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We hear a lot about the culture wars being fought in this country. That conflict is often described as the struggle between those whose deepest commitments were to God vs. those humans who believed their own value systems evolved through what some describe as steady enlightenment.

These folks conclude for most issues the culture war is receding. For example, public opinion about gay marriage has shifted dramatically. While that is true, I think this crowd misses the boat on some other issues.

Some believe the question Who are we? was at one time about how we defined ourselves morally. Many now seem to favor a different answer that emphasizes how we define ourselves ethnically, racially and linguistically. What a change that is and for me its counter-intuitive as well. This new theory says we should emphasize our differences rather than searching for those things we have in common. For example, the civil rights movement at one time told us we should be blind to racial differences, but now we are told attempting to ignore differences is actually racist micro-aggression is the new term.

Does this mean some Americans celebrate a theory that seems to relegate the concept of morality to a low priority level? Is the concept of morality too old-fashioned to be relevant? Has the concept of having moral absolutes been set aside in favor of making personal decisions? Recall Barack Obamas explanation of sinfulness when asked about his religious and moral foundation. He clearly answered a sin was something he considered to be wrong. Apparently he was making a personal decision with no moral absolute as a basis.

Lets apply this apparent shift in moral standards to the recent presidential campaign. Was a de-emphasis on moral standards somehow reflected in the selection of candidates? Many would answer yes. Most voter complaints related to feelings the candidates had ethical and character issues. Were these two candidates delivered to us because much of the country is becoming more comfortable with ignoring moral standards? Would an emphasis on traditional moral standards have generated better conduct by the candidates and better choices for the voters? Think about it.

I believe a true culture requires some level of philosophical consistency and moral and ethical absolutes. Some seem to celebrate standing in the way of developing or maintaining what I consider important a unique American culture. Many radical progressive elements in our society even contradict the otherwise liberal notion we are moving from an old culture to a new one? I believe some of their goals and actions actually suggest we are moving from the old culture to a condition of no culture.

Steve Bakke is a Courier subscriber living in Fort Myers, Fla. He is a retired CPA and commercial finance executive.

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Moving from 'old' culture to 'no' culture - Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier

Saudi king Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, then defense minister, is seen in his office in Riyadh, December 9, 2013 (DoD/Erin A. Kirk-Cuomo)

The Saudi stereotype is bleak. Environmental desolation is mirrored by a cultural desert. Religious police meander between buildings, looking for victims. Women hurry between shadows behind their male guardians. The strict interpretation of Najdi Islam dominates nearly every aspect of life. It is a quiet, bleak place, with the only civic engagement at the mosque, whose loudspeakers are the only music the kingdom ever hears.

Its stark and it sticks in the mind. It is, of course, not totally true.

Saudi Arabias approximately twenty million citizens may be dominated by those who wish the kingdom to look like that; theyve done a bang-up job controlling the kingdoms image. Yet beneath the surface, discontent stirs.

Reuters reports:

When senior Saudi cleric Abdulaziz al-Tarifi told his almost one million Twitter followers that musical instruments were ungodly, it helped spark a hashtag among likeminded Saudis that the people reject music academies.

The hashtag, echoing the language of Arab Spring revolts elsewhere, captured the hostility to reforms that introduced entertainment events from rock concerts and comedy shows to kickboxing into the conservative kingdom.

Even having the controversy feeds the monolithic Saudi stereotype: yet more bearded clerics lambasting modernity and innocuous pursuits.

But simply having the debate is proof of strains within the kingdom. Saudi Arabia has embarked on an ambitious program of modernization on as many levels as it can handle. It has set the artificial deadline of 2030 to get most of them done. For the sluggish Saudi state and the stubborn cadre of clerical conservatives that dominate much of it, this is a huge ask.

Saudi Arabia is a nineteenth-century state with twentieth-century institutions lording over a divided and dividing society.

When Saudi Arabia was first founded during the post-Ottoman 1920s, its founder, Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman, fought a very nineteenth-century tribal war, as sheikhs had for centuries throughout Arabia. He was the state; institutions were fellow sheikhs who commanded different portions of his conquered kingdom.

This lasted until the 1950s, when, after World War II, oil money began to flow in. This coincided with Western, especially American, technology.

To support all this, the Saudis built a twentieth-century state with influences from the postwar West. Ministries sprung up, tribal levies were organized into battalions, passports were issued. The trappings of a twentieth-century state took hold.

