So, we rise from the rubble...
Sunday, April 10, 2022
The Poet: Thomas Gray, "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College"
"Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College"
"Ye distant spires, ye antique tow'rs,
That crown the wat'ry glade,
Where grateful Science still adores
Her Henry's holy Shade;
And ye, that from the stately brow
Of Windsor's heights th' expanse below
Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey,
Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowr's among
Wanders the hoary Thames along
His silver-winding way.
Ah, happy hills, ah, pleasing shade,
Ah, fields belov'd in vain,
Where once my careless childhood stray'd,
A stranger yet to pain!
I feel the gales, that from ye blow,
A momentary bliss bestow,
As waving fresh their gladsome wing,
My weary soul they seem to soothe,
And, redolent of joy and youth,
To breathe a second spring.
Say, Father Thames, for thou hast seen
Full many a sprightly race
Disporting on thy margent green
The paths of pleasure trace,
Who foremost now delight to cleave
With pliant arm thy glassy wave?
The captive linnet which enthrall?
What idle progeny succeed
To chase the rolling circle's speed,
Or urge the flying ball?
While some on earnest business bent
Their murm'ring labors ply
'Gainst graver hours, that bring constraint
To sweeten liberty:
Some bold adventurers disdain
The limits of their little reign,
And unknown regions dare descry:
Still as they run they look behind,
They hear a voice in ev'ry wind,
And snatch a fearful joy.
Gay hope is theirs by fancy fed,
Less pleasing when possest;
The tear forgot as soon as shed,
The sunshine of the breast:
Theirs buxom health of rosy hue,
Wild wit, invention ever-new,
And lively cheer of vigor born;
The thoughtless day, the easy night,
The spirits pure, the slumbers light,
That fly th' approach of morn.
Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond to-day:
Yet see how all around 'em wait
The ministers of human fate,
And black Misfortune's baleful train!
Ah, show them where in ambush stand
To seize their prey the murth'rous band!
Ah, tell them they are men!
These shall the fury Passions tear,
The vultures of the mind
Disdainful Anger, pallid Fear,
And Shame that skulks behind;
Or pining Love shall waste their youth,
Or Jealousy with rankling tooth,
That inly gnaws the secret heart,
And Envy wan, and faded Care,
Grim-visag'd comfortless Despair,
And Sorrow's piercing dart.
Ambition this shall tempt to rise,
Then whirl the wretch from high,
To bitter Scorn a sacrifice,
And grinning Infamy.
The stings of Falsehood those shall try,
And hard Unkindness' alter'd eye,
That mocks the tear it forc'd to flow;
And keen Remorse with blood defil'd,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.
Lo, in the vale of years beneath
A griesly troop are seen,
The painful family of Death,
More hideous than their Queen:
This racks the joints, this fires the veins,
That ev'ry laboring sinew strains,
Those in the deeper vitals rage:
Lo, Poverty, to fill the band,
That numbs the soul with icy hand,
And slow-consuming Age.
To each his suff'rings: all are men,
Condemn'd alike to groan,
The tender for another's pain;
Th' unfeeling for his own.
Yet ah! why should they know their fate?
Since sorrow never comes too late,
And happiness too swiftly flies.
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more; where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise."
- By Thomas Gray
"Members Of Congress Are Now Using Words Like 'Famine' And 'Starvation' To Describe What Is Coming"
"Members Of Congress Are Now Using Words Like
'Famine' And 'Starvation' To Describe What Is Coming"
by Michael Snyder
"I have so much information to share with you today, and I will do my best to be brief. But be warned that this article is going to be longer than usual. Global events are moving so quickly now, and I believe that they are going to move even more rapidly in the months ahead. Sadly, the changes that we are witnessing will have a very real impact on the daily lives of every man, woman and child on the entire planet. As I discussed previously, a global food shortage has arrived. In fact, members of Congress are now using words like “famine” and “starvation” to describe what conditions will soon be like all over the world.
For example, U.S. Senator Joni Ernst just told Fox Business that our planet is facing “impending famine”…"About 40 to 45 percent of the production in Ukraine will be decreased this year because of the war and the scarcity of supplies that go into the planting season. And we know that Ukraine also supports about 400 million people around the world with its food products. So we do see that we have an impending famine. And I’ve heard from David Beasley at the World Food Bank that he’s now going to have to take from the hungry to feed the starving."
And U.S. Senator Cory Booker has previously warned that we could soon see tens of millions of people “dying of starvation”…“Democrats and Republicans in Congress need to quickly come together and approve emergency global food aid in order to prevent tens of millions of people, including millions of children, from dying of starvation,” Senator Cory Booker, a Democrat from New Jersey, told Reuters.
They aren’t exaggerating. Even Joe Biden recently admitted that food shortages are “going to be real”. The one thing that could provide a ray of hope would be an end to the war in Ukraine. But it appears that isn’t going to happen any time soon. In an interview with Fox News on Friday, Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated that his nation will not accept anything less than “victory” in the war…"Special Report’s Bret Baier interviewed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday evening, touching on a wide variety of topics, including what a victory looks like for Ukraine and what Putin is hoping to achieve. Baier asked the Ukrainian leader at the start of the interview how he believes the “war will end” prompting an explanation from Zelenskyy that only “victory” will be acceptable to his country."
Good luck with all that. Now that the Russians have pulled their forces away from Kiev to focus on the eastern front, there is a lot less pressure on Zelenskyy to compromise on a peace deal. And the fact that this conflict has made him one of the biggest celebrities on the entire planet actually gives him an incentive to keep it going.
Meanwhile, millions upon millions of people are already deeply suffering. In Somalia, we are being warned that an “impending famine” is at the door…"What we are now seeing is impending famine similar to that which occurred in 2010/2011 in which more than a quarter of a million people died – including 133,000 children under the age of five. Although some donors have committed to fund Somalia’s Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) which seeks US$1.5 billion, not even 4% of funding required to meet Somalia’s humanitarian needs have been allocated. Like the novel coronavirus, which had impacted many of Somali households, the Ukraine crisis has driven inflation and rising costs in Somalia, particularly for food and energy, at a time when families are already incredibly desperate."
The reason why the situation in Somalia has become so desperate is because that nation normally gets more than 90 percent of its wheat from either Russia or Ukraine…"Finally, in the Horn of Africa 13 million people are already suffering from hunger. Ethiopia imports around 40 percent of its wheat from Russia and Ukraine, Kenya 30 percent, and Somalia over 90 percent."
Meanwhile, the food crisis in Yemen just continues to escalate. One man that was recently interviewed admitted that he and his family “live like ants”…"Experts are warning that the world faces a historic famine. The war in Ukraine is only one of many problems plaguing the global distribution of food. In Yemen, Ghalib al-Najjar skips meals so that his children have enough food. He says he and his family “live like ants or fish…we eat what we can find.”
In Peru, rapidly rising prices for fuel and food have sparked massive nationwide protests…"An ongoing wave of violent protests in Peru shows how the Russian invasion of Ukraine is affecting markets around the world, sparking unrest and deepening political divides. Rising fuel costs originally triggered the protests, which started last week, but quickly intensified into large anti-government demonstrations with marches and road blockades. So far at least six people have died in the chaos, and protesters continue to block at least nine major roads."
In Afghanistan, it is being estimated that 95 percent of the entire population does not have enough food to eat right now…"Afghanistan has faced grave hunger crises before. Two decades ago, people in the country were so hungry they resorted to eating wild grass. But the situation in the country now is unprecedented. Exacerbated by an unusually cold winter and the worst drought in decades, the economic upheaval that came with the Taliban takeover has left 95% of Afghans without enough food."
We haven’t seen anything like this in a really long time. Overall, the World Food Program is warning us that “285 million people face starvation”…"The World Food Program estimates that 285 million people face starvation. The head of the World Food Program, former South Carolina Governor David Beasley, says the world food supply already faced a catastrophe before the war in Ukraine. “We’re so short of funds already, and now with Ukraine, we’ve got 50-percent rations for people, for example, in Yemen, I’ve just cut 50 percent rations for eight million people. Niger, 50 percent rations, Chad 50 percent rations. And 50 percent don’t have anything, those who are in extreme need,” Beasley said."
Of course this is just the beginning. As I specifically warned in "Lost Prophecies" and "7 Year Apocalypse", conditions will eventually become far more severe than they are at this moment.
Here in the United States, nobody is starving just yet, but the cost of living is escalating at a frightening pace. According to a Bloomberg report, the average U.S. household will need to spend $5,200 dollars more just to have the same standard of living as last year… “Inflation will mean the average U.S. household has to spend an extra $5,200 this year ($433 per month) compared to last year for the same consumption basket,” Bloomberg Economics reports."
Having to spend an extra $433 per month to get the same is a hefty, even gargantuan ask for anyone - especially parents who are already struggling to keep a roof over their kid’s heads and food on the table.
And our historic supply chain crisis just continues to get even worse. In fact, the wait times for computer chips just hit another all-time record high…"The wait times for semiconductor deliveries rose slightly in March, reaching a new high, after lockdowns in China and an earthquake in Japan further hampered supply. Lead times - the lag between when a chip is ordered and delivered - increased by two days to 26.6 weeks last month, according to research by Susquehanna Financial Group."
The system is crumbling all around us, and we really are in the early stages of a full-blown economic implosion. Initially, it will be the poorest nations that suffer the most. Millions upon millions of innocent people don’t have enough to eat right now, and that number will rise with each passing day. Normally, most Americans don’t pay too much attention to what is happening on the other side of the world, but food scarcity is growing in the United States too.
