[John Day]

Ilargi, I was spooked at first, wondering how you knew Charles Hugh Smith was the “Charles” who had sent me the healthy food story (Insulin Resistance is Futile), above. Then I saw you were referring to an article of his, and yes, you two mostly agree, as do I with both of you.
As to Pelosi and McConnel making a deal, it was a couple of months ago, not just recently. Remember when Pelosi was so against impeachment, as well she should be, knowing what “discovery” would ultimately bring, then she was OK with impeachment, because Nancy and Mitch made a deal that would let both parties look heroic to their bases, with hidden limits placed on any real risk of massive loss.

[John Day]

Moon of Alabama on the circus that won’t leave town:
​ ​The only reason why the Senate will go the soft way and just vote the impeachment down is because a deal was made between Leader McConnell and Speaker Pelosi.
​ ​The deal prevented an extensive impeachment inquiry and trial that could have hurt both sides with uncertain outcome.
​ ​The narrowness and weakness of the impeachment resolution that can not hurt the president was in exchange for a no-fuzz process in the Senate that will not dig into Biden and will not hurt the Democrats during next year’s election.
​ ​That a deal was made explains why Pelosi has chosen impeachment and not censure even as polls were showing opposition to impeachment. It explains why she allowed only a narrow resolution based on weak evidence. It explains why the House agreed to Trump’s ginormous defense budget in the same week that it produced an impeachment resolution against him. It also guarantees that there would be no deeper digging by Democrats against Trump. It guarantees the he will under no circumstances be found guilty and impeached.
​ ​Both sides can live with the results of this narrow process. The Democrats demonstrate to their core constituency that they are willing to take on Trump. The Republicans show that they stand with their president and against the lame accusations.
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2019/12/the-impeachment-deal-between-the-house-and-the-senate.html#more
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/12/smoke-screens.html
Turkey threatens to close critical US/NATO bases if sanctioned.
(Not mentioned, but known by all, is that the US pretty nearly killed Erdogan in that military coup attempt a few years ago, and he was saved by last-minute Russian intervention.)
​ ​Bottom line: It’s Turkey’s party, and it can buy missiles from Russia if it wants to. After all, placating Russia is important for an energy importer like Turkey. Russian energy subsidies can be a huge economic boon for an economy – just look at Belarus.
​ ​Plus, now that Erdogan has cemented his control over the levers of power in Turkey, even if his decision to re-run the mayoral elections in Istanbul didn’t turn out quite as well as he had probably hoped. He’s eager to establish Turkey as a regional power, and bending to the US on this would make him look week.
​ ​Of course, for the US, Erdogan’s demands present a difficult dilemma: The US and NATO need Turkey to host its bases, but they’re worried that, if the S-400 system becomes fully operational (expected in April), many worry the Russian system could be used to collect intelligence on the stealth capabilities of the F-5 fighter jet.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/turkey-gives-nato-middle-finger-threatens-shutter-critical-military-bases-over

Here’s the deal: Sweet drinks and cheap starchy foods are killing people. Cholesterol medicines are not saving them, but fresh fruit, vegetables, nuts and some omega 3 fats will. Thanks Charles. (Insulin Resistance is Futile)
https://www.pharmaceutical-journal.com/news-and-analysis/opinion/insight/the-cholesterol-and-calorie-hypotheses-are-both-dead-it-is-time-to-focus-on-the-real-culprit-insulin-resistance/20203046.article?firstPass=false

[John Day]

I’m really fond of what I put up at the tail end of 12/10/19 Debt rattle yesterday, when Ilargi was traveling
http://www.johndayblog.com/
Were Other Humans the First Victims of the Sixth Mass Extinction?
This article opens the paradigmatic question of the essential natural characteristics of social groups of Homo Sapiens. It looks at the genetic and fossil history of our engagements with Denisovans Neanderthal and other human races. We shared genes, then exacted genocide upon them. It was a fairly quick progression, even in ancient times, something like a thousand years. Later, with ships, bankers, guns and smallpox, the Americas would be conquered much faster.
To my mind, the essential competitive edge described here is sociopathy, the ability to kill without hesitation or reluctance, and to do so at any scale. Perhaps those other human races lacked sociopathy. We can imagine ourselves completely without it in our society, but questions arise about how things happen in wars and finance, and power relations.
Sociopaths seem to have been essential to our human tendency to overgrow our systems of food production. Sociopaths lead us to population reduction when this happens. It’s brutal, but having sociopaths in a group is a competitive advantage to lacking sociopaths in a group.
We are at a difficult juncture in history, massively overgrown on the long term support system of agriculture and nature, by the one-time pulse of fossil fuels, fossil water, and the discovery of iron, copper, rare-earth metals and uranium.
We have the intellectual and cognitive ability to meet our global needs as humans and as parts of nature, differently, but our nature is to be ruled by our sociopathic members in times of crisis.
We see it around us, wherever there is mass killing and expropriation of wealth. Our sociopaths get ignored or whitewashed. Their sociopaths, and even citizens, get tarred.
The best I can come up with is that the sociopathic rulers are now as threatened as ordinary citizens, by the vast destructive power they wield. Self-preservation dictates that they condone non-destructive methods going forward, but they are human and they panic, too. Meanwhile, they experiment with new forms of war, with their mass control of other humans, through finance and media, as well as armies.
It’s up to us to keep the pressure down and derive day to day solutions which do not involve execution, expropriation and genocide.
This will be a long, slow process, subject to immediate catastrophic failure, but what else is there to do?
https://phys.org/news/2019-11-humans-victims-sixth-mass-extinction.html

The UN General Assembly yesterday officially asked Israel to leave the occupied Syrian Golan Heights.
​ ​The request was made after the resolution was adopted after 91 UN member states voted in favour, nine rejected and 65 abstained.
​ ​The resolution stipulates that Israel leaves all the Syrian Golan Heights occupied in June 1967, stating this is an implementation of the UN Security Council’s resolution.

UN Officially Asks Israel to Leave The Golan Heights

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/12/not-extinct-yet.html
Were Other Humans the First Victims of the Sixth Mass Extinction?
This article opens the paradigmatic question of the essential natural characteristics of social groups of Homo Sapiens. It looks at the genetic and fossil history of our engagements with Denisovans Neanderthal and other human races. We shared genes, then exacted genocide upon them. It was a fairly quick progression, even in ancient times, something like a thousand years. Later, with ships, bankers, guns and smallpox, the Americas would be conquered much faster.
To my mind, the essential competitive edge described here is sociopathy, the ability to kill without hesitation or reluctance, and to do so at any scale. Perhaps those other human races lacked sociopathy. We can imagine ourselves completely without it in our society, but questions arise about how things happen in wars and finance, and power relations.
Sociopaths seem to have been essential to our human tendency to overgrow our systems of food production. Sociopaths lead us to population reduction when this happens. It’s brutal, but having sociopaths in a group is a competitive advantage to lacking sociopaths in a group.
We are at a difficult juncture in history, massively overgrown on the long term support system of agriculture and nature, by the one-time pulse of fossil fuels, fossil water, and the discovery of iron, copper, rare-earth metals and uranium.
We have the intellectual and cognitive ability to meet our global needs as humans and as parts of nature, differently, but our nature is to be ruled by our sociopathic members in times of crisis.
We see it around us, wherever there is mass killing and expropriation of wealth. Our sociopaths get ignored or whitewashed. Their sociopaths, and even citizens, get tarred.
The best I can come up with is that the sociopathic rulers are now as threatened as ordinary citizens, by the vast destructive power they wield. Self-preservation dictates that they condone non-destructive methods going forward, but they are human and they panic, too. Meanwhile, they experiment with new forms of war, with their mass control of other humans, through finance and media, as well as armies.
It’s up to us to keep the pressure down and derive day to day solutions which do not involve execution, expropriation and genocide.
This will be a long, slow process, subject to immediate catastrophic failure, but what else is there to do?
https://phys.org/news/2019-11-humans-victims-sixth-mass-extinction.html

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/12/destination-unknown.html
I am opening with an unusual sort of article, because it represents massive damage already done to children already in school in all developed countries. Is bisphenol-A related to autism, gender confusion, childhood diabetes, dull-children? How vast is this damage, already? What effects are adults having? Obesity and suicide?
I’m just asking. This is pervasive.
Humans are probably being exposed to far more of a widely used dangerous chemical – found in plastics, canned goods and receipt paper – than previously understood, according to a new study.
The analysis, in the peer-reviewed scientific journal the Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, uses a new method for evaluating exposure to BPA, or bisphenol-A.
BPA disrupts hormones critical to many body functions and is linked with obesity and other diseases. Pregnant women who are exposed to it are more likely to have children who have problems with growth, behavior and fertility, as well as a higher cancer risk…
The new research examined levels of BPA in urine but also counted the metabolites of BPA. Metabolites are formed when the body breaks down and eliminates a chemical.
Using the new method, the scientists analyzed the urine of 29 pregnant women in their second trimester and found their BPA exposure levels to be an average of 44 times higher than what was measured with the traditional method…
Patricia Hunt, a co-author of the study who is a molecular biosciences professor at Washington State University, said she was “horrified” by the high levels her group found in the pregnant women.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/dec/05/bpa-chemical-levels-humans-study

While we are talking about things that enter through our guts, Tom found this article, similarly well researched, saying that people who had the Vagus Nerve surgically removed (a treatment for stomach ulcers in decades past) had a 50% decrease in Parkinson’s Disease 20 years down the line. The cause of Parkinson’s is not clearly understood, after all this time, but whatever it is may travel from the gut to the brain via the Vagus Nerve. (Is it a prion illness like Mad Cow Disease and Kuru? Just askin’.)
https://neurosciencenews.com/parkinsons-gastrointestinal-tract-neurology-2150/

Israel Conducted Nuclear Missile Test “Aimed At Iran”: FM Zarif
And he further complained that the West looks the other way when it comes to “about the only nuclear arsenal in West Asia,” but that it “has fits of apoplexy over our conventional defensive [rockets].”
The mystery Israeli test was significant enough to require the temporary diversion of all inbound flights to Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport.
Israeli media publications also considered the possibility that it was a ballistic missile test, likely nuclear warhead capable surface-to-surface Jericho system, an intercontinental ballistic missile which according to foreign reports can support a nuclear payload.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/israel-conducted-nuclear-missile-test-aimed-iran-iran-fm-charges

Epstein Was a Mossad Agent Used to Blackmail American Politicians, Says Former Israeli Spy
“They were agents of the Israeli Intelligence Services.”​ (I think ​Epstein​’s still alive. The dead guy was somebody else.)

