“Of Time, Turnings, Stars & Wars”

“Of Time, Turnings, Stars & Wars”

by Doug "Uncola" Lynn

"Like nature, history is full of processes that cannot happen in reverse. Just as the laws of entropy do not allow a bird to fly backward, or droplets to regroup at the top of a waterfall, history has no rewind button. Like the seasons of nature, it moves only forward."

- Strauss and Howe: “The Fourth Turning”

"Contemplating the concept of time can be quite confounding, to say the least. In the extreme, considering the paradoxical nature of time’s passage will stretch the mind causing thoughts to invert like taffy in a rolling machine or light yielding to the gravity of an Event Horizon before the edge of a Black Hole in deep space.

Knowing Einstein was right means time stops at the speed of light. Surely then, waves of thought must generate their own specific gravity to capture both light and sound, together. Our eyes and ears record each moment and translate events into high definition digital memories which we can recall upon demand and view as celluloid film stock in a dark room.

However, in this dimension, there is another aspect at play that comes attached to time. Space: The final frontier. These conflagrate together and then separate at any given moment never to coalesce again in quite the same way. Time can be recalled like a ghost, or a spectral hologram, on the mind’s screen, but the space will have changed and dissipated entropically like dust digested in the amorphous bellies of Stephen King’s Langoliers.

To put it another way, time changes everything. A couple of years ago one of my offspring had a milestone birthday so we went to a morning movie matinee followed by an expensive late lunch at a fine dining venue. It was there where I chewed my food and contemplated the confounding conceptual continuations of space and time.

The movie was the Star Wars flick, "Rogue One" and the state-of-the-art theater featured stadium seating and a massive UltraScreen Deluxe® with Dolby® Atmospheric Surround-sound which, according to the advertisements, offered the “ultimate moviegoing experience”. As I watched the story unfold in REAL D 3D® with my 3D glasses in place while eating my popcorn and nestled comfortably in the red leather DreamLoungerTM recliner, I thought to myself how I really am in the future. In the lobby after the movie, I checked Drudge on my smartphone and learned Carrie Fisher had died in Los Angeles.

This made me remember way back to my past when I was a preteen and first saw the original Star Wars. I watched it with several friends in an ornately vintage, and solitary, theater in my small town. Through the patina of time and the opaque looking glass of my mind’s eye, I remember hoping no one would tell my parents, or my orthodontist, that I was eating popcorn and lemon drops with new braces on my teeth. Although I was an avid reader back then with a keen appreciation for science fiction, I had not seen a film before that captivated me like the first Star Wars. The excellent storyline, superior special effects, and the characters in the film really made an impression on me.

If my current self could go back to that day, I would meet the geeky, metal-mouthed kid after the movie and tell him some things. I would also mention how, in 43 years, he will celebrate his progeny’s birthday who, at that time, will be several years older than he is now and how he will be seeing another Star Wars movie on the very same day that Princess Leia died in real life.

The ironic confluence of time and space, indeed.

I am sure the mini-me at that time would have pegged me as a brain-damaged old fool and, in turn, would have attempted to persuade me into buying him and his friends a six-pack of beer, a fifth of peppermint Schnapps, a Playboy and a can of chew. After all, according to "The Fourth Turning," by Strauss and Howe, the year 1977 was two and a half “Turnings” ago. Back then, the future wasn’t set. Or was it?

“We perceive our civic challenge as some vast, insoluble Rubik’s Cube. Behind each problem lies another problem that must be solved first, and behind that lies yet another, and another, ad infinitum. To fix crime we have to fix the family, but before we do that we have to fix welfare, and that means fixing our budget, and that means fixing our civic spirit, but we can’t do that without fixing moral standards, and that means fixing schools and churches, and that means fixing the inner cities, and that’s impossible unless we fix crime. There’s no fulcrum on which to rest a policy lever. People of all ages sense that something huge will have to sweep across America before the gloom can be lifted – but that’s an awareness we suppress. As a nation, we’re in deep denial.”

- Strauss and Howe, “The Fourth Turning”

Written by the historians William Strauss and Neil Howe, “The Fourth Turning” was published in 1997 and was, at that time, boldly proclaimed by the authors to be an “American Prophecy”. The book is fascinating in that it very thoroughly documents recorded cycles of history across multiple cultures and eras in order to predict the timing of “America’s next rendezvous with destiny”.

Processing almost like a Cliff’s Notes summary, the book identifies the timelines of historical events and matches them to specific life cycles of people in the form of generational archetypes. What is also interesting is how Strauss and Howe quantify and compare the recordings of history of multiple authors throughout the millennia to find uncanny comparisons in both historical and generational cycles.  Ironically, the comparisons stand up not only to the test of time regarding recorded events in history, but the generational turnings and archetypes also translate to ancient literature and other writings as well, ranging from Homer’s Iliad to the Holy Bible.

The concept of time is discussed in the context of both circular and linear perspectives as Strauss and Howe describe what is called the “saeculum”. The saeculum represents a “long human life”, or approximately 80 to 90 years comprising of four turnings each lasting about 20 to 22 years.

Just as there are four seasons consisting of spring, summer, fall and winter, there are also four phases of a human life represented in childhood, young adulthood, middle age and old age, or elderhood. As each phase of human life represents approximately 20 years, so is each generational archetype identified within historical cycles, or turnings, as follows:

Click image for larger size.

The generational archetypes experience the historical turnings according their life stage, or age. Amazingly, history shows a consistent pattern in how the generations both cause and affect historical events.  The patterns develop based upon how each generation interacts with the other and this also has documented consistencies that are delineated by the authors.

At any given “turning” during the saeculum, the set order of the generations on the age ladder is called a “constellation”. For example, during the Fourth Turning Crisis of 1929 through 1945, America experienced a financial crash, a great depression and a world war. During this period, the Prophet generation was entering Elderhood, the Nomad generation were middle-aged and the Hero generation fought WW II as young adults while the Artist generation were children during that time.

When the Crisis (Winter) era of financial hardship and war was over, the Spring of another First Turning began as the Hero generation led America into a season of unparalleled prosperity from 1946 through President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963. It was then the baby boomer, Prophet, generation began. As young adults, the boomers began to rock the nation with new age flower-power, feminism, guitars and free love. Thus began the Awakening that lasted through Ronald Reagan’s first term that ended in 1984. It was then the Third Turning of the Unraveling began.

