Monday, October 5, 2020

"Covid-19 Pandemic Update 10/5/20"

October 5, 2020 
by David Leonhardt

• President Trump’s doctors acknowledged Sunday that his condition was more serious than they had publicly described on Saturday. Dr. Sean Conley, the White House physician, suggested he had given the rosy assessment to avoid upsetting Trump.
Trump did not disclose to the country the first positive virus test result he received, The Wall Street Journal reported. That first positive test came Thursday during the day. He appeared on Fox News that night and said he was awaiting his test result, which was in fact a follow-up test.
• Trump’s doctors are treating him with dexamethasone, a steroid that has helped severely ill patients, but not typically used in milder cases. Outside health experts said they could not tell if Trump was sicker than he appeared in photos — or if doctors were treating him with unusual aggressiveness.
• Dexamethasone can cause side effects, including confusion, sleep loss and changes in mood and cognition, raising concerns about whether the president’s treatment may affect his ability to do his job.
Trump briefly left the hospital in an S.U.V. to wave at supporters, potentially putting at risk of infection the two Secret Service agents who were also in the car. “The irresponsibility is astounding,” Dr. James Philips, an attending physician at the hospital where Trump is being treated, tweeted.
• Joe Biden’s campaign said he had tested negative for the virus again, five days after sharing a debate stage with the president. Biden will campaign today in Florida, despite public health guidelines calling for a 14-day quarantine after potential exposure. His campaign said he did not need to because he did not have “close contact” with Trump.
 Fearing a second wave of the virus, Mayor Bill de Blasio proposed new restrictions in 20 hot spots in New York City.

Oct 5, 2020 7:55 AM ET:
 Coronavirus Map: Tracking the Global Outbreak 
The coronavirus pandemic has sickened more than 35,224,200 
people, according to official counts, including 7,444,705 Americans.

      Oct 5, 2020 7:55 AM ET: 
Coronavirus in the U.S.: Latest Map and Case Count
Updated 10/5/20, 4:23 AM ET
Click image for larger size.

Sunday, October 4, 2020

"It’s Over For The Dollar: Emerging Evidence Of Hyperinflation That Will Lead To Banking Crisis"

"It’s Over For The Dollar: Emerging Evidence Of 
Hyperinflation That Will Lead To Banking Crisis"
by Epic Economist

"The new monetary stimulus relief issued by the Fed is going to create a massive hyperinflation that will provoke a banking crisis and potentially trigger the dollar collapse on the financial markets. Even though a second round of unemployment checks may sound good at this point in the economic meltdown, what lays behind this policy is yet another attempt of the US government to trap the American currency into an inflation loop. However, as the is hostage to foreign sellers and the market tendency points to a major dollar sell-off, experts have been alerting that how the second round of state money is programmed to swiftly lose utility, which will defeat its own purpose, and soon we’ll witness the dollar lose its purchasing power.

As the economic meltdown unfolds, the Fed continues with policies whose purpose is to sustain a bubble in financial markets. However, when the massive inflation bubble pop the inevitable result will be the total destruction of the dollar. To simply put, the extensive scale of printed money injections will create such an overpowering hyperinflation that the dollar's purchasing power will rapidly deteriorate. 

You may think the main purpose of monetary inflation is to support the economy, but the government’s real reason is that only a large-scale inflation can fund the colossal governmental deficit, which is climbing fast due to higher future welfare liabilities becoming current and also to the political class' disruptive behavior to keep finding new reasons to spend money. Underneath the extravagant spending, there are unsustainable tax burdens on the underperforming US economy. And, the economic meltdown consequent to the health crisis was only the final blow that triggered the dollar downfall.

At the end of the day, as economy expert Alasdair Macleod explained, the real intention behind monetary inflation is to transfer wealth from savers, salary-earners, pensioners, and welfare beneficiaries to the government. In no way does this benefit the people as a whole. It also transfers wealth from savers to borrowers by diminishing the value of capital over time. That is to say, with yet another round of fiscal relief, the inflation of the money supply is now going to skyrocket, meaning that these negative implications are going to get much worse. 

The coming elections will likely be another aggravating factor for it, because prospects to reduce, or at least restraint budget deficits have been totally suppressed by it. No matter who wins, government spending won’t be controlled nor tax revenue will be increased. The thing about unsubstantiated state currencies is that whenever they can be issued to cover budget deficits they will be issued. As a consequence, the inflated currency loses its purchasing power as the pace of its issuance speeds up to compensate - and that's the main traction behind hyperinflation of the quantity of money.

Due to the Fed's monetary response to the economic meltdown boosted by the outbreak, the imminence of a second wave of the virus destroying the possibility of a V-shaped recovery, forthcoming elections, and another stimulus package, a significant surge in FMQ will emerge. Although, right now, FMQ already exceeds GDP, and it will potentially exceed 125% of GDP in the coming months.

This money is raised through quantitative easing which is a policy that overlooks rules to enable the Fed to keep printing money and handing it to the US government. As the fiscal deficit has been expanding way before the sanitary outbreak struck the economy, and after businesses' widespread collapse that led to the direct injection of money into each household due to the staggering unemployment rates, the government debt is predicted to be of $20.3 trillion by the end of fiscal 2020.

