Some Things I Believe

Mark Noonan26 Comments

Looks like a Bernie vs Trump race is shaping up – though the DNC may still figure out a way to knife Bernie at the convention. Be that as it may, we are heading into an election where the choices will be stark. A real “which way do you want to go?” election. It isn’t differences of mere emphasis or method – it is differences about what sort of America one wishes to exist…and visions of America which cannot, ultimately, tolerate the other vision. So, a lot is at stake.

Personally, I think Trump will win – barring the marvelous, all factors are working in his favor. A strong economy. No new wars and old wars winding down. Trump is now scandal-free because the most intense effort ever made in political history to tag him with scandal failed. People are now used to him as President and people have a natural disinclination to make huge changes while things are going well. Meanwhile, his opposition has staked out positions which vast numbers of Americans furious reject – what we’ll find out in November is precisely how many. It could be a lot – but, we learned in 2016 that anything is possible. If Bernie emerges victorious, we’ll know that we are the decided minority in our country and we’ll have to draw some stern conclusions from that. But worries and triumphs are for tomorrow, what I want to do here is lay out, in 2020, what I – Mark Edward Noonan – believes.

The basics remain the same as always: I subscribe 100% to the faith and morals teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. I diverge not an iota from official doctrine. I do, however, think that some changes are needed – more in form than substance – to reflect a greater understanding of how things work and how God’s will is to be applied in practical terms. But, that can be for another day: for this, it suffices to say that I view all matters through the prism of Catholicism, while understanding I live in a pluralist Republic.

1. Some people have so much money that they can buy massive amounts of influence. This wouldn’t be so bad if the purchasers of influence were a mixed bag of differing view, but they’re not. Nearly all of them are one version or another of Progressive who only disagree on minor details – nearly to a man, they despise the people, hate patriotism, think Christianity is evil and are working to consign concepts like private property and the family to the dustbin of history. They have been like this for more than a century – and it is time we start taking away their money as a means of taking away their ability to distort our political life. Bloomberg is turning out to be a disaster on the campaign trail but remember that he straight out bought second place in the Democrat primary for a while…and may yet purchase the Democrat nomination. I know conservatives reading this will get their backs up about how I’m advocating Socialism – but, I’m not. First off, I want the confiscated funds passed out to regular folks but, secondly and far more importantly, once we’ve got the money away from these creeps, hosts of Progressives simply disappear…do not underestimate the number of pundits and scientists and lawyers and advocates who are employed by these vastly wealthy people to sucker you into thinking their way. Find something you don’t like about America in 2020 and, rely on it, if you dig far enough back you’ll find a Progressive rich person who funded the group which got the ball rolling.

2. The post-war system of alliances has to go – it was a stupid idea to begin with and was set up to contain the United States. We haven’t won a war since 1945 because we are pre-committed to losing due to our alliances. Alliances should be temporary and only to serve a specific foreign policy goal.

3. Public education was a bad idea and it should be abolished. Provide funds for poor parents, if you like, but don’t set up school systems. And I mean no credentials for schools, at all; no regulations. Let people do whatever they want in this area. Let anyone who wants to teach, teach – and teach whatever they like. As attendance would be entirely voluntary, the presumption is that it would probably be fairly interesting and it’ll certainly work out better than the current system which passes out diplomas to functional illiterates. Right now it’d be better if the kids were hanging out on street corners…at least there they’d learn something.

4. The States need to be broken up – but Constitutional Convention, if necessary. In my view, no State should have more than 10 million or so inhabitants. Generally, once you get to that large a number of people you’re getting a situation where some large percentage is simply be rolled over by a majority who have different interests. But it isn’t entirely population that matters here: There are also economic and geographic considerations. What does Buffalo have in common with New York City? Bakersfield with San Francisco? Not much – but San Francisco and New York City essentially dictate to Buffalo and Bakersfield. That sort of thing has to come to an end – we’re supposed to be a Federal Republic…not a collection of tyrants lording it over minority populations.

5. The Experts ain’t. In other words – they aren’t Experts in anything, they just have credentials. Remember, for the most part, they are all coming out of the same education system which passes out diplomas to illiterates. It has all been dumbed down…even the elite education establishments have dropped various requirements over the years. Someone from Yale may be better educated than someone from Cal State Northridge…but only marginally so. Even in the hard sciences, there has been a drop off and we’re really just producing mechanics who have Masters degrees. The result of all this is that the people who are in charge – and who believe (often quite sincerely) that they have special insight – haven’t a clue what they’re doing. Time to turn them out…not necessarily fire them all, but start bringing in people who aren’t certified Experts. Imagine if the Department of Labor was headed up by a guy who owned a plumbing outfit in Akron and if it was staffed by a bunch of people who just came in from the private sector? On and on like that.

6. The military needs to be reformed. I doubt our ability to fight a first rate power at the moment. I think that decades of having officers promoted via checking off SJW boxes and having an army of lawyers second guess combat actions has degraded the warrior ethic in the military. If I could, I’d seriously cashier everyone above Lt. Colonel and give everyone in six months to get entirely in shape or get out. Then I’d insist on the most rigorous training exercises for all branches to weed out the dead wood. And I’d institute rigorous physical requirements for joining and no distinctions made based on sex…if the requirement is that a soldier be able to run a mile carrying 80 lbs, then every last soldier in the army will have to do it, or get out.

7. Trade is good – but it must be reciprocal. If we buy from them, they have to buy a roughly equal amount from us. The bottom line is that US economic policy should be geared towards meeting our needs by domestic production if at all possible. Only if we simply can’t make it here should we be looking outside for it…and even then, we should be seeking for ways to start getting it here.

Anyway, that’s where my mind is at on some major issues. Others can have different views, of course. But, I’m right.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan16 Comments

Bernie is supposed to win the Nevada Caucus this Saturday – but I’ve been seeing on TV that Democrats are complaining about how bad the early voting went (and how the heck do you early vote in a caucus? Who is keeping the records?). Meanwhile, the Culinary Union – 800 lb gorilla in Nevada Politics – has been putting out anti- Bernie flyers. My guess: they are going to try and rig it against Bernie. Stay tuned.

Meanwhile, to heck with wanting to run against Bernie – we want Bloomberg! This guy is the archetype arrogant, rich jerk…thinks he’s smart because he’s rich and drips with contempt for anyone poorer than he is. If the Democrats nominate him, we’ll destroy them up and down the ballot.

Coronavirus slowly gets frightening:

More than 700 people in Washington State are being publicly supervised for coronavirus, according to new results from the Washington State Department of Health.

The department said Tuesday 746 people in the state are under public health supervision, including those at risk of having been exposed to novel coronavirus. These people are monitoring their health under the supervision of public health officials.

H/T: Legal Insurrection.

President Trump to visit Los Angeles to check on homelessness and 2028 Olympic prep: going right into the belly of the beast! It is good – it will allow Trump to be front and center being President, attack Democrats on their incompetence…and fire up GOP voters in California to turn out in November. There is, of course, zero chance Trump wins California this year…and I mean zero. But, OTOH, I’ve seen some reports that California Latinos are starting to trend a bit GOP (upper class whites are trending even more Democrat). I can definitely see it: the bottom line is that Latinos have seen big improvements under Trump and most of them are probably tired of the corruption and incompetence of California’s Democrats. What the heck does Jose in Compton, who just wants to raise his family, have in common with Democrats who are too busy fighting climate change to clean the sh** off the city streets? We’ll see how this plays out – Trump wants a popular vote win. He doesn’t need it, but he wants it…he wants to put an end to all Democrat arguments against him. And there were several million pro-GOP voters in California who didn’t show up in 2016 because there was no reason to…Trump wants to give them a reason to show up.

