Already as a newcomer to the US and a first semester student of Political Science this writer has been impressed by two contradictory facts about America. One was that by any standard Americas is a highly successful society. The other insight had been that my new country chronically underperformed in the foreign policy realm. Both conditions were as perceived then and as held today not accidental.
The foregoing has consequences. One is that the facts should not be explained away and that the key to success should be unearthed and applied. Second when choosing a topic foreign affairs should be avoided in case one harbors the desire to be read. Knowing all that here follows another obdurate attempt to discuss an aspect of the state of the world for the benefit of a reluctant American audience.
Regarding Americas current global status there are two contradictory realities. One is that due to the repulsive image projected by her President the US is isolated. Left alone by an alienated global public the country is headed for doom. The other reality is that having broken with restraints that have served elites better than the cause of clarity America finds itself in the midst of a barroom fight among cultures. On one side are the defenders of a restraining propriety. It downscales the ability of a success-proven lifestyle to assert itself as it endeavors to secure its survival. All that worked and works is tainted as it reflects prejudice against everything that enjoys privileged status. Chirping from the high perch of moral superiority that violates the standards of decency set by the priesthood of political correctness. With no reversal of the course and no apology on the horizon the excommunication provoked by success issued from trend-setting parlors is universal.
There is a storm that blows from the opposite direction. It exists it is vigorous and it is gaining in strength. Whether an observer agrees or denies the growing trend he cheers or bemoans depends on his point of reference. The media depict the bad boys" Trump Orbn Kurz Kaczinsky Salvini as pushed back to the modern equivalent of St. Helena (where a banished Napoleon spent his final days). This picture suggests that as the water rises these reactionary representatives of evil and ignorance are about to say uncle. However looking around and registering uncensured facts the impression is that the besieged ramparts held by the political class are crumbling. No surprise. Elites have declared war on the deplorables" because they dared to contradict them. The more the mass becomes alienated from the system that ignores its interests the greater the insubordination.
From Poland through the Czech Republic down to Hungary then in Italy and in France also in Brexit England a growing segment of the population found that its left-liberal ruling class has failed its cause. Why only now?" could be the question. Past failures could be covered up by those that controlled the mass media. Those botches were for the casual observer not self-evident -you cannot see the national debt- and the reversals cause remained unclear to the suggestible. Then came a crisis created by the political class that could not be denied and whose bungling could not be hidden from common-sense driven new majorities.
The crisis of the new type" centers around the matter of immigration. The challenge unfolds along two wings. Driven by ideology the governing elite invited a mass. Due to its volume and the imported attitude it proved to be unassimilable by communities with a national identity and an advanced economy. The catalyst that initiated the revolt of the masses had been the new members of the European Union. For centuries these countries have suffered under alien rule and they had withstood attempts to deprive them of their identity.
This experience made these members of the EU sensitive to threats to their identity and motivated them to protect their independence regardless of liberal dogma. Due to their history these countries rate independence as a precondition to live by their values. With that they locate in a reality that differs from Europes Wests. Also they have a different culture than the lucky countries whose existence has not been threatened by extermination. In this context the entry of a mass that disrespects their ways meets determined resistance. It is amplified because the Islamism of those that claim a right to protection profess to be a wave of conquest which recalls a historic struggle against the same invader.
Western Europes increasingly disobedient voters constitute the other arm of the attack on left-liberal elites. The multiculturalism that the spear-head" of high-minded morality imposes suggests that in practice the theory is bankrupt. Rising crime rates the flaunting of the postulates that are the cornerstones of the democratic order and resisted integration tell that multiculturalisms assumptions are unsound. The once misled not only ignore their leaders admonitions they also flock to parties that dare to call a dud a failure and that promise to break with present-day practices. It is to be noted that the popular abandonment of left-liberal policies extends beyond the forced hosting of uninvited migrants.
As more dare to call a spade a spade skepticism articulates itself at a rising volume. A driving force is that the awareness grows that migrants posing as non-violent refugees are taken as a whole not only violent but also menacingly assertive. Some are even sufficiently unwise to put that into quotable words. That makes out of the right to settle a human right and from its assertion follows the related claim to impose the newcomers ways on the faithless indigenous.
It might be superfluous to point out that the developments in Europe have an American equivalent. It is expressed by the caravan" that moves to the southern border. The arguments of its supporters correlate with what rouses Europe.
The politicized intellectual class expresses its prejudices by the support of its concept of migration. Migration is said to be a right and as such it is limited only by the will of its participants that may ignore the laws of the targeted countries. An origin of this belief is that the moral imperative to combat nationalism" implies that nation states are a source of political sins which makes them illegitimate. Ergo ignoring them becomes an act of virtue. If communities that define themselves as nations lack ethical legitimacy then diluting them serves the cause of decency by creating a homogenous and through practiced brotherly sharing united world.
Since the dawn of democracy the ideologies that attract intellectuals tend to assert that that the educated and morally fit governing element represents the real people. A conflict between the qualified and the masses expresses the immaturity of the numerical majority. This supremacy of quality becomes a moral right to disregard the immature mass that must be saved by corrective re-education.
Such ideas divide populations into qualified leaders and those born to follow the flare carried by the select. Advanced societies produce masses defined by having escaped poverty self-confidence and education. These traits create emancipated individuals that are difficult to lead. Imported migrants will remain dependent and as such in need of benefactors. This condition assures the supremacy of the power elite that can give protection and offer the bread and circus" devised by Roman Emperors who resorted to hand-outs to secure their power.
On the day when election results from Brazil and Germany become public a conclusion demands to be inserted here. Whatever the hoped-for benefits of relying on captive voters and touting elitism might be on the ground the attempt crashes. Traditional parties that endeavor to lead while ignoring their emancipated public experience electoral disasters. Regardless of the upshot of the US mid-terms we have entered a new era of public affairs. The result promises to be a fundamental global realignment led by new political types. The results will leave few things the way they used to be before".
