phoenixvoice
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
The threats against the Colorado Supreme Court justices could very easily be “mini false flags” — instigated by the FBI to discredit those who follow Trump.
Infinite chocolate bar trick explained: https://youtu.be/NmEkL0yHQaI?si=ajURFtVl834LgFoH
Not quite the same as the posted video, but the principles are similar.I hope that the specifics of Milei’s “prescription” are good for Argentina. However, when he talks about government control being at the root of Argentina’s problems, “collectivism” being at the root — I believe that the man is lost inside his own belief system and hasn’t enough perspective of the world to know of what he speaks. Argentina had in the ‘90’s a fraction of the various government controls in place in the US in the ‘90’s. I was there 16 months, walking the streets, speaking with people, entering their homes and listening. There was no belief among the people that collectivism was the answer, and the government didn’t propagandize about collectivism either. The people at the time were excited because their new president was different — he had been Muslim, converted to Catholicism as the president had to be Catholic, and after he was elected he changed that law. There have been many Argentinian leaders who were sure that they had “the answer” to Argentina’s woes.
I have never researched the specifics of Argentina’s history, politics, nor economics. But Milei’s version does not comport with what I observed. Every society has forces that promote individuality and forces that promote the well-being of the group. Healthy societies find equilibrium between the two forces. Outright rejection of either individualism or the group’s well-being will fray apart the fabric of the community. Often, powerful players in human societies will use rhetoric and deception to get members of societies to play a game of “let’s have you and him fight.” The fight is a bait-and-switch to get the masses to not realize that the powerful player is in the meantime consolidating and gathering power. And, just as often, people with medium power — like Milei — get very caught up in the fight, championing one cause with fire and verve. The battle between individualism and group well-being is a sham. Yes, every society needs to find an acceptable equilibrium between the two, but it isn’t an epic battle. The “epic battle” is between good and evil, between truth and lie, between tyranny and freedom, between life and death. Evil people seek to deceive; righteous people seek truth, even when what they find may not be what they were expecting. Most people are somewhere in the middle, and that is okay — life is messy and humans are imperfect. However, “by their fruits ye shall know them,” — some people hanker after lies, deception, destruction, pain and death. Milei — I don’t know which type he is. If he is a decent leader, with compassion for the people of Argentina, then he will seek policies that promote both individual and national well-being and when specific policies fail he will replace them with different ones that address the problems. That is all that can be asked. If Milei instead is so consumed by his beliefs that he cannot make course corrections when policies based on his beliefs fail, then he may be too consumed by self-deception to help the people of Argentina. We shall see.
@ Dr D…
Yesterday wasn’t a defense of Marxism…
My argument is with the way that you characterize a group of people as “Marxist” and then summarily dismiss their perspective. You create a “straw man” and then execute it — and by so doing miss all of the nuance and end up ignoring root problems.The US public school system barely addresses Marxism and Socialism, and when it does address them, it generally excoriates both. You suggested that the US public school system is the reason why those educated therein distrust corporations, and I pointed out that, on the contrary, my distrust of corporations stemmed from the corporations’ own advertising, and not from formal schooling. What I *have* observed in the local public school system over the past 15 years as my children have passed through it, is that the students are conditioned to accept authoritarian rule, and a general lack of encouragement for original thinking and critical analysis. These teachings are simply not socialist/Marxist — rather, they are authoritarian and anti-democratic. (Yes, of course these types of teachings were also present in Nazi Germany and the USSR — *not* because of “socialism” — which has so many definitions and permutations that the word meaning is almost indiscernible and I find myself avoiding the term because I do not know how the listener will perceive it — but because these teachings promote the authoritarianism that is inherent to totalitarian systems.)
It’s as if you have a mental bag labeled “Marxism/Socialism” and throw everything into it that you dislike. The problem with this method — and with straw-man arguments generally — is that is masks the real issues at play. The people who are trying to remake the world as they see fit — the WEFfers, etc. — are not following some “socialist” or “Marxist” playbook. What is going on is much simpler than all of that — a cabal have inordinate power in the current system, that power is slipping away from them, and they are doing whatever they can concoct to attempt to keep and consolidate their grasp of power. Historically, the terms “Marxist,” “socialist,” and “communist,” have been used by the elites — especially after WWII — in order to denigrate individuals who stood up against the elites and the power structures of the elites. (Of course, at the dawn of the USSR many elites of the day supported the Bolshevik Revolution, likely because they wanted to weaken Russia and believed that in the aftermath of the revolution that they would be able to exploit Russia’s natural resources. Stalin didn’t let that happen, so, naturally, the elites ended up opposed to the threat to their world dominance that the USSR posed, and in order to get the populations of the collective West on their side, started things like McCarthyism in the US. Stalin was a ruthless leader, just as totalitarian as Hitler, but since he didn’t attempt world military conquest like Hitler, and due to the fear of nuclear annihilation, the Western populations couldn’t be convinced to have a hot war with the USSR.)
Like many here at TAE, I enjoy your rants. However, sometimes they set off alarm bells in my mind where I think, no, that simply does not comport with reality as I have come to know it. The Marxism/socialism thing is probably generational — you likely were inculcated at a young age by the elites’ propaganda of the day to see Marxism/socialism as the bogeyman, while I didn’t start really looking at the world outside of my own home until the ‘80’s — by that point, Stalin was long gone, McCarthyism was over, and the elites had just suffered a setback in their plans in the 1970s when a lot of the CIA and FBI’s pernicious stuff (MKULTRA, strong suspicion of involvement in the JFK assassination, files kept by J. Edgar Hoover in order to keep prominent figures in line, etc.,) had been uncovered. I encourage you, when you rant, to look a little deeper — yes, what you complain of is unlikeable, but is it Marxist? Is it socialist? By which definition? My father would likely agree with your terms 100% — but do you want to use generational terms? There may be terms that are more precisely defined, and that will make your rants more biting, more concise, and more widely comprehended.