Hanoi Jane will mark the Kent State anniversary at Kent State. WTF is this old, hagged out Commie traitor supposed to say?

Blue on Blue fighting: Soros wants Zuckerberg forced out of Facebook because Soros believes he’s helping Trump. Thing about Lefties is they always assume they’ll be the Commissar, never the Kulak. Zuckerberg is about to learn his lesson…we’ll see if he stands firm or offers a grovelling apology to the Party.

National Divorce or Civil War?

Mark Noonan26 Comments

The other day I saw on Twitter an article about a Canadian case where a father was forced by a judge to address his daughter as a boy because that is what his daughter claims she is – a boy. This was, naturally, a minor child. It caused a lot of outrage but the real issue here isn’t whether or not a kid should transition or whether a parent should accept such a thing. These are important issues, of course, but the most crucial aspect of it was the judge ordering the father to do something he believed to be wrong – in this case, lie about his daughter’s gender. And that, really, is the point of the whole exercise: to force the lie. Either tell a lie – that your daughter is a boy – or be held in contempt of court and go to jail…where you won’t be able to do anything for anyone, least of all your daughter who is being destroyed before your eyes. But, also, if you agree to say the lie then you’ve just lost the most important thing you can be for your daughter: someone who is fearlessly honest. If you’ll lie about something like that, what won’t you lie about?

Another case that caused some comment was the Utah Senate’s vote to de-criminalize polygamy. From the article:

Sen. Deidre Henderson stood on the Senate floor Friday and asked her colleagues to reconsider a decades-old state law classifying bigamy as a felony and making implied criminals of the state’s polygamous residents.

Rather than deter or eliminate polygamy, the Spanish Fork Republican said, the state code’s threat of harsh punishments had driven polygamous communities underground; cut families off from jobs, education and health care; and given rise to a subculture that gives predators “free rein to prey upon vulnerable people.”

Note how our Conservative Republican is busy Conserving…we have to legalize polygamy because if we don’t let these weirdos do what they want, they’ll be weird. Argument sound familiar? You have heard it before. Its the way Conservatism cements Liberalism…because the real reason they are doing this is because SSM became legal and once that was done, there was no argument to be made against polygamy except the same arguments used to attack SSM…it is against Natural Law (which Conservatives are supposed to Conserve). But we jettisoned that with SSM…and by “we” I mean “we Conservatives”. Not all of us, of course, but a large enough number that made the imposition of SSM a bipartisan event in the United States.

And we were all so happy about it, weren’t we? Love is love, right? Two men. Two Women. Three Woman and a Man. A 40 year old and a 15 year old…hey, wait! What are you saying? No one is advocating for that! You insane, mean spirited bigot! The very idea!

But, you know its coming. I’m sure if I dug around enough I’d find serious scholarship arguing for no age barriers, or at least much lowered age barriers. I won’t look for it because I don’t really want to see it – and if it doesn’t exist at this moment, it will in a short while. And you know it. And the argument which will be made – and eventually by Conservative Republicans Super Conserving Conservatism – is that if we don’t lower the age bars, we’ll be giving predators “free rein to prey upon vulnerable people.”

But still in all that, the worst aspect of it all is that we are not being asked to tolerate, but to actively approve. That’s the real problem here: we definitely live in a post-Christian world which not only lacks a mechanism to enforce morality, but wouldn’t even agree most of the time on what is moral – but it isn’t enough, for those running the show, that we who still retain the old morality to live and let live. No: they insist that we participate and approve. We Christians are rather back to square one, as it were: just waiting to be rounded up and led to the arena to provide dinner for the lions. Because it is going to be like that – the Christians of 100 AD made no effort to stop the storied infamies of 1st century Rome. There was no demand that the Games be cancelled or that the licentiousness be curbed…and yet still the Roman world went mad against Christians and tore them to pieces…because they wanted the Christians to approve of the Pagan lifestyle. When such approval was withheld, off the Christians went to provide bloody entertainment to the offended Pagans. Do you get it? Your lack of immorality offends.

