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Part 1: The sleeping giant of the American public has finally awakened

Rick, stating the truth in Casablanca
Have Americans finally awakened?

In my long life there have been a number of times post-election when pundits nationwide have claimed that the results signaled a major cultural transition. This claim was made in 1980 when Ronald Reagan was elected president. It was made again in 1994 when voters gave the Republicans their first majority in the House of Representatives in about four decades. A similar claim was made in 2016, when Trump was elected for the first time.

In every single one of these cases the claim was false. There was no major cultural transition. Republicans might have won control, but the American public and its political class still largely leaned leftward. There was almost no change politically. Despite for example Bill Clinton’s announcement that “The era of big government is over” after the 1994 election, the federal government continued to grow in size and power, and to do so with ever increasing speed.

Even more significant, in every single case, the American people went back to sleep after the election. They considered the election their statement of what must be done, and assumed naively that the new elected officials would obey that statement. No matter how much conservatives attempted to make the public aware that the government remained out of control and was further beginning to institute leftist policies far outside what anyone in America wanted, those attempts fell on deaf ears.

The American people were essentially not interested. The only political movement that moved with any passion was that of the left, and it took advantage of this passion to successfully to get its policies imposed.

It seems however that the 2024 election signals a real cultural transition, far deeper and more significant than the mere shift of voting patterns to the right that most pundits are noting by all demographic groups.

No, what is happening is a shift in passion. The American public has awakened in a way I have never seen. I give you this news report as a clear sign, as the events it describes occurred last week, after the November election, when Americans in the past would gone back into slumber and stop paying attention. Watch and be amazed, not just by the outrage by hundreds of ordinary citizens, but by the fact that this outrage was reported correctly and sympathetically by a television news report.

Rather than go to sleep after the election, parents and students in large numbers descended on a school board meeting to express their righteous anger over the school board’s willingness for years to ignore sexual abuse complaints by students about their teachers. More significantly, this outrage grew quickly because everyone involved was able to get educated about what was happening by the new openness on social media, fueled further by the return of free speech on X.

Nor is this story an outlier. It is the pattern we are seeing nationwide. In another example, when Whoopi Goldberg slandered a bakery in Staten Island — claiming falsely that it refused to fill her order because of her politics when the problem was simply due to mechanical problems that made filling her large order impossible — the public quickly rose up to defend and support the bakery, while lambasting Goldberg for her slander.

Similarly, in only one of numerous recent examples, a Connecticut school teacher went on line to whine about Donald Trump’s election victory, and in doing so she actually threatened violence against Trump supporters. The public response was so loud and overwhelming that her school superintendent immediately removed her from the school premises pending his investigation, and she resigned almost immediately thereafter.

I spent the last four years reporting hundreds of similar slander and blacklisting attacks against the right. In most cases there was little public outcry, either because of apathy or fear of retaliation for speaking out. Now however the public will no longer sit still and take it, but is instead responding with a loud roar. Do not be surprised if Goldberg finds herself fired from her position on the television show, The View, because of this and other absurdly slanderous statements.

Both the school teacher in Connecticut and Goldberg were doing something far different than the hundreds of conservatives blacklisted by the left from 2020 to 2023. Those conservatives were almost always simply expressing reasonable conservative opinions, and getting destroyed because of this. The teacher however was threatening violence, while Goldberg was defaming the bakery with lies. Such behavior is beyond the pale, and should immediately disqualify both from their jobs — teaching any kids anywhere, or doing political analysis on television.

And now, the public is not only aware of these things, it is loudly and continuously rising up to demand consequences for anyone behaving in this manner.

In other words, Americans are no longer asleep. Or as one Japanese admiral wrote in his diary after leading the attack on Pearl Harbor, “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”

The Democrats have done all they could in the past decade to awake the sleeping giant of ordinary Americans. The last four years finished the job. Americans appear enraged and unwilling to fall asleep. Instead, they are using their smart phones to pay attention, and are responding angrily when people in the political realm behave badly.

