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Orwell saw Socialist, Communist, and NAZI totalitarianism up close.

Dezinformatsiya and Gross Luge

Communist Disinformation, Disinformatsiya, and the National Socialist Big Lie, Gross Luge, are evil twins.  Just as the Soviet Union and Nazi Reich were twin Totalitarianisms. George Orwell described both sets of twins in his classic works – “1984” and “Animal Farm.”  Americans should awaken and see the same evil is working here now.

Today, the Left describes any claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election as “The Big Lie.”  At face value, that is flat funny.  After your laughter subsides, see the sinister slither out from what the Left is saying.

The Left is busy redefining “Insurrection” and “The Rule of Law.”

This Left – the Democrat-politicians-and-media (one word) and their every toady in government – including the military, education, arts and entertainment, and religion – ascribe to a specific narrative on every disputed issue.  The Narrative brooks no dispute, no dissent, and demands any that do be silenced – and worse.

Witness how the Left – Commies in my shorthand – will use the violence and breaching of the Capitol to brand the Trump presidency.  Those images of mayhem are their icon for all four years of making America great again.  This is a “burning of the Reichstag” moment for the Left.

It supersedes the previous domestic violence that could be blamed on “The Right” – Charlottesville in 2017.  Before that it was the Oklahoma City bombing in 1994.  Through the years, many acts of individual and police violence were painted with the broad brush of racism, but they’ve had limited half-lives as iconic symbols.

The Left makes the labels stick.  Like, in 2006 when George Allen, running for the U.S. Senate in Virginia, mocked the opposition research guy filming him as “macaca.”  Allen was branded with a racial slur.  Every article and video afterwards labeled him as “George Allen who called an immigrant macaca.”    His name never came up separately from “macaca.’

The Left hasn’t had a single bad label stick on President Trump for the sane half of America.  They hate that.

Frankly, the American Left has used disinformation and the big lie in a big way since the Vietnam War.

So, here’s the heads up for Virginia and America.

The Narrative isn’t about hypocrisy.  It’s not about media bias.  It’s not dirty politics as usual.  It’s part of the Great U.S. Culture War.

The Narrative is Disinformation and the Big Lie.

Read Orwell

Look at how our Leftists are creating an enemies list for jobs, a blackball list for media and arts, de-platforming opponents, blacklisting finance and legal services, censoring individual speech on social media and social credit scores.

The alarming news is the Commies are moving fast to break up the coalition of 74m Americans that voted in the stolen election.  They will work hard to crush dissent.  The Left are Human Secular Totalitarians and their Useful Fools.  Totalitarians do what totalitarians do.

They are coming after your freedom.

Remember this, most Soviets and most Germans figured out they were being feed disinformation and big lies.  Totalitarians’ lies failed to mask the truth.

Luckily for us, half of America already knows the Narrative is Dezinformatsiya and Gross Luge.

The 2020 election shows our 74m is actually a governing majority if we overcome vote harvesting and fraud in swing states.   We have two years to clean up the elections.

Until then, just laugh at the lies.  Mock the Narrative.

Quotes from George Orwell concerning the truth in society, or the lack of it and men to speak it.

 

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One martyr leads to the liberation of France.

Take Heart

“En-cour-age” comes from the French word for heart.  It means “inspire with courage, spirit, and confidence.”  That means “take heart.”

Have you ever lived through a hurricane? Where the eye actually comes over you?  When your house got rocked?

What’s it like the very day after?

It’s awesome how peaceful and beautiful nature abounds around you. The trees are down, damage done, and there’s no power for days, but the beauty of the day and night can’t be lost on the living. It’s great to be alive on that day!

After Jan 21, there’ll be other storms. That happens in nature and the affairs of humankind. Sometimes awful times come – with war and economic devastation wrought by the hands of humans. Such times may come to America – again, as it has in the past.

Yet, no matter how dire your concerns about the incoming administration – take heart. The coalition of 74m voters is a governing majority across America. It is a transformative coalition as powerful as the one FDR forged in 1932. His Democrat coalition held power until 1994. 62 years is a good run. The Coalition of Conservatives, Libertarians, and pragmatic non-ideological wage earners and small business owners is awesome.

