The Millennials in the History of the Mandate

(the following refers to the worldlines of the American Mandate)

The Millennials                          born 1983-2005                                Civic-Adaptive

Like the generation that fought the First American Civil War, their crisis came too soon and was resolved ambiguously, whipsawing between the First Terrorist War under George W. Bush, the feckless delusions of the Barack Hussein Obama Administration, and the return to battle in the Second Terrorist War. In their youth, they fought hard but were frequently betrayed, as their Boomer and Slacker leaders repeatedly shifted direction, and initially failed to take the Terrorist threat with sufficient seriousness.

In their prime (2005-2047) they built greatly and enduringly.  This is the generation that returned to Luna and colonized Mars, restored the economy after the Second Great Depression, and led the conquest of the Carribean Basin in the Third Terrorist War. But here too they suffered repeated betrayal: their hero President John Garcia failed to prevent the San Antonio Massacre, in which the Narcoterrorist government of Mexico executed a partially-successful nuclear strike against Texas.

Their next hero, President AnthonyPowers, staged a coup from above and made himself the first President to rule the United States of America as a dictatorship, bringing about the fall of the First American Republic in 2040.  He completed the conquest of Mexico, winning the Fourth Terrorist War and completely securing American control of the Carribean.   By the time that President Biggs restored the Republic in 2045, they had become more than a little cynical of their political leadership.

They were also quite divided, which became obvious once they started moving into leadership positions (2025-2069).  They ran the cuntry under Powers and Biggs and the Crazy Fifties.  When they advanced into high leadership positions their generalship was largely ineffective in the Second Pacific War.  They were saved from the consequences of their indecision by General Randall O'Hare, himself a late Millennial (born 2001).  They then led on both sides in the Second (2067-69) and Third (2076-77) American Civil Wars, which ended with the victory of President George Custis Lee.

As elders, many saw their lives blighted by these wars, and they were only too happy to surrender their freedom to George C. Lee when he assumedthe title of Commander Lee the First in 2080.  Only the oldest Millennials (such as Jeanne Delarue) remembered a time when the American government did not rule unconstitutionally, save for the brief golden age under Garcia. They had decided to put their trust in princes rather than principles; by and large Commander Lee I did not betray them.  Most Millennials died before the suppression of the Omeganists or the Belt Rebellion.

Retro Review of The Collapsium (2000)

"Retro Review of  

The Collapsium

© 2000 by Wil McCarthy

 Review

© 2015 by Jordan S. Bassior 

George R. R. Martin -- A Giant, Shackled By Dwarfs

"George R. R. Martin --

A Giant, Shackled By Dwarfs"

 © 2015

by

Jordan S. Bassior

Some people were surprised and others saddened when George R. R. Martin came out against the Sad Puppies 3 campaign to restore control of the Hugos to the fans, and expressed (some) support for the Scalzi cabal which is currently trying to control the nominations and voting.  I was not surprised, though I am still saddened, because George R. R. Martin is a great author, the sort who could succeed in the field even if the Haydens of Tor opposed him.

ASoIaF is an extremely good series, the sort of thing that will be read for pleasure a century or more later. It’s notable for the author’s grasp of the premises that (1) not all enmities can be neatly divided into good vs.evil, and also (2) nevertheless, some enemies truly are evil.

However, George R R Martin has problems being even remotely objective about anything more recent than the War of the Roses. He came into his writing career trying to avoid service in Vietnam (literally, he wrote a story, "The Hero" (1971) in part to convince his draft board that he was anti-American) and thus cast his own personal honor with the Left of that time and the political vagaries of its future.

Its future has now led him to a place where they hate his masterwork in a way which he could not have predicted, because of the shifts in the politics of the feminists which now make him “evil” for having rape in his stories (even though not having it would be to absurdly whitewash medieval warfare and undercut one of the main themes of his story, “war is hell”) and furthermore makes him automatically suspect for his race, sex and sexual orientation.

And, because he started his career with an act of semi-betrayal of his own country, one which only became okay because the Left won in the 1970’s, he can’t detach himself. I think he lives in fear that the Left will turn on him, which is sad, because he’s a giant of writing and world-building talents. Dwarfs such as Jemsin and Bradford should be in fear that he will turn on them, rather than the other way round.

Such is the way in which the crimes of one’s past may shackle one decades later, even if one apparently escaped scot-free. And the sad thing? I think the reason this shackles George R. R. Martin is that he is a good man — he understands honor, which is why he can be restrained by the awareness that if he breaks free, he will have to accept that he did something dishonorable.

The worst of it? A draft is itself against Natural Law, it was one of the ways in which America let what it to be imagined military necessity harm its own core principles. This is a delayed price we are paying for the way our own government abused the rights of Americans from 1939 through 1975, albeit in a very indirect fashion.

END.