So if you and your family have enough food to eat tonight, you should be very grateful, because at least for now you are one of the lucky ones."
"Intense Cognitive Workout, Enter a Highly Focused Mental State - Isochronic Tones"
Full screen recommended.
Headphones are NOT REQUIRED for this video/track.
Jason Lewis - Mind Amend,
"Intense Cognitive Workout,
Enter a Highly Focused Mental State - Isochronic Tones"
"This is a high-intensity audio brainwave entrainment session, using isochronic tones. Use this video to increase focus and concentration while studying, working and doing any mentally taxing activity. Listen to this track with your eyes open while doing the task/activity you want to focus on. Although headphones are not required you may find they produce a more intense effect, because they help to block out distracting external sounds."
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"Isochronic Tones –
How They Work, the Benefits and the Research"
This is a brainwave entrainment audio session using isochronic tones combined with music. The isochronic tones are the repetitive beats you can hear on top of the music throughout the track. If you are new to this type of audio brainwave entrainment, find out how isochronic tones work and how they compare to binaural beats here:
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Works for me... Listen folks, whether you want to know it or not we're in the fight of our lives, for our lives right now, and it's going to get unimaginably worse. I'll take any edge I can get, and you should too... Think I'm kidding? This is what's coming world wide, and right here for us, too...and a lot sooner than you want to know...
"Sri Lanka: Violent Protests Explode in Chaos as Nation is on Brink of Collapse"
"One Can Fight Evil..."
They don't know because they don't want to know...
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'One can fight evil but against stupidity one is helpless.'
- Henry Miller
- Henry Miller
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"Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond to-day..."
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Oh, we so deserve what we get...
"Economic Market Snapshot 4/10/22"
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Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...
Only the consequences are real - to you!
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"Economic Market Snapshot 4/10/22"
Updated as available.
MarketWatch Market Summary, Live Updates
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CNN Market Data:
CNN Fear And Greed Index:
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Latest Market Analysis, Updated 3/31/22
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A comprehensive, essential daily read.
April 9th to 12th, 2022
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Financial Stress Index
"The OFR Financial Stress Index (OFR FSI) is a daily market-based snapshot of stress in global financial markets. It is constructed from 33 financial market variables, such as yield spreads, valuation measures, and interest rates. The OFR FSI is positive when stress levels are above average, and negative when stress levels are below average. The OFR FSI incorporates five categories of indicators: credit, equity valuation, funding, safe assets and volatility. The FSI shows stress contributions by three regions: United States, other advanced economies, and emerging markets."
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Daily Job Cuts
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Commentary, highly recommended:
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"The more I see of the monied classes,
the better I understand the guillotine."
- George Bernard Shaw
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Oh yeah...
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And now... The End Game...
"Shopping At Kroger Marketplace! What's Next? - What's Coming?"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 4/10/22:
"Shopping At Kroger Marketplace! What's Next? - What's Coming?"
"In today's vlog we are shopping around the Kroger Marketplace, looking at rising prices, empty shelves, and trying to find some items they don't have that we need to make dinner. It's getting rough out here as stores continue to struggle at getting in products."
Saturday, April 9, 2022
"Weird Signs We Are Headed to a Recession"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly PM 4/9/22:
"Weird Signs We Are Headed to a Recession"
"It is crazy when you look at all the warning signs through history right before a recession has happened. Unfortunately history is repeating itself right before our eyes. People either want to accept that an economic downturn is coming in a big way or they wanna bury their heads in the sand."
“Banks Don’t Have Cash? Coming Crash Will Be Biblical; Used Car Prices Drop; FED Will Hit Brakes”
Jeremiah Babe, PM 4/9/22:
“Banks Don’t Have Cash? Coming Crash Will Be Biblical;
Used Car Prices Drop; FED Will Hit Brakes”
"A Look to the Heavens"
“From Sagittarius to Carina, the Milky Way Galaxy shines in this dark night sky above planet Earth’s lush island paradise of Mangaia. Familiar to denizens of the southern hemisphere, the gorgeous skyscape includes the bulging galactic center at the upper left and bright stars Alpha and Beta Centauri just right of center. About 10 kilometers wide, volcanic Mangaia is the southernmost of the Cook Islands. Geologists estimate that at 18 million years old it is the oldest island in the Pacific Ocean.
Of course, the Milky Way is somewhat older, with the galaxy’s oldest stars estimated to be over 13 billion years old. (Editor’s note: This image holds the distinction of being selected as winner in the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition in the Earth and Space category.)“
Free Download: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, "The Little Prince"
Free Download:
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, "The Little Prince"
by Kirstie Pursey
“‘The Little Prince’, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, is a children’s story with some very profound meanings and some quotes that will really make you think. I have to admit that I never read the ‘Little Prince’ as a child. I think I wouldn’t have known what to make of it if I did. Even reading it as an adult I didn’t know what to make of it!