Furthermore, eventually, the inflation impact will be seen in prices, and ultimately, people will start to reject it as a currency, preferring to trade it in exchange for goods, because it will become worthless paper. While authorities are relying on public ignorance about how money and the theory of exchange works, foreign holders already started to dump dollars or sell them off in exchange for commodities.

Countries that hold the dollar as a reserve currency or as portfolio investment, are witnessing the worsening of the global economic outlook, boosting the deterioration of the currency. Additionally, the second round of stimulus relief will likely spark a banking crisis that will make the whole traditional banking system obsolete, and possibly mark the end of the Fed’s money-printing policy and the beginning of a new digital currency. In any case, the effects on the real economy will be disastrous and the financial markets are going to face another blow."

Gregory Mannarino, "Markets A Look Ahead: Special Report! Critical Updates"

Gregory Mannarino,
"Markets A Look Ahead: Special Report! Critical Updates"

Musical Interlude: Liquid Mind, "When Time Slows (Born Star)"

Liquid Mind, "When Time Slows (Born Star)"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"No, hamburgers are not this big. What is pictured is a sharp telescopic view of a magnificent edge-on spiral galaxy NGC 3628, a puffy galactic disk divided by dark dust lanes. Of course, this deep galactic portrait puts some astronomers in mind of its popular moniker, The Hamburger Galaxy. 

Click image for larger size.
The tantalizing island universe is about 100,000 light-years across and 35 million light-years away in the northern springtime constellation Leo. NGC 3628 shares its neighborhood in the local Universe with two other large spirals M65 and M66 in a grouping otherwise known as the Leo Triplet. Gravitational interactions with its cosmic neighbors are likely responsible for the extended flare and warp of this spiral's disk.”

"Are There Any Questions?"

"Are There Any Questions?"
by Robert Fulghum

"Are there any questions?" An offer that comes at the end of college lectures and long meetings. Said when an audience is not only overdosed with information, but when there is no time left anyhow. At times like that you sure do have questions. Like, "Can we leave now?" and "What the hell was this meeting for?" and "Where can I get a drink?"

The gesture is supposed to indicate openness on the part of the speaker, I suppose, but if in fact you do ask a question, both the speaker and the audience will give you drop-dead looks. And some fool - some earnest idiot - always asks. And the speaker always answers. By repeating most of what he has already said. But if there is a little time left and there is a little silence left in response to the invitation, I usually ask the most important question of all: "What is the Meaning of Life?" You never know, somebody may have the answer, and I'd really hate to miss it because I was too socially inhibited to ask. But when I ask, it is usually taken as a kind of absurdist move - people laugh and nod and gather up their stuff and the meeting is dismissed on that ridiculous note. Once, and only once, I asked that question and got a serious answer…

Papaderos rose from his chair at the back of the room and walked to the front, where he stood in the bright Greek sunlight of an open window and looked out… he turned. And made the ritual gesture: "Are there any questions?" Quiet quilted the room. These two weeks had generated enough questions for a lifetime, but for now there was only silence.

"No questions?" Papaderos swept the room with his eyes.
So. I asked.
"Dr. Papaderos, what is the meaning of life?"

The usual laughter followed, and people stirred to go. Papaderos held up his hand and stilled the room and looked at me for a long time, asking with his eyes if I was serious and seeing from my eyes that I was.

"I will answer your question."

Taking his wallet out of his hip pocket, he fished into a leather billfold and brought out a very small round mirror, about the size of a quarter. And what he said went like this: "When I was a small child, during the war, we were very poor and we lived in a remote village. One day, on the road, I found the broken pieces of a mirror. A German motorcycle had been wrecked in that place. I tried to find all the pieces and put them together, but it was not possible, so I kept only the largest piece. This one. And by scratching it on a stone I made it round. I began to play with it as a toy and became fascinated by the fact that I could reflect light into dark places where the sun would never shine - in deep holes and crevices and dark closets. It became a game for me to get light into the most inaccessible places I could find.

I kept the little mirror, and as I went about my growing up, I would take it out in idle moments and continue the challenge of the game. As I became a man, I grew to understand that this was not just a child's game but a metaphor for what I might do with my life. I came to understand that I am not the light or the source of light. But light - truth, understanding, knowledge - is there, and it will only shine in many dark places if I reflect it. I am a fragment of a mirror whose design and shape I do not know. Nevertheless, with what I have I can reflect light into the dark places of this world - into the black places in the hearts of men - and change some things in some people. Perhaps others may see and do likewise. This is what I am about. This is the meaning of my life."

And then he took his small mirror and, holding it carefully, caught the bright rays of daylight streaming through the window and reflected them onto my face and onto my hands folded on the desk."
- Robert Fulghum, 
"It Was On Fire When I Lay Down On It"

"The Random Revenge..."

“A man who has blown all his options can't afford the luxury of changing his ways. He has to capitalize on whatever he has left, and he can't afford to admit - no matter how often he's reminded of it - that every day of his life takes him farther and farther down a blind alley. Very few toads in this world are Prince Charmings in disguise. Most are simply toads, and they are going to stay that way. Toads don't make laws or change any basic structures, but one or two rooty insights can work powerful changes in the way they get through life. A toad who believes he got a raw deal before he even knew who was dealing will usually be sympathetic to the mean, vindictive ignorance that colors the Hell's Angels' view of humanity. There is not much mental distance between a feeling of having been screwed and the ethic of total retaliation, or at least the random revenge that comes with outraging the public decency.”
- Hunter S. Thompson

The Daily "Near You?"

