Caesar Schmeaser
America doesn’t need to ever become a bluntly authoritarian nor totalitarian state, nor does it ever have to shed its liberal veneer.
In an interview with the Substack Lament for the Nations, political philosopher Nathan Pinkoski is asked The Question Of Our Times:
LIMES: Is America at risk of civil war?
PINKOSKI: Some people talk about a “cold civil war.” I find this a useful concept because it suggests that we won’t see a new Civil War, a country splitting into regions at war with one another, or ethnic conflicts like those in Bosnia. If we ever have a new civil war in the United States, it will resemble the Spanish Civil War. A nationalized conflict. It will divide homes, families, and neighborhoods. I find that highly unlikely in the short or medium term.
Everyone has been trying to find a historical analogue for the prospective second American civil war. The Spanish Civil War has likely been cited most as the shoe which fits. I personally believe that the character of America’s next civil war will be unique, bearing little resemblance to Spain’s or any other historical example. Wars in general take on the characteristics of the societies involved. The only similarity between 2026 U.S. and 1936 Spain is the political polarization, and even there, the polarization in the U.S., bad as it is, is still not near as bad as it was in Spain on the eve of civil war.
The thing about Spain, along with 1910s Russia, was that life was incredibly difficult for most. That and people of the time had virtually no voice, no political representation. Violence was really the only way to speak out. Political divides weren’t simply a matter of differences in culture and philosophy. There were very tangible stakes involved. In today’s U.S., the two sides aren’t divided by class nor deprivation. Both sides enjoy the highest standard of living imaginable for a population this size.
I do agree that the next civil war will divide homes, families, and neighborhoods. Everyone will be forced to pick ideologically-defined sides. The conflict does not fall along geographic lines. I also believe there will be a third side - the security state - which will try to restore order. The point is, a side will need to be chosen. Pinkoski is also correct in saying a civil war is highly unlikely in the short or medium term. I’ll go as far as to say it may not even happen until the next Fourth Turning, which is another 80-some-odd years from now.
We are, however, definitely in a “cold” civil war, and sporadic low-intensity conflict [bold mine]:
The “cold civil war” evokes a hardening of positions, an ideological conflict perhaps without major outbursts of violence, but rooted in the idea that we can no longer live with people who hold an opposing ideology. A conflict in which the question is: wouldn’t we be better off if that ideology and its supporters didn’t exist at all, if they were no longer part of the country? In the Spanish Civil War, it was that impulse that provoked the desire to exterminate the other side and shaped the character of the conflict’s violence. In the United States, we are not at that point; however, there is the deeply destabilizing aspiration to remove the enemy from society. In the short term, this translates into low-intensity violence, political murders like that of Charlie Kirk. If you want to participate in public life, you’ll need a vast security apparatus to defend you. We’ve had attempts to kill Justice Brett Kavanaugh and J.D. Vance. Recently, someone was charged with the attempted murder of the founder of my organization, Russell Vought. Sooner or later, an assassin will succeed. To be in public life, you will need 24/7 security and surveillance. People who cannot endure that lifestyle will withdraw from the public arena. We are moving very quickly toward a low-trust society, where we hesitate to speak openly with neighbors or fellow citizens, because deep down in our hearts we fear encountering someone who wants to eliminate us.
I’d say we already are a low-trust society. In fact, America may be the lowest-trust society in the world:
The only difference is that America doesn’t build nor organize itself as a low-trust society yet. But culturally, socially, we’re already there. Events of the coming years will only exacerbate this trend. The extent to which the U.S. is a multicultural society is overstated, but if we insist upon continued multiculturalization, then long-term, the only way to manage social conflict in such a society, besides Third Worldist race communism, or a surveillance-security state where the rule of law is absolute. Both are less-than-ideal choices, but one’s clearly superior to the other.
