Wednesday, May 1, 2024

"Doug Casey on the End of Western Civilization"

"Doug Casey on the End of Western Civilization"
by International Man

"International Man: The decline of Western Civilization is on a lot of people’s minds. Let’s talk about this trend.

Doug Casey: Western Civilization has its origins in ancient Greece. It’s unique among the world’s civilizations in putting the individual - as opposed to the collective - in a central position. It enshrined logic and rational thought - as opposed to mysticism and superstition - as the way to deal with the world. It’s because of this that we have science, technology, great literature and art, capitalism, personal freedom, the concept of progress, and much, much more. In fact, almost everything worth having in the material world is due to Western Civilization.

Ayn Rand once said "East minus West equals zero." I think she went a bit too far, as a rhetorical device, but she was essentially right. When you look at what the world’s other civilizations have brought to the party, at least over the last 2,500 years, it’s trivial. I lived in the Orient for years. There are many things I love about it - martial arts, yoga, and the cuisine among them. But all the progress they’ve made is due to adopting the fruits of the West.

International Man: There are so many things degrading Western Civilization. Where do we begin?

Doug Casey: It’s been said, correctly, that a civilization always collapses from within. World War 1, in 1914, signaled the start of the long collapse of Western Civilization. Of course, termites were already eating away at the foundations, with the writings of people like Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Karl Marx. It’s been on an accelerating downward path ever since, even though technology and science have been improving at a quantum pace. They are, however, like delayed action flywheels, operating on stored energy and accumulated capital. Without capital, intellectual freedom, and entrepreneurialism, science and technology will slow down. I’m optimistic we’ll make it to Kurzweil’s Singularity, but there are no guarantees.

Things also changed with the creation of the Federal Reserve in 1913. Before that, the US used gold coinage for money. "The dollar" was just a name for 1/20th of an ounce of gold. That is what the dollar was. Paper dollars were just receipts for gold on deposit in the Treasury. The income tax, enacted the same year, threw more sand in the gears of civilization. The world was much freer before the events of 1913 and 1914, which acted to put the State at the center of everything.

The Fed and the income tax are both disastrous and unnecessary things, enemies of the common man in every way. Unfortunately, people have come to believe they’re fixtures in the cosmic firmament. They’re the main reasons - there are many other reasons, though, unfortunately - why the average American’s standard of living has been dropping since the early 1970s. In fact, were it not for these things, and the immense amount of capital destroyed during the numerous wars of the last 100 years, I expect we’d have already colonized the moon and Mars. Among many other things.

But I want to re-emphasize that the science, the technology, and all the wonderful toys we have are not the essence of Western Civilization. They’re consequences of individualism, capitalism, rational thought, and personal freedom. It’s critical not to confuse cause and effect.

International Man: You mentioned that the average American’s standard of living has dropped since the early 1970s. This is directly related to the US government abandoning the dollar’s last link to gold in 1971. Since then, the Federal Reserve has been able to debase the US dollar without limit. I think the dollar’s transformation into a purely fiat currency has eroded the rule of law and morality in the US. It’s similar to what happened in the Roman Empire after it started debasing its currency. What do you think, Doug?

Doug Casey: All the world’s governments and central banks share a common philosophy, which drives these policies. They believe that you create economic activity by stimulating demand, and you stimulate demand by printing money. And, of course, it’s true, in a way. Roughly the same way a counterfeiter can stimulate a local economy.

Unfortunately, they ignore that, and completely ignore that the way a person or a society becomes wealthy is by producing more than they consume and saving the difference. That difference, savings, is how you create capital. Without capital you’re reduced to subsistence, scratching at the earth with a stick. These people think that by inflating - which is to say destroying - the currency, they can create prosperity. But what they’re really doing, is destroying capital: When you destroy the value of the currency, that discourages people from saving it. And when people don’t save, they can’t build capital, and the vicious cycle goes on.

This is destructive for civilization itself, in both the long term and the short term. The more paper money, the more credit, they create, the more society focuses on finance, as opposed to production. It’s why there are many times more people studying finance than science. The focus is increasingly on speculation, not production. Financial engineering, not mechanical, electrical, or chemical engineering. And lots of laws and regulations to keep the unstable structure from collapsing.

What keeps a truly civil society together isn’t laws, regulations, and police. It’s peer pressure, social opprobrium, moral approbation, and your reputation. These are the four elements that keep things together. Western Civilization is built on voluntarism. But, as the State grows, that’s being replaced by coercion in every aspect of society. There are regulations on the most obscure areas of life. As Harvey Silverglate pointed out in his book, the average American commits three felonies a day. Whether he’s caught and prosecuted is a subject of luck and the arbitrary will of some functionary. That’s antithetical to the core values of Western Civilization.

International Man: Speaking of ancient civilizations like Rome, interest rates are just coming off the the lowest levels they’ve been in 5,000 years of recorded history. Trillions of dollars’ worth of government bonds trade at negative yields. Of course, this couldn’t happen in a free market. It’s only possible because of central bank manipulation. How will artificially low interest rates affect the collapse of Western Civilization?

Doug Casey: It’s really, really serious. I previously thought it was metaphysically impossible to have negative interest rates but, in the Bizarro World central banks have created, it’s happened.

Negative interest rates discourage saving. Once again, saving is what builds capital. Without capital you wind up as an empty shell - Rome in 450 A.D., or Detroit today - lots of wonderful but empty buildings and no economic activity. Worse, it forces people to desperately put their money in all manner of idiotic speculations in an effort to stay ahead of inflation. They wind up chasing the bubbles the funny money creates.

Let me re-emphasize something: in order for science and technology to advance you need capital. Where does capital come from? It comes from people producing more than they consume and saving the difference. Debt, on the other hand, means you’re living above your means. You’re either consuming the capital others have saved, or you’re mortgaging your future.

Zero and negative interest rate policies, and the creation of money out of nowhere, are actually destructive of civilization itself. It makes the average guy feel that he’s not in control of his own destiny. He starts believing that the State, or luck, or Allah will provide for him. That attitude is typical of people from backward parts of the world - not Western Civilization.

International Man: What does it say about the economy and society that people work so hard to interpret what officials from the Federal Reserve and other central banks say?

Doug Casey: It’s a shameful waste of time. They remind me of primitives seeking the counsel of witch doctors. One hundred years ago, the richest people in the country - the Rockefellers, the Carnegies, and such - made their money creating industries that actually made stuff. Now, the richest people in the country just shuffle money around. They get rich because they’re close to the government and the hydrant of currency materialized by the Federal Reserve. I’d say it’s a sign that society in the US has become quite degraded.

The world revolves much less around actual production, but around guessing the direction of financial markets. Negative interest rates are creating bubbles, and will eventually result in an economic collapse.

International Man: Negative interest rates are essentially a tax on savings. A lot of people would rather pull their money out of the bank and stuff it under a mattress than suffer that sting. The economic central planners know this. It’s why they’re using negative interest rates to ramp up the War on Cash - the push to eliminate paper currency and create a cashless society.

The banking system is very fragile. Banks don’t hold much paper cash. It’s mostly digital bytes on a computer. If people start withdrawing paper money en masse, it won’t take much to bring the whole system down. Their solution is to make accessing cash harder, and in some cases, illegal. That’s why the economic witch doctors at Harvard are pounding the table to get rid of the $100 bill. Take France, for example. It’s now illegal to make cash transactions over €1,000 without documenting them properly.

Negative interest rates have turbocharged the War on Cash. If the central planners win this war, it would be the final deathblow to financial privacy. How does this all relate to the collapse of Western Civilization?

Doug Casey: I believe the next step in their idiotic plan is to abolish cash. Decades ago they got rid of gold coinage, which used to circulate day to day in people’s pockets. Then they got rid of silver coinage. Now, they’re planning to get rid of cash altogether. So you won’t even have euros or dollars or pounds in your wallet anymore, or if you do, it will only be very small denominations. Everything else is going to have to be done through electronic payment processing.

This is a huge disaster for the average person: absolutely everything that you buy or sell, other than perhaps a candy bar or a hamburger, is going to have to go through the banking system. Thus, the government will be able to monitor every transaction and payment. Financial privacy, even what’s left of it today, will literally cease to exist.

Privacy is one of the big differences between a civilized society and a primitive society. In a primitive society, in your little dirt hut village, anybody can look through your window or pull back the flap on your tent. You have no privacy. Everybody can hear everything; see anything. This was one of the marvelous things about Western Civilization - privacy was valued, and respected. But that concept, like so many others, is on its way out…

International Man: You’ve mentioned before that language and words provide important clues to the collapse of Western Civilization. How so?

Doug Casey: Many of the words you hear, especially on television and other media, are confused, conflated, or completely misused. Many recent changes in the way words are used are corrupting the language. As George Orwell liked to point out, to control language is to control thought. The corruption of language is adding to the corruption of civilization itself. This is not a trivial factor in the degradation of Western Civilization.

Words - their exact meanings, and how they’re used are critically important. If you don’t mean what you say and say what you mean, then it’s impossible to communicate accurately. Forget about transmitting philosophical concepts.

Take for example shareholders and stakeholders. We all know that a shareholder actually owns a share in a company, but have you noticed that over the last generation shareholders have become less important than stakeholders? Even though stakeholders are just hangers-on, employees, or people who are looking to get in on a shakedown. But everybody slavishly acknowledges, "Yes, we’ve got to look out for the stakeholders." Where did that concept come from? It’s a recent creation, but Boobus americanus seems to think it was carved in stone at the country’s founding.

We’re told to protect them, as if they were a valuable and endangered species. I say, "A pox upon stakeholders." If they want a vote in what a company does, then they ought to become shareholders. Stakeholders are a class of being created out of nothing by Cultural Marxists for the purpose of shaking down shareholders."

Editor’s Note: This is going to be the most turbulent decade in US history…The 2020s ​will be more ​dangerous than the 1930s, the 1940s, and even the 1860s. That's because severe crises are brewing on multiple fronts and converging. The whole system will have a complete reset, and soon. It could be the BIGGEST thing since the founding of the USA."

"I Urge All Of You..."

“To me, there are three things we all should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that’s a full day. That’s a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you’re going to have something special. I just got one last thing... I urge all of you, all of you, to enjoy your life, the precious moments you have.”
- Jim Valvano

"How It Really Is"

 

"A Time Is Coming..."

 

"Will Russia Push the Button?"

Full screen recommended.
"Will Russia Push the Button?"
By Martin Armstrong

"Extinction is the rule. Survival is the exception." 
- Carl Sagan

"Dmitry Konstantinovich Kiselyov (born 1954) is a major TV host, and his latest warning to the West is to issue an ultimatum to the UK and the US. On Russian TV, Kiselyov warned that if a Western power deploys soldiers on the ground in Ukraine to ‘inflict a strategic defeat on Russia,’ it will result in Armageddon. Of course, what I find stunning is how the Western press characterizes him as “Vladimir Putin’s propagandist,” and the implication of those words is that they are not a real threat. The press takes NOTHING said from Russia seriously – it’s all a joke, just propaganda. As they said of Rome when it fell, the Romans were still laughing, watching the games to notice they had been invaded. Not a single journalist has any integrity, for they never consider when they are reading the American/European propaganda that what if they are sleepwalking society into nuclear war?