However, it is clear that “The Little Prince” touches on some very deep themes about the nature of life, love, friendship and more. The following Little Prince quotes show just how many philosophical themes are discussed in this small, but profound work.
The story tells of a pilot who crashes into the Sahara desert. He is attempting to fix his damaged plane when a little boy appears as if from nowhere and demands that he draws him a sheep. Thus begins a strange, enigmatic friendship that is both heartwarming and heartbreaking. The Little Prince, it turns out, comes from a small asteroid where he is the only living being apart from a rather demanding rose bush. The Little Prince decides to leave his home and visit other planets to find knowledge. The story tells of these encounters with rulers of strange worlds and de Saint-Exupéry has opportunities to demonstrate some philosophical themes that will make readers think.
On earth, as well as meeting the pilot, The Little Price meets a Fox and Snake. The fox helps him to truly understand the rose and the snake offers him a way to return to his home planet. But his return journey comes at a high price. The book’s bittersweet ending is both thought-provoking and emotional. I would definitely recommend that you read “The Little Prince” if you haven’t already.
It is one of the most beautiful and profound children’s books there are. If you have older children, then you might like to read it with them as it can be a little overwhelming for them to read alone. In the meantime, here are some of the best and most thought-provoking Little Prince quotes:
• “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”
• “A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.”
• “All grown-ups were once children… but only a few of them remember it.”
• “Well, I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies.”
• “Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.”
• “The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched, they are felt with the heart.”
• “It is much more difficult to judge oneself than to judge others. If you succeed in judging yourself rightly, then you are indeed a man of true wisdom.”
• “It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.”
• “I am who I am and I have the need to be.”
• “No one is ever satisfied where he is.”
• “One day, I watched the sun setting forty-four times……You know…when one is so terribly sad, one loves sunsets.”
• “People where you live, the little prince said, grow five thousand roses in one garden… Yet they don’t find what they’re looking for… And yet what they’re looking for could be found in a single rose.”
• “But the conceited man did not hear him. Conceited people never hear anything but praise.”
• “What matters most are the simple pleasures so abundant that we can all enjoy them…Happiness doesn’t lie in the objects we gather around us. To find it, all we need to do is open our eyes.”
• “Where are the people?” resumed the Little Prince at last. “It’s a little lonely in the desert…” “It is lonely when you’re among people, too,” said the snake.”
• “What makes the desert beautiful,’ said the Little Prince, ‘is that somewhere it hides a well…”
• “For me, you are only a little boy just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you have no need of me, either. For you, I’m only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, we’ll need each other. You’ll be the only boy in the world for me and I’ll be the only fox in the world for you.”
• “To forget a friend is sad. Not everyone has had a friend.”
• “Only the children know what they are looking for.”
• “Sometimes, there is no harm in putting off a piece of work until another day.”
• “I should have judged her according to her actions, not her words.”
• “Nevertheless he is the only one of them all who does not seem to me ridiculous. Perhaps that is because he is thinking of something else besides himself.”
• “The one thing I love in life is to sleep.”
• “The machine does not isolate man from the great problems of nature but plunges him more deeply into them.”
• “And when your sorrow is comforted (time soothes all sorrows) you will be content that you have known me.”
Closing thoughts: I hope you have enjoyed these ‘Little Prince’ quotes. Admittedly, they are sometimes difficult to fathom at first. However, like many things in life, the more you think about them, the more they begin to make sense. This is not an easy book to read and the bittersweet ending may leave you feeling a little heartbroken. However, the book offers so many insights into the human condition that it is well worth the time spent thinking about the philosophical ideas contained between the covers.”
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Freely download “The Little Prince”, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, here:
"And In That Very Way..."
"A sad fact, of course, about adult life is that you see the very things you'll never adapt to coming toward you on the horizon. You see them as the problems they are, you worry like hell about them, you make provisions, take precautions, fashion adjustments; you tell yourself you'll have to change your way of doing things. Only you don't. You can't. Somehow it's already too late. And maybe it's even worse than that: maybe the thing you see coming from far away is not the real thing, the thing that scares you, but its aftermath. And what you've feared will happen has already taken place. This is similar in spirit to the realization that all the great new advances of medical science will have no benefit for us at all, thought we cheer them on, hope a vaccine might be ready in time, think things could still get better. Only it's too late there too. And in that very way our life gets over before we know it. We miss it. And like the poet said: The ways we miss our lives are life."
- Richard Ford
"When I hear somebody sigh, "Life is hard,"
I am always tempted to ask, "Compared to what?"
- Sydney Harris
"I'd Still Swim..."
