"The Human Condition"

"The Human Condition"

by Meanings of Life

"Man remains largely unknown of himself. What are we, in our innermost recesses, behind our names and our conventional opinions? What are we behind the things we do in our lives, behind what we see in others and what others see in us, or even behind things science says we are? Is man the crazy being about whom Carl Gustav Jung spoke ironically, when he demanded a man to treat? Is man the Dr. Jerkyll that contains in himself a criminal Mister Hyde, and more than a personality, and contradictory feelings?

Are we the result of our dreams, as Prospero, in the Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” asked? Are we able to raise our nature and become the dignified beings evoked by Pico de la Mirandola: It’s the seeds a man cultivates that "will mature and bear fruit in him. If vegetative, he will become a plant; if sensual, he will become brutish; if rational, he will reveal himself a heavenly being; if intellectual, he will be an angel and the son of God"?

Almost two centuries ago, Spencer characterized the contradictory features of natives from the African east coast: "He has at the same time good character and hard heart; he is a fighter, conscientious, good in a precise moment, and cruel, pitiless and violent in the other; superstitious and rudely irreligious; brave and pusillanimous, servile and dominator, stubborn and at the same time fickle, relied to honor views, but without signs of honesty, niggard and economical, but careless and improvident".

It’s probably a good definition of a certain primitive man, to whom we are undoubtedly connected. But we are also cultural and ethic beings. We are able to change our values and behaviors. As William James says, human beings can change their lives through their mental attitudes. We can grow ethically. We can dominate part of our own instincts. And that’s why we can be different from the indigenous African described by Spencer. More: our thought dignifies us ("All the dignity of man consists in thought", says Blaise Pascal). We are, in many senses, the conscience of the Universe, and its utmost elaborated product. As Edgar Morin says, "in the core of our singularity, we carry not only all the humanity, all the life, but also all the cosmos, including its mystery, present in the heart of our beings".

We are creators, creator beings, and, in a sense, we can create, or recreate ourselves. All goes through our mind. It is our mind that constructs our truths and errors, and also the most sublime things in the Universe. And yet evil and stupidity exist in us. Sometimes we fall, we are stroked, and life reveals its cruelty, and we may think as Mark Twain, and say that it was a pity that Noah had arrived late to the ark. In our innermost recesses, there is also the cruelty and the inhumanity of life. Charles Darwin showed that we are descendants of inferior life forms: we have been long ago a "bush and a bird, and a fish silently swimming in the waters", to use the poetic terms used by Empedocles in its "Purifications."

From a genetic and evolutionist point of view, we contain in us the survival reflexes and the aggressiveness of the life forms that preceded us: "All that threatened the cave man - dangers, darkness, famine, thirst, ghosts, demons – all has passed to the interior of our souls, all troubles us, grieves us, threatens us from inside." (Morin). Besides, we are also beings that can differ significantly from each other. We are equal, but also different. "The awake involve a common world, but dreams deviate each one to its own world," Heraclites rather enigmatically declares. He thought we can’t help sleeping and living in illusory worlds, even when awake.

For all these reasons, Blaise Pascal’s celebrated definition of the human being, despite the hard language, not exactly agreeable to our ears, is undoubtedly one of the most powerful that can be applied to the rather unknown being that we can’t help being to ourselves: "What a chimera then is man! What a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a contradiction, what a prodigy! Judge of all things, imbecile worm of the earth; depositary of truth, a sink of uncertainty and error; the pride and refuse of the universe! Who will unravel this tangle?"

- http://www.meaningsoflife.com/

"We Are Mortals All..."

"We are mortals all, human and nonhuman, bound in one fellowship of love and travail. No one escapes the fate of death. But we can, with caring, make our good-byes less tormented. If we broaden the circle of our compassion, life can be less cruel."

- Gary Kowalski

"Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish."

"Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish."

- Steve Jobs,

Commencement Speech, Stanford University, 2005

"When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true...

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called "The Whole Earth Catalog", which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of "The Whole Earth Catalog", and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now I wish that for you. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish."

○

"Listen to me. We're here to make a dent in the universe.

Otherwise why even be here?"

- Steve Jobs

"How It Really Is"

 

"Last Chance To Get Out Before The Crash"

Full screen recommended.

"Last Chance To Get Out Before The Crash"

by Epic Economist

"The U.S. economy is falling apart all around us. With inflation soaring to the highest level in 40 years, the central bank is trying to stay ahead of a potential hyperinflationary spike by rolling back its Quantitative Easing policies, initiating a taper, and introducing interest rake hikes. All of that indicates that a liquidity crunch is near. According to the financial and economic analyst, Charles Hugh Smith, this might be investors' last chance to get out of the bubble before its inevitable explosion. Investors have missed the timing to get out of the rally several times in the past because the vast majority of them don't see -- or don't want to see -- the rising dangers until after the crash happens and causes very painful losses. But in Smith's view, "every asset bubble has a last chance to get out before the crash point that becomes obvious in the aftermath".

Today, this last opportunity to exit before the stock market crashes is exceedingly difficult to identify for a series of reasons. First and foremost is the extreme confidence investors have at the peak of the bubble that more gains are right ahead. Everyone who sold when the bubble started to show signs of bursting is eager to get back in, so every dip in the market is reversed by 'buy the dip buyers' who have been collecting huge profits from buying previous dips. In theory, even after conditions start to reverse in the broader market, the bubble can still reach a new peak and even a double peak, head and shoulders if investors keep going all-in in the market. The rally that follows the beginning of a downward trend tends to exceed whatever levels were considered bearish triggers. So bullish investors have the deceiving notion that the market still has enough technical support to provide further gains.

But that's when they miss the last chance to exit the market. They keep buying shares to fuel a rally that has already begun to falter. The 'buy-the-dippers' ignore this decline and buy the second dip. "That too falters and once the third buy-the-dip has failed to rally back to previous highs, many buy-the-dippers have been wiped out and the momentum of buying slackens," Smith continues. It's only when investors collectively realize that the 'buy-the-dip' strategy has failed and will not work anymore that a major sell-off begins, turns into a self-reinforcing avalanche, and the stock market finally crashes. For those who want to believe that the rally will last forever, none of this is visible until it's too late to get out of the bubble with some profits in hand.

Right now, bulls are still thinking that fundamentals don't matter and the Fed will do everything in its power to prevent a collapse while bears are still mumbling about elevated risk. However, the tech bubble has already popped. We have already witnessed the first dip and soon traders will realize that there's no way to keep reaching new highs anymore. Everywhere we look, we can find a series of indicators showing that this window is closing fast. But the problem is that most people don't want to look at the red flags. All of this is scaring some veteran insiders, who worry that the stock market will go from a zero-interest rate to a zero-alternative environment. Amongst them is the chief strategist at RIA Advisors, Lance Roberts, who recently warned his clients that "without exception, rate-hiking campaigns led to a negative outcome". The last time we've seen such exuberant stock prices was during the peak of the dot-com bubble. And at this point, anything could derail the market, but Roberts exposes the top ten threats signaling the arrival of a downturn.

Today, the best-case scenario for the market seems to be one in which the number of virus cases significantly drops, inflation fades away by itself, rate hikes and tapering don't affect the economy or stocks, and consumers continue their strong spending. Needless to say, that's a lot of boxes that need to be checked. Only a miracle would bring back economic and financial conditions to somewhat normal levels to impede the looming stock market crash. This last chance to protect yourself from the disaster that is fast approaching. It's your choice to take it or risk losing everything."

- https://www.epiceconomist.com​

"What's Causing The California Mass Exodus And Collapse; Credit Cards Shut Off; Mortgage Debt Explodes"

Jeremiah Babe, PM 1/1/22:

"What's Causing The California Mass Exodus And Collapse; 

Credit Cards Shut Off; Mortgage Debt Explodes"

"Will Real Estate Finally Crash in 2022? Let’s Tour the Current Market"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly, PM 1/1/22:

"Will Real Estate Finally Crash in 2022? 

Let’s Tour the Current Market"

"2021 was a record year for Real Estate sales. What will 2023 bring us? The most interesting part is that real estate has shot up around the world. It’s not just in the United States but the worldwide real estate market is that an absolute peak right now."

Musical Interlude: Ludovico Einaudi, "Natural Light"

Full screen recommended.

Ludovico Einaudi, "Natural Light"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"What's happening at the center of spiral galaxy NGC 5643? A swirling disk of stars and gas, NGC 5643's appearance is dominated by blue spiral arms and brown dust, as shown in the featured image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. The core of this active galaxy glows brightly in radio waves and X-rays where twin jets have been found. 

An unusual central glow makes NGC 5643 one of the closest examples of the Seyfert class of galaxies, where vast amounts of glowing gas are thought to be falling into a central massive black hole. NGC 5643, is a relatively close 55 million light years away, spans about 100 thousand light years across, and can be seen with a small telescope towards the constellation of the Wolf (Lupus)."

- https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap201005.html

"What We Owe To Ourselves..."

"That we can never know," answered the wolf angrily. "That's for the future. But what we can know is the importance of what we owe to the present. Here and now, and nowhere else. For nothing else exists, except in our minds. What we owe to ourselves, and to those we're bound to. And we can at least hope to make a better future, for everything."

- David Clement Davies

"Huxley vs. Orwell"

"Huxley vs. Orwell"

by  Neil Postman

“What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one... 

Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism... 

Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance...

   

Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy...

   

As Huxley remarked in 'Brave New World Revisited', the civil libertarians and the rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.” In '1984,' Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In 'Brave New World,' they are controlled by inflicting pleasure...

In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us."

 - http://www.dailykos.com/
◆

Huxley was quite obviously correct...

"Centering Ourselves: Gathering Our Straying Thoughts"

"Centering Ourselves:

Gathering Our Straying Thoughts"

by Madisyn Taylor, The DailyOM

"All too often our lives can be spread too thin and it becomes important to gather our thoughts and center ourselves to become whole again. When our thoughts are scattered in several directions at once and we are no longer conscious of what we are doing or why, it is time to center ourselves. When we center ourselves, we begin by acknowledging that we have become spread too thin and we are no longer unified inside. Our thoughts might be out of sync with our feelings, and our actions may be out of sync with both. The main signs that we need to center ourselves are scattered thoughts and a feeling of disconnection or numbness, as if we are no longer able to take anything in. In addition, we may feel unfocused and not present in our bodies. Centering ourselves is a way of coming to terms with all the different energies within us and drawing them back into ourselves.

Centering yourself means that you are working from or being aware of the core of your being in the solar plexus area of your body. At first it may not make sense, but as you progress you will understand what this feels like. We naturally know how to center ourselves when we take a deep breath, for example, before making a big announcement or doing something big. Another way to center ourselves is to sit down and engage in breath meditation. We can start by simply getting into a comfortable upright position and noticing as our breath enters and leaves our bodies. Our breath flows into our center and out from our center, and this process can serve as a template for all of our interactions in the world. In conversations, we can take what our friends are saying into the center of our beings and respond from the center. Our whole lives mirror this ebb and flow of energy that begins and ends at the center of ourselves. If we follow this ebb and flow, we are in harmony with the universe, and when we find we are out of harmony, we can always come back into balance by sitting down and observing our breath.

When we sit down to center ourselves we can imagine that we are gathering our straying thoughts and energies back into ourselves, the way a mother duck gathers her babies around her. We can also visualize ourselves casting a net and pulling all the disparate parts of ourselves back to the center of our being, creating a sense of fluid integration. From this place of centeredness, we can begin again, directing ourselves outward in a more intentional way."

- http://www.dailyom.com/

Related:

Michael Sealey, 

"Guided Meditation for Detachment From Over-Thinking 

(Anxiety/OCD/Depression)"

"A Little Late..."

 

The Daily "Near You?"

Lawrenceville, Georgia, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"It Has Become Our Collective Fate..."

"We live in radical times surrounded by tasks that seem impossible. It has become our collective fate to be alive in a time of great tragedies, to live in a period of overwhelming disasters and to stand at the edge of sweeping changes. The river of life is flooding before us, and a tide of poisons affect the air we breathe and the waters we drink and even tarnish the dreams of those who are young and as yet innocent. The snake-bitten condition has already spread throughout the collective body.

However, it is in troubled times that it becomes most important to remember that the wonder of life places the medicine of the self near where the poison dwells. The gifts always lie near the wounds, the remedies are often made from poisonous substances, and love often appears where deep losses become acknowledged. Along the arc of healing the wounds and the poisons of life are created the exact opportunities for bringing out all the medicines and making things whole again."

