President Lyndon Johnson and the 1965 Immigration Act

Ted Kennedy wasn't the only politician who got it wrong about what the 1965 Immigration Act would or wouldn't do to America. The bill was strongly supported and signed into law on October 3, 1965 by LBJ at the Statue of Liberty (Maybe it should be re-named the Statue of Immigration?). Here is an abridged version of his speech that day with some of my comments in bold:

This bill that we will sign today is not a revolutionary bill. It does not affect the lives of millions. It will not reshape the structure of our daily lives, or really add importantly to either our wealth or our power. Wrong - it's one of the most revolutionary bill ever!

Yet it is still one of the most important acts of this Congress and of this administration. For it does repair a very deep and painful flaw in the fabric of American justice. It corrects a cruel and enduring wrong in the conduct of the American Nation. What's so cruel about controlling immigration?

The fairness of this standard is so self-evident that we may well wonder that it has not always been applied. Yet the fact is that for over four decades the immigration policy of the United States has been twisted and has been distorted by the harsh injustice of the national origins quota system. Which you promptly replaced with with another injustice - all but totally ending white, European immigration.

Under that system the ability of new immigrants to come to America depended upon the country of their birth. Only three countries were allowed to supply 70 percent of all the immigrants. Now only three countries still supply the same percentage, just three from the Third World.

Men were denied entrance because they came from southern or eastern Europe or from one of the developing continents. This system violated the basic principle of American democracy--the principle that values and rewards each man on the basis of his merit as a man. If this were true the Sept 11th attacks never would have happened.

It has been un-American in the highest sense, because it has been untrue to the faith that brought thousands to these shores even before we were a country. We can now believe that it will never again shadow the gate to the American Nation with the twin barriers of prejudice and privilege. So you made immigration to America a civil right, not a privilege as it should be.

Our beautiful America was built by a nation of strangers. From a hundred different places or more they have poured forth into an empty land, joining and blending in one mighty and irresistible tide. The land flourished because it was fed from so many sources--because it was nourished by so many cultures and traditions and peoples. Who no longer are interested in "joining and blending", but instead keeping their cultures intact and expanding them.

The days of unlimited immigration are past. Dead wrong, with illegal immigration included, it's virtually unlimited now.

…and so it has been through all the great and testing moments of American history. Our history this year we see in Vietnam. Men there are dying… Neither the enemy who killed them nor the people whose independence they have fought to save ever asked them where they or their parents came from. They were all Americans. By eliminating that same question as a test for immigration the Congress proves ourselves worthy of those men and worthy of our own traditions as a Nation. Those traditions are dying, now everyone is either a hyphenated-American, or would rather be known as a foreign national who just happens to live in America.

If that wasn't enough, LBJ also made a speech on July 1, 1968, marking the day the 1965 Act actually went into effect:

It was nearly 3 years ago, on one of the proudest days of my Presidency, that I stood at the foot of the Statute of Liberty and signed into the law of this land the Immigration Act of 1965.
Today that act takes full force. The lamp of liberty has never shone brighter. The golden door to immigration has never stood wider. The lamp of liberty is about as dim as it ever has been, and the golden door has been ripped off of its hinges.

Every American can be proud today because we have finally eliminated the cruel and unjust national origins system from the immigration policy of the United States. We have righted a long-standing wrong. Cruel and unjust because it favored white Western Europeans.

So today, any man, anywhere in the world, can hope to begin a new life of freedom and a new life of greater opportunity in the United States. No longer will his color or his religion or his nationality be a barrier to him. The only preferences will be for those who already have relatives here… No longer will only three nations supply 70 percent of America's immigrants. No longer will the people of one nation be less welcome here than the people of another nation. So now we are in danger of losing our white majority, of having Islam become a major threat to Christianity, chain immigration from the third world, dominated by Mexico, and becoming a hundred little nations within one overcrowded country.

This landmark act will work to enrich the heart of America--the people themselves. All who, over the years, have dreamed and labored for its achievement can take great satisfaction today.
Together we have helped to preserve the American dream--and more than that--we have opened its promise equally to all men everywhere. No, you are destroying the American dream, by overwhelming us with Third World poverty and tribalism.

President Lyndon Johnson left office a broken man, thanks to the tragedy of the Vietnam War. His name has been cursed by many tens of thousands of older Americans who lost loved ones in that war. Now, he can also be cursed as the President who signed the bill that gave birth to Multicultural America, and the birth of an era that I call The Great Transformation, the transformation of America into a potential Third World nation, an era that is now past its midpoint with the election of Obama as President.

NPR asks Ted Kennedy why he was so wrong in 1965 about immigration, Kennedy is evasive

In 1965, during the Senate floor debate over the Immigration Act, Ted Kennedy stated that:

"First, our cities will not be flooded with a million immigrants annually...Secondly, the ethnic mix of this country will not be upset."

These statements have turned out to be totally false, and it should have become apparent to Kennedy that this was the case way back in the mid to late 1970's. It would have been honorable of him to have come to the Senate floor and stated something like: "We goofed big time on this bill, terribly sorry, and here's a new bill to cut back on our immigration levels, and I urge its passage."

