"Edgy" or the Canary in the Coalmine?

Call it the newest terror of the non-establishment right:  re-entryism:

Edgiest political position you can take: Things actually aren’t that bad, and in fact some things are quite nice. The US government is stable and not evil, resources are abundant and people are living longer and happier lives than they have in the past.

This from The Right Stuff, which has lately been encouraging engagement with the conservative establishment.

This standpoint reveals an odd, perhaps disturbing similarity in all of the narratives, both mainstream and edgisphere.  They all share an underlying need for a villain, for opposition, for hatred.  We have to be *this* close to utter annihilation.  It doesn’t matter that our world offers abundant material wealth and almost limitless means for one to find self-actualization, that in many ways all of this posturing is vanity, actually being content in any way is unthinkable.

Michael Annisimov faced this several months ago when he had an online debate. He was armed to the teeth with arguments for monarchy but was stymied by the question, "What's so bad that we have to change everything?" (That's the impression I got, anyway.)

I think the agitation within the non-establishment right is a matter of a few things. The first is that the opinions expressed over here have been suppressed. The Internet has allowed these opinions to be heard again.

The second comes from my personal sense that we're overextended in all areas. Take the first statement's proposition that the "US government is stable and not evil." "Evil," of course, is a strong statement but I feel that we've foolishly tried to control the world. 28 Sherman has done a great job of explaining US foreign policy of the Cold War (and for a while afterward) as a protection racket. It's not a noble system but at least it's pragmatic. You make sure we have cheap access to your exports and we'll make sure that regional disputes settle in your favor.

Clinton seemed to wrestle with the notion, but Bush and Obama both dove fully into the idea that the US should use its power to impose our ethereal ideals of social perfection. If we were arrogant before, it was an arrogance of strength. We currently have the arrogance of a self-righteous busybody, taking to the global stage to shame African nations about their laws against homosexuality. The former has to be respected while the latter brings only contempt. The former earns the enmity of the weak, who cannot battle with the powerful. The latter earns the enmity of the powerful, who resent being lectured about their petty failings.

America has less of a need to relate well with other countries than, say, the Czech Republic. We're mostly isolated and abundant in resources. But the assumptions of those in power--and those that put them there--are just as foolish as those that drive foreign policy.

The life of Obamacare is a great example of the weaknesses of our current dynamic. The bill was powered through Congress as its most prominent supporters claimed that it had to be passed in order to "find out what's in it." These supporters made a (somewhat pathetic) march of triumph and then claimed that they were victims of racial slurs as they did so. The bill that was signed into law was the creation of an unprecedented legal innovation providing a shortcut past the Constitution. Its provisions have been delayed and altered by extra-legal means. The roll-out of the central website (outsourced to Canada) was a disaster caused by lack of meaningful supervision. Throughout the entire process, those that controlled it pointed their fingers at their opponents, claiming that they were the cause of all the problems. Facts and numbers have been spun so much that there is no telling what the consequences are.

I'm not an end-of-the-worlder. My position has long been that the assumptions we've taken on since the "long march through institutions" are wrong. At its most fundamental, our assumption is that human society can be organized on strictly rational grounds. All difficulties are either the fault of not enough "logic" or Kulaks, who must be driven out.

The system, what we've termed the Cathedral, rewards not results but a determined fervor. "He's a son-of-a-bitch but he gets the job done," is no longer acceptable--one must conform to the assumptions. But adherence to an ideology means lesser adherence to reality. Were the architects behind the Obamacare roll-out hired for their effectiveness or their party affiliation?

The problem with the progressive assumptions is not just that they are unrealistic. It's that they allow for no feedback. The answer to every setback is, "More of the same, only twice as hard," and "It's that redneck's fault. Get him!" One can't argue with that; in their minds, it's the people that fail the theory, not the other way around.

Classical conservatism says that if we halt all attempts at "improvement," then we'll be okay. In some respects, I agree. Not because this system is pretty good and will work if we stop tinkering with it. Instead, if we somehow manage to halt all top-down change, then we can start working around it, forming new traditions. Americans have always been a resourceful and charitable people; left alone to make our own way, we will find a way to be successful and fair without the scolding of professors and bureaucrats.

But, when progressivism fails, its response is to seize more power and more control. After all, the theory wasn't practiced properly and, besides, an immoral enemy got in the way. If we had the power to do things right, and to smote the enemy, then we'd really see how great the theory is.

The agitation from the "edgisphere" is because we are squandering the social, moral and financial capital built up from eons of traditional arrangements and it won't stop until it's all gone. The end of progressivism will be when there are no excuses left. One by one, we've kicked the foundations of society out from underneath us; the non-establishment right is crying out, "Hey, we need those!"

The foundation they kick at hardest is that valuing effectiveness over zealotry. The question at hand is:  How long before the same people who devised the Affordable Care Act are in charge of the highways? How long before they become small-claims court judges? Do you think they'll do any better at that then they have at sweeping national reform?

There's always a chance that each debacle will wake a few up to the fact that their beliefs aren't realistic. One can either choose to double-down on one's ideology or reject it. Maybe someday we'll hear them say, "I don't care what his politics are, he's the best bridge inspector we've got and we need him."

But I doubt it. The progressive mentality is that all of this, all this civilization and organization and infrastructure, just happened naturally. Here we are, in one of the most technologically advanced and wealthiest nations in history--"It took nothing for me to get here, so it should take nothing for me to maintain it."

Go visit a third-world former British colony some time and you'll see the result of that thinking.

The US government is stable in the way a 700 pound man is stable. So stable that, when he inevitably dies, you won't be able to move him and have to let him rot away.

Is it all that bad? Of course not, because all of the national and international horror show is just a performance viewed from the back row. America might lose out for influence in the Ukraine but that won't effect how your streetlights work. The realities of your life as a citizen aren't in Washington but all around you, right where your sitting.

Is the world collapsing? Well, the part of the world that doesn't work. Is it going to effect us? Probably, but we won't be alone. And when the new bridge inspector shows up, you'll know he's an idiot--because you looked in his eyes--and plan accordingly.