Aug 30 2023

Crisis by Design

Apparently, Biden’s puppetmasters are allowing over 7,000 illegal aliens to come into this country every day. That’s 210,000 illegal aliens a month. 2,520,000 illegal aliens a year. Apparently there was an ISIS person smuggling people into the USA at some point. I’m just certain the people that ISIS smuggled into this country are all peace-loving Quakers, right?

And this has been going on since Drooling Joe and his puppetmasters ended any kind of border security on his installation day. I refuse to use the word “Inauguration” as Drooling Joe was installed, not elected.

So now we have millions upon millions of illegal aliens flooding into the country. One of the jobs of the government, one of their actual responsibilities, is to secure the border and protect the country from invasion. As Mr. Porretto points out below, the government is force. That force is supposed to stop people from flooding across the border.

Instead, that force is directed at people who are trying to stop the flow of illegal aliens and other assorted criminals.

The government is protecting Epstein’s client list while killing vets with PTSD in early-morning raids for no good reason.

The government is protecting Hunter Biden, and was protecting him long before Drooling Joe was installed, while framing Donald Trump and lying (both TO and ABOUT) LTG Michael Flynn.

The government, that force, is actively working against you, the Constitution and anyone who wants a strong America, while joining forces with people who want to bring this country down

This is not a mistake. It’s enemy action. It’s the Cloward-Piven strategy being enforced. I don’t think there’s anything that one man, or even a large group of men could do to stop it at this point. All we can do is direct the damage towards Democrat controlled territory. They voted for this. They voted for millions of illegal aliens to come in, so let’s give them what they voted for. Send them all to the sanctuary cities. Send them to D.C. and New York and Chicongo and Lost Angeles and Scat Francisco.

Whatever you do, how ever you do it, just remember that the US Government is totally in control of the Domestic Enemies of the USA. Their actions are not stupid. They are evil and malicious. They hate you, and they want to see you enslaved or destroyed.

Act accordingly.

Aug 30 2023

The Need For Clarity, Part 1

     As attached as I am to it, I must nevertheless allow that Curmudgeonry is not enough. There must be clarity. We must say what we mean distinctly, openly, and fearlessly. I try to be as clear as possible…but others devote their efforts to muddying the waters, and it’s unclear which way the battle is going.

     WARNING: What follows will disturb many. It attacks an assumption that’s widely shared and seldom questioned. Indeed, you might be one of those who will recoil from the notion. But if clarity is the goal, confronting that assumption is imperative.

     We begin.

***

     What defines a government? That is: what distinguishes governments – States – from all other kinds of human organizations?

     Aristotle called such a distinction the differentia: the critical characteristic in a definition that separates the category being defined from others in its genus, or supercategory. The genus of governments is stated above: “human organizations.” Clearly, a government is one such. But what characteristic do governments possess that differentiate it from human organizations that are not governments?

     Take your time over it. There are a lot of false trails. Many of them are highly seductive. Governments’ cheerleaders – i.e., those who think the whole idea is just dandy and want you not to think too deeply about it – try their best to mislead you about it, each and every day. So think hard.

     Let’s have a few quotes on the subject. First, one that George Washington the “Father of Our Country,” did not say but is nevertheless revealing:

     Government is not reason, it is not eloquence; it is force.

     Now some observations from later thinkers and writers:

     Government is an association of men who do violence to the rest of us…. In order to obtain and hold power, a man must love it. Thus the effort to get it is not likely to be coupled with goodness, but with the opposite qualities of pride, craft, and cruelty. – Leo Tolstoy

     I was never molested by any person but those who represented the State. – Henry David Thoreau

     The State represents violence in a concentrated and organized form. The individual has a soul, but as the State is a soulless machine, it can never be weaned from the violence to which it owes its very existence. – Mahatma Gandhi

     Hint, hint. Perhaps we can proceed to the next part of this diatribe.

***

     The sole characteristic that differentiates governments from other kinds of human organizations – book clubs, corporations, regular Dungeons & Dragons get-togethers – is its assertion that a government may use coercive force against others without penalty. That’s the reality behind George Washington’s non-quote. If you’re an agent of the State, you get to bully people – e.g., point guns at them; slap manacles on them; drag them off to wherever – who aren’t agents of the State. Sometimes (cf. Ruby Ridge and Waco, Texas) you even get to kill them. However, they have no such privilege over you.

     Every government asserts exactly that privilege. Constitutions, charters, bills of rights, and so on do not contradict that assumption. They can’t, for the privilege is essential to the State. Without it, it’s just another salon. But the danger involved to Us the People cannot be gainsaid.

     Isabel Paterson’s landmark book The God of the Machine attempted to rationalize government as potentially domesticable by the method of the Constitution. She analyzed it as an engineering document for the specific purpose of chartering a government that could be trusted not to violate the rights of its subjects. And to be fair, it was a valiant attempt to do exactly that. That it took more than two centuries to fail of its purpose testifies to its brilliance.

     Nevertheless, it has failed. That raises the question whether it’s possible to tame the State by any means. I’ve been straining to find the answer for forty years.

***

     Let’s retreat, albeit briefly, from the consideration of governments to the consideration of individuals. We know a few things about Mankind at this point:

  1. Each man possesses self-awareness and purposiveness, at least in potential.
  2. Despite his consciousness of being an individual – i.e., a separate creature from others of his kind – he participates voluntarily in society. That is: he willingly interacts with others some of the time.
  3. He recognizes, and is capable of, both good and evil in the pursuit of his objectives.
  4. He is capable of overriding his instincts, even the instinct for self-preservation, by an act of will.

