Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.
An executive of a Constitutional Republic with an adversarial legal system will have to deal with rich and powerful bad guys. Better to keep them close than to shun them.
The ancient Chinese strategist Sun Tzu, author of the Art of War, is thought to have coined the dictum, “Keep your friends close; keep your enemies closer.” The saying was popularized by the following scene in The Godfather Part II:
Recently I’ve noticed several of my fellow Substack authors expressing concern that President Trump is apparently getting too cozy with Bill Gates and other billionaires. While I share their concern, I also doubt it would be wise for Trump to shun guys like Gates, Bezos, and Altman. They are too powerful and have too much money to be simply ignored. Better to cultivate relationships with them and keep them close. Trump cannot work within the framework of a Constitutional Republic with an adversarial legal system and simply get rid of them.
Likewise, given that U.S. federal institutions were long ago captured by powerful interest groups, there is only so much that Trump will be able to do in the next four years to undo this state of affairs. If he is able to do good work, it is likely to be incremental rather than sweeping in nature. So far, his greatest achievement has been to declare open hostility to censorship instead of embracing it, as the Democrats have done for the last four years.
Regarding Robert F. Kennedy Jr.: He has to make it through the Senate confirmation process before he can do anything. The Greeks didn’t defeat the Trojans by standing before the Walls of Troy and declaring their intention to sack the city. As Virgil told the story in the Aeneid, the Greeks apparently sailed away and left behind a large wooden horse.
Before we pass judgement on Trump and Kennedy, we should give them at least a few weeks in office to get their ducks in a row.
You are right on John.
I'm 90 years old, a Republican Precinct and State Committeeman, and the editor of a local Conservative Republican Organization's newsletter.
The Bureaucratic (unelected) 4th branch of government that the Funders didn't account for when writing the Constitution has had over a full century to establish and entrench itself. It will take a combination of Executive Orders, Legislative Actions, and SOTUS Decisions to dismantle this massive network.
We can only hope that:
1. We get control of our borders,
2. The Armed Forces are restored sufficiently to deter would be aggressors, and
3. The economy is restored and inflation is tamed.
Any more is just gravy.
Thank you for your work.
No one is coming to save us.
None of the provided heroes have our best interests at heart. They serve only to distract and prevent us from taking meaningful action ourselves—the only way we will ever address the calamities forced upon us by the ruling establishment.
Gates, Bezos, and the other self-anointed elites hold power only because we allow it. As for Trump, the idea that he’s simply “being careful” or “playing 4D chess” is absurd. He is no different from the rest—a puppet playing his assigned role to keep us pacified and distracted. If he truly opposed these monsters, he would act decisively, but he doesn’t because he can’t. He is not on our side.
The most important realization is this: no one ascends to the position of Prime Minister or President in any Western nation unless they are already compromised.
Look no further than Romania, where nationalist candidates are being actively prevented from running simply because they oppose the ruling establishment’s agenda.
It’s naive to believe this couldn’t happen in North America—it already has and will continue to happen until men organize and take action grounded in the principles of the Second Amendment.