First, thanks for a very insightful article on such an important topic. I agree (if I understood correctly) that we should endeavor to understand what motivated the Jan. 6 crowd — and other acts of civil disobedience — even if we condemn their intentions. I do go on (and on) but this is about the most important stuff to discuss there is.

Re. "domestic Tranquility," as the old adage goes: 'if you want peace, work for justice'. I am convinced that what is described in the article is the dissolution of Liberalism as an understanding of what justice is, as a result of its shortcomings, both conceptual and practical, being exposed.

I think "we must [therefore] let our minds be bold" enough to consider a better approach to justice itself: how the governance of society ought to be governed. That can't be Marxism, given that Marx abhorred the very idea that justice could actually 'be a thing', to put it in contemporary parlance.

In the course of my studies it occurred to me some time ago that the mistake 'Enlightenment' thinkers made — a mistake that has been perpetuated in Critical Theory and by its proponents' postmodernist cousins — is to think that a product of 'reason' with a starting point that is itself a non-rational artefact can be 'rational'. It cannot. The chain of reasoning can be magnificently logical, but the end product is no more rational than the starting point was. Letters attributed to Paul in the Bible contain magnificent examples of 'reason'. (More recently, I loved when I got to listen to the late Ravi Zacharias on the radio — though theology is not where this is headed, either.)

Ideologies — beginning with the meta-ideology of Liberalism (which has spawned narrower political ideologies, to include political liberalism, libertarianism, et al.) — follow from secular beliefs (or beliefs that can be secular as well as sacral). Secular beliefs are no more rational than sacral beliefs are. (I count Marx as the penultimate equalitarian, whatever his claims to a ‘scientific’ explanation concerning governance might be.)

Thus, ideologies have proven to be no better than religions have been for determining how society ought to be governed. Any ideology brings to the problem all of the issues that any theology brings to it.

I hope that insight of mine gives me a modicum of credibility as a thinker. If I may, I have (fully) developed an account of justice that has as its starting point an observation within material existence (which I got from Warren J. Samuels, via Dr. Fred Boadu when I was a graduate student — in political economy, where philosophy and economics intersect — at Atlanta University): human beings have no choice but to effect choices. That makes choosing integral to being human. That makes the ethic of 'real justice', as I have come to call it, a requirement for every person to respect the capacity to choose of all other people in effecting any choice (whether for oneself or on behalf of any other person, organization, or cause). Hence, justice is 'mutual respect in effecting choices'. For individuals it all boils down to a handful of absolute prohibitions: no killing, harming, coercing, stealing, or manipulating (which includes lying, cheating, etc.) in effecting any choice. (“Harming” in particular does call for a bit more explication.)

If curious, "Can't Get Any Simpler" is a "2 min read" here in Medium with links to several articles on the topic. (Nothing I publish here in Medium is behind the paywall).