The following emerged from one of our recent grueling, Scarriet editor, think-tank sessions.
Senior Scarriet editor (coughing and sputtering):
Seems like whenever bad zhit happens when a repub is prez, he gets blamed for it– but dems get a pass– mlk assassinated when lbj was prez, but has anyone in the media ever blamed lbj for it? not that i’ve seen…. but kent state was nixon’s fault, right? his rhetoric caused it or some such zhit….
Youngest Scarriet editor, Brown University, just hired:
It’s because the Deep State, CIA own the media, the Ivy Leaguers were radicalized by the Vietnam war, sex, civil rights, the left were the hedonistic brains. I think Johnson had announced he wouldn’t run before MLK was killed. And he had already pushed his Great Society.
Scarriet editor, ex-Hoover Institute (shouting):
the only way a conservative can win is if there’s a war, economic collapse– that’s the only time a true conservative is tolerated, but that toleration is only for that moment– once the blob determines the crisis has passed, it’s back to libs…. i understand why people like libs, they want a centrist ideal in the middle of the pendulum swing, but it seems there is no centrism possible anymore…
Scarriet editor, poet, with a sudden grin:
How long can hedonism be centrist?
The miracle of the USA is that for generations hedonism has been ‘centrist.’ Economic collapse just means we print money to rescue ourselves. And printing money is essentially hedonistic and irresponsible. Mythically, the Left is associated with saving ourselves from economic collapse (FDR) and the Right with bringing on economic collapse (Hoover). Even economic collapse can be absorbed by America’s liberal, hedonistic ‘centrism.’ Why is rap so successful? Rap is not music; it’s a celebration of black hedonism, the ultimate liberal insult to conservatives. And yet hedonism has a wise element. Without pleasure, things become gray and even stupid. Pleasure is by far the greatest motivator. The Dems are sex addicts. Pleasure, pleasure, pleasure.
The proper conservative is a sexless Nixon. (Billionaire Trump with his sexy wife destroys that template and confuses people.) The joyless conservative finds pleasure in restraint and work and since there is one Jim Morrison for every 1000 dutiful, clean, nose-to-the-grindstone peasants, Hollywood gods and goddesses are actually few—hedonism is not nearly as widespread as we think (true hedonism takes a lot of money,) so ‘hedonistic centrism’ is built on a lie, a good lie, because the busy bees keep things afloat while hedonism essentially exists where it ought to exist—as a harmless masturbatory fantasy, stimulant, motivator.
Accidentally, America is the perfect blend of hedonistic centrism—we’ve struck on a formula by pure chance (isolating geography; immigration—so Americans themselves are not over-burdened with children and child care; founding documents based on democratic, inter-rivalry insult and “happiness;” founders like Washington (war-stoicism loyalty) and Franklin (diplomacy, science and savvy); and it really shows no signs of letting up.
Stock market keeps booming, wealth attaches itself to charismatic personalities and influencers, innovation and science march on.
The ‘hate Trump’ reaction makes sense—society can’t let conservatives become hedonistic, as well. This ruins the formula and balance of hedonistic centrism.
Centrism dictates everything: free speech, but not too much; right to life, but not too much, liberty, but not too much, foreign adventures and meddling, but not too much, religion, but not too much, hard work, but not too much, leisure, but not too much, democracy, but not too much.
It’s not easy for an empire to keep a sense of humor and proportion, but with all its warring, contradictory elements, America has managed to do just that, and will keep on this track for as long as any of us can see.
Let the “smarter” elements of the middle class peasantry grumble.
The unspoken truth is: work and discipline are fit for most and create core happiness, even as the “smarter” disciplined drones look with contempt upon hedonistic centrism and continually prophesize its doom. Brilliant, relentless intellectual protest, too, is part of the necessary “balance” which is the trademark of lasting—and perhaps immortal—hedonistic centrism.
[Applause. Half go downstairs to the bar. The rest emerge into the sunlight and talk in very small groups.]
—One of the Scarriet editors