An Orgy Of Self-Satisfaction

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A common theme on this side of the great divide is the growing perception gap between the people in the regime that rules over the Global American Empire and the people who are trapped inside that empire. The relationship between the ruled and their rulers is becoming two black boxes. The people see their rulers perform, but why they are doing what they are doing makes little sense. The rulers look over the walls and see nothing but monsters lying in wait for them.

This growing disconnect was on display in the Imperial Capital, when the dictator of Ukraine arrived to a hero’s welcome. Dictator is not a word the regime members use, even though it is the correct title. Zelensky rules with an iron fist, throwing critics into dungeons and terrorizing the people into submission. The excuse is the war, but democratic countries still hold elections in times of crisis. Tyrants suspend the rule of law when it suits their interests.

For most Americans, Ukraine is a weird place far away that has no bearing on their lives, because it should have no bearing on their lives. Most Americans feel for the common people whose lives are ruined by the war. Most American would prefer it if their government did something to end the conflict. In fact, it is safe to say that Americans wish their government were the global peacemaker. That would be something that could genuinely unite a very divided country.

Otherwise, the typical American has no interest in this war. If provided the facts, they would be appalled at the actions of their government. The Ukrainians took delivery of High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) from American and immediately used them to target residential areas of the Donbas. War is always an ugly business and brother wars are the worst in this regard. Even so, the typical American would want nothing to do with the deliberate targeting of civilians.

The fact is, the typical American, regardless of political affiliation, would wholeheartedly agree with John Quincy Adams when he said “Wherever the standard of freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions, and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.”

Anyone living in the world of normal Americans knows this. Despite this, the regime put on a prime time show in which the dictator of Ukraine, dressed like an extra from bad war movie, gave a weird speech to Congress. In that speech he demanded more money from the average American and gave the strong impression that he thinks the average American is not pulling his weight in terms of sacrificing for a country he cannot locate on a map.

What made the spectacle grotesque was the fawning over this belligerent midget by the regime leaders. It was a vulgar display of the disconnect that now exists between the regime and the people. Mitch McConnell came out and said that his number one priority, to the exclusion of all else, is shoveling untold billions into the rat hole that is the war in Ukraine. Imagine being a guy struggling to pay his rent in Kentucky having to listen to that lecture.

What makes the whole thing revolting to the average person is that everyone knows much of the money is being stolen. Even though the FBI has been working long hours to suppress the facts of the Hunter Biden laptop, the typical American knows the Biden family is as crooked as a ram’s horn. They know all of these people are corrupt, yet they have to watch these people celebrate their alleged moral purity over shoveling more cash into the Ukraine money laundering machine.

In other words, the growing gap between the regime and the people is not simply a gap in understanding or a gap in priorities. It is a moral gap. Every day the people inside the regime imagine themselves on higher moral ground than the day before, while the people looking on see their leaders sinking into a swamp of moral depravity. It is not just that there is a gap, but that the gap is rapidly widening. Each new outrage by the freaks of the regime lowers their standing with the people.

Few commentators have noticed the parallel between Washington’s support for Ukraine and the support for Vietnam sixty years ago. It is a good comparison because the cause is the same. The people running Vietnam policy were every bit as deluded about their intelligence as the people running Ukraine policy. In fact, Victoria Nuland and the rest of the Kagan cult are setting new standards for Dunning-Kruger. Mx. Nuland is an unfathomably stupid woman.

The important parallel is deeper than just shared stupidity. Vietnam undermined the trust people had in their rulers to the point where serious people became concerned that the country was headed for a breakup. That was in a relatively homogenous and prosperous country. Today’s America is an irreconcilable collection of fractious and deracinated people with no reason to hang together other than convenience and fear of an increasingly hostile ruling class.

If the economic chickens come home to roost in 2023 as the economic experts tell us, this erosion of trust and respect for the regime will quickly become a crisis. People may look back at this shameful orgy of self-satisfaction, at the expense of the people, as a tipping point in the relationship between the regime and the people. Watching that show, it would take a heart of stone not to hate these people. It was the point when even the most faithful civic nationalist began to hate.

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Comments (Historical)

The comments below were originally posted to thezman.com.

