Unknown Knowns: Part II

Harris as the "anyone but Trump" ticket and the willful ignorance of millions...

“If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.”

~ William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, (1790)

Joel Bowman, with today’s Note From the End of the World: Ormond Beach, Florida...

Deeper and deeper, into the unknown...

How do we know what we know? Philosophers throughout the ages have wondered aloud... psychologists have pondered in the dark... cranks and loons, poets and geniuses have filled entire library shelves, contemplating the “doors of perception.” 

Today, we come at it from a different angle. We are interested not in how we know what we (think we) know... but in how our supposed knowns become unknowns. We refer, of course, to the well-known and oft-practiced art of willful ignorance. 

Until just a few weeks ago, Kamala Harris was the least popular Vice President in living memory. Today, if you believe the polls, she is neck-a-neck with her opponent, on the verge of becoming the very first Indian-African-Jamaican-Irish-American female president in the history of the republic. 

Quite a turnaround, you will surely agree. What happened? What did voters know about Mrs. Harris three weeks ago that they do not know – or do not want to know – today? 

Reader Abuse

We have already seen, in Part I of this little inquiry, how the media has shaped the narrative over the past eight years. In unseating the deep state’s presumptive Madam President, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Donald Trump invoked the ire of many a swampen creature. For this, he endured a public excoriation the likes of which would make an ancient Roman senator blush. 

Day in, day out... week after week... year upon year... formerly respectable mastheads across the country assaulted their readers’ senses with a barrage of hit pieces, accusing the president of every imaginable crime against humanity, and some unimaginable ones, besides. 

He was a white supremecist... a clear and present danger to American democracy... Hitler reincarnated. And his supporters, tens of millions of Americans, were all unreconstructed racists, fascists and extremists, looking to bring the nation to its knees (and not in that virtue signaling, self flagellating, kneel-during-the-national-anthem-at-a-football-game kind of way). 

Declared President Joe Biden on live television: “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” 

Indeed, by the time Biden told his staff it was “time to put Trump in a bullseye” (an obvious, if ill-chosen metaphor), few could have been surprised when a would-be assassin took those words literally and did just that a few days later. And yet, to so much as mention the assassination attempt in polite company today, just a few weeks later, is to be seen projecting a kind of sympathy for the devil. It simply won’t do. 

Anyone Harris

Of course, The Donald is not without his follies and foibles, many of which we have remarked on in these very Notes. But the Führer, he is not.

And yet, if this is what you’ve heard every day, if that is the message running on every news channel and headlining every newspaper, if you’ve been told ceaselessly that your country is on the line, your way of life is under attack... and from a band of card-carrying fascists, no less... wouldn’t you want someone... anyone... to stand up and stop such a force for evil?

Today, that anyone is Kamala Harris. 

Yes, yes... you haven’t lost your marbles. This is the very same Kamala Harris who, three weeks and five minutes ago, even democrat party apparatchiks and their flunkies in the mainstream press couldn’t stomach. 

Here are a handful of comments... not from hostile, “ultra MAGA” conservatives... but from the simpering White Guys for Harris clutch:

She’s a pretty big drag. I think she’s arguably Biden’s single worst political decision ~ Johan Goldberg, The Dispatch

Kamala Harris’s approval rating is now at 28%, which is an historic low for any modern vice president ~ Jimmy Kimmel, The Late Show

We’re hearing it from mainstream media, one outlet after another, one leak after another, Kamala Harris is the worst vice president ever, the worst politician ever ~ Joe Scarborough, Morning Joe

Of course, now that Mrs. Harris is the presumptive nominee, it’s all sunshine and rainbow flags. Along with recasting Biden as the second coming of George Washington (Nancy Pelosi even suggested his likeness be carved into Mt. Rushmore. Seriously.) Kamala Harris has now been remanufactured as the most “energetic politician since Barack Obama.”

“It was mesmerizing... You could just sense the power in the hall. It was the power of joy. The power of laughter. The power of hope for the future.” Morning Joe, MSNBC

“We haven’t seen this kind of energy since 2008, when Barack Obama was a candidate.” The Source, CNN

“The excitement was at a level that, frankly, we haven’t seen since President Obama was running for reelection.” The Morning, CNN

“It goes back to Obama levels of excitement,” The Morning, CNN

[Sidenote: Is it just us, or do these bobbleheads all seem to get the same talking cards?] 

Oh, and here’s our personal favorite, from the man who assured us one month ago that “Joe Biden is not quitting. He’s not built to quit.” Pro waffler Chris Matthews, also on CNN: 

“[Harris] was John Wayne last night. She was a leader. And she was clear that she was the boss.”

Bidenomics, The Border and BLM

You see, dear reader, it matters not whether Mrs. Harris is qualified for the job... that she is the poster person for Diversity Equity and Inclusion... that she managed to secure exactly the same number of delegate votes during her last run for president as did your editor...

All that matters is that she does not have a toothbrush mustache and a goose in her step; that she is not Adolf Hitler Donald J. Trump. As such, voters are willing to overlook an extraordinary record of failure, incompetence and bewilderment. 

This is a candidate, lest we rush to unknow, who told America “The border is secure. We have a secure border”... even as illegal immigration surged to record numbers under her watchless eye... 

That “Bidenomics is working”... even as inflation was rocketing to the highest level in more than a generation...  

That “it is outdated and is actually wrong and backward to think that more police officers will create more safety”... even as cities across America were burning during the BLM race riots of 2020 and the “Defund the Police” movement was gaining traction. 

As for her so-called “progressive” track record, wish-thinking democrats have gone to herculean efforts to unknow the fact that Mrs. Harris defended the death penalty as attorney general of California, opposed a statewide ballot measure to legalize marijuana, jailing over 1,500 people for marijuana offenses (before laughing about having inhaled herself) and criminalized parents under draconian truancy laws, which disproportionately impacted the “brown and black” communities she claims to champion but whom she hopes to never have to actually visit.    

Still, through the fog of media propaganda and the cacophony of their cheerleading, the message rings out: Anyone but Trump.

When it comes to democratic elections, it is not necessarily Capital-T Truth that matters as much as what people think they “know” (or even “unknow”) it to be. 

Where do we go from here? 

Stay tuned for more Notes From the End of the World...

Cheers,

Joel Bowman

P.S. Might unpopular ideas – free markets, civil liberties, common sense – be enjoying a resurgence… even in the woke West?

Might thoughtful individuals be ready to ditch the ‘statist quo’ in favor of a more peaceful, voluntary existence?

Might citizens be ready to shrug off the illusion of choice proffered by their would-be political leaders and their puerile porters in the mainstream press?

Such a reality might be closer than you think. Already, millions of people in hundreds of countries have tuned out of state propaganda, meant only to divide, conquer and impoverish people.

How do we know?

Well, we don’t… but we have reason to be cautiously optimistic. Even these humble Notes now reach dear readers in all 50 states across the US… and in 130 countries around the world. Not bad, given that we only just kicked off this year.

Of course, the ideas of freedom, liberty and independence are not going to spread themselves. And that’s where our dear members come in. Thanks to their support, we are able to remain fully independent… which means no advertisements, no bosses and no bias.

Just free markets, free minds and free people… all the time.

If you’d like to support our work and join the growing community of folks interested in these lately resurgent ideas, please consider becoming a Notes member today. Cheers!