Handy Hubby is a veteran in common parlance, but I’m so glad he doesn’t go around announcing that to strangers like a child desperate for recognition and approval.
We get a discount at Lowe’s, so that’s pretty cool, because we spend loads of money there. It makes perfect sense that corporations reward veterans, because that’s who veterans serve.
Hubby joined the military because he wanted to expand his opportunities, same as many young people today.
Instead of celebrating Armistice Day, we celebrate Forever War.
Retired Lieutenant Colonel (USAF) Bill Astore writes:
“Sadly, as we raise more troops and fight more wars, we seem committed to the opposite. Our military just enjoyed its best recruiting class in years. This “success” is not entirely surprising. It’s no longer that difficult to fill our military’s expanding ranks because many of our young men and women simply have little choice but to enlist, whether for economic opportunity, money for college, or benefits like free health care.”
I served in the Peace Corps, but only one person has ever thanked me for my service, a stranger who didn’t know what the Peace Corps was, but everytime he heard the word “corps” was conditioned to reply with the proper canned reply, “Thank you for your service.”
Everyone knows the Peace Corps is for idealistic, lazy losers, unlike the military, which is for tough, courageous go-getters. Hollywood tells us so.
You want to joing the Peace Corps? What are you some sort of bleeding heart liberal hippy?!
“Since a very young age we are indoctrinated into the idea that wars are the story of “good” guys vs “bad” guys, that we are (of course) on the “good guys team” and the reason that the poor people from our country were (and continue to be) sent to other countries to kill other human beings with technology designed to end sentient life is so that we can “bring them democracy”, “protect our freedoms” and “ensure regional stability”. The truth is nothing even close to that comforting fairy tale.”
The Peace Corps volunteers don’t get included in Veterans Day, which used to be called Armistice Day, to remember the fighting that ENDED.
Once the wars became continuous they had to change the name.
I supported the Peace Corps for over two decades after I returned home, through financial donations, writing articles for their sites and singing their praises whenever I had occassion to do so. I stopped supporting them once I realized they’d turned pro-war.
Hollywood creations and fictional characters like the veteran Jack Reacher are worthy of the fandom of grown adults because that definitely has no resemblance to grown adults worshipping comic book figures like Superman or Robinhood as if they are real people.
“Collectively, we Americans tend to suppress whatever doubts we have about the wisdom of our wars with unequivocal statements of support for our troops. And on days like Veterans Day, we honor those who served, and especially those who paid the ultimate price on the battlefield.
Yet, wouldn’t the best support for our troops be the achievement of the dream of that grizzled vet who cut through a young man’s fog thirty years ago? Shouldn’t we be working to achieve a new age in which the rosters of our local VFWs and Legion posts are no longer renewed with the broken bodies and shattered minds of American combat veterans?”
“Working Towards Peace: Imagine if Veterans Day Became Obselete” Bill Astore, Bracing Views substack.
“There is no honor in tax-payer funded organized murder for profit: War is still a racket” Gavin Mounsey substack
“On November 11th, a day when we have been conditioned to glorify war as “necessary and honorable” let us take an honest look at the true nature of (and profiteers) of Modern Warfare”
Two parallel stories, one personal from two days ago, one political repeated through time and space.
Individual behaviors mirror political failures, or vice versa.
I went for a haircut at the only somewhat nice hotel in our closest small city. I haven’t had a professional haircut in over five years, it was my birthday treat to myself. My hair was really long and wild. I’d come to like it like that, though I knew it needed some taming. While working, Hubby and I kept professional-looking hairstyles, it was expected. Now that we don’t work for wages anymore, it’s kinda fun to let it all grow out, right before it all falls out in old age.
I told the stylist what I wanted. When I was young they called it the ‘long shag’; these days, according to my Youtube search, it’s called the ‘long wolf cut’. The stylist said she understood what I wanted–long layers. I even specified: “I want the waves and curls to be enhanced.” I was thinking–“Big 80s hair, Baby!” Why not! It’s my birthday celebration style, and that’s what I want!
The sytlist proceeded to chop over 6 inches from my hair, blow it dry to pin straight with the help of 3 stinky products, and then to top it off, tried to convince me that’s what I asked for.
Do you need a special license to notice these are not the same?