Bacolod City, Bacolod, Philippines. Thanks for stopping by!

"2020: The Year The System Showed Its Real Face"

"2020: The Year The System Showed Its Real Face"
by Paul Rosenberg

"As we grew up, nearly all of us were inundated with stories of our glorious national fathers, our beautiful democracies, and so on. And being young, we for the most part believed them. The system gave us our prosperity, our comfort, our medicine, our sense of importance. Soon enough we learned that the system was also stupid and perverse, but we found a way around that contradiction by blaming one segment of the system or another: The Blues or the Greens or the Red are the problem; it could not, must not, be that the system itself is the problem. Then came 2020, and the system revealed its true face. I suppose I should be fair and add that the system wasn’t always as rotten as it is now, but regardless, it wasn’t able to prevent the rot that overtook it.

2020, In A Nasty Little Nutshell: The system would like everything except the daily outrages (one for the Blues, one for the Reds) to go down the Memory Hole. So I think it’s important to recap the revelations of 2020:

The system decreed who could work and who couldn’t. This was not done democratically; it was done by edict. “Democracy” did nothing to stop it.

People were arrested for going to church or synagogue. This was the real disgrace of the police forces. Are there any orders from their paymasters they won’t enforce upon us?

Political gangs roam the streets, beating, threatening and burning. Make no mistake, these are covertly authorized political gangs, serving political ends. This vile tactic goes back to ancient Rome at least, where gangs of thugs beat opponents in the streets.

“Science” said one thing then the opposite, supporting whatever power wanted. Not every scientist, but more or less the entire grant-seeking, position-seeking complex showed themselves to be without integrity; they said and did whatever power wanted them to do.

Mass media was as a fear delivery system. They were devoted to capturing eyeballs with fear and monetizing outrage. Journalistic integrity was a joke at best.

Social media silenced thousands of dissenters, purely at the behest of political power. This was no less that the suppression of speech. (If you want to profit from becoming the public square, you have to act like a public square.) Free services have always been parasites, but these have shown themselves to be sycophantic to the point of fascism.

The mandatory school system, around which millions of families had arranged their lives, was ripped away in an instant.

Hate was legitimated. Political loud-mouths and televised faces have treated hate as the voice of justice, instead of the disease it is. Millions have joined in the barbarity, pretending that hate is actually duty, honor, and truth.

More could be added, but this is quite enough to make my point: The system is not what we were taught it was, and 2020 has revealed that quite well.

The System Doesn’t Deserve Us: By referring to “the system” and “us,” I’m dividing the world into two parts, and so I should be clear on what those parts are:

Us refers to producers: the people who grow food, transport it, process it, build machines, provide medical care, and so on. Everyone from the construction worker to the small business owner to the cleaning lady is a producer, and deserve great respect for what they do. We owe all the comforts of our lives, and frequently our lives altogether, to these people.

The system refers to the entire governmental complex that takes our money and couldn’t survive without it. It also includes everything that couldn’t be what they are without them: Central banks, government school systems, businesses that live on government connections, television networks, social media behemoths, and more or less everything high and mighty.

What I’d like is for the producers of the world to become clear on the fact that we don’t need them. Everything they “do for us” is done with our money, which they take from us by force and fraud. And let’s be honest about this: The system is a violent, corrupt and control-obsessed entity. Millions of us would choose other arrangements if we could, but the system forbids them. Forcibly.

We should also understand that this has happened before. Here, to illustrate, is a passage from historian C. Delisle Burns on the real reason Rome collapsed: "Great numbers of men and women were unwilling to make make the effort required for the maintenance of the old order, not because they were not good enough to fulfill their civic duties, but because they were too good to be satisfied with a system from which so few derived benefit."

The system is not worthy of our labor and treasure. Whether or not it once was (and if so, when) no longer matters. 2020 has made this much clear. It’s time to drop our child-training and look at the world like the adults we’ve become."

"DHS Just Banned All Communists and 'Totalitarians' From the USA."

 "DHS Just Banned All Communists and 'Totalitarians' From the USA."
by Flamehuntz

50 U.S. Code § 842. Proscription of Communist Party, its successors, and subsidiary organizations: The Communist Party of the United States, or any successors of such party regardless of the assumed name, whose object or purpose is to overthrow the Government of the United States, or the government of any State, Territory, District, or possession thereof, or the government of any political subdivision therein by force and violence, are not entitled to any of the rights, privileges, and immunities attendant upon legal bodies created under the jurisdiction of the laws of the United States or any political subdivision thereof; and whatever rights, privileges, and immunities which have heretofore been granted to said party or any subsidiary organization by reason of the laws of the United States or any political subdivision thereof, are terminated: Provided, however, That nothing in this section shall be construed as amending the Internal Security Act of 1950, as amended [50 U.S.C. 781 et seq.]
(Aug. 24, 1954, ch. 886, § 3, 68 Stat. 776.)

