skating through Central Park without one’s parents. Free speech today is threatened by fear of reprisal. The stakes in speaking out against the superciliousness of the politically correct have never been higher. It should not be so. Speaking one’s mind should not involve risk. The arrogance of the Left has birthed a conformity of intolerance, as can be seen on university campuses, in corporate boardrooms, in federal bureaucracies and within the newsrooms of our nation’s radio, television and newspapers. Liberty depends on the willingness of people to speak and write freely, even when doing so involves personal risk.

"National Identity"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“National Identity”

July 15, 2020

“The measure of who we are is what we do with what we have.”

                                                                                                Vince Lombardi (1913-1970)

                                                                                                Coach, Green Bay Packers

As individuals, we are a combination of genetics and experience. Similarly, the United States is a product of its genetic makeup – its people, natives and immigrants – and its experiences, which includes everything that has happened over the past four centuries – the carving of towns and villages from the wilderness, the curse of slavery and its abolition, and especially the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Our experiences include the building of roads, railroads and the telegraph, the Civil War, the taming of the west, the industrialization of the economy and the rise of cities, schools and colleges, two world wars, the Cold War and its aftermath, and the internet. Our Country’s genetic makeup continues to expand as immigrants become citizens and new births add to our population. And, so do our experiences. Everything we do – the good and the bad – add to who we are.

We are a polyglot nation, not easily categorized. We are not, as The New York Times with its 1619 Project would have us be, a nation imbued with systemic racism, a country of victims and oppressors. On the other hand, we, as a nation, should be aware of the warts in our past. God, it has been said, cares little of what we have done. He cares about we do and will do.

Robert E. Lee has become symbolic of white oppression. As a defender of slavery and Commander of the Army of Virginia, he deserves reproach. But hatred for what he represented in that aspect of his life blinds us to the whole man. Like all of us, he was complex. His father “Light-Horse Harry” Lee was a Revolutionary War General and Governor of Virginia who landed in debtors’ prison around 1812. He abandoned his family and moved permanently to the West Indies. Lee was raised by his mother who died a month after he graduated second in his class from West Point, where he later served as Superintendent. When the Civil War broke out, he was torn between allegiance to the United States and loyalty to Virginia, his place of birth. (It was a time when people traveled less; so, one’s home state meant more than it does today.) In 1865, at Appomattox, General Lee surrendered his sword without animus to a younger General Grant, who had graduated in the bottom half of his class at West Point. In the aftermath of the War and at a time of bitter recriminations on the part of many Southerners toward the victorious North, Lee supported reconciliation with a reborn United States, later led by his former foe.

Today, Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia does not alone define who we are, but neither do New Hampshire’s White Mountains, Arizona’s Grand Canyon, New York City’s tall buildings, San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge, Florida’s Panhandle or Minnesota’s lakes. The United States is all these things and more. We are the newest immigrants and descendants of those who immigrated four hundred years ago; we descend from slaves and slave owners; we come from most every country in the world and represent every nation, race and religion. The United States is an idea, forged in the fertile minds of our Founding Fathers. For two hundred and thirty-three years, their words of hope and promise have drawn immigrants to these shores. Before that, we were a land to which people escaped, yearning to be free. We are the past, the present and the future. To deny the past, no matter how hurtful it may seem to some, is to pretend we are different than what we are.   

One problem with those who would like to “fundamentally transform” our country and its identity is not their policies (though I disagree with them), it is the adamancy of their advocacy – their silencing of dissenting opinions. It is a campaign that originated in college classrooms and that has now made its way onto the front pages of newspapers, in daily radio and TV news reports and into the boardrooms of our nation’s corporations, churches and eleemosynary institutions. It is an orthodoxy that has become pervasive, with overtones of Karl Marx and Nazi Germany and reminiscent of George Orwell’s “Newspeak.” Our identity should be that of a people freely expressing opinions without fear of retaliation. We should be a nation that treats all people equitably, that does not compartmentalize by race, sex or religion. We should be a nation where people succeed based on their skills, effort and “the content of their character.” We should honor symbols of liberty, like the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia and the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. And we should acknowledge the union of the American states, newly strengthened 155 years ago when Robert E. Lee accepted his loss and chose to stand, as one nation, with the people of the United States.

As a country composed of myriad races, religions and ethnicities, it has always been difficult to define our identity. Our genetic makeup is in flux. This has always been so. In his 1878 novel The Duke’s Children, Anthony Trollope has the American scholar and businessman Ezekiel Boncassen, a self-made son of a tailor, speak to two young English aristocrats about his country: “The influxions[1] are so rapid, that every ten years the nature of the people is changed.” Regardless of our outward appearances, what distinguishes and unites us are our freedoms. One can argue that freedom has not always been equitably applied, and that is true. But no one can deny that we were the first country to exalt the concept of individual liberty and have it embedded in a written Constitution.

