Dear Friends,
It seems to me, leaders lead by example, not by orders. Where the leaders of a society are virtuous, hard working and mind their business, the people are virtuous, diligent and mind their business as well. Where the leaders are villains, the people follow, and become every bit as villainous as their leaders… taking their example. Such leaders, those that are lazy, hedonistic, corrupt liars, most of our world leaders today, must force the people not to be as worthless as they are, so they resort to ever more draconian tactics to keep order. They are working at cross purposes. While they try to order society with violence intimidation and surveillance, they disorder it by their every selfish, egoistic and craven action. The people are given conflicting messages, follow your leader… or their rules?
What if you whipped a herd of cattle to get them to dance on two feet? Would that work? What if you opened every box with a hammer? How would that play out? What if you opened every window while the heat is on… at full blast, and angrily shout, “why won’t this place heat up!” Would that help? How about if you drained all the oil from your car, to save on the expense of oil, then drove across the country? How far would you get? In every instance this is working at cross purposes. Opening the windows while running the heat, running an engine without oil, etc… they work against the goal. That is what our leaders do when they live like the kings of old, above the law, live hedonistic lifestyles and have the hoi polloi pay for their peccadilloes.
They lead us to vice as they whip us to virtue. They have to, else our economy and thus their wealth and power, would crumble to nothing. As Machiavelli said, a corrupt people cannot long be free. Therefore, the more corrupt our leaders are, the more corrupt we will become, the final result will be the loss of our freedom. We see this when they must counter their poor leadership, by using intimidation, social credit scores, law enforcement by surveillance and outright violence. These are the outward manifestations of our loss of freedom. Inwardly we lose our liberty whenever we stop thinking for ourselves and become ensnared in ideas masquerading as truths. In the end, unless we recognize this reality and point it out for others, we will all become slaves.
You might think you are unaffected by what you watch on television, but you are, and if you think you are not… the manipulation has slipped by you. After Bill Clinton had his infamous affair, where the media was all abuzz with the spurious claim, that oral sex is not sex, oral sex became all the rage among teenagers. After all, the President did it in the oval office, and the media said it was not sex. So if it is not sex why not? This was an example of a direct causal relation between a national leader’s actions and the people following their leader. You do as well. When you see the elite get away with crimes that enrich them, do you get angry, or wonder how you could get in on it? Don’t worry that if you just want to get in on it you are a bad person… you are just following your leaders, blindly.
Jesus said to be in the world but not of the world. It is very difficult not to be effected by the sewer we swim in, one can hardly but smell of it, but we can try not to follow our leaders into vice. It starts with the recognition that most of them are psychopaths. They epitomize Thrasymachus’ “great men” and so are the vilest of human beings. To follow such people is to willingly step into a furnace. The future of humanity demands we become the example our leaders refuse, and in fact, are incapable of being. Leading by example and practicing the Golden Rule, as best we can, so that others can see it’s implementation… and follow. Good is attractive and evil is ugly. Most people will choose to follow the worthy and beautiful… and not the hideous, but then, that’s why they made lipstick and propaganda.
Sincerely,
John Pepin
