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The Book of the Week is “Zbig, The life of Zbigniew Brzezinski, America’s Great Power Prophet” by Edward Luce, published in 2025. In this slightly sloppily edited tome, the author threw in the kitchen sink on every historical event that occurred during Brzezinski’s lifetime. Yes, Brzezinski was a major influencer of certain events, but such brief descriptions are overwhelming (or tedious and boring!) for young students of history. For more knowledgeable readers, this is a reference book.
Anyway, Brzezinski’s ancestors were royal family members in what is now Poland. Brzezinski was born in 1928 in Warsaw, but spent his early childhood in various European countries. In autumn 1938, his family fled Europe for Montreal, Canada. He became a Canadian citizen in 1951, and an American citizen in 1958.
Academically, Brzezinski was a genius. He won all sorts of awards. Together, he and Carl Friedrich of Harvard’s Department of Government theorized about totalitarianism of the U.S.S.R. In their book, they wrote of its traits: a monopoly on violence and communications, a majority group who truly believes in their ideology which is imposed officially, ruling by fear and force via law enforcement, and a government-directed economy. But the U.S.S.R. didn’t have a majority group of true believers; it was comprised of diverse territories and peoples. Sounds familiar.
In the second half of twentieth century, Brzezinski’s counterpart turned out to be Henry Kissinger, president Nixon’s foreign-policy sidekick. Kissinger had been born in Europe, had a foreign accent in the United States, was multilingual, and was enjoying a brilliant career. When Brzezinski saw what Kissinger had achieved, he realized he himself had a chance to do the same. He did, as president Jimmy Carter’s foreign-policy sidekick.
After the Soviets launched Sputnik in 1957, the CIA claimed that Khrushchev said the U.S.S.R. would economically catch up to the United States by 1970. Kissinger agreed with the CIA, that that would happen. Brzezinski personally visited the U.S.S.R. and saw that it was in decline. His writings contradicted the prevailing Cold War nonsense.
It was unclear whether the CIA was extremely incompetent in its intelligence-gathering, or was lying in order to incite Cold War animosity among the American masses. Journalists would call such dishonesty, “disingenuous” but nowadays, the public is wise to propaganda such as that. There is hyper-awareness of the general conditions of every country of the world.
Brzezinski became obsessed with convincing those around him that the world should simply let the U.S.S.R. dig its own grave. In 1972, he, along with a few other alpha males with hubris syndrome, founded the Trilateral Commission. It was a nonpartisan think tank that contemplated the geopolitics of the future. The opinions the Trilateral Commission expressed were perceived as evil in different ways on both sides of the political spectrum. That might have been intentional. Currently, all think-tanks are partisan, but there is still this kind of super-rich boys’ club running the United States.
Kissinger, knowing journalists find it easier to write stories about colorful characters who make foreign-policy rather than write stories about complicated foreign-policy issues, played the media. He stroked their egos. Brzezinski accused him of flip-flopping, but the two maintained a relationship of healthy disagreement and civil discourse; they kept the drama going to stay in the headlines in order to stay relevant.
Read the book to learn much, much more about Brzezinski and his times.
The cliche is true: The more things change, the more they stay the same. In the last forty years, three presidents of the United States have become senile while in office: Ronald Reagan, Joseph Biden and Donald Trump. Here’s a song about that, and other universal political conundrums.
EVERYTHING IS CYCLICAL
sung to the tune of “Everything is Beautiful” with apologies to Ray Stevens and to whomever else the rights may concern.
A politician loves his flock of voters,
all the voters of his world.
He’s always ready to fight.
He cares nothing for wrong or right.
A politician loves his flock of voters in his world.
Everything’s political, in the current leaders’ reign.
In the last forty years in America,
three prezzes covered up their senile brains.
Everything’s cyclical, in its own way. It’s human psychology.
The pendulum’s gonna swing the other way.
The voter is in a bind, as backroom deals he cannot see.
We must prepare for what’s in the minds, of our leaders who say we’re free.
At every election, the hypocrites are standing by.
You know candidates’ resentments smolder.
It’s time to take action on ethics and grow up.
Honest stakeholders need to get bolder.
Everything’s political, in the current leaders’ reign.
In the last forty years in America,
three prezzes covered up their senile brains.
Everything’s cyclical, in its own way. It’s human psychology.
The pendulum’s gonna swing the other way.
We shouldn’t care about Trump’s unruly hair, or his apish orange skin. We must focus on his crimes and make sure they don’t happen again.
We need to work together now. Dictatorship is out. Fine.
Stop wasting time on trivial distractions, my friend, and pay liars no mind.
Everything’s political, in the current leaders’ reign.
In the last forty years in America,
three prezzes covered up their senile brains.
Everything’s cyclical, in its own way. It’s human psychology.
The pendulum’s gonna swing the other way.
Everything’s political, in the current leaders’ reign.
In the last forty years in America…