- Michael Meade, "Fate And Destiny"

"We Have No Idea How Good We Can Get"

"We Have No Idea How Good We Can Get"

by Paul Rosenberg

"I can still remember the first time someone told me that they believed in the Calvinist doctrine of “the depravity of man.” It shocked me. To complain about human behavior I very well understood; there’s plenty of bad behavior in the world. But to flatly call the human species depraved... hopelessly unredeemable... that was, and remains, obscene to me.

The sad truth, however, is that the modern West swims in a sea of Calvinism. The corporate bullhorns feed everyone they can a steady diet of the bad, ugly, and if possible the bloody. Under their influence, we would believe that all is darkness, that truth is illusion, that the human path is ever-downward, and that all professions of goodness are scams.

In other words, the minds of millions of people (billions, probably), are continually pushed to imagine that human depravity is a fact. That strategy is terribly effective – there’s no better tool for manipulating humans than fear – but it is no less than obscene and evil. And it’s false. Humans are amazing creatures, and very often kind, gracious and loving creatures.

The Real Revolutionaries: I’ve used this passage from G.K. Chesterton’s "The Defendant" before, but it’s so important that I could use it once a month and feel fine about it: "Every one of the great revolutionists, from Isaiah to Shelly, have been optimists. They have been indignant, not about the badness of existence, but about the slowness of men in realizing its goodness."

The popular image of a revolutionary is of someone railing against the rulers of their place and leading a mob against them to bring in a new political regime. Notwithstanding the ridiculous notion of politics saving us from politics, this has always been a fantasy. It’s very dramatic of course, which is why it remains, but in real life it simply doesn’t happen [1].

The real revolution, certainly in our time, is not to bring anything down, but simply to realize that we’ve outgrown a dark and manipulative public order, and that it’s fit for no more than to be tossed aside, like the worn-out clothing of our youth.

Real revolutionaries don’t want to take over an outmoded and abusive status quo, but to transcend it... to leave it behind and build better things. Behind such a belief, as Chesterton noted, will stand a realization of the goodness of existence.

How Good Can We Get? Consider the millions of hours... billions of hours... wasted every year fighting the mostly-imaginary evils pumped through television, radio and social media. Then, please, consider that the problems so terrifyingly portrayed are seldom really solved. So, what if we spent that time (and energy and money) to improve ourselves instead?

How silly is it to spend our time and treasure fighting within a system that can never allow its problems to be solved – if the system solved them it would have no reason to exist – when we are quite able to improve ourselves instead?

Consider, please: We have no real idea of how good we can get, because we’ve never seriously focused on making ourselves better.

Or, said differently: Instead of endlessly imagining human evil, what if we started imagining human greatness? One is just as possible as the other. So why shouldn’t we take the bright path instead of the permanently dark path that’s proven not to work? And I will add that the progress we have seen in the world... science, medicine and the like... has mainly come from people who imagined better ways, better things,  and better lives.

This, then, is the radical and revolutionary belief that stands before us: That mankind is far better than we’ve imagined... that human life can be satisfying and rewarding... that we are capable of being far more than we’ve imagined. All we have to do is to lift up our eyes and start trying."

- www.freemansperspective.com

[1]  It’s probably worth adding that the American Revolution wasn’t a revolution per se. Rather, it was a new society, on a new continent, that grew in a condition of “salutary neglect,” after which the Crown attempted to drag it into submission. The Americans of 1776 fought to be left alone rather than to bring down the Crown.

"2022: The Year of Breakdown"

"2022: The Year of Breakdown"

by Charles Hugh-Smith

"If we look at the fragility and instability of essential systems, it’s clear that 2022 will be the year of breakdown. Let’s start by reviewing how systems break down, a process I’ve simplified into the graphic below.

1. Regardless of whether it was planned or not, all systems are optimized to process specific inputs to generate specific outputs. Each system is pared down to maximize efficiency as the means to maximize profits. This efficiency in service of maximizing profits requires trade-offs that only become visible when some key part of the system fails.

The system that ships containers around the world offers a useful example. Shipping containers revolutionized shipping and reduced costs by commoditizing containers (all standard sizes), container ships (specifically designed to carry thousands of containers and container ports with specifically designed cranes, docks and truck lanes/queueing.