Another problem with those who would transform the U.S. is that equality and liberty are incompatible. Demand for equality denies the aspirant liberty to succeed. And liberty to succeed means some will fail, so not all will be equal. Nevertheless, we are endowed with equal natural rights. Everyone is (or should be) equal before the law and the right to vote is shared equally, but we are not equal in aspiration, talent, or intellect. (Put me alongside Michael Jordan if you doubt my words.) Our guiding star is the promise in the Declaration of Independence of liberty. It did not come all at once, but, despite imperfections, we are a free people. We cannot let a rising tide of cancel culture and conformity undo what has taken so many years to construct. We cannot let the McCarthyism of those who claim speech constitutes violence forbid the utterance of opposing opinions. We cannot permit this assault on our liberties It is the right to speak without retribution that is essential to our national identity. We lose sight of that at our peril.

---

[1] A word no longer in use but which means infusions of new blood, in this case from immigrants.

"Patriotism and the Mount Rushmore Speech"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Patriotism and the Mount Rushmore Speech”

July 9, 2020

“The essence of America, that which really unites us, is not ethnicity, or nationality or religion.

It is an idea, and what an idea it is – that you can come from humble circumstances and do great things.”

                                                                                    Condoleezza Rice (1954-)

                                                                                    Former Secretary of State

                                                                                    Republican National Convention, August 29, 2012

“Patriotism,” said Samuel Johnson in 1775, “is the last refuge of the scoundrel.” A little more than a hundred years later, Oscar Wilde wrote, “Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.” In 1906, Ambrose Bierce published The Devils Dictionary. In it he accused Samuel Johnson of being too gentle; Bierce defined patriotism as “the first resort of the scoundrel.”  From Mark Twain to H.L. Mencken, wits have had great fun belittling patriots and patriotism.

Patriotism is a positive force. In a cynical age, patriotism appears dated; it is out of sync with progressive beliefs. But true patriotism is deeply embedded. It accepts and withstands criticism. In Notes of a Native Son (1955), James Baldwin wrote: “I love America more than any other country in this world and exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.” That is as it should be – the right to criticize is implicit in free speech. Patriotism is devotion and attachment to one’s homeland and fellow citizens; it does not mean total obeisance, as is required by those from Black Lives Matter and Antifa. Patriotism should not be confused with nationalism, which is divisive, intolerant and nihilistic. In a multiracial and multicultural country, patriotism is what binds a disparate people. Patriotism is inclusive and feeds on love, while nationalism is partisan and is nourished by hate.

Patriotism was the theme of President Trump’s speech at Mount Rushmore on July 3^rd. That was as it should be, as the United States celebrated its 244^th birthday. If one were to read only the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times, or the start of Associated Press’ Jill Colvin’s postmortem, “After a weekend spent stoking division, President Donald Trump…”, one would conclude that Mr. Trump’s speech in South Dakota was dark and divisive. However, if one read it, without knowledge of the speaker, it would appear uplifting and optimistic.

Surprisingly, President Trump delivers a good speech. While he does not write his speeches – no President has since Warren Harding hired Judson Welliver as his literary clerk – the words, when he does not stray from the script, are powerful and inspiring. (His speeches should be read, which is my preference.) On July 16, 2017 in Warsaw, Mr. Trump warned of the steady creep of government bureaucracy, “invisible to some but familiar to the Poles…The West became great not because of paperwork and regulations but because people were allowed to chase their dreams and pursue their destinies.” In this year’s State of the Union, he spoke of years of political stalemate and the divisions it has caused: “We must choose between greatness or gridlock, results or resistance, vision or vengeance, incredible progress or pointless destruction.” He ended that speech optimistically, by asking the men and women of Congress to look at the opportunities that lie ahead: “Our most thrilling achievements are still ahead. Our most exciting journeys still await. Our biggest victories are still to come. We have not yet begun to dream.”

President Trump spoke at Mount Rushmore: “Our founders launched not only a revolution in government, but a revolution in the pursuit of justice, equality, liberty and prosperity… No country has done more,” he added, “to advance the human condition than the United States of America.” He then spoke of the current campaign to “wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values and indoctrinate our children.” The weapon of these advocates is a “cancel culture” that “shames dissenters” and “demands absolute allegiance. If you do not speak its language, perform its rituals, recite its mantras, and follow its commandments, then you will be censored, banished, blacklisted, persecuted, and punished.”  Those were the words alluded to by mainstream media as dystopian. He went on to remind the audience that “nations exist to protect the safety and happiness of their own people…We believe in equal opportunity, equal justice, and equal treatment for all citizens of every race, background, religion and creed.”  He was lighting a candle, not snuffing one out. Yet, this was the speech CBS described as being “fiery,” CNN claimed included “outrageous lies,” and the New York Times said was a “divisive culture war message.”

