[D Benton Smith]

Let’s first stipulate upfront that we are in a number of related situations which pose significant threats to our lives and/or well being in one way or another.

In any disaster that’s serious enough to kill you (that is, result in your physical demise) there are just Two (and a half) Rules for Happy Living :

#1. Stay alive. Do whatever it takes to remain alive. If there is mortal danger, then don’t fall victim. In other words, Don’t get dead. Do what you have to do . If it’s a false alarm then make your call on whether it is false (or not) and proceed accordingly. In either case, you HAVE TO BE ALIVE in order to move on to ANY next step.

#2. Do whatever it takes to prevent this sort of shit from ever happening to you again.

Now there is one additional major point to make, which is also painfully simple (although not at all obvious until push comes to shove) and that is the plain fact that reality is one hell of a lot different than TALKING about what may or may not prove out to be reality.

Here are the current urgent issues which, in my opinion, call for the application of the above two and a half rules :

Covid -19 PLUS how Covid-19 is being used by the authorities for purposes far beyond the scope of public health. These purposes may be nefarious and a threat to your life.

The rigged election which (if team Biden gets its way) will bring the Chinese Communist Party even more deeply into your lives than it already is. The CCP is demonstrably a threat to the life and well being of any population under its rule or influence.

World economic collapse ( The Reset , Fourth Turning, Great Depression 2.0 , whatever you care to call it. )

I don’t pretend to have all (or even a lot) of the answers to these issues. I just thought it would be useful and timely to say something to help us all stay focused.

[D Benton Smith]

@Dr D

Post Script

( I understand and fully accept in advance that you may not be interested in any of this stuff at all )

There is one more news clip that is a real time saver if you want to check this line of research in greater depth. It is from CNN of all places !! That’s a little chilling, in its own right. It means that Georg Friedrich has absolutely top notch public relations advisors. The sort that charge tens of $millions, not tens of $thousands for their services.

Here’s the link to the CNN article : https://www.cnn.com/videos/arts/2020/09/25/interview-with-georg-friedrich-prince-of-prussia-extended-tv.cnn

That’s the end of it. I will not be bothering you this kind of thing any further. Did so just this once because it looked like you MIGHT be interested.

[D Benton Smith]

@Dr D

You strike me as a man who does not tremble at the prospect of mountainous stacks of homework. Still, I should warn you that the hot lead I’m about to hand over is one of the deepest of rabbit holes. Luckily (or un-luckily ?) much of the research work is incontestably legitimate and certified true by the highest levels of whatever bastion of academic authority you choose to believe in (the United States Army Nuremberg Trials legal teams, for example)
Here is the tip : Klaus Schwab is a Nazi. By that I mean a Nazi of the old school goose stepping Heil Hitler jack boots and nifty uniforms variety. As in a real and actual Nazi Nazi . . . or at least his dear old Papa was.
Once you start down that rabbit hole you will almost immediately encounter the most recent avatar of the ancient Habsburg/Hohenzollern crowd and their present day Euro-dreams. Oh my. Such a mess.
Long story short : the Globalists / Davos Crowd / Fourth Industrial ( Fourth Reich ?) / European dynastic families / etc. etc. are pretty much the same bunch that gave us WW1, Hitler, WW2, and whatever the hell is going on now

I’m sure you don’t give a damn about the conspiracy theory aspects of such a deep dive ( and neither do I ) , but when it comes to understanding their present day “Organizing Board” and structure it is invaluable. For example, did you know that there is actually a current King of Prussia ? Well there is. His name is Georg Friedrich Ferdinand , he’s a gen-u-wine Hohenzollern, richer than Midas, and (seriously) dead set on returning to power. Judging from his wealth, activities and grasp of European legal procedures I would have to say that he’s got a pretty good shot at it. I kid you not.

Here is a good place to start , if you’re interested in preventing the the World Economic Forum from accomplishing its stated goals :

https://www.maneco64.net/post/the-origins-of-the-world-economic-forum-go-back-to-the-third-reich

[D Benton Smith]

@Susmarie108

How ( as in the step-by-step kind of “how”) could a scheme of such magnitude actually be executed is not a substantially useful question because It doesn’t matter if a specific crime is possible . It only matters if a specific crime was actually committed .Each of the examples you suggest are possible, because they have been done many many times in the past. As have numerous other scams ( such as ballot harvesting, false voter addresses, false registrations and simple theft.) With hundreds of thousands of employable criminals, and hundred of millions of dollars to pay them, the physical task is not particularly difficult. It’s not even a very big job, compared to moving and selling a 128 tons of heroine, 200 tons of pure cocaine, 500 tons of meth, and gawd only knows how many thousands of tons of weed). (about $150 billion each and every year, all told) . Compared to that job a few million bunko ballots is practically nothing. But that’s just ballots. We haven’t even mentioned computer hacking and software yet.

