Friends and enemies. The military. And what might a "good billionaire" do?

Two powerful groups could make a difference in this crisis... one of them by staying aloof and professional but making their loyalty clear. The other can take decisive and bold action individually, even out of whim!

I've said for years the greater part of the U.S. Military Officer Corps is inherently on our side, for many reasons, though they desperately hope they'll never be asked to step in explicitly, as Praetorian protectors of the Republic vs. internal enemies.  I'll get to that, in a minute.

But first, what could a billionaire, or sub-billionaire, who is loyal to Western Civilization, do that could be decisive at this critical time?

There are many rich folks who feel loyalty to this Great Experiment that gave them everything. They're grateful especially for vast numbers of nerdy creative types who made all their successes and toys and interests possible.  For every mafiosi, KGB-oligarch, gambling lord or inheritance brat, there is some tech-mogul who does not want this unique experiment to dissolve into just another boring feudalism -- especially given feudalism's dismal record of bad governance. And so, many of these folks are donating large sums to PACs aimed at slashing the puppet strings used by Putin, MBS and others to revive treason and confederacy.

But there are better ways a good zillionaire could spend this money. Some of them, like Nicolas Berggruen, Bill Gates and Mark Cuban seek their own paths to enhance democracy... and I offer over a dozen potentially original methods in Polemical Judo.

But down below, in this posting, I'll summarize just one. One that might make the biggest difference.  In fact, it cannot help but make a difference... and possibly save the American Republic.

== The military may be our friend. Get used to it ==

First though, take the time. Read this short letter from Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley to all American forces, that was all in the news a few weeks ago. 

The US military officer corps isn't just deeply committed to civilian rule and law. They are also the third-best educated clade in American life and the most dedicated to fact-centered, pragmatic problem-solving. George Marshall and Harry Truman desegregated the military knowing it was the one move creating momentum against prejudice, from which there'd be no turning back. 

Yes, they are imperfect, as are we all. But if we spurn these skilled and principled and loyal men and women, we are doing Putin's work for him.

A demographic profile of the U.S. military verifies the officer corps is much better educated than the average public and at higher ranks they equal college professors, which many become, after retirement. Enlisted personnel are also demographically above average. And while I am disturbed that Fox News blares out of the TVs in many noncom ready rooms, the proliferation of racial minorities and women in important jobs helps me feel pretty confident we’ll see loyalty, if the Putinists try to trigger civil war. (Though national guard units in some southern states might be iffy.)

And I wrote the above before news broke of strong intel that Russian agencies offer bounties on American lives in Afghanistan.  At which point, I stopped worrying about a possibly lethal split between officers and noncoms, if 'the balloon goes up.' And I welcome reports from any of you, whether the channels are changing on those nocom lounge TVs.

ADDENDUM: Another respected republican comes out against Trump... Former defense secretary William Cohen, a veteran Republican senator, says a second Trump administration would mean the end of American democracy.   See also: “How Trump Lost the Military.” And for some related polemic -- See the Court Martial of Donald Trump. Surely Putin/Murdoch are as surprised as liberals seem to be, by the fierce loyalty to the constitution of our officer corps.

== The coming wave of cheating ==

Okay, we need one more clue. Alas, this alarming list of currently perfected and plausibly-prepared Republican electoral cheats is all-too realistic! The only way to prevent it is by making this a tsunami election, so overwhelming that they don't dare. And even in that case, the cheating will simply shift from the lost presidential race to preserving obscure State Assembly and State Senate positions, where America's real power lies. We need maps showing which LOCAL precincts might be pivotal, if "isolated cases" of fraud disenfranchise a few thousand. 

And Stacey Abrams's voter registration drive must have a second phase. Now ask everyone you know if they are registered. Then ask "Have you checked?"  And yes, many of these aspects are in Polemical Judo.

Okay, let's go back to where we started and put these pieces together.

