Essentially he concieved of the world as entering a post-Hegemonic order where global institutions (the usual suspects) would be self-sustaining under a polycentric order.

From the NRx perspective, his argument boiled down to our friends, the international(ized) progressive movement having successfully detached themselves from reliance on any specific polity, and being able to more-or-less manage and guide the world through international institutions (mainly norms, not necessarily mainly I.E. the UN directly).

What we would call wirepulling on The Movement’s part (not his phrasing) would get the significant powers (the round-up of the usual suspects, which, collectively still hold most of the power, even today) to do what progressives think are the right things, more or less, and uphold the liberal internationalist world order that had been created/put in place by the hegemons.

So (d) would be a self-sustaining supra-hegemonic (above any specific geographic polity) order. In essence one might call this a variant of (a), insofar as it would be the Anglo-Progressive order, though now detached from any ethnic core and not considering America special at all (except perhaps as a tool-among-others). Its roots would remain its roots, though, despite efforts to “diversify” its “decision-making processes” (which are mostly informal anyhow – again, these international institutions are not to be confused with UN, or even NATO. They’re rules-and-norms, specific organizations are only *potential* venues through which these rules-and-norms might work their magic).

This might seem like a dubious project to NRxers, but it’s the actual project of liberal internationalism, aka the progressive movement. We don’t think they have much of a future, but we also respect their track record of success over past centuries. So this outcome should be included in any analysis.

Of course it’s relevant: its emptiness doesn’t prevent it indicating any other “vacuity”.

And no one’s coming to rescue Western Civ, certainly not China. Enjoy the Popcorn.

He really doesn’t know, and probably doesn’t want to..would anyone?

Whether or not tone has shifted reality has, and China can’t come to the rescue even if it wants to…not that those would be the actions of the sane. The Chinese strike me both as sane and having their own problems to concern them.

Did you know they poured more concrete in China in 3 years than we did in 100 years?

Hell maybe the West can exit, into all those empty cities. But that wouldn’t be sane.