Kiselyov is not going to say this on national TV without the Kremlin actually delivering this warning. He said: ‘If Nato countries send their troops into Ukraine in order to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia, then the very moment about which Putin once said, “Why do we need the world, if there is no Russia in it?” would come.‌

Russia has indeed threatened to ‘turn the US into radioactive ash’ and ‘sink Britain’ below the waves. While some NATO leaders have been more circumspect, this need for war to justify the defaulting on debt that is the real factor behind the West’s desire for war will have far greater consequences than these fake world leaders who are all hand puppets of the Neocons. Kiselyov added: “This is not propaganda.” Yet in the West, the Neocons are saying this is a bluff, and Putin will never use Nukes so the West can completely destroy Russia – their hated enemy for decades, without a shot fired?

I have an old Russian friend who we met back in Tokyo some 20 years ago. She has reiterated to me a question, and she is NOT political or involved in the government. “Why does the world hate us so much?”

This is where my experience with governments and geopolitics clashes with the reality of humanity. I know the answer is that these fake leaders will NEVER admit that borrowing year after year to get votes is coming to an end and they can no longer sustain our present monetary system—which is why they are moving to CBDCs, and many are talking about now taxing even unrealized gains in stocks and real estate. They think they can cover up their disastrous fiscal mismanagement since World War II with war.

NATO is scared to death if there is no threat of war, then they will be irrelevant and defunded with the money going to Climate Change. They should heed the words of Mahatma Gandhi, but of course, they will NEVER listen: “An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind.” If NATO keeps up this propaganda that Russia will invade and seek to conquer Europe, what they are doing is pushing Russia into a corner where they might as well commit the annihilation they have been accused of harboring.

When I went into the Kakadu in North Australia and lived off the land for two weeks, my guide, who was the real live version of Crocodile Dundee, warned me that a wounded snake is far more aggressive and even more vigorous/dangerous, so never approach such a snake or I would be dead in minutes. No amount of “training” can prevent terrified wild animals from behaving instinctively or defensively, and trainers and handlers cannot always protect themselves and the public. This has been documented many times with trainers being attacked.

To think for even one second that a nation will not defend itself when its existence is threatened is absolute stupidity. But we have no real investigative journalists and the mainstream media are just propaganda agents that they are accusing Kiselyov of being. Russia will launch whatever it has, as would China, and so would the United States if it is about to be conquered. A defeated person is ALWAYS far more dangerous, just as that snake I was warned about.

This war would be over in 24 hours—instruct Zelensky to HONOR the Minsk Agreement that the West negotiated to buy time to start this war. The West played Putin for a fool. He has offered peace many times. But the West wants the war to cover up the collapse of this, ending borrowing with no intention of ever paying off any debt. All pensions will collapse when they get to the point that they are unable to sell new debt to pay off the old.

I warned on February 22, 2022, that Volodymyr Zelensky would be the man they hired to create World War III. My sources made it clear that the election was rigged. The oligarch behind Zelensky was the same one who hired Hunter Biden. Our future will be destroyed by this man who takes orders from the American Neocon. There will be no DEFEAT of Russia. For anyone in charge of a country that was about to be destroyed, the natural response is to take everyone else with you – just push the bottom.

(1) Russia won – Ukraine has lost, and NO Amount of Money will win this war
(2) The Administration is pouring money down a black hole where NOBODY knows where it is going
(3) Congress is throwing money into a failed war, and they do not demand any accountability, as was the case with Iraq and Afghanistan. Why?
(4) Those who will benefit are the Western firms that invested in Ukraine and have lost their shirt – Another bailout?

This is why our insane leaders are urging us to send in troops to Ukraine, which will start World War III. Russia is warning us NOT to do this, and our Western Press refuses to acknowledge anything our warmonger leaders are doing, no less the risks that they are subjecting everyone to over a civil war the West began with this intention from the outset. Some inside Russia advocate nuking Kyiv in a major display and then showing the world what will happen if we continue to go down this path. They suggest this is the ONLY way to stop World War III and that the people will wake up and overthrow the warmonger leaders pushing us to Armageddon.

Putin is NOT a warmonger despite all the bullshit put out by the Western Press. The West staged the Moscow Nightclub attack and did not even try to hide that they were behind it, hoping Putin would respond. They are desperate to try to get Putin to attack anything in NATO so they can pretend he is the aggressor when it is our Neocons and NATO. What I fear is that Ukraine will try to kill Putin, KNOWING that such an act will replace him with a warmonger, and we will get into World War III. I can confirm that the critics behind Putin have been telling him this war is with the USA and NATO – not Ukraine. The hardliners have told him he should have taken out Ukraine as the US did to Iraq, and this war would have been over in 6 weeks, and Zelensky would not have been able to create his media tour.

If Ukraine kills Putin, it will be at the direction of NATO, and then they will get their World War III. That would be the result if Russia attacked Washington to kill Biden, no matter how unpopular he is. Such an act would galvanize the USA into a single action for war, My concern is that Ukraine is stupid enough to attack Russia and try to kill Putin for his inauguration day – May 7th."
o
"Russia Puts Advanced Sarmat 
Nuclear Missile System On ‘Combat Duty’"

"Moscow has put into service an advanced intercontinental ballistic missile that Russian President Vladimir Putin has said would make Russia’s enemies “think twice” about their threats, according to reported comments by the head of the country’s space agency. Yuri Borisov, the head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, said Sarmat missiles have “assumed combat duty”, according to Russian news agency reports.

