Good interview.
ReplyDeleteMy thoughts? I have long been persuaded that the USA will spiral down to a new Dark Age, similar to the one in Western Europe in the 5th to 7th centuries. I think that, 400 to 500 years from now, a completely different high civilization could emerge in the Ohio River Basin valley and Great Lakes region. However, that is much too far in the distant future for any of us to speculate about.
I also think the the future of the USA will be more tan and brown than white. The recent "migrant caravans" from Meso-America look to me like the beginnings of a new Voelkerwanderung - as in "The Germanic tribes are coming, no matter what Rome does!"
Meanwhile, as for the continued spiritual death and self-destruction of the white European American psyche, have a look at this specimen:
Thanks for not raping us, all you ‘good men.’ But it’s not enough.
Hello MB, Wafers,
ReplyDeleteA brief report from France. Things are getting increasingly similar to the US here. Gang shootings on an almost daily basis, kids threatening teachers at gunpoint in schools and streaming it live on facebook etc... The government in the meantime largely ignores the problem and is busy increasing taxes on petrol instead, which fuels (no pun intended) even more resentment from the population. Meanwhile, progs continue to have their heads wedged deep in the usual place. This one came up while you were away:
https://www.spiked-online.com/2018/10/16/political-correctness-an-elite-ideology/
Kanye
New viewer here! I had rotator cuff plus some other stuff back in April. I could drive with the sling on after 2 weeks, about the same time to type. Now I'm mostly back to normal. those ortho guys know their stuff! Good luck with your healing!
ReplyDeleteJim of Olym
https://theotherlifenow.com/
ReplyDeleteRadical Europeans of the Twentieth Century — In Color
Welcome back MB !!
Hi Dr. Berman and Wafers:
ReplyDeleteHope you are enjoying your vacation. Figured all Wafers would like to read Tom Engelhardt's thoughts on near term worsening of the American Empire's predicament. I think his remarks on Trump are very interesting and he may be right.
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/176492/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_unquiet_flows_the_don/#more
Just a few recent American vignettes
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdBRBmXlkrg
What's Killing America's White Men? BBC News
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHH1PMc87Fk
People Keep Scattering Human Remains At Disney Parks
- in line with MB and J H Kunstler's notes on American obsession with fantasy
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteThank you for all yr gd wishes. I'm back in Mexico. This blog will be operative thru Nov. 11, and then reopen (hopefully) on Nov. 22. I'll post again in a day or so when I've managed to catch my breath.
mb
Welcome back Morris! Hope you had FUN on your trip....the US continued its decline at a rapid pace while you were out of the country.
ReplyDeleteThank goodness for the return of The Greatest Blog in the Western Hemisphere! You'll do fine with the shoulder Dr. B, I'm out of the hospital now and recovering now!
ReplyDeleteLots of news and good articles about the decline and fall of pax amerikkkana out there recently, and yet more voting matters delusions on the left and right. WAFers should have heard the uproar when I said I wasn't voting for our two MN senators, including the beloved Amy Klobuchar, since BOTH voted for El Douche's defense budget...
But, I'm afraid Pittsburgh kinda took the wind out of my sails. I just don't know what to say about that.
MB,
ReplyDeleteGood luck on the surgery. I enjoyed the interview.
I think your diagnosis of the American collapse is spot on. One thing I am struggling with is your recommendation to leave the US. While I recognize that living in America is like swimming in a poisoned river, I'm not sure that uprooting my life and leaving my friends and family behind will help me. What about building communities that put distance between us and the rest of society? Or will that inevitably collapse when the shit hits the fan in America?
krakhed
Hello MB and Fellow Wafers,
ReplyDeleteLong time listener, first time caller... anyway, here's a fun one:
K-9 "Officer" (also known as a dog) killed by black guy after he bit the black guy, who happened to be running in terror from police! A whole community is mourning the dog, as opposed to the man the police shot to death at his own baby shower.
https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/officials-say-29-year-old-detroit-man-killed-k-9-officer-before-being-fatally-shot-by-police?__vfz=rtw_top_pages%3D2855700017683
But hey, at least weed is about to be legal in Michigan (for those of you who don't know this, marijuana kills MRSA. Trust me on this one - I am a Type 1 Diabetic with an artificial heart valve who USED to get chronic MRSA. When the system finally collapses and the grocery stores stop having food and the pharmacies stop having drugs, I recommend growing pot, or just moving to Canada or Uruguay and growing pot there).
Good luck with the future! I predict more police killings, but that most people will be too high to notice or care.
Salutations and greetings! Joining the thread after a short period of lurking.
ReplyDeleteProfessor Berman is a recent discovery for me, but his commentary is, if not quite a revelation (as I have long nurtured similar misgivings about this wretched nation), then certainly a crystallizing witness to the inexorable (and not unwelcome) collapse of a country that, as the record suggests, exhibited profoundly pathological traits from its inception. Recent events only serve as further confirmation of long-term developments in the American psyche, though it must be admitted that the moral and cultural blight has now begun to spread at an almost incalculable rate.
Looking forward to documenting the decline... Wishing Berman a safe and steady recovery from his procedure.
Bienvenidos nosotros amigo Berman,
ReplyDeleteI don't quite know how to say "welcome back", pero...I had a great Monday. Looked in the mailbox and there was a small cardboard parcel with the B&N label. Inside - "Spinning Straw Into Gold", "Counting Blessings", (nice cover photo) and "Destiny".
Good reads ahead. The first 8 pieces in "CB" put me in a meditation in the quiet Tuesday morning sun, and so slow, looking out at winter approaching. Solitude I have in spades. Great poetry Morris.
I did call my bookseller to tell her I was feeling guilty because there was no charge, on the receipt, from two weeks ago, for "Destiny" - just a number. I said: "Faith, I want to make sure the author got credited and paid!" She said: "Don't worry, he did. For you, just consider it a gift from the Universe!" I said: "I'm good with that. How 'bout I buy you a cup of coffee at the Starbucks cafe next time I'm down there?" "No problema", she says.
To follow that today, a good interview. Glad you are back for a brief blog window. I had to go back and review a few of the blog topics back into June. But I'm tellin' ya, it was tough, amigo. I was jones-ing there a bit. But I'm better now. I got a few other things done once I stopped shaking all over. Your session will go smoothly. We've got your back.
Mean
Michael -
ReplyDeleteI'm from the south, so I assumed the next civilization would be more like Rome in the Caribbean.
There are so many things to say about migrants. On one hand I'm enraged by how they step on the poor and deprive them of employment, but on the other hand I see that the dominant (European fragment) cultures are reaching their limit. As society fragments, competition with immigrants (both rich and poor) will expand past housing and employment to things like food.
It's a shame that blacks, a group which stood as one of greatest cultural pillars of the world will probably fade away, leaving behind only their artistic achievements. If any nonnative group on the continent had a chance at making a complete culture, it was them. Who will play the blues at their wake?
I admire the principle of jus sanguinis, and would have liked if Trump had put forward the executive order for its implementation (even if it went to the supreme court and was later struck down), as this would protect blacks and the poor.
Dr. Berman-best wishes for a speedy, uneventful, and peaceful recovery.
ReplyDeleteAt an academic health CONference--it's exciting that the america's "best" and brightest" were dumber than shit. Mental masturbation and we need to /should talk! Just awesome to help with finishing off the empire.
We need you! Don't know what to do with myself w/o the Wafers. In the meantime, there's Ravel.
A few comments from the north:
ReplyDeleteToronto recently hosted the debate of David Frum and Steve Bannon... it stirred up the usual protests... but one Canadian satirical publication nailed it long before the debate took place. https://www.thebeaverton.com/2018/09/munk-debates-steve-bannon-and-david-frum-to-debate-whether-hate-crimes-are-better-than-war-crimes/
And there is a new caravan threat to America... https://outabouter.com/2018/11/01/more-troops-mobilized-in-us-as-caravan-of-winter-adverse-canadians-spotted-heading-for-the-border/
And on a more serious note one Canadians attempt to warn us about the future as America collapses... https://thewalrus.ca/americas-next-civil-war/
And finally good luck with your surgery. We can't imagine life without the GSWH.
MB - Glad you're back, at least for a short time! Missed the blog. Great interview.
ReplyDeleteWe're back in the US, and have begun the process of getting rid of stuff in prep to moving to Italy. No fun at all, but we're looking forward to finally getting out.
Meanwhile, check out Paul Craig Roberts' article, "What This Election Is About". His final statement says it all (although he still holds out a little hope, I think.):
"My conclusion is that America is doomed. The people, with few exceptions, are not smart enough to continue to exist."
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2018/11/05/what-this-election-is-about/
krak-
ReplyDeleteCheck out the New Monastic Option in Twilight.
Terrible news, the GOP losing the House. Not gd at all.
mb
Welcome back Dr. Berman.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the Republicans lost the House, take heart. After two years of the most shameful, corrupt and inhuman policies (i.e. stealing babies from their parents, etc), Trump is still riding pretty high with most Americans. 44 percent approval rating and they gained seats in the Senate. No, all is not lost!
Enjoy your morphine drip and best wishes for a speedy recovery!
Welcome back, MB!
ReplyDeleteThe collapse over the past few weeks have been pretty remarkable -- pipe bombs, an antisemitic mass shooting, 2 innocent and random black people killed in a grocery store, Trump's hysteria over a migrant caravan, sending troops to the border, and on and on and on. I think the Dem win of the House is a good thing, because it's going to enrage Trump even more. Like a cornered animal, it's going to get ugly. Plus, the GOP still controls the Senate, Supreme Court, and White House. The House Dems will spend most of their time obsessing over Kav, Russia, Trump's taxes, Trump's tweets etc. Pesky stuff like health care, our national debt, or rising income inequality will simply remain in the back seat.
I walked past a voting station yesterday and just couldn't bring myself to do it. Why legitimize a system that doesn't give a shit about me or even my community? The best thing I did yesterday was take time off of work and unplug from the TV and Internet. It felt great to walk outside and leave my phone behind.
Not related to the election or downfall of the US at all, but good article here:
ReplyDeletehttps://newrepublic.com/article/152111/oldest-books-say-us
rare that anyone remembers Walter Benjamin's "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" these days...
TY MB for the Mandibles tip, surprised me that our local library (a great one recently voted best in the nation interesting that the major funding came from a pretty far right republican)has a copy on the shelves looking forward to reading it. I think you are exactly right when you tell Americans who might listen to get out now, and I agree with you that history's lesson will be for the rest of humanity to never follow the American experiment - it failed miserably and will kill your soul. 2030 sounds about right too - only 12 short years away.
ReplyDeleteTake care MB, I only have one more refill on my tranquilizers - I'm contemplating whether or not I should ask my doc to induce a coma if they run out b4 you return.
It's been an exciting time while you were out! The vaunted "blue wave" hit a "red tide" and as a result we now have a gridlock situation here in Washington that hands the House gavel back to Botoxface 2, Electric Boogaloo. Herr Trumpenfuhrer seems thrilled with the outcome, and why shouldn't he be? Not only did he gain several Rethuglican Senators who are slightly to the right of Attila the Hun, but until the Dumbocrats nominate their prez candidate 18 or so months from now he gets to point to Pelosi as the "face" of the opposition. No doubt Pelosi and company will play right into his tiny hands by opening more pointless investigations and beating the utterly played out Russia narrative like the mummified skeleton of a dead horse instead of, say, introducing legislation to actually help struggling Americans. As a friend of mine who is completely apolitical put it so well when he saw Pelosi on teevee not long ago, "that has to be the single dumbest human being on the face of the earth."