     No individual man lacks any of those characteristics, except perhaps the demonically possessed. And despite the objections of “thinkers” who claim that good and evil are “socially constructed,” the concurrence on their nature is overwhelming. Evil actions have a common characteristic of their own: they treat another, or others, as things without rights, things to be used.

     That is the eternal and immutable cleavage: what separates good from evil; what has always separated them; and what always will. Tolkien said it quite clearly:

     ‘It is hard to be sure of anything among so many marvels. The world is all grown strange. Elf and Dwarf in company walk in our daily fields; and folk speak with the Lady of the Wood and yet live; and the Sword comes back to war that was broken in the long ages ere the fathers of our fathers rode into the Mark! How shall a man judge what to do in such times?’
     ‘As he ever has judged,’ said Aragorn. ‘Good and ill have not changed since yesteryear; nor are they one thing among Elves and Dwarves and another among Men. It is a man’s part to discern them, as much in the Golden Wood as in his own house.’

     But governments don’t recognize that distinction. The only thing governments respect is government itself: power over others. To work in or for a government requires that you accept government uber alles as your credo. If you don’t – even if you make exceptions – you will be driven out of the State’s legions. That’s why every government, no matter how constituted, eventually goes bad.

***

     If you’re wondering why I’m nattering on about this crap, the reason is simple: The time has come to consider seriously whether there’s a viable alternative to government. The mass murders of the century behind us, and the looming mass murders of the years immediately ahead of us, make it morally obligatory.

     You don’t think so? Then how do you rationalize the deaths of approximately 160 million people at the hands of governments? What is your moral defense for permitting entities culpable in such things to continue to exist? If we permit them to continue, how can we prevent them from killing more? It’s only what they’ve already done. From the historical record and recent events, it’s a solid bet that they enjoy it.

     More anon.

Aug 29 2023

What I have to say is unprintable

They knew that the jab would do this, and they forced our military to take it anyway. Anyone associated with forcing the jab on our military should, at the very least, be confined to the Ft. Leavenworth Disciplinary Barracks, reduced in rank to Private, with forfeiture of all pay and benefits. That’s the LEAST that needs to happen. My baser instincts want to see a short drop and a quick stop for them instead of confinement. Or perhaps a wall, a blindfold and a cigarette.

Oh, and if you think that the military only has 23 cases of myocarditis, I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn that I’d love to sell you. Cash only, but it’s a heck of a good deal. I personally know of at least three people who suffered neurological effects from the jab, one who’s physical health is slowly being destroyed by the neurological damage that was done by the jab, and others who had at the very least temporary paralysis and unknown long-term effects. None of those people are recorded as a vax injury, because the military has no interest in accurately recording the damage caused by the jab. Anything that would cause the “leadership” to be held accountable is suppressed. Trust me, it’s a large part of why I retired when I did. The people up top have no accountability to the people they supposedly lead, and Milley and Austin are so pathetic and corrupt that they couldn’t lead a platoon of infantry into a strip club that was serving free beer at this point. Warriors can tell when the people up top are worthless. Hell, why do you think the Army is suffering a recruiting crisis? Because the warriors, who are instrumental in getting MORE warriors to join, are telling people to hold off and choose a different path.

And let’s not forget that the lying liars who lie, aka the media, refused to admit that there was any danger to the jab. “Safe and effective” was repeated ad nauseum on a daily basis. It was the largest psy-op campaign in history, directed at the civilian population. And the pharma companies knew that the jab would kill people. They knew it would screw with pregnant women and cause miscarriages and stillbirths. They knew it would cause heart issues.

The vax is quite possibly one of the most evil acts ever perpetrated on humanity, because we still don’t know what’s going to happen to people in the future. But based on what we’ve seen in the past few years, it ain’t gonna be good. We’re seeing a large amount of excess deaths, many from “suddenly” or “coincidence”. My sainted mother, who spent decades in health care, is seeing a huge increase in cases of cancer, especially reoccurrences of cancer, and it’s like the cancer is on warp speed when it comes back. There were plenty of medical staff warning people when the jab first came out that the jab prevents your immune system from creating the required defense against cancerous cells. They were silenced, of course, because the government and that evil gnome Fauci couldn’t have THAT information getting loose in the wild.

The fact that the lying liars who lie are now being forced to cover the fact that the jab causes myocarditis tells me that the problem is far, far greater than what they’re actually reporting. This isn’t a news article, this is a CYA story, probably designed to limit the damage that the information will cause. “See, we covered the news! It’s not that bad! Ignore your lying eyes!”

Remember that the media is the enemy of the people. WHY would this story be out now? What purpose does it serve the people who forced the jab on this country?

Act accordingly.

Aug 29 2023

Upsetting, Terrifying, And Vital

     You can approach a movie many ways. Directors view it as a kind of statement. Cinematographers and set designers view it as a kind of visual art. Actors view it as a demonstration of their skills. And producers – mustn’t forget them! – view it as a kind of muscle-flexing: “See what I can do?”

     All of them, without exception, hope you’ll see their movie their way, if not exactly through their eyes. Whatever message they embed in it is the one they’d like you to come away with as you leave the theater. But if the movie really “comes together,” the viewer will get more than that. The impact on him will go beyond statements, artistry, craft, and the rest. As the saying goes, the whole will be more than merely the sum of its parts.

     Nefarious is all that, and more.

     This movie is upsetting. If you’re easily upset, it will get you in a very tender place. In that way, it parallels another movie that many found supremely upsetting. The two would make quite a double feature.

     This movie is also terrifying. Sean Patrick Flanery gives a performance that’s beyond praise. From his lips comes the voice of evil: genuine and unadulterated. While he’s on-screen as Edward Wayne Brady / the demon Nefarious, you hear, as closely as a human is capable of producing it, the anti-gospel of Satan. Unless, that is, there’s something about him that I don’t know and he’d rather we not find out.