The Poet: Mark Jarman, "Coyotes"

"Coyotes"

"Is this world truly fallen? They say no.
For there's the new moon, there's the Milky Way,
There's the rattler with a wren's egg in its mouth,
And there's the panting rabbit they will eat.
They sing their wild hymn on the dark slope,
Reading the stars like notes of hilarious music.
Is this a fallen world? How could it be?

And yet we're crying over the stars again,
And over the uncertainty of death,
Which we suspect will divide us all forever.
I'm tired of those who broadcast their certainties,
Constantly on their cell phones to their redeemer.
Is this a fallen world? For them it is.
But there's that starlit burst of animal laughter.

The day has sent its fires scattering.
The night has risen from its burning bed.
Our tears are proof that love is meant for life
And for the living. And this chorus of praise,
Which the pet dogs of the neighborhood are answering
Nostalgically, invites our answer, too.
Is this a fallen world? How could it be?"

~ Mark Jarman

I couldn't resist!

"How It Really Is"

 

"Moral compass?!" 
 Surely you jest... This is 'Murica!

"The Level Of Intelligence..."

"If Man were relieved of all superstition, and all prejudice, and had replaced these with a keen sensitivity to his real environment, and moreover had achieved a level of communication so simplified that one syllable could express his every thought, then he would have achieved the level of intelligence already achieved by his dog."
~ Robert Brault

"How It Really Will Be, Soon"

 
Good riddance...

"Be Open Minded..."

 

"Things Change"

"Things Change"
by Charles Hugh Smith

"Things change, supposedly immutable systems crumble and delusions die. That's the lay of the land in the "The Empire of Uncertainty" I described Friday. It's difficult not to be reminded of the Antonine Plague of 165 AD that crippled the Western Roman Empire. The exact nature of the virus that struck down as many as one-third of the Empire's residents is unknown; it's thought to be an early variant of measles or smallpox.

One would have guessed the populace achieved "herd immunity" after the first wave devastated the Empire, but that's not what happened. The plague continued until 180 AD, and recurred a decade later, continuing to sow misery and economic costs. Valiant co-Emperor Verus fell ill and died in 169 AD, leaving his adopted brother Marcus Aurelius to struggle on as the sole leader of Rome's efforts to repel invasions and maintain its defenses.

What's different now is the extreme fragility of America's financial and social orders. The apparent strength of the economy rests on increasing extremes of financialization and its corrupting fruit, soaring wealth/power inequality. "The market" would have us believe corporations profiting from "engagement" (i.e. divisiveness and turmoil) are the most valuable assets in the land. If the Empire's most precious assets are the derangements of "engagement," then what else do we need to know about its advanced fragility?

If data stripmined from debt-dependent consumers is the most profitable resource in the nation, that's a definition of distortion and delusion. It's almost as if the American economy and social order have discounted the material world, as if financial leverage, data-mining and "engagement" are all that really matters and the material world will magically take care of itself.

Just as we can't eat an iPad, we also can't eat "engagement" or burn data to keep warm or use leverage and other tricks to conjure up productive wealth. The rising tide of dysfunction and incompetence in America's institutions can be monitored by tracking how functionaries are rewarded for navigating the bureaucratic thickets and padding budgets, not for achieving the institution's purpose.

The Crisis of Competence is increasingly visible, but delusions of grandeur still hold. As everyday life decays into developed-world status, we're told the problem is the hospital or university or corporation no longer has sufficient revenues to cover its bloated expenses, and so the nation must borrow additional trillions to bail out virtually every entity in the land. The concept of financial viability without access to ever-expanding debt has been lost, and with that lost, resilience and competence have also been lost. The status quo's "solutions" are nothing more than doing more of what's hollowed out our economy and society.

Things change. We can't freeze change in its tracks, we can only respond: either competently and effectively, fully aware of our limitations and the risks of relying on debt to paper over our weaknesses, or incompetently, clinging on to delusions of magical thinking, misguided faith in failed leadership and institutions and seeing debt and money created out of thin air as our savior rather than the source of our downfall.

Here's the projection I made on February 2, 2020, a week after Covid-19 was finally acknowledged by authorities as a global threat. By my reckoning, this projection is still on track, and we're approaching "Wave 2 outbreaks around the world, half-measures fail, vaccine months away."

"World finally awakens to the pandemic, global economy slides into depression" is on tap for 2021. Things change. Doing more of what's hollowed out our economy and society is a slippery path to ruin."

Saturday, October 3, 2020

"Debt Creation End Game; California Invades America; Dollar Crisis; Bubbles Getting Bigger"

Jeremiah Babe,
"Debt Creation End Game; California Invades America;
Dollar Crisis; Bubbles Getting Bigger"

Musical Interlude: Liquid Mind, "Laguna Indigo"

Liquid Mind, "Laguna Indigo"

Full screen mode suggested.

"Yes, There Is A Meaning..."

"Yes, there is a meaning; at least for me, there is one thing that matters -
to set a chime of words tinkling in the minds of a few fastidious people."
- Logan Pearsall Smith

"A Look to the Heavens"

“This shock wave plows through space at over 500,000 kilometers per hour. Moving toward to bottom of this beautifully detailed color composite, the thin, braided filaments are actually long ripples in a sheet of glowing gas seen almost edge on. Cataloged as NGC 2736, its narrow appearance suggests its popular name, the Pencil Nebula.
About 5 light-years long and a mere 800 light-years away, the Pencil Nebula is only a small part of the Vela supernova remnant. The Vela remnant itself is around 100 light-years in diameter and is the expanding debris cloud of a star that was seen to explode about 11,000 years ago. Initially, the shock wave was moving at millions of kilometers per hour but has slowed considerably, sweeping up surrounding interstellar gas.”

