Friday, May 10, 2024

"The Gods Laugh At Your Plans: Chekhov, Jaspers, And Life-changing Moments"

"The Gods Laugh At Your Plans: 
Chekhov, Jaspers, And Life-changing Moments"
The most momentous and significant events in our lives 
are the ones we do not see coming. Life is defined by the unforeseen.
by Jonny Thomson

"You’re in the shower one day, and you feel a lump that wasn’t there before. You’re having lunch when your phone rings with an unknown number: there’s been a crash. You come home and your husband is holding a suitcase. “I’m leaving,” he says.

Life is inevitably punctuated by sudden changes. At one moment, we might have everything laid out before us, and then an invisible wall stops us in our tracks. It might be an illness, a bereavement, an accident or some bad news, but life has a habit of mocking those who make plans. We can have our eyes on some distant shore, some faraway horizon, only to find everything come crashing down by the most unseen of events. As the Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote, “The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men. Gang aft agley” (often go wrong).

In Anton Chekhov’s remarkable play, "The Seagull," we meet a cast of characters who are all, in some way, in love with something. The young, idealistic artist Konstantin is in love with the idea of pure art. Arkadin, his mother, is in love with her fans and her celebrity. Konstantin’s girlfriend, Nina, is in love with becoming rich and famous. Everyone in the play has some kind of ambition and plan, or they live in regret over the life they chose. They rail against how misguided or mistaken their life has been, while longing for something else.

They are each like a seagull, flying over the sea or a great lake, and aiming purposefully for the shore. The view up there is wonderful. But the longer the seagull flies, the more oblivious they are to how they tire or weaken. They’re so fixated on some distant horizon that they’re at the mercy to life’s sudden changes. They’re blinkered and distracted, and the gods love nothing more than the hopeful hubris of mankind.

At one point in the play, Chekov has the character Trigorin recount a short story about a gull flying over a lake who’s, “happy and free.” But in the next moment, “a man sees her who happens to come that way, and he destroys her out of idleness.” The seagull is killed, its flight and plans annihilated, in one instant of random thoughtlessness.

Boundary Situations: While so much of our lives are spent in planning and preparation, the most transformative and significant moments are those which come at us out of the blue. These are what the psychiatrist Karl Jaspers called “boundary situations” - the ones we cannot initiate, plan, or avoid. We can only “encounter” them. These are not the mundane, everyday parts of our life - what Jaspers calls “situation being” - but rather they are things which thunder down to shake the foundations of our being. They change who we are. Although these “boundary situations” (sometimes called “limit situations”) change a bit in Jaspers’ works, he broadly sorted them into four categories:

Death: Death is the source of all our fear. We fear our loved ones dying, and we fear the moment and fact of our own death. When we know grief and despair, or when we reflect on mortality, we are transformed. We always know about death, but when it’s a boundary situation, it comes crashing into our lives like some grim scythe; an unforeseen curtain call. The awareness and subjective encounter with death transforms us.

Struggle: Life is a struggle. We work for food, compete for resources, and vie with each other for power, prestige, and status in almost every context there is. As such, there are moments when we are inevitably overcome and defeated, but also when we are victorious and champion. The final outcomes of struggle are often sudden and great, and they make us who we are.

Guilt: Hopefully, there comes a moment for each of us when we finally accept responsibility for things. For many, it comes with adulthood, but for others it comes much later still. It’s the awareness that our actions impact all around us, and our decisions echo into the world. It’s seeing the damage or tears we’ve caused. It’s to recognize that, however small or big, we’ve hurt and upset someone. It’s a profound pull of the heart that changes how we live, and it often comes on unexpectedly.

Chance: No matter how neat and ordered we might want our world to be, there will always be a messy, chaotic, and unpredictable exception. We can hope for the best, and make the plans we want, but we can never take a steering handle on the facts that will affect our existence. According to Jaspers, we each prefer, “assembling functional and explanatory structures… whose central axis lies in sufficient reason” and yet, “despite this, it is not possible for man to control and explain everything. In fact, day by day he faces events that he cannot call anything else other than coincidences or hazards.” We want order, and regularity. What we get is the mercurial and capricious throes of chance.

The best laid plans: What Chekhov’s Seagull and Jaspers’ “boundary situations” get right is that we are each much more vulnerable than we might want to allow. A wedding, three years and a fortune to plan, is ruined by a stomach bug. An hour-long journey home for Christmas winds up getting you stuck in the traffic of a freak snowstorm. A lifetime achievement is overshadowed by a national disaster. Our lives are defined by the unforeseen. We have our dreams, hopes and are flying to some faraway shore. Yet life doesn’t care. Around every corner, at every flap of our wings, everything can change."
o
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 Daily "Near You?"

Dagenham, Barking and Dagenham, United Kingdom
Thanks for stopping by!

The Poet: Rolf Jacobsen, "When They Sleep"

"When They Sleep"

"All people are children when they sleep.
There's no war in them then.
They open their hands and breathe
in that quiet rhythm heaven has given them.
They pucker their lips like small children
and open their hands halfway,
soldiers and statesmen, servants and masters.
The stars stand guard
and a haze veils the sky,
a few hours when no one will do anybody harm.
If only we could speak to one another then
when our hearts are half-open flowers.
Words like golden bees
would drift in.
God, teach me the language of sleep."

- Rolf Jacobsen,
"The Roads Have Come to an End Now"

"Sometime In Your Life..."

"Sometime in your life, hope that you might see one starved man, the look on his face when the bread finally arrives. Hope that you might have baked it or bought or even kneaded it yourself. For that look on his face, for your meeting his eyes across a piece of bread, you might be willing to lose a lot, or suffer a lot, or die a little, even."
- Daniel Berrigan

"A Lot Of People..."