When I tried to explain to her that a “medium bob” cut is not the same thing as a “long wolf” cut, she started in on the gaslighting. She was very skilled at it.
Perception management is not the same as taking accountability.
My hair was so damaged, she had no choice. I wasn’t sitting straight and so she had to keep cutting. It was too puffy before, it was too frizzy before, it looks so much better now. “You look so pretty!” She kept repeating this, as I kept repeating, “Yes, it looks good, you are a talented stylist, but it’s not what I asked for!”
“The weakness of every utopia is the same. It demands that men believe what they can see with their own eyes to be false. The slogans change — “justice,” “progress,” “sustainability” — but the pattern does not. Sooner or later, the ration card, the empty shop, or the failed harvest breaks through the illusion. The lie may govern for a season, but reality always delivers the final verdict.”
Perhaps she only knows how to cut one style? Perhaps, and this is probably true, the short bob looks much better on me, objectively speaking, from a professional standard. Perhaps it is healthier looking and shinier and smoother now, all true.
“But you are still missing the point: It’s not what I asked for, and it’s not what I paid you to do!”
She refused to get my point. Flat out refused. I was not trying to get a refund or even a discount. I’d already tipped her, the transaction was complete. I just wanted her to recognize what she’d done.
We circled around her excuses, and I left, saying I’d return in 6 weeks, which obviously I never will.
“But populations are not passive. They respond not with submission, but with defense — of security, autonomy, and cultural identity. Citizens resist when they sense erosion of their freedoms, dilution of their traditions, or manipulation of their choices. The result is a Nash equilibrium: a tense standoff where each actor maximizes its own interest, constrained by the anticipated reaction of the other.”
Such is modern political life as well. Was she modeling the behavior of the politicians she sees on TV? Does she think, because she’s the professional, her opinion on what my hair should look like trumps my own, even though I’m not a child, but am in fact a middle aged woman who knows what she wants, has requested it clearly, and is paying her quite handsomely?
“Each generation births new architects of destiny — technocrats, visionaries, committees — convinced that this time, the blueprint will hold. That this time, the people will follow. That this time, the outcome will be different.
But history is not kind to central planners. Grand designs imposed from above, no matter how noble their language, inevitably collide with the stubborn complexity of human life. People are not data points. Cultures are not spreadsheets. Societies do not bend neatly to metrics and milestones.
Agenda 2030–2050, like earlier initiatives, assumes global consensus is possible, centralized governance will surpass local challenges, and large-scale ecological and social changes can occur without resistance. These are not lessons learned — they are lessons ignored.”
Lessons ignored, like my stylist. Her job is to do what I pay her to do, not to re-interpret my desires. Even when I expressed clearly, in a non-threatening manner, after paying her, that she did not give me the haircut I paid for, she refused to see her culpability. She blamed my hair and my poor posture.
Her insistance that I recognize and declare how pretty it looks is akin to the Soviet withdrawal from Eastern Europe as they were insisting how they deserve to be compensated for all the expertise they brought with their occupying forces and for the infrastructure they built. But of course, not to be held liable for all that they destroyed, lives nor infrastructure.
“Historical Lessons Attempts to impose totalizing visions from above have repeatedly failed. Examples include: • The fall of Robespierre (Boudoiseau, 2003) during the French Revolution (Britannica, 2003c). • The collapse of Ceaușescu’s regime in Romania (Britannica, 2003b). • The Nazi pursuit of Lebensraum (Britannica, 2003l), which ended in destruction. • Mao’s Great Leap Forward (Britannica, 2003e) and the Cultural Revolution (Lieberthal, 2003), which caused massive human suffering. Each case shows that utopias enforced by elites end in failure, often violently.”
“Socially, the plan underestimates resistance. People do not change because a summit declares it. Habits are resilient. Traditions run deep. When transformation is mandated rather than chosen, it breeds resentment, not renewal.”
The choices and desires of those paying for services must necessarily be a higher priority than that of those performing the services. That includes politicians, and hairstylists.
“4. Restructuring of Daily Life From how we travel to what we eat, the Agenda seeks to reshape daily habits in the name of sustainability. But these are not abstract metrics — they are intimate choices. Mobility restrictions, dietary mandates, and housing redesigns touch the core of personal freedom. The assumption that populations will comply quietly with lifestyle engineering is not just naive — it is politically combustible.”
“State incentives — subsidies, surveillance, social scoring — aim to steer behavior. But when these incentives clash with core values like freedom, identity, and sovereignty, they lose traction. Compliance becomes brittle. Trust erodes.”
I can’t help but wonder if her other clients have always bowed to her bullying style of perception management? Does she insist all her clients praise her work, whether or not they really liked the results?
Just grin and bear it, everyone?
“The Nash equilibrium here is not stable. It is volatile, held together by mutual constraint rather than mutual agreement. Elites cannot push too far without triggering rebellion. Populations cannot fully disengage without risking exclusion or punishment. Populations remain bound to the system because withdrawal carries a price — exclusion, punishment, loss of rights. The equilibrium holds only so long as resistance is isolated. But once enough people disengage together, the balance shifts: punishment loses its sting, and the system itself begins to collapse.”
I suppose only time will tell the truth. Eventually. If I ever run into that hairstylist next time I’m at the hotel I’m inclined to say: “I’m fine with it, it might even grow back before it all falls out. But just for the record, not everyone wants to look like your vision of the sleek middle-aged professional. Some of us have outgrown that look.”
“Agenda 2030–2050 treats the human species as a single actor, capable of coordinated transformation. But humanity is not a monolith. It is a constellation of cultures, histories, and identities. The anthropogenic hypothesis, when stripped of nuance, becomes a justification for centralized control — see here — a mandate for elites to redesign society in the name of planetary health — see here. This is where the danger lies. When ecological urgency overrides democratic process, when sustainability becomes a pretext for surveillance, when global goals erase local voices — the result is not cooperation, but coercion.”
“Agriculture is a major contributor to climate change and the devastation of the planet… The only way to fix this, the necessary step, is knowing what food is.”
Converting Food Tradition Into Science With The Periodic Table Of Food
This was an infuriating propaganda piece on behalf of the Rockefeller Cartel by Forbes magazine, sent by a friend who likes it when I’m infuriated. Bless her heart!
The article is the perfect example of the methods of ideological subversion being used on the public by the corporatocracy through the institutions.
The single quote above I take from the article, rather than quoting it further, is in order to not subject the reader to further mind poison. But rather instead, to offer an antedote.
How does it work? Why are they doing this?
While the excellent article below is a good means of demonstration, it’s first important to notice the labels themselves are meant to be flexible while still garnering a knee-jerk reaction: Communism, Capitalism, two opposing worldviews, that’s the framing.
Except it’s fake, a false dichotomy. These are economic views posing as worldviews for political purposes.
Often political purposes and religious ones overlap, which is why I avoid religion as well as politics when I’m trying to think logically!
The above quote works a similar frame: Science must know what food IS so that agriculture will no longer destroy the planet.
Except the only reason argriculture is destroying the planet is because it was taken over by BigAg MANY decades ago. Before I was born, actually, and I’m getting up there.
They fail to mention this piece of the puzzle, no surprise there. Many societies have thrived and still thrive on non-industrial agriculture to survive. Industry has ruined agriculture in this country, and many others.
Our brainwashing that it is our job to feed and police the world is the actual problem causing the devastion. The industrial-military global order is the problem causing the devastion.
95% of average folks are just pawns in this game.
Leave the terms ‘communism’ and ‘capitalism’ to the side for a moment and consider this:
“What Marx and Engels pioneered wasn’t specifically a political revolution — it was the rewriting of the moral code itself. The Manifesto operates as a systematic inversion of the fundamental value and structures that underpin social organisation. Every principle that helped stabilise bourgeois society — property rights, family inheritance, religious authority, national sovereignty — was methodically reframed through inversion; consciousness programming designed to make the existing moral operating system feel not just wrong, but obsolete.
Programming Permissible Thought Control the language and you control the range of permissible thought. The Communist Manifesto introduced this tactic with rhetorical inversions; ESG and global ethics continue it by redefining terms like ‘freedom’, ‘equity’, and ‘justice’ so that dissent itself becomes linguistically unspeakable. When ‘inclusive’ becomes the only acceptable alternative to ‘extractive’, when ‘sustainable’ becomes synonymous with ‘moral’, and when ‘science-based’ becomes code for ‘unchallengeable’, we’re witnessing linguistic capture similar to that Marx pioneered.
The genius lies not just in changing what words mean, but in making certain combinations of words feel impossible. Try arguing against ‘inclusive prosperity’, ‘women’s rights’, or ‘science-based sustainability targets’ without sounding backwards. The linguistic terrain has been so thoroughly mapped that opposition requires either accepting the loaded framework — or appearing to reject progress itself. It’s a steep uphill struggle, almost guaranteed to waste enormous amounts of time — even though these terms typically function to insert ideological blind spots ripe for later exploitation by full intent.”
Like the quote says–to solve the problem, we must know what food is. Imagine, we don’t even know what food is! We must have science explain food to us in order to not destroy the planet by eating.
esc continues . . .
“Inclusive Capitalism as Semantic Cover for Stakeholder Feudalism ‘Inclusive capitalism’ — promoted by coalitions involving the Vatican, the World Economic Forum, and major central banks — promises to ‘make capitalism work for everyone’. The manipulative techniques are identical to the Manifesto: binary framing where ‘inclusive capitalism’ opposes ‘neoliberal greed’ with no middle ground allowed; euphemistic coercion where investors are ‘guided’ to ESG portfolios and non-compliance means exclusion from financial markets; sacred authority through alignment with religious institutions that sanctifies technocratic control; and guilt transfer where individual consumers — not megacorporations, nor central banks — bear responsibility for systemic problems. You get to keep the word ‘capitalism’… while losing actual market freedom. It’s semantic cover for stakeholder feudalism — the Financial Stability Board and the BIS become moral arbiters of capital allocation, yet you never voted for them.”
This ‘guy’ knows what he’s talking about, read him, not Forbes!
“Recognition and Resistance What we witness is the emergence of something historically unprecedented: soft totalitarianism with global reach, implemented not through revolutionary violence but through institutional coordination and moral manipulation. The most disturbing aspect is how voluntary compliance is manufactured through psychological techniques that make resistance feel not just futile but morally reprehensible. Unlike crude twentieth-century totalitarianism, this system preserves the language of freedom while altering its substance, claims scientific and moral authority rather than raw power, operates through persuasion and micro-incentives rather than force, and presents itself as evolution rather than revolution. Koestler⁶² warned that disembodied rational systems could turn pathological when disconnected from human meaning — today’s ESG frameworks automate that disconnection at global scale.”
Just a couple of vids to share today. I have not (yet) done any sort of deep dive on the Hill Country flooding. I have heard some of the speculation and I’m sure readers could guess my opinion to any question of whether this was a ‘natural’ disaster.
I was confused by this first video showing how quickly the flooding happened in an area that was getting no rain at the time. It looks like something from an amusement park. But, I did hear they opened certain dams in some areas to divert the intense water flow, so maybe that could help explain it. I’m going to look into this part of the operation in future.
What’s far easier to see is the current government propaganda drive, and it’s thick and multi-layered. We’ve got promises of disclosure coming from stooges and patsies being played as blame gets shifted and terminology gets altered.
We will not be led into their narrative spin cycle. That’s why I’ve included the 2nd video. The Spinners want the public blaming small, local cloud-seeding operations, not the global military operations.
NOLAButterfly is the researcher of the 2nd video and has been active for a very long time. Notice how few views she gets, how little exposure. I’ve seen her kicked off multiple channels over the years and get in heated arguments with top researchers like Jim Lee, who definitely looks to me like he’s joined the dark side.
I cannot say if her theories are correct. I can say her silencing speaks volumes to me. From what I’ve experienced and seen myself, I believe she has some very plausible ideas backed by research. She explains clearly in the vid what she sees happening and it’s worth a listen.
Click on the link for the 2nd video, because the embed doesn’t work properly with Rumble videos.
I can relate, I fail them all the time. But that’s not this post.
Here we have two excellent essays that make me think, if this is the new level of social programming, I finally might abide!
Can they teach this in the schools? I might even go back to teaching! (Ok, let’s not exaggerate. We prefer our wee homestead life, even through the weather disasters, great many failures and physical pain.)
I’ve selected my favorite bits, there’s much more to appreciate on each of these Substacks, just follow the links.
The Coward’s Bargain: How We Taught a Generation To Live In Fear by Josh Stylman
“This wasn’t an accident or an overreaction. This was a stress test of how quickly a free society could be transformed into something unrecognizable, and we failed spectacularly. Anyone who actually followed the science understood the only pandemic was one of cowardice. Worse, most people didn’t even notice we were being tested. They thought they were just “following the science”—never mind that the data kept changing to match the politics, or that questioning anything had somehow become heretical. The beautiful thing about this system is that it’s self-sustaining. Once you’ve participated in the mob mentality, once you’ve policed your neighbors and canceled your friends and stayed silent when you should have spoken up, you become invested in maintaining the fiction that you were right all along. Admitting you were wrong isn’t just embarrassing—it’s an admission that you participated in something monstrous. So instead, you double down. You disappear when confronted with inconvenient facts.
Raising Prisoners And this brings us back to the children. They’re watching all of this. But more than that—they’re growing up inside this surveillance infrastructure from birth. The Stasi’s victims at least had some years of normal psychological development before the surveillance state kicked in. These kids never get that. They’re born into a world where every thought might be public, every mistake permanent, every unpopular opinion potentially life-destroying. The psychological impact is devastating. Research shows that children who grow up under constant surveillance—even well-meaning parental surveillance—show higher rates of anxiety, depression, and what psychologists call “learned helplessness.” They never develop internal locus of control because they never get to make real choices with real consequences. But this goes far deeper than helicopter parenting. The ability to hold unpopular opinions, to think through problems independently, to risk being wrong—these aren’t just nice-to-haves. They’re core to psychological maturity. When you eliminate those possibilities, you don’t just get more compliant people; you get people who literally can’t think for themselves anymore. They outsource their judgment to the crowd because they never developed their own.”
The COVID Conformity Test This is how totalitarian thinking takes root—not through jackbooted thugs, but through a million small acts of self-censorship. When a venture capitalist whispers his concerns about immigration policy like he’s confessing to a thought crime. When successful professionals agree with dissenting views privately but would never defend them publicly. When speaking obvious truths becomes an act of courage rather than basic citizenship. Orwell understood this perfectly. In 1984, the Party’s greatest achievement wasn’t forcing people to say things they didn’t believe—it was making them afraid to believe things they weren’t supposed to say. “The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake,” O’Brien explains to Winston. “We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power.” But the real genius was making citizens complicit in their own oppression, turning everyone into both prisoner and guard.”
Neutralization: How Bureaucracies Silence Dissent Through Legal Fuses and Narrative Control by Luc Lelievre
Institutional power rarely reveals its full mechanics in one stroke. Instead, it unfolds in sequences—calculated, procedural, and often cloaked in the language of neutrality. Neutralization, the fourth installment in Luc Lelièvre’s Unbekoming series, dissects this final movement in the choreography of bureaucratic suppression. Building on prior analyses—Heresy, which outlined how dissent is ideologically framed as deviant; Suppression, which explored institutional mechanisms of exclusion; and Omission, which detailed the structural design behind silencing—this essay turns its attention to the silent sophistication of neutralization: the use of legal fuses, narrative gatekeepers, and administrative dead-ends to reroute dissent and erase its public trace.
7. Administrative Gaslighting and the “Fuse Effect”: When Bureaucracy Becomes Theatre
Modern bureaucracies rarely operate through overt acts of repression. Instead, their preferred mode of silencing is procedural — a form of administrative gaslighting that cloaks itself in language of due process while subtly eroding the dissident’s credibility. This technique is not accidental; it is designed.
One illustrative method is what could be termed the “fuse effect”: low-visibility actors within the institutional machinery are positioned to execute decisions that carry legal or symbolic consequences, thus absorbing the potential fallout. These operatives — often legal clerks, junior lawyers, or regional representatives — function as buffers. When the dissident challenges a structural injustice, it is these intermediaries who respond, allowing higher-level decision-makers to remain untouched by controversy. The system insulates itself from reputational risk while continuing its work of marginalization.
But when these “fuses” begin to fail — either through overreach or exposure — institutions escalate. They deploy higher-profile agents, such as communications directors or legal executives, who are tasked with closing the file definitively. In my own case, the surprising intervention of a top-level official from a legal commission — someone with no adjudicative mandate — reveals just how far the institution was willing to go to protect the official narrative. Rather than engage the constitutional merits of my claim, it chose to obscure them through authority signaling and symbolic closure.
This bureaucratic theatre plays out under the guise of objectivity. But for those of us who have documented each step, the pattern is unmistakable: delegitimize the voice, dilute the argument, displace responsibility. These are not failures of oversight; they are evidence of design.
The question, then, is no longer whether the dissident is “right” or “wrong” by institutional standards. It is whether he can endure — and expose — the machinery that seeks to erase him. In that sense, the public record becomes not only a site of resistance, but a form of protection.
A flock, it is not. There will never be a revolution in America.
More like, when I say jump . . .
Kinda like Bugs Bunny getting his feet shot at while Yosemite Sam demands he ‘Dance!’. . .
It’s a relationship.
Americans will never revolt. They will never rebel. I’m not talking our military here, I’m talking the people, the masses, who will gladly vote for war if they are commanded by their team, but who will never en masse lift a finger in inconvenience to support it. A placard, perhaps. But not a pinky finger otherwise.
Why? This man nails it and it’s so spot on I fear reposting it. Truth bombs this huge are usually dropped by assets. Even listening can get you on a list, I’m sure. Because, America is so damn free.
But this murdering convert to Islam is correct nonetheless. Our guns can’t save us from, or in, this battle. We have already lost. We were conquered from within long before this current administration. We do not have the heart to rebel because rebellion and revolution require artists, the kind of artists, and warriors, who cannot be bought. We don’t have that, we haven’t had that for a long time now. We have conformity, collusion, corruption and therefore we’ve got what we deserve. Politics is downstream from culture.
Start at the 1:15 mark, it’s only about 10 minutes, and it’s brutal. Not for the feight of heart, I’m afraid, but absolutely the truth as I see it. Listen and weep, or not.
What do you think? Have you had a personal experience of transformation through art?
I wrote my Master’s thesis on social engineering in 90s, before I had any idea what social engineering was. I didn’t know at the time that’s what I was writing about. The thesis was about women writers of francophone West Africa using their novels as a means to catalyze social change. Liberation through literature, I called it, where practices like polygamy, female genital mutilation, and lack of educational opportunities were voiced in fictional form by the otherwise voiceless.
Certainly it is not at all uncommon for writers to use their works toward such ends. And yet, something about the timing of my thesis, or perhaps the content, resonated less with others than I expected.
I found that instead ‘Art for art’s sake’ had become the more popular mode of the times and works that were considered to be ‘too pedantic’ (which seemed to mean any fictional work with a purpose other than sheer entertainment) were heavily criticized.
I tried for years to pitch similar ideas for publishing to various entities and could find no interest and quite a lot of criticism. Folks wanted to be entertained, not taught. If they had to learn something, they wanted it tightly obscured in a bubble of excitement, like a Dan Brown novel.
But times seem to have changed again and authors and artists with a serious message, with deep societal concerns, seem to be able to find, or are perhaps themselves creating, a growing audience hungry for their transformational content.
It reminds me of some of the criticisms I heard in the 90s—art is not meant to transform or educate, but rather has the sole purpose to simply express the subjective worldview of the creator. Any feelings of universality in a work of art is essentially meaningless coincidence. Art should not be held in the clutches of meaning-making. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Art cannot be personally or socially transformative, except to the artist himself, that is an establishment myth of conformity.
I even had an artist friend, with an art degree, who assisted at a gallery, try to insist to me that the glass flask full of the artist’s excrement (I’m not joking) was to be considered art just as much as any old famous painting.
So I’m very pleased to see this more recent ‘re-formation’ to art with purpose. But, I wonder, can it actually be transformative? Or were all those critical voices in the 90s correct?
What do y’all think?
Here’s a couple of amazing pieces which might have such power. Do you know of others to share? If so, please do link below!
In Shadow: A Modern Odyssey
Kingdom
These works are both by: Lubomir Arsov and you can find an excellent interview with him here:
We were taught in Economics 101 that we live in a market-based economy in the USA. They sometimes threw around the word ‘free market’ as well.
We were also taught it was our prosperity that allowed for so many choices in our free country, which itself was thanks to our progress.
Wonderful words that sound magical together: Progress and Prosperity
And this could almost make sense, it’s not exactly a lie, so it could almost be true.*. Except, we were taught another thing at the same time: We were taught that it is the customers who drive the market.
Now the lie becomes recognizable, because we can easily point to thousands of examples as to how it is not the case that the consumer drives the market.
Here are some of my preferred examples. Feel free to add more in the comments.
The Illusion of Choice
It’s not just thousands of breakfast cereals made up of the same toxic ingredients, but most of the food products available to the average consumer these days.
How about the good ole landline? Soon to be gone the way of the pay phone. We are told that folks just don’t want landlines anymore and so they will begin to discontinue them. California recently had a public backlash, but it won’t matter in the long run. Landlines will be discontinued for the plebs. That is those who haven’t already happily switched to a Smart surveillance system they carry everywhere.
In some cases, probably many, this will happen by forcing (coercing) customers into canceling their service. This is just ‘anecdotal evidence’ as they always say, whereas they have ‘the data’ which says the opposite.
It’s not that landline service has become increasingly poor over the last decade while the costs keep rising, as has happened to us and our neighbors. No, it’s market-driven scientific data that claims folks don’t want them anymore.
Lightbulbs. Low-flush toilets and low-flow shower heads. Wood-burning appliance restrictions and prohibitions. Gas can safety features. Smart washing machines. Electric cars. Sustainable Everything driving up energy costs. “Sin” taxes.
Your market-driven choice: Smart City or poverty
I have met very few folks who wanted any of these market-driven signs of our ever-improved Progress and Prosperity. But again, anecdotal.
Because they are ALL for the Environment, or our own good, of course. And the data says we want it.
Everything I want to do is illegal, like:
Sell raw milk Camembert at the Farmer’s Market (or anywhere else), distill our own whiskey, grow hemp, sell pork chops to our neighbors, refuse to pay taxes that fund wars and bail-out bankers or funds the research that floods our fields.
Behold the market-driven forces of weather modification!
But we are driven into Progress on the Big Bus of Bullshit called Prosperity (undefined term) by unseen forces (mostly unelected and completely unaccountable). Like magic!
Which brings me to my most obvious market-driven fantasy.
More like: Encyclopedia of Useless Myths
Out-of-print books
This one really aggravates me! There are plenty of glaring examples of the deliberate dumbing down of our media and our educational content. Here’s just one perfect example because it’s fresh on my mind from just today.
This book of utter herbal nonsense which I should probably burn on principle, is on its 22nd printing—Cunningham’s Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs.
While Juliette de Bairacli Levy’s books of serious research and immense practical value are mostly out of print, or hard to find, in poor condition and/or expensive, or only available to read online (which I truly dislike, but there are no good public libraries around anymore and books are ridiculously over-priced and of course, I want to do my part for the trees. 😂)
A collector’s copy worth thousands proves there’s no interest whatsoever from the free market.
Why learn the practical magic of the actual benefits and remedies of the common Comfrey when it is demonized by Big Pharma and cajoled and belittled into its ‘fairy magic’ properties thanks to ‘trendy’ books dominating the marketplace, repeating drivel like:
“Worn or carried, Comfrey protects and ensures safety during travel. Also, tuck some into your suitcases so that they aren’t lost or stolen.”
Ah brilliant, so helpful! Our ancestors must’ve been loading up those trunks and buggies with their comfrey leaves. Is Cunningham’s book really worthy of 22 continuous reprints?
Or do folks buy this book for the same reason I did, because they were so desperate to learn practical wisdom about how our ancestors used herbs that they foolishly believed such a popular book must have something of value besides the pretty cover. Fool me once . . .
And in the meantime, arrest that old Amish man who fraudulently claimed his comfrey salve cures skin cancer (surely killing or maiming millions).
*Market-driven I’ve come to realize is a kind of Newspeak, because it has a double-meaning, similar to “stakeholder capitalism”—the market is not meant as in the agora, the market-place, you and I, but as in the stock market.
“In the days since Hamas attacked Israel, that response has translated into contributions of millions of dollars, loads of military gear and mountains of clothing, food and household supplies from Jewish communities across the United States. Items have ranged from granola bars to boots and bulletproof vests. The outpouring has come from the smallest neighborhood synagogues to the wealthiest corners of the Jewish business community – and everything in between. Some 5.8 million Jews live in the United States, according to the Pew Research Center. While there is no sign that Israel is short on basic supplies like granola bars, the donations underscore the concern and connection Jews in the United States feel toward Israel.”
$100 million in one year, and that’s in 1957 dollars!
Life Magazine August 12, 1957 “The Jews Of America and the State of Israel”
“Aid from U.S. to Israel. U.J.A.’s $100 million supports refugees. Generosity to the less fortunate has been an article of Jewish faith since the time of Moses. In the eyes of American Jews, this now means helping the swarms of persecuted Jewish refugees from Europe and the Arab world, for many of whom the one glowing hope is to get to Israel. America’s vessel of generosity is a phenomenal private philanthropy called the United Jewish Appeal, which this year will raise $100 million to help Jewish refugees.”
In the same issue “How U.S. Jews View Jewish State” by George Steiner “We do not, admittedly, have enough information on American electoral trends and voting habits to give a definitive answer. But certain generalization can safely be made. In New York State professional politicians regard a measure of pro-Zionism as a law of survival. In close presidential and congressional elections New York and other urban centers in which Jews are concentrated may determine the margin of victory.”
“It should not be overlooked that the American Jewish community makes itself heard not only at the polls. There are a great many Jewish writers, impresarios and performers—men skilled in presenting ideas and summoning emotions. Whenever Israel is threatened, the voice of Jewish feeling is heard eloquently in the full-page advertisements of leading newspapers and over the loudspeakers at well-attended rallies in New York’s huge Madison Square Garden. This flair for public relations must be taken into account when one tries to say just how much pressure, political and indirect, American Jews can bring to bear on Washington officials in defense of Israel.”
“Adjusting to a new life, Omessi, who had always been an office worker, still wears a city man’s clothes as he awkwardly half-squats in the broiling desert sun to try to prune a grapevine. Of three alternatives in Israel all offering little but hard work and risk, Omessi deliberately chose to join a farm settlement, or moshaw, where he would at least have a home and seven acres of his own and receive about $9 a day for his labors in the vineyard and other projects.” 😂 😂
I wonder how long Omessi lasted as a farm laborer in his new home?!
Steganography and synchromysticism researcher, Stephers, shared a few odd points about the E. Palestine, Ohio train accident and chemical spill that I want to pass along to whoever might be interested.
Stephers: “In this interview, they mention “HAZMAT suits”…and Nathan Izotic mentions “in his industry.” Yet it is NEVER mentioned that he, himself, is a specialist in chemicals (and his wife, Kelly, trained specifically in chemicals and toxicology)…and OSHA HAZMAT certified…Why are they not assisting, given their expertise?”
Me: They also had only moved to the vicinity the previous year, so I’d say they are not exactly ‘locals’ as in they would know the area and people well enough to be the best candidates to interview.
Stephers: “Kelly Izotic (acting as worried local resident) works for Microbac Laboratories. She does not mention that she is an environmental chemical field technician, nor what her company does. If honest, she should be educating the public on air quality and remediation, and supporting on-the-ground hazardous waste analysis.”
Me: Why not interview them as experts in the field, which they clearly are, instead of ‘concerned locals’? And why does she have that insouciant grin the whole time, and he looks like he has to bite his lip to not follow suit and then points to an invisible rash on his face?
They don’t look too concerned to me. Nerves? Bad acting? Or perhaps beaming on the inside with the bank they are about to make on this deal?
Just asking, inquiring minds want to know!
+++++++++
And, even more odd, also received from Stephers:
From the article linked below:
“Ohio resident Ben Ratner was excited when he landed a gig as an extra in a Netflix movie about a toxic disaster in October 2021.
But now the 37-year-old father of four — who lives in East Palestine, Ohio, less than a mile from the site of a train derailment that led to a massive toxic chemical spill and forced residents to evacuate — is living out a real-life version of the movie’s plot that’s continuing to unfold.
“Talk about art imitating life,” Ratner — who plays an evacuee in the film adaptation of Don DeLillo’s novel White Noise about a freight train explosion that releases deadly toxins into the air — tells PEOPLE.
And if that were enough, add another little gem . . .
Ratner’s Star is a 1976 novel by Don DeLillo. It relates the story of a child prodigy mathematician who arrives at a secret installation to work on the problem of deciphering a mysterious message that appears to come from outer space. The novel has been described as “famously impenetrable”.[1] Stephers: I still find it super synchy that Ben Ratner’s mom is named Beth…and *another* Beth Ratner (NOT his mom) just happens to have worked in environmental toxin/hazardous spills clean-up:
