Justin’s
note: Today, Doug and I continue our conversation on why the U.S. could
dissolve over time. Doug says the problems are all bubbling to the surface…and
when the U.S. eventually breaks apart “it will not be peaceful.” (If you missed
Part I, you can catch up right here.)
Justin: What
about political tensions? Because, as I’m sure you’ve seen, the far-left and
far-right are becoming more and more antagonistic. In some cases, they’ve even
become violent towards each other.
Could
radical political ideologies cause the country to break apart?
Doug: Yes,
I think so.
In the
late ‘60s and the early ‘70s, hundreds of bombings took place at universities,
banks, and all kinds of places. The National Guard was in cities like Detroit
during the riots, and they were raking buildings with .50 caliber machine guns.
It was wild.
I don’t
think most remember this. At least, I don’t see it being brought up anywhere.
But as wild and wooly as things were back then, what we have now is much more serious.I lived in Washington DC then. It seemed like there was tear gas in the air half the time I went out on a date on a Friday or Saturday night.
The
racial element is still there, but the ideological element is even more
pronounced.
In those
days, people at least talked to each other. You could have a disagreement, and
it was a simple difference of opinion.
It’s much
worse now. Today, there’s a visceral hatred between the left and the right,
between the people that live in the so-called red counties and blue counties.
You add that to the racial situation. Then
throw in the fact that the rich are getting richer at an exponential rate while
the middle class is disappearing.
And let’s not forget the large-scale
subsidized migration of people from totally alien Third World hellholes. This
is not what the U.S. was founded on. Before changes in the immigration law that
were made in the ‘60s, immigrants were culturally compatible opportunity
seekers that were coming to America to improve themselves.
Now, people from all kinds of alien places
are being imported by the hundreds of thousands by NGOs; they then go on
welfare in enclaves in different places around the country. This is unlikely to
end well. The U.S. is no longer a country.
That
said, I’m actually for open borders. But it’s only possible if, A, there is
zero welfare to attract the wrong types. And, B, all property was privately
owned, to help ensure everyone is self-supporting.
Doug: Absolutely. In my ideal world, there would be approximately seven billion little nation states on the planet, all of them independent.Justin: But Doug, aren’t you against large nation states? Would the Divided States of America be better?
It would be excellent if the U.S. split
into smaller entities, where the people that lived in these entities shared
more in common with each other.
And let
me go further. I think it was a mistake for the U.S. to have come together with
the Constitution of 1789. The Articles of Confederation should have stayed in
existence, with a few modifications. The Constitutional Convention of 1789 was
actually a coup. A successful, non-violent coup. Most people didn’t really care
because the government was such a trivial factor in their lives in those days.
I’m just afraid that when the U.S. breaks
up, which inevitably it will, it may not be peaceful. The existence of the
USA—which is now just one of 200 other nation states, no longer anything
special—is not part of the cosmic firmament. The original founding ideas of
America expressed in the Declaration of Independence have been lost, washed
away. The absence of those principles is why I say it’s going to come to a bad
end.
Justin: Do
you think the United States will dissolve over time? Or will something set this
in motion, possibly a financial or economic crisis?
Doug: An
economic crisis always brings things to the fore.
When the
standard of living is dropping, the government inevitably finds somebody or
something to blame…anything other than itself.
Usually,
they point the finger at foreigners. But if you get the wrong people in the
government, they can point fingers at domestic enemies, the way the Germans did
with the Jews in the ‘30s, or the way the Soviets did with the kulaks at the
same time. Or the way the Chinese did with its enemies of the State under Mao.
There are many, many other examples. Political power attracts the worst kind of
people—and then brings out the worst in them.
Economic
turmoil causes social turmoil and political turmoil. And one of the things that
scares me most is that if things get spooky within the U.S., people in the
government will try to find a foreign enemy in order to “unite” the country.
Incidentally,
I don’t feel that uniting the country is necessarily a good idea. It all
depends on which direction they’re united towards, and united against what. And
do the people of the United States have enough in common anymore to even be
united? I think not, in an age of multiculturalism.
There
are a lot of problems, and they’re bubbling to the surface. When the economy
gets bad, which it will, I think the pot will boil over.