ReplyDeleteIn any event, now that the bullshit midterms are over the media will no doubt be breathlessly awaiting the first official Dumbocrat presidential campaign announcements, probably right after the new year. And thus do idiot America's neverending political campaigns, like its neverending wars, just roll on and on as the country's infrastructure slowly rots away along with the brains of its denizens.
Anyway, welcome back, MB!
Why, it’s like you never left:
ReplyDeleteA Justice Department press release reveals that former J P Morgan trader John Edwards has plead guilty to one count of commodities fraud and one count each of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, price manipulation and spoofing. As part of his plea, Edmonds said that from 2009 through 2015 he conspired with other J.P. Morgan traders to manipulate the prices of gold, silver, platinum and palladium futures contracts. He and others routinely placed orders that were quickly cancelled before the trades were executed, a price-distorting practice known as spoofing. This technique can be used to either drive up or drive down the commodity price.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/06/ex-jp-morgan-trader-pleads-guilty-to-manipulating-metals-markets.html
Welcome back, safe surgery say we all.
Dr. Berman, generally I'm mostly a lurker, though this is definitely first web site I go to every morning. Have read the WAFER trilogy but health issues and free VA care keep me here in good ol'USA. Been trying to keep off the grid since I got "enlightened" so many years ago. Anyway, thought it might be good news Dems won back the house till I realized Pelosi would still be running the show! Nothing ever changes but the freefall off the cliff.
ReplyDeleteNew Chris Hedges interview....The ROT in the American System.
ReplyDeletehttps://theintercept.com/2018/11/07/chris-hedges-on-elections-christian-fascists-and-the-rot-within-the-american-system/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2018/11/06/america-is-no-longer-attracting-the-top-minds-in-physics/
ReplyDeleteAmerica Is No Longer Attracting The Top Minds In Physics. International enrollment and applications to American grad schools are plummeting.
GSWH & WAFERS alike, I have missed this blog. I had developed a case of ennui. Living in this cesspool of a nation does NOT afford a human being much honesty or life affirming dialogue or interaction. Glad you're back, if only for a short time.
ReplyDelete"Blue wave" in the US is/was a fantasy as the Repubiclican's(intentional) gerrymandered themselves in back in 2010.... even if they hadn't, it would have just prolonged the inevitable: American self destruction & the general end to modernity.... may something of the world survive this decay!
Peace,
Rufus
PS Best wishes for an uneventful surgery & a speedy recovery
On the ravages of the digital age, here's a somewhat impressionistic but insightful commentary on the atomized nature of modern-day interaction:
ReplyDeletehttps://lareviewofbooks.org/article/crisis-intimacy-age-digital-connectivity/#
I guess the supreme irony is that, contrary to the quaint and self-flattering conceit that technology would aspire to match and even transcend humankind, we have excelled rather preemptively in reducing ourselves to the levels of machine intelligences: interchangeable, impersonal and rudimentary. Quantifiable and discrete data sets easily convertible for impersonal mass consumption. The computers have become less like us and we more like them.
The anomie will only get worse before it gets better.
Welcome back, Dr. Berman. Good luck with your surgery.
ReplyDeletePastrami and Coleslaw,
I am heartbroken. Like you, I don’t know what else to say.
Meanwhile, this is what Bill Gates is focused on:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-world-deserves-better-toilet-bill-gates/
What a douche.
Hey MB, glad you are enjoying life. I dont know about you but I cannot wait for the political theater from the mid-terms.
ReplyDeleteHello Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteI hope you are doing well. It is good to have you back. Thanks for the link to the interview.
On the subject of American decline, here is a good article that throws cold water on all of the talk about our supposedly booming economy.
“Proof Poverty in the U.S. Is Getting Exponentially Worse”
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/proof-poverty-in-the-u-s-is-getting-exponentially-worse/
Greetings MB and Wafers!
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you're back, MB! After a few days w/o you and the Wafer blog, I found myself languishing in utter solitude; an isolation which sent me into a deep, deep psychosis. So much so, that one morning I woke up in a sanitarium, where I was confined for several days. Apparently, on Halloween night, I had concocted a number of cockamamie scenarios. One scenario found me dressed up like Trumpi, whereby I approached complete strangers, handed them a pair of large scissors from my trousers and invited them to snip away at my clothing resulting in my near nudity. In another, I crawled inside a large cloth bag, either alone or w/an Ivanka doppelgänger, took off my clothes, and engaged in some form of sex. Often times, I would just sit in the bag, for hours, moving occasionally, and then only slightly, to provoke the interest of the passersby who gathered to watch. One observer thought it to be a form of avant-garde art, and invited me to a London symposium on the the destruction of culture. In any case, the authorities considered my erratic behavior quite threatening. I tell ya, I'm happy to be back from my hypnotically dreamlike state, and engaged on the greatest blog in the universe.
Miles
Unknown-
ReplyDeleteI don't post Unknowns. You need a real handle. Thanks.
Wafers-
The vigor of this blog continues unabated. I can't get over how fabulous we are. And thanks 2u all for gd wishes on my shoulder operation, I appreciate it.
Meanwhile, we just have this short window for now, i.e. thru Nov. 11. Then I'll try again at an Internet café in Mexico City on Nov. 22, see if I can actually type with my arm in a sling.
Midterm elections: with a Dem House, it may be more difficult for Trumpi to do as much damage as he wd like. I worry abt that, because I like to have my Trumpis unfettered, like wrecking balls. The last 2 yrs have been a declinist's dream, after all, and I wd hate to see that process slowed down.
Dulouz-
Don't lurk; live! Glad to have you on the blog, amigo.
Bill-
The way you write abt our decline...I tell ya, it's sheer poetry. But in general, the way in which the American head is rammed up the American ass is an inspiration to us all. There are days when I can't believe all of this is actually happening. Am I Rip van Winkle? Did I go to sleep just before Carter got defeated in 1980, and woke up 35 yrs later, and said: No, I'm sure I'm still asleep; this *can't* be real.
mb
Dr. B-
ReplyDeleteWelcome back and best wishes for your upcoming surgery.
You were 100% correct in your prediction-
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/07/parkland-student-activists-florida-races-pro-gun-nra
From the article- Pain for Parkland students after pro-gun candidates win: 'I'm shaking with anger'
Despite months of tireless campaigning, student activists watched with frustration as Florida races failed to bring change
Birn-
ReplyDeleteYou'd think it wd lead to greater insight on the part of the students, regarding the 'value' of prog activity, the true nature of the country, and the 'meaning' of their lives. These things will not happen. What *will* happen is deeper CRE.
Jeff-
There are times when I contemplate our greatness, and get dizzy as a result.
mb
Welcome back MB !!! Missed the GSWH and Wafers ...
ReplyDeleteHope you had a great vacation and please tell the Doctor that you need to be able to start typing asap.. Hoping for a speedy recovery !!
Some amazing Amrikan talent here :
Two middle-school girls -- ages 11 and 12 -- brought knives to their Florida school in a foiled plot to kill classmates, cut them up and drink their blood before killing themselves, police officials said Wednesday. "They told us they were Satan worshipers,"
Girls brought knives to school
And just another day, another shooting in Amrika ...
shooting at Southern California bar
Hey but US is the greatest country on Earth.. go Trumpi.. USA USA USA ....
George-
ReplyDeleteYeah...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/11/08/multiple-injuries-reported-bar-shooting-thousand-oaks-calif/?utm_term=.9bb692909fb2
Do ya think there might be just a little something wrong w/this country?
mb
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteA few notes abt my trip to England and Ireland.
England was largely disappointing. I found the atmosphere in London unfriendly--cold and alienating--and everything was hellishly expensive. A cup of tea at Fortnum & Mason's costs 8 quid--about 11 USD. Everyone rushing around on cell phones, trying to get 'ahead'. Noise, pressure, not a moment's peace. As for Cornwall: a big change from when I was there last, in 1973. Again, everything very expensive, and instead of quiet art colonies, the place is drowning in commercial consumerism. A few gd private art galleries, but prices start at abt 1000 pounds (I bought postcards instead).
Ireland: my friends live in a rural area, abt 30 miles outside of Cork. We went to Lough Gur (Loch Gair), to the Grange stone circle--Bronze Age, abt 3000 yrs old, 47.5 meters in diameter. What an atmosphere. Another time, we went to a pub that hosts a weekly music nite, where everyone brings their own instrument: guitar, fiddle, accordion, concertina. Some folks sang; one guy told jokes. This was a survival of a native musical tradition that the British Empire did not manage to destroy. I cdn't help comparing it to the world of Meghan Markle with her wonderful hats (so exciting), with progs and Trumpites, with American hustlers running around on fones, making 'deals', and so on. Real life vs. Theater, pretension, turkey world. It was the South without the slavery--my idea of the Great Society, a world in which other people are potential comrades rather than potential rivals. A society that values community, friendship, and craftsmanship, rather than the drive to be No. 1, or to be rich or important. Natural Waferdom. I'll be back.
mb
MB - Interesting comments on England. London is ridiculously expensive pretty much everywhere, and on top of it all, all the pubs have been taken over by chains, and the pub food is now not very good. It's very difficult to find a good pub/pub food in London anymore. Definitely NOT a change for the better.
ReplyDeleteTo your comments on Ireland, I just read Linh Dinh's latest, which touches on the theme of Real Life vs Theater, pretension, turkey world, among other things. Worth a read, I think.
http://www.unz.com/ldinh/nation-above-all/
PS - Best of luck with the surgery, we'll miss you!
New video with Chris Hedges..
ReplyDelete"The nature of Illusion is that it's designed at least for the moment to make you feel good about who you are, about your country, about where you're going. In that sense it kind of functions like a drug and those that question that illusion are challenged not so much for the veracity of what they say but for puncturing those feelings.
Attempt to get up and question who we are and where we're going and the critique will be that you're such a pessimist, such a cynic - that you're not an optimist.
Optimism becomes a kind of disease then... where you have this cheerful optimism in the face of utter catastrophe and you plow forward in an optimism that is no longer connected with reality.
If hope becomes something that you express through illusion then it's no longer hope - It's fantasy."
https://vimeo.com/293802639
Good to see you back!
ReplyDeleteThe coverage of these elections was really quite surreal. I think Trumpis succeeded in the final conversion of all society into a form of reality TV.
One of my local districts had one of the pre-fabricated Millennial Women Avenger win, and she gave a speech that may have been appropriate to winning an eighth grade class election. 'Successful' Millenials seem only capable of offering a further slide into infantalism.
BTW, mass shootings also seem infantile in a certain perspective. It's how a child would express feelings.
Adults like challenge, nuance, difficulty. Americans like candy, winning, killing everybody when they feel bad.
Welcome back Dr. B! I think you know by now that you were missed by many, including me.
ReplyDeleteI love Ireland and even though I haven't been there in 35 years I think of it often. The hills, the fog, the rain and the people all seemed to be delightfully intertwined. I, too, have enjoyed hearing live music and spontaneous singing in Irish pubs, in Gaelic no less. Your story makes me want to return, and I probably will before I go to my reward.
Welcome back, and come back to us just as soon as you are able. Good luck with the surgery.
