How do we wield The Ring of Power?
A conversation on power & politics, Lord of the Rings & Avatar: The Last Airbender
Good morning friends! I won’t normally plunk for my new show every week (or email you twice in 24 hours), but I thought you might particularly enjoy this new episode of Right Now which dropped this morning. Why? At the center of this discourse is actually my weekend viewing of The Lord of The Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. There is this robust argument happening on the political right about the virtue of wielding government power for a common or higher good. Traditionally, you’ve always had libertarians and conservatives united around a small-government ideology where they share a distrust of government power. Because people are fallen. absolute power corrupts absolutely, and a “common good” doesn’t really exist (that last one is a more libertarian view). We get to this after an introductory conversation on hope.
This tradition, known as “Fusionism” on the right, has really cracked up. When I watched LOTR recently, I saw Boromir and Aragorn differently. Boromir to me seemed like this “common good” conservative faction who has given way to despair as their enemies grow in strength, and want to wield the Ring of Power in an effort to turn the tide. Aragorn maintains his distrust of that kind of power.
If you want my reading list for this week’s episode of the show, you can find that here.
Against the Blackpill (The American Mind)
https://americanmind.org/salvo/against-the-blackpill/
Nickelodeon creates Avatar Studios to create new Avatar, Legend of Korra content (The Verge)
The Flight 93 Essay (Claremont Review of Books)
https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/digital/the-flight-93-election/
A critique of the Flight 93 mindset by Conor Friedersdorf (The Atlantic)
Can Libertarian and Conservatives keep work together? Fusionism explained by Stephanie Slade (Reason)
https://reason.com/2021/02/10/is-there-a-future-for-fusionism/
Government, Lord of the Rings and wielding the Ring of Power (Townhall)
Rush Limbaugh and generational politics of despair (The Dispatch)
https://frenchpress.thedispatch.com/p/rush-limbaugh-and-the-rights-generational
George Washington and calming the Newburgh Conspiracy
https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/george-washington-calms-down-the-newburgh-conspiracy
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It’s me, Stephen Kent! I’m the curator of Politicize Me, host of “Right Now” and the Beltway Banthas Podcast + forthcoming author of ‘How The Force Can Fix The World’ (Hachette-Center Street). You can follow me on Twitter @Stephen_Kent89.