In 1997, when the Fourth Turning was published, Strauss and Howe used their generational model to predict with remarkable accuracy, the start of the next Crisis in 2005: “By the middle Oh-Ohs, institutions will reach a point of maximum weakness, individualism of maximum strength, and even the simplest public task will feel beyond the ability of government. As niche walls rise ever higher, people will complain endlessly how bad all of the niches are. Wide chasms will separate rich from poor, whites from blacks, immigrants from native borns, seculars from born agains, technophiles from technophobes. America will feel more tribal. Indeed, many will be asking whether fifty states and so many dozens of ethic cultures make sense any more as a nation – and, if they do, whether that nation has a future.”

- Strauss and Howe:  “The Fourth Turning”

In 1997 there was no way to foresee the sequencing of 911, the Patriot Act, Edward Snowden, government incompetence after Hurricane Katrina, the financial crisis of 2007 – 2008, the subsequent TARP bailouts or the election of a mysterious, biracial pied piper to the presidency of the United States.

There is no way anyone could have predicted the ensuing eight years of Obama, the nationalization of healthcare, the orgy of greed hosted by Wall Street at the expense of Main Street, endless wars, unchecked immigration, the TSA, NSA, Homeland Security, the CIA versus the FBI, smart phones, drones, religious discriminations, Occupy Wall Street, the Tea Party, the Alt-right, Black Lives Matter and fake news.

Given the accuracy and timing of Strauss and Howe’s predictions, perhaps there is real validity behind their generational theory after all. And, given this, then we are now within the Winter of a Fourth Turning Crisis.

Can you feel it in the air? High powers in dark places are gathering and sides are being chosen as potential treachery and intrigue lurk around every corner. A global empire stands prepared to battle with populist movements and sovereign nations across the globe while rumors of a neo American civil war abound here at home.

Captured corporate media propaganda outlets and deep state government agencies relentlessly shill for a global empire and stoke the fires of war against a free alternative media while simultaneously provoking a nuclear armed Russia.

Half of the nation’s electorate, on the brink of a financial abyss, would rather kneel before an evil empire than to support the outcome of a free election. Of course, there is no unity in America today. Those days are long gone.

“People young and old will puzzle over what it felt like for their parents and grandparents, in a distantly remembered era, to have lived in a society that felt like one national community. They will yearn to recreate this, to put America back together again. But no one will know how.”

- Strauss and Howe, “The Fourth Turning”

Winter is here.  War is coming. Battles will be waged and conflicts will rage. There will be no escape for what is coming and no guarantee as to any outcome, save one: After this Fourth Turning, there will remain only liberty or tyranny. One, but not the other. For this will be a fight unto the death.

Even so, do many Nomads now entering middle-age, and their Hero generation progeniture, actually understand what is about to befall them? Do they even care? And, for those who do understand and do care; do they know how to fight?

Truly, there are many variables to this historical cycle that were absent in the all of the previous Fourth Turnings throughout history. A few examples would include pervasive and devastating technology with the capabilities of either enslaving, or killing, entire generations of people; a global corporatocracy in control of government agencies, mass flows of information, food and resources; entirely misinformed and apathetic populations with no moral bearing, belief system, or willingness to accept truth in order to stand strong against the dark powers now encroaching; and, finally, there are so many who have been trained to embrace the utopian lie of one world under tyranny. Sadly, many of these may be the new Stormtroopers in waiting.

In the end, we must choose. And not choosing, by default, is a choice. Can a rag tag federation of freedom fighters with truth, liberty and history on their side under a flag of 13 stripes and 50 stars, with idea-fueled keyboards, a compromised internet, and semi-automatic weapons prevail against a galactic empire in control of a technocracy more powerful than any fictional Death Star?

We’re about to find out. Everything that has ever happened before has delivered us to where we are now. Hold on to that. Even more importantly, don’t forget to fasten your seatbelts and place your trays in the upright and locked position. A new journey has begun."

"May the Force be with you."

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

"Catabolic Collapse – Coming Soon To A Place Near You"

"Catabolic Collapse – 

Coming Soon To A Place Near You"

by John Wilder

"If you’re a bodybuilder, the word “anabolic” is your friend. While often used in conjunction with the word steroids, anabolic really means “taking the proteins and stuff you eat and turning it into more complex stuff for your body”. Like I said, that’s a good thing if you’re in shape as a body builder. The Mrs. says that that spherical is technically a shape, so I guess I’m technically in shape. At least in “a” shape.

But just like there is day balanced by night (see, I can be poetic!) anabolic is balanced by the less commonly used word “catabolic”. And, just like an anode has a cathode, catabolic means the opposite. If I’m dieting, the word catabolic is my friend – it rips apart complex molecules like fat that represent stored energy, releasing the energy, and making my shape appear less spherical as the fat is turned into energy releasing sweet, sweet CO2.and plutonium.

Economic growth is anabolic. Building a house takes a complex logistics chain of materials and manpower and creates a yet more complex outcome, assembled only with effort and time. A house fire is therefore catabolic – it torches and burns the whole thing down, much faster than it took to build. But allowing a house’s roof to fail and the house to rot is also catabolic – it just takes a lot longer.

Just as it applies to houses and body shape, catabolic can also apply to economies. Essentially every day after the paving of a road is complete, the road is rotting. At first this happens slowly. However, then, as water gets a chance to penetrate it and freeze and thaw, the decay happens much more quickly.

What happens when we can’t afford to fix stuff? It slowly rots. Buildings slowly decay. Street signs fade. Water pipes burst. Kardashians move in.

Just like keeping a body from starving requires continual food, keeping a complex system operating and running requires continual wealth and effort. Every bridge, unless maintained, will collapse. A comment last week talked about a pullback of restaurants in their area, more in keeping with what was in place decades ago.

Decades ago, even in Modern Mayberry, there weren’t a lot of external chain restaurants, not even a McDonald’s™. McDonald’s© business model requires a Regional owner who owns multiple McDonald’s™ to build a restaurant on land the McDonald’s Corporation© owns and lease the restaurant from the Corporation®. It also requires that the restaurant go through suppliers that the Corporation® selects to purchase stuff like food and cups and napkins. On top of that, the Corporation™ takes a percent off the top for profit. The Regional owner pays the Corporation©, but also takes the profits. The remainder goes to costs, including labor.