The astonishing house cleaning to come
The astonishing house cleaning to come

This is the real transition. American culture for decades has been dominated by a soft leftist bent that the general public was willing to tolerate, even if it often opposed these political goals. That has now ended. The consequences of this change will be hard to measure.

Tomorrow, in part two of this three part essay, I will take a look at how this sea change in the American public’s attitude is influencing the people in power. While it will certainly give Trump and his allies much greater latitude to make many radical changes that in the past would have been politically impossible, it is the changes going on behind the scenes that is more important. Trump is only the most obvious political manifestation of this change.

The less obvious responses elsewhere in the ruling class are both surprising and expected, a contradiction that is simply natural in our complex political culture. And yet, that reaction is maybe more significant than anything Trump plans to do.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

23 comments

  • Related:

    OLD DEMOCRATS, NEW REPUBLICANS AND POLITCAL WARFARE

    “What a fine political mess the weakness of the RINO component of the Republican party and the strength of the radical Leftist true believer zealot Democrats has wrought. ”

    https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/old-democrats-new-republicans-and-politcal-warfare

  • Mark Sizer

    Time will tell, but I believe you may be overly optimistic. Movements do not go quietly into that good night. They rage.

    I agree that a corner _may_ have been turned, but we’re in a labyrinth, not a triangle. There are many more corners ahead. Not the best metaphor.

  • Jeff Wright

    I think the American public has been consistent myself.

    They didn’t want Al Gore shutting down oil, so they voted for Bush–they then elected Obama to get us out of Iraq. Trump for the border (though Fauci cost him an immediate re-election). Biden ended the Afghanistan war, and now Trump is back on the border.

    The American people are telling you what they want.

    Now, all of a sudden, Trump puts this RFK in charge and he and Fox now sound like the Michelle Obama food-police.

    Just keep it up.

  • Mark Sizer: Wait for part three to decide if I am too optimistic. :)

  • John

    Sorry to nit-pick, but “Japanese general” should read admiral.

    Time will tell if the post is correct. I think a lot of the election results were because of inflation. Trump and DOGE need to stop the bleeding – stop printing money. No way is the government going to let go of a blank check, either side. Debt ceiling needs to come back. It may be too late already.

  • Ray Van Dune

    Part of making a real change is getting the celebrity and media people to pay attention to the citizenry’s real concerns.

    That’s why I’m unhappy with Trump supposedly having a rapprochement with the Morning Joe scumbags. Yeah they besmirched HIM, but they lied to US!

    Trump should tell them to go to hell until they apologize to the American people!! And acknowledge their dishonesty, not just the “sorry if you were offended” crap!

  • John: Corrected to admiral. Thank you. As I noted to Mark Sizer, this is only part one of three parter. Stay tuned. I have a lot more to say.

  • Ray Van Dune:

    They “Joe and Mika” who I also personally despise apparently had to bow to Trump after slandering him for 9 years. Their entire media existence depended on it. And Trump welcomes them into his DOJ / FBI raided home for a sit down. Counter intuitive on all levels, and that is an example of true dominant leadership. I suspect he learned that philosophy of operation from Roy Cohen.

    “Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer”.

    What they are and are attempting to do is clear for all to see and Trump will certainly leverage that to his advantage. They may win some corporate imposed requirement to “Fix Things” but they will lose and be used in the long run. They have both revealed themselves as being pure soulless and ideological rudderless media whores.

    You remember this right? Mika B: “Its our job to tell the American people what to think”: https://youtu.be/C3YK9UnDk8U?si=sfXdsuuUKA-I2rb- 2 min.

    And you know who her father was. She is a fully trained psyop operator, and Joe is just another propagandist and tool.

    So weak, so desperate, Leftist.

    Trump wins again.

    Whores and media whores have a place in America too.

    They all have jobs to do.

  • Ray Van Dune

    Cotour, Trump likes to say he works for me (us). So he needs to show it by scoring wins I can celebrate, not just ones that establish private advantage, and he needs to show those notoriously faint-hearted around him how to do it too.

    Another way to look at it: if we don’t notch some scalp-counts, they’ll just keep trying. If they’re gonna FA, then they need to FO, and hard!

