Tuesday April 7, 2020
Copyright © 2020 by RonPaul Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and a live link are given.
Be seeing you
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Resistance Building To Coronavirus ‘House Arrest’ Orders…It’s About Time!
Posted by M. C. on April 9, 2020
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: Constitution, house arrest, stay at home, Sweden model | Leave a Comment »
The New and Improved Propaganda – Doug Casey’s International Man
Posted by M. C. on April 9, 2020
“Let me control the media and I will turn any nation into a herd of pigs.”
Over time, he became extremely adept at controlling the media, and eventually, he only needed to focus on new rhetoric, as the media had become co-conspirators by repeating previously established rhetoric. His overview was,
“Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play.”
https://internationalman.com/articles/the-new-and-improved-propaganda/
by Jeff Thomas
Adolf Hitler and his Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, took great pride in their campaign to instill fear in the German people between 1933 and 1945.
They understood that the strongest and most renewable emotion in mankind is fear, and that, once a people have been won over by fear, there’s very little that you can’t get them to do.
To provide a focus for fear, a demon is necessary. Ideally, the people already fear a demon of some sort. If so, this demon should be co-opted and the fear magnified.
However, if no demon is already perceived by the people, one must be created.
The Nazis chose existing demons. Many Germans had an existing fear and hatred for Jews, non-whites and homosexuals, so the Nazis did all they could to demonise them and to present themselves as the crusaders against these demons.
Once this relationship has been created – that the only way to be saved from the demons is for the government to defeat them – the rest is actually quite simple. The creation of a police state, the banning of publicly held weapons, the pogroms, the waging of war, all of it can be accomplished by describing them as necessary in the defeat of the demons.
Hitler realised early on that the fear need not be rational. Once he understood that principle, he recognised that he could exaggerate the perceived danger of the demons, and as long as he maintained the rhetoric, the fear would increase considerably. As he himself stated,
“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it and eventually, they will believe it.”
His speeches went a long way to increasing the fear, but Joseph Goebbels expanded the fear even more. He understood that if the Nazis took control of the media, they could implement the indoctrination far more thoroughly. Through the media, his goal was to degrade the thought processes of the German people to the point that they behaved as they were programmed to. As he pointed out,
“Let me control the media and I will turn any nation into a herd of pigs.”
Over time, he became extremely adept at controlling the media, and eventually, he only needed to focus on new rhetoric, as the media had become co-conspirators by repeating previously established rhetoric. His overview was,
“Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play.”
The German people were whipped into a lather in their hatred of the demons that had been promoted. When warfare was begun, they went along enthusiastically.
It was only when the casualties began to mount and German cities began to be bombed that they began to falter.
At that point, Messrs. Hitler and Goebbels increasingly relied on a more sophisticated demon: terrorism. As Hitler said at that time,
“Terrorism is the best political weapon, for nothing drives people harder than a fear of sudden death.”
But just what is it about the terrorism threat that’s so effective in scaring the populace?
Well, if Jews, non-whites and homosexuals are a perceived danger, they can be loaded onto trains and taken away, never to be seen again. And if even one such demon slips through the cracks and remains in your neighbourhood, he is, at least, a known quantity. It’s clear to all as to how to address the problem: Report his presence and have the authorities drag him off. Problem solved.
But terrorism is not a person; it’s an abstract.
That may seem like a small distinction, but it’s not. It’s of major importance in terms of its effectiveness in creating fear.
Terrorism is faceless and bodiless. It has no numerical limitation. It can be anyone: the man down the street or the neighbour across the hall. But best of all, an abstract can never truly be defeated. Its threat can be presented as being endless.
And if only the government can save you from the abstract demon, it stands to reason that, whatever rights must be given up, whatever losses must be suffered, this must be accepted. Submission to the demands of the leaders is essential.
Further, once fear has replaced reason, a people no longer ask why submission will bring about results; they simply submit and trust in the State.
As clever as the leaders of the Third Reich were, they only discovered the ultimate demon late in the game… But modern governments took it a step further.
Around the turn of the millennium, the nations of the former Free World began a campaign to create a fear of terrorism. They used the traditional principles: Create a demon out of existing concerns, expand upon the actual, then, through the use of repeated rhetoric, replace reason with fear.
Today, we’re so well-conditioned that, if we were in a queue at the airport and someone held up a sign that said, “terrorist,” we’d all want the authorities to come ASAP and drag him off. We’d have no concern whatever as to what his fate might be. Our only concern would be that he was now gone. Like the Germans, we’ve been successfully programmed to overreact with fear… to a mere word on a sign.
But the New Propaganda predates the “war on terrorism.” It began when another demon, Global Cooling, was created. It then became Global Warming, then Climate Change. In spite of the overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary, the Climate Change demon thrives, due to unrelenting rhetoric. Hitler was correct. Once again,
“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it and eventually, they will believe it.”
But a third demon has recently been born in the form of the coronavirus. Was this a virus that began in the markets of Wuhan? Was it created in a lab by the Chinese? Was it created by the West and planted in China?
In fact, the true cause matters little.
It will be used to full effect as a demon to terrify the masses. It will be blown out of all proportion to justify the further implementation of a police state, the refusal of the right to cross borders and, ultimately, the shutting-down of the economy.
The government will not be blamed, as the virus is an invisible enemy that only governments can save us from. When told to be obedient and to sacrifice beyond all reason, we shall do so.
Terrorism, Climate Change and the coronavirus are the New Propaganda: a triumvirate of demons that are impossible to pin down. They are abstracts that we have been assured will destroy us.
The message is clear: Our only hope in surviving them is submission to those in charge.
Be seeing you
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: demons, herd of pigs, instill fear, Joseph Goebbels, New Propaganda, Terrorism | Leave a Comment »
A Most Sordid Profession – LewRockwell
Posted by M. C. on April 9, 2020
Why does the military not win wars? In part because winning is not in the interest of the Pentagon and those who feed on it. Wars generate profitable contracts for all manner of supplies and equipment. Either winning or losing ends the gravy train.