“When science discovers the center of the universe,
a lot of people will be disappointed to find they are not it.”
- Bernard Baily

Gregory Mannarino, "Something Huge Just Happened! A Possible Game Changer For Presidential Selection"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 5/10/24
"Something Huge Just Happened! 
A Possible Game Changer For Presidential Selection"
Comments here:

"Happiness"

Full screen recommended.
Steve Cutts, "Happiness"
“All the money you make will never buy back your soul. ”
- Bob Dylan

"After 40+ Years, It’s Back"

"After 40+ Years, It’s Back"
by Brian Maher

"Here is a run of recent headlines: “Is the United States on the Verge of Stagflation?”… “It’s Looking More and More Like Stagflation”… “Stagflation Fears Come Back With a Vengeance”… “The U.S. Economy May Be Barrelling Toward Stagflation, an Outcome Worse Than Recession”… “JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon Can’t Shake the Worry America Is Headed for a Repeat of 1970s-Style Stagflation.”

Examples multiply and multiply. Stagflation. The word is as ugly as it sounds - a ghastly portmanteau of stagnation and inflation. It conjures the grimmest days of the disco 1970s. Stagnant economic growth, skyshooting prices, gasoline lines and bell-bottomed trousers were the era’s high menaces. Dormant for decades, many considered stagflation permanently licked. Yet many have acquired its grisly scent… and detected its approaching footfall.

2024 is not 1979 of course. Unlike in the 1970s, official unemployment is low. Gasoline lines have no existence. Popular fashions - through God’s mercy - take far different form. Yet today we witness slackening economic growth and persistent inflation. They do not yet near the stagflationary rampages of the 1970s. The trend is nonetheless… worrisome.

It appears the United States economy is down with a wasting disease. Consider: The real gross domestic product — that is, the inflation-adjusted gross domestic product - expanded 38% between 1969 and 1980. This span stretches across the deepest hells of the stagflationary epoch. Yet between the years 2012 and 2023 the United States gross domestic product expanded a combined 27.6%. That is, in real terms - in real terms - the stagflationary 1970s economy outran the 2012–2023 economy.

Shall we place real economic growth alongside stock market growth? In real terms, the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened 1969 at roughly 6,500. It opened 1980 near 2,850. The S&P 500 plunged from 740 to 360 across the same space. For the stock market, the decade was well and truly lost.

Meantime, the Dow Jones Industrial Average returned 208.4% between 2012 and 2023. The S&P 500 returned 179.7%. That is, economy and stock market endured a divorce of sorts. The 1969–1980 economy excelled the 2012–2023 economy by some 11 percentage points. Yet the 2012–2023 stock market excelled the 1969–1980 stock market by miles and miles and miles.

Recall, both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 hemorrhaged over half their values 1969–1980. What accounts for it? In our estimation the answer is the Federal Reserve. It has assumed a parental and paternal responsibility for the stock market. It had not yet taken aboard this responsibility in the 1970s. Yet time equalizes as nothing else equalizes.

We suspect stock market and economy will meet once again on fair ground. We hazard stock market will fall to the economic level… before economy rises to the stock market level. When? We do not know. We merely hope the gods are kind."

Greg Hunter, "Weekly News Wrap-Up 5/10/24"

"Weekly News Wrap-Up"
Cuomo Vax Injury, Trump Trials Fail, Failing Banks Coming
by Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com 

"A CV19 vax injury that will help wake up the world has been reported. Former CNN News anchor Chris Cuomo is on the airwaves telling the story of his CV19 vaccine injury. He says he has “inflammation” and “brain fog.” Cuomo reveals he is being treated on a regular basis with Ivermectin. Good move, Chris. Sure, Cuomo is eating crow now after he “shamed” people on air who were using Ivermectin to treat Covid a few years ago. I don’t want anybody to be sick from this evil vax or allow it to cut decades off their lives. This is more about waking people up to the fact they need treatment, like Cuomo is getting. Millions of the CV19 vaxed are NOT getting treatment, and Cuomo can shine a light on how they need to be treated with things like Ivermectin to fight the negative effects of the CV19 bioweapon vax. Ivermectin is a cheap, safe and effective “miracle” drug, and more people need to be treated.

All the lawfare (like warfare) cases against Donald Trump seem to be falling apart at the same time. Now, there is evidence from Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey all the cases against President Trump may have been conceived around the same time by the Biden Administration. AG Bailey says he is demanding the DOJ turn over all communications of the illicit prosecutions of President Trump. Bailey says he has evidence that all the prosecutions against Trump were coordinated by President Biden’s minions. Legendary fight promoter Don King says, “We must elect Trump in 2024 to save ourselves.” King might get his wish because it looks like the Biden lawfare cases are not going to stop Trump.

Top people in the financial world are telling the public to brace for bank failures - a lot of them. One billionaire investor named Barry Sternlicht says there will come a time when bank failures will be happening each and “every week.” Sternlicht says, “We are entering a new dark age.” There is much more in the 53-minute newscast.
Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he talks about these 
stories and more in the Weekly News Wrap-Up for 5/10/24.

Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 5/10/24

Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 5/10/24
"Scott Ritter: NATO is Panicking, Ukraine is Collapsing, 
America is Sleepwalking !"
Comments here:
o
Full screen recommended.
Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 5/10/24
"Scott Ritter Reveals Putin's 
Threats To Obliterate CIA-NATO"
Comments here:

"How It Really Is"

 

Click image for larger size.

Dan, I Allegedly, "Is the American Dream Officially Dead?"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, AM 5/10/24
"Is the American Dream Officially Dead?"
"Even if you have health insurance, some doctors are requiring you to pay in advance. This shows you how bad the economy is. This is outrageous that medical procedures have to be paid for like this."
Comments here:
o

Adventures With Danno, "Strange Prices At Aldi!"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, AM 5/10/24
"Strange Prices At Aldi!"
"In today's vlog, we are at Aldi and are noticing some strange price increases! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices as it is getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products! Thank you so much for watching, and we'll see you in the next video!"
Comments here:

Jim Kunstler, "Carnival Rides"

"Carnival Rides"
by Jim Kunstler
“These agencies are not trusted because they are not trustworthy.” 
- El Gato Malo on “X”

"The miasma of anxiety befogging so many brains in our troubled land begins to lift as every narrative served up by the US fascist intel blob goes annoyingly stale and impotent. The worst media meme - that a vicious officialdom is “defending our democracy” - gets laughed out of the room now when repeated incessantly by such shills as Jen Psaki and Lawrence O’Donnell of MSNBC. Everybody understands they want to “defend our democracy” by cancelling your freedom of speech, pounding you into bankruptcy, and stealing whatever remains of your stuff.

Likewise, everything else: that our doings in Ukraine are a “fight for freedom,” that “white supremacy” lurks just out of sight getting ready to pounce on the “marginized” (who are actually running things, and doing it very badly), that “Joe Biden” turned around the economy, that “voting rights” equals non-citizens getting to vote, that election fraud is a “big lie” (and that the J-6 riot over it was an “insurrection”), and that the Covid vaccines were “safe and effective.”

None of these dishonest persuasions work anymore, and all of the persuasion machinery stands in plain sight like so many nauseating carnival rides. One by one, the rides are flying apart, scattering debris and body parts of the poor slobs who were on the rides all over the fairgrounds. And so, the fear rises in the ones running the carnival. The county sheriff stands by looking to round up the sleazeball carnies with their missing teeth and needle tracks inside their elbows. Before long, they will find themselves in the courtroom...

The vicious officialdom put up the carnival and all of its rides to distract the public from the crimes they committed during and after the 2016 election. Donald Trump’s idle talk about putting Hillary Clinton in jail struck nerves throughout the federal bureaucracy, the halls of Congress, and the strongholds of the Clintons and the Obamas.

The Clintons had literally bought the Democratic Party apparatus under the DNC, using the money they grifted into the Clinton foundation from such operations as the Uranium One deal, the Skolkovo war-tech transfer deal, and the Haiti earthquake relief effort. They were sure that ownership of the DNC guaranteed the election for Hillary. It did guarantee that she would overcome Bernie Sanders’ primary election victories and the delegates that came with them, even after Julian Assange’s Wikileaks release informed the world just how the Clintons bought and paid for the DNC and the whole Philadelphia convention. Call this the birth of the “misinformation” cult, in which everything true was converted into a “big lie.”

The problem was, Hillary lost that election. What a surprise! Buying the convention was not enough, it turned out. Those “deplorables” did the unthinkable: cast enough of their stinky votes in just the right rust belt precincts to elect the Golden Golem of Greatness, who was as surprised as anybody, and really unprepared to cobble together an actual governing administration - in the process of which, Donald J. Trump was completely buffaloed by the outgoing Obama gang. They plotted by the lights of the White House Christmas tree to go after the interloper with all they had, starting with the surgical removal of a most dangerous appointee, National Security Advisor Mike Flynn, who knew all the secrets...and from there onto four years of Russia, Russia, Russia...

It’s hardly a mystery anymore how “Joe Biden” got elected. It’s perfectly obvious despite the “big lie” narrative that the 2020 election was stoked with a veritable orgy of ballot fraud and direct election interference by agency rogues, especially the ones leaning hard on Facebook, Twitter, and Google to manipulate what the public actually saw. Don’t believe your lying eyes they told the nation. What is a mystery is why they chose “Joe Biden” to front for the cabal around Barack Obama actually running the show. Never before in US history was there a president who left such a slime trail of bribery and corruption. Just as they had spent all their energy the previous four years in undermining Mr. Trump, they had to spend the next four years propping up and defending “Joe Biden,” and then desperately trying to save their own asses from a Trump return. Meanwhile, they set out on their mission to wreck the country sufficient to clear the way for establishing a transhuman public-private utopia of crypto-Marxian “equity” (theft of property).

All of this political legerdemain summoned up the miasma of anxiety that beclouded the people of this sore-beset republic, and the nearly final blow to them was the Covid-19 operation, set in motion with the phony PCR test, that has now left a substantial number of citizens, vaccine-injured, disabled, and on-course for an early death - a pretty grotesque affront to our democracy. The victims are beginning to realize it.

The battery of Trump trials and lawsuits meant to put him totally out of business are now all simultaneously collapsing. Special Counsel Jack Smith is left doing Chinese fire drills around his office Keurig coffee machine. When the prank-fest in Judge Juan Merchan’s courtroom concludes, whether the jury sees the show for the farce that it is, or not, the Golden Golem of Greatness will be at large again among the voters. If he is clever enough to pick a capable veep that represents something like “assassination insurance” - say, Vivek, Tulsi Gabbard, or JD Vance - then the Obama cabal and the blob that has been protecting it will be swept out of power and into a dragnet of a kind of law actually associated with the word justice.

They are running out of ways to avoid it. All they’ve got left are the direst resorts: war, crashing the economy, another bio-weapon op against their own people, or an outright coup d’état. And even those probably won’t work."

Thursday, May 9, 2024

Canadian Prepper, "I've Received Top Secret Intel, Nuclear Plan Has Changed, Equipment Moves To Border"

Canadian Prepper, 5/9/24
"I've Received Top Secret Intel, Nuclear Plan Has Changed,
 Equipment Moves To Border"
Comments here:

Jeremiah Babe, "Losing Your Job And Car; The Big Shots Are In Big Trouble"

Jeremiah Babe, 5/9/24
"Losing Your Job And Car;
 The Big Shots Are In Big Trouble"
Comments here:

Musical Interlude: Supertramp, "Take The Long Way Home"

Full screen recommended.
Supertramp, "Take The Long Way Home"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"Riding high in the constellation of Auriga, beautiful, blue vdB 31 is the 31st object in Sidney van den Bergh's 1966 catalog of reflection nebulae. It shares this well-composed celestial still life with dark, obscuring clouds recorded in Edward E. Barnard's 1919 catalog of dark markings in the sky. All are interstellar dust clouds, blocking the light from background stars in the case of Barnard's dark nebulae. For vdB 31, the dust preferentially reflects the bluish starlight from embedded, hot, variable star AB Aurigae.
Exploring the environs of AB Aurigae with the Hubble Space Telescope has revealed the several million year young star is itself surrounded by flattened dusty disk with evidence for the ongoing formation of a planetary system. AB Aurigae is about 470 light-years away. At that distance this cosmic canvas would span about four light-years.”