The forensic evidence of specific crimes is piling up like backlogs in Smithsonian warehouse. Listing each case (and its attendant evidence) is certainly possible. Just start web searching. But I think you’ll find it boring as hell, as sleep inducing as bookkeeping, and in the end not very useful at all to you personally. From what I’ve seen, the election fraud of 2020 has involved many many millions of fake votes for Biden. Perhaps tens of millions. The lion’s share was down with hacking and software.

The real problem is not the evidence. The problem is the Gatekeepers . They only have to say “Nope. We don’t see a prosecutable case here, and so we’re not going to prosecute.” Forcing a corrupt gatekeeper to allow scores of criminal cases into a corrupt court system is going to be tough. Ultimately it is all going to come down to the question of which side has the raw power to enforce its will upon the institutions we count on to enforce the laws.

I wish I could say I’m optimistic about that. In my personal opinion It very much remains to be seen.

[D Benton Smith]

I think I just realized what must be the big flaw in Democracy , and why democracy keeps getting abandoned and running off the rails like it does : Democracy just won’t stay put !

No sooner do we fix something but 10 minutes late it’s broken again. Don’t you just wish it would stay operational long enough for us to get some other important things done ? I mean, it would be really nice if I could go to work long enough to pay the mortgage and buy some food. Not to mention ball games, barbecues and the occasional beer at the pub.

Don’t ya sorta yearn occasionally for the good old days ? When you could just wake up in the morning and know what was expected of you and what you had to do ? You did whatever the King damned well TOLD you do, right?

But now, with all this Democracy and everything. Sheesh ! They never told you that being the boss was such a thankless job. And not only that, but being your OWN boss was so much worse ! I mean NOBODY seems to like what you say or do. Everybody in the whole damned democracy seems to have a different opinion than you do, and INSISTS upon yelling it at you. I mean, gimme a break.

[D Benton Smith]

@Michael Reid (conversation carried over from preceding TAE post)

I really like your questions, and would like to take them up one at a time. Here goes :

reference : ” Today my worldview is no longer intact. Is yours?”

Well it sure has been majorly “de-illusioned” recently, but to be simply frank I would have to say that yes, it is very much intact. It seems to me that in a round-about sort of way you are saying the same thing, aren’t you ? Your old “world view” is no longer intact, you say. But does that not ALSO mean that your new view of the world is being formed ? You are more aware today (although maybe uncomfortably so) than you were a year ago, isn’t that so ? Stick with it and eventually your revised (and smarter) world view will feel much more intact than it does at the moment.

ref : ” I have spent most of my life developing weapons for the USA. At this point I am ashamed of that. The USA is the biggest bully in the school that wants to beat you up and steal your lunch money. Where have I gone wrong in my thought process?”

The most highly intelligent (and admirable) human being who I have ever associated with was in precisely the same situation you now find yourself in. Her name was Ann Cardinal. She had scored the highest marks ever recorded on IQ and aptitude tests for her employment in the GSA. During her 40 years long active career She had served as personal secretary to two separate 5 star general members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And would you like to know what she thought about that ? She thought that she had made the best decisions and performed the best actions of which she was capable at the time, based on the situations at that time, and information available to her (which was a hell of a lot of information !). NOW she thought that circumstances had changed, and new information was available and she was adjusting her opinions and actions accordingly. Sure sounds like good advice to me.

reference : ” Leave Venezuela alone and every other country for that matter is my current thinking. Military should only be used for defense and not extracting the wealth out of the rest of the world…which in my opinion is what sanctions are all about. What are your thoughts? ”

My thoughts are very very long and very very complicated . . . although they are founded on very very short and simple basic premises. Essentially , history provides what should be extremely convincing evidence that there are things about human nature, and perhaps the nature of nature itself, that leads to violence, armed conflict, full scale warfare, and the rise and fall of various forms of empire. Your choices are quite limited, in the sense that no matter what you choose to do about that situation you ARE going to be part of it. You can be perpetrators, victim, refugee , attempted reformer or some new solution of you own invention. Regardless of which strategy you choose, you SHALL be a participant ( even a suicide participates to the degree of removing a player from the board ).

There are LOTS of bullies who would like to steal your lunch money. What you choose to do about that is irrevocably up to you. My advice is to inform yourself and become as aware of the world you inhabit to the absolute pinnacle of which you are capable . . . and act accordingly.

