BALANCING ACT

Increasingly Mr. Donald Trump is becoming the fulcrum on which our democratic republic balances, and he has not shown, yet, that he is rigid enough to affect the balance.  This is not to say he isn’t tough.  The constant attacks, threats of impeachment since inauguration, and unusual hatred, would wilt lesser men, and often has.  Much has been made of the turnover in Trump’s administration, as if it represented “chaos” in the administration.  While it may yield a little “chaos,” it is temporary.  The problem is that Trump believes that when someone is hired, he or she owes an outward loyalty, at least, to the “boss.”

What has taken him some time to recognize is that every – as in, every single one – person in a position to execute policy or influence policy, has an agenda.  Worse, since the Obama administration, agendas in Washington are no longer matters of how to accomplish national goals, no nuanced approaches to policy.  Agendas now are only to accept or to oppose the direction desired by the elected president.  Many of those recommended for top appointments, especially on matters of international policy, held an agenda of opposition, and deserved replacement.  The president now must become very strict towards his appointees, and this mood must extend deeper and deeper into the many agencies who are happy to oppose him.  (see: http://www.prudenceleadbetter.com/2019/11/28/due-process/ )

Is Trump up for this?  It is hard to tell.  He seems not to take very much advice, else someone would have tempered his Tweeting; on the other hand, his selections for judgeships reveal good work and recommendation by someone else.  Still, he has not been as thorough in replacing appointees as his predecessor was, and many of those in the White House, State Department, Department of Justice and the “Intelligence Community,” are actively opposed to Trump, his background, his style of work and speech, and to his America-first policies.  Their allies in the Congress and other covens of Democrat-leftists, have done their worst to hamstring the president since he first appeared to have a chance at the nomination, never mind the election.

Despite the roadblocks and mistreatment by much of the press, Trump has managed to accomplish quite a bit, and he has changed the nature of American diplomacy somewhat.  Will it all bear fruit?  It is impossible to say, but certainly no more impossible to predict than have been the results of “normal,” deep-state diplomacy over the past 50 years.  The best way to guarantee the predicted outcomes in all that time has been for the United States to give up more – including sovereignty – than we ever have asked… or received in return.  Predictions of opposing sides’ accepting all the American largesse our “negotiators” could give away, always came true.

One hopes that should we not obtain the quality of a deal we need for U. S. benefit, that our “side” will stay strong and not immediately throw more value to the other side in order to “win” some sort of a deal that politicians can crow about, knowing that after a few dust-ups, most voters will forget what was even at stake and accept that the deal we got is better than “not talking” at all.  This is national hogwash, of course, and it stems from a general attitude of American unworthiness compared to other nations’ interests.  Trump supporters want a bull-dog negotiating for our side, both domestically and internationally.

At some point, one would surmise, the mendacity of the FBI, the CIA, the State Department and even the Obama White House, and the 3-year story of failing to prove any – as in, not even one – of the amazing allegations against Donald Trump and his appointees and supporters, would begin to dissipate the hot tempers that accompanied those allegations, both personal and legal.  At some point, the charges of “racism” and “sexism” should abate; the so-far indefatigable charges of “collusion” with Russians, well-debunked at great effort and expense, should fade away as the truth penetrates haters’ consciousness.  At some point, all of the energy needed to maintain hatred of Trump, the person, could be expected to turn toward political action.

But, with the gaveling into passage of two gaseous “articles of impeachment,” not yet.

NEW LIFE TOWN

Side WALKS no longer: semi-permanent housing.

Leftism, global socialism, in fact, is transforming America’s national unity and our local states, counties, cities and towns.  It is insidious.  Because of George Soros’ financed groups, for example, several counties are suffering under prosecutorial regimes that refuse to prosecute “small” crimes.  Unfortunately, the definitions of the nature of crimes that fall in the “serious” and “minor” lists, are subjective, and proving to be dangerous by their very existence.

Every major metropolis, at least all the ones run by liberals… but I repeat myself, is turning away from public order.  Several have District Attorneys who campaigned on platforms of “criminal justice reform,” which is Orwellian newspeak for leniency toward criminals.  In Boston, which is mostly in Suffolk County, the new D. A., Rachel Rollins, ran with a list of “petty” crimes her administration would not spend time prosecuting.  This was so that “they” could concentrate on “serious” crimes.  One might suppose that every petty criminal – particularly those that enjoyed doing those crimes, or who felt a right to the proceeds of those crimes, or any of their relatives who thought it unfair that their otherwise “good” sons, daughters, nieces, nephews or grandchildren should be hassled or incarcerated when, after all, life has already been unfair to them, voted for Ms. Rollins… all in the interest of social justice.  The D. A., it is fair to say, has never made a living running a convenience store, or an auto-parts store or small grocery.  She has never paid  the increasing insurance rates for small businesses victimized by thefts deemed non-serious; she has never paid the extra-high prices for the products those stores’ neighbors must pay to cover the no-longer-sanctioned thievery.