(And, quite frankly, I comment because it is enjoyable to do so. Also, I respect your intellect and wouldn’t bother criticizing if that weren’t the case.)
Art
Hopper seems to see people as if they were still-life fruit on a table. It is an interesting perspective.Dr D
Yet they feel compelled to phrase it in the way that makes it seem CORPORATIONS are to blame? “Profit seekers”? Why? …Oh, I dunno, trained from birth by a socialist school system, now 40 years inside a glass house that sees all events through the lens of Marxism?Interesting…
I was raised in a conservative household that revered Reagan and distrusted government. I never lost that perspective (and it served me well through the Covid debacle.). As a child I recognized the falsity of advertising, and this was the germ that sprouted into my distrust of corporations. That distrust caused me to not dismiss Marx out of hand, but rather to be interested in his analysis. For over 20 years I have owned a tiny corporation, involved in the running of a business and I have been an employer for a few brief stints. For over a decade I have had to rely on assistance of various sorts, including food stamps and Medicaid, and aid from friends and family, in order to provide sufficiently for my children, as their father turned out to be a selfish a—hole and I was not prepared to support them on my own.I disagree with you…it isn’t that “government is categorically bad” nor that “corporations are categorically evil.” Neither are religions, churches, non-profits, schools (whatever the flavor,) nor other groups fundamentally evil. The problems arise from human organizations that become bloated and powerful, losing touch with the individuals that comprise them or that interface with them, and becoming the tools of humans who are egotistical, out-of-touch with others and/or suffer from behaviors that we often label as “cluster B” or related mental maladies. This could be rephrased into more traditional terms by saying that these organizations have lost touch with Christian values, that their leaders and supporters are corrupt.
Coming to this realization has caused my respect for the US framers of the Constitution to increase, as I realized that they fundamentally understood this and were trying to create a system of government that would resist this inclination towards corruption and tyranny. It didn’t work. That does not mean that their undertaking was not without merit. It does suggest that any human organization is susceptible to corruption, and that we must be vigilant to resist it, and to make adjustments to our organizations to reduce this corruption.
@ VP
You said yesterday:
P.S. Most of us are going to live long enough to see ourselves (+ friends & family) become the *victim*, Just. Like. The. PalestiniansIn the case of the Palestinians, with bombs dropping on their heads, they are currently in a crisis that they can’t do much about. However, as long as the rest of us can avoid that type of situation, and are instead only dealing with problems with varying levels of similarity to The Great Depression, it may be valid to see ourselves as “victims,” but it is in our benefit to understand that recognizing that one is being victimized by another is only the first step of the journey. After that it is important to analyze the situation and realize that often, by shifting perspective or changing the rules that one plays by, many possibilities may emerge. True, according to traditional perspectives we may still be “victims,” — we haven’t the cushy life the TV and movies suggested was rightfully ours — but from other perspectives we may be just fine.
The question, “Have you skipped a meal in the last month because you had no money for food,” is a curious one in the way that it is used. It has happened to me rarely — usually because I didn’t plan well, or life didn’t go according to plans when I was out of my home, I had brought no food with me, and a store where I could use food stamps was not available. I made a very specific choice — ignore my hunger in the present, for a very short while, because the cost of food is more than I wish to spend, and I can eat later at home. There has always been plenty of food at home. (I was raised Mormon, and the indoctrination to keep food on hand stuck.)
Is the question being asked more about poverty or about a person’s value system? Or how well someone plans? (Both of which are also influenced by present poverty, background, personality, and life experiences.)
“From Each according to his ability, TO each according to their need.”
…is not a bad concept, per se, but is insufficient without context.
It can work well in nuclear families and can work well in small social groups. However, it works when the small group has unifying characteristics and values, where the individuals voluntarily value the group and the group cares for the needs and contributions of each member. (This idea is referenced at length in the New Testament, 1 Corinthians 12:14-27.). I suspect that this arrangement cannot work in situations where the involved humans do not have regular, face-to-face contact with each other, as there are human mental processes that are strengthened with face-to-face contact and that weaken without it. Much of Christianity (and likely other religions — but I know Christianity best) is focused around helping individuals and small groups to function in this fashion.However, OUTSIDE of small groups, this cannot be practiced for the benefit of individuals, technology and AI notwithstanding. There are elements of it that can be practiced at larger scale, among groups. For example, no one in the world (except, perhaps, some of the Israelis,) expects the people of Gaza as a group, corralled as they have been for years inside of an open-air prison, cut off from sufficient water, arable land, bountiful fishing, and their own fossil fuel deposits, to provide entirely for the needs of their country without outside assistance. Their ability has been hampered by Israel, and, as a result, aid is given to them with few, if any, strings attached. This arrangement has nothing to do with capitalism.
“Enlightened self-interest” is a loosely-structured, non-oppressive, non-tyrannical, way of interacting among individuals who are outside of one’s small social group in a fashion that promotes some group-cohesiveness among humans that do not interact regularly face-to-face. It is a system where I trust you to take care of you and you trust me to take care of me. The two systems can overlap without creating friction. Both systems break down when presented with anti-social individuals who lie, cheat, steal, etc.
Socialism is often guilty of trying to universalize principles that are valid for small social groups onto society at large — and this does not work because it uses only one component of the system (“From Each according to his ability, TO each according to their need.”) without the accompanying parts, which cannot be leveraged onto larger groups without adjusting the scale. (I.e., it doesn’t work for individuals, but can be leveraged to work between groups.)
Capitalism is often guilty of ignoring the “enlightened” part of “enlightened self interest,” using the tenets of “self interest” to justify anti-social, tyrannical behavior.