[D Benton Smith]

@VietnamVet

reference : “Science that is divorced from the drive for profit has proven to be a useful tool to observe reality. ”

So true, but of late it looks like they married it instead. What happened ? You would probably enjoy what Eric Weinstein and his kid brother Bret Weinstein have to say on that topic. There is hope !

I think the main thing that happened was as an unintended consequence of the Google work model of communications. It is now true that without the full support of Google search results promotion then professionals of every kind ( which includes scientists and universities, as well as business) one becomes utterly invisible and inaccessible to others. If Google likes you (and thus promotes you) then you can thrive. If it does not like you ( and therefore buries or outright censors you) then you disappear from the marketplace and cannot long survive except as a hobbyist. This phenomenon made Google the ultimate and virtually omnipotent “gatekeeper” of pretty much everything that depends upon communications and/or commerce. That’s a lot of stuff, and that profit-driven choke-point obstructing the free and open communication of ideas may well crash our civilization and cost all of us a few thousand years of hard earned progress.

[D Benton Smith]

@Geppetto

Thank you for the David Bohm reference. Somehow or other I had missed him in my own work research, maybe because my early interest in the field (physics) leaned so heavily at first toward the materialist/deterministic school of thought. Based on your mention of him I did a quick scan of his work, and am delighted. Thanks again.

[D Benton Smith]

Apparently an addendum is needed in to remove any nascent doubts and make my position completely unambiguous. First of all, I don’t drink. Sober as a judge (although perhaps I give judges too much credit on that count.)
Secondly, I’m no cheerleader for Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but his sins and virtues are matters for another day. Today’s lesson was , and remains, that @arttua should be grateful that he got off so lightly for his idiocy, treasonous claptrap and covert propagandizing for the Chinese Communist Party.

At best he’s an uneducated and ill informed fool. At worst he is literally a professional troll, and if that’s the case he isn’t the first that has tried to mess things up around here. TAE is one of the last, and best, bastions against the deliberate assault against logic, reason, free speech and human dignity. That onslaught has spewed from the covert intelligence operations of Red China and its sycophants for far too long. We should have shut that door in 1972, instead of opening it (Thanks again Tricky Dick)

So, just in case any one is left with any doubts about the sincerity for my vitriolic contempt for Arttua and his ilk, or who thinks propitiation is the correct response to evil , let me put those thoughts to rest. I meant every word of it, and then some.

[D Benton Smith]

@ Arttua

You are a very poor historian, and not much of a lexicographer either. The US oil embargo on Japan in July 1941 was an effort to stem Japan’s murderous, expansionist, unprovoked blitzkrieg across Asia that had already been running for three years (since 1938) before it’s treacherous sneak attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Japan had already invaded China, slaughtered millions of Chinese civilians en masse , and raped Nanking . They needed oil to do it, so FDR reckoned embargo was better than war.

Sanctions are not war. To equate them is simply stupid, so I guess that settles that. You’re stupid. Now, about that “provocations” thing . Building fake islands for the sole purpose of extending military reach, and forcing peaceful nations from their traditional (and international legally recognized ) waters is provocation. That’s what China is doing, and has been doing for years, and in its typical ham-fisted bullying way continues to do. Peacefully instructing them to stop that provocation is called LAW. I think you’ve got your definitions mixed up. Not too surprising , considering how dumb you are about everything else. Pack up and go back to Beijing, troll. Or perhaps I should say, consider yourself sanctioned, you lying provocative idiot.

[D Benton Smith]

It’s all so confusing. Reality is confusing. Except it isn’t, really. You have understood it well enough for quite some time now, you just don’t choose to get up off your fat (safe) arses to do anything about it. Just like me. And there’s is a perfectly rational explanation why that is.

The horrifying reality  ( and yes, it is horrifying, and yes it is also reality )  is that the economic system of the world is a single system.  A Muslim or Chinese or American billionaire is  . . . first and foremost . . .  simply a billionaire, and that billion has no loyalties. Money has no moral sense, nor patriotic fervor.  It’s just wampum.   The control of money ( and thus the ownership of all things, all salaries, all institutions, all possible interests.)  has no national boundaries. It respects no national values, and obeys no (ridiculously fictitious) “national elections.”  The United States Presidential Election is not an election.   It is a transnational “auction”  attended by all of the billionaires from all over the world.  It will be “won”  by the most powerful faction of players (i.e. has greater control of the money). Right now it looks like CCP and its stake holders have the advantage, but that could change . 
How could it not change ? Things are breaking, shrinking, disappearing (open communication of sensible thought being not the least of which.) The world is getting weaker as a result, and the value of peasant votes weakens right along with it.
In other words, the election and the votes themselves do not mean shit because everything that could possibly pertain to the election and to the votes  (e.g. who got the most votes,  or which votes were legal or illegal, or fraudulent etc.)  is for sale to the aforementioned billionaires.   Even the information about that information is for sale.  That’s why the Chinese Communist Party bought up the  mainstream media,  or suborned it with cash and blackmail as pregame warm-up step #1.  Just as they have also done with Academia,  and the “Uni-Party”. [ Uni-Party;  the financial elites of all stripe considered as a single, politically collaborative,  entity].

