The flame of creativity flickers dangerously. Prometheus’ punishment, was it all in vain?This is the information age. Information, information, everywhere. Constantly assaulting your senses. Information is mainstream. Access to information has never been higher. But it is not the same as access to knowledge. A lot of this information is actually anti-knowledge. The advent of the search engine led to an explosion of information available to the everyman. As did social media. A hundred extraneous details about the lives of people you know far too little, and like even less, are now buzzing around in your head, even if you do not want them. Irrelevant trivia about the number of goals scored by a certain athlete in a 1972 game, or the affair between a prominent celebrity and his stepdaughter. The random useless things you end up google searching on your everyday train of thought. Just because you can, you know?So much so, it’s become impossible to shut out.Art is fading away. Where is it left? In the galleries, where the more incomprehensible a painting, the more artistic it’s considered to be?In the theatre, where the greater the degree of depravity, the more critically acclaimed the work?In your head, with the endless buzzing of ideologies and extracts of pointless conversations and the most mind-numbing data about everything under the sun?Even in the streets, they will pull down the statues of our heroes soon. As soon as the people finish urinating on them in the name of freedom. The boundaries between beautiful and depraved merged until they meant the same thing. Symmetry used to be beautiful. Realism used to be beautiful. Method used to be beautiful. But that beauty is cliché as per modern definitions.Stream of consciousness. Excessive sentimentality. Exaggerated tragedy. Bleakness with edges blackened further in order to be recognisable. Deconstructionism. These are the new parameters. The only parameters.“Art doesn’t have to mean something. Art doesn’t have to be beautiful. Art doesn’t have to be understood. Art doesn’t have to have a point.” But doesn’t it, though?Some artists are eccentric. Maybe even all. But all eccentrics are certainly not artists. How do you think creatively when your university has been stripped of its arches and gargoyles? How do you write a romantic novel in an over-sexualised world where love is ridden off as a naive distraction? How do you write poetry when you hear profanities screamed all day long? When did we become so rich and poor at the same time? Will our children inherit this poverty? What a victory!Possibly, too many are unconcerned, even unaffected by this. Can these “stoics” carry on the legacy of human creativity? They see, and they do not flinch.

"The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts." - Marcus AureliusIn Meditations, Aurelius distills the central pillars and tenets of stoic philosophy. Although it was essentially a journal and never intended for a general readership, it has become one of the most widely read philosophy works in the world. I wanted to elucidate six key concepts of stoicism represented in icons, starting with the four pillars:Courage, or fortitude, is the first pillar of Stoicism. It refers to the ability to face and endure difficult situations without fear or hesitation. Courage involves accepting what cannot be changed and embracing the challenges that come with life.Justice is the ability to treat others fairly and with respect. Justice involves recognizing the inherent value and dignity of all individuals and acting in a way that promotes the common good and the greater good of society.Temperance is the ability to exercise self-control and restraint. This includes moderation in all aspects of life, such as avoiding excess and indulgence in pleasures, and managing emotions and desires.Wisdom is the ability to understand and navigate the world in a rational and logical manner. Wisdom involves using reason to make decisions, seeking knowledge and truth, and recognizing the limits of one's own knowledge.These pillars are book-ended by two central concepts to stoicism - which in latin are referred to as Memento Mori and Amor Fati.Memento Mori translates to "remember you must die" from the Latin. It serves as a powerful tool to cultivate humility, gratitude, and perspective. Stoics believe that by keeping in mind the fact that our lives are finite and that death is inevitable, we are more likely to appreciate the present moment and make the most of our time.Amor Fati translates to "love of fate," from the Latin. It is the idea that one should embrace and love everything that happens in their life, both good and bad, as it is a necessary part of the universe's unfolding. It involves accepting one's fate with gratitude, recognizing that every event that occurs is an opportunity to learn, grow, and become stronger.View the ArtVisit the ShopAbout the Art“In this illustration, I drew inspiration from one of Notre Dame's stained glass rose windows, a fractured relic in the shape of a Roman Legionnaire's helmet. Like the stoic's ideal state of mind, stained glass is at once orderly and beautiful. Ideas radiate out from central first principles in a natural and inevitable succession of deductions and balancing forces. At the helmet's edge I added six pictograms, representing the four pillars of stoicism (Courage, Justice, Temperance and Wisdom) as well as two central concepts of stoicism: Memento Mori ("Remember Mortality"), and Amor Fati ("Love Fate").”Art by Evan Robertson. All rights reserved.

Barbie Movie births a Political ManifestoFar from being a flippant male-bashing rant, I thought the Barbie movie did an excellent job of framing deep questions, smashing idols of simplistic reasoning, and equal opportunity lampooning of the stupidity inherent in either ideological position. Here, I don’t intend to give a detailed review and analysis of the movie, even though I think it is deserving of one. I want instead to point out one scene that I think frames the gender wars cleverly and then offer a political reform to address that problem. I don’t think this is a realistic solution to be implemented by any democracy in the near future, but I do think it is an interesting thought experiment that helps clarify the deep issues at play. Spoiler Alert: Barbieland is in the midst of a political upheaval. Ken has effectively seduced the once independent Barbies of Barbieland and is now threatening to change the constitution to entrench his newly established patriarchy. Barbies resent their once total and complete dominance of Barbieland being wrested from them and plot their revenge by waking their fellow sisters from the hypnotic effect of patriarchy, while duping the Ken’s with their feminine wiles. It’s winner take all politics as either Ken rules or Barbie. In the midst of these machinations, Ken has an intimate moment with Barbie as he looks her longingly in the eye and asks, why does Barbie Dreamhouse have to belong to either me or you, why can’t we share it? The inability to share a home together becomes reflective of the inability to share the political regime. It is a deep statement of the problem and birthed, in my mind at least, the following suggestion. But before we jump to the solution, a little more on the problem. The Barbie Movie also relates the arrival of Barbie to a precipitous drop in birth rates. In the disturbing opening homage to Kubrick’s classic, 2001 a Space Odyssey, young girls take their baby dolls with whom they have been playing mothers and smash them violently on the ground, like the tool wielding ape-like hominids do to the rising crescendo of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, ushering in The Superwoman. Here the movie links one of the grave dangers facing free affluent democracies to the supposed emancipation of womankind. Western societies face a population crash. It seems that free societies continue to promote the short-term interests of the individual at the expense of the longer-term interests of the family. People want and demand greater freedom and refuse to engage the more difficult and responsible tasks of home-building and child-rearing. And our political system encourages that degradation. Leaders are elected for what they give me now, not for the wisdom of their policies to affect a better future for our children. Deficit spending becomes the norm in such a world. There are many ways to mortgage the future for pay-offs in the present. One Solution – Give political power to childrenIn a related post, that also got me thinking about this, Taminad.Crittendan suggests extending voting rights to children. S/He gives solutions to the obvious problems but I believe s/he is thinking in the wrong direction. (I do not recognize the name Taminad and don’t want to make presumptions about gender). I think this solution of universal suffrage for children exacerbates the problem. Children are the most susceptible to short-term thinking. Training for adulthood involves helping children understand why piano practice is better than playing Xbox. Giving the vote to children is tantamount to feeding the beast and electing leaders that extend recess and cancel math class. Votes for Households I think voting should be limited to one vote per household and only households can vote. Individuals that have not yet formed households have not passed the necessary test of citizenry. I think a person is ready to vote once they have proven the ability to partner with another person towards the joint venture of building the future. Barbie and Ken are party-centered career toys that lack genitals. They spend their days dating and flirting but with no ability to consummate a relationship. These are the adults of today and the political leaders of our democracies. Political leaders with no children are not sufficiently staked in the sort of concerns that parents are. People who have not yet learned the give and take of household making, the sort of shared thinking and compromise of living inside a structure which is greater than the sum of its parts - haven't yet developed the sort of virtues necessary to make wise decisions for the super-structure which is the nation. Defining a HouseholdFor the purpose of voting, I would define a household very broadly. I would not penalize people who can't or don't want children. Children should be desired for their own sake and not used as a tool to achieve more political power. Households are classically married couples, men and women who can conceive, raise and nurture children all by themselves without involving third parties. But variations on that theme are also welcome as there are many ways to contribute towards the future and make a home. Grandparents can make a home with their grandchildren where necessary. The elder partners contributing their wisdom won over time and the younger parties their vigour. They are bound together in a contract of mutual assistance whereby they agree to serve the home, the home that provided all parties with certain benefits, even beyond the time the parties need the home. They have a debt of gratitude to help the structures that got them to where they are. This I think is the essence of citizenry, to receive from the collective and then contribute to the collective structures even beyond immediate utilitarian concerns so that it can continue to provide into the future for others. Homes are the basic model of that contract and states should grow out of a collection of homes. Rather than growing out of a collection of individuals that can, at times, work at cross-purposes to the home. DisenfranchisementI think the framers of the constitution thought along similar lines when they left eligibility requirements for voting to the discretion of the states. They understood that some threshold was required and that defining that threshold would go a long way in defining the nature of the polity and the sort of decisions it would make. Most states opted for a land-ownership requirement such that voting became the privilege of white, affluent men. This served to disenfranchise poorer whites, all blacks and women. However, we must be careful not to overly demonize these benighted practices. I am not recommending a return to this chauvinism. But I do want to point out that limiting voting to men did not mean that policies ran counter to the interests of women. Men were capable of seeking policies and furthering institutions that did good for their wives and daughters, their sisters and mothers. When the head of a household votes, especially understanding that he represents the interests of the entire household, he is more inclined to think about what is best for all the members of the household. Certainly, parents thought long and hard about what was best for their children. In fact, giving the vote to children might well have the opposite effect. Parents will be more likely to vote for the things that serve their interests alone knowing that the children can take care of their own interests with their votes. I don't think this reasoning applies to the interests of the black man as their disenfranchisement totally eclipsed them from public consciousness. However, women in Switzerland seemed contented enough with the decisions made by men that they did not insist on the local vote in one particular canton until 1990. Forming a home is something that every adult, rich or poor, black brown or white can accomplish. It is a low common denominator while still being a significant threshold criterion. And better than an arbitrary age criterion, in that it relates to an actual accomplishment. I believe my suggestion takes advantages of this broader, household thinking without the pitfall of privileging male power. By contrast, when men vote for male interests and females vote for female interests you get the sort of social bifurcation that destabilized Barbieland. Households vote for everyone inside the house. Saying that each household gets one vote does not mean we return to disenfranchising woman. The opposite is true. The problem of who votes for the household, the abuses possible when one adult pre-empts the other, are problems that this proposal won’t solve. In fact, it creates a problem for the household to negotiate which is exactly the healthy thing for a family to work through. Who guarantees that a couple is in total agreement when they buy a house in a particular neighborhood? Who knows what sort of manipulations and campaigns went on inside the bedroom before the husband finally folded and bought the house down the block from his in-laws against his better judgement. A vibrant democracy should create problems for thinking adults as they struggle to prioritize different interests. A healthy democracy should mirror the same problems in the minds of the voter as in the mind of the constituent assembly. Or better, the same problems that face a growing family in the Midwest, wanting both increased investment in public schooling for their children and better business environment for their small company should be the same problems faced by the House of Representatives. One vote per household makes the politicking, horse-trading, caucusing everyone’s problem. One vote for every adult above the age of 18 is not better, but it is simpler. It avoids politics in the house and kicks the problem over to the professional politicians. It allows everyone to cluck cluck at those two-faced hypocritical politicians because we are not called upon to really struggle like they are to come up with real worakable solutions. We can keep our hands clean with the purity of our one vote without having to consider the competing interests of the people we live with. We don’t have to do the hard work of convincing anyone of the correctness of our position, we have the privilege of voting whatever we want without having to justify our process or lack thereof to anyone. One vote for every adult is a convenience, a luxury, that avoids conflict at the expense of the value of each vote. Just give everyone the vote, children, mentally challenged adults, just so that no one has to argue about what is better or more important. We devalue the vote because we don’t want the difficulty of having to politic in our own homes. Just like we ask schools to instill our children with virtues because we can’t do it ourselves, we task our elected officials to sort out the impossible dilemmas and competing priorities of more and less government. The Battle of the Sexes should be fought first in the home and then in ParliamentA 2016 study showed the highest gender gap ever recorded since the Higher Education Research Institute of UCLA began polling in 1966. There was an 18-point gap between the number of females identifying with liberal politics versus the number of males. The showdown between Democrats and Republicans, some might say the stalemate, reflects on some deep level the different evolutionary strategies of men versus women. This is a problem that a Parliament cannot solve. In fact, I believe it inverts the problem such that males look to advance their status at home by electing a hyper-male President. And females look to advance their status in the home by strengthening the Democratic party. The opposite should be the case. Every household should benefit from the different strategies offered by men and women. In a time and place where the female mode of operation dominates the household and brings those children greater benefits then that woman should steer that home to vote for a party that offers similar strategies at a national level. And in a home where the male mode of operations seems to confer benefits on the household, then that home should steer its vote towards a party that mirrors a similar mode of operation. Obviously, this is far from simple. And I am speaking in gross generalities. However, my main point is to question the direction in which solutions should be found and then mirrored. I think homes are the living laboratories of differing gender approaches and adaptations to changing environments. I think those differing approaches are modulated inside a home structure and constrained in a healthy way by competing concerns. I think when those concerns are played out on a national scale, unrelated to the problems of a family, they tend to more extreme and ideological positions which become more entrenched and difficult to modulate. In short – one vote per home means that the wisdom each family gains by searching for different solutions, leveraging both male and female modalities becomes the brain trust of the entire nation. Only then can we leave the pink artificiality of Barbieland and return to the real world of births and deaths, young and old, sex and fertility, competition without all out warfare.

Mort de Tiberius Gracchus, 133BCIn the history of Western Civilization, tensions have nearly always existed between the power and authority of the citizens and that of the State. It's easy to forget that Rome began as a Republic and only later transitioned into the Roman Empire. Power transferred, as if on a great Pendulum, from the people to the Caesar. For Rome, this move toward autocracy was due primarily to the life and death of one man, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus.Tiberius grew up at a time of significant Roman expansion. What had begun as a small emerging country over four centuries before was rapidly transforming into the dominant world power of its day. But it was not without stress. The Republic suffered from endless wars as the Romans expanded their territory. But this took a tremendous toll; their economy suffered from numerous recessions as resources were diverted to the "war machine." Food shortages were common, as many of the middle class, called "plebs," struggled to make ends meet.However, like America today, the oligarchs prospered. They acquired large swaths of "Ager Publicus," the land conquered by the Roman Legions. And while it was supposedly public land, it ended up in the hands of the Oligarchs, generally the Roman Senator Class. Thus, the Roman aristocrats could prosper during the tough times, while the "middle class," the plebs, suffered through an uncertain economic future. Worst of all, the lower class, sometimes plebs who had lost their small farms, endured the hardships of slavery.As Rome continued to conquer more and more territory, as its wealth and influence grew, political power became progressively concentrated in the hands of a few. The middle-class plebs found themselves in a giant vice, forced to bear the burdens of the endless wars and often subjected to conscription into the Roman Legion; they would face higher taxes and increasing economic uncertainty as many times their farmland was not fertile, and their access to water was limited.There emerged from this milieu a young man, just in his 20s, who had captured the imagination of the plebs. He was Sempronius Gracchus. Gracchus was an Army Veteran who fought in the Third Punic War as well as the Numantine War, quite an accomplishment for one so young. Gracchus had all the qualities to make a fine Roman Leader. He was himself a Pleb; he understood the Plebeian point of view and could present their case before the Roman Senate. It was just these attributes that the Roman Senate must have observed as they appointed Gracchus as “Tribune of the Plebs.” It was an important position for Gracchus, placing him squarely between the concerns and anxieties of the Roman middle class (the Plebs) and the Central Powers of Rome, the Senate.Gracchus became the focal point in this pivotal political conflict for the Roman Republic. Tremendously popular among the Plebs, he was seen as a force to be reckoned with and a potential threat by the Central Powers. Immediately, Gracchus took up the mantle of land reform. With each subsequent War, the Roman Legion gained new land, land that by rights was public(Ager Publicus), but always seemed to end up in the hands of the oligarchs. It was the one area the Roman oligarchs had used to build their wealth and, ultimately, their power. Land reform was a direct threat to the entrenched oligarchs in Rome. Not afraid to fight, Gracchus pushed for land reform with all his might. He had a fellow Tribunal fired when he opposed Gracchus' reform; he even defied the Roman Senate by signing a treaty without Senate confirmation. In 133 BC, he prepared to present his Land Reform plan to Rome. Unfortunately, the bill was vehemently opposed by a fellow Tribune and failed to gain any traction. But this was enough to show the Roman Senate and all the oligarchs that this young man was a danger to the ruling establishment. Gracchus was incredibly popular and unafraid to use unconventional methods to push his agenda. In short, Gracchus didn't understand his "place" in the Republic. He would have to be dealt with.In what has become standard procedure among the unscrupulous, a riot broke out, and during the riot, Gracchus was murdered. Just who was responsible, we'll never know. That's the genius of using a riot to dispose of someone. Just who authorized the "hit" is, still to this day, mere speculation. While the assassin's identity remains a mystery, most Historians now agree on a couple of conclusions. With the death of Gracchus, the reform that the Plebs sought was finished. There would be no land reform; this was reinforced a decade later when Gracchus' brother also tried to pass land reform, but he, too, was murdered, putting a final end to any hope of reform.But even more, Gracchus' death marked the ultimate end of the Roman Republic. The very thing that had made Rome great, allowing nearly all the members of society to have a voice, was now extinguished, snuffed out. From this point on, the Plebs would not be heard from again.Roman political power would continue to be concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. Ultimately, 160 years later, one man, Gaius Julius, Caesar Augustus, became the first Caesar in a long line of total and complete dictators.Sometimes, the Destiny of the Republic rests upon the Fate of One Man.Follow me here on ThinkSpot for more Stories from the ValueSide

When BHP Billiton’s CEO Andrew Mackenzie addressed shareholders at the 2016 annual meeting, he told them that achieving a 50% female workforce within the decade was a “moral imperative” for the company.This sanctimonious claim was all the more sickening given that his big announcement neatly diverted attention from ongoing protests by Brazilians affected by the collapse of the company’s Samarco dam a year earlier, which killed at least 19 people and devastated the local environment.It worked a treat. The media lapped it up, applauding Mackenzie’s plan to replace half the male workforce with women in this most masculine of industries. By last year BHP had doubled the proportion of female employees – up from 17% in 2016 to over 32% on 30 June last year. To measure their “progress” another way, in the 12 months to June 2022, BHP shed 1,417 male employees (5% decline) and hired 806 more females (7% increase).Women are lining up to come on board. Take a look at this lot, all real Australian women who have sought work through websites advertising mining jobs in recent weeks. An unlikely backbone of our future mining industry?­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­BHP is convinced that this blatant discrimination against men is perfectly legal. But we have exciting news – lawyers have suggested the “special measures” provision in the Sex Discrimination Act that mining companies rely upon for their “positive discrimination” is ripe for a challenge. What’s needed is the right case to bring this on. Our legal friends, who have recognised expertise in this area, say: “The notion that the special measures available under s7D permit untrammelled discrimination against men may be misplaced.” Their comments continue: “There seems to be a misunderstanding amongst some lawyers and in some of the case law that the Sex Discrimination Act (SDA) permits unlimited discrimination against men to address so-called discrimination against women. However, if a case came before the courts which involved significant, positive, relentless discrimination against men in a large organisation in order to quickly achieve an aggressive and arbitrary goal of so-called “equality” (i.e. 50% women working in a particular work place) for no reason other than reaching that goal, then it would be interesting to see if the special measures exception holds up for such an employer.”The lawyers point out that the Australian Human Rights Commission Guidelines on special measures under the SDA say special measures must be “proportionate and properly targeted”.The AHRC guidelines note that the Federal Court has held that the objective of achieving ‘substantive equality’ in s7D means equality in substance, rather than ‘formal’ equality. “It does not mean abstract or speculative, ideal or imaginary equality,” say the lawyers suggesting that on the face of it, the BHP’s very aggressive policy could lack proportionality.The lawyers draw attention to Article 4 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women which underpins the SDA noting that this Article, which deals with special measures, refers to them being acceptable to achieve “the objectives of equality of opportunity and treatment”.This is a key issue. “Nowhere does the Convention refer to equality of outcome”, the lawyers comment. “And that makes sense, because otherwise the Convention would be condoning ongoing and disproportionate discrimination against men, and that would never be the overriding objective of a human rights instrument. These instruments are all about providing opportunity for women, if they want it, and striking a balance - not about permitting rampant unfairness against men.”So, there we are. All that is needed is a man (or group of men) who has been harshly and unfairly treated by disproportionate and aggressive workplace diversity objectives in BHP, or elsewhere in the mining industry, or some other large corporate to take legal action over that treatment.Wouldn’t it be great to see a case that tested the limits of these “special measures provisions” and the dystopian gender equity framework that they prop up in Australia? It would be a real chance to strike a blow against the insidious gender politics taking over this country. Some background for those of you unfamiliar with how these equity goals operate in practice. BHP’s discrimination against men has been relentless with the company achieving much of this feminization of the workforce by advertising women-only positions across the company. Sometimes the ads target women with experience in industries like construction, mining, defence, agriculture, aviation etc. But BHP and other mining companies which have bought into this madness also hire women with no relevant experience, like hairdressers, farmers, teachers, nurses – and boast that they quickly train them to become skilled mining employers.The 50% goal is not just some pie in the sky aspiration. Oh no. Executives’ jobs and bonuses are on the line if they don’t manage to push more women in and men out. There are strict quotas on hiring females and it won’t matter if you were just hiring the best candidates, if you fail to hire enough women you can expect repercussions, starting with loss of bonus pay.The discrimination doesn’t stop at hiring – promotion also is more driven by gender than merit. The overall effect is that women are promoted to management, on average, 9 years earlier than men – according to an analysis of the mining industry by accounting firm BDO.BHP is also leaning on their suppliers to fall into line with their policies like excluding males from some job vacancies, and imposing diversity demands, which an AFR analysis described as “onerous” on contractors.There have been two cases of BHP being sued for sex discrimination by men which have attracted significant publicity. Burak Powers, a former manager within BHP’s Houston petroleum office, sued the company in a Texas Court, claiming punitive damages because he was passed over for promotion in favour of less qualified and experienced women.Powers laid out the “systemic pattern of top-down sex discrimination” that resulted in his position supposedly being abolished, only to be recreated, minus an open interview process, and offered to a less qualified female worker. All this despite his being invited into BHP’s elite Future Emerging Leaders Program and receiving “uniformly positive” performance reviews. He subsequently applied for three other positions inside BHP which were apparently all given to less qualified females.Another man seeking damages against BHP was a former manager for regional Caribbean, Adrian Purdy, who was instructed by the company to fill two vacancies with females. His affidavit recounts: “I was repeatedly informed by senior managers at BHP that it was of paramount importance to hire, retain and promote as many females as possible.” Mr Purdy said two women were subsequently “hired from outside the company, over numerous clearly better qualified males who were already employed at BHP”. Mr Purdy was laid off after raising the matter in BHP’s in-house complaints portal.BHP vowed to fight both cases but ultimately settled with Mr Powers out of court. There’s been no news about what happened with Purdy.Over the years, I have received a steady stream of emails from people in the mining industry, alarmed at what is going on. See this story from a man who was doing plumbing training with another apprentice who happened to be female and indigenous:“Someone from BHP HR phoned her directly and begged her to come on board as the first female plumbing indigenous apprentice. She said she didn’t really want to but BHP kept phoning and eventually she took it. When I asked, ‘What do you actually do?’ she said that they gave her a house in the town not in the mine site, a brand-new Mercedes van, all rent and living expenses all paid for. She only had to work weekdays 7am to 3pm, just driving around changing tap washers all day at worker bathrooms. Her salary was $90,000 which for an apprentice is huge. As you finish your training we want to promote you immediately to supervisor, they said. She was telling me all this with a smile on her face. This boils my piss. Juxtapose that to the young guys in the class working long hours in filthy conditions in Perth earning next to no money.”Recently I spoke to a very cheerful young woman – I’ll call her Belinda - who had newly arrived at BHP’s showcase for gender diversity, the South Flank mine, where already 40% of frontline employees are female and 4 out of 6 senior managers. Belinda had formerly been in childcare but as a recent immigrant she leapt at the chance of trying her hand in this quintessential Aussie industry.Belinda was full of praise for the facilities South Flank set up to attract women – two gyms, an outdoor pool, library, music room, plus daily events such as aerobic classes, visiting speakers, and nightly cooking classes. Over $100M has been spent on new lighting, CCTV, electronic door locks, and security.Hmmm – The Big Australian boasts that all this diversity is improving productivity. It must take some very creative accounting to prove that’s the case once you factor in the costs of all this hoopla to keep women happy, don’t you reckon? And get this - South Flank is a new mine and highly automated so the mine was forced to actually recreate entry-level roles in order to employ unskilled women. Read this ultra-woke Harvard Business Review article which boasts how it all happened.Then there’s the problem of retaining these women – a McKinsey analysis shows the major reason for women leaving mining is “work not interesting” - precisely what you would expect from research on women’s interests.Meanwhile the cheery young Belinda was most impressed by how easy it all was for her, boasting it had only taken a few weeks of training to get her into the large dump truck she’s now driving. “Women take more care of the trucks than men,” she told me. That’s the mantra that pops up constantly when you ask about the BHP boast of a better safety record for women, with “67% lower recordable injury rates.” Of course, the analysis which produced that impressive figure is never presented but you can bet it’s partly due to men still mainly doing the tough, dangerous jobs in the industry while most of the women are safely ensconced in HR, admin and the cushy end of the business.Belinda was proud that one of her group was already being promoted into a team leader role. I’ve heard from men working in this mine about the problems of women thrust into supervisory roles with absolutely no experience. “It’s utter chaos,” one correspondent told me. “The site has developed such a bad reputation that many men refuse to work there. One contractor refused to contract to the site because of severe safety concerns. Just a few weeks ago a truck laden with explosives was rolled.”There’s no way of verifying such stories, and no one dares go on the record talking about what is going on. “If it comes out you’ve talked about this stuff, you’ll lose your job and never be employed in the industry again,” the bloke told me.But it’s obvious that many men in the industry are very wary about women, as this mining contractor explains:“It’s a very weird time up here at the moment. Can’t trust females. I’ve seen women flirt with blokes to have them do their work. Women can be very lazy and not wanting to get dirty (especially working visa women who don’t give a shit about the industry – they only want the money). But I’ve also known women who really earn what they get paid, women who excel at their job. I tend to stay away from the female workforce up here and generally have them swapped out of my crew - I don’t wanna lose my job because some female gets hurt feelings after being lazy at her job.”What happens if you push thousands of young women into a very traditional male workforce? Pretty naturally the industry has been flooded with reports of men behaving badly. We’re currently seeing a huge campaign to change the mining culture “to keep women safe”, after the usual cooked-up “survey” showed heaps of predatory male behaviour, as usual mainly unwanted staring and the like. The result is they are wheeling out rape kits at mine sites, setting up a FIFO sex offenders register, and even introducing robotic dogs at Gina Reinhart’s Roy Hill mine for surveillance of misbehaving men.Robotic dogs? I’m not kidding. I was sceptical when I first saw this video suggesting this was happening but there’s plenty online about ANGUS, the Autonomous Security Robot, designed to “ensure people feel safe on the site.” I’m receiving reports of teasing women deliberately getting men into trouble with the result that the man immediately loses his job: “Would a company accept a single male denial and not sack him when society is already sold on males in mining being sexual predators? No company wants bad publicity. I’ve adopted a policy of ‘say something to a woman only if they ask,” one nervous man explained. Recently WA mines minister Bill Johnston responded to complaints that the mining culture is “a cesspit of predatory sexual behaviour against women,” by saying the best way to solve the issue was to add more women to the mix. How do you like that? They create the problem by pushing young women into this ultra male culture – and solve it by getting rid of men. That’s the world we live in.

