Back in late November of last year I finally finished the third volume of THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO trilogy. It took a bit over 8 years but I did it! As is my custom, I note passages and page numbers as I read and then go back and type these up as summary notes to keep with the hard copy of the book in my “library.” (Somewhere along the line I read where some soon to be famous writer had typed some of the classics in their entirety so that he – or his body – would know how it felt to “write” something great. I guess this is my little version of that with short parts of things that are great. But I digress.) Anyway, I fell behind on this task over the last half of 2022 and have been working on the Volume 3 notes this morning. The following is based on five consecutive of those previously noted passages from that task…as always, presented within the context of my agenda. If you don’t like my version, feel free to read into this whatever you wish.

Remember those ancient days when you were still mostly naïve about the ways of the Uni-Party Ruling Class:

But it was too early yet to start fighting. We are always at the mercy of our assumption that a mistake had been made. Prison? For what? It’s impossible! They’ll soon get it sorted out. … – Page 127

Along the way, some came to see the game for what it was. For some it may have been a knife in the back from Bush-Frist. (But, but, but…Compassionate Conservatism!!!) For others is may have been “When history calls, history calls” and two follow-up assists from Conservative Chief Justice Roberts. Others clued in after several years of McConnell-Boehner Failure Theater. Some of the hard headed ones, like me, held out until 2014…Never Forget Mississippi 2014! But the truth is, for anyone willing to see, there have been near daily opportunities since November 2016. Clarity is available to all:

A few interrogations and it was quite clear: they’d never straighten it out, never let him go. So he must escape! – Page 129

But there are far too many of the rationalizing enablers <<SPIT>> within our perimeter maintain that temptation to always compromise. Maybe the next unread $2 Trillion bill, or the $5 Trillion one after that will finally relieve them of their (willfully) blind loyalty:

But vague hopes of clemency and reasonableness clouded Tenno’s resolution. Only in the Butyrki Prison was he relieved of this burden: his sentence, read out from a piece of paper with a Special Board stamp, was confinement in camps for twenty-five years. He signed his name and felt relieved, found himself smiling, felt his legs carrying him easily to the cell for twenty-five-year prisoners. That sentence released him from humiliation, from the temptation to compromise, from humble submission, from truckling, from promises of five to seven years bestowed like alms on a beggar. Twenty-five it is, you bastards? Right; if that’s all we can expect from you – we escape!! – Page 135

Until then those loyal, rationalizing enablers <<SPIT>> within our perimeter will, no doubt, continue the usual condescending admonishment of those willing to show some backbone. Shut up and get in line…you’re only making is worse for everyone…you are embarrassing us all:

After every fresh escape and every fresh disturbance, the regime in all three Special Sections became more and more severe. (For the historian of the criminal world we may note that the “bitches” in the Ekibastuz camp jail grumbled about it. “Bastards! Time you gave up this escaping . Because you keep trying to escape, they won’t let us breathe any more. You can get your mug bashed in for this sort of thing in an ordinary camp.” In other words, they said what the bosses wanted them to say.) – Pages 205-206

But a show of backbone is what is really needed to finally put some tangible actions behind the campaign rhetoric that so many are all to comfortable putting away for the next 18 months now that the mid-terms have passed…lest an actual spark catches hold:

A bold thought, a desperate thought, a thought to raise a man up: how could things be changed so that instead of us running from them they would run from us?

Once the question was put, once a certain number of people had thought of it and put it into words, and a certain number had listened to them, the age of escapes was over. The age of rebellion had begun. – Page 233

The history of our times will tell but it may be an unfortunate fate for today’s progressives and their loyal, rationalizing enablers <<SPIT>> within our perimeter that the Tea Party Spirit of a dozen years ago seems to be maturing according to historic timelines. The spark is bound to catch at some point.

As I said, read into this whatever you wish…