"The Russian Timeline Critique In The Ukraine"

"The Russian Timeline Critique In The Ukraine"

by Larry Johnson

"A common theme marshaled to “prove” that Russia is failing in its war with Ukraine is that Russia failed to quickly take Kiev and, in fact, was forced to retreat from Kiev. In addition, the military analysts that populate the cable news channels in the United States insist that the Russians are bogged down and not making the rapid progress they (the Russians) expected.

This is nonsense. I defy anyone to show me one statement by Putin or the Russian General Staff where a specific timeline was established or identified. This is a construct of western military analysts who do not have access to Russia’s military plan and are projecting their own wishful thinking as “evidence” of a flailing Russian military. But it is not only western military analysts sounding the Debbie downer dirge. A blogger popular with many Russia watchers, Strelkov, also is pushing the narrative that Russia is bogged down in the Donbas. More about Stelkov in a moment.

I find it amusing that retired American Generals and Colonels who populate Fox, CNN, MSNBC and Newsmax are busy critiquing tactics they themselves have never carried out. The last time the United States was on a battlefield fighting an organized military with potent air power, artillery and tanks was in Korea. Most of these guys (e.g., General Keane) were in diapers or in elementary school. None of them were on that battlefield.

The United States’ war experience since 1960 has been against third world armies that did not have a modern air force and significant armor capabilities. The closest we have come to fighting a real army was the North Vietnamese. But the North Vietnamese relied more on human waves in combating the U.S. military and the United States had withdrawn its combat units from Vietnam with the North Vietnamese swept south and defeated the South Vietnamese. (I want to add that American troops in Vietnam, for the most part, fought bravely despite a military and political leadership that betrayed their sacrifice. It is not un-American to ask the question – what did they die for?)

Russia is not playing the United States’ game. When George W. Bush launched “shock and awe” in Iraq in March of 2003, the media briefings and images from the frontlines played an important role in convincing the American public that our multi-billion dollar military was moving like a devil’s scythe through the Iraqi forces. It was only after Bush’s Mission Accomplished speech that Americans had to come to grips with the fact that we did not control Iraq and that a viable insurgency existed.

So what is my point? The Russian military leadership and Vladimir Putin are not spending time feeding reporters with daily briefs of body counts of Ukrainian fighters or showing drone footage of Russians wiping out Ukrainian entrenched positions.

Americans indulge the delusion that we have a free, vibrant press. Yet, military analysts like Scott Ritter and Doug MacGregor are rarely invited to appear on any cable broadcast to offer a dissenting view on the narrative being force fed to the gullible, ignorant public. I will repeat a point I made early on in the Russian campaign regarding the 40 mile Russian column that lurked for more than a week north of Kiev. U.S. analysts insisted this was evidence of Russian incompetence in keeping these tanks and trucks supplied with fuel. Yet, during the entire time this big fat Russia target sat exposed, the mighty Ukrainian military failed to launch any significant attack designed to destroy that column.

This is not a minor point. No Ukrainian air assets (fixed or rotary wing) attacked the column. No Ukrainian artillery units shelled the exposed Russian tanks and trucks. And no Ukrainian tank units attacked the supposedly stalled Russians. Why? Because Ukraine had no capability to carry out such strikes.

What was Russia doing? Ritter, MacGregor and Martyanov, among others (including yours truly) saw this as a feint designed to pin down Ukrainian forces around Kiev that were dug in while Russia prepped to focus on the Donbas and the southern littoral of Ukraine.

Which brings me back to Mr. Strelkov, who writes: "It has been a week of only the tiniest gains. Furthermore, the gains have come in the wrong area. Mostly the gains have been to the north of Seversky Donets river. Meanwhile, the Izyum bridgehead to the south of the river from which the thrust is supposed to develop has been static (contained)..."

These are facts apparent to anyone so the new copium is that Russia is supposedly killing 500 Ukrainians every day. Except there is no way that Russians would have access to this information, and if you believe that Rybar Telegram actually has access to Ukrainian documents you belong in a mental institution.

It’s the good ole Vietnam strategy I guess. When you can’t show any actual real progress on the ground resort to made-up body counts. Body counts don’t win wars, and besides Ukraine can replace its losses. Russia can not. Any men Ukraine losses will be replaced. Those lost by Russia will mostly not be.

Mr. Strelkov is assuming that Russia’s goal is to quickly conquer the Donbas without regard to casualties of Russian troops. Putin is not Stalin. Stalin did not hesitate to send literally millions of his troops to slaughter in order to stop the Germans. Putin and his Generals are moving much more methodically and cautiously. The Russians are relying on artillery and air strikes to soften up Ukrainian defensive positions. And this is paying dividends. Ukrainian troops are surrendering in significant numbers, especially those who were recently put into service and are not affiliated with the neo-Nazi mercenary forces.

I am particularly puzzled by Strelkov’s claim that, “Ukraine can replace its losses.” Mr. Strelkov cannot be this stupid. Pressing 60 year old Ukrainian men into service is not evidence of a robust military response. It smacks, instead, of Hitlerian desperation. In the final days of the Third Reich Hitler scoured Berlin for old men and young boys to man positions no longer defended by the German regular forces. Ukraine’s Zelensky has embarked on a similar strategy even before the “special operation” began: "Ukraine’s Land Forces announced on Wednesday that it was calling up members of its operational reserves, effective immediately. Reservists between 18 and 60 years of age are being mobilized for a year..."

Russia is not sitting on its haunches licking its wounds. Rather than send troops against fortified positions, Russia continues to hit targets throughout Ukraine with precision missiles. Here is the activity reported on May 4:

• Russia attacked railway substation in Pyatihatki with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked railway substation in Tymkove with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked railway substation in Volovets with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked railway substation in Lviv with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked railway substation in Pidbirtsi with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Protopopovka with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Novaya Dmitrovka with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Sandjeika with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Krysino with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Volnyansk with a high-precision missile;

• Russia attacked military assets of the AFU near Novoalexandrovka with a high-precision missile.