The volume , magnitude  and awe inspiring chutzpah of the lies being told (to the American electorate in particular, at the moment) is so overwhelmingly overwhelming that I’m losing interest in even talking about it any more.It would take a science fiction writer of considerable imaginative skill to even match the depth of deceit and betrayal  that is simply the day-to-day business of the folks who run our world,  and nearly impossible to exaggerate.
It’s all very confusing because deliberate confusion is the primary product of our times. It’s what they’re selling. Hell, they’re shoving it into your face whether you asked for it or not. Why ? Because confusion is better even than secrecy for hiding the dire fuckery they are up to.
No one thinks any of the proposed solutions are going to work. No one. Everyone knows the system is irreparably broken. Everyone. The only question is about what the hell is going to happen as a consequence? Theories abound. Here’s mine :
Some folks are going to get wiped out. Others will be rubbed out. And a precious few will bask in the drug-rush of temporary ( very temporary) and reduced power as the combined strength of failing shrinking illogical systems gets smaller and weaker and dumber.
Most of us , however, ( and here is the good news) are simply going to continue doing what we have always done, which is also the only thing we are able to do. And that is to go on living until further notice.

[D Benton Smith]

@zerosum

Yup. I’m with you on that 100% . ( I would have said 110% , but I’m not registered Democrat )

[D Benton Smith]

@zerosum

In an argument between probability and reality, reality wins every time. Dr, Grimes is arguing probabilities, using math, and good for him. But that doesn’t really speak to reality at all. He’s an ivory tower guy, with no real world experience on how real secrets play out in a real world. To believe something as factually true when both the probabilities and the forensically evidenced realities indicate otherwise, well that would be folly. BUT, so is the reverse. To DISbelieve while the probabilities and forensic evidence are still quite inconclusive, is equally silly, especially when the stakes are high.
Rather than do either of those ill-advised “jumps to conclusion” , why not just apply the Scientific Method? It has worked pretty well so far, and I reckon it will again.
In other words I say count the fucking ballots again because the current numbers and explanations are not statistically believable AND there is already (i.e. even before stringent detective work) forensic evidence of ballot mishandling of sufficient magnitude to change the outcome of a close election . No need to believe anything you can’t see with your own eyes at this point.

[D Benton Smith]

I have a straightforward question for all Democrats and Trump haters everywhere.
If you could dump Trump FOREVER . . . would you ?
Well, obviously that depends on whether you like the Donald or you do not. If you don’t like him ( a lot ) and you could dump him ( forever ) then the answer to the question should be a no brainer, right ?
So why don’t they do it?
It would be so easy. Just call Trump’s bluff. Count the ballots and prove that not only did Joe Biden win the presidency fair and square , but also prove to the entire world (including his most ardent supporters) once and for all, that Donald Trump is both a loser and a god damned liar. It would take all of two days , max, to do that.
So why don’t they do it ?
I can think of a reason.
Can you ?

[D Benton Smith]

@ Ilargi

Great summarizing essay. It should be reprinted world wide but there is no chance whatsoever of that happening, is there? Such a dissemination of rationally beneficial and honestly well intended communication world wide might even calm things down a bit or save few thousand lives. But we all also know that such a sane and beneficial rationale has no bearing whatsoever on what gets printed (or suppressed) about the pandemic pretty much anywhere, don’t we?
Why, it’s almost as if what governments, companies and institutions do or say about the pandemic has nothing to do with the actual welfare of people, and everything to do with a dizzying array of other agendas so numerous and complicated that its impossible to even sort them out (much less choose one to agree with.)
Nevertheless I salute and appreciate your resolve. Hang in there.

[D Benton Smith]

Let’s get right to the point : So-called Universal Basic Income is not one bit crazier than the Universal Basic Outgo that we already have.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, the critics of UBI ( all of them rich guys) say that giving people something for nothing will not only make us go broke, but also encourages laziness by paying people to be lazy. Maybe so. Just like slapping people with an unpayable debt the moment they’re born might be a bad thing because it turns more than half of the entire population of earth into slaves who can never escape from servitude to unelected undeserving uncontrolled unprincipled oligarchs who live off of the debt collection.

Really.

Should not sauce for the goose also be sauce for the gander?