The main effort in the political fight, “Schwerpunkt” for Army types, for the next two years is cleaning up elections in the states. Recruiting candidates to replace Career Pols and Establishment Republicans is next. The ongoing supporting fires – artillery is never held in reserve – are litigation against every government and business overreach against our Constitutional freedoms.

Moreover, this fight is more than politics. Politics is the struggle for power in government.  Government, including the Military, is just one of seven major institutions that shape America.  It’s a necessary hill to take, but only the first objective.

Seriously, take heart.  Smile.  You are part of a great majority dedicated to freedom and opportunity – under the Rule of Law.

After the hurricane passes, you clean up your property.  Get with your neighbors, work hard, and clean up your community.

Now, do it after this January hurricane passes.

Patriotic American women will do a lot more than save stamps in this Great U.S, Culture War.

 

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The best monument at West Point – among its many monuments and statues.

The Point About West Point

The latest cheating scandal at West Point is national news.  The United States Military Academy response and remedy creates more controversy.  Both scandal and controversy aren’t surprising, but they get to the point about what is important about West Point.  The Army motto is “This We’ll Defend.” Look at the U.S. Army as a brick wall protecting our United States of America.  The cement which binds the bricks together is the trust and confidence in the Commissioned Officers.

The binding strength of the trust and confidence that binds the Soldiers, Non-commissioned Officers, Warrant Officers and Civilians as the Army’s bricks is the professionalism and integrity of the Officer Corps.  Officers swear an oath to the U.S. Constitution. Period. Not to the President, superior officers, or any other person or allegiance.

There can be no compromises on integrity.  Integrity means unfailing, uncompromising, inalterable allegiance to Duty, Honor, Country.

The heart of Duty, Honor, Country for the Army and the Nation is West Point.

“Duty, honor, country” in service as Army officers is the whole point of West Point.

Honor is learned by the code: “A cadet will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those that do.” West Pointers are expected to live by that code for the rest of their lives. Most do. It’s vital to the Army as four-star General, combat legend and non-USMA graduate, Melvin Zais told the USMA Class of 1972 before their graduation – West Pointers are the small drop of ink that colors all the water of the Officer Corps.

The only remedy for being “found” on honor was expulsion prior to the Bormann Report after the cheating scandal in the Class of 1977. USMA started giving second chances. A key finding was “the Academy must recognize that it is not treating a disease that can be cured simply by isolating those who have been infected. The Academy must now acknowledge the causes of the breakdown and devote its full energies to rebuilding an improved and strengthened institution.”

The diagnosis and treatment for the cheating scandal of 2020 should be the same. Especially given the rot the recent young graduates’ exposed in their “Policy Proposal: An Anti-Racist West Point.” (See – https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2020/11/17/reviewing-policy-proposal-an-anti-racist-west-point/ .)

Unfortunately, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point’s mission “to educate, train, and inspire the Corps of Cadets so that each graduate is a commissioned leader of character committed to the values of Duty, Honor, Country and prepared for a career of professional excellence and service to the Nation as an officer in the United States Army,” is seen from antagonistic perspectives.

There is no consensus among active duty Army officers or USMA graduates on how to design, plan, execute, and evaluate West Point’s mission. The same divides of the Great U.S. Culture War split the seam where no seam should be found in “Duty, Honor, Country.”

For example, if there’s no agreement on the virtue or vice of celebrating homosexual and “transgender” cadets, there won’t be a common view on what is rehabilitation vs tolerance for honor violations.

Perhaps a detailed, hard look at how well USMA currently accomplishes its mission could reveal some common ground. What is the today’s track record of West Pointers with 5, 20, and 30 years of service? How can it be compared with those of 40, 50, and 60 years ago?

Are West Pointers still distinct, like that drop of ink, among Army officers?

If so, then “drive on.”

If not, then why is there a West Point?

Or, if not, then how must West Point once again “devote its full energies to rebuilding an improved and strengthened institution?” 

