August 12, 2013
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20500
Dear Mr. President,
Once upon a time two real stinkers an especially
snuffy, snuffling pair of Orcs of Orcus (a real Hell) invaded the Land of Order
incognito and in spite of all consuetude and a perfectly good but unfortunately
unused sniff test that would have exposed the masquerade lickety-split wormed
their way to a new home, a shadowed cave, under that fair lands hallowed Bridge
of Wonders. Of course, being, as all Orcs are, lovers of Chaos and Old Night,
they recognized this as a perfectly delightful place from which to attack
Order. (They really enjoyed their work.)
Rising above disorder in unshadowed brilliance
the Bridge of Wonders was built of the efficacy of mutual experience and thus
spanned the generations with the continuity of prescriptive custom and
convention, a history and a language they called their own, and a faith that in
elucidating their imperfect nature offered the guards of Spirit and cognizance,
and it ran to the hearts of the people with the "doctrine of objective
value, the belief that certain attitudes are really true, and others really
false, to the kind of things the universe is and the kind of things we
are."[i]
Hence, they trained themselves to recognize and cherish the good and abhor the
bad. Relativism did not flourish. Nourished by these wonders and many more the
people devoted themselves to the ordering of Liberty, the equality of Justice,
and the integrity of Truth, and they flourished.
Well naturally this did not suite the bumptious
buckos of Orcus one bit; so, famished for pain but happily anticipating the
sanguinary satisfaction of their appetites they set about laying the pretense
for that society's demise. It was party time in the cave: Out came the loin
cloths, teeth were sharpened, the light was choked off, shadows worshipped. No
faith here except in themselves. They claimed to be infinitely perfectible.
Accordingly, the sun setting behind them they
made their way and promulgated their false doctrines by the Tartarean light of
the morning star. The journey had begun.
The Bridge of Wonders and the Land of Order it
supported were caught between two braying epigones of humanity whom we shall
call Bill and Hillary. Diabolical, clever and supremely vicious; they had a
record of destroying good people, and they had a plan.[1]
"The head rules the belly through the chest--the seat, as Alanus tells us,
of Magnanimity,[ii] of
emotions organized by trained habit into stable sentiments."[iii]
Well, this brought sharp toothed smiles of anticipation to their hideous faces.
Then they took out their knives (they were big on gun control) and straightaway
cut out the chest Magnanimity and all. They filled the void with propaganda.
The Orcs of alien sensibilities hating what they
sought to replace beat their drums for change gleefully mindful that change
being what it is would leave nothing of the former substance and further,
reminded people that a vacuous “politics of meaning” would now bring meaning to
their lives. This meant that government by Orc would now remake a chestless
society according to its vision for the land determined not on the basis of
centuries of shared experience and an order of love[iv]
(such thoughts had been done away with) but by mere whim coupled with raw
power. In the shadow of their failure to appreciate the many faceted world that
had been the glory of the age society withered and and became sterile, unable
to reproduce itself. All that was left was an intolerant meanness and a coerced
uniformity. For those who asked why the Orcs and their recreant recruits
mandated an invidious University level training in sensitivity. Previous
generations had abhorred even mocked such totalitarianism in foreign lands,
they said it couldn't happen here but they failed to recognize its insidious
nature. Now it was normal. Again Chaos and Old Night came to their thrones.
Having been newly christened Whiffets of the Land
the people were furnished with a good strong slavish obeisance to whatever
authority happened to be ascendant, and cautioned to never parse what they said
to closely, e.g., "we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what
is in it." Of course they gave them the speech about the egalitarian joy
of nihilism and the hedonistic pleasure of individualism; that always set their
hearts a twitter as long as it was couched in euphemism and nobody asked
questions. The law was corrupted and caught some by surprise, possibly because
they could not believe that anyone would make such utterly asinine law, but
after unanswered appeals on end, their legislators just did not seem all that
relevant to getting things done, there always seemed to be "political
priorities" that took precedence over needed reform, people lost interest
or maybe hope. But in any case, the citizen was exhorted to be a good subject.
This meant embrace subservience, trust government, and never ask too many
questions, the experts would make the decisions. Welcome to the herd. So it
went in the former Land of Order. The End
The moral of the story is this. Beware of people
who driven by hate want to strip you of everything you care about and
everything you believe and who, in spite of a lack of evidence and too often
intentionally ignoring evidence to the contrary, want to force themselves and
their propositions on you. That is the sum of progressives "political
philosophy." Actuated by ingratitude, they bring in their hatred "all
the operations of opinion, fancy, inclination, and will" to bear,
"where only a sovereign reason...should dictate."[v]
This makes of government thus seduced something akin to an empty headed bed
mate and that is something the Republic cannot afford.
I have the honor to be,
LYNN SWARTOS
535 Ryman
Missoula, MT 59802
(406) 694-3475
klmfs2009@gmail.com
Cc:
[These letters are now on my Facebook page. Tell a friend. (This note was not included in the original letter.)]
[1] As
an example of the least of their callousness it should be noted these two had
an unwanted child who despite his manifest claims to the contrary was, after
being slathered with invective, labeled a worthless weiner that did not measure
up and in accord with the Feinstein Doctrine summarily aborted the relationship
(more sharp toothed smiles). It was very sad, in the end he was clearly seen as
a weiner no one wanted.
[i]
C.S. Lewis. The Abolition of Man. Chapter 1
[ii]
Alanus ab Insulis. De Planctu Naturae Prosa, iii
[iii]
C.S. Lewis. The Abolition of Man. Chapter 1
[iv]
De Civ, Dei, xv. 22. Cf. ibid. ix. 5, xi. 28 [ Ordo Amoris or order of love is
Augustines definition of Virtue]
[v]
Edmund Burke. Letter to a Noble Lord. 1795, 1796.
No comments:
Post a Comment