Whipsawed

A whipsaw, but also it means to rapidly move something in different directions, like my brain after reading and hearing the podcasts mentioned below.

After reading this editorial about Trumps completely inappropriate comments about DEI after the recent plane crash in DC, I had occasion to think about how media affects our thinking. Specifically it seems that the last thing I listen to usually resonates and I agree with the speaker/writer and it likely gives me a dopamine hit that is satisfying. In general that is probably why, despite turning off all notifications on my phone, I often find it in my hand and I’m either texting a friend, hoping for a reply, or reading an article or email, or otherwise getting some stimulation that is grabbing my attention. If you have not read the book Stolen Focus

you should consider it as it has a great explanation of the addiction of “infinite scroll” and the guilt people who created that felt about how pernicious it is for grabbing attention.

But that discussion of attention is really an aside. Because what had me whipsawed was my visceral reaction to Trump’s anti-DEI comment, and its inappropriateness, immediately followed temporally with my listening to a podcast about monarchies, and specifically how the US of A has had monarchies in the past. A NYT interview with Curtis Yarvin really messed with my head. This self described “intellectual” (can one do that?), is quoted by none other than JD Vance, roughly,

“Vice President-elect JD Vance has alluded to Yarvin’s notions of forcibly ridding American institutions of so-called wokeism. The incoming State Department official Michael Anton has spoken with Yarvin about how an “American Caesar” might be installed into power.”

But during this same interview, he says of FDR (a hero of progressives), that he could be quite autocratic, implying this allowed him to be effective, saying in the interview:

“It’s an excerpt from the diary of Harold Ickes, who is F.D.R.’s secretary of the interior, describing a cabinet meeting in 1933. What happens in this cabinet meeting is that Frances Perkins, who’s the secretary of labor, is like, Here, I have a list of the projects that we’re going to do. F.D.R. personally takes this list, looks at the projects in New York and is like, This is crap. Then at the end of the thing, everybody agrees that the bill would be fixed and then passed through Congress. This is F.D.R. acting like a C.E.O. So, was F.D.R. a dictator? I don’t know. What I know is that Americans of all stripes basically revere F.D.R., and F.D.R. ran the New Deal like a start-up.”

And furthermore, F.D.R. in his first inaugural address says these things, with an emphasis added by me:

“With this pledge taken, I assume unhesitatingly the leadership of this great army of our people dedicated to a disciplined attack upon our common problems.

Action in this image and to this end is feasible under the form of government which we have inherited from our ancestors. Our Constitution is so simple and practical that it is possible always to meet extraordinary needs by changes in emphasis and arrangement without loss of essential form. That is why our constitutional system has proved itself the most superbly enduring political mechanism the modern world has produced. It has met every stress of vast expansion of territory, of foreign wars, of bitter internal strife, of world relations.

It is to be hoped that the normal balance of executive and legislative authority may be wholly adequate to meet the unprecedented task before us. But it may be that an unprecedented demand and need for undelayed action may call for temporary departure from that normal balance of public procedure.

I am prepared under my constitutional duty to recommend the measures that a stricken nation in the midst of a stricken world may require. These measures, or such other measures as the Congress may build out of its experience and wisdom, I shall seek, within my constitutional authority, to bring to speedy adoption.

But in the event that the Congress shall fail to take one of these two courses, and in the event that the national emergency is still critical, I shall not evade the clear course of duty that will then confront me. I shall ask the Congress for the one remaining instrument to meet the crisis--broad Executive power to wage a war against the emergency, as great as the power that would be given to me if we were in fact invaded by a foreign foe.

For the trust reposed in me I will return the courage and the devotion that befit the time. I can do no less.

We face the arduous days that lie before us in the warm courage of the national unity; with the clear consciousness of seeking old and precious moral values; with the clean satisfaction that comes from the stem performance of duty by old and young alike. We aim at the assurance of a rounded and permanent national life.

We do not distrust the future of essential democracy. The people of the United States have not failed. In their need they have registered a mandate that they want direct, vigorous action. They have asked for discipline and direction under leadership. They have made me the present instrument of their wishes. In the spirit of the gift I take it.

In this dedication of a Nation we humbly ask the blessing of God. May He protect each and every one of us. May He guide me in the days to come.”

With rhetoric like that, it is no wonder that FDR was re-elected so many times. And, even as a progressive who sees,to this day, the benefits of many of the programs he created, I can appreciate the “strongman” persona that had appeal during the Great Depression as a salve to the pain Americans were feeling. Hence the whipsaw nature of my thinking. The supreme irony of course for Trump being president and supposedly a conservative, is that the classic definition of a conservative is one who likes the status quo and wants to maintain it. But the status quo is certainly NOT what is wanted now. On the other hand, a return to some my

thical past which was “Great” may resonate for some, but perhaps only those land-owning-white-males and a few others who shared in that wealth creation. But ask any LGBTQ+ person, or minority, or recent immigrant (most of us are immigrants in some way), and you will not find whole hearted support for “going back”.

So, I look back with rose colored glasses on FDRs reign, and others look at Trump’s reign favorably. And that is the nature of the public discourse. My tyrant is better than your tyrant. Ha.