The speech offended the left, who called it “a battle cry.” In that, they were correct. It was a battle cry for liberty against forces of darkness that want to eradicate our past by desecrating statues and monuments. It was battle cry against the re-education of youth, like the phony narrative of the 1619 project – a project that perverts those who fought for liberty and independence into progenitors of oppression. Our Founders were not paragons of perfection, but neither were they Simon Legrees. The enemy within us is the one that wants to stifle opposing opinions, to “cancel” culture and history. This enemy has totalitarian instincts, demands allegiance from the “woke” and commands others to kneel in homage to their vision. It is a frightening prospect, reminiscent of Jacobin France and China’s cultural revolution.

He ended by saying he was signing an executive order to establish a “National Garden of American Heroes, a vast outdoor park that will feature the statues of the greatest Americans to ever live.” Of the thirty figures mentioned in the E.O., 57% are white men, 27% women and 17% Blacks. Certainly, there will be debate as to who will be included. For example, four missing that I thought should be added: Daniel Webster, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Oliver Wendell Holmes and, of course, my four-greats grandfather, Noah Webster.

Patriotism is many things: respect for one’s country’s history and uniqueness, symbolized by its flag. In the U.S., it is based on natural rights and elevates the individual; it is the recognition that we are a nation of laws, not men; it is tolerance for those of opposing opinions and the willingness to accept criticism. Patriotism was extant in Martin Luther King’s words when he spoke at the Lincoln Memorial in 1963 of the Founders “…promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” words that lead to the passage of the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1965.

America does not need to be “transformed,” as Mr. Biden urged last weekend. We are not perfect, but we are more perfect than other nations. We look to the future, while guided by mistakes of the past. We focus on liberty and ensure that everyone is equal before the law. We strive for equality of opportunities but keep in mind the universal moral truths of the Founders’ words, and we never forget that individual liberty is our greatest asset – the freedom for everyone to achieve his or her dream, as Condoleezza Rice told the Republican convention in 2012. That was the nub of Mr. Trump’s speech last Friday at Mount Rushmore.

Each of us is unique. We are multiracial and come from myriad cultures yet are bound by love for country. We applaud our nation’s ideals yet acknowledge her imperfections. And we understand it is patriotism that encompasses the “Unum,” in the motto of the Great Seal of the United States, E Pluribus Unum.

"November's Election - None of the Above?"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“November’s Election – None of the Above?”

July 4, 2020

“A wise man makes his own decisions.

An ignorant man follows public opinion.”

                                                                                                Chinese Proverb

On a multiple-choice test “none of the above’ may be a legitimate response. But no matter how tempting that answer may seem to voters sick and tired of politics, such a response on November 3, 2020 is not acceptable. As we celebrate our country’s 244^th birthday, we should consider the critical importance of the election four months out.

While no politician is the paragon of virtue drawn by Parson Weems of an idealized George Washington, character has slipped down the scale of traits we treasure when electing leaders. In 2020, we will be offered a choice between a man whose thin skin exposes a large ego, and a man whose intellectual capacity wanes as his defects wax. Mr. Trump’s flaws are well publicized – orange hair, ungrammatical speech, his volatility and personal insecurity seen in his untempered Tweets and his apparent admiration for dictators. But they are all superficial. No matter his appeasing words about Putin and Xi Jinping, he has been tougher on Russia and China than his predecessors. His dyed hair and manner of speaking may offend those raised in coastal, elitist families, but they are far less damaging to democracy than was the misuse of intelligence services by the Clinton campaign and the Obama Administration in undermining a freely elected President. Charges of corruption against Mr. Trump have been investigated for four years by a zealous press, a partisan House, Special Counsel Robert Mueller and a complicit FBI. They came to naught. On the other hand, mainstream media has been largely silent on financial favors sought by Mr. Biden for his son in Ukraine and China and on his alleged sexual assault on a staff member.

Nevertheless, and despite the impurity of both candidates, the single most important factor in this election has been the hijacking of the Democrat Party by illiberal, so-called “progressives.” Professor Wilfred McClay of the University of Oklahoma described the random and willful destruction of statues, acts condoned by many city mayors: “…these acts of destruction are acts of pure, unmitigated hate…,” hatred not dissimilar in its intensity to that levied against President Trump by the New York Times and the Washington Post. “Unless new leaders come forth,” wrote Heather MacDonald in City Journal this past week, “who understand their duty to maintain the rule of law, the country will not pull back from disaster.”