Using physical force (or the enforceable threat of it) to make me pay a tax on food, shelter, clothing and the ground I sleep upon is not a logical extension of some fundamental truth or natural justice . It is a purely arbitrary , human-made rule devised by rulers ( all rich guys.) Maybe that’s a good thing and maybe it’s not, but one thing about it is for sure in either case: it’s “made-up” , invented, and artificial.

It’s just Universal Basic Outgo isn’t it?

How is that fair? How is that not crazy as bat shit?

If I am arbitrarily born into debt and servitude it seems to me both fair and logical that I also get a few “free chips” in compensation. That way I can at least stay alive (barely) on an ongoing basis so as to keep trying to dig my way out of the hole I got thrown into at the git-go.

[D Benton Smith]

zerosum

I like your poem. Sort of like Free Verse meets Haiku meets Banksy. Hope to see some more of it as the spirit moves you.

[D Benton Smith]

zerosum

That’s a funny term, “Life Expectancy”

I don’t don’t know how it’s been for others, but my life didn’t turn out anything even remotely like my expectancy.

But yeah, steer clear of those Rest (in peace) Homes.

[D Benton Smith]

Here’s a little background on me (and why I used ‘wearing clothes’ as an example in the above comment.) At age 12 I lived a year (along with only my family) isolated by hundreds of miles of empty tundra on the arctic coast of northern Alaska. Outside it was routinely 30 to 60 degrees (F) below zero. Dress wrong and you would simply die, within minutes, and there are no second chances) I wasn’t afraid. I loved being outside. But I DID dress properly.

[D Benton Smith]

People have learned how to do all sorts of extremely dangerous things with little or no sensation of fear (drive cars, run chain saws, fly airplanes, shoot guns, get married) It’s all a matter of knowing nature’s rules and following them to the letter ( adults have learned mama has no mercy and less tolerance.)
So that’s how we are going to have to handle this virus & pandemic thing. Can’t hole up forever. Gonna have to come out and do what living requires. That doesn’t mean being being brave or stupid.or pretending that the thing can’t kill us if given a chance, of course. It means don’t give the virus that chance. Get so fast and efficient at the checklist that it’s just another routine task no different than any of the other bothersome precautions that we treat as chores (like wearing clothes instead of running around naked.)
We humans adapt fast. It’s time to get started.

[D Benton Smith]

My Parents Said Know

That’s okay because we knew what you meant. Like my Dad used to say, “Take me by what I mean, not by what I misspell”.

Whitney is a world class world treasure investigator, and obviously ain’t skeered.

[D Benton Smith]

Karl Marx was doing just fine until he got to the part about proposing solutions. His solutions are hog wash just on the face of it, and truly insane if you care to drill down.
So, I guess you could say with some fairness that he was HALF right. He was only thinking about HALF of the paradigm, so it’s no surprise that he only came up with HALF the answer.

He was, in other words, not too much better or worse than the rest of us : a halfwit

[D Benton Smith]

zerosum

There is certainly a lot of smart in the TAE cohort , but I suspect a lot of years as well. I, for one, am definitely a geezer (72).

Advanced age changes both perspective and skin in the game, both of which then necessarily change the strategy. My strategy is unavoidably different than the strategy of a young couple with toddlers (and on top of that my own life has been so extremely unconventional that it’s utterly unusable as a model for anyone .) Some of the specific skills acquired, however, are very much applicable by anyone at any time.

Foremost among the implements in this modest tool bag is the certain knowledge that the present moment (and all of its conditions) are the absolutely inevitable consequence of previous actions by someone or other. In other words, you can’t change the past. But being totally honest about what the past really was can help direct the little bit of power we have to shape the present ( and the future consequence of the things we do in shaping the present with some goal in mind.)

If there is a present lack of resources like time, money, possessions or mobility to achieve an immediately desired objective then that is just a fact. And that fact is the consequence of earlier actions by self and others. It’s worth noting, too, that no matter where someone is on the scale of ‘have and have not’ there will still be the feeling of lacking resources needed to get some particular wanted thing’

All you can do then (in fact all any of us can do, at any time ) is to recalculate the problem into terms of “what must I achieve that is within the capacity of the resources which I either have now or can get my hands on in time to help.”

The bitter irony is that this problem is the SAME problem faced by both Bill Gates, and the Ethiopian herdsman who is one goat away from death by starvation.

Sure wish I could paint a kinder picture of the clockwork we live in, but to the absolute best of my knowledge the only bright spot is that we demonstrably do have awareness and free will. With them we not only will but shall do the best we can with what we’ve got.

[D Benton Smith]

For the sake of you all letting me get through this comment to it’s conclusion before dismissing me out of hand as a pontificating ivory tower philosopher, let’s just stipulate upfront that we ARE now in a situation that poses a significant threat to our lives and/or well being in one way or another.