Chet Raymo, “Trying To Be Good”

“Trying To Be Good”
by Chet Raymo

“A few lines from Mary Oliver's poem "Wild Geese":

    "You do not have to be good.
    You do not have to walk on your knees
    for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
    You only have to let the soft animal of your body
    love what it loves."

"I've quoted these lines before, if not here, then elsewhere. When I first read them back in the late 80s, they resonated with what I felt at the time. I had spent part of my earliest adulthood walking on my knees, both literally and metaphorically, seeking to tame what I took to be the animal within. Saint Augustine was whispering in my ear, and Bernanos' gloomy country priest walked at my side. I was ready to follow Thomas Merton into the desert; indeed, I once took myself briefly to the monastery at Gethsemane, Kentucky, where Merton was in residence. That was a journey of more than a hundred miles, and I was busy repenting, although of what I don't know.

As I read those lines from Mary Oliver in middle age, I had long been cultivating the "soft animal" within, immersing myself in the is-ness of things, the flesh and blood, the gorgeously sensual. No more walking on my knees, repenting. I walked proudly upright, with my sketchbook and my watercolors, my binoculars and my magnifier, sniffing the world like an animal on the prowl. I was letting my body learn to "love what it loves." Those were the years I wrote "The Soul of the Night" and "Honey From Stone" - the most intensely creative years of my life. The world offered itself to my imagination, if I may borrow another line from "Wild Geese."

And now, another half-lifetime has passed. The soft animal dozes, the body seeks repose. And I think of the first line quoted above: "You do not have to be good." What could the poet have possibly meant by that? Of course one has to be good. In a cell at Gethsemane or on the bridge over Queset Brook, one has to be good. And so one tries, one tries. The soft animal of the body that nature has contrived for us is not fine-tuned for goodness.”
“Wild Geese”

"You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things."

- Mary Oliver

"What A Privilege!"

“Whatever your fate is, whatever the hell happens, you say, “This is what I need.” It may look like a wreck, but go at it as though it were an opportunity, a challenge. If you bring love to that moment - not discouragement - you will find the strength there. Any disaster you can survive is an improvement in your character, your stature, and your life. What a privilege! This is when the spontaneity of your own nature will have a chance to flow. Then, when looking back at your life, you will see that the moments which seemed to be great failures, followed by wreckage, were the incidents that shaped the life you have now. You’ll see this is really true. Nothing can happen to you that is not positive. Even though it looks and feels at the moment like a negative crisis, it is not. The crisis throws you back, and when you are required to exhibit strength, it comes.”
~ Joseph Campbell

"Welcome to the Warfare State"

"Welcome to the Warfare State"
by Doug Casey

"War is one of the few things that only the State can do. Indeed, as Randolph Bourne said, "War is the health of the State." Let’s briefly discuss the nature of the State to see why World War 3 is on the way.

The State is like any other living entity: its prime directive is to survive and grow. Bear in mind that the State - the government - is not at all the same thing as the country or society, even though it claims to be. It’s not "We the People"; it’s a distinct entity with its own discrete interests. And that’s actually too mild an assertion. While individuals and companies prosper by providing goods and services to others through voluntary exchange, the State specializes in coercion.

There’s nothing voluntary about the State. Its main products have always been pogroms, persecutions, confiscations, taxation, inflation, censorship, harassment, repression - and war. The State is not your friend.

Mass murder and wholesale destruction are bad enough in themselves. But in wartime, the State enables them with new taxes, new debt, draconian controls, and new bureaucracies. These things linger long after the war is over.

Worse yet, the State does these things with the sanction of the victim; the typical citizen has been taught that almost anything is justified by "national security." Anyone who would normally protest these depredations in peacetime soon learns to dummy-up when there’s a war for fear of being lynched for sympathizing with the invariably demonic enemy.

After the war - assuming a victory, of course - the State’s debt, taxes, regulations and general size never return to pre-war levels. They ratchet up to ever higher plateaus, requiring the State to do more of the same to justify its existence. Government programs, of whatever description, are almost never pulled out by their roots. At most, they’re trimmed, which has the same effect as pruning a plant, i.e., they’re encouraged to grow back bigger and stronger.

Why am I saying these scary things? Because we’re clearly heading towards a big war.

A Clear and Present Danger: I want to make a point in this article that many will find unpalatable, perhaps even incredible: In today’s world, the US military is nearly useless in countering potential threats from abroad. It’s actually a positive danger. And it’s not ready for a real war. If you’re looking for a comforting mainstream analysis, I don’t have much. Let’s start with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

NATO is a US government program that’s taken on a life of its own. Its original purpose was to defend against the Warsaw Pact. But although the Soviet Union and its allies ceased to exist as a military threat in the early 1990s, NATO has continued to grow. Despite agreements with Russia, it’s grown right to their border, even adding traditionally neutral states like Finland and Sweden.

Even if you assume that NATO doesn’t provoke WW3 over the Ukraine (setting aside a discussion of who’s right or wrong and who really started it), the Chinese are likely next on the dance card. They can only see the allied Western states as pointing a gun in their direction. To them, NATO is a provocation to a cultural/racial war. NATO encourages them to make building their military a high priority.

So much for the "End of History." As long as nation-states exist, there will be violent conflict between them. But the way I see it, the nature of war, and even the nation-state itself, is going to change radically over the next 20 years. And, as has been the case throughout history, a prime mover is going to be technology.

Weaponry & Strategy: It’s an old saying: "Generals always fight the last war." That’s not because they’re (necessarily) stupid. But by the time a man gets a bunch of stars on his epaulets, you’re only assured of a competent bureaucrat with good political skills, not someone with a great military mind. Bureaucrats are not daring innovators; they do things by the book. That gives them CYA excuses and plausible deniability if things go wrong.

Apart from simple inertia, fighting the last war makes sense. For one thing, it’s what they know. For another, the equipment and tactics in question have been tested. For another, the weapons exist, and when a war starts, you basically have to "run what you brought."