== Zillionaires who want to save enlightenment… and themselves ==

Abigail Disney helped establish Patriotic Millionaires, a group of wealthy Americans concerned about rising income inequality, who favor higher taxes on the wealthy. “In the U.S., executive compensation has increased by 940% since 1978; during the same period, worker pay has risen twelve per cent. Income inequality hasn’t been this extreme since the nineteen-twenties. Under the 2017 G.O.P. tax bill, the 400 richest Americans pay a lower over-all tax rate than any other group.”

An important article… that leaves out the biggest reasons why the smarter zillionaires - including many of the tech guys - are supporting Democrats. First, competitive market enterprise simply does better under democrats. Period. Almost always, and its most fecund/productive era was during the aftermath of FDR, until the supply side experiments that started our decline in all metrics, beginning with Reagan.  See: economic outcomes vs. rhetoric.

Second, we mentioned how those tech guys owe their fortunes to working side-by-side with middles class engineers who were trained at magnificent public universities. Some still remember who helped them thrive.

Third, while returning to feudalism may sound good to overprivileged male inheritance brats, in fact, our science-loving, educated, transparent and middle class society has out produced the total of all other nations and societies, summed across all of the last 6000 years.

Fourth - patriotism… the blatant association of the Republican Party with the made-over KGB, with Salafist fanatics, Earth-wreckers and others who have systematically torn down American sciences, alliances and the very rule of law that has made it the safest time to be rich.

Which leads us to the biggest reason that many rich folks are veering away from today’s mad oligarchic putsch.  The same reason the ruthless depression era bootlegging millionaire Joseph Kennedy supported FDR… “because I’d rather lose half my wealth to help the middle class than lose it all to angry mobs.”  The imbecile ‘preppers’ who think they can fund wars against all fact-professions and crush all the smartypants ‘boffin’ castes actually think we don’t know where their survivalist hidey-holes are. We who know nuclear science, geneticism cyber and all the rest.

The smartest zillionaires know it’s time for a reset for one reason. Because they can spell the word “tumbrels.”

== And finally... that one thing a zillionaire could do to save the day ==

This was a long posting, but our foundation is laid, now - the coming wave of cheating, the fact that some of the rich realize their time to act has arrived. And so...

The one thing would be to offer whistleblower prizes. Big ones. For any henchman or contractor or aide who knows about a coming cheat. Some scheme now in-motion to purge voter rolls, or to "accidentally shutter polling stations, or lose or invalidate mail-in ballots, or to pervert voting machines, to stir violence... or even to bypass the clear will of the people.

Think about it. Plots and schemes need henchmen! The almost-universally corrupt Republican Secretaries of State in red states cannot do it alone. They have helpers, co-conspirators, foot-soldiers and bribed programmers... any of whom might record a skulking, Bond-villain meeting or copy documents or simply come out in the open. And thus spoil the whole scheme.

This is the greatest fear of the Cabal. It is why their desperate efforts for four years have been to prevent light and transparency from pouring across the land. They know their servants in DC and state capitals and boardrooms are fickle, and so they use more than mere money... tools like blackmail and other threats...

...but a liberal zillionaire needn't erect anything complex, just a prize! And offer to pay legal bills. And heck, throw in some personal security protection, why not? In exchange for an evidence-backed denunciation of plots against Americans' civil rights. 

Dig it: just the announcement of such prizes might terrify some plotters into shutting down!

If you can think of a simpler way for a sub-billionaire to make a crucial difference in our current crisis, you are welcome to offer it below, in comments. But that's my number one. I've been pushing is since the last century. 

And this may be our last chance to see someone step up. Step up to save us all.

Scholarship vs Science

Quite some time ago, an august person on another list I'm on (a list dealing with future methods of philanthropy) posted an essay in praise of St. Johns College as an example of a great center of excellence. This triggered some thoughts I had to write respond with.

Now it occurs to me that some folks on THIS list might also want to see it. The following expresses some thoughts that will seem familiar to many of you. But I think the distinction between "scholarship" and "science" is still poorly understood.