I know for a fact that U.S. military commanders were hoping two weeks ago that Russia had exhausted its stock of precision missiles. Hope is not a good strategy. The Russians apparently did not get that memo (and Ukrainian sources have confirmed these strikes). Further evidence that Russia is opting for the “reach out and touch someone” strategy comes from a video shot tonight (May 4) of a bombardment of Mykolaev aka Nikolaev:

Full screen recommended.

If you think that enduring this kind of shelling is inconsequential then you have no appreciation of the limits of human endurance to such a sustained barrage.

I am not suggesting that the Russians are not encountering fierce resistance by some Ukrainian units. But I am offering an alternative explanation for Russia’s ground strategy. They are under no deadline. They are not going to send their military units into head on assaults and risk unnecessary casualties. And they are going to bomb Ukrainian units relentlessly until they surrender or are destroyed. Time is on Putin’s side.

The biggest failure of western military analysts is to take into account the fact that Ukraine’s economy has been gutted. Ukraine is shut off from imports/exports in the south and dependent on what Europe and the U.S. can send them overland. Fuel supplies in Ukraine are becoming more scarce, not more abundant. Given these realities, can Ukraine feed its people? That will be a critical factor in the coming days."

- https://sonar21.com/

"Megalopolis x Russia: Total War"

"Megalopolis x Russia: Total War"

by Pepe Escobar

Excerpt: "After careful evaluation, the Kremlin is rearranging the geopolitical chessboard to end the unipolar hegemony of the “indispensable nation”.

"But it’s our fate / To have no place to rest, / As suffering mortals / Blindly fall and vanish / From one hour / To the next, / Like water falling / From cliff to cliff, downward / For years to uncertainty." - Holderlin, "Hyperion’s Fate Song"

Operation Z is the first salvo of a titanic struggle: three decades after the fall of the USSR, and 77 years after the end of WWII, after careful evaluation, the Kremlin is rearranging the geopolitical chessboard to end the unipolar hegemony of the “indispensable nation”. No wonder the Empire of Lies has gone completely berserk, obsessed in completely expelling Russia from the West-centric system.

The U.S. and its NATO puppies cannot possibly come to grips with their perplexity when faced with a staggering loss: no more entitlement allowing exclusive geopolitical use of force to perpetuate “our values”. No more Full Spectrum Dominance.

The micro-picture is also clear. The U.S. Deep State is milking to Kingdom Come its planned Ukraine gambit to cloak a strategic attack on Russia. The “secret” was to force Moscow into an intra-Slav war in Ukraine to break Nord Stream 2 – and thus German reliance on Russian natural resources. That ends – at least for the foreseeable future – the prospect of a Bismarckian Russo-German connection that would ultimately cause the U.S. to lose control of the Eurasian landmass from the English Channel to the Pacific to an emerging China-Russia-Germany pact.

The American strategic gambit, so far, has worked wonders. But the battle is far from over. Psycho neo-con/neoliberalcon silos inside the Deep State consider Russia such a serious threat to the “rules-based international order” that they are ready to risk if not incur a “limited” nuclear war out of their gambit. What’s at stake is nothing less than the loss of Ruling the World by the Anglo-Saxons."

Please  view this complete, highly recommended article here:

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

"The West – A Vicious Cycle Of Self-Destruction"

"The West – A Vicious Cycle Of Self-Destruction"

by Egon von Greyerz

“The first panacea of a mismanaged nation is inflation of the currency; the second is war. Both bring a temporary prosperity; both bring a permeant ruin. But both are the refuge of political and economic opportunists.” - Ernest Hemingway

"As the West is standing on the edge of the precipice, there are only unpalatable outcomes. At best the world is facing a hyperinflationary depression later followed by deflationary depression. But sadly there is today much more at stake as the West is frenetically escalating the sound of war drums against Russia’s invasion in Ukraine.

The West Has No Desire For Peace: As the global economy reaches the point of collapse, countries get the leaders they deserve. There is today no leader or statesman in the West who can stand up to Putin in order to negotiate peace. Biden sadly neither has the vigor, nor the ability to play any significant role in solving the conflict. Also, he has the neocons pressurizing him to attack and defeat Russia. And Biden’s rhetoric against Putin is certainly not conducive to peace, with words like war criminal and genocide. Biden mustn’t forget that just in the Vietnam war, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong are estimated to have lost one million soldiers and two million civilians. Unprovoked wars are of course always senseless whoever starts them.

Technically the US did not start a war against Russia. But Russia will of course argue that the US backed 2014 Maidan revolution, ousting the elected President Yanukovych, was a direct threat against Russia. The 1988 NATO map below and the likely one today, if Finland and Sweden join, is clearly a very uncomfortable situation for Russia.

President Zelensky is doing all he can to involve the rest of the world militarily by demanding more money and more weapons from the West, rather than putting his efforts into peace negotiations. Ukraine can of course never win the war against Russia alone. And dragging in the US and NATO can only lead to a war of incalculable consequences and potentially a WWIII which could be nuclear.

And in the West, not a single leader is making a serious peace attempt. From Biden to Johnson, Macron and Scholz, we only hear talk of more weapons and more money for Ukraine. This is terribly tragic and a sign of totally incompetent leadership in the West. Trump had many weaknesses, but he would not have hesitated to initiate peace talks with Putin.

Weak European Leaders: So the US and the West has no ability or desire to achieve peace. And Boris Johnson has welcomed the war as a diversion from his domestic “Partygate” political pressures and therefore has taken an aggressive position against Russia rather than finding a peaceful solution.

Macron is an opportunist who stands with one foot in each camp by being chummy with Putin and at the same time condemning him.

And Scholz, the German chancellor is in an impossible position caused by Merkel’s poor management of Germany’s energy position. The three remaining German nuclear power stations will be closed down and fossil fuels are politically unacceptable. Nearly 60% of German gas imports come from Russia. German industry would not survive without Russian gas. So Scholz wants to have his cake and eat it, sanctioning Russia on the one hand and simultaneously spending billions of Euros buying their energy and other natural resources including food.