In any disaster that’s serious enough to significantly threaten your life there are just TWO immediate objectives:

#1. Do whatever it takes to remain alive. If there is mortal danger, then don’t fall victim. Don’t get dead. If it’s a false alarm then make your call on whether it is or not and proceed accordingly. In either case, you HAVE TO BE ALIVE in order to move on to the next vitally important step.

#2. Do whatever it takes to prevent this sort of shit from ever happening to you again.

Now there is one additional major point to make, which is also painfully simple (although not at all obvious) and that is the plain fact that . . .

. . . those places (or systems) that come through the crisis with the least amount of damage are going to have a distinct advantage (at least temporarily) over those people that get the stuffings kicked out of them. ( example: New York and Washington had a much nicer 1946 than Berlin and Hiroshima.)

If you need or want to know what is going to happen next in this house of mirrors then look to those places (and systems) that are traversing and emerging from the crisis in relatively undamaged condition. These places are simply the ‘who/what/where’ that they are, and probably NOT AT ALL WHO YOU EXPECTED.

Senegal, Africa, for example. https://youtu.be/tqKBNQzEROc

And why are these TYPES of enclaves of reason the right places to look for role models and crystal ball into the future? Because they are the ones best applying objectives #1 and #2 (above.)

I can tell you with extremely high probability (i.e. 100%) that having just been through a more or less existential threat to existence EVERYBODY is going to do their damnedest to make sure nothing like this ever happens to them again. If the Covid 19 debacle was any kind of serious then you can bet the farm that the people who emerge from are going to be even MORE serious. No more bullshit.

They are going to at least TRY do whatever it takes to never have a replay of this pandemic, or any similar threat to their physical and financial health. Those two objectives SHALL be the narrow focus of everybody’s actions going forward, and until further notice.

I strongly recommend RE-examining the information and projections and solutions in terms of the above facts. Is the WHO a dead monster walking (thus safely now ignored) or does it require a proactive coups de grace? Is electro-finance (as per usual) going to recover or is the smart money moving into local agriculture and cottage industry?

The answers to both questions is already out there, in usually overlooked places. Heads up.

[D Benton Smith]

zerosum

Peace and Amen

[D Benton Smith]

fluffer

“A fluffer is a person employed to keep an adult film star aroused on the set. These duties, which do not necessarily involve touching the actors, are considered part of the makeup department. After setting up the desired angle, the director asks the actors to hold position and calls for the fluffer to “fluff” the actors for the shot. Fluffing could also entail sexual acts such as fellatio or non-penetrative sex.”

To that I would include arcane financial Tech-Speak as one of the preferred pornographic pastimes of the present day. Comparable to folks who discuss in great technical detail past arts and sciences that are long gone and will never return, like how to hand craft a gold pocket watch. Not a bad thing, just pointless except as pleasant distraction from an unpleasant reality. A porn of sorts.

The electronic-wizardry-enabled world of globe spanning delusional high finance is going away faster than the television antenna. What’s going to get you in trouble is that what you know for sure (the survival high tech enabled electro-finance as a means of making a living ) just ain’t so. Hear what Mr Twain is telling you.

And the ONLY way you’re gonna get through this transition with your fortunes and skin intact is to make yourself aware of realities that you really really wish were not true. Listen to what Mr Smith is at least trying to convey. I may fail in that attempt, but the message sure as hell ain’t fluff. I’m actually trying to save a few lives if I can.

Look, guys, I’m well aware that I play with words . . . and sometimes too much . . . but it is always and only toward the purpose of encouraging others to become more aware that the world most of us thought we were living in is not the world that actually is. That real world is coming at us like a hot-boxed freight train. Please increase the depth and range of your awareness.

And cut me a fucking break with the snarky shit. Please!

[D Benton Smith]

“What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.”

― Mark Twain

“There is only one thing we know for sure, and it’s that our only avenue of access to the Universe is awareness.”

― D Benton Smith

[D Benton Smith]

I know for a fact that I am not a conspiracy theorist because , by definition, you can’t have a conspiracy THEORY until you have a theory . . . and brother, I haven’t even got a hypothesis yet.

There is such a thing as conspiracy however, and that’s a fact too. I know that because the word is in the dictionary and I’m pretty sure that means something. Even if all it means is that it is a THEORY, well at least it exists to that extent, and is therefore part of that which exists (i. e. reality).

So, I guess that makes me a REALITY theorist, doesn’t it? Like Einstein and Hawking and dudes like that. Much fancier company than you guys. You’re just a bunch of conspiracy hypothesists.

