Video: Correcting Myths Regarding the Founding

C. Bradley Thompson is always a must-watch!

My Epoch Times Contest Entry:

Why I Love America

I love America because of Iron Man.

Wait! Before you put this little missive down and seek out an entry with a little more “gravitas,” allow me to explain. For you see, I do believe, sincerely, that Iron Man is emblematic of what is great about America — and I believe, in this essay, that I can conclusively present my case.

Iron Man - who first appeared in the pages of Marvel’s Tales of Suspense in 1963 at the height of the so-called “Silver Age of Comics” - was the brainchild of four New Yorkers who, essentially, wanted to stretch themselves by creating an “unlikely” superhero whose backstory fell well outside their usual comfort zone. In what way was the Golden Avenger a challenge? Tony Stark – the man inside the Iron Man armor – was a defense contractor, a wealthy industrialist, and a man-about-town who embodied everything Marvel’s generally left-leaning readership was ideologically inclined to despise. “I thought it would be fun,” Stan Lee once remarked, “to take the kind of character that nobody would like, none of our readers would like, and shove him down their throats and make them like him.” And did Lee and his compatriots succeed in this endeavor? Yes! While Iron Man has never been a leader when it comes to comic book sales, he has nonetheless endured for almost sixty years and - thanks mostly to the Marvel Cinematic Universe - has become a globally famous icon.

So how exactly does Iron Man embody what makes America exceptional?

Let us first consider biography. Iron Man’s creators – Lee, Larry Lieber (Lee’s younger brother), Jack Kirby, and Don Heck – all hailed from working class backgrounds. None of these men grew up in fancy digs or attended tony art schools. Each had to climb his way up the societal ladder through hard work, determination, and vision. Yet in America, Lee and the rest ultimately found their paths to prosperity — because in America, even the children of poor urban immigrants can rise.

Consider too what it says about America that a fellow can make it big by selling cheaply printed – and admittedly melodramatic – four-color fantasies. Such a seemingly ridiculous occupation can only exist in a place that is free. To put it another way, the fecundity and ever-present joy behind Iron Man and his fellow Silver Age superheroes have as their necessary antecedent a culture that values open artistic expression and economic liberty. The Soviet Union of the same era could not have created Iron Man — and neither could Maoist China.

But the most important reason why Iron Man perfectly exemplifies America’s singular personality is the broad-mindedness that animated his origin. As noted above, his creators did not settle for crafting heroes with whom they could readily identify. Instead, they deliberately sought to understand the Other — and in the process, they imbued Iron Man with a profound and genuinely moving humanity that transcended his externals. Even a well-to-do “playboy” who seems to have it all, the comics said, can still struggle with chronic illness, alcoholism, and a gnawing, desperate loneliness. Even a well-to-do “playboy,” the comics argued, can have a heart. In the earliest Iron Man comics, no space is given for Marxist diatribes about the evils of the rich; there is only recognition of the universal travails of all mankind. If that’s not a terrific illustration of the American soul, I don’t know what is.

Unfortunately, there is a significant faction in the America of 2020 that wants to do away with the special “American-ness” that made Iron Man great in his original incarnation. This faction wants to limit what we may write and draw, wall off former avenues of advancement and restrict our taste for risk and enterprise, stick us in homogeneous ghettos based on our immutable characteristics, and sow conflict between the supposedly “privileged” and the “marginalized” for the purpose of effectuating revolution. And sadly, this faction now commands the heights of the entertainment industry, including the editorial staff of Marvel Comics. I suppose that’s one unconscious reason why I keep reading and re-reading the old Silver and Bronze Age Iron Man issues; in a way, I suppose I’m trying to remind myself what precisely, as a classical liberal, I value most.

My New BUYcott

A few years ago, my brother, my sister-in-law, and I were at the Topsfield Fair rolling through the hucksters' building in an attempt to avoid a rain shower when Matt - taking in all the people selling massage chairs, housewares, homemade condiments, and various chindogus - said something quite profound: "This is the beauty of America right here -- people with dreams hanging up shingles to sell you something they believe in."

(That was a paraphrase, but it still captures the essence of his observation.)