Epstein Was a Mossad Agent Used to Blackmail American Politicians, Says Former Israeli Spy

​ ​A proposed US-Israeli defense treaty is gaining steam after a meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (currently representing an ‘interim’ government) and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Lisbon this week.
​ ​Speaking of the controversial defense pact, Netanyahu told reporters of the Wednesday discussion: “The meeting with Pompeo was critical for Israeli security,” and added, “We agreed to promote a defense pact.”
​ ​However, such a controversial pact wold have a long way to go in the domestic politics of both nations, considering it would commit the United States to war to defend Israel. This also at a time when Israel has frequently attacked what it deems ‘Iranian targets’ inside Syria and Iraq in what both countries have condemned as acts of brazen aggression.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/proposed-us-israel-defense-treaty-gaining-steam-after-pompeo-netanyahu-meet

[John Day]

John said…
I took my family traveling in 2005-2006, biking and backpacking in Europe, Asia and New Zealand for months, Mom, Dad and 4 teenagers. We sold the house and cars, and blew the money.
We visited Ann Frank’s house, Dachau, the Budapest Ghetto, and also the Tuol Sleng Prison Torture Memorial in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
The lesson is that this is what ordinary people do to each other in this situation. None of the “monsters” began as anything but ordinary, and most of them were also consumed in the carnage. This happens when one group of people sees another as subhuman, or a threat, or a prisoner, or a slave, and then it is almost automatic.
The Russians killed and raped German civilians. Sadly, the Americans under Eisenhower killed Germans, even civilians in concentration camps,as did the French. The European Israelis are doing the same thing to the natives of their “promised land”, the Palestinians, today.
The lesson is, that this ugliness is nascent in all of us. This is the main lesson to take to heart. As long as it seems like somebody bad did this, you miss the point, and you could be tricked to do it to them.

JANUARY 11, 2010 AT 10:34 PM

[John Day]

Oh, I see I had the first comment that day, too. “John” in Blogger format.

[John Day]

I commented on that post 10 years ago. I remember doing so. I almost never commented before that.
Now I’m a pest. 🙂

[John Day]

One thing I really like about the Catherine Austin Fitts interview I posted on the 12/4/19 Debt Rattle is the context she provided 2 years ago to all of the political power struggles we are seeing.

Why are so many top people in politics and Hollywood being taken down?
Fitts says,
​ ​“These people are expensive. This is a fundamental re-engineering. . . . We are watching purges, but these purges are knocking out the expensive people, people we no longer need from the financial coup d’état period, and you are bringing in a new wave of people or you are just downsizing. So, we see sex purges in Hollywood and in various forms of media and entertainment. . . . You have various purges going on because the reality is the world needs to move on. This money needs to be reinvested, and you can’t afford a bunch of egotistical maniacs who were good at stealing money. You can’t use them to build the future, and you can’t afford them. . . . There is a huge amount of money that is floating around in fixed income and derivative markets, and now you’ve got to bring it down into the hard economy and hard assets. How do you do that? You need to switch the caliber of the people for management and reinvestment of the money. You have to do it in a way that doesn’t kick off hyperinflation.”

[John Day]

Ilargi,

Thanks for the reply, and you know I’ve been reading you almost 12 years, now, and steadily.
The dollar being a “waning asset”, up in history for replacement sometime historically-soonish, isn’t contrary to your observation that the petrobuck is still the biggest reserve currency, without an openly nominated replacement.
We can all speculate what might replace it.
I vote “Gold”, but I’m unimaginative.
Gold is popular amongst central bankers again, and the ones I see in the news stories are even keeping it at home, now.

[John Day]

But wait, there’s MORE!

Hunter Biden’s Lawyer Abruptly Quits After ‘Father-Of-The-Year’ Blows Off Child Support Hearing
​ ​Hunter Biden’s lawyer abruptly quit on Monday after the former Vice President’s son and Ukraine energy expert failed to show up for a child support hearing regarding his out-of-wedlock child with a D.C. stripper from Arkansas…
​​Biden has requested that his financial records be sealed to avoid public ’embarrassment’ over claims of ‘significant debts’ ​(and massive Ukrainian bribes and laundered money…)​
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/hunter-bidens-lawyer-abruptly-quits-after-father-year-blows-child-support-hearing

The Clintons regularly stayed at Jeffrey Epstein’s weird New Mexico ranch where the deceased pedophile had grand plans to seed the human race with his DNA, according to his estate manager.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/clintons-vacationed-extensively-epsteins-new-mexico-baby-making-ranch-report

Lobbyist known for Trump ties charged with steering illegal contributions to Clinton
​ ​A lobbyist known for his ties to the inner circle of President Donald Trump has been indicted on campaign finance charges for allegedly using straw donors to conceal contributions to Trump’s 2016 rival, Hillary Clinton, the Justice Department revealed on Tuesday…
​ ​In July, Nader pleaded not guilty to unrelated charges of importing child pornography and traveling with a minor to engage in sexual activity. Nader pleaded guilty to other federal child pornography charges in 1991.
https://www.politico.com/news/2019/12/03/george-nader-mueller-indicted-campaign-finance-075046

The U.S. Government Has Been Run as a Criminal Enterprise: Financial Fraud, Criminal Cash Flows
Interview with Catherine Austin Fitts​ (12/10/17, still pertinent)
​ ​“The U.S. economy is deeply dependent on criminal cash flows. We’re the global leader in money laundering. If we stopped doing that, the economy would be in for a major, major change. . . . The preference for most Americans is to keep that system going as long as it works for them. So, it you are a public official, you are between a rock and a hard place. If you press the red button and stop the illegal cash flows, then all hell breaks loose. . . . The U.S. Government has been run as a criminal enterprise, and I have documented and proved that on multiple occasions. The swamp that exists in Washington is from sea to shining sea. It’s not just in Washington. It’s in every county and every state house in the country. If we are going to change and clean ourselves of enormous financial dependencies on criminal activities, we are talking about a very big change, and it’s not just in Washington.”
​ ​Why are so many top people in politics and Hollywood being taken down?
Fitts says,
​ ​“These people are expensive. This is a fundamental re-engineering. . . . We are watching purges, but these purges are knocking out the expensive people, people we no longer need from the financial coup d’état period, and you are bringing in a new wave of people or you are just downsizing. So, we see sex purges in Hollywood and in various forms of media and entertainment. . . . You have various purges going on because the reality is the world needs to move on. This money needs to be reinvested, and you can’t afford a bunch of egotistical maniacs who were good at stealing money. You can’t use them to build the future, and you can’t afford them. . . . There is a huge amount of money that is floating around in fixed income and derivative markets, and now you’ve got to bring it down into the hard economy and hard assets. How do you do that? You need to switch the caliber of the people for management and reinvestment of the money. You have to do it in a way that doesn’t kick off hyperinflation.”
​ ​So, what are the rich doing with their money?
Fitts says,
​ ​“Gold is what it has always been and that is a real store of value. I am a gold girl.
If you look at the smart money and central banks around the world . . . the smart money is buying gold, and the smart money is buying land. If you read the land report, that’s the top holders of land in the United States. Their holdings have doubled since 2008. I see tremendous amounts of money moving into hard assets.”

The U.S. Government Has Been Run as a Criminal Enterprise: Financial Fraud, Criminal Cash Flows

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/12/world-of-equals.html
Eleni has sent this extensively informative article about all of the trade organizations, trade routes, pipelines, information exchanges, financial exchanges and the geography they cover, which are outside the US Dollar, NATO, SWIFT, etc.
It is vast, and a lot of decisions are being made whether to use these networks more or less, compared to the currently dominant, dollar-based, western financial empire.
I think the weaponization of the dollar reveals that it is a waning asset now, to be exploited for short term objectives, until it is replaced.
One thing I have gained from all of this detailed information is the view that it is possible to have a world of peaceful trade, and that is being offered as an alternative to the militarily backed petro-dollar, which is so coercive these days.
Importantly, a multipolar world, backing way off on bombings and invasions, false-flags and choke-holds, can potentially be much more efficient, and might work on large-scale cooperative projects, like not killing us all.

Is there any global power which approaches the ideals propounded in this quote?

According to Chinese philosopher Xunzi, there were three types of leadership: humane authority, hegemony and tyranny. Humane authority begins by creating a desirable model at home that inspires people abroad. Xunzi[2], proposed that, though hegemons know how to win wars, “The ruler who makes his own state act correctly will attain international primacy.” The domestic determines the international and, since humane authority based on morality rather than power, is superior to hegemony it is more important to win over people than territory. States wishing to exercise humane authority must be the first to respect the norms they advocate and leaders of high ethical reputation and great administrative ability will attract other states.