It’s possible to load a container on some other craft with a jury-rigged crane, but the efficiency of that is essentially a fraction of the optimized system: the jury-rigged crane will only be able to load a handful of containers, the ship will only be able to carry a few containers, and the likelihood of the containers shifting increases.

The infrastructure and labor are both highly specialized. Calling out the National Guard to speed up container offloading is a useless gesture unless the Guard can deliver more cranes and experienced operators. The greater the optimization, the greater the fragility as the breaking of any one link brings the entire system to a halt. Throwing in equipment and labor that the system isn’t designed to use will fail.

Virtually every essential system has been stripped of redundancy, resilience, reserves and adaptability as the means to fully optimize inputs, processes and outputs. The system works well if every link in the dependency chain is working perfectly. Should one link go down, the entire system goes down.

2. Cost-cutting has stripped systems of back-up staffing and expertise. Full-time workers have been replaced by gig workers, contract workers, part-time staff on call, etc. Experienced staff cost too much so they’ve been let go as well, so there is no depth in numbers or knowledge.

3. Management is top-heavy with MBAs and bean-counters with little pragmatic experience or knowledge of the systems they’re managing. Management is optimized to advance those who can generate big profits, not those with experiential skills needed to meet crises in real-world dependency chains, production, breakdowns, etc. So when the system comes apart, managers simply don’t have the knowledge or skills to solve real-world problems.

The skills that are most desirable when everything is running smoothly are useless in crisis. Who do you want to go into combat with, the continuously promoted officer who won high marks for filing reports on time or the officer with actual combat experience who got passed over for promotion because he/she didn’t devote the proper attention to paperwork, meetings, virtue-signaling and derriere-kissing? Unfortunately the vast majority of our systems are managed by people who lack the long experience and hands-on skills needed to meet cascading crises.

4. Systems are now so complex and opaque that they are in effect optimized to fail in ways that are impervious to quick fixes. Bureaucratic mission drift, virtue-signaling, the erosion of accountability, multiplying platforms and software and the endless expansion of compliance and regulatory burdens have loaded every system with numerous points of failure and procedural friction that contributes little or nothing to the organization’s core mission. As resources are devoted to make-work procedural black holes, the mission decays and collapses at the first crisis.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: contacting essential services (tax payments, etc.) rarely generates a timely reply, much less a solution; a new bridge or subway line takes decades to build and is billions over budget; software projects intended to streamline complex regulatory processes (building permits, etc.) never work right and end up slowing the whole system down, fraud is rampant, software security is laughably poor…the list is almost endless.

5. Once the system has been stripped of resources, experienced staff, back-up equipment and supplies and loaded with unproductive friction, even a small crisis will bring down the entire system. In the graphic below, all of these resources are the buffer that enables systems to respond to the pressing demands of crises. Once these are gone, the only possible result is systemic collapse.

6. We’ve collectively lost the ability and willingness to deal with crises for which there is no happy-story ending. We only want to hear the optimistic story, the glimmers of hope, the miracle cures, the painless tech fix, etc., and if we get a dose of reality instead, we’re quick to dismiss the bearer of inconvenient news as an alarmist, a doom-and-gloomer, etc.

In other words, our economy and society have been optimized for failure. Drifting along in a daze of disconnected-from-reality complacency we are completely unprepared to deal with realities that don’t respond to magical thinking, optimism, hope and tech fantasies."

- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

"How It Really Is"

 

Gregory Mannarino, "Must Watch! Calls For 2022"

Gregory Mannarino, "Must Watch! Calls For 2022"

- https://traderschoice.net/

"2022: More Stupidity, More Arrogance, More Evil, More Rebellion"

"2022: More Stupidity, More Arrogance, 

More Evil, More Rebellion"

by Robert Gore

"Chaos will reign as the future upends the past. Chaos doesn’t lend itself to prediction. Stupidity, arrogance, and evil ultimately destroy themselves, but their rampage was unabated in 2021. A group of stupid, arrogant, and evil people are using a virus and its variants to shepherd the world into a scheme of totalitarian global governance. This was conspiracy theory when the virus first surfaced; now it’s nakedly obvious reality. The one redeeming feature of the year was that more people saw the light.

