Patrick Buchanan is a prophet without honor among his own. Despite taking courageous stands in opposition to the culture of death in his columns, books and campaigns, he was abandoned by religious conservatives.  Though he has stood firm against untrammeled immigration, affirmative action, and multiculturalism, he has been disparaged by “racially conscious” conservatives like Lawrence Auster . Naturally, his balanced view on the trade question has engendered heated diatribes from ideological Rockwellites, glib denunciations from “Dynamists,” and blasts from Catoite-types, too.  And of course, his lucid and gimlet-eyed analysis of American foreign policy, and the coming end of the American Imperium, has provoked the ire of the militant nogoodnik faction of the right known as neocons.

In his new book, State of Emergency, Buchanan exhibits a sense of foreboding that has animated much of his work in recent years.  “As Rome passed away, so the West is passing away, from the same causes and in much the same way. What the Danube and Rhine were to Rome, the Rio Grande and Mediterranean are to America and Europe, the frontiers of a civilization no longer defended.”

The primary theme Buchanan hammers home is that the demographic wave of immigration unleashed since 1965 is dramatically different from prior immigration flows.  Moreover, American elites have failed to reckon with the fact that today’s stream of immigrants is significantly different from its predecessors in size and scope.  In ignoring these facts, the chattering classes have enabled the transformation of America from the last best hope of mankind into the polyglot boarding house of TR’s imagination.

Harvard political scientist Samuel Huntington pointed to the same trend in his book, Who Are We?  “Mexican immigration,” wrote Huntington, “differs from past immigration and most other contemporary immigration due to a combination of six factors: contiguity, scale, illegality, regional concentration [in the American Southwest], persistence, and historical presence… Demographically, socially, and culturally, the reconquista (re-conquest) of the Southwest United States by Mexican immigrants is well underway.”

Before 1965, immigration was shaped by the national origins quota system, which granted visas primarily based on an immigrant’s country of birth.  As a result, 70% of visas went to three countries–Great Britain, Ireland, and Germany. However, modifications to the 1965 law established family reunification, and to a lesser extent employment preferences, as the new criteria for admission.  The resulting demographic, economic and cultural tsunami is described by Buchanan, who peppers readers with a myriad of statistics marinated in deep historical perspective, all written in his inimitable style.

“In 1960,” says Buchanan, “America was a nation of 180 million, 89 percent of whom were of European ancestry, 10 percent black, with a few million Hispanics and Asians sprinkled among us. Ninety-seven percent of us spoke English.”

But “by 2050, they [Hispanics] will be 24 percent of a nation of 420 million.  By nation of origin of our people, America will be a Third World country.  Our great cities will all look like Los Angeles today.  Los Angeles and the cities of the Southwest will look like Juarez and Tijuana.  Though we were never consulted about this transformation, never voted for it, and have protested against it in every poll and referendum, this is the future the elites have prepared for our children.”

If public opinion stands in opposition to the demographic changes destroying the American project, why does it continue?  In a chapter entitled “Roots of Paralysis,” Buchanan spreads the blame widely.  Corporations push for amnesty and collude in mass criminality to see their illegal workers pardoned as a means of driving down wages. Economists who believe in the myth of economic man provide ideological cover by putting forth the notion that sovereignty, independence and country itself should be sacrificed to the gods of globalism.  Race-hustling politicos on the Left like LULAC, MALDEF, and the ACLU–supported by big foundations like Carnegie and Ford–see open-borders as a way to augment their power through the manipulation of ethnic voting blocs.  And finally, churches, both Catholic and Protestant, are effectively championing amnesty in the name of feeding the hungry and giving drink to the thirsty. The reality is that churches, too, have succumbed to the politics of guilt.

Buchanan also examines a fundamental and underlying question that lies at the root of the conflict over immigration: What is a nation, and what holds it together?  Such issues are seldom raised in polite company, and Buchanan deserves credit for taking on proponents of the “creedal nation” mythology.  By definition, a nation consists of a largely homogeneous population with a common identity; occupies a contiguous territory; speaks the same language; enjoys the blessings of a common religion, literature, manners, customs, and mythology; is governed by the same principles and traditions; and is conscious of common destiny and solidarity. In short, it is an ethno-cultural entity, not merely a market or set of vague universal propositions.