Those leading “Socialist” systems often blame capitalism for the failures that emerge because the needs of individuals cannot be met by bureaucracies. Those leading “Capitalist” systems often blame socialism for the failures which emerge from their own system ignoring common-sense morality, calling that morality “socialism” to justify ignoring it.
It will be interesting seeing how events unfold in Argentina.
I can understand the popular allure of pegging the Argentinian peso to the US dollar — it was done before, for quite a while, and while I was there (16 months) I noticed no inflation. However, more than 3 decades have passed, there is significant (but not runaway) inflation in the US, and the dollar is weakening as nations seek to do transactions in alternative currencies. The dollar isn’t going to stabilize Argentina as well now as it did in the ‘90’s. And, I believe that it was sovereign debt issues that caused Argentina to decouple from the dollar in the first place — they still have sovereign debt issues. If Argentina is joining BRICS, is pegging its currency to the U.S. dollar really the best option? It seems that it might make more sense to peg it to Russia’s currency.
As far as Milei, I listened to his interview with Tucker Carlson. Milei is an ideologue who warps concepts to fit his worldview. He somehow manages to view restrictions on abortion as in line with Libertarianism — quite a feat of mental acrobatics. If he is so gung-ho on limiting the government, leading to privatization of utilities, etc., then how can he not see that in the area of abortion? I would prefer a leader who is straightforward, for example, acknowledging that, although a Libertarian mindset suggests that the government not be involved in abortion, acknowledging that Argentina is a predominantly Christian, majority Catholic (“Soy catolica apostolica romana”), nation and that Christianity in general, and his own religious views, suggest that abortion is abhorrent, and a government that he heads would restrict abortion. If he can warp Libertarianism to fit his own views on abortion, then he is warping Libertarianism to fit his preferences in other areas and gaslights himself and others to accept his views as “correct.” This is what I saw in the Tucker interview.
I am curious to see where this leads Argentina. I wish Argentina well, but I’m not expecting a rosy outcome. Hopefully, she will simply fare better than she is faring currently.
A “Thanksgiving Day” gift to you all:
One of my sons created this interactive digital greeting card as a project for his high school coding class. :). Enjoy!
https://studio.code.org/projects/gamelab/emojO88drLYBVbCTm7OY2Iepk0GUk8faVNVfNp9GuB4CIA spying on Assange visitors…
The problem is a government that wants *ALL* privileges.
So, okay, Assange, not being a US citizen, *can* be spied upon by the US government. However, as a non-citizen not on US soil, not only do the US Constitution’s protections not apply, neither do the laws of the US apply — i.e., he cannot be tried in a US court under US laws, because the laws don’t apply to him. The US Government can’t be permitted to have it both ways — applying its laws to persons around the globe Willy-Nilly, but not applying protections to the same people the laws apply to.
The CIA is tasked to spy outside the US, but it still has to apply Constitutional protections to US citizens outside the border of the US…which means obtaining a warrant PRIOR to spying on US citizens. If the government doesn’t follow its own rules, then the evidence gathered illegally is inadmissible in court. Which means that if the CIA watches a live feed of Assange talking with his US citizen attorney in the bathroom of the Ecuadorian embassy and didn’t bother obtaining a warrant prior to watching the live feed, then any information so obtained cannot be used to prosecute Assange or anyone else. I’d suggest that even if the live video feed was recorded and not watched live by a US person, that what it contains cannot be used in court unless a warrant was obtained prior to when it was recorded. (You can’t record, let a non-US citizen or non-CIA employee/asset physically located outside of US territory watch the live feed, get a synopsis from the third party, obtain the warrant after-the-fact of the recording, and then use the recording in an investigation or trial.). However, if a third party watches the live feed, the third party could be subpoenaed and testify in court, and the testimony of the 3rd party could be used to obtain a warrant for future spying on a US citizen.
So, yes, by hiring a US citizen attorney, Assange’s private conversations with that attorney should then be confidential unless the US government obtains a warrant to spy on the conversation prior to the conversation taking place. And, any warrant so obtained should hinge upon whether or not there is reason to suspect that the US citizen may be committing a crime, not whether or no the US government dislikes Assange, since US law does not apply to Assange, and therefore the warrant process is irrelevant to Assange’s actions when Assange is not located on US sovereign soil, not engaged in a US-based entity, etc.
The reason why US constitutional protections don’t apply to non-US citizens not located on US soil, not engaged in interactions with US entities, is because US law doesn’t apply. The US government cannot be permitted to “have it both ways” — it must not prosecute Assange under US law and simultaneously not extend to him the protection afforded to those subjected to US law. In spying on and subsequently prosecuting Assange, the US government is arrogating all privileges to itself. This is but one example of how the US government has “gone rogue.”
~~~~
I had the flu for a week recently. It was not Covid. I hadn’t had a bad bout of the flu for nearly 10 years. Twice now I have had music students who can’t understand why I don’t avail myself of the protection of the annual flu shot. It is difficult trying to explain why, in their view, I don’t want “to keep my immunity up.” I’ve been mulling it over — how to succinctly explain in a manner comprehensible to those who have unwavering faith in the US system of medicine. In my view, getting the flu *is* a means of keeping my immunity up. (I just wish that I’d been more aware that ivermectin could help with the flu, not just Covid, because I need to realize such things when I’m well, not when I’m sick — when I’m sick I’m likely to simply follow whatever my views were when I was well. Which meant taking vitamin C, D, zinc, and quercetin.). I suppose that next time I’ll respond with something about how it comes down to my distrust of the pharmaceutical companies (and others) profiting from the medical system — I trust my own immune system more than I trust Big Pharma. And now I understand better *why* vaccines formulated with bits of disabled viruses are dangerous — the disabled bits are not scary enough for the human immune system to mount a large response, therefore the vaccines are laden with highly toxic adjuvants to kickstart the immune response.
