It’s been a golden week for reblogging, as some of my blogosphere buddies continue to generate some amazing content. It looks like I may have to do another Dissident Write feature soon (here are I and II). Armistice Day always brings out the best material, too.
As we head into the weekend—mercifully free of professional obligations—I’m pleased to note the revival of my buddy fridrix’s blog, Corporate History International.
It’s another late post today, as my post-New Jersey schedule is still a bit wonky. I just got done with a twelve-hour stint of uncling, so there was barely time to eat lunch, much less write a blog post—even a quick TBT feature.
Given the recent attacks on conservative journalist Andy Ngo, it seems apropos to dedicate this week’s #TBT to one of my classics of the modern, TPP 3.0 era: “Progressivism and Political Violence.” I wrote this essay back in June 2018, and I’ve probably linked to it more than any other post I’ve ever written, because it touches upon so much of the Left’s pathos.
I wrote at the time that, if the Left lost all the arms of the government, they would use extreme violence to accomplish their ends. That was before I fully appreciated how extensive and pervasive the Deep State truly is—the Left is so entrenched, it can never really be out of power in the current state of play.
Before beginning today’s post, a quick note about last Friday night’s concert: the whole thing came off smashingly. My buddy John and I gave a 90-minute performance at a coffee shop in Hartsville, South Carolina, Crema Coffee Bar, where we’ve played a number of such shows in the past.
This show was, easily, the most fun I’ve had playing this particular venue, our home-away-from-home in Hartsville. John and I took turns playing original tunes, and we both unveiled new selections, John debuting an Irish tragedy entitled “The Sailor,” and I introducing my latest irreverent comedy tune, “Private Lessons (Goth Chick).”
We also enjoyed an excellent turnout, which is not to be taken for granted. Live music doesn’t always have the appeal it once did, and sometimes promoting a show can come across as a bit needy—“please come listen to us!”—especially as everyone you know is in a band these days. Fortunately, our friends and fans were hugely supportive, and it seemed like a capacity crowd at the height of the show. A YUGE “thank-you” to everyone who came out.
My next tour stop is the Juggling Gypsy in Wilmington, North Carolina, on Friday, August 3, starting around 9 PM. You can learn more at www.tjcookmusic.com or on my Facebook page.
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I’ve written a bit about space exploration and the formation of Space Force on this blog, and I’ve long been an advocate semi-publicly of expansion into space. Neil deGrasse Tyson wrote an essay in Foreign Affairs when I still subscribed to the globalist rag that had me jumping for joy. The essay, “The Case for Space,” is one of the best apologias written for the benefits we would reap from funding additional space exploration. Tyson is a poor political pundit, and his fanboyish acolytes are so annoying, they reflect poorly on him, but he knows what he’s talking about when it comes to space.
I’m a fiscal, as well as a social, conservative, but I’m all about spending gobs of government cash on space exploration—and colonization. I realize I’m committing the same error everyone does—“don’t spend my tax dollars… except on all this stuff I personally like or agree with”—but I see a role for the government in space exploration that makes sense constitutionally and functionally, in a way that, say, free bus fare for war widows isn’t.
Like Newt Gingrich—the other great modern essayist on space exploration—I see expansion into space as akin to westward expansion in the nineteenth century. There were a lot of hardy pioneers that took the risks and were “rugged individualists”—but the government granted generous loans and tracts of land to railroad companies to open up those lands. The government—largely Republican-controlled after the American Civil War—played a role in catalyzing western expansion.
Similarly, we see a mix of entrepreneurship and government support today, although the government seems bogged down in its usual bureaucratic inefficiencies, while the hot-shot mega-billionaire flyboys are taking the major risks. Nevertheless, Gingrich wrote over the weekend about this very topic, marking the 49th anniversary of the moon landing.