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2020/04/fred-reed/a-most-sordid-profession/
A few thoughts on our disastrous trillion-dollar military:
It is unnecessary. It does not defend the United States. The last time it did so was in 1945. The United States has no military enemies. No nation has anything even close to the forces necessary to invade America, and probably none the desire. A fifth of the budget would suffice for any real needs.
“Our boys” are not noble warriors protecting democracy, rescuing maidens, and righting wrongs. They are, like all soldiers, obedient and amoral killers. Pilots bombing Iraq or Syria know they are killing civilians. They do not care. If ordered to bomb Switzerland, they would do it. This is the nature of all armies. Glamorizing this most reprehensible trades is just a means of usefully stimulating the pack instinct which we often call patriotism.
The militarily is America’s worst enemy. It does enormous damage to the United States while providing almost no benefit. Start with the war on Vietnam that cost hugely in money and lives, ours and theirs, with no benefit. Iraq: high cost, no benefit. Afghanistan: High cost, no benefit. Syria: High cost, no benefit.
The costs in lives and money do not include the staggering cost of weapons that do nothing for America or Americans. Do you, the reader, believe that you are safer because of the F-35? Do a dozen aircraft carriers improve the lives of your children? Will the B-21, an unbelievably expensive new thermonuclear bomber, make your streets safer? Then add the bleeding of engineering talent better spent on advancing America’s economic competitiveness. The country has many crying needs, falls behind China, but money and talent go to the military.
We cannot escape from the soldiers. The armed forces have embedded themselves so deeply into the country that they have almost become the country. America is little more than a funding mechanism for what clumsily may be called the military-industrial-intelligence-media-Israeli complex. Some of these entities belong to the military (NSA). Some depend on it (Lockheed-Martin). Some use it to their own ends (Israel), but the military is the central infection from which the other symptoms flow. Congress? A storefront, a subcommittee of the Knesset or, as P. J. O’Rourke put it, a parliament of whores. Factories, jobs, contracts, towns depend on military spending. If the Second Marine Division folded, Jacksonville NC would dry up and blow away. So would dozens of other towns. Without military spending, California’s economy would crash. Universities depend on military research funding.
The military has achieved its current autonomy by degrees, unnoticed. The Pentagon learned much in Vietnam, not about fighting wars, which it still cannot do well, but about managing its real enemy, the public. The media, which savaged the war on Vietnam, are now firmly controlled by the corporations that own them. Thus we do not see photos of the horrors committed by American aircraft bombing cities. While the existence of phenomenally expensive weapons like the B-21 is not quite suppressed, coverage is so slight that most Americans have never heard of it. This the Complex learned from the F-35 debacle. And of course Congress, thoroughly bought and wanting jobs in its districts, allows no serious opposition to anything military. Neither Congress nor the media point out the extent to which military expenditure dominates the economy, draining resources from civilian needs.
Why does the military not win wars? In part because winning is not in the interest of the Pentagon and those who feed on it. Wars generate profitable contracts for all manner of supplies and equipment. Either winning or losing ends the gravy train. For example, the war on Afghanistan of almost two decades has become an entitlement program for the arms industry, accomplishing nothing, killing countless peasants, and lacking purpose other than maintaining an unneeded empire and funneling money to the Complex.
How did the Complex free itself from civilian control? The crucial step in depriving the public of influence was the neutering of the constitutional requirement that wars be declared by Congress. The military thus became the private army of the President and those who control him. Then came the All Volunteer Army, which ended inconvenience to or mutilation of the children of people of importance, leaving the body bags to be filled by deplorables from Memphis or Appalachia or Mexico. America’s wars then became air wars and finally drone wars, reducing casualties to very few. The public, both ignorant and uninvolved, became acquiescent.
As I write, we wait to see whether Trump, and those behind him, will put America deeper into the Mid-East and perhaps war with Russia. If he does, we will read about it the next day in the newspapers. It will be expensive, dangerous, and of no benefit to anyone but the arms industry and Israel.
Despite the asphyxiating economic presence, the military keeps aloof from America. This too serves the purposes of the Complex, further preventing attention by the public to what is not its business. In the days of conscription there was a familiarity with the armed services. Young men from most social classes wore the uniform however ruefully and told of their experiences. Not now. The career military have always tended to keep to themselves, to socialize with each other as the police do. Now the isolation is almost hermetic. You can spend years in Washington or New York and never meet a colonel. Military society with its authoritarianism, its uniforms and its uniform government-issue outlook is not compatible with civil society. To the cultivated, military officers seem simple-minded, conformist and…well, weird.
Add it all up and you see that the citizenry has no say–none–over the Complex, which is autonomous and out of control. If the Complex wants war with Russia or China, we will have-war with Russia or China. Ask people whether they would prefer a naval base in Qatar–which most have never heard of, either the base or the country–or decent heath care. Then ask them which they have.
The military destroys America and there is nothing–nothing at all–that you can do about it.
Further, the Complex drives foreign policy, and in directions of no benefit to America or Americans. For example, the contrived fury against Russia. Why this? Russia presents no danger to America or anyone else. The Complex makes foreign policy for its own ends, not ours.
A rising Asia is challenging the America military Empire. The tide runs against the Complex. North Korea faced Washington down and became a nuclear power. The Crimea went back irrevocably to Russia. East Ukraine does the same. Iran got its treaty and becomes part of the world order. In the South China Sea, China ignores the US, which once was supreme in all the seas. The war against Afghanistan heads for its third decade and the war on Syria seems to have failed. Other things go badly for the Empire. The dollar is under siege as reserve currency. China grows economically, advances rapidly in technology and, doubtless terrifying to Washington, tries to integrate Asia and Europe into a vast economic bloc. The Complex beats the war drums as its fingers loosen on the world’s collective throat.