Of course, that never happened. I've often wondered if Kennedy had ever been interviewed about it, and if he would have admitted he was either lying in 1965, or if not, if he might have felt any guilt about how wrong he was. It turns out that NPR did interview him about it in 2006, just as he began to push for another immigration bill that ultimately failed. After a couple of softball historical questions, Jennifer Ludden asks the following, with Kennedy's reply:

Q: What's striking about the debate in 1965 is how so many people did not expect a huge increase in immigration, or a change in the demographics of the nation. You told Congress that immigration levels would remain "substantially the same," and that "the ethnic mix of this country will not be upset." Why weren't these changes foreseen?

KENNEDY: There were enormous changes as a result of illegal immigration. A lot of the antagonism, frustration and anger is better focused at the illegality and the illegals that came here in very significant numbers. [People] are certainly frustrated by the illegality and the explosion of illegals who come here that have impact in terms of the economy, depressing wages, and taking jobs. But on the other hand, they have this incredible admiration and respect for their neighbor, the person at the corner store who is working 18 to 20 hours a day, trying to provide for their family, and whose child is serving in the armed forces of the country. They admire those [immigrants] they see in church, churchgoers who are trying to bring their kids up. So there's a very significant ambivalence in people's minds.

Q: But the level of even legal immigration has increased dramatically since 1965, even though many supporters of the legislation then said it would not.

KENNEDY: Everybody obviously wants to come, because this is the land of opportunity, but we've seen a rather dramatic shift as well in terms of the birthrate here. That was not really foreseen. You're having now the leveling off of the birthrate here among a number of families. You certainly saw that in terms of Europe and Western Europe, where there is an actual decline. I don't think we foresaw that so much at the time, 40 years ago. But that is a fact, and that sends all kinds of messages.
To be energized we need new workers, younger workers, who are going to be a part of the whole economy. We don't have them here in the United States. There are greater outreach efforts being made in terms of trying to keep people in the labor market longer. We need to have the skills of all of these people. The fact is, this country, with each new wave of immigrants, has been energized and advanced, quite frankly, in terms of its economic, social, cultural and political life. And I think that's something that will continue into the future. I don't think we ought to fear it, we ought to welcome it.

Q: Some have suggested it was a mistake to make family reunification the main purpose of our immigration law. They say perhaps we should have a system more like Canada's, which lets people in based largely on their skills. How do you respond to these criticisms?

KENNEDY: I think our tradition of the Statue of Liberty is to be willing to accept the unwashed as well as the highly skilled. There are a lot of people who haven't had opportunities in other places as a result of dictatorships and totalitarian regimes and discrimination. Are we going to say we refuse to let any of those individuals come in because we've got someone who has happened to have a more advantaged situation? I'm not sure that's what this country is all about.

And that was the end of the interview, at least that's all there is on the NPR website. It seems so brief, almost as if Kennedy was getting uncomfortable with the questioning and cut the interview short. And this was an interview from NPR, a friendly liberal network!

Given the chance to be honest, Kennedy instead gives us a typical wishy-washy politicians answer, first blaming the unexpected increase on illegal immigration, which had nothing to do with the 1965 act, which was about giving an equal chance for anybody to immigrate to America legally. He then tries to justify the increase by talking about a completely new subject, America's birthrate, as if the unexpected modest drop in the birthrate of the native born could somehow justify a massive increase in immigration.

The truth of the matter is that the 1965 Act had a provision for unlimited "non-quota" increases for family members in addition to the "quota" or primary part of the Bill. This lead to what has become known as chain immigration, and the overall skyrocketing legal numbers. This provision must have been ignored or overlooked in 1965, but Kennedy and his supporters should have known of its potential. Some people in Washington DID know about it, the same interviewer also reports:

In 1965, the political elite on Capitol Hill may not have predicted a mass increase in immigration. But Marian Smith, the historian for Customs and Immigration Services, showed me a small agency booklet from 1966 that certainly did. It explains how each provision in the new law would lead to a rapid increase in applications and a big jump in workload -- more and more so as word trickled out to those newly eligible to come.

I'd love to see a copy of that booklet from 1966, issued fully two years before the 1965 Act actually went into effect in 1968. It's a shame there wasn't more opposition to the bill back then, for we now know that the 1965 Immigration Act, originally supposed to be a minor addition to the 1964 Civil Rights Act, has become one of the most profound and infamous of any legislation ever to come out of Washington.

Classic MSM column 1991: Pat Buchanan "Longing for the good old days when America was mostly white"

Here's a column from August 17, 1991 that is nowhere else on the Internet, it's not even saved in Pat's own web archive. It's another one that would never see the light of day in any print style Op-Ed page today. The title alone would have newspaper editors reaching for the smelling salts! (Click on above image to enlarge.)

After a discussion of the 1985 movie "Back to the Future", comparing the America of 1955 to 1985, the column basically is a review of Lawrence Auster's 1990 booklet The Path to National Suicide, pdf version here a powerful, tightly written 90 pager that was way ahead of its time in explaining just how serious a threat the combined forces of mass 3rd world immigration and multiculturalism is to traditional America. It's a credit to Buchanan, who already was a well-known mainstream conservative pundit, to give a book that must have been rejected by all the mainstream book publishers the exposure it deserved. In fact, I don't recall ever seeing any other book on this subject published by a major publisher at that time, until Peter Brimelow's Alien Nation came out in 1995.