Self-checkout shoplifting
I witnessed this a couple of weeks ago. My spouse required assistance from the attendant; meanwhile, someone at the kiosk to the side of us left without paying for groceries, taking advantage of the fact that the attention of the attendant was elsewhere.1930s and Anything Goes
I was reviewing the lyrics for Anything Goes yesterday. I can’t help but see parallels with the moral decay of The Gilded Age and the Roaring Twenties and today. The lyrics reference a famous lesbian, the nudist movement, a wealthy woman who visited the Communist Bolsheviks (just like glossy people visited Ukraine in 2022)…it sounds like today.Dr D –
Nice rant on “patriarchy.”
I’ve always found that many men are supportive of women and their ideas and desires. There are always a few blockheads out there…but they are not necessarily male and usually have blockhead ideas in many areas.
Every society has traditions and some of them are bone-headed and some members of every society push against bone-headed traditions.
(I could probably carry on this “head” pun for a while…but today’s list is long and I need to be starting it.)I was thinking that it would be funny-ironic to have both Trump & RFK 2024 stickers on my car. …a way to say: anything but Biden and the Dems…,
It is probably no coincidence that Kucinich leaves the RFK campaign, and RFK begins saying so much that we don’t like around the same time as he announces as an independent. RFK has quite an ego. It would peek out in his interviews—especially when touching on his pet projects, such as vaccination. It also would come out when he would say that he was intending to win the presidential race. He is pivoting to what he—or his new team—believe will make it possible to win as an independent. I still want him to run, but I doubt that I’ll be voting for him. If he wins, then the strategy used was likely a correct strategy for winning. If he loses, then it was not a winning strategy.
What does that mean for how an administration run by RFK would be? I have no idea.
However, I want him to run. It stirs things up. It isn’t what The Powers That Be want, therefore, it mucks with their strategy. I want the WEFfers’ strategies fraying apart—that is when they show their true colors best.
In the meantime…free Assange. Ceasefire in Gaza. Amen.
Zerosum: Without new appropriations for Ukraine or Israel those wars will end.
I keep being reminded of Assange’s words about how the public has to be deceived into war, because the masses do not generally want war.
Social Security…how is it not theft
Oh, that is easy. Anyone who told you that it operated like a retirement account was lying. When it was originally set up, NO ONE had been paying into it, and so today’s collections immediately paid out benefits to retirees. Having a preponderance of impoverished elderly folks is a societal problem. It was believed at the inception of Social Security that someone who had worked their entire adult life, and now was old and incapacitated should not, by default, be impoverished. What this means is that there are a lot of people who paid less into Social Security than what they ultimately get out of it. I may end up being one of those people — I can’t say for sure, as I am planning to increase my income greatly once my kids are grown, and that may offset the fact that for the past 11 years I have gotten more money back from the Earned Income Tax Credit than I paid into Social Security and Medicare, but all of those quarters still count towards retirement. And then there are people who just plain cheat the system — like my ex. The last few income tax records I saw for him he was inflating his deductions — deducting things that weren’t business expenses, counting them once from the receipt, a second time on the credit card statement, and deducting all of his miles for his 1099 job — even though his boss provided him with a gas card to pay all of his gasoline expenditures, both business and private. He would reduce the meager income reported on his 1099 down to about $2,000 per year…all the while living in a home with an $1,100 per month rental bill. On top of that, his boss had given him a $10,000 “loan” that he didn’t have to make payments on, with no interest, and no promissory note. And when he took the kids on vacation, his boss provided him with a large vehicle and paid the hotel cost. So my ex is paying an annual social security on self-employment income of $2,000, and will meet his requirements for Social Security, and draw the minimum based upon paying in a pittance. (And, at that point, without ever bothering to do the math — which will show that he is drawing more than he put in — he will complain bitterly about all of the money he paid into Social Security, and how life was so expensive that he couldn’t save for retirement, and how he is getting screwed by the government because his social security payments are so small.)So…there are people who legitimately contributed to society but didn’t pay a lot to Social Security who will draw from it, there are the disabled, who likely draw more than they paid in, there are the grifters, like my ex (but there aren’t enough non-gun-wielding IRS agents to find him,) and then there are the realities of inflation. To those that complain that they will get less from social security than what they paid in I say: would that I was so fortunate to have a large enough income to pay in so much. You are welcome to take some of your abundant income and invest it in a myriad of ways to augment and expand what you will get from Social Security. Be grateful for that. There are many for whom life has not been so kind.
Choir
The director must have ringers placed strategically throughout the audience, and he is benefitted by the fact the classical music enthusiasts tend to be more musically aware (and to have some music training) than the average group of humans. I’ve been in very good choirs that did a little of this (and similar activities) with the choir only (not audience), and similar activities with a very amateur choir…it would work with ringers — but you either have to have a group of people who have been trained to do this or you have to have a few strong singers (ringers) interspersed who have been trained. The ringers end up cuing the voices of those who don’t know what pitch to sing. When I did this in a small amateur choir I became the ringer for my part.
The onstage choir looks sparse. The director could have trained a good choir in how to do this in about 10-20 minutes before the performance and have half the choristers dispersed throughout the audience as ringers.Good heavens, aspnaz, you needn’t be obtuse.
I left the LDS/Mormon religion…and I no longer belong to it.
But I could not “leave” the fact that my ancestors on both sides were more or less “faithful” Mormons, some of whom crossed the plains in wagons in the 1800s, a few did the multi-wife thing generations back, etc. I embrace that culture every time I pull out my water bath canner.It’s the same for Jews: they can individually leave the religion, not believe a whit of it, they can individually disagree with Zionism, but that does not change the fact that their family heritage is a Jewish one.
One cannot change the history of one’s family tree anymore than a man can become a “real woman” through gender reassignment surgery.
What *matters* is what one does as an individual — how a person lives and treats others. You know…I think that Jesus would agree with me: “By their fruits ye shall know them.” Not the fruits of their parents or siblings or great-great gandpa — but their own words and actions.
We humans have a nasty habit of letting our pattern recognition get the best of us, and it causes us to draw conclusions about individuals based on inadequate knowledge — such as, their clothing style or family tree. Now, such prejudices are likely impossible to overcome, and they are sometimes harmless, sometimes helpful, and sometimes tragic. When the Nazis blamed the Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, and disabled for the problems of society and put them to death — this was tragic. When the Israeli government and too many Israeli nationals blame “the Palestinians” for the actions of Hamas, calling them “human animals” and slaughter countless innocents to kill one member of Hamas — this is devastating.
Yes, there is a great deal of evidence that suggests that there is an elite cabal attempting to remold the world in their favor. There is evidence that some members of this elite cabal are Jewish, and have strong ties to Israel, etc. There are others in this elite cabal who are not Jewish and have strong ties to other, non-Jewish institutions, countries, etc.
I don’t give a rat’s arse what the ethnicity, family, religion, etc., may be of the person is who is trying to take away the liberty and rights of myself, my children, my family, my friends, etc. — I care that someone is making the attempt and I oppose it. If I spend time condemning that person’s ethnicity, family, religion, etc., I’m likely to get distracted from my goal — which is to maintain my rights and liberty, not to pour out hate and vitriol at everyone who shares a background with the oppressor.
@ DBS
So true…
I found that to be glaringly obvious as well when the Israeli people were offered up on a platter to Pfizer. It is the same when Israelis are “settled” into illegal settlements, illegal because it is against international law for Israel to be colonizing occupied Palestinian territory. And also similar to how the IDF howls about Hamas using Israeli prisoners as “human shields” and then the IDF slaughters their own prisoners rather than negotiating for or rescuing them.A lesson to us: if a the world collectively ignores a country committing non-violent or less-violent violations of international law, such as Israel appropriating Palestinian land, settling on it, blockading Gaza, imprisoning Palestinians for mild or made up offenses, then, over time, the violations are likely to grow more bold, and become more violent, as has occurred in Gaza in the past three weeks.
(And then I think about my own country, the US, and how it has violated international law in the decades of my life, growing bolder over time. This is a sorry trajectory.)
Leticia
You mean to say that Trump’s sons agreed with their father’s opinion about the valuation of certain properties? What is so odd about that? Property valuation is highly subjective. Beyond the basics of valuation, there may be special circumstances that are not readily apparent. It doesn’t seem odd at all that Trump and sons would all be familiar with any special circumstances, nor that they might take their father’s valuation statements at face value, signing off on them without questioning the fundamentals.Dr D referenced a Denninger post, which referenced Argentina. Denninger’s depiction of Argentina comports with what I saw in ‘95-‘97, with two minor exceptions:
(1) when I was there, the Argentine peso was tied in value to the US dollar at $1 = 1 peso, so money held value from day to day. I do understand that over the long haul, that valuation was changed quite a while ago, so while my observation was accurate when I lived there, I suspect that Denninger’s outlook is more accurate for the past couple of decades.
(2) Although I didn’t see credit card use, shops for clothes and shoes and household appliances, etc., did offer payment plans for their goods, where the shop owner was offering the credit directly. However, that practice may have also been tied to the fact that at the time the peso was pegged to the dollar and relatively stable.I did get passed a counterfeit 5 peso note once in Argentina. It is kind of funny — it seems a waste of effort to bother counterfeiting a $5 equivalent note.
My point is this: when people familiar with the US and “Western democracies” talk about “socialism” they tend to have some specific ideas in mind, most often related to what Bernie Sanders and Europeans call “Democratic socialism” which amounts to a great deal of taxation, government services for citizens, and a great deal of government regulation of industry. (Of course, soon it is “the tail wagging the dog,” as large industry accomplishes “regulatory capture” and uses the regulation for its own ends.). There may be a case for arguing that the Argentine government has observed “socialist” principles over the past many decades, however, in light of the economic exigencies and realities on the ground, the socialist principles did not translate into a situation for the populace that mirrored the “social democracies” of Europe, nor like the current US.
If anything, I would guess that for the populace of Argentina, there would be more similarities to the late 1800s and early 1900s situation in the US — the government was there, but it wasn’t as powerful, didn’t affect so many parts of life, etc.
I remember that as a young 20-something from Los Angeles, CA, suddenly in Argentina that I found the economic differences to be jarring, and the lack of government guidelines to be disconcerting. (I didn’t like realizing that a pipe was breaking through the apartment wall, nor that I was risking electrocution if I touched the metal medicine cabinet when the bathroom was full of steam.). However, a few decades later, I think that I would adapt readily. Ultimately, less government influence leads to a less regulated public & economic fabric for society, but government regulation is often only a veneer — we trust foods and drugs because of the FDA, but then the FDA is managed by industry, and our trust is misplaced. The fundamentals of the market — some players being honest, and others lying and manipulating to increase their personal gain — are unchanged.
I think that the big takeaways from the current situation and history (especially the last 250 years) is that any large, powerful group runs the risk of attracting corrupt individuals (cluster B types, psychopaths, etc.,) and that the liberty of individuals is at risk when this happens. “Checks and balances” were designed by the US Constitution framers to attempt to avoid this problem. This works…partially, insufficiently. There may be no solution, but it sure would be nice to find a way to “reset” the system that does not involve war or genocide nor maintain the power of any current cabals. The current powerful groups (factions), know that a reset is imminent, and are doing all that they can to ensure that once the cards are reshuffled, that they remain the most powerful player at the table.
