Coercion in a Conservative Regime
The state must be as least coercive as humanly possible, this includes as little edict and mandate as possible - especially the implementation, or just mild use, of a welfare state.
The ultimate clearpill is realizing that God’s Law is the real Iron law. Whatever acts in contradiction to, or rather what I’d call retaliatory rejection, to what Thomas Hobbes’ called the Natural Laws, ends up caving in on itself. Whenever a body of governance tries to act against the basics of human nature, and even moreso, the tendencies that nature acts towards, such a body of governance is quite literally obliged to collapse. This is seen in the Soviet Union’s, not only corruptive, anti-merit form of government that led to absolutely no criticism or feedback, but the fact it had no price system for which the economy to signal the real value of goods and services. In a communist system, prices will always either be too expensive, or too cheap. This is what leads to there being no washing out of malinvestment. It leads to the system collapsing in on itself as it has no meritorious, or even just competent, people in charge. If you have a boom that is built on malinvestment when that boom is undermined by the natural ebbs and flows of the real economy, your eggman bureaucratic despotate will collapse, and unlike a free market, which generally allows for just the losers to lose, it also brings down the entirety of the population living under this system.
Without the price system, the Soviet Union (and similarly, current CCP-led China propping up the cooked books of their defaulting corporations) had a vast bureaucracy that, over the decades, could only guarantee their job via bribes. The more bribing there was, the more cynical people became. The only way to get a good job was through favors. Ultimately, the system itself was like a mesothelioma patient’s lungs that no longer can function, as they become all but scar tissue; a simple resemblance of lungs.
Even in the case of Enron, they did so much financial engineering, subtracting whatever expenses and liabilities they could. This led to less preference over the longevity and profitability of the company, and more preference over how much the head honchos and their cronies could make before it all fell apart.
This is why I resent any form of socialism. I am, by no means, not aware that meritocracies to their fullest extents never really coalesce. You need strong hands, meaty militaries, and ironclad big tents that bring a population together, while also asserting their combined sovereignty. The best example of humanity achieving meritocracy was Ming Dynasty China, where those who were in power just so happened to be the smartest, most civically-learned, well-read historians; talented in cartography and calligraphy, theologically and spiritually-honed, aristocrats. This is why they, and their Qing successors, featured technological and financial highs that modern democracy does not and cannot emulate. Democracy, and political liberalism in all forms, is naturally-inclined towards socialism. Socialism speaks to the desires and perceived injustices that people have and see. For most people, who are economically unread, or otherwise do not understand why socialist policymaking never works in any sense, tend to just think that any injustice they see can be solved by a “let them eat cake” mentality.
That is the basis of socialist thinking: that any societal issue can be solved by the state mandating something.
I even find myself in this type of thinking when weary about the issues of modernity. For those souls who are sensitive to the moral dismay and rampant sinfulness of modernity, it is easy to be trapped in the; “Well why don’t we just get rid of that! Why don’t we just mandate this!” mentality. This is why, consequently, I think it is appropriate for there to be an absolute king that listens and hones in on the people’s qualms and queries. Most people, to some extent, agree that, even just in terms of civil engineering, this is a preferable answer to the complete division and chaos that we have witnessed in the ashes of liberalism taken to its logical conclusion.
In terms of the superiority of absolute monarchy, Thomas Hobbes has it spot on. However, he was very early to the topics of how governments ought to be run. That aspect of his critiques of assemblymen-led governments has been shown to be blatantly true. In terms of economics, however (Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations wouldn’t be published for another 97 years after Hobbes’ death) Hoppe is spot-on.
You see, the mechanics of running a government are quite simple: The Sovereign rules all in his land. When he wants to levy taxes for whatever it may be, or conscripts for a war, he must be a convincing, and decent enough leader, to issue such fiat edicts. This makes the finances of the nation much more hinged on his ability to maintain peace of all classes, races, and creeds. The king has the full weight of the nation on his shoulders.
Now, say you are a Christian (or whoever might be the conservative “faction” in this made up example), who for whatever reason, believe that through whatever financial engineering your mind has cooked up, that the state should support the families of the nation in a welfare-like system, wherein people are paid to have children. Whoever the Sovereign is, whether a King or Assemblymen, issues a law that dictates taxes must be collected for the families of the nation. Likewise, this leads to people having more kids, as they are paid to have children. Generally, the people more likely to have kids, ever since the beginning of the Industrial revolution in the late 1700s, were the peasants. Since technological advancements in medicine and farming made it easier for the people who would otherewise croak to a relatively weak illness or even just their own dolt tendencies, are now allowed to live in relative ease having as many children as possible. So, these people who would otherwise probably work an unskilled job are now given a licensure to make unskilled side-income at the expense of their tax-paying countrymen, they have as many kids as they can, and jump through whatever loopholes possible to gain favor in a system that literally pays them to procreate.