Russia, China, and the European Peninsula

OOPS! Meeting adjourned. Press conference canceled…
​ ​The leak by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation of a clip showing Justin Trudeau, Emmanuel Macron and Boris Johnson caught on a hot mic appearing to ridicule President Trump at the NATO 70 year anniversary summit, appears to have made an already tense diplomatic situation, downright unbearable​…
TRUMP: IF NATO COUNTRIES DON’T PAY `WE’LL GET THEM ON TRADE
​ ​This was a really unusual trip for Trump, who abided by Boris Johnson’s wishes to not interfere in UK elections, got an earful from Macron, woke up to footage of close allies mocking him, and, on top of it all, decided not to get the final say with a presser.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/angry-trump-cancels-press-confedence-leaves-nato-summit-early-after-video-world
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/trudeau-macron-bojo-caught-hot-mic-laughing-trump

​ ​Bloomberg says he is “Running for president to stop Donald Trump and rebuild America.” In reality he is running to stop Bernie Sanders because he knows that given a level playing field Sanders would emerge triumphant. Bloomberg’s strategy is to skip the early states and focus on Super Tuesday in March. This plan is a sign that he is more interested in being a spoiler than in actually being president himself.
​ ​Bloomberg’s impact on New York will be felt for years to come. He described New York as “a luxury product” and he acted accordingly by accelerating the displacement of black people through gentrification. In order to make sure that black New Yorkers got the memo and quickly left town he instituted the notorious stop and frisk police program.
https://ahtribune.com/us/2020-election/3678-michael-bloomberg-bernie-sanders.html

[John Day]

I read everybody’s stuff, even saw JA Kosmos post before he reposted it today.
V.Arnold. It’s nicer where you live. like it , too, but I have work to do here…

If y’all really want to see a lot of stuff to figure out, “the unfiltered swamp”, check out Rense.com. It carries stories that completely disagree with each other all the time. Iconoclastic web design, too. 🙂

[John Day]

Robert E. Lee Elementary, near UT, Austin, where my wife is librarian, was renamed Russell Lee Elementary in 2016, much to the enragement of some who are still pushing for a much more expensive name change.
My friend J.B. a professor of Photojournalism at UT, wrote Lee’s biography, and came by for the rechristening. https://finearts.utexas.edu/feature/news/austin-elementary-school-named-after-professor-who-founded-ut-photography-program

Ilargi, I’m having a hard time posting stuff I thought noteworthy, which you have not yet read. Good choice on Charles Hugh Smith, too. http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/12/degrees-of-freedom.html

The question, “What is freedom”, has already been asked and addressed constitutionally in the US. Why didn’t I know?
​ ​In 1867, Congress expressly recognized that it was possible to agree to work and still be enslaved. With its Anti-Peonage Act, Congress outlawed debt peonage—contracts that force someone to labor in order to pay off a debt, whether it is “voluntary” or not.
​ ​This and other laws reveal how the Reconstruction Congress saw the labor part of freedom as “not just the right to participate in the market, but the right to participate in a way that frees you from undue coercion,” says Rebecca Zietlow, a founder of the Thirteenth Amendment Project, a group of scholars exploring the history and “untapped potential” of the amendment.
​ ​“It’s not much of a stretch,” she says, to argue that this vision of freedom protects against usurious debt contracts, just as it protects against traditional debt peonage.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/11/constitutional-case-against-high-interest-loans/602368/

Different in degree, but coming soon to warmly bathing frogs like us…
​ ​A video out of China shows a man being called in and interrogated by authorities for the crime of criticizing the police on social media.
​ ​The clip shows the man handcuffed to a metal chair as he is asked personal questions.
“Why did you complain about police on QQ and WeChat?” police ask the man.

China: Man Interrogated For Criticizing Police on Social Media

The Military Times has a late, neutral, and probably official read on Trumps Afghan Thanksgiving. It spills no beans.
(My read is that he Public-Relations outmaneuvered the deep state again, after being sabotaged in September.)
​ ​President Donald Trump paid a surprise Thanksgiving visit to Afghanistan, where he announced the U.S. and the Taliban have been engaged in ongoing peace talks and said he believes the Taliban want a cease-fire.
​ ​Trump arrived at Bagram Air Field shortly after 8:30 p.m. local time Thursday and spent 3½ hours on the ground during his first trip to the site of America’s longest war. He served turkey and thanked the troops, delivered a speech and sat down with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani before leaving just after midnight…​ ​
​ ​Trump appeared in good spirits as he was escorted around the base by heavily armed soldiers, as the smell of burning fuel and garbage wafted through the chilly air. Unlike last year’s post-Christmas visit to Iraq — his first to an active combat zone — first lady Melania Trump did not make the trip.
​ ​Trump’s first stop was a dining hall, where the crowd erupted into cheers when he arrived. There, he served turkey to soldiers dressed in fatigues and sat down for a meal. But he said he only tasted the mashed potatoes before he was pulled away for photos.​.. ​
​ ​Trump announced that the U.S. and Taliban have been engaged in peace talks and insisted the Taliban want to make a deal after heavy U.S. fire in recent months.
​ ​“We’re meeting with them,” he said. “And we’re saying it has to be a cease-fire. And they don’t want to do a cease-fire, but now they do want to do a cease-fire, I believe … and we’ll see what happens.”
​ ​The trip came after Trump abruptly broke off peace talks with the Taliban in September, canceling a secret meeting with Taliban and Afghan leaders at the Camp David presidential retreat after a particularly deadly spate of violence, capped by a bombing in Kabul that killed 12 people, including an American soldier…​ ​
​ ​Trump ran his 2016 campaign promising to end the nation’s “endless wars” and has been pushing to withdraw troops from Afghanistan and in the Middle East despite protests from top U.S. officials, Trump’s Republican allies in Washington and many U.S. allies abroad… ​ ​
​ ​The U.S. and the Taliban in September had been close to an agreement that might have enabled a U.S. troop withdrawal…
​ ​Trump made the announcement as he met with Ghani, the Afghan president. Ghani thanked the Americans who have made the “ultimate sacrifice” in Afghanistan and assured the president that Afghan security forces are increasingly leading the fight.
“In the next three months, it’s going to be all Afghanistan!” Ghani said.
The trip came a week after the Taliban freed an American and an Australian who had been held hostage since 2016 in exchange for three top Taliban figures, a move that has been widely seen as a possible entree to rekindling peace talks.
The White House took pains to keep the trip a secret after Trump’s cover was blown last year when Air Force One was spotted en route to Iraq by an amateur British flight watcher…
White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said plans for the visit had been in the works for weeks.
“It’s a dangerous area and he wants to support the troops,” Grisham told reporters before Trump landed. “He and Mrs. Trump recognize that there’s a lot of people who are away from their families during the holidays, and we thought it’d be a nice surprise.”
The president told the troops he was honored to spend part of his holiday with them.
“There is nowhere I’d rather celebrate this Thanksgiving than right here with the toughest, strongest, best and bravest warriors on the face of the earth,” Trump said.
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2019/12/01/trump-thanks-troops-in-afghanistan-says-taliban-want-a-deal/

[John Day]

With compound interest on loans of conjured money from fractional reserve lending, it is inevitable that those creating the money will “own” everything pretty quickly.
Why don’t they own everything already?
what happens when there are multiple, “valid” claims that gratly exceed the actual physical wealth?

In the coming reset, there will have to be something other than the usual sorting out of recent years, which is to give the bankers every asset, whenever there is a question (Wells Fargo Mortgages) and also give them enough conjured money to keep their extractive system intact.
It seems to me that by their own books, bankers already “own” more than what exists, but others also have valid claims on some of it.
Bankers and financial elites need to take the biggest haircut of all time, and fractional reserve lending has to be removed from bankers and central bankers, going forward, if there is a forward…

[John Day]

Nate Hagans had this to say about the divergence of nominal financial capital from physical reality last week. Stoneleigh and Gail Tverberg have often said about the same thing.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800919310067
Fig. 8 is a conceptualization of the last few and next few hundred years (not to scale). The green line represents sustainable flow levels available to humanity which reached technological and geographical limits in the 19th century. The red line represents the one-time pulse of non-renewable natural resource inputs to human economies (oil, gas, copper, etc.). The black line represents financial markers (money, credit, etc.) of the underlying primary capital.

Fig. 8
Download : Download high-res image (89KB)Download : Download full-size image
Fig. 8. Humans and Resource Access.

In the pre-Industrial era up to Point A, humankind migrated around the planet accessing solar flows using relatively simple technology such as agriculture, sails, slaves and animal labor. At the dawn of the industrial revolution, Point B, humanity added the condensed stocks of hydrocarbons to previously flow-based human economies. A valid description of the Solow residual (i.e. the economic growth not explained by labor or capital) was absent during this time because the black line and red line were tracking together.

Between B and C we hit an energy crisis in the 1970s, which we ‘solved’ by both 1) using debt to pull consumption forward in time and 2) globalization and outsourcing to the cheapest areas of production. These changes allowed economic growth to continue until it hit a wall with conventional finance in 2008 (Point C)– at which point central banks and global governments were forced to essentially redesign the entire financial system. This new (ongoing) paradigm involved measures such as too-big-to-fail guarantees, artificially low interest rates (even negative!) (Salmon, 2019), quantitative easing, central bank balance sheet expansion and various GDP-friendly rule changes (Alderman, 2014). The continued increase in global credit allowed: access to costlier tranches of resources, more social programs, cheap financing for renewable energy, and a sustained – if tepid – return to economic growth since 2009. We are now heading towards Point D, where our global monetary representations of reality continue to decouple from the underlying biophysical reality (red curve).