So what is to be done?  Buchanan suggests turning off the magnets that attract immigrants. The first step is terminating birthright citizenship to the children of illegal aliens who become anchor babies.  Next, Buchanan argues that subsidies for illegals in the form of welfare, health care, and education must be denied.  Likewise, employers should face stern punishment for law-breaking, and Buchanan advocates the imposition of fines and possible jail terms to penalize firms that hire illegals.  Finally, the borders must be secured via the construction of a fence across our southern border.

Buchanan’s advocacy of stern measures and his presentation of the facts has spurred the same tired charges of xenophobia and racism.  But Buchanan is largely making a nationalist (or what Steve Sailer would call citizenist) case that as Americans, from whatever ethnicity or nation we have descended, have shaped a common culture worth preserving and share a common destiny worth saving.

Example #1 

Today it was announced that NBC is considering broadcasting centerpiece segments from Madonna’s ‘Confessions’ tour that includes the 48-year-old exhibitionist performing while suspended on a giant cross wearing a crown of thorns.

Christians throughout the country were reportedly boycotting  Madonna albums as well as NBC programming. Pastors throughout the nation railed against this kind of public blasphemy and threatened to run NBC and Madonna’s record label ‘out of business’ if NBC goes forward with this broadcast.

Example #2 

Today it was announced that NBC is considering broadcasting centerpiece segments from Madonna’s ‘Confessions’ tour that includes the 48-year-old exhibitionist performing while flushing Korans down onstage toilets.

Muslims throughout the country were reportedly burning Madonna in effigy while NBC’s corporate offices have been receiving bomb threats since the announcement. Imams throughout the nation railed against this kind of public blasphemy and threatened to ‘bring the wrath of Allah’ against infidel if NBC goes forward with this broadcast.

Example #3

Today it was announced that NBC has decided to not broadcast the Madonna tour deciding that it was insensitive and inappropriate, effectively censoring the 48-year-olds exhibitionist’s talents.

Humanists throughout the country were outraged by this lack of tolerance in NBC and have resolved to pass legislation requiring NBC to broadcast all forms of art.  ACLU Lawyers throughout the nation, intolerant of NBC’s decision, railed against the kind of blasphemy that will not allow blasphemy of other religions to be nationally broadcast. The ACLU has vowed to take such intolerance to the Supreme Court.

The Point 

In all three examples the Holy has been identified by the response of each people of faith to the decision that runs contrary to their belief system. Some Christians somewhere at some time found the Cross to be Holy and so would be, if they still existed, outraged when it is blasphemed. The Muslims find the Koran to be Holy and so are outraged when it is blasphemed. The Secularists find nothing to be Holy and so are outraged when what is thought to be Holy by other peoples is not allowed to be blasphemed.

All three have a sense of the Holy (Christians – Cross, Muslims – Koran, Secularists – The Right to Mock Everybody Else’s Sense Of The Holy) that is not to be tread upon. All three (Christianity, Islam & Secular Humanism) are religions, thus all three have a Holy, and thus all three practice intolerance. All three are intolerant when their vision of the Holy is blasphemed.

As Americans who have been trained in government schools, we clearly see that intolerance in examples #1 and #2 but we don’t see it in #3 because that is the accepted natural default position in our culture. Example #3 is our religion and very few people ever question that their religion is just naturally correct.

“While repeating a firm deploration for any form of violence, His Holiness hopes that the blood that has been shed by such a faithful disciple of the Gospel can sow hope for the building of real fraternity among people with reciprocal respect of everyone’s religious convictions.”

Pope Benedict XVI
Telegram To Religious Order Of Nun Killed in Somalia

I have a few questions for his Holiness followed by a few observations.

Why would a Christian want to live in a culture where respect for Allah or Vishnu or Meaninglessness or Marx was equal to respect for Jesus Christ?

How can the head of the Roman Catholic Church believe that light can have any fraternity with darkness?