Baby monkeys…
…just couldn’t touch me today. I couldn’t stop thinking about dead children in Palestine….Roundup weed killer in fast food
…Every item tested is a sandwich or pizza, so the glyphosate is likely in the wheat flour. Why should we be surprised that some idiot would think it a good idea to spray wheat fields with poison 3 days before harvest? It seems that every era has its own version of food adulteration for profit. When I have the option, I purchase organic wheat and corn and soy products. I figure that I cannot avoid the glyphosate altogether, but I can, at the least, minimize its impact in my family when the non- or less glyphosate option is available.It isn’t as simple as taking a photo with a phone, the photo must be uploaded to the internet someplace with free and open access and a public URL. The user must then be familiar enough with the process to copy the URL and paste it into the comment. Instead of making the process simple and clear and educating internet users on how to do this, we have smartphones that obfuscate the process, all in the service of being “user-friendly” and “secure.” In actuality, it is about mega corporations having control over the internet and our data, rather than individuals having control.
Dr John –
My sister just had her baby by C-section due to a complication. In the C-section, an artery in her uterus was in an odd place and got nicked, and she received 6 pints of blood before they discovered the problem and corrected it surgically. Since we have no idea whether or not the blood came from vaccinated individuals, she (and the baby, who will undoubtedly breastfeed, probably before they realize the potential harm,) will need to detox from spike protein. I was just looking at Dr. McCullough’s spike detox info here: https://covid19.onedaymd.com/2023/03/dr-peter-mccullough-prescription-and.html and it says not to follow this when breastfeeding. Do you have any guidance, or can you point me in the right direction, of spike detox therapy that is okay for a woman who is breastfeeding?Oxy: Dr. D and Covid have trained me to watch for bullshit or angles like a hawk. and watch, I do.
I’ve been doing that since building 7 fell….
It was why I was driven to understand what the hell was going on with Covid, and how I found TAE….Dr D: The legal system is working great.
That is, actually, an illustration of a part of Libertarianism that I question — leaving everything to the courts and litigation can cause atrocities along the way.
For example:
Right now, if the question of where my boys are to live is left up to the family court, I have no doubt, given the situation, the evidence, and the boys’ own wishes, that the result would be that they live with me full-time. However, by the time the court comes to that conclusion we would be a few weeks before — or possible after — their 18th birthday and high school graduation. So, instead, I’m trying to negotiate with their father, who told them two weeks ago that starting 1.5 weeks ago that they could live with me full-time…but then he spoke with his attorney, and is now reneging on what he told them. (I think that possibly his attorney told him what the child support would be like and he blanched.) The prevailing beliefs of the family court is probably why my daughter quietly became suicidal in 4th grade, curiously at the same time that the court insisted that the kids have regular overnights with their father. (Parents have rights! — point out the attorneys. Then how is it, I wonder, that the actual AZ statutes say nothing about “parent rights” and speak of “the best interest of the child?” I think that it is because parents are adults and hire attorneys, while children are nearly voiceless to the family court.)We need courts to stolidly define laws, defend rights, etc. But we also need alternative mechanisms that have the capacity to act faster, more “in the moment,” etc. There is no “perfect system” — only flawed, human systems.
The two-state solution for Israel & Palestine is like a divorce where the children never grow up. It isn’t ideal, but it is better than the alternative, where one spouse perpetually abuses the other. My spouse reminded me the other day that one of the great fears of Israelis is that the Arabs will outcompete them in the baby-making contest and, as a result, a completely democratic, integrated state would be doomed to eventually oppress the Jews. I could point out that since Israel is perpetually inviting in more Jews from around the world that this could be avoided, or that the Jews would have a few generations in which to befriend the Palestinians so that they were disinclined to be oppressive — but that is useless since he isn’t the one who needs convincing, he just happens to be conversant in the concerns of the Israelis.
So, a two-state solution, while far from ideal, would be a way to de-escalate tensions, both sides could be armed to the teeth, and as long as neither violate the borders they can each reproduce and invite immigrants as they see fit. The problem is that Israel has been ascendant for so long now, that it doesn’t see the need to make territory concessions to the Palestinians — it is far too comfortable with the dominant role, and isn’t willing to go from dominance to parity. And that is why the situation is abysmal.
The man opposed to drafting our girls…that is why I don’t believe my daughter will get drafted. I am grateful.
Last week my daughter went to the AZ state fair. I gave her cash to pay for her entrance fee and rides pass. They charge a $2 surcharge for all cash transactions! I suppose that is the next tactic for eliminating cash…. Oh, and the entrance tickets are all via smartphone. I guess the non-smartphone savvy are no longer welcome?
The Revelations prophecy…that is one of the problems with prophecy in general — they tend to be self-fulfilling. It’s hard to know whether such prophecies are the wild ravings of a lunatic or result from a connection with “the divine” or some quirk of the universe. Regardless, it is people who read them and then look at the world and instead of thinking, “Wow, fomenting strife in The Holy Land is a colossally stupid idea,” they think: “Well, strife in The Holy Land is inevitable anyhow, and will hasten The Rapture, so it doesn’t matter if I contribute to the conflict.” Idiotic. Think about it: the Crusaders probably used the same logic to justify their depredations in The Holy Land.
Religious texts *is* a part of the problem with Israel and Palestinians. The problem is not simply that Israelis today are atheists, godless, and lovers of money and the values of “Babylon.” Jewry doesn’t have the New Testament with all of the “love your neighbor” stuff. Even many religious Jews look at prophesies in the Torah and the history of Jericho and Joshua, and believe not in the principles of Western Enlightenment, but rather the principles of ancient nomadic tribes who had no qualms about “total destruction” of the people already living in the territory that God had decreed was to become their own. Instead of looking at the Holocaust as an example of “what not to do” to anyone, these Jews see themselves as “the chosen people,” and better than the rest of the humans on the planet. These Jews don’t want mass murder done to Jews, but don’t care if it happens to another people, to “the unchosen.” I don’t say this because of any grudge or prejudice that I have against Jewish people, nor because of any personal experience that I have with Jews who share this belief; I say it because my spouse was raised an Orthodox Jew and, according to him, this *was* the belief system that was widely shared by Jewish community he grew up in. He lived in Queens, and his family frowned on him playing with the black children in the neighborhood. His father taught in the public schools, but he and his siblings were sent to private Jewish schools. He has rejected most of the culture of his upbringing, and retained primarily the “Judeochristian values” underpinning it all.