This wanton destruction reflects George Orwell’s third slogan, “Ignorance is Strength,” that the past is what our leaders tell us it is, not historical facts. Such ignorance ignores the truth in what Thomas Sowell wrote two days ago: “History is what happened, not what we wished had happened.” This nescience reflects abandonment of the humanities by our universities and the life lessons taught therein. The recent anarchy and deaths in Seattle’s Capitol Hill area would not have surprised those familiar with William Golding’s Lord of the Flies and those who had studied Robespierre and his Jacobin Reign of Terror in 1793 Paris. 

Polarization has become the norm, but in an election year it is exaggerated. Common sense about distancing, hygiene and the wearing of masks has given way to political diktats. While mainstream media has been filled with scare stories of rising new infections in states that did not lockdown sufficiently or opened prematurely, they have back-paged declining deaths from the virus across the country. Protesters of draconian lockdown rules have been blamed for infecting fellow citizens, yet those who march mask-less with Black Lives Matter (BLM) are exempted. It is okay to spread the virus if you are marching for “social justice,” but not if you are marching for your rights as a citizen. Despite ominous headlines about the virus, there has been some good news. In a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Dr. Joseph Ladapo of UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine wrote “…there has not been a single confirmed case of reinfection among the 10 million cases of Covid-19 world-wide, according to a May report in the Journal of the American Medical Association” – a positive piece of news, supporting herd immunity, that has largely gone unreported.

The campaigns must deal with the fact that we are in the biggest economic collapse since the Great Depression – bad for the President but opportunity for his opponent. The media, urban and suburban elitists – those with little concept of what the recession and closing of schools have done to average families – have greeted the news with schadenfreude-like glee. Most continue to work from home offices, inconvenienced but not economically deprived. History-challenged politicians, university and school heads and business CEOs have agreed to the assertion that the U.S. is systemically racist. Millions of dollars have flowed into the coffers of BLM, which calls for the defunding of police and whose website (since removed) described the U.S. as a “corrupt democracy originally built on indigenous genocide and chattel slavery [that] thrives today on the brutal exploitation of people of color.”  This mob of ignoramuses have no knowledge of history; they ignore failing schools and Black-on-Black killings in inner cities; they have forgotten (or never knew of) advances in civil rights over the past half century and are blind to the economic gains made by Blacks in the last two years of the Trump Administration. “They are,” as Communist expert and author Trevor Loudon wrote about BLM, “following the line of the Chinese Cultural Revolution… that toppled statues and desecrated monuments.” “It’s hard to find precedents for a civilization turning on itself with such fury,” said Heather MacDonald in an interview with The Epoch Times.

And yet, and yet, there may be a reaction to this madness – perhaps an over-reaction. Leaders at BLM may have over-played their hand. Just as Extinction Rebellion’s shutting down of London in October 2019 was an over-reach by extremists in the climate wars, the lack of wisdom shown by officials in Seattle to CHOP (Capitol Hill Organized Protest) may come to signify the height of political idiocy. The London episode led to Michael Shellenberger’s writing Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All, a commonsensical look at our changing climate. It is too early to say if some member of the “progressive” Left will, likewise, exchange advocacy and propaganda for reason and facts, as they pertain to the issue of race. Newton’s Third Law of Motion states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. “Jim Crow” laws were enacted by white, southern Democrats in the late 19^th and early 20^th Centuries in excessive response to North-imposed Reconstruction, which provided needed assistance to former slaves but humiliated whites. When a pendulum is moved beyond its usual arc, it does not revert to its normal, central position. It Can’t Happen Here was a satirical play written by Sinclair Lewis in 1935. It was based on the rise of National Socialism in Europe. To believe that America today could not fall victim to authoritarian terrorist groups like BLM and Antifa is to be blind to the fact that schools, universities, media and corporations have already acquiesced to their demands. Democracy shuts down one door at a time.

The election is four months out. With the choice being an undisciplined Mr. Trump or a cognitively impaired Mr. Biden, the temptation may be to check off None of the Above. Such a decision is okay if one is offered a rotten apple or a spoiled banana, but that is never the right verdict in an election. Sometimes we must vote for the least bad candidate but choose we must. This time the choice should be easy. It is the Party, not the candidate. Democrats have become radicalized to a degree unthinkable a few months ago. Daniel Henninger wrote in last Thursday’s Wall Street Journal that “this will be a revolutionary election.” Perhaps, but not revolutionary in the spirit of 1776. This time the “revolutionaries” are more interested in destruction than creation. Gone is the land of opportunity; the future they offer is nihilistic.