A Separate Peace. America is in trouble--and our elites are merely resigned.

Wall Street Journal ^ | October 27, 2005 | PEGGY NOONAN

[.cnI redruM]

It is not so hard and can be a pleasure to tell people what you see. It's harder to speak of what you think you see, what you think is going on and can't prove or defend with data or numbers. That can get tricky. It involves hunches. But here goes.

I think there is an unspoken subtext in our national political culture right now. In fact I think it's a subtext to our society. I think that a lot of people are carrying around in their heads, unarticulated and even in some cases unnoticed, a sense that the wheels are coming off the trolley and the trolley off the tracks. That in some deep and fundamental way things have broken down and can't be fixed, or won't be fixed any time soon. That our pollsters are preoccupied with "right track" and "wrong track" but missing the number of people who think the answer to "How are things going in America?" is "Off the tracks and hurtling forward, toward an unknown destination." ___________________________________________________

I mean I believe there's a general and amorphous sense that things are broken and tough history is coming.

[.cnI redruM]

Intrestingly, I actually agree that there is a sense of 'something' bad about to happen. I'm not sure if it's just media-fanned pessimism, a lack of understanding what's happened or a genuine recognition that it's all gotten too fast and too complicated to keep from crashing down around our ears.

The wierd thing is that there isn't a single concensus as to what that bad thing is. Maybe you guys can take a crack at it. Suggest your own tinfoil hat doomsday theory that will bring America in for hard times.

Mine is that a series of tactical nuclear weapons will be easily shipped across our Southern border, smuggled innocuously into strategic positions and then simultaneously detonated to cause a mass panic and confusion. Instant Dark Ages with just a push of a button.

[sionnsar]

Suggest your own tinfoil hat doomsday theory that will bring America in for hard times.

Ummm... the Bill of Rights effectively ceases to exist...?

[rushmom]

The wages of the welfare state are a loss of freedoms. That is tyranny. Too many people would rather accept that than personal responsibility.

[cripplecreek]

Personally I think the jobs being shipped out are just as damaging as WMDs being shipped in.

[wvobiwan]

Hypocritical liberal moral equivalence of course wouldn't have anything to do with perssimism. /sarcasm

[.cnI redruM]

Hasn't that already happened to a large extent. Who here can even summarize the 10th Amendment without a quick Google search?

[texas_mrs]

I sense 2 bad things happening.

1. That islamic terrorists are trying to wipe us from the face of the earth.

and that
2. The left and the media are all for it.

[sionnsar]

Wow. What a bleak piece. But I think she's wrong here:

Our elites, our educated and successful professionals, are the ones who are supposed to dig us out and lead us. I refer specifically to the elites of journalism and politics, the elites of the Hill and at Foggy Bottom and the agencies, the elites of our state capitals, the rich and accomplished and successful of Washington, and elsewhere.

[.cnI redruM]

>>>>Our elites, our educated and successful professionals, are the ones who are supposed to dig us out and lead us.


Really, outside of the uniformed Military Services, leaders aren't taught that much at all. Leaders on The Hill and Foggy Bottom are not taught how to really lead. They are basically just technical experts at some job function.

[pissant]

I think Peggy is perpetually negative. Reading her these days is like eating tacks.

I'm a helluva lot more conservative than she is and I'm guessing alot more informed on history as well. Every era has it's problems. And I'm damn confident that they will be resolved, just as they always have. The gloom is in Peggy's mind.

[vrwc0915]

It most likely won't be a single event but a series of cascading events involving high unemployment,plague or WMD or natural disaster, plus the chicoms may see a window of opportunity to attack when they perceive that we are week. Add to the fact that a good 50% of US Citizens would openly accept tyrannical socialism as long as they got their turn at the trough of the .gov

Economic collapse and depression, the glue that held society together in the 30's is no longer present.

The war on the middle class through outsourcing and unchecked illegal immigration.

[Chanticleer]

ping

[Jack Black]

Rights not specifically delegated by the Constitution to FedGov are reserved to the States, or the People.

[slowhand520]

I agree with you 100%. To an entitlement society (meaning Libs and the MSM) sacrifice is a nonexistent word. They expect things handed to them. That is why they are against the war and accountability. They require a lot of sacrifice and that is something that the left can't understand. Instead the left teaches us to question everything and promote individuals such as "slackers". Fortunately the left, in my opinion, has not won the war of ideas but sometimes I wonder how long that will last

[Freedom_Fighter_2001]

Dittos... and great home page, pissant.

[jocon307]

"I think Peggy is perpetually negative."

This is a classis Noonan piece, demonstrating yet again that if the word "maudlin" did not already exist we'd have to invent it for her.

Doesn't one always feel sort of gloomy and/or anxious as the golden fall turns towards November? I know I do.

[tom paine 2]

If she thinks the elites of Foggy Bottom are going to lead us to the promised land, she is smoking some real powerful crack.

[pissant]

LOL. Now that is good.

[borkrules]

You are so right.

Jeez, Peggy needs a man. Or something, anything to give the poor dear something to do other than brood.

This is one of her most florid, hysterical, and overblown pieces in some time. And for her, that's really saying something.

I like Peggy Noonan and regularly read her stuff. But she needs to revisit her Reagan years and relearn some of the old man's optimism. Cos things didn't look all that rosy in 1979 either, as I recall. Lots of folks had a very strong sense that the "wheels were coming off" then as well.

[Youngman442002]

I see Iran trying to "wipe Israel off the map" with their nukes...Israel fires back..the Muslims take this as the sign to start their intifada......and a huge world war erupts