We've been trained to think that endless rule by tiny minorities of really horrible people is the natural order of things, but that turns out to be just another lie
The past eight years are best summed up as the People versus the Elite. The Elite are used to controlling the media and the story, but Twitter etc did in fact democratize the public conversation, to the Elite's great dismay. They can no longer destroy a candidate by deciding to do so and telling a narrative, because there are direct ways to communicate with the people. So the Elite are simply setting about taking back control as best they can. It is an age-old battle no different than Patrician versus Plebian.
One thing the People need to realize is the Elite do have a leadership role to play. Hold them account for how badly they are playing it now, but the final equilibrium we reach has to include roles for both, again just as Rome balanced the forces over years. Read Alan Ryan or any other serious political philosopher - the elite have always been given some advantages and looked to for leadership for the system to be in balance.
That’s life... That’s what all the people say. You’re riding high in April, shot down in May. But I know I’m gonna change that tune, when I’m back on top, back on top in June.
The day I learned of the Disinformation Governance Board I immediately posted on my substack that the Ministry of Truth has arrived. I'm 75, wheelchair bound, and made up a cardboard sign to protest the MoT. Unfortunately, I'm one of the younger members of the community, and my neighbors boo'd until I went inside. They thought I was protesting Matt Troth, the new pastor at the Church around the corner.
Some people.........and all those with intelligence and a curious mind capable of critical thinking want to know. That generally does not include the academy of the credentialed but uneducated who seem to think a PHd in education or racial theory are deserving of respect, they aren't.
I’m unsure of the intelligence part but I’m certainly curious.
My epiphany comes from the Twitter files and that no matter how much of an asshole Trump was and is, there was and truly is a deep state out to get him, all sorts of government organizations actively working to get rid of a sitting president duly elected.
Any woke progressives ok with that should forfeit the right to vote for at least 10 years.
The one characteristic that trumps whatever good a Trump Presidency could have been or could again be is his habit of lying as a normal form of speech, maybe as a bizarre means of gaining attention.
But who cares? Let's see. New Yorkers recently elected a liar named George Santos who lies in order to deceive and has no idea apparently that his habit represents the essence of the perversion of American democracy where we no longer value what is right or true because all is relative. The people have, his constituency has asked him to step down.
Can you give me a politician, especially one from the left who does not lie as easily as they breath? Your innate hatreds are at play not Trumps propensity for embellishment. Why pick on the poor schlub that is George Santos when there are many examples of that which you complain who are far more important given their tenure and the enormity of their deceit and duplicity.
There are plenty of assholes running around in Washington, why single out Trump when he currently has no influence on current policy? If your epiphany only occurred upon the release of twitter files where have you been hiding. It's been obvious from the get go that Trump has been maliciously maligned out of hatred not his tendency toward embellishment and untruths, but what politician isn't?
It's kind of funny that when Noam Chomsky says it, people think its brilliant, but when Donald Rumsfeld says the same thing... about unknown unknowns, he's a pompous ass.
IMHO, they both fall into the same category. Professional Assholes.
Like Matt, I prefer people who don't hyperventilate about the personal = political every five seconds. Live a little. Have fun. Watch a ballgame. Go to a concert. Talk to someone of the opposite sex (not gender). Get laid. Anything but worry about fascism being around the corner. Hint: it isn't.
I was censored by Fakebook, for posting a meme of Mussolini's definition of fascism. Tweaker censored me for posting a photo of a Tibetan nun, self-immolating, in context of CCP human rights abuses. I'm inclined to agree with you.
"Almost no one who has fervent ideas has a good epistemic basis for the amount of certainty they have. There is a disconnect between the amount of certainty they have, and the amount of certainty they SHOULD have, through right process."
“The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.” Bertrand Russell
It’s easy take their power from them - and mostly that means just ignoring the middlingly intelligent authoritarian self proclaimed “experts” and their sad weak little gullible sheep. Laughing at them helps. Offering sensible pragmatic alternatives to their idiotic feelings based demands while staying rooted in actual reality destroys their influence.
Single young college kids (mostly women) are the footsoldiers of the tyrannic revolution however and theyre the most emotional and least wise demographic of the country. Difficult to combat bc you cant shut young people up in the age of social media, you cant limit them getting into positions of power or they’ll claim misogyny, even their own parents love them and therefore dont wanna drop the hammer of truth or consequence on them. Young women are the most difficult demographic to combat bc human societies (and men biologically) evolved an inclination towards protecting and supporting that group. But now theyre fully unhinged and enforcing the idiocracy on every college campus, every corporate HR department, and soon every courtroom in america
You hit the hammer on the mail. We went through a more radical human social evolution in the past 60 years than the agricultural society but somehow we pretend nothing happened; any observation or criticism is shouted down with vitriol; they’ve already ruined a lot of institutions and traditional safeguards.
Excellent point. Part of the reason the group has drifted so far, is because their increasing fake progressivism, hasn't cost them anything personally. That might be about to change. Many recent college graduates, especially those without STEM degrees, have spent the last few years being paid far more than they are worth. Secure in jobs obtained with Mom and Dad's connections, in an economic downturn, and without Covid handouts, there will be an economic awakening. Ditto for crime. Defund the police, open the prisons and bail reform take on a new meaning when you or a loved one become a victim. Unemployed and afraid to go out at night, might move abortion rights, in a a state in which you do not reside, off the top of top of one's voting priorities.
Birth control is responsible for most INCELS. 80% of women keep fighting/flirting over the same top-20% of eligible (or ineligible) bachelors - while the dweebs have to get their jollies via only fans. This already is not ending well.
Scary Poppins' lyrics are even more ominous than Matt identifies.
"They’re laundering disinfo and we really should take note
And not support their lies, with our wallet, voice or vote!"
The "our wallet" line was exactly Trudeau's approach to the Canadian truckers. These disinfo experts seem unable to distinguish between "our wallet" and "your wallet."
The combination of smugness and sanctimony of these people is just so revolting.
I think that you'd like my episode on her. She didn't last long enough for it to get much traction but it goes deeper into the mechanism of censorship, which seems up your alley from your moniker. Here's the first paragraph:
Today’s episode looks at the new Disinformation Governance Board of Homeland Security and how it turns facts and logic into terrorism, and arbitrary authority into a power that can overrule Presidents and Congress. Its executive director, Nina Jankowicz, has put her philosophy into a disinfo ditty, which is the only place where you can find her definition of this new form of domestic threat. So I’ll be analyzing her examples and applying to them the original rules of how to figure out when someone’s trying to hidealittle hidealittle hidealittle lie, in her words. These rules, from the home of democracy in ancient Greece, were called rhetorical fallacies. And I’ll end with the 10 Principles of War Propaganda, developed before WWI. But first let’s talk about logic. https://thirdparadigm.substack.com/p/nina-jankowicz-the-warbling-warmonger.
I appreciate the style of your video! Being able to identify arguments that hinge upon strawmen or undoing definitions of long-established words is a fundamental skill to see through the propaganda we are being fed.
Thank you! Yes, etymology is a pet passion for a reason. Words are coined to capture a meaning and using the word with a new meaning is a favorite trick of psyops. I really appreciate you watching my video!
I wish you could comment without donating. Who are the idiots donating to that literal fascist? That’s what blows my mind… not that evil tyrants exist… but that they have supporters.
The Politico piece of poor Nina having to deal with all this while changing diapers was an audacious bit of camouflage writing. Apparently 713 people in the US care enough to help her out with her lawsuit. Ironic that she's going to rely on an objective, public body (a court) to evaluate her claims of truth - if only her disinfo board would have allowed all of us to have the same opportunity.
Also amazing is that she apparently still fails to see determining disinformation as policing speech. Just own it, Nina!
"The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed - where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once." -- Alex Kozinski
I'd love to think it would never be necessary to shed blood to preserve our liberty; but doing that denies how that liberty was established in the first place.
We often overlook how bloody nose human the Constitution is. Core protection of the individual from the machination's of organized thugdom (usually criminal finance). The first tell in the game is wrapped in the flag mouth pieces selling less is more human rights.
Absolutely Agree. 3 things we can do. 1. Keep ourselves informed (this means reading Both Sides), 2. Using that information in talking to family/friends/co workers, 3. Spend you money (as much as possible) on companies/groups that you agree with or promote you agenda.
I don't submit. I rise up. In the words of Will Durant, "it looks like we've got a united minority working against a divided majority". We could unite... Intro:
Just a few days ago I was talking to my twenty-something neighbour, an upper-class Brit from London who is studying "International Relations" at a good university. He's also a very bright guy.
Since we had talked about the Nord Stream pipeline operation last September, and he had reflexively believed that the "Russians did it"; I thought I would mention the article by Sy Hersh that claims America did it.
He not only had not even heard of the article, he had no idea who Sy Hersh is. Need I add that he immediately rejected the idea that America would do such a thing?
So yes, there is a 4th Estate, but, "is our children learning" anything like the Truth from them?
My youngest daughter lives in England & both she & her husband have degrees from Cambridge. The both believe “Russia did it” and no appeals to logic will budge this belief. To me, it’s incredible.
There was an episode of yes prime minister in the late 80s that basically made the point that in foreign affairs most people just want to know who the goodies and the baddies are, but that they they leaders should dictate what happens. And then Bernard asked shouldn’t I’m a democracy the people know at which point he was laughed at.
And another quote “most people don’t care who is making decisions as long as she had big tits on page 3” referring to the suns nudity every day.
We allowed ourselves to abrogate our responsibility and knowledge of what’s going on, and as we know power, once given to a government, is hard to reclaim. We must demand transparency on most things, and we must hold them accountable.
I’ll close with a last antidote- senator kennedy was put on the no fly list. Senator Ted Kennedy! It took president bush’s direct intervention to remove him. Is that can happen to him, imagine what they can do to us…
Actually thinking of America as the Constitutional Republic it is and myself as a responsible citizen in it rather than the member of a democracy seems to shift and re-center my personal psychology in a positive way. Likewise thinking that being reasonable with unreasonable ideologues will somehow change things or that being shocked and indignant at the psyop antic's of MSM/political clown world is anything but a waste of time.
We must demand transparency on *"most things", and we must **hold them accountable.
* I had a Secret security clearance when I was in the AF. From what I saw A lot of that was CYA. Someone screwed up, and it was hidden. Some wasn't, but waaaay to much was/is.
** I think This pisses people off more than anything. The Unaccountability of "Our Better". And the blatantness of it.
StrategyPage keyword Corruption Major cause of problems around the world.
Nothing is destined 100% in America. We're on the precipice of tyranny and must use the two-party system to rebel. The only Republican Biden can beat is Trump; only his ego prevents him from seeing that. In 2024 it will be necessary for Republicans and independents to coalesce around an electable candidate, Youngkin, DeSantis, Tim Scott or Nikki Hayley. We need to begin Jan 21, 2025, with pre-written Executive Orders and legislation to undo the damage Biden has done.
We do need to come together and defeat the criminal financier's backing the DNC/WEF/CCP juggernaut. In America, removing the DNC from power is priority 1. The Republican Party (my opinion) is malleable and open to change right now. The real force for change in play is the expansion of truth/fact based Subscription journalism.
I assume you meant to write the plural form "financiers'" and not the singular form "financier's," unless of course you referencing the favorite right-wing whipping boy George Soros, who, from my understanding, according to right-wing meme gospel, has been tyrannically running the world for the previous decade or more. Probably just a grammatical misstep on your part.
Anyway, the "DNC/WEF/CCP": That IS quite a juggernaut, and hitched to your criminal financiers' wagon a most impressive jury-rigged conspiracy theory. Perhaps it get will legs, once (and if) it passes muster with the Dark and Deep Web's Conspiracy Theory Apparatchiks.
But tell us, just who are these "criminal financiers" you so frighteningly (and obliquely) reference? And the DNC, WEF, CCP joining forces for anything more than colluding in a price-fixing scheme at all the McDonalds in Sichuan Province is a stretch.
Personally I'm not a Party man, but really---you're much better off devoting time and resources to combatting the neo-fascist insurgency movement that is the modern GOP. And yes, yes, the corporate/MSM/legacy media is a hot mess but it is no more of a hot mess than these propaganda-laden substacks we're hanging out in, like so many drive-in theaters, with their bad movies, bad food, but with appealing opportunities for mischief.
Amen to every single word and syllable of this essay Matt! I can't praise this enough and I'll say that I'm ride or die with you and everyone else here, and elsewhere, with these views. We have a choice, we can stick together, and we can have our rights, freedoms, and country back. Nothing is predetermined and I want to say again, we have a choice. I'm proud to be your subscriber.
A key acknowledgement by Matt was how he succumbed to the fear of ostracism:
"Whatever hold these people had on us, and it was real — I spent years worrying about regaining the favor of people who were denouncing me as a Russian asset even as they demanded my vote — it’s gone now"
It's so important that we all be able to take that heat - that's the courage that's needed. These scolds have nothing more than words to deploy against refuseniks, at least right now. If we don't stand up to them now, they will be able acquire more potent weapons for social control in the future, and fighting back will be all the harder. We need to act now.
And they can ruin one’s life at the drop of a hat by commanding banks disallow one’s ability to even have a bank account or payment system. What institution is going to disregard the government? No trial. No due process.
We are acting. Without subscription journalism Musk would have had nowhere to turn. If we stay solid Orwell will be fiction again (at least here in the Republic).
As a thought 100,000 Americans willing to put up a $1000.00 dollars each to put a Presidential candidate on the ballot with the requirement he/she is capable of writing depth articles promoting factual solutions and planks in a pro-citizen platform.
Agree with D. Tucker. And, thankful Matt & Weiss & Shellenberger and all their supporting cast are helping turn the tide, making it easier to for us as individuals to push back against the ‘Security State” mindset that has afflicted the country since Sept 11, 2001.
Although I don't disagree with the overall point, never underestimate the ability of technology to empower a soulless, autocratic minority. (Although, of course, it can also be used for good.) I'm not much of an expert of finance, politics, or most of the other things you write about, but I do know technology.
The Blob is currently beginning a HARD push for Central Banking Digital Currency, as well as mandatory internet ID systems, either one of which would be absolutely disastrous for the average person. This is not theory or conspiracy, there are state level bills being debated and passed right now. Internet ID is fairly obvious, but Central Banking Digital Currency would basically allow the Federal Reserve, an unelected group, absolute control over the finances of private citizens. You think debanking is bad NOW, just wait until your money comes with expiration dates, purchase restrictions, and a social credit score.
I'm not saying it's hopeless, and I cautiously share some of your optimism. But the fight isn't over. They say that's the price of freedom.
Central Banking Digital Currency is the ultimate battle for the preservation any kind of freedom (esp the freedom to be anonymous and to speak freely): if they can force this on the country, we might as well all just get tattooed barcodes.
I recently flew home from Charleston. There was a woman placing an order for herself and her child ... the total came up and she handed the employee a $20 bill. “ No cash, credit cards only.” I was appalled. That’s just wrong. The meal was paid for but I was fuming that people have to have a credit card?!?!
I don’t view it as racist at all. No one whether you are wealthy or not should be forced to have a credit card or forced to use it. Personal choice. I also don’t think Voter ID is racist. Everyone should want to prove that they are that registered voter and only an ID does that, it says nothing about your socio economic status. And a Voter ID is free to everyone.
Wrong! The voter ID is a solution to a non-existent problem. They even set up a commission to show how BAD the voter problem was and it eventually disbanded in failure. Any you know things are bad when a committee can´t find what it is desperate to prove! So, why the big push for voter ID. Racism is reason number one and reason number 2 is young people who move around and go to college and just can´t be bothered with any more bureaucrasy. Guess what both these groups have in common....
Voter ID is required to establish election integrity and avoid the rigged elections we've grown to despise. The lowering of standards to include "underrepresented people" is a facade to gin up votes that otherwise would not occur. Studies in the past have pointed out that lax standards lead to fraud. Part of this problem lies with dirty voter rolls. No accountability for the immense number of votes arriving during the wee hours of the morning. Fraud undermines the faith in elections and the Democrats have cornered the market in the various forms of deceit.
I believe the restaurant is breaking the law. On each and every Federal Reserve note, (what we all call 'cash' ) it is printed "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE". Take a look in your wallet. the wording is ALL debts.
I now live in Mexico where using cash for all purchases = including expensive medical visits=is pretty much the rule. I prefer using my Visa since it helps me keep track of what I am spending and also avoids having to carry large sums of cash with me. But in this cash only society, you have to make sure you ask before buying or using the services of any provider if they take Visa and if not, how much it will it cost since leaving without paying is not an option.
It really becomes a problem when you are registering for a CT scan at the hospital to make sure you don't have a brain bleed after a fall and are told before the scan is ordered to , hand over enough pesos somewhere in the vacinity of $160 dollars. Most people don't expect to fall so don't have that much case on hand but not to worry, there is always an ATM machine in the lobby.
. As the old saying goes, be careful what you wish for.
Learn the law. It's a private business. They can tell you that they only accept payment in the form of sawed logs for goods and services rendered and it's perfectly legal.
I stand corrected per Feldspar’s note. While US dollar bills all state: "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE", they don’t really mean it. From the Federal Reserve website: “There is no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods or services. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise.” There appear just a smattering of Cities/States requiring acceptance of cash.
Obviously a very troubling situation as several have already noted in the comments. The Canadian Truckers Strike an up-close demonstration of the staggering societal control Governments can exercise with “electronic currency”.
On the flip side, I wonder if the U.S. can actually force currency and coins OUT of circulation en route to “cashlessness” a point Sweden seems to be at?
Rob, I was under your same impression until reading these comments. Just yesterday I was standing in the lunch line at my local ski area. The kid in front of me tried to buy his Mac n cheese with a $10 bill, and the cashier wouldn’t take it, said card only (new policy being widely adopted at ski areas since Covid). The kid gave me his $10 and I charged his lunch. And I was thinking, yeah says right here all debts public and private. From an operational standpoint I can see why they prefer to not take cash. Much cleaner accounting not to mention doing away with armored cars and all that, at least until power go out or the internet crashes.
In many poor countries, especially in Africa, paying with your phone is the primary form of payment. This is a huge benefit for countries with few physical banks and large rural and dispersed populations.
Yes but those are relatively free countries as compared to the United States, where the convenience of mobile payments is no longer a marker of efficient and robust commerce but instead an implement of totalitarianism.
I doubt any of those countries are more free than the US. Your claim that mobile payments are a form of totalitarianism is just plain wrong. I managed payments for a multi-billion dollar retailer and know far more about this than you. I am not saying that retailers and payment processors aren’t collecting granular data on everyone to get consumers to buy more or sell advertising. They are.
I get the advantages for transactions like purchases of food and basic commodities for subsistence.
But this is the point where we need to begin having discussions about the problems of general purpose money, and the advantages of having forms of money that can be separated out and designated for special purposes- acknowledging the differences between currency used for essential subsistence transactions, anonymous currency for personal discretionary purposes and personal property acquisition, and capital investments that should require more accountability for both investment and return, particularly those involving real estate property. https://www.keg.lu.se/en/alf-hornborg
I'm not an expert on these esoteric matters. I'd like to learn that there are ethical people with economics expertise who would be willing to collaborate with people like Alf Hornborg on designing better- specifically less ecocidal- systems of exchange, rather than leaving him to labor in obscurity.A process that would start by having ethical people with economics expertise and unblinkered vision acknowledge that Hornborg has made some invaluable points about the way that both humans and the natural world are being abused in the name of serving the purposes of Markets, when it should be the other way around.
Government doesn’t dictate forms of payment at retail, businesses do. Processing cash deposits requires bodies so retailers prefer credit and debit cards despite the high transaction fees.
Wrong. The government DOES dictate the form of payment - as the commenter said, read what is on the dollar bill. Any business that refuses to take cash is technically breaking the law (but they still get away with it).
Hey dum-dum: The helpful PSA message on your currency refers to government debt, not private debt.
But if you believe otherwise it's you solemn duty as an upright citizen (the assumption is that you're paying your taxes, not a convicted felon, etc.) to enlist a white-shoe law firm and make a good faith attempt to ride your grievance all the way to the Supreme Court so the rest of us may pay for our Denny's Grand Slam Pack with Cold Hard Cash.
We have a few places like that here in Ottawa. It's disgusting and terrifying.
For me though the most dangerous threat will be the AIs that they will use to spy on us in ways that I cannot even imagine. (I assume that they are doing this now)
They will also be used to enact perfect censorship. AIs could, for example, monitor every post, every tweet, comment and even a WP document in real time. I fully expect the day will come when they will censor us in real time. Any utterance that runs counter to what the state wants will delete itself even as you type it. Or worse, it will be recast so that it's no longer crimespeak but duckspeak.
CP, it's tempting to dismiss your comment as as hyperbole. I've read so much hyperbole in comments, and my reply posts often focus on debunking hype and scaremongering.
Not this time, though. You're entirely correct. Alarm is completely justified.
They skipping the barcodes and going straight for the brain implants bro. The mark of the beast may be real in our lifetime. Its a battle between Pierre Tielhard de Chardins heavenly nuosphere, and Mumfords demonic megamachine, for what controlling force will blanket the globe
The people shilling for it in the press sound like starry-eyed bobble-heads. The people who want the most to implement it are a different story. They have to be aware of the control implications. But it's like USA-PATRIOT (that foot in the door); the ultimate answer to all objections is "Trust Us", "We're in your corner", etc.
Has ANYTHING the government rolled out worked the first time around?did everyone get vaccinated? How many times has the government been hacked? Your concerns are still valid.
Quote: "never underestimate the ability of technology to empower a soulless, autocratic minority"
You stole the words right out of my mouth. I'm writing on that right now, adding to what this article purports to be about, which is how to respond. Here's a one-page intro, and I think a more human approach. Cheers. https://markgmeyers.substack.com/p/introduction-to-a-democratic-approach
AI plus CDBC would add up to a turnkey panopticon surveillance operation- over all Americans, and everyone on the planet, potentially- requiring very few humans to "administer." And practically impossible to undo. A level of omniscience that even the PRC hasn't been able to fully implement.
I'm not necessarily opposed to mandatory ID as a prerequisite to access individual Internet websites, on request. But not as a prerequisitive to access a browser, or a search engine.
CBDC is wrong, wrong, wrong, practically to the point of metaphysical Evil. And many of its advocates seem to be focused only on its "convenience", and blithely oblivious of its capability to empower totalitarianism- which isn't merely a potential problem; it's a certainty. There are no "guardrails" to protect the individual under such a regime. There's no way to opt out.
I'm one of its defenders, and I point to Yanis Varoufakis's "Another Now" as the best defense.
I won't argue with you because I take your point. But I will only add that our defense of our money is property law, and it's our onky defense now.
We are already at a point where a totalitarian government could take your money. In our current system, property rights are taken via the use of debt and
intermediaries. They give cover to the theft, make it seem less clear, or perhaps justified.
The thing to oppose is authoritarianism, and our best tool is property law.
Thank you, Bob - you are absolutely correct. The CBDC is the most evil thing ever devised in economic history. I am 83 and quite fortunate to be departing this planet soon but I sincerely fear for my grandchildren and further descendants.
Mr. Bob, every baby born in Estonia gets a digital ID at birth. It's coming faster than people realize, and it will be a law, that's the horror of it all.
Criminal financier's and graft have been the behind the scene butcher's of almost every human set back and tragedy the human race has endured. The mask is off. When Davos thugs openly declare that it is time for Americans to accept limited free speech and American elected political leadership stands silent the DNC/WEF/CCP juggernaut has to go.
The antidote to CBDC is simple - DeFi (as in DE-centralized Finance), like Bitcoin and Ethereum. As long as it's DEcentralized, the government can't touch it (let alone control it), which scares the hell out of BigFinance. Hence, the "HARD push for CBDC." So, any system that runs on a DEcentralized blockchain is safe from the government and banking industry, and relatively stable. Sure it can be a bit volatile, but no worse than the stock market, and Bitcoin has increased on average since its inception. Ex: $18K in December, $27K+ today.
Magically, all the private crypto upstarts seem to be tanking. Yet, it was clearly stated at the WEF just a couple of years ago that governments will establish crypto (which, I assume, is the CBDC) as their primary, single currency of choice. Coincidence? (Smirk) Credit cards already track our spending behaviors. I can have an in person conversation about ANYTHING, and an ad pops up on my phone. I really, really want to stay hopeful. I have six adult grandchildren! But (Jerry McGuire) It's a cynical, cynical world. Not sure how to throw sand in the gears, but willing to do the deed for three hots & a cot.
I love the fact that Matt's in an optimistic mood and has delivered a rousing speech to his team, those of us here in Substack exile who were/are convinced that Big Brother/Sister are only in the beta phase of their plan to smother us all in Digital Groupthink, and are amped because we just scored a big surprise win.
But hey, I pay my $5 to quibble, so here goes:
As for the Karens of Homeland Security, "the public rightfully recoiled from these arrogant power-worshipping mediocrities", but that was only because a competent and credentialed sheriff's posse were able to assemble (Taibbi Shellenberger et al.), and were given a big boost by Elon. It makes me think of the early days of the FBI vs John Dillinger: yeah, they stopped one bank job, but how many more plans are in the works? (Also, that poor hideous Singing Censor woman is an emetic in human form.)
Most of my friends are in the Blue Bubble and they've never heard of the Twitter Files (their outlets don't mention them), and there is literally almost nothing that could penetrate their certitude: politics to them means defeating and erasing the hated Deplorables, nothing more, nothing less.
It makes sense that our ideological junkies are in rehab now that it's early 2023, they need to regain some sanity and credibility, but we're about 18 mos out from "the most important election of our lifetimes!" with "democracy on the ballot!" and "literal fascism!": all these ghouls will be unleashed by then and ready to lie, cheat & steal to "protect democracy" aka make sure we all do as we're told.
Clever- you’re probably right. But I was in that bubble until 2018ish? Eventually, you’re apt to see a lie that makes you look at everything you thought you knew. Convincing people that the media is a propaganda dumpster fire isn’t the heavy lift it once was. And it gets lighter every day.
I keep waiting for the break-through moment. So far most have not. I tweeted one of MT's posts and was asked on Twitter how could I support someone who is being paid by Elon Musk? Don't people know about Starlink? Who do they think is behind rockets to the ISS?
The trolls on Twitter are the worst scumbags - they're not the least interested in engaging in real conversation. Ad hominem attacks are their specialty and those fit neatly in Twitter's character count limitations. We should continue to use all available methods to raise awareness and bring sunlight, including Twitter, but not be put off by responses from the Twits.
I hope their bubble does burst and the significant number of people who do trust them and count on them to “protect everyone from the uneducated” (or however they decide to delineate stupid people) stop seeing them as saviors.
I suspect a complication is that those that support the “smarter” people making the decisions get a good feeling when they trust they also will always be above the stupid people, will never be a target, and will always benefit from the government limiting the power of the stupid people (and that it benefits the stupid people as well and thus is benevolent not oppressive). Warm fuzzies built in all around.
It feel like maybe it is too easy to miss how much power it takes to be able to declare a group “oppressive” and silence them. It is maybe also easily forgotten how often things shift, or how different locations have different powerful classes of people. How “oppressive” can any group be if they are easily silenced? How “oppressed” can a group be if their message is in every public square as the only acceptable belief to hold?
For instance, I was stunned to see how popular “safe spaces for victims”became and the resulting segregation was cheered as if it bore no resemblance to USA segregation in the past. To some highly educated people cross cultural celebration became insulting rather than respectful. (Wasn’t that basically the same idea the KKK promoted, even if it was selfishly protecting their own culture instead of the protecting the outsider’s culture from them?) Is the claim that past segregation, and demands to prevent integration in the USA was only wrong because it was based on racism, not good intentions? Add in the fact that a person in an oppressed class becomes oppressive when they cross political lines, and it starts to feel like perhaps the worst sin of all is to develop respect for people with opposing political views? It’s like we forget who the “domestic terrorists” are versus who the “legitimate morally sound protesters” are depends to some extent more on who controls the ability to jail them than on actions taken by the protesters / dangerous revolutionaries. It is easy to forget that historically the same opinion that made a person a hero at one time could leave a person a jailed traitor in a different time period. For instance the difference between Assange “the protector of journalism, freedom, and democracy” and Assange “the spy who leads to innocents dying and endangers democracy” has little to do with what he did and more to do with the consequences he will ultimately face.
There are so many odd contradictory things that the current “brilliant” people need their “like-minded” peers to embrace and force on the “lower-minded” people for the “greater good”. Power dynamics will change who ends up in which group and who is part of the “greater good” to be protected.
Maybe what we need is a cultural shift to let go of a need to get approval from and inclusion in the “greater-minded benevolent” people group and to develop more appreciation for the vast number of people who are publicly and broadly classified as “lesser-minded and selfish”- regardless of which individuals occupy either group? It might feel like there is a permanently “safe” group to be part of, especially if it feels like your group can censor and punish outsiders “justifiably” but I think historically such behavior leads to miserable times for the majority of people no matter who gets that power.
Exactly, if the various aggrieved groups were truly so oppressed, and bigotry so rampant and accepted, it would be impossible for a member of one of those groups to so easily destroy one of the oppressors with mere accusations of bigotry. That people wield those so freely and even gleefully shows that at some level they know things aren’t nearly as bad as they claim.
Unherd released a study showing that only 30% of Brits thought the lockdowns were a bad idea. Dr. Vinay Prasad believes that number will rise significantly over the next few years. I hope he is right. I doubt he is. The effectiveness of getting people to turn on one another and blame each other was breathtaking. Even today, rather than blaming BirxBidenTrumpFauciWallenskyPfizerModerna, there are people still clinging to the idea that 'the science changed' instead of realizing they got conned by parasitic, dishonest, integrity-free political and public health leaders who even today continue to lie, cover up, distract and point at any other 'evildoer'.... anyone other than themselves.
Until 40-50% of we the people pull our heads out, this will continue. It's still happening now. See Ukraine, East Palestine, SVB, Nordstream2, the demonization of Tick Tock to benefit entrenched social media companies, the deliberate destruction of Crypto and on and on and on.
Desmond Mathias referred to a book I should probably remember the name of about a guy who went to live in a German village 8 or 10 years after WW II. The normal people there that had aligned with the Nazi’s, excepting one or two, still had fond feelings towards Hitler and the Nazis even after the horrors had been revealed.
Like the loyal Covidians today, the fact that those who bought the propoganda still believe it doesn’t mean that it will be remembered as good or necessary. It robbed a generation of children of their healthy development taking years off their life from lost education, increasing obesity, and phycological damage - and thats to say nothing of the millions of destroyed businesses, died suddenly, 150 million people who lost their ability to eat, and 1 million poor girls (on the low end) sold into sexual slavery.
That the Covidian masses are still brain washed speaks only to the power of brainwashing. History will not ever look back on this time and see it as positive, no matter who writes the books. Once those committed to the lies are dead or irrelevant the reality of the outcomes is what will be written about.
The accountant of Auschwitz - who was put on trial several years ago testified that he was horrified at the brutality - but he still believed killing the Jews was the right thing to do. That is the power of propaganda - particularly when people are young. Whether we want to admit it or not we will have an entire generation who believe we will die from global warming, that men can become women, etc. We took our eyes off the ball and let bad faith ideologues take over our schools and universities. It will take a generation to rebuild.
As a retired scientist, I was appalled at what Covid did to science. Important papers were censored-- Gazit et al, 2021, showing in a massive (smallest group over 60,000 subjects) Israeli study ( that natural immunity was 27-fold more protective against symptomatic Covid; the same groups as well as others found longer-lasting 5- fold or better protection with natural immunity, publications which were totally ignored and suppressed by the CDC. A Danish paper on masks where the authors hypothesized a 20% protection against Covid, but saw no effect (and a similar no effect of cloth masks found by a large Bangladesh study, though a special mask produced a small (11%) protection from infection. Another Danish meta-analysis (Stabell Benn and Schaltz Buchholzer, 2022) comparing EUA trials and their equivalents of all available Covid vaccines, finding among other things that the US mRNA Covid vaccines, despite combined >37,000 vaccinated subjects and >37,000 placebo subjects in the Gold Standard Trials during a raging epidemic, there was no vaccine protection against death, nor any significant protection against Covid death, although the mRNA had a significant effect on symptomatic Covid. Recently there has been a wave of excess deaths globally (generally deaths drop after "harvesting" of the weakest by a pandemic), and Norwegian researchers found that for every 1% of the population Covid vaccinated in a country in 2021, there was a 0.105% INCREASE in excess deaths in 2022
( preprints.org/manuscript/202302.0350/v1aaaaaa0 . Globally there are about 60 million deaths per year and about 2/3 of the global population is vaccinated, so my math shows about 4 million excess (non-Covid) deaths if the Norwegians are correct. That compares to 6.8 million Covid deaths world-wide. There are many other examples, many papers remain in pre-print due to conflicts with political narratives (and the important work is no longer done in the US, rather in Qatar and similar countries); only papers which support the Official Narratives are quickly published. I'm not saying the papers mentioned are all correct, but they point to directions which should be explored, and if need be refuted.
The lack of curiosity, the destruction of iconoclastic attitudes in scientists bent on supporting political agendas (no doubt to protect grants) has turned American Covid science into an almost Lamarckian enterprise. The lack of dissent/ debate, the authoritarian nonsensical vaccine mandates (with leaky mRNA vaccines shown not to block infection, spread nor death), the pushing of remdesivir (garbage according to the WHO), the early suppression of glucocorticoids (the most effective drug for treating serious Covid cases), the suppression of use of vitamins and supplements (particularly effective prophylactically in the Elderly, many of whom are vitamin-deficient), and of course the deriding of repurposed drugs (as a toxicologist both ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine-- approved to treat diabetics in India-- are both safe at therapeutic doses. HCQ takes forever to load, so is unlikely to be effective acutely. Ivermectin ( c19ivm.org/meta.html ) has shown efficacy, but not in Gold Standard trials (the same sort in which mRNA vaccines failed to block death).
The biggest US failure was to pretend that Covid can kill anybody. Over 90% of Covid deaths are in those aged 65 or older (even the CDC FINALLY admits that) and most Covid deaths are in those over age 80. Only vaccinating these Elderly (and a relatively small percent of seriously ill people) was ever justified.
Agree 100%. I saw all that stuff as it came out in Swiss Policy Research. A few people I texted it to actually read, but many were too gullible to the nitwits who lie about everything on the nightly news.
A solid plurality of voters in this country are today convinced that Donald Trump is a White Supremacist Russian asset (and somehow also a Nazi) who implored his followers to drink bleach, and was just barely thwarted from overthrowing the United States govt. via a speech, or perhaps some mind control.
I was at the Seattle protest, with my partner, Kristin Kolb. We didn't care about Russian collusion. It was his mouth that brought us there. The "grab 'em by the..." comment.
Funny thing is, though, according to certain conservative Catholics, it was the gender bender pioneer academics who worked in Berlin, before inserting hundreds of pedophilic, Marxist priests into the Catholic Church. Happened in the 30s.
"Who's your friend and who's your foe? Who's your Judas? You don't know
Night of the long knives, night of the long knives, Night of the long knives, night of the long long knife"
I’m not convinced that lockdowns were a bad idea. The vaccine was some level of evil. I think conflating lockdowns and mandates muddies the water. Allegedly, there was Covid then delta, then omicron. If that’s true and it morphed into something less lethal due to lockdowns, it should be discussed.
I started following the case of Sweden early on, via the Johns Hopkins CoronaVirus Center, which just stopped collecting data 2 weeks ago (03/10/2023.)
Sweden's mortality for coronavirus alone is slightly elevated in comparison to Norway and Denmark, which had much more restrictive policies. But I don't doubt that you're correct about overall excess mortality.
The wholesale lockdown policy has proved to be terribly disruptive, particularly for school age children and small businesses, and this should have been foreseen and the probable negative consequences should have been assessed. At minimum, the policy should have been modified after the end of the first school year, and expanded once the vaccine was available (and yes, I do realize that this makes Governor DeSantis look good- and no, I'm not a fan of his, for unrelated reasons.)
I'm currently sharing a household with a relative in her 90s. I'm her primary caregiver (thankfully she doesn't need that much of it.) I'm still maintaining quarantine protocols to some extent, and vigilance. Quarantine restrictions for vulnerable populations and people in their immediate circle make sense, and I've had no problem complying with them. That's how it was done in Sweden, although unfortunately covid got the jump on elderly Swedes in group setting like nursing homes early on, before the restrictions could be effectively implemented.
I'm pro-vaccine (for adults), and so are most Swedes- they were early adopters, and the compliance rate is about 80%. I think that was crucial in curbing the pandemic. But the effect of the US general lockdown on the spread of the virus is highly questionable. The data is still being analyzed- and it has to be balanced with all of the other disruptive effects on the economy and social functioning. The negative impacts have been dramatic, and they continue to play out. I think a policy of targeted quarantine restrictions would have been a much better idea.
Sweden doesn’t have the per capita obesity or population density. But next time we can do it your way. When old fat teachers die we can console ourselves with fewer sucides and kids that are not as dumb by virtue of prolonged exposure to their parents. I’m sure someone, possibly you will second guess that decision too.
The notion that a graduated quarantine protocol couldn't possibly contain an exception for elderly, obese, or immunocompromised school personnel and caregivers is entirely a feature of your own speculative fantasy.
Maybe you should take it over to Twitter. I hear they're friendlier to such gimmickry there. Maybe get a rat-pack going, and ratio anyone you can tag as The Enemy with a snark barrage comprised of similar scenarios, with extra hyperbole on top.
What you mock as "second-guessing", others refer to as medical review and risk assessment. For example this panel, which includes Martin Makary, MD, of Johns Hopkins University. https://www.c-span.org/video/?524736-1/centers-disease-controls-handling-covid-19# The written transcript is atrocious, worse than worthless (unless someone has cleaned it up since I've read it), but it makes for a thought-provoking listen.
At the very outset of the breakthrough of SARS-CoV-2 to the outside world in March 2020, I read an article that included comments by an unnamed Australian observer, giving his advice about the best way to stop the epidemic in its tracks: give $50,000 to every household in the country (131 million, in the US), in return for staying completely Wuhan-style locked down for a couple of months. The cost would have been a bit over $6 trillion.
At the time, I thought that was a really drastic recommendation. As it happens, we ended up disbursing around 2/3 that amount in cash handouts anyway, while locking down the country less effectively for a considerably longer expanse of time. (The NYT says it's more like 5/6 the amount https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/03/11/us/how-covid-stimulus-money-was-spent.html )
We'll never know if Total Quarantine in return for for $50,000 would have worked. It might be worth modeling something like that in advance, though, in case of the next breakout of an epidemic virus.
The lockdowns harmed all children, wiped out businesses, ruined marriages, destroyed economies, endangered those vulnerable to domestic violence, retarded education by factors of years, delayed necessary medical treatments, interfered with social and religious activity necessary for mental health, did ab-so-fucking-lutely nothing to protect anyone from the overhyped "threat" of covid --- these are all facts --- and you are "not convinced" they were a bad idea? Do you have a functioning brain stem, sir?
Of all the bad results from the vaccine and boosters that I have heard, this is a new one. A friend told me yesterday of her sister in Oregon who lost all of her hair - head, legs, eyelashes, etc jjust after her third booster shot. I assumed when she started telling me the story, that her sister had alopecia but no, both are convinced it was due to the booster. I overheard a woman telling her friend that she was about to get her 6th booster. I wonder what she will lose.
Reeks, do tell about overhyped. Your sniveling is overhyped. In March of 2020 Italy recorded 900 deaths from Covid in a weekend. Toilet paper was sold out. If Covid spread at its original pace lockdown would have been self imposed by the employees who would have been too terrified to come to work Or too busy taking care of loved ones who wouldn’t fit in hospitals. Which in turn would have crippled the economy to a greater extent and caused even more panic and civil unrest. Comparing original flavor Covid with omicron is lost on this revisionist history indignation. Americans are fat finger pointing assholes. Inaction by government while NY city was clogging its streets with refrigeratored trailers with corpses wasn’t an option.
Meanwhile, COVID’s origins and Fauci Involvement in creating this in the first place. Let’s stipulate your assertions about shitty little businesses or how children were harmed by spending more time with their self absorbed parents etc. None of it even happens without gain of function and lies. And trying to 2020 hindsight the reaction to the pandemic obscures nih and pharmaceuticals much graver crimes. And my brain stem operates about as well as could be expected given my immersion in a culture of hyperbolic mouth breathers such as you
The problem isn't quarantine per se- it's the total lockdown approach that was taken.
I don't view this as conspiracy, though. It was about "erring on the side of caution" taken to an unnecessary extreme. A panic reaction driven by the Cover Your Ass mentality of democratically elected politicians and massive bureaucratic institutions. Political leaders in democratic countries- particularly in election years- are terrified of worst case scenarios for which they might be held responsible. So erring on the side of caution is natural. The problem is that since we're evidently governed largely by Visa Black Card carrying members of the HNW <1% these days, they were easily convinced that the virus was the only challenge they had to contend with. The actual impact of shutting down damn near every brick and mortar business and public school in the country didn't loom large as a counterbalancing priority to them. But what it did to small businesses was devastating (while also enabling massive fraud, though the stopgap compensation programs.) The large corporate businesses had sufficient capital to wait out the quarantine, but what happened to numerous small businesses seems more like the equivalent of getting "laid off" with a severance check. And as for what's happened to public education and adolescent socialization...well, let's hope for a mostly complete recovery, eventually. It's too early to tell. In the meantime, we're "dealing with challenges", as the jargon goes. We, the common people, that is. The <1% were plainly fairly well insulated from the impacts at the household level, as the personal social behavior of some of them has clearly indicated. (Granted, there are a few exceptions on the record.)
The fundamental problem was that the decision-making process about how to organize a response to the pandemic was given over entirely to infectious disease/public health epidemiologists. Their only concern was preventing disease transmission. They proved utterly incapable of assessing the harms of their policies despite many (partially suppressed and marginalized) voices expressing great concern (aka malinformation). They could only see the "good" they would do through their public health expertise. All the other perspectives that needed to be taken into account, including people with expertise in education (not the monsters like Weingarten), child psychologists, economists, medical preventionists, etc, were shut out from the decision-making. The US's disastrous Covid response is THE prime example why response to public health threats cannot be led by public health experts. Their input is obviously very important, but a broader perspective must be considered, with elected leadership weighing it all in making decisions.
It was the "raccoon dog" (sarc) I'm just a prole in construction and I was deemed essential or expendable I'm not sure which one but when the mask issue was being laid out I had to laugh. Wearing a mask to sand drywall or install insulation is not effective unless you use a properly fitted mask and even still you end up sucking in visible dust or fiberglass fibers. In Nov 2020 I started looking at the CDC and state death totals and what age brackets were being effected and it was predominately the 65 plus crowd. If it had been kids I would of been the neighbor telling you to get back in your house. We lacked leadership in protecting us and there is lots of blame to go around. Tony f reminded me of a volunteer fireman who helped start a fire to gain respect in putting out the fire. Maybe the comedians like Jon Stewart or Woody Harrelson on SNL can break through the mirage for the rest of the proles less "informed"
If you read Karl Taro Greenfeld's 2006 book The China Syndrome, about SARS CoV-1, you'll learn enough about "wet markets" to realize that the raccoon dog hypothesis is entirely plausible. But so is the "gain of function research" lab hypothesis.
The thing that can be most confidently concluded is that the release was not intentional- nobody is stupid enough to unleash a germ warfare outbreak on their own soil, right next to their own virology lab.
Your Fahrenheit 451 reference for Fauci is most appropriate!
Can't say I'm surprised by Fauci's public comments - I would probably lie about it too if I'd funded/supported GoF research that led to the deaths of 7 million people.
Your assertion is demonstrably wrong. Delta, which began during heavy lockdowns, was far more lethal than earlier strains. Omicron, which came out once lockdowns had been lifted everywhere on the planet except a few blue states in the US, was far less lethal than any earlier version. Lockdowns drove a more virulent and lethal strain. Delta was never “more mild” than earlier strains.
studies on the failure of government mandated Covid interventions gathered and linked by the highly respected Brownstone. At this point it doesn’t matter if you are convinced, the evidence of failure is overwhelming and replicated.
I read it. A lot of it anyway. It points to a lot of suicide and children’s education suffering. Personally I’m not moved. Next time we can do nothing. I’m personally comfortable with that. But doing nothing will expose other societal woes. And those will be blamed on the lack of action. I see that as revisionist history chicken little speak that defines a once great nation.
You can blame your neighbor or every mask wearing tool or the nearest fat person. Or me. You’re not even wrong. But the fauci pharmaceutical ilk were malevolent and fiercely lying to cover their tracks while becoming grotesquely wealthy. I can blow holes in those studies. I’m hoping to save my ammunition for more deserving targets.
Japan never locked down, but had essentially 100% mask wearing. About two weeks ago the government finally decreed that mask-wearing should now be considered a free personal choice, but most people are still wearing them (even outside).
Lockdowns were absolutely unnecessary and caused irreversible harm especially to children. I’d agree that the vaccine mandates were higher on the moral reprehensibility scale, but no reason we can’t call out both evils.
It morphed into something less lethal because that’s what strains of viruses do and eventually die. The Lockdowns contributed to people staying inside, no Vitamin D, no fresh air and wearing masks inhaling your own germs, fibrous plastic particles and CO2. So Fauci is a flunky virologist or he knew from Day One it was not a natural virus.
I have been saying for the last 6 years, only the liberals can save us from the progressives. Unfortunately, most liberals are largely weak and sheep-like and decided to endure any level of tyranny from the far left vs. being called a racist, homophobe, transphobe or god forbid - MAGA! Thank god there were a few old school liberals like you, Walter and Elon, who all refused to take the knee. Because of this small group if courageous liberals, others are slowly coming out of their bunker, now that it seems possibly safe. While I agree with you that we may have turned the corner, the gutless liberals who enabled this tyranny for the past 6 years need to be called out and shamed for the pussies they are.
Much like only women can save women’s sports, prisons, and womanhood at large. I’m very opinionated and passionate about the issue, but reading the room, this can’t be my battle. You go (real) girls.
Indeed, as my buddy said to me the other day about the practical implication of the “nonbinary” restroom at the new airport - this is just another men’s restroom.
There will be a comeuppance for all of those trans-men who want to use the Ladies' bathrooms. They will be standing in lines waiting to get into one during a 15 minute long intermission and be late for the next act while the men go in and out in 2 minutes. I expect that after experiencing the usual ordeal that women have to go through, they will trans back.
Glad to see some women fighting back in the sports world, and I’m almost embarrassed that athletics pisses me off more than the plight of incarcerated women. But, truth be told, if I ever end up losing it and get arrested I’m Josephine and will be straight dominating those hoes in the showers. I’m not made to hold pockets…
I’m with you trembo. I just witnessed a biological male come in first in slalom and 3rd in GS against 84 biological females (my daughter included) in our state high school ski racing championships. As shocking as it was, more troubling was the apparent resignation to this injustice the girls outwardly expressed. The brainwashing of our youth is real, but at least I can educate my daughter.
Sorry to hear that your daughter is being subjected to this playing field. It’s sheer insanity. There should be a women’s/girl’s division and an open division.
Indeed it is sad to see these short-sighted women cheering this on. What will the landscape look like in another ten years if this goes unchecked?
Yes, it’s one thing to read about it happening far away, quite another to see it up close. I’m cautiously optimistic sanity will prevail. I’ve written to all of my local, state and federal representatives as well as the county and district superintendents. The feedback at the local level has been encouraging. Sadly, they do not make state policy. That’s another battle. If it continues unchecked private leagues will spring up specifically for biological females. Hope it doesn’t have to come to that. I am certain the vast, vast majority of parents feel as I do. They just need the chops to speak up.
Great essay, Matt! I appreciate that you called out the growing realization that apologies are not the proper response to the vocal minority's attempts to cancel and shame. It doesn't fix anything because it's not what they are seeking, and it builds resolve within the ideologies that are threatening to tear this society apart.
By the way, Jan-6 was a constitutionally-protected protest and yet the protesters are being sent to prison... by a tiny minority of horrible people fully supported by a percentage of the general population that are absolutely sure they are not horrible people by being gleeful that these protestors are being sent to prison.
How do I know the 1st Amendment is doomed? Because when the government's role in censorship was uncovered and made public, the left cheered and said good, it's as it should be; because when Biden announced his Ministry of Truth, the left cheered and said good, it's as it should be.
If ours is a government that derives its authority from the consent of the governed, the governed have sent a resounding clarion of approval for repealing the 1st Amendment.
They've already trashed the legal foundation of innocent until proven guilty in the name of the #metoo crowd. Was it really such a stretch to use the foundation of harping innuendo and tantrums to destroy freedom of expression? The strategy was sound; the reach just right, and the worm will make its way through the Bill of Rights eating away at one right after another.
We were warned repeatedly before the Patriot Act was rammed through, that “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety”. And here we are some 2 decades later with a decimated Bill of Rights hanging on by the thinnest of threads, and a more dangerous world than ever before.
I'm waiting for the Sy Hersh insider scoop on 9/11. Like how Building 7 fell at free fall rate, because of a fire in the basement. Until that sunlight shines through, we will continue to have these bacteria crawling all over everything.
Even if we're 100% destined to lose and fall into tyranny, that's no reason to just submit.
Dylan Thomas would agree.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
The past eight years are best summed up as the People versus the Elite. The Elite are used to controlling the media and the story, but Twitter etc did in fact democratize the public conversation, to the Elite's great dismay. They can no longer destroy a candidate by deciding to do so and telling a narrative, because there are direct ways to communicate with the people. So the Elite are simply setting about taking back control as best they can. It is an age-old battle no different than Patrician versus Plebian.
One thing the People need to realize is the Elite do have a leadership role to play. Hold them account for how badly they are playing it now, but the final equilibrium we reach has to include roles for both, again just as Rome balanced the forces over years. Read Alan Ryan or any other serious political philosopher - the elite have always been given some advantages and looked to for leadership for the system to be in balance.
I always preferred the other Dylan:
Standing on the gallows with my head in the noose
Any minute now I'm expecting all hell to break loose
People are crazy & times are strange
I'm locked in tight, I'm out of range
I used to care but things have changed
Only a young man could say such things.
I was referring to the poet. 😉
Eternit my has been put into the hearts of men. We feel we are meant for another world. So we lament this one and the jar of clay in which we live.
I assume you mean "Eternity has been put into the hearts of men."?
That’s life... That’s what all the people say. You’re riding high in April, shot down in May. But I know I’m gonna change that tune, when I’m back on top, back on top in June.
The day I learned of the Disinformation Governance Board I immediately posted on my substack that the Ministry of Truth has arrived. I'm 75, wheelchair bound, and made up a cardboard sign to protest the MoT. Unfortunately, I'm one of the younger members of the community, and my neighbors boo'd until I went inside. They thought I was protesting Matt Troth, the new pastor at the Church around the corner.
Now THAT'S funny!
Funny. And Good Job!
Oh Ministry of Truth. Ok never mind
What is MoT?
It's exhausting to make a case with people so deluded, manipulated, prideful and conned that they are unwilling to look at facts.
How did Yuri Bezmenov put it.... "You can ram an aircraft carrier up their ass and they still wouldn't believe it" - or something like that.
“People not only don't know what's happening to them, they don't even know that they don't know.”
― Noam Chomsky
I would add that they don't even want to know.
Some people.........and all those with intelligence and a curious mind capable of critical thinking want to know. That generally does not include the academy of the credentialed but uneducated who seem to think a PHd in education or racial theory are deserving of respect, they aren't.
I’m unsure of the intelligence part but I’m certainly curious.
My epiphany comes from the Twitter files and that no matter how much of an asshole Trump was and is, there was and truly is a deep state out to get him, all sorts of government organizations actively working to get rid of a sitting president duly elected.
Any woke progressives ok with that should forfeit the right to vote for at least 10 years.
I feel much the same about LORD Trump.
The deep state and media (same thing?) pogrom to "get him", was as obvious as it was reckless and stupid.
The one characteristic that trumps whatever good a Trump Presidency could have been or could again be is his habit of lying as a normal form of speech, maybe as a bizarre means of gaining attention.
But who cares? Let's see. New Yorkers recently elected a liar named George Santos who lies in order to deceive and has no idea apparently that his habit represents the essence of the perversion of American democracy where we no longer value what is right or true because all is relative. The people have, his constituency has asked him to step down.
Trump will not fight Russia.
Biden will.
Life or death.
Pick one.
Can you give me a politician, especially one from the left who does not lie as easily as they breath? Your innate hatreds are at play not Trumps propensity for embellishment. Why pick on the poor schlub that is George Santos when there are many examples of that which you complain who are far more important given their tenure and the enormity of their deceit and duplicity.
There are plenty of assholes running around in Washington, why single out Trump when he currently has no influence on current policy? If your epiphany only occurred upon the release of twitter files where have you been hiding. It's been obvious from the get go that Trump has been maliciously maligned out of hatred not his tendency toward embellishment and untruths, but what politician isn't?
It's kind of funny that when Noam Chomsky says it, people think its brilliant, but when Donald Rumsfeld says the same thing... about unknown unknowns, he's a pompous ass.
IMHO, they both fall into the same category. Professional Assholes.
Like Matt, I prefer people who don't hyperventilate about the personal = political every five seconds. Live a little. Have fun. Watch a ballgame. Go to a concert. Talk to someone of the opposite sex (not gender). Get laid. Anything but worry about fascism being around the corner. Hint: it isn't.
The dark night of Fascism is always descending upon America and yet lands only in Europe.
Tom Wolfe
Chomsky is one of the greatest minds of the 20th century.
Every word of what Rumsfeld said is grammatically and logically perfect.
Fascism is here.
I was censored by Fakebook, for posting a meme of Mussolini's definition of fascism. Tweaker censored me for posting a photo of a Tibetan nun, self-immolating, in context of CCP human rights abuses. I'm inclined to agree with you.
If I remember correctly, Viet Nam was largely Rumsfeld's fault. He distorted the facts to promote a lie.
I think you are confusing Rummy with someone else. Kennedy kicked off the war, which was then promulgated and expanded by LBJ, and Nixon.
Isn’t ignorance a bliss?
;-)) and ;-((
It kind of is!
(Smiles idiotically)
:)
I find Chomskys silence on all this odd.
Oh But They Do!
There’s a whole lot of not wanting to know. It’s a big deal. I think that part needs exposed more thoroughly.
“It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.” - Epictetus
A variation on “you have to know what you don’t know” in order to learn.
Or, if you already know everything it’s impossible to learn anything new.
I see lots of that every day, prime minister Trudeau is a walking parody of intelligence, incapable of learning anything new
"Almost no one who has fervent ideas has a good epistemic basis for the amount of certainty they have. There is a disconnect between the amount of certainty they have, and the amount of certainty they SHOULD have, through right process."
----Daniel Schmachtenberger
“The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.” Bertrand Russell
It’s easy take their power from them - and mostly that means just ignoring the middlingly intelligent authoritarian self proclaimed “experts” and their sad weak little gullible sheep. Laughing at them helps. Offering sensible pragmatic alternatives to their idiotic feelings based demands while staying rooted in actual reality destroys their influence.
Single young college kids (mostly women) are the footsoldiers of the tyrannic revolution however and theyre the most emotional and least wise demographic of the country. Difficult to combat bc you cant shut young people up in the age of social media, you cant limit them getting into positions of power or they’ll claim misogyny, even their own parents love them and therefore dont wanna drop the hammer of truth or consequence on them. Young women are the most difficult demographic to combat bc human societies (and men biologically) evolved an inclination towards protecting and supporting that group. But now theyre fully unhinged and enforcing the idiocracy on every college campus, every corporate HR department, and soon every courtroom in america
As a woman I totally agree with you.
You hit the hammer on the mail. We went through a more radical human social evolution in the past 60 years than the agricultural society but somehow we pretend nothing happened; any observation or criticism is shouted down with vitriol; they’ve already ruined a lot of institutions and traditional safeguards.
Excellent point. Part of the reason the group has drifted so far, is because their increasing fake progressivism, hasn't cost them anything personally. That might be about to change. Many recent college graduates, especially those without STEM degrees, have spent the last few years being paid far more than they are worth. Secure in jobs obtained with Mom and Dad's connections, in an economic downturn, and without Covid handouts, there will be an economic awakening. Ditto for crime. Defund the police, open the prisons and bail reform take on a new meaning when you or a loved one become a victim. Unemployed and afraid to go out at night, might move abortion rights, in a a state in which you do not reside, off the top of top of one's voting priorities.
What you are describing here is a MASSIVE issue. Which no one will touch...
I heard that the California Reparations committee wants to delete the bar exam. So litigation will come down to who can yell "racist" louder.
Birth control is responsible for most INCELS. 80% of women keep fighting/flirting over the same top-20% of eligible (or ineligible) bachelors - while the dweebs have to get their jollies via only fans. This already is not ending well.
They're not dweebs. They're humans.
/sarc implied. Sorry for the offense.
Leave it to the young men to burn it all down
Sweeping Generalizations! Simply not true ... signed a proud Mother of a fairly conservative daughter!
There's no such thing as a "mother". (You're correct. Our indignity at the thorns often keeps us from seeing the roses.)
So the Muslims are right?
Scary Poppins' lyrics are even more ominous than Matt identifies.
"They’re laundering disinfo and we really should take note
And not support their lies, with our wallet, voice or vote!"
The "our wallet" line was exactly Trudeau's approach to the Canadian truckers. These disinfo experts seem unable to distinguish between "our wallet" and "your wallet."
The combination of smugness and sanctimony of these people is just so revolting.
I think that you'd like my episode on her. She didn't last long enough for it to get much traction but it goes deeper into the mechanism of censorship, which seems up your alley from your moniker. Here's the first paragraph:
Today’s episode looks at the new Disinformation Governance Board of Homeland Security and how it turns facts and logic into terrorism, and arbitrary authority into a power that can overrule Presidents and Congress. Its executive director, Nina Jankowicz, has put her philosophy into a disinfo ditty, which is the only place where you can find her definition of this new form of domestic threat. So I’ll be analyzing her examples and applying to them the original rules of how to figure out when someone’s trying to hidealittle hidealittle hidealittle lie, in her words. These rules, from the home of democracy in ancient Greece, were called rhetorical fallacies. And I’ll end with the 10 Principles of War Propaganda, developed before WWI. But first let’s talk about logic. https://thirdparadigm.substack.com/p/nina-jankowicz-the-warbling-warmonger.
I appreciate the style of your video! Being able to identify arguments that hinge upon strawmen or undoing definitions of long-established words is a fundamental skill to see through the propaganda we are being fed.
Thank you! Yes, etymology is a pet passion for a reason. Words are coined to capture a meaning and using the word with a new meaning is a favorite trick of psyops. I really appreciate you watching my video!
Orwell said it all.
Adams identified the abuse of words as a real issue long ago as well.
Strong explanation of rhetorical fallacies on your You Tube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzwB94ZJ0gY
Oh I'm so glad I'm not the only fan of rhetorical fallacies! Thank you, Kathleen.
Rhetorical fallacies often are the only thing being communicated, especially in political discourse. Glad to see this brought up.
Could it be that They (our betters) believe Our wallets Are Their wallets?
Absolutely. And that's the danger of a centralized digital currency.
Here is the GoFundMe page for her lawsuit against Fox News
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-nina-hold-fox-news-accountable-for-its-lies
I wish you could comment without donating. Who are the idiots donating to that literal fascist? That’s what blows my mind… not that evil tyrants exist… but that they have supporters.
The Politico piece of poor Nina having to deal with all this while changing diapers was an audacious bit of camouflage writing. Apparently 713 people in the US care enough to help her out with her lawsuit. Ironic that she's going to rely on an objective, public body (a court) to evaluate her claims of truth - if only her disinfo board would have allowed all of us to have the same opportunity.
Also amazing is that she apparently still fails to see determining disinformation as policing speech. Just own it, Nina!
Yeah, if you have to raise money for a plaintiff's case, it means your lawyers expect to lose.
"The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed - where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once." -- Alex Kozinski
I'd love to think it would never be necessary to shed blood to preserve our liberty; but doing that denies how that liberty was established in the first place.
Second amendment also codifies the most important natural right--the right to life thru self-defense.
We often overlook how bloody nose human the Constitution is. Core protection of the individual from the machination's of organized thugdom (usually criminal finance). The first tell in the game is wrapped in the flag mouth pieces selling less is more human rights.
I chose to be an optimist, or an optimistic pessimist. Because I Read/Study history. Seen this movie before.
Whether optimist or pessimist - or both, or neither - we who owe our lives to this great country need to be fighters!
Absolutely Agree. 3 things we can do. 1. Keep ourselves informed (this means reading Both Sides), 2. Using that information in talking to family/friends/co workers, 3. Spend you money (as much as possible) on companies/groups that you agree with or promote you agenda.
I don't submit. I rise up. In the words of Will Durant, "it looks like we've got a united minority working against a divided majority". We could unite... Intro:
EDIT-fixed-link: https://markgmeyers.substack.com/p/introduction-to-a-democratic-approach
And I think you may have seen this already, SM, but here's my post on:
https://thirdparadigm.substack.com/p/nina-jankowicz-the-warbling-warmonger
Big Sister
You should read the new Stephen Hunter novel where Earl Swagger meets George Orwell…a fictional meeting of truth….
URL?
Amazon.com…..The Bullet Garden….
Thee is also Shooter staring Mark Wahlberg.
Read Em...or many.
We could and should use technology to organize better. Hand down our BIGGEST problem is that our systems have been corrupted.
Let's Build a decentralized digital 4th Branch of Government that Holds The Other Branches Accountable -100% Run by the People
https://joshketry.substack.com/p/lets-build-a-4th-branch-of-government
We already have a decentralized digital 4th Estate that holds the government accountable. We are using it here and now to communicate.
Just a few days ago I was talking to my twenty-something neighbour, an upper-class Brit from London who is studying "International Relations" at a good university. He's also a very bright guy.
Since we had talked about the Nord Stream pipeline operation last September, and he had reflexively believed that the "Russians did it"; I thought I would mention the article by Sy Hersh that claims America did it.
He not only had not even heard of the article, he had no idea who Sy Hersh is. Need I add that he immediately rejected the idea that America would do such a thing?
So yes, there is a 4th Estate, but, "is our children learning" anything like the Truth from them?
Not in this case.
My youngest daughter lives in England & both she & her husband have degrees from Cambridge. The both believe “Russia did it” and no appeals to logic will budge this belief. To me, it’s incredible.
It's called "war fever" and millions have it bad.
A very good friend, highly educated, smart, a world traveller, he fervently believes all the lies, and only get angry with me when I challenge him.
He also lives in an epistemic bubble. I tell him that ______ said______. And he bellows, "WHO?"
He never heard of most of the people I follow on this, like Ritter, McGregor, Scott Horton and many more.
He knows who Hersh is but makes the unwarranted and uninformed claim that he's 'crazy'.
Yeah, okay, sure. I'll tell you what's genuinely crazy and that's working hard to start WWIII, because, because . . .
Bonus points for the Bushism.
The truth is indeed still out there!
And you can find under a rock somewhere in the Yukon boreal forest!
There was an episode of yes prime minister in the late 80s that basically made the point that in foreign affairs most people just want to know who the goodies and the baddies are, but that they they leaders should dictate what happens. And then Bernard asked shouldn’t I’m a democracy the people know at which point he was laughed at.
And another quote “most people don’t care who is making decisions as long as she had big tits on page 3” referring to the suns nudity every day.
We allowed ourselves to abrogate our responsibility and knowledge of what’s going on, and as we know power, once given to a government, is hard to reclaim. We must demand transparency on most things, and we must hold them accountable.
I’ll close with a last antidote- senator kennedy was put on the no fly list. Senator Ted Kennedy! It took president bush’s direct intervention to remove him. Is that can happen to him, imagine what they can do to us…
Actually thinking of America as the Constitutional Republic it is and myself as a responsible citizen in it rather than the member of a democracy seems to shift and re-center my personal psychology in a positive way. Likewise thinking that being reasonable with unreasonable ideologues will somehow change things or that being shocked and indignant at the psyop antic's of MSM/political clown world is anything but a waste of time.
Very Well Put!
We must demand transparency on *"most things", and we must **hold them accountable.
* I had a Secret security clearance when I was in the AF. From what I saw A lot of that was CYA. Someone screwed up, and it was hidden. Some wasn't, but waaaay to much was/is.
** I think This pisses people off more than anything. The Unaccountability of "Our Better". And the blatantness of it.
StrategyPage keyword Corruption Major cause of problems around the world.
https://www.strategypage.com/search.aspx?q=Corruption
No, but it might be prudent to make plans to leave town nevertheless.
Irresponsible not to at this point.
Nothing is destined 100% in America. We're on the precipice of tyranny and must use the two-party system to rebel. The only Republican Biden can beat is Trump; only his ego prevents him from seeing that. In 2024 it will be necessary for Republicans and independents to coalesce around an electable candidate, Youngkin, DeSantis, Tim Scott or Nikki Hayley. We need to begin Jan 21, 2025, with pre-written Executive Orders and legislation to undo the damage Biden has done.
Yes, the Republicans to the rescue for whatever you have that needs rescuing. Meh.
We do need to come together and defeat the criminal financier's backing the DNC/WEF/CCP juggernaut. In America, removing the DNC from power is priority 1. The Republican Party (my opinion) is malleable and open to change right now. The real force for change in play is the expansion of truth/fact based Subscription journalism.
I assume you meant to write the plural form "financiers'" and not the singular form "financier's," unless of course you referencing the favorite right-wing whipping boy George Soros, who, from my understanding, according to right-wing meme gospel, has been tyrannically running the world for the previous decade or more. Probably just a grammatical misstep on your part.
Anyway, the "DNC/WEF/CCP": That IS quite a juggernaut, and hitched to your criminal financiers' wagon a most impressive jury-rigged conspiracy theory. Perhaps it get will legs, once (and if) it passes muster with the Dark and Deep Web's Conspiracy Theory Apparatchiks.
But tell us, just who are these "criminal financiers" you so frighteningly (and obliquely) reference? And the DNC, WEF, CCP joining forces for anything more than colluding in a price-fixing scheme at all the McDonalds in Sichuan Province is a stretch.
Personally I'm not a Party man, but really---you're much better off devoting time and resources to combatting the neo-fascist insurgency movement that is the modern GOP. And yes, yes, the corporate/MSM/legacy media is a hot mess but it is no more of a hot mess than these propaganda-laden substacks we're hanging out in, like so many drive-in theaters, with their bad movies, bad food, but with appealing opportunities for mischief.
exactly. Perfect.
Amen. Fuck ‘em!
Amen to every single word and syllable of this essay Matt! I can't praise this enough and I'll say that I'm ride or die with you and everyone else here, and elsewhere, with these views. We have a choice, we can stick together, and we can have our rights, freedoms, and country back. Nothing is predetermined and I want to say again, we have a choice. I'm proud to be your subscriber.
We’re lucky to have Taibbi diving on the grenade for us. Thanks, Matt, truly.
A key acknowledgement by Matt was how he succumbed to the fear of ostracism:
"Whatever hold these people had on us, and it was real — I spent years worrying about regaining the favor of people who were denouncing me as a Russian asset even as they demanded my vote — it’s gone now"
It's so important that we all be able to take that heat - that's the courage that's needed. These scolds have nothing more than words to deploy against refuseniks, at least right now. If we don't stand up to them now, they will be able acquire more potent weapons for social control in the future, and fighting back will be all the harder. We need to act now.
And they can ruin one’s life at the drop of a hat by commanding banks disallow one’s ability to even have a bank account or payment system. What institution is going to disregard the government? No trial. No due process.
We are acting. Without subscription journalism Musk would have had nowhere to turn. If we stay solid Orwell will be fiction again (at least here in the Republic).
As a thought 100,000 Americans willing to put up a $1000.00 dollars each to put a Presidential candidate on the ballot with the requirement he/she is capable of writing depth articles promoting factual solutions and planks in a pro-citizen platform.
Agree with D. Tucker. And, thankful Matt & Weiss & Shellenberger and all their supporting cast are helping turn the tide, making it easier to for us as individuals to push back against the ‘Security State” mindset that has afflicted the country since Sept 11, 2001.
Yes, since that day. The change could be felt in the air that day and nothing has been right since.
It was the beginning of the end. I remember it well. Anyone who dared to question the need for any of it was shouted down and vilified.
ditto.
👏👏👏👏👏👏👏
Although I don't disagree with the overall point, never underestimate the ability of technology to empower a soulless, autocratic minority. (Although, of course, it can also be used for good.) I'm not much of an expert of finance, politics, or most of the other things you write about, but I do know technology.
The Blob is currently beginning a HARD push for Central Banking Digital Currency, as well as mandatory internet ID systems, either one of which would be absolutely disastrous for the average person. This is not theory or conspiracy, there are state level bills being debated and passed right now. Internet ID is fairly obvious, but Central Banking Digital Currency would basically allow the Federal Reserve, an unelected group, absolute control over the finances of private citizens. You think debanking is bad NOW, just wait until your money comes with expiration dates, purchase restrictions, and a social credit score.
I'm not saying it's hopeless, and I cautiously share some of your optimism. But the fight isn't over. They say that's the price of freedom.
Central Banking Digital Currency is the ultimate battle for the preservation any kind of freedom (esp the freedom to be anonymous and to speak freely): if they can force this on the country, we might as well all just get tattooed barcodes.
I recently flew home from Charleston. There was a woman placing an order for herself and her child ... the total came up and she handed the employee a $20 bill. “ No cash, credit cards only.” I was appalled. That’s just wrong. The meal was paid for but I was fuming that people have to have a credit card?!?!
Isn't requiring people to have a credit card just as "racist" as requiring them to have an ID to vote?
I don’t view it as racist at all. No one whether you are wealthy or not should be forced to have a credit card or forced to use it. Personal choice. I also don’t think Voter ID is racist. Everyone should want to prove that they are that registered voter and only an ID does that, it says nothing about your socio economic status. And a Voter ID is free to everyone.
Pretty sure that was Phil was employing that old sarcasm.
Sure was! (guess I need to add it In parentheses)...
Wrong! The voter ID is a solution to a non-existent problem. They even set up a commission to show how BAD the voter problem was and it eventually disbanded in failure. Any you know things are bad when a committee can´t find what it is desperate to prove! So, why the big push for voter ID. Racism is reason number one and reason number 2 is young people who move around and go to college and just can´t be bothered with any more bureaucrasy. Guess what both these groups have in common....
Voter ID is required to establish election integrity and avoid the rigged elections we've grown to despise. The lowering of standards to include "underrepresented people" is a facade to gin up votes that otherwise would not occur. Studies in the past have pointed out that lax standards lead to fraud. Part of this problem lies with dirty voter rolls. No accountability for the immense number of votes arriving during the wee hours of the morning. Fraud undermines the faith in elections and the Democrats have cornered the market in the various forms of deceit.
No, it's not. It's problematic---but it's not racist.
I believe the restaurant is breaking the law. On each and every Federal Reserve note, (what we all call 'cash' ) it is printed "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE". Take a look in your wallet. the wording is ALL debts.
I now live in Mexico where using cash for all purchases = including expensive medical visits=is pretty much the rule. I prefer using my Visa since it helps me keep track of what I am spending and also avoids having to carry large sums of cash with me. But in this cash only society, you have to make sure you ask before buying or using the services of any provider if they take Visa and if not, how much it will it cost since leaving without paying is not an option.
It really becomes a problem when you are registering for a CT scan at the hospital to make sure you don't have a brain bleed after a fall and are told before the scan is ordered to , hand over enough pesos somewhere in the vacinity of $160 dollars. Most people don't expect to fall so don't have that much case on hand but not to worry, there is always an ATM machine in the lobby.
. As the old saying goes, be careful what you wish for.
Learn the law. It's a private business. They can tell you that they only accept payment in the form of sawed logs for goods and services rendered and it's perfectly legal.
I stand corrected per Feldspar’s note. While US dollar bills all state: "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE", they don’t really mean it. From the Federal Reserve website: “There is no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods or services. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise.” There appear just a smattering of Cities/States requiring acceptance of cash.
Obviously a very troubling situation as several have already noted in the comments. The Canadian Truckers Strike an up-close demonstration of the staggering societal control Governments can exercise with “electronic currency”.
On the flip side, I wonder if the U.S. can actually force currency and coins OUT of circulation en route to “cashlessness” a point Sweden seems to be at?
Rob, I was under your same impression until reading these comments. Just yesterday I was standing in the lunch line at my local ski area. The kid in front of me tried to buy his Mac n cheese with a $10 bill, and the cashier wouldn’t take it, said card only (new policy being widely adopted at ski areas since Covid). The kid gave me his $10 and I charged his lunch. And I was thinking, yeah says right here all debts public and private. From an operational standpoint I can see why they prefer to not take cash. Much cleaner accounting not to mention doing away with armored cars and all that, at least until power go out or the internet crashes.
Sadly you are correct.
I could open a restaurant that only accepted BTC or even "firewood" as payment, and that would be, thankfully, legal.
Thanks for that reminder, Rob.
Soon you’ll have to have a smart phone for the purchases. Don’t have one? The government has a program to provide one, no cost.
You must be technology dependent and you will be happy. I was the anti -Hippy in the 60s/70s... now I am ready to start my own little GFY commune.
I’m the same vintage. My point was that the government is giving you no excuse to not use their CBDC.
In many poor countries, especially in Africa, paying with your phone is the primary form of payment. This is a huge benefit for countries with few physical banks and large rural and dispersed populations.
Yes but those are relatively free countries as compared to the United States, where the convenience of mobile payments is no longer a marker of efficient and robust commerce but instead an implement of totalitarianism.
I doubt any of those countries are more free than the US. Your claim that mobile payments are a form of totalitarianism is just plain wrong. I managed payments for a multi-billion dollar retailer and know far more about this than you. I am not saying that retailers and payment processors aren’t collecting granular data on everyone to get consumers to buy more or sell advertising. They are.
Good one!
I get the advantages for transactions like purchases of food and basic commodities for subsistence.
But this is the point where we need to begin having discussions about the problems of general purpose money, and the advantages of having forms of money that can be separated out and designated for special purposes- acknowledging the differences between currency used for essential subsistence transactions, anonymous currency for personal discretionary purposes and personal property acquisition, and capital investments that should require more accountability for both investment and return, particularly those involving real estate property. https://www.keg.lu.se/en/alf-hornborg
I'm not an expert on these esoteric matters. I'd like to learn that there are ethical people with economics expertise who would be willing to collaborate with people like Alf Hornborg on designing better- specifically less ecocidal- systems of exchange, rather than leaving him to labor in obscurity.A process that would start by having ethical people with economics expertise and unblinkered vision acknowledge that Hornborg has made some invaluable points about the way that both humans and the natural world are being abused in the name of serving the purposes of Markets, when it should be the other way around.
Never thought of money as being an "esoteric matter." Perhaps it's a good habit to begin developing.
Government doesn’t dictate forms of payment at retail, businesses do. Processing cash deposits requires bodies so retailers prefer credit and debit cards despite the high transaction fees.
Wrong. The government DOES dictate the form of payment - as the commenter said, read what is on the dollar bill. Any business that refuses to take cash is technically breaking the law (but they still get away with it).
Hey dum-dum: The helpful PSA message on your currency refers to government debt, not private debt.
But if you believe otherwise it's you solemn duty as an upright citizen (the assumption is that you're paying your taxes, not a convicted felon, etc.) to enlist a white-shoe law firm and make a good faith attempt to ride your grievance all the way to the Supreme Court so the rest of us may pay for our Denny's Grand Slam Pack with Cold Hard Cash.
If the “credit card only” policy took place inflight (which it sounds like it did) there’s a rational reason. Credit cards vs cash slows the
incidence of theft.
However, I don’t disagree with the position presented in this piece.
Money makes the world go ‘round and if the governing powers takee away an individual’s ability to control their own money that will surely be acp
We have a few places like that here in Ottawa. It's disgusting and terrifying.
For me though the most dangerous threat will be the AIs that they will use to spy on us in ways that I cannot even imagine. (I assume that they are doing this now)
They will also be used to enact perfect censorship. AIs could, for example, monitor every post, every tweet, comment and even a WP document in real time. I fully expect the day will come when they will censor us in real time. Any utterance that runs counter to what the state wants will delete itself even as you type it. Or worse, it will be recast so that it's no longer crimespeak but duckspeak.
That will surely be a blow to our freedom.
@McDonalds
CP, it's tempting to dismiss your comment as as hyperbole. I've read so much hyperbole in comments, and my reply posts often focus on debunking hype and scaremongering.
Not this time, though. You're entirely correct. Alarm is completely justified.
They skipping the barcodes and going straight for the brain implants bro. The mark of the beast may be real in our lifetime. Its a battle between Pierre Tielhard de Chardins heavenly nuosphere, and Mumfords demonic megamachine, for what controlling force will blanket the globe
The people shilling for it in the press sound like starry-eyed bobble-heads. The people who want the most to implement it are a different story. They have to be aware of the control implications. But it's like USA-PATRIOT (that foot in the door); the ultimate answer to all objections is "Trust Us", "We're in your corner", etc.
Not Sure/Upgrayedd 2024
Has ANYTHING the government rolled out worked the first time around?did everyone get vaccinated? How many times has the government been hacked? Your concerns are still valid.
Quote: "never underestimate the ability of technology to empower a soulless, autocratic minority"
You stole the words right out of my mouth. I'm writing on that right now, adding to what this article purports to be about, which is how to respond. Here's a one-page intro, and I think a more human approach. Cheers. https://markgmeyers.substack.com/p/introduction-to-a-democratic-approach
[Edit-add: just published: https://markgmeyers.substack.com/p/our-modern-circumstance ]
AI plus CDBC would add up to a turnkey panopticon surveillance operation- over all Americans, and everyone on the planet, potentially- requiring very few humans to "administer." And practically impossible to undo. A level of omniscience that even the PRC hasn't been able to fully implement.
I'm not necessarily opposed to mandatory ID as a prerequisite to access individual Internet websites, on request. But not as a prerequisitive to access a browser, or a search engine.
CBDC is wrong, wrong, wrong, practically to the point of metaphysical Evil. And many of its advocates seem to be focused only on its "convenience", and blithely oblivious of its capability to empower totalitarianism- which isn't merely a potential problem; it's a certainty. There are no "guardrails" to protect the individual under such a regime. There's no way to opt out.
I wonder whether or not they are actually oblivious.
I'm one of its defenders, and I point to Yanis Varoufakis's "Another Now" as the best defense.
I won't argue with you because I take your point. But I will only add that our defense of our money is property law, and it's our onky defense now.
We are already at a point where a totalitarian government could take your money. In our current system, property rights are taken via the use of debt and
intermediaries. They give cover to the theft, make it seem less clear, or perhaps justified.
The thing to oppose is authoritarianism, and our best tool is property law.
Thank you, Bob - you are absolutely correct. The CBDC is the most evil thing ever devised in economic history. I am 83 and quite fortunate to be departing this planet soon but I sincerely fear for my grandchildren and further descendants.
Mr. Bob, every baby born in Estonia gets a digital ID at birth. It's coming faster than people realize, and it will be a law, that's the horror of it all.
Criminal financier's and graft have been the behind the scene butcher's of almost every human set back and tragedy the human race has endured. The mask is off. When Davos thugs openly declare that it is time for Americans to accept limited free speech and American elected political leadership stands silent the DNC/WEF/CCP juggernaut has to go.
The antidote to CBDC is simple - DeFi (as in DE-centralized Finance), like Bitcoin and Ethereum. As long as it's DEcentralized, the government can't touch it (let alone control it), which scares the hell out of BigFinance. Hence, the "HARD push for CBDC." So, any system that runs on a DEcentralized blockchain is safe from the government and banking industry, and relatively stable. Sure it can be a bit volatile, but no worse than the stock market, and Bitcoin has increased on average since its inception. Ex: $18K in December, $27K+ today.
Magically, all the private crypto upstarts seem to be tanking. Yet, it was clearly stated at the WEF just a couple of years ago that governments will establish crypto (which, I assume, is the CBDC) as their primary, single currency of choice. Coincidence? (Smirk) Credit cards already track our spending behaviors. I can have an in person conversation about ANYTHING, and an ad pops up on my phone. I really, really want to stay hopeful. I have six adult grandchildren! But (Jerry McGuire) It's a cynical, cynical world. Not sure how to throw sand in the gears, but willing to do the deed for three hots & a cot.
I love the fact that Matt's in an optimistic mood and has delivered a rousing speech to his team, those of us here in Substack exile who were/are convinced that Big Brother/Sister are only in the beta phase of their plan to smother us all in Digital Groupthink, and are amped because we just scored a big surprise win.
But hey, I pay my $5 to quibble, so here goes:
As for the Karens of Homeland Security, "the public rightfully recoiled from these arrogant power-worshipping mediocrities", but that was only because a competent and credentialed sheriff's posse were able to assemble (Taibbi Shellenberger et al.), and were given a big boost by Elon. It makes me think of the early days of the FBI vs John Dillinger: yeah, they stopped one bank job, but how many more plans are in the works? (Also, that poor hideous Singing Censor woman is an emetic in human form.)
Most of my friends are in the Blue Bubble and they've never heard of the Twitter Files (their outlets don't mention them), and there is literally almost nothing that could penetrate their certitude: politics to them means defeating and erasing the hated Deplorables, nothing more, nothing less.
It makes sense that our ideological junkies are in rehab now that it's early 2023, they need to regain some sanity and credibility, but we're about 18 mos out from "the most important election of our lifetimes!" with "democracy on the ballot!" and "literal fascism!": all these ghouls will be unleashed by then and ready to lie, cheat & steal to "protect democracy" aka make sure we all do as we're told.
I like your first para.
Clever- you’re probably right. But I was in that bubble until 2018ish? Eventually, you’re apt to see a lie that makes you look at everything you thought you knew. Convincing people that the media is a propaganda dumpster fire isn’t the heavy lift it once was. And it gets lighter every day.
I keep waiting for the break-through moment. So far most have not. I tweeted one of MT's posts and was asked on Twitter how could I support someone who is being paid by Elon Musk? Don't people know about Starlink? Who do they think is behind rockets to the ISS?
The trolls on Twitter are the worst scumbags - they're not the least interested in engaging in real conversation. Ad hominem attacks are their specialty and those fit neatly in Twitter's character count limitations. We should continue to use all available methods to raise awareness and bring sunlight, including Twitter, but not be put off by responses from the Twits.
I just mute them (not block).
"It is beginning to dawn on sane, tolerant people everywhere that there are more of us than there are of them, and this still matters in a democracy."
Yeah. It'll be interesting when their bubble bursts and they realize most people don't see them as the heroes and experts they think they are.
I hope their bubble does burst and the significant number of people who do trust them and count on them to “protect everyone from the uneducated” (or however they decide to delineate stupid people) stop seeing them as saviors.
I suspect a complication is that those that support the “smarter” people making the decisions get a good feeling when they trust they also will always be above the stupid people, will never be a target, and will always benefit from the government limiting the power of the stupid people (and that it benefits the stupid people as well and thus is benevolent not oppressive). Warm fuzzies built in all around.
It feel like maybe it is too easy to miss how much power it takes to be able to declare a group “oppressive” and silence them. It is maybe also easily forgotten how often things shift, or how different locations have different powerful classes of people. How “oppressive” can any group be if they are easily silenced? How “oppressed” can a group be if their message is in every public square as the only acceptable belief to hold?
For instance, I was stunned to see how popular “safe spaces for victims”became and the resulting segregation was cheered as if it bore no resemblance to USA segregation in the past. To some highly educated people cross cultural celebration became insulting rather than respectful. (Wasn’t that basically the same idea the KKK promoted, even if it was selfishly protecting their own culture instead of the protecting the outsider’s culture from them?) Is the claim that past segregation, and demands to prevent integration in the USA was only wrong because it was based on racism, not good intentions? Add in the fact that a person in an oppressed class becomes oppressive when they cross political lines, and it starts to feel like perhaps the worst sin of all is to develop respect for people with opposing political views? It’s like we forget who the “domestic terrorists” are versus who the “legitimate morally sound protesters” are depends to some extent more on who controls the ability to jail them than on actions taken by the protesters / dangerous revolutionaries. It is easy to forget that historically the same opinion that made a person a hero at one time could leave a person a jailed traitor in a different time period. For instance the difference between Assange “the protector of journalism, freedom, and democracy” and Assange “the spy who leads to innocents dying and endangers democracy” has little to do with what he did and more to do with the consequences he will ultimately face.
There are so many odd contradictory things that the current “brilliant” people need their “like-minded” peers to embrace and force on the “lower-minded” people for the “greater good”. Power dynamics will change who ends up in which group and who is part of the “greater good” to be protected.
Maybe what we need is a cultural shift to let go of a need to get approval from and inclusion in the “greater-minded benevolent” people group and to develop more appreciation for the vast number of people who are publicly and broadly classified as “lesser-minded and selfish”- regardless of which individuals occupy either group? It might feel like there is a permanently “safe” group to be part of, especially if it feels like your group can censor and punish outsiders “justifiably” but I think historically such behavior leads to miserable times for the majority of people no matter who gets that power.
And let’s start with those idiotic virtue signaling credo declaring rainbow flags in peoples’ yards....
The rainbow is a circle, not a square.
Exactly, if the various aggrieved groups were truly so oppressed, and bigotry so rampant and accepted, it would be impossible for a member of one of those groups to so easily destroy one of the oppressors with mere accusations of bigotry. That people wield those so freely and even gleefully shows that at some level they know things aren’t nearly as bad as they claim.
I think it's a good point, if you look at the options alternative newsreaders may have today. We could get organized. An intro:
https://markgmeyers.substack.com/p/introduction-to-a-democratic-approach
Unherd released a study showing that only 30% of Brits thought the lockdowns were a bad idea. Dr. Vinay Prasad believes that number will rise significantly over the next few years. I hope he is right. I doubt he is. The effectiveness of getting people to turn on one another and blame each other was breathtaking. Even today, rather than blaming BirxBidenTrumpFauciWallenskyPfizerModerna, there are people still clinging to the idea that 'the science changed' instead of realizing they got conned by parasitic, dishonest, integrity-free political and public health leaders who even today continue to lie, cover up, distract and point at any other 'evildoer'.... anyone other than themselves.
Until 40-50% of we the people pull our heads out, this will continue. It's still happening now. See Ukraine, East Palestine, SVB, Nordstream2, the demonization of Tick Tock to benefit entrenched social media companies, the deliberate destruction of Crypto and on and on and on.
Desmond Mathias referred to a book I should probably remember the name of about a guy who went to live in a German village 8 or 10 years after WW II. The normal people there that had aligned with the Nazi’s, excepting one or two, still had fond feelings towards Hitler and the Nazis even after the horrors had been revealed.
Like the loyal Covidians today, the fact that those who bought the propoganda still believe it doesn’t mean that it will be remembered as good or necessary. It robbed a generation of children of their healthy development taking years off their life from lost education, increasing obesity, and phycological damage - and thats to say nothing of the millions of destroyed businesses, died suddenly, 150 million people who lost their ability to eat, and 1 million poor girls (on the low end) sold into sexual slavery.
That the Covidian masses are still brain washed speaks only to the power of brainwashing. History will not ever look back on this time and see it as positive, no matter who writes the books. Once those committed to the lies are dead or irrelevant the reality of the outcomes is what will be written about.
The accountant of Auschwitz - who was put on trial several years ago testified that he was horrified at the brutality - but he still believed killing the Jews was the right thing to do. That is the power of propaganda - particularly when people are young. Whether we want to admit it or not we will have an entire generation who believe we will die from global warming, that men can become women, etc. We took our eyes off the ball and let bad faith ideologues take over our schools and universities. It will take a generation to rebuild.
As a retired scientist, I was appalled at what Covid did to science. Important papers were censored-- Gazit et al, 2021, showing in a massive (smallest group over 60,000 subjects) Israeli study ( that natural immunity was 27-fold more protective against symptomatic Covid; the same groups as well as others found longer-lasting 5- fold or better protection with natural immunity, publications which were totally ignored and suppressed by the CDC. A Danish paper on masks where the authors hypothesized a 20% protection against Covid, but saw no effect (and a similar no effect of cloth masks found by a large Bangladesh study, though a special mask produced a small (11%) protection from infection. Another Danish meta-analysis (Stabell Benn and Schaltz Buchholzer, 2022) comparing EUA trials and their equivalents of all available Covid vaccines, finding among other things that the US mRNA Covid vaccines, despite combined >37,000 vaccinated subjects and >37,000 placebo subjects in the Gold Standard Trials during a raging epidemic, there was no vaccine protection against death, nor any significant protection against Covid death, although the mRNA had a significant effect on symptomatic Covid. Recently there has been a wave of excess deaths globally (generally deaths drop after "harvesting" of the weakest by a pandemic), and Norwegian researchers found that for every 1% of the population Covid vaccinated in a country in 2021, there was a 0.105% INCREASE in excess deaths in 2022
( preprints.org/manuscript/202302.0350/v1aaaaaa0 . Globally there are about 60 million deaths per year and about 2/3 of the global population is vaccinated, so my math shows about 4 million excess (non-Covid) deaths if the Norwegians are correct. That compares to 6.8 million Covid deaths world-wide. There are many other examples, many papers remain in pre-print due to conflicts with political narratives (and the important work is no longer done in the US, rather in Qatar and similar countries); only papers which support the Official Narratives are quickly published. I'm not saying the papers mentioned are all correct, but they point to directions which should be explored, and if need be refuted.
The lack of curiosity, the destruction of iconoclastic attitudes in scientists bent on supporting political agendas (no doubt to protect grants) has turned American Covid science into an almost Lamarckian enterprise. The lack of dissent/ debate, the authoritarian nonsensical vaccine mandates (with leaky mRNA vaccines shown not to block infection, spread nor death), the pushing of remdesivir (garbage according to the WHO), the early suppression of glucocorticoids (the most effective drug for treating serious Covid cases), the suppression of use of vitamins and supplements (particularly effective prophylactically in the Elderly, many of whom are vitamin-deficient), and of course the deriding of repurposed drugs (as a toxicologist both ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine-- approved to treat diabetics in India-- are both safe at therapeutic doses. HCQ takes forever to load, so is unlikely to be effective acutely. Ivermectin ( c19ivm.org/meta.html ) has shown efficacy, but not in Gold Standard trials (the same sort in which mRNA vaccines failed to block death).
The biggest US failure was to pretend that Covid can kill anybody. Over 90% of Covid deaths are in those aged 65 or older (even the CDC FINALLY admits that) and most Covid deaths are in those over age 80. Only vaccinating these Elderly (and a relatively small percent of seriously ill people) was ever justified.
Agree 100%. I saw all that stuff as it came out in Swiss Policy Research. A few people I texted it to actually read, but many were too gullible to the nitwits who lie about everything on the nightly news.
A solid plurality of voters in this country are today convinced that Donald Trump is a White Supremacist Russian asset (and somehow also a Nazi) who implored his followers to drink bleach, and was just barely thwarted from overthrowing the United States govt. via a speech, or perhaps some mind control.
Everything is totally fine.
I was at the Seattle protest, with my partner, Kristin Kolb. We didn't care about Russian collusion. It was his mouth that brought us there. The "grab 'em by the..." comment.
Funny thing is, though, according to certain conservative Catholics, it was the gender bender pioneer academics who worked in Berlin, before inserting hundreds of pedophilic, Marxist priests into the Catholic Church. Happened in the 30s.
"Who's your friend and who's your foe? Who's your Judas? You don't know
Night of the long knives, night of the long knives, Night of the long knives, night of the long long knife"
- AC/DC
And has advanced dementia despite his acing the MOCA test, but Tapioca Joe has his shit together....
I’m not convinced that lockdowns were a bad idea. The vaccine was some level of evil. I think conflating lockdowns and mandates muddies the water. Allegedly, there was Covid then delta, then omicron. If that’s true and it morphed into something less lethal due to lockdowns, it should be discussed.
Be it resolved, fauci should be executed
The remedy was far worse than the virus.
Sweden had the lowest excess mortality in Europe during Covid. The mandates were not only brutal to live through - they killed people.
I started following the case of Sweden early on, via the Johns Hopkins CoronaVirus Center, which just stopped collecting data 2 weeks ago (03/10/2023.)
Sweden's mortality for coronavirus alone is slightly elevated in comparison to Norway and Denmark, which had much more restrictive policies. But I don't doubt that you're correct about overall excess mortality.
The wholesale lockdown policy has proved to be terribly disruptive, particularly for school age children and small businesses, and this should have been foreseen and the probable negative consequences should have been assessed. At minimum, the policy should have been modified after the end of the first school year, and expanded once the vaccine was available (and yes, I do realize that this makes Governor DeSantis look good- and no, I'm not a fan of his, for unrelated reasons.)
I'm currently sharing a household with a relative in her 90s. I'm her primary caregiver (thankfully she doesn't need that much of it.) I'm still maintaining quarantine protocols to some extent, and vigilance. Quarantine restrictions for vulnerable populations and people in their immediate circle make sense, and I've had no problem complying with them. That's how it was done in Sweden, although unfortunately covid got the jump on elderly Swedes in group setting like nursing homes early on, before the restrictions could be effectively implemented.
I'm pro-vaccine (for adults), and so are most Swedes- they were early adopters, and the compliance rate is about 80%. I think that was crucial in curbing the pandemic. But the effect of the US general lockdown on the spread of the virus is highly questionable. The data is still being analyzed- and it has to be balanced with all of the other disruptive effects on the economy and social functioning. The negative impacts have been dramatic, and they continue to play out. I think a policy of targeted quarantine restrictions would have been a much better idea.
Sweden doesn’t have the per capita obesity or population density. But next time we can do it your way. When old fat teachers die we can console ourselves with fewer sucides and kids that are not as dumb by virtue of prolonged exposure to their parents. I’m sure someone, possibly you will second guess that decision too.
The notion that a graduated quarantine protocol couldn't possibly contain an exception for elderly, obese, or immunocompromised school personnel and caregivers is entirely a feature of your own speculative fantasy.
Maybe you should take it over to Twitter. I hear they're friendlier to such gimmickry there. Maybe get a rat-pack going, and ratio anyone you can tag as The Enemy with a snark barrage comprised of similar scenarios, with extra hyperbole on top.
What you mock as "second-guessing", others refer to as medical review and risk assessment. For example this panel, which includes Martin Makary, MD, of Johns Hopkins University. https://www.c-span.org/video/?524736-1/centers-disease-controls-handling-covid-19# The written transcript is atrocious, worse than worthless (unless someone has cleaned it up since I've read it), but it makes for a thought-provoking listen.
At the very outset of the breakthrough of SARS-CoV-2 to the outside world in March 2020, I read an article that included comments by an unnamed Australian observer, giving his advice about the best way to stop the epidemic in its tracks: give $50,000 to every household in the country (131 million, in the US), in return for staying completely Wuhan-style locked down for a couple of months. The cost would have been a bit over $6 trillion.
At the time, I thought that was a really drastic recommendation. As it happens, we ended up disbursing around 2/3 that amount in cash handouts anyway, while locking down the country less effectively for a considerably longer expanse of time. (The NYT says it's more like 5/6 the amount https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/03/11/us/how-covid-stimulus-money-was-spent.html )
We'll never know if Total Quarantine in return for for $50,000 would have worked. It might be worth modeling something like that in advance, though, in case of the next breakout of an epidemic virus.
The lockdowns harmed all children, wiped out businesses, ruined marriages, destroyed economies, endangered those vulnerable to domestic violence, retarded education by factors of years, delayed necessary medical treatments, interfered with social and religious activity necessary for mental health, did ab-so-fucking-lutely nothing to protect anyone from the overhyped "threat" of covid --- these are all facts --- and you are "not convinced" they were a bad idea? Do you have a functioning brain stem, sir?
Of all the bad results from the vaccine and boosters that I have heard, this is a new one. A friend told me yesterday of her sister in Oregon who lost all of her hair - head, legs, eyelashes, etc jjust after her third booster shot. I assumed when she started telling me the story, that her sister had alopecia but no, both are convinced it was due to the booster. I overheard a woman telling her friend that she was about to get her 6th booster. I wonder what she will lose.
Reeks, do tell about overhyped. Your sniveling is overhyped. In March of 2020 Italy recorded 900 deaths from Covid in a weekend. Toilet paper was sold out. If Covid spread at its original pace lockdown would have been self imposed by the employees who would have been too terrified to come to work Or too busy taking care of loved ones who wouldn’t fit in hospitals. Which in turn would have crippled the economy to a greater extent and caused even more panic and civil unrest. Comparing original flavor Covid with omicron is lost on this revisionist history indignation. Americans are fat finger pointing assholes. Inaction by government while NY city was clogging its streets with refrigeratored trailers with corpses wasn’t an option.
Meanwhile, COVID’s origins and Fauci Involvement in creating this in the first place. Let’s stipulate your assertions about shitty little businesses or how children were harmed by spending more time with their self absorbed parents etc. None of it even happens without gain of function and lies. And trying to 2020 hindsight the reaction to the pandemic obscures nih and pharmaceuticals much graver crimes. And my brain stem operates about as well as could be expected given my immersion in a culture of hyperbolic mouth breathers such as you
The problem isn't quarantine per se- it's the total lockdown approach that was taken.
I don't view this as conspiracy, though. It was about "erring on the side of caution" taken to an unnecessary extreme. A panic reaction driven by the Cover Your Ass mentality of democratically elected politicians and massive bureaucratic institutions. Political leaders in democratic countries- particularly in election years- are terrified of worst case scenarios for which they might be held responsible. So erring on the side of caution is natural. The problem is that since we're evidently governed largely by Visa Black Card carrying members of the HNW <1% these days, they were easily convinced that the virus was the only challenge they had to contend with. The actual impact of shutting down damn near every brick and mortar business and public school in the country didn't loom large as a counterbalancing priority to them. But what it did to small businesses was devastating (while also enabling massive fraud, though the stopgap compensation programs.) The large corporate businesses had sufficient capital to wait out the quarantine, but what happened to numerous small businesses seems more like the equivalent of getting "laid off" with a severance check. And as for what's happened to public education and adolescent socialization...well, let's hope for a mostly complete recovery, eventually. It's too early to tell. In the meantime, we're "dealing with challenges", as the jargon goes. We, the common people, that is. The <1% were plainly fairly well insulated from the impacts at the household level, as the personal social behavior of some of them has clearly indicated. (Granted, there are a few exceptions on the record.)
The fundamental problem was that the decision-making process about how to organize a response to the pandemic was given over entirely to infectious disease/public health epidemiologists. Their only concern was preventing disease transmission. They proved utterly incapable of assessing the harms of their policies despite many (partially suppressed and marginalized) voices expressing great concern (aka malinformation). They could only see the "good" they would do through their public health expertise. All the other perspectives that needed to be taken into account, including people with expertise in education (not the monsters like Weingarten), child psychologists, economists, medical preventionists, etc, were shut out from the decision-making. The US's disastrous Covid response is THE prime example why response to public health threats cannot be led by public health experts. Their input is obviously very important, but a broader perspective must be considered, with elected leadership weighing it all in making decisions.
It was the "raccoon dog" (sarc) I'm just a prole in construction and I was deemed essential or expendable I'm not sure which one but when the mask issue was being laid out I had to laugh. Wearing a mask to sand drywall or install insulation is not effective unless you use a properly fitted mask and even still you end up sucking in visible dust or fiberglass fibers. In Nov 2020 I started looking at the CDC and state death totals and what age brackets were being effected and it was predominately the 65 plus crowd. If it had been kids I would of been the neighbor telling you to get back in your house. We lacked leadership in protecting us and there is lots of blame to go around. Tony f reminded me of a volunteer fireman who helped start a fire to gain respect in putting out the fire. Maybe the comedians like Jon Stewart or Woody Harrelson on SNL can break through the mirage for the rest of the proles less "informed"
If you read Karl Taro Greenfeld's 2006 book The China Syndrome, about SARS CoV-1, you'll learn enough about "wet markets" to realize that the raccoon dog hypothesis is entirely plausible. But so is the "gain of function research" lab hypothesis.
The thing that can be most confidently concluded is that the release was not intentional- nobody is stupid enough to unleash a germ warfare outbreak on their own soil, right next to their own virology lab.
Your Fahrenheit 451 reference for Fauci is most appropriate!
Can't say I'm surprised by Fauci's public comments - I would probably lie about it too if I'd funded/supported GoF research that led to the deaths of 7 million people.
Your assertion is demonstrably wrong. Delta, which began during heavy lockdowns, was far more lethal than earlier strains. Omicron, which came out once lockdowns had been lifted everywhere on the planet except a few blue states in the US, was far less lethal than any earlier version. Lockdowns drove a more virulent and lethal strain. Delta was never “more mild” than earlier strains.
studies on the failure of government mandated Covid interventions gathered and linked by the highly respected Brownstone. At this point it doesn’t matter if you are convinced, the evidence of failure is overwhelming and replicated.
https://brownstone.org/articles/more-than-400-studies-on-the-failure-of-compulsory-covid-interventions/
Here's some information, if you are interested: "More Than 400 Studies on the Failure of Compulsory Covid Interventions (Lockdowns, Restrictions, Closures)" https://brownstone.org/articles/more-than-400-studies-on-the-failure-of-compulsory-covid-interventions/
I read it. A lot of it anyway. It points to a lot of suicide and children’s education suffering. Personally I’m not moved. Next time we can do nothing. I’m personally comfortable with that. But doing nothing will expose other societal woes. And those will be blamed on the lack of action. I see that as revisionist history chicken little speak that defines a once great nation.
You can blame your neighbor or every mask wearing tool or the nearest fat person. Or me. You’re not even wrong. But the fauci pharmaceutical ilk were malevolent and fiercely lying to cover their tracks while becoming grotesquely wealthy. I can blow holes in those studies. I’m hoping to save my ammunition for more deserving targets.
Japan never locked down, but had essentially 100% mask wearing. About two weeks ago the government finally decreed that mask-wearing should now be considered a free personal choice, but most people are still wearing them (even outside).
Lockdowns were absolutely unnecessary and caused irreversible harm especially to children. I’d agree that the vaccine mandates were higher on the moral reprehensibility scale, but no reason we can’t call out both evils.
If you don’t understand how the lockdowns violated simple cost/benefit considerations, then you need to go back to elementary school.
It morphed into something less lethal because that’s what strains of viruses do and eventually die. The Lockdowns contributed to people staying inside, no Vitamin D, no fresh air and wearing masks inhaling your own germs, fibrous plastic particles and CO2. So Fauci is a flunky virologist or he knew from Day One it was not a natural virus.
I'm not overly optimistic that the general public will awake from their narrative filled slumber.
It feels at times that we are living in a fevered dream.
Spot on!
"...without lots of sweeteners wouldn’t go well..."
Careful, this will just encourage Jankowicz to sing "Just a Spoonful of Sugar makes the Orwell go down, the Orwell go down..."
Beautiful essay
I’m willing to try being hopeful
I have been saying for the last 6 years, only the liberals can save us from the progressives. Unfortunately, most liberals are largely weak and sheep-like and decided to endure any level of tyranny from the far left vs. being called a racist, homophobe, transphobe or god forbid - MAGA! Thank god there were a few old school liberals like you, Walter and Elon, who all refused to take the knee. Because of this small group if courageous liberals, others are slowly coming out of their bunker, now that it seems possibly safe. While I agree with you that we may have turned the corner, the gutless liberals who enabled this tyranny for the past 6 years need to be called out and shamed for the pussies they are.
Much like only women can save women’s sports, prisons, and womanhood at large. I’m very opinionated and passionate about the issue, but reading the room, this can’t be my battle. You go (real) girls.
Indeed, as my buddy said to me the other day about the practical implication of the “nonbinary” restroom at the new airport - this is just another men’s restroom.
There will be a comeuppance for all of those trans-men who want to use the Ladies' bathrooms. They will be standing in lines waiting to get into one during a 15 minute long intermission and be late for the next act while the men go in and out in 2 minutes. I expect that after experiencing the usual ordeal that women have to go through, they will trans back.
Glad to see some women fighting back in the sports world, and I’m almost embarrassed that athletics pisses me off more than the plight of incarcerated women. But, truth be told, if I ever end up losing it and get arrested I’m Josephine and will be straight dominating those hoes in the showers. I’m not made to hold pockets…
Sorry for the crudeness everyone.
I’m with you trembo. I just witnessed a biological male come in first in slalom and 3rd in GS against 84 biological females (my daughter included) in our state high school ski racing championships. As shocking as it was, more troubling was the apparent resignation to this injustice the girls outwardly expressed. The brainwashing of our youth is real, but at least I can educate my daughter.
There is hope though. See the amicus brief recently filed at the Supreme Court: https://adflegal.org/sites/default/files/2023-03/BPJ-v-West-Virginia-State-Board-Ed-2023-03-13-Female-Athletes-Amicus-Brief.pdf
Sorry to hear that your daughter is being subjected to this playing field. It’s sheer insanity. There should be a women’s/girl’s division and an open division.
Indeed it is sad to see these short-sighted women cheering this on. What will the landscape look like in another ten years if this goes unchecked?
Yes, it’s one thing to read about it happening far away, quite another to see it up close. I’m cautiously optimistic sanity will prevail. I’ve written to all of my local, state and federal representatives as well as the county and district superintendents. The feedback at the local level has been encouraging. Sadly, they do not make state policy. That’s another battle. If it continues unchecked private leagues will spring up specifically for biological females. Hope it doesn’t have to come to that. I am certain the vast, vast majority of parents feel as I do. They just need the chops to speak up.
“Only the liberals can save us from the progressives.” I’m putting this on a t-shirt.
No royalty required, print away!
Bravo Matt! You have never been more eloquent in defense of human rights!
Great essay, Matt! I appreciate that you called out the growing realization that apologies are not the proper response to the vocal minority's attempts to cancel and shame. It doesn't fix anything because it's not what they are seeking, and it builds resolve within the ideologies that are threatening to tear this society apart.
By the way, Jan-6 was a constitutionally-protected protest and yet the protesters are being sent to prison... by a tiny minority of horrible people fully supported by a percentage of the general population that are absolutely sure they are not horrible people by being gleeful that these protestors are being sent to prison.
How do I know the 1st Amendment is doomed? Because when the government's role in censorship was uncovered and made public, the left cheered and said good, it's as it should be; because when Biden announced his Ministry of Truth, the left cheered and said good, it's as it should be.
If ours is a government that derives its authority from the consent of the governed, the governed have sent a resounding clarion of approval for repealing the 1st Amendment.
They've already trashed the legal foundation of innocent until proven guilty in the name of the #metoo crowd. Was it really such a stretch to use the foundation of harping innuendo and tantrums to destroy freedom of expression? The strategy was sound; the reach just right, and the worm will make its way through the Bill of Rights eating away at one right after another.
We were warned repeatedly before the Patriot Act was rammed through, that “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety”. And here we are some 2 decades later with a decimated Bill of Rights hanging on by the thinnest of threads, and a more dangerous world than ever before.
Devastating takedown paired with principled hope. A masterpiece of an article for the times. Matt, beautiful and inspiring work. Good luck.
I'm waiting for the Sy Hersh insider scoop on 9/11. Like how Building 7 fell at free fall rate, because of a fire in the basement. Until that sunlight shines through, we will continue to have these bacteria crawling all over everything.
Write in Assange for President!
He looked the Beast in the eye and didn't blink.
Yeah. We don'thave to accept the "it just burned down" theory.
I hope you're right, and a corner's being turned. I hope there's enough quality left in your country that that can be true.