You’ve heard the term failed state, haven’t you? It’s been used a few times in recent years, notably with reference to Libya after the death of longtime dictator Muammar Qaddafi. We don’t often hear the term elucidated, but a working definition would be a state that cannot maintain order within its zone of asserted jurisdiction.
The point of a nation-state, of course, is to guarantee by enforcement certain norms of order. If events demonstrate that this is not the case within the borders of nation-state X, then the government of X – its State – has failed of its duties. While no nation-state is perfectly peaceful within its borders, there appears to be a threshold value for acceptable disorder. Violence and disorder above that threshold would delegitimize the government – the State.
What is that threshold value? Does it differ from nation to nation? If it does, would we accept more disorder from a democracy than from a tyranny? Or would it be the other way around?
Of course, the question of greatest current relevance is how much disorder the United States can suffer without having its 88,000-plus governments lose their presumption of legitimacy. Suppose the disorder is concentrated in a handful of cities, rather than being spread evenly across the nation? Would that make it more tolerable, or less? How about if it pertains to only one demographic: perhaps illegal aliens?
Surely I don’t need to rant about the influx of those yet again. We all know they’re a pox upon the Republic. We all know illegals commit a disproportionate share of violent crimes, especially in our cities. And we all know that the federal government under the Usurper Regime has tacitly made it a policy to let them in and thereafter, to do as they like.
So how does the illegal-plague and the passivity of our various levels of government toward it bear upon federal, state, and local legitimacy? Is the unresisted penetration of our orders sufficient to deem Washington D.C, illegitimate? If not, how much social, political, and economic chaos would justify such a judgment? On the state and local levels, is the unwillingness of the forces of order to act against illegal alien crimes a deciding effect? Many state and local police forces have been told to ignore those crimes so as not to be slandered as “racist.”
A delegitimized government is the sort that can be toppled to the applause of outsiders. After all, it’s failed. The swelling of chaos within its jurisdiction threatens surrounding districts, which gives those districts cause for fear. Is it not appropriate to support the forces that expel a failed government from its seat of power, such that order might be restored?
It’s not a simple question. Sometimes the replacement for the failed government is much worse than what it displaces. Consider the ejection of the government of South Vietnam in 1975. Fear of the devil you don’t know is natural, and sometimes protective.
This is a question that should be directed particularly at those districts in Colorado where the Venezuelan crime gang Tren de Aragua is flexing its muscles, essentially without any official countermeasure. In my opinion, the failure of the “forces of order” to act against this plague implicitly delegitimizes them and their political masters. Private-citizen Coloradans with armament could act to put down the Venezuelan criminals by force quite legitimately.
No, nothing of the sort has happened yet. But it might – and if it should, it will tell the nation that the Battle of Athens, Tennessee in 1946 was not a “one-off.” The message to those in our political Establishment who believe themselves irreplaceable and untouchable would be plain.
3 comments
Until I read that, my understanding of Failed State was
Unable to accomplish its goals.
But that definition above is a lot more accurate.
Adopted, thanks.
I believe that Trump was first elected due to people having enough of how the Federal government was running. I saw the night of the 2020 election that the election was stolen from Trump as he was leading heavily and then all over the nation counting stopped at the same time for several hours. When they started again at the same time across the country Biden was ahead by just a few thousand in various states yet the counting did not have time to change.
Since that time the Federal Government has run badly. Immediately what Trump did to stop illegal aliens getting into the US and staying here was stopped and massive illegal invasion started. More spending to foreign countries and groups started. The clearing of our equipment and people from Afghanistan was done badly leaving massive amount of equipment in country and leaving many Americans dead and injured. On top of this was massive inflation by the Biden-Harris Admin and less jobs for Americans.
I had seen that Biden was affected by dementia during his election in 2020. The Dems set it up so he was the only one that could win in any Dem primary. The problem for the Dems was that Biden was not running anything and people got more and more sick of how things were. Biden’s polls numbers vs Trump’s numbers were bad so the Dems decided they needed to replace Biden. This was done via the first CNN debate, but Biden said that Harris would take his place, which did not give the Dems a choice of an open DNC Convention.
So now we have Harris running for the Dems against Trump for the Republicans. Harris has many bad issues as she is the most Liberal. Harris has no policies on her website except to take your money. They only policies she states have been Trump policies. I believe this is the Harris plan for the election: 1) keep Harris away from people and reporters, 2) use MSM to prop up Harris to the people, 3) give fake polls showing Harris is tied or ahead of Trump, 4) Dems will steal the election in swing states and having the fake polls will help with blowback. Unfortunately if the steal works I feel we will end up in CW2 as people have reached their limit.
CW II ?
yep. Cause the people who enabled Tren de Aragua need to face the same consequences as the feral savages they imported.