[John Day]

@Dr.D
Burning a gallon of gasoline makes about 20# of CO2, since the weight of the oxygen is combined with the weight of the carbon. https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/contentIncludes/co2_inc.htm
It makes H2O, also.
I wondered before if this lady is the same lady who walked home from church carrying her shoes.

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/incremental.html
I am in the habit of looking at what history demands of us going forward, and also what history has provided at similar junctures in the past.
Right now, at the Wile-E-Coyote moment of global economy, with the cheap and easy resources all in terminal decline, and toxic waste products already a big problem for a long time, we need to steer out of exploitive economic and military competition, and into cooperative stewardship of life on earth.
We will need an efficient economy, in terms of meeting human and ecological needs.
What history has provided in the past is massive war, but there was always resource to exploit somewhere to pay for the war after it ended.
Not this time.
therefore massive war is clearly against global elite interests, though some rigid nationalist elites may speculate a gain for themselves (see Israeli politics).
Cooperative resource stewardship is clearly against power elite goals, but not dangerously so. It won’t kill half of them.
As long as there is a path of little, incremental steps, going forward, then massive war will be the riskier step each time.
If we can make not-WW-3 the obvious step for every power-lizard, every day, then we may keep living to work on this very complicated problem.
Trump threatening war for the media, and not pushing the big red button, is par for the course, as far as I can tell.
What comes next?

North Korea launched a couple of missiles in the general direction of Japan, with high trajectories, which plunked down in Korean waters, far from Japan. Just showing that they can…
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/north-korea-launches-missiles-amid-stalled-nuclear-talks-us

WSJ summarized, for all its huffing and puffing, “China’s leadership still wants a deal to help alleviate pressure on its fast-weakening economy”, which incidentally coincides with Trump’s own interest as he hopes to clinch a deal to boost his re-election bid.
Indeed, as the WSJ’s Lingling Wei also notes, Trump “Trump also chose the evening before Thanksgiving to sign the measure, a time guaranteed to get little attention in the U.S. While his signature still makes the bill law, his timing suggests he was trying to play down the political impact at home.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/china-folds-all-its-bluster-beijing-does-nothing-after-trump-signs-hk-bill

The cat is out of the bag: Boris Johnson is dancing to Donald Trump’s tune, regardless of the damage this might cause to Britain. His promises to maintain Britain’s ‘high standards’ after Brexit are not worth the paper they’re written on.
That’s the only conclusion that can be drawn from a set of leaked papers detailing trade talks between US and UK officials over the last 3 years. The minutes, redacted versions of which Jeremy Corbyn held up at last Tuesday’s leaders debate, were posted by an anonymous source on the discussion website, Reddit. They show how the US administration has already successfully bullied Britain into taking a harder Brexit position, which is good for Trump’s geopolitical games and US big business, but bad for Britain’s economy and British welfare…
​ ​Papers from the time of Theresa May’s ‘Chequers plan’ are illuminating because the administration is clearly furious at May’s promise of long-term alignment with EU standards which would prevent the dilution of British food regulations which US agribusiness hopes to benefit from.​..
​ US officials explicitly mention the infamous chlorine-washed chickens, promising to help the British government sell the concept to a sceptical British public. They attack attempts to reduce sugar in food, the protection of regional products (like Stilton cheese and Cornish pasties) and even nutritional labelling, which they say is more harmful than it is useful.​..
​ … They call the European Parliament’s decision to temporarily ban the Monsanto-owned chemical glyphosate “unhelpful”.​..
…​US seems interested in introducing a ‘corporate court system’ in a US-UK deal, formally known as ‘investor state dispute settlement’ or ISDS, a mechanism regularly used in other trade deals to make government action on climate change more difficult. ISDS would allow thousands of US multinationals access to secretive tribunals, for the first time, where they can sue the British government for treating them ‘unfairly’.​..
​ Both the British and American sides agree that these talks should be secret – exempt from freedom of information rules – and it’s clear to see why.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/leaked-us-trade-talks-show-how-trump-is-dictating-johnsons-approach-to-a-hard-brexit/

French farmers drive tractors through Paris to protest plans for further beatings with globalist sticks.
It has been a long time since farmers got a carrot.

French Farmers Descend on Paris in Fresh Revolt Against Globalist Regulations

Thanksgiving Meditations

Let’s Get Together, Jefferson Airplane (band of Dino Valenti, the songwriter)

Before The Deluge, Jackson Browne

[John Day]

I have considerable overlap today, but I’ve gotta’ run with “Barkie Hates Bernie”. Thanks Ilargi et.al.
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/blessings.html
Today, almost every Democratic presidential campaign starts with what one close adviser to Barack Obama calls “The Pilgrimage”: the journey to the West End to meet the former president.
It’s like kissing The Pope’s Ring. Barkie never had Tulsi over for a luau. Where’s the Aloha?
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2019/11/26/barack-obama-2020-democrats-candidates-biden-073025

Barkie Hates Bernie:
Word is out that Obama would have come out to publicly detest Sanders, if he got too high in early primary polling.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2019/11/obama-privately-considered-leading-stop-bernie-campaign-to-combat-sanders-2020-surge-report.html

Progressive journalist: MSNBC doesn’t try to hide ‘contempt’ towards Gabbard
​ ​Progressive journalist Michael Tracey claimed Tuesday that MSNBC is has dropped all pretenses for their “contempt” towards Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii).
​ ​The political news contributor said the left-leaning network has treated her fellow 2020 Democratic candidates, including businessman Andrew Yang and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) unfairly, but he argued that with Gabbard it, “crosses a certain threshold.”
​ ​“Fundamentally they’re beholden to whatever the market incentives are and right now it’s within their market interests to depict Tulsi as an infiltrator, as a Trojan horse in the Democratic Party and not deal on the substance with what she’s saying which is why over and over again they tar her as a Russian plant essentially​.​”
https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/472056-progressive-journalist-msnbc-doesnt-try-to-hide-contempt-towards-gabbard

Our Girl, Helen of DesTroy​ via Russia Today, a journalistic niche she found:​
​ ​Professional journalists are losing touch with the moral code that once galvanized the profession, a new study shows. But what truth-slinger wouldn’t be having an existential crisis in an industry where facts no longer matter? ​…​
​ ​Punishing good work while reporting bad has drained journalism not just of morality but credibility. While some might be tempted to blame the industry’s fall from ethical grace on President Donald Trump’s voluble scorn for the press as the “enemy of the people,” the disintegration of the profession’s moral center has been underway for years. The constant “disruption” of the journalism industry over just the last 13 years saw online media kill off newspapers, the 24-hour news cycle take over TV, and ad sales vanish, sucked up by the Google-Facebook industrial complex.
​ ​To survive this shifting landscape, as the morality study explains, journalists have had to adapt, leaving their identities in flux. A well-developed sense of professional ethics can be a liability in a newsroom where writers are pressured to deliver clicks by any means necessary. In upside-down-world “news” where speed, novelty and ideological fealty are more important than truth, morality all but disqualifies one to be a journalist.https://www.rt.com/op-ed/474033-journalists-moral-compass-fake-news/

[John Day]

Ilargi,
Firesign Theater had this completely explained in 1974. “Everything You Know Is Wrong”
http://firesigntheatre.com/media/media.php?item=eykiw-rv

Thanks for looking at what I put up, guys.
John-as-wrong-as-most

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/chinese-people.html
​(Outside Hong Kong) The rest of China has these massive and growing re-education camps (satellite photos). All of China has electronic micro-surveillance with AI embedded in all communications devices, facial recognition street-cameras, and so on.
​ ​A series of classified Chinese government documents were leaked by a group of journalists describe the secret operations of detention camps in Xinjiang, reported Reuters.
​ ​Published by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) Sunday, the documents offer a rare look into the massive internment camp for Muslim-majority Uyghur in the troubled western region of China.
​ ​The 2017 documents reveal a list of guidelines “that effectively serves as a manual for operating the camps now holding hundreds of thousands of Muslim Uighurs and other minorities,” said ICIJ.
​ ​The leak shows intelligence briefings of “how Chinese police are guided by a massive data collection and analysis system that uses artificial intelligence to select entire categories of Xinjiang residents for detention,” said ICIJ.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/new-leak-shows-chinas-operating-manuals-re-education-camps-chinese-muslims-xinjiang

​I hear most transactions in China are paid by smartphone now.
Chinese rulers are historically autocratic. Chinese peasants occasionally revolt.
China’s ‘Official’ Virtual Currency Could Be Arriving “Quite Soon” To “Challenge The U.S.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/crypto/chinas-virtual-currency-could-be-arriving-quite-soon-challenge-us

​The US deep state is feeding anti-authoritarian movements in China, and brutal dictatorship in Saudi Arabia.​ Why?
Reuters notes in a series of headlines on Tuesday, China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi criticized US lawmakers for supporting protestors in Hong Kong.
CHINA’S TOP DIPLOMAT YANG JIECHI SAYS CHINA STRONGLY CONDEMNS US BILL ON HONG KONG HUMAN RIGHTS -XINHUA
CHINA’S TOP DIPLOMAT YANG JIECHI SAYS LODGED STERN REPRESENTATIONS WITH US ON HONG KONG BILL-XINHUA
​https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/chinas-top-diplomat-strongly-condemns-us-bill-hong-kong

Alistair Crooke asks, “Is Trump a covert ally to the multipolar order?” (I think that’s called “realism”.)
​ ​We are led to understand that the unipolar ‘moment’ of US ascendency is giving way – grudgingly – to a multipolar world: a reversion perhaps to a more nineteenth century ‘concert’ of powers (or, of significant ‘poles’ – since size is not always the prime determinant). And that Trump is trying simply to prolong that hegemonic, US moment – albeit through different means, which is to say, adopting seemingly bizarre, and sometimes counterproductive, acts and language, that infuriate the American foreign policy establishment.​..
(This part is fun.) ​ ​ In practical terms, Obama can be viewed, as some in Moscow suggest, as the Gorbachev of the American regime, (i.e. the man who began the retrenchment out from certain of the Empire’s more extended nodes); and Trump then, in this analogy, is the Yeltsin of this regime: (i.e. the president who has re-focused on the internal arena, and on reducing the burdens of the republics that used to constitute parts of the Soviet Union).​..
​ Wherever you look around the globe, America’s policies have strengthened the sovereigntists: i.e. Iran, Russia and China. Is this simply paradoxical – or deliberate? As one Russian thinker has noted, “Trump’s conservative tendencies and his deep isolationist predisposition, are placing him in the position of being an objective ally of ours (i.e. Russia and China). One who is facilitating the realisation of our project.”​…
​ And, as a final speculation: Is this somewhat similar to what has been going on between Trump and Xi (i.e. a play analogous to that with Iran)? Is Trump ramping up the max-pressures, and threats of Cold War against China, to substitute for the military war that some of his deep state might love him to fight, but which Trump has no intention of doing?