Matt wasn't wrong. I mean, there is more to the idea of America than commerce, obviously. There is also our (perennially threatened) tradition of limited government and our commitment - as expressed in the Declaration of Independence - to uphold each man's natural rights. But an economic freedom that allows the entrepreneurial spirit to flourish is fundamentally American too; that freedom, in fact, is an embodiment of our rights to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Thus, it is eminently legitimate to point to a guy selling reusable hand-warmers at a country fair and declare him worthy of special celebration.

Unfortunately, we've been saddled with a media class that overwhelmingly fails to understand the quintessential American-ness of our yeoman businessmen. On the contrary, these Twitter Blue Checks would sneer at our hand-warmer salesman and proclaim him an inferior sort. "Ugh," they'd think. "How incredibly gauche to spend your life hustling. How unrefined." It would never cross their mind that surviving in the open marketplace takes skills -- skills we might need at a moment requiring a massive re-purposing of our manufacturing infrastructure.

That's one reason why so many journalists snickered at Mike Lindell yesterday. The other reason, of course, is that, like many recovering addicts, he talks about God a lot. (I recognized the NA/AA mindset as soon as I heard him speak.) But like our Topsfield hucksters, Lindell is a fantastic American exemplar. He pulled himself out of the gutter and into the upper class with a random brainwave he had in the middle of the night -- and when his country needed him, he stepped up without being coerced and started making masks. For that, he absolutely deserved his moment in the Rose Garden. For that, he deserves our business.

So I hereby announce a MyPillow BUYcott:

Because 'Murica.

We Don't Need Control from Above

From Bart Hall on Facebook:

Truckers are saying "fuck the log rules, I'm hauling" and they're getting supplies to the stores. People are stocking the shelves all night and letting old people shop first. Folks are buying meals for truckers, who (obviously) can't go through the drive-ups. Asking 'em what they want, then buying it for them.

Carnival Cruise Line has told Trump “We can match those big Navy Hospital ships with some fully staffed cruise ships”.

GM and Ford have said "hold our cars and watch this -- we can make ventilators where we were just making car parts, starting next week" -- by re-engineering seat ventilators which their engineers hacked together for a new purpose. In under a week.

In a project with which I'm loosely associated, a very-effective agricultural disease-control agent was re-purposed and re-labeled specifically for Corona-virus control by the FDA and EPA in under ten days, from initial request to distribution.

Restaurants and schools have said, "we’ve got kitchens and staff; we can feed the poor kids who used have school lunch.”

NBA basketball players have said, “Hold our basketballs while we write checks to pay the arena staff.”

Construction companies are saying, “Here are some high-end masks for medical staff and doctors”.

Distilleries are making sanitizer out of distilling "heads and tails" which are normally discarded. Nasty shit to drink, but effective sanitizer.

People are tipping grocery check-out clerks and thanking them for taking the risk.

Local, state, and county governments are taking control of everything the feds cannot do. Some are doing it wrong, but for the first time in decades ... they're doing it. Federalism is re-emerging, and the smallest unit of government is the individual and the family. This, too, is re-emerging after decades of dormancy.

As Japanese Admiral Isokuru Yamamoto said, after Pearl Harbor ... “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

I sense this has just happened. We have a wonderful country, the greatest single force for good in all human history. We have closed our borders, with good reason, yet we have top medical people now assisting North Korea in their response to the virus.

Many things have been re-set, and will never be the same.

By microbiological accident, we are living in profoundly transformative historical times.

Amen, Bart. Amen.

American exceptionalism is being eroded

BLUF - American Exceptionalism the thing that makes our country different, and better, than the rest of the world is being lost to the false gods of "one world" and Eurocentric ethos. We need to restore the belief in the primacy of the Individual person, and the aspirational goals expressed in our Declaration of Independence; and codified in our Constitution and the first 10 Amendments to that Constitution (the Bill of Rights).
Victor David Hanson has an excellent column on this erosion and the Loss of American Citizenship. Read it and fight to restore the real duties and privileges of American Citizenship. We need to fight back against the loss of the true privileges of citizenship; and fight back against the unfair burdens of unfair additional duties of America towards the world and for her citiizens (and non-citizens living amongst us.)
VDH column URL;  https://pjmedia.com/victordavishanson/the-death-of-american-citizenship/