MB and Wafers: I hope the Irish are able to hang on to their culture. Maybe they are fated to save Western civilization again. Regarding the US midterms, I say never fear. The so-called “most important election of our lifetimes” will have no lasting impact on the course of events. It’s like a dose of morphine added to the drip line of a terminal cancer patient: temporary relief followed by a return to normal -- to the steady march of the cancer. In this case the palliative patient is good old Uncle Sammy, and he’s been drinking lots of Kool-Aid lately. The midterms were offered up as a miracle cure, but already we can see they just fed the cancer. The president is a cult leader with millions of devoted followers -- fearful, ignorant lemmings drawn to his fantasy world. They won’t quit the cult even if he collapses over a bucket of KFC while watching Fox and Friends. We’re in for some turbocharged chaos in the coming months.
ReplyDeleteMB, you're story of the lotus held to a rock has an analog in Jesus' parable of the sower. Some of the seed falls on good soil takes root and thrives, others are choked out by weeds, and some fall on rock to whither and die in the sun. I have a difficult time believing any kind of authentic Christianity ever took root in America, if you go looking it won't be found in 99% of American churches. It's interesting the seed is sown indiscriminately as though the good crop would always be a minority.
ReplyDeleteGood luck again with your upcoming surgery, Dr Berman. I'm sure we'll have the blog back full-time soon.
ReplyDeleteAs for London, it's the entrance to hell. All kinds of criminals and hustlers from the whole world gravitate to it like shit circling the toilet drain. In fact, my prediction is that the UK will collapse sooner than the US. Brexit, like Trump, is an act of God, but it's much more devastating and irreversible.
And now I must apologise for bringing up a very controversial subject but I think it's interesting to watch this presentation about the 2nd amendment. I am not going to endorse his views, but I would beg people here in favour of gun control to watch it carefully in its entirety or not at all and save time. Thanks.
Anjin-
ReplyDeleteQ: Does Mr. Hedges include in his category of fantasy and illusion his repeated call for the masses to rise up against their corporate masters? Or does that particular illusion somehow qualify for an exemption? Just curious.
Pete-
But what events like these, including the Russia probe, do, is keep everybody worked up, believing that these are real and important things. Like Gore Vidal, I find mass stupidity fascinating.
Dio-
The No. 1 reason I left the US is that I literally had no one to talk to. I just wrote the Mint, asking them to replace "In God We Trust" with the following ditty: "Our Heads Our Rammed; Our Culture--Damned." Wd also make a gd Wafershirt.
mb
Median across 25 countries saying China plays a more important role in the world than it did 10 years ago:
ReplyDeleteChina ����: 70%
Russia ����: 41
Germany ����: 35
U.S. ����: 31
India ����: 27
France ����: 22
UK ����: 21
http://www.pewglobal.org/2018/10/01/trumps-international-ratings-remain-low-especially-among-key-allies/
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteSomeone just sent me this link:
https://thoughtmaybe.com/advertising-at-the-edge-of-the-apocalypse/
I have no time to screen it rt now, but it sounds worthwhile.
mb
More proof that liberals have gone insane: A Red Line Crossed': Nationwide Protests Declared for Thursday at 5PM After Jeff Sessions Fired Just because Trump was mean to evil old troll Jeff Sessions, we're now expected to treat the asshole as if he was some kind of hero? How many of these idiots have ever smoked a joint or done a line of blow--actions for which Herr Sessions would have gladly seen them locked up for years in the nearest federal penitentiary?
ReplyDeleteLiberals have gone insane, part 2--the very worst take on the midterms comes from Clinton water carrier Robert Reich: America Has Rejected Trumpism. Really? Then how come Trump did substantially better in the midterms than Obarfa did in 2010 and 2014?
And almost right on schedule comes word that Hillary fangirl, the Notorious RBG (puke), has fallen and she may not be able to get back up. I swear, Trump's luck is almost supernatural--it's almost as if he was sent here by some divine entity to punish America for its very serious sins.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteIf it's any consolation, never underestimate the Democrats' ability to screw themselves out of every opportunity that's handed to them. Pelosi's recent statements make clear that they have no agenda other than to put on the usual pantomime of #Resistance.
Meanwhile, the spectacle of identity politics grows more blatant and pandering seemingly by the hour.
https://www.rt.com/usa/443459-trumps-clash-cnn-huckerbee/
https://www.rt.com/usa/443476-alyssa-milano-disavows-farrakhan/
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/democrats-turn-on-avenatti-after-white-male-slip-up
MB,
ReplyDeleteGood luck with your upcoming surgery. When you wake up, it'll be a little closer to X-mas. I recommend you ask Santa Claus for this (I know it's on my X-mas list).
https://www.thesun.co.uk/fabulous/7689563/yves-saint-laurent-ysl-penis-jewellery/
Quick pop quiz: name a civilizational value, ideal, or aspiration that is shared by at least 80% of Americans. Are there any @ all?
ReplyDeleteGeoffrey-
ReplyDeleteWinning, getting 'ahead', being No. 1, demonstrating your own importance, etc. Aspiration shared by 99%.
Emerson-
I need all the penis jewelry I can get. Problem is, I can't afford Yves' prices.
Nic-
To sum up: America is a joke country filled with joke people. Basically, a large collection of morons.
mb
Semper Fi:
ReplyDeletehttps://edition.cnn.com/us/live-news/california-shooting-intl/index.html
mb
Hey ugly racist kike, how's your sexless existence?
ReplyDeleteBest wishes for smooth sailing through the operating theatre, MB!
ReplyDeleteYour words about leaving America for having no one to talk to ring so true for me. What a loveless place. Every interaction is a status play. Everyone addicted, medicated, stressed to the point of psychosis, fanatically obtuse, pathologically narcissistic, relentlessly exploitative. Did I mention the bludgeoning stupidity? Or the open corruption?
All together hustling for our lives!
I've dreamt of getting out forever, one way or another. As a child I packed my pretend suitcase to "escape." But it's not always so easy, is it?
Godspeed to all Wafers!
Dr. B,
ReplyDeleteThe documentary(?) "Advertising At the Edge of the Apocalypse" is worth watching. I'm quite certain that most if not all of the folks who follow your blog already know the stuff presented in the video. Nevertheless, the presentation is well done, the claims well supported.
I ended watching two other videos in the thoughtmaybe.com site: Digital Amnesia and The Dark Side of the Smartphone. Both excellent as well. Bookmarked the site and definitely will be spending more time viewing other videos.
Also watched "First Reformed" on your recommendation. Great script, beautiful cinematography and editing. I also love that they shot in the 4x5(?) format instead of the usual 16:9 widescreen. I appreciated the reference to paradoxical consciousness early in the film. Then later on the implication of finding salvation in the soma?
Great interview as usual. I reread the chapter "Playing TAPs" in AWTY. Hard as I try, I cannot disagree. And I'm finding it harder and harder to relate to the other corporate drone coworkers, five days a week. I find solace in reading Wandering God.
Hola MB and Wafers,
ReplyDeleteA provocative piece:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/04/the-american-civil-war-didnt-end-and-trump-is-a-confederate-president
Gore Vidal's Ravello home is up for sale. Anybody have 21.1 million? Would be a wonderful Wafer compound:
https://variety.com/2015/dirt/real-estalker/for-sale-gore-vidals-italian-cliffhanger-1201629757/
Another day, another mass shooting...more bloody blowback from America's endless wars where the shooter served as a hired goon for empire. If I may quote MB:
"Only an act of God can save us now, and personally I don't believe in miracles."
Miles
ps: Wish I could bring u a Canter's Brooklyn Ave. during post-op, MB. Good luck w/yr shoulder surgery.
Jesus,
ReplyDeleteUgly-
Hey, listen up you miserable vaginal blood fart: You are NOTHING more than the afterbirth of a gutter-fuck whore.
Sincerely,
Miles
Ugly-
ReplyDeleteHatred means I'm getting under yr skin, dumbo. The opposite of love is not hatred, you dumb shmuck; it's apathy. You have a lot of energy for me, n'est-ce pas? Good! That shd keep you busy for yrs to come. An excellent way to fill the huge emptiness that is your life; truly worthwhile. Clearly, ya done your parents proud. I can hear them now: "Gosh, what a fine son we raised!"
(Wafers: I usually delete hate mail, but I wanted to give y'all a reminder of what's out there. But never fear: I'm sure Ugly will seek out psychotherapy, try to allow a little love to enter his life. He seems like an open, fundamentally decent sorta guy.)
mb
Jeff-
ReplyDeleteGuardian article is abs. correct, follows logically from WAF ch. 4. The North never did, and never will, apologize to the South, so what we have had since 1865 is the return of the repressed. Trumpi is our Confederate shadow. I don't think I said it explicitly in WAF, but the Civil War legacy is the rock on which the US will finally break.
I tried to visit Gore's home in Ravello when I was in Italy in 2017, but cdn't get in: they were using it to make a movie abt his life, starring Kevin Spacey. They also told me it was for sale, at a mere 20 million euros. I told them I wd check my bank acct and get back to them. Ravello, in any case, is gorgeous.
As for poor Ugly: I'm sure that deep down inside him, there is a wealth of love and kindness just trying to get out. Mark my words: he'll seek therapy, become a changed man.
mb
Then how come Trump did substantially better in the midterms than Obarfa did in 2010 and 2014?
ReplyDeleteA fair question, and I believe I have a halfway-decent answer: A lot of white working-class folk hated Obamacare, and many of them still do. I think it may have been the biggest tactical blunder the Democratic Party ever committed. And that's sayin' somethin'! :-0
I've been re-reading Christopher Lasch lately, and boy, does his analysis hit the nail right on the head in light of modern events. For French Wafers, a very interesting short book came out lately:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.amazon.fr/Christopher-Lasch-populisme-vertueux-Beauchard/dp/2841868982/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1541749548&sr=8-1&keywords=lasch+populisme+vertueux
I also found similarities in his work and your work MB - i.e. Winnicott, transcendent/vertical experience as a key defence mechanism of narcissism etc...
What would Lasch think today seeing Trump & technodouchebags around?!
Kanye
MB
ReplyDeleteGood question... I doubt that Chris Hedges ever will be able to let go of his illusion that a revolution can occur in America. I don't share that illusion with him.
I posted the quote because it mirrors my life experiences. I live in Canada and for 25 years I worked in my cities "skid row" trying to end poverty and foster community. I started in a small community run health center and eventually ended running a small non-profit housing society.
There was a collegial group of people that I worked with over the years and when I finally burned out and retired many people commented that I should feel proud of what I had achieved.
I would state that I felt no such thing because objectively speaking conditions of poverty were much, much worse than when I started, i.e. thousands of homeless people including mothers and children, food banks everywhere in the city that didn't exist when I began, increased opioid and other drug addictions, no living wage, and so on.
And so I heard a lot of comments about being too cynical and negative. And conversely I thought they were denying reality.
And that is why I posted that quote. It rang true to my life.
And that is why I read this blog faithfully. It doesn't deny reality. And rings true to my life.
The last thing Hedges says in the video is "You can't talk about hope if you can't see reality - and reality is pretty bleak but that's the starting point." He is, at least, part Wafer.
Anjin-
ReplyDeleteIt's all just words, finally. I see Hedges as trying to have his cake and eat it too. He wants to be both a declinist and a progressive, and reality doesn't work that way. He spends a lot of time *denying* reality, as far as I can see; denying what he knows is really the case. Talk about living in illusion! His 'hope' is a false hope. And calling for revolution when yr safely ensconced in a cushy NY apt.--Jesus, what can I say. I'm waiting for the day when he will declare an Uprising of the Masses Day, and lead an assault on the Pentagon and Wall St. *That* wd be walking one's talk. (When pigs fly)
BTW: in future, pls watch length. Thank you.
mb
ReplyDelete'Increasing' mass shootings pose 'most serious threat' in US, expert says
https://abcn.ws/2OA7Pd4
A Mississippi man (No Doubt a Trump Supporter) was reportedly fired from his nursing job on Thursday after a viral photo showed him wearing a Confederate t-shirt -- emblazoned with a noose and the words "Mississippi Justice" -- while voting in the midterm elections.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/mississippi-man-fired-after-wearing-confederate-flag-shirt-to-vote-in-midterms
Welcome back!
ReplyDeleteDr. B, I hope there's a new hitch in your giddyup after Ireland, am glad you are back safe, and best wishes on your surgery! How was the Guinness?
Wafers, it is good to reconnect again; I've missed all, including your wisdom.
On the elections: well, in the USA it's all about money, not votes. I mean, it's not like Americans care about the greater good, or anything at all except money. My understanding is that the Orange One effect has led to more money backing the demos, for now, so the richer suburbs switched horses. One article I read talked about the "blue wave" from the coasts engulfing the rest of the country ... we shall see, given that there's a good chance actual water will engulf the coastal areas.
RE: the massacres in Thousand Oaks, CA bar and Tallahassee Fl yoga studio,
ReplyDeletePlease look out for:
bottom lip biting, sad piano musak, hugging, light shows, candles, pensive "news" reporting, "experts" selling their "experistise," replays of sirens/lights flashing, calls to come together and getting to the bottom of what happened, let this not interfere with who we are talk, hero obsessions w/ the intense need to identify the 'heros', calls for ending gun violence with blue ribbon panels, etc...all to get the us mental masturbation on and give a glimmer of 'hope'....
NO discussion abt WHY these massacres occur so often in the us empire. No discussion of why the us was intellectually, spirituality, and ontologically vapid. No connecting any dots.
Rinse, lather, repeat--The denial of reality.
Mike-
ReplyDeleteA few yrs ago I suggested that every American be given an AK-47 and told to gun down anyone they see. What was then satire now seems to be turning into reality.
mb
Here Comes ‘Smart Dust,’ the Tiny Computers That Pull Power from the Air
ReplyDeletehttps://www.wsj.com/articles/here-comes-smart-dust-the-tiny-computers-that-pull-power-from-the-air-1541689224
We’ll be able to wander in our meaningless samsara much more quickly and efficiently now.
Roboto: As someone who just got out of the hospital with a $330,000 bill, of which I had to pay (so far) around $1600 out of pocket, I'm a "thank Odin for whatever healthcare you can get, and get it not matter what" guy now. I'll agree that Obummercare is was a huge missed opportunity, but there were plenty of people I met in there who are now also thanking Ishtar they too had at least something.
ReplyDeleteBut, for profit healthcare is the biggest idiot idea since flushing your toilet with potable water. I'm on an autoimmune drug now that costs less that $200 to make and costs $35,000 to get and administer (via IV). WT and F? Just the cost of the dumbass F-35 fighter (looking at you Bernie Sanders) could at least give some sort of minimum health/dental care to everyone.
Miles & WAFers
ReplyDeleteWe should commence a GoFundMe for our professor, so that he can be sheltered as resident scholar in the Vidal Italian home. That or it should b made into a museum of declinism % empire!
Welcome back Professor Berman
So, I'm coming out of Wal-Fart when a young lady asks me if I'm a local resident and would I sign her petition (she had accosted me when I came in I told her I was in a rush). So I stop and listen to her spiel, but as I'm signing I ask her age. 23 she says. So I figure she's standing in the cold after an election she needs to hear the truth. I told her she should get out of the US as fast as possible, go to any other country you can while you can. At first she laughed but when I told her I'm dead serious I saw a panicked affect suggesting she knew deep down it is true. I don't care anymore if I look like a lunatic with an end is near sign. I really didn't want to believe it but after all that's been said and done over the last two years when an election happens that could check Trump and he actually gains seats in the senate then the jury is back the verdict is in - American heads are indeed full of dog shit.
ReplyDeleteWhat planet is this columnist on?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/09/white-women-vote-republican-why
I mean, yes, I am not a woman, but this is so beyond reason I don't even know what to say... delusions of the Progs ... or whatever Moira is.
Amrikans are a fucking joke ... .. yes, please give everyone an AK47 and let them kill each other.. what a fucking joke this is .. Bush gets a Liberty Medal.. seriously nothing matters anymore...
ReplyDeleteGeorge Bush started an immoral war and he's getting the Liberty Medal
The reason you see Democrats like former vice president and 2020 White House aspirant Joe Biden — who'll be handing the Bushes their medals on Sunday — aiding in the restoration of W.'s reputation is because too many of us so desperately cling to notions that American Exceptionalism makes it impossible to have a criminally bad president — and that a few acts of elite humanitarianism can bring redemption for a "colossal mistake" that was actually a war crime.
Ugly - Why don't you just fuck off to the ugly shithole you came from and continue leading your brainless existence...
MB--I watched the Advertising on the Edge of the Apocalypse video and enjoyed the first 50 minutes immensely. I had always viewed the intrusiveness of American advertising as a symptom of our decline, but the movie makes a good point that it is in fact an integral part of it. Unfortunately, they chose to go all Hedgian in the final ten minutes--offering false hope that we can still turn things around with "awareness." Exactly how such awareness is going to spread among the masses who spend every autumn Sunday from noon 'til near midnight sprawled on their couches, stuffing their fat faces and mindlessly cheering as a bunch of roided up gladiators try to out-maim each other is never explained.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of awareness--today has been a truly surreal one for the American media. Here they were trying to quietly bury the latest mass shooting story down the memory hole as fast as possible because the shooter, who spent a tour as a Marine gunning down Afghani civilians, is pretty clearly blowback from that awful war. Instead they wanted to focus all of their attention and butthurt on Trump being mean to odious CNN White House pool reporters (who were nothing but compliant lapdogs and stenographers when Obama was in office), yet Paradise inconveniently disrupted the narrative by burning to the ground. I said yesterday that Trump's luck seems almost supernatural--just as supernatural as the number of apocalyptic weather-related events that have hit the U.S. since his ignorant ass took office. These are really interesting times to be a declinist.
Bill-
ReplyDeleteI agree, these domestic killings are the inevitable result of our foreign killings. Chickens come home to roost.
mb
Pastrami and Coleslaw & Roboto:
ReplyDeleteMy 55-year old brother-in-law lost his good job of 30 years about 3 years ago and moved back in with my widower father-in-law. He did not look for another job, and did not sign up for Obamacare because he is ultra-conservative (hates Obama,) even though he could have afforded the $400+ per month premiums, due to wise investments and savings. He was recently hospitalized and had to have surgery and now owes the hospital $75,000.
@cel-ray
ReplyDeleteOf course Moira doesn't see herself as being a member of a hate group, does she? To quote:
"The most likely answer seems to be that white women vote for Republicans for the same reason that white men do: because they are racist. Trump, with his raucous rallies and his bloviating, combative style, has offered his supporters an opportunity to savor the pleasures of being cruel. It is likely that the white women who voted for him in 2016, and who will vote for him again in 2020, find this racist sadism gratifying. It is fun for them."
So any woman who doesn't don a pussy hat and run into the arms of the morally bankrupt Democrats is a sadistic racist?! My youngest daughter lives in England and I've tried to explain to her how poisonous the political atmosphere is here now. But it looks like it's crossed the ocean.
@Bill
My favorite saying by Nietzsche :
“When you stare into the abyss the abyss stares back at you.”
MB -
ReplyDeleteHow many messages do you get like that from Ugly above? I don't know how they meant it, as a joke, serious, or what, but I think no matter how seriously, they're obviously a sad person. Really it's best to feel bad for people like that, likely they were hurt by their parents or the world in general, who knows. A lot of people don't even realize they're damaged & hurt, so they just lash out. Some people cope with their emptiness with drugs, some use anger.
Wafers, GSWH,
ReplyDeleteRe: The USMC trained killer/taxpayer-underwritten gunman of Thousand Oaks. One of my few friends is an MD in Houston. He posed the question to me yesterday "Why does the media not call it what is is? Domestic terrorism!" Many of wee Wafers have asked the same question for many years now. As have many whom wee do not know as Wafers. (lots of lurkers out there)
Bill, Morris - it is just that. Blowback.
As the natives observed about the infamous Donner Party's cannibalism "They eat each other." What goes around comes around.
MB - what would be the lodging of choice and convenience in Manhattan come next April's Wafer Summit?
mean-
ReplyDeleteI always stay in the West Village. My favorite usta be the Larchmont on W.11th, but they closed down, sad to say. Suggest you google Hotels West Village NYC. Also, Cheap Hotels in New York might be helpful.
Aaron-
"One is too many," as the saying goes. I get enuf; they are frequently anti-Semitic. Re: not dealing w/yr own inner pain, and then attacking other people as a result: I recall that someone once said, a propos the Nazi burning of books by Jewish psychoanalysts (Freud, Adler, Reich, et al.) that the irony was that they were burning the very books that cd help them. Occasionally I do feel sorry for these people and try to help, make some suggestions regarding therapy or whatever, but I'm 100% sure that this only generates more pain and rage. I don't know how old Ugly is, but I can tell you that between now and the day of his death, nothing will change for him. "Haters gonna hate." There will never come a moment of insight in which he suddenly realizes: Shit, this is no way to live. An additional sobering thought: How many Uglys does the US contain? Brr. It was a bit horrifying to read a message like that, sent only a short while after the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre. I imagine that the slaughter of Jews makes him happy.
Susan-
My favorite Nietzsche quote: "The man who has a why can live with any how."
Birn-
Did he then change his view of Obama and Obamacare? I'm curious.
mb
ps: So Michelle attacks Trumpi, and Trumpi responds in kind. This is news? Who cd possibly give a shit abt this? (Answer: stupid people)
ReplyDeleteps2: This, on the other hand, is news:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/09/matthew-whitaker-acting-attorney-general-wpm-scam
Will Americans care? What do *you* think?
mb
ps3: Nor will this bother them:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/nov/09/fail-state-documentary-for-profit-colleges
Ah, playing with matches and playing with Nietzsche... Will it be a cozy bonfire or National Socialism?
ReplyDeleteHere's another Nietszche quote:
All that has been done on earth against "the nobles," the "mighty," the "overlords," ... is as nothing compared to what the Jews did against them: the Jews, that priestly people who were only able to obtain satisfaction against their enemies and conquerors through a radical revaluation of the latter’s values, that is, by an act of the most spiritual revenge. ... It was the Jews who ... dared to invert the aristocratic value-equation ... saying "the wretched alone are the good ones, the poor, the helpless, the lowly ... and you who are powerful and noble are to all eternity the evil ones."
Zar-
ReplyDeleteUnusual quote, since some of his writings were pro-Jewish, passages which the Nazis had to bowdlerize, obviously. And this particular accusation of a revaluation of values Nietzsche for the most part ascribed to Christianity. One eminent historian, many yrs ago, remarked that if N. had been alive during the 3rd Reich, he wd have been among the 1st to wind up in a concentration camp.
mb
@Cel-Ray Tonic,
ReplyDeleteI don't think any of these Prog writers actually know any Republican women or really any women that don't fit their own demographic of well-educated urban professionals. Trump won white women without college degrees by 28 percent. They are missing the class aspect of this issue.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/12/05/class-dismissed-identity-politics-without-the-identity/
I am sure that racism plays a role but it is not the only factor behind Trump's success. Many Progs are desperately trying to avoid discussing issues of class and power. They don't want to talk about issues like trade and how our trade policies resulted in the loss of 5 million manufacturing jobs between January 2000 and December 2014.
https://www.epi.org/publication/manufacturing-job-loss-trade-not-productivity-is-the-culprit/
@Zar
ReplyDeleteI think Nietzsche would recognize Judaism as an admirably successful countervailing historical force to the pagan antiquity he admired, so that passages like this are an expression of begrudging respect. After all, it was monotheism that first successfully accomplished the revaluation of values he was trying to initiate in his own time- a modern revaluation that had nothing to do with reactionary anti-Semitism.
