"End of the West? Not so Fast"

 The accompanying photo has nothing to do with today’s essay, but I loved the contrast of the snow-covered branches silhouetted against the bright blue sky.

 

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

 

Thought of the Day

“End of the West? Not so Fast.”

January 7, 2026

 

“In this character of the Americans, a love of freedom is the

predominating feature which marks and distinguishes the whole.”

                                                                                                                Edmund Burke

                                                                                                                Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies

                                                                                                                March 22, 1775

 

“What we once called the normative West no longer exists in this form.”

                                                                                                                Friedrich Merz, German Chancellor

                                                                                                                Speaking to business leaders in Berlin

                                                                                                                December 9, 2025

 

“My single most important responsibility as President is to keep the American people safe,” stated Barack Obama during his Presidency, a sentiment echoed by his successors, Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump. But what about their responsibilities to ensure those freedoms cited in our Declaration of Independence and guaranteed by our Constitution? Safety appears to have superseded freedom. Keeping people safe is an important government responsibility, but ensuring individual freedom is its most important duty.

 

In his first inaugural, Thomas Jefferson wrote of the need for “a wise and frugal Government, which will restrain men from injuring one another, [but] shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement...” In his letter from Birmingham jail (April 16, 1963), Martin Luther king wrote: “We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom.” Ludwig von Mises, in The Ultimate Foundation of Economic Science: An Essay on Method, defined what differentiates Western governments: [1] “The essential characteristic of Western civilization that distinguishes it from the arrested and petrified civilizations of the East was and is its concern for freedom from the state.” One has only to look at the plight of citizens in dozens of nations, from China to Venezuela, to recognize that freedom is our most valuable possession.

 

For many politicians, however the dependency of the people on government is an asset. What politician wants to ask their people to work harder or to save more to help ensure a brighter future. Yet, when the state assumes responsibilities better left to individuals, personal freedom lessens as restraints on choice take over. As the power of the state expands, people may feel safer, but it becomes riskier to speak out in opposition. 

 

Those politicians who prefer safety to freedom cite those places where individual freedom leads to personal choices, which, combined with differences in abilities and diligence, leads to vastly different outcomes. People are not equal in abilities. The best gymnast and the best physicist are masters of their respective crafts, but they could not switch places. Those who prefer freedom to safety have history on their side. Individual freedoms, along with the rule of law, the right to own property, tradition and personal virtue, are fundamental to the foundation on which Western civilization was built.   

 

Of course those who carry the greatest influence, teachers and the media, are overwhelmingly of the left, yet voter registration suggests a more nuanced nation – roughly 37% of voters nationally are registered as Democrats, 31% as Republicans, 28% as Independents, according to BallotPedia. In Connecticut, where I live and where all Congressional seats are held by Democrats, unaffiliated voters represent the largest bloc of registered voters at 42%. However, big government is still the preference of most politicians on the right as well as on the left. Benefits once granted are almost impossible to remove. Nevertheless, expanding welfare states have been accompanied with declines in marriages and births. More welfare spending impedes economic growth as investment dollars get diverted. They have, however, increased debt to a level where the easiest decision for a politician is to cheapen the currency. In this, Republicans have been as guilty as Democrats.

 

It is important to understand that individual freedoms, inherent to democracies and fundamental to our concept of the West, are always at risk, as they confound and hinder those who seek political power for personal purposes. “Freedom,” Ronald Reagan said in a 1961 speech in Phoenix, “is never more than one generation away from extinction.” Even so, as long as thought, debate and speech are not cancelled, the West has a weapon unavailable to tyrants – the power of individuals to speak and act.

 

Twice in my lifetime the West was threatened – in the mid 1930s through 1945 from Nazism and Fascism and from 1945 to 1991 by Soviet Communism. In both cases the West was ultimately triumphant, though at enormous costs in human lives. Today, external threats come from Islamic terrorists, a nuclear-armed Russia, and an aggressive Communist China. The latter seeks to extend her military, technological and economic control throughout the world. As well there are internal threats from those who seek to enlarge the role of government, by providing goodies, citing “fairness” and promising to keep us safe. In his January 1^st inaugural address as New York City’s new mayor, Zohran Mamdani spoke for those who see government as the answer to all life’s ills: “We will prove that there is no problem too large for government to solve, and no concern too small for it to care about.” Contrast his words with those of President Reagan (the greatest proponent of individual freedom in my lifetime) at a 1986 press conference where he cited the languages’ nine most terrifying words: “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.”  

 

What gives me hope is that there are indications that some in the West are backtracking on the nanny state – an excessively protective state that interferes with personal choice. Some signs: the declining influence of climate tyrants, skepticism regarding men competing against women in sports and “gender-affirming” (sex changes) for minors, expanding acceptance of the University of Chicago’s 1967 Kalven Report, which declared that a university is “the home and sponsor of critics but is not itself the critic,” and an acknowledgement that Black Lives Matter (BLM), always a divisive organization in a nation where all lives matter, has lost support. In 2020, when Nancy Pelosi took a knee, along with other publicity seekers, BLM had the support of 67% of the population. Today that is around 45%. The re-emergence of talk, at least in some quarters, of accountability, responsibility, mutual respect, and the celebration of our nation’s semiquincentennial all suggest the early stages of a return to the virtues that propelled Western civilization. 

 

Western civilization is not Utopia, it is not perfect. But it has provided more innovation, better economic and social outcomes, and more individual freedoms than any other. Can the West survive today’s assault on its bulwarks from without and within? The honest answer is no one knows.  But, despite Hollywood’s despicable reimaging of George Orwell’s Animal Farm to be released this spring, I suspect the answer is ‘yes.’ Threats to the West in the past have arisen and fallen. Current ones may worsen, but the call of freedom has echoed through the ages with a clarion tone. It is heard by people around the world.

 

 

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[1]What is referred to as the “West” should not be construed as a geographic term, but as those nations who adhere to the concept of individual freedom, so includes countries like Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand.