A penetrating analysis by William S. Lind

William S. Lind is a well-known conservative commenter on US military affairs and geopolitics.  Many consider him rather "kooky", and way off base, but even so, he often makes me think with some of his perspectives.  I don't agree with all his positions, but I'm more than willing to tip my hat in his direction from time to time.

In a recent article titled "Paradigm Shift", he analyzes the almost hysterical reaction to President Trump's meeting in Helsinki with Russian President Putin, and offers a thoughtful analysis of what's behind it.  Here's an excerpt, with its layout (but not its content) slightly edited for clarity.

The Establishment’s hysterical reaction to President Trump’s successful summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin is driven not by outrage but by fear.  The Establishment knows how to succeed in obtaining what it cares about, power and money, within the current paradigms.  Those paradigms include:

• America as the only real world power, before which all other nations must bow;
• an endless supply of money;
• Wilsonianism, i.e. forcing “democracy” down all other countries’ throats;
• and cultural Marxism, which seeks to put women over men, blacks over whites, and gays over straights (where they conflict, cultural Marxism takes precedence over democracy).

But those paradigms are all beginning to shift.  President Trump represents, at least in part, new paradigms which leave today’s Establishment irrelevant, isolated, and powerless.  In response, the Establishment howls in fear and in hatred, especially hatred of a President who represents the heartland instead of the coastal elites.

If we look at each of the above paradigms, we can see the shifts occurring.  Not only does America lack the military power, money, and moral credit to dictate to every other country, all countries now face the challenge of Fourth Generation war, war waged by entities other than states.  This challenge renders competition between states obsolete, something President Trump seems instinctively to grasp, at least in part.  He knows a post-Communism Russian-American rivalry makes no strategic sense; he correctly thinks NATO is obsolete; and he may sense that states everywhere face crises of legitimacy, although of widely varying intensity.  The Establishment howls because one of its major components, the Military-Industrial-Congressional complex must have “peer competitors”, other states it can inflate as threats, in order to justify the trillion dollars a year we spend on national security.

. . .

Meanwhile, the money is running out.  The U.S., and most of the rest of the world, is heading for a colossal debt crisis.  When it hits, we may not be able to afford $100 billion a year in defense, much less a trillion.

This points to a third paradigm shift: the end of Wilsonianism.  Our “defense” budget is really an offense budget.  It supports a military that is supposed to force “democratic capitalism”, which is really oligarchic rent-seeking, down the throats of every people on earth — along with cultural Marxism and its definitions of “human rights” ... President Trump grasps that attempts to turn places such as Afghanistan into Switzerland are foolish nonsense.

. . .

The last shift he not only grasps but rode into the White House on:  the revolt of America’s heartland against political correctness, i.e., cultural Marxism.  The Establishment either believes in cultural Marxism (most Democrats) or is too cowardly to challenge it (most Republicans).  Heartland voters are fed up with it, its advocates, and its sacred “victims” groups, most of whom distinguish themselves by their bad behavior.  In a political battle between the coastal elites and their clients on the one hand and the heartland on the other, the heartland will win.  Look at the percentage of whites among people who actually vote in all the swing states.  The collapse of white acquiescence in cultural Marxism, both here and in Europe, may be the biggest paradigm shift of them all.

There's more at the link.

I highly recommend clicking over to the article and reading it in full.  Mr. Lind makes a thought-provoking case to support his views.

Peter