Lift Up Your Hearts!

Back in February 2020, just before the Florida's Democratic presidential primary, I wrote the following:

I have plenty of opinions on just about any subject, and if you're reading my blog, you know I don't hesitate to make them known. However, I rarely like to discuss politics directly. I also believe strongly in the institution of the secret ballot. Sometimes I don't even tell myself whom I'm voting for until I actually put pen to ballot.

Situations change, and we change in response.

I published my first post to the Politics category in October 2004. Number 100 occurred in March of 2009 (4.5 years later), the count reached 200 in February 2016 (7 years), then 300 in November 2022 (6.5 years), and 400 in September 2024 (less than 2 years). It now stands at 414. Suddenly, I find that I have more political opinions, and more that I'm willing to share. And a lot more to say than I have time to write.

Back in 2018, my friend Eric Schultz wrote an article (unfortunately no longer available) that prompted me to think about a new kind of despair I'd been observing in the Western world. I wrestled with it and put off writing about it because it was a difficult topic and I didn't know how to begin. When I finally stumbled to a start at the beginning of November 2020, I didn't get far. (My Last Battle series currently has only 9 posts, and has somewhat been taken over by Here I Stand.) But the essay I was trying to write was quite different from the one I had planned to write two years earlier. This is part of what I said:

I have been increasingly concerned by the number of people who look around and are overcome by despair. Despair deep enough that they have determined to have no children, because "How could we bring a child into such a terrible world?" If suicide is the extreme expression of individual hopelessness, surely the rejection of reproduction is the same attitude on a cosmic scale.

Although they have this despondency in common, I find that people are coming to this point from many different places, and with many different fears. Climate change, the election of President Trump, an asteroid hitting the earth, terrorism, pandemic, widespread civil unrest, and the takeover of our world by Artificial Intelligence are only a few of the disasters that people believe are on the brink of ending the world as we know it—and any world worth living in. How should we live in such times? How dare we bring children into such a world?

I’ve long wanted to write an answer to these questions, to these fears. In 2018, however, it was composing my response from a position of strength. I saw these concerns as understandable, but not really rational; I certainly didn’t feel them myself to any great extent.

Situations change.

Sometime between the end of 2018 and the end of 2020 (n.b. before the presidential election), I became much less optimistic. Not because of any one particular event or fear, but from stepping back and taking a good look at what has been happening in our country (along with much of the West). I decided it was time to stop sticking my head in the sand about our social and political situation. In truth, I guess it was more a matter of being forced to pay attention, because in the past five or six years, America has gone very rapidly down an insane path, not just in one area, but many. Not that the seeds of the decline weren't sewn long ago; it's the rate of change in recent years that woke up this stewing frog.

It's much easier not to pay attention. And some of us are living such difficult lives that it's virtually impossible to spend the time necessary to seek out the truth about anything. That's one reason I like to pretend that I have decades of life left, that my Must Do list isn't already impossibly long, and that I can afford the time to investigate, and to write what I find. Because it's critically important.

Without going further here into the reasons why I have reached this conclusion—I have already written much, and will continue to write—all of my newfound awareness has led me to this:

• The 2024 presidential race is the most important election in which I have voted since I became eligible at the age of 19.
• For the first time ever, I am voting enthusiastically for my candidate (and maybe more surprisingly, sharing my intentions with the world). I have left behind "He's the lesser of two evils" and truly believe that only one presidential candidate, despite his obvious flaws, has a clue as to the imminent danger we are in, and a direction for swimming out of the rip current in which we are caught.
• I am truly impressed by the diverse selection of highly intelligent advisors and supporters who have realized the same thing and despite their differences have joined together to work with President Trump for causes that I value greatly. This is the first time ever that I have felt understood and represented by any politician. That is no small thing.
• Therefore, it is with a set jaw and a light in my eyes that on Monday I will cast my vote for Donald Trump and J. D. Vance.
• As you know, I much prefer to vote on the real Election Day at my local, physical polling place. But having experienced two hurricanes in less than two weeks, I realize that this election is too important to risk a possible disaster that would make voting on November 5 impossible. Taking advantage of Early Voting seems the prudent thing to do.

It is my deep desire that all who read this will also vote for Donald Trump. But I know better than to hope for that! More importantly, I want you to know that I am not trying to persuade you, and have no desire to argue. My job is to provide information, and tell the truth that investigation, experience, and the wisdom of age have revealed to me. Convincing you is beyond my pay grade.