Quite a precarious position for Germany to be totally dependent economically on its war enemy. At the same time, this is good for the world as Germany has a vested interest to achieve peace.

But we must remember that only a minority of countries are backing the actions of the US and Europe. Africa, South America, most of Asia are not taking sides and continuing to trade with Russia and these regions represent around 85% of world population. So the vast majority of the world has no desire for war with Russia but their voice is seldom heard in the Western dominated media.

As Western leaders continue their war mongering, we must remind ourselves of Winston Churchill’s words: “Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events.”

- Winston Churchill

So Messrs Biden, Johnson, Scholz and Macron should take note that they could soon, in the words of Churchill, be “the slaves of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events”.

Russia is clearly determined to take back what they consider historically belongs to them, which is the Donbas region in the east and southern Ukraine, including Odessa, which gives them full access to the Black Sea. Being totally surrounded by NATO countries, especially if Finland and Sweden join, is clearly another “irritation” for Russia but since these countries have never been part of the Russian empire, it has less significance.

End Of A Monetary Era & A New One Emerging: Politics and money cannot be separated and the geopolitical situation that has now arisen will act as a perfect catalyst to the end of the monetary era since the creation of the Fed in 1913. But what we must remember is that it is primarily the Western controlled monetary system (including Japan) which will come to an end.

America’s and the EU’s final desperate attempt to save their broken system by sanctions on world trade will eventually fail as the Western economies gradually decay in an economic and social breakdown brought about by a quagmire of currency collapse, deficits, debts and history’s most epic of asset bubbles.

The Phoenix emerging will clearly be the East, led by China with Russia as an important partner. China is, population wise, the biggest country in the world and will soon be the biggest country in GDP terms. With total US assistance in the form of know-how and technology China has built up a strategic and advanced manufacturing base with dominance in many sectors. For example, 18% of all US imports come from China including 35% of all computers and electronics. Chinese sellers represent 40% of all top brands on Amazon and 75% of all new sellers.

The US and the rest of the world criticize Germany for being dependent on Russian energy, but the US folly of shifting much of its manufacturing to China certainly qualifies for joint first prize in commercial and strategic idiocy. Since gold is the ultimate money and the only money that has survived in history, it will have a very important role in coming years as the fiat currency system collapses.

The West’s Vicious Cycle Of Self-Destruction: Empires normally suffer a drawn-out and painful death. The fall of the US and the West has certainly been long, starting over half a century ago. But the fake prosperity has benefitted a small elite and lumbered the masses with colossal debts.

In 1971, US debt was $1.7 trillion and 50 years later it is $90 trillion, a mere 53x increase. As the finale of the debt and currency collapse approaches, the desperation rises exponentially. Consequently, increasing amounts of money need to be created and wars initiated to justify the debt explosion, all in a vicious cycle of self-destruction. For over half a century, the US has destroyed its currency and initiated unprovoked military actions in numerous countries – virtually all of them unsuccessful.

Yes, the US has certainly experienced a temporary false prosperity. But that could only be achieved with deficits, debt and printing fake money. The massive cost of the failed Vietnam war led to Nixon closing the gold window in 1971. As Nixon said at the time, “the strength of the currency is based on the strength of the economy”!

Hmmm, half a century later that currency has lost 98% in real terms (GOLD) and the Federal Debt has grown 75 fold from $400 billion to $30 trillion. It took 22 years , from 1971 to 1993 for the debt to expand by $15 trillion. Just in the last 2 years the debt is up by the same amount of $15 trillion.

It is amazing, as Hemingway said, how quickly “political and economic opportunists” can destroy both the economy and the currency.

So there we have it. The US dollar is a totally failed currency reflecting the bankrupt state of the US economy. As I have pointed out numerous times, the US has increased the federal debt every year since 1930, with the exception of four single years. As most currencies have been linked to the dollar since WWII, either through Bretton Woods or through the petrodollar, they have all been dragged down into the swamp with the dollar.

Having started my working life a couple of years before the ominous date of 15 August 1971 (closing of the gold window) I have had the best seat to observe the collapse of a currency system and the sad but inevitable occurrence of war. Intellectually it is a fascinating experience to watch incompetent and desperate leaders who have totally failed to manage both their economy and currency. But even without a world war, the effects of the collapse of the West will have devastating effects on humanity for a very long time.

The current fake monetary system based on $300 trillion of global debt, plus worthless paper assets in the form of derivatives to the extent of around $2 quadrillion, will over coming years collapse under its own worthless weight. Future observers and historians will write many books on a system of smoke and mirrors with fake money, fake paper and grossly overvalued assets, all creating the most colossal asset bubble in history.

Obviously China and Russia will be the kernel of the future world economy with the combination of the globally dominant manufacturing base of China and the world’s greatest natural resource reserves of Russia amounting to a massive $75 trillion."

- https://goldswitzerland.com/

"Mother's Day, 2022"

"How It Really Is"

 

As the song says, "You ain't seen nothin' yet"...

Oh, we will...

“Zelensky Is Trapped”

“Zelensky Is Trapped”

"Gonzalo Lira on the three forces in control of Ukraine’s “acting president”: the oligarchs who own him, the Nazis who will kill him if he doesn’t toe their line, and the State Department/CIA."

Twitter: https://twitter.com/GonzaloLira1968

"WW3 Update: The Next 48 Hours are Crucial"

Full screen recommended.

Canadian Prepper, 5/7/22:

"WW3 Update: The Next 48 Hours are Crucial"

○

“Bloodlust – the disease that makes us the monsters we are 

known to be; it is what wipes away the last of our humanity.” 

- Daniele Lanzarotta

"Slaughterbots: Autonomous Chinese Drone Swarm Flies Through Forest While Hunting For Humans"

"Slaughterbots: Autonomous Chinese Drone Swarm

 Flies Through Forest While Hunting For Humans"

by Tyler Durden

“People blame science. Sh*t, man, people 

shouldn’t blame science. People should blame people.”