The point about West Point.

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From the 1990-92 “Futures” study looking at 2005-2015. Still holding true in 2020.

Class War or Culture War?

The 74 million real votes for President Trump are the potential for a new governing majority – if cheating, state-by-state, can be corrected. The people who work for wages or own small businesses are the new margin of victory in key Northern and Midwestern states. They’re same people who helped Barry Soetero get his blowout of 69 million votes in 2008. They aren’t social Conservatives. They will vote for the candidate who fights for their economic interests. And, their personal freedom. It could be a massive voting shift of the middle class – from hourly wage-earners to prosperous small business owners – to vote consistently for a party that earns their votes. For candidates who fight truly for their lives and families.

It looks like a Class struggle between the middle class workers and the people above and below them economically. The upper class of globalism and government profiteers are aligned with the underclass dependent on government handouts.

But, it’s not really Class Warfare. Evolving economic realities, as well as the policies of the Left and those of Conservatives, create different winners and losers. Economic outcomes force people to choose one side or the other in the Great U.S. Culture War.

Look back to James Fallows’ piece from 1975, “What did you do in the Class War, Daddy?” He made the point that the college kids with privilege got out of the draft and the “working class” went to Vietnam. My Baby Boomer generation was split in two by the war. I believe the years have only papered over the divide.

I believe our division was ideological – based on worldview – which comes from culture. The U.S. Culture War was a slowly simmering feud of opposing worldviews for decades. America was a consensus culture until the Supreme Court banned school prayer in 1962. The end of our Judeo-Christian, free market, individual rights-based consensus culture was made self-evident. The Vietnam War just blew it wide open.

Then, most who were on the Left kept going Left after 1968 and never looked back. Now, they are Human Secularist Totalitarians. I prefer the tiny url: “Commies.” Conservatives conserved their ideas – as their name indicates – while becoming more “Liberty-minded.”

Forward to 1990. In the “Army 21” Study, the Library of Congress’s economists predicted a squeeze on middle class Americans in the transition from the Industrial Era to the Information Era. More Americans would move up in wealth and many more would move down. Income inequality would increase. Middle management and administration would be gutted. Globalization would export manufacturing to the cheapest labor. Meanwhile, the ranks of the wealthy would increase significantly.

Consequently, the key to the future would be the political perception of economic changes.

And, so it is.

Thirty years later, hard-working people in swing states share a political perception that globalization exports good jobs overseas, imports illegal aliens, regulates energy to expensive scarcity and industry jobs out of existence, increases their taxes and drives down their income. In the Wuhan Virus pandemic scare, bad became worse when state and local governments made dictatorial edicts in the name of “science” that robbed small business and non-government wage earners.

Enter “Make America Great Again.” Wage earners and small business owner-workers get it. They see President Trump as the only one on the national stage fighting for them and their families. They love America. They cherish their individual freedom.

It’s from their sense of individuality, not class, that they vote. They’ll vote against the people whose policies rob them and their children of economic opportunity. They’ll vote against the elites and underclass who see everything in terms of race, class, and gender(s) – and always find the ‘Deplorables’ at fault precisely because of their race, class, and gender. They’ll vote for men and women who will drain the D.C. swamp of pungent privilege, corruption, and abuse of power. They’ll vote for courageous candidates who’ll clean up voter fraud and corruption in their state governments.

The political perception of economic change brings wage earners and working business owners to the right side of the Great U.S. Culture War. They could be the new allies of the Social, Fiscal, Defense, and Constitutional Conservatives in a great Republican Party coalition.

Now, will brave and bold Americans run as Republicans in swing states and fight their fight? Or will Republican candidates run to serve the Republican Establishment – and watch the Republic die?

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The leadership of the Falkirk Center is impressive indeed.

