The Payroll of the Bilderbergers
Culture and Politics - Politics
Written by Douglas Wilson
Wednesday, 17 April 2013
The Boston bombing brings the whole question of terrorism front and
center again, and so it is worthwhile to discuss what the point of
terrorism is, considered as a tactic. In the case of the Boston
horror, we do not yet know which direction the tactic was pushing, but
we should make a point of knowing how such pushes are designed to work.
Terrorism aims at eliciting particular political responses from the
targeted society. Those responses would include weariness,
fragmentation, self-accusation, coddling of the perpetrating group, and
immediate politicization. It does not aim at creating a united
and angry response toward the perpetrators of the terrorism. If it were
to do that, it would be a failure as a tactic. This means that the
targeted society must be soft, not hard. Terrorism works only on
cultures that are adrift.
Just as angry dogs can smell fear, so the terrorist mind can smell
the presence of a society upon which such a tactic will work. When I was
a young man, there was no problem bringing your Bowie knife onto the
plane in your carry on. I remember when high-jackings were the new and
latest thing -- and before that, they weren't. The thing that protected
our planes before airport security was obviously not airport security --
it was a cultural security.
When a culture has not yet had a failure of nerve, the terrorists (who are always present somewhere) have to get up their
nerve to attempt the next outrageous thing. The Boston bombing signals a
move into our next chapter with this stuff. What is it that protects us
from terrorist attacks? It is not the TSA. It is not security.
What is it that protects small town Friday night football games in
Alabama? It isn't security. How hard would it be to get a bomb into that
stadium? How hard would it be to get an explosive device into the mall
nearest you? In a free society, it would be, and will continue to be,
the easiest thing in the world. The only reason it hasn't happened yet
(although it is now starting to happen) is that the perpetrators don't
want to push too far or too hard -- if they get unified blowback, they
overplayed their hand. So this new era will likely be ushered in by
dribs and drabs.
But the early returns from the Boston bombing do represent just the
sort of thing that will encourage more of this. Politicians using the
bombing to justify gun control. Journalists hoping out loud that the
culprit, when found, will be a white tea partier named Earl, and not a
jihadist named Ahmed. Immediate political disunity. Conspiracy
speculations forming before the debris has finished falling out of the
sky. Alex Jones continuing on the payroll of the Bilderbergers.
Terrorist acts are theater -- they are violent, but they are still
theater. They are calculated to elicit a particular set of responses
from the audience. Our security operations like the TSA are
counter-theater -- security theater. With a great show of thoroughness,
they prevent you from taking more than 3 ounces of contact lens solution
onto the plane. If that makes anybody feel better about our safety,
then that person is a big part of the problem.
A dissolute free society can be worked, and is, even now, being
worked. A terrorist act achieves just the sort of outcome that they
want. Anybody who wants to answer this horror with a federal department
of "marathon security" is a big part of our problem. Ten years from now,
when you are going through a metal detector in order to get to your
kid's parks and rec soccer game, don't look at me and tell me it is a
small price to pay to protect our liberty. What liberty?
A virtuous free society doesn't need security everywhere -- because terrorist acts, while physically possible everywhere,
could not achieve results that the terrorists would ever want. But . . .
here it is . . . you knew it was coming . . . no virtue without the
blood of Jesus.
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