April 11, 2023
Beating a Dead Horse Dept.
Wafers, honestly, how many times can I say it? America is composed of violent morons and the country is going down the drain, with no hope of reversing trajectory. What could be more obvious? And yet 99% of the American public don't believe this for a minute, and the MSM are oblivious to it. There will be no wake-up moment for either; we'll just simply fade into irrelevance. And yet here I am, boring all of you (I'm sure) with what is basically non-news. Let me just repeat what is going to be my epitaph, and then sign out:
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After promoting Fakebook and Twitter for years as the world turns it all backfires on npr. What a pity for the tech fanatics I suppose. First Fakebook and not Twitter. Another way they will screw themselves is by suggesting to ask the "smart speaker" to tune in directly to their feed bypassing the local stations that help fund them. The buffoonery of the tech fanatics as they discover what tech giveth, tech can taketh away.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.npr.org/2023/04/12/1169269161/npr-leaves-twitter-government-funded-media-label
Harv-
ReplyDeleteThey won't discover anything, because (see WAF ch. 3) tech is the hidden religion of America, and people don't give up their religions v. easily. No amt of slapping, and no amt of urine, will wake these people up. They live like buffoons, and they will die like buffoons. Which means America will die of buffoonery. But then: Bad Is Good.
mb
Harvey—You gotta catch Tucker Carlson’s take on NPR —“the museum of uptight liberalism,” he calls them—being labeled 'state-affiliated media' by Twitter. No doubt Twitter struck a nerve here b/c Biden’s W.H. Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre came to the rescue: “if you’ve ever been on the receiving end of their questions …you know that they have their independence in journalism.” Wow. I.F. Stone (“all governments lie”) is rolling in his grave right now.
ReplyDeleteCarlson rightly points out that most NPR broadcasts —delivered with “pursed lip fussiness”—are essentially “lifestyle pieces, or ‘the features’ as they used to say in the newspaper business.” And that NPR’s audience really must enjoy listening to “unhappy middle age ladies talking about themselves…the narcissism piped directly into their Audi.” But to me, Carlson’s “money-shot” here is when he points out that “now you can’t even listen to it…because the people who work [at NPR] are deranged. They’re ideologues, and in the end ideologues go crazy and start attacking each other…the Revolution eats its own.” I might say more later, but I’m at my 1/2 page now.
https://youtu.be/zAgLJfn96J0
https://www.mediaite.com/online/jean-pierre-defends-npr-when-asked-about-twitter-putting-in-same-category-as-russia-today-or-chinese-media/amp/
https://psyche.co/ideas/a-life-of-splendid-uselessness-is-a-life-well-lived
ReplyDeleteA v unamerican essay about how the pursuit of creative and intellectual activities for their own sake results in an abundance of unpredictable, often unexpected rewards. Reminds me of the essay "Idleness" or the book "How To Do Nothing: Resisting the Distraction Economy" :)
Greetings MB and Wafers,
ReplyDeleteMB-
Terrific news about your new upcoming book! It sounds very interesting. It's really important to realize how disconnected we are from our bodies in this day and age, and I'm happy that you're revisiting this subject again. It's astonishing to realize that many of our insecurities, fears, emotional pain, and anxieties, have a lot to do w/a disconnection to the body. I'm assuming your new book is kind of an afterword to "Reenchantment" and "Coming to our Senses," no?
MB, Wafers-
Hustling 101:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11966135/Couple-turned-doctors-Malibu-mansion-drugs-den-stole-millions-died-overdose.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/02/us/malibu-beach-house-doctor-fraud.html
It's incredibly sad what happened to this guy. He was the eye doctor of a good friend of mine before the shit hit the fan.
Jeff
Roland Tarver,
ReplyDeleteAs if Carlson isn't an ideologue? Sounds like the pot calling the kettle black. But even if that were the case, at least the people on NPR aren't _lying_ to their audience for money like Carlson does.
-- Torreblanca
Torre
ReplyDeleteNPR doesn't lie their audience for money? Money in this case would be donations to support NPR stations.
I thought it worth mentioning a couple of outstanding case where they lie by omission just as the New York Times does.
There's case of NPR's Nina Totenberg and Ruth Bader Ginsburg:
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/09/23/nina-totenberg-dinners-with-ruth-bader-ginsburg-00058467
Totenberg is supposed to be a journalist, at least that's what thought, not a keeper of the secrets of the powerful who she should have been covering objectively. She knew Ginsburg was dying and didn't report on it. Totenberg is just another insider.
The other example I'd like to point out is the lack of coverage of the Sy Hersch story on how US destroyed the Nord Stream II pipe. I search for such a story but could nothing. The Hersch story appeared in Feb. 8. But did a story on March 8 on the question of whether or not Ukraine destroyed the pipeline, with mention of the Hersch story:
https://www.npr.org/2023/03/08/1161859724/ukraines-government-says-it-wasnt-involved-in-the-attacks-on-nord-stream-pipelin
Well, the NYTimes has never covered the Hersch story either as far as I know.
Torreblanca—
ReplyDeleteSorry but there’s no way I can respond to your post. You’ve given me nothing to go on, friend. How about judging Tucker Carlson’s monologue on its own merits, and then sharing your thoughts? Or respond to his critique of NPR yourself, and letting us know what specifically you agree or disagree with? That way we can have a discussion (ie., a ‘debate’ that plays nice) or we can have a dialogue (ie., seek to find a shared connection). I’ve no problem with Carlson’s critique of NPR. But yes, sometimes he comes across as an officious boob, even while at the same time he’s making some valid points. Of course, Wafers are discerning individuals, and won’t throw the baby out with the bath water, which is kind of what you are doing. And what I almost did: I’ve paid no attention to Carlson until recently, when a Wafer posted a link here in which Carlson gives the floor to Jimmy Dore, and lets him speak without interruption! I was impressed. Until then I’d assumed Carlson was just another ”pundit” keeping a seat warm at Fox News. But check out this link below. It’s Carlson’s most impressive monologue that I’ve heard so far. He discusses why Biden’s economic sanctions against Russia aren’t working, and were never going to work, and how the US Dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency is now in serious jeopardy.
https://youtu.be/1t9Cr88sAbk
Dr. and Wafers,
ReplyDeleteCheck out this week’s star road rage. It’s hilarious to see angry USAins go apeshit over a fender bender. LOL!
https://www.wtsp.com/article/news/crime/fhp-tampa-road-rage-incident/67-2bf44056-e421-4314-ac8b-f523a3802a3e
This week’s star robbery occurred ( where else?) in the Big Apple.
https://www.audacy.com/1010wins/news/local/video-park-ave-smash-grab-thieves-steal-usd240k-in-handbags
And forget Don Trump, DeSantis, Pence, and the other 2nd Amendment loving Republicans at the NRA convention. Once again, the GOP’s young rising star is entertaining AR15 fanatics in Idaho! They’re even getting a chance to practice shoot with him! LOL!
https://www.idahostatesman.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/article274289270.html
U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteTo be read together w/Wallace Shawn's play, "The Fever":
https://www.amazon.com/Cobalt-Red-Blood-Congo-Powers/dp/1250284309/ref=sr_1_1?crid=31127UA1ZVYQV&keywords=cobalt+red&qid=1681569882&s=books&sprefix=cobalt+red%2Cstripbooks%2C6093&sr=1-1
Dr. MB,
ReplyDeleteI've been away, spending my time on a deep dive on Climate Change. Sad to say, there's bad news and worse news, nothing good.
According to a recent study by James Hansen; former NASA Goddard Institute director, this concentration of GHGases in the atmosphere means that a temperature increase of 10°C over the long term(100 yrs.) is already locked in. Yep, you read that correctly, according to one of the world’s best climate scientists, 10°C of warming is baked in. That’s 18 degrees Fahrenheit of extra heat. Let’s say he’s only half right, it's still too hot for the planet.