     Jordan Belfi is also impressive as psychiatrist James Martin, brought in to certify Brady’s mental competence for execution. He plays Martin’s part straight: as an admitted, “devout” atheist at the start, but one who is ever more persuaded by the evidence Brady / Nefarious gives him, that the condemned man is possessed by a demon. The counterpoint between the two, written with exquisite attention to rhythm and timing, is seductive in the best sense. You can feel Nefarious’s evil gradually overcoming Martin’s stubborn insistence upon rejecting the supernatural.

     But central to the movie is the question Why? It’s been said many times that “The devil’s greatest achievement is convincing us that he doesn’t exist.” C. S. Lewis laid emphasis on this in The Screwtape Letters:

     I wonder you should ask me whether it is essential to keep the patient in ignorance of your own existence. That question, at least for the present phase of the struggle, has been answered for us by the High Command. Our policy, for the moment, is to conceal ourselves. Of course this has not always been so. We are really faced with a cruel dilemma. When the humans disbelieve in our existence we lose all the pleasing results of direct terrorism and we make no magicians. On the other hand, when they believe in us, we cannot make them materialists and sceptics. At least, not yet. I have great hopes that we shall learn in due time how to emotionalise and mythologise their science to such an extent that what is, in effect, belief in us, (though not under that name) will creep in while the human mind remains closed to belief in the Enemy. The “Life Force”, the worship of sex, and some aspects of Psychoanalysis, may here prove useful. If once we can produce our perfect work—the Materialist Magician, the man, not using, but veritably worshipping, what he vaguely calls “Forces” while denying the existence of “spirits”—then the end of the war will be in sight. But in the meantime we must obey our orders.

     He underlined that concept in That Hideous Strength: one of the reasons I hold that novel in such high regard.

     That is why I find Why? to be the question most urgently pressed upon us by the movie. Why would a demon be so eager to convince an atheist psychiatrist – one, moreover, who has unwittingly been doing Satan’s work – that the supernatural is real, that demons and possession exist, and that Hell has a specific plan of campaign? Possible answers abound, yet none are conclusive. The one Nefarious urges upon Martin is explicit: he wants Martin to write a “dark gospel,” the better to accelerate Mankind’s damnation and self-destruction. But he can’t do so without first getting the psychiatrist to damn himself…and as matters proceed, it proves to be a very close call.

     There’s one questionable note in the movie: the portrayal of Father Louis, a Roman Catholic priest who serves as the prison chaplain, as himself a disbeliever in demonic possession. He also misrepresents Catholic teaching about such things. That would make him a deviate from Catholic doctrine. But perhaps there are reasons such a priest would be sought for that position by prison authorities.

     Please, Gentle Reader: see this movie if you haven’t already. But be prepared. Whether you’re a believer or not, it will affect you. The C.S.O., an agnostic Jew, couldn’t endure it. I can’t guarantee that you’ll do any better than she did.

Aug 28 2023

For No Particular Reason

     Make of that what you will.

Aug 28 2023

The Entertainer’s Narrow Path

     “Pictures were made to entertain; if you want to send a message, call Western Union.” – Samuel Goldwyn

     Yesterday’s brief piece about film director Peter Weir evoked quite a bit of comment and email. Our Gentle Readers largely concurred with my sentiments. I expected that, as our readers tend to be older than today’s typical moviegoer. But the broad subject of how to please one’s audience isn’t confined to cinema. Anyone who addresses the creation of some sort of entertainment must face it.

     All entertainment must, of course, entertain. It can do other things as well, but its first priority must be to divert and please its audience. If it puts any other priority above that one, it will have no audience. Successful writers, musicians, and filmmakers know it. Many have learned that the hard way.

     But some never learn it. Some resist learning it throughout their careers. They put gratifying some personal desire above entertainment. These, to be gentle about it, aren’t as well or widely received as they might otherwise be.

     One divergent path that’s been on my mind recently is the artist determined to experiment. There have been some well-known artists who’ve deliberately stepped across a boundary, risking the alienation of their established audiences, to explore a new mode or medium. A few manage to pull it off without torpedoing their careers. But the majority of such experimenters don’t manage it.

     If you go into any brick-and-mortar bookstore – yes, there are still a few such – to survey the offerings, you’ll notice at once that the books are categorized. Publishers do that because they know that readers’ tastes fall into a number of recognized channels, usually called genres. The categorization procedure helps the reader find what he likes and wants. And yes, it also helps the publishers sell their books; publishing is a business, after all.

     The writer determined to experiment may chafe under the genre system. He might want to cross genre boundaries with his current tale. Or he might want to violate some of the conventions of the genre in which he writes. Some such forays do succeed – the recent trend of incorporating romances into science-fiction stories is an example – but most don’t. If they find an audience, it’s likely to be a minor one.

     There have been a lot of experimenters in contemporary music. These face obstacles comparable to those before the experimentally-inclined writer. Once again, some pull it off; Bob Dylan did so more than once. But most struggle vainly against the force of audience preferences.

     There’s a cleavage to be respected here. It separates the entertainer from the unsuccessful artist. The former emphasizes pleasing his audience; the latter prefers to gratify his own desires. And so the former garners an audience and, quite likely, profits, while the latter mutters about “not being understood.”

     Let it be said at once that there are extremes and intermediate positions to be considered. The entertainer who feeds his audience uncreative pabulum is called a hack. While he may make money, he doesn’t get a lot of respect. The experimenter who finds the “golden mean,” by which he manages to entertain his audience while blazing a new trail in his chosen medium, is celebrated. He may become known as the leader of a new artistic movement. But probing for that golden mean while keeping the bucks flowing in is one tough proposition.

