Guest Post by Jim Kunstler
Hillary’s dumb riposte to Trump’s dumb slogan — make America great again! — was “…America never stopped being great.” I guess she’s been traveling around the strip-mall wastelands of Carolina failing to notice the carnage that lays upon this land like a mortal scrofula. America has been committing suicide by bad choices for decades.
We took the collateral winnings of World War II and poured it into a suburban sprawl alt-universe so depressing that our citizens are the most over-medicated people in the world. That alone might help to explain how Hillary and Trump lumber inevitably toward their respective nominations. The cheering “folks” marshaled out in the Piggly Wiggly parking lots are so buzzed on Klonopin and Zoloft that they can’t tell how these two odious celebrities epitomize the very forces behind their pharmaceutically-masked despair.
A nation sunk in such falsity is sure to suffer life-threatening blowback and it looks like the first thing to go will be the life of the political parties. Both Democrats and Republicans have gone full Whig, riding into the 2016 election on the garbage barge of history. Hillary went on hyper-gloat after last week’s South Carolina primary, where she stuffed her pander-bag with black votes reaped on empty promises to re-boot the Civil Rights era. It was painful to watch that get-me-outa-here smile stretched across her face as she hugged the last selfie-snapper and slouched toward the ordeal of Super-Tuesday.
I don’t care how many primary victories Trump racks up, the GOP poobahs will not support him going into the convention. They will crack the party up into warring factions before they let him hoist the gonfalon of Lincoln and the Gipper. Be warned: plans are already afoot to shove Trump aside, to derail him with some scandal easily excavated from a life spent greasing other pols and playing ball with the mob-riddled construction industry in New York, Jersey, and Nevada. Failing that, they’ll leave him with a gutted shell of the party apparatus and by-hook-or-crook get some other figure to make a well-funded run under a slightly altered banner: Paul Ryan, Bloomberg, Romney, just maybe Kasich. The Koch brothers will organize the money mojo. Failing that, there is always the mysterious magic of the Deep State for winning friends and influencing history.
This is not to endorse the old Republican establishment, just saying that they are increasingly desperate to derail this monster of their own creation, and will go to institutionally suicidal lengths to get it done. It will be more than another election cycle, if ever, before the right-of-center portion of the US political spectrum can realign itself into something resembling party.
Or perhaps this is America’s true imperial moment, when all party politics surrenders to the pre-tsunami undertow of events. None of the idiot network commentators or Wash-Po or NY Times columnists seem to notice that the global economy is sinking into a coma, and in so doing is igniting cluster-bombs of default through the financial system. That so far insidious destruction should effloresce exactly around the time of the nominating conventions. The tide will have visibly gone miles out just as Hillary mounts the podium like some bad joke of a national mommy and Trump sits fretting in his Cleveland hotel room wondering how his rococo dreams of glory turned into a shit sandwich from room service. Yeats’s widening gyre is upon us. The biggest surprise of all yet-to-come is that television will fail to explain it. The second coming will not be the reappearance of the celebrity known as Jesus Christ, but rather of the event called the American Civil War.
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Coming in June
World Made By Hand 4 (and final)
Praise for A History of the Future:
“Kunstler skewers everything from kitsch to greed, prejudice, bloodshed, and brainwashing in this wily, funny, rip-roaring, and profoundly provocative page- turner, leaving no doubt that the prescriptive yet devilishly satiric A World Made by Hand series will continue.” — Booklist
My local indie booksellers… Battenkill Books (Autographed by the Author) … or Northshire Books…
or Amazon…
Man, he really knows how to string words together. I can’t believe someone with that kind of mental acuity really believes that the Republican party is “right of center”.
Oh well, that JHK.
Today’s words for the day: Scrofula, gonfalon, rococo, gyre.
Other than a few fancy words and crafted phrases, (“garbage barge of history” is actually pretty clever) does Kunstler have anything to say, really?
I heard the exact same thing on NPR on the way in to work this morning.
“Hillary went on hyper-gloat after last week’s South Carolina primary, where she stuffed her pander-bag with black votes reaped on empty promises…”
“…cheering “folks” marshaled out in the Piggly Wiggly parking lots (sic) so buzzed on Klonopin and Zoloft…”
It’s well crafted, like beat poetry. Empty because he’s such a dishonest man, but well crafted just the same.
In between all the hyperbole, he is still hoping for a Clinton win over trumpster.
In either case, I will be looking out for #1, as neither will be working for you or me.
“a shit sandwich from room service”.
Exactly what the American people have been served up as “Presidential” candidates.
Don’t look for that garnish sprig of parsley, or pickle to stifle the smell. Bonn Appetite!
