Friday, March 25, 2016

Real-Life Events stranger than Fiction

Let's try to write a fictional story and see what we can learn from it.

There is this guy they nicknamed Baron because he is a wealthy and ruthless businessman. Though he was never elected to any office, he commands everything in the town he runs with an iron fist. He does that by controlling the lives of just about everyone that's important and has influence on the town-folks.

He is getting on with age, however, and knows a few things that his immediate family and the extended part of it, have no clue what they mean. It is that the children, the grandchildren and the in-laws were born with a silver spoon in the mouth, and cannot conceive that things are beginning to change in their town. But he sees the coming change and knows that things cannot continue to unfold as they have been for much longer.

Whereas the signs point to an impending change he knows is inevitable, the signs become fodder for the rest of the family whose members embark on endless debates and ideological fights that tear the family apart. Added to this is a family lawyer who is more of a weasel than an officer of the court … always delighting at throwing gasoline on every brush fire he gleefully turns into an inferno.

The truth about the town is that lesser families have sacrificed like saintly heroes to raise children and give them the kind of education that allowed them to compete against the business empire of the Baron, survive its frequent assaults on them, and beat it in certain areas. And these rising children are getting stronger by the day.

The Baron's family views them as a nuisance that can be dealt with if only the Baron would show a firmer resolve than he has so far. Knowing that this sort of suggestions will get him nowhere, he delegates power to the loudest among his children, and tells them to go deal with the situation themselves.

Well, my friend, it is time to tell you that this fictional story is a metaphor. The Baron is America, his family is the opinion makers, the rising town-folks are the rest of the world, and the weaseling lawyer is the stereotypical Jew. Now imagine an America that is exhausted but trying to remain strong enough and influential enough in a world that is rising with unparalleled vigor. The opinion makers continue to believe that America has the power to tell everyone what to do … with the Jews standing behind them, nudging them to be more aggressive at demanding that the old man show more resolve.

First, imagine one delegation of American opinion makers deputized to go to China intending to warn the Chinese that if they don't rein in their client state, North Korea, they will suffer the consequences. What do you think the Chinese will say after hearing what the Americans had to say? Try this: You who arm Israel, an outlaw entity that launched more than a dozen wars in the region and now occupies a neighbor – are here telling us to rein in North Korea that is neither occupying someone's land nor fighting against a neighbor? Which planet do you come from?

Second, imagine another delegation of American opinion makers deputized to go talk to the Arabs intending to nudge them to participate in the war against ISIS. What do you think the Arabs will say after hearing what the Americans had to say? Try this: You, the West, who have labored for a century to cobble together groups you knew will fight each other, and then lit the match that started the fights – are here telling us to enlarge those fights and turn them into massive inter-Arab and inter-Muslim civil wars? Which planet do you come from?

Third, imagine yet another delegation of American opinion makers deputized to go tell the Russians to stop encircling the nations of Eastern Europe in an attempt to bring them into a sphere of influence that will be dominated by the Russian Federation. What do you think the Russians will say after hearing what the Americans had to say? Try this: You who promised not to interfere with the nations we let loose from the old Soviet Union, and broke your promise – are here telling us not to try extending our sphere of influence? Which planet do you come from?

No great power that I can think of, except for one, has aged gracefully, and so they ended up humiliated. The exception is the Soviet Union that recognized the limits of its power and shrunk itself to a size it was able to manage without fighting against someone. It has a good chance of rising again. Will America learn to age gracefully and pull back the tentacles it extended around the globe?