I had the enormous pleasure of attending the Loreena McKennitt concert at Ryman Auditorium a few weeks ago. The Ryman, the "Mother Church of Country Music," is an incredibly intimate and rich venue for music - especially the sublime voice and thoughtful lyrics of Ms. McKennitt. One of my favorite tunes is called "Skellig," and it tells the story of a dying monk passing on his books to a young novice. This particular monk had done his time on the Skellig Rocks, thought by many to be one of the last outposts of Western Civilization where monks copied the great works of the ages and returned to mainland Europe as teachers in the 14th Century. More recent history seems to indicate that it may have been more of a monastic retreat.
My wife and I visited Skellig Michael, the largest of the rocks some years ago. We actually climbed up those steps you see at the left after a harrowing journey on a fishing boat across the Irish Channel. High atop the peak we came upon the village of the monks where they fashioned beehive huts and lived their day to days. Skellig is a place like Delphi, Greece that makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. Maybe it was my ancient pagan/Druid roots stirring or my semi-modern Catholic mysticism awakening, but it is an amazing place. Sitting in the sun outside the beehive huts, I could feel the stones and grasp the greater sense of place...the incredible loneliness they must have felt looking across to the mainland in the distance.
I have been thinking a lot about Skellig lately. Skellig in the mythical sense, this place where monks copied manuscripts by candlelight and I wonder if we are not heading to the Dark Ages again and where the next Skellig will be. Until a year or so ago, I was confident it was right here. The good ol U.S. of A was the City on the Hill with the ability to preserve good against the onslaught of the horde. Europe is pretty well done (see my last post), Africa and the Middle East are in the basket; China is toxic to live in...Japan, done. Maybe Australia? Maybe. They are having a nice dust-up with their immigrant Muslim population over requiring a citizenship test.
There are two primary reasons for my depression. The first is the American treatment of the war in Iraq and the second is immigration. Note, in the first I said the "American treatment," not the war itself. How's this for a pep talk at a football game: "Boys, I know it's already late in the first quarter and we're ahead 48-0, but we've already lost...sadly, the Coach doesn't know it yet." Well, if Senator Harry Reid were the assistant coach for a footblall team, that's the kind of speech he would give. (Here's another analogy: John Paul Jones Reid approaching HMS Serapis: "We've already been sunk!") Reid's lunacy was just another brick in the wall of insanity being put up by the Fondacrats who are so intent on ruining George W. Bush, that they will sacrifice victory in a foreign engagement to do it. It makes you wonder who hates us more, the Islamo-Nazis or the Democratic Party. What's worse is that he actually gets away with it. Compound this level of Benedict Arnoldness with the military genius of insisting on alerting our enemies of our departure date and I am left standing exasperatedly screaming: "What the f--k?!, What the f--king f--k!!!" (Borrowed that from uber-comedian P.J. O'Rourke; it's what every citizen should yell when they read the actual dollar amount of the U.S. Deficit.)
Then along comes last week with the lovingly crafted "Bi-partisan" bill to "reform" U.S. immigration. (If you haven't already, please view the film I posted earlier here...'nuff said.) I have a better idea in three parts:
1. Secure the border to stop the bleeding.
2. STOP the granting of automatic citizenship if born in the US.
3. Enforce the laws on the books already.
I also addressed this issue earlier in a humble post last year.
Our all out effort to avoid offending anyone has led us to this abyss: by offending no one, we offend everyone and the very concept of what America is will be dissolved. A pox on both sides of the aisle if this travesty makes it through and a pox on this President if he signs, as he seems desperate to, this bill into law.
Folks, the tide is rising and it is not due to global warming. There is a rising tide of desperation in the voices of everyday Americans that feel helpless before an imperial government that seems intent on passing legislation that they don't want. There is a rising tide of thought among worldly elites that the United States is finished and outside of the blogosphere and talk radio, there's not much push back. This national depression can become manic and then terminal. And then we had all better be out looking for our own Skellig Rocks to live on.
Here are two simple facts that underly each of these issues and that everyone seems to ignore:
1. The Muslim world is becoming increasingly radicalized and dangerous. They represent 1.84 billion people in 2007 and it is estimated that 10% are radicalized. Let's see, I'm going to have to take my socks off to count this one...that's 184,000,000 people that want to strap on explosive vests chock full of nails and walk into the nearest Macy's and pull the rip cord. This is what we are fighting and pulling back ain't going to keep them from quenching that desire. Further, there are 6.13 million Muslims (that we know of) living inside the United States. In a recent poll, 8% said that "Suicide bombing is justified," and 9% refused to answer the question. Let's see, 8% X 6.13MM, yup that's 490,400 folks ready to strap on the vest and...
2. We cannot absorb all of the world's indigent population, nor were we founded to become a safety valve for Mexico's population explosion. Thomas Sowell has an excellent column today that debunks the immigration myth - you really need to read it. I would only be restating what he says in a far less elegant way. Mexico has a lot of internal problems and far stricter immigration laws...with uncontrolled immigration, we have become an enabler on the world stage. It needs to stop. Criminal behaviour, i.e. entering the country illegally must be punished or the very fabric of the societal contract will be shredded. Anarchy is the outcome.
These are the two central problems of our age. We can solve them and enter another period of the Pax Americana or we can ignore them, come home, open our borders and a few of us can swim to the Skelligs. For now, I'm going to put the gun back in the drawer and get back to work. I believe that this medium is a large part of our future. I urge you to check out some of Bill Whittle's recent Eject!Eject!Eject! posts. He's busy forming an internet community called "Ejectia." There are a lot of like-minded folks over there working on building a life raft for the "remnant." Of this I am certain...if we don't make our voices heard, a darkness will decend on the land for a long time. The darkness probably won't come in my lifetime, although I see the shadows; but I doubt it is more than a generation away.
Let's Roll!