This one is a gem too… “as Hillary mounts the podium like some bad joke of a national mommy…”
Out here in the Ozarks, we try to ignore the political goings on as much as possible. My poor husband gets rather angry at national news and his dismay and horror at discovering the local news consists of extended coverage of high school basketball have caused us to gather our extensive collection of old movies to play as background noise while he sands, stains and varnishes wood and I prepare the garden plot and tend to my seedlings and animals.
It doesn’t matter if any of us are ready. It is coming.
The dogs are our best friends these days.
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Nick is a perfectionist when it comes to the wood finish. He said that the spindles had to come off to do it right and once I saw how much the oak has “aged” in the two years it has been up, I have to admit he is correct. AGAIN.
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The little cover Nick constructed for the metal wall guide that will help control the settling of the logs over the next few years is another example of my husband’s attention to detail. (There are three other wall guides, but all are in closets. This one should have been hidden by a fireplace in original plans, but we opted out of the fireplace, choosing a wood stove instead. Much more efficient.)
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You can see where the oak has aged around the spindles over the last couple of years. Interesting the changes in the natural color of the wood.
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Now, I do know this has NOTHING to do with Kunstler’s article or the political race. I suppose I am just making my own statement about how we can either obsess over national politics and hope that something changes the horrible state of our nation OR we can plod along with our plans and hope that the rest of the world just ignores us while we plant our garden and varnish our home.
Hi Maggie, you’re lucky that Nick is a perfectionist. When we had our log cabin built years ago I spent days sanding the cedar spindles on the 15 foot railing on the loft to got them as close to perfect as I could. I came up to the house after work the next day and Hubby had put a first coat on them (without asking me first!) Aside from the fact that I do a better job of getting a smooth coat, he had used an old brush and there were 1/4 inch pieces of black bristles EVERYWHERE! It took me another week of sanding and picking off the pieces of black bristles and it still is not the showcase I was looking for. Sigh. Still, it is very hard to blame him when he was only trying to do me a favor.
Glad to see the skepticism in response to this article. Truth be told, I lump this guy in with all the hacks milking the doom meme continuously since 2008. Guys like Celente, Schiff and others constantly telling us to buy gold and vote libertarian, or not to vote, meanwhile they make a living selling articles, not hoarding gold, and liberals continue to push the nation off the cliff.
Only one political party is really out of touch, with its base that is. Of course I’m talking about the Republicans. The Republicans just want to maintain the status quo for another four years. Their strategy of pandering to naive Evangelicals in public while continuing to import foreign masses, fight wars for Israel, and enrich themselves through backroom deals in private has worked splendidly for the last 30 years. They want it to continue at any cost. Yet aside from the geriatric Protestants of Iowa, their base has gotten wise to their ways, partially due to the internet, and partially to seeing the economics of mass immigration finally affecting their daily lives. They want blood, and the establishment does not want to admit the party’s over. They will adapt or fracture into a second tier party, forever losing elections at the national level and eventually at the state and local levels as well.
The Democrats however, know their constituency. Wealthy whites with secure, immigrant-proof jobs in government and academia, vote democrat to assuage their white guilt that accompanies their do nothing job. They are coupled with minorities, rabid feminists, and off the raft immigrants who want handouts, immunity, and the power to legally extort their way into positions of power. The Democrats’ base is growing, the current base of the Republicans is turning 65 at an alarming rate.
@Araven… you are so much kinder than Nick would have been had I done something like that. I understand that the woodwork is a labor of love for Nick and while I appreciate it, I don’t have the keen eye for detail that he has.
I’m better off picking rocks out of the yard and tending to chickens, rabbits and dogs. Is why we are a match made in heaven.
As for Kunstler? He has been trying to sell that book for a while, saying it is “final.” Hopefully, he means that and doesn’t decide there needs to be a sequel.
I like Jim Kunstler. Read him every Monday. That said, he is a New York Jew and is terrified of what Trump might do. Actually, Jim has nothing to worry about. He is a pretty good guy. But the Zionist filth that has been running this country has plenty to be worried about. And each endorsement makes it tougher for the so-called “Republican Establishment” to come up with a workable plan to “Stop Trump”. I have to laugh at those people who are so sure Trump will be the end of the republic but never seem to get excited about the real damage done to our country over the past !6 years by George Bush and Barry Soetero. You must think Trump is a Superman to do worse than they have!
Hi Maggie, I was pretty peeved, but it’s been 9 years so I’ve had some time to mellow 🙂
I really resonate with your comment about the dogs, too. Our oldest Pyr is curled up at my feet snoring as I type. She’s turning 10 this year and it’s not likely that she’ll make 11, so I’m making the most of what time we have left.
