Padova, Italy. Thanks for stopping by!
So, we rise from the rubble...
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Sunday, April 19, 2026
"Just What The Doctor Ordered!"
"The year is 1950. Your doctor lights a cigarette and tells you smoking is fine. He read it in a study. He is telling the truth about having read it. He does not know, or is not saying, that the study was funded by the tobacco industry.
The year is 1958. Your doctor tells you to eat less fat. The evidence is contested. The contestation is not in the public messaging. The food industry has been helpful in clarifying which findings deserve attention. Some researchers who published contradictory data have been quietly defunded. Ancel Keys is on the cover of Time magazine.
The year is 1962. Your doctor prescribes thalidomide to your pregnant wife for morning sickness. It has been approved. The FDA gave it the green light in Europe [JGM - factcheck, EU regulators did that]. Twelve thousand children will be born with severe limb malformations before anyone in an official capacity acknowledges the problem. The families are told the drug was safe. The drug was approved. Both of these things remain true.
The year is 1972. Your doctor prescribes Valium. Britain is in the grip of a benzodiazepine wave that will last two decades. The dependency risk is known internally. It is not shared. Your doctor is not lying to you. He was not told either.
The year is 1999. Your doctor prescribes Vioxx for your arthritis. It is newer than ibuprofen, well-tolerated, and Merck has a study showing it works. Merck also has internal data suggesting it roughly doubles the risk of heart attack. This data will not reach your doctor for four more years. Fifty thousand people are estimated to have died in the interim. Merck eventually settles for 4.85 billion dollars. No criminal charges are brought.
The year is 2002. Your doctor prescribes OxyContin. Purdue Pharma trained its sales representatives to tell doctors the addiction risk was less than one percent. That figure came from a letter, not a study. The letter was about patients with terminal cancer on short-term doses in hospital settings. Your doctor is a GP with a patient who has a bad back. Nobody draws a distinction. Nobody is required to.
The year is 2008. Your doctor checks your cholesterol. Your LDL is elevated. You are prescribed a statin. Nobody mentions that the number needed to treat for primary prevention is approximately 250. Nobody mentions that the muscle deterioration you'll notice over the next two years is listed as a rare side effect rather than a documented pattern affecting a meaningful percentage of patients. The trial that informed the prescription was funded by the manufacturer.
Now it is today. Your doctor has new guidelines. New studies. New consensus. He is confident. He has always been confident. The confidence has never been the problem.The confidence is, in fact, precisely the problem."
"Being Poor Ain't Cheap"
"Being Poor Ain't Cheap"
by Joshua Wilkey
"Poor people are cash cows. It makes no sense, really. One would think that poor people, by virtue of being poor, would not be profitable customers. However, for many large corporations that target the poor and working poor, there's big money to be made on the backs of those who have no money.
At Dollar General Store locations, customers can get cash back on their purchases. This is not novel. In fact, most all retailers these days offer this option. Soccer moms get cash back so they can have lunch money for their children. Restaurant patrons can get money back to leave a cash tip for their servers. I sometimes get cash back at the grocery store so I can buy Girl Scouts cookies on the way out. It's a simple process. Click "yes" when the little screen asks for cash back, tap the $20 icon, and the cashier hands you some bucks along with your receipt. We've all done it. For those who are poor and those of us who are not but who have limited retail options, however, there's often a sinister catch.
I noticed this a few years ago, first at Dollar Tree, then at Dollar General. There's a little asterisk after the standard "would you like cash back?" prompt. The footnote indicates that "a transaction fee may apply." The transaction fee is usually $1 no matter the amount of cash back. If one opts to get $10 cash back, one is charged a dollar. That's a ten percent fee, for a service that costs the retailer nothing. It's just another way for retailers like Dollar General to make a profit off of their customers, many of whom are very often living below the poverty line.
If an organic grocer or movie theater were charging a fee of this sort, I would likely be annoyed by it, but I wouldn't be so annoyed that I would write about it. However, the poorest members of our communities do not shop at Whole Foods, and they do not often get a chance to go see the latest blockbuster at the theater. They can afford neither. In fact, they likely do not have either organic grocers or first-run theaters in their neighborhoods. Instead, they have Dollar General. Dollar General's stores grow like kudzo in rural America. Even if there isn't a real grocery store in most tiny communities, there's probably a DG.
These ridiculous transaction fees are but one example of how corporations make billions of dollars by taking advantage of socioeconomically disadvantaged customers with few options. There are many other examples, though, and politicians continue to allow it at the expense of their poorest and most marginalized constituents.
Payday lending is one of the most sinister ways that large corporations exploit poor people. For those who are not familiar, payday lending goes something like this: People who are running short on money but who have a verified record of regular income (whether it be Social Security, SSI, payroll, etc.) are able to go to payday lenders and receive a cash loan to be repaid on payday. Often, borrowers are unable to repay their full loan balances and simply “roll over” their loan until a future payday, accruing all sorts of fees and additional interest. The annualized interest rate on these loans is often in the triple digits. Yes, that’s right. Sometimes the annual interest rate is over one hundred percent.