“The Sarmat strategic system has assumed combat alert posture,” the state-run TASS news agency quoted the Roscosmos chief as saying. “Based on experts’ estimates, the RS-28 Sarmat is capable of delivering a MIRVed warhead weighing up to 10 tonnes to any location worldwide, both over the North and South Poles,” TASS said in its report.

Putin said in February that the Sarmat – one of several advanced weapons in Russia’s arsenal – would be ready for deployment soon. In 2022, some two months after Russian troops invaded Ukraine, Putin said the Sarmat would “reliably ensure the security of Russia from external threats and make those, who in the heat of aggressive rhetoric try to threaten our country, think twice”.

The Sarmat is an underground silo-based missile that Russian officials say can carry up to 15 nuclear warheads, though the United States military estimates its capacity to be 10 warheads. Known to NATO military allies by the codename “Satan”, the missile reportedly has a short initial launch phase, which gives little time for surveillance systems to track its takeoff.

Weighing more than 200 tons, the Sarmat has a range of some 18,000km (11,000 miles) and was developed to replace Russia’s older generation of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICMBs) that dated from the 1980s. Russia test-fired the Sarmat missile in April 2022 in the Plesetsk region of the country, located some 800km (almost 500 miles) north of Moscow, and the launched missiles hit targets on the Kamchatka peninsula, in Russia’s far east region."
o
RS-28 Sarmat

15 warheads per missile, 11,000 mile range, hypersonic speed of 15,880 mph.
One Sarmat can destroy an area the size of Texas or France.
Do we really want to do this? Pray to God we don't...

"How Inflation Destroys Civilization"

"How Inflation Destroys Civilization"
by Nick Giambruno

"Thanks to rampant inflation, socialism - and the poverty it inevitably brings - could soon become irreversibly entrenched in the US, just like in numerous Third World countries. Rapidly rising food, housing, medical, and tuition prices are squeezing Americans - many do not understand the actual cause of their falling living standards.

The explosion in the cost of living is a predictable consequence of the Federal Reserve’s ongoing currency debasement. Since the Covid mass hysteria, the Federal Reserve has printed more money than it has for the entire existence of the US. From the founding of the US, it took over 227 years to print its first $6 trillion. But during Covid, the US government printed over $6 trillion in a matter of months.

It’s important to put such large numbers into context. A trillion is a massive, almost unfathomable number. The human brain has trouble understanding something so huge. So let me try to put it into perspective. If you earned $1 a second 24/7/365 - about $31 million per year - it would take you over 31,688 YEARS to make $1 trillion. So that’s how enormous a trillion is. When politicians carelessly spend and print money measured in the trillions, you are in dangerous territory.

In short, the Fed’s actions during the Covid scam amounted to the biggest monetary explosion that has ever occurred in the US. Initially, the Fed and its apologists in the media assured the American people its actions wouldn’t cause severe price increases. But unfortunately, it didn’t take long to prove that absurd assertion false.

As soon as rising prices became apparent, the mainstream media and Fed claimed that the inflation was only “transitory” and that there was nothing to be worried about. When the inflation was obviously not “transitory,” they told us “inflation was actually a good thing.” Of course, they were dead wrong and knew it - they were gaslighting.

The truth is that inflation is out of control, and nothing can stop it. Even after the most intense rate hiking cycle in US history, price increases remain persistent. That’s not to mention that prices are never going back to the levels they were. We’re at a new baseline that only gets adjusted higher. It’s like trying to run on a treadmill where the speed only ratchets up.

That’s why many people struggle to keep their heads above water. They simply cannot keep up with the rising prices. Michael Saylor was correct when he said, “The road to serfdom consists of working exponentially harder to earn a currency that is growing exponentially weaker.”

Even though the media won’t tell you, the Fed’s currency debasement is the primary reason why most people are feeling the economic pain of inflation today. They know it’s becoming harder and harder to maintain their lifestyle - but many don’t understand why. They’ll blame supply chain problems, Vladimir Putin, and greedy corporations… anything but the Fed as the source of inflation.

The media’s search for the real cause of inflation is like OJ Simpson’s search for “the real killers,” only more absurd. The deliberate confusion created around inflation opens the door for opportunistic politicians who promise supposed freebies to ease the pain of inflation. Many, unfortunately, succumb to this siren’s call.

Perverse as it is, the policies offered to people suffering from inflation create even more inflation. In other words, inflation has a way of perpetuating itself, much like a heroin addiction, because people will keep wanting more and more of the very thing that is poisoning them. For example, a Newsweek poll shows 63% of Americans “strongly support” government stimulus checks to combat inflation. In other words, let’s fight the effects of currency debasement by engaging in even more currency debasement.

The more inflation reduces living standards, the more people push for misguided government policies like universal basic income, price controls, inflation relief stimulus checks, and a higher minimum wage… which creates a cycle of rising prices. It’s only a matter of time before “fight for $15″ - the rallying cry for a $15 minimum wage - becomes “fight for $20.” Then it’s “fight for $50,” “fight for $100,” and so forth.

People should really fight to end the Federal Reserve and the fake money they create out of thin air and force everyone else to use. It’s the only way to end this insidious cycle that impoverishes everyone except the politically-connected insiders closest to the money printing. But, of course, that’s not going to happen.