"If I were dropped out of a plane into the ocean and told
the nearest land was a thousand miles away, I'd still swim.
And I'd despise the one who gave up. "
- Abraham Maslow
"The Story Of Man"
“The sands of time blew into a storm of images... images in sequence to tell the truth! Glorious legends of revolutionaries, bound only by a desire to be true to themselves, and to hope! Parables of colliding worlds, of forbidden love, of enemies healing the wounds of circumstance! Projected myth of persecution through greed and selfishness... and the will to survive! The Will to survive! And to survive in the face of those who claim credit for your very existence! We survive not as pawns, but as agents of hope. Sometimes misunderstood, but always true to our story. The story of Man."
- Scott Morse
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Vangelis, "Alpha"
This song always suggested the image of our relentless, idealized, noble, glorious March of Mankind through the ages. Despite it all, despite ourselves, we survive and march onward towards our unknown destiny.
Still, some wonder about our true nature as a species, as the Apex Predator of this planet, as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did when he asked,“What can we know? What are we all? Poor silly half-brained things peering out at the infinite, with the aspirations of angels and the instincts of beasts.”
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Indeed, Angelic aspirations regardless, the historical record suggests a less benevolent but far more accurate and truthful view of the instincts of beasts within Humanity...
Steve Cutts, "MAN"
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“What a chimera then is man, what a novelty, what a monster, what chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, yet an imbecile earthworm; depository of truth, yet a sewer of uncertainty and error; pride and refuse of the universe. Who shall resolve this tangle?”
- Blaise Pascal
"Pride and refuse," indeed...
“The Individual vs. The Illusion Of Consensus Reality”
“The Individual vs. The Illusion Of Consensus Reality”
by Jon Rappoport
“This is such a supercharged subject, I could start from a dozen places. But let’s begin here: the individual is unique, because he is he. He is unique because he has his own ideas, because he has his own desires, because he has his own power. That power belongs to no one else. In particular, it doesn’t belong to the State. The State will try, will always try to suggest that it is granting power to the individual, but this is a lie. It’s an illusion broadcast with ill-intent. While everyone else is trying to manufacture connections to the group, under the banner of a false sense of community, the individual is going in the opposite direction.
Philip K Dick: “Insanity - to have to construct a picture of one’s life, by making inquiries of others.”
Consensus reality is the reality of sacrifice. It is coagulating energy, form, content, substance that takes on amorphous shapes studded with slots into which people can fit themselves.
The independent individual thinks what he wants to think. Over time, he keeps graduating into new, more nearly unique levels of what he wants to think. He rises above the group. He rises to his own thoughts.
There is no subject and no substance which is not infiltrated by consensus reality. Wherever you look, you will encounter it. The group is the basis of consensus reality, and the group pact extends everywhere. The group fears a sector where only individual thought can tread. That would be dangerous to the illusion. “Well, we’ve got things well in hand in most places, but over there and over here we’re not in charge. A different kind of reality pervades.” No, that doesn’t work for the group. The exceptions would blow a hole in the rule.
“Stay away from the corner of Lexington Avenue and 34th Street. Something too weird is going on there. We come in and try to inject consensus on that spot and it doesn’t work. Our “sharing” energy bounces off that corner. We may have to call in the troops to surround the place and cordon it off.” Alert! Alert! Consensus reality is breaking down in Sector 328-A! Locate the problem! This is an emergency! Bring in the news team to shore up the illusion! Turn on the hypnosis machines! Group consensus is fraying and fragmenting in Area 768-B! Call the professors and pundits! Discredit the individual! Call him a monster! Do something fast!
Consensus reality is an illusion in the sense that you can see it and I can see it, but we didn’t sign up for it. That’s the catch. Take any area of life, and I mean any, and that’s the case. Wherever there is tight consensus, perception ensues. That’s the whole point. “We, the group, aren’t fooling around. When we sign a pact among ourselves, we intend everybody to see what we decide is there to see.”
So you, the individual, can opt out. That doesn’t necessarily mean the consensus disappears; you can still see it, but you see it without accepting it. You can see the oasis in the desert, which is a mirage, but because you have your own bottle of water, you don’t have to run toward the mirage and fall down on your knees and try to drink from the pool.
Philip K. Dick: “Because today we live in a society in which spurious realities are manufactured by the media, by governments, by big corporations, by religious groups, political groups… increasingly, we are bombarded with pseudo-realities manufactured by very sophisticated electronic mechanisms… And this is an astounding power: that of creating whole universes, universes of the mind. I ought to know. I do the same thing.”
The strong and free individual evolves. He doesn’t stay the same. He doesn’t know everything worth knowing today. He knows enough, but not everything. He continues to emerge with new ideas, new energy, new invention. He becomes larger. He gains more power.
When the illusion of consensus reality attains a level beyond mere slogan, it enters the realm of systems. This is its most convincing format. A system appears to be watertight. Each one of its parts has relations with the whole. This is interesting, because that mirrors what a group is. Each member is a part that connects to the whole. Consensus as a system is like a game of chess that plays the same moves over and over. Game one is the same as game two, three, four… That’s where its illusion of power comes from.
The individual, though, doesn’t proceed according to systems. He isn’t moving from one closed context to another. That’s the group. The individual may retain the same general principles over time, but what he does and thinks strikes out into new territories. Because he creates. There is no individual without creating.
Consensus is the coin of the realm. It is forced from the top, and it is signed up for at the bottom. One hand washes the other. Societies may begin through consensus, but if they have any courage, they shift focus to the job of pulling away coercive restraints on the individual. Regardless, the individual asserts his freedom. It is his to begin with, not the group’s. No one gives it to him.
American society is moving rapidly to an inverse, an upside down structure, in which freedom is looked upon as a privilege grudgingly accorded in the absence of a reason to take it away. The prevalent official attitude is: consensus must be strengthened. It must dominate the landscape.
Through vast experience, the free individual knows that consensus has no theoretical limits. Group-perceptions about the way things are can give birth to the most universally “proven objective truths.” In his explorations, the individual may even find that a demonstrated law of nature is nothing more than a consensus. And, therefore, an illusion.
The group has conception of Normal. Normal is like a message passed around, from hand to hand, and when you look at it closely, for content, it dissolves. There was really nothing there. This is similar to what happens when physicists probe further and further into matter, looking for smaller and smaller particles, and come up with an enormous amount of empty space.
The group consensus is the illusion. Finally, there is mindless hive-action covering a vacuum. This is also what occasionally happens to people who have hidebound political ideologies. The people on the Left move further and further to the Left, and the people on the Right move further and further to the Right. Finally, they are both so distant from government they meet and stare at each other in shock. At that point, they are just individuals.
From my unfinished manuscript, "The Magician Awakes": “You keep saying it doesn’t matter. Sometimes you say it out loud and sometimes it’s just a very strong thought that could cut through a melon. You repeat it over and over - ”it doesn’t matter.” You’re sitting there with the most powerful thing in the universe, your imagination, and yet it doesn’t matter. New worlds are waiting for you. But you don’t pull the trigger.
“You go to meetings. What are these meetings? Who’s there? What do you talk about, the end of the world? Your problems? The conversations seem to be endless…”
“But society runs on groups! It must have groups!” And what? The individual must give in and join and belong? That’s the conclusion? I’m afraid not. Consensus reality is a cartoon that is trying to become as real as steel. What deconstructs the steel and exposes the cartoon? There is only one thing that can do that. Nothing and no one else is going to do that. The individual does it."
"Crazy Prices At Target! What's Coming? - What's Next?"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 4/9/22:
"Crazy Prices At Target! What's Coming? - What's Next?"
"In today's vlog we are at Target and are noticing massive price increases! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices, and a lot of empty shelves! It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"
"The Point..."
“You do not really understand something
unless you can explain it to your grandmother.”
- Albert Einstein
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Full screen recommended.
Moody Blues, "Don't You Feel Small"
"See the world, ask what it's for.
Understanding, nothing more..."
"The Demographics of Financial Doom"
"The Demographics of Financial Doom"
by Charles Hugh Smith
"The saying "demographics is destiny" encapsulates the reality that demographics – rising or falling trends of births and deaths – energize or constrain economies and societies regardless of other conditions. Demographics are long-term trends, but the trends can change relatively rapidly while policies remain fixed in the distant past. This disconnect between demographic reality and policies has momentous future consequences. An appropriate analogy is the meteor wiping out the dinosaurs; in the case of demographics, this equates to the complete financial collapse of the retirement and healthcare systems.
Extrapolating the high birth rates and falling death rates of the 1960s led to predictions of global famine. As death rates declined and women's educational and economics prospects brightened, birth rates fell, a trend that now encompasses most of the world.
As a result of the Green Revolution (hybrid seeds and hydrocarbon-based fertilizers), the Earth supports more than twice as many humans as were alive in the 1960s (3.5 billion then, 7.9 billion now). Now the problem is a shrinking working-age population that will be unable to support the financial and healthcare promises made to the retired generations.
Where Are the Babies? Birth rates in developed nations have fallen below replacement rates, which means populations are shrinking and populations are aging rapidly, i.e. the average age of the populace is rising. I remember reading similar research in the mid-1970s that identified a strong correlation between the relative size of the cohort of young males and the likelihood of war. If the cohort was above a specific percentage of the total population, war was likely. One example was Germany in the 1930, which had a large cohort of young males under the age of 25.