Yet the powers that be remained distinctly nineteenth century: sheikhs and princes elevated by blood dominated the top echelons of power, stuffing the ministries full of family and friends. Many of them were, predictably, not very competent or motivated.

When development was merely a matter of writing checks to get foreigners to build things, this did not produce overt complications. Building a highway, or an office tower, is a relatively straightforward affair.

But to get people in that office tower to run profitable businesses? That is a much harder job.

Getting Saudis to work and work meaningfully is already a massive challenge in the most classical rentier state in history. But there are also generational, regional, sectarian and political conflicts.

There is a massive youth bulge. Normally thats an opportunity for a country. But Saudi Arabia is scarce in every resource but oil and oil, right now, is cheap. Providing jobs is tough.

Whats worse, the nineteenth-century patronage-heavy character of the state means most Saudis expect their government to invent jobs for them, not for citizens to create jobs for themselves.

It doesnt help that the conservatives would call just about any job but prayer, construction, military service and food service sinful.

Unemployed youth tend to channel their restless energy into crime, terrorism, protests and anti-state activities. They drove the Arab Spring, they marched into Syrias and Libyas civil wars. Direct cash transfers from Saudi Arabias still-considerable sovereign wealth reserves can buy many off for now, but that fund will dry up should oil prices remain low much longer.

Then theres the issue of regionalism. Saudi Arabias cultural heartland is its Najd province, the conservative core that conquered the rest. Yet western Hijazis, Eastern Province citizens and its southern provinces along the Yemeni border all do not wholly buy into their overlords worldview. People from Jeddah, near the holy city of Mecca, are quick to point out their modernity; people from Qatif, in the Eastern Province, openly call for the overthrow of the king. Meanwhile, the southern provinces have been forced to duck and cover from Houthi bombardment, something sure to cause resentment.

That Eastern Province, by the way? Full of Shia, remnants of the days when the Persian Gulf was very much Persian. Like their counterparts in Bahrain, they choke under Sunni rule.

Yet to focus on the Shia-Sunni divide leaves out the diversity of Saudi Arabias Sunnis, who may profess they are all one religion but have a vast diversity of religious opinion. Some mumble favorably about the dying Islamic State, others scheme for veil-free weekends in Dubai. In between are a gamut of opinions on religion and life.

This diversity is strictly controlled by powerful kings. Saudis are used to being told what to do, even if they dont agree with the decision. The danger is that soon they will have no strong leader to command them.

Meanwhile, Saud Arabias shaky political contract is being stress-tested by a quagmire in Yemen, stagnating economic growth and glaringly obvious corruption.

Corruption Saudis could endure so long as their cradle-to-grave welfare state provided them with easy cash. But Saudi is suffering a housing crisis, cutting bonuses to state employees and is suffering a stagnating GDP. If the state cannot bribe, it cannot endure.

Saudi Arabia and its allies are not winning the war in Yemen and the bodies are piling up. Dead soldiers coming home from a less-than-essential war is always a recipe for blowback.

In democracies or republics, anger would be channeled into electoral politics; new elites would swap out with old ones peacefully. But Saudi Arabias nineteenth-century state has no such mechanism. Old King Salman has neither check nor balance to his power. His brutish security forces are reliable for now. How they feel about all of Saudi Arabias multiplying problems remains a matter of speculation.

The culture wars are just the most overt sign of the Saudi geopolitical bomb ready to go off. Bet on crisis in the next decade.

This article originally appeared at Geopolitics Made Super, April 21, 2017.

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Saudi Arabia's Culture Wars Strain the Kingdom - Atlantic Sentinel

Have libertariansand the broader right and/or classical-liberal movementreally lost the "culture wars"? Why are universities in the United States and other advanced nations so "constipated, stultified" when it comes not just to free speech but open inquiry and academic freedom?

While I was in Sydney, Australia a couple of weeks ago to speak at the 5th Annual Friedman Conference (organized by the Australian Libertarian Society), I was interviewed by Claire Lehmann, the founder of the great and essential site Quillette.com, about these topics.

The interview, which appears on Rebel Media, is below.

Spoiler alert: I think libertarians have already won the culture war in the most important ways possible. Whether it's businesses like Whole Foods, Overstock, and Amazon; the massive and ongoing proliferation of platforms such as Netflix, YouTube, and Twitter; or gig-economy titans such as Uber and Airbnb, capitalism and entrepreneurship has been recast as an innovative, disruptive, liberatory system that allows us all to produce and consume whatever we want under increasingly personalized and individualized circumstances. What we need to do next to nail down what Matt Welch and I have dubbed The Libertarian Moment is to articulate the ways in which our society's cultural, economic, and even political operating system has already bought into the idea that decentralization, individualism, innovation, and freedom to experiment.