So, what to do?

I’m not sure – but I am inclining towards those who simply want a divorce. That the portion of America which believes a person can change their gender separates from that part of America which doesn’t believe such a thing can happen. It would take some sorting out – how much territory each side gets; divvying up the national debt and military assets; will people have a period of time where they can move freely from America I to America II (and vice versa) with immediate full citizenship status? My guess is that we’d vote by county – and if a majority votes for America I, they are America I…America II, America II. It would make for a bit of a chopped up America II (the Left side) as they have majorities in far few counties but that could be address by negotiation…which would also be a drawn out process.

But, if we don’t divorce, we’ll have to fight. One thing I can’t see is us staying together and at peace when the two sides differ not just on trivia like forms of government, but on basic things like “2 plus 2 equals 4”. For our citizens who really think that “genderfluid” is a thing, 2 plus 2 equals whatever the hell they want at the moment. I’d rather we divorced – because if we fight, then the losing side doesn’t get to live in the America of the winning side. And I mean, at all.

Brokered Convention Open Thread

Mark Noonan21 Comments

They’re saying that a brokered Democrat convention is as likely as Bernie getting a first ballot majority – lots of excitement about that, but I’m still rating is a low probability…the Democrat machine will do all it can to slay the Bernie campaign (including outright cheating). But, we’ll see – the only way the Democrats keep Bernie off the ballot is to have someone go into Milwaukee with more delegates than he has. If they take it away from him after he comes in first, the Bernie Bros will revolt.

James Carville is watching his Democrat Party implode and he doesn’t like it. Too bad, James: you had your chance to save the party when Clinton was impeached…you and the rest pulled out all the stops to save him and this is the long-term result. By diligent effort humans can some times maintain a level of good…but you can’t maintain a level of bad. You keep going until you’re all the way down. How’s the bottom look to ya?

Coronavirus gets worse – I’m sure they’re not telling us the full truth; we can be certain, at least, that the Chinese are lying about it.

Barr gets a little testy about Trump’s Tweets – I don’t think there’s much to worry about here but a bit of advice for Barr: start arresting deep staters and your problem is solved.

Congressman fart-guy says Democrats are open to impeachment Trump again. Go for it, gassy.

Don Surber points out we elected Trump to run Justice. This does need to be hammered home – under the Constitution only the President is charged to see to it that the laws are faithfully enforced. No one else; just the President. He’s the guy who decides who gets investigated, who gets indicted, who gets pardoned. Now, we’ve set it up so that we have an Attorney General and Justice Department to handle the day to day of it all, but they only get their authority from the President. They are not independent of him. They aren’t supposed to be. They can’t be. Law enforcement must be subject to the will of the people.

The Roger Stone jury would make a Stalinist show trial blush. I don’t really know much about Stone – I’ve heard of the gay frogs thing, but outside that my only knowledge is that he’s a harmless kook who puts on a show. He was railroaded by Mueller in an attempt, from what I can tell, to force him to lie under oath about President Trump…and when that didn’t work (which indicates a sense of honor on Stone’s part), he was put in front of a kangaroo court. He should be pardoned.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan26 Comments

I got blocked by Glenda Gilmore on Twitter. Who is she? Well, I honestly didn’t know until after I was blocked. She had made a statement about how Trump’s desire to beautify Federal buildings was his way of ushering Fascism into the United States…Trump likes Greek columns and you know who else liked Greek columns, right? Well, Obama, actually…but, anyways; I made a comment to her Tweet saying along the lines of “maybe its just that people don’t like ugly-a** architecture”; and I was blocked.