I may be wrong, but "Here I stand; I can do no other."

Situations may change, but one thing has not. The answer to the questions I was struggling with in 2018 and 2020 (How should we live in such times? How dare we bring children into such a world?) remains the same: We dare to have children because they are the best resource we have for survival, as individuals and as the human race. Whatever the outcome of this election, whatever troubles come, whatever problems we face—it is our children who will meet the future. Who knows what great and unexpected inventions, discoveries, solutions, and ideas will come from their youthful optimism, energy, and strength? But they have to be born first. Our most important mission is to bring them into the world, bring them up right, and prepare them well.

We just returned from a great visit to New England. (Yes, all through Hurricane Milton, which was a bit of an adventure, but I'll get to that later.) In addition to attending my nephew's wedding, we had a lot of fun with grandchildren.

Grace was amazing! Except for the NG tube, and the bag she carries around all day, wherever she goes, and her central line, and the fact that she asks "Milk in it?" of any new food, you'd never guess she was sick. Just shy of her third birthday, she's as active and energetic and competent as you could wish. And very much in the "Me do it!" stage. Cute as all get out, too.

You knew there was going to be a "But...."

Suddenly, she is sick. Two of her siblings recently developed regular colds, but this doesn't look like a cold: so far, at least, the only symptom has been throwing up, which she did several times last night. At last word, she has no fever—and this is a big part of the prayer request, because in her case a fever sends her immediately to the hospital.

Many thanks for your continuing long-distance love for our little girl.

Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you. —Pericles

Despite the truth of this wisdom of Pericles, aren't we all tired of politics? I can't overstate how critical I believe our political situation to be, but sometimes we just need a little break—from both politics and hurricanes.

For me, I find it surprisingly calming to watch the Black Spruce YouTube channel, which I've written about before. In this video, he's building an outdoor kitchen for his off-grid cabin.

This excerpt is from a conversation between Elon Musk and Jordan Peterson. The whole show is more than two hours long, and I haven't watched it. This, however, is less than 20 minutes and is absolutely worth listening to. I just love hearing smart people converse, especially when they make sense.

If you want to know why Musk, who supported Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden, now hopes for a Trump victory, this is a good place to start. And that's not all they cover.

I'm delighted to have made the switch to Rumble from YouTube, with which I have many quarrels, not the least of which is that it's owned by Google. Yes, I still use it, as I still use other Google products, much more than I'd like to. (I hope to switch away from Chrome to Brave soon as well.) But I much prefer to support a free speech platform when I can.

However, I have recently learned that some firewalls are blocking access Rumble. That's another sore point, but I can't deal with it now, and will instead try to provide YouTube links as well as embedding the Rumble video. I can't guarantee they're complete and uncensored, but I'm hoping they will be better than nothing.

A YouTube link for this video is here.

Today, as I repeatedly refresh the map of Milton's predicted path, I've been thinking a lot about Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four.

My standard hurricane prayer is this: Please diminish, disorganize, and disperse this storm, and divert it to where it will do the least harm.

That's what I pray, and in my better moments that's what I mean.

In my not-so-good moments, however, I find my heart cheering whever the predicted path moves away from our home—which means it's moving toward someone else's.

All I can think of is, "Do it to Julia!"

Author S. D. Smith explains that his children's books are good but not safe—and why that's important. Authors like Smith prepare the ground for children to grow into the heroes we will desperately need.

(Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3)

Rescue the Republic—Join the Resistance

My heart is full.

I still wish I could have been at the event in person. I was not even able to be glued to the livestream, as we were for most of Viva Frei's live coverage of Canada's Freedom Convoy; life was just too busy here on Sunday. Nonetheless, I managed to listen to quite a bit of it as I went about my business, once we got home from church. And I've been slowly catching up on what I missed, now that DarkHorse has most of it available in convenient, bite-sized pieces. In a subsequent post, I intend to publish some of my favorites, so you can easily watch them for yourselves, but if you want to see any or all of them now, you can find them at the DarkHorse link, in more-or-less reverse chronological order.  You could even see the whole event, from the pre-beginning to the closing song, all seven hours of it, here.