In any case, nobody will take up any kind of difficult/un-PC historical sources in the future. I fully expect every book pre 1990s to be banned or abandoned.
For instance, I was tutoring a student who was practicing for a standardized test. The test had a passage in which Eugene Debs talks about protest as the path for mankind to leave the jungle. I had to walk on eggshells just to explain the idea of 'mankind' and how the jungle was understood as a symbol of primitiveness. This is lit from a socialist leader just a century ago; it's now rt wing hate speech to the bowlderizers.
Dr. Berman
ReplyDeleteI live in a rural area, heart of trump country. Recent afternoon at a local watering hole a couple locals started raging against immigrants, build the wall now and so forth. I mentioned our tax dollars might be better spent on some kind of economic aid so they can remain in their own country. All the locals could do is stare blankly at me because I'd "gone off-message". A free exchange of ideas is a lost art out here.
Hello Wafers:
ReplyDeleteBonne chance with your operation, Belman. It's odd seeing these references to "medical bills" here. To much of the world, that term seems curiously similar to "sabre-tooth tiger" or "the consumption."
I don't think I've heard one reference to that Thousand Oaks terrorist at any recent sporting event hosting a "military appreciation night." What gives?
As for that Pittsburgh shooting, the best response I could come up with was to go full-on Jew (that's what I said on the air, too) on my radio show and play the most kezmerish stuff I could - Naftule Brandwein, Benny Goodman's "Bei Mir Bist du Shoen," Ziggy Elman, and Artie Shaw.
I'm currently reading Thomas Frank's Rendezvous with oblivion : reports from a sinking society. Wafers ought to like it.
I'd say something about Fred Nietzsche, but I'm out of space. Ach, the void!
Hi MB,
ReplyDeleteGood you have you back even for a brief period.
In continuation of my previous comment (previous post) Saul really only critiques the existing situation w/o offering any alternative. Gets tedious at places. Still his analysis of the military-industrial-scientific complex as an outcome of our 'rational' civilization is worth the read. Abt your re-enchantment bk, I found your ideas for future interesting. Want to go back to it once more.
Wish you quick recovery after the surgery.
Prasen
https://www.cambridgejungiancircle.com/essay-prize
ReplyDeleteCambridge Jungian Circle: 500 Pound prize for essay on the Significance of Jung in Today's World.
I could see Mr Morris Berman having unique insight into this challenge & obviously he has the highly advanced writing skills to win. MB -- haven't you commented in the past on the importance of Jung having advised that analysts should lie down on the couch themselves? Surely a great contribution to the field that the analyst be analyzed!
George F
Dr. B-
ReplyDeleteRe: My brother-in-law & his views on Obama/"Obamacare." No, he still rails against Obamacare and doesn't think he should have to pay his hospital bill because "it's too high." My wife convinced him that he HAS to start paying something toward the bill. He even rages about Webb Hubbell & the Clintons occasionally. I'm really looking forward to Thanksgiving. I might have to have a few Bloody Marys before they arrive.
I just stumbled upon this Orlov interview from October that might interest Wafers:
ReplyDeletehttps://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2018/10/dmitry-orlov-gives-interview.html
I'm very ignorant about a great many things, so I come to this blog and try to learn, but if there is something I know a little about is Nietzsche. I read almost all his books again and again for many long years in a certain phase of my life, and I never read any single book written about him.
ReplyDeleteThe opposition between a moral for slaves and a moral for masters is a constant in his works. The Jews are in his view the sacerdotal people par excellence. It is the priests, Judaism, in a limited scope first, and then Christianism, which Nietzsche considers an extension or globalization of Judaism, who promote the moral of the slaves. Sorry, but nothing could be farther from the truth than saying that monotheism first successfully accomplished the revaluation of values Nietzsche was trying to initiate. Nietzsche despised monotheism with all his heart. If anything, he wanted to go back to paganism and the moral of the masters before its inversion by religion.
It is true, though, that Nietzsche wrote admiringly of the Jews, and that he would have been among the first to be sent to the camps by the Nazis, but saying the he's full of contradictions doesn't even begin to describe it. Nietzsche is the fallen angel; extremely seductive, beautiful, intelligent... If you dare risk following him for a while, you'll learn quite a few things you would have never imagined before, but if you stay with him to the end, the destination is death, destruction and nothingness. Ironic, isn't it, considering how persuasively he talked about the will to power.
@Tom--you hit the nail on the head. For example, how many poor and working class women, and not just whites, heard Ford's allegations against Kavanaugh and immediately thought to themselves how much they would love to be able to AFFORD to go see a psychiatrist? No doubt plenty of them for whom sexual harassment is simply a daily fact of life looked at Ford and thought, "now you know how I feel, you spoiled little rich brat."
ReplyDelete@MB--In the article about Whitaker, it appears what happened is a bunch of little people tried to play the hustling game and got eaten alive by a much bigger fish. This was a telling quote from one of the victims, who had been an enthusiastic Trump supporter: "How could a president appoint someone like this? And then not have a problem about it when it comes out? He should be taking care of the victims." But dude, "taking care of the victims" is SOCIALISM, don't you understand that? If you play the game and lose, that's your fault for not being a better player.
But do you think that guy has learned his lesson even to this day? Not a chance. The article says he's switching partisan affiliation to the Democrats, which proves he's learned nothing and merely wants revenge.
MB & Wafers,
ReplyDeleteLast day before we descend into the abyss of no blog! Will need to stock up on some good wine.
Don't know if anyone has been following on Truthdig the "American History for Truthdiggers" series by Maj Danny Sjursen, US Army. He's marching through US History, looking at what the myths are and giving the straight scoop on what actually happened. Today's installment (#21) is on the year 1898, when the US officially became an international empire. (He does note that the US was already an empire, with all the attitudes and cultural baggage, but 1898 made it official.) Chilling account not just of the history but of the American character.
https://www.truthdig.com/articles/american-history-for-truthdiggers-tragic-dawn-of-overseas-imperialism/
George-
ReplyDeleteTalk abt synchronicity. I just got invited to give the keynote address to a conference of Jungian analysts in Italy next year. But I'll probably pass on the Cambridge deal; just too damn busy these days. Thanks anyway.
mb
Good luck to all WAFers and especially you Dr. B. The last hiatus almost did me in, but an IV of hot pastrami (plus a few wood fired pizzas) got me through.
ReplyDeleteQuestion for the blog b4 descending into oblivion for awhile:
ReplyDeleteWhat the hell is a "wellness" center? How did these words come together? "you aren't mentally ill, you're just not living optimally." Who gets to decide what "optimal living" is?
O&D, brothers and sisters...
Morris -
ReplyDeleteI pray for your good health and wish you a successful recovery from your surgery. We are lucky to have you and your wonderful blog to document the United States' transition from empire to turkey farm. Your greatness is unparalleled!
origami
The legacy of a thinker who saw philosophy ‘not just as a vocation, but as a way of life he had to lead’
ReplyDeletehttps://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/public/ludwig-wittgenstein-honesty-ground/
a really interesting essay about Wittgenstein by Ian Ground
Suggested film night viewing: the new Netflix production 'Outlaw King', a very good medieval war drama about Robert the Bruce (1274-1329). View anything interesting lately MB?
ReplyDeleteWafers-
ReplyDeleteThis is my last message until around Nov. 25, when the blog will reopen. I check into the hospital tonight.
JJ-
Spike Lee´s latest is abs. fabulous:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7349662/
Origami-
Thanks to you (and others) for yr gd wishes. All modesty aside, I really am great. Who cd deny it? Sometimes I hafta gasp, just looking at myself in the mirror.
mb
THE BLOG RE-OPENS!
ReplyDeleteYes Wafers, I'm back from my surgical adventure. It went very well, except for post-operative pain. I see my dr. this afternoon, for a follow-up. I can type rather slowly, and not a whole lot at one time; but it's do-able, so I think it's only fair to pull you guys back from the edge of the Abyss, and once more fill yr lives with light (and fun).
Wafers rise; America declines. What else is new?
mb
Ouch, my man! Take it easy! But we should also thank you for being so generous & giving us an update!
ReplyDeletehttps://www.vox.com/platform/amp/future-perfect/2018/11/19/18097663/nick-bostrom-vulnerable-world-global-catastrophic-risks
How technological progress is making it likelier than ever that humans will destroy ourselves The “vulnerable world hypothesis,” explained.
'There is some level of technological development at which civilization almost certainly gets devastated by default' -- Prof. Nick Bostrom of Oxford
The most important thing you'll read all month guys. Had you seen this one making the rounds MB?
Jeff Bezos is worth 126B$, but the NY subway is about to collapse:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/20/new-york-city-subway-bus-death-spiral-mta-fares
Welcome Back Morris! Hope you’re feeling batter....onward and downward!
ReplyDeleteHedges calling Pinker Delusional and Dangerous...
https://youtu.be/tCDd3VoAFUs
Welcome back, MB! Glad to hear you are still functional and recovering after your surgery. It's truly a great Wafer Thanksgiving!
ReplyDeleteSince you're laid up and might be looking for reading material, here is an interesting long article about yet another massive scam that combines many American ills we discuss here so frequently: LuLaRoe's $2.3 Billion Legging Empire is Imploding. Reading it I wasn't so appalled by the greedy, larcenous behavior of the CEO and her husband, who are classic American hustlers, but by just how incredibly dumb the people are who have been getting swindled in their desperate mania for easy money. Check out the photo where one woman filled her entire house with cheap unsellable, ugly clothing she like many of the others squandered her whole life savings on hoping to resell it at a substantial profit.
This line from the article pretty well sums it up: "LuLaRoe became a $2.3 billion business in less than 5 years, promising 'full-time income for part-time work'." That reads like the kind of business mantra that comes from Internet spam. It's telling that nearly everyone who got scammed by LuLaRoe (ugh, just that name!) is female. So much for the idea of what a wonderful world it would be if all the men would simply step aside and let women take over.
WB MB glad everything went well. Happy Genocide Day!
ReplyDeleteMay you have a speedy recovery Dr. Berman.
ReplyDeletePeace,
Vince
Welcome back professor! I hope you are doing well now.
ReplyDeleteI am a regularly reader of this blog, but I decided to contribute this time.
Seems like a dark age is befalling us. The German military has uncovered a Neo-Nazi Coup plan.
Day X: Germany's far-right commandos reportedly plotted to kill top politicians when order 'falls'
https://www.rt.com/news/443662-german-army-secret-extermist-network/
I wonder if such groups exist inside the US army.
Hello MB and Wafers!
ReplyDeleteMB-
Great news about your surgery! I hope yr pain level diminishes, and you can get back on the courts before too long. I'm pleased that you liked the new Spike Lee film; I literally gasped when I watched it in the theater. In any case, it's good to have you back, MB.