"He Cannot Help..."

“A person who has not been completely alienated, who has remained sensitive and able to feel, who has not lost the sense of dignity, who is not yet ‘for sale’, who can still suffer over the suffering of others, who has not acquired fully the having mode of existence – briefly, a person who has remained a person and not become a thing – cannot help feeling lonely, powerless, isolated in present-day society. He cannot help doubting himself and his own convictions, if not his sanity.”
- Erich Fromm

“Klingon Worlds”

“Klingon Worlds”
by Seth Shostak, Senior Astronomer, SETI Institute

“The latest planets turned up by NASA's Kepler telescope are- like the kids in Lake Wobegon- gratifyingly above average. These new worlds offer both promise and insights, because they've got traits that are both appealing and mildly disconcerting. In the 11 years since its launch, Kepler has chalked up hundreds of new and confirmed planets. It's also caught the scent of nearly three thousand additional objects, of which probably 80 percent or more will turn out to be other-worldly orbs. Compare this track record to the approximately 700 planets painstakingly rooted out by ground-based telescopes in the last 25 years, and you can appreciate why some astronomers refer to the space-based instrument as a planet factory- churning out new worlds faster than a Hong Kong tailor turns out suits.

But here's the thing: Kepler can find small planets (even smaller than Mercury). And diminutive worlds are more likely to be rocky, and lapped by oceans and atmospheres. In the vernacular of "Star Trek," these would be M-class planets: life-friendly oases where biology could begin and bumpy-faced Klingons might exist.

Three of the new Kepler worlds have both the right size and the right orbital distances to boast temperatures at which water would remain liquid, a circumstance often assumed to be life's sine qua non. One of these planets orbits the star Kepler 69- which is comparable in brightness and size to our Sun. This possibly habitable planet is ingeniously named Kepler 69c. The other two worlds are the spawn of a dimmer star called Kepler 62. Its brood includes at least five planets, but the habitable ones are labeled Kepler 62e and Kepler 62f.

All three of these potentially habitable worlds are "Super Earths." The term isn't intended to suggest planets with azure skies, unpolluted oceans, and sympathetic inhabitants. Rather, it's a reference to size. Super Earths have super girths, between 1 and roughly 2-1/2 times that of our own planet. Habitable, in principle- just a bit bulked up.

According to SETI Institute scientist Jon Jenkins, Super Earths are turning up more and more often. They dominate the new worlds now being found by Kepler. Now that's a bit of a head scratcher, because in our own solar system the number of Super Earths is zero. There's nothing between the size of Terra Firma and Neptune, which is 4 times larger than Earth.

So is our solar system just unlucky, like a family with eight kids but no girls? Or is there some deeper explanation for the absence of a Super Earth nearby? We don't know. And this is an unexpected puzzle for those who wish to know what constitutes an "average" solar system.

The discovery of these three planets has also encouraged scientists who look for life in deep space. The number of potentially habitable worlds discovered beyond our solar system is currently 9, out of a total of 872 confirmed exoplanets. The math is dead simple: it seems that the frequency of planets able to support life is roughly one percent. In other words, a billion or more such worlds exist in our galaxy alone. That's a lot of acreage, and it takes industrial-strength credulity to believe it's all bleakly barren.

So will SETI experimenters fix their antennas on these new planets? Well, the answer's as obvious as a lounge lizard: of course they will. But give consideration to the fact that alien astronomers could have scrutinized Earth for more than 4 billion years without detecting any radio signals, despite the fact that our world is the poster child for habitability. Lots of planetary systems will require examination before we can reasonably hope to find an alien transmission. Still, at least we know that suitable planets are not dauntingly rare.

And there's something else that encourages me in the search for signals from these newly found members of the planetary bestiary. Kepler 62e has an orbital period of 122 days; Kepler 62f's period is 267 days. Consequently, every 89 years these two seductive orbs line up with Earth. They're connected to us in a straight line. If some sophisticated society has colonized both planets, then their back-and-forth communication signals- if any- will be aimed our way during this special moment. So in this case, the new discoveries clue us not only where we should hunt for signals, but when. And that might nicely improve the odds of finding Klingons.”
"I can never look now at the Milky Way without wondering from which of those banked clouds of stars the emissaries are coming. If you will pardon so commonplace a simile, we have set off the fire alarm and have nothing to do but to wait. I do not think we will have to wait for long."
- Arthur C. Clarke, "The Sentinel"
And if they're really intelligent they'll take one look and turn around and go home...


Full screen mode suggested.

"I'm Sure..."


"Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in the Universe or we are not. 
Both are equally terrifying."

