Posted on 09/17/2012 9:03:18 AM PDT by Robert Teesdale
All,
I am in the process of working through a book concept. Most of the framework is there (i.e. the ideas I want to get across, the concepts and details). I would like to solicit some opinions on the introduction and see how the tone, content and style resonates with fellow Freepers.
A couple of quick notes. This is not intended as a theoretical/grandstanding work, but rather one of a) SWOT analysis based on my professional experience and education; b) recommendations of practical tactics on an individual and organizational level based on my conclusions from that analysis; and c) shot in the arm for those of us feeling lack of progress in the ideological/existential kulturkampf enveloping us all. Looking to see if this introduction is something that would 1) capture your interest if you picked it up in the supermarket; and 2) keep your interest long enough to read further. In other words, viable product?
Admin Mods... if this is an inappopriate vanity, please delete. Thanks.
Kind regards,
Robert Teesdale
Over a better part of the last decade there has been an unpleasant and disturbing sea change across the United States. This change is not simply in the nature of our political direction and discourse. Nor is it a mere degradation of civility or hardening of partisanship. What places our nation at grave risk today is a grouping of external existential threats paired with a grossly disgusting framework of enabled entitlement, a deliberately imposed cultural shift sprouted from a bankrupt ideology and furthered by the vicious and merciless designs of that ideology in pursuit of its devastating and murderous goals.
There is a powerful and awakening sea change in America that accompanies these challenges to the survival of the nation. The rise of the Tea Party and its efforts to correct the nation‘s political direction are grown from the underlying resentment, indignation and anger that composes the grassroots conservative movement today. Our resentment, indignation and anger is born out of fear. It is not a fear of gay marriage or abortion or diversity or Federal spending or other relatively trivial points of argument. It is a real fear, and it has a grave and forbidding basis founded in an understanding of both history and the nature of human beings.
It is the fear of speaking aloud the reality of the battle we are engaged in. It is a burying of one’s head in the blankets, and hoping the thunderous knock on the door at midnight does not come.
Conservatives today are a final bastion against the incredible challenges that face the United States. Despite their resentment, anger and indignation they remain a deep reservoir of national strength and power, a bastion against the degradation of the American spirit and the last fortress standing against the tide of threatening evil that draws a black and tightening curtain over mankind.
We are under siege and losing.
Incomprehensibly blatant lies systematically coordinated and disseminated by the mainstream press, vicious and slandering characterizations of conservatives as “haters” and “bigots” designed to muzzle and shame, and coordinated attacks on business and civil rights are an ongoing, endless and constant assault upon normal, hardworking people who have unfortunately taken both their rights and the security of their nation for granted. And despite these slanders and attacks they nonetheless continue to provide the very basis for the national economy and their sons to a proud military that suffers shattered limbs and lives while they are exploited and murdered by an enemy that is deliberately refused official acknowledgment.
It is no wonder that conservatives are paralyzed, both as individuals and as a part of the national sentiment. We are supposed to be paralyzed. Frozen, wide-eyed and trapped, not knowing how to turn or adapt or fight back. That is a specific tactic of the enemy, and it works best when it is actively permitted.
We have been permitting it.
Today it is no longer possible to take the survival of the United States for granted. The most chilling realization necessary for conservatives today is that they are losing the fight to preserve it. Not through weakness of ideology or belief or courage but through a learned helplessness and a sense of inevitability in loss against the seeming unstoppable juggernaut of the collectivist, strident and powerful Left.
The struggle at hand can no longer be ignored by those who believe in the sacredness of individual rights, who believe in the hilltop shining city of America and in the best future for humanity that our Republic sets as an example to the world. Reluctance to challenge the seeming inevitability of our national decline and death is no longer a choice. Being paralyzed is no longer a choice. Being terrified is no longer an excuse.
Our fear permits the death of human hope and our inaction advances the victory of evil. For make no mistake… the end result of collectivist “progress” has proven its evil in the killing pits of Europe, in the execution rooms of Katyn and the festering sea of bones and mud that became a symbol of the Khmer.
There is more at stake than policy arguments about abortion or gay marriage or other more trivial, manufactured crises that continually distract and divert the power and strength of conservatives. At stake is the survival of the Dream, of the life of our people, and a rolling back of the ever-present curtain of tyranny and murder that once again is descending on humanity.
"If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival. There may even be a worse case: you may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."
Winston Churchill understood this as he led the British Empire against the death and destruction of Nazi Germany and the evil it represented, and his words are timelessly correct. Today we face a similar choice; and our shining city now has only a small chance of survival. The recognition that the battles have been shifting and advancing upon us, mutating and growing in a war already in full swing, can no longer be put aside.
Our siege must be lifted.
The Nazis are destroyed and dead. Collectivism and murder, the march of tyrants and oppression, the legions of men ready with shovels and pistols is not. And we can no longer afford to refuse this war.
"It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace – but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
Patrick Henry’s powerful words in 1775 before the Virginia Convention are born from a similar desperation that conservatives share today. We share a fury in the hesitant timidity of the Republican leadership and disgust in the gleeful and unapologetic nature of our enemies. The plain is dark; the struggle confused; and our army alone clashes in ignorance.
We will lift the siege.
We will talk here about the things we have been taught that we are forbidden to speak of, and we will raise searchlights and blast new brilliance and determined resolution across the plain of war. We can no longer be afraid to stand, to cease our losing defense and take the battle to the enemy.
It is time to voice the reality of these enemies against us, to name them. To pour fiercely upwards from the trenches with an indomitable spirit and crush the adversaries that align against America and the future of the human race. We owe it to those who come after us, or they will in their turn fight.. and die as free men and women rather than slaves.
In this book we will talk about how to fight back. We will talk about word and deed, about the unleashing of spirit and the motivation of Men. We will talk about consequences and dangers, and about costs and risks.
About the necessary spirit to attain and seize victory when the outlook seems grim and hopeless.
“All men who feel any power of joy in battle, know what it is like when the wolf rises in the heart.”
Theodore Roosevelt knew his Americans. Their spirit isn’t gone yet.
We’re going to let slip the dogs of war, and seize victory again from the darkness as our fathers did in Virginia and the bloody, steel-rained skies over London. We’re going to win.
And we’re going to enjoy it.
Ping... had you specifically in mind as someone that might have some useful input.
Well stated.
Sorry, but the vocabulary and writing style are about 10 grade levels above your average supermarket crowd...
I would absolutely buy it.
I have been having similar thoughts recently. Wishful thinking? Maybe.
On the other hand, there is so much greatness in “normal” America, that I just believe that we can’t be killed off. Yes, the institutions that sort of formed the social fabric, the social relationships...those are for the most part destroyed. No point in belaboring that. It’s just a fact.
So...what separates us from, for example, the French Revolution or from France in say 1787?
Well, the greatness and goodness of the American people. That is what.
Also...personally, I am post-millennial. I believe that theological position to be true. Yet, I also see the historical cycle as set forth in The Fourth Turning and otehr sources as basically correct. The 70 year rule, etc. Even pagan sources like WB YEats saw this clearly and if you put all these together, and look at the dates, there can only be one conclusion: we are within 3 to 5 years of another major calamity. Sort of like if 2008 in the financial markets had not been postponed......
I think personally that we could be within 3 to 5 years of a major blackout....which will be followed by a major reboot.
NOW...know that I did NOT fall for Y2K. I did not fall for the bird flu panic, or any other panic.
But I did see that the US elected obama in 2008, and that he has a good shot at being re-elected (though I think Romney will pull it out....but as of today, it is still close....which suggests that something is very rotten in America).
So as to avoid yammering on, again, I would absolutely buy your book. I hope you write it. We could all use an analysis of where we are which says, likely correctly, that we are looking at a meltdown and a reboot. But....it is going to be ok because WE are going to rebuild.
And....we are going to enjoy it.
You are correct about the problem this country/world faces, the biggest one being the abject denial of reality that has become almost required in "polite society".
You want me to pretend it's perfectly normal for two men to be married? You me to pretend that he is a female because he says so? Oh, so that baby you want to abort isn't really human eh? On and on, and it's not just on the social issues but every single issue. Spending our way out of debt and taxing our way to prosperity.
They are at war with common sense among other things.
Don't like my tax policy? You're a racist!
Don't like my spending priorities, you're a racist!
It is like a mental illness and for too long we have treated it as if it's okay to have that illness. To be a leftist today you have to think that it's a crime to blasphemy allah but impolite not to blaspheme Jesus.
It's hard to keep the rules straight because they change day to day and depends on the situation.
Is it to be called “TEXTBOOK CONSERVATIVE”? Do I have to take classes at the community college now?
I don’t agree with the premise that conservatives have been paralyzed by fear and that our inaction has led us here. In my view people that are politically conservative are (as Eastwood pointed out) by definition, conservative in nature. We do not go around pooping on police cruisers, dressing as zombies, and screaming slogans. Most of us are too busy working hard and raising our families. For the most part we don’t even care what other people are doing as long as they are not infringing on our rights. That is where we are right now. Obama has pushed us too far. We are being attacked for our values and belief in American exceptionalism. In November we will shove back, and it may look like a landslide.
Yes, this “real life” focus is something I intend to address. It is getting in our way.
“Sorry, but the vocabulary and writing style are about 10 grade levels above your average supermarket crowd...”
Yes. You need to read and re-read Strunk & White’s “Elements of Style” until you completely internalize it.
Writing professionally takes a thick skin. 90% of what everyone writes is crap. If you don’t like being called on it, you’re in the wrong field.
Your introduction could be re-written as one 4-5 sentence paragraph and would be the better for it. Writing is a two - part process. First, you write in order to figure out what it is you want to say. Then, you figure out the best way to say it. Your intro is a rant, not a finished product, but that’s OK - you’re still in part one.
I’ve worked as an editor for thirty years. I know how the process works. You’ve got a lot of work ahead of you. If you choose to stick it out, good luck, and Godspeed.
bump
Noted, thanks. Getting this rolling is like stretching before a workout.. inevitable cracks and pops in the cold joints.
Finding the right balance between “asynchronous value disparity in ideological efficacy” and “four legs good, two legs bad” is going to be a challenge. Working on that.
I haven’t read any of the other posts so as to give you my straight up uninfluenced opinion.
It is well written and in a subject I am highly interested in, but I found myself skipping sentences. I found it too dry to hold my concentration and my mind was seeking sentences with more life in them as a brain break. I think if you were to write this as a column sized essay (obviously without talking about the rest of a book), people would know it was short and could then focus on each of your intelligent and well written but somewhat heavy sentences.
But as the intro to a book, even if I saw it in a store and wanted to have it, I’d be hard pressed at home to pick it up.
Look at Mark Steyn’s work. He can get in quite complex construction and topics as well, but his humor makes him a JOY to read. I know a lot of us read extremely fluently out here in book buyer land, but we still want it to be fun. No one goes for a run in an underground tunnel when they can choose a road with nice scenery.
I think your book no doubt — your point, as well as your strength in writing and precision of concept — would be well received if you edited for a bit more fun. Put in some small sentences that have a bite to them like celery. Find absurdities and humor, even somewhat ironic or sarcastic (all the humor you can sometimes find in a sad political situation!) if need be, and very sparsely sprinkle it in. Do not attempt to be actually FUNNY like Mark Steyn because he is a born entertainer and most people could not pull it off.
I liked it. Just needed more places to rest and satisfy my reading eye in there.
Yes, exactly. I am in the “figuring out what to say” stage, no question. First draft is serving also the purpose of actually getting momentum of the process going.
I find that the real writing discipline takes hold as I see the printout pile getting thicker.
Skin too, especially with Freepers doing the input. Grin.
Thanks, this does crystallize my own initial “dislikes” into a good voice of the consumer. Really helpful!
It reads like an Op-ed or the first in a series of articles in a magazine or newspaper.
Incomprehensibly blatant lies systematically coordinated and disseminated by the mainstream press, vicious and slandering characterizations of conservatives as “haters” and “bigots” designed to muzzle and shame, and coordinated attacks on business and civil rights are an ongoing, endless and constant assault upon normal, hardworking people who have unfortunately taken both their rights and the security of their nation for granted. And despite these slanders and attacks they nonetheless continue to provide the very basis for the national economy and their sons to a proud military that suffers shattered limbs and lives while they are exploited and murdered by an enemy that is deliberately refused official acknowledgment.
Lots of books on it. Thomas Sowell’s book, “the vision of the annointed” is a good place to start. Dinesh D’Souza has also written some great books about it.
Write at the level of your target audience... Good luck with your project!
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