It was this column by Pat that referred me to Auster's book, which after reading it had a major effect on me in my transformation from a 1980's liberal into a 1990's traditional conservative. It was like getting hit on the head with a hammer, the arguments were so clear, a real "Teachable Moment", as a modern day leftist educator would say.

It also had a positive effect on Brimelow as well. In Alien Nation he refers to it as "perhaps the most remarkable literary product of the restrictionist underground, a work which I think will one day be seen as a political pamphlet to rank with Thomas Paine's Common Sense." (Alien Nation, page 76). That's some heavy praise, and I'm glad to be able to upload a copy of what may have been the only MSM column to give the book a positive review.

The Liberal Multiculturalist's Anti-Bill of Rights

I hope that anyone reading this is familiar with America's first ten constitutional amendments,
also know as the Bill of Rights. They were written to protect the people from a despotic government, in particular the ones the Founding Fathers were familiar with. If you need a refresher, see this link: bill of rights.

Some have argued that the Bill of Rights has become increasingly meaningless in today's America, and I would have to agree that some of them are largely ignored, but not all of them. Still, they are all slowly becoming endangered, and a key reason for this is the rise of Modern Liberalism and its chief form of enforcement, what I have named in earlier posts as the Bureaucratic Class.

One thing that makes it difficult is that their enforcement is a subtle one, call it Political Correctness if you wish, but it really is more of a "what you can & can't say or think" matter than an actual set of codified beliefs or laws. This is likely deliberately done in order to complicate matters and confuse us, and to hide the truth of where Liberals want to take us.
Therefore I going to try to make things more clear via the list below, mirroring the original Bill of Rights:

What if modern liberals were to codify their beliefs into their own “Anti-Bill of Rights”:

Laws for the Modern Liberal, Multicultural West:

1-There shall be no discrimination or intolerance of any kind, against any minority group, for any reason. Violations are racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. (a.k.a. The Prime Directive).

2-Only liberals can define who a minority group is, and what is racist, sexist, homophobic, etc., and they can redefine this as many times as needed.

3-Our diversity is our greatest source of strength. Anything that adds to our diversity is permitted.

4-All expressions of diversity must not just be tolerated, but celebrated.

5-The national boundaries, identities, and traditions of Western countries are to be abolished.

6- Immigration into Western countries is to be as unrestricted as possible and referred to as Migrations of Oppressed Peoples. 6a- No human being is illegal.

7-No white majority raced city, state, or country can actively continue to preserve this majority. To do so is now officially racist.

8-Religious expression by Christians is permitted only if no other group objects. Muslims, in particular, are exempt from this law.

9-Differences in intelligence and behavior amongst groups is a social construct, and a product of white racism. Any evidence to the contrary is also racist.

10-Ultimate goal: Where everything is either forbidden or compulsory.

In a word, all of the above can be summed up as Deconstruction, that being the elimination of the West's previous culture, race, faith, and traditions and replacing it with a sort of Utopian Brotherhood of Man. Group differences would still exist, but would be meaningless. It would be a racially diverse multicultural society, borderless, but without group conflict.

But the problem is while this Grand Experiment, this Walden Two is ongoing, (1) the rest of the world continues its traditional ways of tribalism and group conflict, and (2) the West winds up with an oppressive government, because the Experiment will ultimately fail, human nature being what it is. That's why I listed #10 above, it would be the mirror opposite of the intent of the original Tenth Amendment.

Rare MSM articles about the future of the USA (Part Two) American Apocalypse Soon

In 1994 the New York Post, one of the few major newspapers with a Republican/Conservative Op-Ed theme, hired a young columnist named Scott McConnell, who wasn't shy about writing about immigration/multiculturalism, and its negative effects on America.

On 7/19/95, he wrote a column titled "American Apocalypse - Soon?" (Growing doubts about the lasting viability of a multicultural U.S.), which must have given his boss a good case of indigestion. McConnell's conclusion was that:

"In it's current direction, the U.S. - aggressively multicultural, libertine and violent in its mass entertainment, with an expanding Third World population and its corporations eager to pull up stakes and transfer jobs abroad - hardly seems stable over the long term."

Thirteen years later his conclusion looks to me to be even more valid than in 1995. There is no Internet link for the article that I could find, so I have uploaded the original above. (Click it to enlarge).

McConnell also wrote several columns supportive of Pat Buchanan's 1996 Presidential bid, and critical of the Dole/Kemp ticket. Despite this, he was named the Post's editorial page editor in 1996, but it was to be a brief stint. He was fired in 1997 due to a silly P.C. controversy over a column dealing with Puerto Rican Statehood. He became part of a group of immigration restrictionist writers that I call the "Purged Ones", which included the likes of Sam Francis (Washington Times), Peter Brimelow (National Review) and Pat Buchanan (Republican Party), all whom were fired from their positions around that same time.

Scott McConnell now writes for the bi-monthly publication The American Conservative. http://www.amconmag.com/

Rare MSM articles about the future decline of the USA (Part One) Militant Musings

Op-Ed newspaper editors and columnists have largely avoided the subject of a decline and fall of America, particularly if the cause is considered Politically Incorrect, i.e. due to Mass 3rd world immigration, Multiculturalism, and diversity-out-of-control. There have been rare exceptions, however, and this and future posts will highlight a few of them.