Sincerely,
Miles D. Deli
Welcome back Professor. I’m sorry, but Chris Hedges should not throw stones at Pinker. Hedges and his foolish revolution are delusional and dangerous. Hedges and Chomsky need to leave their intellectual fiefdoms and spend the rest of their days with the Kardashians and Lorenzo Riggins. They can write a BDSM erotica collection together.
ReplyDeleteDr. B, so glad you are back and the surgery went well!
ReplyDeleteHappy Thanksgiving, everyone.
I have much to be thankful for, but this blog and this community top the list.
Puss
MB -
ReplyDeleteGreat to have you and the GBOE back !! Wish you a speedy recovery ..
Meet a classic Amrikan idiot .. (sad though that he got killed for this ) ...
Isolated tribe kills American with bow and arrow on a remote Indian island
Mr. Chau, an American thought to be in his 20s, was floating in a kayak off a remote island in the Andaman Sea. He was about to set foot on one of the most sealed-off parts of India, an island inhabited by a small, enigmatic and highly isolated tribe whose members have killed outsiders for simply stepping on their shore. Mr. Pathak said Mr. Chau, believed to be 26 or 27 and from Washington State, may have been trying to convert the islanders to Christianity. Right before he left in his kayak, Mr. Chau gave the fishermen a long note in case he did not come back. In it, police officials said, he had written that Jesus had bestowed him with the strength to go to the most forbidden places on Earth.
Wafers--I've been reading Seymour Hersh's memoir, Reporter, which I highly recommend. Hersh tells a lot of good anecdotes--including this particularly grotesque but telling one: One of Hersh's older colleagues, Tom Wicker, recounted the reaction of LBJ to a highly critical story about Vietnam Wicker wrote in late 1965 when the war was still highly popular with the American public. Right after it was published, Wicker was at LBJ's Texas ranch with a bunch of other reporters when the whole press corps was told to be at a remote spot at a certain time. Right after they arrived a big Lincoln convertible came screaming up to them at top speed. The driver--Johnson--slammed the car to a halt and yelled for Wicker to climb in. They roared away at top speed for a short distance without speaking until LBJ again slammed on the brakes, got out, dropped his pants and defecated right out in the open. He then wiped his hindquarters with leaves and grass, got back in the car and again without saying a word drove back to the others, where he ordered Wicker out of the car.
ReplyDeleteWicker told Hersh years later that he knew right then 1). that Johnson was crazy, and 2). he would never end the war. Wicker didn't report the story because his bosses would never have allowed it, though he had regretted ever since not trying to find a way to get it into print. That was the moment that Hersh realized that Johnson in his way was just as unhinged as Nixon.
It isn't Trump that's the problem, it's a whole system that elevates inhuman monsters like most of our recent presidents to positions of power.
Welcome back Dr B. Glad to hear your surgery went well. Best wishes for a speedy recovery. I think orthopedic surgery is one area of technological progress that's a net positive for humanity. O and D
ReplyDeleteWafers-
ReplyDeleteThank you all for yr gd wishes. Post-operative pain still remains, but at least I can type! Let the discussion continue!
mb
Hello Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteI am glad that you are back and that your operation went well. I hope your recovery also goes well.
Back on the declinism front:
Alcohol-related deaths are increasing in the United States with the biggest increase found among women.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2018/11/16/alcohol-deaths-emergency-room-increase-middle-aged-women-addiction-opioids/1593347002/
A new study linking depression and loneliness to social media use.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/new-study-claims-facebook-instagram-and-snapchat-are-linked-to-depression-2018-11-09?mod=mw_share_twitter
Hi MB,
ReplyDeleteSo nice to have you back. I hope you get back full strength soon.
Prasen
Black Friday Pummelings!!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theamericanmirror.com/seasons-beatings-men-brawl-in-walmart-aisle-during-black-friday-sale/
Francois,
Sorry, but Hedges and Chomsky have a MUCH better and more accurate understanding of whats taking place out there in the country...they are both much closer to being Wafer’s than Pinker will ever be. I’m assuming you too ara a Wafer, or you wouldn’t be here.
Hi all! Dr. B, hope the pain subsides soon.
ReplyDelete"Oligarchic control compromises a society’s ability to make correct decisions in the face of existential threats. This explains a seeming paradox in which past civilizations have collapsed despite possessing the cultural and technological know-how needed to resolve their crises. The problem wasn’t that they didn’t understand the source of the threat or the way to avert it. The problem was that societal elites benefited from the system’s dysfunctions and prevented available solutions."
Strong words ...
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2018-09-25/the-ecological-crisis-is-a-political-crisis/
There are some questions in the way he has organized his argument, but he's extending Diamond and Tainter's analyses on collapsing societies ...
Given the complexity of the problem, there is no single cause ...
Hola MB and Wafers,
ReplyDeleteTurkeys outta control dept.:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF8n2oKajek
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOKDzQz0QRs
Miles
Welcome back Dr. Berman and Wafers.
ReplyDeleteIt's fun watching usa-ers sate their corporate masters by buying lotsa drek during "black" Friday. Certainly they're gonna rise up anytime!
Any guesses on what % know of black Thursday?
Onward and downward!
Welcome back Dr. B! Glad things went well, I've been trying to stay off the web during the tday break, but have to visit the blog at least daily.
ReplyDeleteGeorge: I was going to post that one, typical American or what? No consideration of anything but himself (instagram, etc.).
For any Eastern Canadians, this show looks worth checking out. Medieval/Netherlandish art is my favorite! https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/11/23/medieval-europe-power-and-splendor/
Welcome back, Dr. B!
ReplyDeleteHere's one for you- we went to DC today to visit the Smithsonian; The Nat'l. Museums of Air & Space and American History. You would not believe the amount of dust and dirt settled on top of many of the artifacts. If you could have touched some of the historic aircraft, you could have written "wash me" on the wings with your finger. Just another subtle sign that we are on an "onward and downward" path.
https://www.rt.com/uk/444717-zizek-jordan-peterson-pinker/
ReplyDeleteThat's a lot of ego, amigo!
- Land Shark
MB: thank you for returning from the land of anesthesia - civilizational collapse ain't the same without you!
ReplyDeleteHere's a nice little bit of reading for Wafers.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.counterpunch.org/2018/11/23/thieves-like-us-the-violent-theft-of-land-and-capital-is-at-the-core-of-the-u-s-experiment/
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteThanks again for yr gd wishes. Am now launched on an extended program of physical therapy, including exercises, ice, meds, and so on. Cross fingers, it'll work.
Am enjoying all yr posts. Meanwhile, once again, don' ferget to see Spike Lee's new film.
mb
Hi Wafers,
ReplyDeleteA colleague told me this past week that he's off Facebook. I'm so proud and happy for him! I flew the crapbook coop back in Jan 2015, and haven't looked back. I found some people from the past, but 99.9% of them just want someone to read their posts ... addicted to those FB likes, and not interested in real life conversations.
Gary Jules' Mad World: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4N3N1MlvVc4
And an essay inspired by the the song: https://www.theburningplatform.com/2018/11/19/mad-world-3/
“Drop out of school before your mind rots from exposure to our mediocre educational system. Forget about the Senior Prom and go to the library and educate yourself if you’ve got any guts. Some of you like Pep rallies and plastic robots who tell you what to read.”
― Frank Zappa
It's kinda sad when the only real person you can talk to is in the throes of late stage alcoholism but my one and only friend is just that. Nevertheless he idolizes Bob Dylan, and is a counter cultural proto-Wafer, we've had some good talks. Over two years ago he had hip replacement surgery and has been strung out on percocet ever since. How fucking stupid is it to prescribe refills of 90 tabs/month and not observe his really pretty obvious signs of being alcoholic? It's gotten so bad he just wants to die (how he's still alive is a mystery.) I finally broke down and called his doctor hopefully they'll cut him off this week. I mention this MB b/c I hope Mexican docs know better than to prescribe what essentially is black tar heroion for pain management. Our American opiod crisis is real and horrific.
ReplyDeleteI grew up in Colorado Springs in the 70's and can vouche for Spike Lee's film this area is full of neo-nazis.
Jjarden, I agree that Hedges and Chomsky are much closer to being Wafers than Pinker. They and others, like Michael Moore, Howard Zinn, and Ralph Nader celebrate the American people being as I believed Bill Hicks called them the Salt of the Earth. But unlike Bill, they mean it and that is dangerous and delusional thinking.
ReplyDeleteProfessor, would it be possible to establish a chronology post on this blog starting with Benjamin Rush saying the U.S. would end in an orgy of selfishness and include all the others such as H.L. Mencken for example who saw the people’s true nature. If we had one post showing the timeline leading to the orgy of selfishness in one post I could crush progs quickly, like the way you crush trollfoons. Thank you.
The chaos continues to escalate. Now the police responding to a mass shooting at a mall have killed someone not even involved.
ReplyDeleteUSA Today: Man killed by officer at mall was not the shooter
Let us give thanks...
ReplyDeleteOn the theory that any day that brings news of bad outcomes for the Facebook founder and his feckless friends is a good day, this report from the Guardian:
An American software company founder, visiting London on business, found himself the subject of a summons from a chairman of a Parliamentary committee. The chairman wanted to see Facebook documents the American was thought to possess: he is currently in the middle of a legal dispute with Facebook over its policy regarding data and privacy controls. Refusing the chairman’s request, which was delivered by a sergeant at arms to the visitor’s hotel, and ignoring the two-hour deadline for compliance, the American was subsequently delivered to Parliament under escort.
Her Majesty’s Government are not amused by Facebook founder Zuckerberg’s rejection of a Parliamentary request to appear for questioning.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/nov/24/mps-seize-cache-facebook-internal-papers?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Gunnar-
ReplyDeleteLet me tell you abt medical treatment in the US vs. Mexico.
In the US, when you file a claim, the ins. co. immediately rejects it. Company workers are told to do that. Then you have to wage a war of correspondence, to get them to honor the claim. The one time I did that, after 6 mos. they sent me a check for $57. Here, my ins. co. honored the claim as soon as they saw my MRI. No conflict whatsoever.
My experience with medical personnel in the US was inevitably depressing. They take blood or whatever in an atmosphere of silent resentment. If you try to talk with them, they just shrug. Here, the hospital staff was not merely polite, but actually engaging. Sensing my nervousness, they tried to distract me by asking me where I was born, what I did for a living, etc. The anaesthesiologist took time to explain exactly what the procedure was, and my surgeon came by as well. Very friendly
I'm guessing that the cost of this operation wd amt to 75K or more in the US. Here, total cost was abt 20K (USD); my deductible was abt 2K. That's all I'll be billed for.
Why anyone wd want to live in the US is beyond me.
mb
@MB--my total hospital stay after my cancer surgery was 45 days at the illustrious Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. My experience with the hospital staff was quite similar to yours in America (they used to wake me up every morning at 4:00 to draw my blood at a time when sleep was the only respite from the daily horror I was otherwise experiencing). Plus the food was absolute garbage--sub-high school cafeteria quality at a time when I was losing 20% of my body weight and desperately needed the calories. One idiot attendant managed to unhook one of my tubes while drawing my blood and spray me with urine without so much as even an "I'm sorry." The one exception were the nurses, who for the most part were dedicated and VERY hard working. They had to be, because the recovery wards were so short-staffed that otherwise the level of care would have collapsed completely. Seeing up close and personal just how badly Hopkins is managed really gave me an insight to how Ben Carson got to be so successful.