  • Skunk Bucket

    In today’s schools praying is banned, but preying is evidently just fine.

  • John

    Another example to the original post is that youtube no longer has a monopoly on video. Rumble is growing, and weakening youtube’s ability to censor and cancel. Combine Rumble with X and signal is getting out. The time is now to support Rumble and X.

  • Brian

    That Japanese Admirals name was Yamamoto who was the architect of the Dec 7th 1941 Pearl Harbor attack

  • MDN

    I shared a similar take across my mailing list with a slightly different take. I agree that things feel a lot more promising after this election with conservatives no longer intimidated from speaking out publicly.

    But what triggered my take was Elon Musk posting a note that his PAC is not closing down or even slowing down post election. Rather they have already begun ramping efforts for the coming special elections triggered by cabinet appointments as well as the midterms to keep the ball rolling. And it is a pro-active focus on such election centric blocking and tackling that will guard against falling back asleep. Thus I see Musk as the real giant that has been aWOKEn, and filled with a terrible resolve.

    But it is tremendous to see that the popular culture has woken up too!

  • Henry Stoat

    The true threat to the Republic is economic. The national debt is now $36 trillion and climbing. Interest is 17.18% of the budget. No one is even talking about this. What’s the plan for when interest is fully half the budget? Print some more paper money? How long will it be before inflation causes a gallon of milk to cost $50?
    As bonds, notes and bills become due they are not retired (paid off), but “rolled over”. This means new bonds are issued and sold at auction. If no one wants them, the Federal Reserve prints up the money to buy them – with the tap of a key. This is called “monetizing the debt”. Every dollar they print causes devaluation.
    At the current rate, in 10 years interest will be 100% of the budget, and absolutely no one is trying to stop it. What I want to know is, what is the endgame here? What do the psychopaths in power plan to do when hyperinflation drives the value of the dollar to zero?
    Default is inevitible. Deliveries will stop. Power will fail. Cities will empty.
    Ten years is not really all that long. A real purge is coming on the horizon.

  • GeorgeC

    Will freedom on Mars be an example? Hey: libs in Concord Massachusettes are now dealing with the fact that Ford visited for the 200th anniversary of April 19 1775 and Trump might visit for the 250th.

  • Dave Walden

    Robert:

    I am always supportive of your site and the perspectives you share on it!

    A MAJOR inflection point occurred in the 1964 election in which Barry Goldwater, who I term to have been a “serious Reagan” before there was a Reagan, was absolutely trounced by Lyndon “Great Society/Guns % Butter” Johnson! To illustrate what has happened to the Republican Party since that event, here is a quote by Goldwater he made during the 1964 campaign:

    “I have little interest in streamlining government or in making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size. I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom. My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them. It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution, or that have failed their purpose, or that impose on the people an unwarranted financial burden. I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is “needed” before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible. And if I should later be attacked for neglecting my constituents’ “interests,” I shall reply that I was informed that their main interest is liberty and that in that cause I am doing the very best I can.” – Barry Goldwater

    As I cannot allow myself otherwise, I remain hopeful and maintain my optimism which flows therefrom. As the consequences from past political follies/tragedies plague the efforts of those within the Trump administration who have the best of intentions, the remains of the media’s “extinction event”- that was, in fact, an inescapable effect of the election, will doggedly unfold!

    I hope the surviving creatures in the congress are “up” for their (media’s) death throes!

    (I wish I could contribute more than I do but I have, over the years, maintained what I remain able.)

    Dave Walden

  • Dave Walden:

    Thank you for bringing that Goldwater quote to my attention, I will be using it.

  • Chris

    George C … and what was the issue at Bunker Hill and Concord? Government seizure of firearms

    Henry Stoat I agree that very hard times are coming but they are more than economic. The economic situation is only one issue – but a major one as you point out. The world economy follows the US and so the world too will suffer. In addition, there are many evil ones who wish to solve, or try to solve their woes by harming others. A weakened US presents that chance. We will need to choose how we react.