Managed DeclineDear Friends,It seems to me, the elite want to manage America’s decline, and will brooch no exception to that paradigm. There’s a ton of money to be made riding the US into the ground. Then the global administrative state that comes after will be glorious. That’s why the idea of America in ascendance, is not just unthinkable, but infuriating to the elite. Those who seek to stop the decline are therefore, enemy number one, even as those who seek America’s fall are allies by default. They’re captured by the idea that if only they can manage the decline of America, so us grazing masses don’t notice, then they can grind it to dust, and restart a new world order from the ground up. In the image they find appealing. A global bureaucratic nanny state, run by experts, from which there is no escape.Any friend of America is an enemy of the elite. That’s why Trump is so despised by the elite. He doesn’t want to manage the decline of the US, he wants it to go into ascendance again! That rat! Moreover, when he was in power, he actually did it. That in and of itself can never be forgiven. Pointing out the ineptitude of the elite, whether contrived or true, is unacceptable. Plus it opens a portal for the victim class to see the mechanism of our oppression. A nation in ascendance, is by definition, not in decline. Since decline is what the elite seek, Trump and anyone like him, who would see the US ascend, is enemy number one. That’s why they’re willing to make up anti constitutional “laws” to get the man. They’ve become unhinged at the threat to their plans… to manage the decline of the US.Any enemy of America is a friend to the elite. You see this in the way the elite so love the CCP. Abetting the chemical warfare against our youth with open boarders. Nothing says, “The Fentanyl must flow…” like welding the gates to the boarder open. Speaking of open boarders, it’s no shock to conclude that American culture will be watered down by millions of people flooding into the nation. Just like British, French, and German culture is watered down by millions of illegal immigrants. Undermining the culture itself is a great way to create decline in a nation. Making inflation by shutting down the economy (creating supply shortages) and handing out stimulus (increasing demand) will force inflation, even in a world’s reserve currency… and thus manage the decline of our nations.A managed decline is very profitable to those who manage the decline. They know the timing of the absurdity and short the stocks of the industries they are bankrupting. Naked short sell an investment you’re demolishing by exploiting law as a means to destroy… ride them to zero, take the profits and hand back the worthless paper to the shareholder. I’m sure Nancy Pelosi could conduct a university level class on this tactic. The inflation angle is a historically tested way to transfer wealth from the bottom to the top. Print money and give it to the top. The top gets the utility of the printed money while the bottom pays the inflation price. Argentina has used this strategy to fleece the people many times. Like Lucy offering Charlie Brown a football, the Argentinian elite say, “This time…”We have to ask ourselves, do we want to ride America and Europe into the ground, or do we want to ride it to infinity and beyond? Because in truth those are our options. Every problem we have, is self imposed by the elite, to achieve their end game of a glorious new world order, where we’re ruled by experts with the unlimited authority they need, to make us do the right things. Because, the elite are better educated, smarter, and well dog gone it, just better people than us. Riding our nations into the ground using the naked short selling model. Borrow the shares (get power) use the power to destroy the nation, then cash out. If they can manage the decline of America and Europe, they could birth a CCP type world government. If they can manage the decline. To have my druthers, I prefer ascendance.Sincerely,John Pepin

For months, the Biden Administration and the Federal Reserve have told us that this economy is just like Goldilocks. The tale of the little girl who has found that breakfast has been served. And what’s more, it’s “just right.” Like the Economy, it’s not too hot, and it’s not too cold. President Biden tells us that we’re “building back better.” Over at the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell tells us that endless monetary tightening will solve the inflation problem without causing undue slowing in the Economy. It’s all “just right.”Many of us feel that things aren’t “just right” at all. In reality, this Economy is slowing dramatically, and we expect to see the most dramatic example this morning when the Bureau of Economic Analysis releases its latest report on Corporate Profits.CORPORATE PROFITSCorporate Profits (blue, left scale) Interest Rates (Fed Funds, red, right scale)**If Wall Street analysts are anywhere close in their projections for today’s profits, what we are beginning to see is genuinely staggering. This year profits have been the weak sister in economic reports. After having peaked last year at over $2.5 trillion, American Corporate Profits have fallen 2.7% in Q1 and 5.9% in Q2. Roughly speaking, profits declined the previous quarter by nearly $150 billion. And remember, that’s income, so it is apparent that companies will have to cut back, likely shelving new projects, reducing sales projections, and probably laying off staff.UPDATE: Although Corporate Profits beat Wall Street Expectations, rising a tepid 1.6%, that did little to blunt the basic thesis that Corporate America is suffering. The last time we saw Profits decline like this, the Economy was either in a Recession or a Pandemic.Ask any economist what their favorite indicator for the stock market is, and they’ll likely tell you it is Corporate Profits. That’s because, in the economic sense, what investors (not speculators) are buying when they purchase a stock is that company’s future earnings. The investor hopes earnings will continue to grow and thereby cause the price of their stock to rise. A direct, long-term correlation exists between stock value, revenues, and corporate profits.If earnings are rolling over and declining, that would remove one of the fundamental supports for this bull market. Combine this with the latest revision to employment (see: https://www.valueside.com/2023/08/25/revised-the-economy-lost-70k-jobs-in-march/), and it paints a highly dire picture.Overall, what we’re seeing is a decline in employment after revisions. Remember, the Bureau of Labor Statistics revised the March Employment Report and has yet to revise April, May, June, and July. There will likely be more surprises when those revisions are announced.And now we see corporate profits declining; we’ll wait to see if that’s confirmed with this morning’s report. So what’s Washington’s response?POLICY IMPLICATIONSTwo major initiatives are coming from Washington, the first proposed and the second implemented.President Biden has proposed raising the Corporate Tax Rate by 7%, from the current 21% income tax rate to 28%, at current corporate revenues, reducing net income by roughly $160 Billion. It would further decrease the corporate earnings that are the central driver of the Economy. Fortunately, this tax hike remains a proposal and has yet to be acted on by Congress.On the other hand, the Federal Reserve has fully implemented its monetary policy, and its effects are impacting the Economy now. As you know, the Federal Reserve has been hiking interest rates for a year and a half; their current interest rate is 5.5%. For corporations (and individuals), this has meant that their “cost of funds” has risen by over 500 basis points. Loans with meager interest charges, perhaps less than 1%, now have an interest rate of 5.5% or greater. That’s an increase in interest rate charges of nearly $650 billion per year on the outstanding Corporate Debt of $12.7 Trillion. And, because loans must be paid first, this is a direct reduction in Corporate Income.WILL THE BEARS COME HOME?So, overall, it’s becoming more challenging to see the Economy with “Goldilocks’s Glasses.” If today’s corporate profits Report is as dire as most on Wall Street estimates, it shows that we are at the weakest point since the Pandemic, with Profits declining at nearly the same rate as back then. Combine that with further “revisions” of employment by the Bureaus of Labor Statistics, and you have two of the most essential economic components that are struggling.Further, the one remaining bright spot, consumer spending, would be the real outlier, and it’s hard to imagine how consumers could continue to spend in this kind of environment.UPDATE: When consumer spending was announced this morning, it showed a 59% drop in Q2 from the previous Quarter. This was a real surprise and indicates that this economy is becoming quite sick.It may also mean that when the Bears do return to Wall Street, they’ll find that someone’s been eating their porridge.Follow me here on ThinkSpot for more stories from the ValueSide.

‘None of the 15 institutions rated annually managed to repair their images, with many remaining at or near their all-time lows.’Recent Gallup polls Normally, votes cast at elections are reflections of citizens’ values. But the infantilization of western citizens in recent decades makes it fair to wonder if voting has become as much a scramble at the pork barrel as an expression of social values. The exception is Europe, where the steady shift to the political hard-right in response to illegal-migrant-driven culture-smashing is clearly that, a response. Next: the Internet as an information superhighway didn’t happen. Instead, we have an instrument of government/corporate/left-wing-social-media control. This makes opinions-gathered-on-street-corners a less-tampered-with form of data. Google ‘gallup historically low faith in institutions’

Just for fun: one of the interesting things about ‘the information environment’ in Jakarta, Indonesia, in 1997, when I was living there, was the simple fact that everyone who wasn’t a card-carrying member of The Party of The Dictatorship knew that everything was a sham. The vaunted ‘tiger nations’ economy, the press, the tedious speeches, the parliamentary proceedings, the flags and songs, the wide range of pro-regime organizations – all bogus. But as you were getting about on the smoke-belching wrecks of buses that plied the city center, Ukulele Guy would hop aboard. Ukulele Guy was usually a ragged uni student. He’d flit aboard at the back of the bus while it was stopped at the lights. Then, as the bus lurched off, he’d sing a little ditty, something like: “It’s all bogus!Indonesia corrupt.President corrupt.President family corrupt.Bogus bogus!Gotta have change now.” Then he’d zip up and down the aisle, collecting a rupiah or two in an empty crisps packet, and step down into the crowd the moment the bus stopped at the next lights. The fantastic reality of the republic at that time – thirty-two years into the dictatorship – was that everyone knew that whispers and gossip and Ukulele Guy were as good as it got. PS Google: ‘Film Dokumenter Tragedi Jakarta 1998 Gerakan Mahasiswa’Although it was only a baby riot – there are no camera men or ambulances at real riots -- from 19:20 to 19:40 is not a bad insight.At 17:44 there’s a shot of the fence of the university. I’m on the inside, about twenty feet to the right of the guys in the shot. Was there all afternoon and evening.Wrote up my journal at about two a.m. the next morning, still on campus. Here’s the page:https://imgur.com/WDh3Ns1

The Party LineDear Friends,It seems to me, the first amendment’s right to free speech is studiously enforced… as long as you agree with the State. Take the example of Jordan Peterson. Does anyone believe that if he was pushing the official party line, climate alarmism, trans rights and depopulation… the regulating body would have demanded he undergo reeducation? Of course not! Only a fool would believe that. A double standard. If Peterson was a good post modernist expert, he would be lauded as a ground breaking free thinker. Because, as we all know, “free thinking” is thinking what the state wants you to think. Freedom of speech (for those who speak the party line) is a hallmark of Marxist and fascist regimes. That freedom to speak is protected viciously by the State. Politically inconvenient opinions however, not so much.The experts believe that an opinion carefully crafted by experts must be the right one. How could it not be? If the smartest, wisest and most moral people craft an opinion, then having a different opinion is not only in bad taste but is actually dangerous. How far will we go to protect ourselves from danger? A very long ways. We’ve built a multi trillion dollar a year apparatus to protect us from every conceivable threat. So it’s not a big step to silence people who are actually dangerous. They’re a menace not only to society but to themselves. Such self destructive thinking must be controlled. The experts have deemed it so. With the existential threats the human race faces like, global climate change, man made viruses, and trans people barred from the women’s bathroom, we must act, there’s no time to debate.Wrongthink, if you think of it, is extremely dangerous. Any thought that’s not sanctioned by the experts in the bureaucracy, is obviously, wrongthink. We’ve already established that anything dangerous is subject to regulation, to protect us from the bogyman, so it seems clear that wrongthink should be regulated as well. Since the State doesn’t have telepaths, yet, to monitor our thoughts, censoring our speech, is the only way to protect free speech. Allowing people to spout wrongthink willy nilly would encourage wrongthink, and in such an environment, how could rightthinking get through? That’s why only State sanctioned speech can be allowed. Not just allowed but protected at all costs. You see how perfect the progressive’s logic is… if a bit orbital, machiavellian and narcissistic.Everyone knows, allowing doctors to practice medicine is very dangerous, that’s why we have expert bureaucrats to tell them how to do it. Doctors have a myopic view of their role. They see themselves as caregivers to the sick and injured. While a bureaucrat has a much wider field of vision. The bureaucrat understands that the role of all experts, is to move society from the political age, to the administrative age, the age of experts. All other considerations, like curing illness, alleviating suffering and saving human lives, are subservient to that goal. Any medical procedure that is politically favored, (moves society closer to the goal) no matter how detrimental to the patient is protected. Doctors that engage in politically inexpedient ones however, will have their license to practice endangered.In our new corporatist order of things, all your rights are protected by the full weight of the government, as long as they are in line with the government’s views. No stepping on any of them will go unpunished. God help anyone who engages in iconoclasm on a politically favored tag. Our experts in the bureaucracy will regulate every aspect of human life. All you have to do is agree. Jordan Peterson didn’t, and soon will either become one with Landru, else be ostracized. Donald Trump is getting his just deserts for standing up to the experts that run the State. If your with them, your rights will be protected, but if your against them, you have no rights. The logic is as perfect as it is circular… and is the core ethos of Marxist, corporatist and administrative states.Sincerely,John Pepin

‘Racism in American still survives among the left and the right, and especially at the extreme fringes of both.’Taminad Crittenden ‘Racism . . . survives [on] the left’ – this is an admirably astute insight: the political left is racist. But whether you’re being called ‘racist’ or ‘proto-fascist’ or ‘fascist’ or ‘revisionist’ or ‘counter-revolutionary’ or ‘menshevik’; or it’s ‘inauthentic preferences’ or ‘pre-revolutionary consciousness’ or ‘internalized homophobia’; or you’re an ‘anti-vaxxer’ or a ‘conspiracy theorist’; or a ‘sexist’ or a ‘homophobe’ or an 'Islamophobe' or an ‘ableist’ or an ‘ageist’; or just ‘neo-liberal’ or ‘bourgeois,’ the historical practice of the political left has been, ‘as the revolution develops,’ to demonize more and more of those not in the hyper-zealot core of the movement. Think about this, readers. This is Stalin’s purges in the 1930’s. This is the Chinese Cultural Revolution. This is The Shining Path in Peru. This is Cambodia. And today? You’re a racist if you don’t wanna sit through corporate LGBTQI DEI indoctrination sessions. You’re a racist if you even wanna discuss the trans industry. You’re a racist if you say that the average Muslim man is a sexist homophobe. Whatever. The fact is that the citizens of the west are now rapidly dividing into just two factions: ‘Burn the world to the ground!’ and ‘Stop them burning the world to the ground!’In closing, two Notes. One: to discriminate against a group that discriminates against you is entirely defensible. The marker of the group may be a uniform or skin color or something else. Doesn’t matter. This is a fact of (human) nature, of the which the left is entirely ignorant.The addition of black and brown stripes to the Pride Progress flag is an unequivocal public declaration of some form of racist intent/program. Two: an academic named ‘Przeworski’ has an excellent definition of authoritarianism: lies, fear, and economic affluence.Now, it’s the economic affluence thing that most folks would miss. That is, folks will put up with demeaning crap like LGBTQI indoctrination sessions until the economy collapses.

Dr. Miriam Grossman Destroys Gender Ideology in 5 MinutesTo oppose Drag Queen Story Hour for kids, go here https://tfpstudentaction.org/petitions/drag-queen-story-hour-protest Dr. Miriam Gro

Modern Crimes Against HumanityDear Friends,It seems to me, the elite today appear to be guilty of some mighty serious crimes against humanity. The circumstances, were the suspect you or I, would be sufficient to get us charged. Moreover, as the crimes go unpunished, they get worse and more blatant. The election of Donald Trump seems to have been the trigger for the real insanity. During his inauguration progressive agitators burned down most of Washington DC, to the silence of the media, police and courts. Then there was the Russia collusion hoax, leading to the release of Covid. That crime against humanity was followed up by suppressing safe effective available treatments, for unsafe ineffective DNA altering clot shots. Impeaching Paxton to punish him for doing his job. Culminating in the Maui fires where 2000 kids are missing.The creation of Covid was itself a crime under international law. The excuse, they’re creating chimeric viruses, to have vaccines on hand should they emerge naturally… is like saying, “I’m launching these bowling balls ten thousand feet into the sky, to deflect incoming meteors…” Though, given the likelihood of a Chinese cave bat getting aids, is non existent… making the second example is far more likely to work. Plus, bowling balls falling from the sky is far less dangerous than forcing humanity to take an untested and as it turns out, harmful shot. We know the technology was transferred to the CCP by Fauci and the NIH, that Covid was gain of function, the vaccine doesn’t work, masks make it worse, and they were forced on us by the elite, at cost to our careers. All crimes against humanity.The disparate application of the law is an example of a late stage civilization eating itself. The founding documents are used to justify the ever growing authority of people who detest the ideas in those documents, as well as the people who wrote them, and so are dedicated to their destruction. Abandoning the foundational myth is the death knell of a nation. The US foundational ethos was, equal treatment under the law, freedom of expression, to keep and bear arms, of religion, in our papers and persons, to privacy, to own property, to farm that property, to start a business, etc… every one of these freedoms are now subject to license, regulation and arbitrary rule. Backed up by the courts. The same courts that stopped Trump as President from reversing unconstitutional edicts of prior Presidents.The open and obvious election fraud, mail in voting, sending ballots to random addresses, zero signature matches, not to mention the video of illegal counting, covering the windows and ejecting republican election monitors, etc… then fabricating a false flag on Jan 6 to cover it all up… are the actions of evil people. People that will stop at nothing. Villains who would start a fire to steal land from the folks that live there, forbid water to stop the fires then put up police road blocks, forcing the victims back into the flames. Fiends who would cover up the fact 2000 children are missing from those fires. Are they little piles of ash, or are they now the playthings of pedophile elites? Who knows? I wouldn’t put it past them… would you? Both options are crimes against humanity that need to be punished.With each crime, the crimes get worse, and how much worse are we going to tolerate? Now the elite in Texas are impeaching the only Attorney General to stand up to the corruption. They’re making an example of him so no others will dare stand up to them. Until the elite are given an opportunity to prove themselves not guilty, I and all sane people will hold our elites guilty for these crimes against humanity. They would force you or I to prove our innocence, on the flimsiest of charges, to our great expense. Why are we allowing them to get away with literal murder, child molestation, and egoistically exploiting their power? Our power is our voice. Write them, ridicule them, and let them know just what you think of them. From the top to the bottom, let the elites know, we hold them equally guilty.Sincerely,John Pepin

Conservative journalist Katie Hopkins, the most banned woman on the planet, tells us what the harsh sentences being given to the January 6 defendants are really all about:“The whole purpose of what’s being done to the J6 defendants is to serve as a warning, to serve as a message. The reason has nothing to do with the law. The reason is it’s a message: “Don’t you dare play up. When we lock you down and we shut you down to force Biden through in 2024, don’t you say a word. Don’t you take to the streets. Don’t you dare protest. Don’t you dare have anything to say when you see fraud happening before your very eyes because look what we will do to you. We will crush your soul and your family. We will make you weep and beg for your life. And we’ll spit on you anyway.””America is under siege by enemies inside and out. Their goal is to destroy our nation's sovereignty and make us subservient to the globalists who want to turn the entire world into a technocratic totalitarian slave colony. We are all that stands against the forces of evil and endless tyranny. We have to take it seriously. We have to take it personally. Or else we'll be taking it shackled, on our knees.

‘Genghis Khan was among many recorded warlords who would often employ the mass, indiscriminate murder of men and boys he felt threatened by regardless if they were soldiers, civilians, or simply in the way.’ ‘The Mongol army conquered hundreds of cities and villages and killed millions of people. One estimate is that about 11% of the world's population was killed either during or immediately after the Mongol invasions, around 37.75–60 million people in Eurasia.’ Was sitting in the garden just yesterday, listening to Dan Carlin’s podcast history of the Mongols. This morning, I read Pope Guy ‘praising the massive 13th-century state for its “absence of conflicts,” ’ Is it any wonder at all that trust in Gubmints and social institutions has fallen to all-time lows?

End of Life Ireland (EOLI), a group campaigning for the legalisation of euthanasia, held a public meeting in Dublin last week to present their views. It was a revealing insight into their objectives and how to get there.The main speaker was Greg Mewett, a palliative care doctor from Australia who believes that patients have a right to end their lives. He admitted that this view is quite “heretical” among palliative care circles. (The Irish Association for Palliative Care is opposed to ‘assisted dying’. You can find their document on the matter here).Dr Mewett said that “voluntary assisted dying” should not be seen in opposition to palliative care as more than 80% of patients who wish to end their lives have gone through some form of palliative care before.He stressed the importance of language in trying to convince people, saying that euthanasia or assisted suicide are bad terms, while the word “voluntary” is key.He wants the law in Australia changed so that doctors can offer patients the option of assisted suicide.One of the local speakers was John Wall, an Irish campaigner who said he was able to convince the Government to change the definition of ‘terminal illness’ and, as a consequence, to extend the eligibility for a medical card to those who are given a prognosis of up to 24 months.He believes that ‘assisted dying’ is simply a matter of choice, and it should be available even for prognoses longer than 24 months. He claimed that the life span of 6 months or shorter, which is common in other jurisdictions that allow euthanasia, is too short. “How long do you want me to suffer?”, he asked.Another speaker was Dr Brendan O’Shea, a GP from Kildare. He is former head of the Irish College of General Practitioners and was representing on this occasion a group of about 100 healthcare professionals, mainly GPs, working with End of Life Ireland. They call themselves ‘Irish Doctors supporting Medical Assistance in Dying’ and believe that ‘patient autonomy’ should be always respected, even when patients wish to be killed.All the Irish medical bodies that have taken a public position on this topic are of the opposite view.Doctors are probably the major opponents to changes in legislation in this area. When, during the debate, someone pointed out that the Hippocratic Oath clearly rejects euthanasia, Dr O’Shea replied that nowadays Hippocrates would have written a different oath. We cannot know this, of course, and it is hard to see why, as suffering is a permanent feature of the human condition and pain was far less treatable by doctors in Ancient Greece than it is today.EOLI on their website acknowledge that “it can be difficult for healthcare professionals to publicly support providing Medical Assistance in Dying.” To help their campaign an anonymous register of healthcare professionals has been created.Another speaker was Tom Curran from Exit International, which is probably the most radical pro-assisted suicide organisation in the world, as they believe that it should be available to any mentally competent adult, for whatever reason.Mr Curran, partner of the late Marie Fleming whose request for assisted suicide was rejected by the Supreme Court, told the audience of how he helped to draft legislation in this area.Justin McKenna, a solicitor that deals with health cases, also spoke. Michael Nugent of Atheist Ireland, who could not attend, sent a video showing full support for the event.The public meeting was attended by about 60 people, mostly sympathetic with the aims of the organisers. During the debate following the presentations only a couple of interventions showed some concern. A man suggested caution and mentioned how the slippery slope has operated in other countries, such as Canada, after assisted suicide has been legalised.The organisers are very confident that the general population and most politicians are on their side and will hold similar events in the future. In 2024 they will host the World Federation of Right to Die Societies conference.Those opposed to assisted suicide needs to be as well organised as its proponents.

President Biden meets with General Secretary Xi**It's been a half-century since President Richard M. Nixon set the United States firmly on the path to globalism. The date was February 28, 1973, when the President sat down with Premier Chou En-lai of the People's Republic of China and signed the Shanghai Communique. Named after the city, they were meeting in, this was merely an agreement to talk. But it was the most revolutionary economic statement of the Twentieth Century.The Communique would set in motion a trading agreement between what would become the two largest economies in the world. For China, this marked when they emerged from their pariah state to become a full member of the community of nations. From a diplomatic point of view, this was when China positioned itself to become a recognized part of the United Nations and eventually replaced Taiwan on the Security Council (UN Resolution 2758).As dramatic as the diplomatic emergence of China was, it was in the economic sphere that China shone. Although it was a long and arduous task, China eventually grew to become the world's manufacturing hub. To achieve this goal, China had to upgrade its plants and equipment. But primarily through the technological aid of the Western Developed nations, principally the United States, China acquired the technology to compete internationally.But that's only half the story of how China has become today's economic powerhouse. Before many of those Western Nations existed, China had been a trading center. Merchants for multiple generations had learned how to exploit a market and control price advantages to capture another nation's trade. With the direct intervention of the CCP (the Chinese Communist Central Party), which subsidized their effort, Chinese companies became the low-cost providers of American brands in electronics, personal computers, smartphones, and other hi-tech goods.This Chinese strategy suited the American elites to a "T." For years, the American Political class had been restricting American manufacturing. The "Rust Belt" is a startling example of a lack of clean air and water standards. The fact that the Cuyahoga River in Ohio was so polluted that it caught fire was the seminal event that united the country in its fight against pollution.That fight began with Nixon and his environmental and safety measures, principally the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). For the next decade, the United States enacted the most stringent environmental requirements in the world. To this day, the decade of the 1970s is known as the "environmental decade."Of course, there were two ways to solve the nation's environmental issues: we could have cleaned up our plants and factories. But that would have cost much money and taken years to complete. On the other hand, Nixon presented an alternative. Why not offshore those plants to China? China was ready and willing to replace our factories with their own. Moreover, China had little to no environmental requirements or workplace regulations.China was, you'll pardon the expression, like the wild, wild west. Free and open, and willing to produce cheaper goods than we could ever match with our more regulated industry.And so the exodus began. American factories, by the droves, moved across the Pacific. The elites were happy, as profit margins, driven chiefly by this low-cost Chinese production, continued to increase. The overall effect on the American economy was profound. Consider this: the most profitable companies, the ones with the most significant incomes, all follow this business model, American marketing with offshore (principally Chinese) production. Almost the entire US Tech Industry now has its manufacturing facilities in Asia.Unfortunately, there was one group that suffered: working Americans. That's right, and the 21st Century has seen a steady reduction in the number of US Citizens who are gainfully employed. Indeed, other factors have also contributed to the decrease in the number of American workers, chiefly the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, there can be little doubt that the massive move of American factories to other countries has also contributed to that trend.America moves jobs to China. It's no accident that as Chinese manufactured goods began to dominate trade(red line, right scale). Americans lost jobs (US participation rate, blue line, left scale).Americans have come to accept the "Made in China" label for generations. Seeing a Chinese brand on your clothes, smartphone, personal computer, or retail goods is now perfectly acceptable. As one Wag noted, shopping in Walmart is like shopping in Beijing.However, in Washington, things are changing. All those offshore goods are no longer as popular as they once were with our politicians. Although their methods and goals differ, President Trump and Biden have pursued goals that could significantly reduce our trade with China.President Trump began reducing Chinese Trade by imposing Tariffs on certain Chinese items. Motivated principally by economic concerns, Trump saw that the Chinese needed to compete on a level playing field. The combination of cheap labor, safety or environmental standards that are far less than the US standards, and financial support from the CCP meant, to Trump, that the Chinese Manufacturers could undercut Americans on price. The Chinese were "dumping" (selling at artificially low prices) their goods and ultimately capturing the American Markets. On the other hand, President Biden comes at the trade issue from a very different place. Biden has been the most aggressive President in using the economy to achieve political objectives. He has wielded "Sanctions" like a sword. And his chief opponent has been Russia. Although, as we've noted before Russian Sanctions began in 2014, it has been Biden in his brief time in office that has ramped up their use, cutting off all imports of Russian Oil and Gas, expelling Russia from the SWIFT International Settlements System, and seizing Russian Central Bank and private assets.This Sanctions Battle against Russia has driven them closer to China and the other BRICS Nations than ever before. Russia uses the Chinese International Settlements Systems (CIPS) to facilitate trade today. It sells much of its oil and gas and agricultural products to China, India, and the rest of the BRICS Nations.Overall, the result of Biden's aggressive Sanctions Policy has been to curtail American dominance in international trade and finance. And to cast the Global South free from the American hegemony. Washington assumed, of course, that the rest of the world could not "live without us." However, that remains an open question. Currently, the BRICS Nations are doing quite well. Only time will tell how successful this Biden global trade policy will be.But we do know that the American Manufacturing Policy of the last half Century is ending. From here on, the United States will need to bring back essential production and supplies if we expect to maintain our quality of life. Follow me here on ThinkSpot for more stories from the ValueSide.

SufferingDear Friends,It seems to me…How many hours do you spend worrying about suffering? Are you missing what the world is offering? As you spend hours at ease. Doing whatever you please. Then when you finally look back, your whole life at, will you remember the pain or playing in the leaves?We all need a modicum of afflict. Else we won’t grow up even a bit. Maturing never. Adulthood to sever. Because without something to endure, we simply can’t mature, and will remain children forever.Even time at work isn’t so bad. It distracts us from going mad. Deep in productive labor. We build a world in which to savor. But in the end, do you want to spend, time with coworkers or the people you favor?Of suffering life’s not full. There’s a lot of goodness and that’s no bull. But we magnify the pain. Then discredit the gain. Bringing past ache into the now, as if it will help us somehow, to be relived again and again.Illness can’t be ignored. Especially when you’re floored. The material becomes intense, so much we lose our sense. Though it usually only lasts a short time, and after that we’re fine, but the memories it makes are dense.The choice really is ours. We have the power. To remember the good. Not be caught in a torrent like a fragment of wood. The daily memory we make, hopefully for goodness sake, will serve us as best it could.Despair anger and depression, can become a consuming obsession. A comforting place. Where life’s joys we needn’t face. A hidden fortress, where we needn’t impress, and our magnificent suffering we can embrace.Though things may seem hopeless now. They will get better somehow. If we have not what we want. Know that change is a constant. It won’t come to you, without struggles not few, and then only in quotient.About your self centered affair, with deep and abiding despair. Before you have a fit. The world couldn’t care a whit. Though reaching great heights, can be quite a fight, especially from the bottom of a pit.Those that live in glee. They’re happier than you or me. Of jokes they may be the butt. Some may even cut. Made by people jealous of happiness, as if it makes the gleeful feel duress, and the hecklers are a pack of nuts.So remember this sage advice. Before dwelling on bad think twice. Life’s hard but we’re here. The wise don’t live in fear. Our joys out number despair, and most just don’t care, but life’s more than it may appear.Sincerely,John Pepin

"Dreamer's Lullaby" by Thomas Bramel performed by Petros BourasThe piano solo Dreamer's Lullaby was composed for and dedicated to Petros Bouras in celebration of his newborn baby boy. It was premiered by Petros in the St. Gilles City Hall in Brussels, Belgium on February 5, 2018. Petros comments about this performance: "I decided to perform at the ed

The term ‘neoliberalism’ is being used by the new generation of left-wingers in the same way that the last generation would have used the term ‘capitalism.’ Recall that we’ve discussed at length ‘devolution’ – how a revolutionary program can be run within the structure of an existing nation-state (rather than a communist party outright seizing control of that nation-state in a revolution). Now consider the reformist left. It taxes capitalism rather than seizing control of it. It regulates capitalism rather than seizing control of it. Perhaps there’s been a shift from ‘We are revolutionists, and we hold that capitalism is bad!’ to ‘We are devolutionists, and we hold that neoliberalism is bad, which means that we regulate and tax ‘capitalism’ when it suits us; and we shut down certain ‘capitalist’ ventures when it suits us; and we are best friends with ‘capitalism’ when it suits us. Perhaps we’ve shifted from revolutionists hating capitalism to devolutionists hating neoliberalism.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is the most impressive politician I have seen in a long time. And he comes in our hour of urgent need, running for the White House in 2024. Therefore, today I am doing my part to help a man possessed of integrity and wise leadership to win the most powerful office in the world, and so usher in a new era of peace, prosperity, justice and freedom for a troubled world. Even if you are not American, you are human and so touched by the US president’s hand. Here I present 33 reasons why RFK Jr. is a man you really want to support in his campaign.1) scientific literacy, critical thinking and debating prowess2) embodying and deeply appreciating the nuances of health3) preaching and embodying unity, civility and love4) courage and integrity5) peace and anti-imperialism6) free markets and fair regulation7) soulful and balanced environmentalism8) legal knowledge and skill to fix agency capture9) curious, empathetic, devoted to listening10) incredible memory, knowledge, intelligence11) former drug addict, a model of self-discipline12) wants to scale down the American war machine13) champions privacy, civil liberties, democracy, sovereignty14) advocates peace, diplomacy, merely economic competition15) populism, humility, service16) admirable people support him: scientists, Drs, journalists, philosophers17) RFK has significantly more support than Biden or Trump in the polls18) wants to bring the CIA under control, stop its coups and warfare19) pardon Julian Assange, release and encourage whistleblowers20) decriminalise/legalise marijuana and psychedelic medicine21) empower regenerative agriculture and family farm ownership22) end the forever wars, rebuild the middle class and infrastructure23) work ethic: writes books, reads widely, sues bad actors, running for 202424) humour, light-heartedness, spiritual surrender to what is25) family and cultural background devoted to justice and service26) restoring a hard border but with “wide gates” for legal immigration27) aid families against Vanguard neo-feudalism without expanding debt28) transparent to public scrutiny due to hours galore on podcasts29) ignored and attacked by corporate media as he is a threat to oligarchy30) surging in popularity despite ruthless censorship and smear campaigns31) best candidate for upcoming perils: financial crisis, WHO, war, censorship32) proven leader: 7 children, lawyer, Waterkeeper, CHD, lockdown protests33) now or never for USA to return to roots and model democracy for world www.kennedy24.com If you are persuaded that RFK in the White House is a good thing for you, your family, your country, the USA and the Earth, then why not tell it to a friend or share this episode? Let us take responsibility for a better world.Episode 72: 33 Reasons To Support RFK Jr. For PresidentRobert F. Kennedy Jr. is the most impressive politician I have seen in a long time. And he comes in our hour of urgent need, running for the White House in 2024. Therefore, today I am doing my part to help a man possessed of integrity and wise leadership to win the most powerful office in ...youtu.be

Modern economies struggle to contain inequality. Headlining most political manifestos, the fight to halt, or at least subdue, the flow of wealth from the bottom to the top, while promoting the advancement of humanity, is a universal aim. Despite the application of copious cognitive capacity, and repeated, interminable political speeches on the subject, the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.This concept was dubbed ‘The Matthew Principle’, named for the book of the Bible in which Jesus told his gathered disciples, “For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.” It is likely that this effect permeated societies for millennia before the time of the New Testament. The anthropologist, David Graeber’s book, ‘Debt, The First 5000 Years,’ supports this view.Misconceptions and ignorance appear to play a major role in the apparent political impotence on conquering inequality. A large majority of politicians and economists, in a position to influence policy, seem to perceive the economy through an unnecessarily narrow frame. Viable options are outside this frame of reference and rendered invisible.The main weapon in the economic armoury, to control the distribution of resources, is taxation. In modern times, (the last 5 decades or so), low tax policies have dominated, irrespective of which party was in office. UK individuals in the highest tax bracket, in this time, have their wealth reduced by less than half of that lost to HMRC in the post war period. With the rich retaining wealth, to balance the economy, one would think that Government would want to increase spending at the margins, to improve the living standards of those at the bottom.Politicians, advised by orthodox economists, have an aversion to Government spending without the balancing effect of taxation. The ideal, to this school of thought, is a balanced budget. It is easy to understand why the politicians believe this to be the case. From their understanding of business or household economics, the idea that spending is constrained by income, is completely rational. There are no such excuses for economists.The reality is that a balance between Government spending and taxation, in an economy, like the UK’s, causes a downward spiral of living standards of the most vulnerable in society. The missing link, is the fact that the Government is the monopoly issuer of the national currency. There is no purely monetary limit to Government spending. Without this knowledge, it is easy to see why politicians find the Matthew principle so hard to counteract.In the non-Government sector, the situation is very different. No private sector actor can add to the net financial assets of the private sector. It may appear that commercial banks create money when authorising loans or mortgages, however, each additional deposit of funds is counter-balanced by the liability of the repayment agreement.It may be useful to visualise the metaphor of a vortex to describe the private sector economy. With the public in fixed positions distributed at random through the contours within the whirlwind, currency is sucked towards the centre. The citizens are both buyers and sellers as they constantly work and spend to supply their daily needs and desires. At each transaction some tax is whisked out of the vortex completely and destroyed. This occurs at every contour of the vortex.People who work to provide goods and services receive regular wages against the flow of the vortex, however, the encouragement to take on debt through mortgages or loans reduces the ability to save. Marketing influences the public to spend to their limit by the hinted temptation towards hedonistic thrill-seeking and the fulfillment of desires. Thus, most of us become stuck in our own seller/buyer – seller/buyer cycle within the vortex, as we sell our labour and buy, what we perceive as, life’s essentials.Crucially, for our investigation of the Matthew Principle, at each transaction in the private sector economy, a percentage of profit is made. This behaves in a very different manner to the taxed or earned money. Profit is, an arbitrary addition to the true value of a product or service, justified by the idea that business owners require an incentive to innovate and develop technology with the aim of improving the population’s standard of living.It appears that profit creates money out of thin air - a form of alchemy. This is not the case. The truth is, profit is a re-distribution of the fixed money supply. In the vortex, at each transaction, the percentage of profit is sucked towards the centre. Over multiple daily transactions, at the macro level, currency is sucked inwards, being gathered at the inner layers by an elite few.It should be obvious, from the vortex metaphor, that a balanced budget, where any Government spending into the economy is balanced by taxation and borrowing is a flawed concept. The outer contours of the vortex, the most vulnerable in society, require the net Government spending to mitigate the magnetic draw of funds to the wealthy heart of the whirlwind. Without a net input by Government, the rentier sector must impoverish those with least, over time.It should also be evident that Government spending alone, will not solve inequality. The spending must be targeted to those in need. The UK currently runs a sizable deficit, but still, the wealthy thrive while poverty increases. A look at the way the Government ‘offsets’ this net spending, reveals a reason for the persistence of the Matthew effect.At present, the UK Government has a (completely unnecessary) policy, of balancing all deficit spending with the sale of gilts to that value. Gilts are UK Government bonds, sold to “borrow” back some of the money government had already spent into the economy, in the days when pounds were convertible to gold. Those days are long gone, and bonds are now a policy choice used to manage debt and liquidity, and support the policy interest rate, however, they do play a lead role in the Matthew Principle story. Gilts are interest-bearing forms of money, slightly less liquid than a cash deposit, but still relatively easy to transfer into cash if required. This interest portion is a form of UK Government deficit spending. It is money that Government spends into the vortex, and it is targeted. However, these interest payments are targeted at the very centre of the vortex. This money goes to the already wealthy in direct proportion to how much wealth is held. In 2022 UK Government debt interest payments totaled £111 billion.The UK Government deficit for 2022 was £137 billion. Therefore, only £27 billion of net Government spending found its way into the economy outside of the interest payments on gilts. Admittedly, institutions like pension funds and insurance companies invest in gilts, so there is a pathway for a percentage of the spending to find its way into the main economy.The sad fact is, that this system of paying wealthy people for having money, not only perpetuates the Matthew Principle, but exacerbates it. If we are serious about defeating inequality, there are several steps that must be taken. By introducing a fixed interest rate, at zero or just above zero, then bond issuance becomes obsolete and can be stopped. Over time the interest payments will fall to zero as the gilts are paid off.Economists will argue that manipulation of interest rates is the Government’s main tool for inflation control. The reality is that there are as many ‘tools’ for inflation control as there are reasons for inflation (which are numerous). The policies with most influence in conquering inequality would be a job guarantee scheme, as described by Pavlina Tcherneva in her book, ‘A Case for a Job Guarantee’, and an increase in state pensions to a rate that would provide reassurance, security, and comfort for all in their later years.Government spending would be targeted to the precise areas of need in the economy and will, over time, reduce the width of the vortex and with it the distance between the privileged and the most vulnerable.Just as poverty is a sign of a dysfunctional economy, so too are billionaires. The Matthew principle is society’s canary in the coal mine. When the effect is obvious, society is in danger of breaking down. Instead of complacently ignoring the growing inequality in the UK, it may be worth questioning whether we, the UK public, should carry on acting like hedonistic teenagers, or whether it is time to get a grip and seek a bit of maturity.

Dereliction of Duty in American Politics “They should rule who are able to rule best.” – Aristotle Remember when in 1974, the Watergate scandal, forced Republican President Richard Nixon to resign? Let’s not forget the Democratic Presidential nominee Gary Hart’s scandalous extramarital affair with Donna Rice in 1988. Reaching a new low and not to be outdone, Democratic President Bill Clinton, in 1998 with one of the most embarrassing of all for “not having sex” with cigars and intern Monica Lewinsky causing him to be impeached for committing perjury and obstruction of justice. This incident is allegedly said to have caused real-life horrific Wag the Dog ramifications in bombing the Middle East during this presidential sexual scandal. Perhaps the most elementary was in 1992 by Republican Vice President Dan Quayle for his inability to correctly spell potato, basically ending his hopes of a presidential career. Then in 2004 came Democratic Presidential nominee Howard Dean with his overly enthusiastic flamboyant famous “yeah!” aka “the Dean Scream,” which cost him his presidential political ambitions. In 2006, Presidential Democratic nominee, John Edwards, the “pretty boy with perfect hair and smile," impregnated his mistress during the campaign, while his wife, now deceased, was battling cancer all the while supporting his presidential nomination. Edwards' narcissistic behavior cost him his political ambitions. And last but certainly the most infamous narcissist of all, former President Donald Trump. The twice impeached and four-time criminally indicted shameless former president who blatantly and lawlessly was seeking 11,780 votes, who sexually abused Jean Carroll amongst other crimes, and is still deceiving the people of America with false claims of voter fraud and a stolen election along with aspirations of four more years even though as I stated over a year ago, that by engaging, participating and or supporting the January 6th “insurrection,” Trump is disqualified from running for the office of president by Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment. These occurrences, all of which have taken place as facts within the past 50 years, and we have not even begun to talk about presidents and presidential candidates prior to 1974. Many great presidents and nominees could make this list as well, but we cannot continue to cry over spilled milk when the very essence of our future is at stake.“Experience without theory is blind, but theory without experience is mere intellectual play.”- Immanuel KantI was impressed with Vivek Ramaswamy until I wasn’t. After watching the GOP Presidential Debate, I came to the conclusion of just how naïve and ill-prepared Vivek is regarding foreign affairs. The American President has the power to issue executive orders, sign treaties, and determine foreign policy. Vivek’s answers were quick, some truth, some contradictive, some lies, and some, where it seemed he had learned repetitive knowledge without actual expertise or experience with a huge serving of governmental mimicking theatrical scrambled eggs. Basically, Vivek wants to be nothing more than a Trump wannabe, a Trump mini-me. Essentially, one can easily identify how corrupt a person, or mostly a politician is by the size of his bank account. Vivek gives me the Sam Bankman-Fried FTX Crypto guy vibes and there is no difference between Vivek Ramaswamy and Elizabeth Holmes from Theranos Inc., with the fraudulent blood tests scheme and Vivek’s fraudulent Alzheimer’s medication that did not work. Vivek is a copycat, a carbon copy of Trump’s divisive and failed politics. Even though Vivek claims he wants to bring the nation together using the same status quo, foreign policies have to be understood, believed, and executed without error or at least zero to minimal collateral damage and not just repeated rhetoric from someone’s political ideology. Is Vivek perhaps trying to appease the GOP and Trump to alleviate guilt from the guilty Trump cult that the GOP has become? Watching and listening to Ramaswamy, I couldn’t stop thinking about the character, Dr. Andrew Fassbach, from the movie World War Z. Dr. Andrew Fassbach was a young intellectual Harvard graduate who was an inexperienced, naïve virologist hired by the United Nations to find out the root cause of the virus that was destroying humanity. In the movie, Dr. Fassbach is arrogantly verbally trying to school Gerry Lane, played by Brad Pitt, who is a highly experienced retired investigator for the United Nations. Lane has the experience and has seen firsthand how the environment can destroy humankind and Dr. Fassbach only speaks of how Mother Nature can be the worst serial killer of all. To make a long story short, when Dr. Fassbach was sent into a real-life crisis, he manages to accidentally trip, shooting and killing himself within seconds of his first mission, never getting off the plane. The experienced Gerry Lane/Brad Pitt doesn’t seem at all surprised even referring to the Harvard doctor as “just a kid” earlier before departure. While Vivek is an intellectual Harvard and Yale businessman, he does not have the experience on how the political world works. It is one thing to be confident, but Vivek is arrogant and cocky. The irony of an 18-year-old excited wide-eyed Vivek in 2003 asking presidential candidate Al Sharpton a question regarding political experience or lack thereof. Verbiage, “written words are merely concepts and you must go through the experience.” – Saint Augustine. Knowledge is merely a concept of learned thoughts that become ideas, evolving into theories from education that can only be proven to be truths through experience. Experiencing said ideas and truths surpasses the knowledge of them. Letting Vivek run the country at this time is like giving the keys of a Lamborghini needing repairs to an overly enthusiastic, overzealous anxious teenager, who has never driven a car before. While knowledge always overshadows ignorance, experience will always overpower knowledge. Does America have time for a novice on-the-job training politician? The answer is no. Perhaps if the world was not already in such chaos, with war drums loud and constantly beating from Russia, Ukraine, China, North Korea, and Iran to name a few, Ramaswamy could be our guy. Years ago, America had to deal with a major crisis every few years here and there. But now, it’s around-the-clock chaos, crisis, wars, and rumors of more wars. Vivek is a little too excited, power-hungry, and naive because he is somewhat clueless regarding how the real world works amongst its leaders, dictators, global allies, and enemies. Unfortunately, his overeducated knowledge doesn’t equate to wisdom which comes from experience. Perhaps if he listened more and ran his mouth less, he might familiarize himself with world political affairs. The world is intertwined and for him to repeat Trump's rhetorical nonsense is beyond naïve. I do agree with a lot of what he said, but his ignorance regarding foreign affairs or policies is incongruous, to say the least. It’s not easy to run our own country, but as the leader, one must be well prepared, and well equipped to handle any outside crisis affecting our nation. To me, the most important job of a president is keeping America safe from enemies abroad and staying in tune with our allies is paramount. Vivek appears obnoxious and rude because he speaks over people, rarely letting others have a say. A leader must be not only a good listener but a great listener. Therefore, how can he possibly be a good leader? He has much to learn. Guess Harvard and Yale failed him in the social and listening skills department. Vivek believes a conspiracy theory that our own government was involved in the 911 crisis and suggests censorship was the cause of the January 6th insurrection which is ludicrous because Trump and his minions were the masterminds of the January 6th insurrection. When Vivek was being interviewed by journalists using his own words, Vivek shamelessly pushed back by insulting and telling them that their ignorance or misunderstanding was what the issue was rather than taking responsibility and accountability for his own words. It’s disappointing because I had hopes for Vivek. The more he spoke, the more I listened, and the more informative I was as a voter that he is not what America needs, at least not at this point in time. America is akin to the Titanic and is quickly sinking. Perhaps our only life raft is someone like Chris Christie or Nikki Haley. Unless God forbid, Kamala Harris finds a way through the backdoor by finding a way to find a way or Michelle Obama decides to run for president bringing back the Obama’s continuing decline of American morals. After Trump ran and won the first time, the door is wide open for any clown to waltz right in. I can’t get over that painting of a female president in the background of both the Democratic presidents and the Republican presidents by Andy Thomas which was shown in my article “Cruella” Kamala “de Vil”, First American Female President, Thinkspot, August 2022. “Our civilization will sink to a state like that which is found among the bees, ants, and other insects – a state wherein the male is ruthlessly killed off. In this matriarchal empire which will be established the female rules. As the female predominates, the males are at her mercy” – Nikola Tesla America is not short of political government theatrics, that’s for sure. That being said, electing someone who is ill-prepared and not experienced is hazardous to our country. Vivek says he will just find a way to persuade Putin to no longer be BFFs with Xi. Wow! Really? I guess Vivek hasn’t heard of BRICS. A well-established, organized, and powerful economic group of world leaders which was established in 2010. Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa are not to be toyed with and Vivek’s verbal “rapability” cannot dismantle BRICS. Vivek’s naïve outlook on Tawain and his misunderstanding of Israel’s importance is beyond comprehension. If he goes along with the Republican’s ignorant idea of going to war with Mexico in order to win the war against fentanyl, he is in for a rude awakening. It takes a special kind of stupid people to think that bombing Mexico is justified. It requires open dialogue with the Mexican Government, a strategic plan along with Mexico’s permission to fight the drug cartels and not its citizens or the Mexican Government. The ignorant Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Lindsay Graham, and John Neely Kennedy thinking they can just bomb Mexico proves American politics is run by morons. John Neely Kennedy once said, “Mexicans would be eating cat food out of a can and living in a tent behind an Outback Steakhouse restaurant if it were not for their nation’s proximity to the US and Mexico should be invaded because of the drug cartels.” Where do I begin? First, Kennedy’s disgusting and racist remarks to our allies are beyond ignorant. Perhaps the only one behind an Outback Steakhouse with a Mexican in a tent is his wife Rebecca because I’m certain the ignorant disgusting wrinkly old man Kennedy can’t even satisfy his own wife because he is full of hate on matters he knows nothing about. The war on drugs is more complicated because America supplies Mexico with guns and Mexico supplies America with drugs through the cartel supplied by China. Yeah, make that make sense. Drugs are brought in because the doors are left open by greedy politicians making millions supporting the NRA. And let's not forget Trump and Steve Bannon who pocketed the money and never built the wall. So, if you want to blame somebody start looking in the mirror. Good luck invading Mexico as they will fight you with the guns, we provided them. Secondly, if you go to war with Mexico, they might just reclaim their land that America stole many years ago so no need to worry about proximities. If these are the same Trump policies and agendas that Vivek will continue, the American people will not comply. The war on fentanyl is an American problem as well. The majority of the dealers are Americans. The manufacture of fentanyl begins in China. Work with the Mexican Government to fight the drug cartel, cutting off the pipeline from China and eliminating the drug’s high demand. There is only a supply because of the demand. Offer American citizens incentives such as jobs, skills, and education, giving them a purpose and aim for their own life without drugs. Experience matters and understanding foreign affairs matters even more. Therefore, Vivek Ramaswamy no longer has my vote. Vivek, I to play tennis when time permits. I’ve seen your moves and they don’t impress me much. I’m certain I will never run into you, but please put on a shirt when playing tennis because no one wants to see that chia pet chest hair of yours. On another note, the majority of my readers are probably wondering why I’m so hard on the Republican Party. I’ve been a Christian Conservative Republican my entire adult life up until Trump. I actually voted for Trump the first time only to find out he is nothing but a criminal, a fraud, and most devastating of all, is how he has deceived the church and divided our once great nation. Now I’m a Christian Conservative Independent. I cannot be a Democrat because my beliefs, values, and views differ. Republican Conservative Christians are supposed to know better because we are God’s people. We are supposed to be the party of law and order, fiscal responsibility, and Christian values. However, since Trump took office, the Republicans have become the party of hate. Republicans went from funding the police to defunding the FBI. Trump even wants to abolish the Constitution. Jesus Christ said to pray for your enemies not promote hate. The Democrats have already crossed the line and some have jumped over the cliff because they have a reprobate mind. The Republicans of today are following suit. There is no difference between the woke delusional moral deception and hate. Sin is sin and hate is hate. We are supposed to hate sin, not the sinner. Republicans now only hunger for Trump's chaos and divisiveness even when other politicians are offering a better way; a more down the straight and narrow line with the Republican values. However, Republicans are now rejecting what they once believed and stood for. They just want to fight fire with fire. The Republican Party has become too stupid to realize that common sense is needed more now than ever before. Go back to the moral basics in our modern times. Stand on truth, and everything else will fall into place. The youth of today cannot relate to all the daily nonsense and they see the GOP as a bunch of hateful lazy old rich hypocrites with nothing in common and nothing to offer. Humble yourselves to God and your constituents. In my humble opinion, it is my belief based on historical facts that the Democratic Party is advocating Socialism and Communism Governance while the Republican Party is promoting and advocating Authoritarian and mostly dangerous Fascism Trump Governance. “Without deviation, without deception, without any ifs, buts or whereases, freedom of speech means you shall not do something to people for views they have, express, speak or write” – Hugo L. Black However, both political parties have drunk the crazy Kool-Aid, just different flavors. The ideology that America has stood for freedom, liberty, and justice for nearly 250 years is on the brink of collapse. The current path we are on can only be stopped by those whom we put into office. We are running out of time. We need to wake up before America ceases being a free nation under God. We cannot lose the spirit of America. “The Spirit that prevails among Men of all degrees, all ages and sexes is the Spirit of Liberty.”- Abigail Adams