“Our Muhlenberg Moment: Calling Virginia Patriots and Pastors”

Conference held by the Falkirk Center of Liberty University

December 7-9, 2020

I was in the “Muhlenberg Moment” at Liberty University’s Falkirk Center conference. Attended as a patriot guy, not a pastor. It was a great gathering of Virginia’s Conservative Clans and receptive Christian ministers. It was the best and most effective meeting since Pat McSweeney assembled 50 activists from across Virginia in 2007 to oppose the onerous HB 3202 (No taxation without representation). Like the tribes of Israel, some represented large interests – the national Conservative organizations – and others, like me, carried the banner of Mom and Pop activist organizations.

The focus was education for Virginia voters in the impending 2021 elections. Virginia and New Jersey will be the only shows on the national stage. The output was improvements in communications across our Commonwealth. The outcome will be the product of the serious networking done there.

The ministers shared the challenges and successes of educating their flocks about Christian citizenship. The name of the conference is a sharply pointed reference to John Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg.  He led the men of his congregation to serve in our American Revolution. Look him up, it’s a powerful story about men of Christian faith fighting for freedom.

Travis Witt was at the helm to put this ark of conservatives and ministers together, get it out on a sea trial, and bring it back safely to port. He did an outstanding job. Including his dramatic presentation of Muhlenberg himself. That alone was worth being there.

Liberty University Vice-President Scott Lamb and his Falkirk director, Ryan Helfenbein, are impressive and inspirational for their vision, focus, and wisdom.  I don’t impress easily.

The pen will be my bayonet.

My Muhlenberg Moment

Three weeks (which is 3 times 7 for Hebrew numerologists and readers of https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2020/11/29/november-29th-the-day-after-thanksgiving-at-7-years-of-completion/ and https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2020/11/18/on-becoming-caleb-at-70/ ) after I change my usual prayer to be like Caleb in health – to be like Caleb and have one more mission.  Yes, one more hill for old infantryman to take.  Voila! I know which mountain and city to attack personally. I got my mission. Good news is that I’m not going up alone.

The Virginia First Foundation will direct our energy to win one mountain of seven that shape our culture in Virginia called “Education.”  We’ll work to replace that which can’t be re-conquered.  “We”, as the Virginia First Foundation, will work friendly with a lot of other folks already in the fight in their zone of action. Of course, we will provide supporting fires for assaults on the other six mountains of culture.   And, shoot the 10 meter targets that appear to us.

The military metaphors abound in this adventure.

Jesus said “the gates of hell shall not prevail” against his church (Matthew 16:18). That means the church, the body of believers, is on the offense. Even as far as attacking hell.

Education, for the most part, is in the hands of the Cultural Marxists or, as I prefer – Human Secularist Totalitarians. There are wonderful Christians and Jews in Education, but they aren’t leading it in its current spiral of dumbing down Virginians. Or, filling them with hatreds of the Identity politics.

We’re in it to win it.

Caleb had the Hill Country and Hebron to take at age 85. At age 70, I’m setting my sights on making education in Virginia – in every aspect – the best in the Nation. That includes improving the Biblical literacy of Virginians.

I’m ready to be as Caleb as I can.

The leadership of the Falkirk Center is impressive indeed.

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In Hebrew numerology the number seven means completeness

November 29^th, The Day After Thanksgiving, at 7 Years of Completion

In Biblical Hebrew, the number “7” signifies completion. The universe was created in seven days and other sevens, as well as multiples of seven, are found about 860 times throughout the Bible. Seven seems significant.

Seven years ago, when November 29^th was the day after Thanksgiving my wife had a massive stroke. On December 9^th, she died from another one. Now, we who knew and loved Nellie Katherine Kyle Bowden have completed seven years of living and grieving.

One year ago, on November 29^th, I had a second heart ablation to correct atrial fibrillation. I told my family and the doctors that I wanted to re-purpose the date from sadness to hope. That could seem selfish of me, but my intent isn’t to forget her – rather it’s to add new meaning to old memory.

Because I believe the number seven in the Bible has a special connotation to the meaning of “completion.”

Seven years is more than a linear measure of time from start to finish. It’s more than meaning something is done.

Seven years is a measure and weight of the full volume of time. It’s about the full meaning of what was done.

It’s about the fulfillment more than the finishing.