As usual, the Trump administration, as Gingrich writes, is thinking “big league” when it comes to space, and Vice President Michael Pence is heading up a revived National Space Council. The NSC is charged with exploring placing bases on the moon to reduce the costs of launches, which would be much more fuel-efficient in the moon’s reduced gravitational field (which is one-sixth that of Earth’s).
In a larger, cultural sense—since I’m not versed enough in the technical side of this subject, I’m deflecting to where I can bloviate on slightly more solid ground—I don’t understand the disinterest in, even hostility toward, space exploration. In general, I’m dismayed by the lack of pioneering derring-do and spirit in American culture today. Aren’t we descended from rugged frontiersmen and women who crossed oceans, forded rivers, climbed mountains, and endured dysentery to get here?
A few years ago, I stumbled upon one of those writers I love—a slightly fringe character who writes about weird, just-outside-of-the-mainstream topics. The author in question is James D. Heiser, a bishop in the Evangelical Lutheran Diocese of North America and a founding member of the Mars Society, a group that aims to put Americans on Mars.
I first stumbled upon Heiser after reading a review of his book “The American Empire Should Be Destroyed”: Alexander Dugin and the Perils of the Immanentized Eschatology, which is about the titular figure, an eccentric, Rasputin-like character who advises Vladimir Putin in some capacity. That book led me to another Heiser work, Civilization and the New Frontier: Reflections on Virtue and the Settlement of a New World, a collection of essays—mostly his introductory remarks at various Mars Society annual conventions—about the settlement of Mars.
The basic argument is that the quest to settle new worlds will stretch Americans not just scientifically, but spiritually: in striving for the stars, we’ll cultivate the classical virtues that make civilization possible, and, in the process, reinvigorate our earthly civilization.
I believe there’s something to this thesis. Struggle—be it the struggle to survive on the hostile Martian plains, or to make ends meet here on Earth—breeds growth. Adversity is the heat that tempers the iron of the soul.
Space has much to offer: abundant natural resources, the thrill of discovery, hot alien babes (just kidding about that last one). But it also has the potential to inspire future generations of Americans to reach for the stars—both physically, and spiritually.
On Tuesday, I wrote about the “Human Toll of Globalization“—the dire consequences, both economic and moral, that befall a community when its primary economic engine is gutted through a naïve faith in unbridled free trade and globalization. Another title for that piece might be almost a mirror of this essay’s from 2016: “Civil Society Needs Cash.”
I don’t want to take that argument too far, though. In the case of Danville, Virginia—and countless other American towns that have seen their prosperity flee abroad, or to bicoastal urban cloisters—a decaying economy wrought decaying morality, civil society, and civic pride. That would suggest that prosperity, in and itself, cannot sustain true morality and virtue.
Indeed, as I argue in the essay below, “Capitalism Needs Social Conservatism,” excessive prosperity and material comfort breed a kind of moral complacency, what Kenneth Minogue likened to widespread Epicureanism (an excellent essay, and well worth reading if you don’t mind subscribing to The New Criterion, which is also worth the price). Richard Weaver—one of my intellectual heroes—compared the material comfort of the then-mid-twentieth-century West to a drunk who, having grown addicted to alcohol, and requiring ever-greater quantities of it, no longer has the capacity to obtain the very substance he craves.
Milton Friedman famously argued that economic liberty is a necessary precursor to political liberty. Similarly, I would argue that morality and virtue are necessary pillars to sustaining economic liberty for any length of time. Indeed, George Washington argued that religion and public morality were “indispensable” to a self-governing republic.
In my mind, the orthodox libertarian (in the political sense, not the “free-will” libertarianism of the free-will-versus-determinism debate in modern philosophy) commits the same error as the orthodox Marxist in relying too much on economic analysis of behavior. The idea of the “rational man” or “man as a rational animal” is a uniquely modern concept, and while Westerners have tried hard to shoe-horn themselves into that mold, the inner, teeming depths of our souls are still pre-rationalist. We need God, and we still live according to symbols, rituals, and virtues.
