This is the time of year when people try to make sense of the preceding twelve months. It’s a fool’s errand, in one sense. A year is an arbitrary division of time. We decide what it means in retrospect, and we never get it exactly right. But the meaning we give it will guide our actions in the future, in thousands of conscious and unconscious ways.
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Posted by
instamatic on 01/18 at 06:01 PM
Maybe someday we’ll look back and say this was the year a revolution began
No, the only real revolution is in science and engineering. And as you probably know, biology is now the leading science. A key biological fact is that in the ‘60s, the decade of revolutionary activity, the average age of the population was about 27 or so. Today the average age is middle age. Middle aged people are not going to start a revolution. If you want anything at all, anything to move in any way, you are going to have to find young people to go along with you.
Not to disparage the possibilities: this year will be the most exciting year since ‘89, when the Berlin Wall was torn down. However it’s infant leftism to think revolution is in the offing. Humanity has not evolved materially, physically and cognitively for a revolution and might not do so until the 22nd century. And the 22nd century wont know our simian politics. Apes fight for power, food and sex, whereas humans fight for power, money and sex—such is the extent of political progress.
Something crucial that everyone neglects: charisma. Franz Neumann, writing in 1942, said that the Leader (Hitler) undeniably had charisma—and that charisma is an important factor not discussed enough. [Richard, you reference charisma in this: “Any year that…takes David Bowie, Prince, and Leonard Cohen…”]
Not to draw a parallel between Trump and Hitler. Trump is a loudmouthed boor, yet no monster. Trump is charismatic, and if Hillary Clinton had his sort of charisma, this Friday would’ve seen her being sworn in as president. If Trump hadn’t charisma, he’d never even have entered the primaries last year. Now, though Trump is no monster neither is he a good person. Trump possesses the charisma of Reagan albeit few other qualities.
So we ought to keep charisma in mind when thinking of the primaries three years from now. It is not too early. In 2020, America might elect a real person with or without charisma—not a piece of political cardboard.
What will occur politically this year? Another Occupy-type movement; it is all our primitive political system can allow. This summer will be the 50th anniversary of the summer of ‘67—which will see a renewal of culture. But cultural renewal only: renewal in politics is decades in the future. We’d have to outgrow our simian power, money, sex grasping first: that is way off in the distant future.
The way leftists talk of the future, it is almost as if they think ETs are going to come to Earth to save us. When Donald Trump becomes potus, then it is time to call things into question.
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