Is Trump a ‘Covert Ally’ to the Multipolar Order?

What’s the world coming to?! Nice story of practical community action at the right time…​
When a deep red town’s only grocery closed, city hall opened its own store. Just don’t call it ‘socialism.’
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/11/22/baldwin-florida-food-desert-city-owned-grocery-store/

[John Day]

I’ve got nothing new, but I spent yesterday really studying Professor Nate Hagans’ essay, from the tail end of Friday’s excellent Debt Rattle. You might consider that, too. Nate was at The Oil Drum, and later The Monkey Trap, but in the past few years he has been teaching ecological economics, has students, has a book ou (I just ordered) and another soon. https://www.amazon.com/Bottlenecks-21st-Century-Synthesis-Predicament/dp/1687233160/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2GKWEI9YFFFCX&keywords=bottlenecks+of+the+21st+century&qid=1574604533&sprefix=bottlenecks+of+%2Caps%2C193&sr=8-1
This is superbly well organized, immediately actionable analysis, for the non-avoidant.
​A bunch of mildly clever, highly social apes broke into a cookie jar of fossil energy and have been throwing a party for the past 150 years. The conditions at the party are incompatible with the biophysical realities of the planet. The party is about over and when morning comes, radical changes to our way of living will be imposed. Some of the apes must sober up (before morning) and create a plan that the rest of the party-goers will agree to. But mildly clever, highly social apes neither easily nor voluntarily make radical changes to their ways of living. And so coffee and stimulants (credit, etc.) will be consumed during another lavish breakfast, but with the shades drawn. It’s morning already.
​ ​It is likely that, in the not-too-distant future, the size, complexity, and (literal) `burn rate’ of our civilization will be much reduced by forces other than human volition. This paper suggests that we will not plan for this outcome.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800919310067

[John Day]

Keep the ethanol out of your chainsaw. It eats the insides of the fuel system. Always use premium gas.
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/truth-or-politics.html

8 minutes of Tulsi Gabbard. Her campaign says she was the most googled candidate again.
( I couldn’t find any tally yesterday when I looked)
Glad to hear it. She’s righteous. No blinks or pauses. 8 minutes, one, single, brief “uh”.
No slack for the swamp from this warrior-sister!
She slays with truth. (They may have to JFK her.)

Netanyahoo, Indicted For Bribery, Fraud And Breach Of Trust, Becomes More Dangerous
The Attorney General of Israel just indicted Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahoo in three cases. The announcement comes at a time of political stalemate. It might help to resolve it.
Israel had two parliament elections this year which both ended in a political stalemate. Neither Prime Minister Netanyahoo of the Likud Party nor Blue and White coalition leader Benny Gantz managed to form a government. Both were unable to find enough additional votes to form a coalition and to gain a majority.
Now the parliament has 21 days to find a majority. It will likely fail and a third election seems inevitable…
The charges have been known for quite some time and the timing of the official announcement seems political.
Netanyahoo will now come under intense pressure to resign. It is very much his personality that blocked the forming of a new government. Should he be removed over the next 21 days it might be possible for the parliament to form a government and to avoid a third election.
But Netanyahoo will fight tooth and nail to gain and keep immunity. He will try to delegitimize the judicative and he will use any available trick to stay in office.
That makes him even more dangerous than he usually is.
He might even decide to something, like starting a big war, to prevent his removal from power.
Lebanon, Syria and Iran must watch out.
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2019/11/netanyahoo-indicted-for-bribery-fraud-and-breach-of-trust-becomes-more-dangerous.html

​Lebanon color revolution update:
​ It should be said at this point that Hezbollah is a responsible stakeholder in Lebanon’s stability and therefore understands the need to make tactical decisions in pursuit of the larger strategic end of preventing external forces from driving wedges between the country’s cosmopolitan socio-religious groups, hence why it’s entered into the certain political partnerships that it’s had out of its interest in working within the legal system to carry out responsible reforms to the best of its ability. These noble intentions have been deliberately misportrayed by those who have wanted to remove Hezbollah from the government for some time already as part of their never-ending campaign to delegitimize it, after which they believe that it’ll become more susceptible to the joint US-“Israeli”-GCC Hybrid War against it.

The Lebanese Color Revolution Is a Defining Moment for the Resistance

Let’s all talk peaceful co-existence in a multipolar world before the nuclear-weapons Jinni gets out of the bottle, OK?
Three months after a major and still somewhat mysterious rocket explosion in Russia’s far north which caused radiation levels to spike at least sixteen times above normal, President Putin confirmed in statements Thursday that his military is developing a weapon that has “no equal in the world,” according to Interfax news agency…
At the time Reuters cited dangerously high levels of radiation emitted from the military test facility: “Greenpeace has cited data from the Emergencies Ministry that it said showed radiation levels had risen 20 times above the normal level in Severodvinsk around 30 kilometers (18 miles) from Nyonoksa.”
Enough official descriptions of the experimental weapon had been pieced together for analysts to speculate at the time that it had been a prototype nuclear-powered cruise missile known in Russia as the 9M730 Burevestnik and by Nato as the SSC-X-9 Skyfall.
Putin had first unveiled the experimental technology during a 2018 speech showcasing Russian defense technology developments. The chief stunning claim behind the hypersonic missile is that it can traverse the globe indefinitely at “faster than Mach 5” based on its nuclear powered core.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/putin-deceased-scientists-mystery-blast-were-developing-unparalleled-weapon

​ The major Japanese daily Asahi Shimbun revealed this week that Chinese officials issued a stern to warning to Japan and South Korea against any move to host intermediate-range missiles on their soil.
​ ​Citing both Japanese and US sources, the newspaper said Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi issued the message to his Japanese and South Korean counterparts in August — an action apparently triggered by President Trump’s announced official withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty with Russia.
​ ​Given a key administration criticism of the INF is that it doesn’t account for developing technology and advanced missiles of major powers like China, Beijing is said to be worried over the fallout of a potential new US-Russia arms race for southeast Asia.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/inf-collapse-triggered-china-pressure-japan-skorea-against-us-missile-deployment

[John Day]

I have to wonder if Sanders think the financial crash will come before erection-day, even before the Democratic primary.
Is he positioning himself on the potential timeline of elite disarray and desperation?
Just speculating… He sure looks like he is really running.

[John Day]

I just sent Bernie some money for what he said last night. I have not done that since 2016 primary season, supporting Tulsi Gabbard as the anti-war candidate, but Bernie just went “over the top” as they said in WW-1 trench-warfare.
It wan’t a lot of money, but a lot more than the $2.70 he’s been bugging me for for months.

[John Day]

Look​ there​, an ​I​mpeachment!
​ ​House Democrats have slipped an unqualified renewal of the draconian PATRIOT Act into an emergency funding bill – voting near-unanimously for sweeping surveillance carte blanche that was the basis for the notorious NSA program.​..​
​ ​A roll-call vote on the bill was split exactly along party lines, with all 230 Democrats standing up for unconstitutional mass surveillance – including progressives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota), who spoke out against it earlier. Two other Democrats opted not to vote, but not a single representative dared oppose party groupthink.
https://www.rt.com/usa/473842-patriot-act-betrayal-democrats-house/
https://newrepublic.com/article/155793/hell-democrats-just-extend-patriot-act

​My read on Trump diplomacy on the Korean Peninsula is that he is suddenly adding this $5 billion increased price for keeping American occupation forces in South Korea, to facilitate a step-down of those forces, which is what North and South Korean governments want. Koreans don’t want to be 2 countries at war with each other, just because they were occupied by competing outside powers after WW-2.​ Maybe I’m wrong, but I see a pattern.
​ ​Though South Korea had successfully negotiated cost sharing agreements for decades, the current timing to the crisis couldn’t be worse, given stalled US-DPRK talks and threats of new missile tests, not to mention the looming US presidential elections next year. CNN reports of the crisis:
​ ​The sudden end to the talks, which were in their third round, comes amid renewed tensions between the allies after President Donald Trump hiked the price tag for US forces roughly 400% for 2020, a move that frustrated Pentagon officials and deeply concerned Republican and Democratic lawmakers.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-south-korea-talks-abruptly-halted-over-trumps-47bn-price-tag-troops

[John Day]