- Mira Grant, "Countdown"

"A swarm of micro-drones autonomously navigated a dense bamboo forest in China without GPS, able to avoid trees, branches, and brush. The incredible footage suggests these drones could one day be used for search and rescue efforts or even put to sinister use: hunting humans. Chinese scientists from Zhejiang University published a report and footage of ten lightweight drones maneuvering at speed through a forest. The technology behind the drones autonomously navigates the best flight path through high-tech sensors.

Lead author Xin Zhou wrote in a paper published Wednesday, in the journal "Science Robotics," that "multi-robot aerial systems are a symbol of future technology" and cited science fiction films, "Prometheus" (2012), "Ender's Game" (2013), "Star Wars: Episode III" (2005), and "Blade Runner 2049: (2017), where drones or drone swarms were used, which ultimately "inspired" the research team. Here is the drone swarm navigating through the woods. Full video below:

Full screen recommended.

In another experiment, Zhou and his team showed the drone swarm could track a human "target" through a field of trees:

Commenting on the breakthrough research is Enrica Soria, of the laboratory of intelligent systems at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland, who told The Telegraph: "This work presents a notable contribution to the robotics community and an important step towards the application of drone swarms beyond the constrained environment of a laboratory, not only for exploration in forests but also for a range of safety-critical missions in human-made environments, such as urban areas with humans and buildings."

What's terrifying is if researchers transfer the technology to Beijing, or even the military, who could use the advanced drone software for hunting humans, if that's for domestic surveillance purposes, or equip it with weapons for the modern battlefield.

About five years ago, the world's leading AI researchers and humanitarian organizations warned about lethal autonomous weapons systems, or killer robots, that select and kill targets without human control. Future of Life Institute released this dystopic video of "slaughter bots."

Full screen recommended.

- https://www.zerohedge.com/news/

Must Watch! "It’s Game Over This Week for the Global Economy"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly 5/7/22:

"It’s Game Over This Week for the Global Economy"

"This is a pivotal week in our economy. We are going to get the consumer price index numbers on May 11. If they are above 9% everything will be finished. Interest rates will dramatically rise for mortgages, and this will affect the businesses around the world."

"Inflation Is Going To Destroy Your Life; Markets Are Going Much Lower; Maxing Out Credit Cards"

Full screen recommended.

Jeremiah Babe, 5/7/22:

"Inflation Is Going To Destroy Your Life; 

Markets Are Going Much Lower; Maxing Out Credit Cards"

Musical Interlude: Logos, "Cheminement"

Full screen recommended.

Logos, "Cheminement"

"A Look to the Heavens"

“To some, the outline of the open cluster of stars M6 resembles a butterfly. M6, also known as NGC 6405, spans about 20 light-years and lies about 2,000 light years distant. M6 can best be seen in a dark sky with binoculars towards the constellation of Scorpius, coving about as much of the sky as the full moon.

Like other open clusters, M6 is composed predominantly of young blue stars, although the brightest star is nearly orange. M6 is estimated to be about 100 million years old. Determining the distance to clusters like M6 helps astronomers calibrate the distance scale of the universe.”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110906.html

"If You Caught A Glimpse..."

"If you caught a glimpse of your own death,
would that knowledge change the way you live the rest of your life?"
- Paco Ahlgren, "Discipline"

The Poet: Jane Hirshfield, "Instant Glimpsable Only For An Instant"

"Know Thyself"

by Chet Raymo

"The ancient Greek aphorism, attributed to Socrates and others. Good advice, I'm sure. If only we knew what it means. Is it the same as the "examination of conscience" we were asked to perform as young Catholics? "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned." Well, yes, it is good to ask ourselves if we have lived up to our highest moral aspirations. But surely "Know thyself" means more than that.

Does it mean to be aware of our self-awareness? That is to say, not to act impulsively, but reflectively. Thoreau's "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."

Or perhaps it means to apply the method of scientia to the problem of consciousness, treat the mind like a fish that can be dissected at the lab bench, watch the brain flickering on the display of a scanning machine as the subject is stimulated with love, sex, fear, music, pain. Neuroscience. Daniel Dennet's book audaciously titled "Consciousness Explained." There is a line from a poem by Jane Hirshfield, in which she questions herself: "A knife cannot cut itself open/ yet you ask me both to be you and to know you."

Is it hopeless then? Is there an essential absurdity in a thing knowing itself? Does knowing necessarily imply a knower more complex than the thing known? Is it possible that we might fully understand, say, the neurology of the sea slug Aplysia, that favorite subject of experimental neurobiologists with only 20,000 central nerve cells, big nerve cells, ten times bigger than human neurons, but not the workings of the human brain, with its 100 billion nerve cells, each one connected to thousands of others?

Hirshfield's poem is titled "Instant Glimpsable Only For An Instant." Perhaps that is the best we can do. To know ourselves in those fleeting moments of recognition than come now and then, often unbidden, sometimes as the result of a chance encounter with beauty or with ugliness, sometimes bidden out of the silence and solitude of meditation - a flash upon one's inward eye that is, perhaps, all the ancients were asking for when they asked us to "know ourselves."

- http://blog.sciencemusings.com/

○

"Instant Glimpsable Only For An Instant"

"Moment. Moment. Moment.

- equal inside you, moment,

the velocitous mountains and cities rising and falling,

songs of children, iridescence even of beetles.

It is not you the locust can strip of all leaf.

Untouchable green at the center,

the wolf too lopes past you and through you as he eats.

Insult to mourn you, you who mourn no one, unable.

Without transformation,

yours the role of the chorus, to whom nothing happens.

The living step forward: choosing to enter, to lose.

I, who am made of you only,

speak these words against your unmasterable instruction -

A knife cannot cut itself open,

yet you ask me both to be you and to know you."

~ Jane Hirshfield

The Daily "Near You?"

San Luis Obispo, California, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"A Parade Of Fools..."

"Humanity is a parade of fools, 

and I am at the front of it, twirling a baton."

- Dean Koontz

Freely Read Online: Rainer Maria Rilke, "Letters to a Young Poet"

"Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are 

only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage.

Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence,

something helpless that wants our love."