I hope Trump does win and every one of TPTB Rockefeller NEOCON RINO fears comes true and they all have to sell their homes and move into single wide trailers in Mississippi or West Virgina. May sorrow and regret fall on their traitorous heads like rain drops in a hurricane.
Kunstler presents a novel idea in this piece: Americans who are smitten with Hilary and Donald are drugged out of their minds.
maybe they’ll all relocate to the West Bank !!
@The Tumbleweed
Greetings,
I agree with you and I take with a grain of salt everything the doom pushers have to say. My guess is that the truth lies somewhere between Alex Jones and NPR. As for myself, I like Kunstler because I like his writing style and I read him more for his critique of public spaces and his diatribes against urban sprawl. After all, our communities should be designed to bring us together.
Whether or not this election is a Whig moment is anyone’s guess.
What’s goin on Maggie. I seen uh house identical ter yers and it was cypress. Yer house cypress Maggie?
Kunstler has wonderful prose, but also a near perfect record as a false prophet. Because he is Jewish, I picture the false prophets in the Old Testament to be just like him; a silver tongue so slick that you keep forgetting his failed prognostications. And always enjoy his next one.
He’s a non religious jew, just like me. Secular, agnostic what ever the label. I think his
writing is outstanding!
Gayle, I think if either of them are elected, we will all need lots of booze and/or drugs.
IGOR. ,what the hell is wrong with you ? Don’t you know this is a goy website ?
Whats bb, ball bag? show me where it says no jews you stupud scrotum.
Geez, Hardscrabble, any organization that at least advocates some restraint on the free-shit army is right of center these days!
Her shel , what the hell is wrong with you ? I never said Jews were not allowed you Meathead. In fact I wish more would come to this goy website. All you got to do is ..Jesus Christ .. and that causes a satanic reaction and they leave. Sad.
“We took the collateral winnings of World War II and poured it into a suburban sprawl alt-universe so depressing that our citizens are the most over-medicated people in the world. That alone might help to explain how Hillary and Trump lumber inevitably toward their respective nominations. The cheering “folks” marshaled out in the Piggly Wiggly parking lots are so buzzed on Klonopin and Zoloft that they can’t tell how these two odious celebrities epitomize the very forces behind their pharmaceutically-masked despair.”
Mostly JHK is a clever word-smith…and we enjoy that. Cheers. I had to look up 3
of the mystery words, (gonfalon, grye, scrofula) but know rococo. So what?
Get a dictionary or thesaurus…and you too can employ a unique word choice.
I am bugged by the man’s constant harping on urban sprawl. He lives in a small rural town
in upstate NY. He does not live and work steps away in Manhattan!!
As for the political parties? That is all an illusion to pretend there are major differences.
At least now, there is little to distinguish one from the other. HRC = barf. I saw a video
clip of Mr. Trump from 25 years ago…and he said the same things then, that he says now.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much hope to avoid collapse…and the inevitable takeover of
the country. There will be change. I am now recognizing why some people say we deserve
this outcome. Is flouride an amnesiac? Everyone knows what zoloft is; Klonopin is a
crappy drug…unless you have a seizure disorder.
Maggie,
I’m the only person here that gives 2 shits about yer pictorial so yer best engage me in uh conversation. I have lots and lots of experience with cypress construction and I have some advice as ter what sealant yer gonner need fer yer exterior. I also recommend not letting yer gay son git any where near the place cuz uh flamer like that would ignite yer precious cabin inter uh conflagration of fabulousness. That boy needs uh ass kickin.
If there is the slightest whiff of manure or cow farts in the air, BW is sure to show up. Gather round the bean pot.
Am I the only person who noticed JHK’s assertion that the OP worthies will do all they can to block Trump’s nomination? Not many people talking about that possibility. It would be as interesting as it would be amusing.
I noticed that assertion, but since I expect him to have an unfortunate accident before the convention which will be quietly filed away as poor aircraft maintenance or terrorist attack.
I was involved in the GOP convention in Oklahoma in 2008 when the Tea Party movement was promoting the idea that the establishment control of the process could be overcome if enough people like “us” got involved. I learned that a majority of precincts are not represented at the convention since people generally don’t understand the process. Since I showed up, I became precinct captain for my precinct which had NO OTHER members present. My vote counted for almost 2000 people. I felt very important. HAHA
However, it soon became apparent that the establishment folks didn’t want anyone upsetting their finely tuned decision=making process. And so, if Trump manages to win the nomination with delegates, I’m betting there will be some technicality that prevents his actual run or tragic end to his campaign.
” vote democrat to assuage their white guilt that accompanies their do nothing job. ”
Yep, the tumbleweed sees it clearly. That’s as good an explanation as any I’ve read for the upper middle class white GS10s and their love of the democrats.