She, is however, a person with quite impressive credentials and is currently a professor of history at Harvard – she’s top of the Elite. Looking at her credentials, I’m not sure if she just doesn’t know anything, or knows it all and simply chooses to believe stupid things. In the end, it doesn’t matter: out of ignorance or malice, she’s yet another person running our culture determined on the destruction of civilization. The barbarians are not at the gates: they are within the walls and destroying everything they touch. Mark my words – if we don’t have a very swift reaction against barbarism, in 100 years people will be trying to cure cancer with poultices and goat entrails.

Biden in finished for all intents and purposes – but you wonder what cruelty keeps his handlers from telling him to get out? The latest bit:

On Sunday, Joe Biden snapped at a voter in New Hampshire, calling him a “lying, dog-faced pony soldier.”

The dust-up came after the voter asked Biden, “How do you explain the performance in Iowa and why should the voters believe that you can win a national election?”

“You ever been to a caucus?” Biden replied.

After the voter said she indeed had attended a caucus, Biden shot back: “No you haven’t. You’re a lying dog-faced pony soldier.”

I’m getting embarrassed for the guy: he’s a very old man clearly of declining physical and mental capacity – he should be in a retirement home, not on the campaign trail.

The Coronavirus continues to spread as China’s government cracks down on Chinese trying to talk about it. Once again: if it just a flu, why be particularly concerned about it? People will get sick, some few will die, most will get better in a week or two. Is this just the Chinese government being stupidly over-cautious, or is this disease far more infectious and deadly than anyone is letting on? I guess only time will tell.

In New Orleans, apparently for years, the DA issued fake subpoenas. The people hit with these fakes are now suing – and the prosecutors are running to the courts claiming they have immunity as government officials. Trouble is, they are probably right thanks to some monstrously stupid Supreme Court rulings in the past. A huge part of criminal justice reform must be making prosecutors fully responsible for their actions – if they fake or hide evidence; if they knowingly send innocent people to jail, they’ve got to pay high criminal and civil penalties. Those we give the authority to send people to jail or to the executioner must be held to an extremely high standard.

A Leftist psycho rammed his van into GOPers registering voters and the news about it has been completely blacked out by the MSM. If you still needed proof that the MSM are mere DNC propagandists, here you are.

RSM notes that Populism is popular – and, increasingly, effective. The story he notes specifically is how President Duterte of the Philippines has cleaned up his country – his linked article tells of Filipinos who live in crime-free neighborhoods where business is good and no one lives in fear. You know: just like all normal people want to live. Contrast this with the Globalist Elite which wants us all to live in sh**-strewn streets where criminals roam free…all done to punish us for not being up to Globalist Elite standards. What is happening is the rebellion of the normal – mom and pop got pissed and started voting against the Elite…and mom and pop, kind as they are, really don’t mind if criminals and bums are given rough treatment.

SOTU Open Thread

Mark Noonan35 Comments

Did you watch it? If you didn’t, you missed an amazing speech. I remember Reagan, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen one as good. If you did miss it, here’s the text – but you’ll want to find a video of it. Worth every minute of your time.

Wow and wow and just more wow. It was a grand and glorious thing – hitting on the massive accomplishments of Trump’s term but also bringing everyone to tears several times…if you didn’t get misty eyed over Brigadier General McGee and his grandson, then you’re just a dirty commmie.

How in heck are these Democrats going to beat this guy? I guess we’ll see what they do – but Nancy tearing up her copy of the speech as Trump stepped down is an indicator of how bad this is going for them.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan31 Comments

A good Tweet of mine might normally get a dozen or so likes – the Tweet I did suggesting we’re going to primary Romney after his witness vote is up to 429 likes. Methinks ol’ Mitt really screwed up on this one.

What was the upside for him? A kind mention or two in the MSM…but the downside is he’s revealed he’s learned nothing and forgotten nothing. A fit of pique over Trump not making him SecState and he’s placed himself in real jeopardy for re-election in Utah.

