The redbuds and dogwoods in our neighborhood are in full bloom, and while we’ve had something of a wet, cold spring thus far, one can see the signs all around. Before you know it, summer will be here, with picnics, baseball games, vacation trips, motorcycle rides, all the usual joys.
So instead of crafting policy, we generate bumper sticker phrases and pretend we’ve solved a problem.
And yet, I can’t readily recall when I’ve looked forward to the coming of summer with such a deep sense of dread. Last New Year’s Eve I invited The American Spectator readers to “Expect the Worst in 2024.” My predictions for the new year included continued inflation, an increasingly nonsensical climate change agenda, lack of support for Ukraine in its war of self-defense, pressure on Israel to let Hamas “get away with it,” and an ever more aggressive pro-abortion fanaticism. The open border showed absolutely no signs of being closed, burdening our resources beyond capacity and threatening the security of our communities and of the nation itself.
I struggled then to find reasons for hope, and now, as we find ourselves well into the year, I find myself even more discouraged at our prospects. One wants, of course, to take comfort in small victories, but in all honesty, the victories seem both too small and too late. It’s all well and good that the U.S. Congress, finally, appears to be ready to provide critical military aid to Ukraine, but our dithering has made things notably worse. We stepped up, for a moment, to assist Israel in defending itself against an unprecedented missile attack from Iran, but largely it seems to gain leverage to prevent Israel from completing the vital mission of crushing Hamas. We’re finally clearing the path to provide more assistance to Taiwan, but Chairman Xi can hardly have viewed our recent performance as anything other than an invitation to adventurism. And we’ve made a gesture toward enhancing our own defensive resources, but tentatively and without the urgency that our current weakness demands. (READ MORE from James H. McGee: Nuclear Weapons and US Allies)
Here at home, the cities that once proudly adorned themselves with the “sanctuary” title are now crying “no mas,” without actually doing anything meaningful to condemn Joe Biden’s disastrous border policy. One could laugh at the recent squirms, for example, of Denver’s pompously progressive mayor, but the situation there and in other once-great cities is anything but amusing. Even less amusing is the Biden administration’s continued effort to thwart Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s efforts to compensate for the egregious failures of the federal authorities.
DHS Secretary Mayorkas was finally impeached, in a momentarily satisfying but ultimately meaningless performative gesture. But performative gesturing has become the stock in trade of our elected leaders, perhaps the only thing they seem capable of doing. Certainly, it’s the one thing that the loudest — and therefore, sadly, the most influential — seem most interested in doing. Once this seemed primarily the province of Democrats, particularly such loudmouths as the members of “the Squad,” but, more and more, this seems true of Republicans as well.
Getting things done now takes a back seat to getting on TV, particularly with House members from safely blue or red districts. The decision to enter politics always required an outsized ego, now, at the left and right fringes, politics seems to have become a magnet for megalomaniacs. Gaining headlines is easy — sitting down and solving problems, particularly the difficult problems this country now faces, is surpassingly hard.
So instead of crafting policy, we generate bumper sticker phrases and pretend we’ve solved a problem. Or, we outright lie. “Build back better” has been one such lie, along with virtually every other economic policy of the last three years. “Forgiving” student loan debt is another outright lie. Somebody has to pay for it, and that somebody isn’t Joe Biden, or even Hunter, despite the money they’ve raked in from their various endeavors. Hunter would have to really get busy cranking out paintings to cover half a trillion dollars in student loan debt.
So, no, “forgiving” student loan debt is really about a payoff, a payoff to the colleges and universities who’ve benefitted for decades from the student loan racket, the lenders who will be protected from default, and the legions of gender studies majors who, if unable to latch on to a DEI sinecure, will be relegated to making lattes or even to hiding out in mom and dad’s basement. Their hard working peers, with real jobs supported by real work experience — and often with real loans for tools and materials and vehicles in order to go to work and get it done — will be stuck paying the bills for all this.
As long as we continue down the current path, the bills will pile up, and so will the problems. Conservatives might hope that an across the board Republican triumph next November would change things decisively for the better, but recent history suggests otherwise. After all, the first two years of the Trump administration also witnessed Republican control of both branches of Congress, and, aside from gaining a conservative majority for the Supreme Court, conservatives were given little to cheer about, not least because Republican congressional leaders seemed clueless about how to get things done. Recall “Obamacare repeal” or even “build the wall.”
Moreover, while the condition of the country today would seemingly argue for a “red wave” election in 2024, we saw such hopes dashed quite decisively in 2022. One doesn’t even have to delve into electoral fraud to see how the deck remains stacked against conservative candidates at every level. The mainstream media undercuts honest discussion of such tragedies as the murder of Laken Riley, or any other violence that doesn’t fit the approved narrative. Why should we expect anything different when the continuation of their favored policies is on the line, as it will be in 2024. The lies will abound.
Looking back, then, to my New Year’s essay, I don’t see anything in recent months by way of encouragement. But that article went far beyond a lament for our inability to get things done. My fundamental point, the point that drove the “expect the worst” title, was that some really bad things were going to happen in 2024. Specifically, I argued that as the election season progressed, we could expect increasingly frequent demonstrations and increasing violence from the likes of Antifa, particularly if the polls began to promise a Republican victory in the fall. In particular, I pointed to the “mostly peaceful protests” of 2020, and suggested that the pretext would always be there for more such dedicated violence. (READ MORE: We Ignore Africa at Our Own Peril)
What I failed to see then, however, was how the “death to America” fanatics would learn and grow in their ability to cripple the nation. Wave after wave of pro-Hamas demonstrations have become a fact of life, and their central feature, anti-Semitism, has served as a magnet attracting all the other left-wing haters into their orbit and onto the streets. The obvious absurdity of “queers for Palestine” has been pointed out many times, but one can only wonder at how October 7 promoted an environmental agenda. The mind boggles, but fanatics always seem to have an affinity for other fanatics.
Now we’ve gone beyond the usual protest marches to more coordinated nationwide assaults on public order, notably, but not exclusively, the blocking of key urban arteries and bridges, stacking traffic up for miles, preventing workers from getting to work, children to school, and goods to market. What was shocking about these protests was not only their scale or their ugliness, but the extent of their careful orchestration, an advance from the merely tactical to the strategic. These were no longer simply protests, but rather threats, naked displays of power, attacks on the life and livelihoods of ordinary Americans.
On April 15 the country was ill-prepared for such a widespread and synchronized assault, and, I fear, this was merely a precursor. The fact that the so-called “A15” movement’s call to action extended not just across the U.S., but also to multiple locations overseas suggests a guiding hand at work. Further evidence comes with the latest waves of college protests, which offer additional evidence of nationwide coordination, plus financial, legal and logistical support. More than one observer has noted how the tents set up on some campuses seem to have been acquired from a single source, and this may be the least of the evidence of a hidden hand orchestrating the protests.
One can only speculate. We know that money from various Hamas-affiliated organizations has flowed into the U.S., both before and after 10/7. But could there be more, more from those various power players who wish to see the U.S. brought low. The Russians? The Chinese? Iran’s Revolutionary Guards? We’ve seen little evidence that the current administration is making an effort to find out. Regardless, while arrests have been made, there seems little stomach in official Washington for getting to the bottom of these protests, nor any enthusiasm about condemning them. If ever Joe Biden was offered a “Sista Souljah” moment, this was it, but he seems to have been taking a nap instead.
As we saw in 2020, the line between “peaceful protest” and deliberate violence has become very thin. If there are bad actors in the background, “thin” soon turns nonexistent. When there are serial enablers in positions of power, when the so-called “authorities” are unwilling to undertake the necessary actions to preserve order, when some in authority see themselves the beneficiaries of disorder, we have every reason to fear the result. Left unchecked, deliberate violence can quickly turn murderous. (READ MORE: West Point: Still Duty and Honor, but Maybe Not Country)
For those who remember other “long hot summers,” the portents are there. We need to brace ourselves and, more, steel ourselves to hold course in the face of these threats.
James H. McGee retired in 2018 after nearly four decades as a national security and counter-terrorism professional, working primarily in the nuclear security field. Since retiring, he’s begun a second career as a thriller writer. His 2022 novel, Letter of Reprisal, tells the tale of a desperate mission to destroy a Chinese bioweapon facility hidden in the heart of the central African conflict region, and a forthcoming sequel carries the Reprisal team from the hills of West Virginia to the forests of Belarus. You can find it on Amazon in both Kindle and paperback editions, and on Kindle Unlimited.
