>The Republican Party, with the exception of a few national-level personages, may be as useless as ever. lawl... but true >mportant as spontaneity is, the substantive and exemplary importance of what elected governors and legislatures can do is even greater. Because Govs. DeSantis of Florida, Noem of South Dakota, Kemp of Georgia, Abbott of Texas (to a lesser extent), and others defied the directives first of the Trump, then of the Biden administration regarding COVID restrictions, their states compiled an incontrovertible record that proves how intellectually wrong, substantively disastrous, and politically malevolent those directives were and are. This is a touchstone for impeaching the oligarchy’s legitimacy on other matters as well, and proof—if any further be needed—that for good and ill in the 21st century, the 50 states need not fear to do pretty much as they please. Nullification has been a fact of U.S public life since Colorado and California rewrote drug laws. There is no reason why it should or can stop there. We need a rebellion from the states. >When the Gillette company aired an ad on toxic masculinity, nobody had to tell millions of its customers to shave with other razors. Truth again >Once a majority of Americans understand that Google, Amazon, Twitter, Facebook, the Times, and Gannett are partisan instruments—that they use lies, censorship, and insults to subjugate us to a form of oligarchical totalitarianism—a substantial portion of their customers will begin to patronize alternatives, and their power over information will cease. That is because their power depends on the public accepting the pretense of objectivity and neutrality that these platforms still see fit on occasion to wear after sucking the life out of 20th-century American media. Stripping them of this borrowed pretense, and highlighting their overtly manipulative partisanship, must be every action’s proximate objective. They will never understand. They don't pay enough attention or even care. The only thing that might change that is the collapse of the welfare state. Right now that keeps them placated. *edit.. It's not only the poor that don't care to realize this. Too many well off or middle class are either too distracted or love the confirmation bias. >The moment that the Smiths cease to think of Harvard and Stanford products as “smart,” and instead think “pretentious,” they deprive the oligarchy of much of its legitimacy. The moment that they realize that most colleges sell expensive four-year vacations from responsibility, they can stop supporting them, and ask instead where and at what price they may best obtain the combination of knowledge and credentials they seek. Or work in the trades. >That is why going one’s own way Haha... yeah fuck dealing with them bitches... Oh wait he's talking about something else. >Angelo M. Codevilla That article was amazing. I just looked him up and I'm about to read all his books.