"I'm sure the universe is full of intelligent life.
 It's just been too intelligent to come here."
- Arthur C. Clarke

"The Decline of Critical Thinking"

 

"The Decline of Critical Thinking"
by Lawrence Davidson


"In 2008 Rick Shenkman, the Editor-in-Chief of the History News Network, published a book entitled "Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth about the American Voter" (Basic Books). In it he demonstrated, among other things, that most Americans were: (1) ignorant about major international events, (2) knew little about how their own government runs and who runs it, (3) were nonetheless willing to accept government positions and policies even though a moderate amount of critical thought suggested they were bad for the country, and (4) were readily swayed by stereotyping, simplistic solutions, irrational fears, and public relations babble.

Shenkman spent 256 pages documenting these claims, using a great number of polls and surveys from very reputable sources. Indeed, in the end it is hard to argue with his data. So, what can we say about this? One thing that can be said is that this is not an abnormal state of affairs. As has been suggested in prior analyses, ignorance of non-local affairs (often leading to inaccurate assumptions, passive acceptance of authority, and illogical actions) is, in fact, a default position for any population.

To put it another way, the majority of any population will pay little or no attention to news stories or government actions that do not appear to impact their lives or the lives of close associates. If something non-local happens that is brought to their attention by the media, they will passively accept government explanations and simplistic solutions.

The primary issue is “does it impact my life?” If it does, people will pay attention. If it appears not to, they won’t pay attention. For instance, in Shenkman’s book unfavorable comparisons are sometimes made between Americans and Europeans. Americans often are said to be much more ignorant about world geography than are Europeans. This might be, but it is, ironically, due to an accident of geography. Americans occupy a large subcontinent isolated by two oceans. Europeans are crowded into small contiguous countries that, until recently, repeatedly invaded each other as well as possessed overseas colonies. Under these circumstances, a knowledge of geography, as well as paying attention to what is happening on the other side of the border, has more immediate relevance to the lives of those in Toulouse or Amsterdam than is the case for someone in Pittsburgh or Topeka. If conditions were reversed, Europeans would know less geography and Americans more.

Ideology and Bureaucracy: The localism referenced above is not the only reason for widespread ignorance. The strong adherence to ideology and work within a bureaucratic setting can also greatly narrow one’s worldview and cripple one’s critical abilities. In effect, a closely adhered to ideology becomes a mental locality with limits and borders just as real as those of geography. In fact, if we consider nationalism a pervasive modern ideology, there is a direct connection between the boundaries induced in the mind and those on the ground. Furthermore, it does not matter if the ideology is politically left or right, or for that matter, whether it is secular or religious. One’s critical abilities will be suppressed in favor of standardized, formulaic answers provided by the ideology.

Just so work done within a bureaucratic setting. Bureaucracies position the worker within closely supervised departments where success equates with doing a specific job according to specific rules. Within this limited world one learns not to think outside the box, and so, except as applied to one’s task, critical thinking is discouraged and one’s worldview comes to conform to that of the bureaucracy. That is why bureaucrats are so often referred to as cogs in a machine.

Moments of Embarrassment: That American ignorance is explainable does not make it any less distressing. At the very least it often leads to embarrassment for the minority who are not ignorant. Take for example the facts that polls show over half of American adults don’t know which country dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, or that 30% don’t know what the Holocaust was. We might explain this as the result of faulty education; however, there are other, just as embarrassing, moments involving the well educated. Take, for instance, the employees of Fox News. Lou Dobbs (who graduated from Harvard University) is host of the Fox Business Network talk show Lou Dobbs Tonight. Speaking on 23 March 2013 about gun control, he and Fox political analyst Angela McGlowan (a graduate of the University of Mississippi) had the following exchange:

McGlowan: “What scares the hell out of me is that we have a president... that wants to take our guns, but yet he wants to attack Iran and Syria. So if they come and attack us here, we don’t have the right to bear arms under this Obama administration.”
Dobbs: “We’re told by Homeland Security that there are already agents of Al Qaeda here working in this country. Why in the world would you not want to make certain that all American citizens were armed and prepared?”

Despite education, ignorance plus ideology leading to stupidity doesn’t come in any starker form than this. Suffice it to say that nothing the president has proposed in the way of gun control takes away the vast majority of weapons owned by Americans, that the president’s actions point to the fact that he does not want to attack Syria or Iran, and that neither country has the capacity to “come and attack us here.” Finally, while there may be a handful of Americans who sympathize with Al Qaeda, they cannot accurately be described as “agents” of some central organization that dictates their actions.

Did the fact that Dobbs and McGlowan were speaking nonsense make any difference to the majority of those listening to them? Probably not. Their regular listeners may well be too ignorant to know that this surreal episode has no basis in reality. Their ignorance will cause them not to fact-check Dobbs’s and McGlowan’s remarks. They might very well rationalize away countervailing facts if they happen to come across them. And, by doing so, keep everything comfortably simple, which counts for more than the messy, often complicated truth.

Unfortunately, one can multiply this scenario many times. There are millions of Americans, most of whom are quite literate, who believe the United Nations is an evil organization bent on destroying U.S. sovereignty. Indeed, in 2005 George W. Bush actually appointed one of them, John Bolton (a graduate of Yale University), as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Likewise, so paranoid are gun enthusiasts (whose level of education varies widely) that any really effective government supervision of the U.S. gun trade would be seen as a giant step toward dictatorship. Therefore, the National Rifle Association, working its influence on Congress, has for years successfully restricted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives from using computers to create a central database of gun transactions. And, last but certainly not least, there is the unending war against teaching evolution in U.S. schools. This Christian fundamentalist effort often enjoys temporary success in large sections of the country and is ultimately held at bay only by court decisions reflecting (to date) a solid sense of reality on this subject. By the way, evolution is a scientific theory that has as much evidence to back it up as does gravity.