This may partially explain the increasing reliance on economic war (sanctions) and cyberwarfare – nations no longer have large enough cohorts of young males to field armies where high casualties are a reality. In broad brush, several trends are visible in many nations and cultures.
The Economics of Demography: One is that having children has gone from being an economic necessity or benefit to a tremendous financial liability in the developed world. A Danish friend once commented that only wealthy families could afford to have three children now in Northern European countries. The same can be said of the U.S. and many other countries, once we consider the higher demands now placed on parents.
Where in the good old days of previous generations, parents were deemed adequate if they provided a roof over the kids' heads, basic meals and clothing. Education was left up to the public schools, and public college was low-cost, should the child want to continue their education. (The University of Hawaii tuition was $89 and student fees were $27, for a grand total of $117 per semester from 1971 to 1975, $780 in today's dollars. I was able to support myself, pay all my university expenses and carry a full class load on a part-time job – in one of the two most expensive cities in the nation, Honolulu.)
In a fully globalized "winner take most" economy, parents with aspirations for a top 20% career and lifestyle for their children have a much more demanding burden. Parents seeking to give their children a leg up must provide costly enrichment lessons and juggle complicated schedules of after-school classes. Prestigious universities now expect more than mere academic excellence; applicants must show evidence of leadership, civic engagement, etc., and even public universities are outrageously expensive.
The Oldsters: Another trend is the cultural bias of favoring the elderly in terms of government support. As workers increasingly lived long enough to actually retire, social and political values supported government funded pensions and healthcare for retirees. In the high birth rates 1940, 50s and 60s, governments greatly increased benefits for the elderly/retired, as everyone assumed there would always be 4 or 5 workers for every retiree. Relatively few people lived to age 80 or older.
The steady decline in birth rates and the steady increase in longevity have dropped that ratio to less than 2 workers for every retiree. In the US, there are 127 million full time workers and 69 million Social Security beneficiaries (including disabled). That is less than 2 full time workers for every beneficiary. In a recession, Boomers will continue retiring en masse while the workforce will shrink. A ratio of 1.5 workers to every beneficiary isn't that far away. Is there any doubt this ratio is unsustainable financially? No.
Double-Whammy: These two trends are a double-whammy on those young adults having children: the costs of raising kids is much higher, the expectations are much higher while the government support is heavily weighted to the elderly populace, which is exploding as people now live into their 80s and 90s. (My Mom is 93, my Mom-in-law who we care for here at home is 91, our neighbor's Mom is 99, and so on.)
We have elderly friends who retired from federal government jobs at age 55 after 30 years of service and have collected 40 years of retirement. Is this financially sustainable? No. The actuarial foundations of Social Security and Medicare were based on 4 or 5 workers per beneficiary and average lifespans around 70. Retirees were expected to collect benefits for 5 to 7 years, not 25 to 30 years.
These systems are fundamentally unsustainable at current retirement ages (55 for many government workers, 62 for "early retirement" Social Security and 67 for full benefits and Medicare at 65), current longevity trends and less than 2 workers per retiree.
The Only Way Out: The only way to reverse these demographic trends would be for government support for retirees taking a back seat to government support of children and young parents, greatly reducing the financial burden of having children. The only way an economy can support a massive population of elderly is if there are enough young workers entering the workforce to keep the society and economy functioning.
Forward-looking populations would realize supporting parents and children is the only way to support future retirees. But humans aren't very forward-looking; we want all the good stuff now. So the elderly support politicians who promise their benefits are sacrosanct and untouchable – except to increase them.
Almost all elderly people vote while a much lower percentage of young people vote. So the government continues supporting the elderly even as the population of elderly explodes and the means to provide this support are in free-fall. Retirement ages have barely budged, increasing a mere two years in 40 years from 65 to 67, while lifespans have greatly advanced and the worker-retiree ratio has collapsed.
Open-ended healthcare expenses are an invitation for profiteering, fraud and unnecessary or even harmful medications and procedures. By some estimates, 40% of the $1.5 trillion dollars spent on Medicare and Medicaid annually is paper-shuffling, fraud and needless medications and procedures.
Something’s Gotta Give: A third trend is female workers wanting a fulfilling career and children, too. With childcare costing $25,000 or more annually, one parent may essentially be working just to pay the childcare costs for two children.
A fourth trend is relying on high birth rate immigrants to substitute for native-born workers is no longer viable, as birth rates have plummeted in nations that provide immigrants.
As the saying has it, something's gotta give. Doing nothing will lead to the collapse of the programs benefiting the elderly while the birth rate continues declining. All these values and programs assumed high birth rates, high worker-retiree ratios and modest costs for raising children were forever. They weren't. Now we need a new set of values that reduce or eliminate the financial burdens on parents raising children. It would be nice if we could afford to pay for everything we want but printing money to do so just collapses the entire system.