Impeachment wraps up on Wednesday – though some Democrats are saying they’ll go right back to it. It wouldn’t surprise me: kamikaze attacks seem to be all they have left. This may well allow the GOP to take back the House in November. If we’re going to re-elect Trump, and I think we will, how many Trump voters will be inclined to vote down-ballot for a Democrat who is almost certain to impeach him again in 2021?

Coronavirus: getting a little more interesting out there. What I’m wondering about is why we care so much? Tens of thousands of Americans die every year from the flu and what I haven’t heard is that this flu is particularly more deadly or infectious than any other flu. Why the big deal about it? It would be sad if an additional ten or twenty thousand Americans die this year because of the flu, but that wouldn’t be an Earth-shaking tragedy. I’d only be worried about a flu which is set to kill millions…something like the Spanish Flu 1918-1920 which killed many tens of millions (in a much smaller global population). Is this what some are expecting and only letting it slowly dribble out? Or is it just a big nothing?

Bolton’s betrayal has been rankling me – and makes me wonder if any of them, Democrat or Republican, can be trusted? I think of the way that MacArthur was slandered into political irrelevance while his much less competent former subordinate, Eisenhower, is still lauded to the skies. Has it been that for a very long time, the good people have been destroyed so that the bad people can thrive? So that, really, bad people can make themselves look good? How many of the heroes of the past 100 years have survived real scrutiny? How many supposed bad guys have, on second look, turned out to be rather heroic? LBJ was a racist pig of a man. JFK was jumping on everything in a skirt. MLK has very definite questions about his morality. Truman sent men to die in a war they weren’t allowed to win. The Elder Bush let the completely defeated Saddam survive. Meanwhile, we know Joe McCarthy was completely right; that per MacArthur there really is no substitute for victory; that Patton correctly perceived the threat of the USSR…and all of them were taken to task by the same people telling us that people like Truman and Kennedy are icons of public service. And keep in mind that I’m deeply versed in history and am only now coming to this realization…how much less will less informed people see it? We are indebted to Trump – by accident or design, he exposed the essential corruption at the core of American institutions.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan29 Comments

Jared Kushner’s peace plan was released – looks like it would be excellent for the Palestinians if they would accept the deal (and the money) and settle down to build themselves a national life…but we can rely on it the Palestinian leadership will reject it out of hand and work up some paid mobs to pretend to be the Palestinian people expressing their righteous anger. Two things will decide the fate of this plan:

1. Trump getting re-elected: if he is, then US policy on this won’t change any time soon.

2. Most of the Muslim world telling the Palestinians to accept the deal or get bent.

We’ll see how it comes out. Elder of Ziyon has a brief rundown.

The impeachment thing still goes on – now with Bolton being the White Knight who will save the day for the left. What really irks me is now many times we on our side went to bat for Bolton and this is how he pays us back. They really are garbage, these old-line GOPe types, aren’t they? You wonder if they ever really believed anything they ever said when they were supposedly on our side. Thanks to RINO’s like Mitt and Collins, there’s still some back and forth about whether witnesses will be called. Ultimately, the witnesses, themselves, don’t matter: there’s nothing for them to tell. But it is amazingly irritating that the RINO’s keep doing this stuff – they’ve got to realize by now that we really can’t stand them doing this. In the end, though, its all a big nothing: Trump won’t be removed – it is only a 1% chance that any GOPer actually votes to convict (10% chance that Manchin votes to acquit).

The Supreme Court ruled that Trump, indeed, has the power to enforce American law which bars welfare bums from immigrating.

Latest on the Coronovirus: 100,000 may already be infected. I’m still pretty “meh” about it.

Some of our Liberal and Never Trump Elite Expert Super Smarty-Pants guys yucked it up about how we Trump supporters are all morons. They have been massively dragged on social media for it, and deservedly so. But it got me thinking: these guys really aren’t too bright and really don’t know much. They are always insulting us as having not gone to college and that we don’t read books. But I’d stack my list of read books against any of these dimwits…and I’ll bet mine is a lot larger and covers more variety.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan39 Comments

I had to be reminded that the impeachment trial was still going on – I tuned into maybe half an hour of it the first day. Apparently I’m not the only person tuning it out: ratings for the show are abysmal.