The purpose of the seven years is completeness.

Completion is the wholeness, the fulfillment, of the seven years.

Like the seven years Jacob served to win Rachel. Like the seventy years the Jews were in the Babylonian captivity. It’s what happened during the time more than just the passage of the time.

So, what is my completion after seven years of loss?

The greatest gain in gratitude, contentment, peace, and joy of my life. Truly. All completed at age 70 which is the Biblical completion of life. And all came directly from the awful grieving.

My book, A Grief Felt, published in this seventh year tells my tale of grieving to gratitude with God. The book serves others in their grieving. Its completion is a huge part of the purpose of my seven years.

Of course, my grieving will continue after this seventh anniversary.

But, grieving is just one part of life. In the past seven years, my patriarchy had three miscarriages, two births, one marriage, one separation, and one current pregnancy, as well as moves, job gains and losses. Six grandchildren grew wonderfully through these years. Life, as it is, large and complicated as it is, unfolded for another seven years.

What my grieving completed during this particular seven years was the purpose of this septenary of my loss.

I can only speak for myself. Again, grieving begat gratitude, contentment, peace, and joy.  Precisely because of this completion, I changed my prayer for health like Caleb in the Bible to be given a last fighting mission like Caleb.

Will I read and write as my fighting the good fight as the purpose for seven years or multiples of seven years to come? Or, is being Papa to seven living blessings – in March 2021 – the greater purpose? Serve some other purpose?

Aren’t there many purposes possible? Aren’t there many purposes in every moment we live? Yes, certainly so.

However, the greatest purpose of our complete being is to love God with our whole heart, mind, strength, and soul. Our next purpose is to love others as we love ourselves.

To this purpose is the whole completeness of my conscientious life.  I starting loving God with my all my heart as a little boy. I’m broken and failed as all men are, yet I know who I have always loved first.

Seven years since that terrible “day after Thanksgiving”, God is good. All the time. No matter what. NO MATTER WHAT.

Seven is significant in the Bible.

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Saving Western and American Civilization is the fight of our lives.

The Fight of Our Lives

Please spend about $10 and one hour of your life to buy and watch “The Fight of Our Lives”.  I get no residuals from the sales, although I probably should since so much of my writing is evident!  Clearly, the brainiacs on this video have been reading my blog, Deo Vindice, since my first, best piece “One Front: Two Wars.”

(Read it again with updated comments – https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2020/09/13/9-11-at-19/ )

I know I should be in the credits at the end, but it’s okay. They use some of the exact words I’ve written for 20 years about our Great U.S. Culture War and the World War Against Islamists (WW IV).   They identify the key role of Christianity and Judeo-Christian thought in Western Civilization. And, the absolutely essential element – the Rule of Law.

The video accurately names both enemies of the West as “Totalitarians.”  They don’t use my awful mouthful of “Human Secularist Totalitarians” for the Left – Socialists, National Socialists, Fascists, Communists, Progressives, Liberals, and Democrats.  They identify the problem with Islam, but don’t use my specific term “Islamist Totalitarians.”

Furthermore, they talk about something I’ve struggled to write for some time. How does the West regain its confidence? How does Europe finally recover from WW I and embrace Christianity again? How does America recapture or replace its 7 institutions (government/military, business, education, media, arts/entertainment, religion, family) to win the Culture War?

I made my personal commitment on my 70^th birthday to ask the Lord, as a wannabe Caleb, for one more hill to take. One fight for my pen to serve as my sword.

But, how do we rally the inspired one-third of America needed to win a new Revolution?  That’s about 110m men, women, and children willing to give their life, liberty, and treasure.  Give it all.

Perhaps my wee words can join the good folks of “The Fight of Our Lives” to answer these questions I posed the week after 9-11.

Americans will speak to the dark hours of legitimate doubt with characteristic straightforwardness:

• Who are we fighting?

• Why? What are we defending?

• What will be victory?

• How much, how long, what risk will war cost?
• What must I do?                    