     This is on my mind today because of some musical wanderings I’ve been indulging. A few days ago I mentioned Jim Dawson in a fit of reverie. Dawson had one very popular record, his 1971 album Songman. After that his popularity waned, possibly because his later offerings were seen as repetitive. Another musician who started off well, Tim Buckley, never did anything twice. Consider these representative tracks from six of his albums:

     Buckley originally had a following, but it dwindled as he wandered among styles and modes. Despite being hailed as an upcoming sensation for his first two offerings, he died in poverty at the age of 28.

     The path of success in combining entertainment with innovation appears narrow indeed. There’s no help for it. Worse, complaining that “my audience doesn’t understand me” is banal and boring. Even your fellow artist-innovators are indisposed to listen to you; after all, they think you should be listening to them. There’s a moral in there, somewhere.

Aug 27 2023

The Chronicle of the DC, 27 Aug 23: Admission By Inuendo

In attempting to assure Maui residents that help would eventually come to them, the White House tweeted they were — ahem — laser-focused:

Well, the Dew Point is where the temperature drops to the point that water-vapor condenses out of the atmosphere.

The DEW point is where a high temperature laser is targeted.

I don’t believe our Sus worshiping enemy has a conscience, so there is no way this was a Freudian slip. So I’d interpret it more along the lines of:

“Yeah, we coulda done it. So what do you think you’re gonna do about if we did?”

Aug 27 2023

Massive Concurrence

     Every now and then, an artist in some medium will come along to remind us about what really matters. Today, AoSHQ co-blogger “The James Madison” highlights one such artist:

     Listening to [Australian film director Peter] Weir in interviews, I find it hard not to really like the guy. He’s soft-spoken, unassuming, and very intelligent, and he makes the assertion that he’s really just out to tell “a good tale”. Well, bollocks, I say. William Wyler was out to just tell a good tale. Weir, though, has a very strong theme and series of motifs running through his work to the point where you think it’s intentional. As a writer, I can say that I recognize my own themes in my books, but they just end up being stories I’m interested in telling that I unconsciously mold into stories that speak to what I want to say about the world. I don’t think Weir was intentionally bending stories to his own worldview, just that it was a natural effect of most creatives.
     Anyway, I’d distill his work into a phrase: “human connections in systems that discourage it.” That seems generic and a bit glib because I have to generalize to a certain point because the “human connections” end up being of such variety, and the “systems” end up being of such variety, that you have to step a bit back at that level.

     Exactly. Weir grasped the essence of fiction. Fiction is about people and the ways they interact:

  1. With other people;
  2. With their own pasts, presents, and emotions;
  3. With events and challenges from the world around them.

     Peter Weir isn’t widely known despite his excellent films. Probably Master and Commander is his best-known work…and despite its brilliance, financially it wasn’t very successful. It was based on terrific prose storytelling from Patrick O’Brien. It featured wonderful performances, including Russell Crowe’s career-capping best as Captain Jack Aubrey. It was set in a thrilling milieu, as picturesque as cinematography can be…but it hardly made any money. There’s a moral in there, somewhere. But I digress.

     To tell stories that touch the human heart, you must focus on the human heart. What could be more obvious? Yet far too many would-be storytellers in our time think the way to great fiction is through bombast and titanic events: superheroes, world-shaking conspiracies, alien invasions, hordes of zombies, the opening of the gates to Hell, and likewise. Such matters can only be useful as a backdrop for far smaller things: love and hatred, commitment to an ideal, self-discovery, and personal growth.

     Just a few early-morning thoughts from yet another storyteller. I’ll be back to this later. Just now it’s time for Mass.

Aug 27 2023

Can Everything Be Digitized?

     From a recent essay by Leo Hohmann:

     Technocracy is much different than Marxism or communism. In a Marxist state you have government ownership of the means of production. But in a technocracy, which is the preferred model of self-appointed globalist elites at the World Economic Forum, the Rockefeller Foundation, Gates Foundation, Club of Rome, United Nations, et al, you have government working in public-private partnerships (PPPs) with large corporations to create, staff and enforce an all-encompassing digital surveillance state. Think of it as Naziism on a global scale with access to modern digital tracking technology.

     We might condense that paragraph thus:

     Technocracy is fascist-style totalitarian rule with extensive technological support.

     Hohmann isn’t the first to capture the idea in this fashion. From a not-quite-as-recent novel by George Orwell:

     He took a twenty-five cent piece out of his pocket. There, too, in tiny clear lettering, the same slogans were inscribed, and on the other face of the coin the head of Big Brother. Even from the coin the eyes pursued you. On coins, on stamps, on the covers of books, on banners, on posters, and on the wrappings of a cigarette Packet — everywhere. Always the eyes watching you and the voice enveloping you. Asleep or awake, working or eating, indoors or out of doors, in the bath or in bed — no escape. Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimetres inside your skull.

     It looks like we have the answer.

     Orwell wrote well before computers became ubiquitous. He may never have heard the word “digitization.” He didn’t need it.

Aug 26 2023

The Tour of Honor

For those who don’t know me as well as some, I’m what people might call a motorcycle “enthusiast”. Although perhaps that word is not quite right as I’m less enthusiastic about the machine and more enthusiastic about where it can take me.

I like to ride. A lot. I purchased my currant iron horse in 2020, and I’ve put over 38,000 miles on it since then. Had this summer not sucked so badly, I would have had at least ten thousand more.

One of the rides that I was introduced to some years back is called the Tour of Honor. It’s a military fundraiser combined with long-distance riding. I was determined to get at least one state under my belt this year, and so this last Sunday and Monday I took off and completed Washington. Thanks to the wildfires in Canada there was a blanket of smoke over the entire state. It cleared up a bit near the Puget Sound, but once I got off the ferry the smoke came back. After I had hit my last stop, I rode through a thunderstorm. Apparently the storm and I were going in the same direction because it was two hours of rain, on mountain pass roads, in the dark. By the time I got home almost every muscle in my upper body was locked and frozen into position, not due to the cold but due to the stress of riding dark mountain roads in the rain. I had to unscrew myself from my seat when I got to a dry location. It took me a couple days to recover from that.

That was followed by family showing up for a vacation, and so I’ve spent the past couple of days drinking beer, eating lots of good food, going to the county fair and generally trying to have a good time. That’s not always been successful. I can’t ever remember being an introvert in my youth, but these days if I don’t get some measure of alone time I end up rather grumpy. So there’s been some time where it’s been me, a cigar and a book out in the woods.

All this to simply say I’m not dead, and I’ll be back soon. And if you ride motorcycles, check out the Tour of Honor link up above. I promise that it will take you to parts of your state that you haven’t seen. I’m still hoping to finish Idaho and Oregon this year before the weather gets too cold and snowy.

Aug 26 2023

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 the wind.” — Robert A. Heinlein

     The pervasive loss of trust in large American institutions, whether public or private, is now beyond dispute. Approximately no one reflexively trusts anything from the federal government, the news media or any so-called “expert.” Too many items of propaganda have been labeled as fact. Too many liars stand before us unrepentant.

     That decline in trust would be bad enough all by itself. But it has a secondary consequence that few reckon with: the dismissal of the statements of institutions even when they’re correct.

***

     I happened upon the following at Gab a little earlier this morning:

     I hadn’t known about this fellow before. I have no idea what claims he actually made to entice customers for his apricot-pit formula. I do know that he’s no longer with us. Apparently kidney cancer got him eventually, though further specifics are unavailable.

     Apricot pits contain significant amounts of amygdalin, which is toxic. Amygdalin is the chief reagent used to make Laetrile, an “alternative medicine” promoted not long ago as a cancer cure and preventative. The FDA has condemned both Jason Vale’s merchandise and Laetrile as both ineffective against cancer and harmful to the human body.

     Say what you will about the Food and Drug Administration – I certainly do – but in the cases of Laetrile and amygdalin, it appears to have been correct. Yes, it’s an untrustworthy institution. Yes, it’s been caught in a number of deceptions aimed at achieving particular effects. But now and then it will be correct; it will provide useful, accurate information. The destruction of its reputation as a reliable consumer-protection agency will cause some persons to disregard those instances along with all the rest: Hey, it’s the FDA. You know how much they lie. Anything to keep the bucks coming in from Big Pharma.

     There’s no gain to anyone from dismissing accurate, useful information. Indeed, there’s a loss that could extend all the way to losses of lives. Yet what are we to do with the emissions of untrustworthy institutions?

     The casualties of Big, Deceitful Government include the losses that occur from this phenomenon. Yet analysts and public-policy commentators seldom address them.

***

     If you’re a regular Gentle Reader, you know I’ve got a bee in my bonnet about the loss of our former, high-trust society. This is just one of consequences that largely goes undiscussed. Yet it matters, perhaps more than many other, more obvious deceits and betrayals. We can’t know how much it matters because its effects cannot be measured – and that may be the most poignant aspect of all.

     The late Marshall Fritz, in speaking of an important rhetorical technique he called “the Randsberger Pivot,” made note of the perversity of simply attacking an institution like the FDA as untrustworthy. Done baldly, that doesn’t get your listeners thinking along with you. It gets them thinking about trichinosis, salmonella, and botulism. The FDA purports to protect us from those things…and on net balance, it does a pretty good job. What’s tragic is how the FDA’s revealed errors and deceits have caused so many to dismiss everything it says or does. The question we should be asking is how to separate the good work and the reliable results from the deceits and rent-seeking which have tarnished the FDA’s reputation.

     The answer is, of course, competition: the flowering of many food-and-drug-soundness organizations, all private, all competing with one another for the public’s trust. But that subject is too large for the tail end of a tirade.

     The argument for competition rests on the belief that people are likely to be wrong…. In the end, the case against an authoritarian system of resource allocation rests on the same principle as the case against an authoritarian structure in any discipline: part of the case…is that no person or body of persons is fit to be trusted with such power; the (other) part…is that no one person or group of persons can say for sure what new knowledge tomorrow will bring. Competition is a proper response to ignorance. – Brian Loasby

Aug 25 2023

Crime And The Individual Perspective

     John Hinderaker asks in a plaintive tone: Is Crime Still Illegal?

     All of these descriptions are somewhat sanitized. We have seen the videos: gangs of twenty or more criminals will descend on a store, often blocking the street in front of the store with their vehicles, and rampage through the establishment stealing whatever relatively high-volume items they can get their hands on.
     Sometimes, of course, theft is carried out by smaller groups of shoplifters or by individuals, who simply load up a shopping cart and walk out of the store without paying. Very few of these stolen goods are intended for consumption by the thief. Rather, they are sold online. Organized crime is a highly profitable business.
     Of course, theft has always been with us. See the 8th Commandment. But why is organized theft at the present level suddenly a problem? I think it is mostly due to post-George Floyd cowardice. Criminals of all sorts have been emboldened by irrational attacks on law enforcement and a perverse sense that crime constitutes a sort of retributive justice. When elected district attorneys proudly announce that they do not intend to prosecute criminals, and when the State of California essentially legalizes shoplifting, what do they think is going to happen? Obviously, theft will skyrocket.

     The problem goes beyond the loss of effective enforcement and any sense of “retributive justice.” Time was, any individual American could easily have told you that theft and many other illegal acts are simply wrong. They’re evil. They violate the rights that inhere in individuals and legitimate businesses. We don’t need to ask the opinion of the law; God has already given us The Law on those things.