249 Comments

Robert #334712 December 23, 2022 8:21 am 0
I’m not seeing Civic Nationalists show the kind of emotional reaction the rest of us have. Even after the shameful Zelensky show. Steve Sailer and people like him don’t seem to have a lot of self-reflection on this issue.
Bilejones #334710 December 23, 2022 7:37 am 0
New header picture for our Mr Z http://johnhelmer.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/2786THE-MONTREAL-WORLD-VIEW-1.jpg
Alzaebo #334667 December 22, 2022 7:52 pm 0
p.s.- along with a Wauconda, Washington, there’s also a tiny town named George. (I asked 8 people, “George is in the state of…?”– not one got it. “Georgia?,” most said.)
Alzaebo #334666 December 22, 2022 7:43 pm 0
Are we being goaded into the Boog? Web:“…there would be violent riots on the streets of USA and they would put Bosnia to shame, as everyone in America is armed” CW2 doing to us what the Rus and Uke Slavs are doing to each other?
I Forgot my Pen #334660 December 22, 2022 7:08 pm 0
I had the unfortunate chance while in an office today to glance at the TV playing fox news morning shows. The insufferable idiot Brian Kilmeade, as well as the standard clueless blond and other host were fawning over Zelensky- what a great speech, what a great man- dressed seriously because he means business! The co-host for a split second expressed doubt about the narrative, something along the lines of that he gets suspicious when Dems and Rep clap enthusiatically together. And then he just went back to repeating the regime’s dogma like nothing happened. This is fox news for you, and is what most of the normies will lap up, so count me skeptical that this was a point where the civic nationalist began to hate.
Jack Dobson #334664 December 22, 2022 7:26 pm 0
Why are you giving the enemy money by subscribing to cable?
I Forgot my Pen #334672 December 22, 2022 8:17 pm 0
I don’t have cable. saw it in the office
Enoch Cade #334673 December 22, 2022 8:19 pm 0
Au, Brian Kilmeade. A principled conservative and author of The President and the Freedom Fighter, about Abe Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. He should hang, in Minecraft.
Alzaebo #334658 December 22, 2022 7:01 pm 0
Can we replace the little blond girl statue facing the bull on Wall Street with Woodsy the Drug Owl?
Hemid #334675 December 22, 2022 8:30 pm 0
Last I heard, Li’l Hubris had been yanked away from the path of the bull and was being toured around the world, to be photographed standing (doomed) in the eyeline of literally every manly statue.
Vizzini #334643 December 22, 2022 6:29 pm 0
In fact, it is safe to say that Americans wish their government were the global peacemaker. Um, no. There’s a fundamental conflict with that job and the quotation you use two paragraphs later: “But she goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy.” I’m with John Quincy Adams.
usNthem #334632 December 22, 2022 5:38 pm 0
Would it be too much to ask that all the governmental elites wrecking the country and making a mockery of what it once stood for, experience slow and extremely painful expirations – publicly?
Lucius Sulla #334636 December 22, 2022 5:58 pm 0
I’ve been thinking about this.I used to think these people deserved the guillotine or firing squad.I’ve shifted to thinking these people deserve re-education through hard labor. These are the “learn to code” types, the “retrain miners to be healthcare workers” types. Well, they can be “re-trained” to spend 12-hour days in a coal mine.My post-revolution economy will require many raw inputs – coal, oil, copper, tin, iron, etc, and these people will need to be re-educated in the mines or on oil rigs.How satisfying would it be to send shitlibs to spend the rest of their lives doing hard labor?
Ploppy #334637 December 22, 2022 6:02 pm 0
Way ahead of you. Obligate subsistence potato farming, and only let them wear sack cloth clothes. Then children can be brought on field trips to jeer and throw rotten vegetables at them while they pat out their latkes.
Pozymandias #334644 December 22, 2022 6:30 pm 0
I’m personally on board for sending 85% of the shitwhite population of Oregon (where I’m trapped) to labor camps at this point. These smug fuckers need to be put to work rebuilding the industry and resource base the politicians they elect have sent to China or just destroyed in the name of Gaia. The farmers in Eastern Oregon are going to need help bringing in the harvest once the 90 million or whatever wetback Mexicans are deported. Fuck, fuck, fuck, I’m so fucking angry about everything right now I think I would shoot Santa and all his reindeer if they showed up with a fucking Uke flag emblem on their uniforms.
MiguelinID #334788 December 23, 2022 3:03 pm 0
Come to North Idaho. I got out of Oregon recently, never looked back. The natives here are reflexively “support the blue”, “MAGA 24” naïve, unaware of the termites hard at work in their backyard. But us Blue Stater immigrants are a bit more wise to the game and are working on a slow grind of disinfection.
Vizzini #334645 December 22, 2022 6:32 pm 0
That would take the risk that some soft-hearted and even softer-headed idiot would later pardon them. No. Against the wall with them.
3g4me #334654 December 22, 2022 6:49 pm 0
Lucius Sulla: Mao sending professors to labor on rural farms, or Pol Pot sending all the self-styled intellectuals out to the countryside, makes perfect sense once you’re on this side of the political divide. Except I’m even harder and colder the longer this goes on – I doubt they’d be worth feeding even as manual laborers. They each get only as much as they deserve – a streetlamp and a short length of rope.
Ostei Kozelskii #334671 December 22, 2022 8:16 pm 0
Oh, they’d be worth feeding–to the Great Whites off Montauk.
Dr. Mabuse #334740 December 23, 2022 10:40 am 0
There are just too many now. I want an out of sight, out of mind solution. Load them by hundreds onto barges, tow them into the middle of the Atlantic and sink them. The hardliners of the French Revolution did this (in local lakes and rivers) – they called it “the republican baptism”.
Ostei Kozelskii #334670 December 22, 2022 8:13 pm 0
I vote construction worker in Duluth.
Pozymandias #334684 December 22, 2022 9:35 pm 0
We could take a page from the Gulag Archipelago and have them haul logs across the ice road over one of the lakes up there. We might need to annex the adjacent part of Canada that has the nicely named Great Slave Lake though.
Bilejones #334711 December 23, 2022 7:40 am 0
I’ll say it one more time.Woodchipper.
Ostei Kozelskii #334669 December 22, 2022 8:12 pm 0
If you’re in tight with The Man Upstairs, why don’t you get on the blower and see what he’d be willing to do?
PeriheliusLux #334681 December 22, 2022 9:14 pm 0
Unarmed police officers in communities of color
Pozymandias #334685 December 22, 2022 9:39 pm 0
Oooh, I like that one. Assign them to illegal weapons confiscation detail in, say, Baltimore. Wait, you guys said you were FOR gun grabbing?!? Hehe.
The Wild Geese Howard #334618 December 22, 2022 3:18 pm 0
OT: Invasion USA continues as ICE reveals plans to ship invaders to NGOs in Tennessee: https://www.zerohedge.com/political/ice-prepares-release-illegal-immigrants-tennessee
LineInTheSand #334626 December 22, 2022 4:23 pm 0
Poor Tennessee! I follow some music producers on youtube and they say that half of Los Angeles’ music people have moved to Nashville.Under our currents system of “freedom!” communities have no defense against this.I’d like to see a system where any organization of contiguous landowners could veto the arrival of any new person or business. Of course, bribery would still be a problem, but my system would be a game changer.In a local election in the town that I lived in until 8 months ago, I enraged the libertarian conservatives when people were discussing who were the “smart growth” or “managed growth” candidates and I asked who was the “no growth” candidate. “You’re not going to tell me what I can do with my property!” They all wanted to sell their properties to Californians and move to another small town.
Ben the Layabout #334646 December 22, 2022 6:32 pm 0
I like your idea. I would add a kicker: Imagine if the law allowed any sized contiguous group of landowners, if unanimous, to unilaterally freeze zoning on their properties. In other words, it could never be put to a “higher and better” use, same types of structures, no subdividing and so forth. Once done, it would be irrevocable*. Individual properties could be sold, but the use restriction would remain as if on a deed. I suppose eminent domain would always be a risk. I’m not sure how that’d be handled. But hey, I’m fantasizing here; you can’t expect me to have all the answers.*This has been done in somewhat allied ways. For example, when a landowner donates property to the local government upon the binding condition (?) that it be made or kept as a recreational park for perpetuity. Or easements on land that set aside wilderness areas. And so on.
Pozymandias #334656 December 22, 2022 6:55 pm 0
It’s important to be thinking about what legal and political structures can replace both democratic socialism and unbridled neoliberal capitalism as well as our (sadly) unworkable notions of total freedom of speech. One problem we face is that the authoritarian Left, while almost always a minority even in Blue states, never faces any consequences for its attacks on our freedoms or way of life. We see this in the gun control “debate”. Here in Oregon, the idiot Portlanders rammed through an obviously unconstitutional bag of gun grabbery called Measure 114. It’s now in the process of going through the court system and may never take effect. The problem is that the fuckers who created and backed it are free to just try again and again. Since these people have a lot of money and nothing better to do*, it becomes a game of nickel slots that they can play with our rights. In addition to land use rule changes there needs to be a system to hold politicians and individuals criminally liable for these kinds of attacks on our freedoms. Just some things to think about for the new Constitution after the crackup.* Nothing better to do and a lot of money – also known as rich White wammen. The sickest part of it all is that these bitches get almost all their money from their cucked husbands.
anon #334689 December 23, 2022 12:56 am 0
I remember reading about a Turkish ruler (Hamid or some such fellow) who executed his viziers and bureaucrats if their policies resulted in harm and to the citizenery. And their heads were put on a spike and displayed publicly in a prominent place. I am beginning to think he had a point there.
3g4me #334659 December 22, 2022 7:02 pm 0
Line: My favorite from a vlog comment thread today: “-23 here in Montana this morning. I hope the Californians are miserable.” But your sad point is well made. People are generally selfish and short-sighted. They don’t think the ramifications of anything they do will ever come back to anyone, let alone themselves. My husband and I are already discussing what sort of provisions we can and ought to make to ensure the land and home we’ve bought remains unsold after we’re gone.
Nick Noltes Mugshot #334635 December 22, 2022 5:56 pm 0
Don’t worry. Give each illegal a coonskin cap, an annual pass to Dollywood, and set of Graceland place mats and they will assimilate just fine.
Pozymandias #334652 December 22, 2022 6:41 pm 0
If the wild talk about the Boog ever comes to anything it will be something like this that actually triggers CW 2.0. Some gang of well armed Fed monkeys will encounter an equally well armed National Guard unit or state militia while trying to find some place to stash a bunch of Numericans that’s safely away from the mansions of the white shitlibs and where the rednecks won’t be able to do what needs to be done with them. The Martha’s Vineyard thing was a fun bit of theater since the fags who live there weren’t going to do anything rash but done in reverse it could lead to real trouble.
Jack Dobson #334665 December 22, 2022 7:28 pm 0
Think about this: Tennessee’s Attorney General could file suit and keep this evil bottled up in court for a while. Has he done so? I bet not.
The Wild Geese Howard #334683 December 22, 2022 9:16 pm 0
I like Indiana’s AG, who just lead a successful suit to squash jab mandates in federal court. I have a chance at a job there, but all my overseas time may give the clearance investigators heartburn. D’oh!
Synthetic Gold #334676 December 22, 2022 8:40 pm 0
Invasion USA continues as ICE reveals plans to ship invaders to NGOs in Tennessee: Now that itself is ropeworthy.
george1 #334687 December 22, 2022 10:30 pm 0
The new Americans are better than the desendants of the Mayflower.Just ask Ben Shapiro.
KGB #334598 December 22, 2022 1:46 pm 0
Off topic question for B125 if he shows up. What are you hearing about the stabbing death in T.O.? Is it safe to assume that the 8 little darlings involved would be considered by Justin Trudeau to be more Canadian than you?
B125 #334613 December 22, 2022 3:03 pm 0
You’ll have to specify, there have been many incidents lately in and around Toronto. 8 Teens stab man to death:–https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/8-teenage-girls-charged-with-second-degree-murder-after-man-fatally-stabbed-in-toronto-1.6202695 I tried sending a list with more but it was flagged as spam. Diversity is our biggest strength.
KGB #334640 December 22, 2022 6:10 pm 0
This is the one I referred to. All 8 are minors who met online, ages range from 13-16. It appears they then met up for a night of wilding that culminated in the stabbing death of a homeless man. My spider sense tells me that none of them had parents named Gordon and Rosemarie.
B125 #334614 December 22, 2022 3:05 pm 0
Another one: 2 white women stabbed, one to death , by illiterate Chinese man on the subway. “Random” attack of course. https://www.blogto.com/city/2022/12/woman-identified-fatal-high-park-subway-station-stabbing/
TO #334728 December 23, 2022 10:10 am 0
I lived in High Park some 20 years ago, Runnymede station. I recall meeting Platinum Blonde frontman Mark Holmes who also lived in the neighbourhood with his mom I believe at the time.
B125 #334615 December 22, 2022 3:06 pm 0
indian brawl:–https://globalnews.ca/news/9359676/brampton-fight-30-people/ indian Swordfight:–https://toronto.citynews.ca/2022/09/14/sword-swinging-brampton-brawl/
B125 #334616 December 22, 2022 3:07 pm 0
bigger indian brawl on diwalihttps://www.insauga.com/video-500-people-fight-in-mississauga-during-diwali-celebrations/
B125 #334617 December 22, 2022 3:08 pm 0
Tibetan man lights tibetan woman on fire on the bus, kills her:–https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/woman-fire-toronto-kipling-nyima-dolma-1.6517447 not a serious country
TO #334730 December 23, 2022 10:12 am 0
The immigrants seem pretty serious
Felix Krull #334596 December 22, 2022 1:41 pm 0
Dictator is not a word the regime members use, even though it is the correct title. I think “bagman” is closer to the mark. Zelensky, personally, has zero power, he’s just a sock puppet.
Jack Dobson #334604 December 22, 2022 2:11 pm 0
Yes. When Zelensky rationally decided to enter into peace negotiations, Boris Johnson showed up and told him about his life prospects.