As I wrote in 2016, “Without moral common ground and shared values that stress self-control, liberty rapidly turns to libertinism. Libertinism without a great deal of wealth leads to shattered lives, which in turn wreck families and communities.” I’ll explore these ideas further in my upcoming eBook, Values Have Consequences.
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For the past week, I’ve written about the decline of the nuclear family, with follow-up posts about divorce and sex education, and about the negative impact of the of the welfare state on family formation. These post have generated some wonderful discussions and input from followers, and I’ve been surprised by their popularity.
As I wrote in “Values Have Consequences,” I’m devoting Friday posts to discussions of social conservatism. Social conservatism is increasingly the red-headed stepchild of the traditional Republican “tripod” coalition that also includes national security and economic conservatives (with the rise of Trump, populist nationalism could count as a fourth leg). Politically, this marginalization makes some sense, as it’s not likely that fifty or sixty years of cultural attitudes and values will be changed at the ballot box.
Nevertheless, social conservatism is an important leg of the tripod. Indeed, I would argue that the three coalitions are not at odds, but create logical synergies that allow each leg to stand. The stool is much more stable when the three legs work together.
Economic conservatism–by which I mean the belief that freer markets, fewer and lighter regulations, and lower taxes, or what is more properly called neoliberalism (after the classical liberalism of the 18th-century thinkers like Adam Smith)–is wonderful and hugely important. It’s led to massive gains domestically and globally, lifting untold millions off people out of poverty. It allows people to enjoy a greater variety of goods and labor-saving devices, and provides more leisure time (and plenty of things to do during that time).
But free markets unmoored from guiding principles, strong and stable institutions, and the rule of law can morph into mindless Mammon worship. Without a shared sense of trust and belief in human dignity, capitalism becomes cold and abstract.
Further, full-fledged economic liberalization without the limiting principles applied by constitutionalism and a morality supported by strong families and a robust civil society can lead to socially-destructive disruptions and behaviors.
As I’ve argued many times, making mistakes or bad choices is the necessary price of liberty. But for self-government to work effectively–and to avoid social instability–a healthy dose of social conservatism is the best medicine.
To offer an illustration from recent history, contrast the post-Soviet experiences of Poland (and most of Eastern Europe) with that of Russia. Despite decades under Communism–an ideology that was aggressively atheistic, stressing loyalty to the state and Communist Party over all else–Poland roared back into the West. It adopted neoliberal (modern conservative) economic policies, and was one of the few European nations not to suffer severely during the Great Recession.
Russia similarly adopted “shock therapy” after the Soviet Union collapsed for good in 1991. Rather than experiencing a huge economic boom, however, well-connected former Communists and others close to the old regime made off like bandits, leaving most Russians left holding the bag.
What’s the difference? For one, the Russians lived under Communism for nearly a generation longer than the Poles, meaning there were several generations of downtrodden, state-dependent Russians by the time the USSR collapsed. Many of these Russians were unable to adjust to a free-market system after living in a closed economy for so long.
Another key difference–and one that I think is extremely significant–is that Russians lost any scrap of civil society they might have possessed prior to the Bolshevik takeover in late 1917. Civil society–the institutions between the basic family unit and the government, like churches, schools, clubs, civic organizations, etc.–was automatically preempted when every club, organization, or activity became part of the Soviet government. The severely crippled (and, as I understand it, collaborationist) Russian Orthodox Church was unable or unwilling to push back against Soviet rule, providing little in the way of a spiritual alternative to the totalizing influence of Communism.
“[F]ree markets unmoored from guiding principles, strong and stable institutions, and the rule of law can morph into mindless Mammon worship.”
Poland, on the other hand, managed to maintain its deep Catholic faith. The Catholic Church as an international organization (and with powerful, influential popes, most notably the Polish anti-Communist John Paul II) could never be wiped out completely by Soviet Communism. Further, the Poles formed the Solidarity trades union movement, which offered an alternative to official Communist organizations.
