{"id":55775,"date":"2021-07-06T06:00:28","date_gmt":"2021-07-06T10:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?p=55775"},"modified":"2021-07-03T16:20:24","modified_gmt":"2021-07-03T20:20:24","slug":"when-the-people-get-in-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/","title":{"rendered":"When the People Get in the Way"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In an article on a broader topic (which we\u2019ll get to later), Christopher Bedford cites what some experts in our ruling class are proposing to solve America\u2019s problems.<\/p>\n

In The New York Times<\/em> last week, Ezra Klein hosted a round table with several thinkers about what is to be done. Sci-fi novelist Kim Stanley Robinson said the oil industry will have to be abolished totally and completely. Scientist Saul Griffith said that our notions of property and ownership will have to die to save the planet. Democracy itself\u00a0might have to go<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In\u00a0a 2019 essay<\/a>\u00a0for Foreign Policy, Cambridge University professor David Runciman said, \u201cDemocracy is the planet\u2019s biggest enemy,\u201d and suggested that an authoritarian Chinese one-party system might be the only one capable of tackling climate change. The New York Times<\/em>\u2019 Tom Friedman has pondered much the same: A one-party system with people like Friedman and Runciman in charge.<\/p>\n

\n

We\u2019re told that maybe even the very idea of what it is to be human has to change for the climate. A\u00a0video from 2016<\/a>\u00a0that went viral last week shows bioethicist S. Matthew Liao speculating that maybe we can get humans to stop eating meat if we forcibly engineer all of them to have a meat allergy.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not saying that these suggestions have any chance of being implemented, and any number of outrageous proposals can get sympathetic media coverage.\u00a0 But these ideas are still very revealing of a particular way of thinking that, I believe, is increasingly in prominence.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s dig deeper into the reference to Tom Friedman, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning pundit for The New York Times\u00a0<\/em>and syndicated columnist.\u00a0\u00a0Back in 2009, he wrote<\/a>,<\/p>\n

One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks. But when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Then in 2010, he fantasized on Meet the Press<\/em> about what could be accomplished \u201cif we could just be China for a day<\/a>\u201c:<\/p>\n

I have fantasized\u2013don\u2019t get me wrong\u2013but that what if we could just be China for a day?\u00a0 I mean, just, just, just one day.\u00a0 You know, I mean, where we could actually, you know, authorize the right solutions, and I do think there is a sense of that, on, on everything from the economy to environment.\u00a0 I don\u2019t want to be China for a second, OK, I want my democracy to work with the same authority, focus and stick-to-itiveness.\u00a0 But right now we have a system that can only produce suboptimal solutions.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That was a long time ago, but Friedman still praises China<\/a> for its capacity to get things done, whereas the United States can\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Notice the theme in all of these statements:\u00a0 We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People\u2013the ignorant masses empowered by democracy\u2013get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy in favor of an aristocracy of highly-educated progressives and the technocrats they would employ is the only way to solve our problems.<\/p>\n

This is enormously significant, representing a new kind of radicalism.\u00a0 The anti-democratic revolutionary movements of the past billed themselves as popular mass movements in which \u201cthe People\u201d\u2013specifically, the lower classes\u2013would rise up from below to overthrow their masters. This was true of\u00a0 both Marxism and Fascism.\u00a0 But now the proposed revolution is from the top down, in which a cadre of the upper class (defined not by birth or even wealth but by education and professional standing), would overthrow everyone else to form a new kind of oligarchy.<\/p>\n

In fact, today, in China, you can\u2019t even be a Communist unless you have a college degree and are an elite professional.\u00a0 So says an article<\/a> from the South China Morning Post<\/em> on the strict requirements being implemented for membership in the Communist Party.<\/p>\n