One of the most stunning ones ever was a quasi-fictional one written by William S. Lind, titled Militant Musings - Looking back from the year 2050, which appeared in the Washington Post on 4/30/95. It tells of a breakup of the USA into several smaller countries, with a restoration of traditional conservative values, and is rather graphic at times. It's long but worth the time to read. This is the only link to the full article that I could find on the Internet. http://www.originaldissent.com/forums/archive/index.php?t-171.html

By William S. Lind, Sunday, April 30, 1995: "Militant Musings: From Nightmare 1995 to My Utopian 2050"

The triumph of the Recovery was marked most clearly by the burning of the Episcopal bishop of Maine.She was not a particularly bad bishop. She was, in fact, quite typical of Episcopal bishops of the first quarter of the 21st century: agnostic, compulsively political and radical and given to placing a small idol of Isis on the alter when she said the Communion service. By 2037, when she was tried for heresy, convicted and burned, she had outlived her era. By that time only a handful of Episcopalians still recognized female clergy, and it would have been easy enough to let the old fool rant our her final years in obscurity. But we are a people who do our duty.

I well remember the crowd that gathered for the execution, solemn but not sad, relieved that at last, after so many years of humiliation, the majority had taken back the culture. Civilization had recovered its nerve. The flames that soared about the lawn before the Maine statehouse that August afternoon were, as the bishopess herself might have said, liberating.

In this Year of Our Lord 2050 we Victorians have the blessed good fortune to live once again in an age of accomplishment and decency. Most of the nations that cover the territory of the former United States are starting to get things working again. The cultural revival we began is spreading outward from our rocky New England soil, displacing savagery with civilization a second time.

I am writing this down so you never forget, not you, nor your children nor their children. You did not go through the war, though you have suffered its consequences. Your children will have grown up in a well-ordered and prosperous country, and that can be dangerously comforting. Here, they will at least read what happens when a people forget who they are.

Was the dissolution of the United States inevitable? Probably. Right up to the end the coins carried the motto E Pluribus Unum, just as the last dreadnought of the Imperial and Royal Austro-Hungarian navy was the Viribus Unitis. But the reality for both empires was Ex Uno, Plura.

You see, some time around the middle of the 18th century we men of the West struck Faust’s bargain with the Devil. We could do anything, say anything, think anything with one exception: Verweile doch, du bist so schoen (Stay, you are so beautiful). We could not rest; we could not get it right and then keep it that way. Always we must have novelty – that was the bargain.

It’s funny how clearly the American century is marked: 1865 to 1965. The first Civil War made us one nation. After 1965 and another war, we disunited – deconstructed – with equal speed into blacks, whites, Hispanics, womyn, gays, victims, oppressors, left-handed albinos, you name it. In three decades we covered the distance that had taken Rome three centuries. As recently as the early 1960s – God, it’s hard to believe – America was still the greatest nation on earth, the most powerful, the most productive, the freest, a place of safe homes, dutiful children in good schools, strong families and a hot lunch for orphans. By the 1990s the place had the stench of a Third World country. The cities were ravaged by punks, beggars and bums. Laws applied only to the law-abiding. Schools had become daytime holding pens for illiterate young savages. Television brought the decadence of Weimar Berlin into every home.

Didn’t anyone realize that when the culture goes it takes everything else with it? Of course, some people knew. But going back to a culture that worked, to traditional, Western, Judeo-Christian culture, meant breaking the Faustian bargain.

By the 1990s, too late of course, people were willing to do even that. Rummaging among old papers – Maine winters give you time for rummaging – I ran across a January 1992 poll by Lawrence Research: 59 percent said the nation’s leaders should be taking the country back toward the way it had been; 61 percent thought life in the 1950s was better than it was in the 1990s; 47 percent said their grandparents’ lives were happier than their own – and the margin was 15 percent higher among blacks, whose grandparents had lived under segregation. But those people had no voice. The folks who could be heard – politicians, television stars, porn queens – all jigged along in the Faustian dance as the Devil himself tooted out the tune. They looked neither forward nor back.

Then the hammer blows fell. First, the currency collapsed. Inflation had been jerking upward for years because the only way the government could manage its massive debt was to pay it off in inflated dollars. People had adjusted as they did in other Third World countries, opening foreign currency accounts, bartering, burying gold in the back yard. The, in the spring of 2001, a new administration really opened the valve. By that summer, inflation was running 40 percent per month; by fall, 400 percent. Financial Weimar had followed cultural Weimar. The middle class was wiped out.

By the year 2005, it was obvious that AIDS was spreading fast. Everyone had friends, relatives, neighbors who suddenly were stricken. But the government will still pumped out the same old line. Terrified of the gay lobby, officials conspired to reassure the public that there was no cause for alarm, that "homophobia" was the real problem.In fact, the government suppressed evidence to the contrary, fearing to cause panic. They were right. When the Los Angeles Times broke the story that it was spreading by unknown means, the cities emptied. Most people came back, because they had to go to work or starve, though they left the children in the country if they could. People demanded the quarantine of anyone diagnosed as HIV positive. Instead, the government classified the infected as "disabled," which made any preventive measures illegal discrimination.