ReplyDelete@Gunnar--I can relate to your story as well. When I was undergoing my treatments they used to just throw dilaudid pills at me by the handful. I still take opiods every day to control the severe neuropathy which was a major and apparently permanent side effect of chemotherapy, and can testify that with proper management and physician oversight (I see a pain management specialist these days) they can be a real blessing for those of us who suffer chronic severe pain. But certainly people with addictive tendencies shouldn't be allowed anywhere near them. Of course, it is they who are the most profitable to the drug companies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXIMve-54HA Welcome back Dr. Berman! I hope you had a great trip. You are missing out on all the fun here in the States!
ReplyDeleteDr. B
ReplyDeleteI'm in the United Arab Emirates. Let me put it to you this way. My SO who teaches here asked a couple of her female students why she never saw any homeless people here. They were confused. One of them said "home? less?" My SO had to explain the concept and give context. The two students were upset to the point of crying. Everyone who lives here is provided for when they don't have as much. The Middle East isn't a region of terrorists. They're a rich, tapestry of both modernism and a traditionalism that has gone back 100s to 1000s of years. The middle east isn't what the USA portrays it to me. It is more complex then that.
In no way did I intend to imply there aren't legitimate uses for opioids - I know when I get to my end of days I want a morphine drip to send me into the great beyond. To round out the story of my friend he was sent to a real pain management doc who told him no way, no how. Instead he kept going to the ER where they'd give him two or three doses until finally one of the docs reluctantly sent him to the local Dr Feelgood who dopes him and a bunch of other people real good. It's amazing to me medicaid allows such "clinics" to operate.
ReplyDeleteSometimes I get optimistic and begin to believe the 'blue wave' really can make a difference but I have to remind myself that any real plan to bring about lasting change would be shrugged off by the American people as wimpy and ineffectual. We have really sick ideas of what strength and weakness constitute. Was Jesus hanging on a cross a sign of stupid idealistic weakness or a demonstration of strength through defeat? Most people I meet wouldn't even understand the question.
Imagine having a presentation in front of an Asylum Officer in a classroom. Seriously, my professor/immigration attorney thinks its neat to have an Asylum Officer in the classroom, instead I don't know raising hell about the situation at the border. These "officers" are an effing JOKE. what are they waiting for? Bullets to fly over the border?
ReplyDeleteHola los Waferes,
ReplyDeleteGSWH - the blog has resumed,full speed ahead! Glad yer back. Godspeed in recovery, though it will take some time and orthopedic therapy effort. You will get there.
During the blog hiatus I polished off a first read of Spinning Straw Into Gold, Counting Blessings, and half of Destiny. Good stuff! (I have met Irene...)
Wafers: I urge you all to secure copies of these and all other MB tomes. Digest, enjoy, share and buy extra copies for friends and other receptive minds. I repeat myself here, but this seems to be the best and most direct way to help Morris to pay off that largely reasonable medical expense. Let's give him a vote of confidence for helping us to clearly see the light about many things. I Thank You, Morris.
Puss K. / Tom S: Thanks for the Frank Zappa quote. He always was and still is a proto Wafer. And a Wafer Hall of Fame posthumous inductee. And thanks for the links to oligarch illness and alcohol illness topics. The alcohol one affects so many whom we all know of. Unfortunately...
american "life" was simply 60-80yrs+ on a stationary bike set at resistance 7-9.
ReplyDeleteThen you croak.
Apologies to Camus.
Ol' Botoxface is at it again, telling The Guardian that in order to stem the tide of right wing populism, Europe must stem the tide of refugees from the Middle East. Of course, the evil old warmonger failed to mention her own very prominent role in destroying so many Middle Eastern countries and thus causing the flood of refugees into Europe. The Red Queen also neglected to mention her and her husband's substantial role in helping to hollow out America's manufacturing economy, even going so far as saying: “I don’t know why at this moment that (right wing populism) is so attractive to people..." Yet this fucking idiot is testing the waters for yet ANOTHER presidential run.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of Europe, there were mass strikes in numerous EU countries at hellhole Amazon warehouses on Black Friday. So what was National Propaganda Radio doing as a feature story back here in the U.S.? Why, a free infomercial for the world's richest asshole and substantial NPR contributor in which no mention was made of the many environmental and labor concerns surrounding Amazon's entire predatory business model. Nope, just a nice little story for good American liberals to listen to while doing their online holiday shopping with Prime before hopping in the Lexus SUV to drive down to Amazon...er, Whole Foods to do the weekly grocery shopping.
Bill-
ReplyDeleteI've been thinking about starting a grocery chain that offers inferior products at inflated prices. Name: Partial Foods.
mean-
I shd make u my publicist!
mb
Why American capitalism is failing – and can it be saved?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.nbcnews.com/think/video/why-american-capitalism-is-failing-and-can-it-be-saved-1380922947632
Hello Dr Berman et al., spare Africa's fragile democracies a thought as Trump's quick-slow-quick march against the ramparts of democracy gathers momentum and his amoral enablers lower the draw bridge with fevered industry. Pre-Trumpism the debate in the U.S. was whether to intervene in ethnic conflicts on the continent. However, the looming existential issue we face is that his fiendish divisive and racist rhetoric is summoning the diabolical forces of tribalism run amok. Equally alarming for African women and the girl-child are his cruel and primitive mysogynistic attacks. I am a female Nigerian Harvard educated International lawyer based in Lagos,Nigeria and an opinion writer for the Guardian Nigeria newspaper. I am also a regular contributor to the Global Policy Institute Blog, Loyola Marymount University,California on the Trump Administration and Africa. My work has appeared in The Hill, Washington DC in the same vein.
ReplyDeletehttp://gpiblog.lmu.edu/the-emperor-has-no-clothes/
https://t.guardian.ng/opinion/trumpism-a-path-to-ethnic-cleansing/
irene_fowler@yahoo.com
As General Motors workers start interviewing for jobs at All Night Burgers or the Executive Clean Car Wash, this item to complement the news from Detroit;
ReplyDeletehttps://www.truthdig.com/articles/5-facts-that-privileged-americans-dont-want-us-to-know/
“Record Low Unemployment? Yes, Because One Hour of Work Counts as Employed
“Part of that “booming” economy is a low unemployment rate. As noted recently, the Bureau of Labor Statistics bases the official unemployment rate on employees “who did any work for pay or profit” during the week being surveyed. That includes part-time workers who are employed for just one hour a week. The unemployment rate also fails to include those who have given up looking for work—4 percent more Americans than in the year 2000.”
The BLS conveniently fails to point this out. And the media, relying on the Executive Summary in preparing their newcasts, never look behind the curtain. Anything that might shake the American Exceptionalism/Unceasing March of Progress story is to be avoided. And don’t look for them to conduct interviews with GM workers, who were made certain promises during the 2008 crisis that have proved all but meaningless. Still, let’s not fail to mention the good news: GM stock rose 5 percent on the news of the closures/sackings.
I don't get it, Wafers. Why does Trumpicus feel free to flagrantly insult and undermine the US National Security establishment/apparatus? Correct if I'm wrong, but the last President (JFK) who tried this (slightly) wound up w/his brains blown out in broad daylight on an American street. Take a look at this list:
ReplyDelete- Trumpo conducts verbal warfare against former CIA chief John Brennan.
- Trumpola savagely denigrates most intelligence he receives from his own security agencies -- no matter if it's about Russian interference during the election down to North Korean nuclear compliance.
- Trumpi disagrees w/his own CIA when they conclude that a Saudi assassination squad (ordered by the Saudi Crown Prince) took out Khashoggi.
- Trumpcard then goes after admiral William McRaven as a "Hillary Clinton fan" and "too slow" to locate bin Laden, when he was the guy who commanded the Navy Seals in an action that resulted in the assassination of bin Laden.
- Trumptard fails to show up to honor the dead of WW I because of a *rain* delay.
- And now it's the Southern border, essentially a publicity stunt.
I tell ya, it's uncanny. Why the hell is Trumpicus still breathing? I ponder this question daily.
Miles
Hello Wafers:
ReplyDeleteGood luck on your recovery, Belman, and listen to your physiotherapist. I've been in physio since July (mainly a lot of exercising with various giant rubber bands) and it's helping.
That was weird seeing the Zappa quote that Puss Killian posted, as I had just read it earlier that day on a Zappa quotation site. Great minds and &tc.... By the way, whenever I see "Puss Killian" I picture Tura Satana at the keyboard.
That's about all I have to contribute today.
Your slogan could be "Partial Foods; why pay less."
ReplyDeleteHola los Waferes,
ReplyDeleteMB - flattery will get you some places with me...all kidding aside, I gave up part time hustling back in 2015. I liked booking our own gigs, in that simpler time before my retirement...I rejected full-time hustling many years before that. (a good quote comes to mind re: gratis publicist work; next post.)
Novella two in "Destiny" is just pure enjoyment. I remember back in 1981 or so, living in Santa Fe, when Ten Thousand Waves opened. That was a year after we had gotten tired of not-enough-income in Taos and had relocated to the capital city of New Mexico. I've always been poquito loco, but it has not killed me yet. California was great fun after NM. I could not live there now, with what I think I know. But it is STILL the best country in amerika. I empathize w/the poor schmucks ex of "Pleasure", California. The pres must have inhaled too much smoke on that day.
Man, the news feed while you were "on sabbatical" was a total declinist, dysfunctionalist smorgasbord! Holy hot tamales! The Big Question: will drumpf crash and burn first or will the amerikan nightmare proceed him? Dual process?
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Charles Dickens
Biz as Usual!
Irene-
ReplyDeleteWelcome; we are honored to have you here.
mb
Aww...how nice.Glad to be on board.
DeleteDr. B-
ReplyDeleteAnother day in the USA: Fight over national anthem leads to gunshot wound during family's Thanksgiving-
https://www.wral.com/warrant-fight-over-national-anthem-led-to-gunshot-during-cary-family-s-thanksgiving/18024067/
And now for the gd news...
ReplyDeletehttps://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/11/26/elon-musk-says-he-will-probably-move-mars/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cbebec477db6
There are 8 million stories in idiot America. Here are some of those stories:
ReplyDeleteWoman spent 3 months in jail for cotton candy that cops insisted was meth. Headline could also read: "What might happen to YOU if you can't afford a lawyer."
Phoenix man angry about homeless population kills homeless man. Title Claimed he shot the man 5 times "accidentally."
Historical Society Apologizes For ‘White Dorchester’ Holiday Invitation. Apparently some overly sensitive American snowflakes have never heard of the phrase, "White Christmas."
And lastly, anyone who thinks the Dumbocrats will easily beat Orange Julius in 2020 needs to read this somewhat tongue-in-cheek but all too accurate handicapping of the Dumbocratic presidential field. It's like I've said before--Trump's luck is almost supernatural, and it appears to be continuing with the likes of Harris, Biden (current front runner--double puke) and Booker as his likeliest potential opponents (other than Bernie, who they'll do everything they can to sabotage).
Hi everyone,
ReplyDeleteAny idea why CNN is losing sleep over anti-semitism in Europe? Real the issue may be, but why this sudden awakening?
Prasen
Dr. B
ReplyDeleteI think if the migrant caravan is looking for a better life then they're probably better off staying in Mexico. By the way, como estas Senor Berman. How are you? How are things down in Mexico with the Migrant caravan coming through?
Cambridge students create Babylonian film in original language
ReplyDeletehttp://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/babylonian-film-in-original-language-139238
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/11/27/academic-revives-ancient-babylonian-2000-years-language-died/
this is fascinating! Here is the film
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxYoFlnJLoE
Ordinary-
ReplyDeleteI was surprised the figure (20%) was so low!