In recent weeks our proud Teal Independents have been busy showing their feminist credentials by supporting student activists seeking to force universities “to do more” about sexual assault on campus. "All of us women who have attended tertiary facilities in Australia know someone who has been raped while at university," pronounced Dr Monique Ryan. Well, perhaps in your circles, Monique.Wentworth’s Allegra Spender was on ABC radio jumping on board the ABC's latest questionable claim - that 275 people are sexually assaulted on our campuses each week.Is that disinformation, or simply misinformation? This wild 275 headline figure has provided useful propaganda for media stories supporting Education Minister Jason Clare’s recent attack on the universities. The ABC attributes the statistic to the 2021 National Student Safety Survey. Yet Universities Australia, who ran the survey, said the 275-a-week claim was not in their survey results. It appears to have come from the End Rape on Campus (EROC) activist group who extrapolated from the tiny 2.7% of the student population who bothered to answer the survey to the whole student population and included it in a submission to the Federal Government.(Funnily enough, they got it wrong by using 1.3 million for the student population, when government statistics show 1.6 M is nearer the mark. Haha, those pesky activists could have claimed 339 rapes a week if they’d got their sums right!)The manufactured statistic was derived from an extremely dubious statistical manoeuvre, specifically warned against by the Australian Human Rights Commission which ran the previous survey. The Commission stressed the respondents were “self-selected students who were motivated to respond” which means these responses “cannot be regarded as representative of the Australian university student population as a whole.”It's rather like counting up the number of different models of car in a smash repair shop and using this to warn drivers about comparative safety of vehicles. Note that this calculation was based on the tiny 1.1% of students answering the survey who claimed to have been sexually assaulted in the previous year – using the broadest possible definition which included any sexual contact such as being kissed as well as any sexual activity involving drugs or alcohol. (About half of these assaults weren’t actually on campus but took place in private homes, clubs and other outside locations. So, they weren’t campus sexual assaults at all.Clearly, that measly result was very disappointing for the feminist activists who’d worked so hard to try to get these numbers up. A social media post from EROC zealots announced a social media event to keep people company while they complete their surveys. Hmm, surely that’s rather like helping someone fill in their slip at the ballot box.So EROC corrupted the survey by manipulating responses but were so disappointed with the minimal 1.1% result that they were inspired to come up with the 275-a-week concoction.The activist group’s 275-a-week concoction was endlessly quoted by not only the ABC but also Greens Senator Larissa Waters, and all manner of feminist groups who have jumped on the bandwagon to attack the universities.Jason Clare has responded by giving EROC just what they always wanted - namely an “expert” independent taskforce to make sure the universities toe their line. And who’s got the gig to run this show? Patty Kinnersly, the CEO of Our Watch – Australia’s main organisation for promoting domestic violence misinformation. Kinnersly is to be given oversight of our kangaroo courts and the massive Sexual Assault and Harassment (SASH) bureaucracy running rampant in our universities.Such an oversight body had long been a goal for the activists. They worked on Malcolm Turnbull’s woke education Minister, Simon Birmingham, who had the taskforce on the drawing board before Turnbull was turfed out and Birmingham lost his job. When that happened, as mentioned recently in The Saturday Paper, the Minister’s adviser sent an email to one of the activists saying, “We were so close!”With this Labor government so keen to act as a feminist lapdog, times are good for the campus activists. In the name of keeping women safe on campus, the taskforce will require universities to be transparent about their responses to sexual violence incidents, promote more training of students and staff in “respectful behaviour”, more information about where to report incidents, more consistent and accessible complaint processes. Sanctions will be applied to recalcitrant universities. It’s enough to drive Vice Chancellors to drink. They’ve already had years of bending over backwards going along with this whole circus. In the year following the release of the previous (2016) survey – which, as I explained at the time, showed universities were very safe places for young women - the sector introduced 800 new initiatives against sexual violence, rolling out respectful relationships and sexual consent programs, specialist counselling, first responder training, safety apps, college-based initiatives. The list goes on.Most worrying of all was the truly Kafkaesque kangaroo court system set in place across the university sector, with accused students instantly suspended from university, publicly shamed, and facing secretive committees intent on believing all complainants and denying accused men normal legal protections. Countless male students have had their education destroyed and lives ruined. See my website for videos and blogs telling some of their stories.Universities did all this but still it was never enough. Just look at the efforts made by woke ANU Nobel Prize winning Vice Chancellor Brian Schmidt, who, ever since he was appointed, has been kowtowing to feminist bullies determined to paint his esteemed institution as a hot bed of sexual violence.In his first year he featured in local newspapers grovelling to tearful girls claiming to be victims of a “rape crisis” and announced he would put “unlimited resources” into “this wicked problem.” After four years of constant effort, protesters interrupted a university speech claiming he still wasn’t doing enough. “Your Nobel Prize isn’t helping you now,” screamed one protester.Earlier this month ANU students held their sixth annual rally against the “ongoing crisis of sexual violence at the university.” Phoebe Denham, a former student, was quoted in a local newspaper reporting that when she left school planning to go to the ANU, her friends were horrified: “Had I not seen the statistics? How could I possibly be safe if I move to ANU?”Universities quake in fear that they will find themselves in this cruel spotlight, under attack from the feminist rabble for some claimed failure in their efforts to keep women safe. Such is the state of terror that one university recently banned the use of their normal email system for discussion of SASH matters. All such communication must now be printed off and put in the little yellow envelopes to be delivered by internal couriers!Is it any wonder that many of the bosses of our university are ready to throw in the towel? They’ve realised that no matter what they do the activists will cook up more manufactured statistics to claim there’s still a problem. “Many believe the pendulum has swung too far already,” says a senior administrator who wanted to remain anonymous, pointing to recent prominent campus rape cases which ended up being thrown out of court, with the universities admonished for damaging young men’s lives by automatically believing dubious complainants.Witness Alex Matters. I first wrote about this former ANU law student’s extraordinary story some months ago but last month he was interviewed on Sky News by Sharri Markson. How embarrassing for the ANU that the girl at the centre of the Matters court case had an official role on their SASH student staff when she found out that someone else had accused her regular fuck-buddy, Alex Matters, of rape. She threw Matters under the bus with her own absurd allegations which later fell apart in court. Matters has been found not guilty of all charges and little Ms Advocate exposed as a lying, manipulative vixen. And then there was the harrowing tale published last month in the Weekend Australian about a Sydney University student, Jacob, who also had his life destroyed by false rape allegations. Jacob’s lawyer, Sydney SC Tom Molomby was scathing about the woman who fabricated the accusations against him, describing her as “Ruthless. Remorseless. Shameless. Calculating. Cruel.” I urge you to read this revealing case – see here. After a 14-day trial, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars, the jury took two hours to find Jacob not guilty. The judge required the prosecution to pay defence costs – showing this case should not have ended up in court. Jacob had been thrown out of the university right after the accusations were made.With the media finally exposing the tragic impact of such cases on the lives of these young men, is it any wonder universities are wondering how they ended up caught up in this mess?I’m told many Vice Chancellors breathed a sigh of relief back in 2019 when the brave former Education Minister Dan Tehan told a conference of the university regulator TEQSA that universities should get out of the whole territory. That was just after a Queensland Supreme Court case ruled universities have no business adjudicating sexual assault – which unfortunately was overruled in an appeal the following year.A few months ago, there were signs that some universities were prepared to stand up against the feminist onslaught when Universities Australia shelved a proposed new student consent program following objection from some vice-chancellors. The Saturday Paper sneered that this was due to concerns about its explicit nature. But why would universities sign up for another attempt to indoctrinate students with the feminist spin on conducting sexual relationships when they know that even students get the message, activists will still claim an ongoing crisis?A university library officer mentioned that when they introduced 24/7 opening hours for their university library kids started showing up dressed as if they were going on a date night for pre-booked private study rooms. Let’s face it, there’s no way to control the behaviour of 1.6 million young adults, many of whom are having their first taste of life free from parental supervision.Given that the sexual consent courses teach female students that they’ve been raped if they have too much to drink and have sex, and that “staring” is sexual harassment, it’s clear that the feminist view of sexual relationships provides constant fuel for the accusations destined to end up in the campus kangaroo courts. One well-meaning Vice Chancellor who decided to personally monitor a SASH hotline found herself confronted with late night emails from girls complaining boys were staring at them. Naturally the universities are told they would be victim blaming if they were to promote initiatives that could make a difference – such as finding ways of controlling drinking of male and female students. And encouraging women to know their own minds and clearly express decisions around consent, rather than loading the whole responsibility on the shoulders of young men. The whole business has long been a mug’s game for the universities and the easily-led Albanese government is about to make matters a lot worse – for universities and the young men in their care who deserve fair treatment.

Criminal GovernmentDear Friends,It seems to me, while some people are criminals, all governments are criminals. By criminal I mean breaking the classic laws of any nation, murder, theft, and fraud. In fact, most people don’t engage in any of those things, yet all government’s do. What’s war but State murder? What are taxes but State theft? Moreover, if I lie to my government it’s a felony, but if my government lies to me it’s politics. A government agent rarely opens his or her mouth without lies oozing out. Such as half truths, total fabrications and withholding exculpatory evidence from the victims of lawfare. Even as those who we know are criminal, state actors, demand those of us who don’t break the law, turn over more power to those who do… themselves. In what universe does that makes sense?“Come on now,” I can hear some of you saying. “Taxing is not theft. Perhaps civil asset forfeiture is, but taxes surely aren’t?” The same argument is made for war and lying, they protect national security. You don’t want the Russians or CCP knowing what we are up to, would you? The Russians and CCP know everything our government does! Heck, General Miley even told the CCP he would dime out Trump to them if he considered war. National security is to keep us from knowing. Does anyone think national security would be endangered should the JFK murder files be opened? If something is illegal, criminal and immoral for the individual to do, that individual can’t then delegate a State to do it. We can’t delegate that which we can’t do, including theft, fraud or murder. The state then is criminal.People who do criminal acts are criminals. That doesn’t seem to be a controversial statement, except to criminals who want to justify their crimes. Since all governments engage in criminal acts those who abet those crimes are criminals. If you steal money and I find out, and don’t tell the government on you, I am guilty of abetting after the fact. If I even bring you food, when your surrounded by IRS agents for not paying income taxes, I’ll be sent to prison for abetting the standoff. Any act that helps the furtherance of a crime is itself a crime. Therefore, every member of government is a criminal. As long as that government continues engaging in crime. If a government were to stop engaging in crime, it’s no longer criminal. Just as, a person who stopped robbing banks, stops being a bank robber.Disarming those who aren’t criminal serves no purpose but to protect the criminals. Since empirical evidence proves, we’re ruled by criminals, protecting their brothers in villainy only makes sense. Other regulations like bans on collecting rainwater, minimum wage laws and limiting what can be grown on someone’s land, only serve to crush the little guy and elevate the big guy. Taxing and spending, despite the sales pitch, moves wealth from the bottom to the top in a myriad of ways. A few are, increasing inflation, the top is close to the purse strings, and the top has accountants to get out of paying taxes in the first place. They usurp power and claim we delegated it to them, when that’s patently absurd, we didn’t have that power to delegate. The elite are smart criminals.Once you understand that government and most of what it does is criminal, then it’s actions come into focus. Spastic court rulings make sense, like rewarding people for breaking into homes, paying BLM arsonists for the indignity of being arrested, as those same courts throw Jan 6 protesters in prison for decades. The insane regulations, power grabs and the way the elite treat our Constitution like toilet paper, is a sure sign they’ve abandoned all pretense of justice, and have gone full retard. It’s immoral for me to murder, steal or defraud people, so I can’t delegate those powers to the State. The State then is a criminal fraudster that has convinced us it can do anything, because we “delegated them the authority through our Constitution, and it’s in our best interests…” say the criminal liars.Sincerely,John Pepin

President George HW Bush and General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev in HelsinkiOn this day, September 11, 1990, the American President announced the beginning of the New World Order. Appropriately enough, it was President George HW Bush who made the announcement. After all, he was its chief architect. Before a special Joint Congress session, Bush outlined his vision for this New Order of the Ages.It was a time of extraordinary global turmoil. The United States was putting in place the men and equipment that would invade Iraq next year. While on the other side of the Globe, Estonia, Lithuania, and Georgia were declaring that they were each a Sovereignty Country. And, in less than a year, the Soviet Union would dissolve. So, as Bush ascended to the Podium that evening, he was doing little more than reporting to Congress and the American People the events occurring worldwide. It was also his opportunity to get out in front of this march of history.He begins his speech by saying:"We stand today at a unique and extraordinary moment...Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective — a new world order — can emerge a new era — freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more secure in the quest for peace." It was the first time the phrase "new world order" was uttered by an American Leader. For many, this new construct would lead to confusion and debate. In the years to come, many would return to this speech, trying to determine Bush's real meaning. Many thought that Bush was calling for a "One World Government?" While it is true that Bush was, in a real sense, a "Globalist," it was a Global Order with one indisputable leader: the United States.Later, in the very same address to Congress, Bush goes on to provide a listing of America's role in this New World Order:"America and the World must defend common vital interests — and we will. America and the World must support the rule of law — and we will. America and the World must stand up to aggression — and we will. And one thing more: In the pursuit of these goals, America will not be intimidated."Notice the positioning: it's "America and the World..." America in the leadership position. Bush's New World Order is an order with just one leader, America. America's leadership position would become a reality in just a year. With the fall of the old Soviet Union, the remaining superpower became the US of A. Like the coalition that Bush built to invade Iraq, Bush saw America as the premier nation. While other countries joined the "coalition of the willing," the United States took the leadership role in providing the bulk armaments and military personnel for the battle.For the next 32 years, this American-centric New World Order has prevailed. It is an order in which the United States has not hesitated to use its armed forces against any country that opposed the NWO. In that time, the US began no fewer than 18 separate military actions against such diverse nations as Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo, Niger, and Haiti, to name a few. The era of the New World Order has created an America that has become the most militarily aggressive in history.Some have said that the United States behaves like the "policeman of the world." More accurately, America has merely been enforcing its vision of this New World Order.However, the NWO was shaken to its core on February 24 last year, with the Russian Special Military Operation in Ukraine. Russia was acting in complete defiance of the US Global Order. Ukraine had been a virtual vassal state of America for a generation or more. The current US President had spent much of his career focused on Ukraine. Under President Obama (2009-2017) as Vice President, Biden was appointed "point man" to oversee US support for Ukraine. A position that made Biden the ultimate overseer for the country. It was a natural role in the American New World Order. As the World's remaining superpower, America, under Obama and Biden, assumed the role of arbiter to the World. Ukraine was one of the chief hotspots of the time, so it was only natural that our Nation's Vice President should guide them in the ways of the NWO. There was simply no opposition. At the time, Russia lagged far behind the Americans in Military might. So, Russia was in no position to object to the American assertion of control of Ukraine.Over time, that all changed. Under President Putin, the Russian Federation has built a tremendous military and an economy that can withstand the full sanctions of the American and European Colossus. When Russia invaded Ukraine, it appeared to be a mismatch. Ukraine had the largest Army in Europe, with nearly 200,000 active personnel. It was fully equipped with the latest, most technologically advanced weapons from the US and NATO. Many in the West saw Russia as a less-than-capable force, consisting mainly of conscripts who were not as well trained as the Ukrainians.However, the actual results on the battlefield have not borne that out. Once considered a poorly trained and disciplined force, the Russians have proven to be an extremely formidable foe. For 18 months, Russia has more than survived the battle, going toe-to-toe with Ukraine. By many European assessments, Russia is now actually winning the war.A Russian victory would be nothing short of an earth-shattering event. The Russian incursion in Ukraine is completely overturning the New World Order. It has shown that the United States' claim to supremacy may no longer be valid. The champion has met its match. For Eighteen times, the United States fought off any challenger to its World Order. But not this time. This time, Russia remains standing. It remains resolute.The Russian performance in the war speaks volumes to a world that is ultimately ruled by raw power. For 33 years, America has not hesitated to exercise its might as the only Military superpower. The American New World Order stood on the shoulders of the World's most powerful military.However, each day that Russia remains on the battlefield in Ukraine, it becomes a vivid demonstration that American power is waning. It is a lesson that the rest of the World recognizes: former "friends" and "allies" are beginning to desert America. You see that in those countries that are joining BRICS, the international trade organization. Long-time "allies" like Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and India are leaving the American sphere to join this independent association.Today, September 11, is the 33rd Birthday of the New World Order, an Order that reflected the scope and reach of one country, America. Throughout history, the World's order has been a function of the power and might of its most dominant nation. Today, America's preeminence is facing its greatest challenge. It's uncertain if our "New World Order" could survive a Russian victory in Ukraine.Follow me here on ThinkSpot for more stories from the ValueSide.

WAVE RIDERS ASSEMBLE!Last Christmas I gave you my heart, no that wasn’t it, last Christmas I had a deep-ass conversation with fitness and lifestyle don Dr. Dan Go for his podcast. Then weeks went by, and it didn’t come out, and I forgot about it. Well, 9 months later, IT JUST CAME OUT, so you can go listen. Since it was recorded so long ago, I literally don’t remember a single thing we spoke about, so I had Jayson EVA and Letitia listen through it to make some clips and remind me what the blazes happened.“It was amazing!” reports Jayson. “You had a lot of great points hence the number of clips on the list. I think it was a fun, intellectual podcast, Akira.”Well, that’s good to know. The guy being interviewed is a bit different from the guy I am 9 months later, for one thing, he couldn’t do handstand push-ups, and I can, but that doesn’t entirely invalidate his opinions.I shall now hand it over to Letitia for a breakdown.FORSOOTH!Podcast: A Deep Dive into Flow States, Creativity, and Life with Dan Go and Akira The DonIn this compelling new episode, Dan Go and Akira explore everything from the power of music as a delivery mechanism to finding meaning in life.Episode highlightsMusic as a powerful medium: Akira elaborates on how music serves as the most impactful delivery mechanism known to man. The creative process: Akira breaks down his own creative workflow and how to defeat man-made myths like wRiTeR’s bLoCk. "You can only find the magic by actually showing up every day. " He dives into what it takes to create Meaningwave and how to "nail down that truth as quickly as possible."Synchronicities and meaning: Akira explains how paying attention to synchronicities can lead to greater awareness and what some might consider to be communication from the divine. "If you have meaning in your life, you don't need motivation." Fitness and mind-body connection: Akira shares his transformation after taking fitness and nutrition seriously, and how it had a massive impact not just on his body, but also on his mind. AI and art: Addressing concerns about the effect of AI on art, Akira advises that "you've got nothing to fear from this stuff if you are a unique individual broadcasting the most uncompromised version of yourself."Life post-alcohol: Akira speaks candidly about his life after quitting alcohol. "Alcohol is only going to get in the way of your true adventure."Listen to the podcast now on your major podcast platform of choice!ELSEWHERE IN THE MU!DUNEWAVE: ODYSSEY album is coming! And because you’ve been asking so much for so long, we’re making it available on CD and cassette! Behold:We are now but mere WEEKS away from the finish line, the unveiling of the full, 16-track album. And, yes, for the first time ever in Meaningwave history, we're doing CDs and cassettes!LUXURIOUS CD DIGIPACK! WITH FULL COLOUR 24-PAGE LYRIC BOOK!BEAUTIFUL CASSETTE! WITH FULL-COLOUR LYRIC FOLD-OUT AND GLITTERING SPICE-INFUSED CLEAR GOLD CASSETTE SHELL!We also have a wealth of luxurious custom-designed DUNE apparel including hoodies, pants, and a zip-up bomber jacket, amongst other garms of greatness. Apparel is shipping immediately, and the CD and cassette will ship on the week of the album’s release on September 22nd.GET YOURS NOW WHILE YOU CAN!LOVE! TO! YOU! AND! YOUR! FAMILY!Akira The DonDon Studios Playa Del Carmen MKII, September 2023

‘a study that is still having repercussions today' If you found famed sex-researcher Dr. John Money in a basement, doing to children what he did to the Reimer twins, you’d call the Kiddy-Sex Police. But because he was a bleeding-edge ‘behaviorist’ at a time when such anti-human-nature perspectives were very much in vogue, he got away with a very great deal: ‘Postwar, in any case, there was a move away from people being innately, biologically, inherently anything . . . . We'd just seen Nazism, [where] the emphasis had been put on the idea that certain people were innately evil - Jews and gypsies, among others - so the emphasis on culture and society fitted well with social democratic ideals.’ Colapinto’s As God Made Him details the case of Brenda/David Reimer. This case is known in at least basic detail to anyone who as studied nature-nurture: a male baby loses his penis in an accident; famous Dr. Money arranges to have the baby raised as a girl (beginning with rudimentary sex-reassignment surgery); the result is publicized as a success that proves The Theory; it takes decades for the world to understand that the whole thing was a ghastly failure/a proof that being male has a genetic basis. And here, readers, we side-step to that aspect that concerns us: Lysenkoism. The above was happening in the 1960’s-70’s – the era that we are calling the ‘second Lysenkoism’: anti-human-nature but pre-postmodernism. However, if we compare these events to what we’re experiencing today, there’s an astonishing similarity. A political zealot gains a central position in academia. She/he ruthlessly advances her/his agenda. And ridicules and punishes anyone who produces counter-indicative material. And a cohort of fellow zealots uncritically follows her/his lead. No matter how badly the whole thing ends, none of the zealots admits any error. PS This is an utterly absorbing book. It and Inventing Transgender Children are the two books I recommend most highly so far.

Since my girlfriend broke up with mei have more time to do things, and more money to spend on whatever.Whats the point though?

It’s me, I’m the guy they talk about, I’m the one who did his own research. I am an amateur virologist. I have no credentials to display and no achievements to boast of, and no one will write me a recommendation. I cannot find work in virology and never will, I will always be an amateur. Direct at me whatever slings and arrows the amateur virologist is due, for I am one.But I am an amateur virologist with an acute appreciation for the professional virologist. I do understand the difference. I know firsthand how hard professional virologists work and how much respect is properly due that work. My father was a surgeon, a professional surgeon, and I know how hard he worked to become one and to remain one. I saw it every day in my own house. I do know how hard the professionals work.When I was in the first grade my father asked me if I had been taking any tests at school, and I said sure, we take a spelling test every Friday. He asked to see them and I said I still have the one from last week and brought it back. I was six years old and no one had ever told me to try and get the highest score on a test. No one had told me, it did not naturally occur to me, and I found tests boring. I had a very low score. This did not sit well with the professional in the house.My father kept me at the kitchen table late into the night and made me practice spelling each word on the test, starting at the top and going down, until I could spell it perfectly. When I could spell one word on the test perfectly each time he would go to the next word on the test and we would start over. He made me repeat each word on the test over and over until I could spell it perfectly without hesitation over and over again. Then I would have to do the same for the next word on the test. When I could finally spell all the words on the test perfectly there was no reward or praise. Perfect is just barely good enough, it’s what you should always score on a test, and being perfect doesn’t mean you can celebrate, it just means you can stop now and go to sleep. Because perfect is just barely good enough.I was young, but I understood what my father was teaching me. He was not teaching me how to spell. He was teaching me the family business. We lived in a nice waterfront home and took nice vacations and had nice things, because my father was a successful surgeon who could afford them. He was born poor and started working after school in a factory when he was twelve, he worked every summer in college and medical school and he worked his whole life. He made something of himself by graduating first in his high school class and getting a scholarship. A devout Catholic, he always dreamed of attending Notre Dame, but they wouldn’t come up with the money. There are dreams and there is reality.My father made a very comfortable living as a surgeon because he did well in his residency, and he did well in his residency because he did well in medical school, and he did well in medical school because he did well in college. But before that my father was a child and he practiced the questions on tests over and over again until he could do them perfectly, because perfect is just barely good enough. My father did well in life because he practiced skills and knowledge over and over again until he could do them perfectly without hesitation over and over again. He made his money as a surgeon, but he was a surgeon because he practiced skills and knowledge over and over again until he could repeat them perfectly without hesitation. Because perfect is just barely good enough.What my father was teaching me that night was the family business, the source of the family money, the waterfront house, the nice vacations, all of it. The source of all this money was repeating things over and over until you could do them perfectly. This is hard work and not everyone wants to do it. Everyone wants a waterfront home, but not everyone wants to repeat things over and over until you can do them perfectly. My father wanted to repeat things over and over until he could do them perfectly. He was teaching me how he made all that money that I got to spend, and he was teaching me the family business which he wanted me to continue in. He was teaching me how to learn and to work and how to hold yourself to the highest standards so I could be a surgeon as well. Because perfect is just barely good enough. It doesn’t mean you can be happy, it just means you can stop now and go to sleep.I never became a surgeon, or even a very good student. This wasn’t going to be my path through life and eventually my father accepted that. But he gave me the choice, he let me know how to become a surgeon, if that is what I wanted. You do it by repeating knowledge over and over again until you know it perfectly. You do it by work. A surgeon is a surgeon because of work. Everyone is what they are because of work. I did my own kind of work in my own way, but my father gave me the opportunity to be a professional virologist if I so chose. I understand what my father was teaching me. Every time a neuron fires the threshold for firing is lowered and it becomes easier to fire on the next try. A neuron, the nerve cells in your brain that control your thoughts and actions, will only fire if the threshold for firing is reached. Every time you make that neuron fire the threshold is lowered. This is why things become easier with repetition. Each repetition lowers the threshold for firing. This is why speaking a foreign word or using a new skill is so embarrassingly difficult at first, but with enough practice it becomes easy. It becomes easy because repetition lowers the firing threshold on the relevant neurons to the point where getting them to fire and make the action occur becomes easy. But it is never easy at first. Repetition is always needed to lower the threshold, in the beginning it is always hard and remains hard until you put the work in. Everything is because of work.Professional virologists have put the work in. They have repeated skills and knowledge to the point where the firing threshold is so low the skills and knowledge are easy for them. They have changed their brains through work. They are professionals because their neurons are different from the amateurs and their neurons are different because of work. The amount of prerequisite knowledge needed to be a professional virologist takes a lifetime to master. It requires a lifetime of repeating skills and knowledge until the firing threshold on countless facts has been lowered until you have mastery of the subject. The usual estimate is that students learn two million facts in medical school. That is two million sets of neurons that have to have their firing threshold lowered through work. This is something to be respected and I do respect it, more than most. I respect the professional virologist.Health is a life or death concern and so perfect is barely good enough. Professionals have to spend a lifetime reducing the firing threshold on countless facts and skills. No one in a short time or as a part-time pursuit can lower the firing threshold on enough facts and skills to be good enough for something where not being perfect means someone else not being alive. Perfect is just barely good enough, and perfect requires a lifetime of work mastering countless facts and skills. No amateur can do this.I’m a smart guy, I have confidence in myself. I can learn things quickly and I have confidence in my conclusions. When Covid hit and so much of the official story seemed odd and lacked coherence and explanatory power I immediately suspected the official version and began studying the topic on my own. I became an amateur virologist. I knew it would be difficult, but I have great confidence in myself. I trusted my own sense of what is right or wrong and began forming conclusions.Many of those conclusions turned out to be wrong. They were wrong because I am an amateur virologist, not a professional virologist. Once I learned that Covid enters the cell through ACE2 on the cell surface I became fascinated by this, it seemed like the fundamental key to understanding Covid. I learned how the body needs a certain amount of ACE2 on the lung cell surface and Covid uses this to enter the cell. The Covid vaccine produces spike proteins that interact with ACE2 the same way the whole virus does. I thought to myself, if the body has a need for a certain amount of ACE2 and the vaccine is making spike proteins that use up the ACE2, won’t the lung cell make even more ACE2 on its surface to compensate? Won’t this increased amount of ACE2 make the lung cell even more vulnerable to viral entry?I thought to myself, is the lung cell upregulating ACE2 expression in response to vaccination and thus making things worse, not better? For months I looked for research on this and found none. I thought I had figured out a puzzle no one else had, I had discovered something new. Because no one was talking about it in the scientific literature and the logic seemed obvious to me, so I thought I was the inventor of a new and useful idea.Everyone wants to be the inventor of a new and useful idea. Having a new idea is easy, having a new and useful idea is very, very hard. Everyone wants to be known for discovering a new and useful idea because everyone wants to be known for doing something that is very hard, something that most people can’t do. Human nature desires recognition and praise, this is not a weakness, it is a normal part of being human. No one has to be ashamed of wanting to be proud. The desire for recognition is normal and universal. Wanting to be known for doing hard things is normal, no criticism is due. And I thought I had discovered something new and useful. I was very happy about this.The body needs a certain amount of ACE2 and I could see a way the vaccine would be using up that ACE2, making the lung cell make more of it, and since ACE2 is the door the Covid virus walks in through, this would make things even worse. I thought I had done something hard: discovered a new and useful idea. I looked and looked and found no information against this. For months I was very happy. But I was wrong. I am only an amateur virologist. The reason no one was talking about the effect of the vaccine spike protein on ACE2 upregulation is because the professional virologists already asked similar questions with SARS in 2005. These questions that came to my mind had already come to the minds of the professional virologists and they investigated these issues and by 2006 they knew the lung cell down regulates ACE2 in the presence of a virus that uses ACE2 as the door into the cell.I was wrong and the reason I could find no discussion of my interesting idea in the scientific literature is they were discussing new questions, not an old question that was already answered in 2006. A professional virologist has to master mountains of information, they have to lower the firing threshold on the neurons guarding countless facts until they can access them perfectly. The amount of prerequisite knowledge needed to come up with a new and useful idea in virology is beyond what the amateur virologist is capable of. I was wrong and it took me months to learn I was wrong. This is why I am an amateur virologist and not a professional.I understand the difference between an amateur and a professional. I know how hard the professionals work and I believe they are due great respect for this, and also waterfront homes. Anyone can do the work, but only someone does. Everything that is so, is so because of work. Professional virologists are professionals because they did the work I never chose to do. I had the opportunity, my father showed me how. But I chose not to. And so it takes me months to learn no one is talking about my questions because this is 2020 and those are 2006 questions to the professionals. And I am an amateur.I do understand how hard the professionals work. Every professional in every field. No one wants someone to watch what they do for a living for a few minutes and start giving advice. Everyone wants the time and effort they spent lowering the firing threshold on the skills and knowledge they need to do their job respected by others: because work is nearly the one thing in the world most deserving of respect. Effort is a result of choices and choices are the only things about us deserving of respect, and the choice of learning things until you can do them perfectly is the choice deserving of the second most respect in the entire world. Because everything that is so, is so because of work.Everyone wants recognition, everyone wants to be thought well of. I am part of everyone, I hoped my idea about the threat of ACE2 upregulation in response to ACE2 consumption by the vaccine-produced spike protein was both new and useful. It made me feel happy to think I had done something both new and useful, two of the hardest words in the world to put together. But I was wrong. It hurts to be wrong, no one wants to be wrong. Schoolchildren are taught that real scientists are just as happy with a null result as a positive result, but obviously that isn’t true. Scientists are human too and they want a positive result, they want proof that they discovered something new and useful, because that is hard to do and everyone wants to be known as someone who can do hard things. The desire to be seen well by others is felt by all and is one of our strongest desires.When I realized my idea was wrong, it did hurt. You want people to see you in a positive light, you want to be successful and have a position in life, a waterfront home. But you can’t lie. It hurts to be wrong, but you have to be adult about it and admit it, and move on. You can’t hide being wrong because you want to be seen well by others, or you want a waterfront home. You simply have to tell the truth, even when that means telling that you were wrong, or that you fell short in some way.I am just an amateur virologist, I have no job offers in virology coming my way now or in the future. But I understand how to learn. It is just work, you repeat the skill or knowledge over and over again until you have mastered it. I haven’t learned enough about virology to be a professional virologist. But I have put a lot of work into this. The Covid era feels like forever, but it's been four years of our society being obsessed with this. I am an amateur, but I know how to learn. I know how to examine an idea for its explanatory power, meaning its ability to explain the past, its internal coherence, and most importantly its predictive power, its ability to explain the future. I know how to tell if something is true. And I can do this for any field, given the time to learn the prerequisite knowledge to the question. I am smart, and I can work hard when I want to. I have put a lot of amateur virologist hours into Covid over these years, and I know that ACE2 is the fundamental determinant of comparative risk. ACE2 is the door the Covid virus uses to enter the lung cell. It has to find a door into the lung cell before the immune system kills it. If a virus takes too long to enter the cell it will be found by the immune system first. If a virus easily finds entrance into host cells it will rapidly proliferate. For Covid the key to all of this is ACE2. The more ACE2 your lung cells have, the more doors for Covid to enter before the immune system finds it. The virus is racing against time, it has to find a door into the cell before the immune system finds it first.Relative ACE2 levels are the fundamental source of relative Covid risk. Those with the most ACE2, the most doors into the cell for the virus, are at the most risk. And those with the fewest doors are at the least risk. No one has fewer doors than children. I am an amateur virologist, but I know this to be true.Children are born with very low ACE2 levels in the lung. The nose and throat cells of all people have high enough ACE2 levels to become infected and test positive for Covid, but the lung is all that matters for risk of serious injury, or death. Children are born with very low ACE2 levels and then the levels increase with age. This is the real reason the elderly are at such risk of death from Covid, they have the highest ACE2 levels. For the elderly the virus can easily enter through this door before the immune system has time to find it.But for children, it is the opposite. Children’s ACE2 levels are so low that they are at no significant risk for injury from Covid. They can generate positive test results because ACE2 levels vary between cell types. Not all cell types have ACE2 on the cell surface, one of the ones that do is gametes and this may matter. Nose and throat cells express ACE2 on the surface and their levels are different than the lung, everyone has a nose and throat that can get Covid, not everyone has a lung that can get Covid. Most children do not, and maybe even all children. The ACE2 levels of children are simply too low to be at a significant risk of injury.I am just an amateur virologist. Nothing I know is unknown by the professional virologists, nothing I can do in this field is better than what a professional can do. But I do know how to learn, and I know how to judge truth. I can examine ideas for explanatory power, coherence, and above all predictive power. I can come to understand the fundamental relationships that govern the behavior and form a model from which I can answer novel questions and integrate novel data, this type of modeling is the ultimate goal of all learning. I am only an amateur virologist, but I do know that because of ACE2 levels children fundamentally have almost no risk of injury to Covid in comparison to adults.All we are in the end is our choices. We can choose to do the work, or we can choose to not do it. But we can all choose to tell the truth or not. I am not a professional virologist, but I know how to judge comparative risk for Covid. I know some of the professional virologists are lying. We all want recognition, we all want to be seen well by others, and we all want a waterfront house. In the end, we have to choose if we are willing to lie to get these things. The right answer is no, do not lie. The right answer is to tell the truth. You should always tell the truth. Perfect is just barely good enough.I am an amateur virologist, I do my own research. The professional virologists are better than me. This is because of my choices. I did not choose to do the work, and they did. I respect that. All we are is our choices and the choice to do work is the second most important thing to show respect for in this world, and I respect the work it takes to be a professional virologist. But the most important choice we make is the choice to be good people, and to tell the truth. This is the one choice that deserves the most respect. I am just an amateur virologist, but I am an honest amateur virologist. That is just barely good enough.