She represents the very odd, even twisted logic of liberalism: people of certain skin colors and economic circumstances are not responsible for their actions, since they are largely RE-actions to (pick all that apply) racism, systemic racism, institutional racism, heritage of slavery, social injustice, police brutality, departmental (police) racism, lack of education resources, having to pay for Transit rides and poor housing.  In fact there IS systemic racism and it is the outrageously expensive welfare racism that has destroyed the family structure of inner-city populations – mostly of color – since the “Great Society” began.  Regardless of what people of any color may think about brown-skinned people, even if their thoughts are racially vile – and they’re out there – it is only the actual impact of “racism” that truly matters.  It is safe to say that only an infinitesimal fraction of “racist” or prejudicial thoughts have any impact on anyone besides the ignorant thinker.

Racism is as natural as breathing, otherwise, today, there would be no ghettos forming.  People, however, prefer people like themselves: those who look like, sound like and “live” like themselves… even those who eat the same foods and attend the same churches.  It’s as natural as breathing.  What each ethno-centric group thinks about the others is mostly inconsequential.  Should they think nicer thoughts?  Probably, but it’s not anyone’s business what thoughts they think unless… unless they take some negative action because of them.  Burning down or looting some Korean’s store because of racial hatred is racism that actually matters.  Stealing from any store because you think life has been unfair to you because of “racism,” is actual racism that matters.

Consigning 4 or 5 generations of black and brown people to welfare dependency, and now “legally” enabling them to be more effective criminals, that is real racism that matters.  To help counter black welfare hopelessness, the same liberals promote and finance abortion-on-demand as some sort of civil right, and, as evidently intended, it reaches 60% or more of its pinnacle of “success” by killing off black and brown babies.  What a country.

San Francisco, formerly under the guidance of Gavin Newsome, now the winsome governor of California, has, in the span of less than a decade, converted itself from a city of beauty to one where humans are enabled, if not encouraged, to live more like animals, thanks to new “rights” afforded to those so inclined, to camp out in public spaces, take illegal drugs in public, commit certain levels of crimes to support their “oppressed” life choices, fornicate in public, and relieve themselves wherever the fancy strikes them, now amounting to 20,000 or more defecation “rights” in public places, including sidewalks, parks, playgrounds and schoolyards, each year!  Uptight “conservatives,” San Francisco authorities discovered, have no right to impose lifestyle choices on others not as fortunate.

Dogs and other animals at least endeavor to cover up their feces.  Once public nudity was found to be a “right,” was public defecation far behind?  Once public defecation was ensconced among constitutionally protected “rights,” was defecation in a super market far behind?  That’s where the toilet paper is, after all.  The astronomical property values in San Francisco are starting to slip, and segregation from public areas is growing for those able to afford it.  Dystopia.

Liberalism appears to have partnered with global socialism on the path toward destruction of “Western” culture and North American culture in particular.  A very effective way to accomplish that goal is to disrupt cultural norms, one of which has ALWAYS been that laws mean what they say, those who break those laws deserve legal sanctioning for those criminal acts, policing, prosecution and adjudication shall be, BY LAW, unbiased, fair and based only on the law.  In other words, no individual in the chain of justice has the power, logically, to decide the resolution of cases outside of the lawful process – certainly not on the premise of some sort of triage due to “limited resources.”

Who represents justice for victims?  Isn’t justice the key reason for relinquishing personal sovereignty to a government?  Where does ANY law convey authority to an individual to judge some people’s justice as more valuable than that of others?  None does, in fact, but many are deciding that justice somehow varies based on skin color.  This is not to say that injustice hasn’t been meted out by white authorities based exactly on skin color.  It was shameful then, and is shameful, now.  But how is injustice for most citizens able to correct, or balance, injustice meted out for some others in the past… even if the past was yesterday?  It isn’t, of course, unless perceived in a certain level of hatred… hatred spawned in racism, a terrible way to conduct public safety and other policies.

Public safety is attacked hourly by the growing hordes of “homeless” people accumulating in major cities, all liberal bastions of victimhood.  Clearly, feeling sorry for people who, in the vast majority, choose to be how and where they are, neither improves their condition or living circumstances, nor their health or humanity.  Victimhood requires someone to be “oppressing” those in uncomfortable straits, and liberals/socialists, never exhaust the reasons that misfits, criminals, drug addicts and otherwise “homeless” denizens are not responsible for their situations.  Indeed, it seems more cruel to perpetuate – practically promulgate – living “on the streets” rather than forcing those who do so to “shape up.”