Rescue the Republic was a good mix of serious speakers, comedians, and musical groups; I even enjoyed the music, which may surprise some of you, given that it is not what I'd call "my kind of music." And whoever could have dreamed up the idea of putting Jordan Peterson and Russell Brand on stage together? It was magic.

The whole admixture was magic. It wasn't a Trump rally, although there were plenty of Trump supporters among both the presenters and the crowd. There was a large contingent of Kennedy supporters, and those who cheered loudly at any mention of Tulsi Gabbard, and plenty of folks who came not to support a particular candidate but because they are deeply concerned about the situation our country finds itself in. It wasn't a rally about individuals, but about issues.

Nor was it only Americans, because what happens in America affects the whole world. When Brand opened with "My fellow Americans," the line didn't get as much of a laugh as it deserved; not everyone realized at first that Brand is from the United Kingdom. And Peterson of course is Canadian.

Kennedy's slogan, "Make America Healthy Again" was more prominent than "Make America Great Again," though MAGA was well represented. I suspect that most of those at the rally will indeed be voting for Donald Trump (and the foreigners wish they could), because they see him as our best chance in what is probably the most critical election in my lifetime—but that was not what the event was about.

The rally, to the best of my ability to tell from this distance, was a huge success. It was nothing of what I feared, and everything I had hoped for—and more. It was just the right sized crowd, too.

As I watched the livestream, I was at first disappointed that I didn't see the Mall overflowing with a huge, supportive mass of people. But it didn't take me long to realize that this was a human-scale crowd, and it was perfect. A place for encounters with people one might otherwise never have rubbed shoulders with, a crowd as diverse at the speakers themselves, united because they all care so deeply and know they have very important work ahead of them.

Do you know what else I saw?

Joy.

Real, deep joy, in both the crowd and the speakers. I refuse to let the Democrats take over that word, or that concept. I'm sorry, but when I see them talking about "joy," they don't look joyful; they don't sound joyful. It appears forced, as if they're trying to generate a feeling they know is important but with which they are actually unfamiliar. Similar to the difference between the scripted "Joe Biden, we love you" and the love I see demonstrated at Trump rallies.

For all that the Rescue the Republic Rally was about a profound, life-and-death emergency, there was no feeling of doom-and-gloom. It makes me think of Henry V and Agincourt:

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

I fear that those unfamiliar with Shakespeare may misconstrue some of the language, but he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother perfectly describes the unity-in-diversity, joy-in-adversity feeling of the rally. These are my kind of people.

My heart is full.

I've been remiss in updating Grace's Journey; my only excuse is that no news is good news! She has been doing well. For a more complete update from Jon, see their new Daley Pondering blog post, from which I will quote extensively. Jon is writing.

It has been great to have less medical stuff going on these days, and we get more comments about her being "so cute" in the grocery stores and the soccer games, etc.

Her hair is growing in, and I don't think I've heard her referred to as a boy in a while (for a while she just looked like she had a really short haircut, but it is growing out more). She discovered the 18 month clothes bin in the attic the other day and has been wearing some onesies, since she mostly still fits into them. She'll turn three next month.

Life, however, is still far from normal.

We continue to do weekly dressing changes - we had a full day yesterday and so she fell asleep during the change - it is hard to imagine kids screaming through it, but we are certainly blessed to not have that problem. She happily puts on her mask and then holds her hands above her head until it is done.

She has been gaining weight, and we've started up the steroid tapering off again and doctor visits are every other week, once a month to Dartmouth and once a month to Boston, so that schedule is nicer too. It is possible that the steroid taper will be increased and be done soon, which then triggers the start of the cyclosporine (immunosuppressant) taper, which will be the end of the meds entirely!

Her nasogastric tube fell out while she was sleeping last week.... She woke up in the morning and brought the tube down already pushed out of her throat. So, we proceeded to the semi-unapproved installation of a new tube, and it went successfully.... We'll see what Boston says about that on Wednesday. Last time, Dartmouth recorded the procedure as "without contacting medical providers", and did an x-ray to confirm proper placement, but didn't explicitly forbid it in the future.... I think that because we know the exact length of the insertion, there is fairly little risk involved—a nurse at Children's told me that she will really start coughing if it is in her lungs rather than her stomach, and we verify the pH after insertion as well. (The supply house apparently thinks it is reasonable for us to do the procedure, because they send all the equipment to do so, though maybe they are thinking a visiting nurse—they are sometimes surprised to hear that we do dressing changes ourselves.)