Teaching Critical Thinking? As troubling as this apparently perennial problem of ignorance is, it is equally frustrating to listen to repeated schemes to teach critical thinking through the public schools. Of course, the habit of asking critical questions can be taught. However, if you do not have a knowledge base from which to consider a situation, it is hard think critically about it. So ignorance often precludes effective critical thinking even if the technique is acquired. In any case, public school systems have always had two primary purposes and critical thinking is not one of them. The schools are designed to prepare students for the marketplace and to make them loyal citizens. The marketplace is most often a top-down, authoritarian world and loyalty comes from myth-making and emotional bonds. In both cases, really effective critical thinking might well be incompatible with the desired end.

Recently, a suggestion has been made to forget about the schools as a place to learn critical thinking. According to Dennis Bartels’s article “Critical Thinking Is Best Taught Outside the Classroom” appearing in Scientific American online, schools can’t teach critical thinking because they are too busy teaching to standardized tests. Of course, there was a time when schools were not so strongly mandated to teach this way and there is no evidence that at that time they taught critical thinking. In any case, Bartels believes that people learn critical thinking in informal settings such as museums and by watching the "Daily Show" with Jon Stewart. He concludes that “people must acquire this skill somewhere. Our society depends on them being able to make critical decisions.” If that were only true it would make this an easier problem to solve.

It may very well be that (consciously or unconsciously) societies organize themselves to hold critical thinking to a minimum. That means to tolerate it to the point needed to get through day-to-day existence and to tackle those aspects of one’s profession that might require narrowly focused critical thought. But beyond that, we get into dangerous, de-stabilizing waters. Societies, be they democratic or not, are not going to encourage critical thinking about prevailing ideologies or government policies. And, if it is the case that most people don’t think of anything critically unless it falls into that local arena in which their lives are lived out, all the better. Under such conditions people can be relied upon to stay passive about events outside their local venue until the government decides it is time to rouse them up in some propagandistic manner.

The truth is that people who are consistently active as critical thinkers are not going to be popular, either with the government or their neighbors. They are called gadflies. You know, people like Socrates, who is probably the best-known critical thinker in Western history. And, at least the well-educated among us know what happened to him.”

"If you want to tell people the truth, make 
them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you."
- Oscar Wilde

The Daily "Near You?"

 
Tallahassee, Florida, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

Mark Twain, "Congress"

 "Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress.
But I repeat myself."

"All Congresses and Parliaments have a kindly feeling for idiots,
and a compassion for them, on account of personal experience and heredity."

"...the smallest minds and the selfishest souls 
and the cowardliest hearts that God makes."

"The lightning there is peculiar; it is so convincing, that when it strikes a
thing it doesn't leave enough of that thing behind for you to tell whether-
Well, you'd think it was something valuable, and a Congressman had been there."

"It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly
native American criminal class except Congress."

"Fleas can be taught nearly anything that a Congressman can."

- Mark Twain

Too bad the jokes on US...

"Markets vs. Politics: Which Will It Be?"

"Markets vs. Politics: Which Will It Be?"
by Brian Maher

"No man can avoid politics. All are in siege. No rival field of human enterprise can approach its ferocity. War is the extension of what by other means… in Mr. Carl von Clausewitz’s grim telling? The answer is politics of course. Today we file a scorching tort against politics. Politics separates, divides, enrages, disrupts - as war itself separates, divides, enrages, disrupts. Democratic politics offer no exception. Reduce electoral politics to its naked core…
The Essence of Electoral Politics: You have Candidate X. You have Candidate Y. Each is nothing more in this world than a liar, jackleg or rogue. This human sculch appears before the voters, hopeful of election. Both roar their flubdubberies before eager and attentive crowds. Both shout their propagandas. Each denounces the other as an arm of Satan. Amazingly, both are correct. This we witnessed Tuesday evening.

Come the election... 50.1% of voters may yank a lever for X. 49.9% may pull one for Y. X claims the laurel. He proceeds immediately against the desires, hopes and interests of the hapless 49.9%. Each day they live they wither, cringe and chafe beneath X’s atrocities… helpless as worms on fisherman’s hooks. Only upon some distant November can they heave this jackal out. Assume they do... Y - or some other Y - comes in. X’s voters must then endure their own parallel hells until the following election. The case of President Donald J. Trump is exquisitely in point…
In Politics, Smaller Is Better: One segment of the nation is with him. The other is against - many violently against. Why should either boss the other for four entire years? The same pitiful calculus applies to elections at any level of American government… down to canine-catcher. But the higher the office… the greater the menace.

The mayor of Why, Arizona, may impose his torments upon his encircled victims - as may the mayor of Whynot, North Carolina. Yet their victims are free to jump the fence. The bordering hamlet might run to saner and more tolerable settings… and so the oppressed flee.