Instead, the more likely outcome is that the US is headed straight into an inescapable downward spiral of a political-inflation cycle that follows a clear pattern and creates a self-perpetuating doom loop.

1. In a fiat currency system, the government will inevitably print an ever-increasing amount of currency to finance itself.
2. This makes prices and living costs rise faster than wages.
3. The average person feels the pain but doesn’t understand what’s happening.
4. More people support politicians who promise freebies to supposedly relieve the pain inflation causes.
5. In order to pay for the “freebies,” the government prints more currency.
6. This creates even more inflation, and the cycle repeats.

Most of America Depends on the Government: At this point, we have to ask ourselves whether the political situation in the US will improve. Unfortunately, the data points to a troubling but inevitable answer… “no.” The reason is simple: a growing majority of US voters are receiving money from the government.

An estimated 47% or so of Americans already receive some form of government benefit. But I don’t think that accurately reflects the situation. At least, not when considering all the government employees and those in the nominally private sector who feed off the warfare state. This includes defense and other government contractors who win huge, no-bid contracts.

People involved in the military-industrial complex live off government slops as much or more than those who collect food stamps and other traditional forms of welfare. Yet they aren’t counted in the statistics. Any honest account of who depends on the government needs to include them.

When you count everyone who lives off political dollars instead of free-market dollars, we’re already well north of 50% of the US population. In other words, the US has already crossed the Rubicon. There’s no going back. The growing majority of voters who collect net benefits from the government is a built-in constituency to perpetuate policies financed by ever-increasing inflation. That’s a big reason why I think currency debasement is inevitable.

What You Can Do: Unfortunately, most people have no idea how bad things can get when the political-inflation cycle spirals out of control, let alone how to prepare. The price of groceries, medical care, tuition, rent, and everything else will only rise. The only question is, how fast will prices rise? It’s an established trend in motion that is accelerating and approaching a breaking point.

We will likely see incredible volatility in the financial markets that could decimate many ordinary people’s life savings and retirement assets. But I’m not just talking about a stock market crash or a currency collapse… It’s something much bigger… with the potential to alter the fabric of society forever. It’s created an economic situation unlike we’ve ever seen before, and it’s all building up to a severe crisis on multiple fronts. It could all go down soon… and it won’t be pretty."
o
Full screen recommended.
Demonocracy, 
"US Debt of $30 Trillion Visualized 
in Stacks of Physical Cash"
This video depicts "only" $30 trillion. 
For a true current debt amount go here:
o
"The national debt in the United States is steadily increasing year after year, finally reaching a historic level. This situation is concerning, with a fast-paced growth at a rate of a staggering $1 trillion accruing to the national debt every 100 days. The recent total in January of this year was a record-breaking $34 trillion.

What’s going on with this immense amount of debt? On today’s show, we’re going to talk about some of the main factors brewing behind the scenes. This massive amount of looming debt proves a serious lack of financial responsibility within the US government, including skyrocketing spending habits that will have serious lasting effects for the American people for decades to come."

Adventures With Danno, "Dollar Tree Brings In Higher Priced Items! This Is The Start!"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, AM 5/1/24
"Dollar Tree Brings In Higher Priced Items! 
This Is The Start!"
Comments here:

Dan, I Allegedly, "Even Giants Like Walmart Collapse!"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly AM 5/1/24
"Even Giants Like Walmart Collapse!"
"Walmart was on its way to revolutionizing healthcare with low-cost services right next to their superstores, but now, they've pulled the plug, despite initial success claims. What went wrong? And what does this mean for you?"
Comments here:

Gregory Mannarino, "The Entire System Is Coming Apart Faster, And It's No Accident"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 5/1/24
"The Entire System Is Coming Apart Faster,
 And It's No Accident"
Comments here:

Tuesday, April 30, 2024

"The Ironic, The Tragic Thing..."

“One can fight evil but against stupidity one is helpless… I have accepted the fact, hard as it may be, that human beings are inclined to behave in ways that would make animals blush. The ironic, the tragic thing is that we often behave in ignoble fashion from what we consider the highest motives. The animal makes no excuse for killing his prey; the human animal, on the other hand, can invoke God’s blessing when massacring his fellow men. He forgets that God is not on his side but at his side.”

“There is no salvation in becoming adapted to a world which is crazy.”

- Henry Miller

"I Reveal Myself..."

“At this point I reveal myself in my true colors, as a stick-in-the-mud. I hold a number of beliefs that have been repudiated by the liveliest intellects of our time. I believe order is better than chaos, creation better than destruction. I prefer gentleness to violence, forgiveness to vendetta. On the whole I think that knowledge is preferable to ignorance, and I am sure that human sympathy is more valuable than ideology. I believe that in spite of the recent triumphs of science, men haven’t changed much in the last two thousand years; and in consequence we must try to learn from history. History is ourselves.

I believe in courtesy, the ritual by which we avoid hurting other people’s feelings, by satisfying our own egos. And I think we should remember that we are all part of a great whole, which for convenience we call nature. All living things are our brothers and sisters.”

- Kenneth Clark, “Civilization”

"There Was A Tale He Had Read Once..."

