In a recent broadcast, Rush Limbaugh presented a very interesting theory about America’s culture war.
He began with a summary of a provocative article by Mytheos Holt posted in the Ron Paul Forums (April 20, 2016), entitled “Trump Is the Culture Warrior We Need”. Mr. Holt asserts that the culture war between the traditionalists and the Left which began in earnest in the 1990’s is over. The Left won some time ago, although the traditionalists don’t know it. They are fighting a rear guard action as though they could still win. But it is too late. The shift in public opinion on the many issues of contention in the 1990’s, including sex, drugs, war, institutions, and the role of government occurred with astonishing rapidity, over just the past ten or twelve years, and the Left has lost no time in solidifying its control through legislation, court verdicts and popular entertainment.
Donald Trump, says Mr. Holt, is the only voice which can be heard against the cacophony of the triumphant Left because he attacks from inside the “new” culture. He has mastered the media with his combination of celebrity, glitzy lifestyle, outlandish language, and iconoclastic positions on so many topics. He freely uses all the terms which have been banned by “political correctness”, and unabashedly supports positions unthinkable by the Left. And the reaction is massive acceptance. In Mr. Holt’s opinion, all the characteristics which would have condemned him to ridicule in the past have in fact made him invulnerable to attacks from the Left as he forges a new path to the resurgence of the America which has been drifting away.
Mr. Limbaugh proceeded then to explain his own views on the change in culture. He believes that there is no longer any consensus on the Judeo-Christian principles of morality upon which America was founded. This breakdown has left the nation with no rational basis by which to discern right from wrong. Instead, there has arisen an ethic based upon “us versus them”, meaning that the new view of society has divided the population into various groups, each of which views its own success in terms of defeating one or more different groups.
We are thus not “Americans”, or “Christians”, but black (versus white), poor (versus rich), young (versus old), Hispanic (versus Anglos), minority (versus majority), immigrants (versus Americans), etc. The new morality dictates that each individual accept whatever moral stance the group advocates to the exclusion of all other positions. Morality is thus a product of group loyalty rather than any rational process or logic which transcends the group and allows dialog with other groups. If this trend is allowed to continue, Mr. Limbaugh concludes, civilization as we have known it is doomed.
The analyses of both these gentlemen are intelligent, provocative and alarming. Their differing insights as to the nature and timing of the new cultural phenomena are especially telling. My own understanding of the culture war provides yet a third interpretation. It begins with the traditional terms for the division of society into multiple sub-groups, as “subcultures” or “tribes”.
Americans have always shared with other societies a certain tribalization based usually on ethnicity, sectarianism, geography, occupation, or national origin. What held all these tribes together was a realization that tribal loyalties might have to bow to the common good – willingly or unwillingly. This understanding is summed up in the statement that “America is a nation of laws.”
This consensus has always been fragile, and never truly universal, as in the case of slavery, the various outbreaks of violence and protest, such as Hoovervilles, race riots, union wars, and other incidents in American history which required the use of military force to restore peace.
What is unique about today’s situation is that the definition of the common good is no longer a consensus. While polls tell us that the majority of Americans do not accept the understanding of the common good as proclaimed by the courts, the power to enforce these minority concepts of freedom lies in the hands of the Leftist minority, because they control the government and therefore the laws. The Left has actually turned the tables on the traditional law-abiding American by creating laws which enforce their views on a number of controversial issues. By advocating “a nation of laws”, conservatives have marginalized themselves as “lawbreakers”.
This situation has been significantly affected by two factors. First is the arrival of mass media. Any message can be promulgated instantly and universally today. Pop culture has focused increasingly on past injustices and hypocrisies which have always coexisted with the calls for law and order, but have generally remained unknown until recently. These messages have undermined the prestige of our institutions to a disastrous extent.
Two cases in point. As it has become increasingly known that many of the Founding Fathers of the United States of America were not only idealists but simultaneously slaveholders, their legacy in the Declaration of Independence (by slaveholder Thomas Jefferson), the Bill of Rights (by slaveholder James Madison), and the Constitution itself (championed by slaveholder George Washington) has been diminished to the point of oblivion for many contemporary Americans, particularly black and Native American populations. The standard call of conservatives for interpreting the Constitution as “the Founders intended” becomes moot in the minds of these groups. When the Constitution is sidelined, the entire legal structure of the United States is called into question.