- Rainer Maria Rilke, "Letters to a Young Poet"

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"The Restless Heart" 

by Chet Raymo

In "Letters to a Young Poet", Rainer Maria Rilke writes: "We should try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue." To which I would add, let us trust the gifts that nature has given us- curiosity, attention, reason- and if our personal lives are destined for oblivion, then know that we have made of ordinary things something grander and more enduring. We are the transformers. We are bestowers of praise. "Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them," Rilke advises the restless young poet, echoing the great Catholic mystics: "And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

Is it enough? In the long history of humanity, no hope has been so enduring as personal immortality. At every time and in every place men and women have assumed they will live forever. It is our solace, our balm for the restless heart. Even Neanderthals, it seems, placed flowers in the graves of their dead, presumably to grace the afterlife.

But the lesson of modern biology is clear: Death is final. Do we lapse then into morbidity? Do we rage, rage against the dying of the light? We have art. We have science. Even a rhyme can thumb its nose at death, says Seamus Heaney. We can each of us try to live our lives as poetry, to add to the world an element of graciousness that is not strictly necessary, to leave behind a spoor of rhymes that marks our passage on the Earth.

Yes, the spirit is flesh, but the spirit is more than flesh. The spirit is flesh in interaction with a universe of almost unimaginable grandeur and complexity. The windows of the flesh are thrown open to the world. The spirit is a wind of awareness, a pool stirred by angels."

Some part of the spirit will linger after the flesh is gone, as memories in other flesh, as words, music, science, rhymes- as a world nudged slightly in its pell-mell course towards good or bad. But the self is mortal: This is the existential fact that agitates the restless heart. "We are biological and our souls cannot fly free," writes Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson, summarizing what science has taught us about ourselves. He adds: "This is the essential first hypothesis for any consideration of the human condition."

- http://blog.sciencemusings.com/

○

Freely read online "Letters to a Young Poet",

 by Rainer Maria Rilke, here:

- https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/German/RilkeLetters.php

"The Rules"

 

"How It Really Is"

"'Sorry For The Inconvenience' Stickers Everywhere At Kroger! What's Coming?"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 5/7/22:
"'Sorry For The Inconvenience' Stickers 

Everywhere At Kroger! What's Coming?"

"In today's vlog we are at Kroger Marketplace, and are noticing inconvenience stickers everywhere! The last time we saw this many, there was a major food shortage. For the past few weeks we have seen a steady increase in food prices around the country. In addition we are also seeing a lot more empty shelves. It's getting rough out here as stores continue to struggle to get in products!"

Tucker Carlson, "This Is The Road To Chaos And Collapse"

Full screen recommended.

Tucker Carlson, "This Is The Road To Chaos And Collapse"

"Our World of Lies"

"Our World of Lies"

by Paul Craig Roberts

"If the inflation narrative we are being fed is true, the sanctions policy of the US government makes no sense as the worst sufferers are the American and European populations who are paying for the supply restrictions in higher prices and interest rates.

As Russia is an exporter of energy and minerals, higher prices result in more export earnings. It is Americans and Europeans hit with the high prices who are experiencing the sanctions.

Ask yourself why with supply shortages, disrupted supply chains from the mindless lockdown policy, and rising inflation the US government drove inflation higher by inhibiting supply with sanctions. Is the cause of the current inflation Federal Reserve money printing or is the cause the reduction in the supply of goods and services caused by Washington’s Covid protocol and “Russian sanctions”?

Ask yourself why the Biden regime is more concerned about gangster-state Ukraine than it is about the US inflation rate and the welfare of American citizens.

Ask yourself if the current high gasoline price is really a result of sanctions preventing oil from coming to market. As far as I can tell, Russia continues to sell oil and natural gas. It is only the small US purchases of Russian oil that have stopped. The small amount of oil involved cannot explain the price rise. Most likely it is the oil companies using the “crisis” narrative to raise prices.

Ask yourself if an interest rate rise by half a percentage point is enough to cause a 1,000 drop in the Dow Jones. Presumably, the argument is that a higher interest rate raises costs and drops earnings, thus the stock market’s decline. But if higher interest rates raise costs, how are they anti-inflationary? Most likely the stock market fell because the Federal Reserve said it is halting its policy of printing money to support stock and bond prices.

Instead, the Federal Reserve is going to sell stocks and bonds from its $9 trillion dollar portfolio built by buying stocks and bonds for more than a decade in order to support the New York Banks and Wall Street. When Quantitative Easing began, the Federal Reserves portfolio was $800 billion. Today it is 11 times larger. This huge increase in the Federal Reserve’s portfolio explains the long rise in the Dow Jones and the fortunes made on Wall Street.

None of the narratives we are fed are true. The narratives serve agendas that are not disclosed to the public. It is a fiction that “Western democracies” are self-governing. How can people self-govern when they live in a world governed by false explanations serving hidden agendas?"

- https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/

"Ukraine & World War III"

"Ukraine & World War III"

by Martin Armstrong

"Our computer warned back in 2013 that Ukraine would be the place where World War III would begin. I warned that the ONLY way to prevent that was to split Ukraine based on the language. While the propaganda is that Kyiv is fighting for freedom and democracy, they have refused to allow Donbas to vote and recognize their independence. The hatred in the West of the Russian-speaking East is well documented. It stems from the period of Stalin’ starving of 7 million Ukrainians to pretend that Communism was working. The fact that Stalin was not Russian but a Georgian has been lost in the pages of history.

The Dnipro River was the border between the old Russian Empire and Ukraine. The East of that river was NEVER Ukrainian territory. It was assigned to Kyiv under the USSR for administrative purposes. Crimea was always Russian and was merely assigned to Kyiv in 1954 under the USSR. Nevertheless, we are to throw the entire world into war over this nonsense only because it serves the objectives of the Neocons and the World Economic Forum which cannot pull off this Great Reset without also overthrowing both the governments of Russia and China. Sorry to inform them that our computer has NEVER been wrong on geopolitical forecasts and it is written in stone, in the end, the West will lose to China, which has already stated that it is in a strategic partnership with Russia. SO while people die to fill Zelensky’s offshore accounts and I warned from the outset that he was the agent who would create World War III, he has been preaching this is World War III to engulf the entire world for this territorial grab that is historically unjustified.

