Jan 142021
 
 January 14, 2021  Posted by at 10:12 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,


Jackson Pollock Male and female 1942

 

House Votes To Impeach Trump For ‘Insurrection’ (RT)
Twitter CEO Defends Banning Trump But Says It Was A “Dangerous” “Failure” (JTN)
Putin Orders Mass Vaccination Against COVID19 With Sputnik V Jab (RT)
Moderna CEO Says The World Will Have To Live With Covid ‘Forever’ (CNBC)
WHO Team Arrives In Wuhan To Investigate Pandemic Origins (AP)
Two NYC Residents Reported To Have UK COVID-19 Variant (AMNY)
EU Leaders Demand “Standardised” Vaccine Passport For Travel (SN)
Polarization, Then a Crash – Michael Hudson (AN)
Biden To Propose Massive $2 Trillion Stimulus (ZH)
Biden Taps Veteran Interventionist Samantha Power to Head USAID (Antiwar)
As Biden Vows To ‘Defeat The NRA,’ Gun Sales Continue To Soar (JTN)
Former Michigan Gov. Snyder Charged For Flint Water Crisis (JTN)
Unemployment Rate Above 20% For Lowest-Paid Workers – Fed’s Brainard (CNBC)
Cancel Yourself (Michael Krieger)
New Zealand City Closes Busy Road For Weeks To Protect Sea Lions (G.)

 

 

 

 

What would need to be proven in a courtroom, does not in Congress.

House Votes To Impeach Trump For ‘Insurrection’ (RT)

Arguing he incited an “armed rebellion” against the US, the Democrat-dominated House has voted to impeach President Donald Trump again. But with his term expiring in a week, it is unclear when the trial will proceed. After several hours of debate on Wednesday, the House of Representatives voted to formally impeach the president over the January 6 unrest at the US Capitol, when a group of Trump supporters broke into the building and interrupted the joint session of Congress meeting to certify Democrat Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 US presidential election. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the Senate will reconvene on an emergency schedule to conduct the trial, however.

Reports in mainstream US media were conflicted, with some outlets citing anonymous sources to claim that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) was eager to do so and help the Democrats get rid of Trump. However, McConnell’s spokesman said on Wednesday he would “not consent” to doing so before January 19, putting the trial into Biden’s term as president. House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-South Carolina) told CNN on Sunday that the Democrats might even give Biden a hundred days “to get his agenda off and running” before they send the articles to the Senate. The delays and calculations are at odds with rhetoric coming from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) and her impeachment managers, who called Trump a danger to the country and urged his immediate removal.

Democrats have even argued that Trump and anyone supporting him ought to be barred from holding any office under the 14th Amendment, passed after the Civil War to punish leaders of the Confederacy. “We know that we face the enemies of the Constitution,” Pelosi said on the House floor on Wednesday. “We know we experienced the insurrection that violated the sanctity of the people’s capital – an attempt to overturn the duly recorded will of the American people. And we know that the president of the United States incited this insurrection, this armed rebellion against our common country. He must go.”

Read more …

“..those moves “over the long term … will be destructive to the noble purpose and ideals of the open internet.”

Twitter CEO Defends Banning Trump But Says It Was A “Dangerous” “Failure” (JTN)

Twitter co-founder and CEO Jack Dorsey on Wednesday evening composed a 13-tweet-long thread on the social media platform he leads in which he defended the company’s recent permanent ban of President Donald Trump while still claiming that the ban constituted a “dangerous” “failure.” Dorsey, who helped found the microblogging platform in early 2006, said in the thread that, though banning Trump out of fears that he was promoting violence was “the right decision for Twitter,” an account ban nevertheless “has real and significant ramifications.” “While there are clear and obvious exceptions, I feel a ban is a failure of ours ultimately to promote healthy conversation,” Dorsey said. “And a time for us to reflect on our operations and the environment around us.”


In addition to fragmenting the public conversation, Dorsey said, such a ban “sets a precedent I feel is dangerous: the power an individual or corporation has over a part of the global public conversation.” Referring to the recent purge of the social media app Parler from multiple digital platforms, Dorsey argued that those moves “over the long term … will be destructive to the noble purpose and ideals of the open internet.” “Everything we learn in this moment will better our effort, and push us to be what we are: one humanity working together,” Dorsey said in the thread.

Read more …

“move from large-scale vaccination to mass vaccination.”

Putin Orders Mass Vaccination Against COVID19 With Sputnik V Jab (RT)

President Vladimir Putin has instructed the Russian government to begin rolling out a coronavirus vaccine for the entire population from next week, with more than 1.5 million people having already received the jab.
In a meeting with ministers on Wednesday, Putin said that the time had come to “move from large-scale vaccination to mass vaccination.” He added that the Sputnik V formula, developed by Moscow’s Gamaleya Institute, was “the best in the world.” While comparisons between different vaccines are hard to draw, given the unique circumstances under which they have been developed, he insisted that “no others demonstrate this level of protection and such a degree of safety.”

However, the president expressed concern over the global fight against Covid-19, saying that “we see across the world, unfortunately, that it is not yet possible to strangle this disease, and we cannot prevent all the negative consequences associated with it.” Responding to the new directive, Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova reported that the mass immunization program will begin next week, from 18 January. While 1.5 million people in the country have already received their first jab, according to the Russian Direct Investment Fund, which financed Sputnik V, the list of those eligible was still subject to a number of restrictions.

Doctors, teachers, factory workers, municipal officials and those working in finance and the media were initially offered appointments first. However, there was speculation that, in practice, few checks were put in place before people were given their injection. It is still unclear how the mass-immunization program will be administered, and whether all Russians will be offered shots at once, or staggered based on their age group. Putin added that Sputnik V was particularly well-suited to being made available across the entirety of the world’s largest country because “thank God, our vaccine does not require any unusual conditions for transportation,” and can be stored at ordinary refrigerator temperatures.

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A good thing if you’re a vaccine maker?!

Moderna CEO Says The World Will Have To Live With Covid ‘Forever’ (CNBC)

The CEO of Covid-19 vaccine maker Moderna warned Wednesday that the coronavirus that has brought world economies to a standstill and overwhelmed hospitals will be around “forever.” Public health officials and infectious disease experts have said there is a high likelihood that Covid-19 will become an endemic disease, meaning it will become present in communities at all times, though likely at lower levels than it is now. Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel appeared to agree Wednesday that Covid-19 will become endemic, saying “SARS-CoV-2 is not going away.” “We are going to live with this virus, we think, forever,” he said during a panel discussion at the JPMorgan Healthcare Conference.


