- Conservative pundit calls for “civic uprising” against Trump…
- Reforming America’s “whorehouse”…
- Is Trump the most significant president since FDR?…
Dear Reader,
Mr. David Brooks is a self-described “conservative.”
Yet let us consider Mr. Brooks’ most recent column in The New York Times.
This fellow agitates for a “civic uprising” against President Trump.
Civic uprisings do not track, generally, with American institutions.
Yet Mr. Brooks places his faith in American institutions. And he believes this president menaces those institutions.
These are the institutions that “make our lives sweet, loving and creative, rather than nasty, brutish and short.”
Among these institutions are:
- Constitutions to restrain power, international alliances to promote peace, legal systems to peacefully settle disputes, scientific institutions to cure disease, news outlets to advance public understanding, charitable organizations to ease suffering, businesses to build wealth and spread prosperity, and universities to preserve, transmit and advance the glories of our way of life…
- What is happening now is not normal politics. We’re seeing an assault on the fundamental institutions of our civic life, things we should all swear loyalty to — Democrat, independent or Republican.
Rise up, Elites!
Thus the time for “a comprehensive national civic uprising” has arrived:
- It’s time for a comprehensive national civic uprising. It’s time for Americans in universities, law, business, nonprofits and the scientific community, and civil servants and beyond to form one coordinated mass movement. Trump is about power. The only way he’s going to be stopped is if he’s confronted by some movement that possesses rival power…
- Right now, Trumpism is dividing civil society; if done right, the civic uprising can begin to divide the forces of Trumpism.
Just so. I am heart and soul for institutions that… in Mr. Brooks’ telling… “make our lives sweet, loving and creative, rather than nasty, brutish and short.”
Yet are these the institutions that in fact exist? I am not convinced — in many instances — that they war against their declared purposes.
Shall we interrogate the recent history of the “fundamental institutions of our civic life, things we should all swear loyalty to?”
Democracy, Really?
Let us revisit the plague year of 2020.
What did the fundamental institutions of our civic life inform us?
That lockups were necessary. That facial masks performed gorgeously. That the novel vaccines were safe and effective — and that hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin were neither.
Any who rose to challenge these claims were labeled the common enemy of mankind… and very likely an agent of Satan.
When they tried to talk the “social media” outlets — in strict collaboration with federal authorities — placed tape upon their mouths.
That is because they were attempting to disseminate “misinformation” and “disinformation.”
Did a critic hold a doctoral degree in epidemiology or related field? Could he claim several decades of relevant experience that informed his dissent?
Did he occupy a perch at such a learned institution as Yale University or Stanford University?
It made no nevermind. The masking tape went across the mouth.
And “fact checkers” lacking any credential within the medical disciplines said he was wrong.
Yet who has time validated — the official experts — or the officially denounced experts?
I believe the evidence validates the second group, the officially denounced experts.
“We Were Wrong”
I cite the following headline, dated Jan 30, 2023:
“It’s Time for the Scientific Community to Admit We Were Wrong About COVID and It Cost Lives.”
Beneath which:
- As a medical student and researcher, I staunchly supported the efforts of the public health authorities when it came to COVID-19. I believed that the authorities responded to the largest public health crisis of our lives with compassion, diligence and scientific expertise. I was with them when they called for lockdowns, vaccines and boosters.
- I was wrong. We in the scientific community were wrong. And it cost lives.
- I can see now that the scientific community from the CDC to the WHO to the FDA and their representatives repeatedly overstated the evidence and misled the public about its own views and policies, including on natural versus artificial immunity, school closures and disease transmission, aerosol spread, mask mandates and vaccine effectiveness and safety, especially among the young.
- All of these were scientific mistakes at the time, not in hindsight.
There you have your admission of guilt. Under withering cross-examination the witness continues:
- [It] resulted in thousands if not millions of preventable deaths… We created policy based on our preferences, then justified it using data. And then we portrayed those opposing our efforts as misguided, ignorant, selfish and evil. We made science a team sport, and in so doing, we made it no longer science. It became us versus them…
Do not forget — this man was in lockstep with the “experts” at the time. More yet:
- Labeling this speech “misinformation” and blaming it on “scientific illiteracy” and “ignorance,” the government conspired with Big Tech to aggressively suppress it, erasing the valid political concerns of the government’s opponents.
Yet this is the “scientific institutions to cure disease” Mr. Brooks would have us trust?
The 2020 Election
Let us next take under examination the 2020 presidential election.
Fifty-one former officials of the United States intelligence agencies informed the American public that Hunter Biden’s laptop computer was the product of “Russian disinformation.”
It was not the product of Russian disinformation — as even the Federal Bureau of Investigation concedes.
The Russian disinformation theory was itself the product of American disinformation…
Disinformation issued and disseminated by 51 former officials of the United States intelligence agencies.
A decisive segment of the American electorate claimed they would not have voted for Mr. Biden had they been aware of the younger Biden’s laptop computer.
Meantime, the institutions Mr. Brooks carols advanced the accusation that Messieurs Trump and Putin conspired to swing the election in the former’s favor.
Thorough investigation revealed that the accusation was largely — if not entirely — phantom.
The accusation itself was in every likelihood “disinformation.”
Should the American public place trust in these institutions?
Mr. Brooks… evidently… believes it should.
American “Law”
This fellow cites the legal system — another cherished institution of American life.
Yet is this not the same legal system that conducted ruthless “lawfare” against candidate Trump?
Even legal experts who do not care for Mr. Trump one whit denounced the preposterous torts leveled against him.
They claimed many of the charges lacked all legal grounding.
Many American voters who likewise did not care for Mr. Trump swung to his defense. They believed a vast injustice had been done him in the interest of political ambition.
Again I ask: Is this the institution in which Mr. Brooks would have us trust?
Mr. Brooks laments that:
“We live in a country with catastrophically low levels of institutional trust.”
And it baffles him that it is so? Here he acknowledges a degree of institutional guilt:
- University presidents, big law firms, media organizations and corporate executives… have to show the rest of the country that they understand the establishment sins that gave rise to Trump in the first place. They have to show that they are democratically seeking to reform their institutions.
Reforming the Whorehouse
I refer to the previous passage. Democratically seeking to reform their institutions?
It is foolish — and highly so — to entrust sinners with the restoration of virtue.
Here I am reminded of the late author, Mr. Frank Chodorov.
He argued, with piercing insight, that most reform aspires to “clean up the whorehouse [while] keeping the business intact.”
True reform must often assume the shape of the wrecking ball.
I depart with an observation. As I have argued before:
If the institutions despair that the American people no longer trust them… they need but stare into a very clear mirror.
The blame is entirely theirs.
Brian Maher
for Freedom Financial News