“There was a tale he had read once, long ago, as a small boy: the story of a traveler who had slipped down a cliff, with man-eating tigers above him and a lethal fall below him, who managed to stop his fall halfway down the side of the cliff, holding on for dear life. There was a clump of strawberries beside him, and certain death above him and below. "What should he do?" went the question. And the reply was, "Eat the strawberries." The story had never made sense to him as a boy. It did now.”
- Neil Gaiman

Gerald Celente, "Kent State 2.0: Storm Troopers Will Beat And Kill Protesters For Peace"

Strong language alert!
Gerald Celente, 4/30/24
"Kent State 2.0: Storm Troopers 
Will Beat And Kill Protesters For Peace"
"The Trends Journal is a weekly magazine analyzing global current events forming future trends. Our mission is to present Facts and Truth over fear and propaganda to help subscribers prepare for What’s Next in these increasingly turbulent times."
Comments here:

Jeremiah Babe, "People Can't Afford To Shop At Walmart; Eat At McDonalds Or Buy A House"

Jeremiah Babe, 4/30/24
"People Can't Afford To Shop At Walmart;
 Eat At McDonalds Or Buy A House"
Comments here:

Musical Interlude: Alan Parsons Project, “Ammonia Avenue”

Alan Parsons Project, “Ammonia Avenue”

"A Look to the Heavens"

"These clouds of interstellar dust and gas have blossomed 1,300 light-years away in the fertile star fields of the constellation Cepheus. Sometimes called the Iris Nebula, NGC 7023 is not the only nebula in the sky to evoke the imagery of flowers, though. Still, this deep telescopic view shows off the Iris Nebula's range of colors and symmetries in impressive detail.
Within the Iris, dusty nebular material surrounds a hot, young star. The dominant color of the brighter reflection nebula is blue, characteristic of dust grains reflecting starlight. Central filaments of the dusty clouds glow with a faint reddish photoluminesence as some dust grains effectively convert the star's invisible ultraviolet radiation to visible red light. Infrared observations indicate that this nebula may contain complex carbon molecules known as PAHs. The pretty blue petals of the Iris Nebula span about six light-years."

Chet Raymo, "Starlight"

"Starlight"
by Chet Raymo

"Poor Calvin is overwhelmed with the vastness of the cosmos and no small dose of existential angst. He is not the first, of course. Most famously the 17th-century French philosopher Blaise Pascal wailed his own despair: "I feel engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces whereof I know nothing and which know nothing of me. I am terrified...The eternal silence of these infinite spaces alarms me."

And he didn't know the half of it. Not so long ago we imagined ourselves to be the be-all and end-all of creation, at the center of a cosmos made expressly for us and at the pinnacle of the material Great Chain of Being. Then it turned out that the Earth was not the center of the cosmos. Nor the Sun. Nor the Galaxy. The astronomers Sebastian von Hoerner and Carl Sagan raised this experience to the level of a principle - the Principle of Mediocrity - which can be stated something like this: The view from here is about the same as the view from anywhere else. Or to put it another way: Our star, our planet, the life on it, and even our own intelligence, are completely mediocre.

Moon rocks are just like Earth rocks. Photographs of the surface of Mars made by the landers and rovers could as well have been made in Nevada. Meteorites contain some of the same organic compounds that are the basis for terrestrial life. Gas clouds in the space between the stars are composed of precisely the same atoms and molecules that we find in our own backyard. The most distant galaxies betray in their spectra the presence of familiar elements.

And yet, and yet, for all we know, our brains are the most complex things in the universe. Are we then living, breathing refutations of the Principle of Mediocrity. I doubt it. For the time being, Calvin will just have to get used to living in the infinite abyss and eternal silence. He has Hobbes. We have each other. And science. And poetry. And love."

Kahlil Gibran, “The Prophet: Freedom”

“Freedom”

"And an orator said, “Speak to us of Freedom.”

And he (the prophet) answered:
" At  city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself
and worship your own freedom, Even as slaves humble themselves before
a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.
Aye, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have
seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.

And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even
the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you,
and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.
You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your
nights without a want and a grief, But rather when these things
girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.

And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights 
unless you break the chains
which you at the dawn of your understanding 
have fastened around your noon hour?
In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains,
though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle your eyes.

And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that
you may become free? If it is an unjust law you would abolish,
that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead.
You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing 
the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them. 
And if it is a despot you would dethrone,
see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed.

For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud,
but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their own pride?
And if it is a care you would cast off,
that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.
And if it is a fear you would dispel,
the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.

Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace,
the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished,
the pursued and that which you would escape.

These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling.
And when the shadow fades and is no more,
the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light.
And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters 
becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom."

- Kahlil Gibran, “The Prophet: Freedom”

"A Brave New War, Part II: The Anti-Israel Swarm"

"A Brave New War, Part II: 
The Anti-Israel Swarm"
by John Robb

"Anti-Israel protests are showing up everywhere. Censorship, police crackdowns, and social threats (you won't get a job) aren't working. Here's why. The war in Gaza has:

• stalled, generated high casualties, and exhausted the IDF;
• left Hamas intact, ignited political unrest at home, and didn’t recover the hostages;
• been conducted so poorly that most of the world (the ICJ vote and polling support this) now believes Israel committed genocide and other war crimes; rendered the term anti-semite nearly worthless due to rampant misapplication and overuse.

Additionally, the pro-Israel network is finally realizing they are losing (have lost) the US information war as well.

• Protests. An anti-Israel networked swarm is mobilizing protests to generate the chaos needed for a BLM-style cultural shift.
• Voter unrest. The Democratic party is in full panic mode. Electorally decisive numbers of young voters have demonstrated that they will stay away from the polls due to Biden’s participation in Gaza.
• Negative information flows. The ratio of anti-Israel vs. pro-Israel media packets is running 100 to 1, even with nearly complete control of major media and aggressive censorship on most social networks.

