Wednesday, July 05, 2017

The Increase in Entropy in the USA

I have been reading, with some interest, opinion and conjecture that the country is headed towards a schism, a new “Civil War”.

Victor Davis Hanson <here> points to the continued open nullification of federal immigration law by “sanctuary cities” similar to what the South did with respect to civil rights for blacks in the Jim Crow era.  Dennis Prager <here>, Rev. Dr. Susan K. Smith <here>, David Horowitz <here>, all openly speculate.

And now, I read this:

REPORT: Flyers distributed in San Diego calling for the genocide of the “white” race:

     http://www.10news.com/news/mysterious-filers-threaten-genocide-of-the-white-race

The Virginian, Robert E. Lee, detested the vitriol and bombast of the South Carolinas leading up to the Civil War, people he called “fire breathers”.  He did not want a Civil War.  Had Virginia not seceded from the Union, he would have fought for the Union, and today arguably would have been a widely revered general instead of now having communities, goaded by Black Lives Matter, remove all vestiges of the Confederate role in the Civil War from the public, with statues of Robert E. Lee being defaced and removed altogether.

For a people so comparatively well off (compared to the balance of the world’s population) it seems incongruous that we would have such a low threshold to violence.  People with nothing more to loose find it very easy to revolt.  People of means usually consider the loss of their family, wealth, power, and status before moving to take power away from the government or rage against "the other".

Yet, there is a long history of civil disobedience and riots in the time line of the nation.

Looking at the Wiki of US Riots over time, you get the accurate sense that the 1960’s (53) and 1970’s (30) were a sad time.  I remember.

You also get the sense that this decade (2010’s, 32 major riots recorded so far) is on track to at least match both prior decades.  The list for 2010’s conveniently omits the 2011 flash mob riot in West Alles at the 2011 Wisconsin State Fair, the 2011 flash mob riot in Des Moines at the Iowa State Fair, and the several flash mob riots in Chicago (3,000 “youths” at the Ford City Mall, 400 “youths” at Navy Pier, 400 “youths” along the Magnificent Mile, and in 2010 the North Avenue Beach closure which outwardly appears to have been suppressed in the press - by the City leadership?).  When you reclassify “wilding youths”, not only in Chicago, but Philadelphia, Louisville, and across the large cities as “riots” then you get a feeling that record is in fact larger.

This review does not include the violence against police in Dallas in 2016, but you get a similar flashback to the Texas Tower shooting in Austin Texas in 1966.

I doubt we're headed for a Civil War, but depending on how we deal with what is to come in the waning years of this decade, we could be in for a bumpy ride.