Another key point Pinkoski astutely raises is how those who cannot afford security won’t be able to participate in the political process. Similarly, those who cannot afford a lawyer won’t be able to so much as participate in local city council meetings. America doesn’t need to ever become a bluntly authoritarian nor totalitarian state, nor does it ever have to shed its liberal veneer. Just as most people already don’t participate in the political process, a country can suppress political participation by simply raising the costs of doing so. It’s already happening. Some are allowed to get away with speaking out. Others aren’t. The future is now.
On the topic of security, Pinkoski makes the case that, contrary to most narratives, the state is becoming stronger, not weaker:
LIMES: In previous decades, the deep state was still able to secure the cooperation of private actors. Now the techno-capitalists are telling the state: step aside, you’re not capable of defending the country. What has changed in the balance of power?
PINKOSKI: Critics of neoliberalism have long argued that the rise of capital would sooner or later subordinate politics. I think, however, it is better to view contemporary developments as a sort of public-private partnership that manifests itself in different ways. It is very difficult for capital to act against the interests, pressures, and imperatives of the national security state. Any analysis of the triumph of capital must reckon with the extent to which these bureaucracies control the system—a power that has only increased in recent years. For example, it has become more difficult to maintain a prominent political profile by criticizing the national security state. You end up having to speak well of it. Not long ago, we had people in Congress proposing to abolish the CIA or break up the FBI. Today, those figures have vanished. The Trumanite security apparatus, created at the beginning of the Cold War, has expanded its powers since 9/11 and shows no sign of reversing course. The most successful companies in recent years are those that have joined forces with state bureaucracies. Palantir is a prime example.
Several essays ago, I made this very argument: the security state is the constant, the proverbial deep state, and the true source of all power in the U.S. It’s not the military, as it was for much of history. Those with access to information, all the nation’s secrets, and charged with enforcing the law, this is the hand behind the throne in the postmodern era. The deeper America sinks into crisis, the more legitimacy the security state will gain, and thus the more powerful it’ll become. The security state is the only entity capable of overthrowing the president and it’s the one institution every administration must have on-side.
I always cringe when comparing the U.S. to Russia or any other country, because the comparison is always so imperfect. However, just as Russia is ruled by a “spookocracy” - a state dominated by intelligence and law enforcement agencies, where highest levels of government are occupied by those of said services - plus an oligarchy of businessman who dominate the petroleum and natural resource markets, future America will be a spookocracy as well, backed by oligarchs of the tech industry. We’re already seeing our evolution into just such a state.
Pinkoski is asked about the extent to which Trump is accelerating the trend towards authoritarianism:
LIMES: Trump is attempting a revolution of constitutional powers. What is the risk of institutional chaos?
PINKOSKI: I don’t think it fuels chaos among the branches of government. If anything, it fits into a broader sociological and legal debate that has been ongoing for some time in the United States regarding the powers of the executive branch. The Trump administration is attempting to restore the so-called unitary executive by offering a different interpretation of Article 2 of the Constitution. That’s the legal aspect. The sociological aspect lies in the fact that, since the Watergate scandal in the 1970s, the president has been viewed as a threat, at least in the imagination of the baby boomer generation. Exercising too much authority is seen as authoritarianism. The full exercise of the president’s powers puts the Constitution at risk. With the gradual passing of the baby boomers, these anxieties are receding. The question from now on will not be whether, but how to exercise the powers of the presidency. The desire for a strong executive is growing, not the consensus on what it should do. It could be a “blue Caesar” for the Democratic Party’s priorities or a “red Caesar” for the conservatives’ priorities. Since everyone wants this sort of Caesar who does what he says, the issue is not so much chaos as the fact that every presidential election will be seen as existential. This is how people will mobilize, even those least attentive to the political system. [MR] The current Supreme Court favors this interpretation, being composed of as many as six originalist justices, a school of thought that has invoked the unitary nature of the executive branch since the Reagan years, if not earlier. The Court will grant the president increasing discretion, and this will raise the stakes in the election.
