orenda review

FIN DE SIÈCLE

trumpism

Trumpism and the remaking of world order

Friday, 10 November 2017

As the soul of America travels through the katabasis known as Trumpism, we are able to catch a glimpse of the various conjurings out of the Hegelian grimoire taking place that are shaping the narrative of the current historical moment. Rhetorically, the most strident voices against Trumpism are decrying what they view as a Völkisch pastiche underway, as if part of the country is under the spell of some kind of cult of personality mixed with a dash of ethno-nationalism – a mass ritual that will result in a society full of Minute Men asking non-whites for their identification papers, ready to deport anything not wrapped in Old Glory. The staunchest examples of this kind of politico-cultural gemeinschaft are Nazism and Zionism. But does Trumpism parallel these kinds of weltanschauung? In some ways it does, but in others ways, it represents the opposite. The one world government, resulting in a nationalist backlash, leading to a multilateral denouement dialectic being played out misses the larger picture. Namely, the new thesis that results from the synthesis we seem to be heading toward. Trumpism fits the fascist moniker in that it embodies romantic ideas of the great return to a Golden Age, (more…)

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TILTING AT WINDMILLS

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Red herrings, identity politics, and the futility of the coming culture wars

Tuesday, 24 January 2017

The Left is in high dudgeon, but for the wrong reasons. Identity politics and the culture wars are turning political ideologies on their heads, with California, a bastion of collectivist social policies, now rebuking the power of the federal government, with some even invoking the Lone Star State secession card. Liberal elites are falling over themselves decrying the end of civilized society with the inauguration of the short-fingered vulgarian, and the professional classes are lamenting the poverty of American culture as all the fascists, racists, and ignorant plebes are now behind the wheel of government and have been given the nuclear codes. The hyperbole has been something to behold among the most frenzied sectors of the Left’s Social Justice League.

The Left has been sleeping with the enemy for decades, and has been co-opted by its own supporters at the highest levels of the public and private sector, as governments and foundations all play their part. Left movements are so often futile because they are all funded by social engineers that have no interest in the goals and values of the citizens at the ground level trying to affect change. A recent case in point: The Clinton Foundation set up a textile factory in Haiti that provides jobs for women, which sounds like a noble mission. A GPS company was then brought in to provide free cell phones and microfinancing to these women, with the ostensible purpose of giving them access to communication tools, capital, and the ability to start their own businesses. Everyone can feel good about public-private cooperation and the spirit of American philanthropy at this point. What was the actual purpose of this venture? (more…)

THE FOURTH PHILOSOPHY

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The Russian Federation, the Trump Administration, and the coming global multipolar system

Sunday, 13 November 2016

From the perspective of the United States and the West more broadly, Russia has always represented those who would not bow down or atone for their refusal to recognize the Son with the same reverence as the Father. The debate surrounding the filioque has been emblematic of the conflict between the East and West for thousands of years, and up until quite recently, the West has been winning.

According to historian and Roman propagandist Josephus Flavius, the “fourth philosophy” is a term synonymous with the nationalist Jewish revolutionary sect the Sicarii, which was active during the reign of Roman Emperors’ Vespasian Flavius and his son Titus. The Sicarii articulated their conviction that they would not worship the Flavian Emperor as God and refused to submit to Roman rule. And just as Christianity was used as an agitprop against the Sicarii to vilify the Jews and supplant their God with Jesus Christ (Titus Flavius), so too was communism used against Russia in order to attenuate its imperial aspirations and limit its power and influence of Central Asia, i.e., the Heartland.

The fourth philosophy referred to by Josephus Flavius has another ideological connection with Russia. In Aleksandr Dugin’s aptly titled book, “The Fourth Political Theory,” Dugin, a one-time advisor to Putin much like Brzezinski in the West (only not as influential) and thought-leader among some on the Alternative Right, outlined the long term strategic thinking of Russia (more…)

ON MASTERY – PART II

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The nature of concentration and focus in the development of mastery

Monday, 10 October 2016

For some scientists, the nature of perception is culturally mediated, especially when comparing West and the East. Much of the research seems to indicate that Eastern culture is more naturally inclined to be “in concentration,” while Western culture employs the perceptual habit of being “in focus.” Concentration and focus represent the two primary perceptual paradigms in the development of mastery. The subject-object relations of concentration and focus are fundamentally different, where the former is best understood as a gathering of one’s attention, and the latter a selecting of one’s attention. Both are necessary skills that one must develop in the process of continuous, incremental improvement – or mastery. These are the two primary methods of information processing available to us when communicating with someone or learning a new skill. Concentration is governed by Yin energy, while focus is governed by Yang energy. Both are expressions of intent, with concentration by its very nature being an internal process, while focus is an external process. Taking a closer look at these two processes, (more…)

AMERICAN AGITPROP

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Socio-cultural myth and the problem of American exceptionalism

Thursday, 8 September 2016

Associated colloquially with the Special Snowflake Syndrome, American exceptionalism has permeated the minds of its citizens since The Founding. And for all of America’s imperial ambitions, its root hog, or die attitude will not likely cause it to outlast or outshine the great empires of antiquity.

Those on the Left who have made their bones engaging in polemics of American exceptionalism are engaged in the most profound kind of irony, in that their activities are primarily funded by the same plutocrats that have promulgated the very myth that they seek to dispel, wholly unaware that they are participating in a controlled opposition campaign.

This reality has been well understood since before the American Founding, and was articulated quite explicitly by historian Oswald Spengler in his seminal two-volume work, Decline of West, where he explained the nature of Homo economicus and its spiritual degradation:

“There is no proletarian, not even a Communist, movement that has not operated in the interest of money, in the directions indicated (more…)