Monday 25th of August 2025
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the danger of change.....

When I was growing up in central Pennsylvania, my working-class family took vacations to places we could drive to—for example, Pine Creek Gorge upstate, better known to locals as the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon, or Delaware, where an aunt and uncle lived on the way to Rehoboth Beach. To this day, neither of my parents have been on an airplane, or west of the Mississippi River. The first time I flew anywhere was the summer after I graduated from college.

 

America 2050

Why Our Country Is Too Big Not to Fail
Maybe the United States was doomed from the start. And Jean-Jacques Rousseau can explain why.

Matthew Sitman
December 6, 2022

 

I mention those biographical details to explain the relative lateness and force of a realization I had on a trip to Wyoming in my mid-twenties. A friend had moved to Sioux Falls, South Dakota, where he was a teacher. As a graduate student, I had my summers off, too, so I’d fly to Sioux Falls, he’d pick me up at the airport, then we’d pack food, gear, and supplies into his car and head west to the mountains and hiking trails that usually took two or three days of driving to get to. I’d never seen country so vast and so empty, and I remember going long stretches without passing a gas station or restaurant, let alone anything resembling a town. Sometimes, I’d notice a solitary house off in the distance and think about why someone might have moved there, or stayed, and just how much they must want to be left alone.

At the time, I was in a doctoral program studying political theory, and I couldn’t help but relate my experience of Wyoming to the texts I was reading, especially the Federalist Papers, and, even more important, a late, somewhat offbeat writing of Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s, The Government of Poland. The two were linked in my mind by Willmoore Kendall, who had been William F. Buckley Jr.’s professor at Yale and an early contributor to National Review. He’d also translated Rousseau’s short treatise about Poland and written a provocative introduction to it that, among other things, explicitly compared its arguments to those of James Madison and Alexander Hamilton.

Rousseau finished The Government of Poland in 1772, after a Count Wielhorski, supposedly on behalf of a convention that gave itself the task of drawing up a new constitution for the country, solicited his advice. Rousseau didn’t know much about Poland, though he claimed to study its history and laws for six months before offering his recommendations, and he may have taken on the project for the money. As such, The Government of Poland has tended to languish in relative obscurity, in part because it fits uneasily among Rousseau’s other political writings. Whereas one might expect the author of The Social Contract to tell the Poles to set about razing that country’s old order, Rousseau does no such thing—if anything, he impresses upon them the danger of change, and directs them to keep the most backward and unworkable features of their existing system.

These peculiar suggestions have typically been attributed to The Government of Poland being a “practical” work, one that takes up the concrete problems of a particular regime, as opposed to the more “theoretical” Social Contract. Or perhaps Rousseau, the aging revolutionary, had taken a conservative turn in his last years. Kendall would have none of it. A close reading of the text, he argues, revealed a more esoteric truth: The Government of Poland wasn’t really about Poland, it was about the “radical vice” Rousseau saw emerging—what Kendall called the “territorially extensive modern state.” “Large populations, vast territories!” Rousseau writes. “There you have the first and foremost reason for the misfortunes of mankind.” If man was born free, but everywhere in chains, here was one reason why.

For Kendall, the significance of reading Rousseau’s Government of Poland in this way was the challenge it posed to the theory of the U.S. Constitution expounded in the Federalist Papers, especially Madison’s idea of the extended republic. So many debates about the American system of government understandably focus on the mechanics of how it works (or doesn’t)—say, Senate rules or the separation of powers—that it can be easy to forget that the Framers’ true innovation was attempting to govern such a large territory by anything resembling popular government. Thus, the terminological confusion that prompts the right’s favorite refrain, “a republic, not a democracy.” At the time, democracy mostly was associated with the direct democracy of ancient city-states, and, in the Federalist Papers, Madison gropes toward different linguistic formulations to describe the Constitution’s newfangled combination of the sovereignty of (some of) the people, representation, and federalism across what was already a massive country.

I’ve thought a lot about Kendall’s reading of Rousseau, and its implications, in recent years amid all the discourse about our deep political divides and possible “national divorce.” The states it took me days to drive across in my twenties—South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana—were not yet a part of the United States when Madison wrote on behalf of the Constitution, and neither were dozens of others. But even then, Madison believed that an extended republic would contain a “greater variety of parties and interests,” preserving liberty by ensuring no faction could wrest control of the government. For Rousseau, that was the problem—the greater the scale, the more and different kinds of people, with proliferating and conflicting needs and desires, a regime would have to encompass. A similar argument was made by the Anti-Federalist opponents of the Constitution. The pseudonymous Cato, who many believe was New York Governor George Clinton, held that republics should be small, because larger territories allowed for greater wealth to be accumulated, which would eventually lead to the regime’s demise. And, anyway, he wrote, “The extent of many of the states of the Union, is at this time almost too great for the superintendence of a republican form of government.”

If I can take some liberties with Rousseau’s argument, I think his essential insight about scale has to do with what it would feel like to be governed in a country with “large populations” and “vast territories.” He praises ancient founders—or rather, legislators—like Moses and Lycurgus, for creating peoples; that is, for founding regimes in the fullest sense of the word, something like a shared way of life, which for him necessarily could only be extended and stretched so far. To put it in American terms, how could legislation promulgated from a distant capital, aiming to govern a mind-bogglingly diverse people stretched across a continent, not cause too many of them to chafe too often?

Rousseau’s argument obviously can be put to nefarious contemporary uses—a way to give a veneer of intellectual seriousness to hostility toward pluralism. But it also can serve as a reminder of the affective dimensions of citizenship, and how difficult it can be to govern a place as various, in multiple senses, as the United States, even assuming the good faith of its many people. For most of our history, we’ve evaded this challenge by excluding, in various de facto and de jure ways, some portion of the people from counting, making our political system and power structures more homogeneous than the lives they ruled. The window in which the United States has attempted what Rousseau thought so misguided—to nationally govern a vast, diverse people in a vast, diverse place—has been rather narrow.

I’m doubtful that the experiment will still be going by 2050. I don’t necessarily mean that the United States will “collapse”; in fact, I think that’s unlikely. The Constitution will still be under glass in Washington. But in the years to come, under the pressure of negative polarization, geographic sorting, an ever more fragmenting culture, and the extant anti-democratic features of the Constitution, ambitious national governance will be nearly impossible, with a right-wing Supreme Court attacking whatever accomplishments are mustered. Maybe state governments will take on new importance, or regional coordination and policymaking become more prevalent; maybe not. If I had to predict, stalemate, halting achievements stymied by legal wrangling, and continued conservative assaults on what few public goods remain will carry the day, a behemoth military and security apparatus atop a gradually crumbling society incapable of reckoning with its problems. What could go wrong?

 

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

 

         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

 

ILLUSTRATION AT TOP BY DOUG CHAYKA

 

SEE ALSO: https://yourdemocracy.net/drupal/node/32297

Here we might all think of Jean-Jacques Rousseau as an avantgarde knight of Enlightenment about the human species, but Rousseau was a brutish chauvinist pig — like good old Winston Churchill who was also a racist and a misogynist. So much for the "Noble Savage"... 

deadly sins....

 

Land of the Deadliest Sins

DONALD JEFFRIES

 

Christianity has always emphasized the severity of the Seven Deadly Sins. The Catholic Church defined them as pride, greed, envy, wrath, gluttony, lust, and sloth. Looking around at America 2.0, it’s hard to escape the conclusion that Deadly Sinning comes as naturally to us as betrayal or dishonesty, which apparently don’t qualify.

Pride can be seen in the scrunched up duckfaces of every young girl, as she posts selfie after selfie, like all her fellow narcissist friends. It can be seen in the face of the bully, after he’s sucker punched someone. You know, as in the Knockout Game. You’ll find it on the glowing faces of executives who’ve outsourced or eliminated thousands of jobs, as they announce how much larger the tax free bonuses will be at Christmas. You’ll hear it in the excessively loud laughter of the practical joker, after he’s humiliated someone. But now we have a Pride Month. And it’s devoted to something no decent person should ever be proud of. Gay Pride gave way to LGBTQ Pride. It’s more inclusive. So the mother who pushes her son to become a “girl,” and the newly emasculated lad himself, become extraordinarily proud. But there is no pride in say, being a faithful husband or wife for a half century. Or just being a good Samaritan.

There are some things to be justifiably proud of. Any parent’s face should be flushed with pride as they hold their newborn baby. Or watch them accomplish great things on the sports fields, or cheer them as they graduate from high school or college. Tear up as they walk down the aisle, and dance at their wedding. Genuine heroes should be proud. A firefighter who saves a child from a burning building. A soldier whose valor earns him a Purple Heart, even though the cause he was fighting for was senseless. Inventors who make all our lives better. Nikola Tesla had a right to be proud. The artist who creates a timeless work. But there’s a huge difference between any of that, and Pride Month, for instance. To paraphrase the late Norm MacDonald, that’s not an achievement. Or to revel in your obesity, for instance. The Fat Acceptance movement has created vain monsters out of those who shouldn’t be shamed as they often were in the past, but certainly shouldn’t be celebrated for an inability to control themselves.

Greed. Despite the enduring popularity of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, there are too many who have spirits only slightly less selfish than Ebeneezer Scrooge. We would not have the world’s most shameful disparity of wealth, and I could never have written a book exposing it, without the systemic greed that powers corporate America. Every family has a story of a miserly parent, or sibling, or adult child, that won’t help out a loved one, despite having riches to spare. I have found that, generally speaking, the more money one has, the less generous one is. I’ve heard a few old geezers explain, “How do you think I got rich?” No one gets rich pinching pennies, as Survival of the Richest shows. The same people who like to say, “You can’t take it with you,” very often act as if they do intend to take it with them. Or, conversely, spend it all before those they supposedly love the most in the world can inherit it. You’ll see photos of elderly parents taking lavish vacations, captioned, “spending my kids’ inheritance!”

Envy. Now, I’m as guilty of this as anyone else. I envy those conspiracy celebrities that inexplicably have millions of followers. We all have envied something our neighbor, or a family member, has. A bigger house. A newer car. We might envy someone’s good looks, or the fact he has a trophy wife. Or the great accomplishments of his children. The fact he has a cushy job with wonderful flexibility and outstanding pay. When you have a society where over 70 percent of you live paycheck to paycheck, and have less than $1000 in savings, that’s going to happen. How could it not? I think this is the one Deadly Sin that is the most explainable. I’m not sure that our younger people have any more envy than we had back in the misty days of America 1.0. But they probably have a more burning desire to be famous for fame’s sake. A social media “influencer.” A few people have accused me of being that. I think that’s ridiculous. If I thought I was one, I might very well be struck with a sudden burst of the Deadly sin of pride.

Wrath. This is a tough one. If we mean simple anger, we’re all guilty. All doomed to burn in the flames of Hell. Who doesn’t get angry from time to time? I would define wrath more as an anger with repercussions; wielding authority over those with less power. The Old Testament depicts a wrathful God. We all know that great power usually doesn’t come with great responsibility, despite what Spiderman’s Uncle Ben said. And wrath often interferes with the possibility of forgiveness. It’s not just scorned women who have such wrath. It’s very hard for most people to apologize. Or forgive. Mainly because they have pride. You could call it vanity or conceit. They’re part of the same family. Now I think some wrath is justified. For instance, you could fairly say that my writing is full of wrath, directed towards our politicians, business leaders, celebrities, etc. Basically anyone with real power. Call it Deadly Criticism.

Gluttony. One trip to a large public event will reveal this particular Deadly Sin in all its glory. The overpriced corn dogs, cotton candy, and beer stuffed into ever chubbier faces. The average woman today weighs 170 pounds. That was the average weight of a man in 1960. And the average man has a size forty waist. Even as a pathfinding obese child, I never got beyond a size thirty eight. When the Sheeple of America 2.0 aren’t chanting, “USA! USA!” they’re chanting, “Super size it!” The filmmaker who produced the great documentary Super Size Me, Morgan Spurlock, died at only fifty three in 2024, of what they called “aggressive” cancer. Others would call it turbo cancer. Spurlock publicly chided McDonald’s for not giving employees the whole day off to get their vaccine. Ironically, Spurlock survived (barely) a month of nothing but McDonald’s, but was done in by the COVID psyop. When Victoria’s Secret starts glamorizing overweight models, you know that gluttony is being institutionally celebrated.

Lust. Perhaps the most prevalent Deadly Sin of all. I’m guilty of it all too often. They created an entire world of Deadly lust in online pornography. Sex has been used to sell virtually every product for well over a half century. They use sex with advertising because they know it activates the lust in so many potential consumers. At least for me, it’s the hardest Deadly Sin to resist. If you’re at the beach, or a swimming pool, and an attractive female in a bikini walks by, your head is going to turn robotically. That might not be lust exactly, but it is surely interest. Is interest a Deadly Sin? Half of all marriages end in divorce. In every case, it was because of someone’s lust. Few people leave their spouse for the nunnery or priesthood. Maybe the Muslims have the right idea. Does covering every inch of a woman’s body, and even her face, curtail the innate male lust? I’m just keeping it real, because we males are a lusting bunch.

Finally, we have sloth. I don’t think very many people were guilty of this Deadly Sin back in America 1.0. But now? Males and females, and all the assorted gender fluids, are comfortable in wearing pajamas in public. With all that massive weight gain, you’re going to need a lot of stretchable sweat pants. You wouldn’t want to pop a button while super sizing. And XXXL tee shirts. I don’t think they had anything bigger than an XL when I was young. XL is now pretty much the standard. You don’t have to dress like Ward and June Cleaver did around the house. But we used to at least try to be what they called “presentable” in public. Very few are presentable in public now. Look at all the “People of Walmart” photos. I don’t even know where they buy that kind of outlandish clothing. We’ve gone way beyond casual. Way beyond the untucked world I argued for in my radical youth. We are firmly in sloth land now.

I don’t mean to sound like a blue nose. I know I’m a hopeless sinner but I have faith the Lord will forgive me for my imperfections. I know I could never hurt anyone, let alone commit murder. I would never rape even the loveliest girl in the skimpiest thong. Sexual emergencies only apply to nonwhite migrants. I try to hold my envy in check, by remembering the blessings I have, and how many people might envy me. I don’t really display much pride. I could brag about having had ten books published. Perhaps if I’d sold as many books as a Stephen King, then I might have a swelled head about it. I might even look down my nose at the peasants who bought them. But having pride over being a heterosexual? I.E., normal? Pride at not undergoing a gender transition? Pride over my skin color? What am I, Aretha Franklin? You can be happy with yourself without spelling out R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

Greed should be the easiest Deadly Sin to avoid. I know, you’re thinking- that’ easy for you to say, Mr. Share the Wealth. Huey Long is your hero. If you have the financial wherewithal to help a loved one in need, but don’t, then you’re greedy. Period. We all watch or read the story of Scrooge, and get the point. It makes us feel a special warmth at Christmas. And yet, does the message of the story really cause anyone to change? Demonstrating that the most wealthy are indeed the greediest, Warren Buffet is said to have refused to help his daughter pay for a kitchen remodeling, or help out with his granddaughter’s college tuition. He probably kicks puppies, too. Bill Gates, like many rich and famous entertainers and athletes, is a crummy tipper. Greed is the lifeblood of our corrupt and monstrously unfair economy. Our disparity of wealth is a Deadly Sin in itself. How many bankruptcies, suicides, and divorces, could be avoided with just the figurative pocket change of a One Percenter?

Anger, or wrath, can be a good thing, if channeled at the proper target. For instance, it would hardly be sinful for the masses who are suffering under the tyranny of our criminal overlords to be angry at them. I mean, how are we not angry at them? What exactly do they have to do in order to arouse our anger? I see their sinful wrath in every foreclosure, every repossession, and every unfair job termination. Sometimes, we should be angry. It’s cathartic. My good friend John Barbour, still vigorous at ninety two, told me, “Donald, there are two reasons why I have lived so long. One, is my anger. The other is my laughter.” A sadistic ruler turns his wrath upon the common riff-raff, just like an immature child steps on an anthill. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, the great English populist Lord Acton reminds us. We have every reason to fear the wrath of the elite.

We should try to sin as little as possible, and to sin even less in a deadly fashion. We know right from wrong instinctively. But human beings are wired for certain behaviors like lust, for instance. I don’t know, it probably was a lot easier to avoid lusting back in the days when women wore dresses that pretty much camouflaged their figures. There were no bikinis to be found anywhere on the prairie. There was little pride expressed then, either. No Colonial babes were taking selfies. It’s possible that some farmer was excessively proud of his crops, or a wife of her homemade preserves. There couldn’t have been much gluttony, because most of the people were lean and hard. No such thing as obesity. No plus sized models. Actually, no models at all. A man might fall in love with a woman because of a pretty face and a sweet disposition. Clearly, there was less Deadly Sinning going on.

So how bad has America 2.0 gotten? How low have we sunk? The Bible tells us the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, which were so bad that Lot’s wife was turned into a pillar of salt. What exactly could they have done, to earn such fire and brimstone? I mean, we have fifty seven genders now in our modern world. New girls emerge from biological boys, and vice versa, every day. Oral sex, which was once illegal in at least parts of the country, has become almost as common as French kissing. Anal sex isn’t far behind. After all, you can’t really have homosexuality without oral or anal sex, can you? And our culture now celebrates this behavior, with a Pride Month. Were the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah prouder than the LGBTQ crowd? How many sexual variations could they possibly have had, which the rabbi running PornHub, or the non-Christians running Hollywood, have somehow overlooked?

Thankfully, a belief in Jesus Christ makes all sin forgivable. This doesn’t mean we should Deadly Sin to our heart’s content, and then tearfully repent on our deathbeds. I hope I don’t sound too much like a televangelist with this article. Albeit one who isn’t a millionaire, guilty of the Deadly Sin of greed. No one is perfect. I do wonder what murder, rape, and theft would be considered, if things like lust and gluttony are considered Deadly Sins. I would think killing and hurting others would be considered more severe, but what do I know? I don’t find it hard to be a good person, but it is sometimes hard to love your neighbor, let alone love your enemy. We all judge others more harshly than we would want to be judged. There’s a reason why almost everyone finds it impossible to follow the Golden Rule. Personally, I will continue to try and control my wandering eye, and my wandering mind, with too little success.

https://www.activistpost.com/land-of-the-deadliest-sins/

 

READ FROM TOP.

 

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

 

         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

         RABID ATHEIST