It appears that the antics of the House Managers are turning off a lot of Senate GOPers and there may not end up being one GOP vote for the Democrats…but there is a chance that two or three Democrats may vote with the GOP.

Meanwhile, the FISA court admits the warrants (or, at least, some of them) against Carter Page were bogus. Of course they were: the whole thing was bogus from the start. Always remember that all these things which were set afoot in 2016 were started by people who were certain they’d be answering to President Hillary come January, 2017. What’s happened since then has only partially been about getting Trump…they are also desperately trying to cover up what they did.

The coronovirus thing out of China – you worried about it? I can’t get worked up about it. So many of these health scares have come and gone with no real ill affect on a major scale – I guess I’m just a bit jaded about it. Though my supposition is that if the Chinese government is really locking down cities, they are at least worried it is easy to transmit from human to human. But I’ve only elevated my personal Threat Level from “Whatever” to “Huh: Interesting”.

The Democrats are getting ready for Iowa and New Hampshire – I’ve seen this and that about them. It is rare, as it turns out, for one candidate to win both contests. I guess that means we can expect a Biden win in Iowa and Sanders in New Hampshire. Meh. To me, it doesn’t really matter – unless Sanders wins both because that means the Democrat bosses will go nuts to crush Sanders…and make it so obvious that at lot of the Bernie Bros will stay home in November. A lot of people – some I actually respect – are now talking up Bernie’s chances and, additionally, trying to claim he’s the Democrats’ best chance to beat Trump. I don’t see it. Beating Trump, I mean. What in heck other than Socialism, SJW insanity and Orange Man Bad do any of these clowns bring to the table? All signs point to a strong economy through 2020 and Trump is not the guy to get us into a war…what is the event that would make people move away from Trump?

Very interesting:

The head of the one of the world’s largest Muslim organizations paid an unprecedented visit to the site of the Auschwitz extermination camp on Thursday, where he participated in remembrance prayers for the Jewish victims of the Nazi Holocaust.

Lots of things like this are going on – signs that the hatred between Jews and Muslims is abating, at least in some quarters. After Trump moved the embassy to Jerusalem, told the Palestinian leadership to pound sand, set his Jewish son-in-law to find a path to peace, whacked Iran’s terrorist mastermind…funny, huh?

Brexit becomes official as Queen Elizabeth gives Royal assent. Britain leaves on the 31st. I honestly didn’t think the Brexiters would pull it off…the British Ruling class was just so entirely dead set against it…and make no mistake about it, Boris Johnson is part of that class; but he was the only one in it who realized that the people wanted it, and whomever gave them what they wanted would be rewarded with power.

The Anti-War Poison

Mark Noonan3 Comments

I had never seen Journey’s End before last night, when I watched the most recent version of it. It is considered the archetype of the anti-war play – the way it is supposed to be presented. And I have to say, what I saw was excellent movie making; it is well worth your time to watch it. But it also left me cold.

The movie is set in the last few days before the German’s Spring Offensive in 1918 and centers around the officers of a British infantry company manning the front lines. Key to the plot is Captain Denis Stanhope, a war hero who has been in the trenches for three years and is presented as a man clearly crushed by what he had endured over the years. The action is strictly small scale – no grand war scenes. Just life in the trenches and the terrible anticipation of what everyone knows is coming: a major German offensive which will have a devastating impact on precisely the men manning the front line. The point is to make you sympathetic to the men caught up in the awful trauma of World War One and it drives home, especially at the end, the pointlessness of war.

But, war isn’t pointless, and I think that is what left me cold.