The Nazi Ukrainian troops are clinging to control of the steel plant in Mariupol. Our sources say that the Russian troops have breached their defenses and hand-to-hand combat is even taking place inside. They have asked for support from Kyiv, but so far that is not coming. This is the final stronghold and this fierce attack is to deliver the Kremlin a victory against the Nazis days ahead of a major Russian military holiday on Monday.

The steel plant is the last area in Mariupol still under Ukrainian control, and its fall would be a blow to Kyiv. Putin again called Macron for he is the only leader who appears to be interested in a peace agreement. Putin misjudged that the West NEEDS war with Russia and they are counting on the belief that he will not use nuclear weapons.

In reality, there are those who argue that the smartest thing that Russia could do is to take a lesson from the USA. The argument calls for the use of a small tactical nuke and take out Kyiv and then call the bluff of the USA and NATO. Would the West retaliate and go nuclear which would then result in Europe and the USA being in the direct line of fire? I doubt it. But once the US dropped the two bombs on Japan, that ended the war. With the Pelosi delegation saying there is no peace and only total victory with the defeat of Russia is acceptable, this will be another endless war.

"What did Liz Truss expect of Russia’s reaction to her insane and outlandish claims of ‘weakening this nuclear state“?  “A recent Russian state TV program has stirred outrage and made headlines across the United Kingdom after a television presenter featured a simulated demonstration of how the Russian navy’s nuclear submarines would take out the UK with ease.

The segment aired late last week on public broadcaster “Channel One” and featured the chairman of the nationalist Rodina political party, Aleksey Zhuravlyov, who declared that “one Sarmat missile and the British Isles will be no more.” 

Full screen recommended.

What is important to understand is that 1 Hiroshima Bomb Explosion was equal to 0.01434034416826 Megatons of TNT. Today, Russia has more nukes than anyone, but just one is 100 megatons. One can take out the entire island of Britain. The people behind Putin would nuke Kyiv following the lesson of World War II betting that the West will not retaliate and destroy the entire world. We are certainly rolling the dice and our braindead world leaders do not seem to comprehend either the risk or strategy."

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

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Related:

• "Ukraine, Romania, Moldova... vs. Transnistria: A WW III Scenario"

• "This Time, NATO Better Take Putin’s Ukraine Warnings Seriously"

"25 Facts About Income Inequality In America That Will Blow Your Mind"

Full screen recommended.

"25 Facts About Income Inequality In 

America That Will Blow Your Mind"

by Epic Economist

"The world's richest country is also the most unequal country on the planet. Today, average American workers have way less power relative to the corporations, investors, and institutions that rule our society than at any other point in the history of our nation. Wealth has never been so highly concentrated, and those who don't have it are forced to fight for their right to exist in a country where social mobility is almost non-existent. Over the past several decades, the ultra-rich have been rigging the same so that more and more money continues to be funneled into their pockets.

The biggest, meanest concentrations of wealth are devouring everyone else's with a big help from government policies. Since the foundation of America, "Capitalism" has come to mean something completely different. It was supposed to be about the empowerment of individuals and families and small businesses. Instead, it has become a system of exploitation. We have actually been left with Corporatism, which produces a handful of winners and a whole lot of losers. But, when wealth and power are so highly concentrated, economic rewards are doomed to flow only to the hands of the few.

In the United States, the income gap between the wealthy and the rest of the population has been significantly growing, by every major statistical measure, for more than three decades. Over the past decade, paychecks at the top have skyrocketed while flatlining at the bottom. The bottom 90 percent have seen their wages grow by a mere 8.7% compared to 20.4 percent for the top 1 percent and 30.2 percent for the top 0.1 percent. According to the latest Executive Excess report, in 2021, 50 major companies reported CEO pay 1,000% larger than worker pay. Those companies include Walmart, McDonald’s, and many other highly profitable corporations.

Corporate giants are so powerful that it is virtually impossible for small businesses to directly compete with them. According to the Forbes list of 400 richest Americans, three men own as much money as the bottom 50 percent. But as the US top 0.01 percent have accumulated more wealth, they have paid a smaller share of total U.S. taxes. Many of these institutions have become so big that the global economy literally cannot afford for them to fail. A handful of corporate bureaucrats control approximately 90% of the world's trade. So what happens if those companies collapse?

By contrast, average workers are, of course, never "too big to fail". Big banks and large companies can always ask for bailouts, but if you're late on your debt payments you can be thrown in the streets - or, worse, you can be chucked into prison. The numbers we exposed today are proof that our system has become corrupted beyond all recognition. Now more than ever, it is time for Americans to start recognizing their worth and start think how are we going to take power back to our hands."

For that reason, in this video, brought some stunning numbers that expose the true extent of income and wealth inequality in our country."

- https://www.epiceconomist.com/

Musical Interlude: 2002, "Breathing Light"

Full screen recommended.

2002, "Breathing Light"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"How do clusters of galaxies form and evolve? To help find out, astronomers continue to study the second closest cluster of galaxies to Earth: the Fornax cluster, named for the southern constellation toward which most of its galaxies can be found. Although almost 20 times more distant than our neighboring Andromeda galaxy, Fornax is only about 10 percent further that the better known and more populated Virgo cluster of galaxies. 

Fornax has a well-defined central region that contains many galaxies, but is still evolving. It has other galaxy groupings that appear distinct and have yet to merge. Seen here, almost every yellowish splotch on the image is an elliptical galaxy in the Fornax cluster. The picturesque barred spiral galaxy NGC 1365 visible on the lower right is also a prominent Fornax cluster member."

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130111.html

"We've All Heard..."