The self-impressed and self-anointed rule not by claim of divine right, but by claim of superior intelligence and virtue. Real intelligence and virtue hope to find the same in other people; our commissars prey on human weakness. Fear and panic are their allies, truth and rationality their enemies.

As word leaks out of Covid outbreaks on 100 percent vaccinated college campuses, sports teams, naval vessels, and cruise ships, and as fully vaccinated athletes drop incapacitated or dead in front of stadiums full of people and millions of TV viewers, the truth that can’t be hidden is grasped by anyone with a shred of intellectual integrity. The vaccines have failed their ostensible purpose, to protect against the virus and its variants. They have, however, admirably fulfilled their real purpose: a totalitarian grab for power and control.

The coming year will see attempts to institute the rest of the agenda: mandatory vaccination, implanted vaccine passport microchips, fully digitized money, a social credit system, and segregation or elimination for those who refuse to play along. The coming year will also see the inexorable progress of the Doom Loop described in “The Means Are The End.”

The vaccines and their perpetual boosters are an intentional attack on the human immune system. They will continue to produce their adverse effects, including impaired natural immune system functionality, which increases susceptibility not just to Covid and variants, but to many other maladies as well. Early indications are that the omicron variant is more likely to strike the vaccinated than the unvaccinated.

Because it’s essentially the common cold, Omicron has been hailed as the usual downward viral mutation that either burns itself out or becomes an endemic but low-level threat. Covid, therefore, is over. The optimism is misplaced and betrays either ignorance or deliberate obfuscation of the true aims of the Covid commissars. Covid has never been about health and safety, it’s been about power and using vaccines to insidiously and inexorably degrade the true frontline health defense, the immune system. The commissars would insist on vaccinations and boosters even if Covid developed a beneficial variant (see “The Oopsilon Variant,” SLL, 9/1/21).

The gap between excess deaths and baselines will continue to widen in highly vaccinated areas. That makes blaming the steadily shrinking pool of unvaccinated scapegoats problematic, so the deaths will be blamed on breakthrough Covid even though its downward mutations make it less lethal.

Any actual science that might point the finger at vaccines, particularly autopsies, will continue to be discouraged or banned. The surprisingly few autopsies that have been conducted indicate that the spike proteins the vaccines prompt the body to produce end up in virtually every human tissue, organ, and system and cause persistent, long-term damage (see here and here). Real science will be ignored, as it has from the beginning, and the commissars will continue to chant: “Get vaccinated and booster, booster, booster forever.”

The Covid and vaccine charade is an excellent distraction from the mess they’ve made of the world, particularly the U.S. government and its satraps. In government nothing succeeds like failure and they continue to double-, triple-, and quadruple-down on failure.

No country has ever fiat-debted its way to prosperity, and many have done so to their ruin, but the last two years have seen an unprecedented explosion of such debt. While it initially produces an increase in demand from those who receive it, that sugar high soon runs into an iron law of reality: pieces of paper and computer entries don’t conjure real goods and services.

With more demand and the same or less supply, fiat-debt inflation conjures only rising prices as both producers and consumers catch on to the currency debasement. Count on prices ratcheting higher as those responsible for it continue to blame the phenomenon on everything but their currency debasement. It will continue as government debt “monetization”—exchanging government fiat debt for central bank fiat debt—remains essential to financing governments.

Creditors will express their dissatisfaction with microscopic yields in a world of non-transitory, persistently rising prices by selling the debt instruments that are handing them negative real yields (nominal yields minus the inflation rate). Interest rates being the inverse of bond prices, falling bond prices will cause interest rates to rise, which would put pressure on all debt-supported financial and real asset prices as well.

Rising interest rates will make it increasingly difficult for governments to fund themselves. Central banks will continue to fill the every-increasing gap in demand for government fiat debt, a financial Doom Loop of fiat-debt inflation met with more fiat-debt inflation that eventually becomes hyperinflation. It will be hard to blame this Doom Loop on the unvaccinated, although attempts will be made, but there is another set of all-purpose scapegoats available: Russia and China, the leaders of an Eurasian-centered multipolar axis.