Basically, the instability in governance isn’t the result of power imbalances between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of government. It’s that Our Democracy consists of two drunken mobs constantly fighting over who gets control of the White House. The president, whomever it may be, is increasingly asked to do more and more, much of which strays well beyond the confines laid out in the Constitution, beyond what the Founders intended, and doesn’t even benefit the country as a whole. I hesitate to call this “Caesarism” as Pinkoski does, since the term implies an intractable political crisis, an existential emergency, which can only be overcome through a strong executive. I believe America to certainly be in crisis, if not emergency, but most Americans, particularly on the Left, either don’t see it that way, or are motivated by achieving total political victory at any cost.
I think a Caesarist leader will eventually come to power in the U.S. However, I believe he’ll be less overtly authoritarian than we might expect. Political legitimacy in the Anglo-American world still depends on projecting a veneer of democracy; overtly autocratic or dictatorial leaders will likely be resisted by both sides. This obviously depends on how bad things get, but as I so often say, predicting worst-case outcomes is like predicting your own death. Even America’s most authoritarian leaders - Washington, Lincoln, Delano Roosevelt - aren’t generally described as dictators because they all appeared to work within the system and didn’t transcend the rule of law, though they might’ve skirted it. Note, also, that Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt were America’s leaders during our Fourth Turnings.
American Caesar will likely rely on the managerial bureaucratic national security state to maintain order. This is how things work for the most part now, anyhow.
On the hot topics of immigration and race:
LIMES: How important is race in the nationalist revolution?
PINKOSKI: The top issue for people is immigration. It’s important to specify this because it relates to a broader concern: assimilation no longer works; we no longer have a unified American culture. It’s not an ethno-nationalist aspiration. It’s not an effort to preserve or restore a particular racial homogeneity. Of course, there are people who care about race, genetics, and IQ. But that is not what drives the movement; if anything, it is the anxiety stemming from the fact that mass immigration has diluted our shared culture and weakened the economy. If we survey MAGA voters, we find that few fear the country will become less white. If anything, they fear that immigrants are not incentivized to assimilate. I do think, however, that some cases require us to consider the ethnic aspect. One concerns the Somali fraud scandal. The debate is not that some particular race should be excluded from the United States. Instead, it is about noticing that some groups we have legally accepted for quite some time have very little interest in assimilating. Therefore, we remove the special legal privileges that make it easier for them to enter into our country. I think this is an acknowledgment that some tribes in the world do not find a suitable place in the United States and view the country more as one to exploit than one in which to assimilate. [MR]
Despite the Left’s attempts to malign it, the Right isn’t motivated by ethno-nationalism. No, we don’t want America to become any less White than it is. But that’s because race, like it or not, has strong implications for what kind of country we’ll become. Institutions aren’t people-independent. America’s institutions were established by Anglo-American Whites and, for most of our history, maintained by European-descent Whites. It’s because of them we’ve come as far as we have.
America has racists. But unless you’re speaking of dyed-in-the-wool White nationalists and supremacists who live far removed from our population centers or have done prison time, of which there are few, even most tolerate a more diverse country, content to complaining about it on social media. Americans, Whites specifically, are the least racist people in the world. It’s a demonstrable fact.
But once you begin messing with the cultural make-up of the country, once the country becomes a free-for-all for certain foreigners and minority groups, that’s not going to sit right with any reasonable person. It has nothing to do with your attitude towards diversity or race, in fact. It’s a simply question of consistency and fairness: are we all playing by the same rules or not? Just as important: are we on the same team? Or are we competing tribes?
Pinkoski also gets at something I’ve brought up many times, about how the increasing diversity of the country is making much of our discourse on things like race outdated:
Another point to consider is that we no longer live in the 1960s, when the country was 90% white and 10% Black. For the left, the central struggle for decades has been reconciliation between whites and blacks. Many debates, right up to Black Lives Matter, centered on one question: what responsibilities do the former have toward the latter? Since the country’s racial composition has changed profoundly, that debate is no longer as relevant as it once was. I believe that much of the left and the conservative old guard feel nostalgia for the clarity of debates during that biracial era. But both are thinking of a demographic map of the country that no longer exists. The real problem is the cultural fragmentation among various ethnic groups that has emerged in recent decades and whether it is still possible to revive civic nationalism.