Back in, say, 1960, all the profits, including the money the local bank lent for the mortgage on Ma and Pa’s Diner, stayed in the community. Many of the costs would as well, especially if the beef and vegetables were locally sourced through the butcher. While the City wasn’t a closed economy, it still retained a lot of the money currently being extracted and kept it local. But when the economy is prosperous, there’s enough wealth being generated, and the extraction of a bit of it doesn’t matter all that much.

Now? The excess cash is hoovered out of the local economy with maximum velocity. That turns the people that would have run Ma and Pa’s Diner or the butcher shop or the local grocery store into wage employees rather than entrepreneurs. Amazon© and eBay™ have removed the reason for small shops selling specific items like games or cooking utensils, and that leaves room for Walmart™ to sell bulk commodities. At least our local Walmart® isn’t like a Target® store in the big cities, which I hear now come complete with their own police precincts.

In a small town like Modern Mayberry, that’s one thing, but last week I wrote about the beginning of the collapse of the casual dining (as opposed to the philosophic problem created by causal dining) restaurant chains. There are none of these in Modern Mayberry, because we’re far too small for an RedAppleChiliLobsterBees™. No, the extraction is starting to fail in the suburbs as well.

It was mentioned that area was going back the earlier “norm” of restaurants, but the reason is because the middle class has been squeezed. This squeezing of the middle class is catabolic and will destroy demand. This is why, right now, the economy shrinking while stocks continue upwards. A recession is occurring in the middle class even as profits are up. This is the collapse, but as discussed, it’s not sudden, until it is.

I’ve described Modern Mayberry, but I’ve also described the core areas of many larger cities, where as our economy moved from making things into reality to making profits on paper, the core died. I’ve walked through the bones of industries long sent overseas and seen the majestic steel columns holding up the roof over an empty space, long since dead and forgotten. That’s also catabolic.

The good news is that it starts slow, but picks up speed. As I’ve said before, we’re standing on the edge of a new land ready to be born, that will be far different from what we’ve seen in the past. The things we’ve taken for granted will no longer be there in many cases. I’m looking at you, Social Security.

What matters is the rebuilding. There will be choices to be made – some that will lead to freedom, some to serfdom. As we’ve seen that paths leading away from the True, Beautiful, and Good always end in failure, most often spectacular failure, I’m optimistic. I must be. That’s why I keep dieting."

- https://wilderwealthywise.com/

"Not Such An Easy Business..."

“Over the years you get to see what a struggle life is for most people, how tough it is, how easy it is to be judgmental and criticize and stand outside of situations and impart your wisdom and judgment. But over the decades I've got more tolerant of people's flaws and mistakes. Everybody makes a lot of them. When you're younger you feel: "Hey, this person is evil" or "This person is a jerk" or stupid or "What's wrong with them?" Then you go through life and you think: "Well, it's not so easy." There's a lot of mystery and suffering and complication. Everybody's out there trying to do the best they can. And it's not such an easy business.”

- Woody Allen

The Daily "Near You?"

Weatherford, Texas, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"It May Be Necessary..."

"You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated.  

In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, 

so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, 

how you can still come out of it." 

 - Maya Angelou

"This Real Moron Thing..."

 

"Today Is Mine..."

“Today is mine. It is unique.

Nobody in the world has one exactly like it.
It holds the sum of all my past experiences and all my future potential.
I can fill it with joyous moments or ruin it with fruitless worry.
If painful recollections of the past come into my mind, 

or frightening thoughts of the future, I can put them away.
They cannot spoil today for me.”

- Alcoholics Anonymous

"We Know Now..."

"We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace - business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering. They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob. Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me - and I welcome their hatred."

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

"As they stand today..." Graphic says it all.

o

"Alan Shore Closing Argument On The Abuses Of Government"

"Epic closing argument from ABC's - 'Boston Legal' that illustrates the erosion of our Constitutional liberties and abusive government. This can no longer be defined as a Republican versus Democrat issue. Both parties are equally responsible, as are we, the electorate, for we continue to vote the same quality of politician(s) into office over and over."

"The Universe as Pool Hall"

"The Universe as Pool Hall"

by Fred Reed

"We will start this magisterial explanation of everything with the time-honored approach of the philosopher, beginning with the things we know beyond doubt and then reasoning from them to suitably astonishing truths. As we know, Descartes began by saying, “Cogito ergo sum,” I think therefore I am.” (Ambrose Bierce, a more profound thinker, said, “Cogito cogito, ergo cogito sum. Cogito.” Butthis way lies madness.) So with what certain knowledge can we begin our quest?

Our only certain knowledge is that we don’t have any. Acceptance of this condition will diminish the world’s output of philosophy, or so we may hope, but this column faces reality with a brave front. We may now list our certainties: We don’t know where we came from, where we are, why, what if anything we should do while we are here, and where if anywhere we go when we die.

On this bedrock we shall construct our philosophy of everything. However, before we begin thinking about these profound matters, we need to take into account one more certainty: Thinking is impossible. I will explain. But what it comes to is that while we know nothing about which to think, it doesn’t matter because we couldn’t think about it if we did know something.

Why? Consider the brain. It is an electrochemical mechanism, blindly obeying the laws of physics and chemistry (chemistry being the physics of the interactions of atoms). For example, consider a nerve impulse propagating along a neural fiber, depolarizing, sodium in, potassium out. Pure chemistry and physics. When the impulse comes to a synapse, a neurotransmitter diffuses across the gap, pure chemistry and physics. It can’t do anything else. Even chemicals with long, imposing names cannot make choices. The neurotransmitter then binds to receptor sites, because it has to. Textbooks of neurophysiology state it thus: “A brain has less free will than a wind-up clock.” Or at least if it were so stated, it would be. This is close enough for philosophy.

Putting it precisely, the state of a physical system is determined entirely by its previous state. This establishes beyond doubt that we have no free will, and that what we think are thoughts were determined at the time of the Big Bang, if any.