In defense of this practice, many payday lenders and their high-dollar lobbyists argue that they are simply offering a service to poor borrowers that said borrowers cannot obtain anywhere else. This is partially true. The poorest members of society have no access to traditional forms of credit. Some even lack access to checking accounts because of low credit scores or a history of financial missteps.
I know some people who make occasional use of payday lending because they genuinely have emergencies arise that they could not address without a short-term infusion of cash. I also know people, including members of my own family, who have been riding the high-interest payday loan merry-go-round for years, and who have paid thousands more back than they have borrowed yet still owe more. In debating the role of payday lending in our communities, it is essential that we take a nuanced approach. Some form of short-term credit is necessary for those mired in poverty. However, it is flat-out immoral that we regulate payday lending so loosely in many places that people end up feeling crushed under the weight of small high-interest loans that they have no hope of ever repaying. Taking out a $1,000 payday loan should not mean a person becomes tied to tens of thousands of dollars in debt.
Another egregious example of corporations exploiting the poor is rent-to-own retailing. Companies like Aaron’s and Rent-a-Center purport to offer a valuable service for the poor. Because those at the bottom of the socioeconomic spectrum are seldom able to save for big-ticket items like appliances or furniture, these retailers offer a pay-by-the-month scheme that often requires no credit check and no money down. The result is that customers pay as much as three times the retail price of the item, assuming they are able to make payments until the item is paid for. When they are not able to maintain the payments, the retailers simply show up to repossess the items.
Like payday lenders, rent-to-own retailers argue that they provide a valuable service to poor consumers. However, many observers, myself included, conclude that some rent-to-own practices are ethically questionable and tend to target vulnerable consumers who need immediate access to essentials like appliances and bedding. In many states, companies are not required to disclose the final price of the items. Instead, they simply tell customers the amount of the monthly or weekly payments. Because companies call the arrangement "rent-to-own," in many places they are not required to disclose the amount of "interest" customers will pay because it technically isn't interest. When consumers can no longer afford the payments and have to return the item, they often get no credit for payments they have made even if they have paid substantially more than the item is worth. Many customers never realize that they are paying as much as three times the retail price for their items. Those who do realize it likely have no choice apart from going without a bed or refrigerator.
In some instances, state attorneys general have successfully sued major rent-to-own retailers for violating usury and consumer protection laws. However, because these retailers are covered generally by state laws rather than by federal laws, there exists a hit-and-miss patchwork of regulations. Some consumers enjoy greater protections than others. The only determining factor is their location. Those states with more corporation-friendly attorneys general are unlikely to see any activity that might force retailers to behave more ethically toward their customers, because such enforcements will result in a drop in profitability for the retailers. Many major corporations spend good money to be sure that politicians protect their interests rather than the interests of consumers. Rent-to-own retailers and payday lenders are no exception. The poor, of course, can’t afford lobbyists or political contributions.
There are some who will argue that the free market, not the federal government, is the best solution to corporations that exploit the poor. However, those at the bottom of the socioeconomic spectrum, especially the rural poor, do not live in anything resembling a free market. Also, it is important that we label the behavior of rent-to-own companies and payday lenders as what it is: exploitation.
In the hills of Appalachia, poverty is often the rule rather than the exception. One of the most poverty-stricken ZIP codes in the United States is Manchester, Kentucky. Manchester is located in Clay County, which has a population of just over 20,000 people. According to the most recent US Census data available, the per-capita income average between 2011 and 2015 was just $13,802 (less than half the national average) and 46% of the population lives below the poverty line. In Manchester, Rent-a-Center is often the go-to option for poor people looking to buy appliances or furniture. The county has a Walmart, but the nearest discount appliance and furniture dealers are miles away, too far for many to drive. There are some locally-owned options, but few in Clay County are able to pay cash for major purchases given the high rate of poverty and the low rate of employment.
In addition to the rent-to-own retailers, Clay County also has no less than five payday lenders, but only two traditional banks. Conveniently, the primary shopping center in Manchester currently houses a Dollar General, a Rent-a-Center, and two payday lending branches, all within feet of one another.
In places like Manchester, rent-to-own and payday lending outfits thrive. They do so often to the detriment of the poor folks who frequent their businesses. Those promoting the so-called free market approach might argue that customers are not forced to do business with these types of companies. However, given their dire financial circumstances and lack of available options, poor people in Manchester have little choice. They are excluded from participating in the wider world of commerce, often because of forces beyond their own control.
Manchester is not a rare exception. Particularly in central Appalachia, rent-to-own retailers are often the only option for poor people, and payday lenders outnumber banks by large measure. In addition to being food deserts, many poverty-stricken communities are retail deserts. In the most isolated rural areas in Appalachia, Dollar General is one of the only available retail options. Within ten miles of our house in rural Jackson County, NC, there are four Dollar General stores, and our community isn't even particularly isolated. Dollar General is the closest store to our home, and my wife and I tend to shop there by default because it is either that or a ten minute drive to the closest grocery store, or worse, a twenty minute drive into town. While we have the resources to go to town any time we want, many of our neighbors do not. The folks in the trailer park down the road often walk to Dollar General because they have few other options. This does not seem much like a free market driven by competition. Therefore, "free market" solutions simply do not work here.
