They say history repeats itself -- I'm a big believer in this theory, which is why I try
to spend more time on this show talking about big ideas and political philosophies rather
than day to day political rumblings.
Most of our political debates and media coverage has devolved into catchy sound bites and zingers,
usually staged around some sort of publicity stunt instead of true substantive debate.
Even protesting these days seems to be more about screaming and hashtagging than making
a coherent argument.
Just think back to the election itself -- did the candidates and media spend more time on
the issues, or on the circus?
I think the answer is pretty obvious.
Understanding political philosophies helps to guide us through the endless noise that
comes out of our political machine.
This is why I've tried to talk about issues like gay marriage in a context which shows
you can be liberal and for gay marriage because you want gay people to be treated equally
under the law, or you can be libertarian and for gay marriage because you don't want the
government involved in a contract between two consenting adults.
If you understand the philosophic underpinnings of liberalism and libertarianism in this case,
it can bring you to the same conclusion.
Without understanding political philosophy, your thoughts on any day to day issue will
be guided more by your feelings than by facts.
We see plenty of facts over feelings in our public discourse these days, and it's partly
why we are so divided as a nation.
By the way, that isn't to say feelings don't matter at all, because we're humans and they
do, but the way we are governed has to be based on what is empirically true, not just
what makes us feel good.
Beyond just knowing political philosophies, knowing history is an incredibly important
part of having a well rounded understanding of how the world works.
Think of how many people you talk to who claim to know everything about what tax system is
right or what foreign policy is best.
Next time ask them something specific, like "tell me the reasons a flat tax is wrong"
or "remind me the history of the middle east during the ottoman empire."
Everyone on television seems to have the need to pretend they know everything about everything.
These are the people you have to watch out for the most.
If history does repeat itself, I'm not exactly sure what it's repeating right now, and no,
I don't think we're repeating Nazi Germany even thought it's a very trendy phrase to
say that these days.
We truly are at a unique crossroads in American politics, which I can't directly compare to
any other time.
It's not just America having two diametrically opposed political parties between the Left
and the Right.
With Donald Trump in the White House, we now have a presidential wild card who has turned
political alignments on their head.
For example, Democrats are now suddenly arguing for states rights because they don't like
all the federal power Trump has with his series of executive orders.
This political chaos is also pushing massive amounts of people sick of the extremes on
both sides into some sort of amorphous middle.
There doesn't seem to be a political leader for this New Center, nor anyone mainstream
talking about it, but mark my words it's here.
The key to this New Center's success will be who sees it first and turns it into a political
movement.
Whether that means a new party, or a reforming of one of the two major parties, or something
else altogether, that remains to be seen.
On top of this new political alignment, we also have access to information like never
before.
As I often talk about, we walk around with the world in our pockets --- right now, you
can connect with someone across the globe just as easily as with someone across the
street.
The genius and power of the internet's ability to change our physical world can't be over
stated.
This connectivity has started revolutions in the middle east and shined light on the
inner workings of our government via Wikileaks.
But at the same time, so much of the information is not just noise alone, but noise intended
to deflect, confuse, and upset you, made by people who want to profit off you or outright
control you.
Of course if our mainstream media had done their job for the past 8 years, which is to
be the guardian of truth in our society, then maybe the importance of the internet wouldn't
be so vital to our functioning democracy in 2017.
Unfortunately cable and network news dropped the ball at almost every corner and here we
are.
They cozied to power instead of keeping it in check, they colluded with the people they
were supposed to keep watch over, and they partied with the very politicians they were
supposed to be reporting on.
Now, suddenly the mainstream media is trying to get its mojo back by being hard on Trump,
but I would argue it's basically too late to do that.
Actually it's kinda sad watching them flail around knowing that less and less people are
paying attention to them.
Even right now there's talk they they are going to cancel the White House correspondents
dinner because so many in the media dislike trump.
Think how insane that is... when they like the President they can party and drink with
him...
now they don't, so the jig is up.
Maybe we needed them to guard the guy they liked as much as the guy they don't like.
At the same time we more and more cater the News to ourselves, we don't listen to pundits
we like, we impugn the motives of anyone we disagree with and we block friends and family
who dare have a different opinion.
All of this is exactly why we need to know history and philosophy more now than ever.
We need to understand where we came from so we can know where we're going.
We need to know why the founding fathers wrote the constitution the way they did.
We need to understand why they yearned for freedom and liberty in a way that seems archaic
to us now, but is possibly the most important lesson we could learn in 2017.
With all this in mind, I can't think of a better guest for this week as we continue
our partnership with the fine folks over at Learn Liberty.
Dan Carlin is a radio and TV personality who hosts two podcasts, 'Common Sense' and 'Hardcore
History.'
As a self described political martian, Dan uses thought experiments to try to make some
sense of the modern world.
On his podcast Hardcore History he hosts long, well thought out presentations of historical
events set to the backdrop of how we might view these events thought a current day lens.
While he isn't technically a historian, he's proven himself to be incredibly adept at storytelling
history in a way that offers some modern day answers to historical events.
If history repeats itself then lets make the next repeat a little more enlightened... and
a little less painful... than the last go around.