Religiously, this conflict is a mess. I think it foolish to frame the problem from a New Testament and/or Enlightenment perspective, or even as some sort of intergenerational “Stockholm Syndrome” reaction to The Holocaust. Some rabbis (like the one in the video near the top of this page) preach against mistreating the Palestinians. Some Jews look to the first time the Hebrew people entered Palestine, raining death and destruction upon the then inhabitants, murdering them so that their children could not intermarry with the prior inhabitants in the future, and use these texts to justify a present-day Apartheid (or worse) regime.
Dr D – 3D printing, building, etc., have you ever run across “aircrete?” It is an interesting building material. https://domegaia.com/blogs/aircrete-dome-mastery/aircrete-101-the-ultimate-guide
It has advantages and disadvantages, but is really interesting. It can be DIY. I often look around at the homes from the last few decades here in Phoenix, AZ, and shake my head — homes built primarily of wood with no forests in sight! This really is rather stupid. My home was built in ‘49 with a brick exterior and wood beams for roof and interior walls. Traditionally, homes in this stretch of the world were built with adobe or stone, with wood used where adobe or stone was not suitable.I have thought about what you (Dr D) suggested about a week ago — the solution to the problem of my ex abusing my kids being to threaten him with a shotgun. What you may not have realized is that you illustrated the situation of women, generally. Women are, generally speaking, not as physically strong as men. Therefore, the only way I can overcome the influence of an uncivilized man is by using force (or might) that is greater than his. Whether this “might” is a shotgun (which I did not fashion myself), or a court order enforced by police, or a CPS representative threatening prosecution, is somewhat irrelevant — as an adult woman I have to rely on the combined resources of my community to overcome the innate strength of an uncivilized man who is determined to do ill to myself and/or my children. I think that the fact that I am a woman and that you are a man ends up informing greatly the disparities in our world views. As much as I prize the values of responsibility, self-reliance, and independence, ever since I became pregnant with twins 18 years ago I have been required to seek outside help from my community in order to properly raise my children. One could say that this has been due to the failure of the father of my children to properly execute his role as “father” and “husband” — and I would tend to agree with that perspective! However, unfortunately, there are messed up men who shirk their responsibilities, and then the result is women and children who must rely upon the general community for the support that the derelict man does not provide. Because, very often, even a woman who works her a** off cannot provide every needful thing that her children require.
As it is, I am very grateful to CPS this weekend…. CPS has somehow convinced my ex that he should allow my three teens to live where they want, and in a meeting with the mental hospital, myself, my ex, and CPS this past week, my ex verbally agreed that the three kids would go to my home. I am suspicious that once his attorney wades into this that it isn’t going to be so easy, but my kids are with me instead of their father for fall break (from school,) the court granted me temporary sole custody of my daughter, and my kids are calm and happy at the present. I don’t know what “carrots and sticks” were employed by CPS…but, so far, it is working.
I didn’t spend much time on the math puzzle, but the first pattern that I saw emerge suggests the top number would be 17.
On another note, one of my 17 year old sons noticed two days ago that the formula for the circumference of a circle is the derivative of the formula for the area of a circle. I was gobsmacked, as I had neither ever noticed it nor ever had it pointed out to me. I am so proud of my son, who has been accepted into the computer engineering program at ASU.
I really struggle to understand the perspective of thinking people who take some sort of umbrella term for a group of others, say, “deplorables,” or “MAGA crowd,” or American “Indians,” or “wetbacks,” or “Jews,” and then ascribe the same thoughts and actions to all of the individuals therein and literally believe that this is an accurate representation of the individuals assigned to these groups. We *know* from life experience that this isn’t how human societies work. Our minds create these groupings because we humans are very good at pattern recognition and we have to group and arrange stimuli and concepts so that we are not overwhelmed by all of it. However, it is imperative that we understand that these groupings are not reality, they are models that we use to enable us to communicate with each other using language. For example, I am appalled by the oppression of the State of Israel towards the Palestinian people contained within the territory that Israel controls. Yes, the actions of the state apparatus can be correctly ascribed as “by the Jewish people who live in Israel” if we point out that the Israeli government is a flavor of a “democratic republic.” However, at the same time I am also aware of a subset of the Jewish population of Israel and around the globe who are horrified by the treatment of the Palestinians by the State of Israel, some of whom organize together to oppose this oppression. And, as most of us who comment here also live in Western-style democratic republics and/or have a lot of familiarity with them, we realize that, very often, the policies of such governments do not truthfully express the “will” of the majority of the voting populace of the country, as very sophisticated apparatuses tend to emerge in such countries so that a well-positioned minority lend out-sized influence over these nations’ government policies and actions. This suggests that many government actions and policies are NOT expressive of the views and preferences of a majority of those who live there.
Wolf pup howling…
My dog realized a few years back that vocal (singing) warm ups are like dog/wolf howls. He has decided that he wants to join in the fun. So, whenever I do vocal warmups, he joins in. He does this when my singing students do their vocal warmups with me. He realized that the piano accompanies student vocal warmups, so now, sometimes general piano playing means to him that it is “time for a pack howl.” This is mostly hilarious, except when I’m teaching vocal harmony as his howls are not quite harmonious enough, are loud, and are too big of a distraction!…if the judge or commissioner actually spoke with my children, they would find out that not being required to go to their dad’s house would be a relief, like a holiday, like the best gift, ever. Better than Disneyland or Dave and Busters + $200 in tokens. The court operates under generalized assumptions that are completely wrong in this situation. DCS is the only agency that goes first to the children, to find out their perspective in way that is not filtered through another adult.