Health officials will have to continuously watch for new variants of the virus, so scientists can produce vaccines to fight them, he said. Researchers in Ohio said Wednesday they’ve discovered two new variants likely originating in the U.S. and that one of them quickly became the dominant strain in Columbus, Ohio, over a three-week period in late December and early January. Pfizer researchers said its vaccine developed with BioNTech appeared to be effective against a key mutation in the U.K. strain as well as a variant found in South Africa. Moderna’s vaccine has been authorized by the Food and Drug Administration for use in Americans who are 18 years old and older. Additional studies still needed to be completed in children, whose immune systems can respond differently to vaccines than those of adults.

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Two have already been refused entry because of positive PCR tests.

WHO Team Arrives In Wuhan To Investigate Pandemic Origins (AP)

A global team of researchers arrived Thursday in the Chinese city where the coronavirus pandemic was first detected to conduct a politically sensitive investigation into its origins amid uncertainty about whether Beijing might try to prevent embarrassing discoveries. The 10-member team sent to Wuhan by the World Health Organization was approved by President Xi Jinping’s government after months of diplomatic wrangling that prompted an unusual public complaint by the head of the WHO. Scientists suspect the virus that has killed 1.9 million people since late 2019 jumped to humans from bats or other animals, most likely in China’s southwest. The ruling Communist Party, stung by complaints it allowed the disease to spread, says the virus came from abroad, possibly on imported seafood, but scientists reject that.


CGTN, the English-language channel of state broadcaster CCTV, reported the WHO team’s arrival. The members include virus and other experts from the United States, Australia, Germany, Japan, Britain, Russia, the Netherlands, Qatar and Vietnam. A government spokesman said this week they will “exchange views” with Chinese scientists but gave no indication whether they would be allowed to gather evidence. They will undergo a two-week quarantine as well as a throat swab test and an antibody test for COVID-19, according to a post on CGTN’s official Weibo account. They are to start working with Chinese experts via video conference while in quarantine. China rejected demands for an international investigation after the Trump administration blamed Beijing for the virus’s spread, which plunged the global economy into its deepest slump since the 1930s.

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In Holland, with 5,000 new cases on Tuesday, a warning yesterday that in February B.1.1.7 could cause 150,000 new cases per day.

Two NYC Residents Reported To Have UK COVID-19 Variant (AMNY)

Two New York City residents, one from Manhattan and the other from Queens, have contracted the mutated COVID-19 strain that was first identified in the United Kingdom—leading to a second nationwide lockdown of the country—Mayor Bill de Blasio said Wednesday. Both people were originally diagnosed in late-December using genetic sequencing — a method used to identify the new strain — which returned results “within the last few hours,” according to city Health Commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi. Over 30 countries have reported cases of a new COVID variant, known as B.1.1.7, first identified in the UK last fall. In response, several countries have shut their doors to travelers from the United Kingdom in order to mitigate the spread of the virus.


Earlier this week, Washington announced that all international travelers will be required show proof of a negative COVID-19 test before boarding a flight starting Jan. 26 in response to the variant’s spread. But on Wednesday, de Blasio said that the measure fell short of what is needed to control the virus and again called for the federal government to issue a travel ban from Britain. “That’s not good enough,” de Blasio told reporters. “Here is proof positive that someone who was in the UK has brought the variant back here. We need that stopped. All flights from the United Kingdom should be canceled immediately by the federal government.” State officials reported the first case of the new variant on Jan. 4. Since then, officials have reported a total of 12 people in New York state have contracted the B.1.1.7.

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“..so called ‘immunity’ passports “pose extremely high risks in terms of social cohesion, discrimination, exclusion and vulnerability.”

EU Leaders Demand “Standardised” Vaccine Passport For Travel (SN)

EU leaders are demanding that the Commission should ‘standardise’ a vaccine passport across all member countries, and that it should be required for people to travel throughout the area. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has penned a letter to EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen, outlining that “Persons who have been vaccinated should be free to travel.” The letter calls for a “standardised certificate, which will prove that a person has been successfully vaccinated.” While it stops short at advocating mandatory vaccination, the letter further urges that “It is urgent to adopt a common understanding on how a vaccination certificate should be structured so as to be accepted in all member states.”

Mitsotakis has pledged to raise the issue during an upcoming EU summit on January 21, declaring that “there is an urgent need for a high-level EU-wide mobilization to move things forward.” Vaccine passports have previously been touted by the EU, with officials suggesting back in April that visa applicants would also be required to be vaccinated. EU countries including Spain, Estonia, Iceland, and Belgium have all indicated that they are open to some form of vaccine passports, as well as sharing the data across borders. This week, it was also revealed that Denmark is the latest country to announce that it is rolling out a ‘Covid passport’, to allow those who have taken the vaccine to engage in society without any restrictions.

However, the EU’s data protection chief Wojciech Wiewiorowski recently labeled the idea of an immunity passport “extreme” and has repeatedly said it is alarming, and ‘disgusting’. The spectre of so called ‘immunity passports’ is looming globally. Having left the EU, Britain would not be part of any standardised European scheme, however it has now confirmed that it is rolling out vaccine passports, despite previous denials that it would do so. Recently, the government in Ontario, Canada admitted that it is exploring ‘immunity passports’ in conjunction with restrictions on travel and access to social venues for the unvaccinated. Last month, Israel announced that citizens who get the COVID-19 vaccine will be given ‘green passports’ that will enable them to attend venues and eat at restaurants.

A litany of other government and travel industry figures in both the US, Britain and beyond have suggested that ‘COVID passports’ are coming in order for ‘life to get back to normal’. Anna Beduschi, an academic from Exeter University, commented on the potential move toward vaccine passports by EU, noting that it “poses essential questions for the protection of data privacy and human rights.” Beduschi added that the vaccine passports may “create a new distinction between individuals based on their health status, which can then be used to determine the degree of freedoms and rights they may enjoy.” A report compiled last year by AI research body the Ada Lovelace Institute said so called ‘immunity’ passports “pose extremely high risks in terms of social cohesion, discrimination, exclusion and vulnerability.” Sam Grant, campaign manager at the civili liberties advocacy group Liberty has warned that “any form of immunity passport risks creating a two-tier system in which some of us have access to freedoms and support while others are shut out.”

Read more …

“..the city let the landlords keep all of the gains in land value. And they just raised the income taxes and went into debt to pay for the subway.”

Polarization, Then a Crash – Michael Hudson (AN)

[..] ever since the Bronze Age you had the temples and the palaces providing basic needs. Because if you leave this to the private sector, then you’re going to have a situation where the private supplier has a chokehold on the economy and can say: your money or your life. There are certain things that governments are supposed to supply and which industrial capitalism wanted government to supply. Because they didn’t want employers or their employees to have to pay for them. These are a number of things. Governments obviously have to supply military defense. You can’t leave that private people but also healthcare, for instance. The conservative party in England, Benjamin Disraeli said: health is everything; we have to spend on health.