In response, the pro-Israel network is doubling down on attempts to control the situation. So far, this strategy isn’t working:

• Escalate to reframe. Israel attempted to reframe the war’s narrative by attacking Iran. This attempt failed, surprisingly, due to Iranian restraint. Worse, the exchange led to a significant weakening of US power in the region.
• Control TikTok. The pro-Israel network ran a successful political effort - using fear of China as a false flag - to force the sale of US TikTok (a portion of the most heavily used network in the world) to censorship-friendly investors. However, this isn’t effort may still go awry since there are already signs that TikTok will fight this tooth and nail (while ramping up amplification for anti-Israel media packets in the meantime).
• Zero tolerance. The pressure to align Universities with the pro-Israel network and crackdown on anti-Israel protesters is intensifying. This effort isn’t working as expected. It’s generating the opposite effect as intended. Let’s dig into this.

Amplifying the Opposition: The Columbia protest is an excellent example of how the pro-Israel network’s zero-tolerance approach isn’t stopping anti-Israel protests and speech; it’s growing it.
Here’s the timeline:

• Aggressive alignment. On April 17th, the President of Columbia University was hauled before Congress and aggressively grilled over a growing criticism of Israel on Columbia’s campus. This coercive alignment effort worked.
• Seeded event. Simultaneous to this testimony, a small group of protesters set up a “Gaza Solidarity” tent encampment on Columbia’s campus (left image below). It was tiny and likely to disperse during finals week or when summer vacation started.
• Mistake. Under pressure to crack down, the University’s president asked the NYPD to arrest the protesters and remove the camp (falsely claiming they were suspended students and thereby trespassing). On April 18th, the NYPD complied and arrested more than 100 protesters, and the University used the trespassing arrest to suspend their student status.
• Self-Harm. These heavy-handed tactics backfired (right image above), and the protest quickly grew in size and support (including a walkout by the University’s professors in solidarity). Moreover, anti-Israel demonstrations spread to other Universities, and with each new attempt to crack down on it, it grew and adapted.

One potential explanation for this outcome is that the pro-Israel network walked into a trap, as Israel did in Gaza. ~ John Robb. So it goes..."
o

The Daily "Near You?"

Tillsonburg, Ontario, Canada. Thanks for stopping by!

The Poet: Robinson Jeffers, "Love That, Not Man Apart From That"

"Love That, Not Man Apart From That"

"Then what is the answer? Not to be deluded by dreams.
To know that great civilizations have broken down into violence,
and their tyrants come, many times before.
When open violence appears, to avoid it with honor or choose
the least ugly faction; these evils are essential.
To keep one’s own integrity, be merciful and uncorrupted
and not wish for evil; and not be duped
By dreams of universal justice or happiness.
These dreams will not be fulfilled.
To know this, and know that however ugly the parts appear
the whole remains beautiful. A severed hand
Is an ugly thing and man dissevered from the earth and stars
and his history... for contemplation or in fact...
Often appears atrociously ugly.
Integrity is wholeness, the greatest beauty is
Organic wholeness, the wholeness of life and things,
the divine beauty of the universe.
Love that, not man apart from that,
or else you will share man’s pitiful confusions,
or drown in despair when his days darken."

- Robinson Jeffers

"I Wish..."

"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo. 
"So do I," said Gandalf "and so do all who live to see such times. 
But that is not for them to decide.
All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."

- J.R.R. Tolkien, "Lord of the Rings"

"The Interlocking of Strategic Paradigms" (Excerpt)

"The Interlocking of Strategic Paradigms"
By Alastair Cooke

Excerpt: "Theodore Postol, Professor of Science, Technology and National Security Policy at MIT, has provided a forensic analysis of the videos and evidence emerging from Iran’s 13th April swarm drone and missile ‘demonstration’ attack into Israel: A ‘message’, rather than an ‘assault’. The leading Israeli daily, Yediot Ahoronot, has estimated the cost of attempting to down this Iranian flotilla at between $2-3 billion dollars. The implications of this single number are substantial.

Professor Postol writes: “This indicates that the cost of defending against waves of attacks of this type is very likely to be unsustainable against an adequately armed and determined adversary”. The videos show an extremely important fact: All of the targets, whether drones or not, are shot down by air-to-air missiles”, [fired from mostly U.S. aircraft. Some 154 aircraft reportedly were aloft at the time] likely firing AIM-9x Sidewinder air to air missiles. The cost of a single Sidewinder air-to-air missile is about $500,000”.

Furthermore: “The fact that a very large number of unengaged ballistic missiles could be seen glowing as they reenter the atmosphere to lower altitudes [an indication of hyper-speed], indicates that whatever the effects of [Israel’s] David’s Sling and the Arrow missile defenses, they were not especially effective. Thus, the evidence at this point shows that essentially all or most of the arriving long-range ballistic missiles were not intercepted by any of the Israeli air and missile-defense systems”.

Postel adds, “I have analyzed the situation, and have concluded that commercially available optical and computational technology is more than capable of being adapted to a cruise missile guidance system to give it very high precision homing capability … it is my conclusion that the Iranians have already developed precision guided cruise missiles and drones.

The implications of this are clear. The cost of shooting down cruise missiles and drones will be very high and might well be unsustainable unless extremely inexpensive and effective anti-air systems can be implemented. At this time, no one has demonstrated a cost-effective defense system that can intercept ballistic missiles with any reliability”.

Just to be clear, Postol is saying that neither the U.S. nor Israel has more than a partial defence to a potential attack of this nature – especially as Iran has dispersed and buried its ballistic missile silos across the entire terrain of Iran under the control of autonomous units which are capable of continuing a war, even were central command and communications to be completely lost.