Now, no philosophical essay can be held in repute unless it contains words ending “ism.” The reigning creed today is materialism, the philosophy of the wantonly inattentive. Many who believe in materialism are of high intelligence, and so can only be sufficiently inattentive by great effort. Anyway, a materialist believes than nothing exists but space, time, matter, and energy, however hyphenated. That is, physics. As the physicist Joe Friday said, “The physics, ma’am, just the physics, and nothing but the physics.”

This means that the Big Bang, if any, was set up, or I suppose I should say, set itself up, like one of those billiard-table trick shots. You know the kind: The balls seem randomly placed on the table but bounce around a lot before miraculously running into the pockets like birds returning to their nests. In the Bang, if any, all those subatomic whatsamajigggers erupted forth at exactly the right angles and velocities so that, billions of years later, they formed Elvis, San Francisco, and Hillary. (This had to be by chance, since no one in his right mind would form Hillary on purpose. QED.)

Next, consider plane geometry as taught in high school. (You may wonder why we have to consider it. Well, we just do.) Plane geometry deals with planes, lines, points, angles, and nothing else. It is useful and interesting, but it cannot explain a cheeseburger, Formula One race, or political hysteria. Why? Because cheeseburgers exist in three dimensions, which plane geometry doesn’t have. Formula One races involve matter, energy, and motion, which plane geometry also doesn’t have. Hysteria is an emotional state associated with liberal co-eds in pricey northern colleges who, thank God, do not exist in mathematics.

What it comes to is that a logical system is defined by its premises, and all downstream results are mere elaboration. (Of course, as established in the beginning of this luminous essay, we have no premises except the lack of premises, but philosophy readily overlooks such minor hindrances.) Plane geometry is not wrong. It is just incomplete. To state it in mathematical terms, you cannot flatten a cheeseburger enough to fit into a plane.

Physics, the foundation of the current official story of everything, also depends on its premises. Physics is just mathematical materialism. From its equations one may derive all manner of fascinating and useful things, such as planetary motion, npn transistors, smartphones, nerve gas, and hydrogen bombs. (Some of these may be more useful than others.)

But, just as you cannot get strawberry milkshakes from plane geometry, because they are not implicit in it, there are things you cannot derive from the equations of physics: Consciousness, free will, beauty, morality, or curiosity – the whiches there just ain’t in physics. This would not worry a rational thinker. He (or, assuredly, she) would simply state the obvious: Physics is not wrong, but incomplete. It does what it does, and doesn’t do what it can’t. Not too mysterious, that.

However, the true-believing physics-is-all Neo-Darwinian matter-monger cannot admit that anything – anything at all – exists outside of physics. Since some things obviously do, the only-physics enthusiasts have to resort to contorted logic. I think of kite string in a ceiling fan. Or simple denial.

For example, sometimes they say that consciousness is merely an “epiphenomenon.” Oh. And what does that mean? Nothing. (Actually it means, “I don’t know, but if I use a polysyllabic Greek word, maybe nobody will notice.”) Epiphenomenon of what?

Sometimes they will say, “Well, consciousness is just a by-product of complexity.” But if consciousness is a byproduct what is the primary product? A computer is somewhat complex, so is it somewhat conscious? Is a mouse less conscious than a human or just, in some cases, less intelligent? A materialist ignoring consciousness is exactly equivalent to a geometer ignoring cheeseburgers.

We will now examine the question, where did we come from? The answer is ready to hand: We don’t have a clue. We make up stories. The physics-only folk say, see, there was the Big Bang and all these electrons and protons and things flew out and just by chance formed Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company in the most motingator a-stonishing pool-table trick shot ever set up. Just by accident. Damn! Who would have thought it?

Of course any sane person, to include materialists when they are thinking of something else, would say that TSMC was designed by hordes of Chinese engineers. But of course designing anything requires mind and intelligence (or a computer designed to simulate these things), But Mind cannot be derived from the equations of physics. Therefore we are all mindless. In general human behavior supports this.

Of course other stories exist. Yahweh created the world, or maybe Shiva, or Allah, and I think some remote tribes believe that it just appeared on the back of a giant turtle. I have no information on the matter, though frankly I incline to the turtle story, but will let the reader know the instant I find out.

The weakness of creation myths from Bang to Turtle is the question of the five-year-old, “But Mommy, where did God come from?” or “Who made God?” Fifteen years later in dorm-room bull sessions he will phrase it differently, “Well, what came before the Big Bang?” Same question.

A sort of second-echelon creation myth now in vogue is Darwinian evolution, also a subset of physics and therefore completely determined. Mutations are chemical events following the laws of chemistry. Thus trilobites had no choice but to form, and so they did. Metabolism is physical from the level of ATP to animals eating each other.

There is of course no such thing as a sex drive, teenagers notwithstanding, since no sort of drive can be derived from physics. (This will no doubt devastate Pornhub.) From this the inevitable conclusion, proven by physics, A that we cannot reproduce. Therefore we either have always existed or do not exist at all.

To give oneself an aura of overwelling wisdom, one may say things like ontology, epistemology, entelechy, and teleology, but these do not detract from mankind’s underlying and perfect ignorance. It’s all a trick shot, I tell you."

- https://www.unz.com

"A Short Mental Break..."

Earth, Wind & Fire, "Fantasy"

Gap Band, "You Dropped A Bomb On Me"

Hey, I needed a short mental break away from all this mess! Some old favorites...

We now resume our regularly scheduled programming, already in progress...

"How It Really Is"

 

"So long as the deceit ran along quiet and monotonous, all of us let 

ourselves be deceived, abetting it unawares or maybe through cowardice..." 

- William Faulkner

"Nonconformity and the Normalcy Bias"

"Nonconformity and the Normalcy Bias"

By Julian Wash

"Today I would like to return to your awareness an aspect of the Human condition that surrenders to a curious state called “normal.” Normal is a cultivated space, fashioned from how we see ourselves and how we’d like others to see us. It’s a weighted measure, balancing self-appraisal against the opinions and judgment of others. It is a dynamic state, subject to change depending on which way society pulls the levers on public opinion and the laws that govern social order. But most of all, normal is an assumed state of cooperation and expectation.

A scant sixty years ago, in the so-called “Bible belt” region of the Deep South, it was considered “normal” to require African Americans to sit in the back of a bus. One can therefore surmise that it must have taken an “abnormal” few to observe and recognize this as wrong. Those that voiced opposition were labeled sympathizers, resistors, agitators and radicals. And those were the nicer words. Of course now it is normal to honor these nonconformists for their courageous efforts in spear-heading the civil rights movement. So you see, “normal” is anything but what it claims to be.

In the following paragraphs we will reexamine the state of normal to see what purpose it serves, if any at all. What is normal now was not necessarily normal yesterday. And what is normal for you may not be normal for me. At any rate, normal is one of the dumbest terms to ever curse the planet. Normally I would not write on such a topic, but I thought I’d make this special exception. After all, it is normal for me to do the unexpected.

Normal This: That’s what I think of normal. The term is a tool. Those who acquiesce to its narrow and ephemeral parameters might also be considered “tools.” Does one seek normalcy because they desire this brand of conformity? If so, then what is their more noble purpose? Is it to go on mirroring and repeating everything they have been told? This regurgitation is what some might call normal - but I call it being complacent and undiscovered. Surely all people have a novel vibration that they wish to share or at least discover within themselves. So why do they insist on merely towing the line and wearing blinders? One could persuasively argue they have little choice. The normal need to earn a living and bucking the system is not the way to do it. So they play along to get along - and many will surrender their hearts ambition for the lure of a paycheck.

Were you ever given the choice to see the world as you like? Probably not. The world as we know it was engineered into our awareness from the moment we uttered our first words. Sad to think perhaps some will never know the feeling of abnormal. A good conformist would never entertain such dirty thoughts anyway. But on the contrary, to label someone as “normal” strikes me as offensive indeed. Normal tells me that one doesn’t really understand their unique place in this world. There is nothing normal about normal. Normal is a conformity stress that can skew and shape the best of us into docile, compliant and mindless little servants. It’s a dead end. There is no need to explore further once normalcy has been achieved.

Yes, we’re all encouraged to operate within templates of normalcy. We go to school, get married, buy a house and hope for normal kids. We work our normal jobs and attend church and maybe, if we’re lucky, we’ll have the time and means to take up something truly meaningful and normal - like golf. And just as we begin to get the ever-so slightest inkling of this elusive and artificial state called normal, it’s time for us to retire or to check out of this world all together. You see, on the eighteenth hole we may indeed start asking ourselves what sinking that put was really all about. And though one may take delight in saying they played under par, I can’t help but wonder if the ball somehow played the player and not the other way around. But I’ve digressed.

That which we regard as normal is anything but. The “normal” I see takes the form of an elaborate maze cut though a corn field. We’re not allowed to peak over the stalks because then we might realize it’s all just a game. That would ruin it for you and everyone else. And we’re not allowed to shuck an ear because we might realize the corn is too perfect to be in a natural or organic state. There is something profoundly disturbing about that which is too perfect in this land of normal.

Lies Taste Good: The term “normal” follows us everywhere we go. Our doctor might say our lab test results were normal. They might also say our blood pressure is normal. Well those are the words we want to hear. Normal is good. Abnormal is bad, very bad. I was once told I had abnormally high cholesterol levels and that it was likely a “genetic” anomaly. Surely I was a walking heart attack and I was only in my early twenties. Blood thinners were recommended as were statin drugs. A genetic anomaly indeed and so I thought to do some research.

Turns out I had elderly relatives with the same condition. They took nothing for it and yet they were otherwise healthy and in their eighties. And so I chose to take nothing for my condition. My basis for normal was therefore quite different than the medical assessment. I questioned the well-meaning entity with the white coat and germ laden stethoscope. That was not the normal thing for me to do. I did not take his advice. All these years later, I’m so happy I didn’t. The very latest research now shows higher cholesterol might actually be a good indicator, whereas very low cholesterol could be a serious cause for concern. I take zero medications. Is that normal?

The normal person’s modus of operandi is to never challenge the status-quo. Eat lies like they were made of candy. Believe what we are told about JFK, 9/11, GMO’s, flu vaccinations, fluoridated water and a whole host of other yummy little fictions. Do not ask about “false flag” invasions, chemtrails, printed paper currency, or whether the “Federal” Reserve is indeed federal. Ask not these questions. Remain in this insulated cocoon called normalcy and it will protect you. Step outside of normalcy and expect to be mowed down by flag waving, Bible thumping, hypnotized, zombified lynch mobs that would swear to you that they are the normal ones. Yes, they will call you a kook - or worse. After all, that’s what they called Rosa Parks, Dr. King and so many other prominent and benevolent people of great courage and strength. If this is what being a “kook” is all about then count me in. It’s the sort of company I’d like to keep anyway.

Then there’s the normal behavior thing. A schoolteacher might tell the parents of little Johnny or Amy that their child is behaving normally in class and has a healthy and normal attitude. You should be proud. Your child is normal. What! Why would I find this so disturbing? Did the school suck away the defining aspect that made this child unique as an individual? Perhaps I would ask the teacher if they would mind defining what is meant by normal. Then I would ask if Albert Einstein was normal, if perhaps Nikola Tesla was normal, if Mother Teresa was normal, if Mahatma Gandhi was normal, if Leonardo da Vinci was normal… and anyway I think I’ve made my point. So why would I want little Johnny or Amy to be your little normal? No thank you. Class dismissed!

I understand that some may think I’m taking this whole “normal” thing out of context. I assure you I am not. Unlike the more inert and discretionary term of “typical,” normal belies an acceptable assumption of truth or fact. When the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant radiation levels were spiking during the early months of the tsunami disaster, governmental agencies were compelled to redefine what “normal” meant in terms of radiation exposure. Their solution was to simply raise the old level to a much higher one and called it safe. So now people in the Fukushima Prefecture could breathe a deep sigh of relief and relax after being told that radiation levels had been restored to normal. The “typical” readings were way off from where they had been, of course - but “normal” had been redefined to satisfy immediate concerns. Can you see why I don’t care much for that word?

Where Do We Go From Here? There’s a road less traveled that beckons those who seek higher truth. It can be a lonely road indeed. The nonconformist takes the long way home and questions all things along the path. In doing so, they may often feel lost and vulnerable at times. But as their journey continues, they begin to acquire great wisdom. They will question all things synthetic in nature. They will question government and how it controls the masses. They will question organized religion and how it culls the population. They will question education and how is syncopates the minds of children. They will question mass media and its dubious exploitations. So where does the road go from here? Simple. One must remain in a state of knowing. One must continue to question and yet still manage to live their lives with a smile on their face and with love in their heart.

One must allow “normal” people to see you in a proper light. One should be polite and courteous and lend a helping hand. If we are angry and overly-aggressive in our views, we’ll be relegated to that “kook” category of nonconformity. But for those who are highly principled and self-aware, they can usually articulate their views in an open and benevolent manner. Such people live by example. I’m a big fan of civility and the Gandhi-esque manner of peaceful noncompliance, love and tolerance. The most beautiful form of rebellion is to simply fold ones arms and say no. If people of all nations could muster their power and resolve to do this, there would never be another bullet fired upon another. Such a deplorable act would be considered grotesquely insane and absolutely inhuman. So there’s a glimpse of a “real” normal world as I see it. Seems we’ve got a ways to go to get there.

And so to the powers that (think you are) I want to say I am not your “normal” product; I do not believe in your NDAA. I do not believe in your Patriot Act. I do not believe in your torture and preemptive wars. I do not accept this as normal by any definition of the term. And so I say no! And I say it with authority and I say it with conviction. I am one person, but I’m awake and aware and that makes me powerful indeed. I am free to speak my mind and state my cause. I am not your minion. I possess free will and a free mind. I am not ensnared by your tainted vision of a new world order. And as testimony of the Divine, others are now waking from their slumber and are asking questions of a probing nature. I’ve come to this world to know peace - and so I do not accept the guns you hide behind your velvet curtains of deception.

Final Thought: I’m unable to digest this non-organic meatball called normal, so don’t wave it in front of me. What in the heck is rolled up in it anyway? One should think twice before putting that in their body. It pretends to be something it’s not. So what’s it all about? I sense that people have a hunch that they’ve been repeatedly lied to for a very long time. But try as they might, most just can’t quite get a grip on it. Meanwhile, the PTB keep throwing everything they’ve got at us with the hope of keeping us in some kind of a normalizing, mind swept stupor. But why?

There are many who are feeling fearful or panicky for no obvious reason. Chronic fear turns into anxiety. Anxiety may turn into depression. Depression often turns into a doctor’s visit. The doctor’s visit turns into a prescription for an antidepressant. The antidepressant appears to help but soon more is needed. The doctor prescribes a second antidepressant to be taken along with the other. Soon additional meds are sought and delivered. They are “needed” so that one can deal with their depression along with a whole host of other medical issues that seem to be cropping up. Soon one can find themselves quite dependent on that normal person in the white coat who knows better than we do.

But here is what I have found to be true. It is not entirely correct to call it “their” depression. It is “our” depression. If our brothers and sisters are feeling depressed for no apparent reason, then I might suggest we reexamine what is called normal. Society is a seriously flawed, screwed-up, sad state of affairs that tries to pass itself off as normal. We consistently attempt to attune ourselves with this “normalized” societal standard because we’ve been trained to do so. But this creates an asymmetrical tension that can spawn a boat-load of psychological incongruities within - a sort of internal tug-of-war between what we know to be right and what society dictates as normal. So how does one manage this? Well, we can try taking the long way home.”

- http://rattlereport.com/

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"Taking the long way home" you say? OK!

Supertramp, "Take The Long Way Home"

"The Universe as Pool Hall"

"The Universe as Pool Hall"

by Fred Reed

"We will start this magisterial explanation of everything with the time-honored approach of the philosopher, beginning with the things we know beyond doubt and then reasoning from them to suitably astonishing truths. As we know, Descartes began by saying, “Cogito ergo sum,” I think therefore I am.” (Ambrose Bierce, a more profound thinker, said, “Cogito cogito, ergo cogito sum. Cogito.” Butthis way lies madness.) So with what certain knowledge can we begin our quest?

Our only certain knowledge is that we don’t have any. Acceptance of this condition will diminish the world’s output of philosophy, or so we may hope, but this column faces reality with a brave front. We may now list our certainties: We don’t know where we came from, where we are, why, what if anything we should do while we are here, and where if anywhere we go when we die.

On this bedrock we shall construct our philosophy of everything. However, before we begin thinking about these profound matters, we need to take into account one more certainty: Thinking is impossible. I will explain. But what it comes to is that while we know nothing about which to think, it doesn’t matter because we couldn’t think about it if we did know something.

Why? Consider the brain. It is an electrochemical mechanism, blindly obeying the laws of physics and chemistry (chemistry being the physics of the interactions of atoms). For example, consider a nerve impulse propagating along a neural fiber, depolarizing, sodium in, potassium out. Pure chemistry and physics. When the impulse comes to a synapse, a neurotransmitter diffuses across the gap, pure chemistry and physics. It can’t do anything else. Even chemicals with long, imposing names cannot make choices. The neurotransmitter then binds to receptor sites, because it has to. Textbooks of neurophysiology state it thus: “A brain has less free will than a wind-up clock.” Or at least if it were so stated, it would be. This is close enough for philosophy.

Putting it precisely, the state of a physical system is determined entirely by its previous state. This establishes beyond doubt that we have no free will, and that what we think are thoughts were determined at the time of the Big Bang, if any.

Now, no philosophical essay can be held in repute unless it contains words ending “ism.” The reigning creed today is materialism, the philosophy of the wantonly inattentive. Many who believe in materialism are of high intelligence, and so can only be sufficiently inattentive by great effort. Anyway, a materialist believes than nothing exists but space, time, matter, and energy, however hyphenated. That is, physics. As the physicist Joe Friday said, “The physics, ma’am, just the physics, and nothing but the physics.”

This means that the Big Bang, if any, was set up, or I suppose I should say, set itself up, like one of those billiard-table trick shots. You know the kind: The balls seem randomly placed on the table but bounce around a lot before miraculously running into the pockets like birds returning to their nests. In the Bang, if any, all those subatomic whatsamajigggers erupted forth at exactly the right angles and velocities so that, billions of years later, they formed Elvis, San Francisco, and Hillary. (This had to be by chance, since no one in his right mind would form Hillary on purpose. QED.)