And you don’t want to, in principle, make money off crime. But in America we’re privatizing the penal system, the jail system. So you have increasing pressure on government, on governors, to arrest people, put them in jail especially on drug use, where you can employ them at 10 cents an hour. And lease them out to companies as low priced labor. But most of all, government is supposed to provide the infrastructure: the transportation, the communication, the telephone system. And the idea is that if you leave like cable TV to private suppliers, they are natural monopolies. The idea throughout history from classical Greece and Rome, medieval times in Europe is that natural monopolies should be in the public domain.

Because you don’t want to provide opportunities for monopoly rent. Because monopoly rent, like land rent and natural resource rent, is not a necessary cost to production. You want the necessary cost of production to be the material costs and normal profit. Because obviously you need people to have some incentive to do things. But the incentive is supposed to be normal profit, not super profits, not just a free lunch. And so if you let transportation become privatized, then it is going to cost the workforce much more money to get to work and to get to a job. If you let the oil industry be privatized and the profits from the natural resource, and that’s the patrimony of mineral rights, oil and gas is all going to go to the private financial sector not to be used as the tax base.

And if you have the land rent, essentially if the government, for instance, in New York City, they spent let’s say a billion dollars on extending the second Avenue subway line up along the wealthy Upper East Side. That increased land values for landlords all by about twice the amount by about $2 billion. Because people now were closer to the subway station, they didn’t have to walk. They had better transport. All of this increase in land prices could have financed the extension of the subway and still been able to lower the subway fares for the rest of new Yorkers. Instead, the city let the landlords keep all of the gains in land value. And they just raised the income taxes and went into debt to pay for the subway.

So, you have a privatization of wealth that is not created by landlords, not created by individuals. Certainly the oil companies don’t create the oil in the ground. And the mining companies don’t create the mineral resources. All of these things are given away freely. The United States lets forestry logging companies and mining companies get whatever they can take from the public domain for free instead of getting the results of this publicly owned land to finance the public budget. Taxes in the United States could be drastically reduced on wages and on profits, if you would just tax the unearned monopoly rent, the economic rent that is not necessary for production.

Read more …

How to spook markets.

Biden To Propose Massive $2 Trillion Stimulus (ZH)

Last week, Goldman sparked a buying frenzy in the market (and selling in treasuries) when the bank said it expects the Biden admin would unveil a “modest” $750 billion fiscal stimulus plan, including some $300 billion in “stimmy” checks to Americans. However, as bank after bank tried to upstage Goldman and threw around stimulus estimates as high as $1 trillion or even more, the market barely noticed when late this afternoon, incoming Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer reportedly “pressed” (in Bloomberg’s words) Joe Biden to propose more than $1.3 trillion in spending for his initial round of Covid-19 relief.

According to Bloomberg, “the two have discussed Biden’s plans ahead of the president-elect’s announcement on his economic-rebuilding proposals… Biden is set to speak at 7:15 p.m. Thursday to outline “his vaccination and economic rescue legislative package,” his transition team said in a statement.” But if markets ignored the Schumer report, they sure as hell noticed the CNN report which hit just after 9pmET, which prompted traders to take a double take because apparently Schumer “pressed” Biden so hard to expand the next stimulus round, he literally squashed the president-elect, who is now “expected to unveil a major Covid-19 relief package on Thursday and his advisers have recently told allies in Congress to expect a price tag in the ballpark of $2 trillion,” CNN reported citing two people briefed on the deliberations.

The Biden team is taking a “shoot for the moon” approach with the package, one lawmaker in close contact with them told CNN, though they added that the price tag could still change. The proposal, which is just shy of the Democrats’ demand late last year when they sought a $2.2 trillion stimulus, only to agree on a $900 billion enacted last December, “will include sizable direct payments to American families, significant state and local funding – including for coronavirus vaccine distribution and other emergency spending measures – to help those struggling during the pandemic.”

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Why does the US have so many neocon women in high places?

Biden Taps Veteran Interventionist Samantha Power to Head USAID (Antiwar)

On Wednesday, Joe Biden announced that he will nominate Samantha Power to head the US Agency for International Development (USAID). Power served as ambassador to the UN for President Obama from 2013 to 2017. Before that, she worked on Obama’s National Security Council, where she played an instrumental role in pushing for US intervention in Libya in 2011. Power argued in favor of US intervention in Libya under the guise of protecting human rights and preventing genocide. She was joined in her crusade by then-Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and Susan Rice, who served as the UN ambassador at the time. Reports from 2011 say the pressure from Power, Rice, and Clinton is what led Obama to intervene militarily in Libya, even though his other top advisors were against it.

Then-Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates would later say that in a “51 to 49” decision, Obama decided to bomb Libya. The US-NATO intervention in Libya that led to the brutal murder of former Libyan ruler Moammar Gaddafi was an absolute disaster. Destabilizing Libya turned the country into a haven for al-Qaeda-linked militants, resulted in targeted killings of black Africans, sparked a refugee crisis in North Africa, and even led to the creation of slave markets. For her efforts in convincing Obama to destroy Libya, Power was promoted. As the US ambassador to the UN, Power advocated for US intervention in Syria and stood by as the Obama administration backed the Saudis in their brutal war against Yemen’s Houthis.

While Powers has since taken a public stance against the war in Yemen, she omitted her early role in supporting the vicious war from her memoir that was published in 2019. In the book, Power defended her decision to intervene in Libya and argued that more intervention in Syria could have prevented some of the war’s atrocities. While it’s not exactly a national security position, Power will have a lot of influence on foreign policy from her future role as the head of USAID. The agency is often used to fund US regime change efforts. For example, in September 2019, USAID announced it would be providing $52 million to Juan Guaido, who the US recognizes as president of Venezuela, despite the fact that Nicolas Maduro holds the office. Earlier in 2019, the US supported Guaido in a failed coup attempt.

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Peaceful protests coming.

As Biden Vows To ‘Defeat The NRA,’ Gun Sales Continue To Soar (JTN)

The FBI’s firearm statistics show that 2020 was a record-breaking year in the firearm industry with a 39.9% increase in FBI firearm background checks. With a worldwide pandemic, a summer of violence in cities across the country, the U.S. presidential election and now the transitioning of administrations, 2020 was no ordinary year. With a total of 39,695,315 completed background checks – up from 28,369,750 in 2019 – the year marked the most firearm checks in history, based on FBI data as far back as 1998. Since 1998, nine out of the top ten highest firearm-check weeks occurred in 2020, with the highest check weeks being in the middle of March and the beginning of June.


December, in the midst of election irregularity claims by Trump, saw the highest month of background checks. At over 7.4 million, Illinois saw the most background checks in the country. The fear of the unknown and what’s to come continue to drive sales through the roof. Since the breaching of the Capitol on Jan. 6, gun stores have seen an increase in sales from a fairly even mix of Republicans and Democrats, according to research from TMZ. Gun shops reported increased sales up 400% this past week compared to the week before, with many stores being sold out of guns and ammunition. As Inauguration Day draws closer, sales could continue to stay high with Biden recently saying he will “defeat the NRA.”

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Abominable.

Former Michigan Gov. Snyder Charged For Flint Water Crisis (JTN)

Former Republican governor of Michigan Rick Snyder has been charged with two counts of willful neglect of duty in connection with an investigation pertaining to the Flint, Michigan water crisis, which received much national attention at the time. The Associated Press reported that, according to the state archivist, there has never before been a sitting or former governor charged with wrongdoing connected to their tenure as Michigan governor. “Flint was in chronic financial trouble in 2014 when a Snyder-appointed manager who was running the majority Black city carried out a money-saving decision to use the Flint River for water while a regional pipeline from Lake Huron was under construction,” the outlet noted.


“The corrosive water, however, wasn’t treated properly and released lead from old plumbing into homes in one of the worst manmade environmental disasters in U.S. history,” the wire service reported. As reports have shown, such as from the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of the Inspector General, there was plenty of blame to go around. CNN reported that the IG report “strongly criticizes the local, state and federal government’s response to the Flint water crisis in 2015 and 2016.”

Read more …

So what has the Fed done to help?

Unemployment Rate Above 20% For Lowest-Paid Workers – Fed’s Brainard (CNBC)

Unemployment for the lowest-paid workers in the U.S. is above 20%, a figure that Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard said underscores the importance of policy help for the economy. The figure indicates how uneven the recovery has seen since efforts to control the Covid-19 pandemic resulted in the biggest quarterly GDP drop since the Great Depression. “The damage from COVID-19 is concentrated among already challenged groups,” Brainard said in a speech Wednesday. “The K-shaped recovery remains highly uneven, with certain sectors and groups experiencing substantial hardship.”


At a time when the national unemployment rate has come down from the pandemic peak of 14.7% to the current 6.7%, Fed economists estimate the jobless rate for the lowest quartile of earners is “likely above 20%,” Brainard said. That comes as the Black unemployment rate is 9.9% and the Hispanic rate is at 9.3% while the rate for Whites is 6%. Fed officials have made “inclusive” employment gains a priority and have adjusted policy to try to make that happen. A new approach will allow inflation to run higher than the central bank’s 2% goal and the unemployment rate to fall beneath what had traditionally been an indicator of higher inflation before the Fed will raise interest rates.

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“We can’t run and hide hoping to be the last one hauled off to the abattoir. It’s time to step up.”

Cancel Yourself (Michael Krieger)

There’s no reason to rehash what happened over the last several days, but the gist of it is that significant components of internet infrastructure were weaponized for ideological and political purposes. If we’re being honest with ourselves, we all knew this day was coming. We just didn’t want to admit it or confront it, because it’s not a comforting or easy thing to admit or confront. But the day has arrived and we’re no longer in a position to ignore it. The most concerning aspect isn’t that it happened, but that it could happen at all. The internet is clearly broken, possibly dying, and if we want to digitally associate freely again at some point in the future, we have no choice but to fix it.

Although I have no team in the parochial political fight, I’ve chosen one in the broader ideological battle. The wielding of such concentrated and unaccountable power over human communication has crossed a very serious line and sets us up for a future world I’m uninterested in participating in. As such, we have no choice but to confront the issue head on. People who think this is about Trump for me are the most ridiculous people. I never voted for him, supported him or took him seriously. While I recognize the role he played in the greater scheme of this massive historical cycle, the best thing that can happen is for him to disappear as a political force and be understood as the spectacle and distraction he was. I’m not here to lecture anyone about who they voted for, but I’m here to connect with people of all political persuasions ready to become serious and admit that a real strategy is needed to address the unaccountable power of the national security state oligarchy. Conventional political avenues are a dead end at this point.

I recognize that tens of millions of frustrated, angry and concerned minds are trying to make sense of it all and reorient themselves. This presents a giant opportunity, but also very real danger. All the emotion being felt currently can be channeled into negative avenues such as violence, aimless spectacles, Trump martyrdom or a futile search for the next political savior guaranteed to disappoint, or it can be channeled in productive ways. That’s why I’m here writing this post at this moment. Enough people are finally motivated to respond, but what really matters is the nature of this response. The dominant aggregate reaction is what will determine the future.

Most of us eagerly, or more likely lazily, embraced the current insipid and dull paradigm in the name of convenience, low prices, and free shipping, but we never stopped to consider the sacrifices made along the way. We swallowed it whole, became comfortable fat and happy, and now the facade’s about to be slowly stripped away unless we bend the knee to an ever narrowing Overton Window of speech and behavior parameters. It begins with social media purges, but it won’t end there. All the special things we sacrificed from the prior era are gone, yet the consequences are here to stay. We can’t run and hide hoping to be the last one hauled off to the abattoir. It’s time to step up.

Read more …

This should be the most normal thing in the world. Instead, it’s news.

New Zealand City Closes Busy Road For Weeks To Protect Sea Lions (G.)

The second largest city on New Zealand’s South Island has closed a popular road for an entire month in order for a sea lion to nest safely with its pup. Dunedin City council said in a Facebook post it would close John Wilson Drive above the city’s St Claire beach for a month to allow “some special residents to use the road safely”. “A New Zealand sea lion and her pup have taken up residence at the golf course next door and are regularly crossing the road to get to the beach,” the council said. “You can still visit the area by foot or bicycle, but please give the sea lions lots of space (at least 20m) … New Zealand sea lions are endangered and one of the rarest sea lion species in the world.”


The harbour city, home to 120,000 people, regularly shuts roads during the summer months to allow wildlife to cross safely, but typically only for a day or two at most. The month-long closure has been applauded by locals, many of whom urged the council the make it permanent to protect vulnerable wildlife. Sea lions are threatened in New Zealand and are often attacked by dogs or chase humans if they get too close. The animals, which can weigh up to 200kg, have been giving birth in and around Dunedin since 1993, and since protection efforts have ramped up – both official and otherwise – the sea lion breeding season has become a fixture of the summer months, with at least 20 pups expected in the city this year.

Read more …

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle January 14 2021

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 45 total)
  • Author
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  • #68299

    Jackson Pollock Male and female 1942   • House Votes To Impeach Trump For ‘Insurrection’ (RT) • Twitter CEO Defends Banning Trump But Says It Was
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle January 14 2021]

    #68302
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Jackson Pollock Male and female 1942

    That’s quite a work.
    I wonder; did he (Pollock) understand his painting?

    #68303
    John Day
    Participant

    Facebook is dinged FOR NOT CENSORING HARD ENOUGH!
    Do you see where this is going rapidly?
    Their failure was in letting regular people coordinate their trips for a peaceful political protest.
    “Facebook Played Major Role Coordinating ‘Capitol Riot’ As Sandberg Deflects Blame”
    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/facebook-played-major-role-coordinating-capitol-riot-sandberg-deflects-blame

    #68304
    John Day
    Participant

    When we bike toured the South Island about this time 15 years ago, we hung out on some rocks by the ocean with some sea lions. They were ok, and so were we.