Trump is sure weird, which looks like a big part of why he was elected, his anti-appeal.
We are in weird times. This weirdo “turned pro”, to channel Hunter S Thompson/
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/left-unsaid.html

Google search results by candidate are not released this time.
Tulsi Gabbard led each of the previous times.
That’s not a preferred narrative.​ Bernie, either…
Would MSNBC ever dare favor the Democratic Party establishment? Of course not!
​ ​Just kidding. But I at least thought that the de facto media arm of the Democratic National Committee might be a little bit more discreet. Wednesday night’s debate in Atlanta, moderated by MSNBC, was openly skewed toward Warren and tried to all but ignore outsiders such as Tulsi Gabbard and Andrew Yang.
​ ​This was evident from the debate’s very first half hour. Warren got at least three questions before Yang or Gabbard were even acknowledged.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/this-msnbc-democratic-debate-is-rigged-against-anti-establishment-candidates-like-tulsi-gabbard-and-andrew-yang

​Bernie Sanders gets routinely slandered by MSNBC, not merely ignored.
​https://www.jacobinmag.com/2019/11/corporate-media-bernie-sanders-bias-msnbc-warren-biden

Sanders took a principled stand on US Foreign (AKA “war”) Policy. This is a huge initiative.
​ ​“One of the big differences between the vice president and myself is he supported the terrible war in Iraq, and I helped lead the opposition against it,” declared Sanders. “And not only that, I voted against the very first Gulf War as well. And I think we need a foreign policy which understands who our enemies are that we don’t have to spend more money on the military than the next ten nations combined.”
​ ​Responding to a question about whether he would negotiate a deal with the Taliban in order to get the United States out of Afghanistan, Sanders argued that the time has come to “rethink the entire War on Terror.”
​ ​“I think it is time, after spending many trillions of dollars on these endless wars which have resulted in more dislocation and mass migrations and pain in that region, it is time to bring our troops home,” said Sanders.​..
​ Sanders seized every opportunity to outline foreign-policy alternatives in the fifth round of Democratic debating. Joining several of the candidates in calling out President’s Trump’s approach to Saudi Arabia, he declared that “Saudi Arabia is not a reliable ally.” Sanders argued that the United States must promote negotiations between the Saudis and the Iranians, telling both “we are sick and tired of us spending huge amounts of money and human resources because of your conflicts.”
That in itself was a strong statement, but the senator did not stop there.
​ ​“The same thing goes with Israel and the Palestinians,” said Sanders. “It is no longer good enough for us to be pro-Israel, I am pro-Israel, but we must treat the Palestinians with the dignity they deserve.”
https://www.thenation.com/article/palestine-debate-bernie-sanders/

[John Day]

Thanks J.A.Kosmos.
There is work to be done, while I am yet able, and I plan it and I do it.

[John Day]

Calvin and Hobbs cartoon gets to the point, today. We change and stuff changes, though it is harder to see from day to day.
Nicole Foss, Stoneleigh, and Raul/Ilargi came from “The Oil Drum”, if I am not mistaken, though I was introduced to TAE before The Oil Drum. Gail-the-Actuary Tverberg has a similar worldview, from her longer time at The il Drum, and Ugo Bardi still stands up for the unopular-but-not-wrong-yet The Limits To Growth, from 1973.
Cognitive views may be similar, but feelings and personality can sure divide people who agree on “facts”. Trump is divisive, and those who deal with him better, do so abstractly. I suspect Nicole/Stoneleigh does not deal with Trump abstractly, but viscerally, and he’s repulsive to a lot of smart women. I helped set up Nicole’s talk at the Unitarian Universalist Church, here in Austin, in about May 2010. I enjoyed sitting and talking to her for a half hour or so, before the place opened up. It was nice weather, late afternoon. She gave a very good lecture, attended by a good crowd, many from my Buddhist group, and some I recognized from the Peak Oil group I attended a couple of times. Time keeps passing…
I’m not focusing on the Impeachment Hearings, because it is purely and simply elite power struggle, not any kind of search for truth, and it’s tawdry. The “facts” I see, go so much against Biden and the Democratic elites that I am constantly dismayed by just how opposite a view most people have of it. Propaganda 24:7, from all sides, is what Americans get.
It has to break badly, before it can re-organize, and I really do not look forward to that, though I prepare daily.
It has already taken about 7 years longer to happen, than I expected, and it ain’t quite happened yet, and my preparations have gone so much slower than I expected, and the move to Hawaii to do permaculture in December 2012, was followed by the move back to Austin in June 2013.
Just finding ways to do that stuff here, now. http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/10/guacamole-fans-saturday-morning-at-600.html I’m the older guy, with the skinny pony tail.

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/extra-rich-people.html
Peter Turchin has set up analysis, based on Complexity Theory, that predicts periods of political discord. When the ratio of rich people to working people rises, it eventually leads to fighting among the elites and aspiring elites, which somehow involves regular people killing each other in droves. The severity of the die-off is one of the ways of grading mild, moderate or severe. The 2020s are poised to be one of those periods for the US. These are the transcript and slides of an hour lecture, given in Utrechet, Netherlands, earlier this month. The transcript link doesn’t work for me today, but the slides tell the story.
Rich people are very expensive to keep, and are inclined to lie, cheat and steal when playing with others on a good day…

A History of the Near Future: What history tells us about our Age of Discord

http://peterturchin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/MPF2019.pdf

Charles Hugh Smith:
All the status quo “fixes” only hasten the collapse of the status quo.
That economic, social and political conflict is accelerating is self-evident.
What’s open to debate are the core drivers of conflict / disorder /unraveling.
https://www.oftwominds.com/blognov19/confict-accelerating11-19.html

“​Algorithmic Feudalism”​
​ ​Google has the power to shape your mind by limiting what you have access to, while at the same time wielding the power to destroy your livelihood with a tweak of an algorithm. Although a lot of the most nefarious stuff is still being conducted at the margins so the masses don’t realize what’s happening, stealth censorship will continue to be rolled out until the internet most people use becomes for all practical purposes an information gulag where nothing but shameless propaganda is pumped onto screens by hidden algorithms tweaked (for your own good) by billionaires.
​ ​A perfect example of this can be seen in how YouTube hides ones of the most popular videos ever made regarding the attacks of September 11, 2001. The short clip made by James Corbett, is titled 9/11: A Conspiracy Theory, and has over 3.2 million views. Nevertheless, here’s what YouTube spits out if you search by the exact title of the video.
​ ​https://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2019/11/18/algorithmic-feudalism/
​ ​Keep scrolling and you still won’t find it. This isn’t YouTube helping users find the information they want, it’s YouTube hiding content from its users. Moreover, the only reason I’m aware of the censoring of this particular item is because I’m familiar with the video from years ago. You can be certain this sort of thing is more common than you realize and will only get worse.

Do The World’s Energy Policies Make Sense?, Gail Tverberg​
(The reset will be into a world of less fossil fuel, less, manufacturing, less “wealth”)​
​ ​In order for coal production to grow as much as the higher emission scenarios assume, there needs to be a major turnaround in the situation. World coal prices would need to rise substantially. In fact, coal in very difficult locations for extraction, such as under the North Sea, need to become profitable to extract. This situation seems very unlikely.
​ ​It seems to me that climate modelers should be considering more realistic scenarios regarding CO2 emissions from fossil fuels. One scenario which should be considered is the possible near term collapse of several governmental organizations, such as the European Union, World Trade Organization, and the governments of several oil exporting countries.
Do the World’s Energy Policies Make Sense?

[John Day]

@moonraker,
Ilargi’s not right-wing, and you seek comfort and solace where none is to be found.
The world will never again be as you fondly recall it, no matter who you blame.
Get to work, Amigo!
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/worth-working-for.html

Gathering in Groups as Society Falls Apart (harder than it may sound)
“Everyone wants community. Unfortunately, it involves other people.” I used that line in lectures on frugal living when talking of the loneliness of consumerism and the benefits of sharing resources. We idealize the good old days of people helping people out. But can we live them, given who we have become?
Individualism is one of the many privileges of ‘the privileged’ in Western society. We have options and choices about where we live, with whom, of what genders, ages or races, whether we are child-free or have a brood, what we eat, what we believe, jobs we’ll accept, and on and on and on. As people look at civilizational breakdown in detail, though, they realize that to survive, other people might not be optional – joining a group, a farm, a small town might be necessary.
Survival is not a solo sport. If it happens, it will happen in community – intentional, multi-generational family, accidental – where we can share the work, grow food, trade, defend ourselves, socialize, learn, teach, repair. Civilization, it turns out, has a lot of services built in that will need to be maintained as long as possible or created anew… or done without.

Gathering in Groups as Society Falls Apart

The technical starting point of any major war is, in fact, incidental. Most any excuse will suffice. What’s necessary is two opponents, each of whom accuses the other of attempting to foment aggression. At that point, all that’s needed to light the spark is a young soldier or agitator with an itchy trigger finger, or a politician with a show of bravado, or a military leader who chooses to break from his orders to stand down.
In many cases, if the war does not start spontaneously, a false-flag incident suffices. One country creates an event which it purports is an act of aggression by its opponent. (The recent events in the Strait of Hormuz have a distinct false-flag odour about them.)
Again, the actual catalyst matters little. Once the rattling of sabres begins, as it has, presently, in the Middle East, all that’s required to create a major war is a slipup or a nudge.

