Wow. The Codevilla essay seems to be making quite a splash. I haven’t waded through the whole thing, but most of what I’ve read I agree with, and don’t find particularly controversial.

I think the Ferguson piece is more relevant than Glicks. We are rapidly approaching a time when US power will be greatly diminished, for the exact reason F cites. You can’t maintain a Military to police the world if you’re using 20% of your funds to pay interest on your debt. So this is going to go away. Very few, even here at Belmont, will admit that now, so this’ll have to be one of those things that looks obvious in hindsight.

Ferguson says that people don’t see this because they think of history as a cyclical thing. I agree, and it’s easy to do if it has been for your entire life, especially with an historically ignorant population like we have in the US. We’ve lived the good life, it’s about to come to a screeching halt, and we don’t know if our population will be able to handle it. We don’t know how the world will react when the US is unable to hold things together. Will they be tough enough? will I be tough enough? I think so, because there will be little alternative.

Domestically we have a boatload of problems, but I have to agree with L3 when he says that these are actually opportunities. The problem is that there is no unifying theme now. Once the SHTF, the first instinct for most people will be to expect the Federal Government to come to the rescue, because that’s the default answer for every problem at the moment. When it becomes obvious that the Feds are helpless people will look to other entities, whether it’s their State Governments, Charity, Churches, or whatever. At that time we will have an opportunity to give the Feds a real haircut and put them back in their rightful place. I hope when that time comes that we don’t blow it.