     But that once-common moral grounding is getting to be ever less common. Many parents never bother to impress it on their children. The schools have no room for it; it’s “exclusionary” if not “racist.” The entertainment media’s glorification of antiheroes and bad-boy protagonists continues the moral numbing process.

     If you sense the hand of the transnational-progressive Left behind this, you’re not alone.

     Today, J. B. Shurk speaks to the ongoing paradigmatic change in perspectives. Concerning the good-versus-evil dichotomy, he says this:

     Not long ago, it was common for conservatives to see the Marxist left as foolishly mistaken — a collection of young and inexperienced troublemakers who would eventually “snap out” of their common delusions once forced to confront reality.
     Now people understand that the left’s real mission is to reject reality. Castrating boys so that they can pretend to be girls is not “healthy.” Perpetuating racism as social policy is not “justice.” Imposing a “woke” State religion over personal conscience is not “moral.” Aiding and abetting child sex–trafficking and drug-smuggling at our borders is not “compassionate.” Stealing property is not “equitable.” Just as with Leninism and Maoism before, today’s leftism is evil.

     The destruction of the moral norms upon which Christian-Enlightenment civilization was built is a systematic undertaking. The disappearance of those norms will mean the disappearance of the civilization founded upon them. Soon, individual decisions on matters of right and wrong will be unpredictable by disinterested parties.

     Regard the following cartoon:

     Ponder the message behind the obvious one. In ten or twenty years’ time, would the therapist ask for the prescription slip back…or grope for his “samples” and jam a a few down his patient’s throat?

     Resist. And pray.

Aug 25 2023

The Last Stand

     Apparently, what’s been widely rumored is true:

     I listened to Sid Rosenberg on WOR radio [CBS NY], and he said he’s hearing that the masks, lockdowns, and other restrictions are returning. They are coming back. You must resist. They are changing America, and that includes taking your freedoms away.
     […]
     This past week, Hollywood studio Lionsgate announced it was reinstating a COVID mask mandate for its employees. As we reported, Morris Brown College in Atlanta is reinstating its mandates for staff and students. Other colleges are following suit. Rutgers and Georgetown require indoor masking despite the evidence masks had no effect. Over 100 schools still require vaccination despite the myocarditis/pericarditis side effect.

     The Usurpers were so buoyed by their success the first time around that they’re betting they can get away with doing it again. Should they succeed, it will mean the end of all remaining individual freedom in these United States, including the freedom to assemble and the freedom to travel. Would anyone care to argue the point? Do you sincerely believe that a government that requires that you get its permission to leave your own home will respect any of your other rights?

     Convince me if you can. I stand with Scott Adams:

     Remember that your oppressors are willing to kill you for daring to defy them. If they’re willing to do that, how could they possibly be sincerely concerned about your health?

Aug 25 2023

Things To Think About (UPDATED)

     First, an old commercial:

     Getty made more than one such commercial. (I think I have the full set.) They embedded the same premises. Whether they stimulated much thought is unclear. But the message is not.

     Now a picture:

     Reflect on that for a moment. Freedom must perforce include the freedom to choose one’s associates for oneself, regardless of the reasons or the context. Most of us would choose not to employ lawbreakers, for example. But apparently that’s forbidden by law as a form of “discrimination:”

     Biden’s Department Of Justice is now suing Elon Musk’s SpaceX for daring to require an employee to be a citizen or legal permanent resident in the United States of America in order to be employed by the company. In their press release, the DOJ explains that they’re suing because “SpaceX hired only U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents” while they “refused to hire qualified asylees and refugee applicants and repeatedly rejected asylee and refugee applicants because of their citizenship status,” and even “discouraged asylees and refugees from applying for open positions.”
     I mean, it stands to reason that if one of the qualifications for employment is that the employee be a citizen or legal permanent resident, then non-citizen asylees and refugees aren’t actually “qualified applicants,” are they. They lack a major qualification for the job. And perhaps SpaceX discouraged them from applying because they knew they weren’t qualified for the position based on them not being citizens or lawful permanent residents.

     UPDATE: If you don’t believe it, here’s the DOJ’s press release.

     So try your best to stay on the right side of the law. You don’t want to be indicted for “attacking democracy,” do you? And of course, try to avoid “hate speech” like this:

     I need more coffee. Back in a bit.

Aug 24 2023

When The World Is Too Much With Me

     I’m old: 71. The older I get, the less patience I have for a great many irritating and inconveniencing things. A barrage of those things will send me to one of my “escape hatches:” fiction; music; yard work; chess; weapons (this is a big one lately); cooking; or some other. Each of them possesses the power to divert me from my cares and restore me to calm. That’s a very good thing (cf. “weapons”).

     Music is an especially valued retreat. I can hide in the memories associated with it. It’s almost as good as a chronoscope that way. But as with all good things, there’s a price to be paid: I can remember too much.

     Memories of bad things, things that hurt badly or cost heavily, extract one sort of price. Yet most of those things have been more instructive than destructive. I unlearned many mistakes through the simple mechanism of suffering for having made them. I still wince at recalling them, of course, but I value the lessons they imparted.

     Remembering the good things can hurt a lot worse.

     I shan’t go into details. Rather, if you’re of a comparable age and feeling brave, listen to the song embedded below. I first heard and loved it in 1972. What memories does it bring back? Wince-able ones that remind you what a careless, thoughtless sort you were…and possibly still are from time to time? Or glorious ones that make you wish you could have frozen time right then and there, when you knew all the joy life could offer you…and hadn’t yet realized that the greater your joys, the worse it would hurt to have them slip away, as all joys must with the passage of time?