This amounts to paradigm change – clearly for Israel, for one. The huge physical expenditure on air defense ordinance – 2-3 billion dollars worth – will not be repeated willy-nilly by the U.S. Netanyahu will not easily persuade the U.S. to engage with Israel in any joint venture against Iran, given these unsustainable air-defence costs.

But also, as a second important implication, these Air Defense assets are not just expensive in dollar terms, they simply are not there: i.e. the store cupboard is near empty! And the U.S. lacks the manufacturing capacity to replace these not particularly effective, high cost platforms speedily.

‘Yes, Ukraine’ … the Middle East paradigm interlinks directly with the Ukraine paradigm where Russia has succeeded in destroying so much of the western supplied, air-defence capabilities in Ukraine, giving Russia near complete air dominance over the skies.

Positioning scarce air defense ‘to save Israel’ therefore, exposes Ukraine (and slows the U.S. pivot to China, too). And given the recent passage of the funding Bill for Ukraine in Congress, clearly air defense assets are a priority for sending to Kiev – where the West looks increasingly trapped and rummaging for a way out that does not lead to humiliation."
Full article is here:

"A Kind Of Stubborn, Unrecognized Courage..."

"For many great deeds are accomplished in times of squalid struggle. There is a kind of stubborn, unrecognized courage which in the lowest depths tenaciously resists the pressures of necessity and ill-doing; there are noble and obscure triumphs observed by no one, unacclaimed by any fanfare. Hardship, loneliness, and penury are a battlefield which has its own heroes, sometimes greater than those lauded in history. Strong and rare characters are thus created; poverty nearly always a foster-mother, may become a true mother, distress may be the nursemaid of pride, and misfortune the milk that nourishes great spirits."
- Victor Hugo

"The Ghetto-ization of American Life"

"The Ghetto-ization of American Life"
by Charles Hugh Smith

"Behind the facade of normalization, even high-income lifestyles have been ghetto-ized. Consider the defining characteristics of a ghetto:

1. The residents can't afford to live elsewhere.

2. Everything is a rip-off because options are limited and retailers/service providers know residents have no other choice or must go to extraordinary effort to get better quality or a lower price.

3. Nothing works correctly or efficiently. Things break down and aren't fixed properly. Maintenance is poor to non-existent. Any service requires standing in line or being on hold.

4. Local governance is corrupt and/or incompetent. Residents are viewed as a reliable "vote farm" for the incumbents, even though whatever little they accomplish for the residents doesn't reduce the sources of immiseration.

5. The locale is unsafe. Cars are routinely broken into, there are security bars over windows and gates to entrances, everything not chained down is stolen--and even what is chained down is stolen.

6. There are few viable businesses and numerous empty storefronts.

7. The built environment is ugly: strip malls, used car lots, etc. There are few safe public spaces or parks that are well maintained and inviting.

8. Most of the commerce is corporate-owned outlets; the money doesn't stay in the community.

9. Public transport is minimal and constantly being degraded.

10. They get you coming and going: whatever is available is double in cost, effort and time. Very little is convenient or easy. Services are far away.

11. Residents pay high rates of interest on debt.

12. There are few sources of healthy real food. The residents are unhealthy and self-medicate with a panoply of addictions to alcohol, meds, painkillers, gambling, social media, gaming, celebrity worship, etc.

13. Nobody in authority really cares what the residents experience, as they know the residents are atomized and ground down, incapable of cooperating in an organized fashion, and therefore powerless.

I submit that these defining characteristics of ghettos apply to wide swaths of American life. Ghettos are not limited to urban zones; suburbs and rural locales can qualify as well. The defining zeitgeist of a ghetto is the residents are effectively held hostage by limited options and high costs: public and private-sector monopolies that provide poor quality at high prices.

Daily life is a grind of long waits/commutes, low-quality goods and services, shadow work (work we have to do that we're not paid for that was once done as part of the service we pay for) and unhealthy addictions to distractions and whatever offers a temporary escape from the grind.

We've habituated to being corralled into the immiseration of limited options and high costs; the immiseration and sordid degradation have been normalized into "everyday life." We've lost track of what's been lost to erosion and decay. We sense what's been lost but feel powerless to reverse it. This is the essence of the ghetto-ization of daily life.

Behind the facade of normalization, even high-income lifestyles have been ghetto-ized. But saying this is anathema: either be upbeat, optimistic and positive or remain silent. What's worse, the ghetto-ization or our inability to recognize it and discuss it openly?"

"How It Really Is"

 

Adventures With Danno, "One Dollar" Items Everyone Should Be Buying At Meijer Right Now!"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, AM 4/30/24
"One Dollar" Items Everyone Should
 Be Buying At Meijer Right Now!"
Comments here:
o
Meanwhile, elsewhere...
Full screen recommended.
Travelling with Russell, 4/30/24
"I Took My Wife to a Belarus Supermarket In Russia"
"What does a Belarus supermarket look like inside? Join me on a tour of a Belarus supermarket in my small town in Moscow, Russia. Hatni Supermarket in Aprelevka, Russia is a unique supermarket made up of over 90% Belarus made products."
Comments here:
o
o
Full screen recommended.
Different Russia, 4/30/24
"Go Shopping in Russia - Inside Huge Garden Center"
Comments here:

Dan, I Allegedly, "Is Your Money Vanishing?"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, AM 4/30/24
"Is Your Money Vanishing?"
"If you listen to the experts, everybody’s doing just fine right now. I had so many people write me and tell me how they do not have any extra money and I cannot even find a job."
Comments here: