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Thursday, July 17, 2025

Dan, I Allegedly, "Restaurants Are Spying On You! Here’s How"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, AM 7/17/25
"Restaurants Are Spying On You! Here’s How"
"Restaurants are spying on you - yes, you heard that right! In today’s video, I share how some restaurants are digging through your social media profiles before you even step foot in their dining rooms. From Michelin-starred spots in the Bay Area to high-end eateries worldwide, they're building profiles based on your spending habits and dining preferences. Is this the future of dining or a total invasion of privacy? Let’s talk about it. Plus, we dive into how data collection extends beyond restaurants. From grocery rewards programs to travel spending trends, it seems like everyone is tracking us these days. And don’t get me started on the crazy $285,000 green vehicles planned for the postal service - what is going on?"
Comments here:

Here are the links for the stories mentioned in this video:

"Life..."

"Life is not what you see, but what you've projected.
It's not what you've felt, but what you've decided.
It's not what you've experienced, but how you've remembered it.
It's not what you've forged, but what you've allowed.
And it's not who's appeared, but who you've summoned.
And this should serve you well until you find what you already have."
- The Universe

"A Saturday Night In Starbucks"

"A Saturday Night In Starbucks"
by Paul Rosenberg

"Several years ago, an unusual set of events found me at Starbucks on a Saturday night. It had been a reasonably decent day, but somehow the pressures of the world – its parade of negativity – had had its effect on me. Sitting in the Starbucks cured me.

What I Saw: It was a very average Starbucks in a very average location. And the very average people sitting with me were a nearly perfect cross-section of the American demographic. To my left was a middle-aged black man, doing something on his laptop. Just past him was a middle-aged white woman doing the same. Past her, in the corner, were three teenage girls – one black, one white, one Latin – studying together.

Behind me was another black man with a laptop and piles of papers, and past him a young couple falling in love over lattes. At the big, center table was a 25ish woman, with multiple piles of paper upon which she was working very hard. After a while, her boyfriend showed up. She hugged him, laid her head on his shoulder, and they kissed. It was sweet. Then he got to work with her.

There were also people coming and going. They were more of the same: A cross-sectional American parade of people behaving quietly and well. Watching these people, I decided that it would be far better to spend time helping them than to obsess over all the threats in the world. These are the people who deserve our efforts.

What Would Help the Bright Side of Humanity? My observations brought me to the question of how to help the bright side of humanity, and I decided that a great start would be to assure them that their way is right… that they have every right to live their way. That concept should be utterly obvious, but the fact is that productive people have been assiduously taught to abandon their ways whenever authority speaks.

This is the great error of the bright side people, and those of us who recognize it must make this point repeatedly: The narratives of the power-seekers service primate models of organization. They do not serve human advancement.

The people I saw in the Starbucks held a different and better set of ideals. They believed that everyone should be treated with respect; that coercion and fraud are wrong; that everyone should be left alone to do as they please, so long as they don’t intrude upon others. This decent side of humanity needs to know that their ideals should never be abandoned, no matter how earth-shatteringly urgent a reason may seem. The people I saw in the Starbucks, to be blunt about it, were morally superior to the powerful and the fear-peddlers. Their ways should be held above.

And Once They Do? Once the people I saw at Starbucks start believing in themselves, the world will change, and massively. These people – and there are untold millions of them – are productive and cooperative. Their problem is that they’ve been laying their virtues at the feet of fear-peddlers. Once the Starbucks People decide that fear and subservience are contrary to life itself, they will move into a better age. Such transitions are difficult, of course, but once these people truly believe in their own ways, the ways of the fear-peddlers and sacrifice-collectors will pass away. May it be soon."

"One Day..."

 

"How It Really Is"

"Few Really Ask..."

“Very few beings really seek knowledge in this world – few really ask. On the contrary, they try to wring from the unknown the answers they have already shaped in their own minds – justifications, confirmations, forms of consolation without which they can’t go on. To really ask is to open the door to a whirlwind. The answer may annihilate the question and the questioner.”
- Anne Rice, “The Vampire Lestat”

Gregory Mannarino, "It Passed! Corporate Currency/Stablecoins Controlled By The FED"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 7/17/25
"It Passed! 
Corporate Currency/Stablecoins Controlled By The FED"
Comments here:

"While the we slept, they moved. They pushed through corporate-run stablecoin legislation… handing control of your money, your future, your freedom to Wall Street, the Fed, and Babylon's digital cage. This is not a CBDC… it’s worse.

A Fed-sanctioned token system issued by mega-corporations surveilled, controlled, and tracked from the shadows, with no oversight! At least with a CBDC there would be Congressional Oversight! But with this privatized token currency/stablecoin. There is nothing. We were not even asked if this is what WE the People want! Instead… they did it under cover of darkness, while the people were distracted. This is not democracy. This was a coordinated abomination.

A stablecoin is a digital token that’s designed to mimic the value of a real-world currency, like the US dollar. It’s meant to be “stable.” but… It’s not real money. It’s not cash. It’s a digital I.O.U. issued by private corporations or banks, and now overseen by the Fed. (In this case after the House passed legislation last night while you were asleep and or otherwise distracted). It can be frozen, tracked, controlled, or even erased with a keystroke. It’s not freedom, it’s programmable compliance/digital slavery.

Lions… now is the time to roar! Call your Representatives. Flood social media… especially Trump’s Truth Social. Let them know we see you. This is the moment to rise, not freeze. This is how digital chains are forged… And if we do not act now, we will wear them.
- GM

Bill Bonner, "Trade Squashing"

"Trade Squashing"
by Bill Bonner

Poitou, France - "The headline news this morning. Bloomberg: "Trump eyes tariffs of 10% to 15% for 150 countries." Over many centuries people learned to trade with one another, peacefully, to get what they wanted. Trade with family, trade with friends, trade with the next town...with a foreign country...with people you never met in places you never heard of. As civilization expanded, so did trade. The most successful empires expanded the trading area and financed themselves largely on trading wealth - Carthage, Rome, the Mongols, Venice, Holland, England and America. But now we’re going in the other direction...squeezing off trade as if we were kinking a garden hose. And for reasons that often have little to do with trade itself.

- To fight the flow of drugs. The New York Times (also this morning): "Trump Has Promised More Tariffs on Mexico. President Trump has threatened to increase Mexico’s tariff rate to 30 percent starting Aug. 1, claiming the country hasn’t sufficiently tackled drug cartels.

- To punish international judges when they don’t see things your way. POTUS: "By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America... I, DONALD J. TRUMP, President of the United States of America, find that the International Criminal Court (ICC), as established by the Rome Statute, has engaged in illegitimate and baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel."

- To suborn a foreign nation’s internal justice system. CBS News: "Trump threatens Brazil with 50% tariff, citing "Witch Hunt" against Bolsonaro."

- To reward a big campaign donor. Embraer is Brazil’s biggest airplane manufacturer. And its major competitor - Boeing - is one of Trump’s biggest supporters. Business Insider: "Around three-quarters of Embraer's business jets and nearly half of its regional airliners are delivered to US clients. "Given the relevance of this market, we estimate that if this [Trump's tariff plan] moves on at this magnitude, we will have an impact similar to that of COVID-19 in terms of the decline in the company's revenue," CEO Francisco Gomes Neto said, per Reuters."

- And of course, to force Americans to pay more for imports while rewarding friends with contracts. Times Now: "President Donald Trump announced a landmark trade agreement with Indonesia on July 15, 2025, via Truth Social, opening the Southeast Asian nation’s market to U.S. goods for the first time. The deal includes Indonesia buying $15 billion in U.S. energy, $4.5 billion in agricultural products, and 50 Boeing jets, while paying a 19% tariff on exports to the US."

- Or how about this? The US dollar has lost 10% of its value, worldwide, so far this year. And US policies (BBBA, tariffs, deportations...) are almost sure to mean even greater losses for dollar holders. But don’t even think of diversifying. Fortune: "Donald Trump threatens 100% tariff on countries that turn away from the dollar."

- And how’s this for winning friends and influencing people? BBC: "Trump threatens extra 10% tariff on nations that side with Brics." "Any country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of BRICS, will be charged an ADDITIONAL 10% tariff. There will be no exceptions to this policy," Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on Sunday."

What are the consequences of all this trade squashing? Money Talks: "U.S. Trade Drops Second Straight Month As Tariff Effects Emerge." "...uncertainty drives shifts in global commerce patterns and gold trading reaches historic levels."

The Daily Mail: "Americans felt a sting at the grocery store last month. Overall inflation hit 2.7 percent in June compared to a year earlier, the Labor Department said Tuesday. That is 0.3 percent higher than last month's 2.4 percent reading."

And The Wall Street Journal: "A chaotic rollout of tariffs is starting to filter through to price tags on store shelves. An immigration crackdown is beginning to weigh on jobs growth, measured by federal surveys. Taken together, the impact of President Trump’s whirlwind six months back in office is showing up in the economy." Stay tuned…

Adventures With Danno, "Mega Shopping At Kroger"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, AM 7/17/25
"Mega Shopping At Kroger"
Comments here:

Wednesday, July 16, 2025

"AI Will Replace The Middle Class, Trump Sparks Chaos On Wall St."

Jeremiah Babe, 7/16/25
"AI Will Replace The Middle Class, 
Trump Sparks Chaos On Wall St."
Comments here:

"Epstein, Donald Trump and Sexual Blackmail Networks, w/Nick Bryant"

Full screen recommended
The Chris Hedges Report, 7/16/25
"Epstein, Donald Trump and 
Sexual Blackmail Networks, w/Nick Bryant"
"Despite a strong desire from the public to get to the bottom of the Jeffrey Epstein case, which saw the trafficking and sexual exploitation of thousands of young girls, the cabal associated with Epstein continues its conspiracy to suppress the ugly truth of the ruling class."
Comments here:

"Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill': Defense Dollars, Debt, and the Real Cost of Spending Sprees"

"Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill': Defense Dollars, 
Debt, and the Real Cost of Spending Sprees"
by International Man

"International Man: Trump's so-called "Big Beautiful Bill"involves massive government spending - how do you see that impacting the already unsustainable US national debt, and is there any real distinction between that and the kind of spending we saw under Biden?

Doug Casey:
It's ironic that the "Big Beautiful Bill"has the same initials - BBB - as Biden's "Build Back Better." I haven't read all 887 pages of the bill. And I suspect very few Congress critters have either; it's something only a lawyer or a lobbyist might do. But I have read analyses and summaries. It's clear that it's just a hodgepodge, a conglomeration of notions and pork. Nothing new, just like almost every other bill that's come out of Washington, DC, for many decades.

There's very little to recommend it if you're concerned about freedom and prosperity. It's essentially 887 pages of additional things you must do, and must not do, with penalties for non-compliance, and new taxes to fund it all.

Trump's utter lack of a philosophical core is increasingly evident. I've come to the conclusion that, other than his entertainment value, troll-like sense of humor, and not being Kamala Harris, the only consistently good thing about Trump is his anti-woke stance. And he's not anti-woke based on philosophical principle, but just because of his gut feelings.

The bill doesn't just raise spending and taxes, it creates chaos, adding complexity through new mandates and cutouts. Typical of narcissists, much of what Trump does will wind up making enemies everywhere, for no good reason. But he doesn't realize that. He's what's known as a bullshit artist. He thinks his glib words actually pull the wool over people's eyes, when all they do is expose him as a shallow conman.

International Man: What should have the bill done?

Doug Casey:
There's no attempt to implement the findings of the DOGE, which uncovered immense amounts of fraud, waste, and corruption within the US government. DOGE could have changed the course of the US. But it turned out to be nothing but a shameless PR stunt. No wonder Musk quit in disgust.

Instead of adding to the deficits and total debt, which is what this bill does, I would have liked to see an outright default on the national debt. I realize that sounds like an outrageous, even ridiculous suggestion, because it would lead to the wholesale failure of the current financial system. So let's explore a few particulars of the mad concept.

The Fed should be abolished. Gold should be reinstated as the national currency. About 90% of Federal agencies should be abolished. The "defense"budget should be decreased by 75%, instead of being increased to a trillion dollars per year. All US troops should withdraw from all foreign bases. The government should resign its membership in the UN, NATO, and scores of other clubs and treaties. All aid and subsidies of domestic corporations and foreign governments should cease… There's a lot more, but that's a good start.

Regarding the national debt, it effectively transfers wealth from the average taxpayer - who is already being devastated by currency inflation - to the wealthy individuals and institutions who own it. The debt will be defaulted on eventually, probably indirectly, through inflation. I simply believe it should be defaulted on directly. Insofar as a default can ever be honest, that's the only honest way to do it. Compare it to a 100-story building on the verge of collapse. It's better to conduct a controlled demolition, with a warning, than wait for it to fall on everyone unexpectedly.

There are other reasons for a default, however. First, it would free future generations of Americans from being turned into serfs just to pay it off. Second, it would punish the people who have enabled the State by lending it money to fund all the terrible things it does, like fighting wars, enriching its lackeys, and expanding the welfare state.

But none of that is going to happen. I only mention these things for your intellectual amusement. Maybe John Hunt and I will do a novel about the way a default would sort out. But we're behind schedule on "Terrorist," the 4th in the current series. So, one thing at a time as we watch the ongoing collapse of Western Civ…

Another bad thing about the big buffoonish bill is that it's a distraction from the corruption exposed in the Epstein matter. Trump has said he doesn't want to hear any more about Epstein. I expect he will, however. It should be the biggest scandal since the Dreyfuss affair in France at the turn of the 20th century.

International Man: Trump's bill includes a $1 trillion allocation for defense spending and provisions that appear to expand the President's authority. Does that signal a trend toward militarization and centralized power under the guise of economic or national security?

Doug Casey:
Absolutely. I'm surprised that there's not wholesale outrage at the fact that it increases annual defense spending to a trillion dollars a year, when, in fact, military spending could and should be cut back radically. This is further proof of how supine and degraded the average American has become.

For one thing, it funds the so-called "Golden Dome,"which we analyzed in some detail last week (link). In addition, it designates about $170 billion to ICE and border enforcement. While sending illegal migrants back where they came from is a good thing, as with all government agencies and actions, the extra agents that are hired will never be fired. The 100,000 new detention beds contemplated by the act will remain long after Trump is gone. They will just be repurposed by the Democrats. The government will continue growing like a cancerous self-licking ice cream cone.

The bottom line is that the bill directs a lot more power and dollars toward the State, and in no way cuts back the State. Americans may not like the migrants, but I suspect they're going to like thousands of new ICE agents checking to see if their "papers are in order" even less.

International Man:
When comparing Trump's spending to Biden's "Build Back Better"agenda, do you see any meaningful differences in their impact on the economy, or is it simply two sides of the same inflationary coin?

Doug Casey: The main difference between them is who gets the pork and the rhetoric that surrounds it. For instance, there's a section in the bill reinforcing farm subsidies, which - depending on various conditions - slop from $30 to $60 billion per year to farmers, as if they were hogs. Nothing new, these egregious subsidies have been around for many decades. They're welfare payments. In addition to corrupting farmers, they necessitate the Department of Agriculture (DOA), which employs 100,000 bureaucrats. Anything the DOA does that's useful would be done by entrepreneurs. This bill just further cements industrial agriculture in place and makes the survival of family farms even more difficult.

You might also consider the $1,000 "Trump accounts"for kids. Trump loves anything with his name attached to it. But it's a bad idea. It gives the public the idea that Trump is giving them something for nothing, and gets them in the habit of receiving stolen goods. Needless to say, a new agency will have to be set up to monitor the accounts. Maybe the amount should be raised to $10,000 or $100,000. Then Trump could claim he was creating a whole generation of multimillionaires.

International Man:
Do you believe the spending surge under Trump, including this bill, will help normalize trillion-dollar deficits, and what does that mean for the US dollar going forward?

Doug Casey: Forget about trillion-dollar deficits. That's far in the rear-view window. We're looking at three, four, and five trillion-dollar deficits. That's after the multi-trillion-dollar tax increase through tariffs. Also, the BBB has almost no reference to deregulation. It's just another tax, spend, and borrow bill. The additional chaos it causes might immanentize the financial eschaton that we're facing. I'm not talking about ten years or even five years from now. I think it'll happen within Trump's term.

And the Republicans, worthless as they are, will be blamed. I couldn't care less about them, but because they're somehow associated with free market values, those values will also be blamed. In 2028, therefore, the chances are excellent that the lefties will be elected. Even assuming that Trump serves out the remainder of his term, which I think is in doubt. Things could get seriously out of control.

I'm afraid that Trump is acting much like Roosevelt did in 1932. Few people know that when Roosevelt ran for office, he ran on what amounted to a radical free market platform. His proposed policies were almost libertarian in nature, as a reaction to the horrible statist and dirigiste policies of the benighted Herbert Hoover, who's always falsely painted as a free market guy. After Roosevelt was in office, he instituted something close to socialism in the US.

I think Trump - who's always been an egomaniac - is turning into a megalomaniac. The man never, ever, admits he's wrong. That's very dangerous. It's scary. For a while, because Kamala was defeated, it looked like Morning in America. But unfortunately, morning only lasts six hours. Washington’s new “Big Beautiful Bill” may go down as the final nail in the dollar’s coffin."

Gregory Mannarino, "Alert! Global Debt-Shift, Government Sanctioned Digital Currency"

Gregory Mannarino, PM 7/16/25
"Alert! Global Debt-Shift, 
Government Sanctioned Digital Currency"
Comments here:

Musical Interlude: Deuter, "Sound of Invisible Waters"

Deuter, "Sound of Invisible Waters"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"Large galaxies and faint nebulae highlight this deep image of the M81 Group of galaxies. First and foremost in the wide-angle 12-hour exposure is the grand design spiral galaxy M81, the largest galaxy visible in the image. M81 is gravitationally interacting with M82 just below it, a big galaxy with an unusual halo of filamentary red-glowing gas. 

Around the image many other galaxies from the M81 Group of galaxies can be seen. Together with other galaxy congregates including our Local Group of galaxies and the Virgo Cluster of galaxies, the M81 Group is part of the expansive Virgo Supercluster of Galaxies. This whole galaxy menagerie is seen through the faint glow of an Integrated Flux Nebula, a little studied complex of diffuse gas and dust clouds in our Milky Way Galaxy."

"So, How Do You Beat The Odds..."

“So, how do you beat the odds when it’s one against a billion? You’re just outnumbered. You stand strong, keep pushing yourself against all rational limits, and never give up. But the truth of the matter is, despite how hard you try and fight to stay in control, when it’s all said and done, sometimes you’re just outnumbered.”
- “Meredith”, “Gray’s Anatomy”
“In the movie “The Lion in Winter”, when the sons, in the dungeon, think they hear Henry coming down the stairs to kill them:
Richard: ”He’s here! He’ll get no satisfaction out of us! Don’t let him see you beg! Take it like a man!”
Geoffrey: “You chivalrous fool! As if the way one falls down matters!”
Richard: ”Well, when the fall is all that’s left, it matters a great deal.”

"Does Anyone Know..."

"All sins, of course, deserve to be treated with mercy: we all do what we can, and life is too hard and too cruel for us to condemn anyone for failing in this area. Does anyone know what he himself would do if faced with the worst and how much truth could he bear under such circumstances?" 
- Andre Comte-Sponville
Joe South, "Walk A Mile In My Shoes"

"The Science of Why We Repeat Mistakes"

"The Science of Why We Repeat Mistakes"
by The Hutch Report

"History has shown us that we have made many, many mistakes as a society. It has also demonstrated that we tend to repeat previous mistakes made, despite our better judgement. “But why do so many people make the same errors over and over again?” This was the question asked in an article published in The Atlantic.

Procedural memory or Process memory is a part of your long-term memory. It is responsible for knowing how to do things. It is considered a subset of, what is sometimes referred to as, your subconscious memory. Memory is basically nothing more than the record left by a learning process. Thus, memory depends on learning. But learning also depends on memory. The knowledge stored in your memory provides the framework to which you link new knowledge by association.

When we do something repetitively it gets recorded into our neural pathways. The brain is not able to tell whether or not we are forming a good habit or a bad habit. Our neural pathways are therefore created for both positive and negative behaviors, depending on where you place your focus. Our brains see a repeated action, whatever it may be, and creates a pattern. It automates that action appropriately for the next time. This allows us to save energy.

A study by Johns Hopkins, published in the 'Journal of Current Biology', showed that a subject’s attention towards a previously reward-associated stimuli was positively correlated with the release of dopamine. “Dopamine released within the caudate and putamen is known to underlie habit learning and the expression of habitual behaviors.” This means that there is evidence that our brains are wired to pay attention to things that were once rewarding, even if they aren’t anymore.

We tend to fall victim to a number of human biases that dominate the direction of our thinking. The Ego Effect, or Egocentric Bias can lead us to keep making the same mistakes over and over again. Example, someone who is highly skilled in a certain expertise may struggle to imagine the perspective of others who are more unfamiliar with it.

In 1987 we experienced Black Monday in the US as the stock market fell precipitously. As Investopedia recounts, “There were some warning signs of excesses that were similar to excesses at previous inflection points. Economic growth had slowed while inflation was rearing its head. The strong dollar was putting pressure on U.S. exports. The stock market and economy were diverging for the first time in the bull market, and, as a result, valuations climbed to excessive levels, with the overall market’s price-earnings ratio climbing above 20. Future estimates for earnings were trending lower, but stocks were unaffected.”

During the savings and loan crisis, the US experienced the failure of 1,043 out of the 3,234 S&L banks from 1986 to 1995. It is believed that the failure began with inflation that started in the 1960s, which led to Paul Volker, U.S. Central Bank Chairman at the time, to raise interest rates. Mortgage rates eventually topped out at 18.45%. This helped bring on a recession which saw the beginning of the S&L crisis. Deregulation of the industry, combined with regulatory tolerance, and fraud worsened the crisis.

During the 1990s, we experienced a Finnish, Swedish and British banking crisis. In 1997, we experienced the Asian financial crisis. 1998 saw the Russian financial crisis, followed by the Ecuador and Argentinian financial crises in 1998-1999.

In 2008, we experienced a financial crisis that ravaged the economy and engulfed the country and the world. The government and the Central Bank intervened with a number of bailout programs, which saved the banks, stabilized the financial system and corporate America. Not surprisingly, the combination of regulatory tolerance and fraud allowed the banks freedom to do as they wished, and worsened the crisis…..once again.

Having the Central Banks and Governments backstop every poor practice perpetrated by financial institutions has, time and time again, created a situation of “moral hazard.” This essentially means that if you are confident somebody will bail you out, you will have a tendency to risk as much as you possible can.

In addition, financial institutions are looking for that dopamine hit. As we previously described from the Johns Hopkins study, our brains are wired to pay attention to things that were once rewarding to us. It is then understandable how greedy bankers will keep trying to identify those high risk, high payoff investments despite the risk and dangers.

Government, Central Banks and Regulatory authorities tend to fall prey to the Ego Effect bias. They believe that they are smarter than everyone else, and have a hard time to understand how the general population would not see things the way they do. It is all under their control!

So, we can see how not only have we not learned from our past mistakes, we continue to make them. Looking at the present economic situation, the level of asset prices and the bravado of the current Central Bankers, you can expect another crisis to arise, which will most likely be more severe than the last. Why? Simply because they have shown us that they are not capable of learning from past mistakes.

Does this mean that humans are not capable of learning from their mistakes? No, we certainly are. It just takes effort and a large amount of humility. It may not seem that way at the moment, but in an increasingly complex and uncertain world which we live, people and organizations that embrace failure and create a strong culture around learning from their mistakes will ultimately thrive. Hopefully we’ll learn from our mistakes following the next once-in-a-lifetime crisis!"

The Daily "Near You?"

Jaipur, Rajasthan, India. Thanks for stopping by!

The Poet: David Whyte, "One Day"

"One Day"

"One day I will say
the gift I once had has been taken.
The place I have made for myself
belongs to another.
The words I have sung
are being sung by the ones
I would want.
Then I will be ready
for that voice
and the still silence in which it arrives.
And if my faith is good
then we'll meet again
on the road,
and we'll be thirsty,
and stop
and laugh
and drink together again
from the deep well of things as they are."

- David Whyte,
"Where Many Rivers Meet"

"The poem is a little myth of man's capacity of making life meaningful.
And in the end, the poem is not a thing we see -
it is, rather, a light by which we may see - and what we see is life."
- Robert Penn Warren

"This Very Moment..."

“Hope is always about the future. And it isn’t always good news. Sometimes, hope can imprison us with belief or expectation that something will happen in the future to change our lives. Similarly hopelessness isn’t always about despair. Hopelessness can bring us right into this very moment and answer all of life’s most difficult questions. Who am I? Where am I? What does this mean? And what now?”
- Daniel Gottlieb

Kahlil Gibran, “The Seven Selves”

“The Seven Selves”
by Kahlil Gibran

“In the silent hour of the night, as I lay half asleep, my seven selves sat together and thus conversed in whispers:

First Self: "Here, in this madman, I have dwelt all these years, with naught to do but renew his pain by day and recreate his sorrow by night. I can bear my fate no longer, and now I must rebel."

Second Self: "Yours is a better lot than mine, brother, for it is given me to be this madman’s joyous self. I laugh his laughter and sing his happy hours, and with thrice winged feet I dance his brighter thoughts. It is I that would rebel against my weary existence."

Third Self: "And what of me, the love-ridden self, the flaming brand of wild passion and fantastic desires? It is I the love-sick self who would rebel against this madman."

Fourth Self: "I, amongst you all, am the most miserable, for naught was given me but the odious hatred and destructive loathing. It is I, the tempest-like self, the one born in the black caves of Hell, who would protest against serving this madman."

Fifth Self: "Nay, it is I, the thinking self, the fanciful self, the self of hunger and thirst, the one doomed to wander without rest in search of unknown things and things not yet created; it is I, not you, who would rebel."

Sixth Self: "And I, the working self, the pitiful laborer, who, with patient hands, and longing eyes, fashion the days into images and give the formless elements new and eternal forms – it is I, the solitary one, who would rebel against this restless madman."

Seventh Self: "How strange that you all would rebel against this man, because each and every one of you has a preordained fate to fulfill. Ah! could I but be like one of you, a self with a determined lot! But I have none, I am the do-nothing self, the one who sits in the dumb, empty nowhere and no-when, when you are busy re-creating life. Is it you or I, neighbors, who should rebel?"

When the seventh self thus spake the other six selves looked with pity upon him but said nothing more; and as the night grew deeper one after the other went to sleep enfolded with a new and happy submission. But the seventh self remained watching and gazing at nothingness, which is behind all things.”

"Never Regret Anything..."

"Meanwhile..."

Meanwhile, in a sane, civilized society, a much needed
 normalcy break from the never-ending bad, depressing news...
Full screen recommended.
Lisa with Love, 7/16/25
"Weekend In Modern Russian Village"
Comments here:

"How It Really Is"

 

Dan, I Allegedly, "Insiders Tell All - Leaked Secrets from Inside Big Business"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, AM 7/6/25
"Insiders Tell All - 
Leaked Secrets from Inside Big Business"
"What They Don’t Want You to Know – Real Workers Expose the Truth: Mortgage brokers are disappearing, and in this video, I’m diving into why this is happening and what it means for the housing market and beyond. With insider information you won’t find in the news, I’ll uncover shocking revelations about Discover’s mortgage department shutdown, the challenges facing mortgage loan officers, and how AI is transforming the industry. Plus, I’ll share updates on economic trends, like rising debt, housing issues, and job losses in key sectors. From fake billing scams to postal service struggles, this video is packed with eye-opening insights you need to know."
Comments here:

Adventures With Danno, "Dollar Tree Items Everyone Should Buy Before Prices Go Up!"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, 7/6/25
"Dollar Tree Items Everyone Should 
Buy Before Prices Go Up!"
Comments here:

Bill Bonner, "Fuji Bomb"

Mt Fuji looms over the skyline of Tokyo in Japan.
"Fuji Bomb"
by Bill Bonner

‘Sire...worse than a crime, you have committed an error.’
- Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord

Youghal, Ireland - "A crime is whatever the feds say it is. Often not what you think it oughta be. But an error is different. It is a left turn when you should have turned right. It is forgetting your wife’s birthday. It is a budget deficit, when you should have been running a surplus. In the Big, Bad, Budget Abomination for example, there are two huge errors.

The obvious one: they could have increased the deficit...or decreased it. They chose more spending, not less... even more money they don’t have on programs they don’t need. And they are doing it on such a large scale - with $2 trillion deficits - it is sure to blow up the entire US financial system.

We all know you can’t spend more than you make for long. But some people delude themselves with the fantasy that we’ll ‘grow our way’ out of the debt trap. As we’ve seen, in the light of federal policies, such growth is less and less likely. Deportations will lower the supply of labor. Fortune: "The U.S. may see more than 500,000 people emigrate from the country as a result of President Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation campaign, according to a recent report from the American Enterprise Institute….could likely result in a hit to the U.S. labor force that would shrink the country’s gross domestic product, new data shows."

And deficits will gobble up the supply of capital. Seeking Alpha: "As government spending increases, the less productive public sector absorbs more labor and resources, starving the more productive private sector of these critical inputs."

The predominant view is that while the feds’ deficits are clearly a mistake, it will take many years for the harm to show up. So, the consequences, such as they are, will likely fall on our children and grandchildren, not on ourselves. And since none of us knows the future...why worry about something that may or may not actually happen sometime in the distant tomorrow?

Yes, of course, the iceberg is dead ahead. But maybe AI will figure out how to avoid it. And yet, the danger grows closer. CBS News: "Inflation rose in June...for the second month in a row." Whether this marks the beginning of large price increases or not, we don’t know. But it might be a good idea to keep an eye on the lifeboats, just in case.

Other Debt Crisis Deniers look to Japan for comfort. Except for the fact that their economy is shrinking (along with their population) a Fuji of debt - the biggest pile in the world - hasn’t seemed to bother them. But wait. Even there, the error is becoming more apparent. The Mainichi: "Yield on 10-yr Japan gov't bond hits 1.595%, highest since Oct. 2008…at the time of the global financial crisis caused by the collapse of U.S. securities firm Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc."

The Japanese can do math. At 250% of GDP, even a small increase in interest rates has a devastating effect on government finances. The government must borrow to cover the interest payments, which widens the deficit...increases the debt...and raises the interest cost - whereupon the error flashes like a funeral parlor with a neon welcome light.

Back in the US, the Republicans’ spendfest goes on and the errors multiply. Not only are they spending too much, they are claiming to spend too little. After all, if huge deficits don’t really matter, why try to save money on medical care for those who need it? The Hill: "GOP lawmakers are warning that slashing spending on Medicaid and food assistance will cost the party seats in the midterms - threatening their razor-thin House majority - by kicking millions of Americans off safety-net programs." The poor lawmakers had to decide. Which error, which sin, which mistake to make. Being fair about it, they make them all."

Gregory Mannarino, "Freefall Economic Policy? It's Not What You Think"

Gregory Mannarino, 7/16/25
"Freefall Economic Policy?
 It's Not What You Think"
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"Truth..."

 

John Wilder, "Epstein: How Deep Is The Rabbit Hole?"

"Epstein: How Deep Is The Rabbit Hole?"
by John Wilder

“I’m thinking somebody got away with murder.”
– "Minority Report"

"When I started thinking about how to structure this post, Philip K. Dick (PKD) came to mind. Dick, if you’re unfamiliar with him, was an enigmatic man. Where other science fiction writers liked to speculate about the nature of reality, PKD obsessed about it throughout his life. If you watch movies, you’ve certainly seen some based on his work. "Blade Runner," "Screamers", "The Adjustment Bureau", and "Total Recall" are some of them.

In each of these, nothing is what it seems. The base level of reality is always a lie, and only digging allows the Truth to come out, and often none of the characters are ready for what lives at the bottom of the rabbit hole.

As I turned on the TV to, perhaps, put on some background noise for when I write I looked at the computer-suggested suggestions of things to watch. The first movie suggested? "Minority Report."  Yup, the PKD story about clairvoyants who see future crimes before they happen. I’ll just mark it down as a coincidence, for now, though I certainly didn’t hit “play” and decided to write this post in silence instead.

Epstein is the story of the day, rather his files. One of the glaring things about the story is how it is all played out in the media as “Jeffrey Epstein, disgraced American financier and child sex offender.” Let’s go back a bit to the beginning, and unravel a bit. What, exactly is true about Epstein?

Well, he never got a degree, yet was tapped to teach physics and mathematics for the Dalton School, the kind of school that educates the children of the (primarily, but not entirely) Jewish kids of the rich and powerful of New York. Epstein was fired from the school. There are stories of him attending keggers with the kids he was teaching. You connect the dots.

But in the first (but not last) example of Epstein failing upwards, one of the people he came in contact with was a parent of one of his students – Alan Greenberg, CEO of Bear Stearns. Greenberg hired Epstein, who had a quick rise. But, after fewer than five years at Bear Stearns, Epstein was fired for misconduct. This time, however, it was probably for screwing over, not screwing, a customer.

Fired, living in New York, something happened. Around this time, Epstein began letting some people know that he was actually an intelligence agent. He showed them things like an Austrian passport with a Saudi address. The whole, “doing things to make billions” is entirely missing at this point, and in fact one of the businesses he formed around this time turned out to be one of the largest Ponzi schemes in history.

But Epstein was never implicated in the scheme, so he opened a wealth management firm for people who were billionaires. What, exactly, they were supposed to learn from an ex-high school teacher without a college degree is unclear. And, there seems to be only one billionaire, Leslie Wexner, owner of Victoria’s Secret© of record. Wexner, of note, claims to have been possessed by a dybbuk, or malicious spirit of a dead person clinging to the living because of its unresolved sins. I’m not making this up.

For whatever reason, Epstein was given large amounts of control over Wexner’s cash in 1991. Perhaps the dybbuk made him do it. 1991 is also the same year that billionaire Robert Maxwell (born Jan Ludvik Hyman Binyamin Hoch) died, though to be fair, Maxwell died later in the year after Wexner had given control of hundreds of millions of dollars to Epstein, so it’s hard to say if they’re the same dollars.

Robert Maxwell was presumed to die swimming naked off the Canary Islands in the middle of a financial default. Maxwell’s body was found, and it was all found to be just an accident. You know, an accident that happened just as Maxwell’s financial empire was melting down around him and questions swirled. Maxwell’s funeral was attended by the Israeli prime minister, the Israeli president, and six current and former heads of Israeli intelligence. Completely normal for a guy who was just a newspaper guy and publisher.

Did I mention that Maxwell owned (in addition to his newspapers) Pergamon Press, the premier publisher of scientific breakthroughs from the 1950s onward? No? Or the allegations that Maxwell was Mossad? No? Well, I’m sure those high Israeli intelligence agents were at his funeral because they just had openings in their schedule that day and needed something fun to do.

Or that most of Maxwell’s fortune vanished after his death? I’m sure that whoever identified the naked body that had been found at sea wouldn’t lie to help the troubled executive close the book on an uncomfortable financial situation and a legacy that would likely make him a traitor to his adopted United Kingdom. Or that his daughter, Ghislaine Maxwell, suddenly showed up in Jeffrey Epstein’s life right after her father died and Epstein seemed flush with cash?

Enough contradictions and coincidences exist about Epstein just with the above to question how Epstein was living the life of a billionaire on a Bud Light budget. Airplanes. Houses. An island. Those are the trappings of a someone who has been put into the position to create a honey-pot, to gather incriminating the financial, industrial, entertainment, news, and political elite of a country. But there may be more.

Eric Weinstein got a Ph.D. in math, but the particular math he focused on was more tied to physics, particularly the geometry of space-time. Which explains why he works at an investment firm, I guess.

Of particular note, Weinstein has made the claim that he thinks that physics was derailed in the 1970s to stop more fundamental discoveries from being made – he has described the last four decades of theoretical work as leading nowhere except into mathematical fantasy. Of note, Weinstein himself is not without controversy.

Regardless, Weinstein talks about his single meeting with Jeffery Epstein. It was in 2002 (or so, he said) when another venture capitalist suggested he go to meet Epstein. This is pre-scandal Epstein, but Weinstein describes that all of the people working for him were women, younger than thirty, and quite attractive. During his meeting, Weinstein was taken aback. Apparently, Epstein knew intimate details of Weinstein’s work in mathematics, details that Weinstein says, “He shouldn’t have known.”

Do a search on YouTube® for “Epstein and Weinstein” and you’ll see several interviews, done over the course of years, where Weinstein talks about the meeting. The interviews are consistent with each other, so Weinstein has his story straight. “He was a construct,” Weinstein told his then-wife after meeting Epstein.

It’s an odd phrase. Weinstein describes several oddities of the meeting in addition to the details of his work, but kept describing the conversation as sort-of a verbal Ju-Jitsu. Whenever Weinstein would follow up a comment and begin to go too deeply into a subject, Epstein would deftly change the subject.

Weinstein walked away with several impressions – Epstein wasn’t a genius currency trader (what he purported to be at that time). Per Weinstein, Jeffery Epstein wasn’t remotely a world class trader. Secondly, Epstein was looking for something else from Weinstein. On multiple interviews, Weinstein describes the meeting as one where the hair on his neck stood on end – like a meeting with someone evil, or, perhaps, Evil.

Weinstein also made the observation that while it was entirely feasible that Epstein was running a honey-trap to get incriminating evidence for the control of political, business, and entertainment figures, there was something more with the ‘construct’.

He figured that Epstein was like an intelligence “department store” where just one aspect of what he did was tied to the honey-trap. He pointed to Epstein’s constant work with physicists working on fundamental science. Remember, Robert Maxwell owned Pergamon Press, where all of the scientists would try to publish their groundbreaking work, for decades.

Maxwell had the ability to see breakthroughs before they were public, and to suppress or, perhaps control the way that science has been developing. For decades. Was Epstein an extension of Maxwell’s work? Why else did Epstein stay so involved with advanced math and physics, even holding a conference of 21 top physicists, include three Nobel Prize winners at his house? Why was Jeffrey Epstein so inquisitive about the cutting edge of theoretical physics?

Alexander Acosta, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida said, “I was told Epstein ‘belonged to intelligence’ and to ‘leave it alone’.” Acosta was told it was, “Above his pay grade.”

Oddly, Epstein’s estate seems to contain little money, as if his persona as a billionaire was entirely contrived – a spy’s idea of what a billionaire’s life would be like, but unable to stand up to the scrutiny of a recorded, information heavy world where his financial “genius” could be tracked. Could Epstein be another Eli Cohen, the Egyptian-born Jew who faked being an Arab on behalf of Mossad so Cohen could throw drunken prostitute parties for Syrian officials as a honeytrap, back in the early 1960s? It rhymes. And if Mossad only has one joke, why not keep at it as long as it gets a laugh?

The nation deserves that the information about Jeffrey Epstein be made public. The suicide seems...convenient, just like Robert Maxwell’s death. The odd fumbling of video information, the inept non-disclosure disclosure of already public information by Pam Bondi...it’s not working.

Epstein is too big to blow over, though I honestly don’t think anyone is ready for how deep this rabbit hole goes. It doesn’t matter how many PKD-like twists it takes. The Truth matters, and even if it causes mass global disruption, we need to see it anyway, because if it’s hidden in darkness, it will do nothing but fester. That, however, just might be my own minority opinion."

"Tucker Calls Out Israeli Blackmail - GOP Reels Into Civil War"

Full screen recommended.
Kim Iverson, 7/14/26
"Tucker Calls Out Israeli Blackmail - 
GOP Reels Into Civil War"
"Tucker Carlson just detonated a political firebomb at Turning Point USA - accusing Israel of blackmailing U.S. politicians and suggesting that Americans who serve in the Israeli Defense Forces should lose their citizenship. The reaction? Chaos. Zionist GOP figures are fuming. America First conservatives are cheering. What started as a speech is now revealing a deep and growing divide inside the Republican Party. Who do our leaders really serve - the American people, or a foreign government? We break it all down."
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"The Epstein Factor: Connecting Dead Children In Gaza With Abused Ones In The US"

George Galloway, 7/15/25
"The Epstein Factor: Connecting Dead Children
 In Gaza With Abused Ones In The US"
"Prof. Seyed Marandi: It's been downhill for the Israeli regime for 21 months but the Epstein revelations have made it even worse. While Europeans and Americans haven’t even imposed token sanctions."
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Denzel Washington, "The World Thought Iran Was Finished, Then Came The Unexpected"

Denzel Washington, 7/15/25
"The World Thought Iran Was Finished, 
Then Came The Unexpected"

"In this powerful and eye-opening speech, legendary actor and speaker Denzel Washington shares deep truths about resilience, leadership, and the underestimated power of nations - focusing on Iran's unexpected comeback when the world thought it was finished. This 22-minute motivational journey draws powerful parallels between personal growth and a nation’s revival. Learn how faith, unity, and persistence can defy global expectations and rewrite destiny - both for countries and individuals. If you’ve ever been counted out, underestimated, or pushed to your limit - this is YOUR message. Denzel’s words will ignite your spirit, awaken your strength, and help you understand the real meaning of rising after the fall."
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