[D Benton Smith]

PlanetaryCitizen

Dr. Bright is a drug salesman for his “former” employer Novavax, Inc. I which markets products competing directly against Hydroxychloroquine in the Covid 19 narket.

His willingness to completely incinerate his professional reputation (conflict of interest, personal gain, fraud) in public by suing will be rewarded with a bigger salary at at a better job once the heat comes off. He’s Fauchi’s conjoined soul-twin’.

His vapid posturing is all about knocking out the competition and cornering the Cov19 market

[D Benton Smith]

The World Health Organization is a consortium of stakeholders who envision themselves as the developers, manufacturers and distributors of the vaccine. They want to be seen as the indispensable solvers of a problem, so the problem must be ( and must be seen to be) as big as possible.

Should they accomplish their objective that means not only would they have powerful authority to direct unimaginable sums of money towards the people & organizations tasked with developing, making and selling the drug, they would actually BE those recipient individuals and organizations. Nice. Talk about having your cake and eating it, too. (Of course all of the above would be done within the framework of profitable business, so those same stakeholders would also be claiming any profits that might accidentally slip though the cracks along the way.) Inextricable rat-lines to, from, and through China are woven throughout. As are banking and OLD old money (Think European). As are numerous official intelligence agencies stretching back to (at least) the run up to WW2.

In addition to the above mentioned benefits, is a very special bonus prize : once established as the sole controller of a thing that people must receive in order to live, then this consortium becomes the de facto owner of the whole shootin’ match. Not duke; not earl; not prince. King of the hill, and the globe it rode in on. So you see how they really do want to have that, right ? And have you seen any of them do big, consequential, action towards achieving it ?

The above described consortium of stakeholders is not the only consortium of stakeholders. I see at least three others, and maybe a fourth if you count the extremely loose-knit cohort of “wild card” independent thinkers and doers. The disorganization of this fourth quasi-group defies description.

The thing of it is, this isn’t a spat or jostling for better seating at the shit show. This is a war. It has already been twice as disruptive of human activity as world wars one and two put together. Hey, people, the WORLD is in lockdown. Wake up and smell the cordite. And remember, it’s always the noncombatants who suffer the most casualties. Call this a call to cognitive arms. You must choose sides and start thinking. Then you best start doing , based on your absolute best damned estimate of what really IS , and what the hell is actually on around you. Time’s a wasting.

[D Benton Smith]

As though anyone with a brain cell for company needs any further confirmation . . .

Notice that efforts to discredit Remdesivir are coming from the same sources (using the same com channels) as similar attacks against Hydroxychloroquin , medical masks, drastic non-medical mitigation, investigation of Wuhan virology lab, and every single word Donald Trump has spoken since birth. These same authorities and media outlets sing the praises of the WHO, CDC, NIH, Tedros, Bill Gates and the basically good intentions of the Chinese Communist Party.

See any kind of a pattern there ?

Like war, perhaps?

Hint : it’s a war.

And in war, who is it that lets those ‘dogs of war’ slip in the first place ? Don’t be distracted by the baying dogs. Go for the guy with the leash.

Forget the noise unless it’s actually biting your ankle. Noise only and always comes AFTER the fact. Aiming at the noise is a failure to ‘lead the target’ . Go for the source of the signal, go for the hands that hold the reins of power. Track back to the individual human beings who repeatedly and consistently obstruct things that help and promote things that harm or waste time.

I DO NOT advise an overabundance of kindness when you find them. Rest assured they would be happy to do the same for you.

In the final analysis it is always and only you, personally, who are the final arbiter and last decider of what’s real and what you ought to to do about it.

[D Benton Smith]

Ilargi

The physician who created the first quinine pill treatment for malaria (John Sappington) was from a little town called Arrow Rock, Missouri, not far from here. Back in that day (1832) most doctors still used leeches (yeah, blood sucking leeches) to treat malaria which was rampant due to Missouri’s many rivers, swamps, soggy bottomland and mosquitoes. Anyway, Sappington and his quinine pill were much maligned because his treatment competed so successfully against theirs. In the end Sappington and the pill prevailed, maybe because more of his patients survived and were thereby more likely to pay their doctor bill.

[D Benton Smith]

V. Arnold

Yours was not a simple request, it was hostile. Now obviously the hostility was aimed primarily at boscohorowitz rather than me, but you didn’t mind using MY communication and MY complement as your weapon. I resent having my good intentions being hi-jacked like that. You got a problem with someone, you tell it to them. Don’t use me as your foil. As was the jab about ad hom attacks and the presumptuous innuendo of saying “Very telling “, well that’s just more of the same isn’t it. You are boring and rather stupid and aggressive, all for no good reason. Well, no, actually. I suppose there is a good reason for the stupid.