If the medium is the message (all props to Marshall McLuhan)if an operating system is more important than any specific content generated within that systemwhat has been abjured as "late capitalism" for decades has effectively ended all debates about how libertarian policies and mind-sets have freed us from bland top-downism in all parts of our lives. This isn't to suggest that we are in any way living a utopian dream. It's simply to point out that even after 15 years of drowsy economic growth and a massive expansion of state (and in many ways, corporate) power, our living standards continue to rise. Add to that huge advances in tolerance and change when it comes to racial, ethnic, and gender disparities and transformative shifts on topics as varied as drug policy, sexual orientation, criminal-justice reform, and gun rights too.

Cultural and political pessimism isn't just a losing strategy, it's a misimpression. Again, that's not to say that massive problems don't exist and need to be confronted. Will we ever see an actual federal budget again, much less that cuts government spending? U.S. foreign policy remains a shameful, disastrous, and destructive hodgepodge of hubris and stupidity. Speech and expression are under attacks from the right and the left, and the bipartisan turn against free trade and the easy movement of people across borders needs to be beaten back. As the late, great Arthur Ekirch explained in his neglected masterpiece The Decline of American Liberalism, forces of decentralization and centralizationof liberation and authoritarianism, of individualism and collectivism, of choice and coercionhave been slugging out in the United States since before there was a United States. The question is whether we are moving generally in a direction of more autonomy and less restriction on how we live our lives.

But...well, watch the interview already.

The rest is here:
Nick Gillespie: Libertarians Have Won the Culture Wars, Even Though Universities Are "Constipated, Stultified" - Reason (blog)

Formany years, Donald Trump tweeted Sunday afternoon, our country has been divided, angry and untrusting. Many say it will never change, the hatred is too deep. IT WILL CHANGE!!!!

As persuasive as the ALL CAPS are, I have my doubts.

Put aside Trumps specific shortcomings for the moment. The presidency has become ill-suited to the task of unifying the country, because the presidency has become the biggest prize and totem in the culture war. Like the religious wars between Catholics and Protestants in England, if one side controls the throne, it is seen as an insult and threat to the other. And whoever holds the throne is seen as a kind of personal Protector of the Realm.

The political parties have been utterly complicit in the process. Exploiting social media and other technologies, Republicans and Democrats shape their messages around the assumption that they and they alone have legitimate ownership of Americas authentic best self. Thats why whichever party is out of power promises to take back America as if the other side were foreign invaders.

Barack Obama was elected in 2008 in no small part to fulfill the promise of his 2004 Democratic Convention keynote address: to banish the slicing and dicing of America into Red States and Blue States.

The colors of the electoral map may have been smudged and scrambled over the last eight years, but the underlying polarization Obama inherited from George W. Bush only intensified on his watch. Trump will be the third president in a row to promise to unite the country, and he will almost certainly be the third in a row to fail.

The ugly squabble between the president-elect and Representative John Lewis (D., Ga.) over the weekend offers a glimpse into how bad things will get.

Lewis earned his icon status on the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Bloody Sunday in Selma, Ala. But over the years, hes traded some of his moral capital for partisan chips, insinuating that only the Democratic party has ownership of the civil-rights era and its victories, despite the fact that a higher share of Republicans voted for the Civil Rights Act than Democrats. Indeed, the goons who cracked Lewiss skull on the Edmund Pettus Bridge were acting at the behest of a Democratic governor and Democratic local officials. Even the bridge was named after a Democrat.

In 2008, Lewis saw nothing wrong with comparing Senator John McCain (R., Ariz.) to the segregationist Alabama governor George Wallace, adding: Senator McCain and Governor Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division. He did it again in 2012, insinuating that voting for Mitt Romney might lead America to go back to the days of fire hoses, police dogs, and church bombings.

This was not idealism, but poisonous cynicism, and it helped contribute to the feelings of resentment that were so essential to Trumps victory. Now, Lewis is going further still, refusing to attend Trumps inauguration and arguing that Trump cannot be a legitimate president because of Russian meddling in the election. Lewis may have reason to believe that Trump did not win fair and square, but questioning Trumps legitimacy is exactly what the Russians probably wanted from the beginning: to undermine Western and American faith and confidence in democracy. (Its a sign of Lewiss partisanship that he also boycotted George W. Bushs first inauguration because he didnt think Bush was legitimate either.)