Next, consider plane geometry as taught in high school. (You may wonder why we have to consider it. Well, we just do.) Plane geometry deals with planes, lines, points, angles, and nothing else. It is useful and interesting, but it cannot explain a cheeseburger, Formula One race, or political hysteria. Why? Because cheeseburgers exist in three dimensions, which plane geometry doesn’t have. Formula One races involve matter, energy, and motion, which plane geometry also doesn’t have. Hysteria is an emotional state associated with liberal co-eds in pricey northern colleges who, thank God, do not exist in mathematics.

What it comes to is that a logical system is defined by its premises, and all downstream results are mere elaboration. (Of course, as established in the beginning of this luminous essay, we have no premises except the lack of premises, but philosophy readily overlooks such minor hindrances.) Plane geometry is not wrong. It is just incomplete. To state it in mathematical terms, you cannot flatten a cheeseburger enough to fit into a plane.

Physics, the foundation of the current official story of everything, also depends on its premises. Physics is just mathematical materialism. From its equations one may derive all manner of fascinating and useful things, such as planetary motion, npn transistors, smartphones, nerve gas, and hydrogen bombs. (Some of these may be more useful than others.)

But, just as you cannot get strawberry milkshakes from plane geometry, because they are not implicit in it, there are things you cannot derive from the equations of physics: Consciousness, free will, beauty, morality, or curiosity – the whiches there just ain’t in physics. This would not worry a rational thinker. He (or, assuredly, she) would simply state the obvious: Physics is not wrong, but incomplete. It does what it does, and doesn’t do what it can’t. Not too mysterious, that.

However, the true-believing physics-is-all Neo-Darwinian matter-monger cannot admit that anything – anything at all – exists outside of physics. Since some things obviously do, the only-physics enthusiasts have to resort to contorted logic. I think of kite string in a ceiling fan. Or simple denial.

For example, sometimes they say that consciousness is merely an “epiphenomenon.” Oh. And what does that mean? Nothing. (Actually it means, “I don’t know, but if I use a polysyllabic Greek word, maybe nobody will notice.”) Epiphenomenon of what?

Sometimes they will say, “Well, consciousness is just a by-product of complexity.” But if consciousness is a byproduct what is the primary product? A computer is somewhat complex, so is it somewhat conscious? Is a mouse less conscious than a human or just, in some cases, less intelligent? A materialist ignoring consciousness is exactly equivalent to a geometer ignoring cheeseburgers.

We will now examine the question, where did we come from? The answer is ready to hand: We don’t have a clue. We make up stories. The physics-only folk say, see, there was the Big Bang and all these electrons and protons and things flew out and just by chance formed Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company in the most motingator a-stonishing pool-table trick shot ever set up. Just by accident. Damn! Who would have thought it?

Of course any sane person, to include materialists when they are thinking of something else, would say that TSMC was designed by hordes of Chinese engineers. But of course designing anything requires mind and intelligence (or a computer designed to simulate these things), But Mind cannot be derived from the equations of physics. Therefore we are all mindless. In general human behavior supports this.

Of course other stories exist. Yahweh created the world, or maybe Shiva, or Allah, and I think some remote tribes believe that it just appeared on the back of a giant turtle. I have no information on the matter, though frankly I incline to the turtle story, but will let the reader know the instant I find out.

The weakness of creation myths from Bang to Turtle is the question of the five-year-old, “But Mommy, where did God come from?” or “Who made God?” Fifteen years later in dorm-room bull sessions he will phrase it differently, “Well, what came before the Big Bang?” Same question.

A sort of second-echelon creation myth now in vogue is Darwinian evolution, also a subset of physics and therefore completely determined. Mutations are chemical events following the laws of chemistry. Thus trilobites had no choice but to form, and so they did. Metabolism is physical from the level of ATP to animals eating each other.

There is of course no such thing as a sex drive, teenagers notwithstanding, since no sort of drive can be derived from physics. (This will no doubt devastate Pornhub.) From this the inevitable conclusion, proven by physics, A that we cannot reproduce. Therefore we either have always existed or do not exist at all.

To give oneself an aura of overwelling wisdom, one may say things like ontology, epistemology, entelechy, and teleology, but these do not detract from mankind’s underlying and perfect ignorance. It’s all a trick shot, I tell you."

- https://www.unz.com

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Food for thought...

"Existence from Nothing? 

What You Are And The Creation of the Universe"

"Democracy..."

 

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed 

(and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with 

an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."

- H. L. Mencken

"The Entire System Is Crumbling! Major Red Flags Are Popping Up For Banks, Small Businesses And Retailers"

"The Entire System Is Crumbling! Major Red Flags Are 

Popping Up For Banks, Small Businesses And Retailers"

by Michael Snyder

"The first panacea for a mismanaged nation is inflation of the currency; 

the second is war. Both bring a temporary prosperity; both bring a permanent ruin. 

But both are the refuge of political and economic opportunists."

 - Ernest Hemingway 

"If the economy is fine, why are so many signs of trouble erupting all around us? Those that keep insisting that the U.S. economy is heading in the right direction conveniently ignore the very troubling facts and figures that I regularly share with my readers. When you take an honest look at the cold, hard numbers that the economy keeps producing, there is only one logical conclusion. Our entire system is crumbling, and it appears that conditions will soon get significantly worse.

Just look at what is happening to our banks. The FDIC’s most recent report tells us that there are 63 “problem banks” in the United States, and collectively our banks now have 517 billion dollars in unrealized losses…"According to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s first quarter report, the US banking system is sitting on a collective $517 billion in unrealized losses and has 63 “problem banks.” Those losses have been sparked primarily by a surge in interest rates over the past two years, which have driven down the price of fixed-income securities held by banks.

Unrealized losses held by banks increased by $39 billion in the first quarter relative to the fourth quarter of 2023. “Higher unrealized losses on residential mortgage-backed securities, resulting from higher mortgage rates in the first quarter, drove the overall increase,” the FDIC said."

I would love to know what banks are on that list. Wouldn’t you? But the FDIC will not tell us. As Daisy Luther has accurately noted, the FDIC won’t release that information because they are afraid of bank runs…"We don’t get to know which banks are in trouble. It could be my bank. It could be yours. Or maybe it’s not. Are they big banks? Small ones? The list is confidential to inhibit the likelihood of bank runs finishing off these institutions."

