As I mentioned in a post yesterday, I was delighted to seeThe Fourth Turning is Here book, which I purchased and read over the course of just a couple of days (which is no mean feat, since this sucker is nearly 500 pages long).
I truly enjoyed the book, although I’d say easily 70-80% of the book is there for fleshing out the concepts. The entire thesis of this book, as well as its prediction about what is to come, could be condensed down to probably about thirty pages or so. This is not to say that the bulk of the book is fluff; it’s simply not essential to the points being made.
I’m certainly not going to try to boil it down further into a single post, but I’d at least like to share a variety of thoughts and impressions drawn from my reading. I’m going to be completely lazy and just bang this out as a series of individual, disjointed paragraphs. I’ve also interspersed a variety of graphics that are related to the content.
Broadly speaking, I think America, and the world, is heading straight for a catastrophe. According to the author, this is as it always has been, and such a catastrophe is both healthy and inevitable.
As you look at your computer screen right now, there doesn’t seem to be anything catastrophic at ALL. The stock market makes lifetime, worldwide highs every single day. The VIX is barely in the teens. Everyone seems head-over-heels optimistic about how great the AI-empowered future is going to be. And yet…………they’re wrong.
Cyclic Assumption – the underlying basis to the entire book (and to my charting too, incidentally) is that human behavior follows broad, repeating cycles. The passing centuries make no difference to the big picture. If you believe that time is linear, and novel, and unrepeating, you might as well stop reading here.
Delayed, Not Denied – Cycles can be delayed by government interference, but no government is big enough to permanently forestall the inevitable. The $36 trillion in debt that America has undertaken to placate its citizenry has delayed catastrophe, but the debt consumption is exponentially accelerating, and it’s going to make the disaster exponentially worse.
Welcome, Crisis – The crisis has been, through human history, restorative. Well, what if it’s worldwide nuclear war? Well, maybe that’s where the good news no longer appears. Or maybe it’s necessary. The point is, something awful is coming, and it’s required.
The Older Book – As a longtime fan of the original Fourth Turning book (which came out in 1997), I had assumed that 9/11 had kicked off the crisis. The author declares that, yes, 9/11 was important, but it was a precursor, and we were still in the Third turning when it happened. The true commencement of the Fourth Turning was the (oh-so-sweet) Great Financial Crisis of 2008. That was fifteen years ago.
The 2024 Election – I have said many times that the election, which is only eight months away at this point, is going to be a world-shaking event. Based on what we see today, it seems quite obvious that Trump isn’t just going to win, but he’s going to win in a landslide. What happens after that is, I believe, the key. All holy hell is going to break loose, and it may go on for years. The United States is about to get turned inside out and upside-down.
Divisiveness Reigns – America doesn’t feel like America anymore. Blacks hate whites. Woman hate men. Gays hate straights. Theists hate atheists. Blue hates red. We’re all turned against one another. This, according to the author, is completely typical of a Crisis. The amazing thing is that, when people least expected, the people of a nation become united again in a way that they never could expect or believe.
Ineptitude Reigns – Isn’t it interested how the federal government can’t even execute the most basic function of creating a budget anymore? With increasing frequency, the legislative branch has to cobble together some Continuing Resolution that will permit the government to limp along for a few more months, weeks, or days, until such time as the next C.R. is required.
Dreading then Cherishing – The most interesting insight the book had to offer was the nature of how humanity views the final throes of a Crisis. Before it happens, they dread it. They want to avoid it. “Let this cup pass” is the basic disposition. However, once they’re on the other side of it, people agree they could not imagine a world in which it – – whatever “it” is at the time – – didn’t happen. In other words, you weren’t going to find a lot of folks in 1948 who thought America’s involvement in World War II was an error.
Clean Geography Not Necessary – Another eye-opener for me had to do with civil war. People talk about a new civil war in America, and it always struck me as silly, because the “original” Civil War had clean geographic boundaries (North vs. South) whereas the present day is a messy mishmash of political tapestry. The author makes clear that nice, neat geographic lines are the exception, not the rule, for civil war, and the United States could absolutely have another civil war, even with the mosaic of red and blue throughout the fifty states.
The Year 2034, Give or Take – The Crisis period began in 2008. Obviously, the author cannot pinpoint when it ends, but he estimates sometime between 2028 and 2036, which he admits is an enormous range. Let’s just say something like another decade.
The Question from 2014 – Another thought from lil’ old me: what if, in 2014, you did a sweeping survey in which you asked everyday people, “Over the next decade, who will be the most important and consequential political figure in the United States?” How many people would have said Trump? Maybe 0%? And yet, that’s the right answer.
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Debt – We are all living in an imaginary paradise right now, fueled by debt. As a youngster, I live in a world in which the national debt was a few hundred billion dollars (which, even then, was considered shameful). We’re going to be $40 trillion in debt next year. This is not sustainable.
Wealth Confiscation – They do not get into this within the book, but in my opinion, wealth confiscation is going to become extremely fashionable in the 2030s. The combination of popular resentment and a desperate need for cash is going to compel governments to bleed the rich dry, to the extent they can.
Ancient Scholars and Jung – The book is quite educational about various scholars from around the world, and throughout thousands of years, who have had something or another to say about the quartet of “seasons” in human life and the life of human civilization.
The Question of September 10, 2001 – In a similar vein to the 2014 question: how do you think the nation was feeling about its prospects the day before 9/11 happened? The economy was in some trouble, yes, but on the whole, Pax Americana still seemed fully intact. It only took about thirty minutes for all human history to completely pivot in another direction. Think that one dirty bomb might do the same?
This is a vitally important book, and I humbly suggest you get yourself a copy to study and highlight.
There are decades when nothing happens, and there are weeks when decades happen.
– Lenin
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