Faith, big sister and bone marrow donor, has been doing well also. This donation recovery period, which was supposed to last no more than a couple of weeks, has been a long, slow process involving physical therapy and chiropractic care. (The transplant doctors pretty much washed their hands of the problem.) But she estimates that she is now "98% back," and has been able to enjoy playing on the high school girls' soccer team, which means a lot to her. Her coach and her teammates have been great, encouraging her to play when she can and rest when she needs to. They even celebrated Leukemia Awareness Month—the "color" of which is orange—by dedicating a game and a fundraiser to Grace, Faith, and their whole family.

(click to enlarge)

The high school principal said there was a "sea of orange" in the school that day, and there were a lot of people wearing orange at the game.

The team raised about $1600! The opposing team gave the family flowers, though they did not go so far as to refrain from winning the game.

I saw it most dramatically in the Democratic Party's response to President Biden's debate performance, this total disconnect with reality, followed by an abrupt and dizzying volte face. How could they not have known about his cognitive decline, which had been obvious for years, and why was it so suddenly a matter of national panic? (I've already written about that.)

When it comes to our country's economic situation, the same phenomenon has occurred. We go for years and years of ever-increasing prices, obvious to anyone who does his own grocery shopping, or fills up his own gas tank, or has to find his own place to live, and the government officials tasked with keeping us informed insisted there was no inflation, could be no inflation, inflation was a thing of the past.

Jobs? They insisted that unemployment was down, and job creation up. The people knew better—we knew that high-paying jobs were still going away; it was low-paying service jobs that made up the bulk of the deceptive numbers. We knew that what looked like good employment numbers was actually people taking on second or third low-paying jobs in order to make ends meet.

We were told again and again that the job market is good, there's no inflation, and the economy is robust. But with a reversal as sudden as the evaluation of the state of President Biden's mental faculties, inflation is now a critical problem, the unemployment numbers are frightening, and the economy needs to be saved. (By the same people who have been managing it for almost four years now?)

How is it that there is now panic over something that so many of us have been worried about for years? Where have these people been?

(As an aside, how is it that Vice President Harris thinks we should trust her to "fix" the housing problem, when she bears responsibility for adding nearly 10 million people to the population pressure of those who need housing?)

That's a long introduction to this video interview, from August, with Jeremy Tucker. He has a good grasp of economic theory and reality, and is worth listening to. However, it is long (over an hour), as too many interviews are. There is a full transcript below the video, for those who prefer text.  Here's an introduction:

Just one set of numbers, released on Friday morning, showing a small increase in the unemployment rate, completely shifted the attitude in Washington, Wall Street, and the mainstream media. We went from celebrating a booming economy and the absence of inflation to suddenly believing that a recession is probably already here. The world seems to be falling apart, and panic selling begins. It’s an overreaction, to say the least. First, the data is already a month old, so the recession didn’t just happen on Friday. It was from the previous month. Secondly, the numbers weren’t particularly bad compared to the past. It has been obvious to me and many others for at least two years, if not longer, that we never fully recovered from the lockdown period. Worker participation ratios and labor participation rates are still below 2019 levels.

When we analyze the jobs data, we see a growing gap between the household survey and business payrolls, indicating potential double counting in the establishment survey. This gap never existed before, but now it’s widening. It’s becoming more extreme, with one set of data dropping and the other rising. This has been happening for several months over the past year.

Additionally, there have been revisions to the jobs data every month. For example, they would initially report 220,000 jobs, but then revise last month’s 190,000 jobs down to only 90,000 jobs. Where did those jobs go? It seemed like all the jobs were being pushed forward a month and taken out of the previous month’s count. There have been illusions in the data all along. I lost interest in the headline unemployment numbers because they don’t include discouraged workers or account for people who have dropped out of the workforce. The unemployment data only counts those who are actively looking for jobs and can’t find one. While that number may be relatively low, it doesn’t mean a healthy job market.

In other words, the job market has not been healthy for a very long time. There was something that shattered the psychology of denial on Friday morning. It had something to do with Wall Street and the attachment of Main Street Media to the headline unemployment number. Once that news broke, everything else crumbled, and suddenly someone shouted, “There’s an elephant in the room!” and chaos ensued.