When I got my first record deal in 2005 I managed to convince the label (which took a lot of finagling) to give me a chunk of the recording budget directly (rather than it all going to their recording studios), and used it to buy a bunch of equipment and make my own home studio.This came in very useful a year later when they decided they didn't want to release the album I'd recorded for them as it was - due to lyrical content they objected to - and I decided I didn't want to change it, so I bought the album back with the money I'd gotten from having one of my songs in that My Super Ex-Girlfriend movie, and carried on recording 100s and 100s of songs with that equipment I'd finagled.I'm still using the exact same mic I bought then, an AKG 414B, which has been all over the world and is responsible for the vocals on about 95% of my records.Anyway, I just discovered, after seeing one listed on Reverb, that it is now considered a "rare vintage mic", and that people pay 1000s of dollars for one!So the lesson isIf you want rare vintage gearAll you have to do is buy stuff when you have an opportunityThen look after it for a couple of decadesAnd you will eventually haveRare vintage gear.AMAZING.MEANWHILE!I have been editing the new DUNEWAVE music video, and it has almost finished rendering so, that will be live SHORTLY!Speaking of which, The album, DUNEWAVE: ODYSSEY, releases on September 22, and because you’ve been asking me for LITERALLY YEARS… We’re making it available - FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER IN MEANINGWAVE HISTORY - on CD and Cassette!LUXURIOUS CD DIGIPACK! WITH FULL COLOUR 24-PAGE LYRIC BOOK!BEAUTIFUL CASSETTE! WITH FULL-COLOUR LYRIC FOLD-OUT AND GLITTERING SPICE-INFUSED CLEAR GOLD CASSETTE SHELL!We also have a wealth of luxurious custom-designed DUNE apparel including hoodies, pants, and a zip-up bomber jacket, amongst other garms of greatness. Apparel is shipping immediately, and the CD and cassette will ship on the week of the album’s release on September 22nd.GET YOURS NOW WHILE YOU CAN!LOVE! TO! YOU! AND! YOUR! FAMILY!Akira The DonDon Studios Playa Del Carmen MKII, September 2023

"Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one." - Marcus AureliusIn Meditations, Aurelius distills the central pillars and tenets of stoic philosophy. Although it was essentially a journal and never intended for a general readership, it has become one of the most widely read philosophical works in the world. Here's a free online version if you want to check it out.So I tend to overthink things. My ability to make decisions is sometimes paralyzed by my consideration of endlessly branching unknowns. This has become more pronounced in recent years, perhaps due to the increasing chaos of the world, perhaps due to the mounting responsibilities of age. Aurelius has been a real source of wisdom for me, and this quotation is the kick in the pants I sometimes need to get off the "but what if?" train. Soren Kierkegaard similarly observed that "life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards." The future remains uncertain always, and so I will inevitably make choices that in hindsight were foolish or wrong. But, as cliché as it is, making any choice is better than no choice at all. Arm yourself with as much wisdom as you can gather, but when it comes down to it, you have to choose as best as you can and live "forwards." Like Kierkegaard, Aurelius was clearly a deep and passionate thinker. Think of all of the endlessly branching thoughts that he had to explore before arriving at each and every single epiphany worth writing down in his journals. I'm sure he knew what it was like to overthink and understood the necessity of spurring yourself to just do the thing you instinctively know is right.In my illustration, the voluminous text of Meditations spills out of an open book, forming a river of overwhelming concepts. A rider crosses the river over a bridge engraved with pictograms representing the four pillars of stoicism (Courage, Justice, Temperance and Wisdom) as well as three central stoic concepts: Memento Mori ("Remember Mortality"), Amor Fati ("Love Fate"), and the Inner Citadel.For more details on the pictograms, read my first Aurelius post below.Marcus Aurelius"Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one." - Marcus Aurelius Obvious State 11x14 Art PrintobviousstateView the PrintVisit my Shop

The daily argy bargy of trans vs. anti-trans should be ‘moored,’ but is not ‘moored,’ to an understanding that All This is utopianist. Radical feminism, open-ended affirmative action, Californian reparations for slavery, rampant nanny-statism, financial stimulus in response to GFCs and Covid lockdowns, the elimination of university-entrance exams, gender theory – these are all, in one way and another, not about making the world a better place, but about making the world a perfect place. So, a brief and simple Post. Historical conservatism accepted inequality. Classical liberalism advocated a level playing field. Left liberalism advocated a level playing field and help for those who hadn’t gained access to that field. (Singer’s expanding moral circle is in the background here.) The revolutionary left has always been utopian, and the contemporary devolutionist left is no exception.

WTI Crude Oil Prices are up 30% since June. Something that's bound to hit us in the wallet.**At 8:30 a.m. this morning, Eastern Time, the Bureau of Labor Statistics will release the most important economic report of the month, guaranteed to be the report that has the most impact on our financial well-being. It is the announcement of last month's change in Consumer Prices. As the cost of almost everything in our country is constantly rising, we consider this one of the best measures of inflation.The Index was created during the dark days of World War I. While American soldiers were overseas in Europe, food shortages and transportation issues began to appear back home in America. Food prices spiked, and consumer's income was squeezed. The Bureau of Labor Statistics recognized the problem and decided there should be some way to compensate the folks back home. They created the Food Price Index to measure the average family's cost increase.It's interesting to note that merely by focusing the nation's attention on the cost of food, it has helped farmers and regulators create the world's most productive agricultural sector. Even with today's high inflation, food prices remained under control until recently. And even then, much of the rise in ag prices was attributed to the rising cost of Energy, as modern mechanized farms and food transportation are significant consumers of Energy.The original Food Price Index has changed into the current Consumer Price Index, a basket of often purchased items for the average American family. Today, the CPI, according to the BLS, is used "to adjust income eligibility levels for government assistance, federal tax brackets, federally mandated cost of living increases, private sector wage and salary increases, and consumer and commercial rent escalations." The CPI affects the income of hundreds of millions of Americans. However, the CPI is no mere exercise by some far-away government agency. It accurately measures how you and I spend our money. And, taken as a whole, it should be a primary way to measure the effects of public policy. After all, it began 100 years ago as a measure of increasing food prices. These results have led to changes in tax policy, agricultural policies (designed to maintain low farm prices), and government financial aid programs.So, let's all put on our "green eye shades" and see if we can see what may be contributing to our current high inflation. We begin in January 2021, when Joe Bide was inaugurated as the 46th President of the United States. We will use the Bureau of Labor Statistics published CPI results as our source.BACKGROUNDFor the ten years before Biden's assuming office, the highest level of inflation was in September 2011, when inflation rose to 4.2% (monthly reading, annualized rate). From the end of 2011, inflation never again reached 4% anytime in the next nine years.However, all that changed after the new President took over the reins. In a little over three months, inflation shot up to 4.25, and a year after that, inflation was steaming ahead at more than 9%, a level not seen in this country in 40 years. Biden must have brought some new policies that caused prices to rise exponentially.Let's see if we can find what was driving this inflation. And what specific policies may have contributed?We begin with a review of Medical Costs. Were higher hospital and doctor costs driving these higher prices? Nope, medical care was not the cause. The highest jump in medical since 2021 has been 5%, only about half of inflation's peak. Overall, services, in general, have contributed little to inflation. Neither the cost of automobiles nor clothing could be considered a driver of overall higher prices.If you review all the different categories of expenses for the CPI, you find that only one type rose so much that it pushed inflation. And that category in Energy, or more specifically, gasoline prices. Eight different times since 2021, gasoline costs have risen by 47% or more.That ought to get our attention. The jump in gas prices has been so far from the average that they've put a dent in all our wallets. I remember last fall when the cost to fill up my SUV was more than $100. The first time that ever happened. Granted, it has a large gas tank, at 20 gallons, but when the gas price reached $5, the station said, pay me a "C" Note.So profound has this rise in gasoline prices been that if we took away the jump in gas prices, you would immediately reduce inflation by at least 2 1/2%.What's worrying consumers today is the recent rise in the cost of gasoline and its derivative oil. In less than three months, West Texas Intermediate Oil has risen from less than $70/barrel to nearly $90/Barrel, a rise of almost 30%, something that's sure to hit us square in the pocketbook.Perhaps we need less monetary tightening and, instead, a better energy policy in our fight with inflation.**Follow me here on Thinkspot for more stories from the ValueSide.

Constitutional ConsequencesDear Friends,It seems to me, the reason breaking a law has consequences, is because a law without teeth is a mere suggestion. What would happen if a bank robber who was caught… only had to give back the money that they hadn’t already spent? Everyone would rob banks. It would be stupid not to. The same holds true of constitutions and constitutional law. There are no consequences for violating our Constitution, in the most vile of ways, so our elites violate it all day in every way. The worse that could happen is the power they usurped, and are using now, will have to be given back. I propose a better paradigm. Give our Constitution’s teeth. Write in a few consequences for violating it. Let’s make violating our Constitution at least as punishable as growing one hundred acres of wheat.If a constitution is a contract, where only one party is held to it, while the other is given free reign, it’s not a contract, it’s slave papers. In a contract both parties give something and get something. Moreover, it’s an established precedent that any ambiguity, goes against the party who wrote the contract. In the case of our Constitutions, the elite write them, enforce them and violate them at will, because the elite don’t punish themselves. When was the last time you turned yourself in for speeding? Even as the elite interpret any ambiguity as giving them more power. That’s how they expanded the Commerce Clause to give the administrative state unlimited power to regulate. Because a farmer grew too much wheat on his land. That ambiguity led to Wickard v Filburn and the exponential growth of the bureaucracy.Laws without punishment have no effect, just as constitutions without teeth are useless, and have proven themselves worthless for multiple centuries. Take the Magna Carta, when King John was forced to sign it, the elite thought they had done a great thing, and had slashed the power of the king. That was far from the truth. Even today in the British commonwealth, a “constitution” is a slave document, instead of a charter of basic human rights. How do we know this? As in Canada, the people have no rights, only those the elite randomly grant. Take for example the rounding up and prosecuting of the truckers in Canada… or the arrest and prosecution of people engaging in silent prayer, facebook wrongspeak and for carrying chefs knives to work, in Britain. Not the actions of limited governments.What sort of teeth should we add to our constitutions? Criminal law has something to say here. Fines, jail, and even capital punishment are in line for violating our Constitutions. Fines for first time “minor” violations, jail for habitual offenders, all the way up to the death penalty for those actively engaged in a conspiracy to overthrow the Constitution. Obviously, politicking to change the Constitution within the parameters set forth in the Constitution, would not only be okay, but protected by the Constitution. Just as trying to change a law by writing op eds, running for office and creating special interest groups is legal. Only violating Constitutional limits would be punishable. Every government official, under this system, that called social media to censor Americans, would be fined, and some might go to jail.History has proven that sooner or later, the elite will ignore any limits in their constitution, and usurp power. It’s human nature. Moreover, not one elite has ever been punished criminally, for violating a constitution. Especially the US Constitution. Instead, they’re rewarded with usurped power to wield, increased political favor, and everything that comes with the first two. All of our Constitutions have become slave papers instead of contracts. The elite have made it so. They do as they please, while we’re limited by unconstitutional regulations, monitored, and taxed to pay for it. It’s past time to add teeth to all our Constitutions. Put in large fines for minor violations and jail time for greater violations, even execution. Then enforce them, as zealously as they enforce their arbitrary edicts, on us.Sincerely,John Pepin

When the philosophy of America is no longer about building up but of tearing down, the “Great Experiment” is over. This situation is the major reason that Obama won in 2012 (aside from massive voter fraud, of course). His comment about voting being the “best revenge” startled and horrified older Americans who still view the nation according to its founding principles of opportunity and liberty. But Obama wasn’t speaking to them. He spoke to the voters who gave him the White House: the young who see life as an “us vs. them” scenario, minorities, most of whom believe that somehow their rise depends upon someone else’s fall and single women who often find themselves because of the cultural assault on the traditional family, one failed relationship from poverty. Generations of propaganda pressing the economic concept of the “finite pie” has instituted permanent class envy together with its ongoing war between the supposed “haves” and “have-nots” while ever more people—whatever their social and economic situation—consider themselves among the latter. America has gone from a “classless society” in which an individual could rise to whatever heights his talents and efforts would take him, to a culture in which people find themselves assigned to their respective classes—wealthy, middle and poor—from which the chances of “moving” higher—minus some great stroke of luck or the efforts of the government—are virtually nil. Interestingly enough, when we were a nation without classes, more people than not moved up, poor to middle, middle to wealthy. But in the new socialist environment, such is no longer the case. Indeed, the only class that seems to be gaining in numbers is the poor and the only one shrinking daily is the middle class. All of the political and economic warfare against the wealthy has done little to lessen their numbers or their wealth. It seems only to have made them more entrenched and less open to the influx of those lower on the economic ladder. The present American philosophy of class envy and economic warfare will produce the same sorry results as every other socialist “experiment.” Nonetheless, it will continue to play out because the majority of Americans have forgotten the lessons of the past, abandoned the concept of opportunity and effort and embraced the desire for revenge against those whom the government with its media allies have presented as their enemies. In a way, the current emotional atmosphere in America is akin to the mindless rage motivating those who think that killing large numbers of innocent people will somehow satiate their desire for personal vengeance. Their rage is directed outwardly but it is really the result of personal failures for which they cannot or will not take responsibility. Their intention is to destroy anyone and everyone whom they perceive as being “responsible” for their situation and whether they do it with the bullet or the ballot, the results are the same: the death of a nation.