Thus, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Poland emerged with a strong civil society anchored in a richly Christian worldview and ethic. The shared sense of morality–one that stresses mutual respect, the dignity of human life, and the importance of honesty–allowed the complex deals and uptempo economic exchanges of capitalism to occur smoothly and rapidly. From these civil and religious values came a firmer grasp of and respect for the rule of law, making predictable economic activity and long-term planning possible.
Russia, on the other hand, devolved into a fast-paced, nationwide run on the national cupboard. Those with good connections grabbed whatever public funds and goodies they could. Normal Russians couldn’t figure out why their government checks and free lunches stopped coming, and couldn’t understand why (or how) to pay taxes. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, all civic organizations ceased to exist, because they were all part of the Soviet government. Without any civil society or other enduring institutions to model good behavior and to stress and enforce moral values, Russia struggled–and continues to do so–to adapt to global capitalism and democracy. Not surprisingly, they’ve turned to a dictatorial strongman for guidance.
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What of the American context? As I’ve written before, I’m skeptical of full-fledged libertarianism–what I would broadly define as the marriage of economically conservative and socially liberal views–because it fails to acknowledge the need for strong moral values to uphold its own economic assumptions. Liberty and self-government can only really work when coupled with self-imposed order and restraint. Without moral common ground and shared values that stress self-control, liberty rapidly turns to libertinism. Libertinism without a great deal of wealth leads to shattered lives, which in turn wreck families and communities.
Eventually, unbridled, unchecked lasciviousness–even among (formerly) responsible adults–results in social chaos, requiring a dwindling number of hardworking, honest, and thrifty individuals to pay for the ramifications of poor moral choices that have been magnified many times over.
“[L]ibertarianism… fails to acknowledge the need for strong moral values to uphold its own economic assumptions. Liberty and self-government can only really work when coupled with self-imposed order and restraint.”
Capitalism’s blessing of unparalleled abundance is also a potential curse. Without a strong civil society that stresses good moral values–and without proper historical perspective–it becomes easy to take that abundance for granted.
That abundance also allows, for a time, more and more individuals to pay for the price of bad decisions. Prior to the modern era, few people were wealthy enough to risk the negative consequences of immorality. Now, Americans and Westerners enjoy a level of material comfort and well-being that can absorb at least some of the unpleasantness of questionable choices. Over time, however, that security breaks down.
Richard Weaver likened the situation to an alcoholic who is so addicted to his drink, he’s unable to do the work necessary to pay for his addiction. The more he needs the alcohol, the less capable he becomes of obtaining it. Likewise, the more individuals become addicted to luxuries, the less able they are to work hard to maintain them.
To avoid the fate of Weaver’s drunk, we must recognize the importance of social conservatism. While we should maximize individual liberty as much as possible, and within the bounds of the Constitution, we should also stress the moral and religious underpinnings that make that liberty both possible and responsible.
This past Monday night, President Trump nominated Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, predictably sending progressives into apoplectic (and apocalyptic) fits of self-righteous virtue-signaling and white-knighting. Naturally, Leftists realize their decades-long project of circumventing representative government through the courts might backfire—when you create an excessively powerful institution and lose control of it, you start to worry that weapon will be turned back on you.
There’s been a great deal of analysis since then of Kavanaugh and how his nomination might shift the direction of the Court. I’m not steeped enough in the details to make a judgment call myself, though it seems that Kavanaugh is remarkably experienced, and interprets the Constitution fairly narrowly (in the sense that he’s not one to create “emanations of penumbras” of rights or legislate from the bench).
I’m a bit concerned that he’ll be too restrained, a la Chief Justice John Roberts, who disastrously upheld the Affordable Care Act twice, the second time largely on the grounds that the Court should avoid overturning what legislatures enact. That’s a good impulse generally, but not when the plain language of the act states something contrary to what the Court rules, and the Court deciding that Congress “meant to write it another way” is a funny way of exercising judicial “restraint.”