And it is a crucial distinction, having much to do with why our present civilization has been able to break with dismal habits of the past.

Anyway, it is a bit of a rant. Ignore it, by all means, unless this sort of thing entertains you.

db

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Great Books of the Western World

St. John's University deliberately designed their curriculum around the "Great Books of the Western World", the paramount product of decades of endeavor led by Robert Hutchins and Mortimer Adler at the most unique major college in America, the University of Chicago. The same institution that fostered Leo Strauss after World War II -- the intellectual godfather of today's neoconservative movement.

Now, I own a set of the Great Books and refer to them often. I have no trouble with the notion that Western Civilization is worth fighting for and that it is important to maintain strong connections to that culture's roots, stretching back to Greece, Rome and so on.

Further, I will freely admit that St. Johns and the University of Chicago produce fine scholars. (Any well-funded institution that attracts passionate teachers will do the same, whatever their theory.)

But I want to say something about the Enlightenment, which is supposedly the underlying meme of Western Civilization. It took many strange paths. The French branch is a perfect example of what can go wrong. Starting with the radicalism of the French Revolution, it aimed at huge reforms, liberating the individual from domineering institutions like monarchy, aristocracy and clergy.

But it veered off course by returning to the ancient habit of subservience. Having abandoned kings and clergy, the French transferred habitual reverence to a different class of professionals -- elitist scholars.

Though democratic in theory, French society is even today dominated by graduates of the Grand Ecoles who - whether they go into the government bureaucracy, the arts & sciences, or commerce - are considered an elevated order of being. They can do no wrong. Yes, aristocratic status is achieved meritocratically (by test scores) instead of simply inherited. But it still amounts to fostering an ongoing, cohesive elite.

Moreover, the French believe that they are spreading a better/preferred version of the Enlightenment, by emphasizing reason and a European philosophical tradition that began with Plato, more than 2500 years ago. A tradition that was built up through Descartes, Kant, Hegel and so on, through existentialism, and all sorts of other isms. Including those that post-modernists preach in hundreds of dismal humanities departments and those that Leo Strauss preached at the University of Chicago.

(Cautionary note. I livd in Paris for two years and I know full well that all generalizations suck. I know many French people who do NOT think this way. My generalization is about the turn taken broadly by that wing of the Enlightenment.)

The University of Chicago is by far the most European-style university in America, especially with its emphasis on producing “scholars” in a more traditional sense... savants who win point by CITING prior savants. Sages who are thoroughly well-read in classics and grounded in the Platonic tradition, under which Reason is perceived as the opposite of
superstition.

But here's the crux. Reason is not the opposite of superstition. It is a BRANCH of superstition. The French Enlightenment, the European  philosophical tradition, and scholasticism in general, are dangerously self-indulgent styles of mysticism that have (thanks heavens) very little to do with OUR branch of the Enlightenment. Or at least with its better and most successful aspects.

Freud and Marx (and Ayn Rand, for that matter) were among countless examples of once-promising intellects who got suckered down the ego driven paths of mystical shamanism, emphasizing incantations over experimentation. Guru-worship over the brash criticism of post-docs. Simpleminded "reason" over facing the true complexity of human nature.

In contrast, the Anglo-American Enlightenment, typified by Franklin, Madison, Lincoln, Wilson, Edison and Marshall, is not without idealism. But it is idealism rooted in a worldview that is fundamentally pragmatic.

Your goal is to find practical ways to get the most positive-sum games going for the most people, most of the time. And you do not let dogma stymie you from trying whatever may work, whether it is altering market rules to foster vigorous competitive creativity, or experimental education, or state
intervention to stop millennia of waste by letting children or all races and genders compete on a level
playing field.

Above all, you PRAGMATICALLY seek ways to overcome the one worst aspect of human nature...

...the one trait responsible for most of our tragedies...

...our propensity for self-deception.


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Yes, this was in many ways repetitious of earlier rants... so I'll stop here. There was more. But maybe I'll post it in following commentary.