    #68305
    John Day
    Participant

    Michael Hudson closed with this, which is a critical consideration:
    HUDSON: A Centrist is somebody who looks at all problems as being marginal, not structural and so you can only have a little change. So a centrist is a right wing, neoliberal supporter of the financial sector and implicitly anti-labor and anti-industry. A centrist is someone who doesn’t want any change in the system and just goes with the status quo. Because they can’t imagine that every economy tends to polarize naturally between wealthy people at the top impoverishing the 99% at the bottom. And the centrist doesn’t realize that. A centrist thinks that economies tend to move towards equality and equilibrium. And the reality is economies move towards this dis-equilibrium, polarization and then there’s a crash. Polarization and then there’s a crash. But a centrist says: don’t do anything at all. So essentially you should just stand aside and let Obama and Biden and the rest standby while the financial sector monopolizes the economy and impoverishes it.

    #68306
    John Day
    Participant

    Michael Yon, war correspondent, compares his experience at the Washington Riot, up front with ANTIFA agents provocateur in Washington DC last week, to his long experience with Hong Kong protesters. He details Hong-Kong-tactics ANTIFA adopted.

    #68308
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Added to the long posts yesterday.

    So much wrong with Hudson, I’ll spare you. It’s like every sentence. But it’s easy to tell when his conclusion is “Moderates and Centrists = violent terrorizing extremists” A ≠ A

    Also even in his own sentences, as all logic on earth seems to be suspended, he says, “government is necessary and critical to fix this / Government is the cause of all these things breaking.”

    Pick one. I have to pick one: so do you. I pick that only government has the guns to enforce monopolies, and once you have government power large enough to do this, it’s guaranteed that the wealthy will hijack and direct government to make 100% monopolies and 0% competition. Competition. Bankruptcy. You know: Capitalism. His answer: more government. Because of course the rich don’t now / never will control government to get even more as we spiral into a complete merger of corporation-and-state authoritarianism we see in the last 24 hours. Nope! Not like that at all. I’m seeing things.

    It’s just too much to get into.

    #68309
    kultsommer
    Participant

    Circus of impeachment parade yesterday, shaky emotional voices coached by night before call: “You know what to say. Right?” if ever was the one. DC – Hollywood for the, not only physically, ugly people indeed.

    Based just of direction of immigration flow, in all post war decades, one can comfortably say that capitalism had an upper hand over it’s counterpart. So why kick the opponent who is already on the ground? Why, right after the FDR death, and somehow by miracle of a perfect timing “Atlas shrugged” surfaced into day light, followed by McCarthy craze? All culminating in the end, eighties, where Rambo was slaughtering Soviets in droves and “Gulag archipelago” declared the best book written, ever. Why constant drumbeat: Stalin. Mao, Stalin, Mao? Because in “socialism overall package there is that little nasty seed that Michael Hudson (and Ricardo over century ago) is talking about. While promoting the glory of “better mousetrap inventor”, power entity was all this time really protecting rentier, easy money class which today, we can say it, almost has a full control.

    Always looking for Arnold’s art comment out of sheer curiosity. As they say in my country: One who sings (or making genuine effort to “get” art, as in this case) has no evil thoughts.

    #68310
    John Day
    Participant

    https://www.johndayblog.com/2021/01/find-alternatives.html

    ​Video analysis of ANTIFA agents provocateur setting up the circumstances which directly led to the shooting death of Ashli Babbit. A lot of specific video was taken, and is analyzed with identification of individual provocateurs and their actions before, during and after her shooting.​

    ​ ​What did Pelosi and McConnell know of the planned attack on the US Capitol before the House impeached President Trump for inciting violence?
    ​ ​President Trump was blamed for the siege of the US Capitol last Wednesday, however the FBI confirmed the attack was planned several days in advance.
    ​ ​Investigative reporter John Solomon dropped a bombshell on Wednesday night and said the DC police rejected his FOIA request for records pertaining to their investigation of the siege of the U.S. Capitol.
    ​ ​The DC police said release of the records would be ‘personally embarrassing’ and privacy-invading.

    DC Police Reject FOIA Request For Records Related to Their Probe of Siege of Capitol – Insider Leaked Maps, Internal Docs to Help Assist Rioters Navigate Building

    ​Everybody’s asking “Is 2021 an Echo of 1641?”​ , Charles Hugh Smith has the story
    ​ ​The reason why history rhymes is that humanity is still using Wetware 1.0 and so humans respond to scarcity, abundance and conflicts over them in the same manner.
    ​ ​I am struck by similarities between the conflict-torn mid-1600s and the present: global climate change (The Little Ice Age in the 1600s), political upheavals and wars which intertwined civil and imperial conflicts. Global Crisis: War, Climate Change and Catastrophe in the 17th Century is a fascinating overview of this complex era which disrupted regimes and empires from England to China.
    ​ ​Climate change (The Little Ice Age) generated scarcities of grain in a time of burgeoning human populations. As in the present day, everyone assumed ample harvests would continue forever–expanding abundance is the New Normal. Alas, Nature is not a steady-state system and cycles are not tamed by our desire for ever-expanding abundance.
    ​ ​Humans respond to scarcity by assessing who’s getting the biggest pieces of the shrinking pie. When hunger begets desperation, various dynamics are set into motion as those without agency and capital, i.e. political and financial power do whatever they can to get enough to survive while those holding the majority of political and financial power, jockey to maintain or expand their power.
    https://www.oftwominds.com/blogjan21/1641-redux1-21.html

    ​Bringing America together: ​CNN’s Don Lemon: If You Voted For Trump, You’re With The Klan, The Nazis, & The Rioters
    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/unity-cnns-don-lemon-if-you-voted-trump-youre-klan-nazis-rioters

    ​2021 May be the Year that the World Loses Confidence in the Dollar
    (It’s sure hard to know when the trap door will fall out and all of the bypass channels will take over in the global economy)​

    2021 may be the year that the world loses confidence in the dollar

    #68311
    Mr. House
    Participant

    Here is an interesting question for you:

    How does someone get covid after getting a vaccine that doesn’t have covid in it? Is the MRNA causing your body to make covid?

    #68312
    Mr. House
    Participant
    #68313
    Dr. D
    Participant

    As predicted. 1st Day of the 1st one and the first talks:

    2nd
    https://imgflip.com/i/3kgwhu

    “But what about SECOND Impeachment?” “I don’t think he cares about second impeachment, Pip.” Hahahahahaha. I don’t know about you, but we’re all having a great time.

    And because, logic is dead, at the same time reporters say “You don’t just shrug this off” NBC reports: “You just shrug this off.”