     Old friends: listen and remember. Young friends: if your time hasn’t come yet, consider dragging your feet a bit.

Aug 24 2023

The Chronicle of The DC, 24 Aug 23: Fomenting Toxicities [Updated]

The same city that tolerates homelessness and welcomes illegals who add to it, could not be clueless as to the public health degradation that had to come with it.

The city of Los Angeles will issue a citation for washing one’s car in one’s driveway. The object was to penalize addition of untreated soap which will travel by sewers to the ocean. They based this on studies that considered all the complicated nutrients and by-products that contribute to algae growth — then concluded the run-off to be too environmentally unfriendly. Yet far worse additions to the open sewers they somehow never considered would be a consequence of their “liberal” open outdoor policies? What else is needed to recognize how nasty the enemy is? Dysentery brought to the first world is equitable — right? Or would you rather pass?

For a short synopsis of the report use this link. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/TqTjjh4bUKE?feature=share (I’m sorry, but I could not get WordPress to embed it.) The full report is below.

This is only Los Angeles. But this agenda is coming to cities all across the Western world. Such policies are incrementally leading to our ill health, starvation, terrorism and death. Yet only a few major commentators forthrightly dare tell you that the powers that be (TPTB) are at war with each of you.

TPTB are determined to be ruthless in following their agenda. So expect no mercy from them. They are strict adherents to a religion, Survivabllity, that they do not openly profess, but their relentless progress to which they are enthralled is missed by only those too stupid, ignorant, naive, or cowed to speak of it. One might be labeled a conspiracy nut. Ooh. Self-censoring is self-denial of your most basic human rights.

Here’s a clue. Their belief is so strong that if you want to survive, if you want your loved ones to survive, it would be best that you adopt a belief system that is far stronger.

Here it is: Even if you have caused death, be it by accident or even by intent, you are not nearly as disgusting a human being as these death cultists. They are seeking victims on a scale that will swamp the death toll of the last century.

Simply repent of your past ill deeds, no matter how large or small, and join with the rest of decent humanity. We all turn to our Creator for help. He will listen to those who sincerely repent of past ill deeds. In that faith we will find a way to turn the tables. One individual at a time.

We outnumber them. They can’t operate their death machines without an army of competents for long. Everything they are doing is destroying the font of competence. Lack of people solid in mathematics is key, but it’s only part of it.

Faith in a Higher Power, and the courage that is fed by it, will supply our victory as it has so often in the past. The advancements of the modern age would have never happened without it. It will defeat the deranged, postmodernist Progs.

UPDATED to include a grace note queued up to where Bill Whittle almost says what I long to hear him say about L.A.: 

https://youtu.be/-e9cq2KrBfQ?t=876

“You can no longer explain this by stupidity. You just can’t….” He just fails to take it the rest of the way.

Aug 24 2023

Targets And Guards

     If you’re a longtime Gentle Reader, you’ve surely seen this Clarence Carson quote before:

     [W]e are told that there is no need to fear the concentration of power in government so long as that power is checked by the electoral process. We are urged to believe that so long as we can express our disagreement in words, we have our full rights to disagree. Now both freedom of speech and the electoral process are important to liberty, but alone they are only the desiccated remains of liberty. However vigorously we may argue against foreign aid, our substance is still drained away in never-to-be-repaid loans. Quite often, there is not even a candidate to vote for who holds views remotely like my own. To vent one’s spleen against the graduated income tax may be healthy for the psyche, but one must still yield up his freedom of choice as to how his money will be spent when he pays it to the government. The voice of electors in government is not even proportioned to the tax contribution of individuals; thus, those who contribute more lose rather than gain by the “democratic process.” A majority of voters may decide that property cannot be used in such and such ways, but the liberty of the individual is diminished just as much as in that regard as if a dictator had decreed it. Those who believe in the redistribution of wealth should be free to redistribute their own, but they are undoubtedly limiting the freedom of others when they vote to redistribute theirs.

     I use it frequently because it’s important for several reasons. Most Americans are unaware of the amount of freedom that’s been taken from them. The above, which was written in 1964, sketches in the bare outline. The substance they delineate goes to every aspect of American life. Yet even then there was a semblance of opposition to ever-expanding government / ever-shrinking liberty. Now and then those who held freedom to be the highest political value would win a victory or two. The advocates of the Total State disliked that and sought ways to prevent it.

     What the statists found was that the “desiccated remains” they’d left to us were capable of mustering sufficient resistance to them, on occasion, to set them back for a while. To quench that possibility:

  • Freedom of expression had to be curtailed;
  • The electoral process had to be prevented from thwarting them.

     They hadn’t realized at the outset that free speech plus the franchise could seriously impede them. Yet now and then it did so, notably with the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, and the election of Donald Trump in 2016. The emergence of the two-way World Wide Web threatened to make communications among freedom advocates too fluid and convenient to be withstood. If it were permitted to flower indefinitely, the game would be up for good. So freedom of expression had to go.

     The emergence of the “communications concentrators” – Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube – was vitally important to the statists. Those conveniences fatally weakened the “blogging culture” that was the bastion of freedom advocates. There were nearly 60 million blogs operated at its peak. Nearly all had comments sections, many of which were very lively. Owing to Facebook and twitter, the great majority of those blogs are either gone or idle. The concentrators had herded opinionated Americans into a small number of controllable pens, where their ability to be speak and be heard could be limited or suppressed completely.

     Then there was all that pesky voting. In a way it served the statists’ purposes, for they could point to vote totals – if they were sufficiently large, at least – as evidence of “support for the system.” But that turned sour when the voting went against them, so they decided that on balance elections were unfavorable to their aims…at least, if their opponents had a chance of winning them.

