Just before jetting off to enjoy his Christmas holiday, Mitch McConnell left a nice lump of coal for America with his $1.7 trillion (or more!) omnibus spending package. There’s a lot to hate in this package, between millions for LGBTQ museums in New York and extra funding for the House Diversity and Inclusion office.
But the most galling thing about the omnibus is this juxtaposition: More than $400 million is dished out to American “allies” (one cannot put enough quotes around that word) like Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, and Tunisia to assist them in their “border security.” Meanwhile, back in America, the millions allocated to our own border patrol are not allowed “to acquire, maintain, or extend border security technology and capabilities, except for technology and capabilities to improve Border Patrol processing.” Put another way, extra funding for Customs and Border Protection is only allowed to assist the escalating human flood at the border, while no new spending is allowed to stop it.
A century ago, and for all human history before that, having a coherent border that one could defend was what separated a state from the state of nature. But today, a border is a luxury. A luxury so valuable, it turns out, that it’s only available to the Third World.
The concept of the “Third World” originated in the Cold War. In that era, America and its close allies were the First World. The Soviet Union and its satellites were the Second World. And the rest of the planet, the dozens of countries contested between the two superpowers, were the “Third World.”
Less developed and less industrialized, the “Third World” was soon equated with poverty and deprivation. Yet today, even as the Third World remains poor, there are countless privileges that still exist in the Third World yet are vanishing from our supposedly wealthier country.
In the Third World, you can have a real border, and America will even pay for it to have walls and fences and armed guards. In the Third World, you’ll still find schools that teach pupils to love their country and appreciate its history and achievements, instead of loathe them. Do I think Turkey is a particularly amazing country? Not really – but most Turks do, and I’m glad they think that way.
In Mexico, childhood obesity is a major problem – so much so that the government has banned the cartoon mascots that adorn cereal boxes in America. What it doesn’t have is the ludicrous campaign against “fat-shaming” that America has.
In the Third World, people are still tethered enough to basic reality that the worst poisons of the American psychological empire can’t take root. You know what I’m talking about: the transgender frenzy is the ultimate “First World problem,” a development so absurd that only a wealthy country could get away with indulging it for a moment.
In the Third World, police might be corrupt, but nobody is so delusional as to think they should be abolished. Nobody intentionally allows criminals to flourish where they could easily be stopped. Only the First World sees it as normal to cede the centers of its richest and most beautiful cities to its most violent citizens.
In the Third World, there is no presumed moral failure if a tight-knit, homogeneous community still exists. It’s not a target to be atomized, “enriched,” or replaced. Life is allowed to carry meaning, rather than being shattered by a torrent of nihilism. People still attend church and believe in something greater than themselves.
Thanks to the latest omnibus, Ukraine will get another $45 billion to help them in their war against Russia. It’s not surprising. When you are a developing nation, you have the privilege of being allowed to resist an invasion. If only America had that right as well.
Charlie Kirk is the CEO and Founder of Turning Point USA, the nation’s largest and fastest growing conservative youth activist organization, and host of The Charlie Kirk Show.