Regardless, my sense is that Kavanaugh is a solid and safe pick. I’d much rather have seen, say, Utah Senator Mike Lee get the nomination—there’s no ambiguity about his commitment to constitutionalism—but Kavanaugh might stand a better chance of surviving his confirmation vote (after a predictably theatrical bout of boisterous dissent from doomsday-speaking Democratic Senators).
But I digress. In attempting to analyze the Supreme Court, Conservative Review‘s Joseph Koss has applied a nifty little model to try to make sense of where the Court has been, and where it might be headed with the addition of Kavanaugh.
Koss is quick to point out that he’s not completely satisfied with this model—he applies the classic Dungeons and Dragons alignment system (the nerd in me is rejoicing)—and that some justices don’t quite fit into one of the nine slots, but he explains his placements thoroughly and carefully.
Check out his analysis here: https://mailchi.mp/ab9d22079504/supreme-court-alignment?e=0d04a04a52
He also invites readers to tell him how wrong he is here.
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What do you think, TPP readers? Is Kavanaugh a slam-dunk pick? A Washington-insider swamp creature sell-out? A rock-ribbed conservative? Leave your thoughts and comments below!
The modern Left idealizes political violence. That’s a bold statement, but it’s true, and the truth of that claim dates back to the French Revolution. That revolution—so different from our own—was the root of almost all totalitarian movements in the 20th century, and of the American Left’s current mood for mob activity in the name of “progress.”
The big story in the world of the American Right this week has been Democratic Congresswoman “Auntie” Maxine Waters’s calls for active disruption of Trump administration officials in their private lives, to the point of harassing them at restaurants, department stores, and gas stations—even picketing at their homes, as happened to Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen‘s home twice.
Waters’s execrable remarks—and her blasphemous contention that “God is on our side” (if she’s referring to Baal, the ancient Canaanite fertility god who worshipers tried to appease with child sacrifices, I’m sure he is pleased with Democrats’ support of abortion, but THE One True God must be weeping constantly over those lost lives)—were inspired by the ouster of White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders from the Red Hen, a restaurant in Lexington, Virginia. In a Fox News interview after the fact, Sanders’s father, former Arkansas Governor and bassist Mike Huckabee, alleged that the progressive owner of the restaurant followed the Sanders party down the street, heckling them.
None of these events, in my mind, are surprising, but, rather, a reminder of the progressive Left’s taste for violence—or, at the very least, of achieving its long-term political goals by “any means necessary” (a slogan of the so-called “Resistance”).
Recall the soon-forgotten shooting of congressional Republicans last year as they practiced for Congress’s annual interparty baseball game. That attack, the fevered result of a Bernie Bro’s break with reality, nearly killed Louisiana Congressman Steve Scalise. It’s easy to forget the anti-Trump hysteria of 2017 (because the anti-Trump hysteria of 2018—after the President’s proven himself in office—seems even more unhinged), but the Left was out for blood after the Inauguration, with pink-hatted activists shouting at the sky in protest.
The Left has taken America’s cold civil war hot because it doesn’t control any of the levers of power in government. With the retirement of swing Justice Anthony Kennedy, progressives may see their last ace-in-the-hole, the courts, lost for a generation (to be clear, the Left is still dominant in academia, pop culture, the arts, major non-profits, the corporate world, and pretty much everything that isn’t the federal and State governments). The last tactic, then, is to amp up their social intimidation to borderline—and, if necessary, actual—violence.
Consider that the Left can only push forward its agenda for any length of time through means of coercive power (although maudlin emotional manipulation comes in handy, too, and works well with easily-manipulated “feel-good” types). Traditionally, that’s been through the power of the state—the massive reach of the federal government.
It was the modern political Left, growing out of the Progressive movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, that brought first the New Deal, and then the Fair Deal and the Great Society, that vastly expanded the size, scope, and reach of federal power.