That's only a taste. Even the transcript is long, and technical in places, but is a good introduction to the sleight-of-hand that our government has been using to play with the economic numbers on which so much depends. And not just the current administration, either, though it's increasingly egregious.

(Part 1) (Part 2)

Rescue the Republic—Join the Resistance

It's almost here!

Rescue the Republic: Join the Resistance will run from 12pm-7pm on Sunday, September 29th. 

The stage will be located northeast of the WWII Memorial (east of 17th Street) and open viewing will extend all the way to the Washington Monument. The program will consist of a mix of musical artists, comedians and thought leaders who alternate in a fast-paced program.

I have too much going on to sit glued to the livestream tomorrow, but I hope to check in now and then, and then listen later when I can.

Why am I a bit nervous? Because this is so important to me, and I know that (1) large events, especially ones about which people may have strong feelings, attract bad actors and false flag operations; (2) petty thugs without any political feelings whatsoever are tempted by crowds of any sort to engage in unpleasant activities; and (3) even the best of audiences can sometimes be swept along by irrational action. (I believe that when President Trump stood up after the Pennsylvania assassination attempt, showing himself alive and well to the crowd, that action was a major factor in keeping both fear and anger—and likely more injury—to a minimum in the crowd.)

Why am I so excited about this? Excited enough that despite my intense dislike of crowds, I wish I could be a part of it? Because for the first time in many years I am feeling the unity in diversity I experienced so many times in my younger days, when I was a part of several minority movements that attracted people of a wide variety of political, social, religious, and demographic backgrounds. People who enjoyed and learned from each other as we worked together for a good cause that was more important to us than our differences. I miss that, a lot. And among the people who are participating in this rally—many of whom I would never have thought I would have rubbed shoulders with, even metaphorically—I'm finding the same joy.

In the following clip, if you listen from 1:09:10 to 1:24:25 (15 minutes) you will hear Bret Weinstein, one of the organizers, acknowledging the risks of holding such a rally, and expounding on the critical importance of the potential benefits. Please listen, especially if you are feeling fed up with the whole political process and are tempted to sit this election out.

Is this taking sympathy too far?    Porter after MOHS surgery this morning.

Heroes do not always appear heroic until time has a chance to reveal the magnitude of their actions.

From Hillsdale College's Imprimis July/August 2019.  "Rediscovering the Wisdom in American History" by Wilfred M. McClay.

So accustomed are we to thinking of Lincoln in heroic terms that we forget the depth and breadth of his unpopularity during his entire time in office. Few great leaders have been more comprehensively disdained, loathed, and underestimated. A low Southern view of him, of course, was to be expected, but it was widely shared in the North as well. As Lincoln biographer David Donald put it, “Lincoln’s own associates thought him ‘a Simple Susan, a baboon, an aimless punster, a smutty joker.’” Abolitionist Wendell Phillips called him “a huckster in politics, a first-rate, second-rate man.” George McClellan, his opponent in the 1864 election, openly disdained him as a “well-meaning baboon.” For much of that election year, Lincoln was convinced, with good reason, that he was doomed to lose the election, with incalculable consequences for the war effort and the future of the nation.

In case you are curious, here's the lastest predicted path (11 a.m.):

The public schools around here have already decided to close for tomorrow, and I wonder why.

I take the possibility of a hurricane seriously and tend to err on the cautious side (no hurricane parties); what I question is the timing. So many times in my memory have schools been closed for days that turned out to be absolutely fine. With the weather—especially storms—you simply can't know so far in advance what is going to happen, so why make the decision so early?

I didn't grow up with hurricanes, but we had "snow days," and never knew till the same day whether we'd have school or not. Those are great memories: ears glued to the radio, listening to the list of schools that were closed. It was usually a long list, since most school districts were local and small, and my school district began with an "S" and thus came near the end. Oh, the cheers when they finally called our name (or groans, if they didn't)! My mother cheered as enthusiastically as we did—or so it seemed to me at the time.

The deciding point for closure was whether or not the roads could be plowed in time for the school buses to make their runs. (All but a small handful of us walked to my school, and they never worried about us, but they closed the whole district if the buses to other schools couldn't run. I was grateful for those rural schools.) The Superintendent of Schools would wake up early, assess the situation, and make the decision then.

I don't understand why Florida doesn't do the same.