Don’t expect politicians to speak this truth. Now and for a long revolutionary season of a dozen years or so, you – yes, you – must recruit and elect brave people who understand the fight of our lives is Western Civilization. Christianity. Judaism. America. Our family, faith, and freedom.

Brave, bold, dedicated patriots are needed at every level of government, including the military, as well as at every station of business, education, media, arts/entertainment, religion, and, of course, in our families.

You can read about The Fight of Our Lives – and hit the connections to rent or buy it at https://docemetproductions.com/the-fight-of-our-lives/

It’s worth your time and money. I get nothing but the knowledge that you are better armed for the good fight ahead.

 

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Being like Caleb means more years fighting the good fight.

Joshua and Caleb were ready to fight and win

On Becoming Caleb at 70

Take the hill. Follow me.

The Bible says Caleb was 40 when he and Joshua spied out the Promised Land for Moses with 10 other scouts. When they returned, the other ten lied about the enemy. They made up excuses for their fears. The people cried and complained.

Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, “We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.” (NIV Bible, Numbers 13:3O)

Caleb was rough and ready to do as the Lord commanded. But, the people rebelled and wouldn’t go.

Fast forward 45 years until everyone of Caleb’s generation is dead except Joshua and him. At this point, he had been fighting for 5 hard years since Moses gave his last order, “The Lord will lead you into the land. He will always be with you and help you, so don’t ever be afraid of your enemies.” (Deuteronomy 31:8) Caleb wants to claim and settle his share of the land.

Caleb is told to conquer one more mountain.   Just one more city. Take Hebron.

Caleb tells Joshua, “So here I am today, eighty-five years old! I am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out; I’m just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then. Now give me this hill country that the Lord promised me that day. You yourself heard then that the Anakites were there and their cities were large and fortified but, the Lord helping me, I will drive them out just as he said.” (Joshua 14:10-13)  

He is 85 and fit for war. Caleb is fit when war meant carrying a heavy shield and sword!

Yet, Caleb has one more fight to win before he can live in peace with what is his. He goes out and accomplishes the mission. Caleb won. And there was peace in the land. (Joshua 14:15)  

Ok, I’m not Caleb. Nowhere near being a warrior like him. But, I’ve wanted to be like Caleb for 20 years. Two decades ago, the verse about being fit for war at 85 jumped off the page during daily Bible reading. After I learned more about Caleb, I made a prayer request.

“Please let me be like Caleb to live vigorously to my end and die quickly. If that would be at age 85, that’d be great! Whatever You Will.” I’ve kept that request in my supplications.

At age 70, I’m changing my prayer.

“Please give me one more mountain to conquer. One more hill for this old infantryman to take. Then, let the land know peace, please.”

The hill I want to take is, actually, the 7 “mountains” of American culture. The mountains are the institutions which shape society into American culture. They define America.

America’s 7 mountains are:

• Government/Military
• Business
• Education
• Media
• Arts/Entertainment
• Religion
• Family

Currently, these mountains are owned or infiltrated by persons who believe or submit to ideas that form Human Secularist Totalitarianism. These ideas evolved from the French Revolution. They may have a longer, darker history back to the Roman Emperor Diocletian or worse – Genesis 3. The ideas always lead to awful outcomes – mass murder. In the past hundred years, the Human Secularist Totalitarians have called themselves Progressives, Socialists, Communists, National Socialists, Fascists, Liberals, and Democrats.

Conservatives, especially Christians, have a moral imperative to conquer these mountains to restore, above all, The Rule of Law.   Then, restore the Constitution – just as written – and real federalism with individual and economic freedoms.

We can do this.

At age 70, I’m unfit for military service.   My sword is my pen. I actually use fountain ink pens and type my longhand into cyberspace.

“Oh Lord, weaponize my words against the forces on America’s mountains! Please, Lord, let me fight the good fight until my last breath. Help your People win the Great U.S. Culture War.”

What a blessing to win in the next 15 years and see the victory like Caleb. Or, like Moses, just glimpse the Promised Land. If not, whatever is Your Will.