While Americans were largely content with some government assistance during the throes of the Depression—and naively believed that the federal government could actively solve the nation’s problems after the Second World War, given the government’s success in fighting that global conflict—they could not stomach actual Marxism. So it was that Democrats began gradually to lose their mid-twentieth-century vice grip on the ballot box.
With the rise of the “New Right” in the 1960s and 1970s, followed by the election of His Eminence Ronaldus Magnus in 1980, Leftists increasingly turned to the courts to fulfill by judicial fiat what could not be achieved at the ballot box.
Take, for example, the overturning of California’s ballot initiative, Proposition 8, to amend the State’s constitution to outlaw same-sex marriage. In California—the beating heart of the modern progressive movement—a small cadre of unelected officials overturned the will of the people.
Similarly, Justice Kennedy more or less decided that federalism doesn’t matter, and we should believe that the Founding Fathers meant to support casual same-sex boning, but just forgot to put it in the Constitution (I have friends who support same-sex marriage who disagree with the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling, arguing that it oversteps the Supreme Court’s constitutional authority).
The courts were the back-up plan. I’ve actually read (anecdotal evidence alert) some progressives posting on Facebook to the effect that, “Well, we overplayed the judicial activism thing for too long, and we relied on it at the expense of electoral victory.” Those comments are rare—more of them are childish weeping and/or promises to move to Canada or “stop joking around.”
Now that President Trump is in the White House, Republicans control Congress, and the Supreme Court is ready to tip narrowly toward constitutional originalism, Leftists are apoplectic, and are showing their true colors. They have two choices: make a compelling case to the American people to elect more Democrats in November, or double-down on hysteria and send us hurtling closer towards the Second American Civil War.
While there’s been much talk of a “blue wave” this November, the Left’s outbursts and fascistic tactics seem to be hurting Democrats nationally. That doesn’t mean they won’t take the House or the Senate—after all, some of these districts are so blue they keep voting in borderline illiterates like Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas—but their chances are narrowing.
Even if they do take control of one or both chambers, President Trump will still control the executive branch, and, as yet, has done nothing impeachable (being crude or saying awesome stuff on Twitter don’t qualify as “high crimes and misdemeanors”). Sure, they might try, but it would be like the Radical Republicans impeaching President Andrew Johnson for ignoring an unconstitutional act of Congress—purely politically-motivated.
If there is impeachment in the House, it will fail—Trump will not be removed from office by the Senate—the Democrats will find themselves stuck for another two years with a president they irrationally despise. The way things are going, he’s likely to win reelection in 2020 (please, sweet Lord).
But all of this is conjecture. There’s a good chance Republicans hold onto the House and pick up vulnerable Democratic seats in the Senate (such as Heidi Heitkamp’s seat in North Dakota). What then? With a new conservative Supreme Court justice, the Left is marginalized at the federal level, other than their Deep State cronies.
My guess is that we’ll see more insanity and violence before we see less. The Left will double-down on this progressive agenda for a decade, until a moderate, Bill Clinton-style moderate appears, or the economy turns sour (not likely!), or they can cobble together another Obama-style rainbow coalition.
The question is, will their propensity for political violence boil over into full-scale warfare and defiance of constitutional authority? We’ve already seen California nullify federal law by refusing to enforce immigration law. Distrust between people of different political backgrounds is at feverish highs.
Beyond some fringe kooks, no one on the American Right wants to see violence. But the progressive Left’s deep-rooted love of “punching Nazis” and strangling dissent won’t broach much room for disagreement.
We’re living in scary times.
Ever since President Trump ordered the creation of Space Force earlier this week, I’ve read a lot of snarky Facebook posts and the like mocking the idea.
Some of these posts consist of the usual arm-chair analysis: “Trump did it to distract from the child separation crisis!” and the like (if you look at the timing of the child separation crisis issue, though, it seems like something Democrats ginned up to distract from the IG report released last week).