They have seen this train wreck coming and have been “dedollarizing,” a polite term for getting out of crappy fiat debt before it gets even crappier. They’ve also been stockpiling “Real Money” (gold and silver). On current trend the Russians and Chinese will have most of the world’s real money when the American block’s currencies collapse. They will of course be blamed for that collapse, which bears a startling resemblance to blaming the unvaccinated for refusing dangerous vaccines that don’t protect the vaccinated. Like probity at a frat party, logic is always in short supply among collapsing governments.

If it weren’t, our collapsing government wouldn’t be trying so hard to antagonize the governments of Russia, China, Iran, and the rest of the Eurasian block. Vladimir Putin has issued an ultimatum. Perhaps he’s bluffing and the high-tech weapons he and his Chinese buddies have been bragging about are fictional. Perhaps they’re not, but don’t expect American policymakers to even acknowledge the possibility.

Good poker players always reckon the cost of being wrong before they call a bluff, but nobody in the Biden administration seems to have any recognition of the downsides. They include losing a world war against a powerful alliance. The American political establishment floats on an arrogant bubble of belief in a military that just lost Afghanistan, wastes much of its appropriations on boondoggles like the F-35, and whose leadership is more interested in woke doctrine and Covid orthodoxy than defending the country. Even victory would be Pyrrhic: a few more Americans than Russians and Chinese left standing after global nuclear annihilation.

The bright spot of 2021 can be summed up in three words: Let’s Go Brandon! Just as the Trump election had much wider significance—as much a vote against those who presume to rule as a vote for Trump—Let’s Go Brandon! encompasses the entire presumptuous class, not just the increasingly despised Biden. Their dirty secret is that they’ve been at war with the 99 percent since FDR. Their greatest fear is that the 99 percent catch on, which they increasingly are.

Once enlightened, they don’t go back to sleep. They don’t watch CNN or take out subscriptions to the Washington Post or New York Times. Instead, they turn to the alternative media, a hydra that continues to defy the many efforts to suppress or eradicate it. They make Robert F. Kennedy’s take down of Saint Fauci the number one Amazon bestseller and Let’s Go Brandon! a viral cry of rebellion. Never underestimate the power of great memes, which can be more powerful than blockbuster disclosures and incisive commentary.

The Internet is home to much of the world’s remaining vitality. Governments want to kill the vitality without killing the Internet, which is essential to commerce, finance, production, infrastructures, governance, and armed forces. It can’t be done. China offers a test case. By the government’s own falsified statistics its economic debt-fueled “miracle” is faltering as it stifles the Internet and enacts other totalitarian measures.

Vitality’s root word is vital, and the vitality and dynamism that flow from freedom are vital for economic, social, and political progress. If the presumptuous class thinks docile automatons and a state-approved, bulletin-board Internet will produce anything but regress they’re deluded.

And evil. Their ultimate aim is to kill millions or billions, and whatever remains of the human spirit. Ultimately they are cowards, as are their praetorian military and police who they think will protect them. Their loyalty only extends to their next payday and the opportunities their positions give them to extort and terrify the citizenry.

There is abundant docility, but the human spirit is unquenchable and animates the growing rebellion. The rebels already greatly outnumber the miserable mélange of rulers, hangers-on, and the praetorian guard. Most of the docile will meet the fate evil has in store for them. The graveyards will be filled with Darwin awardees who didn’t think or act for themselves. However, the hell this evil is bent on creating for us will assuredly be its own as well.

One bothersome detail dramatically ups their fear-and-loathing quotient: most of the U.S. enlightened own firearms. Imposing totalitarianism is going to be a whole different kettle of fish than in the EU, Australia, and New Zealand, although many of their unarmed citizens are commendably taking to the streets. Whatever bravado cowards demonstrate disappears when the other side starts firing back.

Beyond the continuing stupidity, arrogance, and evil of the presumptuous class and the intensifying resistance to it, predictions about 2022 are a fool’s errand. The centrifugal forces of decentralization and autonomy are overwhelming the dying forces of centralization, command, and control. The process is bloody and chaotic. Chaos doesn’t lend itself to prediction.

The obvious advice is to do the best you can to stay prepared financially, logistically, and emotionally. The only other nugget is to think and act for yourself. There’s no guarantee that will keep you out of the graveyard, but failure to do so guarantees a spot."

- https://www.theburningplatform.com/

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Hat tip to the Burning Platform.