In the spring of 2009 the blacks of Newark rose and took over the city. They rebelled not against whites but against their real oppressors: the drug dealers and drug users, gunmen and hit men, car thieves and squatters and the rest of the scum who made life hell for the majority who wanted to work and walk home safely and not to see their kids shot in front of their houses. They knew who the guilty parties were, and they went and got them with ropes and kitchen knives. For the first time in decades, Newark saw peace.

Average people cheered, but the federal government, drooling such pieties as "due process" and "law and order" (in a place where the law had long since ceased protecting anyone but criminals), sent in the National Guard. The people of Newark met the troops and begged for their help, and the soldiers either went over or went home. Air Guard painted pine tree insignia on its aircraft and threatened to bomb any federal forces approaching Newark. On May 3, Gov. Ephraim Logan of Vermont told the legislature that the federal government no longer represented the people of his state and asked for a vote of secession. Vermont became a republic the next day.

The first Civil War was, on the whole, a gentlemanly affair; the second one wasn’t. Here in northern New England we were lucky. Because we didn’t have many ethnic divisions or cults or Deep Greeners, we didn’t have militias shelling the cities and ravaging the suburbs. Elsewhere, it was what Lebanon and Yugoslavia and the former Russian empire saw in the late 20th century. The Reconquista drove the Anglos out of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and Southern California; the Anglos drove the Hispanics our of what was left of the American West. Blacks and Hispanics in L.A. turned on each other, but there were a lot more Hispanics. Korean marines landed in Long Beach to get their people out.

The Deep Greeners took over Oregon, and North Americans got their first taste of totalitarianism. If you weren’t one of them, you didn’t get a Breathing License and they tied a plastic gad over your head! That lasted three years until the rest of the state recaptured Portland with Japanese help (they needed the timber). Both Portland and Washington are doing okay now; recently they got the right of send non-voting delegates to the Diet in Tokyo.

After the usual series of coups, northern California ended up as the Azanian Republic. It made Oregon seem rational by comparison. The Azanian government in Berkeley was, in its final incarnation, run by a coalition of radical feminists, Maoist guerrillas and militant vegetarians. The only capital crime was eating meat. The end came after Azania was overrun by animals, who, by law, could be neither killed nor neutered.

Elsewhere, it took about 10 years for the hate caused by decades of illegitimate government to work itself out. Not much was left of the cities or the people who had lived there, but most folks in the countryside at least had been able to eat. By 2017, the South had a second Confederacy going. Southern culture had stayed pretty strong, outside the cities anyway. Florida was a mess, or course, but otherwise Dixie didn’t see much fighting.

But it is our New England history that concerns me. We were the luckiest. Maine and New Hampshire quickly followed Vermont into secession, and upstate New York came in too – after ceding New York City to Puerto Rico. We knew we were all in this together, so we formed the northern Confederation in 2010. Massachusetts was not invited, but in 2011 New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland joined (Canada didn’t survive into the 21st century). We had some tough economic times, but nobody starved and we had only one rumpus on our own soil – an attempted putsch by a small band of Deep Greeners in Vermont that was put down by a small band of state cops with a couple of fire hoses.

But it was what happened on the cultural front that really made the difference for us. The Retroculture Movement had been growing quietly since the mid-1990s. It wasn’t political, just individuals and families deciding to live again in the old ways. By the early 2000s there were Retroculture books, magazines, clubs, even special communities for people who wanted to discover how Americans used to live and how to bring back the old was. Some people liked one period, some another, but gradually more and more found themselves looking to the Victorian era as the model. The Victorians in England and America had been an astoundingly productive bunch, building, inventing, creating, conquering – all the things we needed to do again if we were to be civilized people.

The family was the first Victorian institution to make a comeback. With everything else falling apart, people saw pretty quickly how important a family is. That would have happened without Retroculture, but the Retro Movement helped us see how to make families work. We dug out the many books (most written by women) the Victorians had published on how to make a good home, raise children and live together happily (the secret was sacrificing the late 20th century’s god, the self). The good ladies of the League of militant Homemakers made sure women put duty to husbands and children first; those who refused so they could pursue a "career" were given a bring embroidered "C" to wear over their left breast.

The schools came next. We tossed out the vast accretion of "professional" educators and found ordinary men and women who knew their subjects and were dedicated to passing on the culture to a new generation. The kids learned to read with Mr. McGuffy’s readers. They learned to figure on a chalkboard instead of a computer that did the work for them. They learned the difference between right and wrong and got their bottoms fanned until they did. We deconstructed most of the universities. After all, they had started this "multiculturalism" hysteria that ended up with millions of people dead in the wars that followed. The ideologues gone, real scholars emerged from hiding and began offering Greek and Latin and the great books of Western civilization to anyone who wanted to learn.

Christians took back their churches from the agnostic clergy, and the pews filled up again. The church, not the government, became the problem-solver when people were hungry or sick or old and without family. The government was broke anyway and was busy defending the borders with not much tax base left.

As the Victorian spirit spread, standards were revived. Communities decided that some things were acceptable and some weren’t. Crime wasn’t; with justice locally controlled and the lawyers digging potatoes, somebody who mugged on Tuesday hanged on Wednesday.

Entertainment was expected to be decent. In a world that had grown ugly enough, there was small desire for ugliness in art and music as well. The Victorian entertainments were revived, and young people in particular went in heavily for choral singing. The last rock concert was held in 2013 in the Cleveland arena. It featured all the big rock bands left in North America and most of the remaining rock fans too. The Greater Cleveland Garden Club sealed the doors and pumped in a herbal compound, derived largely from Queen Anne’s lace and Viola odorata, that rectified brain damage in the cranial region connecting hearing to taste. The fans were soon holding their ears and whistling "Dixie," and the ancient Rolling Stones ended up improvising Albinoni on their electrical guitars.

By the mid-2020s, people had started to speak of the Recovery. Things were starting to work again, at least for us up north. And it was obvious why: The Victorian spirit and Victorian practices, were making them work. The slogan became, "What worked then will work now" and, of course, it did. That broke the Faustian bargain. We had found where we wanted to settle down and stay – right there in the age of Queen Victoria – and we did.

In gratitude to our Victorian exemplars, the Northern Confederation became, in the year 2035 A.D., the nation of Victoria. It was done by citizen petition and referendum, the way all important questions are decided. In fact, there isn’t much other government – nor is it needed, now that we again have a virtuous citizenry. The legislature meets for a couple of months every two years, with citizen legislators who are paid one hundred gold dollars per annum and can’t be reelected. To prevent a government bureaucracy from growing, the federal capital moves every six months from one province to another; at last count it had 76 employees. The president of Victoria is chose by lot from among the handful of registered voters who offer to serve.

And so it was that in 2037 we burned the bishopess. We knew this act would close the seal of the old book, the book that had seen us go from decay to dissolution to Recovery. The auto-da-fe was symbolic; the Recovery was in fact already on solid ground or we wouldn’t have ad the moral fiber to torch the old girl.

We are hopeful as we look to the future, and not only here in Victoria. Victorian parties are growing fast in other nations in North America, in the Confederacy and in Trans-Mississippi. Only in Nueva Espana, where California’s old Hispanic Party is locked in bitter warfare with the Indian revivalist Aztec Alliance (their slogan: "You’ll leave your heart in Mexico City") does it look hopeless. Elsewhere, there is even talk of some kind of a new union, much looser, of course, built on shared values and culture, not a shared public trough.

But there will never be another Washington. We have learned, after all, some lessons from history.

After reading this, all I can say is "God bless the nation-state of Victoria!"

Mr. Lind is a member of the Free Congress Foundation, started by Paul Weyrich. http://www.freecongress.org/

The Actual Fall: Four Likely Outcomes

Here I will try to explain what I mean by the "fall" of the United States, after a long decline has taken place. Generally I'm referring to the Federal Government and political system. At some point, (again at least 20 years out) it will suffer a crises that will either:

1. Force it to collapse permanently, like the Soviet Union.

2. Survive, but change into something so different (and worse) that it would be unrecognizable from the former version other than in name only.

3. Merge with Canada and Mexico into a greater North American Union.

4. Collapse, but eventually be revived in a far weaker role, more in line with its original role in the 1789-1829 (pre-Jacksonian) period.

The crises that would provide the final blow likely would be economic or political, in the form of a banking/finance crash similar to but worse than our current one, or a disputed Presidential election similar to 2000, or even a terrorist attack or series of assassinations in Washington that removes the leadership. (The other trends I mentioned on Nov. 14th's post are too slow to provide a sudden, fatal crises, but would still be occurring at the time.)

I also give any of the four outcomes listed above an equal chance versus the others to happen, there isn't one in particular that I think is most likely at this point in time. All four would almost certainly be accompanied by an economic Depression similar to or even worse than the 1930's, although a recovery would eventually occur.

If outcome #1 were to happen, it would likely be due to either a large number of States and its citizens formenting something along the lines of a Tax Revolt in response to a sudden, massive tax increase by the Federal Government, or a successful secessionist movement by a group of Red or Blue states with the Federal Gov't. being so weakened it would be unable or unwilling to resist (unlike 1861.) Another possibility would be what I would call "reverse secession", where several of the most dysfunctional States (those with the largest Dependent class) would be kicked out of the Union and form their own country or countries.

Either way I think in the end you would see four or five new countries form, all with their own Constitutions, Militia, and currency. Some might even go back to the gold standard, if they could seize or share the substantial reserves we still have at Ft. Knox and elsewhere. Geographically we could see a (by then) mostly Hispanic country in the Southwest of former Blue states, (Atzlan?) another one in the Northwest made up of mostly Blue states, a large country of Red states covering the Inter mountain West and Great Plains, one or two countries of Blue states from the Upper Midwest to New England, and yes, the South would rise again as a group of Red states. Texas would be a key player, it could go one of three ways, West, South, or inter mountain/Plains.

If outcome #2 were to happen, if you are alive then you may want to emigrate. The catalyst would be the same as with #1, but this time the Federal Gov't. would put up a successful crackdown, using military force where needed. It would likely result in a despotic regime with near dictatorial power, a suspension of the Constitution, and the near total abolishment of State governments. It would be like living in Tibet under Mainland China's rule as it is now. As I said above, it would still call itself the U.S.A., but strictly in name only. It would likely have some support from a portion of the Red or Blue states, with most of the oppression focused at its opposite color. If this seems far fetched just take note of how much more power the Federal Gov't. acquired after the Civil War compared to before. A second round as described above would again give the Federal Gov't. more power, to the point you might as well call it an Empire.

Outcome #3 is the nightmare of the NAU conspiracy theorists come true. It may come about after an economic or political crisis where it will be sold (falsely) as a way of diluting the costs onto another layer of government. If the crisis were worldwide, it also could occur in conjunction with the E.U. into a first attempt at World Government. Either way, the U.S. Federal Gov't. would still exist, but with slightly less power. It would mainly mean another increase in your taxes going to a new but unaccountable and non-elected government. However, it would be the darling of the Dependent Class, which at this point would be a majority in the USA.

The theory behind this outcome happening is that for decades now we've seen America become more and more a country that doesn't make things but manages things! Right now, in 2008, there are more Government workers than in manufacturing, and the gap just keeps growing. The Government's percentage of the total GDP is about 20% and growing. Every time there is a crisis, we get another increase in Government's size. A good example is the creation of the Dept. of Homeland Security after 9/11. In the end, this outcome wouldn't be as despotic as outcome #2 above, but it would be best described as a velvet Dictatorship of Rules and Regulations. It would be the choice outcome for the Liberal Multicultural Elites.

Outcome #4 would be the most optimistic and preferred one. It would likely happen with a start similar to the timeline in outcome #1, except that instead of several smaller new permanent countries forming, at some point shortly after the initial Federal Gov't. failure, and a recovery after a Depression, a new Constitutional Convention is held to re-start a new Federal Gov't. with extremely limited powers, similar to as it was in 1789. It must be noted that this could only occur if the Dependent Class were reduced to a smaller minority than it is now, and more importantly, after an across the board rejection of modern Liberal Multiculturalism, and a return to more traditional cultural norms nationwide.

Some concluding thoughts:

It will be possible to have one of the new smaller permanent countries from outcome #1, (almost certainly a group of Red staters), also make the same choice to reject Liberal Multiculturalism. Again, its Dependent class size would have to be greatly reduced. The risk here is if a nearby former Blue State country still has a large Dependent class and still are run by Liberal Multiculturalists, and is lacking in raw materials, a Chittum-esque Civil War II could break out. This is why I believe the only real positive outcome would be #4.

There will be a period of severe civil unrest and 1960's era rioting during the time of the collapse and economic Depression, but it will end after a few years as any of the four outcomes becomes established.

It is assumed that the mass 3rd World Immigration we have now will continue up until the crisis point that triggers any of the four outcomes, but will then end, either by legislation or by the fact that things will be so bad no immigrants will bother coming. In outcome #3, however, it will resume and continue until overpopulation concerns likely ends it by mid-century (40-50 years out).

Reasons for the death watch: Too many problems at once!

Below I will identify eight areas of concern. These are all long term trends that have slowly built up to become a combined crisis. It is my belief that while each one by itself won’t be fatal to the USA for 20 years, if left unaddressed their combination will prove to be a fatal blow, and they are all happening simultaneously. They are ranked in order of importance:

1. Economic - Record public & private debt, massive bank & mortgage bailouts, growing wealth gap between rich & poor, Baby Boomers retirement costs (unfunded liabilities). The key is government's reluctance to pay for expenses now, via increased taxation, but by borrowing.
But make no mistake about this - borrowing is nothing more than a tax on the future, a future that isn't here in person to complain about it. It is unsustainable and in the end, there will be no future.

2. Cultural - Liberal Multiculturalism, mass 3rd world immigration (legal & illegal), morality gap between the blue & the red states, political correctness, loss of our European white majority, all resulting in an increasingly bitter tribalism. Inability to communicate with others (multilingualism). Voluntary re-segregation of America racially. Loss of a shared, unifying culture.

3. Political - Inability and outright refusal of elected leaders to see more that four years ahead. Excessive influence and power of special interest groups, (the new "fourth branch" of government).The suppression of debate by the Left, along with their increased viciousness. Citizens lack of trust and confidence with their government. (The Productive class wants less government, but the Dependent class needs it, yet government, really just a big over sized bureaucracy, can’t deliver.)

4. Burden of Empire/Military - Cost of military over extension. Too many foreign commitments. Belief that only we can solve all the world’s problems. Pax Americana! We have practiced a benevolent but expensive style of Imperialism - we have taxed ourselves so that other countries won’t have to tax themselves for their own military! Lately we have switched to borrowing from them in order to continue to do the same thing. This cannot continue indefinitely.

5. Overdependence - Becoming overdependent on the rest of the world not only for durable goods, but increasingly for agriculture (food), energy (oil), labor (immigration) , and finance (borrowing). In the beginning the USA (post 1776) was a nation of self-reliant farmers, tradesmen & pioneers. With the Industrial Revolution it still was a self-reliant producer of goods, thanks to an abundance of raw material. Now, it’s increasingly a nation of paper shufflers and salespeople, with false wealth produced by over leveraged credit.

6. Intellectual - A college degree is now so common, (despite the cost), that it’s really just a rubber stamp to certify you are eligible for middle-class employment. Many college degrees are watered down with useless areas of study and courses, particularly in the Humanities and Social Sciences. How are programs like queer & women’s studies going to produce future leaders with the knowledge to tackle the above problems?

7. Spiritual - Growing gap between the liberalism of the Clergy vs. the traditionalism of the Congregation. There are two very striking things about religion in America. One is the large number of intensely religious people; the other is the number of intensely, angrily irreligious people. American faith has generated its mirror opposite: a growing number of fierce God-haters.

8. Overpopulation - Not a serious problem yet but it will be in 20-30 years, or as we approach 400 million total population. By then it will be impossible to handle without a repressive central government. I wouldn't rule out an attempt to limit family size as China does now. Also don't forget the increasing cost of building new schools and roads, infrastructure repair, waste management, and stress on the environment.

(Numbers 6 and 7 stem from number 2, culture, but I felt they were important enough to list separately.

The problem here for the Federal Government is that it will be increasingly called upon to manage items #2 through 5, and perhaps even #6 & 7, but item #1 will put way to much stress on it. It won't be able to solve these problems while the interest on the Debt, now 8% of the budget, grows and grows. It MUST pay that interest every year, (more & more of it going overseas), or it defaults. It is my belief that this stress will eventually prove fatal, and as the Federal Government goes, so goes America. For a more in-depth analysis of the problem, see this column by John Derbyshire here.

Introduction

To the reader:

Welcome. What is USA Death Watch? It is designed to be a journal that will chronicle the sad but likely future downfall of the United States of America over the coming years, including the likelihood of a collapse or breakup of the Federal Union. I define likely in this case as a greater than 50% probability within the next 20 years, with the chances increasing beyond that point. The reason I think it first becomes likely in 20 years is that this is when all of the Baby Boom generation will have retired under current law, and the economic stress on America will become constant and severe. But this isn't the only reason, and while there isn't one reason in particular that could lead to this, a major concern of mine is the slow but steady transformation of America's citizenry from one that was productive to one that is dependent.

Sociologists say that there are traditionally three "classes" in a society, an upper class, a middle class, and a working class. I no longer see this as valid. First, it's the middle class that is doing most of the work now, and the "working class" is really now better referred to as the "dependency class", thanks to the modern welfare state. In essence we still have a three class system, but I would rename them the Productive class, the Bureaucratic class and the Dependent class.

The Productive class doesn't need government's help, it is self-reliant as much as possible. It produces most of the real wealth of the country.

The Bureaucratic class is basically the Government, at all levels from local to Federal, plus some private non-profit organizations.

The Dependent class is basically anyone who relies on government, or any other groups handout for their existence, and that can include institutions as well as individuals.

Traditionally, (and ideally) the Productive class is the largest of the three. America up into the 1960's would be a good example, with a few brief exceptions. Since then, however, the Productive class has shrunk while the Bureaucratic and Dependent class have grown. At present we have a system where the Bureaucratic class now manages the Dependent class, while relying on the Productive class to provide the costs.

For example, decades of mass 3rd world immigration, with the ideology of Multiculturalism supporting it, has given us a large number of poor people along with excessive Diversity, which has lead to group conflict. This requires a large & growing Bureaucratic class to manage the conflict, as well as redistribute wealth & power amongst the groups.

It is my belief that should the Dependent class become the majority, its demands and needs will overwhelm what the Productive class can contribute, and the system will fail, along with the Government.

I now refer the reader to the following quotation (falsely attributed to the Scottish late 18th century writer Alexander Fraser Tytler):

Democracies are temporary in nature; they simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. Democracies can exist until voters discover that they can vote themselves generous benefits from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the treasury, with the result that democracies finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy and deficit spending, which is followed by an economic depression and a period of political anarchy or despotism.

Does this sound more and more like what's happening in America today? I believe it does!

Here's another quotation with the same theme:

The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 250 years. During those years, these nations progressed through the following sequence:

From bondage to spiritual faith;
From spiritual faith to great courage;
From courage to liberty;
From liberty to abundance;
From abundance to complacency;
From complacency to apathy;
From apathy to dependency
From dependency back to bondage.

Again, doesn't this read a lot like the route America has taken over the years? The time it takes isn't as important as the steps taken to complete the circle. America broke free from its bondage under King George the 3rd, only to become so re-dependent on its own government to the point that the dependency really is bondage.

Finally, adapted from the blog of Mencius Moldbug's unqualified reservations:

"If there is one pattern we see in the public policies the government produces, it's that they tend to be very good at creating dependency. We can observe the dependency system by imagining what would happen if Washington, DC, out to the radius of the Beltway, were to suddenly disappear. What would happen? Many, many checks would no longer arrive. Children would go hungry - not just in North America, but around the world. Old people would starve. Babies would die of easily preventable diseases. Hurricane victims would squat in squalor in the slums. Drug companies would sell poison, stockbrokers would sell worthless paper, etc."

"Washington has made itself necessary. Not just to Americans, but to the entire world. Why does Washington want to help, say earthquake survivors? Because helping is what it does. It dispenses love to all. Its mission is quite simply to do good, on a planetary basis. Why then turn down free help, including plenty of free stuff, and possibly even some free money? Because dependency is another name for power. The relationship between dependent and provider is the relationship between client and patron. Which is the relationship between parent and child. Which also happens to be the relationship between master and slave."

In future posts I will try to list and discuss the many reasons I have come to conclude that the USA is indeed on a long slow deathwatch. Comments are welcome.