Much of what I’m reading, though, consists essentially of, “Wow, what a stupid idea. Like we need to have a military in space,” or the more bleeding-heart, “Why do we want to dominate space. LOVE TRUMPS HATE!” That latter one is usually followed up with a link to the Wikipedia entry for the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, as if some Gene Rodenberry-style, early Star Trek-esque treaty is going to keep the ChiComs from building a death laser on the moon (don’t laugh—the Chinese are just wily enough to do it). I’m tired of people using the name of a meaningless treaty in lieu of an actual argument.
When did we stop dreaming? What happened to that Gene Rodenberry-style, early Star Trek-esque drive for space exploration? I realize much of this animosity toward the idea is knee-jerk partisanship: bearded hipsters who probably still sleep in Star Wars pajamas hate Trump so much that they can’t get behind this amazing idea. If Obama had ordered it, they’d be throwing craft beer tasting parties sponsored by Blue Moon.
But I also suspect that Americans aren’t dreaming big anymore. I read a little bit by National Review‘s Charles C. W. Cooke some years ago in which he talked about how great his WiFi-enabled gadgets were, and he essentially argued that we needed to appreciate the future we have instead of the sci-fi rock opera vision of the future we want (R2-D2 playing the bass guitar, taking summer vacation on the moon, using lightsabers, etc.).
While I am incredibly thankful that I can find clips like the one above in mere seconds (even if it is in another language)—and to have vast storehouses of human knowledge mere keystrokes away—does that really mean that’s all there is? Is it ungrateful to say, “Hey, this is incredible—how about even more cool innovations?”
Space is the final—and endless—frontier. As such, it will be the next battleground of human conflict. Instead of laughing at the idea of Space Force, let’s figure out how to make it an efficient, effective fighting force to ensure that liberty endures beyond the 21st century—and our pale, blue dot.
My morning ritual involves drinking coffee from a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles mug (you may want to reconsider how much you take my analysis to heart, dear reader) and watching various podcasts/vlogs on YouTube, usually Ben Shapiro (or one of his colleagues), Steven Crowder, or Scott Adams.
So, one morning this week I saw an ad featuring the tantalizing E3 trailer for Fallout 76. For the uninitiated, the Fallout series of games posits an alternate future in which the United States and China slugged it out in a thermonuclear war during the mid-twentieth century, and decades (or centuries) later humanity emerges from various “vaults” (elaborate, underground bomb shelters) to reclaim the radioactive wastelands around them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=M9FGaan35s0
The E3 Trailer for Fallout 76. You should watch it at the very least for the great cover of John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads“
Yes, it’s all quite nerdy, but when you’re a ten-year old boy trapped in a hairy man’s body—and have read a lot of Cold War history—it’s the kind of thing that gets you excited in the morning.
What really excited me about this announcement is that Fallout 76 takes place in Appalachia—specifically, a big ol’ chunk of West Virginia. Most Fallout games take place in the ash-strewn ruins of metropolitan areas, including Washington, D.C., Las Vegas, and Boston. Other than the rural deserts of Nevada, the game has not delved much into an almost-exclusively rural region (more die-hard fans will surely object; I’m not as familiar with the first two Fallout games and their settings, other than they seem to be focused on California; respectful corrections are welcome).
I’d always wondered what it would be like to experience a post-apocalyptic South Carolina (digitally, to be clear; fortunately, it looks like President Trump is ensuring we won’t have to do so for real), and have been hoping for a Fallout game set in the rural South. West Virginia isn’t really the South—I’m sure that will rile up further controversy—but it’s close enough. I assume that, if nuclear Armageddon were to occur, the best place to be would be somewhere rural enough the ChiComs wouldn’t try to blow it up.
So, what does this have to do with politics, the purported purpose of this portly page? Vanishingly little, other than it is cool to see a major video game set in the heart of Trump Country.