On the other hand, at least when it turns out to be a false alarm, the kids here have a nice day off. But as I understand it, they must make up missed days later in the year, which we never did, and it sure seems unfair to shorten an expected vacation!

I've discovered that very often when I am impressed by an Epoch Times article, the author turns out to be Jeffrey Tucker. Here's another one: "The Undying Necessity of Moral Courage." Please be sure to read as well my comment at the end of this post.

Tucker is a realist, and the article starts out depressing, with a reiteration of insights from Joseph Schumpeter's book, Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy (1942). But it ends with a bit of hope.

I keep going back to this treatise for guidance in our strange times, mainly to better understand the interaction of economics, politics, history, and culture. His outlook is probably best described as transideological; a partisan of capitalist systems, he was not optimistic about human nature itself.

You can see the entire work as an elaboration on the following principle sometimes attributed to the Stoics: “Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And weak men create hard times.”

Yes, capitalism works. Manna falls as if from heaven, and people are no longer taught its source through any lived experience. Better lives, richer lives, more opportunities rain down on the population as if by magic.... What does this do to human character? It trains people to believe that the ancient virtues are no longer operational. We don’t need fortitude, resilience, courage, and determination. A credit-soaked world no longer needs thrift, prudence, or sobriety. Instead, rising wealth of the sort we’ve experienced since the late 19th century trains people just to go along for the ride. Careerism replaces courage. Credentials replace talent. Erudition replaces wisdom. Indulgence displaces prudence.

States come to believe that they can promise their populations anything and that normal accounting has been superseded. They create giant cradle-to-grave welfare states. They intervene in every conflict, domestic and foreign, as if there are no limits to resources. The culture celebrates recklessness, sloth, and opportunism instead of discipline and fortitude.

Schumpeter was even more correct than he knew. In 2020, the wealth seemed so automatic, so inevitable, so indestructible, that most nations in the world actually set out to shut down their whole economies in a new science experiment in disease mitigation, all while they waited for labs to roll out some magic cure that turned out to not work. ... And how did most people respond? They went along.

People’s lives absolutely fell apart. Arts, culture, mainline religion, and so much more fell apart. Major media lined up to push official messaging. So did Big Tech. The upheaval utterly changed the functioning of life itself. It was a fiasco for the ages, and guess what? Weak men did indeed create hard times, and those have hit everyone very hard today. 

All of this is backdrop to the real crisis of right now, and you know the substance of it: It is a political crisis now illustrated by an attempt on Donald Trump’s life. He was spared by the grace of God: a sudden turn of his head toward the screen caused the bullet to slice off the top of his ear but miss his head. ... But the story does not stop there. Having been shot at and bleeding from his head, he rose to his feet and rallied the gathered crowd while promising to fight on and urging others to do the same. As security forces got him away from the violence, he fist-pumped the air one more time and then left.

(I took the photo from the article; the attribution is AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

In our times, we’ve rarely if ever seen anything like that. Those who said he was a mere actor, influencer, opportunistic politician, or businessman on the make saw a different man when faced with mortality itself. He exercised resilience, fortitude, and moral courage, all those ancient virtues that are so ill-practiced in our times but which ultimately drive history. Most people I know, even those who completely oppose his politics, are still in awe of that scene. It rocked the world and made history.

We ... are so accustomed to a culture of inauthenticity ... that it is startling to witness an authentic display of genuine fearlessness in the face of death. If I may say so: We needed this. Desperately. We all needed to remember and know that it matters.

All politics aside, our times have deprecated and driven out the old virtues and toughness along with it. I’m convinced that an authentic display of exactly that is precisely what the world craves right now. We need it more than ever in our lives. Otherwise, we will continue to go the way that Schumpeter predicted, straight to the doom he foresaw for Western culture.

From what I have observed over the last 70+ years, I can affirm that these points are accurate and important. However, I want to add this: Good times do, indeed, breed weak people; for one thing, they allow us to survive and procreate. But they also provide the stability and means through which art, culture, and creativity can flourish.

I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine. — John Adams

It is also true that there is no inevitability about the idea that individuals are determined by their times. Bad times bring forth heroes, flawed and broken as they may be, in greater number—but they also provide unusual opportunities for villains. And there's no reason why the good, the strong, and the virtuous can't flourish during times of ease and plenty, albeit that it takes firm intention, deliberate practice, and self-discipline. I look at our family, friends, and neighbors, and see much to give me hope.