Whether they can get away with fighting the last war depends mainly on whether there has been a significant change in technology. Up to early industrial times, one change in a lifetime was a lot. After all, how often do major innovations like the stirrup or gunpowder come along? But since the advent of industrialized warfare with the American conflict of 1861-1865, changes have been very rapid, and the rate of change is accelerating at warp speed.

The military is not unaware of this; as I said, they’re not stupid. In fact, today’s officers are highly educated; almost all are college graduates, for what that’s worth. Most field grade officers have done graduate work as well. That’s one reason the US emphasizes high-tech weaponry.

The military is throwing ever greater amounts of money on larger, more complex, and vastly more expensive pieces of equipment. The idea is to stay technologically ahead of any potential enemies. Maybe the US can maintain its lead as long as it’s a simplistic scenario of our tanks, planes, and ships against theirs. But the chances of things staying that simple are close to zero. The whole paradigm is about to change.

This is true for several reasons: today’s "hi-tech" weapons (F-35 fighters, Abrams tanks, aircraft carriers) are already obsolete. They’re certainly a nightmare to maintain and keep personnel competent. New drones, missiles, and torpedoes are both superior to and vastly cheaper than conventional weapons. Biological and cyber weapons obviate them all. If they’re deployed in earnest, it’s "Game Over".

Projecting force worldwide with 800 bases, $100 million aircraft, and carrier fleets, is ruinously expensive, especially for a bankrupt government that’s "on tilt". But that’s the essence of American doctrine. The concept of "defense" itself is obsolete for a nation-state. Let’s look at this in a bit more detail.

1. Today’s "Hi-Tech" Weapons Are Obsolete: Starting with a blank piece of paper, during World War II, the US developed one of the conflict’s finest fighters, the P-51 Mustang, in 117 days and produced it for $50,000 a copy - say about $500,000 in today’s dollars. It’s true that the F-35 is considerably more complex, but relative costs should have been dropping because of advances in materials, techniques, computers, robotics, and such, not escalating over 100-fold in real terms. A friend who knows about these things tells me that every hour of operating time on an M-1 Abrams requires 8 hours of maintenance. For a F-16, it’s 20 hours. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that only 30% of F-35’s are flyable at any given time.

Unsustainable runaway costs are apparent everywhere. When you’re paying upwards of 15 billion dollars for an aircraft carrier (without any aircraft or auxiliary ships), $500 million for a B-2, and $7 million for a tank, you can’t afford to buy very many of them. And you absolutely can’t afford to lose any. Apart from the costs, it takes many months or years to produce more.

On the other hand, despite sophisticated defense armaments, a swarm of cheap sea-skimming missiles might sink a carrier and its 5000-man crew - not to mention a single hypersonic missile. A hit with a cheap shoulder-fired missile can bring down any low-flying aircraft, and at $10,000 a copy, the battlefield can be peppered with them. Fire-and-forget missiles transform tanks into expensive iron coffins; ultra-cheap commercial drones can drop explosives anywhere. Cheap, accurate, small, and numerous missiles are the modern equivalent of Sam Colt’s six gun, which not only made the little guy equal to the big guy, but superior - because big guys are big targets. Drones the size of bumblebees will seek out highly trained and very expensive infantrymen.

Like a small person who knows he shouldn’t fight a giant on his own terms, US adversaries will use the military equivalent of Aikido, turning the opponent’s own might against him. The Houthis in Yemen recognize that it costs the Americans millions to blow up a mud hut, which is, in popular parlance, "unsustainable." In addition to creating more enemies. They see themselves as the under-gunned rebels in Star Wars when they destroy the Empire’s Death Star, substituting daring and cleverness for the enemy’s overwhelming physical capital.

2. Today’s Conventional Weapons Will Soon Be Totally Obsolete: This whole discussion will be completely academic in a generation when nanotechnology becomes practical. The idea is the creation of machines and supercomputers atom by atom. The essence of the technology is making things larger from a molecular level rather than trying to miniaturize them.

It’s likely to be the most important event in human history, including the conquest of fire. It will change the very essence of life itself totally, irrevocably, and unrecognizably - including the nature of armed conflict. An excellent, albeit conservative, description of a nanotechnic future is offered by Neal Stephenson in "Diamond Age," which I highly recommend. Nanotech weapons will be available to everyone after a delay, much as gunpowder was in the 15th century. That assumes, of course, that the cyber and bioweapons now available to everyone don’t obviate the whole question.

In the meantime, the trend to miniaturization will continue apace. Microchips and other computer components are commercially available everywhere, and they’re cheaper and more powerful every day. The next generation of weapons will be highly miniaturized robots, weighing at most a few pounds apiece, probably designed with running or flying insects as models. Construction will be facilitated by the use of off-the-shelf electronic products. That's in addition to full-size Terminator-style robots, AI-piloted and armored vehicles.

A $50 billion fleet can be devastated by a few score missiles; a formation of soldiers wouldn’t stand a chance against an attack by thousands of very cheap microbots. Just as a hundred tiny ants can easily overwhelm a scorpion, cheap and tiny machines will turn current military behemoths into useless artifacts. Any country will be able to have a truly formidable military for a fraction of today’s costs.

3. Overextension as a Formula for Disaster: Fighting a war next door is one thing; doing so on the other side of the world is something else again. Fuel, materials, and troops are very costly to transport and maintain at the end of a 10,000 mile airlink. Doing so is likely to result in what has been called "imperial overstretch"; if you try to cover all the bases, you become overextended, vulnerable, and bankrupt. The US currently maintains a military presence of some description in about 100 countries, and almost all of those emplacements are an active provocation to somebody.

Question: If social spending cannot or will not be cut, with $1 trillion in interest that must be paid each year, debt growing at $2 trillion per annum, and money already being created by the trillions annually, what is going to give when times get tough? Will the government get involved in yet another serious foreign military adventure? Of course. They see it as a solution, not a problem.

A poor country can fight a war using human capital - like Korea in the 1950s or Vietnam in the 1960s. But a country like the US is almost forced to use financial and technological capital because human life has a high price tag for us. That makes for a problem when we don’t have the financial resources to maintain a military that’s both very expensive and ineffective.