Public vagrancy laws have, in some liberal jurisdictions, been set aside as somehow un-Constitutional.  In other words, “society” has no right to require either living or sanitary standards.  Drug addiction and public urination, defecation and lewd exposure are now civil rights.  “Crimes of survival” are to be tolerated by the more fortunate in order to balance past – possibly current – oppression of “the homeless.”  Cultural standards, norms, are now simply suggestions.  By extension, then, one is left to decide which laws enforcing standards are worth obeying: very poor statecraft, to be sure, helping, steadily, to dissolve social and political unity.  The natural result will be imposition of social order by a police state.  The mindset of modern liberalism is creating, or has created, sets of problems that are insoluble by democratic republicanism.

A woman in Seattle was brutally raped at a car dealership by a “homeless” man.  Her screams brought help too late to prevent the consummation of the assault.  She has spoken out as loudly as she can against policies that foment Seattle’s growing homeless/lawless population.  Liberals, at least those who still feel sorry for poor, victimized, homeless criminals, attacked the victim for spreading a story that might reduce public sympathies for “homeless” people!

In Los Angeles many homeless people “live” in the terminals at LAX international airport.  They cause problems, of course, including filth, lewd and lascivious exposure to both adults and children, stealing of small packages and purses – generally discomfiting the traveling public.  Some keep themselves clean in the restrooms, some don’t.  Some avail themselves of indoor plumbing, some don’t.  The situation is tolerated.

Liberal administrations shrug at the existence of these “intractable” problems.  Cities spend tens of millions “addressing” the homeless problem, basically in trying to contain it.  But they cannot, or will not, contain the drugs, the diseases, the “petty” crimes or the human failure.  Liberalism is incapable of creating or imposing order and standards in urban centers.  Does this mean the problems are unsolvable?  If liberals declare a condition as “normal,” does that stop consideration of ideas for its solution?

To correct the conditions, or causes of homelessness and addiction, requires changing the beliefs of those who cling to that way of life.  This is not to say that most, or even very many of those living on the streets intended to live this way or even want to live this way, but they cling to it out of fear.  It is their life and their comfort.  It is where their co-sufferers live, their friends and drug dealers, some quite petty, sharing more than selling.   To be torn away from them is the most grievous outcome imaginable.  They help one another and bond with one another.  “Arresting” them is no solution, since the penal system cannot provide what is missing.  Individual cities cannot simply “place” them in housing: their beliefs won’t have changed and their habits and life-choices will immediately resume.  For most of the “street” people, a new belief in both themselves and in their legitimate place in civilization, must be learned – inculcated, if you will.

OMG!  Do you mean “re-education camps?  You fascist!”  Yes.

The loudest screams will come from leftists, for whom the entire country is a well-orchestrated re-education camp – but let that go for the moment.  There is no long-term, or even short term solution to rampant, growing homelessness, other than changing the beliefs of those who cling to that way of survival.  Pursuit of happiness, indeed.  They need a new happiness, and not one drug-induced.  A test-city/county needs to be selected and a tightly defined state of emergency declared.  The resources of a wealthy nation, and its brain-power, must be applied to a new community where survival depends on learning and practicing the skills of construction, farming, sewerage treatment, fire-prevention… every single skill and craft needed to operate a small town.  Every homeless or addicted person in the test region will be brought there.

Removed from filth and literally forced to be clean, in every way, and drug-free, our test-community will rise from a tent-city to a constructed one.  Individuals will be detoxed and then taught nutrition and self-care and then their old skills or new ones will be employed – as will they – to create a model community.  These people are not worthless, they are lost or trapped.  If they do not work they will have meager sustenance.  If they work and contribute and grow, they will eat better, live better, perform better.  Much like the American legion’s “Boys’ State” and “Girls’ State” programs, they will form neighborhood groups and eventually town or city councils.  They’ll elect leaders and establish schools for themselves and their children.  They’ll learn how to build and furnish houses in the most eco-friendly ways, and they’ll produce goods or foodstuffs to sell to others so that their town can afford fuel, electricity and so forth.  From completely subsidized they will become completely independent, a program that will probably take 4 or 5 years.  With success, every drug addict, homeless or not, could be sentenced to “New Life Town.”

To accomplish this will require military discipline and regimentation, and a domestic “Peace Corps” to assist relatively backward people to learn to be civilized, to live well through self-discipline and responsibility, rather than enforcements.  They are the wayward children of America.  We know how to effect adult maturity and responsibility, we do it all the time with our own children.  For how many more decades and ruined lives will we refuse to “raise” these people?