It would seem, then, that the drift of American progressivism away from the working class to college-educated professionals, not just in academia but in our major corporations, is not just an odd but temporary aberration (along with the shift of the working class to conservatism), but an actual political and ideological development that bears watching.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Image<\/a> via pxfuel, free for commercial use, DMCA\u00a0<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People–the ignorant masses empowered by democracy–get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That’s what we’re hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":55817,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,19,35,36],"tags":[8724,655,10913,1813,1838,10916],"class_list":["post-55775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-america","category-government","category-philosophy-2","category-politics","tag-critics-of-liberal-democracy","tag-democracy","tag-oligarchy","tag-progressivism","tag-radical-ideologies","tag-technocracy"],"yoast_head":"\nWhen the People Get in the Way<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People--the ignorant masses empowered by democracy--get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That's what we're hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"When the People Get in the Way\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People--the ignorant masses empowered by democracy--get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That's what we're hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Cranach\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cranachblog\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-07-06T10:00:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-07-03T20:20:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/305\/2021\/07\/pxfuel.com_.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"515\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Gene Veith\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Gene Veith\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/\",\"name\":\"When the People Get in the Way\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2021-07-06T10:00:28+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-07-03T20:20:24+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/f9ca8670bcc51908a78994c0484dbfa1\"},\"description\":\"We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People--the ignorant masses empowered by democracy--get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That's what we're hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"When the People Get in the Way\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/\",\"name\":\"Cranach\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/f9ca8670bcc51908a78994c0484dbfa1\",\"name\":\"Gene Veith\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/054d79faea5d476edd8f99e5f14fb17f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/054d79faea5d476edd8f99e5f14fb17f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Gene Veith\"},\"description\":\"Gene Edward Veith, Jr. is a writer and retired literature professor, serving as Provost Emeritus at Patrick Henry College. He has authored over 25 books on Christianity and culture, literature, classical education, and theology. Dr. Veith previously held academic and editorial roles at Concordia University Wisconsin and WORLD Magazine. A respected voice in Lutheran and classical education circles, he holds a Ph.D. in English and several honorary doctorates. He and his wife, Jackquelyn, live in St. Louis and have three children and twelve grandchildren.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cranachblog\/\",\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gene_Edward_Veith\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/author\/geneveith\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"When the People Get in the Way","description":"We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People--the ignorant masses empowered by democracy--get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That's what we're hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"When the People Get in the Way","og_description":"We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People--the ignorant masses empowered by democracy--get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That's what we're hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/","og_site_name":"Cranach","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cranachblog\/","article_published_time":"2021-07-06T10:00:28+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-07-03T20:20:24+00:00","og_image":[{"width":768,"height":515,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/305\/2021\/07\/pxfuel.com_.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Gene Veith","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Gene Veith","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/","name":"When the People Get in the Way","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#website"},"datePublished":"2021-07-06T10:00:28+00:00","dateModified":"2021-07-03T20:20:24+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/f9ca8670bcc51908a78994c0484dbfa1"},"description":"We experts know what to do.\u00a0 But the People--the ignorant masses empowered by democracy--get in the way of our solutions. Eliminating democracy is the only way to solve our problems. That's what we're hearing from a wide range of sources, heralding a new kind of radical ideology.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2021\/07\/when-the-people-get-in-the-way\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"When the People Get in the Way"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/","name":"Cranach","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/f9ca8670bcc51908a78994c0484dbfa1","name":"Gene Veith","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/054d79faea5d476edd8f99e5f14fb17f?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/054d79faea5d476edd8f99e5f14fb17f?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Gene Veith"},"description":"Gene Edward Veith, Jr. is a writer and retired literature professor, serving as Provost Emeritus at Patrick Henry College. He has authored over 25 books on Christianity and culture, literature, classical education, and theology. Dr. Veith previously held academic and editorial roles at Concordia University Wisconsin and WORLD Magazine. A respected voice in Lutheran and classical education circles, he holds a Ph.D. in English and several honorary doctorates. He and his wife, Jackquelyn, live in St. Louis and have three children and twelve grandchildren.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cranachblog\/","https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gene_Edward_Veith"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/author\/geneveith\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1281"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}