Can the US afford to fight a continuous war in the alleged search for continuous peace? The experience of previous empires, from the Romans on, suggests the answer is no.

America’s best defense is a strong economy with lots of technological innovation, not an overweening military. If the US government, with its taxes, regulations, currency inflation, and welfare, were to disappear, the country would experience the greatest and most genuine boom in world history. In a decade, even China would appear as relatively insignificant as Nigeria today. It would be almost impossible to threaten a genuinely advanced America.

It’s equally important not to give any government or group a reason to launch an attack. People the world over love the idea of America; they love the culture, the cars, the food, the freedom, you-name-it. They like the good things American corporations used to make. They don't mind good-natured, free-spending American tourists.

What they don’t like is US boots on the ground or in their airspace, fomenting coups to install "democracy." If Washington DC ceased to exist, the other 96% of the planet’s population would have no more incentive to strike America than Costa Rica.

Of course, I may be anachronistic in that view. Over the last 50 years, while the US was building an arsenal to fight Russia and China, a different threat has been building. The Muslim world, which has been in what amounts to a Forever War with the West for 1400 years, is cyclically on the march again. They have two very important weapons.

One is firm and fanatical beliefs. The West, on the other hand, has lost all confidence; it’s flaccid and believes itself to be evil. As Napoleon said, in warfare, the psychological is to the physical as three is to one. The prognosis for America and Europe is not good. They’ll be conquered both psychologically and by migration. America’s bloated military will be useless.

Islam’s second weapon is many hundreds of millions of young Mohammedans. From a military viewpoint, they are infiltrating the demographic and political structure of the West and changing it. And if things ever go kinetic, scores of millions of young fighters are cheaper and more effective than expensive hi-tech hardware. There’s much more to be said on the topic of the Forever War with Islam.

Where this is Going: As a reader, I presume you agree with me on some of the above or are at least willing to listen to the argument with an open mind. I suspect that’s not the case with most Americans, however. They view the military as a national treasure or even an icon.

On one level, I can understand this atavistic attachment. As a kid I wanted to go to West Point - but was cured of the temptation by four years of military high school. In college, during the Vietnam War, I was signed up for the Marines PLC program (yes, I was a slow learner). But then I simultaneously drew 365 of 366 in the draft lottery (it was a leap year) and was medically rejected as 1-Y because I had broken my right leg in 17 different places only a year before. At that point, I figured the cosmos was trying to send me a message like, "If you really want to go to Vietnam, do you really need the government to pay your way?"

American’s warm feelings toward the military are largely misplaced. And I speak as someone who likes soldiers. Whatever its star-spangled history, the US military no longer serves much of a useful purpose because of the ongoing evolution of technology. Worse, it’s become an active danger. What’s left of its esprit de corps is being eroded by DEI, LGBT, and anti-whiteism. Soldiers’ first loyalty is naturally to each other - although that’s been weakened by Wokism. Their next loyalty is to their employer, who they trust less and less. Their third loyalty is to those they supposedly protect and serve, but they have less and less in common with them.

Combine those problems with others I’ve listed, and it’s no wonder the militaries of Western countries are becoming less and less reliable and effective. Not good; at the very time their governments are provoking war with Russia, China, and smaller counties.

Let me sum things up. US foreign policy is putting this country on a collision course with any number of other countries. The US military is in a position to fight the last war, but not the next one, because the weapons the US is loading up on are basically dinosaurs. And like dinosaurs, they’re unbelievably expensive to feed. The likely bankruptcy of the government during the next economic downturn will make feeding them near impossible.

When the next conflict occurs, it’s likely to do extensive damage in the US itself. It will be hard to insulate yourself from World War 3. It makes the Southern Hemisphere look better all the time.

Your first line of defense, of course, is common sense survivalist stuff. You know the drill: buy gold, silver, and get a survival retreat with a year’s supply of food, fuel, and ammunition. Keep gaining skills and knowledge. Try to become self-employed. Surround yourself with reliable, like-minded associates. Keep a low profile with the authorities. And, I might add, enjoy yourself; don’t take things too seriously. We’re dealing with the human condition."

The Daily "Near You?"

Shawnee, Oklahoma, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

Judge Napolitano, "Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: 'We Are On A Path To WWIII."

Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom, 5/9/24
"Prof. Jeffrey Sachs: 'We Are On A Path To WWIII."
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"The Constancy of Change"

"Heraclitus," by Johannes Moreelse, 1630
"The Constancy of Change"
Political tension, creative destruction and the time for freedom.
by Joel Bowman

Melbourne, Australia - "Is the west ready to embrace free market capitalism? How about America? The UK? Canada? Australia? We’ll come back to that question in a moment. First, we probe a little deeper...

Darkness and light... goodness and evil... freedom and The State. The world is animated by powerful forces. Seen and unseen alike, they drive markets... politics... civilization itself... in opposing directions. A seller aims to capture the highest price for his good or service... a buyer, meanwhile, is on the hunt for bargains (and alternatives). He threatens to “take his money elsewhere” if he doesn’t get satisfaction. The market weighs, measures... and takes notes.

One candidate offers voters security, cradle to grave welfare, a “social safety net” and other unicorn treats... his opponent promises only to leave them alone, free to enjoy “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” after their own fashion. The people look, listen... and scratch their heads.

An experienced generation advises caution, patience and quiet adherence to reliable tradition... the youth have discovered a “new” way forward, a shinier trinket, a quicker, cheaper thrill. “This time is different,” they boldly declare, minds untroubled by the pangs of doubt.

Change as Constant: Occasionally, these opposing forces are evenly matched. Buyer and seller agree on a price, for example. Warring tribes broker a peace deal. A husband and wife set aside their differences... and agree to get a divorce. But stasis is not in nature’s nature. “Change is the only constant,” observed the pre-Socratic philosopher, Heraclitus (c. 535 – c. 475 BC). Everything remains in flux.