    “He unknowingly had Covid-19. Now his blood contains rare antibodies.”
    https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/he-unknowingly-had-covid-19-now-his-blood-contains-rare-n1254232

    Yes, with your family, you CAN shrug it off. OR you can get injured. Which is why you need to prioritize high health, get outside, go to the gym: love, laugh, be happy. Oh wait, all outlawed. And use HCQ, and Ivermectin. Also outlawed. …Total coincidence, of course. And it’s not like the lockdown states are all worse than the free states…what’s that? They all are? But in any case, we’re all going to keep getting it, this is admitted, today in an article by Merck, so no point in any lockdown, economy, division, and there never was.

    As said the 1st day. “But what about SECOND lockdown?” “I don’t think the people care about second lockdown, Pip.”

    “Trump was blamed for the siege of the US Capitol “ There was a siege? When? Can you show me the pictures? “I don’t think that word mean what you think it mean.”

    “A siege is a military blockade of a city, or fortress, with the intent of conquering by attrition, or a well-prepared assault. This derives from Latin: sedere, lit. ‘to sit’. Siege warfare is a form of constant, low-intensity conflict characterized by one party holding a strong, static, defensive position.”

    But “We create our own reality now” and all the definitions made up as-we-go, right Merriam-Webster? When you’re on the side of Karl Rove, you’re on the side of the angels for sure.

    “If You Voted For Trump, You’re With The Klan, The Nazis, & The Rioters” AntiFa. Logic. Got it.

    #68314
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    @ Raul

    “A good thing if you’re a vaccine maker?!”

    Yes, but maybe also the first death knell for the vaccine industry since this isn’t a vaccine and it doesn’t work?

    “Why does the US have so many neocon women in high places?”

    Because, while men are crazy about going at each other in identity groups like armies and sports teams, women are inherently more ruthless at the core. In nature, perhaps the only species where a bull male will take on a female with cubs when she’s had enough, is the gorilla: the male grabs her youngest infant and smashes its head on a rock.

    Message: I can protect your kids or kill your kids. Which will it be?

    We have ample gorilla DNA in our immediate genetic inheritance backline. Men do this all the time. Women submit to this bullshit all the time. I blame neither of them: it’s in their genes.

    “Happy is the one who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks.” Pslam 137.9

    Some women long for a man with a big dick. Understandable. I longed ror a woman with a big baseball bat who knows how to use it. Fate gave me the ex Mrs. Sherburn.

    Honey Hush

    Poor Mr. Sherburn. He confused a big dick with a baseball bat:

    Well, come in this house, stop all that yakety-yak
    Come in this house, stop all that yakety-yak
    ‘Cause your sugar daddy don’t want no talkin’ back
    You keep on a-tellin’, talking ’bout this and that
    You keep on a-talkin’, talking ’bout this and that
    I got news for you, you ain’t nothing but an alleycatTurn off the waterworks baby, they don’t move me no-more
    Turn off the waterworks baby, they don’t move me no-more
    When I leave this time, I ain’t com’ back no-more
    Honey hush! Oow!I said come in this house, stop all that yakety-yak
    Come on in this house woman, stop all that yakety-yak
    Don’t make me nervous, I’m holdin’ a baseball bat
    Well it’s a hi-ho, hi-ho silver
    A hi-ho, a hi-ho silver, hi-ho, a hi-ho silver
    Hi-ho, hi-ho silver
    Hi-ho, hi-ho silver away

    Wasn’t he surprised?!

    Sometimes but not often, a cover is as good or better than the original:

    Hi Yo Silver

    #68315
    Noirette
    Participant

    Dr Day, that vid. – M. Yon, was interesting, merci.

    On the moment, i looked at some vid. clips of the Storming of the Capitol (so-called) and my first impressions was ‘very photo op’, some really suspicious details (not the guards letting ppl in, that is ‘other’) ..

    But then pretty much all protests / angry crowd .. collective scenes are photo ops, in the sense that the participants, today, are aware that they are participating in a ‘show’ that will be photographed, filmed, etc. and that is the point, what they crave .. By their mates moreover…ppl present beside them.. amongst others…

    (In the past 25 years or so there have been ‘show’ protests that are pure ‘show’ – the organisors, and participants, make money – the protestors pander to the media, have no real cause. FEMEN is a typical ex. Pussy Riot maybe – Idk much about them.)

    What the vid. does not address is that ppl are paid to participate, act. Many protestors (and agent-provocateurs) are semi-profesionals doing Ok paid temp gigs, they take contracts, like ‘extras’ for movies. This financial circuit is not investigated.

    Anecdote, from my personal knowledge, from ppl I know.

    The protestors in the Maidan (before the showdown, Ukraine) were paid between 7 and 20 Euros a day, Excellent pay.

    Young women who joined the White Helmets (yes they had / have a women-brigade, for photo ops mostly, Syria) were paid 200 Euros a month, as a fixed salary.

    Femen protest photo, *warning!* topless

    https://bit.ly/3srZf5a

    Syrian White Helmets women photo, well covered up.

    https://bit.ly/3qrr4ZP

    #68316
    a kullervo
    Participant

    An everlasting intoxication, a forever high on righteousness and revenge, that’s what living in Paradise is all about while others burn in Hell.

    Can you spot the difference between current politics and Christian beliefs?