A second case is the revelation that hundreds of Catholic priests in America and elsewhere were in fact pedophiles who were protected by their bishops for generations. The fundamental horror of such a history has undermined the reverence for religious institutions traditionally accorded in American law and practice. More importantly, the credibility of the Judeo-Christian morality itself has suffered a severe blow especially in sex-related issues. The fact that other institutions have begun to report the same problems, including Protestant churches, Boy Scouts, military services, athletics, and schools have expanded the disdain for organized religion which has been a trend for the past generation in Western countries. Institutional authorities do not carry much weight when it is common knowledge that they do not follow their own rules.
A second unique factor in today’s world is the presence of the Obama administration. The strategy which was used to elect the president twice was precisely the use of demographic data to pinpoint the various subcultures which could be expected to respond favorably to the “us versus them” appeal of a black man. This “divide and conquer” strategy, of course, would never have worked if there had been no basis in reality for the approach. What the Obama campaign did was to exploit very effectively these divisions first in order to get elected, and second in order to govern.
It should not have been expected that self-proclaimed victims of over two centuries of racial injustice would show the same reverence for the Constitution and institutions that Americans had come to expect from their president. After all, this is the same system under which their predecessors were persecuted. And so it was. With the aid of a Democratic Senate and an extremely aggressive Attorney General, President Obama became a truly transformational president. He transformed the American presidency into an autocracy, the federal government into an oligarchy, and the American public into an anarchy composed of self-seeking tribes, each of whom views its success in terms of defeating its enemies.
How can Americans recover our national identity? First, we must accept the realities of the political world we live in. Mr. Holt is right about that. The reality we must face is that we too belong to a subculture. Unquestionably, there is one very large tribe in America which stands for constitutional government, a system of checks and balances, individual freedom, a free market economy, freedom of religion, and a military dedicated to protecting the United States rather than to social experimentation. This election is essentially a test of whether this tribe really represents a majority of Americans. It is a tribe which recognizes the traditional American dream as its corner stone. Its enemies are all the other tribes which do not believe in this cause.
In order to win this election, however, the “American tribe” must convert some of the other tribes to its cause. This mandate requires certain concessions. Mr. Holt is only half right when he says that the culture war has already been decided. Some issues have been decided, it is true, but the war has not been lost.
The issues which have been decided by overwhelming public opinion have to do with opposition to government trying to legislate personal morality, especially sexual morality. In order to win in November, the American tribe must accept as settled law gay rights, abortion rights, and any other “invasions of the bedroom”. An estimated 43 percent of the American electorate are now independents, including 41 percent of all college students and 35 percent of African-Americans. (www.Independentvoting.org) In general, they want government to stick to secular issues and stay away from personal matters – typically, a position associated with the Libertarians.
Another factor which must be faced is that the “American” tribe is considered by many in the Obama coalition to be the “old, white people’s” tribe. Overcoming this stereotype is also a requirement if the American tribe is to win back the control of the government in 2016. Outreach to non-white tribes and Sen. Bernard Sanders’ youthful constituency is critical. While the truly undecided voter population is probably only 7 percent (9 Million) of the total population (Reuters), in certain states they will decide the election, with its due impact on the electoral college. Luckily, we have the economy as a wedge issue. Everybody – whatever their tribal loyalties – wants a stronger economy than the Obama Democrats have been able to foster. The Republican case for expanding the economy, with a successful businessman as its standard bearer, should be highly credible to other groups.
The most important reality facing the American tribe is its sacred mission to prove that, in spite of past sins, the American ideals can really work, that the American tribe is truly open to all tribes, and that traditional American civic values are ultimately the best hope for us all to achieve a successful life, protect personal liberty, and procure equal justice for all. If we are granted this last chance, we must prove by our actions that we deserve it.
The candidacy of Mr. Trump appears to jibe with this profile more fully than that of the other candidates on the Republican side. In this assessment, I reluctantly agree with Mr. Holt. I also agree with Mr. Limbaugh that this election may well decide the final outcome of the culture war.
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