A price, for example, is settled in the moment, at the very point of exchange. But it is not eternal. Like a Polaroid snapshot, it represents the world as it is in an instant, before any number of swirling variables, both known and unknown – sentiment, momentum, volume... trends, obsolescence, regulatory interference etc. – conspire to tilt the scales, in favor of buyer or seller, from one day to the next. (Incidentally, this is why sustained price controls never... ever... ever... work: price discovery is a process, not a product. And as a process, it is particularly adept at resisting arrest.)

Similarly, over in the murky political realm, where we’ve lately been observing the Greatest Experiment of Our Age, myriad forces connive to push and pull in opposite directions. On the one side, the free market is the purest expression of the will of the people, unforced, unbound, unihbibited. A man remains at liberty to say, do and imagine whatever lunatic fantasy his heart desires... provided he does not interfere with his neighbor’s right to do likewise.

Standing guard against such rough and raw liberty, state actors relentlessly harass and harangue, corral and cajole, browbeat and bully... terrorizing one and all on the absurd pretense that civil society would collapse without their ceaseless vigilance and selfless service.

Two-Way Road: But like price discovery, politics is more “process than product.” The weight of the state under which man labors depends on whether liberty or tyranny is in the ascendency. Mostly heavy as a stone... rarely light as a feather... the burden is seldom constant. Rather, there is a tension between the two opposing forces; freedom on the one side, coercion on the other.

In dialectics, this phenomenon is known as a “unity of opposites,” wherein two antagonistic forces are considered both dependent on, and acting against, one another in a given field of tension. The nature of the political realm remains the same – the squabbling, the infighting, the politicking – even as its expression bubbles and boils, in a state of constant unrest.

Heraclitus illustrates the basic idea using the following aphorism: “The road up and the road down are the same thing.” But why is this important? And how is it relevant today, two and a half millennia after that clever ol’ Ephesian traipsed the ancient agora?

First, because change is still the only constant, all these years on... and second, because far from being cause for concern, much less lamentation, tension is not merely part of the process, but fundamentally necessary for any change at all. Indeed, it is often during periods of extreme pressure, mounting stress and unrelenting strain that we witness the most revolutionary breakthroughs.

Adversity builds character, say the old timers. No pain, no gain, coaches tell their athletes. What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, reckoned Nietzsche (himself a great admirer of Heraclitus).

Whether in the biological world (evolution through adaptation and natural selection)... in economics (Schumpeter’s creative destruction)... or in the dark arts of politics (revolutions, revolts and rebellions since time immemorial)...crises have a way of inspiring our very boldest ideas, accelerating our sharpest innovations, catalyzing the conditions required for unimaginable quantum leap. (Even if it is simply that we may begin the whole process over again.)

Pressure mounted for almost three quarters of a century down in Argentina before the citizens there finally embraced the concept of liberty. And now, folks around the world are putting their fingers to the breeze and sensing freedom, even if the winds are only faint. Which brings us all the way back, full circle, to our opening line of inquiry...

Libertarian Leanings: Given Javier Milei’s rise down in Argentina, might we begin to see a shift toward libertarian, free market principles elsewhere, in the US... the UK... across the west? US presidential candidate, RFK, Jr., is sounding dangerously libertarian of late. Here he was a couple of months back, when some were speculating he might even make his run on a libertarian ticket: “I’ve actually been aligned with the libertarians on a lot of issues for all of my career [...] My record on environmental issues going back forty years has been a market-based approach.

We don’t have free market capitalism in our country. We have corporate crony capitalism...and that’s what’s destroying the environment. True free markets promote efficiency, efficiency means the elimination of waste. Pollution is waste. In a true free market, a true free market would require us to properly value our resources. And it is the undervaluation of those resources that causes us to use them wastefully.

In a true free market you can’t make yourself rich without making your neighbors rich and without enriching your community. What polluters do is they make themselves rich by making everyone else poorer and they do that by escaping the discipline of the free market and forcing the public to pay their production cost, by externalizing their cost. On this issue and many other issues I am very aligned with libertarians.”

And now, just last week, we learned that Donald Trump has accepted an invitation – and a challenge – to appear at the Libertarian Party’s National Convention later this month. “Libertarians are some of the most independent and thoughtful thinkers in our country, and I am honored to join them in Washington, DC, later this month,” said The Donald. “We must all work together to help advance freedom and liberty for every American...”

The theme for the 2024 Libertarian National Convention is “Become Ungovernable.” According to the party’s statement: “This was chosen following the previous years of unconscionable authoritarian actions by the United States Federal and State governments, which saw citizens confined, indoctrinated, lied to, and inoculated against their will. The citizens of these United States must become ungovernable to regain their basic rights and freedoms.”

Whether or not one believes Messers. Kennedy, or Trump, whether they believe their own words, the simple fact that two of the country’s leading candidates for presidency are even addressing the “libertarian fringe” tells you something about where they sense voters are headed...and the change that is in the air."

“What was scattered
gathers.
What was gathered
blows away.”
~ Heraclitus

"A Realistic Attitude..."

"It was the essence of life to disbelieve in death for one's self, to act as if life would continue forever. And life had to act also as if little issues were big ones. To take a realistic attitude toward life and death meant that one lapsed into unreality. Into insanity. It was ironic that the only way to keep one's sanity was to ignore that one was in an insane world or to act as if the world were sane."
- Philip José Farmer

Bill Bonner, "All Of The Biggies Want Inflation"

"All Of The Biggies Want Inflation"
The US owes $34.7 trillion. What if debt holders realized that 
the Fed was not really going to fight inflation...and that 
they were just going to ‘print up’ trillions in pieces of green paper?
by Bill Bonner

Dublin, Ireland - "Like a depressed person at an open window, yesterday, we left an important question unanswered: ‘Why can’t we just muddle through the debt problem? Why does it have to end in crisis and disaster?’ Talk about muddled! The question was put to Jared Bernstein, Joe Biden’s top economic advisor. In an interview, painful to watch, he seemed to be doing an impersonation of Leslie Nielson’s inimitable Frank Dribben:

"The US government can’t go bankrupt because we can print our own money... The government definitely prints its own money. The government definitely prints money and lends that money... The government definitely prints money...It then lends that money by selling bonds. Is that what they do? They sell bonds and then people buy the bonds and lend the money. Yeah...”