Tell ya what. Let’s just agree to dislike each other. I have no problem at all just forgetting you even exist. From now on I won’t talk to you or about you, and I expect the same from you.

You are of course entitled to take one more shot at me to save face or whatever. Give it your best shot and then let it go. I’m not going to reply.

[D Benton Smith]

V. Arnold

Unnecessary Roughness. Penalty : public correction.

Speaking for myself is all that I did. I have a high regard for Boscohorowitz and so I said it.

You on the other hand, just took a totally unprovoked cheap shot at me because of some kinda beef you have with him. What, you don’t have enough people who dislike you already that you gotta drum some up by picking fights with strangers?

My advice for you is to stay away from tough bars and IQ tests.

[D Benton Smith]

The Boss (aka boscohorowitz )
Ilargi
et al

I am chastised, but in defense of my oblivious disregard of manners I need to say that I did ALSO place my comments on your blog ( as well as this one ). Here was my reasoning ( or call it an excuse ) : my words were not intended SOLELY for your eyes only. I wanted the other minds here to see what I had to say on matters that were first raised here. It was a bit complicated. I erred. I will do better.

However, and to be closer (at least) to honestly expressing my full opinion, I am forced to counter-complain that you DID slip back to TAE to look for what might be evidence for your ‘back of the noggin’ sociology experiment. You have to admit that (in addition to being apoplexy-inducingly-aggravating) the stuff you read at TAE is frequently very INTERESTING.

As Bob Dylan alluded in Desolation Row, if you don’t want the boys to notice then you shouldn’t walk into this kind of dive.

You are hands down the sharpest tack in the sandbox, so I welcome your input always . . . even when it’s to read me the riot act. To be perfectly blunt, we need you.

[D Benton Smith]

zerosum
Arttua

Drug vendors are hawking their own wares and panning the competition ? I’m shocked. Shocked I tell you!

[D Benton Smith]

anticlimactic

Opponents to the use of Hydroxychloroquine in the treatment of Covid 19 should retain the incontestable right to refuse such treatment if and when it is offered to them in hospital.

I’m trying real hard right now not to come across as a psychopath, but in regard to the VOCIFEROUS opponents to Hydroxychloroquine treatment I strongly encourage them to exercise that right.

[D Benton Smith]

boscohorowitz (the Boss)

At your invitation I popped over to your excellent blog at Nine Billion Names and Counting , and read with admiration and interest your post : “How A Lone Wolf Prays To God” .

It’s a wonderful prayer, and deserves earnest praise, BUT it was actually the motto in your home page header that just can’t be resisted.

“coppula eam, se non posit jocularum” (translation: “Fuck ’em if they can’t take a joke.”)

And that’s precisely why the Universe delights in screwing us over. We can’t take the same practical joke that we love to dish out.

Look at the world and laugh. Look at the world and cry. Look at the world and laugh and cry at the same time. Anyone examining reality who is not laughing and crying at once, with complete sincerity, just doesn’t understand what they’re looking at.

So yeah, fuck ’em (us, of course) if they (we, of course) can’t see the humor in this situation.

[D Benton Smith]

boscohorowitz ( the Bos[s] )

May your antibodies prosper.

[D Benton Smith]

This old world seems to be having an existentialism crisis. Sure hope it’s the mid-life sort of crisis, and not the, you know, ‘bucket list’ kind.

In either case, I trust that you will keep on doing the best you can with what you’ve got. I sure intend to. That’s all any of us can do, right ? All 7.5 billion of us, just doin’ the best we can with whatever we got at the time. Trouble is, every single one of us billions has got a slightly different opinion about what constitutes “best”. Is that best for me or best for thee? Whatever, and no matter. We are still going to do it.

A very strong argument could be made for the statement that the world we now inhabit (precisely as it truly is right this minute) is merely the sum total of a very long history of everybody doing the best they could with what they had. Talk about democracy! That’s PURE democracy. Every single living thing on the rock. Free to wade in and get our hands bloody any bloody time we want.

The intricately intertwined crises we are currently experiencing ( take your pick) are simply the underlying problem made manifest.

We have been lying to each other (for justifiable personal advantage) just a wee bit too much, and this is what we got. ( I do hope you’re not blaming this mess on some other species or spook) We must tip the balance just a smidgen back the other way now.

Now is the time to talk, people. Now is the time to BARGAIN. Now is a time for putting as much out there on the table as humanly possible, so that we can be as aware as humanly possible, of what actually IS and what the hell is going on around us.

It’s a gambling contest, and your own awareness is the only chip you’ve got.

[Author]

Posts