    #68317
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    This fight is the big one you’ve all been waiting for, so dreadfully, and for so long.
    A small yet clearly visible and powerful group of Democrat Party top leadership, Tech giants and Military Industrial Corruptocrats have just carried out stunningly aggressive attacks on the President of the United States, and millions of his law abiding supporters
    The Dems are accused of executing the most brazenly fraudulent election in history , followed by hyperbolic claims that correcting, challenging or even freely discussing the possibility of election fraud were horribly unlawful punishable offenses.
    Did I say that well enough ? I’m saying that in transparent service to a self-admitted hostile foreign power (China), Democrat Party politicians and leaders illegally rigged the U.S. Presidential election, and then immediately made it literally illegal to accuse them of the crime. It is now a punishable offense to claim or publish evidence of the crime, or even discuss the subject of the crime to anyone in any setting at any time. Or so the opponents say, and those opponents are in positions to exert legal, financial, technical and physical force with or without any further permissions from you for that authority.
    It is no longer even necessary to communicate one’s opinion that fraud may have taken place and should be investigated. Merely wondering if it might be true is now , literally, a criminal act. Law abiding citizens are being arrested and charged at this very moment .
    In openly coordinated action the Main Stream media and Big Tech companies (Google, Twitter, Facebook and Amazon) conspired to immediately and simultaneously deprive the President and his tens of millions of supporters of access to the public communications platforms they controlled , in unambiguously intentional violation of their Constitutional right to free speech. These are enormous and egregious crimes against the nation itself, because they obliterate the most basic ( in fact essentially necessary ) of the fundamental human rights which make America a democratic republic in the first place: the right to know and share vital information.
    Considering that Democracy is literally founded on the principal of giving everyone a voice in discussing and deciding issues, it is pretty crazy to make that same process of democratic discussion and decision to be an act of treason. Yet that is precisely what they have done.
    How crazy will their next “solution” be ? Well, I’m saddened and horrified to predict that , based on their previous solutions, their next solution will be to use lethal force to prevent thought and communication and evidence of election fraud from being seen or exchanged by anyone.
    But, you say, that’s too crazy to believe ! No one will do that !
    To which I say, ” Of course they will do . How silly to say otherwise because they are doing it, right now, at this very moment. And they are ramping it up with maximum haste. Why so fast ? Because they know that if they fail to stop the discussion about election fraud then they shall lose everything . They know this, and they believe this, because it is true. They know there was massive fraud because they are the ones who did it ! They have no doubts about that. You may have doubts, but they don’t. They know for sure. Trump won, Biden lost, and Biden’s team knowingly committed willful treasons betrayals and enormous felonies in the process. All of the perpetrators fear losing their fortunes and their power (and rightfully so) , but the leadership stands to lose a lot more than that. Their leaders expect the very realistic possibility of losing their freedom or even their lives. For them this is an existential crisis.
    Better than anyone else, these lawbreakers KNOW what is in store for themselves when the truth finally leaks its way out into fully public awareness, about what they did and why they did it.
    Stealing an election on behalf of a hostile foreign power is a very very big deal. Those who did so knowingly and maliciously will almost certainly be sent to prison for life or executed. So it is no wonder why they fight against disclosure as though their lives depended upon it. Their lives do depend on it.
    Remarkably, alternative media ( far from being powerless) now have it completely within their ability to turn this apparent defeat into glorious victory. It’s as easy as talking. If they choose to do it then no one can stop them. All they have to do is tell the truth. Just say it or write it . . . and put it online, just like I’m doing now.
    Hold the fraudulent election trial in the unregulated public forum of the internet. Outline, list, summarize, explain, document, present evidence and argument ALL of the facts, statements, affidavits, forensics, etc. and broadcast it hither and yon across the Internet in the same way are practiced in doing. .
    Don’t wait for “Declas” , SCREW official declassification permission. Just print it. Fuck the possible exposure of spies, just dox the bastards. Lay every single fact right out there in the sunlight and let people sort it all out for themselves. Let the people of earth decide what’s right or wrong about any and all of it.
    Why do this ? Because if you don’t do it by peaceful means (like unrestricted freedom of speech and exchange of vital information) then it is going to be settled the other way . That other way would be a bloodbath such as the world has never contemplated.
    Don’t think of it as the “3rd” or “4th” World War, though, because it will be no such thing. Oh for sure it will involve the whole world, that’s obvious, but it won’t be nation vs nation. It will be internecine Civil war , on a planetary basis, and it will have to be to the bitter end . . . because both sides believe ( honest to God believe ) that they must prevail in order to survive at all. If and when my thoughts and identity and grasp of what life is all about suddenly because Capital Offenses punishable by death or imprisonment (because my opponent deeply believes these characteristics are deadly evil !) , I will be forced to kill or be killed . And so will you . On BOTH sides of the philosophical false divide.

    #68318
    a kullervo
    Participant

    Why does the US have so many neocon women in high places?

    Because when it comes to relentless, unmitigated venomous ill will, women clearly overcome men.

    Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

    #68319
    Mr. House
    Participant

    “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.“

    I concur. I’ve never witnessed anything quite like a table of females in the lunch room breaking down someone who broke “norms” into tears and all a public display. Mean girls the movie doesn’t even begin to show this behavior.

    #68320
    Veracious Poet
    Participant

    Pick one. I have to pick one: so do you. I pick that only government has the guns to enforce monopolies, and once you have government power large enough to do this, it’s guaranteed that the wealthy will hijack and direct government to make 100% monopolies and 0% competition.

    Have not the supra-equal animals, that bully for their elite breakaway civilization, made that bloodily apparent by now?

    While promoting the glory of “better mousetrap inventor”, power entity was all this time really protecting rentier, easy money class which today, we can say it, almost has a full control.

    Anyone that isn’t part of the in-crowd is steadily approaching neanderthal status.

    Manipulating herd behavior is approaching apex, with the greatest victories yet:

    Disarming the patriarchy, through ever expansion of rutting season, neutering morals and ethics into unstable double entendre…

    Goading females to shed their maternal instincts and scoff at the resulting cognitive dissonance, corrupting the most wonderful experience into nightmare.

    And to complete the gaslighting of individual/collective identity, throw in some gender pathological propaganda ~ Rejection of norms within the Infinite is after all original sin, and is the progenitor of all mental disorders.

    And last but not least, don’t forget to foment ever-present monsters to fear & destroy ~ Children love a good apocalyptic bedtime story.

    There are invisible rulers who control the destinies of millions. It is not generally realized to what extent the words and actions of our most influential public men are dictated by shrewd persons operating behind the scenes. ~ Edward L. Bernays

    #68321
    WES
    Participant

    I wonder how long it will take for the liberal progressives to discover that they have been had, again, by Biden/Obama and company?

    Biden is installing the same old group of criminals, as before!

    The minimum threshold of loyalty for appointment, is you must have already committed a crime for this crime family!

    Samantha. Check.
    Victoria. Check.
    Sally. Check.

    #68322
    WES
    Participant

    Today is day 1 in Ontario for an 8 pm curfew!

    The police can now stop you for any or for no reason. They can now enter your home without a search warrant too.

    They can now ask you what is in your lunch bag. They can now say the letter from your employer labeling you an essential worker is just a piece of paper. They can fine you as they please. All this has already happened!

    We now live in a police state!

    #68323
    WES
    Participant

    Q: So what has the Fed done?

    The Fed has been helping poor people by making them much poorer!

    And just to let the poor know they are poorer, they are making the rich, richer!

    To help the poor, for starters, they have caused rents to increase. Not satisfied, the Fed is printing money to increase the cost of food and everything else required by the poor to just survive!

    The poor should be grateful!

    What, they are not? Print more money until they are!

    #68324
    WES
    Participant

    If you are confused by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, well you should be!

    You see confusion results when Jack:s actions and what he says don’t match!

    Jack bans Trump. Jack says banning Trump bad.

    No, really, you are not confused!

    Actions speak louder than words! But you already knew that!

    That is why you were confused!

    #68325
    WES
    Participant

    So for the poorest workers, unemployment is above 20%.

    Biden will help them all by tearing down the wall and opening up the border!

    They will all grovel at his feet!

    #68326
    WES
    Participant

    Question:

    Which president helped sell the most guns in US history? Yes, Obama!

    So after breaking Obama’s vote record, Biden has set his sights on breaking Obama’s gun sales record?

    #68327
    WES
    Participant

    How clever of China to quarantine the WHO delegation for 2 weeks and setting up video conferences!

    I could never have seen that one coming!