Yeah, that’s what they do. But why? Stephanie Kelton, proponent of Modern Monetary Theory, wonders: ‘Why does the federal government have to borrow its own money?’ A talk show host, interviewing her, leaped to the obvious absurdity: "Why don’t we just print up $1 trillion coins? We give one to China. One to Social Security, etc. We just pay off our debts in one fell swoop. Heck, we print the money anyway."

It seems like a no-brainer. Debt problem solved. Stamp the invoice PAID... and move on. This is not just a ‘theoretical issue.’ Here’s the head of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, Maya MacGuineas:

"We’re less than a decade away from a massive solvency crisis that would slash benefits for over 67 million seniors and severely limit their access to health care soon after. But instead of running to fix this problem, our politicians are running away from it. Social Security’s retirement trust fund will be insolvent when today’s 58 year-olds reach the normal retirement age and today’s youngest retirees turn 71." Note to Kelton, Bernstein et al: Retired people don’t eat paper.

Right now, the Fed is balancing itself on the ledge. It wants inflation... to stir animal spirits and repress the real level of US debt. But it would be suicide to jump off and lower rates immediately, with the whole world watching.

The US owes $34.7 trillion. What if debt holders (and retirees) realized that the Fed was not really going to fight inflation... and that they were just going to ‘print up’ trillions in pieces of green paper?

All the people who put their faith in the Fed and the US dollar with their lifetime wealth... what would they think? The Fed is supposed to be guarding the value of America’s IOUs — from its venerable 30-year Treasury bonds... to its green walking around money, in 1s, 5s, 10s... and more.

Even our own housekeeper in Argentina, who lives in a mud hut up in the Andes mountains, a six-hour hike from our house, keeps her savings in green paper. It was an easy way to protect it from the Argentine peso. What if she knew that the US officials were no more reliable than their own jefes at the Banco Central de la Republica Argentina?

The Banking Cartel: So far, bondholders think they can trust the Fed to protect their money. Good luck. The Fed is a cartel of Big Banks. Its main purpose is to make sure the banks have enough money. If they run short, the Fed will swindle your children - with inflation - to give them more. All of the biggies want inflation:

• Big Government needs inflation to reduce the real value of its current debt... and allow it to continue confiscating the wealth of the nation.
• Big Money wants inflation because it owns the nations’ assets; ultra-low interest rates and deficits cause inflation, but they increase prices for their stocks and bonds.
• Big Business, too, thrives on inflation. Upstart competitors can’t get funding. Small businesses go broke. Big Businesses get bailouts.
• Even Big Media prefers inflation to ‘austerity.’ Inflation is a way to fund the wars and boondoggles that it loves so much.

All of them want to survive and grow... concentrating wealth and power in the big, here and now, institutions of the entrenched elites. But the real key to the feds’ embrace of inflation is this: They have no other choice. TINA. Politically, There Is No Alternative. These powerful groups would never accept the drastic cutbacks needed to reduce US debt (budget surpluses!)

You can’t muddle through a debt crisis. As in a train wreck or old age, muddling through won’t take you to the other side. The adventure has to end before a new one can begin. Social Security and Medicare are going broke. US debt is rising faster than inflation can cut it down. In another spell of high inflation, the Fed would be unable to raise rates sufficiently to bring it under control.

The feds’ only option is inflation... more inflation... sustained inflation at levels high enough to reduce the real value of US debt. Wait for it."

"A Simple Choice..."

"It comes down to a simple choice, really. 
Get busy living or get busy dying."
- "Andy Dufresne", "Shawshank Redemption"

"How It Really Is"

 

Dan, I Allegedly, "Are Things Really That Bad?"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, AM 5/9/24
"Are Things Really That Bad?"
Is the economy really in bad shape? How do you feel? 
Do you think things are going to improve? Or do things get worse from here?
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"Wars And Rumors Of War: The Middle East"

Full screen recommended.
Scott Ritter, 5/9/24
"Warning: Israel and Iran's Escalating 
Conflict Threatens Middle East Explosion"
Comments here:
o
Full screen recommended.
Times of India, 5/9/24
"Iran-Linked Fighters Bomb IDF Barracks In Golan Heights; 
Back To Back Missiles Barrage"
"Hezbollah launched drones and missile attacks at military installations in Al Metula, Shlomi, and Manara.Sirens were sounded across golan heights to warn of imminent threat from Hezbollah's drones. Israeli media reports casualties and significant damage to military personnel and installations. Major fatalities were reported in Malikieh and Avivim military barracks."
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Col. Douglas Macgregor states that Hezbollah has 200,000 missiles...
o
Full screen recommended.
Oneindia News, 5/9/24
"Hezbollah Takes Revenge For Rafah: 
Israeli Army Suffers Massive Blow In New Missile Blitz"
"Hezbollah launched coordinated strikes on Israeli targets in Northern Palestine, including barracks and military buildings, in support of Gaza and retaliation for Israeli attacks on southern Lebanese villages. The clashes have caused casualties and displacement on both sides, with Hezbollah vowing to continue until Israel halts aggression against Gaza."
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o
Full screen recommended.
Times Of India, 5/9/24
"'Will Hit Israel...': Iran's Big Nuclear Threat 
After Khamenei's 'Call For Action' Over Gaza"
"Iran will have to “change” its nuclear doctrine if its existence is threatened by Israel, says an adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, Kamal Kharrazi, raising renewed concerns about an Iranian nuclear program that Israel and others say has been focused for decades on producing an atomic weapon anyway."
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o
Full screen recommended.
Scott Ritter, 5/9/24
"Israel has Breached Camp David Accords 
and Declared War. Will Egypt Respond?"
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Adventures With Danno, "Kroger Items Everyone Should Be Buying This Week! Saving Big Money!"

Adventures With Danno, AM 5/9/24
"Kroger Items Everyone Should Be Buying This Week! 
Saving Big Money!"
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Gregory Mannarino, "Alert! My Strongest Warning To Date!"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 5/9/24
"Alert! My Strongest Warning To Date!"
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