The fact is, no non-White person whose family arrived after 1965 can tap into America’s regrettable racial history as a grievance, because it’s not their history. The fear among non-Whites is that what happened to blacks and other non-Whites in the past could happen to them again, and while this is true in theory, it’s also about as useful as worrying about an EMP attack. We simply don’t live in the same country as 100 or even 70 years ago. And if your distrust in the racial majority’s willingness to do right by you is that strong, that’s an argument for not living here to begin with. You can’t choose to be a minority despite being deathly afraid of what the majority might do to you.
The upside to greater diversification is that it’s made it more difficult for any one group - blacks specifically - to monopolize discourse or grievance. The downside is, as a group, the multicultural Left remains a potent political force. Many on the Right won’t like this, but even as we believe America is better off as a majority White country, some level of diversification needs to be accepted, if not wholeheartedly embraced. The level of demographic change in the U.S. has been so massive, like it or not, that it needs to be factored into any future political coalition. Whining about it, talking about remigrating everyone, these aren’t solutions.
Finally, love it or hate it, White consciousness simply isn’t a thing in America, the West let alone. So, while it’s a losing game trying to win the black, Asian, and Hispanic vote, focusing entirely on winning the White vote is going to become an exhausted strategy as well, especially as Boomers begin passing on in greater numbers. I’ve always said America isn’t a racially-divided society. It’s primarily the black community that pushes race as an issue and other minority groups are following their lead. At some point, we’ll need other groups to be part of the coalition as well.
Pinkoski is asked bluntly about the future of democracy:
LIMES If it isn’t, does that mean democracy becomes impossible too?
PINKOSKI: That is the real challenge. I believe immigration is a political priority precisely for this reason: if we want a homogeneous country, in the sense where everyone shares the same civic and constitutional culture, we must be able to adjust immigration accordingly. If we accept a million people a year—not to mention illegal immigration—in an already fragmented context, we make the task more difficult.
That’s it. That’s all there’s to it. In a Substack to come, I’m going to address an argument made recently by a prominent commentator who says assimilation isn’t just overrated, but totally unnecessary. For now, it’s enough to say that the country most Americans, Left or Right, think they want can only be had through homogeneity, which, as Pinkoski explains, means we share a common civic and constitutional culture. This doesn’t mean you can’t have immigration. It does mean the types of people you bring in, along with how many, matter. It also means immigration can never be allowed to be weaponized, as it’s been by the Left.
Final point:
LIMES It seems to us that assimilation no longer works among Americans of different backgrounds, precisely because of what you were saying just now: mutual hatred for those who don’t think like you. Is democracy possible under these conditions?
PINKOSKI: No. If the atmosphere is so heated, if we are so fragmented, we cannot have a functioning democracy. Instead, we will have a strong security state to prevent violence from erupting. It is a different kind of government, not a democratic one. That is why the next ten years are decisive: they will show whether the experiment of mass democracy is still possible or whether it will be gradually eroded and set aside in the name of peace and stability. [MR] That is why we must follow very closely what is happening in the United States, because it is a massive political experiment to make that entire system of mass democracy work. Tensions and conflicts continue to mount. The new technological order in which we live reinforces ethnic identities and ideological loyalties. Digitalization and instantaneous communications do not consolidate equality. They do not consolidate freedom.
Americans have been successfully indoctrinated into believe democracy and diversity are basically synonymous. They have nothing to do with one another. In fact, democracy works best when differences are few and there’s nothing to really argue about besides tax rates and zoning laws, the boring stuff. Once democracy is used to decide things like who belongs atop the oppression hierarchy, what’s a woman, when does life begin, whether America should feel guilty about colonialism, that’s the beginning of the end of the system because the political process cannot resolve such fundamental or subjective questions about reality.