But the game’s setting has had an interesting economic impact. Apparently, online searches pertaining to tourism to West Virginia have shot up; the site West Virginia Explorer has seen fifteen times the traffic since the game was announced. The theme park Camden Park has seen an increase in calls for merchandise and inquiries about ticket sales.
West Virginia has struggled economically, especially during the Obama administration’s war on coal, and while it has enjoyed a mild comeback under President Trump, it’s still a very poor State.
Further, one usually one only sees video games in the news when some specious talking head claims they cause violence (they don’t), so it’s refreshing to see one having a positive effect on a beautiful State that could surely benefit from the tourism dollars.
My recommendation for the next Fallout game? Set that sucker in the ruins of Charleston, South Carolina… or maybe Cheraw.
Retired U.S. Navy Captain Jerry Hendrix has a piece up at National Review Online entitled “Space: The New Strategic Heartland” in which he urges Congress and the Department of Defense to establish a “Space Force” and to get serious about space exploration and colonization. It’s an excellent read, and makes some compelling points about why space is, truly, the final frontier.
Captain Hendrix bases his analysis in “heartland theory,” developed in 1904 by British geographer Halford Mackinder. 114 years ago, Mackinder argued that the “heartland” of future geostrategic conflict was Eurasia. Decades later, as Hendrix explains, former President Richard Nixon wrote that the Middle East and Africa—with their vast mineral resources—would hold the key to determining the victor in the Cold War (influence in these regions, Nixon argued, would determine whether capitalism or communism would prevail).
Now, Hendrix makes the case that space is the new “heartland,” and makes some intriguing points to that effect. Anyone who has followed the career and writings of former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich will be familiar with these arguments; indeed, a decade ago I wrote a rough draft of a paper arguing for lunar colonization on similar grounds.
To summarize, they are as follows:
If space is going to remain a competitive domain, the United States will have to take the lead. I shudder to think of a Chinese controlled-moon, for example. I know it sounds batty, but do you really want the Chinese constructing a lunar death laser? They have the manpower and disregard for human life to do it.
There is room, too, for a conservative approach to space exploration, and we shouldn’t reflexively recoil at government involvement in this regard, so long as it’s done the right way. Just like the Homestead Act of 1862 (Gingrich actually proposed a “Homestead Act” for the moon!) or the role of the federal government in leasing lands for railroad companies, Congress can provide the framework for space exploration and colonization that would allow the free-market and private enterprise to kick in and work their magic.
What we should avoid is a bureaucracy that is so obsessed with “safety” and “diversity” that our space program is stillborn in its terrestrial cradle. Fortunately, there is a way forward, and Newt Gingrich delivers again.
Shortly after winning the South Carolina Republican presidential primary in 2012, Gingrich gave a speech in Florida in which he promised that, by the end of his second term as President (sigh… if only), we’d have a colony on the moon. When he gave this speech, I began hooping like a silver-backed gorilla—and immediately donated $100 from my meager 2012 salary to his campaign. He was widely derided for this position, but John F. Kennedy made a similarly bold claim in his young presidency—and, sure enough, by 1969, we had a man on the moon.
Since then, Gingrich has remained a strong supporter of space exploration. Indeed, he’s written on the topic twice recently, and I would encourage readers to explore his ideas further (I should note that I am heartened to see so many writers suddenly taking an interest in space exploration again).
1.) “A Glimpse of America’s Future in Space in 2024” (22 April 2018): http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2018/04/22/newt-gingrich-glimpse-america-s-future-in-space-in-2024.html
2.) “Entrepreneurs will change space exploration (31 May 2018): https://good-politic.com/newt-gingrich-entrepreneurs-will-change-space-exploration/2614/
The economy is swinging again, American patriotism is back in style, and President Trump is a bold reformer who dreams and acts big (league). America is perfectly poised to build upon our already substantial lead in space exploration, and frontiers are our specialty.
Let’s go to Mars! Let’s build a colony on the moon! Let’s mine asteroids!
The Portly Politico 