Does the Pope even deplore the violence it takes to resist violence?

It looks to me like the same multi-culturalist bug that has bitten everybody but the Muslims has bitten Pope Benedict XVI. The Muslims alone seem to get it. They seem to alone understand that respect for Allah requires them to believe themselves superior to the followers of all other gods. Now, of course they are wrong, given that Allah is just a mute, stupid, bastard idol, but at least grant them the integrity of their convictions. It seems the Muslims alone understand that if they are forced to live in a culture where reciprocal respect of everyone’s religious convictions exist then Allah is playing second fiddle, with all the disrespect that implies, to the god who insists that everyone’s religious convictions must be reciprocally respected.

This multi-culturalism is going to get us either all killed or bowing and scraping to Allah. Multi-culturalism explains why Politician dingbats exist who are going around saying Islam is a religion of peace. Multi-culturalism is why we are fighting Terrorism and not Islam. We are no more fighting Terrorism now then we were fighting punji sticks in Vietnam. You see, Multi-culturalism is the faith system upon which our way of life is built. We cannot pinpoint for attack a set belief system (Islam) without at the same time attacking our own way of life. If we were to demonize Islam we would at the same time have to admit that our own faith system that teaches that all cultures or religions are equal is not true. So we are left in the position where if we attack Islam, we would at the same time be attacking the infrastructure belief system upon which our culture is setting. Victory over Islam would then mean defeat of the faith system that informs our own way of life.

And of course our enemies realize this. When somebody draws cartoons of Muhammad or when the Pope speaks out against Islam, the Muslims are there screaming ‘intolerance’ and because our way of life has tolerance as the holy grail we retreat into mouthing absurdities that Islam is a religion of peace. Here we are fighting what is supposed to be the new version of the Cold War and because our defacto faith system is what it is we can’t even identify the enemy. Indeed, instead of identifying the enemy, we ask him to the White House for Luncheons or we give him tours of the security systems at our National Airports.

My friends, Islam is only the enemy after the enemy that will not allow us to name and identify our enemies. That enemy is far more dangerous for that enemy is sitting in our halls of power and in our Sanctuaries and in our marketplaces and is residing in many of our own souls. The real enemy is the enemy that keeps us from identifying ourselves as a uniquely Christian people. We will not be able to name and defeat our enemy that threatens us from the outside until we defeat the enemy that holds our own Citadel.

That battle is the greater of the two we face. 

 

About a year ago, I wrote a short essay on the messianic statecraft of Paul Wolfowitz. It makes for very compelling reading.

Back in the bad old days of American impotence in late 1960’s and 1970’s, Wolfowitz began his meteoric rise by proclaiming that ongoing revolutionary changes in information technology could transform the nature of warfare itself. Computers and whiz-bang weapons systems would allegedly provide opportunities for offensive military action by virtue of their accuracy. Military precision, in turn, would free policy makers from the moral ambiguity that had served to constrain the untrammeled use of American power previously. In Wolfowitz’s Eden, the American hegemon is not merely the New Rome, but the New Jerusalem. American power is hence baptized and infused with a moral dimension, spreading “universal values” (abstract flim-flam like “democracy” and “freedom”) while unconstrained by the collateral damage of war.

Unfortunately, Wolfowitz didn’t take account of the fact that technology tends to have a leveling effect. And new technologies have clearly democratized modern warfare, and empowered the practitioners of what William Lind has called Fourth Generation Warfare. Just as the printing press helped to undermine the dominion of the Catholic Church, new technologies and methods of warfare are slowly undermining the State’s monopoly on violence.

As far back as 1989, Lind pointed to the potential for technology-driven Fourth Generation Warfare. Lind wrote:

If we combine the above general characteristics of fourth generation warfare with new technology, we see one possible outline of the new generation. For example, directed energy may permit small elements to destroy targets they could not attack with conventional energy weapons. Directed energy may permit the achievement of EMP (electromagnetic pulse) effects without a nuclear blast. Research in superconductivity suggests the possibility of storing and using large quantities of energy in very small packages. Technologically, it is possible that a very few soldiers could have the same battlefield effect as a current brigade.