So we just don’t know. If Americans had the truth, there would be bank runs all over the country tomorrow morning. That is a rather comforting thought. And the condition of our banks just continues to deteriorate because mountains of commercial real estate loans are going bad. At this point, it has become clear that we have never faced a commercial real estate crisis of this magnitude in our entire history…"The CRE sector faces the triple whammy of falling prices, falling demand, and rising interest rates. The post-pandemic rise of telecommuting and work-at-home programs crushed demand for office space. Vacancy rates in commercial buildings have soared. This has put significant stress on commercial real estate companies. The biggest bankruptcy in 2023 was the failure of the Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust. The company had loaded up with more than $1 billion in liabilities."

The collapse of the commercial real estate market could easily spill over into the financial sector. That’s because a lot of loans are coming due. According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, around $1.2 trillion of commercial real estate debt in the United States will mature over the next two years. A lot of financial institutions will fail during the months and years that are ahead of us. Just hope that your money is not in one of them.

Meanwhile, one recent survey discovered that approximately two-thirds of all small businesses in the United States are teetering on the brink of disaster…"A new survey reveals that over two-thirds of small business owners are terrified of the state of the economy under Joe Biden’s watch, fearing that current conditions and ongoing downward trends will lead to them having to close their businesses.

As reported by the Daily Caller, the poll from the Job Creators Network Foundation (JCNF) shows that 67% of small business owners maintain such fears about the economy as it stands today, marking a 10-point increase from sentiments two years ago. In the same poll, participants’ perceptions of economic conditions for their own businesses fell from 70.2 to 68.1. Perception of national conditions fell even more drastically, from 53.2 to 50.4."

Maybe you don’t care about what is happening to our small businesses. But you should, because close to half of all workers in the United States are employed by small businesses…"Forbes estimates that at least 46% of all employees in the United States, around 61.6 million people in total, are employed by small businesses." I think that it is quite an ominous sign that the household survey showed that the U.S. economy lost a whopping 408,000 jobs last month. Sadly, I think that a lot more months like that are coming.

Retailers are also really struggling right now. In fact, as Mark B. Spiegel recently discussed, major retailer after major retailer has been reporting disappointing sales numbers…"The U.S. economy seems to finally be cracking. This month a slew of retailers (off the top of my head: Target, Lowe’s, Macy’s, Kohl’s, Best Buy and Foot Locker) reported negative year-over-year sales comps, and that’s before adjusting for the inflation that makes them 3% to 4% more negative in “real” terms. Others (Dollar General and Burlington) reported same-store sales comps in the +2% range, but that too was negative when adjusted for inflation, while Walmart and Nordstrom comps managed to roughly keep pace with inflation, but were unable to exceed it."

At one time, Walmart was an unstoppable retail behemoth. But now even Walmart is closing down stores…"WALMARTS are closing across the country – and retail experts say the cuts are signals of a bleak future for shoppers. The multi-million dollar corporation has closed nine stores so far this year, which could be a warning sign for other retail giants."

Of course the stores that Walmart is shuttering are just a drop in the bucket compared to what other chains are doing. As I detailed in an article that I posted last week, we are on pace to lose 7,800 stores in 2024.

When the Drudge Report used the term “retail apocalypse” in one of their headlines on Monday morning, that was not an exaggeration at all. We really are in the early stages of a historic meltdown. And the outlook for the months ahead is extremely bleak. In fact, Harry Dent just told Fox News that we should brace ourselves for “a bigger crash than we got in 2008 to ’09”…"Speaking in an updated interview with Fox News Digital, Dent cautioned that the “everything” bubble has still yet to burst, and it may be a bigger crash than the Great Recession.

“In 1925 to ‘29, it was a natural bubble. There was no stimulus behind that, artificial stimulus per se. So this is new. This has never happened,” Dent said on Tuesday. “What do you do if you want to cure a hangover? You drink more. And that’s what they’ve been doing.”

Flooding the economy with extra money forever might actually enhance the overall economy long-term. But we’ll only see when we see this bubble burst,” he added. “And again, this bubble has been going 14 years. Instead of most bubbles [going] five to six, it’s been stretched higher, longer. So you’d have to expect a bigger crash than we got in 2008 to ’09.”

Our leaders were able to keep the game going for years by pumping trillions upon trillions of dollars into the system. But they didn’t fix anything. Instead, they just delayed the inevitable. Our entire system really is crumbling all around us, and as it crumbles we are going to see chaos on a scale that most people don’t even want to imagine. Already, major cities from coast to coast are being terrorized by theft, violence, drugs, homelessness, gangs and anarchy. If things are this bad already, what is America going to look like once our leaders completely lose control of the economy?"

- https://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/

o

Snyder asks, "what is America going to look like once our leaders completely

 lose control of the economy?" Here's the answer, from sea to shining sea...

Full screen recommended.

Our 50 States, 6/15/24

"Homelessness in Texas:

 Growing Homeless Crisis in 2024"

"Homelessness in Texas: Explores the growing homeless crisis in Texas in 2024. According to the National Alliance to End Homelessness. Texas had an estimated 113,200 people experiencing homelessness on a single night in 2023. We examine the latest statistics, including the number of people experiencing homelessness, and delve into the causes like rising housing costs of living in Texas."

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

o

Full screen recommended.

Earnings Elevator, 6/15/24

"This hard-hitting video explores the stark realities of the homelessness crisis in two of America's most populous states: New York and California. With a combined homeless population of over 600,000 individuals, these states face an unprecedented challenge in addressing this growing issue.

Through a thorough examination into the latest statistics, demographics, and personal stories, this video paints a vivid picture of the hardships faced by those experiencing homelessness. From the disproportionate impact on Black, Latinx, and Native American communities to the vulnerability of single adults, families with children, and unaccompanied youth, the video highlights the complex nature of this crisis.

The video also examines the financial burden of homelessness on both states, the debate surrounding homeless encampment bans, and the urgent need for affordable housing solutions. By combining data-driven analysis with powerful personal narratives, this video aims to raise awareness, foster empathy, and inspire action towards addressing this critical issue.

Join us as we explore the human stories behind the statistics and emphasize the importance of providing hope and opportunities for those experiencing homelessness in New York, California, and beyond. "

Comments here:

- https://www.youtube.com/

Included are over 60,000 homeless veterans, 22 of whom commit suicide every day.