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The Snapback

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Published : October 22nd, 2013
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Category : Editorials

     Well, at least the poobahs cleared a path to the annual orgy of Christmas, which, along with the S & P 500, have become proxies for the American economy. Lately, the Christmas season starts directly after Halloween, so, the whole fourth quarter of the year becomes a circus of ceremonial distractions. In the background, though, the nation grinds toward anguish, measured in soiled Justin Bieber dolls deposited in the landfills.

     Historians who look back on these strange years of suspended consequence will marvel at how this empire of grift kept its wheels turning after its engine died. Being on the downhill slope is often enough to keep anything going. One might think the young people of this land would be seething at the eclipse of their futures, but it seems they have been successfully lobotomized with cell phones — when the endorphin hits lag between text messages, they can watch sitcoms, or porn.

    You can be sure there will be a snapback from all this drift and anomie, and when it comes, the snap will be savage. Like the US economy, the Republican Party is dead but hasn’t gotten the news. It killed itself just as the Whigs did in the years before the Civil War, by splitting up into factions — one faction of “know-nothings” preoccupied with scape-goats opposed to a faction of sclerotic parasitical fat-cats too timid and greedy to engage in the emergencies of the day.

     The Tea Party faction should change its name to the Cracker Party because it represents the interests of white southerners who are too dumb to know what these emergencies amount to. They are really more comfortable with the supernatural, hence their fondness for religions based on snake-handling, visitations of the dead, and motor sports. Personally, I believe they will eventually contrive to form their own break-away Cracker Republic and attempt to re-enact the Civil War. They will fail, and starve, and find themselves back in an even worse long-term depression than Dixieland experienced from 1860 to 1960, in a de-suburbanized wasteland of bare subsistence farming. Their highest art will be soup-making.

     The non-Tea Party Republicans will just shrivel and vanish out of sheer irrelevance. This leaves the Democrats to become the focus of intense ire as they attempt to ‘splain why the nation’s affairs went to shit on their watch. A lot of them will end up being executed and plundered by the new kid on the block, the Savior Party, led by some charismatic character willing to ignore procedural protocols to clear away the debris left by his-or-her predecessors. Alas, the juice will not be there to permit the Savior to really control a territory as large as the continental USA. By juice, I mean money and oil. Thus, the nation enters its new dark age.

    Who knows when that will get underway in earnest, though I think the folks who say 2014 are onto something. If you believe in cycles, which I tend to, then it rhymes nicely with 1814 and 1914, two watersheds when one epoch ended and another truly began. 2014 would logically be the year that China tells America to go piss up a rope. The message would be sent on the back of the envelope containing $2.7 trillion in official American debt paper. As Ole Blue Eyes used to say, this could be the start of something big.

      Sentient observers of the current scene are clearly frustrated by the remarkable homeostasis that seems to rule the scene, these horse-latitudes of history where the air is still and nothing moves and the mind is exhausted by watchful waiting. Things will get lively, soon enough, so enjoy the holiday quarter of the year which is so soon upon us. Gorge on candy corn. When you recover from that, roast a turkey. Then make a nice figgy pudding. Then pop some bubbly and salute your loved ones. Then gird your loins for the new age of consequence.

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James Howard Kunstler has worked as a reporter and feature writer for a number of newspapers, and finally as a staff writer for Rolling Stone Magazine. In 1975, he dropped out to write books on a full-time basis. His nonfiction book, "The Long Emergency," describes the changes that American society faces in the 21st century. Discerning an imminent future of protracted socioeconomic crisis, Kunstler foresees the progressive dilapidation of subdivisions and strip malls, the depopulation of the American Southwest, and, amid a world at war over oil, military invasions of the West Coast; when the convulsion subsides, Americans will live in smaller places and eat locally grown food.
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Jim probably doesn't even know a Tea Party guy. People who want government constrained by the Constitution seem to terrify lib/progs. Beats me!
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Say what? Kunstler's rant this time is akin to a 17 year old drunk standing wobly legged on a box spewing all he knows to all within ear shot. There is no real subject, just a mish mash of crapola. He takes a few shots at politicians, throws in a couple of facts and calls it a wrap.

Yes Howard, we know Obama is a Muslim he's admitted it, check out the youtube vid. Yes Howard we know politicians love to argue and throw hissy fits. Yes we know you hate all religions except for your mother earth worship. But have you got anything new to add?

Good grief man, think and engage your brain before you let you body pound away on a keyboard like a bunch of caged chimps. Otherwise this slop is destined to become your every Monday heave up.
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Kunstler has a unique view of history that, not surprisingly, facts contradict. He loves to take a recognizable problem, twist it, and come up with some off-beat solution -- all with his usual splattering of foul language and big words. For instance he says of on-going conflict in the Republican party: "It killed itself just as the Whigs did in the years before the Civil War, by splitting up into factions — one faction of “know-nothings” preoccupied with scape-goats opposed to a faction of sclerotic parasitical fat-cats too timid and greedy to engage in the emergencies of the day."

It is true that the Whig party collapsed, but not for the reasons Kunstler would urge gullible readers to believe. It was the indifference to slavery that killed the Whigs and that launched the nascent Republicans and not 'greed' that Kunstler suggests -- just as the indifference to Government encroachment on individual rights will kill (if it hasn't already) the Republican Party.

Kunstler rails against the Christian element among the Republicans and the Tea Party -- probably the only thing he gets right, calling it a "supernatural" element. But then ignores the many time he himself has invoked the supernatural image of Mother Earth taking vengeance on the polluting human species.

Kunstler reserves especial venom for the Tea Party of which he says, "The Tea Party faction should change its name to the Cracker Party because it represents the interests of white southerners who are too dumb to know what these emergencies amount to." Say what? Did he not listen or avoid listening to Ted Cruz's filibuster? If anything the Tea Party is the only hope left for defending what remains of the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and the Constitution itself.

Does Kunstler have any negative thing to say about the former slave owning Democrats or our current Islamic leaning President? Anything at all to say about the coercive nature of Obamacare? Let us listen. Ah, no. Nothing, not a word, not a peep, and that says volumes about Kunstler's priorities and values.

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Even though I'd rather be dragged over a bed of hot burning coals, I have to admit that old Jim C. really nailed it this time. Kunstler must have emerged from a three-day drunk just before deadline to pen this rambling, semi-coherent screed. While I generally appreciate his insights, it is quite amazing that leftists and even old line leftists like Kunstler start foaming at the mouth whenever a Tea Party member passes by. How can anybody dare express a viewpoint that diverges from their self-anointed enlightenment and sense of goodness? Well, we all have our bad days. Perhaps it is best if we don't advertise them over the internet.
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BAH. Today JHK has simply taken to looking for enlightenment in heaved up curry. This is such a useless pile of ___________ that I'm surprised he'd put his name on it. He can bring up some interesting points, some real conversation starters never mind arguments by some who post here but today I think we can all shout a unified WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING?

JHK, suffering flashbacks from previous years of substance abuse?
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James, your insights, as always, are so remarkably probable. I believe America entered the Dark Age with The Patriot Act:when our government mandated groping and fondling at the airports. On the other hand, considering the consequences of the wars, too-big-to-fail and quantitative easing: it's bound to become a LOT darker age in the future.
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Jim probably doesn't even know a Tea Party guy. People who want government constrained by the Constitution seem to terrify lib/progs. Beats me!  Read more
Jake - 10/23/2013 at 5:03 PM GMT
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