Dollar General is, I believe, fully aware of the demographics of their shoppers. They know that there are often few ATMs near their locations, and their customers often lack access to traditional banking anyway and end up paying fees of three or four dollars to access their money at ATMs. Especially for people who depend on Social Security or SSI for their income, access to money is an important issue. Dollar General and similar retailers, it seems, understand this. Their solution is not to offer a resource for their customers but to profit from their customers’ limited access to funds. It's cheaper than an ATM, but it's a fee more affluent shoppers never have to think about. While there is nothing illegal about this, it is certainly morally questionable.
That’s the thing about the so-called free market. It makes no accounting for moral right or wrong. That, free market proponents allege, is up to the consumers. Poor consumers, however, still need to eat. They still need ovens and beds. Consumer choice and self-advocacy is often, like so many forms of social or political action, a full-stomach endeavor. When one is hungry, one’s ability to be an activist is diminished. When poor people have no choice but to do business with the greedy companies who reap a hefty profit from their customers' lack of options, those drawing the short straw simply do what they must to survive. Surviving is what poor people do best, and it makes for a miserable life. I know, because I have been there.
When poor people have little option but to do business with discount retailers who charge cash-back fees, rent-to-own retailers who charge inflated prices, and payday lenders who mire their customers neck-deep in impossible-to-pay-back high-interest loans, they are even less likely to ever escape poverty. The stark reality is that poor people often pay substantially more for essentials – bedding, appliances, housing – than would those of us with means. If my wife and I needed a new washer, we'd shop around for the best deal and go buy it. In fact, we might even buy it from Amazon Prime and get free two-day shipping. When my mother, who lived her entire life in poverty, needed a new washer, she was forced to buy one from a rent-to-own outfit that charged her an outrageous delivery fee and hassled her every time she was even a few hours late on a payment. She probably ended up paying $2,000 for a $450 washer. The poor do not have access to Amazon Prime like the rest of us because they can't afford a hundred bucks a year to subscribe. They do not get free delivery and obscenely low prices. They get fleeced.
The limited options available to those in poverty are rarely considered by the political ideologues who are so prone to victim-blaming. These retailers, who are all too often protected by state and federal lawmakers from both parties, package their predatory tactics as opportunities. What they are really selling are tickets on yet another segment of the poverty train. The politicians who protect them should be deprived of options and see just how much more expensive it is to survive. They should be ashamed for protecting those who profit from poverty, and those of us who know about it and have the resources to fight back should be ashamed for letting it happen to our neighbors."
Dan, I Allegedly, "Pawn Shops Are On Fire!"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, 4/19/26
"Pawn Shops Are On Fire!"
"Americans are borrowing money at record levels, and the warning signs are everywhere. Pawn shops are seeing a massive surge in activity as people scramble for quick cash just to cover basic necessities like gas and bills. At the same time, buy now, pay later loans are collapsing under record defaults, especially among younger consumers. This isn’t just affecting low-income households - this financial strain is hitting the middle class and beyond. In this video, we break down the growing debt crisis, rising delinquencies in auto loans, and the real reason people are falling behind financially. From collapsing discretionary spending to struggling businesses and job instability, this is a snapshot of an economy under pressure. If you want to understand what’s really happening with money right now - and how it could impact you - this is a must-watch."
Comments here:
"Mega Shopping at Kroger, Digital Coupon Deals Everywhere"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, 4/19/26
"Mega Shopping at Kroger,
Digital Coupon Deals Everywhere"
Comments here:
"How It Really Would Be"
How the treacherously lying money-whore
main stream media would report it today...
"A Long March..."
"The life of Man is a long march through the night, surrounded by invisible foes, tortured by weariness and pain, towards a goal that few can hope to reach, and where none may tarry long. One by one, as they march, our comrades vanish from our sight, seized by the silent orders of omnipotent Death. Very brief is the time in which we can help them, in which their happiness or misery is decided. Be it ours to shed sunshine on their path, to lighten their sorrows by the balm of sympathy, to give them the pure joy of a never-tiring affection, to strengthen failing courage, to instill faith in times of despair."
- Bertrand Russell
○
This always suggested the March of Mankind through the ages, and,
incredibly, despite ourselves, we march on to our unknown destiny...
Vangelis, "Alpha"
"The Obedience Cult"
"The Obedience Cult"
by Paul Rosenberg
"Not too many years back, warnings of Peak Oil circulated widely, and they made me consider something a good deal more dangerous: Peak Obedience. If that concept strikes you as odd, there’s a reason: We’ve all been living inside an obedience cult.
In our typical “scary cult” stories, we find people who have given up their own functions of choice and do crazy things because they are told to by some authority. But so long as people are within the cult, none of it appears crazy. So, inside a cult of obedience, obedience would seem righteous, and more than anything else it would seem normal. And I think that very well describes the Western status quo.
Obedience, however, should not seem normal to us. Obedience holds our minds in a child state, and that is not fitting for any healthy person past their first years of life. It also presupposes that the people we obey have complete and final knowledge; and in fact, they do not: politicians, central bankers, and the other lords of the age have been wrong – obviously and publicly wrong – over and over. So, obedience is not a logical position to take. Nonetheless, the mass of humanity believes that something horrible will happen if they don’t obey. After that, they merely need to be supplied with a defensible reason to comply.
But all of that, even though true, isn’t what I’d like you to take away from this discussion. My primary point is this: When we obey, we make ourselves less conscious; we make ourselves less alive.
Why Obedience Is Peaking: Over the past two centuries, authority has benefited from a perfect storm of influences. There was never such a time previously, and there probably will never be another. Briefly, here’s what happened:
Morality was broken: For better or worse, Western civilization had a consistent set of moral standards from about the 10th century through the 17th or 18th century. Then, through the 20th century, those standards were broken. Note that I did not say morality was changed. The cultural morality of the West was not replaced, but broken. The West has endured a moral void ever since. Previously, people routinely compared authority’s decrees to a separate standard (most often the Bible), to see if they held up. But with Western morals broken, authority was freed from examination, and thus from restraint.
Economies of scale: Factories made it much cheaper to produce large numbers of goods than the old way, in individual workshops. Economists call this an economy of scale. Thus a cult of size began, making “obedience to the large” seem normal.
Fiat currency: Fiat currency has allowed governments to spend money without consequences. It allowed politicians to wage war and to provide free food, free education, and free medicine… all without overtly raising taxes. Fiat currency made it seem that politics was magical.
Mass conditioning: Built on the factory model, massive government institutions undertook the education of the populace. And more important than their overt curriculum (math, reading, etc.) was their invisible curriculum of obedience to authority. Here, to illustrate, is a quote from the esteemed Bertrand Russell, who is himself quoting Johann Gottlieb Fichte, a founding father of public schooling: "Education should aim at destroying free will so that after pupils are thus schooled they will be incapable throughout the rest of their lives of thinking or acting otherwise than as their school masters would have wished."
Mass media: Mass media turbocharged authority and obedience in the 20th century, followed by the free account vultures of Facebook, Google and others. All of this went beyond authority’s grandest dreams. These things created an unnatural peak for authority. But now, this perfect storm is thinning.
Peak Obedience Is Brittle: Through the 20th century, the people of the West built up a very high compliance inertia. They complied with the demands of authority and taught their children to do the same, until it became automatic. People obeyed simply because they had obeyed in the past. Authority quickly became addicted to this situation, basing their plans on receiving every benefit of the doubt.
Automatic obedience, however, is a brittle thing. Economies of scale are failing, the money cartel has been exposed, government schools have lost respect, mass media is fading away and everyone knows that Facebook is an addiction. The game continues because the populace is distracted and afraid, but that won’t last forever.
And Then? It has long been understood that complex systems breed more complexity, and eventually break themselves. As central authorities try to solve each problem they face, they inevitably create others. Eventually the system becomes so complex, and its costs become so great, that new challenges cannot be solved. Then the system and its authority fail, as they did in the Soviet Union.
But again, that’s not my primary point. Rather, it’s this: Obedience disengages our best parts. Obedience degrades our creativity; it undercuts our effectiveness and especially our sense of satisfaction. Don’t sign away your life, no matter how many others do."
For more, please see "The Twilight of Authority."
"I Visited The Main Cathedral of the Russian Armed Forces"
Full screen recommended.
Travelling with Russell,
"I Visited The Main Cathedral of the Russian Armed Forces"
"Park Patriot in Moscow, Russia has one of the most famous Churches in all of Russia. The Main Cathedral of the Russian Armed Forces is a spiritual symbol of Russia, glorifying the greatest victory of life over death."
Comments here:
o
Full screen recommended.
Oh my God...
"Trump, Sanity, and Obedience"
"Trump, Sanity, and Obedience"
by Edward Curtin
“Shameless self-willed infatuation
Emboldens men to dare damnation,
And starts the wheels of doom which roll
Relentless to their piteous goal”
– Aeschylus, "The Oresteian Trilogy: Agamemnon"
"Many people are saying that Donald Trump is insane. He may be. So too Benjamin Netanyahu. But if so, it is a form of insanity that includes the calm sanity of Adolf Eichmann and Harry Truman as they went about their business of mass extermination.
Crazy, to use the vernacular, is an elusive word nearly impossible to define, especially when an entire society can be crazy, as Erich Fromm, the German-American social-psychologist, has argued. Obedience is a much touted virtue, not only in overt police regimes but in so-called democracies – but obedience to whom? To mass murderers?
Obedience can be imbibed through osmosis. I remember Regis, my Jesuit high school’s motto – Deo et Patriae, for God and country – and how it linked obedience to God with obedience to the United States. I am certain that such a linkage would be denied by school authorities, but of course the Jesuits are known for their guile. So it didn’t surprise me when I was applying for a discharge from the Marines during the Vietnam War and was being questioned by a group of Marine Officers and one starting screaming at me: “What the hell kind of God are you talking about? I’m a Catholic, too, and my God supports the Marines and the war in Vietnam.” It was hard not to laugh sardonically, especially as he gesticulated with his large cigar for emphasis. I was then sent to a psychiatrist for evaluation who told me, to my great surprise, that he agreed with me and that the country’s leaders were insane.
Adolf Eichmann was declared “perfectly sane” by a psychiatrist who examined him when he went on trial for his routine daily tasks of carrying out Hitler’s orders to exterminate Jews. It was just another day at the office for Eichmann.
Harry Truman was not examined after he ordered the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki; he was assumed to be sane in committing these satanic crimes of mass murder. Just another state executive doing his duty by carrying out the orders of his puppet masters.
Those were the good old days when everyone knew who was sane and who was nuts. Now we seem very confused. Perhaps Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Gaza, Ukraine, Iran, etc. have discombobulated many minds about who is sane or not, who is a mass murderer, who evil and who good, depending on which functionary is in the White House. Perhaps not.
If Trump is insane, how did he twice become the president of the United States? Do “sane” people – the well-adjusted ones? – not realize that Trump is the nominal head of an immense system whose history is one of mass murder from Wounded Knee to the recent U.S. slaughter of hundreds, mostly young girls, at the elementary school in Minab, Iran.
Trump gave the orders, but he did not launch those missiles. Nor did Netanyahu massacre Palestinians with his own hands. These fat boy killers prefer to keep their dainty hands clean of blood – to have their functionaries do the killing. I think of other functionaries and the names they gave to the atomic bombs they dropped on Japan: Fat Man and Little Boy. And we talk about sanity.
The “sane” obedient ones do the killing; the soldiers who carry out orders. As the Trappist monk Thomas Merton wrote in his profound book of essays, "Raids on the Unspeakable," in 1966: "It is the sane ones, the well-adapted ones, who can without qualms and without nausea aim the missiles and press the buttons that will initiate the great festival of destruction that they, the sane ones, have prepared. What makes us so sure, after all, that the danger comes from a psychotic getting into position to fire the first shot in a nuclear war? Psychotics will be suspect. No one suspects the sane, and the sane ones will have perfectly good reasons, logical, well-adjusted reasons, for firing the shot. They will be obeying sane orders that have come sanely down the chain of command. And because of their sanity they will have no qualms at all. When the missiles take off, then, it will be no mistake. We can no longer assume that because a man is “sane” he is therefore in his “right mind.” The whole concept of sanity in a society where spiritual values have lost their meaning is itself meaningless."
Our problem, as the historian Howard Zinn once said, is civil obedience, surely not civil disobedience, that people everywhere are so submissive to authority that they will dutifully obey the orders of people like Trump and Netanyahu. Such obedience, all false rhetoric to the contrary, is drilled into us from birth through overt and covert methods of fear inculcation.
My dear departed mother’s father was a New York City cop. When she was young, he made her and her mother, trembling with fear, sit at the kitchen table, upon which he put his revolver, and warned them to obey him or else. Such tyrannical behavior was slightly mitigated decades later when he and my grandmother lived with us. When he heard that any of us eight kids were misbehaving, he, old, feeble, and long retired, would don his police uniform and stomp down the stairs waving his long baton to frighten us. I never got to ask my mother why she tolerated this. Such is the long life of fear.
There are reports that by April’s end the U.S. will have 60,000 troops in Iran’s vicinity. If Trump gives the orders to invade Iran, how many will refuse? How many will refuse to send missiles into more Iranian schools and homes? If Trump gives orders for a nuclear strike, can we expect military individuals with consciences to disobey? Will any heed Pope Leo’s voice about this war? That it is immoral.
It takes a system to wage war, and civil and military obedience to support it. That system – what former CIA analyst Ray McGovern has adroitly named MICIMATT: The Military-Industrial-Congressional-Intelligence-Media-Academia-Think-Tank system – is so deeply woven into American society and therefore the hearts and minds of its citizens and military personnel that one can only hope against hope that Trump’s orders will be disobeyed by many. It is a desperate hope, I realize.
"War Is A Racket," as Marine Major General Smedley Butler once put it. It is waged for the tyrannical oligarchs and always kills mostly civilians. Over ninety percent now, probably more. Innocent people, little girls at school, babies in their mothers arms – it is organized state terror. War is immoral. It is not complex. It is simple. Like the gospel message the Pope is conveying.
Like all tyrants, Trump is surrounded by sycophants, fearful little people like Karoline Leavitt, JD Vance, Marco Rubio, Peter Hegseth, Robert Kennedy, Jr., et al. The whole crew groveling at his feet are implicated in his war crimes. To hear Kennedy defend Trump’s war on Iran, his Ukraine and other policies, by claiming his father, Senator Robert Kennedy, and his uncle, President Kennedy, would agree with Trump is to pass through the looking glass. Kennedy, also a staunch defender of Israel and its savage policies, makes me shake my head in wonder. Was his political conversion, like St. Paul’s, from a light from heaven that sent him to the ground where Trump’s divine voice asked him to hop on the MAGA train? Or was the voice more insidious and subtle, a quiet call from someone else late in the night? However it happened, it is complete, and he is now fully marching to the drums of war along with Trump’s ass-kissing entourage. I, once Bobby Kennedy, Jr.’s ardent supporter when he announced his run for the presidency, feel like a fool.
Let me recommend an important film – Terence Malik’s "A Hidden Life" – about a different type of man, Franz Jägerstätter, an Austrian peasant farmer from an isolated small mountainous village who refuses to take an oath to Hitler and fight in the German army. He knew that his refusal would not stop Hitler; but he also knew his conscience came from God and not the state. So he said no. NO! I will not follow orders, despite everyone telling him to do so. For his refusal, he suffered terribly and was beheaded. In my review of this film which I wrote six years ago as Joseph Biden was three weeks into his presidency, I said:
While Franz is eventually put on trial by the German government, it is we as viewers who must judge ourselves and ask how guilty or innocent are we for supporting or resisting the immoral killing machine of our own country now. Hitler and his Nazis were then, but we are faced with what Martin Luther King called ‘the fierce urgency of now.’
Many Americans surely ask with Franz, ‘What has happened to the country that we love?’ But how many look in the mirror and ask, “Am I a guilty bystander or an active supporter of the United States’ immoral and illegal wars all around the world that have been going on for so many years under presidents of both parties and have no end? Do I support the new cold war with its push for nuclear war with its first strike policy? Do I support, by my silence, a nuclear holocaust?’
The questions still linger. Let Thomas Merton and the twenty-two years-old Bob Dylan have the last words:
For since man has decided to occupy the place of God he has shown himself to be by far the blindest, and cruelest, and pettiest and most ridiculous of all the false gods. We can call ourselves innocent only if we refuse to forget this, and if we also do everything we can to make others realize it."
"The Strait of Hormuz is Closed Again…"
"The Strait of Hormuz is Closed Again…"
by Larry C Johnson
"The above image above show the Strait of Hormuz when it was partially opened and now, when it is closed. For a brief moment on Friday, 17 April 2026, Donald Trump told a partial truth… The Strait of Hormuz was open for business, but only for ships that coordinated with and were approved by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. That all came to a sudden end on Saturday, 18 April, following Donald Trump inflammatory statements about blockading all Iranian ports. Iran made it clear to JD Vance during the final hours of their last meeting in Islamabad that Iran’s 10-point plan is non-negotiable.
The disruption of the global supply chain caused by Iran’s blockade is not fully grasped by most people. I liken it to radiation sickness… Assume that someone survives the blast of an atomic bomb but is bombarded with radiation. It may take days or weeks for the lethal effects to cause harm to the victim. In this case, the victim is the global economic, financial and industrial system. It will take months (for partial oil recovery) to several years (for full LNG, urea, and helium normalization) for Persian Gulf exports to return to pre-war levels. This is due to a combination of physical destruction, logistical bottlenecks, security risks, and policy overhang from the 2026 Iran war (February–April 2026). Let’s review the factors that will prevent an immediate return to the exports levels that existed on 27 February.
Extensive Physical Damage to Critical Infrastructure: U.S./Israeli strikes and Iranian counter-attacks hit refineries, storage tanks, pipelines, oil/gas fields, and processing plants across at least nine Persian Gulf countries. The most severe damage occurred at Qatar’s Ras Laffan Industrial City (the world’s largest LNG hub). Iranian missile strikes in March 2026 knocked out 17% of Qatar’s LNG export capacity (12.8 million tons per year). QatarEnergy’s CEO stated repairs will take 3–5 years, partly because key components (e.g., turbines) are highly specialized and hard to replace quickly. This single facility also produces much of the region’s helium (a byproduct of natural gas processing) and affects urea/ammonia output.
Slow Demining and Security Verification in the Strait of Hormuz: Iran laid extensive sea mines during the conflict. Even with US-assisted removal underway, professional mine countermeasures are inherently slow and require repeated sweeps for safety. As of April 18–19, 2026, shipping traffic remains minimal despite Iran’s “open” declaration. Major shipowners (including BIMCO and Norwegian associations) are still demanding proof of cleared routes, Iranian compliance, and reduced risks before committing vessels.
Insurance, Risk Premiums, and Shipping LogisticsWar-risk insurance premiums exploded (from ~0.125% to 0.2–0.4% of hull value per transit). Many insurers canceled Gulf coverage entirely during the height of the crisis. Tankers and crews were scattered globally; rerouting around Africa became standard. Rebuilding confidence, renegotiating contracts, and recalling experienced crews takes months.
Commodity-Specific Timelines:
Oil: Some wells can restart in days/weeks, but full Gulf system recovery (damaged fields + logistics) will take several months to 1–2 years.
LNG: Dominated by Qatar; 3–5 years for full Ras Laffan repairs.
Urea (fertilizer): Tied to natural gas feedstock; Gulf supplies ~45–46% of global seaborne urea. Restart + shipping delays mean months of tight supply.
Helium: Qatar supplies ~30–33% of global production. Damage to Ras Laffan means 3–5+ years offline.
Global Economic Effects of the Supply Cutoff: The cutoff (peaking at ~20% of world oil, ~20% of LNG, plus major shares of urea and helium) created the largest supply shock in modern energy history and is rippling far beyond fuel prices.
Energy Inflation & Stagflation Risk: Oil prices surged (Brent briefly over $120/bbl); LNG prices in Asia jumped >140%. Higher costs for transportation, electricity, and manufacturing feed into broader inflation while slowing growth.
Food Price Spike via Urea Shortage: Gulf region supplies ~20–46% of global traded fertilizers. Shortages already forced plant shutdowns in India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. Farmers in import-dependent countries (India, Brazil, parts of Africa) face reduced planting or higher costs → higher global food prices in 2026–2027.
Tech & Healthcare Disruptions via Helium: Critical for semiconductor manufacturing (chip cooling/fabrication), MRI scanners (superconducting magnets), fiber optics, welding, and aerospace. Shortages are already hitting supply chains; healthcare delays and chip production slowdowns are expected for years.
Broader Impacts: Supply-chain chaos, higher consumer prices (gasoline, groceries, medical procedures), reduced GDP growth in Asia/Europe (most exposed), and potential recessionary pressure in vulnerable economies. Even the US feels indirect effects through global commodity markets despite lower direct dependence.
In short, even if the US meets Iran’s demands and the Strait of Hormuz is opened for regular business on Monday, 20 April, the combination of war damage (especially at Ras Laffan), lingering security/insurance fears, and policy overhang means full export normalization is a multi-quarter to multi-year process - not a quick switch. The outlook for the global economy is not good, and will worsen the longer this war goes on."
Mario Nawfal interviewed me today when news broke that Iran had again closed the Strait of Hormuz:
Saturday, April 18, 2026
"If the U.S. Invades Iran… Here’s What Happens Next"
A Must-view!
Full screen recommended.
Professor Jiang, 4/18/26
"If the U.S. Invades Iran…
Here’s What Happens Next"
"What happens if the United States launches a full ground invasion of Iran? In this in-depth geopolitical analysis, Professor Jiang breaks down the military, economic, and global consequences of such a move. From the خطر of Øرب in the Middle East to the potential collapse of global oil supply, this video explores how a single decision could reshape the world order. Featuring insights on strategy, resources, and power dynamics, this analysis uncovers what may come next if tensions escalate into full-scale conflict."
Comments here:
"The Ceasefire Was A Joke; The US Economy Is Running On Financial Fumes"
Jeremiah Babe, 4/18/26
"The Ceasefire Was A Joke;
The US Economy Is Running On Financial Fumes"
Comments here:
"Trump Melts Down in Vegas Speech as Tiny Crowd Exposes Him"
Freedom Feed USA, 4/18/26
"Trump Melts Down in Vegas Speech
as Tiny Crowd Exposes Him"
"Donald Trump just gave one of the most embarrassing speeches of his political career - in Las Vegas, 90 minutes late, before a tiny crowd. He didn't know what a corner store was. He genuinely argued he's not a senior citizen at 78 years old. He dismissed expert warnings about $300 oil and took credit for numbers that don't hold up. He called an active war with Iran a "little diversion." And through all of it, he kept insisting the economy is booming. This was the Great Big Beautiful Bill affordability tour. And the man selling it couldn't name a basic working class institution."
Comments here:
"Prof. Marandi: Alert! Strait Closed Again, 'We're Prepared For War'"
Canadian Prepper, 4/18/26
"Prof. Marandi: Alert! Strait Closed Again,
'We're Prepared For War'"
The strait of Hormuz has been closed again, major airlift into the region,
the US will start boarding Iranian linked vessels abroad next week.
Comments here:
Dan, I Allegedly, "Banking Just Changed - It’s All Bad"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, 4/18/26
"Banking Just Changed - It’s All Bad"
"The rules for banking are changing fast - and most people don’t realize how serious this has become. Across the country, bank accounts are being closed without warning, withdrawals are being questioned, and everyday transactions are getting flagged by AI systems. You don’t have to be doing anything illegal to get caught up in this. In this video, Dan from iAllegedly breaks down real-world examples of businesses and individuals losing access to their accounts overnight - and why this trend is accelerating. From new citizenship verification requirements to aggressive transaction monitoring and sudden account shutdowns, the financial system is shifting toward tighter control and less transparency. Banks can now restrict access, ask questions about your own money, or terminate your account relationship with little to no explanation. This video explains what’s happening, why it matters, and the steps you need to take right now to protect your money, your access, and your financial future."
Comments here:
"A Look to the Heavens"
"Sculpted by stellar winds and radiation, a magnificent interstellar dust cloud by chance has assumed this recognizable shape. Fittingly named the Horsehead Nebula, it is some 1,500 light-years distant, embedded in the vast Orion cloud complex.