The enemy, Human Secularist Totalitarianism, is all around us. There’s a hill where you live that must be taken. Your family. Church. School. Local government. Every single election for anything. Business. Media. Arts and entertainment. Speak truth to power. Do not be afraid. Expect attack and persecution. Replace what is wrong or build better alternatives.

At 70, I pledge to be like Caleb.  To the best of my ability. To never quit.

Who is with me?

Can a Bubba be like Caleb?

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Three Score and Ten Years of Life

Psalm 90:10 The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

Another birthday with another graphic and more prose? Really?

Why so many words about myself?

It’s introspection, not self-indulgence.

Because I write. Writers write about what they know. Then, we improvise to make the message. Tell the story. Use words like clay to mold the image we want.

So, I’m writing what I learned from introspection since I was a teenager. Sharing what I experienced, understand, and believe about living to “speak life.” However fleeting the connection is made, it’s worth it to illuminate a thought, bring a smile, or strike a chord in another person. The “me” in the words is just the vehicle.

A moment a writer shares with a reader is worth the hours it took to write what’s read in minutes. It is in the moment, every minute, in which we are aware that we are alive – here.

Rather than write about the millions of things others know much more about, I’ll write odes like these birthday epistles.

I’ll write what I really want to say about being 70 tomorrow when I am 70. The birthday pieces below have some themes. Family, duty, life is short, passion or vigor, relationships, ain’t dead yet, and God is Good – All the Time, No Matter What.  No Matter What.  Many have the same words – even though I didn’t look back to compose each piece. Remarkable how some things don’t change in one life. Perhaps such consistency is the hobgoblin of a small mind. Or, it could be reassurance of a coherent, solid life. You choose.

There’s a break after 2013. My wife died. The pieces that follow are different to me, because I recall how different it felt to write them. I didn’t want to dwell on loss or grieving. I’m pretty sure the reader can’t see what I felt. There was a little less self-editing because I’m not under female supervision.

Regardless, read if you like. You may find something that strikes a chord in you.

2009:   https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2009/11/20/59-and-counting/

2010:    https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2010/11/16/part-1-of-3-on-turning-60/

https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2010/11/17/part-2-of-3-on-turning-60/

https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2010/11/18/part-3-of-3-on-turning-60/

2011:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2011/11/18/my-birthday-not-another-day/

2012:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2012/11/18/second-birthday-my-dad-never-had/

2013:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2013/11/19/63-and-counting/

2014:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2014/11/19/64/

2015:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2015/11/22/on-being-65/

2016:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2016/11/17/substance-without-stature/

2017:  null

2018:  https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2018/11/15/on-68/

2019: https://jatticus.wordpress.com/2019/11/19/69-i-aint-dead-yet/

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West Point should NOT graduate cadre for the Red Guards

Reviewing “Policy Proposal: An Anti-Racist West Point”

The June 25^th, 2020 document, “Policy Proposal: An Anti-Racist West Point”, signed by nine members of the USMA Classes of 2018 and 2019, is a childish Cultural Marxist screed. At best, call it misguided passion – excused as youthful excess. However, if the insidious ideas expressed came from their four years at West Point, then put the United States Military Academy and the United States Army on high alert now. The divisions sown by such invidious identity politics are prejudicial to good order in the Army. Ironically, their “Anti-Racism” actually promotes racism that is a cancer to the Army.

It’s difficult to comment on the 40 pages in less than 80 pages, because it isn’t written in English. It’s written in the Newspeak of Cultural Marxism. Terms like “white privilege”, “anti-racism”, “intersection between race, ethnicity, gender, and class”, “diversity and inclusion”, and “Black, Latinx, and other marginalized people” beg definition.

Hiding in the gibberish there are accusations of three failures – systemic racism, anti-racism not in the curriculum, and the absence of anti-racist space. It concludes with a list of absurd demands.

Actually, the three accusations of failure are three monumentally complex presumptions. These presumptions are about ideas on race and a fixation on racial identity that disallows dialogue. For example, no discussion of senior USMA officers’ white privilege is possible when white privilege doesn’t exist – empirically and demonstrably. Any attempt to answer them as written imputes reason and logic where none exists. A first order dialogue should start with “Explain in detail who, what, when, where, why, and how the Commandant and Dean have white privilege.”