You can add whatever caveat to this system, as even Conservative Christians seem to be so disenchanted with the idea of liberty and autonomy that they are adopting the dunce policymaking of Communist China. Albeit, fashioned with the labels of their own individual or group values because they saw that Hungary was doing their own version of trad socialism, but it doesn’t change the fact that this inadvertently will create an untouchable class of people who depend on the state. Of whom, the state can militarize in any way possible so that these people’s gibs are maintained. This is always the end result of any form of public funding for the end result of benefitting a certain group over another. The only time that public coffers are ever spent in non-coercive way that benefits the entire nation is when the state is in a defensive war, and the sacrifices of the citizenry’s quality of life is important to be made to maintain their own commonwealth’s sovereignty.
However, the state must be a private entity, owned by the King, and act purely on its own behalf, as to be as blatant and honest as it can be to those it is coercing to benefit the state’s coffers. If the King has to actively convince his people, and the people are rather seen as his people, then his sovereignty hinges on providing as much accepted protection that all people’s are generally comfortable with. His entire institution’s livelihood depends on keeping his people together, and making sacrifices where such sacrifices must be made, whether it be partition, or conquering another nation that continuously affronts his people’s sovereignty.
For instance, a gang of roving bandits mustn’t be seen as simple misunderstood fellows, much like the modern US government sees its own situation with domestic crime and invading illegals. A sovereign nation would deal with these afflictions, whether it be war, reparations, or what have you. I cannot bear to tangent forever, but it must be understood that the democratic republic’s psychopathic rules benefit solely from maintaining more and more chaos, as it continues to convince its reliable patsies that it is trying to solve its own artificially-created messes. The Democratic Party, and the Cathedral, do not care about your cities collapsing, or illegals replacing your dying culture. They literally couldn’t care less, and the form of government they act within is the reason this has been so easy for them.
So likewise, the issue of a low birthrate and well, poverty, are issues to specifically those who think through the filter of liberalism and the myth of progress. The quality and happiness of a people does not solely hinge on poverty. Birthrates, in my opinion, would naturally rise when communitarianism returns to the forefront of American life. If that means sacrificing the instant gratification, hypermaterialistic world we currently live in then, I think you might agree, so be it! Poverty, or simply just there being poor people, is not a sign of a society’s quality. If we are modest, yet live lovely, meaningful lives with less prevalence of depression and moral degeneracy, is that not better off? Those who do not recognize that truly Christian Commonwealths have charity and community that pick up the slack for what would otherwise be a dysfunctional welfare state. People have forgotten how to stop thinking through the filter of the mighty state, or seeing through the lens of mandate. They don’t realize that for most of human history, especially in times of peace, people functioned in communities, and to some level, giving their allegiance to a Monarch to bring some level of peace and civility that otherwise would be a constant state of tribal warfare.
Socialism will never work. Coercion of the state is a constant, and I will never pretend that that doesn’t have its place. I will never pretend that anarchism is even a real “system.” I do not believe in an ideal system. If you are a Christian, and hold firm faith that Moses spoke to God, in the incorporeality of the spiritual realm, and in that, for lack of a better term, there is an absolute Good and Evil, then I implore you, give me a system that works perfectly; where man can pretend to rule, with some iron fist, in a way that God can. There simply isn’t. God gave us the tools, speaking to Moses, bringing inspiration to the minor prophets, and sacrificing Himself in the most real way He could, through Jesus Christ His Son, so that we might have an opportunity at being saved from the horrors of this world. All things being perfect, the Kingdom of God rules. In this broken world, where nothing is quite as smooth and perfect as we intend — the road to hell being paved with good intentions — where every edict that steals productivity to provide some short-term benefit to a class or group at the expense of another, in a world of constant give and take, I implore you; give me your Maoist five-year plan that solves the issues of fatherlessness in households and the crime and heartache that it is tied to, the amount of casual sex that our society glorifies, the desires the youths prefer to worship over God, that they will no doubt regret later in life.