All It Takes Is a Slipup or a Nudge

Pipelines to Europe are a major physical asset under contention in global power games.
Europe is quickly becoming one of the most important export destinations for gas exporters. Production is decreasing quickly due to political and technical developments. The next few decades are promising for exporters. Nord Stream 2 is arguably one of the most contentious projects currently under development. Denmark recently granted the last necessary permit to start construction activities in its EEZ and analysts now agree that the project’s completion is only a matter of time. In reality, the pipeline’s future was decided long before construction even started due to external factors such as Poland’s decision to diversify away from Russian gas and Western Europe’s determination to turn away from nuclear and fossil fuel production.
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/The-Inevitable-Finale-Of-The-Nord-Stream-2-Saga.html#

Ousted Bolivian President Evo Morales has accused the US-headquartered Organization of American States of making a political decision in backing the right-wing opposition, saying the coup continues to wreak havoc after his exile.
Speaking from Mexico a day after he fled Bolivia, Morales said: “The OAS is in the service of the North American empire.”
Morales said he “could not understand” how his military commanders could show such “disloyalty.”
“That confirms that my great crime is to be indigenous. It’s a class problem,” he said.
The exiled president said that after freeing itself from the International Monetary Fund, the Bolivian economy was doing better.
We had big plans in the field of exports.
Yet, the coup plotters “do not accept the nationalization of natural resources,” Morales said.
Morales also claimed that a mechanical failure on a helicopter he was traveling on in early November was “not accidental” and said he wants the incident to be investigated. The helicopter was forced to make an emergency landing just after takeoff due to a “mechanical fault in the tail rotor.”
https://www.rt.com/news/473353-evo-morales-imf-exports-oas/

According to Max Keiser, there could be “a catastrophic trapdoor opening underneath the US economy.”
When China announces as a surprise its 20,000 tons of gold and a gold-backed cryptocurrency that “will kill the US dollar deader than a doornail,” it will be a “Pearl Harbor-type event and it’s coming in the next six to nine months,” he predicts.
https://www.rt.com/business/473222-china-gold-crypto-us-dollar/

[John Day]

Lots of history rhyming, I’m afraid. Can we survive it?
The story about FDR’s war with central bankers is presented in a clearer light than I have seen it, a more favorable light to FDR (who “died funny”), and unfavorable to Truman, who FDR never trusted, and (puppet) Woodrow Wilson.
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/sociopaths-at-war.html
Bolivia’s President Evo Morales was overthrown in a military coup on November 10. He is now in Mexico. Before he left office, Morales had been involved in a long project to bring economic and social democracy to his long-exploited country. It is important to recall that Bolivia has suffered a series of coups, often conducted by the military and the oligarchy on behalf of transnational mining companies. Initially, these were tin firms, but tin is no longer the main target in Bolivia. The main target is its massive deposits of lithium, crucial for the electric car.
Over the past 13 years, Morales has tried to build a different relationship between his country and its resources. He has not wanted the resources to benefit the transnational mining firms, but rather to benefit his own population. Part of that promise was met as Bolivia’s poverty rate has declined, and as Bolivia’s population was able to improve its social indicators. Nationalization of resources combined with the use of its income to fund social development has played a role. The attitude of the Morales government toward the transnational firms produced a harsh response from them, many of them taking Bolivia to court.
Over the course of the past few years, Bolivia has struggled to raise investment to develop the lithium reserves in a way that brings the wealth back into the country for its people. Morales’ Vice President Álvaro García Linera had said that lithium is the “fuel that will feed the world.” Bolivia was unable to make deals with Western transnational firms; it decided to partner with Chinese firms. This made the Morales government vulnerable. It had walked into the new Cold War between the West and China. The coup against Morales cannot be understood without a glance at this clash…
China’s Tianqi Lithium Group, which operates in Argentina, was going to make a deal with YLB. Both Chinese investment and the Bolivian lithium company were experimenting with new ways to both mine the lithium and to share the profits of the lithium. The idea that there might be a new social compact for the lithium was unacceptable to the main transnational mining companies.
Tesla (United States) and Pure Energy Minerals (Canada) both showed great interest in having a direct stake in Bolivian lithium. But they could not make a deal that would take into consideration the parameters set by the Morales government.
Morales himself was a direct impediment to the takeover of the lithium fields by the non-Chinese transnational firms. He had to go.
After the coup, Tesla’s stock rose astronomically.

After Evo, the Lithium Question Looms Large in Bolivia

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/workings.html
MSM Adamantly Avoids The Word “Coup” In Bolivia Reporting​, ​by Caitlin Johnstone ​ ​
​ ​There has been a military coup in Bolivia backed by violent right-wing rioters and the US government, but you’d hardly know this from any of the mainstream media headlines…
​ ​The indigenous leader of a socialist South American government which has successfully lifted masses of people out of crushing poverty, which happens to control the world’s largest reserves of lithium (which may one day replace oil as a crucial energy resource due to its use in powering smartphones, laptops, hybrid and electric cars), which has an extensive and well-documented history of being targeted for regime change by the US government, simply stepped down due to some sort of scandal involving a “disputed election”. Nothing to do with the fact that right-wing mobs had been terrorizing this leader’s family, or the fact that the nation’s military literally commanded him to step down and are now currently searching for him to arrest him, leading to ousted government officials being rounded up and held captive by soldiers wearing masks.

MSM Adamantly Avoids The Word “Coup” In Bolivia Reporting

​ ​Two days before Bolivian president Evo Morales was pushed out by the country’s military, Mark Weisbot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research penned a warning about what was happening, and what might unfold, in a Nation article titled, The Trump Administration Is Undercutting Democracy in Bolivia.
He noted:
​ ​Multilateral organizations like the Organization of American States (OAS) have a certain perceived impartiality because they are, in theory, controlled by a diverse group of nations. But sometimes a great power can wield a disproportionate influence. It could theoretically be a coincidence that both the Trump administration and the OAS have tried—without offering any evidence—to discredit Bolivia’s national election in the past couple of weeks. But it’s more likely that this dangerous, ugly, and destabilizing operation is being pushed by Washington.
​ ​This “destabilizing operation” came to a head yesterday when Morales resigned under pressure from the military amidst a wave of protests and violence. The situation is Bolivia is complicated, but one thing you can be sure of is anything you hear or read in U.S. mass media will be a heaping pile of lies and propaganda…
​ ​Morales was barred by the constitution from running for another term, but he attempted to override this with a referendum which he lost 51% to 49%. The Bolivian Supreme Court later ruled that term limits were unconstitutional, so he decided to run again. He then won this new election in the first round by the 10% spread required, but the Organization of American States (OAS) immediately called into question the validity of the result. This sparked weeks of protests and culminated in yesterday’s military coup. According to Mark Weisbot, the OAS has provided zero evidence of election fraud, and also notes that approximately 60% of the OAS budget comes from the U.S. government.

Bolivia Adds to the Ranks of Global Political Chaos

Bolivian Coup Comes Less Than a Week After Morales Stopped Multinational Firm’s Lithium Deal
“Bolivia’s lithium belongs to the Bolivian people. Not to multinational corporate cabals.”
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/11/11/bolivian-coup-comes-less-week-after-morales-stopped-multinational-firms-lithium-deal

​The Many Ways Sanders and Warren are Different, and Why It Matters:
​https://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2019/11/the-many-ways-sanders-and-warren-are.html

[John Day]

David Stockman interview excerpts:
Donald Trump is all by his lonesome. He’s home alone in the Oval Office. Now, half of it, he can blame himself. If he hires someone, a known idiot like John Bolton, what does he expect is going to happen except that everything he wanted to do is going to be undermined…
​ ​When you have a regime change policy—and this was the one real positive thing Trump brought to the table. He said regime change has failed; we’re not going to do it under my policy.
​ ​Why do you think the North Koreans are quasi-starving? And I know the Communist elite and Kim’s family and so forth live a pretty fat life, but nevertheless they’re in dire straits economically.
​ ​Why do they invest all this money in developing nuclear capability and missile capability? Because they don’t want to be regime changed. Kim is a young man, he’s in his mid-30s, and he doesn’t want to be another Muammar Gaddafi or Saddam Hussein.​..
…I think the stock market is in its last days of bubble excess. I think the economy is slouching toward recession within a matter of a few quarters or months. If that happens, Trump is toast. Elizabeth Warren becomes president, and then that’ll be a whole new ball game that is hard to figure.​..
…Foreign policy has been totally taken over by the Democratic paranoia about Russia and Putin and meddling in our elections.
​ ​Now it’s extended to the whole impeachment inquiry and Ukraine-gate. That’s what the whole debate is going to be about. The debate is going to be about a sideshow.​..
​ …​It’s not even mentioned because, as I say, the Warfare State machinery essentially squelches any kind of debate, suffocates any kind of thought that at all deviates from the status quo.
​ ​The big issue in the world today is war and peace, and we’re facing a campaign in 2020 where it won’t even be mentioned.

David Stockman on How the Deep State Really Works

[John Day]

And I am at fault for posting tht article about human cooperation here, which I found very useful. Since cooperation between generations has helped us be healthy families, and have more and healthier children, is not everything being done in society today, to atomize us and make each of us a separate automaton, answerable to a computer, a form of birth control and destruction of humanity.
Is our current society not a form of genocide?
Who will replace us?