The growth of robotics, remotely piloted vehicles, low probability of intercept communications, and artificial intelligence may offer a potential for radically altered tactics. In turn, growing dependence on such technology may open the door to new vulnerabilities, such as the vulnerability to computer viruses.

Small, highly mobile elements composed of very intelligent soldiers armed with high technology weapons may range over wide areas seeking critical targets. Targets may be more in the civilian than the military sector. Front-rear terms will be replaced with targeted-untargeted. This may in turn radically alter the way in which military Services are organized and structured.

One clear lesson of the American failure in Iraq and Israel’s Lebanon debacle is that though Islamic militants are still decidedly low-tech, technology is now moving faster than the diplomatic and political resources to control it. Hezbollah’s success against Israeli tanks likewise demonstrates that missile technology is becoming democratized.

More ominous is a trend noted by leftist historian Gabriel Kolko. An increasing number of states can cheaply obtain near weapons-grade plutonium. “Within a few years,” writes Kolko, “many more countries than the present ten or so – the Army study thinks Saudi Arabia and even Egypt most likely – will have nuclear bombs and far more destructive and accurate rockets and missiles.”

All of this means that the United States would be much better off pursuing a defensive rather than aggressive strategy in the misnamed War on Terror. In On War, Clausewitz argued for the superiority of defensive war. “So in order to state the relationship precisely, we must say that the defensive form of warfare is intrinsically stronger than the offensive. This is the point that we have been trying to make, for although it is implicit in the nature of the matter and experience has confirmed it again and again, it is at odds with prevalent opinion, which proves how ideas can be confused by superficial writers.”

In short, any foreign policy strategy should seek to insulate us from disorder. To quote Lind, “America’s grand strategy should seek to connect our country with as many centers and sources of order as possible, while isolating us from as many centers and sources of disorder as possible.”

What the Iraq war has accomplished is little more than the destruction of a State, which created a vacuum exploited by the purveyors of disorder. Such actions “as the war in Iraq,” says Lind, “tend to isolate us from successful states and run counter to our interests.”

So the key is some degree of military retrenchment, and creating rapid-hitting Special Forces that can strike quickly and lethally. But we also must separate ourselves from dependence on foreign oil and seal ourselves off to a greater degree from the sea of humanity now fleeing disorder. Lind says correctly that disorder will naturally produce hordes of refuges and immigrants. Nevertheless, “accepting refugees from centers of disorder imports disorder.”

A corollary to reconsidering our interventionist foreign policy is taking moves domestically to secure the nation. In a new book entitled Defeating Jihad, Serge Trifkovic argues passionately and persuasively that Islam is incompatible with Western mores, folkways, and institutions. Trifkovic endorses greater domestic spying on Muslims and supervision of Islamic Centers using a variation of McCarran Internal Security Act of 1950, denying security clearances to Muslims, and immigration policies that exclude all persons engaged in “Islamic activism.”

Trifkovic’s goal seems similar to Lind’s–separating the United States from growing global disorder by emphasizing defense rather than offense. “The victory,” says Trifkovic, “will not come by conquering Mecca for Americans but by disengaging America from Mecca and by excluding Mecca from America. Eliminating the risk is impossible. Managing it wisely, resolutely, and permanently is something attainable.”

Conservatives looking for answers to the crisis the West faces should be looking to the likes of Lind and Trifkovic. Though their analysis may be flawed around the edges, they avoid the foolish nihilism and moral relativism of the Left without succumbing to the mindless interventionism of the Neocon Right.

In olden days a glimpse of stocking
Was looked on as something shocking,
But now God knows,
Anything goes!
Good authors too who once knew better words
Now only use four-letter words
Writing prose,
Anything goes!
If driving fast cars you like,
If low bars you like,
If old limbs you like,
If Mae West you like,
Or me undressed you like,
Why nobody will oppose.
When every night the set that’s smart is
Intruding in nudist parties in studios,
Anything goes!

