America on the Edge of the Cliff
America on the Edge of the Cliff
The most obvious problem is out-of-control government spending.
Fletch Daniels - NOV 20, 2023
There is more than an average share of discontent brewing from sea to shining sea as ever more Americans get the sense that their country, which has been pivotal to ensuring global security, stands on the edge of a cliff. Many comfort themselves by looking at other pivotal moments in our history where the country’s future was in doubt right before the ship was righted. But, due to a confluence of factors, it is hard to imagine America bouncing back.
There are four problems that, if not reversed soon, will lead to collapse, and America will fall.
1. The most obvious problem is out-of-control government spending. The interest on the national debt is pushing toward a cool trillion dollars, clocking in at $659 billion for fiscal 2022, gobbling up ever more American tax dollars. While wise politicians should be sobered by that number, they instead are pushing the ship to ludicrous speed in search of Mad Max. It is forcing ever higher deficit spending since it is mathematically impossible to bring in enough tax revenue to buy off voting blocs, meaning that it will skyrocket in the years ahead. It’s a serious problem that demands serious politicians in both parties. But you first need a serious electorate, something in short supply these days. The “ask not what your country can do for you” ethos of yesterday has transformed into the “give us more free stuff and we’ll take some reparations on the side” grievance ethos of today. America’s political leadership, voted in by an electorate addicted to handouts, will take the approach of Belshazzar, the Babylonian king who was partying even as the armies of doom were at the gates. What’s the tipping point? Few of our leaders seem to care. I suppose that when collapse comes, we can at least take great comfort in the fact that we paid for the retirements of the charmingly corrupt Ukrainian cocktail class.
2. So how did we get to this state where solutions seem impossible? That’s where the second trend comes in, which is the complete takeover of our institutions by real radicals, not the pretend kind that the Mitt Cheneys of this world see behind every rock.
The core of this problem was the complete fall of the American university, which has been in motion for decades. All institutional rot flows from that. The teachers who are radicalizing America’s kids, the Pravda press who control the narrative, the social media kingpins kicking up a pining among our youth for Bin Laden, the politicians, lawyers, bureaucrats, writers, publishers, and industry leaders all have one thing in common: they were indoctrinated and radicalized in American universities.
We’ve reached an interesting point in our history where Americans are far more likely to be intelligent, wise, and self-controlled if they never set foot in an American university. Once the university system fell and started cranking out generations of people who see the world only through an oppressor versus oppressed lens, the other institutions toppled like dominoes. Why study something useless like math when you can marinate in classes focused on whom you should resent and hate the most?When a nation faces tough times, it relies on its norms and institutions to pull it out of the nosedive. But most of our institutions have reached a point from which they cannot be saved, and, sadly, we aren’t going to adapt Ripley’s advice from Aliens and nuke them from orbit since it is the only way to be sure.But we should starve them of resources at every opportunity.
3. A big part of why these institutions stand secure in their corruption and toxic missions is the lack of common values and decency within America today. We can all see what is happening on the surface since it is largely happening out in the open at this point. But the spiritual condition that underpins it is a deeper concern. We are suffering from a societal lack of respect for life and from an inability to see a common humanity within our fellow citizens. These Jewish and Christian spiritual values are what allowed us to see other people as neighbors instead of enemies. The collapse of those values is what enables a gang of fifteen boys to take joy in beating someone to death.
The recent elections were somewhat instructive as to where we are as a nation — not because of who won, but due to how they did it.In the weeks leading up to the election, there was a never-ending parade of commercials in my home state of Virginia featuring Democrats extolling the wonderful glories of abortion. They could have replaced the “D” with an “A” after their names because they ran as the abortion party.It was the only issue they ran on, the one value to rule them all. And the electorate embraced many of them for it. It is already a certainty that it will be the one issue that Democrats run on in 2024.When it comes to basic societal values, diversity is not our strength.
Our once common values, even if we sometimes failed to live up to them, were enshrined in our founding documents and formed the foundation of our society. That foundation has now been shattered, and we are left with nothing that binds us together.Remove agreed upon norms of decency that are expected of everyone, and you end up with Lord of the Flies, or the latest “mostly peaceful” fiery protest du jour by the lovely lemmings who make up the core of the Democrat party, or what passes for San Francisco these days.
4. So what would an American collapse leave behind? That should be more obvious now than perhaps it was before the brutal Hamas attacks of October 7. Most of Europe is falling to Islam and is too far gone to reverse course. Death-spiral birth rates among native Europeans combined with out-of-control migration from the Islamic world has led Europe to where it is today: a continent full of countries whose policies will increasingly reflect its population. While the blatant antisemitism is on full display for all to see, it’s going to get a lot worse, to the point where anyone who is not willing to convert to Islam will find himself either under attack or marginalized as a second-class citizen. The left prattles on about Islamophobia, even as it tries to ignore and gloss over very real antisemitism, but no such thing as Islamophobia can actually exist, since a phobia is an irrational fear.
The pro-terrorist mobs who blot out the scenery in London and other European cities (and take over the previously mentioned American universities) will seem quaint in another decade. Even if migration were cut off tomorrow, it wouldn’t matter at this point based on disparity of birth rates.
Why does this matter to America? For one, our politicians are every bit as foolish as the globalist Europeans we are emulating. The only thing that has slowed down America from suffering the same fate is geography. As horrific as our open borders are, they would be far worse if we bordered Islamic states.Even at that, Islamic migration is already influencing our electoral politics and policy positions, which was on display when the president tried to bully Israel into a foolish ceasefire, almost certainly out of concern over losing Michigan, as just one obvious example.More importantly, it is hard to imagine America flourishing in a world where most of its traditional allies have fallen to Islam. Indeed, this will only exacerbate the descent into brutish darkness.How could Israel even survive in such a world?
While there are plenty of other trends to be concerned about, these four all but ensure that the American moment, short of a spiritual reawakening, will end far sooner than most expect and it is wise to start preparing for that outcome. In the meantime, these are the areas where conservatives should focus their efforts, or at least be aware of these trends and how they are influencing other policy discussions. We need to educate as many people as we can on the stakes involved, and now is a great moment for that, when so many of the systemic problems should be obvious to all.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/11/america_on_the_edge_of_the_cliff.html