Despite the absence of clarity in thought, the call for agendas at West Point comes out of the word fog:

• Identity. There is a Black Cadet identity separate from a Cadet’s identity with their Class. And there’s hubris about “the Academy’s perception of me as a Black woman.” Some cadets have ‘Whiteness.” A few are “white, cisgender, heteronormative Protestant men.” Which means they are super privileged. Even at West Point. Allegedly, West Point is supposed to recognize many identities and make a big deal about them. In fact, any adjective before “Cadet” as an identity is an injurious division to West Point and the Army.
• Separation. Is the call to “invest in spaces that protect and nurture Black cadet identities” a demand for separate, but equal, “spaces” based on race? Any division of space by race will not promote unity or “cooperate and graduate” teamwork.
• Political activism. In the first place, why did West Point ever make a public statement on the Black Lives Matter Movement? Since when does the Army comment on current events that aren’t exclusively military matters? The demand for a quicker, more politically correct comment should be countered by West Point as “No Comment” in the future.
• Grievance and victimhood. One element of evidence was, “I was so uncomfortable that I went back to my room and cried because I wasn’t white and wasn’t a man.” Pity party crying like that isn’t what old graduates associate with being a West Pointer and Army Officer. Who knew that mute monuments and old names create a “psychological toll?” Perpetually celebrating grievances breeds permanent victimhood.
• Indoctrination. The comprehensive demands for courses, replacing instruction, training, events, quotas, spaces, monuments, committees, and racial communities is the stuff of Mao’s Red Guards. Implementing a single item proposed would inject a live cancer into West Point. The indoctrination is, by definition, racist.
• Politicization. Ridding West Point of “sexism, ableism, fatphobia, transphobia, homophobia, xenophobia, and classism” as well as racism and white privilege needs political commissars in the chain of command. As the Bolsheviks knew what was needed to make the Red Army “red”, so too, they “envision a future in which the Academy has publicly acknowledged its white supremacist history… all cadets and faculty are educated in anti-racism… an anti-racist space that values the lives and experiences of Black Cadets… a space with anti-racist monuments.”
• Destruction. Physically destroying Reconciliation Plaza and removing “all names, monuments, and art honoring or venerating Confederate figures”, as well as “establish a commission on whether to contextualize or remove other problematic relics of slavery, the Confederacy, and white supremacy” is as much like today’s Taliban or ISIS implementing Islamist Totalitarianism and the past destruction by Communist, National Socialist, or Fascist Human Secular Totalitarians. Destruction never creates good will. Culturally cleansing West Point today won’t stand the test of time tomorrow.

So, what should West Pointers make of this?

I’m bemused that the inspiration for the proposal is the “Black Manifesto” my classmates put out in September 1971. I attended some of the meetings where the issues were discussed back then. I thought my classmates’ emotions exceeded their concerns, but acknowledged their earnestness. This proposal is quite different from their wish list.

In every class, some West Pointers fail to live up to their classmates’ common standards of Duty, Honor, and Country. But, the exceptions truly prove the rule that in every Class most graduates have striking commonalities of key values and identity. That unity of purpose serves the Army and the Nation.

Anything which divides a Class is detrimental to the Corps, West Point, and the Army. Consequently, what is wrong with the proposal jumps out of every paragraph. Their call to grip hands “to live up to the values of Duty, Honor, Country” mocks those values.

Where did so much wrong become such self-righteousness in recent graduates?

When and where did they absorb so much Cultural Marxism?

If they picked up these poisonous ideas at West Point, the toxic points of origin must be found and cleaned up. Completely. Now.

James Atticus Bowden

USMA, Class of 1972

USMA, Department of Social Sciences, 1981-84

The humorless man in black is a Red Army Political Commissar. The US Army should not have Commissars of Political Correctness at the United States Military Academy. Never at West Point or anywhere else.