"The early bird catches the worm. A stitch in time saves nine. He who hesitates is lost. We can’t pretend we haven’t been told. We’ve all heard the proverbs, heard the philosophers, heard our grandparents warning us about wasted time, heard the damn poets urging us to seize the day. Still, sometimes, we have to see for ourselves. We have to make our own mistakes. We have to learn our own lessons. We have to sweep today’s possibility under tomorrow’s rug, until we can’t anymore, until we finally understand for ourselves what Benjamin Franklin meant: That knowing is better than wondering. That waking is better than sleeping. And that even the biggest failure, even the worst, most intractable mistake, beats the hell out of never trying.”

- “Meredith”, “Grey’s Anatomy”

"The Problem Is..."

“How small a portion of our life it is that we really enjoy. In youth we are looking forward to things that are to come; in old age, we are looking backwards to things that are gone past; in manhood, although we appear indeed to be more occupied in things that are present, yet even that is too often absorbed in vague determinations to be vastly happy on some future day, when we have time.”

- Charles Caleb Colton, “Lacon”

○

“The problem is, you believe you have time.”

- Buddha

Gregory Mannarino, "Markets And More! Crash? Meltup?"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 5/6/22:

"Markets And More! Crash? Meltup?"

- https://traderschoice.net/

"The Ministry of Truth - Everything You Need To Know!"

Full screen recommended.

AwakenWithJP,

"The Ministry of Truth - Everything You Need To Know!"

Bill Bonner, "Ace Pilot Powell"

"Ace Pilot Powell"

by Bill Bonner

Youghal, Ireland - "Consumer prices are rising. Real wages are falling. Investors are panicking. Productivity is dropping. The trade deficit is getting worse. Mortgages and car payments are rising. And here comes the ace pilot, Jerome Powell, in for a landing:

Our subject today is incompetence. So much of it is on display we gasp… and wonder; when God created man, did he overestimate his abilities?

MarketWatch: "The productivity of American workers and businesses sank at an 7.5% annual pace in the first quarter - the biggest drop since 1947 - in a reflection of ongoing supply shortages and other drags on the economy. The amount of goods and services produced, known as output, fell at a 2.4% rate in the first three months of the year. Yet hours worked rose at a 5.5% annual rate, the government said Thursday."

Yep… another sign that the 21st century, so far, has been a flop. MarketWatch continues: "Unit-labor costs surged at 11.6% annual pace in the first quarter. Over the past year these costs have risen at the fastest clip in 40 years. Unit-labor costs reflect how much a business pays an employee to produce one unit of output - say a ton of steel or a box of cookies."

Hourly compensation, or the amount of wages and benefits paid to employees, increased by 3.2%. Yet adjusted for inflation compensation fell 5.5%, underscoring that rising prices are hurting breadwinners. Wages aren’t keeping up with inflation. Productivity – how much you can do per hour (time is limited) – is the key to wealth. In rich nations, productivity is high. In poor ones, it is low. When productivity goes down, people get poorer.

New technology… along with the Fed’s careful piloting… was supposed to speed up productivity, not decrease it. What went wrong? The internet… the blockchain… new vaccines… self-driving cars – were they all such disappointments? We have a dictum to explain it: technical genius is no match for political imbecility.

Send in the Clowns: Looking back, the incompetence of federal policymakers is staggering. Bernanke’s bailout of Wall Street was supposed to make US markets stronger; instead, they’re more fragile than ever. 

The Trump/Biden trade restrictions were supposed to reduce trade deficits; now they’re bigger than ever.

Money-printing was supposed to make a stronger economy, with higher wages… But real disposable personal income is falling hard and the economy is getting smaller.

Ultra-low interest rates were supposed to push the inflation rate up to an ideal 2%... instead, the CPI is almost 9%; the Fed missed the mark by 350%.

What a bunch of clowns.

The fed’s financial and economic policies over the last 21 years have been a disaster: The lowest interest rates in the last 500 years. More money-printing than ever before. Meddling… tinkering… controlling – and deficits, deficits, deficits! – all of which have only squandered real wealth, slowed the economy and added some $50 trillion in debt to the US economy.

People borrowed. People spent. The spending produced business profits. Stock and bond prices went up. The rich got richer. And now, inflation has slithered in, like a snake at a teenage slumber party. Shrieks of terror have caused the central bankers to “pivot” to a hardline, hard-assed, hard-nosed policy stance. But these are the same people who caused today’s inflation… who didn’t see it coming… who denied it had come… and who claimed it would go away soon (with no need to take action). And now, they can no longer duck it or dodge it. So they say they have the ‘courage to act.’

What do you think? Have they got it right this time? Jerome Powell has the hoe in his hands; will he bruise the head of the serpent… with higher interest rates and QT (quantitative easing)? Or… faced with a bear market and a recession... will he fumble the job again? Here’s Charlie Bilello:

The US Money Supply has increased by over 50% in the last 3 years, the largest 3-year increase ever. The only other times when Money Supply increased by [greater than] 40% in a 3-yr period: 1973 & 1977-78. Both were followed by high inflation, recessions (1973-75, 1980, 1981-82) and bear markets. Stay tuned..."

- bonnerprivateresearch@substack.com

The Daily "Near You?"

Delhi, Ontario, Canada. Thanks for stopping by!

Jim Kunstler, "Nausea Rules"

"Nausea Rules"

by Jim Kunstler

"The way financial markets puked this week, they must have started reading the news. Let’s face it, the headlines are a little short of reassuring. The $6.49 price on a gallon of diesel is enough alone to tell you that the nation can’t do business the way it’s set up to do, and there isn’t a new model for running things ready to launch - not even Klaus Schwab’s utopia of robots and eunuchs.

What’s out there, rather, is a model of breakdown and collapse which the Woked-up, globalist neo-Jacobins are doing everything possible to hasten. US-inspired sanctions on Russia have quickly blown-up in America’s face. How’s that ban on Russian oil working? Do you understand that US shale oil - the bulk of our production - is exceptionally light in composition, meaning it contains not much of the heavier distillates like diesel and aviation fuel? ‘Tis so, alas. Truckers just won’t truck at $6.49-a-gallon, and before long they’ll be out of business altogether, especially the independents who have whopping mortgages on their rigs that won’t be paid. The equation is tearfully simple: no trucks = no US economy.

