Category: trust

Look Sharp: Narrative Engineering In Progress!

     Beware the narrative engineers in government and the media, the ones who craft fear and suspicion from quite ordinary things. Have an example:      In December of 2021, the Pentagon furthered the ‘white rage’ narrative, warning that ‘extremism’ within the ranks was on the rise, which would require ‘detailed new rules’ to prohibit service …

Continue reading

“That Can’t Be!”

Dave: Everybody cheats. I just didn’t know. Dad: Well, now you know. [From Breaking Away.]      Have you become more skeptical as you’ve aged, or less?      There’s an awful lot of utter nonsense being purveyed by the extended media, these days. By “extended,” I mean to subsume all providers of information, not just the …

Continue reading

The Downside Of Deceit

     “A thousand truths do not mark a man as a truth-teller, but a single lie marks him as a damned liar….Lying to other people is your business, but I tell you this: once a man gets a reputation as a liar, he might as well be struck dumb, for people do not listen to …

Continue reading

The Chronicle of the DC: 7Aug23 Tainting Blood

Red Cross ends blood-donation restrictions that singled out gay and bisexual men Well, why not? After all, they got away with accepting blood from those who took the clot-shots. Since HIV takes so much longer to achieve the cults’ goals, this decision ought to raise not a ripple now.

Warning: Transition In Progress

     The most dangerous time for the people of a country transitioning from freedom to tyranny is the period of transition itself. The events of the transition period are invariably bloody. However, those events are also educational. Once the opposition has been destroyed, the survivors are aware of what it will take to remain survivors. …

Continue reading

On Deceit

     A huge number of people are running around who are determined to deceive others about something. It’s not news to any Gentle Reader of Liberty’s Torch that systematic deceit has become the hallmark of our politics. What’s on my mind this morning is the pervasiveness of deceit in ordinary life.      Spouses lie to …

Continue reading

Decline And Fall, Informational Edition

     Every institution arises to serve a purpose. If the purpose is accorded good and worthy, and if the institution serves it well, it will flourish. But that’s not a permanent state of grace. An institution that ceases to serve its intended purpose, no matter how well it may have done so in the past, …

Continue reading

They Call It Anarchy, But It’s Actually Hell

     Heard the name of Gonzalo Lira lately? If you have, it’s probably because the Zelensky regime in Ukraine has thrown him into prison him for writing stuff Zelensky doesn’t like. But at one time, Lira was better known for this essay, which embeds this critical observation:      When the backbone of a country starts …

Continue reading

Call The CSI Macro!

     What’s that, Gentle Reader? You don’t remember that one? Oh, it’s simple. Just four little words: “People lie; evidence doesn’t.”      I should add, for completeness, that “people” also: Are frequently mistaken; Can be deceived about what they saw or heard; Come with agendas and priorities of their own; Can be “bought.”      The …

Continue reading

The Low-Trust Society: A Case Study

     I snagged the graphic below from Ace of Spades HQ. The story it tells, though four and a half years old, is an important one. It’s easy merely to allow yourself to be appalled and then pass on to other things. In today’s sociopolitical environment, that’s no longer wise. Anyone could be caught in …

Continue reading

Sociopolitical Impossibilities

     Many years ago, a wise man named Rev. William J. H. Boetcker wrote these lines: You cannot bring prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot help small men by tearing down big men. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer. You …

Continue reading

Untrustworthy

     The C.S.O. and I recently watched and greatly enjoyed Mark Wahlberg’s star-vehicle Shooter, about a master sniper who’s used as the frame-up pigeon in an assassination conspiracy. It’s a high-body-count action movie and replete with entertainment throughout, but one particular bit will remain in my memory for a long time to come. Sniper Bob …

Continue reading

When Your Lie Is Found Out…

     …shout it even more loudly:      FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf has spent the last year warning that growing “distortions and half-truths” surrounding vaccines and other medical products are now “a leading cause of death in America.”      “Almost no one should be dying of COVID in the U.S. today,” Califf told The Associated …

Continue reading

Prescience Or Naivete?

     The following was written in 1972:      A fiercely combative system characterized by a high degree of tension must eventually overload and collapse. There are only so many put-ons that man can sustain before his entire system of interrelationships becomes ambiguous and, ultimately, meaningless. Twenty years ago, the need for a book probing the …

Continue reading

Day From Hell Alert

     The C.S.O. has another procedure scheduled for later this morning. Once again it will involve a long drive, a lot of cutting (for her) and a lot of waiting (for me), a long drive back, and then postoperative care most of which will fall on my shoulders. When we get back there will be …

Continue reading

The New Standard For Guilt

     Amendment V: No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any …

Continue reading

Trust And Its Enemies

     This morning, Cold Fury co-contributor SteveF has posted an excellent piece on a subject of great importance: trust. (Yes, I’ve ranted about it too.) Steve delves into the developments that allowed dishonest behavior to explode:      One is the increasing population and increased concentration in urban areas. When everyone in a small town knows …

Continue reading

Perspectives

One of my favorite Catholic writers is the late Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen:      Venerable Fulton John Sheen (born Peter John Sheen, May 8, 1895 – December 9, 1979) was an American bishop (later archbishop) of the Catholic Church known for his preaching and especially his work on television and radio. His cause for …

Continue reading

Progressions

     Time was, anyone with a high school diploma could be relied upon to know at least a little about mathematical progressions: arithmetic (additive), geometric (multiplicative), and others. If you had a little awareness of limits, you might even be able to work out how an open-form progression can be reduced to a closed-form expression. …

Continue reading

Strokes

     I’d intended to write a Jeremiad about this bit of viciousness — thank you, John Hinderaker, for bringing that to my attention — but I’m just recently back from Sunday Mass, and events, or perhaps non-events, have pointed me in another direction for today’s tirade.      You’re unlikely to read anything else today like …

Continue reading

Load more