Of course, Trump made things worse. He attacked Lewis, saying the congressman should finally focus on the burning and crime infested inner-cities of the U.S. instead of falsely complaining about the election results. Predictably, Democrats rallied behind Lewis, whos basically the partys living saint, and theyre already fundraising off the spectacle.

The Democrats will stop baiting Trump when he shows he can refuse the bait. Which means they wont stop.

Theres an almost literary quality to Trumps insecurities; he craves respect more than almost anything else, and yet respect remains agonizingly elusive in part because he takes everything too personally.

The presidency, normally a job for people with thick skins and a nose for insincere flattery, promises to only heighten Trumps sense of entitlement to respect and exacerbate his inevitable resentment when he doesnt receive it. So well continue on divided, angry, and untrusting.

Jonah Goldberg is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a senior editor of National Review. 2017 Tribune Content Agency, LLC

Link:
Donald Trump & John Lewis: Culture Wars Deepen Party ...

Good morning, readers! Were enjoying an assortment of eclectic longreads today for a variety of tastes, from the frontiers of medicine to sexual harassment scandals in USA gymnastics. As always, were curious to know what youre reading, so drop us a line in the comments!

If you havent already,subscribe to the Global Commentpodcast on iTunes and Soundcloudand catch up on the first episode, a fascinating interview with Omar Saif Ghobash.

Some of the most amazing leaps and bounds were making in modern science involve going backwardslike really backwards, as in, delving into sewers for ancient, yet cutting edge, treatments for severe infections. This is an outstanding read.

But while the scientists in Paris celebrated the 100-year anniversary of the discovery of phages, these biological weapons are nearly impossible to get to patients in the US. Using natures own viruses to treat infections doesnt jive with the FDAs process for approving new pharmaceuticals, nor Big Pharmas motive to sell one-size-fits-all pills for the masses.

The editors at Catapult excel when it comes to finding, and perfecting, thoughtful essays that may read like a stream of consciousness ramble until suddenly all the pieces fall together, click, revealing something elegant and beautiful and complex. This is no exception.

I move. The front of my new house is also brick, but it is real brick. This house was once a mansion on top of a hill where white people forced black people to perform the tasks of their bondage. Our neighborhood is named after this house. The old front of the house has columns and faces what is now our backyard. In the backyard is a church which chimes every hour from eight in the morning to eight at night. At noon and six, it is fancier, a song. The floors are painted green and none of the outlets have three prongs.

When your father has spent most of your life in prison, how do you reconnect? This is a complex reflection on family, culture shock, and how we interact with each other in era heavily mediated by technology and distance.

Id seen my dad approximately four times over 30 years, but I only remembered two of them: a visit when I was 12 years old, and one when I was 25. When I thought of visiting my father, I pictured the beige rooms, the beige uniforms, and how everything seemed to be nailed down. I always brought bags of change to use at the vending machines. I knew he had a sweet tooth, and I wanted to buy him something sweet. He always got reprimanded by guards for holding my hands too long.

Israel needs caregivers. People in the Philippines are looking for new opportunities. Is it an ideal match, or does it come at a dark price thats only visible after commitments are finalised?

The most pressing need for workers is in the caregiving profession. In 2009, there were fewer than 250,000 Israelis over the age of 80; by 2059, there will be well over a million, according to one population projection by the Central Bureau of Statistics. Added to that is a serious shortage of working hands: In the 1990s, the ranks of the caregiving sector in Israel were occupied primarily by female immigrants from the former Soviet Union. But that population is now largely retired, leaving a major vacuum.

USA Gymnastics has been rocked by a series of sexual harassment and assault scandals in recent years. Its also been making headlines for training incredible athletes who are sweeping international competitions. Can the two be separated?

If the press had been expecting to find the women merely happy to receive Olympic recognition, they were sorely mistaken. As she had a decade before, Dantzscher spoke up about their difficult Olympic experiences. Others, though, like 2000 national champion Elise Ray, spoke up about how they felt about how difficult and traumatic those experiences had been.

If you enjoy our work, please consider supporting us witha one time or recurring donation. We believe in paying writers, andwe rely on our readers to help us continue serving up interesting, dynamic, and engaging commentary every weekday. To make sure you dont miss any of that commentary, you can subscribe to our newsletter below and if youre interested in writing for us, check outour contributor guidelines.

Photo: Alec Perkins/Creative Commons

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Must reads: Gymnastics, phages, culture wars, labour, life after prison - GlobalComment.com