Personally, I would raise all retirement ages to match the rise in lifespans, limit Social Security benefits to those with no other pension or retirement income, limit publicly funded extraordinary healthcare measures for people over the average lifespan, tax revenues rather than labor, and pay all childcare and after-school programs expenses currently paid by parents, plus a modest sum per child that can only be spent on after-school enrichment classes and programs. That seems common-sense to me, but I'm open to other permutations of hard choices.
Hard choices lead to better outcomes than collapse, but few have any stomach for hard choices. Politicians who make hard choices that require sacrifices of powerful lobbies and voting blocks lose elections. The fantasy that we can "print our way out of any problem" is strong because it's so convenient and apparently so successful - at first. Whether we admit it or not, collapse is the default "solution." That destiny has already been written by demographics."
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"To Have and Have Not"; "Global Food Crisis"
"To Have and Have Not"
Global food shortages are about to get real.
by Joel Bowman
Buenos Aires, Argentina - "Month-long protests... food shortages... rolling blackouts... and a 700 basis point rate hike. That’s what happens when your government goes broke, inflation gets out of hand and the local currency begins to spontaneously combust in consumers’ pockets. Just ask the good people of Sri Lanka. After a month of practically non-stop protests and street demonstrations, and facing severe shortages - nay, outages - of everything from food, fuel, power... even medicine, the government stepped in on Friday and jacked up its key lending rate by 7%. But with “official” inflation already running close to 19%, and supply chains tightening around the world, one gets the feeling the toothpaste is already out of the tube for the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.
In fact, many countries across Europe and Asia are already feeling the pinch of too much paper money chasing too few (and too unreliable) real world goods. And we’re not just talking Birkin bags and iGagets here (although, presumably, there’s a backlog there, too...) but everyday consumables people need to actually... you know... live.
Why does this matter, apart from the obvious and harrowing abyss of the alternative? As witnessed during the last year of the great covid panic (remember covid?) honest, hard-working citizens are generally ok with their Amazon deliveries being delayed a few days. They can even “suck it up” when their preferred lunch item is temporarily unavailable at their favorite restaurant... or when their plane is delayed because of pilot and/or fuel shortages.
But when staple grains like wheat and corn become “insecure,” and bellies go empty... well, that’s when mobs take to the street with pitchforks and heads of state begin fueling up the chopper for emergency Helivac plans.
So, where are we with all that, food prices and such? Here’s NPR: "The Food and Agriculture Organization announced on Friday that its FAO Food Price Index, which tracks monthly changes in the international prices of a "basket of commonly-traded food commodities," averaged 159.3 points in March. That's up 12.6% from February, which already saw the highest level since the organization began tracking in 1990. It's also 33.6% higher than it was last March."
BPR Investment Director, Tom Dyson, sent around this rather unpleasant chart yesterday afternoon...
Hmm…Transitory inflation... two weeks to flatten the curve... pandemic of the unvaccinated... Putin’s Price Hike...Look where listening to these people has gotten us so far. What’s that definition of insanity again? Something about doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results?
And on that note, here’s word from our resident macro analyst, Dan Denning, checking in from the High Plains of Laramie, Wyoming... "Food lockdowns? I have to admit, I didn’t see it coming so soon. Granted, we’re talking about lockdowns and curfews in Peru, where rising fuel, food, and fertilizer prices led to street protests, which led to lockdowns and curfews.
This month Lima. Next month, Los Angeles? It may be early to start expecting food lockdowns (and riots) in America. It starts with empty (or emptier) shelves. Fewer choices. Higher prices. And then? And then the public finds out that cheap energy is a critical component to cheap, digestible calories. Take away one, and you take away the other. This is not a supply chain issue. And it’s not Putin’s food riots. What is it? It’s inflation. And as history shows, when high prices start to lead to empty stomachs, people with nothing left to lose start to take matters into their own hands. Keep this in mind in Shanghai, too.
China’s Communist Party has locked down the city of 25 million because of 20 thousand new positive Covid cases per day earlier this week. On Twitter, you’ll find stories of people opening as many food delivery apps as they can in the morning, hoping to get something delivered by the end of the day (with no luck, in some cases).
If you were the sort of person who was inclined to conspiracy theories, you might begin to wonder if mass starvation was part of the population control playbook. First plague. Then war. Then famine. Strictly by the Book.
Soaring food prices, their effect on social stability and civil society, and Chinese ‘zero covid’ policy in Shanghai are the stories NOT making the front page this week. That’s why I led with them from my desk in Laramie. Misdirection is when a good magician draws your attention to something unimportant so that you miss the important thing (the trick). Keep your eyes open...
Looking at the tax-and-spend bonanza in DC... and judging by what’s already coming down the pike in other countries around the world... from Colombo to Shanghai to Lima and beyond... what you’re seeing at your local grocery store and gas pump may only be the beginning."
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