Magic mushrooms are one of the most potent plant medicines in the world, when used responsibly they can be a highly effective treatment for many different mental health issues, such as addiction, depression and anxiety, just to name a few. They do not mask symptoms or temporarily numb pain but can potentially assist people in overcoming and conquering their mental health issues for good. Organically grown magic mushrooms do not contain any artificial substances which means that they do not lead to many of the negative side effects associated with pharmaceutical drugs, such as dependency, disease or death, you cannot become addicted to, or overdose on magic mushrooms. Yet even though they are far safer and more effective than pharmaceutical drugs they are surrounded by hesitancy, resistance, excessive precautions, fear, stigma and prohibition. This irrational behavior is not due to any predictable risks of danger or injury but is mainly driven by unconscious fears. The issue is not that magic mushrooms are dangerous, but that the psychedelic experience that they induce triggers three unconscious fears which are present within most human beings, these are the fear of the self, the fear of the unknown and the fear of the sacred. This is why psychological development and self-knowledge are so important, without an understanding of your own psychology you are bound to be ruled by unconscious forces. Those who lack self-knowledge are not only ruled by unconscious forces but highly susceptible to self-deception as well, a man cannot think freely or independently unless he has individuated, until then he will remain bound to the collective and his thinking, words and behaviors will be constrained to the limiting beliefs and prevailing narratives of the collective unconscious. What is interesting about this phenomenon is that it doesn’t matter if you are a highly educated and distinguished professional or an uneducated and utterly ignorant fool, both can be just as influenced by unconscious forces in the absence of self-knowledge, the study of psychology is indispensable. The fact that people can remain unconscious to such a large degree, before, during and after being educated in Western society is egregiously concerning. The psychedelic experience is one of the best ways to raise your consciousness and free yourself from the fetters and limiting beliefs of the collective unconscious. Having psychedelic experiences on a regular basis can result in massive expansions of consciousness in relatively short periods of time, one psychedelic experience may induce a greater expansion of consciousness than what may have otherwise taken years of concentrated effort to accomplish without the use of psychedelics. This can enable you to become aware of, and activate the multi-dimensional aspects of your self, affecting you mentally, emotionally, physiologically and spiritually. Magic mushrooms are often referred to as teachers or guides, they appear to have a mirroring effect which reflects the level of consciousness and state of mind of the individual, giving them only what they are ready for. The study of Jungian psychology can be used as an additional form of guidance for exploring the self through the psychedelic experience and is also a powerful way to raise your consciousness in and of itself. Combining the two can act as a powerful catalyst to the initiation, amplification and acceleration of psychological development, promoting massive expansions of consciousness with a strong sense of direction and understanding. This is not to say that you should rush the process of raising your consciousness, you should always start by taking it slow and finding your own pace, going too fast can potentially overwhelm you and may lead to various psychological disturbances and imbalances. Again, this does not necessarily mean that magic mushrooms are dangerous, because you can just as well induce these psychological issues by raising your consciousness too fast through the study of Jungian psychology, even without the use of magic mushrooms. Jungian psychology and magic mushrooms are invaluable tools in the journey to self-hood and should be utilized by anyone who seeks self-knowledge. The biggest barrier that people face in relation to the psychedelic experience, psychological development and raising their consciousness is fear, fear hinders growth, progress and development keeping people’s psyches in a state of default. Many of the mental health issues and psychological problems that people struggle with can be greatly alleviated or even resolved by facing their fears. Arrested psychological development, fear and unconsciousness are so rampant in society that they are not only viewed as normal and acceptable, but even demanded through conformity, those who are unconscious are pathologically hostile and resistant to those who are not. One of the first steps to overcoming your fears is to become aware of them. By learning about the three great fears of the psychedelic experience you can gain great insight into yourself and how much these fears may be affecting you; this can also enable you to grasp the magnitude of how influential these fears are in dictating the behavior of entire societies. It is very easy to notice these fears in other people, and although we can learn much from observing others, we must guard against projection and avoid getting distracted from ourselves. Far too many people get caught up in projection because it allows them to judge the shortcomings, flaws and folly of others while ignoring their own, and it always happens that what they tend to notice in others is exactly what they should be addressing within themselves. Or as Jung stated, “Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.”. In order to better understand these three great fears and the level of influence that they have on human behavior I will share a brief summary of each, but keep in mind that unconscious fears are complicated, they may be viewed from many different perspectives and in various combinations depending on your level of understanding.1-The Fear of the Self Why is the fear of the self so rampant in modern societies, is it because the societies themselves are structured in a way that promotes materialism, vanity and triviality, naturally leading people to become identified with their persona, while completely neglecting or rejecting their true self? Or is it possible that the collective fear of the self has actively influenced and shaped the structure of modern societies, creating a superficial role-playing environment which is congenial to those who lack self knowledge and are only conscious of their persona? One persona is usually insignificant and will rarely play much of a role in changing or influencing the structure of a society, but millions of people who are identified with their persona can shape and mold the structure of a society to an exceptionally large degree, even if it is done unconsciously. The persona is like a mask that ‘individuals’ wear mainly for social purposes and personal presentation, and although it is an important aspect of the self, those who are solely identified with it are predominantly unconscious. One must consciously pursue psychological development and look within to explore the self, unfortunately most people choose to shun, ignore or reject themselves out of fear, keeping their psyches in a state of default and remaining unconscious of their inner world. When an ‘individual’ chooses to shun, ignore or reject their own self, they become a puppet to unconscious forces which often turn them into their own worst enemy, wreaking havoc on their life, health and relationships through their own unconscious driven thoughts, choices and behaviors. Carl Jung summed up this phenomenon beautifully when he said, “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” This avoidance of the self is not only driven by the fear of the self, but also by a refusal to take responsibility, by remaining ignorant of the self the ‘individual’ is also choosing to remain unconscious which enables them to assume the role of a blameless victim. Unconscious ‘individuals’ are slaves to their lower desires, driven by greed, lust, gluttony, pleasure, distraction, etc., they will choose things, associate with people, engage in behaviors and put themselves in situations that lead to sickness, disease, depression, guilt, shame, turmoil, pain, suffering, danger, injury, abuse, etc., but will rarely ever acknowledge that the terrible things that befall them are the result of their own poor choices. Magic mushrooms may act as a solution to this because they can reconnect you to your true self, expanding your consciousness and leading you to self-knowledge, but only for those who are willing to face themselves, even in the presence of fear. Carl Jung summed up the fear of the self best when he said, “People will do anything, no matter how absurd, to avoid facing their own souls.”. Rejecting the self is not only an act of cowardice but a betrayal of the self as well, it leads to feelings of guilt, shame, regret and often drives men into states of mediocre stagnation or degenerate decline. Although the path to self-knowledge, growth and change can be challenging, it is well worth the effort, especially when you consider that the alternative is a type of unconscious self-induced hell. As hard as the journey to self-knowledge may be, it is not all bad, it is also empowering, energizing and invigorating, it can lead you to better health, vitality and a more meaningful existence. The difficulty for most people is that they have a lot of darkness that they must embrace and work through in their journey, this darkness may stem from repressed emotions, trauma or unresolved conflict. However, the most important darkness that an ‘individual’ must face is their shadow, the shadow is the dark aspect of the self which contains the qualities and traits that have been rejected because they are deemed to be bad, evil or unacceptable. Most people are not consciously aware of their shadow because they have not even begun their journey to self-hood, their shadow is usually completely repressed, if they do become conscious of its influence or presence they attempt to ignore or suppress it, but suppressing the shadow is a form of self rejection that can turn you into your own worst enemy in the same way previously mentioned. The shadow must be confronted and integrated into the personality, which is a vital part of the individuation process. The amount of darkness that an individual must embrace in their journey to self-hood will determine the potential brightness of the light that they will find in it. In this way darkness can be viewed as something good and beneficial because light could not exist without it. Or as Carl Jung wrote, “No tree, it is said, can grow to heaven unless its roots reach down to hell.”. It is one thing to fear the darkness within yourself, but many people are just as scared of their own light, or as Plato said, “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.”2-The Fear of the Unknown The fear of the unknown is one of man’s oldest and most powerful fears, people will go to great lengths to ignore, dismiss and deny the existence of certain subjects, information or ideas that may trigger this fear. The collective fear of the unknown has played a major role in the formation of Western academia and its doctrines, many subjects are foolishly dismissed and treated as taboo, not because they are illegitimate or have been discredited, but because they frighten people and cause discomfort. This fear of the unknown is triggered by magic mushrooms because the psychedelic experience is in many ways an embodiment of the unknown and mysterious. The reaction to the psychedelic movement that took place in the sixties can give us insight into how the unconscious fears of the collective can stifle and hinder the progress and advancement of everyone. Rather than embracing and integrating these plant medicines into society, the unconscious fears of the collective and the authoritarian tyranny of the state led them to be demonized and prohibited. Much of the unconscious fear around psychedelic plant medicines has been greatly amplified by deceitful propaganda campaigns that persuaded millions of people to believe that they were dangerous drugs that would lead to addiction and self destruction. Part of the reason that these campaigns were so successful is because the fear was already present. It seems that the state may have even strategically exploited the collective fear of the unknown in a way that enabled the population to cower from their fears with a false sense of righteousness and a facade of superiority, believing themselves to be better than the “criminals” and “degenerates” who use these “dangerous” and illegal “drugs”. This behavior between the state and the population resembles that of the relationship between a narcissistic parent who shields their child from reality, this overbearing protection prevents the child from growing up, causing them to become weak, docile and delusional. Only in this case it is grown men and women who are choosing to remain in unconscious ignorance with an infantile dependence on the state to protect them, telling them what and how to think even into their old age. These conditions of safety, comfort, and ease are the very breeding grounds for what Nietzsche referred to as “the last man”, a man who lives a meaningless life of ignorance, hedonism and laziness. The most dangerous aspect of this last man lies in the fact that he is the rule, he is like an ocean of mediocrity that threatens to drown all exceptional individuals in unconsciousness and triviality, one must be a strong swimmer to endure his superfluous presence and overwhelming influence. This is why it is so important to face adversity, many men instinctively know this and seek to challenge themselves through activities that promote strength, stamina and endurance, such as weightlifting, martial arts, boxing, cold exposure etc., this is also why many men prefer to work jobs that require hard physical labor. Physical strength, stamina and endurance are extremely important, but the greatest strength we can ever attain comes from within, and it only comes to those who are willing to face their fear of the unknown. Facing your fear of the unknown in this way can be seen as a form of mental adversity which will enable you to cultivate fortitude and grit. The psychedelic experience is naturally feared because it is unknown and mysterious, but when you combine that with the fear of the self and the fear of the sacred it becomes a powerhouse of unconscious fears. Facing each of these fears through the psychedelic experience should be viewed as opportunities to become stronger by overcoming them. Fear is a great robber of life which can prevent you from reaching your highest potential, or as Joseph Campbell put it, “The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek. Fear of the unknown is our greatest fear. Many of us would enter a tiger's lair before we would enter a dark cave. While caution is a useful instinct, we lose many opportunities and much of the adventure of life if we fail to support the curious explorer within us.”3-The Fear of the SacredThe fear of the sacred is the greatest of these three fears because it encompasses the fear of the self and the fear of the unknown simultaneously. All life is sacred, including the self, but most people have become so disconnected from the sacred that they have grown to fear it, if by chance they do encounter or experience it they often interpret it as something separate from themselves, as something unknown. Magic mushrooms trigger this fear because the psychedelic experience that they induce is, or at least has the potential to become sacred depending on the nature and intention of the individual. Taking a full dose of magic mushrooms, which is 5 dried grams, may lead to what is referred to as a religious or mystical experience. These experiences are unique to the individual and usually difficult to articulate, but they can be broadly summed up as a powerful reconnection to the sacred aspects of reality, which include the self, the earth, nature, the cosmos and the universe. These experiences often lead to massive expansions of consciousness, psychological rebirths, personal transformations, spiritual awakenings and miraculous healings. They are usually described as the most powerful and meaningful experiences that the individual has ever had. Reconnecting to the sacred may be unfamiliar, strange and even terrifying for certain people, the further one drifts away from the sacred, the more their fear intensifies. The collective fear of the sacred is so powerful and prevalent in Western academia that it has virtually eradicated the knowledge of, relationship to and even the capability of having belief in the existence of the sacred. Much of the atheistic materialist reductionist doctrines of the West are the products of defense mechanisms within the collective unconscious which are meant to protect people from their fears by pretending that they do not exist, a type of denial through self-deception which masquerades as intellect. Hannah More described this cunning trickery when she said, “The ingenuity of self-deception is inexhaustible.”. Atheistic doctrines are naturally popular because they resonate with the collective unconscious, they offer the same type of protection to the masses that they do to those who create and/or regurgitate them. This is not protection from any danger or threat, but protection from fear, from facing truths, realities and subjects that trigger discomfort and uncertainty. This is why science has degenerated into somewhat of a religious cult, it is used as a haven by those who have chosen to shun the sacred out of fear. The fear of the sacred is particularly intense amongst the indoctrinated, they do not have the capacity to think beyond their education, this is the degrading and dehumanizing nature of atheistic doctrines, they mislead people into believing that they are an insignificant fluke, a product of chance in a universe with no meaning, which is a perfect recipe for nihilism. Logic would dictate that this fear of, and disconnection from the sacred would be absent in religious people, however, it is often just as strong in them as it is in their supposed opposites – atheists. Carl Jung shed some light on this paradox when he stated, “One of the main functions of organized religion is to protect people from a direct experience of God.”. Those who cling to atheistic materialist reductionist doctrines are not very different from many of those who cling to religion, their behavior is simply driven by unconscious fears. Most religious people use organized religion as a form of protection from their unconscious fears in the same way that others use science. They will go through the motions of going to church, listening to a priest, reading religious texts, etc., but will avoid any deep or meaningful religious practices, such as contemplation, introspection, meditation, ceremony, ritual, etc. What’s even worse is that many of them will criticize, slander and attack those who are involved in these deeper religious practices, foolishly labelling anything that triggers their unconscious fears as witchcraft, summoning demons, evil, etc. Atheistic academics do the same thing by referring to such religious practices as superstitious, imaginary, hallucinatory, etc., they also do this to their scholarly opponents and critics by labelling them as pseudo-scientists, quacks and conspiracy theorists. This is how unconscious cowardice defends its delusions, through dismissal, denial, and slander. People of this type are always compelled by programming and driven by unconscious forces; fear, conformity, tradition, convention, public opinion, political correctness, the need for acceptance, the desire to appear “good” to others, etc. What these types of people fail to realize is that until they raise their consciousness and begin to attain self-knowledge, their thoughts, opinions and perspectives are irrelevant and worthless in the presence of truth. The indoctrinated are often arrogant and narcissistic, when they can no longer rationally justify their position they resort to personal attacks, they will mock, scoff, ridicule, slander, sabotage and mischaracterize anyone who challenges their delusions. At this point objective truth becomes irrelevant and civilized discussion impossible, the mob will stand behind whoever affirms their delusions and embodies their ‘values’. This is why almost every position of power and influence in Western society is occupied by incompetent, mediocre and delusional men, democratically elected leaders are the epitome of the unconscious mob. Or as H. L. Mencken stated, “Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.”. Being disconnected from the sacred is a disease and shunning its existence out of fear is cowardice, the reason people are so resistant and hostile to the truth is because they are scared to face reality. Or as Friedrich Nietzsche put it, “Sometimes people don't want to hear the truth because they don't want their illusions destroyed.” Nietzsche was well aware of man’s propensity to shun reality by creating phantasmagorical worlds in which he could shelter himself from his fears and from truths which he was not willing to face. In The Will to Power he wrote, “Metaphysics, morality, religion, science – they are portrayed in this book as nothing more than different forms of deception; with their help we can believe in life. ‘Life is supposed to inspire confidence’; the task thus imposed is tremendous. In order to solve this problem, man must already be an inveterate liar, but he must above all else be an artist. And so he is: metaphysics, religion, morality, science – all are mere artefacts of his determination to create appearances, to lie, to escape from ‘truth’, to deny the ‘truth’. This ability, man’s artistic ability par excellence, thanks to which he violates reality with his lies – he has in common with all that is. After all, he himself is a part of reality, truth and nature; how could he help but share in its genius for lying!...”. Magic mushrooms and the psychedelic experience can assist you on your path to healing and growth, but only if you are willing to face your fears and embrace change. Psychological development forces you to take responsibility for yourself because the more self-knowledge you gain, the more you begin to realize that you are in control of your life, and that it is your own thoughts, attitude, behavior and conduct which are continually shaping it for better or worse. The psychedelic experience can enable you to explore your own psyche in more depth, this is symbolized by the hero’s journey which leads to the fight with the dragon and the treasure hard to attain. This treasure is the inner wealth which can only be attained through self-knowledge, or as the Master Yeshua said, “But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty, and it is you who are that poverty.”. The implication here is that rejecting your self will lead to an inner state of destitution which can never be alleviated by anything external because it is the very absence of your own soul. It should become clear why some men can have everything they desire; money, power, influence, fame, women, yet they can still become depressed and even end up committing suicide. This is not to say that it is bad or wrong to be rich and enjoy material possessions, money can enrich your life and empower you to a very large degree, but if you are infatuated by these things and your life revolves around them, then you are merely a slave to them. The idolization of riches and material wealth is a sure path to bondage and desolation, or as it says in Mark 8:36, “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his soul?” One of the biggest problems with Western society is that people are encouraged and programmed to value and strive for money, wealth, luxury, comfort, fame, etc., as if attaining these things would lead to some kind of fulfillment, as if they were the very goal of life itself. These things and conditions can be useful for those who know how to use them, however, most people who attain them for their own sake are spoiled and corrupted by them, falling into decadence, weakness, degeneration, hedonism, perversion, sadism, arrogance, false pride, conceit, despotism, meaninglessness, nihilism, etc. In modern societies money is the most valuable asset that a man can attain because it is the only way for him to shelter and provide for his family, historically these tasks were far more difficult, they required physical strength, stamina, endurance, courage and survival skills, these were not optional traits that you could cultivate in your free time, they were instinctual necessities demanded by the conditions of nature. Living in safety, comfort and ease is antithetical to the nature of men, it disconnects them from their instincts and masculinity making them soft and weak. Men should learn to embrace adversity and view the challenges and obstacles that they face as opportunities to become stronger, no matter how daunting they may be. They should strive to excel in their physical strength, mental acuity and spiritual health through the pursuit of self-knowledge and personal development. Magic mushrooms can be used as the keys to personal evolution, but only for those who seek to evolve.

The other day I heard this idea that had no name to it.It goes something like this.Nobody lives more than 120 years. Essentially every 120 years we are all replaced by a new batch.Everyone alive today, from the oldest person to the newborn baby will not be alive in 120 years.I had also recently seen the movie, "Oppenheimer" and there was a scene of the bomb being dropped in the dessert- the bright light enveloping everything in its radius. I thought of the idea that we are all going to experience this nuclear event, in fact, we are, but it is happening gradually.It happens everyday when we hear in the news, for example, that famous actors are passing away.We've heard of "immune escape" explaining the idea of a new covid-19 virus that has mutated enough, or enough in the right place, to no longer be recognized by the immune system and, therefore, we are no longer protected from the shot or from having been exposed previously.Is it possible to have 120 year batch escape?Biblically, 120 is a significant number. Moses, one of the most saintly people in the Torah- not perfect, but as good as it was able to get- died at 120.Also, in Genesis, it says, "My spirit shall not abide in man forever, for that he also is flesh; therefore shall his days be 120 years."In Judaism, 120 years is considered to be a lifetime. "ad (until in Hebrew) 120" is a common birthday wish you give, "May you live until 120".And we don't, on average. So there is work to be done in health and life development to get to that without it being a contradiction to G-d's words in Genesis.However, the drive to live longer does not recognize any boundary. When you are 20, you don't necessarily feel like you need an extra year in your old age but when you are finally there, wherever there is for you, you would still want one more day. To not want another day of life is suicidal.Some things break the barrier of 120. The bible is a good example. It has existed, unaltered, for thousands of years. It has achieved 120 escape.Anne Frank did not live past 16 years of age but her diary apparently will achieve 120 escape.Writing in general, is an attempt to achieve 120 escape and beyond. My attempt here to coin the term, "120 escape" is an attempt to achieve 120 escape.Writing carries the counter party risk of relying on the physical components of things like paper, or electricity and server space, and password preservation, in combination with the non-physical medium of word of mouth transmission.Word of mouth transmission is a medium that allows for ideas, both true and untrue, both good and bad, to achieve 120 escape. For example Sigmund Freud, if not for his professional connections and awareness by the masses would not have achieved 120 escape. He might have been more right than wrong, he might have had novel ideas and useful ones. But if he were completely on the outskirts of the academic/ professional community, if he was not recognized, as a homeless person is not recognized, his ideas would not have been recognized. There are a lot of people with new or "crackpot" ideas. They are everywhere, In cities, in rural areas. Nobody has a monopoly in interesting people that have interesting ideas and theories on things. But Freud's power wasn't only in his ideas in isolation but in the ideas being able to be transferred effectively to those that would consider them and to find that they had merit.Does a communication live if it is in book form, stored away on a high shelf? It may not live today but it is potential to live in that form. Art achieves 120 escape. Van Gough's painting of himself has achieved it. The Mona Lisa has achieved it. Even if the painting itself falls apart, it will have been preserved in electronic form enough it an accurate copy that, even if it is manipulated, there will have been enough of the original disseminated into the awareness of the masses that the original will have been maintained.If the whole population were extinguished in one moment, like a collective candle of all humanity being snuffed out in one second, there would still be the potential for potential for life of the Mona Lisa so long as the other components of the painting continued to exist, i.e. the painting itself or some electronic representation of it were still powered.However, there would still be 2 ways it could die. All mediums that it existed on were destroyedIt was lied out of existence in the first place (canceled)The drive for significance is a powerful one. It is to say, "I was here." by either writing it on the wall graffiti style or by leaving your mark on the world Mark Zuckerberg style by supplying the world with virtual walls to write on.This writing in this place is an attempt at 120 escape, just as having a baby and having a family full of babies is.Eating well and exercise or taking a medicine that you need is life drive and is also an attempt at 120 escape.Collecting things is an attempt at preservation. 120 escape.Hoarding disorder is, in part, an attempt as 120 escape. There is life drive threaded into it although it is also death drive as it is avoiding facing the papers.Ultimately, as the bible says, we will not escape the limitations of this physical universe as we are, in part, physical.As the universe expands, it seems that, over tremendous amounts of time, eventually everything will be pulled apart until even the smallest of the smallest things in existence will be pulled apart. We may achieve 120 escape in the foreseeable future but even if we could preserve life itself or a message to transcend gaps in life, gaps in time or gaps in groups of living beings that are alive, eventually we will no longer have living things to transmit the message to nor will we have media with which to store it.So therefore, the significance to our lives does not lie in what mark we leave on it, but rather on the choices we make. The choices are recorded in a non-physical, heavenly book that is not subject to the physical limitations of space and time. The choices are not measured based on their impact on the physical world because the physical world (universe - same word in Hebrew = olam) is limited, will not exist one day and therefore doesn't matter, ultimately. People get discouraged because they feel like they don't have enough power to change things in this world. But this world is not the thing that needs to be changed as it is not going to last. It is as temporary as the use of the plastic water bottle. Once you had the one event when you drank the water out of it, it will be tossed into the garbage or "recycled". Point is, the bottle served its purpose and lost its value once its relationship with you in the moment of the drinking from it finished.So too with this world. It is amazing. It is a gift to be enjoyed. And, most importantly, it is a gift for you to have this moment to make a good free will choice.You are your choices. The record of those are the only thing that live forever. How can I prove it to you? I cannot think of a way to prove a non-physical thing in a physical universe. But only something non-physical has the chance to live forever.You can't take it with you, whatever it is, everything that it is, because it is not you.You can't even take you with you.But you give birth to your choices and that is why you (and we) are here.Those babies live forever.How do I know it?I don't matter.You know it. You've always known it.Therefore, if you choose to write a book and put it away under lock and key, if it then gets damaged beyond recognition due to breakdown over time or if the process is hastened due to flooding or what-have-you, did it still matter?If a tree falls in the middle of the forest but nobody was there to hear it, did it fall?If you don't write a book or a word but go out into the forest and speak to G-d, did you speak?Yes you did speak.If you speak to nobody identifiable, the very act of speaking means you spoke to somebody.Speech is a communication to somebody. The message in the bottle may never reach its destination. But speech is always heard by the Listener as are thoughts and prayers.

HomelessThese are the most difficult days for Cities in America, ever. Daily, we see the symptoms of their struggle with crime, the homeless, and the drug-addled on their squalid sidewalks. The internet is full of videos of the "trank" addicted in Philadelphia, the muggings and fights on New York Subways, and the "Shooting galleries" in San Francisco. It's not a pretty picture. Most of us, myself included, are overwhelmed by the human degradation of these suffering people.To think that all of this has happened in just three years! There can be little doubt that the country has been let down by its leadership. Poorly conceived and barely planned strategies were implemented to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. It didn't have to be like this. American political leaders, from the President on down, have the most sophisticated planning models in the world at their fingertips. They are manned by some of the best-trained, most well-educated researchers and technicians. All are on staff at places like the US Treasury Department, the Congressional Budget Office, and even the Federal Reserve, where, if memory serves, there are nearly a thousand Ph.D. Researchers. And, if that weren't enough, these leaders could have, and should have, reached out to any of the many world-class research universities and "think tanks."All of these people and organizations would have been more than willing to come to the aid of the Government. Our politicians' radical new policies could have been "played out" in the computer labs nationwide long before they were employed.But, by all accounts, that was never done. Instead, a very close group operating within the Administration "shot from the hip" and mandated policies and procedures that had never seen the light of day before. Chief among these was the "Economic Lockdown." For the first time in history (outside of Communist China, which was acting simultaneously), an entire population, not just those who showed the symptoms of illness, were quarantined. Vast swaths of the population were told to remain at home. Fortunately, unlike the Chinese, we didn't weld people in their homes. Additionally, many businesses were deemed "non-essential" and forced to close their doors. What were the criteria to determine essential versus non-essential? We don't know. It was a random determination by some power-mad local politicians free of any basis in science or logic.The results of all these draconian actions were predictable and could have been anticipated by any of the country's myriad of economists and researchers. However, the economic result was a free fall. What could you expect from such a massive lockdown? In that dreadful second quarter of 2020, the economy essentially stopped, falling at an annual rate of 32%—the most significant decline in our history. And make no mistake, these lockdown policies and quarantines were the origins of the troubles we see today in our cities.The small businesses and tiny services that held our great cities together were compelled to shut their doors. That little coffee shop on the corner? Non-essential, close it down, said the authorities. And so a mom-and-pop business that for years had served coffee and snacks to those who worked in the massive office building ceased.For the locals, it was an inconvenience, a small step that made going to work more of a chore. But for the city, it is an open doorway, an abandoned space, that the indigent and the homeless would now fill. A spot where junkies could get high, and prostitutes could ply their trade. It was the first small step toward the city's deterioration.And things were pretty much the same in that shiny new glass and steel skyscraper behind the coffee shop. Up there, workers were required to stay home to work "virtually." Multistory buildings were virtually abandoned. Many workers adapted quickly. They found that "working" in their "jammies," without the need to commute or dress up, was preferable to the old system. Today, companies have struggled to bring employees back to the office. Such well-known brands as Apple Computer, Amazon, Blackrock, and JP Morgan now require workers to show up in person at least part of the week. It's difficult, if not impossible, for even these mega companies to require 40 hours in the office.Many consider this a simple matter of personal preference: "I should be allowed to work wherever I want," goes their thinking. They miss the reality that much of what happens in a well-functioning society is due to social norms and conventions. At its peak, America was built on a series of these conventions. Over multiple years, thousands of businesses discovered that their workers can be more productive working together in an office.It's not a whim from the office manager. It's a tried and true strategy that has allowed the country to build the world's most robust, most efficient economy. The American free-enterprise system measures each step in every company's production or service process. It's what we call profitability. Most businesses have found that office workers produce better results when they work together in an office. It results in higher corporate performance, i.e., profits. While there are exceptions to this rule, workers coming together in community work best in most companies. If it didn't, companies wouldn't bear the tremendous costs of providing a suitable office space for those employees.WHAT LIES AHEADThat's a brief rendition of the past three years. We need to understand that much of the pain and suffering of today's cities are directly due to extremely detrimental public policy. While we may argue the plus and minuses of the lockdown as a medical strategy, there can be no argument that, as an economic policy, it was a total disaster. Those policies of quarantine and lockdown have set many of our cities on a track toward complete deterioration.Unfortunately, what we see today may be only the beginning of a story that is now playing out, the ramifications of which need to be addressed.Part Two will follow.Follow me here on ThinkSpot for more stories from the ValueSide.

Experts Deference To ExpertsDear Friends,It seems to me, there’s a devilish nature to the excuse du’jour of the progressives, that they can’t answer a basic question because they aren’t experts. Like, they can’t discern a boy from a girl, because they aren’t doctors. That answer sidesteps the question, distracts and gives the false impression, experts are always right. Historic evidence of their being wrong most of the time notwithstanding. When asked their intentions, good people tell them, while evil people change their story, fog the air and attack. Claiming ignorance because one isn’t an expert does all three. It changes the story because they claimed to be experts before claiming not to be, fogs the air by changing the subject from the question, to whether it takes an expert to answer it, and attacks by putting the question on the defensive.One way to not answer an inconvenient question is to side step it. Have you noticed how often politicians don’t want to answer straight forward questions, especially progressives? Instead they use every conceivable means to distract, by changing the subject, attacking the question and answering a query they weren’t asked, doesn’t speak well of their intentions. If someone has been caught lying, over and over, plus they can’t give you a straight answer to any question, they’re probably hoodwinking you. Well, that’s not actually true, they’re definitely hoodwinking you. If someone claims they’re so smart they should be a supreme court justice, for example, but can’t discern that which a toddler can, you have to question their discernment, judgement or their intentions.With today’s inversion of morality, where truth is villainy but hypocrisy is heroic, responsibility for one’s actions lays in the view of others. Today’s elite’s claim they’re such whizzbangs, they can change the weather, but cleaning up corruption, fixing government spending or showing up to work sober, are outside their capabilities. The captured media is agog with how our experts have done such a wonderful job. Giving the experts credit where credit isn’t due. Politicians claim to be so smart, they can regulate every action of the individual, by the bureaucracy. For our own good. If things go wrong they can blame the bureaucrats. Even as the bureaucrats blame the politicians but consider themselves the real power behind the throne. No one takes responsibility but everyone in government vies for credit.No notion could be more pernicious or counter productive than the false belief in the experts. History doesn’t pull punches when it comes to the credibility of experts. From bleeding to draw out our bad humors, to mercury to cure syphilis, experts have been consistently wrong. Today’s experts brought us the Covid virus, made in a lab by experts for our enjoyment, mandated the vaccine that neither stopped the spread nor was safe, and now they’re engaged in undermining elections, to save democracy. Experts have arrogance in common. They’re arrogant, and why shouldn’t they be? They are the smartest people in the room. Their the best educated with university degrees. Plus, they have a more nuanced morality, than the common herd. So why shouldn’t they have unlimited power? Or so the logic goes.All three fallacies, sidestepping a question, avoiding responsibility for one’s actions and deferring to experts, lead to evil. Even if done by saints toward a Utopian goal these tools lead to bad outcomes. Because no one is omnipotent, except God, but usurping the role of God is the point, isn’t it? It’s one of the reasons the experts do these things. Villains don’t tell their victims, they’re going to be victims, beforehand, that makes victimizing us harder. So, villains sidestep questions, attack the questioner and distract. Since we know this in our hearts, and now know it in our heads, when you see an elite distract, differ to experts or attack the question, you know they have no good intentions. They’re villains who’re planning to victimize you, so take heed, and act accordingly.Sincerely,John Pepin

The world is growing more and more “humanitarian” every day. In fact, being a “human” has taken precedence over being a man or a woman or a citizen or an Asian. It is on a cosmopolitan plane that the modern man in search of his soul seeks his identity. Anything on a less macro level is seen as a “label”. A label to be put on as a costume at will, or ripped off like you would a bandaid, as an act of liberation, even if it takes some of your skin along with it. The usage of the word ‘human’ has risen consistently since the 1900s. I pinpoint the start of this to the Industrial Revolution. After reaping its gains in productivity, for the first time in the history of mankind, we saw the possibility that resources that had been scarce as long as man knew, could perhaps be in surplus one day. At least some of them. I wouldn’t say all of man’s desires can be satiated by increasing production, but man certainly thought so. At least then. In a sense, ‘the machine’ freed the human. The ‘us versus them’ mindset that had been in place since centuries, began to be questioned. For the first time, we could afford to think of ‘us AND them’. The social effects of the Revolution were countless and far-reaching. I am not going to go into them any further. I have no issues with the humanitarian movement, in principle. I credit an overwhelming number of the victories of modern civilization to this change in thought. But what happens when such an idea is stretched beyond practical principles or public policy, and gains a cult following? Everyone is eager to prove how much they care about humanity, how committed they are to humanitarian causes, and how sympathetic they are to the dispossessed. Worse still, they are eager to prove that others are not as compassionate as they are, and this makes them feel victorious. They point fingers at those they deem ‘less moral’, censor their books or cancel them altogether, making their views unacceptable for expression. This momentary moral superiority is the hero complex bursting forth in a generation that is not permitted to win at anything else.Not being encouraged to partake in the traditional roles that people played and excelled in, leads to a lack of individual striving on any front of life. Earlier man could ‘win’ at the tasks these roles called on him to perform. He could be the strongest warrior of his tribe. Or the most industrious farmer. Or an excellent father. A wise teacher. A committed citizen. A dependable husband. A devoted son. A faithful brother. And so much more. He drew meaning from doing right by his people. He derived his ‘humanity’ from his social relationships. Undoubtedly the Industrial Revolution helped us make great strides in preserving humanity. Ironically, in the process, we ended up undermining the value of human industry. With humanity made an inherent virtue rather than the collective fruit reaped by the industry of civilisation, with humanity as the means rather than the end, with the welfare state that acts as father to his children, what is man left to do now? He walks out on his wife and kids (that is if he marries at all). He abandons his parents in his old age. He does not know his neighbour. Human relationships are disincentivised. The rent-seeking behaviour of people looking to align themselves with bigger, popular causes to justify avoiding their personal failings and abdicating individual responsibilities is an act of rebellion by man’s unconscious after his refusal to the call to adventure. Putting the human above the individual, and above the family, even above the community, is not always for the greater good it purports to achieve. The result? A total collapse of meaning.

