Your analysis of Trump's threatened annexation of Greenland seems on point, but seems an element of his larger strategy. A good deal of ink has been lately spilt regarding the absence or slowness of effective response in the face of destructive envelopment by forces of the administrative blitzkrieg. As the pillars of democratic institutions are seen to crumble, as the center seems unable to hold, we each would seek shelter, first impulse to hunker down, hope this too will pass. Yet one may ask where shelter might be found. The choices before us, and surely more to come, may be stark, as they have often been in times before, as history shows of those who stood for principle at risk of great personal loss, and as well illumes those who might have made a difference but chose ignominy as the price of their advantage. For many complicity may seem the only rational course, overawed as they may be as witness to the fall of others. For many, if not most, their course of action, or lack thereof, will be to strive for balance between defense of principle, i.e., promotion of ‘the good’, that which is harmonious with personal and broadly shared societal values, and that of perceived necessity. The island where complacency was possible regarding such matters continues to erode.
Your analysis of Trump's threatened annexation of Greenland seems on point, but seems an element of his larger strategy. A good deal of ink has been lately spilt regarding the absence or slowness of effective response in the face of destructive envelopment by forces of the administrative blitzkrieg. As the pillars of democratic institutions are seen to crumble, as the center seems unable to hold, we each would seek shelter, first impulse to hunker down, hope this too will pass. Yet one may ask where shelter might be found. The choices before us, and surely more to come, may be stark, as they have often been in times before, as history shows of those who stood for principle at risk of great personal loss, and as well illumes those who might have made a difference but chose ignominy as the price of their advantage. For many complicity may seem the only rational course, overawed as they may be as witness to the fall of others. For many, if not most, their course of action, or lack thereof, will be to strive for balance between defense of principle, i.e., promotion of ‘the good’, that which is harmonious with personal and broadly shared societal values, and that of perceived necessity. The island where complacency was possible regarding such matters continues to erode.