About five light-years "tall", the dark cloud is cataloged as Barnard 33 and is visible only because its obscuring dust is silhouetted against the glowing red emission nebula IC 434. Stars are forming within the dark cloud. Contrasting blue reflection nebula NGC 2023, surrounding a hot, young star, is at the lower left. The gorgeous featured image combines both narrowband and broadband images."
The Poet: Dylan Thomas, "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night"
"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night"
"Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light."
- Dylan Thomas
○
The Marmalade, "Reflections Of My Life"
"The world is a bad place, a bad place, a terrible place to live,
oh, but I don't want to die..."
"Ways We Numb Ourselves - Emerging from the Grey"
"Ways We Numb Ourselves - Emerging from the Grey"
by Madisyn Taylor
"Numbing yourself prevents you from confronting your issues and keeps you from ever finding resolution or peace. We are born equipped to experience a complex array of diverse emotions. Many of us, however, are uncomfortable confronting our most powerful emotions. We may shy away from delight and despair and deny life's colors by retreating into a world of monotone grey. We may numb ourselves to what we are truly feeling. It's easier to suppress our emotions than to deal with them, so we may momentarily turn to pleasures such as alcohol, food, sugar, shopping and too much television. We may even numb our hearts. While it's normal to temporarily seek distractions as a means of coping with intense emotions, numbing yourself prevents you from confronting your issues and keeps you from ever finding resolution or peace. When you are numb, there is no pain or powerlessness, but there can also be no joy or healing.
The activities that numb you may seem harmless or pleasurable, but using them to numb yourself diminishes the quality of your life. Numbing yourself so that you don't have to feel intense emotions can often satisfy a surface need while blocking your awareness of a deeper need. You may find solace in food or shopping when what you really need is spiritual nourishment. The less you feel, the less alive you feel. Your feelings add vividness to your experiences and serve to connect you to the world around you. It is possible to disavow yourself of numbing behaviors a little at a time and once again taste life's rich flavors. When you sense that you are engaging in a particular behavior simply to deaden your emotions, stop and ask yourself why. Examining the feelings that drive you to numb yourself can help you understand what is triggering your desire to emotionally fade out.
With each numbing activity that you cut out of your life, you'll find yourself being more aware and experiencing a greater emotional acuity. Senses once shrouded by the fog of numbness become sharp and acute. Traumas and pain long hidden will emerge to the forefront of your consciousness and reveal themselves so that you can heal them. You'll discover a deeper you - a self that is comfortable experiencing and working through intense emotions with courage and grace."
o
And sometimes, you just reach this point...
Full screen recommended.
Pet Shop Boys, "Numb"
o
“Knowing can be a curse on a person’s life. I’d traded in a pack of lies for a pack of truth, and I didn’t know which one was heavier. Which one took the most strength to carry around? It was a ridiculous question, though, because once you know the truth, you can’t ever go back and pick up your suitcase of lies. Heavier or not, the truth is yours now.”
- Sue Monk Kidd
“To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.”
- Arundhati Roy, "The Cost of Living"
"We Don't Have A Clue..."
“We don’t have a clue what’s really going down, we just kid ourselves that we’re in control of our lives while a paper’s thickness away things that would drive us mad if we thought about them for too long play with us, and move us around from room to room, and put us away at night when they’re tired, or bored.”
- Neil Gaiman
"War Is A Racket"
"War does not determine who is right, only who is left."
- Bertrand Russell
“Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die. The was the "war to end wars." This was the "war to make the world safe for democracy." No one told them that dollars and cents were the real reason. No one mentioned to them, as they marched away, that their going and their dying would mean huge war profits. No one told these American soldiers that they might be shot down by bullets made by their own brothers here. No one told them that the ships on which they were going to cross might be torpedoed by submarines built with United State patents. They were just told it was to be a "glorious adventure".
Thus, having stuffed patriotism down their throats, it was decided to make them help pay for the war, too. So, we gave them the large salary of $30 a month! All that they had to do for this munificent sum was to leave their dear ones behind, give up their jobs, lie in swampy trenches, eat canned willy (when they could get it) and kill and kill and kill...and be killed.
War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes. "
"Why don't those damned oil companies fly their own flags on their personal property - maybe a flag with a gas pump on it?"
- Brigadier General Smedley D. Butler, 1937
Freely download "War Is A Racket", by Smedley Butler, here:
"For The Most Part..."
"Human beings never think for themselves, they find it too uncomfortable. For the most part, members of our species simply repeat what they are told - and become upset if they are exposed to any different view. The characteristic human trait is not awareness but conformity, and the characteristic result is religious warfare. Other animals fight for territory or food; but, uniquely in the animal kingdom, human beings fight for their 'beliefs.' The reason is that beliefs guide behavior, which has evolutionary importance among human beings. But at a time when our behavior may well lead us to extinction, I see no reason to assume we have any awareness at all. We are stubborn, self-destructive conformists. Any other view of our species is just a self-congratulatory delusion."
- Michael Crichton, "The Lost World"
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