The same dynamic applies to states. Has a California or an Oregon or an Illinois gone lunatic? For many they have. But a Texas or a Tennessee or a Utah holds out asylum. These local competitions form a severe brake on the natural rascalities of politics. It is, in fact, the crowning glory of the American device of government. But to escape a president a fellow must quit the country altogether - or rot down four years until he takes another go at the vote booth. And if the scalawag wins reelection?  Then our wretch voter must endure another four years under occupation - for a total of eight.

There is politics for you. The business is so dismal... it can wear the soul out of the stoutest fellow. Now contrast the political system with the market system…

Voting in the Marketplace Is Entirely Different: Free markets - authentically free markets - lack entirely the violent combats central to politics. They are scenes of peace, tolerance… and justice. Let us draw a parallel case to our previous example of candidates X and Y...

A Coca-Cola holds itself out before the American people. This candidate claims to be the “real thing.” “Vote for me,” it says. Behind another podium stands a Pepsi. “No. Vote for me,” counters this fellow. Drink me “for the love of it.” Each cries his case.

This fickle and capricious voter pulls the lever for Coke. Or he pulls the lever for Pepsi. He opens his wallet for the one or the other. Does his vote injure, usurp or ruffle the opposing voter? Does he club the other voter over the head… as he does in politics? In no way, no shape, no form.

Satisfied Voters: A voter for either is a satisfied voter. Neither has any care to impose his preference upon the other… or deny him his soft drink of choice. Multiply this one example countless times and in countless directions - and you have a picture of majestic electoral peace.

McDonald’s versus Burger King, Honda versus Ford, Nike versus Adidas, Walmart versus Target… it is all one. A vote for any of them is peaceful as a dove. This voter on the free and open market holds no gun to the other voter’s ribs.

When he votes in politics - conversely - he does hold a gun to the other’s ribs. He seeks to impose his preferences upon the other fellow who does not wish to be imposed upon. To pull a lever is to pull a trigger.

Red State vs. Blue State: Chain a red-state American to a blue-state American. Force them to vote between any product on the free and open market. The blue-state voter may razz the red-stater’s ghastly and barbarian tastes. The red-state voter may in turn razz the blue-stater’s effete and supercilious tastes. But neither attempts to dragoon or bayonet the other. Each is free to vote his own way, as he might. And so peace prevails between them.

But give them the choice of Trump versus Hillary or Trump versus Biden... They will fall into savage combat… as the Kilkenny cats fell into savage combat. One will win. One will lose.

We must therefore conclude the free market’s voting system is vastly superior to political voting. A vote in the marketplace is a “win, win” deal, as our co-founder Bill Bonner styles it. What is politics then but a colossal “win, lose” deal? And market voting improves the world in ways large and small…

Voting in the Free Market Improves the World: Each business must compete for the consumer’s vote. That vote harms no one, as we have established. It also benefits many. It benefits many because a vote sends a signal. It tells the outvoted to field an improved product - or take the consequences. And an improved product lifts this world that much higher.

If a business fails the market’s harsh and ruthless voting, it falls into bankruptcy… and goes away. Yet here is perhaps politics’s greatest crime, its most scarlet of sins: It has drained away “social power”... and channeled it off into state power. That is, politics has stripped society’s power and liberty… and placed them in the state’s hands.

Social Power vs. State Power: Albert Jay Nock (1870–1945) was a gentleman and thinker of deep and penetrating insight. Nock bemoaned the loss of social power during the New Deal: "If we look beneath the surface of our public affairs, we can discern one fundamental fact: namely, a great redistribution of power between society and the State…

It is unfortunately none too well understood that, just as the State has no money of its own, so it has no power of its own. All the power it has is what society gives it, plus what it confiscates from time to time on one pretext or another; there is no other source from which State power can be drawn. Therefore every assumption of State power, whether by gift or seizure, leaves society with so much less power. There is never, nor can there be, any strengthening of State power without a corresponding and roughly equivalent depletion of social power...

Heretofore in this country sudden crises of misfortune have been met by a mobilization of social power. In fact (except for certain institutional enterprises like the home for the aged, the lunatic asylum, city hospital and county poorhouse), destitution, unemployment, "depression" and similar ills have been no concern of the State but have been relieved by the application of social power."

As the frog in its pot acquiesces to the gradually warming water… the citizen has acquiesced to his gradual loss of social power: "Thus the State "turns every contingency into a resource" for accumulating power in itself, always at the expense of social power; and with this it develops a habit of acquiescence in the people. New generations appear, each temperamentally adjusted - or as I believe our American glossary now has it, "conditioned" - to new increments of State power, and they tend to take the process of continuous accumulation as quite in order."

The lingering vestiges of social power are in the State’s sights. And many voters are hot to sign them away.

Is There Any Alternative to Politics? Do we propose an alternative to the political arrangement? No - not earnestly. We diagnose a disorder… we do not prescribe a fix. Besides, most would find a true alternative hard to worry down. It would be very rough stuff.

We have previously held out the relative virtues of monarchy to jab cherished democratic theories. But we certainly do not expect - nor do we propose - a return to monarchy. But you say we are a republic, not a democracy. It is the best we can do in this fallen world of sin and evil. Just so. We will not argue. But as French historian François Guizot said of republics: “I have no use for a republic that begins with Plato... and ends necessarily with a policeman.”

"How It Really Is"