    #68328
    zerosum
    Participant

    Inauguration
    civilians not allowed to come.
    + 20,000 peacekeepers will be paid overtime, R&B to replace citizens
    Trump, broken, and disappearing in the twilight wearing only his depends
    Biden will repeat his “dream” for the next 100 days

    #68329
    WES
    Participant

    Oh, about that impeachment thingy.

    Impeachment is a purely political thing.

    Impeachment is not a legal thing even though the politicians want you to believe it is a legal thingy.

    They need to impeach Trump because they are afraid of him and want to ban him from playing in their political theater.

    They want to use the state to enforce their monopoly on power!

    #68330
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    Always looking for Arnold’s art comment out of sheer curiosity. As they say in my country: One who sings (or making genuine effort to “get” art, as in this case) has no evil thoughts.

    That’s an interesting saying, thanks: I’d like to think it’s true…

    #68331
    WES
    Participant

    zerosum:

    Quebec and Ontario have now beaten DC in the race to being a police state!

    Are you under curfew in BC yet?

    #68332
    V. Arnold
    Participant

    zerosum
    …Trump, broken, and disappearing in the twilight wearing only his depends…

    That’s pretty funny…

    …but what’s going on in the U.S. is pretty damned ugly…and embarrassing…

    #68333
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    @ a kullervo

    “Why does the US have so many neocon women in high places?”

    Because when it comes to relentless, unmitigated venomous ill will, women clearly overcome men.

    “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.“

    Oh my. When we’re not pedestalized (isn’t that a nasty-sounding word?) we’re demonized. How men fear us!

    My experience is that hell hath no fury like a scorned or burned narcosociopath of either gender, period, but your choice in drag coloration may vary.

    @ Mr. House

    “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.“

    I concur. I’ve never witnessed anything quite like a table of females in the lunch room breaking down someone who broke “norms” into tears and all a public display. Mean girls the movie doesn’t even begin to show this behavior.

    Unlike men, who bond together in groups to napalm innocent children because some higher up told them to. And let’s not foget football thug hooligans, who combine both attributes, and then, again being men, must of courtse insitutionalize this into some kind of club gang rule book of inclusive behavior that must be followed to maintain any status and perhaps even rights of belonging.

    Beware Bitches Wearing Nuts… especially yours

    Don’t make me call you “cunt”, boyz. It would me seem unladylike.

    Who thinks the cinematographer in that Folds video isn’t male?

    Full oyrics from thr studio version:

    “Bitch Went Nuts”

    (The answer you seek my son only poses more questions.
    Ask many women why relationship has failed.
    Each woman offer unique reason for demise.
    One woman may say, “man could not commit.”
    Or, “man is douche, and is now free to make love to himself instead.”
    Another woman may say, “man had changed,”
    or even, “man no longer satisfactory lover.”
    But my son, ask many men same question all over the world, “why has relationship failed?”
    Each man, each time, will give same, simple answer)

    The bitch went nuts.
    She stabbed my basketball.
    And the speakers to my stereo.
    She called me ‘cunt’
    But nothing prepared me for
    what I found when I came home.
    Oh and I made my own bed. I lie in it.
    You lie in yours. You lie, you lie, in yours.
    But they want more, they’re at my door with torches.
    Please leave me alone, you know.
    Just shut it. Just shut it. Just shut it.

    The bitch went nuts.
    She photoshopped my face
    onto every boy who’d done her wrong.
    And as she burned I telepathically into the brains of all her embittered rooms.
    Oh, now, now they want more. They’re at my door with torches.
    Scores, and scores, and scores to settle with themselves.
    You would have thought I’d scorned them all.
    They’ve got a doll of me, they’re burnin’, they’re burnin’, they’re burnin’, they’re burnin’, they’re burnin’ their own memories.

    Why do they all go?
    Why do they all go?

    The bitch went nuts, y’all.
    But everyone said she might.
    Holy fucking shit.
    Seriously now.
    Now they want more. They’re at my door with torches.
    Scores and scores.
    You would have thought I’d scorned them all.
    They’ve got a doll of me, they’re burnin’.

    Why do they all go?

    #68334
    zerosum
    Participant

    No curfew in bc. Just the sameold. The numbers are steady around 500.
    Will Nancy allow Trump to get 1/2 mast and allow his fan to walk past his coffin in the capitol.
    Will Trump be able to get security protection like the other expresidents?
    Just thinking about changing the economic/social/political system will get you in trouble with the law.
    Just read that 6 Quebecers got the virus after getting the first vaccine. Change is in the air.

    #68335
    madamski cafone
    Participant

    But it is true that we have cooties.

    Cooties

    Actually, we have cooters not cooties, but sometimes they have bugs. Part of life with a chronically reopoening wound.

    #68336
    Veracious Poet
    Participant

    Is everyone enjoying the carnivalesque clown show unspooling in the District of Criminals?

    You think that’s MRNA vaccine that El Presidente electo was shot up with?

    Hmmm….

    #68337
    WES
    Participant

    Poet:

    If that is Mitch, then the clown suit, suits him perfectly!

    #68338
    WES
    Participant

    Madamski:

    I don’t remember the cooties bug! I must have suffered a deprived childhood!

    #68339
    WES
    Participant

    Zerosum:

    No, President Trump will be denied a state funeral.

    Also no fly by either. Unlike their hero John McCain where the Navy had to order navy pilots into the air!

    The deep state would probably be afraid that the whole air force would fly by!

    #68340
    sumac.carol
    Participant

    I love Michael Hudson’s definition of a centrist. I feel like I am being slowly smothered when a centrist tries to restrain my thoughts.

    Re governments being the root of all evil- I really dunno. We humans seem to need some organizing entity, even at a small scale. Is the issue that anything beyond a small scale is prone to corruption? Certainly there are a bazillion examples of that. However, people across the globe have set up governing bodies (including many self-selected dictatorships of course) since at least around the time of Christ — I don’t think governments are a bug in the system – I think our tendency to create governance reflects the nature of human behavior.

    On the evil women thingy: Women have throughout history been the less-valued gender, treated more like chattel – what are the psychological impacts of that? Certainly in our capitalist world, the poor, and minorities, of both genders are also less-valued, likely sharing similar psychological impacts. Perhaps in our stage of capitalism/corporatism/fascism(?) gender has a somewhat lesser impact on behavior than other factors? Better access to opportunities allows women to obtain powerful positions, which put on display the character traits that were otherwise invisible in certain individuals?

    #68341
    a kullervo
    Participant

    Unlike men, who bond together in groups to napalm innocent children because some higher up told them to.
    (madamski)

    And children killed by women, aren’t they also innocent?
    Are some innocents more innocent than other? Some murders more gruesome than other?

    It’s all too easy to let the passions obfuscate the reasoning – ataraxia is possible yet elusive, but always transient, as everything else.

    Best regards.

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