     Capturing the electoral processes involved advances on several fronts:

  • The Secretary of State project;
  • The multiplication of methods for committing vote fraud;
  • The reduction or elimination of mechanisms that promote election integrity.

     No Gentle Reader of Liberty’s Torch needs to be told how that turned out.

     If free expression could be completely squelched and elections corrupted nationwide, the statists would have dismantled the last guards against their complete and permanent hegemony. They’re very close to victory, as the 2020 and 2022 elections have demonstrated. If that victory occurs, it will be because statist strategists understood that the guards that protect a target must be taken down first. That’s the core principle in the study of systems vulnerability.

     Free expression and (relatively) honest electoral processes weren’t all-powerful guards for freedom. The history of the century past should suffice to establish that. But they were potent enough to allow freedom lovers the occasional triumph. Once the statists eliminate their vestiges, there will be nothing left but armed revolt.

     Just a few gloomy thoughts about the popular slogan acronymized as TINVOWOOT.

Aug 24 2023

Skirting The Laws 101

     If you’re determined to break a law, the one thing you must not do is say so plainly. Now that the Supreme Court has struck down racial preferences in higher education, those “institutions of higher learning” that want to favor one race over the others must exercise some subtlety:

     The Biden administration is openly encouraging colleges and universities to ignore a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that forbade discrimination on the basis of race.
     Among the high court’s most anticipated rulings of its 2022-23 term was a pair of cases brought by Students for Fair Admissions that ended the practice of “affirmative action” — race-based admission practices.
     Or at least the high court purported to end affirmative action. But President Joe Biden is having none of it.
     […]
     It’s just a matter of replacing direct questions of an applicant’s race with something more subtle, according to Adam Kissel, a visiting fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Education Policy.
     He said that they would have tried to skirt the Supreme Court even without the White House’s blessing.
     “Colleges will continue using admission essays to give special treatment to favored identity groups,” he told Newsmax. “Several colleges have already added or altered essay questions in ways that will make it easier to identify an applicant’s race.”

     Antidiscrimination law is unenforceable as written, but it’s very useful as a political bludgeon. It will be enforced solely when it suits the ruling power – i.e., when it can be used against that power’s opponents. For elite universities to practice racial preferences “on the q.t.” is quite all right with the political elite. But don’t imagine that you could get away with preferential hiring in your little business. The crosshairs will be on your chest before you can recite Maxwell’s equations (integral form only, please).

     Any law that is not enforced and can’t be enforced weakens all other laws. — Robert A. Heinlein

     Thanks, Bob. They don’t listen when I say it. — Me

Aug 24 2023

Interesting Contrasts Dept.

     Does anyone else remember how the mainstream media treated President George W. Bush on September 11, 2001? When Dubya received notice of the attack on the World Trade Center, he was reading a story to a classroom full of kids. He continued to do so for a few minutes before attending to the horrifying news from Manhattan. Media flacks screamed and shrieked and poured oceans of vitriol on him for not instantly dropping everything and flying to New York.

     The media’s treatment of “Sleepless Joe” Biden for his two-weeks-late reactions to recent events in Maui has been a bit different:

     LAHAINA, Hawaii — President Biden and first lady Jill Biden arrived in this grief-stricken community Monday afternoon, touring damage from one of the deadliest wildfires in American history and attempting to channel one of the president’s signature traits: comforting those who have lost loved ones.

     Read the rest, if you have a strong stomach for fawning and hypocrisy. Oh, and don’t you dare, you shameless right-winger, claim that Biden fell asleep at the memorial service:

     Conservative pundits used low-quality video on social media platforms Tuesday to spread a false claim that President Joe Biden fell asleep during a memorial for Maui wildfire victims.
     Fox News host Sean Hannity was among those who shared low-resolution video on X, the social media app formerly known as Twitter. Hannity’s post was viewed more than 425,000 times within a few hours, and similar videos posted by others received thousands more views on YouTube, Instagram and TikTok.

     Biden’s eyes were closed and his chin was practically resting on his upper chest…but he wasn’t asleep. He was just resting his eyes. How could you defame the man by saying otherwise?

     “Trust the mainstream media!!” — the mainstream media.

Aug 24 2023

Newsworthy But Underreported

     Animal lovers pay attention to stories that feature animals in important roles. And no, it’s not all about skateboarding dogs or cats playing table tennis; we look for incidents in which animals have been important in people’s lives in unusual ways. We’re especially alert for incidents in which domesticated animals – pets – come to harm at the hands of humans, for that is a violation of the bond that unites us to our furry friends.

     Thus I was surprised to learn about the following incident, which took place three months ago:

     Employees and pets at a Maryland dog retreat narrowly escaped an SUV when the vehicle ran through Sniffers Doggie Retreat earlier this month.
     Video shows a typical day at the Rockville, Maryland facility, with a customer having a discussion at the front desk when a white SUV appears outside the front doors.
     The SUV appears to come to a stop at the curb and then moments later, it bursts through the glass doors and entry way at the dog retreat.
     Then it keeps going.
     The SUV plows into an office space where a trio of employees are shown running out of the room to avoid getting crushed.
     Then video shows the SUV continuing through the building before it comes to rest in the back room where the dog retreat has dozens of crates lined up for canine customers.

     Apparently neither humans nor dogs were harmed, though two dogs were briefly missing.

     Please watch the embedded video. The “authorities” have said repeatedly that “this was an accident.” But there was a driver at the wheel of that car. What kind of “accident” causes an SUV to power thirty feet into and through a building, plowing into doors, walls, furniture, and fixtures in three rooms, and then come to a stop? What was the driver doing? Was he unconscious or malevolent? And what will be his role in making Sniffers whole again?

     Applause to Mike Miles at 90 Miles from Tyranny for alerting me to this.

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