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/relating-ideas.html
The conclusion is obvious. The details are important to understand our human context.
​ ​In terms of population numbers, few species can compare to the success of humans. Though much attention on population size focuses on the past 200 years, humans were incredibly successful even before the industrial revolution, populating all of the world’s environments with more than a billion people. Kramer uses her research on Maya agriculturalists of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula and the Savanna Pumé hunter-gatherers of Venezuela to illustrate how cooperative childrearing increases the number of children that mothers can successfully raise and—in environments where beneficial—even speed up maturation and childbearing. Kramer argues that intergenerational cooperation, meaning that adults help support children, but children also share food and many other resources with their parents and other siblings, is at the center of humans’ demographic success. “Together our diet and life history, coupled with an ability to cooperate, made us really good at getting food on the table, reproducing, and surviving,” Kramer writes.
​ ​During her time with the Maya, Kramer constructed a demographic model that considered how much household members consume, as the family grows and matures across a mother’s reproductive career, balanced against how much a mother, father, and their children contribute. She found that Maya children contributed a substantial amount of work to the family’s survival, with those aged 7-14 spending on average 2 to 5 hours working each day, and children aged 15-18 spending as much as their parents, about 6.5 hours a day. Labor type varied, with younger children doing much of the childcare, older children and fathers fill in much of the day-today cost of growing and processing food and running the household. “If mothers and juveniles did not cooperate, mothers could support far fewer children over their reproductive careers,” Kramer writes. “It is the strength of intergenerational cooperation that allows parents to raise more children than they would otherwise be able to on their efforts alone.”
https://phys.org/news/2019-11-human-population-ability-cooperate.html

I’m Watching My Students Become Soldiers in Our Endless Wars
At West Point, Graduation Day felt more like a tragedy than a triumph.
​ ​My greatest fear, I said, was that their budding young lives might closely track my own journey of disillusionment, emotional trauma, divorce, and moral injury. The thought that they would soon serve in the same pointless, horrifying wars, I told them, made me “want to puke in a trash bin.” The clock struck 1600 (4 pm), class time was up, yet not a single one of those stunned cadets—unsure undoubtedly of what to make of a superior officer’s streaming tears—moved for the door. I assured them that it was okay to leave, hugged each of them as they finally exited, and soon found myself disconcertingly alone. So I erased my chalkboards and also left.
https://www.thenation.com/article/afghanistan-army-west-point/

​”It can’t happen here”…​
​ ​Where did all the time go? Thirty years ago this week the Berlin Wall fell. Then Soviet chairman Mikhail Gorbachev freed the Baltic states and allowed divided Germany to reunite. It was a geopolitical earthquake of historic proportions – and a major miracle of our times.
​ ​The once mighty Soviet Union had become exhausted by its long military/economic/political struggle to keep up with the much wealthier United States and its rich allies. Moscow had 40,000 tanks, but its economic infrastructure, crippled by Marxist ideology, was an empty shell.
​ ​A senior KGB general in Moscow told me that, a decade earlier, the renowned Soviet physicist Andrei Sakharov had warned the Politburo that failure by Soviet industry to account for deprecation to modernize and replace outdated equipment would provoke a major crisis by 1990. This is exactly what happened.
​ ​By 1990, Soviet industry was broken down, outdated or rusted away. The Kremlin could no longer maintain the Soviet welfare state with its free medicine and education, long holidays, vacation spas, early pensions and unaffordable military spending. Arms alone may have accounted for over 40% of Moscow’s budget.

MIRACLE IN BERLIN

[John Day]

Hi Ilargi,

I think this is the third time you have used that picture, and the lady who might be the same one, who has never been out of (Georgia?) and has a withered hand got at least 2 showings.

Just sayin…

[John Day]

http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/narratives.html

Caitlin Johnstone, Life Minus Narrative
(I can’t access her site or comments, due to clever artificial intelligence filtering, but I’m on her email list. You might be able to access this link, though.)
​ ​Humanity’s movement into full psychological health, if we ever get there, will look very much the same: as a collective we’ll stop buying into the narratives we’re being fed, and we’ll start seeing things as they are without the narrative overlay. And from there we can use the power of our numbers to force a change into a wholesome relationship with each other and our environment.
​ ​You can catch a glimpse of what this will look like for yourself right now. Ignore all the narratives about why things need to be as they are, and you simply see things as they are: resources disappearing from the hands of the many into the hands of the few, weapons of war being spread around the globe, journalists locked in cages for telling the truth, increasing surveillance, increasing police militarization, increasing imprisonment, increasing censorship. That’s world minus narrative. That’s what’s real.

Life Minus Narrative

​Eleni sends this Kunstler piece from Russia!​
He says those dedicated public servants at the CIA and FBI are afraid for their very well being under the evil, sexist, racist Trumpian regime.
The CIA and the FBI are in a fight for their lives now. The evidence shows pretty clearly that these rogue agencies conducted all the election “meddling” of 2016 and that the RussiaGate hysteria was an engineered smokescreen to hide their tracks and cover their asses when the certainty of a Hillary election triumph nauseatingly resolved unfavorably in the cold, gray dawn of 11/8/16. Despite the chatter about an “insurance policy,” they were quite unprepared for the exposure that loomed.​..
​ ​It’s not an overstatement to say that many of the figures behind this gigantic web of lies and deceit ought to answer charges up to and including treason. The question is whether Messers Barr & Durham have the cojones to cater the banquet of consequences that this huge cast of characters should be made to feast from. Another question is whether these desperate characters and the agencies they represent will go all the way now and attempt to enlist the military brass in an outright overthrow of the executive. There are already intimations of this. It would be answered by the kind of civil violence that has broken out in other parts of world where other Deep States have worn out their welcome — and their legitimacy.
https://russia-insider.com/en/media-criticism/cia-fbi-fight-their-lives-russiahoax-implodes/ri27825

​Elizabeth Vos reviews lessons from 2016, in a world where nothing has actually changed.
​ The Democratic Party’s bias against Sen. Bernie Sanders during the 2016 presidential nomination, followed by the DNC defense counsel doubling down on its right to rig the race during the fraud lawsuit brought against the DNC, as well as the irregularities in the races between former DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Tim Canova, indicate a fatal breakdown of the U.S. democratic process spearheaded by the Democratic Party establishment. Influences transcending the DNC add to concerns regarding the integrity of the democratic process that have nothing to do with Russia, but which will also likely impact outcomes in 2020.
The content of the DNC and Podesta emails published by WikiLeaks demonstrated that the DNC acted in favor of Hillary Clinton in the lead up to the 2016 Democratic primary. The emails also revealed corporate media reporters acting as surrogates of the DNC and its pro-Clinton agenda, going so far as to promote Donald Trump during the GOP primary process as a preferred “pied-piper candidate.” One cannot assume that similar evidence will be presented to the public in 2020, making it more important than ever to take stock of the unique lessons handed down to us by the 2016 race.

It’s the DNC, Stupid: Democratic Party, Not Russia, Has Delegitimized the Democratic Process

Another Billionaire White Knight, saddling up to joust for the honor of the DNC?
Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, after saying in March that he wouldn’t run for president, is backtracking and preparing a potential run for a 2020 bid, a spokesman for the billionaire tells CNN.
Bloomberg is expected to file the necessary paperwork to get on the Democratic primary ballot in Alabama this week, the spokesman said, the clearest sign to date that the former mayor is seriously considering following through with something he has been weighing for weeks.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/07/politics/michael-bloomberg-alabama-2020-primary/index.html

[John Day]

H Ilargi,

I didn’t mean to dis you, but what you said is what I say and we’ve been saying it for years, as has Stoeleigh, Gail-the-Actuary Tverberg, Ugo Bardi and so on.
I just took it as a starting place for discussion today. It’s like my discussion most days.
e are at a cusp for our species. We can become stewards of life on earth, or keep burning things up into a brick-wall crises of thermal-death, as energy disapears and toxic waste chokes us all.
We will have to take sociopaths out of power. I’m ready to bell that cat.
Who’s up to help me?

hands?

It’ll need to be a bunch of us, and some of us will get killed…

waiting…

[John Day]

Today’s compilation is “Life Support Systems” same theme, some different aspects…
http://www.johndayblog.com/2019/11/life-support-systems.html
How Private Equity Vampires Are Killing Everything
Hostile takeovers by vulture capitalists use leveraged loans to buy companies like Sears, sell off long-accumulated assets, borrow massively, buy back stock to raise the price of the stock the vultures hold, so they can sell it, let the company die, and find another to bleed to death.
This is killing the host. The parasites are running the business. This can be prevented with different financial laws.
https://www.thenation.com/article/private-equity-deadspin/

Auto Industry Recession is Tanking Global Economy
This may not be a “problem”. 7 year payments on a $65,000 pick up truck are “normal” around here.
https://www.zerohedge.com/economics/recession-auto-industry-tanking-global-economy

Democratic politicians have a blind-spot for cars and excessive driving.
​ ​Sanders’ plan aims to speed up this process by offering a “cash for clunkers”-style grant program that would purchase electric vehicles for low- and medium-income drivers. Over 10 years, the plan would cost $2.1 trillion, enough for roughly 54 million EVs at today’s average price of $36,600 each. It is the largest single expenditure in Sanders’ $16.3 billion climate plan.
​ ​Matthew Lewis, a climate and urban policy consultant in Berkeley, said Sanders’ plan is an inefficient way to spend such a large outlay. “Even as a symbolic victory, it’s not much of a victory,” Lewis said. “It’s like, ‘Congratulations, you just threw away enough money to build a great public transit system in every city in the country.’”…
​ ​“Depending on how much you drive, a car that’s 10 to 12 years old might actually be better for the environment than replacing it with an electric vehicle,” Lewis said.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-democrats-baffling-blind-spot-on-carbon-emissions_n_5da4db19e4b0cad669a9b705

​America’s food-chain map.
Truck everything thousands of miles in multiple steps, irrespective of distance, invisibly to the grocery shopper. “Sustainable”?
​https://www.fastcompany.com/90422553/the-first-map-of-americas-food-supply-chain-is-mind-boggling

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