Everybody loves conventions. But do they? The Consumer Electronics Show. Comic-Con. DreamHack. Oatakon. ValleyCon. The Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show. The Atlanta Scout Show. The Wanenmacher Gun Show. The North American International Auto Show. There’s some kind of convention for everyone, right? So why do I get dirty looks when I wear my favorite convention shirt? They get to have their conventions. Why can’t I have mine? Bringing up a Convention of States always draws very emotional responses. “Oh no! We can’t have a Constitutional Convention. They might do anything…” Well there you go. We certainly can’t have that. And yet these same people will righteously complain that it is way to difficult to amend the Constitution. How they can’t see the contradiction is utterly amazing. Let’s straighten out a few misconceptions. First, it’s not a Constitutional Convention. That term is used to scare people. Constitutional Conventions are only used when you want to replace the form of government you already have. Generally speaking, those who want to change our country into something else are perfectly happy manipulating the government we already have. A Constitutional Convention does not suit their purpose. Second, the purpose of a Convention of States is very specific. It’s used to *propose* Constitutional Amendments. It doesn’t matter whether Congress proposes an amendment or a Convention of States proposes an amendment, it still has to go through the approval process which works the exact same way. The proposed amendment is sent to the states for their approval. At least 75% of the states must vote in favor of the amendment, for it to became part of the Constitution. Third, and most important, only politicians are ever involved in the amendment process. It does not matter whether were talking about Congress or a Convention of States, they are all politicians. Anyone who says it’s “safer” to have the politicians in Washington make these decisions hasn’t thought it through. All politicians are dangerous. Trusting the ones in D.C. to make all your decisions for you is the path to disaster. The politicians who represent you at a Convention of States will be appointed by your state government. In case you haven’t noticed, it is much easier to vote out a problematic state politician than a national one. Your state is going to do everything it can to keep you happy by sending politicians to the Convention of States who will represent you well. Personally, I think the Constitution doesn’t need any major changes although some clarifications might be nice. Let’s clarify the General Welfare clause, the Commerce clause, the Necessary and Proper clause, and the other clauses that have been used to expand federal power beyond the limits enumerated in the Constitution. Regardless, a Convention of States can’t fix the biggest problem with our Constitution because that problem is not within the document itself. Despite its short length, most people have never read it. Many of those that have read it don’t understand its purpose and meaning. This lack of understanding leaves the public open to the machinations of politicians who use such ignorance to their advantage. In the end, the key to having a functional constitutional republic is having as many citizens as possible who understand and actively support their Constitution.

In the first Post on As Nature Made Him, we noted that ‘No matter how badly the whole thing ends, none of the zealots admits any error.’ The dates here, concerning the Reimer case, extend from the 1960’s to the turn of the century. But it gets very interesting if we compare those to some dates in Brunskell-Evans’ Inventing Transgender Children. By 1998, piles of data that contradicted Money’s claims were coming to light. But by 2005, groups like ‘GIRES’ and ‘Mermaids’ were already major influences on the U.K.’s National Health Service. That is, the zealots didn’t even break stride.

Genesis, the Biblical story of creation, seems to be founded on the twelve signs of the zodiac. Each day of creation is made of two opposing signs. Six polarities. Six days of creation. The order of appearance, follow the three crosses of the zodiac, the Cardinal Cross, the Fixed Cross, and the Mutable Cross. The zodiac is made of four trines and three crosses. Each trine connects the three crosses, and each cross is made of a point from each four trines. Each of the four trines of the zodiac is an element. Fire, Earth, Air, Water. Each leg of a trine is a modality: Cardinal, Fixed and Mutable.This makes twelve unique points. The 12 signs of the zodiac are these 12 unique points as archetypal symbols. They are universal laws of Geometry. The Cardinal legs of the four trines makes the Cardinal Cross (left), the Fixed legs of the four trines makes the Fixed Cross (middle), and the Mutable legs of the four trines makes the Mutable Cross (right).Genesis day one and two is the Cardinal Cross. Day three and four is the Fixed Cross. Day five and six is the Mutable Cross.Genesis day one: Aries opposed by Libra:In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day ‘In the beginning’ -Aries, the Cardinal Fire, and the first sign of the zodiac, rules beginnings. ‘God created the heaven and the earth. ’ The Fire element rules creativity (the Earth element rules creation). The Cardinal Fire is the spirit of God; the Holy Ghost that animates all living beings. Aries, the Cardinal Fire is the ‘I am’. Aries rules action. The ability to act. The Cardinal fire is action, autonomy, instinctual will, and instinctual desire. Aries rules mornings, east, and the crack of dawn where the light first appears, before the Sun ‘Let there be light!’ (Light is Cardinal Fire). At the crack of dawn (Aries) the darkness is still upon the face of the deep and the world seems void and without form. Likewise, at the beginning of anything, what is yet to come has not yet taken form. Aries is the crude oil of the spirit and not yet in-formed (without form). Like a newborn.‘And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters’. Aries emerges from preceding Pisces, the Mutable Water. Aries, the first sign is the Alpha, and Pisces the last sign is the Omega. They meet at 360 and 0 degrees. The beginning emerges from the end. Horns still wet. ‘And God saw the light’: Light is of the fire element. Light enables us to see (observe, become aware). There can be no observer without the observed (and no observed without the observer). Consciousness comes about by awareness of what is. Consciousness is of the air element. Fire is always opposed by Air. Libra, the Cardinal Air, opposite Aries, rules ‘the other’. The observed to the observer. The desired to the desire. The evening to the morning. Aries is the Cardinal Fire and rules sunrise, east, rise, and morning. Libra opposite is the Cardinal Air and rules sunset, fall, west, and evening. Libra, the scales, is the universal law of balance. Aries rules action, and Libra opposite reaction. As Issac Newton said; Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. (God saw the light) ‘that it was good’. Libra the scales, weighs, and rules judgment (reaction). God judges the light as good. Libra also rules grace and beauty (the desired, it is good). This judgment is repeated through the other days, as all the archetypes have a reaction, a polarity, a judge. (Cardinal law of Libra). ‘and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night.’ Morning (Aries) and evening (Libra) divide the light from the darkness, and mark the beginning of day and night.‘And the evening and the morning were the first day.’ By the evening on the first day, we can draw a line back to the morning (west to east) and we have the horizon that divides the heaven and the earth. With Aries and Libra, God has created the heaven and earth and divided the light and the darkness,.Note! The compass has west to the left and east to the right (the directions for one self when facing north), but the zodiac is pictured as another person facing you, where their left will be to your right and visa versa. Thus on the zodiac, Aries to the left, rules east and right, and Libra to the right rules west and left.Libra (evening) being the first polarity, rules polarities and the universal law, that every action (Aries) has an equal (Libra) and opposite (Libra) reaction (Libra). The repetition of ‘And the evening and the morning were’ at the end of each day of creation, reminds us that every archetype (any one being=I am=the rule of Aries) is subjugated to the law of Libra, and is part of a polarity (no I am without what I am not, no observer without the observed). That each of the six days is a polarity of two opposing signs.Now we have the law of One (I am) and the law of Two (duality). Together they create the law of three: If there is rise (Aries) and fall (Libra) there must also be the peak. The point where rise changes to fall. The noon to the morning and evening. The peak is the law of three. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction and that has an effect. The peak. The law of three. Day two: Cancer opposed by CapricornAnd God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day. Capricorn, the Cardinal Earth, at the top of the zodiac, rules matter (earth element), and structure (firmament). Capricorn is the fish tailed mountain goat, and rules mountains, trines, the hierarchy, the top (the peak), up, the above, heaven (And God called the firmament Heaven), walls (firmaments that divide) manifestation, (the effect), karma, and rain, (the waters above). And because the peak, like anything else, is subjugated to the law of opposition (law of Libra), if there is peak, there must also be the opposite of the peak. The affected to the effect. The down to the up. The valley to the mountain. The midnight to the noon. This is how the vertical line comes about. The vertical line is day two.Cancer the Cardinal Water, opposite Capricorn, at the bottom of the zodiac rules below and water (the waters below). The evening and the morning on the second day means the polarity (evening and morning=polarity) of Capricorn and Cancer. The Cardinal Cross is the fundament for everything else. The Cardinal Cross rules that every action (Aries) has an equal (Libra) and opposite (Libra) reaction (Libra) which affects (Cancer) and has an effect (Capricorn) The Cardinal Cross is the Spirit (Fire, Aries) made Matter (Earth, Capricorn). The Spirit (Fire) has manifested in physicality (Earth, firmament). The Cardinal laws are the laws of manifestation, and everything in existence (everything manifested) is subjugated to the laws of the Cardinal Cross.Now that the law of three (effect) has been created, creating the law of four by the law of two applied to the law of three, we have the trine and the cross. The next cross, the Fixed Cross, begins at the Fixed leg of the Earth trine, just below Aries and the beginning, at the second archetype Taurus, the Fixed Earth, opposed by Scorpio, the Fixed Water. Day three: Taurus opposed by Scorpio:And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the third day. Capricorn, the Cardinal Earth (top of the trine), rules physicality and manifestation; Taurus, the Fixed Earth, rules individual physical objects, the individual body (individual bodies of matter), abundance, fertility and fertile soil. Scorpio the Fixed Water, opposite Taurus, rules individual waters. Lakes. Immovable (Fixed) bodies of water. The gathering together of individual bodies of waters and land. Taurus and Scorpio. Taurus is the second sign of the zodiac, and comes after Aries where things begin and are still yet to become (void and without form). At the Taurus stage things start to take shape ‘let the dry land appear’, like the landscape appears in the morning when the Sun is above the horizon, at the stage just after Sunrise. In case you wonder why Taurus below the horizon on the zodiac, would rule the time a day after sunrise, it is because the earth is spinning, and so the point of what appears now here (east), moves counterclockwise on the zodiac. At dawn (ruled by Aries), the day is below us. As we turn counterclockwise, the sky seems to turn clockwise. As the morning progresses, imagine the horizon now being Taurus/Scorpio, and a little more light has appeared. The point of now here (east) now has Taurus appearing. The ‘I am’ (Cardinal law of Aries, and east) is now Taurus, and ‘the other’, the polarity (Cardinal law of Libra and west), is Scorpio.Taurus, The Fixed Earth, rules abundance, fertility and fertile land, ‘let the Earth bring forth grass’, and Taurus rules the individual body (physical objects), individual bodies of grass and herbs and trees. Scorpio opposite rules reproductive organs, conception, death, fertilisers, and immortality. The polarity of Taurus/Scorpio is the ability to reproduce (Yielding fruit after his kind whose seed is in itself). Day four: Leo opposed by Aquarius: And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Leo, the Fixed Fire, is ruled by the Sun, (the greater light in the firmament of heaven that rules the day). The Moon, the lessor light (though ruler of Cancer) get its light from the Sun (thus by making the light of the Sun, the light of the Moon is made simultaneously). Aquarius, the Fixed Air, opposite Leo, rules stars (stars are ‘other suns’, opposite=other, Leo=Sun, for Leo Aquarius opposite is ‘the other’= other suns). Aquarius, the Fixed Air rules science, astronomy and astrology, that is used to be able to use the lights in the firmament of the heavens to understand the signs and seasons, and days and years. ‘and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years’ . We know from the Sunlight what a day and a year is (a day is one rotation of the Earth, and a year is one journey around the Sun). With a Moon circle (from Full Moon to Full Moon) of 29,5 days, there is most often 12 Full Moons in a year (sometimes 13) dividing the year into 12 months (months=Moons). The stars are used as road signs to see where we are on the journey around the Sun. The Cardinal Cross marks the four seasons. Spring Equinox in late March, when the Sun seen from Earth enters the constellation of Aries, and the day and night is of equal length with the light increasing, Summer Solstice and the longest day of the year (peak of light) in late June, when the Sun enters the constellation of Cancer. Fall Equinox when the day and night is of equal length with the light decreasing, when the Sun enters the constellation of Libra in late September, and Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year (peak of darkness) when the Sun enters the constellation of Capricorn in late December. Four seasons, each with three phases. Cardinal, Fixed, and Mutable The Fixed months are the months after the Cardinal months when the season has fully manifested or crystallised, and the Mutable months are the months after the Fixed (and before the Cardinal), where what was crystallised in the Fixed months start to break down/change/prepare for/making way for; the next Cardinal kickstarter.Day five and six:The Mutable Cross is Genesis day five and six. Now the world becomes changeable, movable, multiple, mutable. All the individual bodies whose seed is in itself begin to multiply and moveth upon the earth.I think the order of polarity; whether day five is the polarity of Gemini/Sagittarius and day six the polarity of Virgo/Pisces, or visa versa can be discussed. The symbolism switches between both lines on both days.Both Gemini and Virgo are ruled by Mercury, and before the discovery of Neptune (modern ruler of Pisces) both Sagittarius and Pisces were ruled by Jupiter, and so the meaning of Gemini-Virgo and Sagittarius-Pisces sometimes overlap.So let’s look at the two days simultaneously. Day five;And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day. Day six. And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. In day five birds and whales are created. Gemini, the Mutable Air, rules birds (birds are what moves=Mutable in the air), Pisces, the Mutable Water, rules the ocean that brings forth everything that hath life, and whales (ocean animals are what moves=Mutable in the water). This breaks the system of polarities. Unless one would make the argument that ocean animals is Pisces (Mutable Water), and opposite animals on land Virgo, (earth) would in that case also cover birds. (Virgo/Pisces polarity). Or reversed one could make the argument that with Gemini ruling birds and thus small wild animals, the whales are covered by Sagittarius ruling large wild animals (like horses) and whales are large wild animals, that we hunt (the bow and arrow).In day six cattle and the human is made. Again the argument for both polarities can be made. One may say that the human is Virgo, the Mutable Earth, where thought (Mercury) is embodied (Earth), Virgo also rules pets (small domestic animals) and Pisces opposite therefor in that case would rule large domestic animals (cattle). One may also say that with Virgo ruling small domestic animals, that dominion over animals (domestic=dominion) covers this. Pisces, the last sign rules completion (God saw everything he had made). And it makes sense to start in Aries the first sign and end in Pisces, the last sign.The order so far is Fire to Earth on the Cardinal Cross (enter Aries, exit Capricorn, day one and two), Earth to Air on the Fixed Cross (enter Taurus exit Aquarius), which would make it logical that as the Mutable Cross enters in Air (Gemini) and exits in Water (Pisces). Fire to Earth, Earth to Air, Air to Water. But reversed one may say that what distinguishes humans from animals is language, and language is ruled by Gemini. Gemini also rules two of the same (male and female created he them), and thus also rules copies (let’s make man in our image). Gemini rules siblings (twins), and Adam and Eve are siblings. The human being given dominion ‘over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth’ is illustrated by Sagittarius, the Mutable Fire where the human torso controls the horse body.This order also makes perfect sense because the Earth Trine is the creation (matter=materialisation), and from the Cardinal Cross, the Fixed Cross and Mutable Cross spring from the Fixed and Mutable legs of the Earth Trine. By ending in Sagittarius, the Mutable Fire, the spirit (Cardinal Fire) has become informed (Mutable Fire). Perhaps it is both at the same time? If you see the answer, please let me know.Either way, by the sixth day of creation, the geometrical picture has been completed, all points are connected, everything is connected to everything else (everyone has food), and all is symmetrical. And behold, it is very good.Bless God!

The Mechanism Of ImpeachmentDear Friends,It seems to me, our elites are using the impeachment, like Pericles used the ostracism… to do the opposite of their reason for existing. Pericles, the ancient Athenian ruler, exploited his arbitrary power to get any would be rival, ostracized. Like the progressive faction uses the impeachment to go after political dissidents, to establish a one party state. Both examples use a power given to limit the power of the elite to oligarchy, and especially a single elite from becoming a tyrant… to abetting those very crimes. The establishment went after Trump twice, once to hide the Biden crime family’s crimes in Ukraine, the second to further the crime of election rigging in the 2020 election. They also went after Ken Paxton for standing up to their unconstitutional edicts, rulings and regulations.Ken Paxton stood up to the administrative state during the Covid fiasco. With the passage of time and cooler heads, as it turns out, the administrative state was wrong about everything. From the mask mandates, to the vaccine mandates, everything they did was wrong and led to worse outcomes for humanity. Not to mention creating Covid in a lab in the first place. So when a State Attorney General, Pen Paxton, stood up to them, they had to do something. They were outside of Constitutional limits by a long shot, and they knew it. So, like any rabid dog, they attacked. They called their bootlicks in the Texas House and ordered them to impeach Paxton in the dark of night… without evidence. So they did. Just like Pericles, they used a mechanism to control corruption, to forward corruption.Soros Prosecutors, Like Big Fanny, and Alvin Bragg, who use their positions of authority to abuse the electoral process, are why the founding fathers put impeachment into the Constitution. As a mechanism to remove obviously corrupt players, like them, from positions where they can damage our republic by their corruption. That they are immune to impeachment, but those who stand up to the deep state, are subject to impeachment in the dark of night, is a sure sign impeachment is being used to the opposite of its intent. Exactly as Pericles used the Ostracism to silence his political adversaries, today’s progressives are using impeachment, as well as licensure and reputational destruction, to silence theirs. If that doesn’t work, they simply censor, and the US Supreme Court stands behind their censorship.Now that one of theirs, Biden, is under investigation to impeach, in full view of the public, not in the dark of night, the progressive faction is freaked out. They claim McCarthy is weak because of it. I agree, weak because he couldn’t hold the conservatives from impeaching the obvious criminal. Biden is on the face of it, guilty of influence peddling, all other crimes are subservient to that. Yet he isn’t charged with influence peddling? I wonder why? The clues are obvious, we have evidence of Hunter putting Dad on the phone to Burisma, the discussion of payment for getting rid of the prosecutor, Biden got rid of the prosecutor, and then more phone calls discussing the consequences of not paying up. That is prima facia evidence of influence peddling, bribery and a host of cascading crimes to cover them up.Impeachment was instituted to stop corruption, as Solon implemented the ostracism, to stop arbitrary rule. Yet both have been turned to their opposite. Pericles, while ostensibly avoiding politics, exploited the ostracism to vanquish his political foes. Our modern versions of Pericles have used their authority to silence, intimidate and destroy those who wouldn’t parrot their lies. Make no mistake, that’s exactly why Trump is under indictment in several states and the corrupt federal district of DC. That’s why Paxton was impeached in the dark of night and is now the subject of an FBI witch hunt. Wouldn’t it be more practical to use the impeachment against corruption instead of to promote corruption? Impeaching corruptocrats like Biden, Fanny and Bragg is why the Founders put it in our Constitution.Sincerely,John Pepin

The Mechanism Of ImpeachmentDear Friends,It seems to me, our elites are using the impeachment, like Pericles used the ostracism… to do the opposite of their reason for existing. Pericles, the ancient Athenian ruler, exploited his arbitrary power to get any would be rival, ostracized. Like the progressive faction uses the impeachment to go after political dissidents, to establish a one party state. Both examples use a power given to limit the power of the elite to oligarchy, and especially a single elite from becoming a tyrant… to abetting those very crimes. The establishment went after Trump twice, once to hide the Biden crime family’s crimes in Ukraine, the second to further the crime of election rigging in the 2020 election. They also went after Ken Paxton for standing up to their unconstitutional edicts, rulings and regulations.Ken Paxton stood up to the administrative state during the Covid fiasco. With the passage of time and cooler heads, as it turns out, the administrative state was wrong about everything. From the mask mandates, to the vaccine mandates, everything they did was wrong and led to worse outcomes for humanity. Not to mention creating Covid in a lab in the first place. So when a State Attorney General, Pen Paxton, stood up to them, they had to do something. They were outside of Constitutional limits by a long shot, and they knew it. So, like any rabid dog, they attacked. They called their bootlicks in the Texas House and ordered them to impeach Paxton in the dark of night… without evidence. So they did. Just like Pericles, they used a mechanism to control corruption, to forward corruption.Soros Prosecutors, Like Big Fanny, and Alvin Bragg, who use their positions of authority to abuse the electoral process, are why the founding fathers put impeachment into the Constitution. As a mechanism to remove obviously corrupt players, like them, from positions where they can damage our republic by their corruption. That they are immune to impeachment, but those who stand up to the deep state are subject to impeachment in the dark of night, is a sure sign impeachment is being used to the opposite of its intent. Exactly as Pericles used the Ostracism to silence his political adversaries, today’s progressives are using impeachment, as well as licensure and reputational destruction, to silence theirs. If that doesn’t work, they simply censor, and the US Supreme Court stands behind their censorship.Now that one of theirs, Biden, is under investigation to impeach, in full view of the public, not in the dark of night, the progressive faction is freaked out. They claim McCarthy is weak because of it. I agree, weak because he couldn’t hold the conservatives from impeaching the obvious criminal. Biden is on the face of it, guilty of influence peddling, all other crimes are subservient to that. Yet he isn’t charged with influence peddling? I wonder why? The clues are obvious, we have evidence of Hunter putting Dad on the phone to Burisma, the discussion of payment for getting rid of the prosecutor, Biden got rid of the prosecutor, and then more phone calls discussing the consequences of not paying up. That is prima facia evidence of influence peddling, bribery and a host of cascading crimes to cover them up.Impeachment was instituted to stop corruption, as Solon implemented the ostracism, to stop arbitrary rule. Yet both have been turned to their opposite. Pericles, while ostensibly avoiding politics, exploited the ostracism to vanquish his political foes. Our modern versions of Pericles have used their authority to silence, intimidate and destroy those who wouldn’t parrot their lies. Make no mistake, that’s exactly why Trump is under indictment in several states and the corrupt federal district of DC. That’s why Paxton was impeached in the dark of night and is now the subject of an FBI witch hunt. Wouldn’t it be more practical to use the impeachment against corruption instead of to promote corruption? Impeaching corruptocrats like Biden, Fanny and Bragg is why the Founders put it in our Constitution.Sincerely,John Pepin

The view from "Top of the Rock," Rockefeller Center**For much of my career, I spent most of my time meeting with clients and prospects at their offices, representing our investment firm to financial companies, banks, insurance companies, and brokers in various cities. Generally, I worked out of two offices, one in New York. The other is in San Francisco. I want to introduce you to those two cities as I saw them.**First Office in New York's Rockefeller CenterI like to arrive early to the office in Rockefeller Center when the only ones around are the gaggle outside watching the taping of the Today Show and the various cleaning crews. It was well before all the tourists came, but fortunately, the coffee shop was open as always. A cup of Joe, and I was ready for the day.Rock Center, as the locals know it, is a magical place. There is a unique quality to the light caused by that weathered Indiana Limestone, which has mellowed over the years to a gray/beige patina that gives the center a wonderful glow. It's been nearly a century since John D. Jr., son of the famous oil magnet, first decided to build what has become the heart of Gotham. The time was the height of the Roaring 20s, although the project would not be completed until the midst of the Great Depression.It was just 15 years after America's Central Bank, the Federal Reserve, was founded. And therein lies much of the story. You see, Rockefeller Center represents the old America, a time when the country was an agricultural and industrial powerhouse but not yet a financial one. It was just after the 19th Century period of the " Robber Barons" period, but at least one of those Barons remained, John D Rockefeller Jr.These families had acquired enough wealth to finance even the most ambitious real estate projects, like Rockefeller Center. However, in the case of John D. Rockefeller Jr., he utilized all the financing strategies available to him, leasing, instead of purchasing outright, the property from Columbia University. He took short-term bank loans to manage cash flow. But by and large, Rockefeller relied on his vast family fortune to build this magnificent edifice.Business was personal in those days, who you knew was vital in getting a "deal." The concept of a Rockefeller Center began when a close friend, Ivy Leadbetter Lee, was invited to a presentation in mid-1928 on selling some property in mid-town. The Metropolitan Opera was looking for a new theater. They had outgrown their old Opera House and were looking to move. Lee, whose background was in Public Relations, immediately saw an opportunity for Rockefeller to create a tremendous multi-use facility that could become a focal point of the City. It took some convincing, but eventually, Lee persuaded Rockefeller to begin the project and even got Rockefeller to lend his name. Plans were finalized two years later, and construction on the "Rockefeller Center" began.So it was that the entire project rested on the shoulders of just one man, John D. Rockefeller Jr. Today, those first completed buildings are approaching 100 years in age. While the design and appearance of the buildings remain as fresh as when they were built, the methods of construction and certainly that kind of financing have long passed. Today, no one would consider self-financing a major commercial project like the "Rock."The Salesforce Tower, San Francisco (on the left) Next, San Francisco's SoMa District The other office I worked out of was in the SoMa section of San Francisco. SoMa, or South Of Market (Street), has been the "cool," up-and-coming section of a, until recently, revitalized West Coast City. However, when I began working from this office in the late 1980s, San Francisco was still the "stuffy old" neighbor to the north of Los Angeles. LA was vibrant and growing, driven principally by Holly Wood. It was where young professionals migrated, and everyone wanted to be "seen." In contrast, San Francisco was the home of staid, conservative banker types (my clients, LOL!).That all changed when the Tech Companies in Silicon Valley, just to the south, decided that they'd like to have a more urban setting. There was a new way of developing urban properties, and the best example was just a couple of blocks from my old office. It's the Salesforce Tower. The methods used to finance and construct this gleaming steel and glass skyscraper are as far removed from Rockefeller Center as you can get. As far as its high tech, "Curtains of Glass" are from traditional Indiana Limestone.Today, no visionary put the family's money on the line to build this towering edifice. There is no John D. Salesforce. We wondered who the final owner would be for most of its construction.The project began as an effort by the City of San Francisco to clean up what had become a derelict area South of Market Street. It's a vital point: the City of San Francisco sold the land. It would ease the development process, as building inspectors and permit clerks become more amenable when the "boss" is involved. You see, the City controls the permit process. Without the active consent of the City and various regulators and inspectors, this project would have never gotten off the ground.Although construction had not yet begun, the project was still known as the (future) Transbay Tower. The date was 2007, and a group from Texas, the Hines Interests Limited Partnership, won the rights to begin building. As it turned out, Hines owned the property for five years. During that time, they began obtaining architectural plans and approvals. It took Hines two Years (2012 to 2013) to complete the sale to Boston Properties. Boston Properties is a Real Estate Investment Trust, and the stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange.Boston Properties then starts construction and lands a lead tenant, Salesforce. Salesforce, in turn, agrees to lease half the building and obtain "naming" privileges. And just like that, Transbay Tower became Salesforce Tower, the tallest building in San Francisco and the second largest building west of the Mississippi River.It's All A SpeculationThe entire Salesforce Tower project was a "spec." The City speculated that someone would come along to develop their project. Hines LP supposed that they could get the project approved and begin construction. Boston Properties imagined that they could build the building and get it rented. Even Salesforce speculated they could pay their rent for the 15-year lease term.Making all this spicier is that most of these transactions were likely leveraged. The two principals, Hines and Boston Properties, probably used bank lines of credit to make the down payment, with a mortgage to secure the final financing. In this way, the bank, or financing company, has become a partner in the development. As long as the lead tenant, Salesforce remains in place and meets its lease payments, everything is hunky dory. However, should Salesforce or a substantial number of other tenants falter, then the troubles begin. And those troubles affect not just the owner, Boston Properties, but all the banks and financial companies that supplied financing.And that happened during the Great Financial Crisis of 2008-9. During that time, commercial real estate loans' delinquency rate rose nine-fold in less than two years. (see chart)Currently, everything is working as it should down at the Salesforce Tower. However, old friends tell me that the rest of San Francisco could be faring better. Vacancies, especially for retail businesses, are skyrocketing. A city that used to have a vacancy rate of mid-single digits is now looking at up to 40% of empty store space. Shops and stores that are out of business don't pay rent. It's a world in which each "partner" along the way must rely on all the rest. And, if you follow the logic, that's how a local tragedy, like the closing of the neighborhood store, becomes a national financial crisis when up the ladder first the owner, then the lender (banks) aren't paid. It's a world that John D. Rockefeller Jr. wouldn't recognize.Follow me here on ThinkSpot for more stories from the ValueSide.

