Discussion about this post

User's avatar
kertch's avatar

I am watching the news today, Decemder 5th, and I hear Senator Dick Durban proposing that illegal aliens should be allowed to gain instant citizenship by joining the military. Here come your "foreign occupiers". Bringing in foreign mercenaries to quell the native population is a time-honored strategy of empires. In America, the British brought in Hessians from Germany.

Expand full comment
Frank Lee's avatar

Obviously, the average subscriber to The Upheaval is educated, informed and politically centered to center-right (by today's relative measure).

N.S. Lyons is a gem.

I subscribe to several Substack newsletters. About half of them are center-right leaning in their content. The other half are left of center. There are no real center-left sources. That pollical animal seems to have gone extinct to be replaced with people adopting most, if not all, of what the rest of us clearly identify as radicalism of the most absurd flavor.

I am generally alone commenting on these left-leaning sites. When they go to personal attack claiming I am a brainwashed, Fox News consuming cult of Trump MAGA-head, I point out that I am commenting on their left tribe site and I don't watch any cable news.

But I am very lonely commenting on these sites.

Also, the WSJ which used to have a great center to right leaning comment section, is overrun with lefty trolls. This happened with the WSJ allowed online commenting for their free academic subscriptions.

I know it can hit a budget, but it would be great if more clear-thinking center and right-leaning political brains would subscribe and comment on sites that are cesspools of left groupthink. The reason is that within the existing readership are people that keep getting their screwed up views and ideas validated by kooks that share the same.

In the political rhetorical game, my job is to inject logos into their almost pure pathos... while also challenging their assumed ethos. Those most committed to their ideology are not my target to persuade. They are only opportunities to leverage to show those owning some remaining shreds of open-minds and critical thinking to turn away from the radical absurdism.

My last plea for more help on these left comment sections is to point out the value in reading what other political tribes you disagree with are currently discussing, and helping develop skills for debating them. They are armed to the teeth with rhetorical devices, but just about everything they advocate is a mess of mistakes and wrongness, and thus generally easy to shoot holes into.

I read The Upheaval because it expands on my understanding and vocabulary for what I know to be the truth. However, the topics are often on critical social and political "upheavals" that are bad and dangerous... and I think more of us should be dedicated comment section warriors to fight what is bad and dangerous.

The Upheaval better arms me for that task!

Expand full comment
120 more comments...

No posts