Europe, the old original homeland of Western Civ, isn’t just losing face, it’s blowing its head clean off going along with “Joe Biden’s” economic war. Are Germany, France, and the rest of that bunch really so dead-set on jamming Ukraine into NATO that they’re willing to go full medieval for it? By which I mean sitting in the cold and dark with empty plates. That’s a hard way to go just to prove somebody else’s point.

The war in Ukraine itself was apparently losing its sex appeal for the click-hungry news media. No matter which way The New York Times and friends tried to spin it, they failed to grok both Russia’s determination to neutralize Ukraine and its ability to get the job done, even if it takes a longer-than-expected grind to finish. That’s how important it was to Russia that Ukraine not become a forward missile base and bio-weapons lab for its adversaries. When that operation concludes, the West will be left economically crippled and humiliated - which are conditions that historically portend regime change. Will America cough up “Joe Biden” like a hairball to get those trucks running again? Might the Dems themselves resort to releasing the kraken known as Hunter’s laptop just to send the old grifter packing?

In the meantime, the leaked Roe v Wade cancellation ruling shoved the Ukraine fiasco offstage so as to provoke more useful histrionics for the dreaded midterm elections upcoming. The poorly-understood truth is that said ruling will only send the abortion question back to the individual states. But let’s get real: places like New York, Massachusetts, Maryland, and California are not going to enact any new anti-abortion laws, and that’s where most of the people having hebephrenic breakdowns over the issue live. Which is to say there’s little danger that the shrieking denizens of these Blue states will lack abortions. So, how much has the party only been pretending that Roe v Wade is its primal touchstone?

The strange parallel question has been raised: might laizzez-fair abortion be a cover for the evident new problem that Covid-19 vaccines have made a shocking number of birthing people incapable of reproducing? There’s a buzz about it, anyway. It’s a fact that Pfizer excluded pregnant and breastfeeding women from all phases of its mRNA trials. Among the various harms now ascribed to the mRNA shots are infertility, miscarriage, and newborn abnormalities. But, of course, that sort of rumor - in this case coming from cases among vaccinated military personnel and not so easily hushed up - is just what the many lurking censors want to slap down in any forum where ideas could be exchanged. It’s misinformation!

And so, the derangement volume knob over Twitter changing ownership stays up at eleven. Imagine what will happen if the supposedly 70-odd percent of Americans who got vaxxed learn in a re-liberated Twitter Zone that the Covid-19 vaccines are not “safe and effective.” According to Zero Hedge, twenty-six globalist NGOs with ties to George Soros signed a letter saying, “Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter will further toxify our information ecosystem and be a direct threat to public safety, especially among those already most vulnerable and marginalized.”

They are, as usual, projecting - since what is a greater threat to public safety than inducing tens of millions of frightened citizens to accept multiple shots of a poorly-tested pharmaceutical cocktail that can kill you six ways to Sunday? The folks in-charge (and others who would like to be the boss-of-you) don’t want you to know any of this. The pharma companies, the doctors, the hospital administrators, and the politicians must be frantic with terror of being found out.

Altogether, the scene looks like a multi-dimensional nightmare. Broken economy… sinking Western Civ… police state tyranny… vaccine death and injury… starvation…. So, there it is. Oh, look, those markets… they’re puking again!"

- https://kunstler.com/

"Nationwide Baby Formula Shortage Hits "Shocking" Levels, Sparking Panic Among Parents"

"Nationwide Baby Formula Shortage Hits "Shocking" Levels, 

Sparking Panic Among Parents"

by Jack Phillips

"A nationwide shortage in baby formula is worsening, according to a new analysis, as parents have expressed alarm over the worrying trend. At retail locations across the United States, about 40 percent of the top-selling infant formula products were not in stock for the week ending April 24, said Datasembly. The company said that it tracked baby formula stock at more than 11,000 stores nationwide. “This is a shocking number that you don’t see for other categories,” Ben Reich, CEO of Datasembly, told CBS News. “We’ve been tracking it over time and it’s going up dramatically. We see this category is being affected by economic conditions more dramatically than others,” Reich added.

Previously, drugstore chains like Walgreens and CVS have announced they would limit how many baby formula products each shopper can purchase at a given time. In a statement, Reich cited inflation, product recalls, and supply chain shortages as why there is “an unprecedented amount of volatility for baby formula.” And he believes that the shortages will continue in the near future. “We expect to continue to see the baby formula category being dramatically affected by these conditions,” Reich said. “Baby formula stock, which has been one of the more affected categories so far in 2022, and one that will continue to demonstrate higher than average out-of-stock levels.”

Meanwhile, some parents have expressed alarm on social media about the apparent lack of infant formula on shelves. “If the [mainstream media] can talk about the toilet paper shortage ever [sic] hour, they should be talking about the baby formula shortage at least,” Danielle Miller, a mother, wrote on Twitter last week. “We ended [up] finding the Amazon brand online but not everyone is so lucky to be able to feed that. Please share. This is every store!”

“The baby formula shortage is unreal!” GET THESE BABIES SOME FOOD!” another mother wrote on Twitter along with a photo of empty shelves, adding that “it’s a crisis all over.”

Another parent, Irene Anhoeck of San Francisco, told local media that “we’ve noticed it being difficult to find maybe a couple months ago - two, three months ago - and then just recently we can’t find it.” She added, “We’ve tried all the local Targets. We checked Costco, Costco online, Walgreens, Long’s. Can’t find it anywhere.”

In February, a major baby formula producer, Abbott Nutrition, recalled numerous lots of its products following reports of bacterial illnesses in infants. Last week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a notice to consumers telling them not to consume any products manufactured at Abbott’s facility in Sturgis, Michigan, over concerns of contamination."

- https://www.zerohedge.com/

“FED Must Save The Market Today; Retail Is Crashing; Market Bloodbath; Housing Wealth Destruction”

Jeremiah Babe, 5/6/22”

“FED Must Save The Market Today; Retail Is Crashing; 

Market Bloodbath; Housing Wealth Destruction”

○

Related:

"The Great Crash Of 2022... What Happens Next?"