Our Contemporary Tower of Babel

 

I decided to do some lighter reading – novels, books where I would not be so focused on disciplined study and the like.  So I picked up The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Yeah, I know.  Not the lightest reading.  But the reasons why behind choosing this book will be made clear at my other blog in a few weeks – basically, this novel was recommended as a good novel for a Christian man to read.

I don’t know how often I will post something from this book, but some quotes will be too good to pass up.  To begin:

In the majority of instances human beings, even the evil-doers among them, are far more naïve and straightforward than we suppose.  And that includes ourselves.

This seems to suggest that we need not find some complex plot, or deep organizational momentum behind many of the actions we see around us.  People go in the direction that they go, because that is what they want to do.

They are “far more naïve and straightforward than we suppose.”  How might this be understood?  Well, since the novel was recommended by a Christian for Christians, I will go to the Bible:

Ephesians 6: 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

During the reaction to covid, there were emerging countless articles on this idea that there had to be a spirit – an evil spirit – behind the actions of many of the government and political leaders everywhere around the world.  They all acted in concert, in a manner that was clear at the time – and even more so today – that was purposefully designed to crush humanity.

All of humanity was under siege.  From Ephesians 2: 2 “… according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience.”

Were they naïve?  Perhaps many who were driving humanity into darkness were not aware of the spiritual hosts of wickedness which they were serving.  Can someone always know when he or she is in the grip of an evil spirit?  As they are sons of disobedience, they just do what they do because that’s what they want to do.

As to straightforward?  This seems clear – there was an objective to crush mankind.  They did not mess around, no games or trickery.  Like bulls in a China shop.

But, note the quote from Dostoyevsky, the end: “And that includes ourselves.”  We all live driven by a spirit.  The question to ask ourselves: What is the spirit that drives us?  Pray it is this one:

Romans 8: 14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.

Returning to the book, Alyosha (the third son) answered just the question of which spirit drives him:

No sooner, having given the matter some serious thought, had he been struck by the conviction that God and immortality existed, than he immediately said to himself: ‘I want to live for immortality, and I will accept no half-way compromise.’

Are we that driven?  Am I that driven?  No half-way compromise?  We know what is said about lukewarm Christians:

Revelation 3: 15 “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. 16 So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.

Matthew 5: 13 “You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.

There is no such thing as a half-way Christian.  You are either all in – 100% – or you are out. 

Alyosha was struck by just this point:

One Way DOGE Might Work

 

I have previously considered this DOGE – department of government efficiency – to be led by Elon and Vivek.  My conclusion:

Even if Trump [because I am still not sure he will be inaugurated] and Musk get in, nothing like this will happen.  Can you even comprehend the weight of those who suck on the government teat?  Everyone who is anyone will fight against every action to reduce the spending.  Banks, the military-industrial-complex, heck, even Trump’s best supporters will fight this (“keep your government hands off of my Medicare”).

At most, Musk and his buddies will make some aspects of government more efficient – Blackwater will fix the DOD, Palantir will fix the CIA and FBI, etc.  You get the idea.    

I want none of that.

I have thought about one way it could work, but first a slight detour for a clue, from several days ago when the eleventh million government shutdown was threatening civilization:

With a Friday deadline to fund the government looming and Republican lawmakers at loggerheads over House Speaker Mike Johnson’s proposed stopgap spending bill, the conservative House Freedom Caucus is touting a plan to slash federal spending that conveniently leaves the bloated Pentagon budget untouched.

This is the one way DOGE might stand a chance to be implemented.  It doesn’t take a rocket scientist (none at NASA, plenty at SpaceX) to know that the spending trajectory for the United States is unsustainable.  Now, I am not saying next year or in ten years.  But, thinking long term, it just isn’t.  Tack on the exponential growth of Social Security and Medicare…you get the idea. 

DOGE can work if the DOD and the spook agencies want it to work.  And they will want it to work if they want to continue their fun and games; others in government will want it to work because the only thing backing the US Dollar is aircraft carriers and the stationary carrier in the Middle East.

Now, all government agencies have this desire for continued survival.  But Joe Biden, for all the incoherent things he said over the last four years, got one thing right – and I will paraphrase greatly: who has the F-15s?

It isn’t the Department of Agriculture or the Department of the Interior or the Department of Education.  It sure isn’t grandma and grandpa waiting for a return on all the money they put into the system for forty years.

If the DOD and spook agencies see that the only way they continue over the next fifty years is for all other aspects of government spending to be drastically reduced, well, that’s just what will happen.

Conclusion

Now, I am not sure such rationality exists in any department of this $7 trillion monstrosity.  But not everyone in the military and spook hierarchy is stupid. 

And they have all the meaningful guns.