We are not permitted to gainsay the views of the play’s author: Robert Cedric Sherriff. He was an infantry officer in World War One who fought at Vimy Ridge, Loos and Passchendaele; among the hardest fought battles of the war. What he describes about the soldiers life is true. Just as true is that his play reveals he was gravely embittered by what he had suffered. And, who can blame him? Like so many of Britain’s youth, he was swept up into war and then placed into the meat grinder which was the Western Front. He did what he did, suffered what he suffered, and then wrote about it as he thought best.

Still, there are relevant facts which are not even mentioned in the play – notably that the British did win the war, and winning the war was good for Britain and the world. What should also be noted in any discussion of the particular battle the play describes is the incredible courage of the British soldiers in the battle. The British were heavily outnumbered in the sector attacked and the Germans were staking all they had on the offensive – they hit the British with the strongest forces made up of the cream of the German army; and the sector they hit, primarily the British 5th Army, was the least prepared part of the British line. The men performed prodigies of valor blunting the German attack and extracted a huge blood price for the advance. Because they fought so well – units often fighting until exterminated – the British were able to hold the overall line and eventually stop the German offensive well short of success. The Germans would keep battering away through the Spring, but they never came closer to actual victory than that first attack on March 21st and all the while the number and quality of the German attackers deteriorated – and so quickly that not five months later, the British Army launched their counter-attack at the Battle of Amiens, which spelled final defeat for Germany. All of this – all of the context which would make a person fully understand why Captain Stanhope’s company was there and what they would do before destruction – is left out of Journey’s End, and thus gravely distorts the picture of World War One.

And after watching it, I realized just how terrible was this poison that the play injected into all considerations of war and patriotism. Even the really great war movies of late (Saving Private Ryan, eg) are infected with this basic idea that war is just nothing but bad and that the men who fight in war are lambs led to slaughter by unfeeling commanders. It isn’t really like that; lambs led to slaughter don’t stand and fight when cut off and running low on ammunition. That is what lions do. They could have quit, after all; and, in all war, men do quit. The British had a fairly good idea when the attack would come because, among other things, German deserters had told them it was coming – and as these men were part of the assault force, this means that even in the very best units of a good army, there are men who take the measure of the situation and decide that living is the most important thing. I’m sure there were British soldiers who took off to the rear or went hands up at the first sign of the Germans – but they were few and far between. Most gritted their teeth and fought until destroyed or taken because all means of resistance were exhausted.

A play like Journey’s End robs the men who did stand and fight of the glory they had earned at the highest possible price – and it robs their fellow citizens of the heroes which are needed to sustain the sacrifices necessary for national survival. And, yes, it is heart breaking to think especially of the youngest men who are killed in war – so much of what could have been is lost and that is a terrible human tragedy which must never be downplayed. But to make it the only thing you talk about is wrong; just as it is wrong to merely dwell on the errors of the high command without assessing whether or not, at the end of the day, they secured victory.

One may think that a world without war can be made. That by some mechanism of talk, fight can be prevented. If you believe that, then I’ve nothing to say to you other than the whole course of human history is against you – and the number of wars currently going on indicates that if there is some way to bring about peace on Earth (absent the action of God) then it certainly isn’t going to happen any time soon. In short, there will be wars – and while war is bad, losing a war is the very worst thing that can happen to your nation. If people would not be slaves to a foreign conqueror, then they need to study the arts of war…and this includes understanding the value of bravery and sacrifice. And you can’t value what you think is garbage – which is what Journey’s End, and it’s long line of successors, says war is: nothing but garbage.

We need, I think, some correctives to this, and it needs to be done where the damage was done: in popular culture. Plays, movies and books need to be created which celebrate bravery and sacrifice…that after the war, the men who stood to it did, indeed, lead long lives and useful ones. That what they fought for endured, because they fought for it. That the pitiful young man killed shortly after arriving on the line did provide, in his numbers, the sinews for victory; that his death wasn’t pointless.