—From “Anything Goes“

According to the Times of London, a Church of England priest has continued to officiate as a cleric in spite of his conversion to Hinduism. The Rev. David Hart’s diocese renewed his license even though he moved to India, changed his name to Ananda, and serves in a Hindu temple in Thiruvananthapuram, a village in southern India.

Hart, er Ananda, recently published a book entitled “Trading Faith: Global Religion in an Age of Rapid Change,” where he discussed his conversion to Hinduism. It should also come as no surprise that Hart was a Fellow of the Jesus Seminar and secretary for the World Congress of Faiths.

In an interview, Mr. Hart said, “I have neither explicitly nor implicitly renounced my Christian faith or priesthood.” However, in his capacity as Hindu priest, Hart daily blesses a congregation of about 60 with fire that has previously been offered to Nagar, the snake god.

Hart believes his move will “be read in the spirit of open exploration and dialogue which is an essential feature of our shared spirituality.” “My philosophical position is that all religions are cultural constructs,” he said. “I am acting out God’s story in local terms.” Nothing like diving headlong into a stew of theological relativism.

I know that I should probably critique the unbiblical, heretical view of God on display; that I should point out the flaws in his soteriology, parse his syncretism, and harp on his gross violations of God’s holy and perfect law. Clearly his epistemological foundations are in need of challenge. But I’m going to resist those urges and in the spirit of Elijah (see I Kings 18), will resort to a bit of sarcasm instead.

When I read this news item, all I could think of was “The Simpson’s” episode entitled “Homer the Heretic,” where Homer rejects Christianity. At one point, he is discoursing with Apu at the local Quickie Mart. Seeing a statue of Ganesha in the “employee lounge,” Homer chides Apu:

Homer:
“Hey, Ganesha. Wanna peanut?”

Apu:
“Please do not offer my god a peanut.”

Homer:
“No offense Apu, but when they were handing out religions, you musta been out taking a whizz”

So true. But even worse are the “Christians” who allow such idolatry from their own clergy.

On Friday, the Senate Intelligence Committee released a report scrutinizing Saddam Hussein’s alleged ties to radical Islamic terrorists before the March 2003 invasion. “What was the gist of the report, Darrell? Boil it down,” you say. Well, OK, the administration claims linking Iraq and al-Qaida were complete balderdash. “Postwar findings indicate that Saddam Hussein was distrustful of al-Qaida and viewed Islamic extremists as a threat to his regime, refusing all requests from al-Qaida to provide material or operational support.”

Keep in mind that Iraq-supporting warmongers are running the Intel committee, so this isn’t a mere partisan hit-job. In fact, the report is part of a five-part study that the Senate Intelligence Committee has undertaken examining the Bush administration’s use of intelligence before the invasion of Iraq. Three committee reports remain classified (i.e., suppressed), including one which compares prewar statements by Bush administration officials to intelligence available at the time.

To take one example, before the war, leading administration figures parroted liars like Stepen Hayes, fomenting the charge that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was fitted with a prosthetic limb in a Baghdad hospital and stayed to recuperate in Baghdad as a VIP guest of Saddam Hussein’s regime for months. This myth played into the notion that a sinister connection existed between al-Qaida and Hussein.

It still isn’t clear whether Zarqawi sought medical treatment in Baghdad, but even if he did, is it hard to believe Saddam might not have been perusing check-in logs from the local hospital? That in fact a terrorist like Zarqawi, who was hostile to the secularism of the Hussein regime, might have snuck into town undetected. According to the Senate report, Saddam “attempted, unsuccessfully, to locate and capture” him and the Iraqi regime “did not have a relationship with, harbor, or turn a blind eye toward Zarqawi.”

Zarqawi, it must be remembered, operated from an area in northern Iraq outside Saddam’s control, effectively protected by the American enforced no-fly zone.

The point is that Saddam was a thorough secularist and wanted nothing to do with the messianic aims of Wahabbi extremists like Zarqawi. Likewise, the divisions within Islam are significant, and we would do well to extricate ourselves from the region and allow them to fight among themselves.

Yet until immediately before the war, the president had no idea that Islam was a sectarian faith. Gee, that might have been handy to know before preparing a war, don’t you think?