New England is the cultural zone of innovation and progressivism par excellence in the US.  Conservative voices there have been rare as a result.  Yet when they do arise, they are usually quite powerful and prophetic:  from the past, writers like Nathaniel Hawthorne and Robert Frost, for instance; more recently, Michael Warren Davis (author of The Reactionary Mind: Why Conservative Isn’t Enough).  It appears that we may be able to add Tucker Carlson’s name to that list as well.  Even casual interviews with him yield compelling ideas.  In this one conducted by Nicholas Bartulovic, populist conservatives/revivalists inside and outside of government will find ideas worthy of reflecting upon and acting on.

Going in reverse order, near the end of the interview, Mr. Carlson exalts the broader ties of family that have been eroded over the years, and encourages people to strengthen them once again:

‘“Another thing that we have completely forgotten in the West, but used to be a hallmark of it, is the idea of loyalty to your family and your wider clan.” he continued, adding that parents should foster that sense of loyalty as a tide against what he called “substitutions” for family.

“Things are changing, though, and what people in the last century substituted for family, like a career, politics, and media, are now being reexamined, and a lot of people are returning to and craving the real,” he said.

Those kinds of familial bonds will help people to safely navigate a world that is brimming with gigantic corporations ready to exploit them.  Mr. Carlson calls out big banks in particular, and suggests a return to the practice in the earlier years of Christendom that greatly restricted usury:

‘He then added, unprompted, “You know, the best moment in this entire presidential campaign wasn’t the cat memes or Joe Biden stepping aside, but was when Trump announced the other day that he was going to cap credit card interest rates at 10 percent. That was truly brave! I never send candidates money but that actually made me consider donating to his campaign.”

‘I asked him to elaborate. “It goes to what we were talking about earlier—who is more an enemy of the American people, the Mullahs in Iran or Chase Bank?” he asked. “It’s just crazy to me that all Abrahamic religions have prohibitions against usury and somehow we as a society are okay with banks sending out unsolicited credit card applications to 20-year-olds who are still in college and charging people 25 to 30 percent interest, saddling them with debt for the rest of their lives? We used to call that loan sharking, now I guess it’s just normal.”’

His last and longest piece of advice is related to the country he mentioned briefly above – Iran.  That advice?  Stop believing the reports put out by the War Party in DC (which includes both Republicans and Democrats):

‘I asked what his interactions with people on the tour had been like. Sounding somewhat dejected, he replied, “There seems to be a lot of chaos, a lot of lying going on in our country. I am amazed at the amount of blatant propaganda that people still believe.” Asked what he meant specifically, he answered, “This stuff with Iran.”

‘I asked whether he meant the FBI’s assertion that there were teams of Iranian-backed groups in the US trying to kill Donald Trump. “You don’t really believe that, do you?” he interrupted. I denied it. “Okay, good. Because, you know, I’ve been around the block, and since 2003 it seems like everyone in the intel community shouts ‘Iran, Iran, Iran,’ every time there is a national security threat,” he said. “It’s truly shocking that people, especially those on the right, still believe that Iran is our greatest national security threat.”

‘I asked Tucker for his reaction to Mark Levin’s recent suggestion that the United States should treat Iran’s speculated involvement in the assassination attempts on Donald Trump as an act of war. He scoffed, “That’s truly deranged. Hard to believe and take seriously. Anyone who is repeating this line about Iran is a liar. Realistically, Iran does not want a hot war with the United States and has tried to avoid one for the last year. It is one of the most sinister lies out there.”

‘I asked him whether he thought, despite Donald Trump’s anti-war posturing and his selection of J.D. Vance as a running mate, the neocon/hawkish wing of the Republican Party had been fully ousted from influence of the electorate. “Are you kidding me? We haven’t exorcized the neocon establishment at all!” he said with a laugh. “You have to understand though that this is not a right/left thing. Just look at the second guy who tried to kill Trump. Fundamentally, he believes the same exact things that someone like Bill Kristol, David Frum, and Victoria Nuland believe.”

‘“That’s the scary thing. You have all of these people telling us that Iran, Russia, North Korea, are the greatest threats to our national security and I just simply don’t believe that,” he continued. “It really seems at this point that the Democratic Party and the national security establishment are in fact our greatest threats to national security.”’

Mr Carlson is consoled that many have had their eyes opened in this regard:  ‘“I guess the only real consolation is that the people that I’ve met on this tour have really been anti-war, anti-violence and are deeply concerned with the current trajectory of U.S. foreign policy.”’

Will those kinds of people be able to prevail on 5 November and in future elections?  We will see.  May God help us.

Regardless, Tucker Carlson has given us a trinity of ideas that we ought to take firm hold of and implement to the best of our abilities, whether in our private lives or as government law or policy:  strengthen the extended family (not just the nuclear family), attack usury, and a promote a peaceful foreign policy that throws all the pro-war voices of the past 25 years to the curb.