There isn’t an answer. Ironically, this only leads to the natural state of war that man is in, unless there is some combining force of the state — an absolute monarch — that pacifies him. If you rule the libs with con leaders, is that not a state of war? The simple fact is that when coercion is utilized by the state for the preference over one group over another, that the state is acting in the same exact short-term time preference that any democratic republic or socialist republic acts in. The woes of the family breakdown in the West, apart from the existential issues with instant communication and the unstoppable cyclical nature of human civilization, is based in the mistakes our nation made when we threw out the recognition of the very real nature of there always being an aristocracy and plutocracy, that the state is always based in some level of coercion, that using the coercive tool of the state to levy wealth for itself or its cronies (or the ruling party’s constituents) is an outcome of tyranny and corruption. We abandoned this knowledge because it was beneficial for those in power to take advantage of the people - plain and simple.
The proclivity for assembly-led nations where people are split up and “represented” by an “elected” group ends in division and bloodshed. The assemblymen have everything to gain in utilizing the coercive aspect of the state, and everything to lose in maintaining peace and harmony among their opposing polities.
I am not trying to offer up a holier-than-thou point-of-view. I will always be the first to say that I am wrong, or that there is more for me to learn. However, I see many Republican politicians, national conservative (but socially liberal) foreign parties, and those in the broader circles of paleo and nRX making the same mistakes that certain bad parties of a bygone era in a certain faltering European country made. Sorry, arguments for a mighty state will always get you soundbited and disregarded. Sorry! I don’t make the rules!
And I’m not trying to make it seem like the state is useless. It most certainly is not. The failure of libertarians (and surprise, surprise, Hoppe is right again) is that they became socially liberal, and hedonic in their lifestyles. The stiff, socially conservative or moderate, suit-wearing Austrian economist libertarians of the 1970s have little if at all similarities to the libertarians of the modern Libertarian Party. This is why, among many other happenings, I think modern conservatives just have a bad taste in their mouth about libertarianism, or even just the idea of there being a small state. They think the state ought to be used as a weapon against their foes, much as the libs are doing right now. I don’t blame you if you are like this. I also agree heavily with Moldbug and BAP that the state is essentially functioning as a communist assemblage. What else is the natural logical conclusion of not only a democratic republic, but one that specifically embraced the communist definitions of ideas like equality and opportunity.
This is where I would like to conclude, too: I do not wish to have any compunctions with my reactionary counterparts who have less of a libertarian bent (and, no, I do not take any pride in calling myself a libertarian). I simply wish for them to separate their rightful frustration with the establishment, the Cathedral, the ruling elite, and the quite clearly Satanic powers-that-be from their own understanding of how a proper state functions in peace time — which is what we want, PEACETIME. Currently, the US is in a state of total war, and to avoid saying anymore keyword warrants that will get me shadowbanned from existence, I would like y’all to ponder where your frustration is begotten, why your solution is so gloomy and angry, and what you can do to turn it into something actually useful and productive in whatever post-regime change world we are in. Because those who want to simply turn the state against their foes are missing the point, and will only cause more irreparable damage than any good that might come from it.
The answer to our current bloated debt that will only end in a stifling, whimpering collapse is not turning the gun on the bad guys. It’s subjugating them, returning everything to some level of neutrality, and constructing a system that offers nothing but the littlest amount of coercion from a state that acts as a representative of everyone that it governs. That means returning to what worked: charity, church, community. The state should never, and I mean never, utilize its coercive tools willy-nilly to garner the affection of a group over another. You might think that that coercive property is useful at times, but just like Milton Friedman said,
“Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program.”
Every state-mandated edict, no matter how good the intentions are, will lead to permanent dismay that only gets solved through, not reform, but some aspect of revolution. If your system starts with the properties of a socialist republic, no matter how much you want to paint the Christian label, it will fall to the entropic proclivities that every actively coercive state, regardless of government form, falls to. Whether it be a gov’t-mandated program for funding childcare led by a self-described Conservative leadership, or funding abortions by a self-described Liberal leadership; no matter how perceptively moral, or blatantly immoral, the outcome will be the same.
I will defer to Hoppe’s Democracy: The God That Failed for any specifically moral mandates. As someone who is against abortions, I think it is pertinent abortions be banned, as they are murder. Now, abiding by the same rule that “cons should govern cons, libs should govern libs,” I think that it is perfectly appropriate and can function in this possible, and even likely, future. Once we start manufacturing a welfare state, governing groups differently, favoring certain people over other, utilizing the coffers of the state, then we are doomed to the compulsive foibles of democracy and socialism.
“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”
Josh Billings