The Culture Warrior

I listened to a Book on Tape by Mr. Bill O'Reilly of Fox News called The Culture Warrior. In this book, Mr. O'Reilly gives a short biography of his journalistic career where he saw a concerted effort on the part of the media to give traditional American culture the shaft. Seeing that the news was extremely onesided, Mr. O'Reilly realized correctly that there was a very big need for a balanced approach to news that brought out both conservative and progressive views. Mr. O'Reilly apparently remembered reading The Art of War in school (Both Machiavelli and Sun Tzu are in vogue). Anyway, Mr. O'Reilly took his career one step further. Rather than just filling a need, Mr. O'Reilly has declared himself a General Sun Tzu in the great Culture War. He further invites his readers to become Sun-Tzus in the culture war.

Bill O'Reilly makes some very good points in his work and is doing a world of service in showing how overboard the secular progressive left has become. The problem I find is that by declaring himself a General Sun Tzu, Mr. O'Reilly seems to have forgotten which culture he is fighting for.

Sun Tzu was a warlord from ancient China. His wisdom is a formula for armies to follow in their domination of other armies.

The Sun Tzu warlord model for organizing a society ends up pushing the vast majority of people into a state of subserviance with just a few powerful overlords that dominate.

The real strength of the American system is that we had found ways out of the system of domination and submission that characterizes most socio-economic systems. Conservatives who've become enamored with Machiavelli and Sun Tzu have a tendency to become part of the forces which are undermining the culture they claim to be defending.

How to put it another way?

There is something really wierd with the secular progressive movement.

If you start tracing back the trends of the secular progressive movement, you will find that it went through a similar fascination with alternative philosophies Machiavelli and Sun Tzu.

Both Machiavelli and Sun Tzu said wise things. The problem is that these things are out of sync with the classical liberal tradition. The conservatives who march off to defend traditional Amerrican against the evil secular progressives end up being part of the game that erodes the classical liberal traditions that made the United States great.

BTW, have you noticed that since O'Reilly came out with the Culture Warrior that secular progressives have come out with the same idea of being generals in the culture war.

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Now, the theme of the culture war is that modern American society is divided into two warring factions. These are the traditional Americans and the secular progressives.

Again the problem with this type of thinking is that it is out of character with the founders of this nation who were hoping that we could reason through issues and not let the issue carve the deep divides that they do today.

The American Burka

I was taking a walk on an absolutely beautiful Fall day. This was one of those crisp afternoons where the sky was crystal clear, the sun was muted with sufficient high cloud coverage to minimize the glare. The temperature was in the mid sixties.

I passed a group of disaffected youth on the street. They were all bundled up in the fashion statement of the day ... the venerable hoodie. One of the members of the group was clearly male. Two were clearly female. The other shuffled in a nondescript asexual method.

As I approached the group, the hooded figures aimed a feeble shrug in my direction to avert any human to human greetings ... as if I did not already know that people in the United States were not supposed to acknowledge eachothers presence when we passed on the street.

This was not the first time I have seen the hoodie. I have seen a large number of kids sulking around with their identities safely guarded in the tiny haven of a hoodie. I have even seen been the subject of a hollow stare of a meth-infected eyes daring a glance from beneath of a hoodie in my direction.

If it was a beautiful day that was actively driving in my mind the beauty of this planet earth, I would not have noticed the disaffected teens sulking around oblivious to the world around them. It was such a beautiful day that I really began wondering what type of fashion statement would make teens shut off the world to close themselves in the anonymous shadow of a hood.

As I thought of the hoodie, a vision of the oppressed women forced to wear burkas in the mideast shot into my vision.

Yes, it makes sense that, as our nation declares defeat to the forces of radical Islam, American youth would begin cloaking themselves in the American Burka.

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David Horowitz has a few pictures of the two hoodie clad activists who tried to disrupt his speach at Ball State. Yes, as we declare defeat, it makes sense that we both act and dress like the victors.

Scotty-less

Scotty died.

I am now starting to worry that there is no one at the helm to beam us up.