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<p>A Lefty "American Redoubt" eh?</p>
<p><a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2016/11/6_maps_that_show_what_us_would.html">Cascadia</a>
vs <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Redoubt">Redoubt</a></p>
<p>NM's neighbor and abusive ex-spouse, TX seceded from the US power
grid long ago (never joined) and this week may tell us what they
learned from *last year's lesson" in inter-dependency and
preparation. Beto O'Rourke had a very snarky response to Abbot's
claim (and self-contradiction) that he could guarantee that there
would be no failures of the grid in the future (just unpredicted
load-shed-events). It was something about TX being the greatest
energy producing region in the world, but refusing to spend the
extra single-digit percentage to make it resilient to the kinds of
weather events that are becoming more common (climate change?!).</p>
<p>Of course, in my little libertarian-utopian sovereign nation of
one I am melting snow on my woodstove today because the measures
*I* took against sub-freezing weather in my wellhouse were
insufficient up to and including (apparently) triggering a failure
in my 40 year old, now deprecated GE breaker for the pump. I
guess I'll be going to the big-box store (cuz the little box
doesn't have enough variety and Jeff Bezos game never delivers
sooner than next day) to buy a new subpanel as well as
breakers/wiring (all made in China I suspect, because I want the
*cheapest* viable option of course, I deserve it!) whilst
grumbling about "planned obsolescence", "Chinese junk" and "Goddam
Globalization". If I could just get George Soros to task one of
his space lasers (at low power) down my wellhouse and thaw
everything out, I'd be in techno-utopian fat-city, neh? Or I
could just leave the breaker out and instead splice in a
lower-guage bit of wire and call it a "fusable link". The
wellhouse is far from my house and is constructed of concrete
block... so no big worries about fires? <br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 2/4/22 10:02 AM, Marcus Daniels
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:BYAPR11MB3830FB768F40E3F01489FD75C5299@BYAPR11MB3830.namprd11.prod.outlook.com">
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<p class="MsoNormal">As Omicron was ramping up Joy Reid said
something along the lines of “Is there a way to cut out a safe
place to live these days [free from all the anti-vaxxer
crazies]?”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">That resonated with me. I think that’s a
plausible way how life could be in ten years. Some
municipalities & companies, maybe some states, will appeal
to individuals that value, well, reason, and others will
not. Then the exercise becomes one of which brands are in
some sense profitable. This will of course deepen
polarization, but over the course of several generations the
unprofitable approaches will die a desperate and lonely and
death. Some of the woke brands won’t make it, but neither
will some of the reactionary brands. It is not clear what
will happen to the federal government during this time,
perhaps the kind of oscillation the author imagines. The
trick will be to insulate oneself from it until the political
power of the crazies is ground down by repeated failure and
steadily decreasing economic power.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<div>
<div style="border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1
1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in">
<p class="MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> Friam
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com"><friam-bounces@redfish.com></a> <b>On Behalf Of
</b>Steve Smith<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Friday, February 4, 2022 8:32 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a><br>
<b>Subject:</b> [FRIAM] Democracy in Name Only: endemic
regime instability<o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
</div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">Someone
here is more likely than I to have actually read Ziblatt and
Levitsky's
<a
href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Democracies_Die#:~:text=How%20Democracies%20Die%20is%20a,process%20to%20increase%20their%20power."
moz-do-not-send="true">
How Democracies Die</a> </span><span
style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#172B4D"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">A
recent article (behind a subscribe-wall) included the
following quote:</span><span
style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#172B4D"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#172B4D"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;color:black"><a
href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2022-01-20/americas-coming-age-instability"
moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2022-01-20/americas-coming-age-instability</a></span><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<blockquote style="margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-size:13.5pt">America
may no longer be safe for democracy, but it remains
inhospitable to autocracy.</span></i><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-size:13.5pt">Rather
than autocracy, the United States appears headed toward
endemic regime instability.
</span></i><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-size:13.5pt">Such a
scenario would be marked by frequent constitutional
crises, including contested or stolen elections and
severe conflict between presidents and Congress (such as
impeachments and executive efforts to bypass Congress),
the judiciary (such as efforts to purge or pack the
courts), and state governments (such as intense battles
over voting rights and the administration of elections).
The United States would likely shift back and forth
between periods of dysfunctional democracy and periods
of competitive authoritarian rule during which
incumbents abuse state power, tolerate or encourage
violent extremism, and tilt the electoral playing field
against their rivals.</span></i><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
</blockquote>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;color:black">I found this
characterization of our plight very compelling, if also very
disturbing.</span><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;color:black">It seems as if we have
"tumbled our gyros" but in a different mode than the
rhetoric about "Civil War" and "Descent into Autocracy" seem
to suggest. It also characterizes a lot of the
aspiring/limping democracies we know of in the world today
up to and including extreme examples such as Russia which
fits the DINO (democracy in name only) label pretty well.</span><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;color:black">This conception of the
problem lead me to a very well written HS student-essay by
the same title:
<a
href="https://hac.bard.edu/amor-mundi/democracy-in-name-only-2020-01-02"
moz-do-not-send="true">democracy-in-name-only</a>.</span><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:13.5pt;color:black">Within this essay was a
poignant quote:</span><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<blockquote style="margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.5pt"><br>
</span><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Source Sans
Pro",sans-serif">In the words of Alexis de
Tocqueville,</span><span style="font-size:10.5pt">
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<blockquote style="margin-top:5.0pt;margin-bottom:5.0pt">
<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span
style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Source Sans
Pro",sans-serif;color:#222222">“A new science of
politics is needed for a new world. This, however, is
what we think of least; launched in the middle of a
rapid stream, we obstinately fix our eyes on the ruins
which may still be descried upon the shore we have
left, while the current sweeps us along, and drives us
backward toward the gulf.”<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="background:white"><span
style="font-size:10.5pt"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
</div>
<br>
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