The
loyal opposition is the party out-of-power in a polity that stands divided into
two factions — assuming the polity can still function as such, which, apparently,
it no longer can. Historically in the USA, this used to allow for the tempered
regulation of changing conditions during two hundred years of a rapidly
evolving techno-industrial economy that pumps out more goodies year after year
while the population grows and grows.
Much
of America, political leaders especially, assume that this arc of growing
goodies and more people will just keep trending up forever. They are just plain
mistaken about that. Rather, the whole industrialized, wired-up world is rolling
over into the greatest contraction ever witnessed. The only thing that’s
postponed the recognition of this reality is the profligate borrowing of money,
or shall we say “money” — data entries that pretend to represent secure wealth.
This amounts to borrowing from the future to pay for how you live today. Of
course, the act of borrowing is based on the supposition that there will enough
future productive activity to allow you to pay back your borrowings with
interest. This is obviously not the case now, in the face of epochal
contraction, especially of affordable energy to keep things running hot.
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Thus, the US has decided to
get through the approaching winter by setting its house on fire. The two
political parties alternately in charge of things are driving around the
burning house, stopping at intervals to run Chinese Fire Drills. We call these
“elections.” Both parties pretend that the burning house is not a problem. Mr.
Trump, aka the Golden Golem of Greatness, has taken “ownership” of the rising
temperature in the burning house. “Hey, at least you’re not
freezing now.” He and his party have been piling all the furniture
inside the house on the fire, to keep the heat up, rather heedless that flames
are starting to shoot out of the attic.
The
other party has no quibble with burning down the house. In fact, this has been
the Democratic Party’s sovereign remedy for problems since the War in Vietnam,
when it was explicit policy to burn down villages in order to save them. Seemed
to work, until it didn’t — and then we just tried to forget about the whole
sorry exercise. It still haunts them, though. So these days they’ve decided to
destroy the culture that abided inside the burning house. They’re taking down
the draperies and collecting all the clothing and tchotchkes and framed
photographs of loved ones, and piling them on top of the burning furniture, doing
their bit to keep the heat up.
You might infer from all this
that no matter whatever else the Republican and Democratic parties might do now
is not going to prevent the house from burning down. In a month, or six months,
or eighteen months, they will be left standing stunned in the ashes. How’d this happen!?! Even the clown cars they were
riding around in will be smoldering wrecks. And then the rest of the people of
this land can sift through ruins, seeking a few trinkets or useful tools with
some remaining value. These people will be entitled to call themselves
“survivors.” And they will act like survivors should act: by earnestly
assessing how the house happened to burn down, and using what few assets and
resources they still have at hand to shelter-in-place, while they draw up plans
for a more sensible house.
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If
there was a true loyal opposition in this land, they would have called the fire
department long ago. But they were too busy texting out their contrived
grievances and sending cute Instagrams of each other in pussy hats to friends
and allies while the flames of the burning house reflected off the screens of
their iPhones. The vaunted technology did not save the day. It only stole their
attention.
If it
happens that the Democrats lose the midterm elections a few weeks ahead, they
will jump up and down and holler that the elections were stolen from them, that
somebody meddled and colluded to deprive them of victory, and that will amount
to throwing just enough gasoline on the still-burning house for one final
glorious burst of heat and flame before the rafters crash through the floor.
Welcome to the Long Emergency.
Reprinted with permission
from Kunstler.com.
James
Howard Kunstler is the author of The Long Emergency, Too Much Magic, The
Geography of Nowhere, the World Made By Hand novels, and more than a dozen
other books. He lives in Washington County, New York.
Copyright
© 2018 Kunstler.com