Just as I do, Pinkoski thinks America’s political future entails a strong security state. That’s the only way the country in its current state can remain intact with minimal disorder. Despite their favorable attitude towards it, even many liberals fail to recognize how diverse the U.S. is; along with Canada, it’s actually a demographic outlier in the West. If you look at the way other multicultural societies throughout the world manage to keep order and peace, it’s not through a laissez-faire approach with occasional state intervention. Rather, the state uses its power aggressively. At the same time, not all demographics are equal: there’s typically a core ethnic which has more influence than the other groups. They tend to be the majority as well. You see this dynamic in Southeast Asia, specifically.
I don’t know how viable this model is. What I do know is that it’s the only solution, the only way to avoid a complete crash-burn. Even without a dominant ethnic group, the strong security state is very much guaranteed. Call it the “international airport model,” where you’re constantly under surveillance and the people running the airport, who may be a diverse group themselves, hold absolute authority over you.
I’ve shared most of Pinkoski’s essay here, but do read it yourself to get the full context and gist of what he’s saying. I think it shows that among those thinking most critically about our current state of affairs, the future isn’t as unpredictable as it seems. We’re very clearly headed in a particular direction, and it’s not towards more freedom and democracy. I’m an absolutist for neither, because we don’t have as much freedom as we think and we most certainly don’t have a democracy. By the way, the Founders weren’t freedom and democracy absolutists, neither.
Plato said it thousands of years ago, Max Weber and Oswald Spengler a century ago: mass democracy eventually becomes authoritarian. Sometimes, it becomes outright tyranny. Another reason why it’s foolish to so steadfastly defend mass democracy, besides the fact it doesn’t work, is because all that accomplishes is delaying the inevitable. Tyranny would be bad, yes. But authoritarianism? Once more, Americans have been indoctrinated into believing even a dysfunctional mass democracy is the only government worth having. Disagree all you’d like, but that’s just not true. Most governments throughout history haven’t been democratic, nor have the most stable forms of government been democratic. So, like with all things, try not to worry so much about it.
Civil War: More Questions Than Answers
Let’s examine some more recent commentary on civil war. First up:
This is an underrated aspect of any prospective civil war. The state must be viewed as a faction of its own. Ironically, if a state joins forces with one faction or the other, it tends to eventually be overtaken by said faction. This is why we must also consider the fact the state may end up not taking sides at all, instead consolidate power, appeal to the masses (with a Caesar-like figure), and defeat both sides. That could happen, too. But that implies the two ideological factions are actually weak, and if they’re that weak, we’re probably not having a civil war.
This account had an interesting thread on the topic:
This is why I say the form the next American civil war will take likely has no true historical parallel. We have a better idea of what it won’t be versus what it will be. Americans are more loyal to their belief systems and ideologies more than they are to their states, regions, or even families. How exactly this breaks down in practical form is difficult to imagine. Folks can hypothesize, but it doesn’t mean they’ll be right.
I retain my thesis: no civil war, but a prolonged, “Years Of Lead”-style period of low-intensity conflict lasting at least a decade, punctuated by short - think a few weeks to several months - of broad-scale politically-motivated violence and unrest which shakes our foundations. The only question is whether the status quo political order will survive this stretch of low-intensity conflict. My guess is no, according to the rules of the Fourth Turning theory. But that’s just a best guess on my part.
There Is One Outside Chance For A Cure…
Friend of this blog Nicole Williams, a historian, explains what can only fix this:
It is clear (or has been clear) to me that if the government of the United States is unwilling to abide by the written constitution, and especially federalism as envisioned in the document, then we should break up the country.
The United States is the 3rd most populous country on the planet. The scope and scale of life within the United States is out of scale with human flourishing. The only thing that holds the country together is the promise of material wealth.
It’s not virtue, we aren’t virtuous. It’s not honour, because the country has little to spare. Our states don’t operate in the best interests of their citizens, they see them more like human resources which can be used up and tossed aside.
If we aren’t going to try to hold onto the principles of decentralized government and a written constitution, what are we preserving? A flag? Vibes? A giant foam finger that says, U-S-A, Number 1?
Get real.
Secession. As American as you can get.
What do couples whose differences become irreconcilable do? Divorce. I understand that breaking up a state isn’t the same as breaking up a marriage. But the fact that something’s hard to do makes it neither impossible nor not worth doing. It all depends on how serious we are about solving our problems. As I said a while back on a different topic, don’t complain about a problem you intend to do nothing about except argue.
Why do you think the Founders established a federal republic, anyway? Because they wanted to give themselves a way out. Sure, most Founders preferred the union remain intact into perpetuity. However, they preferred de-centralized, multi-tiered governance because they wanted to be able to opt out if they decided things weren’t working out. That, not democracy, is what makes the American form of governance great.
Unfortunately, what should be done isn’t what will be done. As Neil Howe, one of the authors of the Fourth Turning theory, points out, no country as old as the U.S. has ever broken up peacefully. Not only that, if we could agree on splitting up the country, that paradoxically suggests our politics are healthier than they are currently. To successfully break down the country, both sides would need to agree to not force the unconditional surrender of the other side. The likelihood of that happening isn’t next to nil, it’s nil, period.
Bottom line: barring a major civil war or total state failure, both of which are strongly unlikely events, the U.S. isn’t breaking up. We could do it. But history supports the likelihood we won’t. So, what’s left to do?
I begrudgingly believe the most ideal outcome for the future is a non-ideological dictatorship whose top priority is security and order, doing whatever it takes to achieve it. Only the security state and a security-first minded leader can successfully achieve such an outcome. Yes, breaking this union up is the best choice. But it’s also not a realistic one. Inertia is the most powerful force in the universe and it takes a tremendous amount of force to overcome it. If anything, trying to break this thing up will likely lead to the very outcomes we’re trying to prevent.
I think the thing to remember is that civil war is a logical outcome of our ongoing divergence. But it’s not inevitable. Some people seem to believe that talking about it makes it more likely to happen. I’m of the belief such events are well beyond our control, that it’s not up to us to decide, for good or for better. Someone could put out a call for a civil war right now and nobody would show up. While those who say a civil war could never happen here exasperate me, those who say it not only absolutely will, but within the next election cycle, exasperate me more lately.
What do you think? Will we ever see a Caesar? If so, what form will he take? What will the new political order look like? Have your thoughts evolved any when it comes to civil war? Is separation a likely outcome?
Let’s discuss it in the comments section.
Max Remington writes about armed conflict and prepping. Follow him on Twitter at @AgentMax90.
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Just a thought, but it can probably be dismissed.
The ultimate "wild card" in all this is the Earth itself. I'm not not talking about nonsense like the climate change hysteria. I'm talking serious Earth changes, such as a massive subduction zone earthquake on the West coast that smashes the infrastructure, or one of the brutal years-long droughts that have historically occured in the western US long before the advent of widespread fossil fuel use, or an event such as a Yellowstone supervolcano eruption. Everyone's calculations would instantly be rendered irrelevant.
But as I said, this can probably be dismissed.
Democracy: great for "means" questions; terrible at "ends". Great at finding the right way to pursue the common good; terrible at deciding what "good" is.
National divorce: The 2 sides have diverse philosophical ambitions. Red is localist: "Blue wants socialism and pink haired lunatics, y'all are weird, but OK." Blue is universalist: "You may not suppress human rights anywhere, ever, and we will fight you if you do." Red might coexist; Blue definitely would not. BTW: Despite claiming to be value neutral, liberalism has been universalist since the beginning (1700's). It is more like a religious theology than a political program.
Pew Survey: Weird that the United States tops the list of countries who view their fellow citizens as immoral and Canada bottoms the same list. Why?
"Intertia is the most powerful force in the Universe." Yep. That's why I'm a fat man. :-)