The Wild Geese Howard #334611 December 22, 2022 3:01 pm 0
There are rumors Elensky’s personal bodyguard includes several SAS squaddies. Nice work, if you can get it.
Pozymandias #334668 December 22, 2022 7:52 pm 0
My impression is that the entire “Ukrainian military” is imported mercs, disproportionately from the UK. I think they’re actually found a bit of a synergy here in modern British society. The UK in general is a cuck’s paradise, gun control that makes even a Californian want to join the NRA, laws that make it illegal to say anything even remotely nasty about the hordes of ex-colonials the government lets in, laws that make you a criminal for kicking someone’s ass in a fight even when they attacked you. Taxes that make legitimate employment a hopeless drag.Then again, if you’re a young White man who fancies playing war and takes trips to France just to shoot pistols you can be encouraged with the thought that you can basically play with all kinds of guns all day and get paid under the table by your government if you head east and call yourself a freedom fighter.In Clown World Ukraine British taxes pay you! It’s really hard to imagine that even the most anti-Russian Ukie seriously wants to die for a cause that is so transparently cooked up in Tel Aviv and Washington D.C. Even total sellouts and sociopaths over there have got to be aware that they will get none of the spoils even assuming the Clown Axis somehow prevails.
Mike #334686 December 22, 2022 9:45 pm 0
If that’s so about the mercenaries, then I hope that none survive. As it is if I were Russian, I’d make it a point to never take a one prisoner. They are the lowest of the low and don’t deserve anything else in Minecraft of course.
US of Ass #334867 December 25, 2022 6:08 pm 0
Uk is less diverse than California or the state you’re in. Fewer street poopers too. Taxes are about the same as the US if you factor in healthcare state taxes. I don’t think the UK is providing the majority of troops for Ukraine. Russia seems to be using a lot of mercs so I guess Russia must be cuck’s paradise.
Ostei Kozelskii #334579 December 22, 2022 12:47 pm 0
But there is one major difference between Vietnam and the Ukraine. In the early- to mid-sixties the vast majority of Americans wholeheartedly supported the prosecution of proxy wars against the USSR, which was viewed as the Evil Empire, even though Ronald Reagan had yet to bestow upon it that appellation. And support for the anti-communists in Vietnam was an example of this position.Today, nobody in his right mind sees Russia as a global scourge the likes of the USSR. Russia is not animated by a clear and expansionist ideology such as Marxist-Leninism. In fact, it seems to possess very little in the way of an ideology at all, and what ideology (Russian nationalism) it does espouse cannot have any appeal to renegade citizens of AINO or the governments of Paraguay, Spain, Tanzania, Pakistan and Indonesia. Russian nationalism will not precipitate nuclear missiles in Cuba or a revolution in India. Russia’s concern is Russia and with defending itself against an aggressive, expansionistic Global American Empire. And the people of AINO, ignorant and degraded though they undoubtedly are, do not support impoverishing themselves to fund war against a country whose chief desire is merely to be left alone.
The real Bill #334584 December 22, 2022 12:58 pm 0
And then there is the fact that, starting with Bill Clinton, Western rulers have repestedly assured Russia that we had no intention of bringing Ukraine into NATO.When at some point along the line, Putin realized they were lying, it made perfect sense to take measures of his own, to assure that that would be the case.Imagine if Mexico and China formed an alliance; and Mexico announced their plan to install Chinese-made rockets— capable of reaching anywhere in the United States— on the Mexican side of the Rio Grande.How is it that America can announce and enforce the ‘Monroe Doctrine’— that what happens in nearby territory is indeed our business— but Russia cannot do the same?
Ben the Layabout #334649 December 22, 2022 6:37 pm 0
Apparently it’s perfectly all right to invade our nation, if it’s done by unarmed undocumented aliens (and by legal immigration), a few million persons per year.
The Greek #334638 December 22, 2022 6:09 pm 0
As someone that lives in an area deep in the hive, I can tell you that they unquestioningly drink up the regime messaging on Ukraine. I’m FAR more likely to see a Ukrainian flag (or a rainbow flag for that matter) in my area than an American flag.
Steve #334690 December 23, 2022 6:16 am 0
Everyone knows that the whole charade is about protecting the Deep State’s “investments” in Ukraine.
Tempazpan #334578 December 22, 2022 12:45 pm 0
Obviously, the way the Brandon regime gets around the economic crisis and public dissatisfaction is to tip us into all-out war with Russia with a super convenient “Pearl Harbor’ (9/11) event. They’re banking on Americans having the same reaction as they did in 1941, with Brandon as FDR. I’m not so sure.
The Wild Geese Howard #334593 December 22, 2022 1:29 pm 0
I think this possibility is somewhat likely. In conjunction with Pearl Harbor v3.0 they will probably attempt to ban cash/make it trash and roll out their desired CBDC.
3g4me #334662 December 22, 2022 7:13 pm 0
Wild Geese: I concur it’s a question of when, not if, they roll out the CBDC. My husband is convinced that this will create not an immediate barter economy, but rather a black market in cash (perhaps similar to the old hard currency markets in the eastern bloc countries). I can see that up to a point, but question how long fiat currency will be accepted either here or abroad once the CBDC becomes official. Lots of gambling/hedging on what ifs.
Dinodoxy #334680 December 22, 2022 9:11 pm 0
America already has a digital currency.At least 95% of the value of all transactions is either credit card, checks of eft.
Soldier of Misfortune #334678 December 22, 2022 9:01 pm 0
We’ve been in a military (mis)adventure somewhere most of the time since WWII. Has the U.S. actually declared war in the archaic, constitutional way (a vote by Congress) since 1941? No wonder we can’t seem to define who exactly we are at war against. Or what victory or defeat would allow us to declare the war over.
Pozymandias #334679 December 22, 2022 9:04 pm 0
I’ll concur with this for a bit of an odd reason – Pokemon. My wife is an avid player of the various Pokemon games. Basically, the game allows you to own various magical creatures called Pokemon (“pocket monsters” in Japanglish) and then force them to fight each other in gladiatorial battles. You can also trade them with other players and most of the games allow you to just find them “in the wild” and capture them. Some of the Pokemon have special magic too. There are some that are “shiny” and others that are “ancient” (like the Great Old Ones but for Pokemon). The Pokemon have some sort of cryptographic credentials set up by the parent company to keep people from just manufacturing arbitrarily powerful Pokemon and winning all the time. They are essentially some of the original NFTs. The combat is turn-based and thus is more of “head” skill than just blasting away in an FPS game.The game is interesting because I think it mirrors the real world a bit better than traditional skill games like Chess. In Chess, a few master-level players will dominate any contest and the game’s allotment of pieces is the same for every player. In Pokemon, players who lack skill can make themselves more competitive by spending time and even real world money to trade for powerful Pokemon.The GAE ruling class is basically somewhat like a gang of old Pokemon players who’ve been together for ages and where most of the new players can’t be fully trusted. Indians, Chinese, Mexicans, Arabs, all are rightly distrustful of the WASPY and Jewy old elite and trade amongst themselves. The old gang, though, does have a LOT of really good ancient and shiny Pokemon. What are they in real life? The alphabet agencies, the deep state. Even with those advantages, the sharpest members of the old gang know that their fate is to be gradually edged out by the newcomers they themselves invited in to use to attack those of their own ethnic tribe that they didn’t care for (that’s you and me).So this is where the “Russian 9-11” is going to come from. The old guard will grab their best, shiniest, most ancient PeopleMon and put them in play doing some crazy one-off attack that can be blamed on Putin. As the radioactive clouds are still lingering above D.C. they will announce their putsch, banning all the outsider players, seizing their Pokemon, and preventing the fate they richly deserve.This is also our cue to finally say enough is enough, dissolve the vile empire they preside over and throw the whole lot of them in the Gulag forever. Any way it goes, the economy is fooked and the dollar is burnt toast but at least we still have time to avoid the dictatorship they’re planning.
David Wright #334547 December 22, 2022 11:46 am 0
https://www.shorpy.com/node/5120?size=_original#caption See you all at the Zblog christmas party. Byob
David Wright #334550 December 22, 2022 11:47 am 0
This one.https://www.shorpy.com/node/5120
The Wild Geese Howard #334565 December 22, 2022 12:14 pm 0
Half the workers in the photo are women. The TV told me women were totally oppressed until 1973!
The real Bill #334566 December 22, 2022 12:16 pm 0
Great pic! Maybe it’s just me, but I found myself thinking: “I wonder who’s fucking who?”
Alzaebo #334631 December 22, 2022 5:30 pm 0
“Will Clarence in Sales ever get up the nerve to ask out Hermione from Accounting? Is there gin in that oilcan? Ask the bear.”December 1925A heart of stone? I must not have one.I want to personally thank D-Wright for the most crystalline observation ever made in Western civilization: “well then, why isn’t the pluckiest little country Wakanda?”The brother called me to celebrate Hanukkah. He’s probably glad they’re letting Bankman-Fried out for Christmas.I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t.Not stony enough.I couldn’t tell him that I won’t bow to a bunch of jumped-up high-yellows, quadroons, darkie halfbreed Obamas who were complaining about slabery even all the way back when.
Alzaebo #334633 December 22, 2022 5:38 pm 0
Should’ve picked our own cotton? No, we shoulda never taught those whitegirl chasers to read, in Sumer.
karl von hungus #334562 December 22, 2022 12:05 pm 0
pretty cool! i like the christmas tree from 1919. something clark griswold would love 😛
Ben the Layabout #334544 December 22, 2022 11:41 am 0
I generally agree with today’s essay. It’s no secret that the US openly props up an extremely corrupt foreign actor. So what else is new? This, perhaps: We now do so openly. And, apparently, not even cases where valid US interests are furthered. To prop up the business interests of the powerful, yes, but long-term national interests? Doubtful.At the risk of some down votes, may I point out that our own United States is not entirely exempt from being a tyrant, at least at selected times in her history? The government had no problems suspending the Bill of Rights during the Civil War. In WW I era journalists, protesters and others were imprisoned for the crime of speaking out against the war. In WW II American citizens were forcibly interned for the crime of being an inconvenient ethnic group. All these and many more may be be justified by the exigency of wartime. And perhaps they are. But that doesn’t change in the least the problem that a government will change or ignore its own laws whenever the “need” arises.I love my country but I fear my government. I’ve rarely been one to buy into my national myths, either. Lady Liberty has a very long history of — to borrow a Biblical allusion — offering to help others to remove a splinter from their eye when she has a plank, nay, an entire lumber yard, in her own.
The real Bill #334569 December 22, 2022 12:27 pm 0
Heck, the Bill of Rights has already been suspended; or at least, severely truncated:Our Second Amendment rights— which the Bill of Rights states “shall not be infringed”— that is, even the outermost edges of it should be sacrosanct— has been severely pruned.First amendment freedom of speech and assembly is gone. After Charlottesville, it’s become clear that freedom of assembly depends solely on the whims of local authorities. And “hate speech” laws, and all the words you aren’t allowed to say, have rendered freedom of speech a thing of the past.Joel Skousen makes the point that welfare payments— taking money from one group without their permission, to pay another group— is a violation of the Constitutional prohibition against the unlawful seizure of property.And the “anti-discrimination” laws of the ” civil rights movement” destroyed our freedom of association.Remember the 10th Amendment? Which was supposed to limit the powers of the federal government to what was specifically stated in the constitution?
Ostei Kozelskii #334624 December 22, 2022 4:10 pm 0
“Our own United States”? I don’t think any regular poster on the blog considers AINO his country anymore. We have been alienated from our own nation.
ArthurinCali #334542 December 22, 2022 11:39 am 0
AFAIK, Russia isn’t killing 100K Americans with fentanyl, nor are they showing up by the millions at my border. Not our problem. Put another way, anytime Rob Reiner and Lindsey Graham are on the same side…well, I have questions, is all.When I first saw the picture of Pelosi and Harris raising the Ukraine flag in the Congressional Chamber, I thought it was photoshopped. No way would there be a foreign country’s leader giving a speech and demanding more money with his flag being held behind him. Clown world doesn’t begin to describe this fairy tale we’re watching.Oh, and I learned the definition of a ‘Vatnik’ the other day when someone called me one. It means a slow-witted Russian who loves him some Putin.Being called a Putin-lover, or even the dreaded label of Communist, is a real kick for this retired veteran. As if being cautious on military support and escalation automatically makes one a “Vatnik.”Maybe those of us who have experienced war prefer diplomacy.
3g4me #334663 December 22, 2022 7:21 pm 0
ArthurinCali: Excellent comment. With the final addendum – That what passes for diplomacy in Weimerica IS war.
Jack Dobson #334536 December 22, 2022 11:27 am 0
These psychopaths seem hellbent to put Putin in a position where a nuclear first strike is a rational action. I can’t even wrap my head around such insanity. Apparently the Regime and its court thinks such an exchange isn’t possible or, even worse, that they can somehow survive a nuclear exchange. If I lived in either D.C. or NYC I would have left weeks ago. The fact people who live there seem content to stay put indicates they are just as delusional as the clowns managing this shitshow. Cognitive dissonance seems almost universal. The alternative explanations is a population that tolerates Drag Queen Storybook Hour is as suicidal as psychotic. I suspect it is the former and straight-up pathological denial/disassociation.The Jacobins have nukes. What possibly could go wrong?