Washington desperately needs to stop the rollback of American power, stop the erosion of the dollar, block the economic integration of Eurasia and Latin America, keep Russia from trading amicably with Europe. It will do anything to maintain its grip. All of its remote wars in far-off savage lands, of no importance to America or Americans, are to this purpose. A militarized America threatens Russia, threatens China, threatens Iran, threatens North Korea, threatens Venezuela, expands NATO, on and on.
America has been hijacked.
Be seeing you
Government’s favorite sport-War
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: B-21, F-35, Pentagon, trillion-dollar military | Leave a Comment »
Coronavirus Hysteria: the Flat-Curve Society and ‘the Curious, But Quite Authentic, Inability to Think’ – LewRockwell
Posted by M. C. on April 9, 2020
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would demand that millions upon millions of their fellow Americans be forced out of their jobs, into debt, and, in the case of business owners who have been coerced to shutter their doors, out of their very livelihoods.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would demand that the dreams of millions and millions of their fellow Americans be shattered.
Let me be blunt: The Flat-Curvers are no different than Eichmann as far their invincible mental conformism is concerned. Like Eichmann, they too possess a curious, but quite authentic, inability to think.
By Jack Kerwick
Hannah Arendt was a 20th century Jewish philosopher whose family had to flee their home in Germany upon the rise of the Third Reich. Years later, she witnessed the trial, in Jerusalem, of Adolph Eichmann, the architect of the Holocaust.
Eichmann, Arendt observed, wasn’t at all the monster that she expected to see. His actions were monstrous, but he didn’t strike her as monstrous or wicked at all. However, what Arendt did notice about Eichmann is that he exhibited “a curious, but quite authentic, inability to think.”
An inability to think.
It wasn’t that Eichmann was stupid or otherwise unintelligent. Nor was it that he was literally or intrinsically incapable of thinking. Rather, he had no inclination, no will, for critical thought.
“However monstrous the deeds were, the doer was neither monstrous nor demonic, and the only specific characteristic one could detect in his past as well as in his behavior during the trial and the preceding police examination was something entirely negative: it was not stupidity but a curious, quite authentic inability to think.”
Eichmann, Arendt continues,
“…functioned in the role of prominent war criminal as well as he had under the Nazi regime; he had not the slightest difficulty in accepting an entirely different set of rules. He knew that what he had once considered his duty was now called a crime, and he accepted this new code of judgment as if it were nothing but another language rule.”
Eichmann’s speech while on trial inspired Arendt to coin the expression, “the banality of evil.” The latter is
“…no theory or doctrine but something quite factual, the phenomenon of evil deeds, committed on a gigantic scale, which could not be traced to any particularity of wickedness, pathology, or ideological conviction in the doer, whose only personal distinction was a perhaps extraordinary shallowness.”
Ordinary people, Arendt contended, could become purveyors of wickedness, not because they necessarily subscribe to a false and malicious doctrine or belief system of some sort—they needn’t have any doctrine—but because they may possess an “extraordinary shallowness,” i.e. an inability to think.
She continues, remarking that Eichmann not only was guilty of “inconsistencies and flagrant contradictions” during his trial; he was not “bothered” by such contradictions. This is because he could think only in terms of stock phrases and clichés (today we could add “bumper sticker slogans” and “memes”). Arendt explains why this is a problem:
“Cliches, stock phrases, adherence to conventional, standardized codes of expression and conduct have the socially recognized function of protecting us against reality, that is, against the claim on our thinking attention which all events and facts arouse by virtue of their existence.”
Now, this in itself is not problematic, for if “we were responsive to this claim all the time, we would soon be exhausted.”
What distinguished Eichmann, though, is “that he clearly knew of no such claim at all.”
Whether through advertence or inadvertence, Eichmann didn’t recognize that thought that’s limited to what amounted to the memes of his day isn’t thoughtful. Thoughtful people dare to think through the implications of the myriad of “standardized codes of expression and conduct,” recognizing that not only do they fail to do justice to the intricacies of reality; they must fail to do so, for, omitting as they do large swaths of the world, they tend to contradict one another.
This inability, this unwillingness, to think, Arendt suggested, is inseparable from evil doing.
“Is evil doing, not just the sins of omission but the sins of commission, possible in the absence of not merely ‘base motives’ (as the law calls it) but any motives at all, any particular prompting of interest or volition? Is wickedness, however we may define it, this being ‘determined to prove a villain,’ not a necessary condition for evil-doing?”
Simply put:
“Could the activity of thinking as such, the habit of examining and reflecting upon whatever happens to come to pass, regardless of specific content and quite independent of results, could this activity be of such a nature that it ‘conditions’ men against evil-doing?”
The answer to Arendt’s question is a resounding “YES.” And she is correct.
If ever proof was needed of this, we need only observe with our own eyes and ears the rise of The Flat-Curve Society. On the show The Walking Dead, a virus has brought to fruition an apocalyptic scenario that reduces the dead to zombies who the living refer to as “walkers.”
The Flat-Curve Society consists of what we may refer to as “the Corona Walkers.” With an eeriness the likes of which I don’t recall ever having seen in my nearly 48 years on this planet, the Corona Walkers, aching in desperation to “Flatten the Curve!” even at the expense of causing immeasurable suffering to untold millions of human beings both here in America and around the globe, increasingly resemble zombies. Readers here know the beings to which I refer:
The Corona Walkers avoid, not just physical proximity with other human beings, but even eye contact, and now most have half of their faces covered with surgical masks. Nor do they speak much at all.
They basically cower in their homes—“Shelter in Place! Save Lives!”—and have ceased living.
And yet, the Walkers of the Flat-Curve Society, though they have Socially Distanced unto the point of their own social deaths, are indeed members of a herd. They are, as their Leaders in Big Government and Big Media remind them with a phrase that could’ve come from one of Orwell’s dystopian novels, “apart together.”
Cut off from their churches, their families, their friends—yet apart together.
The Flat-Curve Society, if asked to identify itself, would have to give the same answer given by the demon who Jesus exorcised from a possessed man in Mark 5:1-20:
“My name is Legion, for we are many.”
The Corona Walkers are everywhere. They are Legion. They are many.
They are scary and, I fear, promise to become more irrational and, hence, scarier the longer their Leaders continue to spook them with tales of the Apocalypse.
Let me be blunt: The Flat-Curvers are no different than Eichmann as far their invincible mental conformism is concerned. Like Eichmann, they too possess a curious, but quite authentic, inability to think.
Nor did Arendt understand herself to be limiting her characterization of Eichmann solely to Eichmann. She was referring to a phenomenon, a phenomenon that—unfortunately, and as has become glaringly obvious to all who observe the Corona Walkers with a mixture of bemusement, incredulity, and, yes, horror—all too common.
The countless billboards and traffic signs on interstates and turnpikes flashing injunctions to “Stay at home!” and “Flatten the Curve!” express as unambiguously as can be for all with eyes to see “the curious, but quite authentic, inability to think” on the part of the Flat-Curvers.
Social distancing; Self-Isolation; Self-Quaranting; Stop the Spread; and, of course, Flatten the Curve!—these are the “clichés, stock phrases,” and “conventional, standardized codes of expression and conduct” that immunize the Flat-Curvers against the “claims” on their “thinking attention” made by reality.
It is their inability to think through the propaganda with which their Leaders incessantly besiege them that has produced some concerning outcomes.
(1)Their inability to think has rendered them oblivious to the contradictions of their Leaders (Dr. Fauci, despite scaring the public with the claim that The Virus is ten times deadlier than the seasonal flu, quietly conceded in The New England Journal of Medicine, along with his co-author, Dr. Redfield, director of the CDC, that for all they know, it may have a mortality rate comparable to that of the .1% of seasonal influenza).
(2)Their inability to think has left them unaware of the world-distinguished epidemiologists, virologists, and other medical experts whose testimony have been conveniently omitted from the official narrative but who have been insisting from the outset that the hyper-fear mongering over COVID-19, grounded as it upon bogus assumptions, incomplete information, and falsehoods, is wholly unwarranted (A list of these specialists and their remarks can be found here).
(3)Their inability to think has consumed them with what Al Ridenhour, founder of the combative system, Warrior Flow, and his instructors at Warriors Way Combatives refer to as “irrational fear.” While rational fear Master Al, echoing Plato, Aristotle, and most of the ancient and medieval thinkers who identified it with courage, recognizes as indispensable to keeping people safe, he never tires of insisting that irrational fear is an enemy to be surmounted.
Though everyone has their share of irrational fears, the objective should be to resist them, not indulge them. The current situation, the Flat-Curve Society, supplies as instructive a lesson in irrational fear as any that any of us have had ever had, for it is an opportunity to witness irrational fear en masse.
It is rational to fear getting sick. It is irrational to fear it to the extent that one is willing to spare none of the major expenses listed above in order not to get sick.
But it is very rational for the rest of us to fear the Corona Walkers.
Edmund Burke had memorably remarked that the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. His point here dovetails with that of Arendt’s in that both recognized that otherwise reasonably decent human beings, from fear of the repercussions of defying the Zeitgeist, can be responsible for the evil actions brought about by the evil dictates of indecent human beings in which they have acquiesced.
Otherwise reasonably decent human beings, that is, by virtue of their lack of courage to follow the Human Imperative to think, a command and a blessing from God, must share culpability for the evil that they’ve permitted.
Would the Flat-Curvers, in order to win The Corona War of 2020 (or is it a war in perpetuity, like “the War on Terror?”), permit, maybe even encourage, the executions of those who they judge to be guilty of violating Social Distancing protocols?
This may sound like a stretch, but consider that just a month or so ago, no one could’ve imagined that but so many weeks later, a whole new vocabulary—Social Distancing, Flatten the Curve, Stop the Spread, Save Lives!—would not only emerge, but monopolize, our political discourse.
In order to prevent people from catching what amounts to a flu, consider what has happened over a period of just a few weeks (admittedly, a period that has seemed like an eternity):
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would so readily, eagerly, relinquish their Constitutional rights.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would demand that millions upon millions of their fellow Americans be forced out of their jobs, into debt, and, in the case of business owners who have been coerced to shutter their doors, out of their very livelihoods.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would demand that the dreams of millions and millions of their fellow Americans be shattered.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would be complicit in and, more distressingly, cheer on the establishment of hotlines to police for neighbors (and relatives?) to use in order to report those who they think are not observing Social Distancing guidelines.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that Americans would allow, and endorse, the harassing, shaming, physically attacking, arresting, and even killing of their fellow Americans who they, or the authorities, charge with being in violation of Social Distancing guidelines.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that just a few weeks later, Americans would bombard their local grocery stores, transforming them into something like the equivalent of Great Depression-era soup kitchens: Because of their determination to hoard items, throngs of people line up outside of their supermarkets waiting for the doors to open.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Yet even the soup kitchens of the 1930s, I’m pretty sure, didn’t require the presence of armed security officers as our grocery stores now require—another thing that no one just a few weeks ago could’ve imagined.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined that churches would be closed for Easter—and that millions of Americans, including American Christians and church leaders, would be fine with this.
Flatten the Curve! Stay at Home! Save Lives!
To summarize the foregoing, the point, ultimately, is this:
Just a few weeks ago, no one could’ve imagined the explosion of The Flat-Curve Society.
This being said, if, by the lights of the Flat-Curvers, Victory over The Virus is of categorical importance, then is it really such a stretch to think that, given the injection of just a little more fear and panic, they would support the execution of dissidents and resistors, i.e. those who challenge the dominant line that The Virus is the second coming of The Black Plague whose defeat demands the sacrifice of every good for which generations have fought and died?
Perhaps, hopefully, even they would draw the line there. Yet what I’ve been at pains to show here is that they have already gone, and at neck-breaking speed, much further than any liberty-loving, truth-seeking, God-fearing American could’ve genuinely thought as recently as one month ago.
The Corona Walkers are more frightening than the zombies on The Walking Dead. The zombies will just eat the living. The Corona Walkers, if they have their way, will kill their victims by a thousand cuts, destroying their dreams; driving them from their homes, their jobs, their livelihoods; isolating them from their friends, family members, religious communities, neighbors; saddling them with debt, depression, anxiety, panic attacks, criminal records, fines, and, yes, suicidal thoughts.
The study of the harms—and they will prove to be immense in both number and degree—brought about by The Flat-Curve Society and its “curious, but authentic, inability to think” has yet to be done. But I suspect that there will be numerous such studies that, hopefully, will receive the attention needed to dissolve the Society and prevent it from rearing its ugly head when the opportunism of Big Government and Big Media leads to the declaration of the next incarnation of the Black Plague.
As for the rest of us who have been turned into dissidents for daring to leave our homes:
We must never forget.
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: Adolph Eichmann, Corona Walkers, Flat-Curve Society | Leave a Comment »
The ‘Coronavirus’ Worm Has Turned: It Is Now Time To Face the Truth – LewRockwell
Posted by M. C. on April 9, 2020
When the Fed brags about it’s “tools” they amount to nothing but a plastic hammer. The Fed knows a massive correction (recession) is in the cards due to their easy money. They don’t have a clue as to how to remedy this situation.
The correction is the remedy.
The take away is bailout money is not going to you. Boeing, McDonnel Douglas, bankster cronies and boondoggles like solar panels, electric cars and politically correct social engineering projects will reap the benefit.
It is a bad sign that many companies previously bailed out are no longer viable. Think Obama’s electric car poster boy – Chevy Volt. Bankrupt solar panel and electric car battery companies.
The other item is no reserve banking. Until now banks had to keep something like 15% in reserve for people withdrawing savings.
That is now zero.
Theoretically a bank can now lend out every penny of customers savings leaving nothing for withdrawal.
“A society becomes totalitarian when its structure becomes flagrantly artificial: that is, when its ruling class has lost its function but succeeds in clinging to power by force or fraud.” ~ George Orwell (1956). “The Orwell Reader: Fiction, Essays, and Reportage”, New York : Harcourt, Brace
It is time for some hard truth that seems to escape nearly every American, but in reality, it is truth that is purposely hidden from view by the entirety of the mainstream. With this coronavirus fraud, the bigger picture is left in the shadows, and this of course is by design, and easy to accomplish in a country consumed by fear. The bigger picture that is only being addressed by a small number of people is the real elephant in the room, but virtually invisible to the masses. This is certainly due to deceit and corruption, but also is made so complicated as to assure that the common man does not understand it, and in fact will not pursue the real story behind this pandemic facade. These hidden enemies of all people and freedom are the Federal Reserve Banks and those controlling the monetary system.
If one travels back in time just a few years to the 2008 economic breakdown, many lessons could be learned, but apparently never were learned by those most adversely affected by such criminal behavior. During what should have been a collapse, banks and corporations, mostly those favored by the political class and the Federal Reserve, were all bailed out at the expense of the taxpayers. Actually, most everyone in this country was harmed except those favored players, but buying up the markets and claiming to save the country by printing money out of thin air has led to this current situation now in place. The economic debacle faced by all in this country today is not only far greater than what happened in 2008, but is not even comparable at any level. It is the equivalent of comparing a gentle rainstorm to a Category 5 hurricane.
Since the average person, and frankly most all others as well, ignore the workings of the Federal Reserve, it is time to expose what is actually going on with this criminal and scandalous private central banking system, and how this false flag called the Covid-19 pandemic is being used by the Fed to achieve agendas that will change the economic structure of this country and others forever. This is no accident, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with coronavirus, but that excuse is the impetus for restructuring the entire monetary system. A statement issued by the Federal Reserve through the Federal Open Market Committee on March 15th of this year stated that due to the coronavirus outbreak:
“The Federal Reserve is prepared to use its full range of tools to support the flow of credit to households and businesses and thereby promote its maximum employment and price stability goals.”
This surpasses propaganda, and is an outright lie with very sinister intent, as the Federal Reserve fully understands that increasing its balance sheet reserves has absolutely nothing to do with helping average people, households, or businesses in this country. Those reserves are not bank money, and cannot and will not ever be distributed to common people. In fact, all bank reserve requirements have been eliminated, so no reserves are now even necessary for banks to make loans. The entire process is a fraud, and is only meant to prop up the Fed so as to bail out its allies in crime in banking and corporate America, not those families being purposely destroyed due to a lie.
The U.S. economy has continued to worsen since the 2008 housing disaster and banking implosion, and has continued on its way to an imminent collapse. The Fed claims to be printing massive amounts of money and increasing its reserves due only to this coronavirus scare, but that is ludicrous and is also a flagrant lie. In September of last year, well before the so-called coronavirus pandemic was known, the Fed was in a dire position, and began dramatically increasing its balance sheet reserves and daily repurchase agreement (REPOs) “loans” to the banking sector, this in advance of any virus, not due to it. Massive Fed and banking problems began many years ago, and have worsened continuously, causing this economy to be on the edge of total failure. This has been known for a long time, so given the obvious lies, it is prudent to ask if this coronavirus was created as a cover for a failed economy. In my opinion, that is not only possible but also probable.
The 2 trillion dollar bailout also said to be for working Americans is also a lie, as only a few pennies on the dollar will ever get to working people. The bulk of all monetary distribution, and handouts will go to the inside accomplices at the top of the heap. Anyone paying attention should understand that all government is based on lies, deceit, corruption, and power growth, and the only way to achieve success in this atrocious venture is to retain tight control over the populace by striking fear in the hearts of all of society. Hence the coronavirus, which if purposely manufactured and introduced or not, is being used to accomplish agendas that are so far-reaching as to be nearly impossible to conceive. I lean heavily toward the side of this virus and the politics of fear being intentionally created, and that the panic and manipulation was due to a false pandemic, and not an accidental event. While this position will seem extreme to most, time will change that posture. The biggest world governance and monetary reset in history is coming soon due to this ruse.
The government that is telling you they are going to save you from a virus is the same government that is going to destroy your lives. That same government is expecting and leveling economic destruction on the country, and the Fed stated that unemployment just in this quarter alone would reach 32%, which equates to 47 million people out of work. Rocket science is not required to figure out the ramifications of this kind of unemployment tragedy. It is possible that before or during the third quarter of this year unemployment per capita could be double what it was at the height of the Great Depression. This is something that cannot be overcome by Fed policy or political interference, and in fact would signal an end to this economic system.
What will you do when the banks close? What will you do when you have no access to savings due to a monetary collapse? What will you do when riots, looting, and civil unrest are a normal part of your lives? What will you do when it is too late to do anything?
Keep in mind that the Fed balance sheet, money that will never be seen by any normal citizen, will most likely reach 10 trillion to 12 trillion dollars in the near future. Consider that regardless of any more coronavirus aid packages created by government, that little if any will reach or help the general population, but will go to government cronies. Consider that any and every “emergency” declared by government in the future will lead to in-house imprisonment, as has been openly admitted by the current administration officials. Consider the prospect of living in fear and isolation for life!
This is much more complicated and sinister than I can present here, but we are in the midst of a complete global restructuring of the monetary system, and one that will be devastating to all but those few with trillions in assets and in the most powerful positions. The rest of us will not only suffer, but will be left with poverty, despair, and death. This coming global reorganization, whether its finality is during this current “crisis” or not, is now inevitable in my opinion unless a very dramatic turnaround by the masses is forthcoming. Without a mass uprising against this tyranny, this nightmare will never end.
I cannot know exactly how this will turn out, but the writing on the wall would indicate that an abolishment of the world economic and monetary systems, and replacement with a new system is in the works. One thing is certain, if I am right about this, it was planned long ago, and all the pieces have been put into place to construct a new world economic order.
See this link to gain an understanding of current Fed fraud and of government corruption during this current crisis.
Also see these links here, here, here.
Be seeing you
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: 2 trillion dollar, bailout, coronavirus fraud, Federal Reserve, no reserves, REPO | Leave a Comment »
Erie Times E-Edition Article – State can seize medical supplies
Posted by M. C. on April 9, 2020
Combatting a pandemic means we all have to work together and that means..
Taking you private property. Just like collecting another tax.
Who better to decide the best use of your property than the state.
By The Associated Press
Pennsylvania emergency management officials will be permitted to commandeer N95 face masks, ventilators and other crucial medical equipment for use in the fight against COVID-19 under an order signed Wednesday by Gov. Tom Wolf.
The order mandates that private and public health care facilities, manufacturers and other companies tabulate their supplies of personal protective equipment, drugs and other medical equipment and within five days provide an inventory to the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency.
PEMA will make the supplies available to areas of the state hit hardest by the coronavirus pandemic, Wolf’s order said, and it will be up to state agencies to repay the entities from which the equipment was taken.
‘Combatting a pandemic means we all have to work together and that means we need to make the best use of our medical assets to ensure the places that need them most have them,’ Wolf said in a statement.
‘Today, I am signing an order that will allow us to transfer supplies, and information between medical facilities to both high-population, high-impact areas and lower population areas that might not have as many existing medical resources,’ he said.
Several other states, including New York and Minnesota, have issued similar orders.
In other coronavirusrelated developments: Cases: The Department of Health reported 1,680 new confirmed cases of the virus, bringing the statewide total to more than 16,000. There were 70 new deaths, for a statewide toll of 310.
For most people, the virus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up in a couple of weeks. Older adults and people with existing health problems are at higher risk of more severe illness, including pneumonia, or death.
Vacation rental owners defy order: Short- term rental property owners in Pennsylvania continue to advertise lodging in defiance of Wolf’s coronavirus shutdown order, administration officials said Wednesday.
Wolf banned short-term residential rentals last week after state lawmakers in the Pocono Mountains complained that property owners had been trying to entice travelers from virus hotspots New Jersey and New York.
But owners are continuing to advertise availability using Airbnb, VRBO and other platforms, ‘unnecessarily putting the health of the public in even greater jeopardy than is already the case,’ wrote Dennis M. Davin, secretary of the Department of Community and Economic Development.
Davin wrote to Airbnb Inc. and Expedia Group, which owns VRBO, asking them to tell hosts who are violating the shutdown order that they are not allowed to operate.
Airbnb said it has already informed hosts to check for local restrictions on shortterm rentals.
Flags lowered: Wolf ordered flags at all state buildings and grounds to be lowered to half-staff until further notice to honor victims of the pandemic. He invited all Pennsylvania residents to follow suit.
Warehouse inspections: More than 20 local governments in hard-hit northeastern Pennsylvania are banding together to make sure the warehouse industry and other large businesses are following state health and safety orders amid an alarming rise in virus cases in the region.
Regional code enforcement teams in Luzerne County will perform random inspections of large commercial buildings that remain open during the COVID-19 shutdown, officials announced Wednesday. Luzerne County has reported more than 1,100 cases of COVID-19, one of the highest infection rates in the state.
Be seeing you
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: Airbnb, medical supplies, N95 face masks, PEMA, residential rentals, VRBO, Warehouse inspections | Leave a Comment »
How the Left Is Trying to Blame Capitalism for COVID-19 Deaths | Mises Wire
Posted by M. C. on April 8, 2020
Two elephants in the room go unaddressed in this argument. First, if a vaccine for the virus would save millions of lives in the US alone, potentially tens of millions of lives worldwide, why would that product not be profitable? Does the author honestly think that a product that could literally save one’s life would not be in high demand?
Secondly, why does the blame for failing to develop a vaccine fall squarely on private pharmaceutical companies? What about all the other developed nations that have some form of single-payer or universal healthcare system that the Jacobin crowd thinks will save us all? Why didn’t any of them develop a vaccine?
Learning from the 2015 MERS outbreak, reports ProPublica, “Korean officials enacted a key reform, allowing the government to give near-instantaneous approval to testing systems in an emergency.”
The result? “Within weeks of the current outbreak in Wuhan, China, four Korean companies had manufactured tests from a World Health Organization recipe and, as a result, the country quickly had a system that could assess 10,000 people a day.”
Not hesitating to exploit a health pandemic to advance their ideological agenda, Jacobin magazine on March 26 published an article attempting to proactively blame “millions” of coronavirus deaths on “capitalism.”
Titled “How Capitalism Kills during a Pandemic,” the article advances tired slogans about free markets placing “profits above people,” buttressed by faulty and at times self-contradictory arguments that prove unpersuasive.
To set the most alarmist tone possible, author Nick French begins by warning the reader that the coronavirus “will likely kill millions of people in the United States alone.”
This prediction cherry-picks the most ominous of such projections, irresponsibly relying on the report from London’s Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team, who own authors admitted includes projections that are “worst-case,” combined with the incredibly unrealistic caveat that “there are no interventions or changes in people’s behavior.” The report further admitted that “Epidemic timings are approximate given the limitations of surveillance data in both countries,” in essence cautioning that such predictions will be moot once more sufficient data becomes available. (The Jacobin article was published before a leading author of the report altered his predictions based upon the dramatic responses imposed in countries around the world.)
With the reader sufficiently shocked by the worst-case projection of victims based on partial data and unrealistic assumptions, French quickly assigns the villain: “Many of these fatalities could have been avoided if we had a social order that placed the needs of people over profit,” he declares.
Helping to shape the readers’ cartoonish image of evil capitalism, the article informs us: “capitalists prioritize profits over the welfare of their workers and of humanity as a whole,” and adds, “They will pollute the environment with deadly toxins and planet-destroying greenhouse gases before spending money on safe production processes.”
Mass death is but an unconsidered side effect in the heartless system of capitalism. Such is the framing that French establishes.
This leads into his specific critiques:
“First, pharmaceutical companies could have started to develop a vaccine for the virus years ago. The novel coronavirus that is now ravaging the world is actually one of a family of coronaviruses (including SARS and MERS) with which we have long been familiar,” French notes. “It would have been possible to begin research on vaccines and cures for coronaviruses in general, giving us a head start on treatments for the current outbreak. But pharmaceutical companies did not pursue this research, because the prospect of a cure was not sufficiently profitable.”
Two elephants in the room go unaddressed in this argument. First, if a vaccine for the virus would save millions of lives in the US alone, potentially tens of millions of lives worldwide, why would that product not be profitable? Does the author honestly think that a product that could literally save one’s life would not be in high demand?
Secondly, why does the blame for failing to develop a vaccine fall squarely on private pharmaceutical companies? What about all the other developed nations that have some form of single-payer or universal healthcare system that the Jacobin crowd thinks will save us all? Why didn’t any of them develop a vaccine?
Next, the article addresses concerns about the consequences of the economic shutdown being imposed on the American economy. “Losing a job could result in losing your health-care coverage or being unable to pay your student loans,” French writes. This concern is entirely justifiable.
But somehow French doesn’t see the irony in lamenting the close tie between one’s job and health insurance coverage—a result of government policy making insurance coverage tax exempt—as somehow the fault of “capitalism.” Without government interference, far more health insurance coverage would be owned by individuals, not supplied by employers.
Moreover, the student loan debt crisis is largely a government phenomenon as well. Decades of government subsidies and low-interest loans have helped drive up college tuition, and the federal government owns more than 90 percent of all student loan debt.
French blames “capitalism” for putting individuals in precarious situations that are highly exacerbated by the pandemic crisis, but the roots are to be found in government intervention.
Next, he blames greedy capitalist owners for forcing workers to go to work and risk their health because doing otherwise would “hurt bosses’ bottom line.”
In the following paragraph, however, French is forced to concede that the only specific example he cites, Starbucks, despite staying open for a while, “has since shifted to only providing drive-through service because of employee pressure.”
In a competitive market, employers must treat employees reasonably well, or else they will be bid away by more hospitable workplaces.
French then points out the shortages of personal protective equipment such as face masks at hospitals across the country, insisting that this too “is the product of a system that puts profit over people.”
Not so fast. Cumbersome FDA approval processes have been instrumental in slowing the production of much-needed face masks. Moreover, it’s profit-driven private companies such as 3M that are ramping up production of face masks right now in order to bail out the unprepared public health system.
Undaunted, French insists, “If we adequately invested in public hospitals or used state resources to rapidly produce necessary medical equipment, the unfolding pandemic would not hit our health-care system nearly as hard.”
What amount of “investment” would be adequate goes unmentioned. Also unmentioned are the certificate of need (CON) laws still in place in thirty-five states, which require healthcare facilities to get permission from a government commission to expand or otherwise invest in additional medical equipment. These commissions are often stacked with representatives from existing hospitals, who have an incentive to restrict new supply and thus limit competition. Imagine if potential rival retail stores needed to get permission from a committee full of Walmart and Target executives in order to open a new location.
CON laws are one of countless government interventions limiting the supply of medical care in the US. In this the American Medical Association also plays a vital role. As reported by the American Conservative, the AMA “artificially limits the number of doctors, which drives up salaries for doctors and reduces the availability of care.”
For more than a hundred years, the AMA has successfully lobbied governments to enact laws that restrict the number of new doctors in the country. AMA activities have included dramatically decreasing the number of medical schools across the country and turning the process of becoming a doctor into a monumental feat that “requires navigating a maze of accrediting, licensing, and examining bodies.”
The only system putting “profits over people” is that of government interference into the healthcare industry.
French next tries to convince readers that countries with single-payer systems are well equipped to handle the outbreak, unlike the allegedly free market US system.
But on this attempt he also can’t avoid self-contradiction or a downright obfuscation of facts: “Despite the fact that Italy’s health capacity has been overstressed by the particularly brutal explosion of coronavirus there,” he writes, “its universal single-payer health-care system is ensuring that every person, no matter their job or income level, can receive the best treatment possible.”
Well, not every person.
As Politico reported as early as March 3, weeks before French published his article, “anesthesiologists and doctors are being called on to make increasingly tough calls on who gets access to beds and respirators when there are not enough to go around.”
Instead of every person receiving treatment, as French would have you believe is happening, doctors in Italy are forced into “prioritizing younger, otherwise healthy patients over older patients or those with pre-existing conditions.”
French also insists that “Single-payer systems have allowed Denmark and South Korea to quickly institute coronavirus testing on a large scale, which has been essential to their success in slowing the virus’s spread.”
In the case of South Korea, however, it was a previous decision by the government to get the public sector out of the way and allow private sector companies to come to the rescue in cases of emergency that was responsible.
Learning from the 2015 MERS outbreak, reports ProPublica, “Korean officials enacted a key reform, allowing the government to give near-instantaneous approval to testing systems in an emergency.”
The result? “Within weeks of the current outbreak in Wuhan, China, four Korean companies had manufactured tests from a World Health Organization recipe and, as a result, the country quickly had a system that could assess 10,000 people a day.”
In these unprecedented times, many are scared, mourning, and otherwise looking for a villain to blame. Jacobin wants to convince readers that somehow for-profit capitalism is to blame for an underwhelming preparedness. Their argument, however, amounts to little more than sloganeering and half-truths. If anything, it’s the wealth created by capitalist systems that will save lives during this pandemic.
Be seeing you
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: capitalism, certificate of need, Imperial College, Korean, MERS, pharmaceutical companies, Vaccine | Leave a Comment »
Freedom Still Matters, Even in the Midst of a Virus | Mises Wire
Posted by M. C. on April 8, 2020
Protecting our lives and our liberty is a responsibility that is not simply delegated to the government—we still retain it. It is important to remind people of the benefits of a free society during and after this pandemic.
On Friday, Pope Francis delivered a special sermon to pray for an end to the COVID-19 pandemic. Indeed, the depressing scenery of the deserted St. Peter’s Square on the rainy night matched the words of the Holy Father:
Thick darkness has gathered over our squares, our streets and our cities; it has taken over our lives, filling everything with a deafening silence and a distressing void, that stops everything as it passes by; we feel it in the air, we notice in people’s gestures, their glances give them away. We find ourselves afraid and lost.
The image of the “plague” crucifix added a special gravity to this prayer, as the unusually high mortality rates in Italy and especially Lombardy have made the disease seem like a modern plague. Some of my friends there intentionally did not travel to their home cities in fear of infecting their elderly parents and have spent the last four weeks isolated in their rooms. Regardless of our political views, all of us wish for a quick end to this situation. However, as a lot of us devote most of our attention to the “defeat” of the coronavirus, we pave the way for the unrestrained authoritarian measures of our governments.
There’s Little Public Resistance
Most of our government officials have not enforced these measures on their own initiative against a people that completely rejects the curbing of their civil liberties. On the contrary, some politicians feared that they might be seen as as too weak for not supporting lockdowns enough. Make no mistake, there is widespread public acceptance of the restrictions imposed by government, as, for example, the surging approval ratings of the Bavarian minister president, the first in Germany to impose strict measures, show.
This panic policymaking could easily be the basis for a modern form of unlimited government. As Lord Acton remarked:
Whenever a single definite object is made the supreme end of the State…the State becomes for the time inevitably absolute.
Right now, public health, which has already been a popular topic among the modern absolutists, is that single definite object. Politicians and wannabe politicians in the affected Western countries complain about how the health system is not capable of handling this exceptional situation because the government has not spent enough money, and they call for more spending, more taxes, and more debt to fund it. There are more contagious diseases than the novel coronavirus, so why not use the emergency powers to protect against them? The public will be susceptible to these points. COVID-19 might prove to be a similar catchword to “9/11” or “Bataclan,” that can always be invoked to expand the power of the state over the lives of its citizens.
It is important to be aware that the current government interventions are legitimated by the voters. Fear and the desire to abdicate some individual responsibility, which comes with the choice whether to change my lifestyle or not, have been important fuels for this havoc.
Pope Francis framed his sermon around Mark 4:37–41:
And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full. And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish? And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye have no faith? And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another, What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?
The Holy Father notes that we find ourselves in the situation of the disciples, caught off guard by a disaster. And, naturally, in times of crisis, people look to their leaders. The leader of the disciples was Jesus, whom the wind and the sea obeyed. However, our leaders do not have his divine powers, and forgetting that there are limits to what single men and governments can achieve might create a modern absolutism of governments whose powers are assumed to be godlike. Only individual adaption to this new situation will be able to create a sustainable solution. For that, we need our civil liberties and the freedom to make choices for ourselves. Protecting our lives and our liberty is a responsibility that is not simply delegated to the government—we still retain it. It is important to remind people of the benefits of a free society during and after this pandemic.
Be seeing you
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: covid-19, Freedom, Jesus, pandemic | Leave a Comment »
Elizabeth Warren Calls for Mail-In Voting, Ban on Cleaning Voter Rolls, Sworn Statements in Lieu of Voter ID
Posted by M. C. on April 8, 2020
For instance, Warren wants to forgo providing proper identification and instead allow eligible individuals to vote “with a sworn statement of identity instead of a voter ID.”
Says the lady who swore she was a native American.
Where else but the US congress would Warren be tolerated? Oh wait, the University of Houston, University of Pennsylvania and Harvard.
We will all be Chicagoans.
by Hannah Bleau
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) on Tuesday formally joined her progressive counterparts in demanding mail-in voting and took it a step further, pushing a ban on cleaning voter rolls and urging officials to allow eligible individuals to vote “with a sworn statement of identity instead of a voter ID.”…
Be seeing you
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: Elizabeth Warren, Mail-In Voting, Sworn Statements, Voter ID | Leave a Comment »