The reason why the commissioner didn’t do the order of protection is because of an urge towards “limited government,” towards not removing children suddenly from a parent, and to ensure that the judiciary acts based strictly upon law and not upon the emotional whims of people who come to them in supplication:
(a) There is no indication that their father has physically harmed them or will in the near future. (My rantings about his prior suicide attempts, and current suicidal ideation and access to a gun, notwithstanding.) The law states that there must be an indication of domestic violence recently or currently or that it will happen soon AND that the person(s) to be protected are in immediate physical harm.
(b) AZ statute does not define “verbal abuse.” AZ statute does define “domestic violence” and defines “harassment” in a way to include domestic violence, and says that “domestic violence is a dangerous crime against children.” My ex’s behavior towards the children very clearly meets the AZ legal definition of “harassment,” but the Commissioner did not feel that she could act. I asked her if it was possible, under AZ law, for a parent to “harass” a child. She paused and said: “I do not know.” She told me that if he had said these things to ANY CHILD EXCEPT HIS OWN CHILD, that she could issue the order of protection. Since the AZ judiciary has chosen to give parents very large latitude in “parenting style” with respect to the interpretation of harassment, the commissioner followed the law as she understood it.Based upon the judge’s response to my emergency petition, it looks like the judge looked at the law narrowly in the exact same way as the commissioner (despite the fact that a family judge has more leeway than a commissioner): their father has not physically harmed them, my daughter physically harmed herself, therefore there is no danger of “immediate and irreparable harm,” by father towards the children and the family court is loath to suddenly remove children from parents.
Children are forbidden from entering a commissioners court room, therefore the children cannot speak for themselves. (This is for the children’s own protection.) The emergency petition process is written only — the judge does not have to face the parent asking for emergency orders, and even in the evidentiary hearing now scheduled for October 26, the family court will not permit my children to testify, so I have to get someone (other than myself — my own testimony is automatically considered “tainted” because, of course, I must be understood to likely be a “vindictive ex,”) to testify about what the children have told this individual. Currently, the only person who has spoken with the children at length about this stuff is the DCS rep, and I’m not sure whether or not I can subpoena him to testify. I don’t even know what the children may have told him, because I only saw the boys briefly Friday afternoon, and I wasn’t going to discuss it in detail with my daughter at the mental hospital surrounded by people who work there. (And one of those worker people, I’m pretty sure, was periodically taking down notes about her perception of my daughter and of me, in some sort of code into a book.)
Child protective services (DCS in AZ) often gets a bad rap. And yet, this morning, I find myself pleading with a rep from DCS to help me protect my kids.
Tuesday night my daughter was so overcome with negative emotions in her father’s home that she cut herself repeatedly with a knife. She came back to my home Wednesday, and would be spending two days with me. Thursday I went to court and asked for an order of protection on the children’s behalf against their father. The Commissioner was very apologetic, said that my ex exhibits “terrible parenting,” counseled me to file for emergency temporary orders, and denied the OoP. I think that the Commissioner may also be the person who reported the situation to DCS. Friday I went to court and filed for emergency temporary orders to change custody. On my way back home, I was contacted by the rep from DCS, who had already interviewed my children at their school. The situation finally got bad enough for DCS to investigate for emotional abuse! While speaking with the DCS rep, I found out that the judge denied my petition. I did the only thing left to me — I picked my daughter up from school and took her to a mental hospital for emergency care, rather than permit her to return to her father’s home. I had to allow my sons to return. Yesterday I read DCS’s policy manual, trying to understand their procedures, and see how DCS may help, hinder, or be neutral as this goes forward.
I understand why DCS often gets a bad reputation. And yet…if they only had a good reputation, they would not be doing their job. Because there are people in this world who hurt the people whom they love. My ex is one of these.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/man-amazon-erased
Last sentence of the article:
If we ponder that relationship for a moment, we might conclude that many of the things that we believe we control are really on loan as a means of controlling us.As someone working in IT, during the last decade I have noticed increasingly how devices for users have fewer and fewer controls offered to the end user. Previously, devices tried to come up with interfaces that helped end users to understand what they were controlling. Now, it’s as if manufacturers are telling users: “Don’t worry about it. All of this tech stuff is too difficult and hard for you to understand. I’ll note your preferences and manage it all for you.”
Dr D: And some will have turned out okay and work and stay here, as always.
But it always comes back to free stuff they didn’t work for.
This is a good point. There are a handful of people that I have gotten to know pretty well while living in Phoenix whom I suspect don’t have their documents in order. All of them work very hard, and their status does not bother me in the least. Two did receive some “freebies.” For one, it was education of the children, both those born here and born elsewhere and free healthcare for the children born here. (I don’t know if they always utilized the free healthcare — it may have just been when a child born here fell and broke a bone and required care that was beyond the family’s ability to pay.). The other was a woman in her sixties, still working very hard, who received steeply discounted healthcare.
Also, I think it is important to remember that “sanctuary cities” originally became a thing due to practical necessities of operating on a city level — not because of partisanship. Once people are living in cities, it can become problematic when there is a sizable sub-population that is terrified of coming in contact with the police, fire department & paramedics, and city officials. This fear can lead to crime being tolerated and people being abused. Local officials wanted to be able to come in contact with the undocumented living there so that they could deal with realities on the ground. Originally, sanctuary cities were not about supplying freebies to the undocumented.
As it is, it is the feds who are creating these problems, and, ultimately, the cities and localities who have to deal with it.