Bill-
But surely Botox Face will carry the day.
mb
Greetings Wafers & welcome back MB! I'm so glad to hear that your surgery went well, and hope the physio goes smoothly.
ReplyDeleteWe packed out the first group of household goods the day before Thanksgiving, were absolutely exhausted from all the sorting, donating, cleaning, etc. We are now on a road trip to various relatives letting them know we're moving to Europe.
And then yesterday I bashed my foot into a sofa leg and broke my little toe! What timing. Sigh - it's always something.
I'm so happy to be reading all the posts. I've been amazed, but heartened, at the quickening pace of decline, mind boggling. But the Dems are doubling down on their usual vapid 'program', thereby ensuring a second term for Trumpi to continue his appointed task. Honestly, onwards and downward can't come fast enough. And we can't leave fast enough.
Returning home on Greyhound from a trip north I parked my bags b4 the hike home and lit a smoke. A young man stepped up and asked if I had a spare. W/O hesitation I gave him one. Pretty soon an older man wearing cowboy hat companion to the younger, approached with a quarter and asked for another. 'Keep the quarter' I said. He replied 'you're a true cowboy.' Having never been called one I had to consider what he meant. I realized it was like the northerner/southerner discussion we sometimes have. Had I accepted the quarter I'd of been from the north. I concluded being called a real cowboy is probably the highest compliment one can receive in the west. 'You help me when I'm down and I'll help you.'
ReplyDeleteThen I decided to watch The Ballad of Buster Scruggs on Netflix. Talk about amplifying a theme! Written, directed and produced by the Coen brothers it's their best work in years maybe ever (imo). Are there any better film makers right now? Recommend highly ***** + Tom Waits as a gold prospector! (apologies for length)
So great to hear that Ireland is managing to hold fast to its old cultural traditions and to real living! England, in contrast, sounds completely lost; a wrecked society decimated by decades of Thatcherism, Murdochracy, and the oppressive, paranoid, surveillance state disease it caught from the US.
ReplyDeleteDusting off my Irish passport. Thank you, my Belfast grandma, for being born in one of the last redoubts of sanity.
She looks like shit doesn't she?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.instagram.com/sherylsandberg/?hl=fr
Hi Ordinary Indian, please, I do beg you, stop watching CNN. Trash has a way of sticking to your brain. Complete blackout of the presstitutes will markedly improve your mental health. Even in the extremely rare cases where the presstitutes don't publish complete bullshit, the selection of the topics is always following an agenda. I guess the CNN obsession over antisemitism in Europe is just a distraction from the fact that the US is already 85% gone in the way of Nazism: "We're hanging nooses to remind people that times haven't changed."
ReplyDeleteP.S. So glad your operation was a success, Dr Berman.
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteRest assured, we'll have the last laugh. Problem: it won't be so funny.
mb
al-Qa'bong, I'm glad you enjoyed the quote. When I was very young, Zappa was a figure of fun (Moon Unit had just been born), but I've wised up.
ReplyDeletePuss Killian is a character in a John D. MacDonald series of pulp fiction novels known as the Color Books (each title had a different color in it). Puss was the love interest of the main character Travis McGee. Fictional Travis lived on a houseboat in Ft. Lauderdale near his friend Meyer, an economist whose boat was named the John Maynard Keynes. MacDonald himself was a trained economist (Harvard? Too lazy to look it up) but found fame and fortune as a fiction novelist and screenwriter. He also wrote Condominium, and that dark story Cape Fear, made into movies.
The Color Books were remarkable, and of interest to me was that this character in a series of novels is talking about how the environment in Florida is getting trashed over time (written back in the 60s and 70s). A philosopher who treated women well in the Mad Men era, the character of Travis is remarkable in many ways, and still quite popular. JD died in the early 80s, too young, which is around the time I discovered his books in a bookstore.
What in the world would we do without bookstores?
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ReplyDeleteThere are 8 million stories in Idiot America. Here are a few of those stories:
ReplyDeleteFlorida man disemboweled with a sword on Thanksgiving. Wife arrested along with her boyfriend. "Witnesses said Ramsey was nearly slashed to death and was hugging his intestines against his body."
Woman passes gas in store, then pulls knife on an offended customer. Shanetta Yvette Wilson, 37, was in the checkout line at the Dollar General...John Walker, the customer standing next to her, got into a verbal dispute “in reference to the defendant farting loudly...”
Florida police chief gets three years in prison for framing innocent black men. “When I took the job, I was not prepared,” Atesiano told a federal judge on Tuesday. “I made some very, very bad decisions.”
And lastly: Having caused two of the deadliest wildfires in state history along with a deadly natural gas pipeline explosion, one of the biggest threats to life and limb in California has been determined to be: Pacific Gas & Electric. Meanwhile, in September former leftist icon Jerry Brown signed a bill to allow PG&E to pass its liability for starting wildfires on to its customers.
Thr American Way.....I’m going to do whatever the HELL I WANT, and my neighbors and community can go F—K themselves.
ReplyDeleteTown forcing man to pay $2,000 a night for Christmas lights
https://abcnews.go.com/US/video/town-forcing-man-pay-2000-night-christmas-lights-59486634
Trapped in the vortex of 'F5 tornado level' Trumpian lies. In a March 2017 op-ed for the Guardian Nigeria I wrote, 'Trump's tenuous grip on reality is evidenced by his innumerable glib,potentially dangerous and remorseless lies. When confronted with irrefutable facts from multiple official sources which dispel his untruths, President Trump and his fawning apologists and obstreperous mouth pieces individually and collectively retreat to their 'safe place'of phantasmagoria, denial and hubris, often times behind the visible and sacred seal of the Presidency. They are more than content to live in this alternate universe of alternative facts and are insistent on foisting this world on the whole planet'.
ReplyDeletehttps://t.guardian.ng/opinion/americas-leadership-in-crisis-and-merkel-now-in-charge/
Greetings MB and Wafers,
ReplyDeleteRebecca Lynn Phelps, 31, arrested for battering her boyfriend after he refused to have sex w/her on Thanksgiving night. Apparently, this was Becca's second incident:
https://www.local10.com/news/florida/florida-woman-arrested-again-after-being-denied-sex
Hmm, how many Wafers have been battered during sex? Zero, I'm guessing.
Miles
Greetings Professor-
ReplyDeleteI think once of your most telling statistics (if I recall correctly) was that Americans are 5% of the world's populations yet consume 80% of the world's antidepressants and what does that tell you about life in the USA?
Here's another one: Americans are killing themselves in record numbers and at an increasing rate? What does that tell us about daily life in the USA? 45,000 Americans kill themselves per year (not including accidental opioid ODs whose number is even larger). More shockingly: 1.2 million American attempt suicide each year! This number is crazy.
At this rate, I think in 10 or 20 years, it will only be us 174 Wafers left (and then we can vote to shut the whole damned country down).
BrotherMaynard
Existential Strain Redux...
ReplyDeleteI agree that the Cohen brothers' The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is a fabulous movie. No doubt it's dark. It's also beautiful; hauntingly beautiful. Two of the stories in particular stand out for me - I've been turning them over and over in my mind for the last couple of days.
First, there's the tale involving the miner (Tom Waits). Although it's hard not to have a good deal of affection for his character, for me, the story-within-the-story involves the miner's complete lack of regard for the staggering beauty around him. I would find it hard to imagine a more heavenly, Edenic location. And yet, how does he react? He marches into the center of the valley and digs a bunch of holes; holes that will help guide him to a lode of gold. It's a mentality of extraction, not appreciation or awe, that he follows.
Then there's the story involving the limbless, "Wingless Thrush", who recites poetry and prose with such skill and power that I felt my soul start to weep. And yet, even Shakespeare, Shelley and Lincoln can't escape being upstaged by a chicken.
Two examples of people being offered a glimpse of a world beyond that of brutal, selfish struggle; but if they even perceive the glimmer, they opt for the 30 pieces of silver rather than step into an elevated existence. It reminds me of a quote from Bruce Catton, quoted here in this forum years ago (thanks Birney Zoave!)...
"As it faced the cathedral aisles of endless virgin forests it shouted for immediate daylight in the swamp, even if whole generations must be brutalized for it."
Bro-
ReplyDeleteSlightly less than 5%, and 67% in dollar sales.
Jeff-
Somebody better give this woman a vigorous shtupping b4 she terrorizes the countryside.
mb
Ital: Congrats! Don't lose heart and get out!
ReplyDeletePol Spy: I'd move to Belfast in a split second, but it may become a shit-show if the Rep of Ireland goes with Brexit and No. Ireland (currently still part of EU) doesn't. We're talking walls and border guards and stuff. Who really knows what will happen, but most of the Irish ex-pats at the rugby match last weekend were pretty worried about it.
Welcome back, MB! Glad everything went well and that you were surrounded by caring medical professionals. I sadly know a few nurses here in Turkey-land that get wasted the night before and then go in the next day to help patients. On one hand, I can't blame them considering the sad state of affairs with hospital staffing and long, draining hours. But at the same time, it's completely self-centered. You wouldn't want your nurse hungover while sticking a needle in your arm.
ReplyDeleteAnd our decline continues....
Keeping them dumber in Oklahoma. Hopefully this will make it's way nationally:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2018/11/27/republican-party-an-oklahoma-county-makes-clear-its-opposition-public-education/?utm_term=.cca0c1cb76fe
Man Dies After Being Shot In Head By Wife During Crack-Fueled Fight Over Breakfast Oats:
https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2018/11/29/john-maki-dies-shot-over-breakfast/
Amazon HQ2 fraud:
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/video/why-amazon-s-hq2-tax-breaks-are-bribery-and-fraud-1154870851629
Glad to have you back, Professor! Good to hear the surgery went well.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if you've seen this one yet, but it's the best cultural collapse piece I've seen all afternoon... though, sadly, I think Kate Beckinsale is British, so this points to collapse of Western Civilization, not just the U.S. Empire.
Long story short, a penis facial might speed your recovery.
Enjoy!
https://nypost.com/2018/11/27/kate-beckinsale-hops-on-the-penis-facial-trend/
Philosopher John Gray has a cpl appearances in The New Statesman
ReplyDeletehttps://www.newstatesman.com/2018/11/john-gray-rowan-williams-conversation-christianity-atheism-cambridge-literature-festival
https://www.newstatesman.com/2018/11/power-pleasure-profit-david-wootton-review-john-gray
Welcome back, all! Hope you are once more serving for match point soon, Dr Berman.
ReplyDelete@MR interesting about OK. I actually hope the public schools expand into full time day cares because *that* would only hasten our decline.
Academic subjects as such are a joke to 90 percent of all Americans, especially the teachers and administration. In my short stint in the system, I was once told point blank by a principal- you are trying to teach them too much- why bother?
Reform is impossible, so we are left with expanded idiocy (maybe mandatory school until age 35? That should help some pensions) vs a return to a feral, pre-literate state (likely the future iPad virtual picture school). Pick your poison.
Amazon HQ scams & Musky scams
ReplyDeleteElon Musk's Boring Company announced that it was withdrawing plans for a high-tech transportation tunnel below the 405 freeway along Los Angeles' Westside.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna940981
I am shocked !
Meanwhile in the bible belt.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.news-leader.com/story/news/crime/2018/11/29/springfield-crime-road-rage-killing-vehicular-homicide-elizabeth-mckeown/2120454002/