Self-DefenseWhere should I start?The SourceSep 18, 2023“Amateur’s talk hardware (tools and techniques). Professional’s talk software (mindset).” – Lt. Col. Dave GrossmanWhen it comes to learning self-defense, almost universally, people start by learning a technique (i.e. move, strike, block. etc.) or how to use a tool (i.e. gun, knife, pepper spray, etc.). However, when you really think, would it not be better to begin with learning how to recognize and avoid a conflict before you might need that tool or technique?Everyone wants to do fun stuff.We all want to do the fun stuff first, it’s human nature. No one wants to have an in-depth look at real world violence, let alone confront it in person. It’s easier (and frankly more fun) to attend a self-defense class or handgun class, practice a few times with the group, and leave feeling good because you “did something.”Guns are a good example. A gun is a great equalizer, especially for women, however, it is a tool for a very small subset to problems. On average, you are four to five-times more likely to be involved in a conflict where a gun is not morally and ethically acceptable nor would be legal if you were to use it to defend yourself.If you are only focusing on the “tool” or “technique” you are missing the piece that could help negate the possibility of having to use either.Are you missing the key component?Tony Blauer, inventor of the SPEAR System, calls it the 3-D’s; Detect, Diffuse, Defend. Detection is your awareness and will solve most problems long before they become one. The ability to recognize common pre-attack indicators, as well as having the confidence to trust yourself enough to act, are two of the most essential tools in your self-defense toolkit.Most people have no idea how criminals think or behave and rightfully so. They are not like you, in fact, most likely, they are the opposite of you entirely. You must have a basic understanding of how they operate and think to survive in today’s world.Sadly, the sole focus of most trainers in this industry is on teaching tools and techniques that may or may not be effective during the fight. Your focus should begin with what happens before the fight, so that you can avoid it all together.You must have a solid understanding of what to look for, pre-attack indicators, how predators choose their prey, how they think and operate, and how to change your behavior to be de-selected if you become their target.Final ThoughtsWe are often asked where someone should start when it comes to learning self-defense. If we had our way, everyone would begin with awareness, avoidance, and de-escalation training. A little bit of awareness will go a long way in preventing a large number of problems.Our goal is for you to be able to recognize a potential conflict far enough away that you have time to avoid it all together, change your behavior to be de-selected as a victim, or, worst-case, prepare for the impending fight.Remember, there are no rules. You cannot apply your sense of fair play or morality into a situation where there is none. If you do, you will most likely become a victim. We are often told to think outside of the box. There is no box. The bad guys do not have a box, nor should you.There are a number of considerations when looking for a self-defense class. A major factor in your choice should be if they are focusing on what happens before the attack as much, if not more, than whatever tool or technique they are teaching.If you like this type of contentThe Source is free. If you like this type of content, please consider subscribing and sharing this post.If you have any questions, comments, or an idea for future articles drop a note in the comments below. We’ll do our best to get back to you asap.Check out our courses and upcoming classes at www.womensfirearmacademy.comShareLeave a commentShare The Source - By Women's Firearm Academy™ - We Teach Confidence

One: we’ve neglected to note that perhaps the primary reality of ‘trans’ is that most people have no idea what is really going on, and don’t much care anyway. Two: an increasingly visible group is that of women – academics, journalists, conservatives, concerned mums, and feminists (both heterosexual and lesbian) – who are bravely publicizing the negative impacts that trans is having on women and girls -- ‘erasure’. So, do we not welcome their efforts? Three: some Bud-Light-boycott anti-woke-corporation sentiment is vaguely evident to me. If any reader has a grasp of this, please do post. Four: legal backlashes and de-transitioning are also gaining attention. Five: although wild conjecture is all we can manage today, there seems no doubt that resistance to ‘trans’ will merge with resistance to other disastrous left-wing policies, particularly in the U.S. (and the U.S. presidential-election cycle starts quite soon). Note that the seven-years-delayed backlash to the policies of forcing massive numbers of illegal aliens on European populations is well and truly underway. Six: the Why-is-trans-attractive? project: conservative Switzerland has six times as many LGBTQI folks as conservative Hungary. Say what?! Seven: Christians and Muslims standing shoulder-to-shoulder against trans zealotry is a thing to ponder. Finally: the concern of Big Gubmint is only ever Bigger Gubmint. Covid was a godsend. It behooves us all to keep an eye out for whatever lunacy is incoming. Guvvy Corp efforts to control the impacts of inflation? And is anyone following neuro-diversity?

Hi Thinkspot! I hope everyone is doing well!I am back after a lengthy break. There's a lot going on right now in the world and I will try my best to catch up quickly.After Greece, I was immediately ready to get back to the grind.I have been working on self-discipline and have recently (finally) discovered Akira the Don and his Jocko/Jordan Peterson tracks. LIFE-CHANGING.It's forcing me to upload a picture and I have no storage space left (probably time to fix that). Here is a picture of my grandpa!

It is not the case that a concern with the minutiae of ‘trans’ is the same as being soft on trans. It may be the case that the most ardent opposition to trans is undertaken by those who think that some sliver of individuals are ‘trans’ in some definable way.

‘Detransitioners speak of trauma from experimental drugs and surgeries, of having been manipulated and deceived by adults, and of being abandoned by adults when they detransitioned. I have seen them abused and defamed on social media, accused of being transphobes and liars, and of trying to keep genuine trans people getting the treatments they need. In fact, most are simply urging caution, and have no desire to stop others living as they wish.’ ‘[The detransitioners] bought into an ideology that is incoherent and constantly shifting, and where the slightest deviation is ferociously punished.’ ‘One consequence of opening women’s spaces to males is to recast two common male sex crimes as rights. Exhibitionism – non-consensually displaying one’s genitals – is so common that many women will tell you that the first time they saw a penis was when a stranger flashed at them. Voyeurism – non-consensually viewing someone in a state of undress – is known to be a precursor to contact sex crimes. Entering a changing room constitutes consent to see and be seen by the other occupants while undressed. Women grant that consent on the basis that these occupants will be female; gender self-identification removes that basis while denying that it does so. It therefore turns facilities intended for women into places where males can commit exhibitionism and voyeurism with impunity.’ Research projects like ours have certain patterns. One is that notions that seemed crazy at first – because the political front-of-house crowd are shouting that they are – become underpinned by more and more quality references, and thereby stop seeming crazy. Helen Joyce’s book Trans sets a new standard, as it ably navigates far more complex issues than other (also very useful) books have done. I must be careful about over-enthusiastically recommending books for readers. Brunskell-Evans’ text Inventing Transgender Children is excellent because its divided-into-chapters format allows you to poke about over time. Abigail Shriers’ text Irreversible Damage – three years old now – is a good place to get a first sense that ‘this trans thing’ is way more complex than has been explained to you. But Trans is fabulously good, and we’ll be poking about it in forthcoming Posts.

The UN's Sustainable Development, Worth The Investment?I confess that I'm an "Annual Meeting" fanatic. I enjoy attending these once-a-year meetings of management and shareholders. It's the recap of the past 12 months, the best opportunity I know of to get to know the people who run the organization: to catch a glimpse of their personalities and what they have planned for the future.Just such a meeting occurred on Monday, although it needed more structure and detail provided at the Annual Meetings for public companies we have here in the US.The occasion was the 15th anniversary of the United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals, the halfway point of a program envisioned to be completed in 2030, just over six years from now. That's just the precision investors look for specific goals with a set time to achieve them.Unfortunately, in too many of the Sustainable Development Goals, there are at least two variables, meaning that the Goal may be achieved by either improvement in one factor OR a decline in the other factor. Gender Equality (SDG#5) is like that. In that case, more equality may be achieved either by an improvement in the economic outlook for Women or a decline in the economic outlook for men. The same can be said for SDG#10 Reduced Inequalities.So, let's look at three of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, using data from the US Federal Reserve, to see how three of the most pivotal goals are working out so far.Sustainable Development Goal #1 PovertyThe Goal here is to eliminate "Extreme Poverty." Their measure is the World Bank's "International Poverty Line." The concept is that the poorest among us receive sufficient money to provide for one's necessities: food, clothing, and shelter. In 2022, Extreme Poverty was defined as living on less than $1.90 per day or up to $5.50 per day in higher-income countries.Here, the United Nations finds the same results as we observed in the United States: Poverty is increasing, not decreasing. While the United Nations reports that Poverty has increased by 7% in the last couple of years worldwide, Poverty in the US rose by less than 1%. With just seven years left to eliminate Poverty, this task is getting all the more difficult.Sustainable Development Goal #2 Zero HungerThe Goal here is to eliminate Global Hunger. There are several dimensions to how the UN looks at providing food for the World's population, including sustainable farming practices and particular nutrition requirements. But we can use price to approximate the intersection between supply and demand reasonably. And with the World's population steady, an increase or decrease in price should reflect an increase or decrease in supply. Again, using the Federal Reserve's data, the global food price has increased by roughly 40%. (H1, 2015 to H1, 2023). Food supply has taken a giant reversal in the seven years of SDG. While exogenous factors may be involved (such as the COVID-19 pandemic), the UN is not meeting the challenge of Global Hunger.Sustainable Development Goal #7 EnergyThe United Nations estimates that 800K people live without electricity globally. The UN aims to provide electricity primarily using "clean," i.e. renewable energy sources.Again, price provides that intersect between supply and demand.From 2015 until 2023, the Global energy cost has risen by 44%. Yet another Sustainable Development Goal that is drifting away, becoming less likely rather than more likely.Speaking before the UN on Monday, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres indicated that 30% of the Sustainable Development Targets are below the levels needed to meet their 2030 goals. And many of these goals are lower than when the Project began. These declines reflect a project that is off the rails and increasingly appears that it will fail.Sustainable Development Goal #17 PartnershipSo, what's the answer to this less-than-stellar track record? Why, money, of course.Sustainable Development Goal #17 is Partnership. To the United Nations, it appears that the United States and the other UN member nations must become more of a "partner" in this plan, meaning providing more funding. Currently, the US provides $12.5 billion per year for UN operations, plus a few more billion here and there for any particular need that may come along.But under Goal # 17, we need to be more of a partner, providing 7/10th% of our national economic output to Sustainable Development. Although it may not sound like much, that 7/10th of this year's GDP would reach an astounding $178 Billion.That's a lot of money for a project that isn't progressing.

Javier Milei is predicted to win Argentina’s presidential election on October 22nd, and after checking him out I am very impressed with his presence and his principles. His recipe to reverse the staggering economic decline of his nation is to shrink the state and restore its resourcres and power to the people. For liberty is the core and foundation of not only our happiness but also peace and prosperity. Unfortunately, governments all round the world have become ever more controlling and socialist – intervening in our economic life in an attempt (often corrupt, but sometimes genuine) to improve the conditions in society by forcibly reallocating resources. Yet the ideals of socialism are only possible through the mechanism of capitalism – free markets, private property, the non-aggression principle. Classical liberalism, or ‘libertarianism’, sees the state as the protector of these conditions and as a destructive parasite whenever it grows beyond this healthy limit of purpose. Just as with RFK Jr. in the USA, Mr Milei seeks to bring the bureaucracy back into line, which is what we need in all countries. I wish Argentines the best of luck in rediscovering their freedom, prosperity and the pride it rightfully restores. May we all join such a movement!Episode 74: Javier Milei For El PresidenteJavier Milei is predicted to win Argentina’s presidential election on October 22nd, and after checking him out I am very impressed with his presence and his principles. His recipe to reverse the staggering economic decline of his nation is to shrink the state and restore its resourcres and...youtu.be

Print, Spend And RegulateDear Friends,It seems to me, no amount of Federal Reserve tightening will lower inflation, as long as the federal government increases spending, five dollars for every dollar the Fed wrings out of the private sector. Add to the drastic increase in the money supply, driven by print and spend policies, the supply reducing effects of over regulation, bans and cronyism, and you have the perfect equation to cripple the private economy with inflation, while canceling public debt by the same mechanism. Elegant, though psychopathic, if you think of it. The US is taking the Argentine path to economic oblivion. Wring the economy of wealth through print, spend and regulate, leading to currency destroying inflation, then rinse and repeat. Inflation always and everywhere moves wealth from the bottom to the top.Most people only think about the demand side of the inflation equation. The supply side has the same effect on inflation as demand. In the case of our over regulated economy, any increase in interest rates, especially coupled with burdensome regulation, will result in supply shortages. Supply shortages themselves lead to inflation, as long as those shortages last. Offshoring can mitigate the effect but the utility of screwing workers is coming to an end. So, even as the Fed raises interest rates to ostensibly lower inflation, those increases actually exacerbate the supply shortages, while doing nothing to cut demand. Because, if Keynes is to be believed, government demand is equal to private demand. Increases in regulations, taxes and outright bans on production, must lead to inflation.The reality is, the benefits of profligate spending are immediate, while the negative side effects often take years to develop. Because the stuff purchased can be used immediately. That’s why so many people buy toys they can’t afford. “Buy now pay later…” is the motto of the shark. Since this game works so well on the masses, who actually have a personal responsibility to pay the money back, how much more effective do you suppose it is to a politician, who gets the benefit, while someone else pays it back… later? That’s why politicians will never cut spending, it’s not in their interest, cutting spending is in someone else interests. So, like corruption, blurting out in anger, and drunkenness… profligate spending bestows the benefit immediately, while the cost is paid later.The interest payments on the debt amount to almost a trillion dollars a year. The debt surpassed 33 trillion dollars and is shooting up. The US debt to GDP ratio is over 122%! Nations across the globe are looking to divest themselves of US debt, and create an alternative to the US dollar, as the world’s reserve currency. In that environment, the US elite simply can’t print and spend enough. No need to raise taxes, inflation will drain us tax mules, in stealth mode. Even as the government is spending trillions a year (37% of GDP), the Fed is raising interest rates forcing the consumer to spend less, so the elite can spend more. No amount of crushing us will squeeze enough spending out of the economy, to lower inflation, as long as the government spends five dollars for every dollar squeezed out of us.Print, spend and regulate policies lead to economic destruction. Moreover, they’re almost unavoidable in our system of government. The incentives are to tax, print and spend… the nation into oblivion. This outcome reverberates throughout history. To fight the inflation their policies inevitably create, the elite squeeze the little guy. Then they increase their own spending driving inflation up ever more. The real brilliance is that the elite make it so difficult, even to the point of literal shut downs, that supply shortages become a factor of doing business. Which, in and of themselves, will trigger inflation. What we have then, is an elite doing everything in their power to increase inflation, while using that nation impoverishing inflation, to gain power, permanence, and enrich themselves… how Hegelian of the elite.Sincerely,John Pepin

‘Autogynephilia is the arousal that comes from imagining yourself in the role of the opposite sex.’ ‘If you had asked, “are you a woman inside?” I would have replied, “I don’t think so,” ’ she says. What I always knew is that I wanted to have a woman’s body.’ If you are just passing though, welcome! Readers, we’re going to bracket off autogynephilia. It’s written about in Joyce’s Trans, Murray’s The Madness of Crowds, and Stock’s Material Girls. However, the notion is hotly contested; and as it’s a subset of a subset, it’s not an easy thing to define in brief. Whatever. We will work it out; and one reason we want to work it out is that the trans industry doesn’t want autogynephilia discussed. Next: ‘The notion is hotly contested’ is code for ‘Trans activists are insane.’ Everywhere we look – activists infiltrating government, activists infiltrating think tanks and NGOs, activists meddling with parents’ rights, activists contacting children directly – we find the repetition of brazen untruths (sin of commission) and the suppression of counter-indicative material (sin of omission). That is, our thesis of a ‘third Lysenkoism’ is lookin’ good! Second Last: wow! We’ve been working together for nearly a year. The Posts must total twenty-something-thousand words. We have some framework in place; but we also have a mind-boggling amount or material in the offing: Foucault, Butler, John Money, Gramsci, Marcuse (Eros and Civilization). There’s DSD’s. There’s gender-diverse cultures. There’s a two-volume encyclopedia of fascism in the mail. And we want specific data – like Dr. Miriam Grossman’s – on activists’ untruths.* Final: hitching home from town, I met a guy who works in the mines here in Western Australia. Married with kids. No time for research. And although this guy knows little about ‘LGBTQI,’ he loathes the now-regular company sessions at which – and I quote – ‘They stuff this sh*t down our throats!’ *There are some great stats in Stock’s Material Girls.

I received a private message from a Twitter subscriber asking me to explain why the Republicans will not support Donald Trump. It’s always very gratifying to receive messages like that. The support I get online means a lot to me and I always appreciate the words of encouragement I receive from my online friends. Being asked to explain things shows a level of trust that I find very gratifying and I hope I can live up to that trust.The entire explanation of why the Republicans will not support Trump is too long, but I will try to provide a short version. American politics is stalemated and both sides would be happy to continue this stalemate until the end of time. Normal people can clearly see that things are only getting worse and we need to change, but no one in the leadership of the two parties cares, they are happy with things the way they are. Both sides imagine they will someday win a permanent victory over the other, but both are wrong. We are on an infinite treadmill to nowhere.Whenever one side gains an advantage it uses that advantage to make its message more extreme, which then reduces its popularity and we are back to the beginning. No advantage is permanent and we always return to stalemate. The Democrats have the advantage of immigration turning the country Hispanic and could use that to take over the country, instead, they use it to make their culture war policy positions and waste their potential advantage through things such as advocating child sexual mutilation. No matter how many Hispanics move to this country the Democrats will remain roughly tied with the Republicans by constantly making their culture war positions more extreme and driving voters away and keeping the stalemate in place. It is an infinite treadmill to nowhere.The Republicans are part of this and also throw away any advantage by using any new uptick in popularity to make their positions more extreme, thus losing that popularity and returning to the stalemated positions. Both sides do this which is why nothing changes. Both sides intentionally aim for 51 to 49 victories, they aim for the most extreme platform capable of winning a slight majority. This prevents either side from advocating a moderate platform that would win enough votes to end the stalemate. Their own decisions make the stalemate permanent.Most people are generally aware of this stalemate and understand that the Democrat leadership’s real focus is the culture war and they merely use the more popular Leftist positions of assisting the unfortunate as a means of getting votes to put their culture war policies in place. Even Democrat voters generally understand that this is how the party operates. What is harder to understand is what the Republicans are trying to do. To understand this you have to understand the Protestant capture of the Republican party and the generally ignored aspects of America’s religious history.The first wave of immigration to the Colonies was from England and went to the north and the coast. The second wave was from Ulster and went to the south and the inland parts not already settled, meaning the Appalachian mountains. Ulster contains the most valuable farmland in Ireland and so all Catholics had been evicted and their farms given to poor Scots on the condition that they were faithful Protestants. This event radicalized these people and they became the most anti-Catholic and pro-Protestant group of people in the world. Their social identity comes from their religion and they focus on the theological conflict between salvation by faith and salvation by works as the almost entire focus of their religious life. They are entirely consumed with the belief that salvation by faith is the answer to every problem and salvation by works, or Catholicism in general, is the cause of every problem. In practice, these are the Evangelicals.Not all Protestants believe in salvation by faith, the high earning Protestant denominations never believed in it or abandoned it by the early nineteenth century. The Church of England never strayed from Catholic teachings on this subject and English Protestantism lacks this hatred of Catholicism that the Scots who settled in Ulster and then moved here have. Liverpool is half Irish, all of The Beatles were Irish, no one in England cares. The Evangelicals care, and thus the violence of northern Ireland.Evangelicals are mostly descendants of the Ulster-Scots and the entire movement is a product of their culture, as revealed by its geographical distribution. Evangelicals are roughly 25% of the country or half of the Republican party. But they stick together and the other Republicans don’t. In the 90s the Evangelicals took over the party and it has been their possession ever since. They will not allow the Republicans to stray from their religious vision.Part of this vision is an adherence to a peculiarly American conception of free market economics which Evangelicals use as an attempt to put their religious ideas into political practice, and also as a strategy for fighting the culture war. This vision of the free market mirrors their religious beliefs: do not try to use your own intelligence to solve problems, simply put your faith in God to solve them for you magically. The Evangelicals put this into political practice by saying we should not try to use our own intelligence to solve problems, but put our faith in the free market to magically solve our problems for us. The free market ideology of the Evangelicals allows them to convert their religious preferences into policy preferences. This is why they are religiously opposed to free healthcare and will not have a rational discussion of it. Because it is a religious issue to them.The culture war revolves around the problem of Black poverty, which no one wants to speak openly about. Everyone knows the problem is Black culture, including every single Black person you have ever met. The Democrat's plan to solve this problem is essentially to import solutions from Europe, to imitate European social democracy in this country on the conviction that this will cure Black social problems, including poverty. Democrats understand that the Hispanic immigration they are promoting is making the country poorer and reducing quality of life, but they assume once Hispanic immigration has given them enough votes to thoroughly imitate Sweden then all of the problems of both the Blacks and recently immigrated Hispanics will be solved by these programs. This is the bedrock assumption behind most of what the Democrats do. Of course in reality Blacks in Europe make 35% less than whites, same as here. The Democrats have a fantasy image of Europe.The problem from the Republican perspective is the Blacks are Protestants and that is supposed to solve all our problems. In the same way the Democrats have an unrealistic faith in the power of European social programs, the Republicans have an unrealistic faith in the power of Protestantism and its political stand in; the free market. Republicans avoid directly confronting the issue of Black poverty and use free market and responsible spending rhetoric as a way of avoiding an issue that they can’t deal with rationally without admitting their worldview is flawed. Both parties' worldviews are flawed, Europe does not have the answer to Black poverty, and neither does the Protestant religion.Because the people in control of the Republican party prioritize religion they will not allow any political positions which threaten their use of free market ideology as a political expression of their religious views and as a means of avoiding having to subsidize obviously inferior cultures. Instead of simply having a frank discussion about culture they try to avoid paying for other people’s mistakes through free market rhetoric and speeches about the budget deficit. These are the only tools they are willing to use for this problem because their religious beliefs box them into a corner. Anyone who doesn’t stay in this box becomes the enemy of the Republican establishment. Trump does not stay in this box.Trump is a Queens Catholic. Officially he’s a Protestant, but anyone who grows up in Queens is a Catholic anyway. And he spent his youth in Catholic schools, he is unavoidably Catholic on the inside. Trump is the only real Catholic President this country has ever had. Kennedy was too assimilated into prep school culture and Biden is just a grotesque figure with no religion. Trump speaks for the majority of Americans who do not want to fight the Democrat's culture war and do not follow the Evangelical lead. This is the real majority of all Americans, but they have no political structure to work through. What we need is a real party. Until then political outsiders who rebel against their party's orthodoxy are the closest thing the normal people in this country have to a voice. Both parties work together to stop these people, including Trump.As a Queens Catholic Trump promotes policies that go against the free market ideology of the Republican establishment. Examples would be:Trade. The Republican establishment uses the free market as a stand-in for God himself. Stop trying to make your own decisions and have faith in the free market to make decisions for you. Trump is a Catholic on this and wants to use his own intelligence and make the decisions that are best for America and not rely on the free market to magically save everyone. Immigration. The quality of a country is determined by the quality of the culture of its inhabitants. Cultural progress is uneven and some countries are far behind others. If we let culturally backward immigrants arrive our quality of life will diminish. These things are obvious to a Queens Catholic, but to the Republican establishment we just have to throw our hands in the air and let … the free market fix everything. Like God did in the Bible, but for some reason nowhere else.Equality. To a Queens Catholic equality means equality of opportunity, not of results. This brings up the question of culture, which the Republicans run away from. Their real answer to this question is one they dare not say, simply have faith and God will provide. So they run away from cultural debates and let the Democrats control the issue. Trump brings the Republicans into conflict with this. The Republicans do not want to fight this fight because their religious loyalties make it impossible for them to do well, so they resent Trump for making them get into arguments they can’t win.There is also Trump’s style of communication, which is conversational. This again simply means he is a Queens Catholic. The elites attacked him for asking “Why do we still have NATO?” This is a perfectly valid question. It means Trump is speaking his thoughts out loud, having genuine conversations with other people. The Republican style of communication is to sermonize, this is the style of American politicians in general. American political speeches are Protestant sermons in disguise. Trump does not sermonize, he simply has conversations like a Catholic from Queens. This style repulses many.The simple answer is that Trump fights fights the Republicans don’t want to fight. He fights fights that are hard for an Evangelical to fight, because of the way their religion boxes them into a corner on issues. The Evangelicals are essentially the Ulster-Scots who were radicalized when they were given farms stolen from Catholics. To avoid guilt over what the stolen farms they adopted a hostility to Catholics and a complete commitment to Protestantism. This was not farmland they received, they were given entire working farms, the house, the barn, the animals, an entire farm taken from Catholics and gifted to them. Their emotional response was to become religiously radicalized in favor of an extreme Protestant position.These people used to be Democrats and made that party awful, in the 90s they took over the Republicans and have made it awful. They are not smart people, look at how they made W. Bush the President. They are not smart people and they are completely consumed by religion and this boxes them into corners. Trump is a Queens Catholic on the inside and violates their unwritten rules. The Republicans can never forgive him for this and will backstab him at every opportunity.I have long felt the only hope for this country is a new party that would represent the true majority of Americans, the ones who simply want the government to work to give them a higher quality of life and uphold common sense moral values. Both the Democrats and Republicans are hostile to this. Trump is not, he is a Queens Catholic on the inside and thinks the way the average person does. The elites of both parties will never forgive him for this, including the elite of the Republican party.The average person is socially conservative and economically liberal. People do not want porn in schools but they do want the government to aid the unfortunate. Trump represents these people. If the Republicans would follow his example and be socially conservative and economically liberal they would win 75% of the vote. Trump said he would teach the Republicans how to win. They refuse to learn. They refuse to bend on their free market ideology because it is tied to the religious obsessions of the Evangelicals. The leadership of the Republican party will always be against Trump and anyone like him. They would rather lose than change. This is why the only hope for this country is a new party and I do what little I can to encourage this. It is our only chance at a happy future.

“ ‘Reproductive futurism’ is, by historical left standards, a politics from a galaxy far far away.”Oh Wow! This Is Ugly!! (One) It’s the decades-long time-span of our course that gives us insight. Consider, for example, my experience of trade unionists in the early 1980’s. Notwithstanding that these unionists were ‘left wing,’ most thinkspot folks would have liked them. They were paying mortgages and raising families. They had vegie gardens. Living wages and workplace safety were their prime motivations. (There were communists in the leadership.) If you’d suggested at that time that their children might want to get on their hands and knees in smelly toilet cubicles to enjoy loads of strange men’s semen so they could buy drugs and silicone implants – because ‘reproductive futurism’ -- you’d have copped a punch in the mouth. A decade later – when I was working with party communists – basic civil rights for gays and lesbians was a major aspect of the program. But neither trans nor postmodernism had traction. That is, the general anti-family stance of communism that dates to the Nineteenth Century was in play; but most gays and lesbians were more so concerned with acceptance as ordinary citizens than with indoctrinating children to anti-social lifestyles.* *Though I do accept that some folks see ‘mere’ homosexuality itself as an ‘anti-social lifestyle.’

LimericksThese are heady days,For the elite’s wicked ways,Their corrupting touch,That harms so much,Because the elect have proven crime pays. There once was an elite so malevolent,They did crimes that were apparent,Election Fraud and false flags,Covid jabs and the mask gags,And as for pedophilia they had a penchant. There once was an elite so corrupt,The people said enough is enough,We voted them out,Without a doubt,But election fraud made it too tough. There once was a nanny state so smothering,Some said it was all consuming mothering,With experts abound,No truth could be found,And in so created much suffering. The first was from a downed wire,The second from a screeching tire,But who really knows,The way Maui wind blows,And the boy with matches says I didn’t start the fire. There’s one thing we all know,If the economy is running slow,It’s not the little guy,Who doesn’t wear a tie,Blame the elite who run the show.