American Elephants

An important new article from the Hoover Institution, “Hanson: Struggle Between Elites And Masses Defines US Policy,” is about Victor Davis Hanson rather than by him. I suggest that it is “important” because it is a good look at American policy and “history, he says, offers lessons for today’s technology-driven world, especially when it comes to elites,the masses, and the future of society.”

He says that globalization has enriched the coastal corridors of the country and have more in common with Paris or Tokyo than with Ames, Iowa. The “elite” mindset occurs in this geographic concentration, and their attitudes are favored by Academe, the media, government agencies and technology companies that dominate the airwaves and the internet. There’s a big disconnect. High living materialism on one side, which a more rural America regards as superficial indulgence and decadence, that is not only wrong-headed, but bad for the country.

In terms of public policy, Hanson has recommended “rethinking the geography of power,” starting with moving the United Nations from New York City to Haiti, Libya, or Uganda whose capital cities are underappreciated, yet appropriate cities at the frontlines of poverty and crises and thus better places from which to conduct international governance.

As for US cabinet agencies, he suggested transferring the Department of Agriculture to somewhere more agrarian-minded, such as Topeka or Fresno, where bureaucrats would then spend more time with the farmers they regulate. Likewise, he said, Salt Lake City might be an ideal home for the Interior Department; Houston or Bismarck for the Energy Department; and Youngstown, Ohio, or Flint, Michigan, for the Departments of Labor, and Commerce.

“Washington, DC is often considered out of touch, both politically and geographically, with the rest of America,” he said. “Transferring seats of power to hoi polloi is not just practically smart, but morally long overdue.”

Well, yes. That would straighten out a lot of governmental excess.  He said “pragmatism” is the most important quality of rural people. They are familiar with the nature of weather and the seasons. They understand nature better, and have a sense of life as unpredictable and tragic.  The disconnect means that the checks on our excesses  are disappearing. The coastal elites can give virtue-signalling speeches on TV, but fail to understand  the actual consequences of their own abstract ideologies.

When and how did it become acceptable for large businesses to be political advocates?  To use their businesses to capture all the personal information of the ordinary American people in order to sell it to advertisers and whoever for whatever purposes, making themselves fabulously wealthy by doing so. And appointing themselves judge and jury of what information we can receive and what information we can publish.

Do read the whole thing. It’s food for thought, and worth your time.