    WWII coming directly after the Depression presented the US with a similar set of choices. What would the world be like if we had not entered that conflict? See the The Man in the High Castle – Phillip K Dick (the Amazon series is very good).
    This is an example of what could have been. The possibilities today are many.

    Today, not only could we see the evil descend upon the “innocent” and weak; we could see the evil ones fight amongst them selves – see Russia’s pacific port Vladivostok, the PRC have historical/political claims on this region. These could include nuclear exchanges. I believe the US power and desire for a peaceful pacific today help to keep the potential conflict at bay, A weakened US – no longer the World Cop – could bring this and other potential conflicts to boil. We will need to decide what we will do.

    The current state of the US is different than prior to WWII:
    30% of world manufacturing vs 18% (behind PRC 20%)
    A generally fit population vs today’s rates where 23 states report 35% obesity
    A population that truly had individual responsibility vs today’s dependent society
    A population that had deep religious beliefs that made moral choices vs expedient ones
    …etc

    We have so much to rectify and I believe President Trump is on the correct and right path, but we have a great and perhaps unrealized burden across the board. When the hard times come; and they will be hard vs. what President Trump says; will this population still carry the torch? This will be the test. Then we will see if Robert’s treatise that the US giant has awakened is true.

  • Related:

    A RISING TIDE DROWNS POLITICAL TREASON

    “That sentiment and those aspirations are at the core of the coming D.J. Trump administration. Let the tide rise, drown political treason and lift all boats and let freedom reign in America. And it only took 60 years to be realized.”

    https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/hubris-barry-goldwater-political-treason

  • Max

    “President Vladimir Putin in September warned that such a move would put NATO “at war” with Russia — and that if Ukraine were to attack Russia with long-range missiles then Moscow would “take the appropriate decisions based on the threats.”

    Peskov said Monday that Putin’s position is that such strikes would ultimately be carried out not by Ukraine, but by the countries that permit such missile use.”

    https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2024/11/19/ukraine-strikes-russian-border-region-with-us-made-missiles-moscow-says-a87067

    Hard line backup Communication cables cut by China between Germany/Finland and other countries. If blast happens, satellites useless. Everyone blind.

  • pzatchok

    If we could keep the left and the Dems from changing back in to a party for the people the right could make HUGE gains in the next two elections.

  • letmepicyou

    It has? I highly doubt it. 99% of you still can’t quote a single line from your Bible, yet believe wholeheartedly all kinds of ridiculous nonsense told to you by Zionist-corrupted ‘evangelicals’. Not one of you can identify where communism comes from, but if told “communism is a Jewish construct”, well suddenly you know where it DOESN’T come from, despite having absolutely no idea where it DOES come from. Weird, how non-knowledge forms spontaneously in the brainwashed mind, isn’t it?

    Nobody can seem to figure out why the HEBREW ISRAELITES of the Bible were called “Israelites”, and why the Jews of the so-called “Israel” in the middle east are called ISRAELIS. Was there a name change? Not that I’m aware of. Last time I checked, the “Jews” in “Israel” are NOT the “Hebrew Israelites” of the Bible. But, oh yeah. The sleeping giant is awake. To what? Nap time?

    None of you can identify where the “star of David” is mentioned in the Bible (hint: it ISN’T mentioned, because it doesn’t exist).

    I could start in the book of Genesis and list things none of you are aware of by matter of FACT.

    If you think the “sleeping giant has awakened”, I think you’re out of your mind with some kind of psychological illness. Not 1 of you knows scripture. Not ONE. Or there would be universal rebellion over those who follow the STAR OF REMPHAN who infest our government and who make up nearly the ENTIRETY of all “presidential” cabinets. Trump…Biden…Obama…Bush…doesn’t make a bit of difference, THE CABINET REMAINS THE SAME. RAN BY ZIONIST AIPAC ADL JEWS. PERIOD.

    Sleeping giant awake my a**.

  • If these subjects are so important to you and your argument, could you please provide the answers to the questions that you ask?

    Or are you going to keep your perspective and your conclusions secret?

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