Jack Dobson #334545 December 22, 2022 11:42 am 0
Also, if you have not done so, please read the comments to a National Review propaganda piece that masturbates furiously to the idea of war with Russia. These deranged people richly deserve to die in a nuclear holocaust. Unfortunately, millions of others who do not want any part of this madness will roast right along with them.
Chet Rollins #334591 December 22, 2022 1:15 pm 0
The NYT has designated bots to drive discourse, and I’m sure NR has something similar.
Ben the Layabout #334548 December 22, 2022 11:46 am 0
If you’ve ever read a detailed report of what a nuclear war would entail, you might prefer to be at Ground Zero. I know I would. 🙁
Jack Dobson #334552 December 22, 2022 11:51 am 0
True, but the odds are the vast majority of these people do not believe such a thing is real. Again, and it’s worth it, read the comments to a NR Russia war propaganda piece. It is horrifying to be in the same country with these NPC’s.
The real Bill #334599 December 22, 2022 1:57 pm 0
Ben,You may know more about this than I do— and please feel free to correct me —but it’s my impression that the damage that would result from a nuclear war has been greatly exaggerated.The people within the (10-mile?) blast radius would be killed, and the winds would carry radioactive fallout, which is potentially lethal.But it’s my understanding that there wouldn’t be a ‘nuclear winter’, in which the entire planet’s climate would tank.As I understand it, those of us not in immediate proximity of likely targets, or directly downwind from them, would certainly survive, and likely suffer no ill effects from the bomb itself.
Ploppy #334641 December 22, 2022 6:15 pm 0
An exchange between Russia and the US would likely produce at least one cold summer and crop failure. The starvation would primarily hit the third world as the grain production of the US, Canada, and Russia is eliminated.
Ben the Layabout #334661 December 22, 2022 7:10 pm 0
The points you state are consistent with most of what I’ve been taught (military) and/or read over the years. The problem is that you have overlooked second and third order effects. Here are just a few off the top of my head:1. Hard radiation. The damage downwind (fallout) would be difficult to predict but non-trivial. But the areas that were direct hits would be uninhabitable for decades, perhaps centuries.2. By far the biggest damage and losses of health/life would be due to the collapse of infrastructure, or of civilization in the worst cases. A modern nation won’t work very well if most of its technology is destroyed or inoperable due to lack of power, water and other services we take for granted. Given a near-total breakdown of industry, transport and governance, it’s not hard to extrapolate that the majority of the population would likely be dead of starvation, disease and other ills. Certainly a remnant would survive, but most of them in rather dire condition.3. Obviously the more bombs detonated, the worse for everyone. There’s no way to predict of course, but I suspect that a “limited” nuclear exchange is squarely in the realm of fantasy.I’m no credentialed defense consultant of course, so my knowledge is hardly detailed. But if the balloon goes up, my first choice would be to be part of an expanding ball of ionized plasma. Unfortunately my current location likely precludes that, and thus I would be in (2) for perhaps a few days or weeks. I’m a creature of a civilized world. If it must pass, then I would just as soon go with it.
cg2 #334742 December 23, 2022 10:42 am 0
I suggest drinking heavily.
Alzaebo #334634 December 22, 2022 5:46 pm 0
I’d reply, but I’m sheltering in place under my desk.
Sammy #334576 December 22, 2022 12:42 pm 0
Not everyone who lives in NYC is woke and not everyone is here by choice — many are too poor to move.
Jack Dobson #334585 December 22, 2022 1:01 pm 0
I realize this, but if people can move out they should, particularly if they have children.
Ostei Kozelskii #334625 December 22, 2022 4:15 pm 0
Just as many of us in AINO don’t have the scratch to move to Switzerland.
Steve #334691 December 23, 2022 6:20 am 0
The rush to consolidate transgender “rights” in so many countries shows how crazy our world has become. It’s like they are trying to outdo each other and see who can be the most insane. This either ends in revolution or a mass grave. Or maybe both.
Diversity Heretic #334519 December 22, 2022 10:55 am 0
This post has been one of the Zman’s best. My only difference with it is that I do not see Victoria Nuland as stupid or even just ignorant; she is distilled evil. The Russians have charaterized the West as Satanic and if ever a demon has taken human form, it is Victoria Nuland. Perhaps someone can rewrite Rudyard Kipling’s 1917 poem, “The Beginnings,” using the phrase, “When the civic nationalist began to hate;”
The real Bill #334534 December 22, 2022 11:24 am 0
It does have a certain ring to it:The Wrath of the Awakened Civnatby Diversity Heretic[adapted from:The Wrath of the Awakened Saxonby Rudyard Kipling]It was not part of their blood,It came to them very late,With long arrears to make good,When the Civnat began to hate.They were not easily moved,They were icy — willing to waitTill every count should be proved,Ere the Civnat began to hate.Their voices were even and low.Their eyes were level and straight.There was neither sign nor showWhen the Civnat began to hate.It was not preached to the crowd.It was not taught by the state.No man spoke it aloudWhen the Civnat began to hate.It was not suddenly bred.It will not swiftly abate.Through the chilled years ahead,When Time shall count from the dateThat the Civnat began to hate
Woodpecker #334609 December 22, 2022 2:58 pm 0
They were not easily moved,They were podgy — willing to waitTill every beer was pursued,Ere the Civnat began to hate.
Bilejones #334651 December 22, 2022 6:41 pm 0
I think Madeline Albright gives Noodelman a run for her money in the evil stakes.
RealityRules #334823 December 24, 2022 12:47 am 0
Barbara Spectre has to be in the sweepstakes.
Steve #334692 December 23, 2022 6:22 am 0
She is certainly evil, as are most of the players in this. However, like all neocons, she has zero awareness of where her actions will lead. Look at all the neocon iniatives since WW2. They all failed and they all had totally predictable negative consequences that were only “unforseen” by the instigators.
Diversity Heretic #334706 December 23, 2022 7:01 am 0
Were any of the consequences negative insofar as the personal situations of the neocons were concerned? Any lost jobs or other degrading circumstances? I suspect not.
Steve #334820 December 23, 2022 9:33 pm 0
No consequences whatsoever. That’s why they can so easily move on to the next “project” when the current one fails. They are cloud people with no skin in the game.
Paintersforms #334516 December 22, 2022 10:38 am 0
I wonder how many Americans know who J.Q. is, or his dad for that matter, how many know Hamilton wasn’t black.
The real Bill #334523 December 22, 2022 10:58 am 0
Wakanda, baby!“We wuz KINGS!” I suspect there’s also a cohort of Americans for whom “Black Hamilton” was a wake-up call: ‘They really are intending to rewrite history, with Whites as the bad guys!’
KGB #334570 December 22, 2022 12:28 pm 0
A couple years ago, Z-Man calledHamiltona minstrel show for white progressives. I’m still waiting to use that line on someone to see if blood gushes from their eyes.
george1 #334563 December 22, 2022 12:08 pm 0
Hell, most today probably can’t tell you who George Washington was.
The real Bill #334572 December 22, 2022 12:29 pm 0
And the ones that can, would probably tell you that he was a sexist, racist, homophobic, trans phobic, xenophobic bigot of the worst sort.
Hoagie #334607 December 22, 2022 2:42 pm 0
The last White man with that last name?
RealityRules #334824 December 24, 2022 12:52 am 0
The docents I encountered at SC heritage sights are positioning him as a philanderer. You will see. It is coming. When that happens we need to get our hands on the MLK orgies.
Jack Dobson #334586 December 22, 2022 1:02 pm 0
Probably less than could point out where the Ukraine–nay, the United States–is on a map.
ProZNoV #334511 December 22, 2022 10:24 am 0
This orgy is a huge disappointment, is going to leave an incredible mess no one wants to clean up, longstanding relationships will be permanently damaged, and everyone will be finger pointing for decades about what a stupid idea it was in the first place.$100 billion “to Ukraine” works about to about $200 million for every single Congressinal district. Funny money or not, a functioning electrical grid, a working border, and decent highways seem like a better play.What started as “only small arms” and “humanitarian aid” has escalated to long range HIMARS, US soldier operated Patriot batteries, full ELINT and satellite coverage by the US military, and a war that is obviously being run from the Pentagon.(All I want for Christmas this year is NO GLOBALTHERMONUCLEAR WAR)
Spingerah #334577 December 22, 2022 12:44 pm 0
Would you settle for a limited nuclear holocaust? DC only for instance?
Tempazpan #334580 December 22, 2022 12:49 pm 0
Panetti, Petraeus et al (the deniable voices “outside of government”) seem to be priming us for some kind of nuclear strike. My thinking is that it will be a NATO strike on Russia.
miforest #334583 December 22, 2022 12:58 pm 0
“decades” ? like we have that kind of time .who are you kidding . we actually do have even bigger problems .https://rumble.com/v1ssoto-interview-90-canadian-sudden-or-unexpected-doctor-deaths-dr.-william-makis-.htmlin countries with high compliance , huge problems loom on the horizon . not only sudden deaths, but live births have fallen off a table . here in the midwest and huge grain storage facility burned down from unknown causes. the latest of many.https://www.mlive.com/news/saginaw-bay-city/2022/12/fire-still-burning-at-saginaw-county-grain-elevator-hours-after-sparking.htmlenergy crisis looming in europe destroying their countries and agriculture . here at home , millions of poultry destroyed over a phantom bird flu and cropland being retired for green projectshttps://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/jul/07/iowa-pipelines-farmers-indigenous-people-fightit’s almost like someone is planning on creating some very bad conditions .
Steve #334693 December 23, 2022 6:23 am 0
Just a quick note here to squelch some of the sexism and patriarchial oppression: shouldn’t it be HERMARS?
Jeffrey Zoar #334510 December 22, 2022 10:21 am 0
“If the economic chickens come home to roost in 2023 as the economic experts tell us”I have spent a lot of time thinking about stock market crashes. Recessions. Studying historical ones.If the crash and recession that is widely predicted for 2023 comes to pass, it will be the best forecasted crash and recession that there has ever been. Normally it doesn’t work that way. In fact, never has it worked that way. Factor in that you can rely on the msm to be wrong. Thus I deduce that 2023 will either be better than expected, or far, far worse than expected, so bad as to be unthinkable. Chickens will come home to roost, because that’s what chickens do, but my crystal ball says not just yet, not in 2023. Things will appear to improve and everyone will breathe a sigh of relief, saying “Thank God we made it through that,” and bullishness will once again take hold, before The Big One hits. That forecast is worth what you paid for it.I also take note of how the nation held together through the Great Depression. We call that GD 1.0, but back then it was considered GD 2.0, the people of that time considering GD 1.0 to be the period precipitated by the Panic of 1873. (Notice how these things happen every half century or so?) Anyhow, the point is, the nation held together. Would this much more populous, much more diverse nation of today be able to do so?Unfortunately I think probably so. The plandemic showed me there isn’t much revolutionary fervor out there. Of course everybody was getting free money then, and that money still had value. Presumably at least one of those two things would no longer be true.
Paintersforms #334518 December 22, 2022 10:53 am 0
“If the crash and recession that is widely predicted for 2023 comes to pass, it will be the best forecasted crash and recession that there has ever been.” Excellent point. Otoh this one started 15 years ago and has been held at bay with money magic, so the only thing surprising about it might be the timing. Or maybe that’s the typical scenario, idk. Kinda dumb about these things lol.
Citizen of a Silly Country #334524 December 22, 2022 11:00 am 0
The global economy never really recovered from the GFC. We’ve been in what someone called the “Silent Depression” ever since. Basically every metric shows that something broke in 2008-09 and never fully healed.
Mr. House #334535 December 22, 2022 11:26 am 0
Indeed and the break up of all their “fixes” began in the winter of 2018. Remember that December, Powell raises one last time and stocks took quite a tumble. Steve Mnuchin is calling up the banks on the red phone. That spring powell begins to cut rates and says he will end QT or reducing the feds balance sheet in the fall. The end of summer/fall of 2019 the repo market, where all the problems of 2008 began, begins again. October of 2019 all the leading actors of covid hold a “simulation” of a flu that then rears its head in early January. And still you can’t convince some people that this is all about power. Because they can’t be bothered to pay attention, and then call you a conspiracy theorist, sigh. And the best part is you’ve been warning them about something like this since 2008 happened, and they just roll their eyes.
Mr. House #334541 December 22, 2022 11:37 am 0
The people who rule us have led us to a dead end, but they don’t want you to see that dead end, because then you might throw the money changers out of the temple. Most of their wealth is in the stock market, they don’t have cash in the banks, but they can get cash from the banks by using their “paper wealth” as collateral. They have the most to gain from keeping the stock market elevated by printing cash using .gov credit (your credit that you don’t get to borrow from). And that is what they’re doing. Give up your worldly possession and wealth, you’re going to lose it anyway, and spend the last few years of your life fighting for truth (the US is bankrupt) and justice (rebuilding and keeping those with any tops positions in the old system away from the new system).
Ben the Layabout #334554 December 22, 2022 11:55 am 0
That scenario sounds much like what investor turned Covid analyst (?) Ed Dowd preaches — that the spending frenzy come the Covid-19 “pandemic” has been a desperate attempt to prop up an unhinged financial system. I’m not familiar with him, but one of his essays appears in, of all places, Robert Malone’s brand new “Lies My Government Told Me.”
LineInTheSand #334606 December 22, 2022 2:29 pm 0
“Basically every metric shows that something broke in 2008-09 and never fully healed.” And quantitative easing was our oxycotin.
Tars Tarkas #334627 December 22, 2022 4:24 pm 0
Is it just 15 years though? I would say it more likely started in 1971 when Nixon ended the gold exchange.The Moon program, the great society, Vietnam and the background cost of the military/MIC basically bankrupted us and Nixon defaulted.The last year the debt did not increase year over year was like 1962. We had the runaway inflation of the 70s and then high interest rates brought it down, so maybe you could say it started in 1981. We’ve been blowing bubbles nonstop since 98 or so. We’ve had at least 24 years of bubblenomics. We’ve been printing money to keep us going a long time.However, “the sky is falling” narratives predicting collapse and or hyperinflation have failed for 40 years. I get a kick out of a video on youtube of Doug Casey in 1981 on Donahue or something like that predicting imminent hyperinflation. He’s still calling for it along with a bunch of other contrarian commentators. Who knows how long they can keep this going.I heard on Wed before Thanksgiving when nobody was looking, Congress or the fed, I forget which, officially created the “digital Dollar.” So that could be a sign they think something major is coming. God help us all.
Mr. House #334630 December 22, 2022 4:45 pm 0
Covid was the sign that something major is on us and it wasn’t covid. If you print more money in a month they you did from all of 2008 thru 2019, what is your first idea of what will happen? Hyperinflation? Not if everybody is locked down……………………
Citizen of a Silly Country #334522 December 22, 2022 10:57 am 0
Yeah, this is, by far, the most anticipated (non-war time) recession in the history of the world. Like a hurricane forming in the ocean, it’s being tracked minute by minute.I also agree that Mr. Market always manages to surprise everyone, so we’re either going to have a surprisingly mild recession or a surprisingly harsh recession. Or something else entirely.Regardless, I also agree that unless this turns out to be far, far worse than expected, this downturn won’t be the event that crashes the system. The debt just isn’t there yet.However, we are seeing cracks in the system. Japan is barely hanging on. Europe is scrambling. But the US remains solid. Yeah, our debt to gdp is high, but the world financial system still views treasuries as pristine collateral. We’ll be able to buy our way out of this downturn, but, again, the fact that the periphery is showing signs of trouble says that it’s coming – just not now.The global banking system nearly collapsed in ’08-09 when banks decided that mortgage-back securities weren’t worth what they thought they were. With their collateral degraded, banks shut down lending. The fed jumped in and used treasuries to fill that gap, and treasuries have been what banks have used ever since for collateral.The system crashes when banks decide that treasuries aren’t worth what they thought that they were worth because there’s nothing left after treasuries. There’s no authority beyond the fed. It’s the end of the line.
The real Bill #334525 December 22, 2022 11:01 am 0
Or are they predicting a recession, which they can then claim to have “saved us from”, when it doesn’t occur? I’m like Paintersform: economics has always puzzled me; I don’t pretend to understand it. Just like I don’t understand how they can keep on printing money…..
Citizen of a Silly Country #334557 December 22, 2022 11:59 am 0
Remember, we’re global reserve currency and treasuries are the collateral for the global banking system. We’re not just printing debt for us, but for the whole world. The global banking system needs those treasuries to function. They’re buying them hand over fist right now. At some point the debt will matter, but not now.
The real Bill #334573 December 22, 2022 12:32 pm 0
Economist, Michael Hudson has an interesting take on it all: https://www.unz.com/mhudson/german-interview/
PrimiPilus #334530 December 22, 2022 11:12 am 0
Thus the need for digital currency?
PrimiPilus #334531 December 22, 2022 11:14 am 0
…. Or I should say: “their need for a digital currency?”
Alzaebo #334639 December 22, 2022 6:09 pm 0
Primi just nailed it. Citizen’s digital treasuries will be repriced in the bond markets. Perhaps in the smart cities scenario, the domina (ruling) class will have a currency based on SDRs, the real assets they’ll own; the proles will have digital chits, used only in one’s proscribed locale. Kind of like the renminbi and yuan (international versus domestic money in China.) China, the next horse to be ridden by the money-lenders, could use the unpoisoned farmland of the US. Since the whites will spit in the food, they’re importing their brown pickers now.
Ben the Layabout #334558 December 22, 2022 12:01 pm 0
A digital currency would only provide the “advantage” of allowing Them even stronger control. Not the least of which would be 100% transaction tracking and no doubt ability to create, limit, or destroy “wealth” at a whim. However, the fundamental problems of any fractional reserve and/or fiat money system remain: it’s all ultimately make-believe, a money unit not tied to any real-world standard of value.
Steve #334694 December 23, 2022 6:27 am 0
Exactly. CBDCs are all about control. And the sheep will love ’em: so convenient! Keep using cash, folks!
Mr. House #334537 December 22, 2022 11:28 am 0
“but the world financial system still views treasuries as pristine collateral” Does it? If so then why have we been doing QE for 14 years? If the world saw our debt as pristine then we wouldn’t have to print dollars to buy it with.
Citizen of a Silly Country #334555 December 22, 2022 11:56 am 0
Yes, it does. Or, at least, the banking system does. Foreign central banks may have other ideas. Look at the data, foreign private entities – banks for the most part – can’t get enough t-bills. https://twitter.com/JeffSnider_AIP/status/1605681508446085126/photo/1 The dollar/T-bill system continues to rule the global banking system. Until the banks have doubts about T-bills, the US can’t keep the plates spinning. And, really, what else is there to use as collateral. The banks know that the system – their system, their jobs, their businesses – needs the treasuries to exist. They’re not going to throw it away easily.
Paintersforms #334582 December 22, 2022 12:54 pm 0
“But the US remains solid. Yeah, our debt to gdp is high, but the world financial system still views treasuries as pristine collateral.” Again, dumb on these things, but doesn’t that mean we end up getting screwed the hardest? Or do we go on being the world’s banker by having the best… debt? Wtf how did debt ever become wealth?
Paintersforms #334589 December 22, 2022 1:07 pm 0
Maybe a stupid question. Probably when economics stopped being about creating value and became about extracting it. Look at it that way, and everything makes perfect sense, everything is working exactly as intended.
Alzaebo #334642 December 22, 2022 6:23 pm 0
“stopped being about creating value and became about extracting it.” Solid gold, right there. They usurped the king’s prerogative of minting coin; the profit no longer goes back into the nation. Taxing the citizens, income tax, to pay the king’s war loans does the same- the value is extracted from the nation, rather than hoarded in the king’s vaults.
Citizen of a Silly Country #334605 December 22, 2022 2:13 pm 0
Debt can be wealth. If I loan you money that you use productively so that you can pay me back with interest, I have an asset, an asset that makes me wealthier.The banking system – the Eurodollar system – is based on collateral. Banks, hedge funds, etc., lend or get lent money (usually dollars) by putting up collateral. T-bills are the most liquid and accepted collateral out there.T-bills are the foundation of the global banking system. Other collateral is less liquid, less accepted or less safe. German bunds are super safe and accepted but there’s not enough of them.As such, there’s a massive appetite for T-bills. (Longer-term treasuries are a different matter.)But, you say, look at our debt to gdp. It’s crazy. And it is, but just like an individual, you can’t always look at debt to income but also what other assets does a person own. The US has a massive economy, massive resources and a massive military. We have a lot of assets.But, yes, our debt is an issue. (We can’t handle interest rates above inflation for very long. Can’t happen.) But what’s the alternative collateral for the global banking system? What’s better than T-bills?Nothing. And nothing will be better for the foreseeable future. And don’t give me gold. Banks want to transfer assets at the push of a button.However, yes, at some point, our debt will matter. At some point, even banks won’t want t-bills because inflation eats away at them so much. That’s when things get very weird and possibly very ugly. Without t-bills, how does the banking system function? Everything else is even worse than t-bills as collateral.Imagine a banking system where no one trust the collateral of the other side. That was 2008-2009 with mortgage-back securities. The system nearly stopped working, which would have been a depression. Treasuries filled that gap. But there’s nothing to fill the gap if t-bills are no longer considered safe.That’s game over.
Mr. House #334610 December 22, 2022 2:59 pm 0
Its still been a depression, except that those that print the money get to pick the winners and the losers. Bet you can guess who they pick! And i submit gold and other precious metals as a replacement for TBILLS. Can’t be printed to help you in your picking of winners and losers.
Mr. House #334612 December 22, 2022 3:02 pm 0
Has Tech really created a single F’ing thing the last decade that would explain how over valued it is? Or is that just part of the illusion they try to sell you while you pump 0% money into tech and claim its changing the world? Twitter is the easiest example of this but look at amazon which i’m sure many of you buy crap off of. They operate with almost zero profits, and didn’t pay state sales tax for years. Just a coincidence i’m sure. OH BOY MY TOASTER CAN NOW CONNECT TO THE INTERNET AND SPY ON ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Paintersforms #334621 December 22, 2022 3:57 pm 0
Maybe I’m out there, but I think debt is sin, i.e., there’s a spiritual element to it. Of course the world is going insane, because we’re balls-deep in it. Of course these things usually end in war, because after a point the blood of innocents and destruction of assets is all that can pay the debt.We don’t do big wars these days, and we’re loathe to give up our stuff, so we have small forever wars and clown world instead. Stretch it out, make it hurt more in the end for the extra time. Don’t blow Johnny up, chop his johnson off and make his life hell, etc.That’s what’s really going on, I think, and that’s probably why the thing hasn’t gone belly up yet. Quite an innovation, doing Satan proud, no doubt. Makes me want to vomit.
cg2 #334753 December 23, 2022 11:32 am 0
“The US has a massive economy, massive resources and a massive military. We have a lot of assets.”Everybody forgets this.
Tars Tarkas #334526 December 22, 2022 11:02 am 0
There is absolutely nothing in our history that can really compare to the situation we are facing. That is basically both the good and the bad.We have a lot of economic problems, but little economic strength. We have the impending SS problem (all of SS’s assets are the federal government’s liabilities) and medicare problem while carrying over 100% of GDP in debt. Many US states will become insolvent with a large stock drop. We have worked very hard to force other countries to want to end the Dollar reserve system, which is really our one major economic strength.If the system were to break, it will make the great depression seem like a boom-time. It will be worse than Russia in the 90s. We already have statistics compatible to Russia in the 90s. We have an epidemic of suicide and drug abuse and ODs. Drug ODs are the number one cause of death in people under 50. This would likely get much, much worse. Russian men hit the bottle our men will hit the needle or pipe. Our younger men will be selling it and in gangs.
Jeffrey Zoar #334527 December 22, 2022 11:11 am 0
Medicare isn’t the problem everyone thinks it is. One night, in a late session, with little or no public discussion prior, congress will raise the eligibility age. And again, as needed.
Mr. House #334543 December 22, 2022 11:41 am 0
Sure it is, do you know how much fraud is going on in healthcare? Guess how much it takes to remove a tick head that you didn’t remove yourself because it was on your chest and woulda been hard to get at with a knife. Took them all of five mins to do after making you wait for an hour, guess how much it costs? You might start to think they just make these prices up as they go along.
3g4me #334674 December 22, 2022 8:27 pm 0
Jeffrey Zoar: I wish to f**k they would. I’m going to be forced to sign up for the damned thing before next Christmas. I don’t want it – I don’t trust the doctors or the fedgov and I don’t want anyone else to control (via payment) what healthcare I do or do not get. Oh, I’m all for getting whatever benefit/assets I can out of AINO’s maggoty corpse before Jose or Jaquan or Rajeesh get theirs, but I don’t regard Medicare as an asset.
Steve #334695 December 23, 2022 6:30 am 0
Looking at other “conservative” websites, the main topic of conversation is who will get the GOP ticket in 2024. There is zero realisation that it really doesn’t matter who the candidate is because it no longer matters. DC is beyond salvation and so, almost certainly, is the entity known as the USA. Any truly conservative State governor should be strengthening their state and making it as autonomous as possible, because the break-up is coming. And a good thing too!
Mike #334553 December 22, 2022 11:54 am 0
The Great Depression was actually two depressions, one in 1929 and the other in about 33-34 I think. In many ways the second Roosevelt depression was much worse than the 29 one. There was likely no coming out of that one unless there was a war. That’s why I’m pretty sure Roosevelt saw to it that we got into one. WW II pulled the country out of the depressions, without it Roosevelt had screwed up the country so badly who knows what would have happened.
Woodpecker #334622 December 22, 2022 4:02 pm 0
>> Factor in that you can rely on the msm to be wrong. Hard to see how there *cannot* be a recession with rates going up as they are. I guess one possibility is the Austrian concept of the ‘crack-up boom’ – people finally get the message that inflation’s here to stay and get busy spending whatever cash they have. That would put things off for a few months.
Severian #334505 December 22, 2022 10:09 am 0
My favorite Vietnam anecdote was when one of Kennedy’s boys — Ted Sorensen? — unironically called his buddies “The Ministry of Talent.” They really believed that, y’all… they really did. They went to Hah-vud, so they’re so much better than you. (Second favorite anecdote: JFK, whose claim to fame as a combatant was getting his stupid ass sunk by the Japanese, declaring that “Just because a man is a general doesn’t mean his opinion on military matters is worth a damn”).Just flabbergasting hubris. Even after a few decades marinating in Clown World, the sheer arrogance of the “Ministry of Talent” still takes my breath away. And the truly horrifying thing is, they really *were* mega-ultra-geniuses compared to the Juggalos infesting DC these days.
The real Bill #334509 December 22, 2022 10:16 am 0
That’s one thing that hasn’t changed: they really do think they’re better than us. Part of their Ivy League education, I imagine.
LineInTheSand #334520 December 22, 2022 10:56 am 0
I’m willing to grant for the sake of argument that a lot of those guys have a higher IQ than me. But if your basic premises about human nature and how the world works are inaccurate then all that IQ power is probably going to make you even more wrong. The most obvious example of not seeing human nature accurately is racial egalitarianism. Lots of people smarter than me at least appear to believe in that and all that IQ still makes them spectacularly incorrect. The ability to see the world accurately probably defies quantification.
The real Bill #334529 December 22, 2022 11:12 am 0
That’s it: IQ does matter; but having a firm grasp on reality matters even more.You could be the smartest person on the block; but if what you believe about the world is fundamentally incorrect, your smartness isn’t going to help you any.In fact, it may get you into trouble, when you imagine that “A guy as smart as me has got to be right.”While in fact, your dumber neighbor down the street— whose understanding of reality is more accurate— will do better at navigating the world around him.Anyone accepting the reality of radical egalitarianism is bound to be confronted with outcomes he doesn’t expect. And the more he sticks to his beliefs, the more confused he’ll become. He can only blame it on “systemic racism” and “White privilege” for so long….On the other hand, we humans have proven ourselves to be very adept at fooling ourselves: at “seeing” what we want to see, or expect to see, despite the fact that what we’re “seeing” isn’t really there.And on the lower-IQ side of things: apparently there were blacks who thought Wakanda was a real place….
george1 #334546 December 22, 2022 11:44 am 0
Some smart guy called it Mal-Education.
Ben the Layabout #334564 December 22, 2022 12:13 pm 0
On a standardized test long ago, one of the questions was “Ten birds are sitting on a fence. You shoot one. How many are left?” The correct answer was assumed to be nine, of course. Yet many people answered “none.” This mystified the creators of the test, until they found a cultural component. “Country” people were more likely to have hunted, and common sense would say that firing a shot would scare away the remaining birds. Perhaps those hicks in flyover land aren’t quite as dense as the Ivory Tower would like to believe 🙂
Spingerah #334590 December 22, 2022 1:15 pm 0
North central washington state there is an actual Wauconda, only thing there anymore is a post office. Extremely rural. Was in the P.o. in comes a black guy, dread locks gold chsins.He asked the clerk how he could get a mail box. At his place, She told him she didn’t know.He asked me,I told him he had to have a tested safe water source, preferably a drilled well.Untill then he could get a P.o. boxOn leaving outside was a uhaul rental pickup with two other blacks and a 250 gallon water tote in the bed.I asked the driver if they were planning on mineing vibrainium.Their eyes got big. Tough country up there with no water.
Steve #334696 December 23, 2022 6:32 am 0
It’s amazing how many people I know with super high IQs are triple jabbed and totally onboard with the Covid garbage. Meanwhile, all the “dumb, stupid, ignorant bozos” I know, see it for what it is and wouldn’t take the needle if you paid them. An intelligent person is just a stupid person with a higher IQ.
Tars Tarkas #334628 December 22, 2022 4:31 pm 0
Most of them deny IQ. It really is remarkable how they believe both they are better than everyone and we’re all equal. IQ is no match for fanaticism. They just use more convoluted and sophisticated arguments to convince themselves.
Poirot #334629 December 22, 2022 4:42 pm 0
As Steve Sailer once put it: “The typical white intellectual considers himself superior to ordinary white people for two contradictory reasons: a] he constantly proclaims belief in human equality, but they don’t; b] he has a high IQ, but they don’t.”
Outdoorspro #334512 December 22, 2022 10:25 am 0
“Second favorite anecdote: JFK, whose claim to fame as a combatant was getting his stupid ass sunk by the Japanese, declaring that “Just because a man is a general doesn’t mean his opinion on military matters is worth a damn””Not so sure about that one now. Considering the current crop of Flag Officers (yeah, I’m looking at you Milley). I dunno what politics does to these guys. I served under Admiral James Stavridis way back when, when he was driving ships. One of the smartest guys I ever met and a brilliant ship Captain. He eventually became Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and was in the running for SECDEF. Now he’s all over MSNBC, selling Ukraine and Climate Change.
Mike #334620 December 22, 2022 3:48 pm 0
When Kennedy said that it was partly true but now it’s absolutely true. There isn’t a flag officer who isn’t a disgrace to the uniform now.
Jeffrey Zoar #334514 December 22, 2022 10:28 am 0
Even later in life when he was making his apology tour, McNamara still thought himself superior. For his superior contrition. An honorable man would have committed sepukku.
Citizen of a Silly Country #334504 December 22, 2022 10:08 am 0
Zelensky’s outfit punctuates the Hollywood nature of this whole affair. Like every cartoon or Super Hero movie character, he wears the same outfit in every scene. Our rulers have melded fantasy with reality for their own pleasure and profit. Tragically, the magic pixie dust that makes this possible is money from working Americans and the lives of young Ukrainians and Russians. Our rulers are both insane and evil.
dr_mantis_toboggan_md #334500 December 22, 2022 9:50 am 0
The problem with our “leaders” and this Zelensky character is none of them are recallable at the ballot box. There is no redress of the many grievances that we have against ours and likely the Ukrainian people have with their “leaders.” When both the GOP and Democrats lock arms and say giving billions to the Ukies while many in this country starve is our most important priority, the CivNats are getting a lesson in the one-party state that voting harder and believing in muh constitution won’t do anything to arrest. This grandstanding, loathsome as it is, is good in that respect. This will swell our ranks and chip away at the regime’s legitimacy.In Vietnam, we dropped more bombs on the North than we did in the entirety of World War II, so much so that we were running out of bombs. That forced us to use 20-plus year old bombs that led to some disastrous fires aboard aircraft carriers.We’ve spent more money on the Ukies and their war than we did in AFG from 1946 until our pullout in the opening days of the Biden “administration.” It’s obscene that much of this money is getting redirected into the pockets of those who vote for it.Sending Patriots to the Ukies is madness, mainly because they’re likely to fall into Russian hands and because we don’t have enough PAC interceptor missiles to go around.
Mike #334559 December 22, 2022 12:02 pm 0
Probably at this point there’s little benefit to the Russians if they get some Patriots. There anti-air missiles are likely better than the Patriot. Patriots have performed poorly in Saudi Arabia against some pretty crap stuff thrown at them by Iranian/Houthi rebels. I’m wondering if there’s a benefit to testing our stuff in the Ukraine. It may kill our arms sales to foreign markets if serious buyers (unbribed) pay attention to how they’re performing.
Ben the Layabout #334567 December 22, 2022 12:18 pm 0
It also gives the Russians excellent ability to collect intelligence how NATO weaponry works in the field.
dr_mantis_toboggan_md #334602 December 22, 2022 2:02 pm 0
Getting valuable ELINT data from the Patriot batteries will give the Russians the ability to counter them, either through jamming or lethal SEAD (suppression of enemy air defenses via missiles or smart munitions). The Patriot system is not a highly mobile system, so it’ll mainly be used to protect population centers, large bases and industrial areas.The reason why we kicked the Turks out of the F-35 program was that the S-400 batteries sold to them by the Russians could’ve given them lots of data on the radar signatures of the Lightning, which would’ve made for a big intelligence coup. The risk wasn’t that the S-400 would tattle-tale this information back to the Russians, but there are ALWAYS tech reps (I do this for some aircraft) and others who’d be privy to this information. And stuff is often sent back to the country of origin for periodic deep maintenance and upgrades.
The real Bill #334494 December 22, 2022 9:41 am 0
Bravo!The comment thread here is always good, but today it’s especially excellent.The gap between the American people and those ruling them has long been there: more than half a century ago, the evil Lyndon Johnson was assuring the American people that “victory in Vietnam” was “right around the corner”; while admitting in private that we had no chance of winning. “But I’ll be goddamned if I’m gonna go down in history as the president who lost Vietnam.”I wonder what the peoples’ reaction would’ve been back then in 1965, had they known what a duplicitous, venal liar their president was: a man who was willing to continue sending tens of thousands of young American men into a senseless war, in order to save his political reputation.So maybe the gap has been there for a long, long time; and it’s just that more people are becoming aware of it.
Mr. Generic #334539 December 22, 2022 11:34 am 0
> had they known what a duplicitous, venal liar their president was: a man who was willing to continue sending tens of thousands of young American men into a senseless war, in order to save his political reputation. > So maybe the gap has been there for a long, long time; and it’s just that more people are becoming aware of it. Hi, Bill. Allow me to introduce you to another former president: His name was Abe…
The real Bill #334575 December 22, 2022 12:40 pm 0
I hear you: I’m not a fan of Abe Lincoln.On the other hand, he was a race realist, and an unashamed White supremacist; as shown by his words in his 18 September 1858 debate with Stephen Douglas:“I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will for ever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be a position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.”
The real Bill #334588 December 22, 2022 1:07 pm 0
And I must admit to a grudging admiration of Johnson’s words, after he passed the Civil Rights Act— as quoted by Ronald Kessler in his book “Inside the White House: ” I’ll have those niggers voting Democratic for the next 200 years.” And so far, he’s been right….
PrimiPilus #334597 December 22, 2022 1:44 pm 0
Reading down into this review, one come’s to the writer’s interesting outlining of what happened very early on to get us into this fix: https://newcriterion.com/issues/2023/1/federal-foes
Maxda #334493 December 22, 2022 9:36 am 0
Listening to Rand Paul rant about the orgy of spending they are about to pass, I realized what they’ve done. All the “emergency funding” passed during COVID is now the baseline. Just like after 911. That’s why Paul was saying that 2019 spending levels would balance the budget, but they are going to print an extra $trillion instead – which means inflation remains high next year.
thezman #334495 December 22, 2022 9:42 am 0
Baseline spending is now the default. They even have new language to make it even more treacherous. A slight decrease in the projected increase is a gutting of the program.
Diversity Heretic #334517 December 22, 2022 10:39 am 0
This was also true of most of the Reagan budget “cuts” in the early 1980. A reduction in a projected increase was (and is) called a cut even though more money is spent every year. In the interest of objectivity, projected increases are often necessary to provide services at the level of the baseline year, given increases in population, especially something like the population covered by Medicare, because the boomers are aging. I wish English had a word for “reductions in increass.”
Alzaebo #334648 December 22, 2022 6:36 pm 0
“given increases in population” Weird. The white heritage population isn’t increasing. Except as aging Boomers on Medicare.
Diversity Heretic #334707 December 23, 2022 7:06 am 0
Medicare was the specific example that I gave. Medicaid, on the other hand, which is a program for low-income people, increases as the low-income population increases, which is definitely occurring at the present time.
The real Bill #334496 December 22, 2022 9:42 am 0
I like Rand Paul. He strikes me as one of the few honest men on Capitol Hill.
Chet Rollins #334497 December 22, 2022 9:43 am 0
There’s really no brakes on the spending, which means everyone in Washington knows the dollar is going to go off a cliff at some point. Once that happens, they’ll try to restart with a CBDC because there will be no other option The Indian they enthroned in Britain will probably start the alpha test for the new system soon.
Enoch Cade #334540 December 22, 2022 11:36 am 0
I like Rand, but I do honestly believe that we’re beyond the point where spending even matters. It will never be dialed back/restrained, ever. I remember falling for that “PorkBusters”/Tea Party shit back in the day (and quite hilariously, I just got a call from the Tea Party Express (!!!) asking for shekels). As we have learned. all those principled Republican types are quire happy to print fiatskis with abandon provided the end-users are customers of the MIC and/or Israel.
Alzaebo #334650 December 22, 2022 6:39 pm 0
Well, duh, how else is Israel going to pay its mercenaries?
george1 #334549 December 22, 2022 11:47 am 0
The elites all know what is coming. They are just stealing everything they can now before the music stops.
Steve #334697 December 23, 2022 6:35 am 0
Don’t worry, Maxda. It still has to go before the House, and I’m sure all those wonderful GOP folks will vote it down…
Peenemunde #334492 December 22, 2022 9:32 am 0
Mencken-level, sir. “As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”
Locust Post #334491 December 22, 2022 9:31 am 0
Z, this is your best essay ever. I hate these disgusting, immoral and profoundly stupid people. I’m happy I have some company.
The real Bill #334498 December 22, 2022 9:44 am 0
I agree: Z’s words are always worth reading, but he knocked it out of the park today. A voice crying in the wilderness.
TomA #334490 December 22, 2022 9:30 am 0
But not Bongino. The Rush Limbaugh heir apparent is still using his megaphone to promote voting harder-harder and his groupies will chase the carrot of a mythical political messiah coming in 2024 until the gas chamber door closes behind them. And that said, Bongino is still one of the most rational shills in ConInc., so there really is no hope of a grassroots persuasion campaign waking up the masses. We have to ride this train off the tracks, over the cliff, and all the way to the bottom of the gorge before meaningful change can occur. It has to get much worse before it can get better.The only strategy available to the sane is to get off the train somewhere remote and relatively safe (minimum 100 miles to the nearest big city), and then hunker down to wait out the collapse. And the sooner it comes, the less painful and destructive it will be. At the very least, keep a tent and bug-out bag in the front closet ready to go. This is not a drill.
The real Bill #334506 December 22, 2022 10:11 am 0
This is what a lot of people don’t seem to realize: it’s not going to get any better. The old America is gone.George Floyd America has taken its place.*What they’re doing to statues of Robert E Lee, they’d like to be doing to you*Joel Skousen’s book ‘Strategic Relocation’ provides an excellent overview of which parts of the country are likely to be livable, once the ________ (economic collapse, race war, cyber-attack, or whatever straw-on-the-camel’s-back finally brings it all down) attains critical mass. You don’t have to agree with everything he says to appreciate the wealth of information he provides.It’s long been the case that “as California goes, so goes America”. How long will it be before the chaos and insanity that characterizes California today— a level of dysfunction that few Americans could’ve imagined a few decades ago— arrives at a theater near you?A bug-out bag is good, but you need somewhere to go. For those who are able, getting out and establishing yourself in a safe area *before the shit hits the fan* is a much better approach.But basically, yes: it all boils down to being far enough from a large city that the vibrant cannibalistic hordes won’t be able to get to you. Ideally, you’ll want to find yourself in the midst of a community of legacy Americans, in a rural area that is to some extent agriculturally self-sufficient.I suspect that most of us struggle to some extent against “normalcy bias”: the feeling that things are going to continue as they are, with no radical change. Who, back in the 1950s and 1960s, could ever have imagined the present reality?And even realizing that, it’s still difficult to imagine how bad things might get.But those who are able to do so— to put themselves ahead of the curve— will one day be glad they did.
p #334560 December 22, 2022 12:02 pm 0
I have a family type compound with limited and gated ingress/egress backed up to a hill in the redoubt with multiple water sources and extra electrical outlets outside, multiple sources for fecal waste disposal, trees for firewood and a clear line of sight for 2 miles. I have told my friends and relatives if they have to get out of Portland Oregon they can bring their RV’s over to me but they have to bring all their food and tools and take a daily turn on the watchtower. I believe one good fright like being burgled violently or shot or raped will at least open their eyes somewhat and make them more accepting of the truth, and if it does come to that, I would rather have been betrayed by someone I know..
Ploppy #334647 December 22, 2022 6:36 pm 0
Can I come? I’ve got board games and a splitting axe that goes through wood like butter.
Steve #334698 December 23, 2022 6:37 am 0
Me too? I can play the Ukelele and sing “I’ve got a lovely bunch of coconuts!”
Ben the Layabout #334571 December 22, 2022 12:28 pm 0
Points well made. We discuss these topics occasionally. Folks, it’s good to prepare for an emergency, but how realistic is your plan? As already said, you should have that relocation place already chosen. Do you actually own it? Or more importantly, are you a known quantity (family, friends, there?) Even if you own a plot of land and camp there in fine weather, it’s not like you can just throw up your dome tent or park your RV and wait out a serious collapse. Physical security? Securing supplies? There are many difficult uncertainties. And realistically, just how distant is your retreat? Come serious trouble, it seems very unlikely that you can just drive leisurely down the Interstate to your Hidden Valley.
The real Bill #334581 December 22, 2022 12:50 pm 0
Yep: imagining that you’ll be able to get there— assuming that gas stations will still be operating and roads will be passable— hoping that no one has found your stash of beans, bullets, and bandages, and depleted it; or found your hideaway and occupied it— may be better than nothing, but not the best alternative.Best of all is to be occupying it *before* the shit hits the fan.And as the original poster p alludes to, there is strength in numbers: a compound of like-minded individuals has a much better chance of survival than the best-stocked hideaway of a single person.
Steve #334699 December 23, 2022 6:39 am 0
No-one can survive on their own, no matter how well prepped. You have to have any alternative community around you of like-minded people. And heavily armed too.
3g4me #334677 December 22, 2022 8:58 pm 0
The real Bill: Friend of mine had a client/customer yesterday who apparently just moved here to the DFW area a week ago from Seattle. She was vociferous in her denunciation of her former home, where her family had roots going back 100 years. Told my friend how much she despises ‘the homeless,’ who are all druggy/antifa types. Apparently the city had grown outward towards her family land (apparently not large acreage but more than just a suburban lot). Said she could no longer drink coffee on her porch because the homeless would fling their shite at her. Per my friend, this woman said she wanted people to know that she didn’t just leave or ‘escape’ from Seattle; she FLED from it.Fascinating and horrifying to hear – and yet she fled here, to the diversity-infested burbs of DFW? Don’t know who this woman is or whether she has family/friends here or was misled by the RahRah Texas propaganda that’s out there. And meanwhile, we’re counting the days until we relocate to our not-in-Texas rural mountain acreage (postponed to late winter for various reasons beyond our control).
Sammy #334587 December 22, 2022 1:04 pm 0
okay, you live in big city — time to ‘bug out’ — grab your tent & bug-out bag — WHERE DO YOU GO? Go into the streets to fight it out with the gangs of roving youfs? Try to find a quiet place in a park? There’s no escape.
Mike #334603 December 22, 2022 2:06 pm 0
Can someone explain how Bongino got to where he is today without being placed there? He has no discernable talent that I have seen in the very few minutes I’ve listened to him. And, I hate to say it, he is one of the ugliest men I’ve ever seen. Of course he isn’t the only person on the stage today who is like like that, coming out of nowhere to fame and riches. There are businesses like that too, Black Rifle Coffee for example that just seem to come into existence and become big without any effort. Of course they have CIA connections and my explanation is money laundering because the CIA has to be raking it in now.
Alzaebo #334653 December 22, 2022 6:47 pm 0
Finally somebody said it.That dude is flat-out ugly. Weird ugly.Mutant, Frog Prince, or They Live–but man, is he look strange.
Mr C #334608 December 22, 2022 2:44 pm 0
Checked twice, you didn’t mention fog. Feeling okay TomA?
TomA #334619 December 22, 2022 3:35 pm 0
Yes, I push the fog meme a lot. The reason is simple. Too many in the DR have a bad habit of painting a target on their back or joining a militia movement infested with undercover agents or confidential informants (hello Ray Epps). But that said, it’s true that you can be of some help by getting entrapped by the Stasi. It keeps them busy and distracted. Ditto for riots and LEOs. Part of the fog consists of these diversionary tactics. I applaud your sacrifice.
imbroglio #334488 December 22, 2022 9:29 am 0
If you recall, Carl Oglesby’s “Containment and Change” pointed out that Vietnam was rich in bauxite and other raw materials needed for aerospace and computer technology. The military served to clear out the Vietnamese who were in the way of extensive mining operations, echoing, in its way, the Sykes/Picot arrangement of what became, post WW I, the oil producing Middle East.Wasn’t Ukraine the breadbasket of Europe/West Asia before the current conflict? If so, an element of U.S. aggression may be, via NATO, to take possession of that breadbasket. Russia may be saying “nothing doing,” having its own designs on Ukrainian wheat and grains, reincorporating Ukraine into its former state as a Russian province.
thezman #334499 December 22, 2022 9:44 am 0
The estimated value of the natural resources in the Donbas is $12 trillion. The Donbas has a massive coal reserve. The rest of Ukraine is very fertile land. So year, the New World Order was supposed to have Slavs producing useful things for the beautiful people in what is now Ukraine.
Citizen of a Silly Country #334502 December 22, 2022 9:52 am 0
I seem to remember another guy with the same plan.
Mike #334568 December 22, 2022 12:26 pm 0
I downvoted you Because I think Putin is more concerned with the people of the Donbas and other primarialy Russian areas of the Ukraine. That said, it doesn’t hurt at all that the region has tremendous potential if taken away from the thieves and exploiters who’ve had it since 1991. The Ukrainians are so similar to sub-Saharans that it’s scary. They inherited a resources rich, educated populace from the USSR and made it into a failed state even before the war started. It’s a sin just how stupid the people are in that place.
Alzaebo #334655 December 22, 2022 6:52 pm 0
Monsanto, Cargile, and ADM already have the contracts written. Add in natgas pipelines, and it’s an inevitable.
mmack #334487 December 22, 2022 9:21 am 0
“For most Americans, Ukraine is a weird place far away that has no bearing on their lives, because it should have no bearing on their lives.”The Lovely 🥰 Mrs. is more than a little upset 😠Jeopardy!was interrupted by this little glad handing schmuck coming hat-in-hand to Congress. My thought was if this little twerp could travel from Kiev (sorry, Keeeeeeev) to Washington D.C. things mustn’t be too dangerous.“Most Americans feel for the common people whose lives are ruined by the war. Most American would prefer it if their government did something to end the conflict.”Yup, but there’s too much graft and corruption in it, so Washington will fight to the last Ukrainian.“In that speech he demanded more money from the average American and gave the strong impression that he thinks the average American is not pulling his weight in terms of sacrificing for a country he cannot locate on a map.”That’s gratitude for ya. 😏“What makes the whole thing revolting to the average person is that everyone knows much of the money is being stolen. Even though the FBI has been working long hours to suppress the facts of the Hunter Biden laptop, the typical American knows the Biden family is as crooked as a ram’s horn. They know all of these people are corrupt, yet they have to watch these people celebrate their alleged moral purity over shoveling more cash into the Ukraine money laundering machine.”Speaking of money laundering, I have to wonder how much of this showmanship is to distract from something else bubbling up:https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/ftx-collapse-two-bankman-fried-associates-turn-against-him/ar-AA15y34S“Zixiao (Gary) Wang, 29, former FTX co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, and Caroline Ellison, 28, the former CEO of Alameda Research, the hedge fund founded by Bankman-Fried, have pleaded guilty to federal charges in the Southern District of New York, according to court documents published on December 21.Both of them agreed to provide the authorities all the information at their disposal to further assist in the investigation.”Hmmmm, you give a Woodsy Owl 🦉 lookin’ gal a couple bil, a beach house, and the high hard one and she still shivs you in the back. THERE’S gratitude for ya. 😒I suspect Mopey Sam is going up against the wall. He f’ed over enough folks in the Regime there’s a bullseye on his forehead. Maybe we’ll have more stoyak like last night to distract us (Hat Tip to Sev at Founding Questions for that useful word).
Jeffrey Zoar #334503 December 22, 2022 9:54 am 0
SBF is a fall guy. The regime is happy to have folks looking at him instead of them.
Steve #334700 December 23, 2022 6:42 am 0
Agreed. All the Q Tards think that SBF will be the straw that breaks the Deep State’s back. It won’t be. He’ll be the scapegoat, just like Ghislaine was for the Epstein affair: the “bad apple in the barrel”. If, of course, he survives long enough.
David Wright #334485 December 22, 2022 9:16 am 0
There is a reason that the little ass shows such effrontery when he keeps demanding more money. He is the front man for this colossal grift and it’s a not so subtle reminder that you keep paying up or sordid details will drop on some of you crooks. You know, I’m doing my job , now do yours. So they fawn, grandstand and applaud on cue while pretending to be on the moral high ground. Normies around me are going nuts now.
Götterdamn-it-all #334481 December 22, 2022 9:07 am 0
Watching all this should give millions of Americans an idea of why the Russians harbor a smoldering hatred for the Anglo-Zionists and what they are doing to Ukraine. I suspect that hatred will burst fully into flame in a few weeks. I sincerely hope a Russian Kinzal missile catches Zelensky squarely in the nose. No quarter for these vermin.
Uwe #334513 December 22, 2022 10:27 am 0
The Biden regime is more Celtic than Anglo. The Russians are more concerned with killing up to 5 million Ukrainians than waging war against Washington. They also believe they have a few scores to settle with Poland,Germany,and the Baltic States. Moldova as well.This is primarily a central/eastern European affair when all is said and done. It’s unwise to see every local issue through the lens of your own hatred.
rasqball #334521 December 22, 2022 10:56 am 0
More Celtic than Anglo?Qu’est-ce-que-c ‘est? Brah…?
Citizen of a Silly Country #334574 December 22, 2022 12:40 pm 0
Yeah, the Biden administration is just filled with people of Irish descent. Nope, no other group makes up almost every slot. Nope, nothing to see here. So, are you a liar or an idiot? Because you’re certainly, at least, one of them. I will say that you’re correct that they should be a regional affair that we have no interest in. But those “Irish” members of Biden’s cabinet who actually rule over the country have a very long history with Eastern Europe and Russia. It’s a very personal affair to them.
george1 #334688 December 22, 2022 10:51 pm 0
Stalin knew how dangerous they were and purged them. They have wanted Russia back ever since.
B125 #334592 December 22, 2022 1:28 pm 0
lol who is going to tell him
Jack Boniface #334479 December 22, 2022 9:05 am 0
The symbolism was perfect when Zelensky handed smiling Pelosi and Kamala a Ukrainian flag, and they held it up so it obscured the American flag behind them.
Enoch Cade #334478 December 22, 2022 9:02 am 0
It’s an interesting existential/psychological experience, living in a polity whose elites either outright loathe you (that would be the democrats) or are hypocritical liars who hold you in contempt while mouthing platitudes to Abraham Lincoln and muh freedoms. I cannot look at the flag or any symbol of the “united” “states” without wanting to spit.It’s accentuated if one’s a Southerner. West Point plans to scrub its campus of all references to graduates who served the Confederacy. I’m actually pleased by this — I don’t want my brave ancestors sullied by any association with the incompetent rabble of mercenaries that is the “world’s finest military.” Tossing the idea of “reconciliation” is fine too. One hopes that Southerners will wake up to the nature of the regime that rules them, and that what it is doing represents no deviation from the “principles” of Abe Lincoln and the Republican party.The collapse of this evil, smug, degenerate, Satanic polity cannot come soon enough. I’m hoping that 2023 will be a year of absolute misery for the sheep.
Götterdamn-it-all #334483 December 22, 2022 9:11 am 0
Amen, brother. Amen.
The real Bill #334515 December 22, 2022 10:35 am 0
What better emblem of moral degeneracy could you possibly have; than a society that tears down statues of Robert E Lee, and replaces them with statues of George Floyd? And it’s not at all unlikely that these are the people that will be ruling us in the near future.
george1 #334556 December 22, 2022 11:59 am 0
Agreed. Take down all of the statues and monuments. The great men of our past would not want their images to be displayed to the current population of moral degenerates imbeciles and foreigners that are everywhere today.
karl von hungus #334600 December 22, 2022 1:58 pm 0
“2023 will be a year of absolute misery for the sheep” it’s only what they deserve.
joeyjünger #334476 December 22, 2022 8:58 am 0
During the Iraq-Iran War, Saddam called on all Iraqis to turn in their precious metals to help fund the War. Next thing you know, everything Saddam owns, from AKs to his car, is plated in gold. Is that more egregious than what we have going on here? Sam Bankman Fried—the incompetent, disheveled Ponzi king—set up a massive aid operation for Ukraine that looks designed solely to funnel tens of millions to the Democratic Party. The President’s son isn’t killing people with carving knives at palace dinners like Uday Hussein, but if you’ve seen the videos from his laptop, you know he’s come pretty close.And still there’s not much to add at this point. People (not led by dissidents, but mostly apolitical people) are either going to snap at some point or they won’t. It might take a carton of eggs being twenty dollars and having no heat, or something could break the next time America’s mothers have to watch Joe Biden lean in and sniff some ten-year old girl’s head or compliment her on how she crosses her legs.Right now it’s just the waiting game. But that’s fine, as this is Christmastime, and—contra the massive psyop run against us as white men, especially the relatively young white men among us—we’re still breathing. Keep your powder dry, your despair to a minimum, and don’t touch the Sackler sugar, and maybe we’ll come through the other side alive, and free.
Gunner Q #334528 December 22, 2022 11:12 am 0
“People (not led by dissidents, but mostly apolitical people) are either going to snap at some point or they won’t.”If the Trump phenomenon is a reliable indication, they’ll sit and take it until an alternative… fully developed… is offered to them. At which time, they’ll choose between two masters.Normie America is spiritually dead. I don’t just mean the religious context. They wake up in the morning, look at “what is” in complete ignorance of yesterday or tomorrow, and make the most of the moment. They have no future, treasure no past, enjoy no culture, maintain no continuity. They have bodily urges and little else. They do not, or cannot, imagine a better future other than “just like now except it works”. That’s all that Trump ever offered; a status quo that ‘works’; and it was enough to build an empire-sized cult following.And maybe that’s part of the Great Reset… reducing the human soul to nothing but animal appetites. ARE we qualitatively different from livestock? If so then how so?
PrimiPilus #334601 December 22, 2022 1:59 pm 0
This !!! It’s the death of the spirit, the willful destruction of our culture … and at its core, our mythology, that has unplugged the regular heritage Americans. One group is clinging to something now fully dead, out of fear, disorientation and longing. Cultural production lies at the center of the epic fight — myth manufacturing and myth maintenance are critical functions we lost when our creative and cognitive classes dyed their hair pink, pierced their genitals, and stampeded left.
Steve #334701 December 23, 2022 6:45 am 0
Spot on. We are in the waiting stage. It seems like the DS is winning, finalising their final big push, and that the sheep are terminally aslumber. Not so. This is the calm before the storm. I expect 2023 to be rather interesting.
Marko #334473 December 22, 2022 8:52 am 0
Thank you Z-Man for having to watch that sh*tshow for me. I just saw a few pictures and it was enough to give me murderous thoughts towards our “elected” representatives. I am most angry because they are causing me to want a meltdown or revolution. I do not want this for my friends or family. Most people are good people, and have no idea – or worse don’t care – about the goings on in Washington, thinking they’re just bozos and we can safely ignore them, and grill the weekends away. But the regime’s actions will affect normal people, most of whom are still proud to be American. There’s a special place in hell for those that steal from and lie to normal working people.
Chet Rollins #334480 December 22, 2022 9:05 am 0
There was an article that was quickly memory-holed that estimated an incredible amount of graft from the billions going to Ukraine, and this is on top of the insane weapons inflation from our MIC. It would be really interesting if someone could make a 1-1 comparison between money sent and actual weapons delivered, and by that I mean actually in Ukraine on a battlefield.There are maybe ten republicans talking about the obvious money-laundering, while no right wing think tanks or media entities will touch it with a ten foot pole.This coincides with our money becoming more are more worthless in items that matter, like houses, health care, and food, even as economic figures point to low prices of frivolous items like T.V., real let them eat cake vibes.More and more, we’re only a rich country on paper.
Jeffrey Zoar #334501 December 22, 2022 9:51 am 0
In relative terms, the money being spent on Ukraine is a pittance in the overall looting of the treasury going on these days.
The Wild Geese Howard #334508 December 22, 2022 10:15 am 0
Well, if anyone has a real need to upgrade their laptop or monitor for work or business purposes, now is a pretty good time to be looking. I believe prices on these things will drop more in the new year.
Enoch Cade #334482 December 22, 2022 9:08 am 0
My friend, it’s time to embrace meltdown and revolution. The “principled” writers at (eg) American Conservative and American Greatness will prattle on about how such and such a policy tweak will “restore the Republic”; the ridiculous Victor Davis Hanson can publish a contemptible essay outlining 10 Reaganite/civnat steps to fix the polity, but it’s absolutely unfixable. It’s been a criminal enterprise since Lincoln and, like Napoleon’s empire, requires ceaseless war to pay for itself. The best thing one can do, I believe, is get out of the reach of the cities and buy property in rural areas. F–k America.
LineInTheSand #334486 December 22, 2022 9:18 am 0
Mr. Cade references this VDH articlehttps://ussanews.com/2022/12/19/victor-davis-hanson-10-steps-to-save-america/. I couldn’t resist the urge to scan the article because getting angry is one of my few pleasures these days. In fairness to VDH, his 10 steps would help the country, if they were implemented. It’s instructive to reflect upon why they will not be implemented and even if they were, they would be inadequate: Tribalism > Shared Values One of our many disadvantages as whites is that we have difficulty imagining how powerful a force tribalism is on non-whites and the chosen.
Steve #334702 December 23, 2022 6:48 am 0
Yep. Sites like AC, AM and American Thinker (sic) drive me crazy. Their shtick seems to be that if only we can get BLM to read the Constitution and do a few civics classes, everything will return to normal. Oh, and if we win the WH in 2024, we can turn this around! They are pathetic.
David Wright #334471 December 22, 2022 8:43 am 0
At this point one can’t be blamed for being driven to the Putin side of this. I was willing to agree that both leaders were not worthy of support, but no, they have to rub my nose in it.If it wasn’t for the people/victims of Ukraine I would just support total annihilation of it.I couldn’t bear watching that sordid spectacle in Washington yesterday with all the preening, moralizing and open theft going on.The least the little focker could do is buy his first suit before he comes begging and wagging his finger at us. It’s all too much.
The Wild Geese Howard #334472 December 22, 2022 8:50 am 0
There’s a funny picture floating around of Elensky in a three-piece suit casting a very worried sidelong glance at the Donald. He looks like a kid about to get caught for being naughty. Too bad the Don was in on the prep for the current mess, even if it was to a lesser degree.
LineInTheSand #334474 December 22, 2022 8:55 am 0
I feel ya, bro. I resist the urge to tell all the virtue signalers in my life that I love Putin just to enjoy the shocked horror on their faces. But I have to remind myself that I don’t love Putin. I am just really annoyed by these empty-headed poseurs and their infuriatingly high self-regard.Andy Nowicki is a writer of grotesque fiction who was around when the term “Alt Right” was popularized. I find him both fascinating and annoying.He has taken to wearing a tee shirt that says “RUSSIA” to provoke the kind of reactions that you might expect. He records people’s reactions to his shirt on his youtube channel.
Vegetius #334538 December 22, 2022 11:30 am 0
Andy is alright. Spencer dumping him and Derb Jr was the best thing that could have happened to either of them.
Marko #334475 December 22, 2022 8:58 am 0
I’m thinking of switching from Greek Orthodoxy to Russian Orthodoxy purely out of spite
JerseyJeffersonian #334551 December 22, 2022 11:47 am 0
Considering that the Greek government was thinking about sending their old S-300s to Ukraine to help their largely “Orthodox” brothers and sisters at the same time that that little jevv Zelensky is confiscating the churches and properties of the Othodox Church in Ukraine that is still in communion with the Othodox Church in Russia, that would seem quite reasonable. Oh, and btw, the Russians let it be known in no uncertain terms that, should that weapons transfer actually happen, there will be consequences.
The Wild Geese Howard #334594 December 22, 2022 1:34 pm 0
Pretty sure the Greek shipping oligarchs that really run the country will have a nice talk with the Prime Minister that it would be a really bad idea to mess with the huge profits they make trans-shipping laundered Russian oil.
3g4me #334682 December 22, 2022 9:14 pm 0
Marko: Haven’t watched this yet, but the horrified recounting at Daily Mail piqued my curiosity. The basic idea sounds great, to me (re being pro-Putin out of disgust with their Zelensky worship) https://videos.dailymail.co.uk/video/mol/2022/12/22/1140965100930383405/640x360_MP4_1140965100930383405.mp4
Compsci #334532 December 22, 2022 11:15 am 0
My impression of Zelensky when watching the news film of his arrive was that of Castro—another tin pot dictator. He arrived in NYC to address the UN in his green fatigues. Seems to me, all these dictators seem to like wearing military garb and the accompanying trappings—whereas leaders of free countries abhor military garb outside of specifically called for functions.
Mike #334595 December 22, 2022 1:35 pm 0
I think Chavez did the same thing for his sulphur speech at the UN. He was right.
george1 #334561 December 22, 2022 12:04 pm 0
Yes. One can believe what one will concerning Putin. However he did not start this conflict and did not want it. He tried to stop it before it began.
Mike #334623 December 22, 2022 4:03 pm 0
Truth is, at one point I would have agreed with you about “except for the people” but now I’d like to see every Ukrainian off the face of the earth. They are a disgusting people who can’t seem to get along with anyone. I always thought the Holodomor was a bad thiing but Russians knew them best and they did the right thing. It’s a nation of grifters, thieves and whores with no honor or decency. They somehow think they are a master race and they haven’t done anything to show. They’ve lowered themselves to subhuman levels since 1991.
Steve #334703 December 23, 2022 6:49 am 0
Why not be on Putin’s side? 80% of the world is. The US and Europe are less than 10% of the global population.
NateG #334470 December 22, 2022 8:39 am 0
One look at the little clown Zelensky and the thugs running the government in Ukraine and it’s obvious that they’ll never pay off any of the loans given them. This whole thing is a surrealistic nightmare. Looking at Nuland and the other incompetent, overrated fools running the government and it’s sad and depressing to see how low we’ve sunk.
Götterdamn-it-all #334477 December 22, 2022 9:02 am 0
Thugs are running our government, too.
Major Hoople #334484 December 22, 2022 9:12 am 0
I felt that way for a long while. Now, however, it’s no longer a “we.” Those aren’t my people, that’s not my government, and I’m not an American patriot. For my own people, yes, not for American government.
The real Bill #334533 December 22, 2022 11:15 am 0
I love my country. It’s the government I don’t trust.
Altitude Zero #334489 December 22, 2022 9:30 am 0
Yes, the sheer corruption on the part of everybody concerned in this mess is simply astonishing. In fact, the Ukraine situation makes Vietnam look like an exercise in exalted idealism. Sure there was some financial funny business, as there is in every war, and the MIC of the time certainly didn’t mind all those weapons orders, but generally speaking, there was a lot of actual idealism involved. Eisenhower and Kennedy believed that Communism in SE Asia was a genuine threat to the Free World, Diem was a man who loved his country and wanted the best for it, and even Ho-Chi-Minh was an idealist of a sort. You can say that some of these people were misguided, and that perhaps all of them were, but they weren’t just in it for the bucks and f*cks. Zelensky makes Diem look like George freaking Washington.
Spingerah #334507 December 22, 2022 10:15 am 0
And these are good times.Would anyone happen to have Vicktor Bounts cell number?I’d like to place an order. In minecraft.
theRussians #334469 December 22, 2022 8:35 am 0
We are living in the matrix. We took the red pill and are sitting at the computer terminal watching the code scroll down the screen.I don’t even see the code. All I see is blonde, brunette, redhead. Hey uh, you want a drink?it’s hideous and I can’t stop seeing the corruption.


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