Global warming doesn’t stop at net zero, and there is no “carbon budget to stay under 1.5°C or 2°C”, it’s complete nonsense. Global warming is not driven by current emissions but by 1 trillion (yes, Trillion) tonnes of historic CO2 + other GHGs already in the atmosphere. The ocean has absorbed 90% of the excess heat and this will have consequences for thousands of years if not millions.
https://arxiv.org/abs/2212.04474
Joe, Trout-
ReplyDeleteWe have degraded the planet; we have degraded the nation; we have degraded each other; and we have degraded ourselves. These are facts, not opinions. Based on all of this, what does the future look like, for the US?
mb
US 'disappointed' by Chinese court's decision to uphold death sentence for American citizen
ReplyDeletehttps://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/04/14/china/us-citizen-death-sentence-upheld-china-intl-hnk/index.html
How touching! Sort of incredible how little the US cares abt its own citizens, home or abroad. What a capricious existence ..
Ro-
ReplyDeleteThe US might also be cautious abt offending China w/a stronger statement or adjective, e.g. "outraged." More evidence as to who is really the hegemon. World perception is that it ain't us any longer.
mb
Dear Doctor Berman,
ReplyDeleteI showed "The Fever" in a library years ago.
The bad news was that the library sound system didn't work.
The good news was that the crowd was willing to read the text on the screen without the sound, and at the end gave the film a great applause.
So a reading as you recommended will be rewarding.
Glenn-
ReplyDeleteI saw it performed (by a woman) in a private home in Seattle in the early 90s (theater, not film). Pure genius, and it makes the pt that 1st world and 3rd world are interconnected in an exploitative way--and that the 1st world is getting sick as a result, not just the 3rd world. That bk, "Cobalt Red," is a perfect example of this. The fact is, that every time someone in the US makes a cell fone call, a child in the Congo moves closer to death. The sickness on our end of it is well-established: higher rates of depression, anxiety; lower rates of empathy; not really being present in the world; and even damages to brain physiology. This is the theme of The Fever: we kill them, and we make ourselves sick.
mb
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteIs this Episode 2 of the Julian Assange story?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/15/pentagon-leaks-suspect-reaction-republicans-tucker-carlson
Is the radical right, right? After all, despite endless MSM propaganda, it does look like Ukraine is losing the war.
mb
ps: ya just gotta love America:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/15/south-dakota-governor-kristi-noem-grandchild-guns-nra
ps2: But maybe there is (some) hope:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/apr/15/barnes-and-noble-bookstores-james-daunt
Roland,
ReplyDeleteI haven't thought through my position on this clearly but I'll try to respond. I feel like when someone has shown that they're not intellectually honest, it's better to not engage with them at all. Carlson is known to lie for money (see the current Dominion voting machines lawsuit), and him having one opinion that makes sense doesn't justify paying attention to him.
ccg,
I agree with you that "lying by omission" is a big problem, certainly in U.S. media.
-- Torreblanca
delete-
ReplyDeleteWe are a discussion forum, not a bulletin board. Plus, find a different handle.
mb
Hello, Wafers from Andalucia, Spain. This year, I am celebrating my 5th year in Spain thanks to Dr. Berman's advice in 2018 while I worked for DOD to leave Great America for good. And I am glad, I did. I settled with my family in Sierra Nevada Mountains, Andalusia. We bought finca close to the lake and now we live off the grid. I love it. My life is very simple, with minimal technology but a great community and amazing nature all around us. I do not miss the life I had for almost 2 decades in the US. I read your books always Dr. Berman or I reread them. I read your CH3 from WAF and I think, I highlighted 70% of the chapter. Technology makes me sick, I don't know a more inhumane way to live. If I knew what I know now about the US, I would never move there in the first place. But I am from Slovakia and the American Dream propaganda was powerful. From 2018 until now the US is spiraling down faster than anyone would think. Daily news from the US:
ReplyDeletehttps://us.yahoo.com/news/shooting-leaves-4-dead-multiple-142218304.html
https://us.yahoo.com/news/hundreds-teenagers-flood-downtown-chicago-025708611.html
https://us.yahoo.com/gma/man-dies-attacked-dogs-while-204900558.html
It looks like teens are not happy in the so-called greatest country. I wonder why? Maybe they need more TDs.
Liv-
ReplyDeleteGreat to hear from you. Be advised that this yr will see 2 new bks from my pen. So few take my advice; so many suffer as a result. See my epitaph in the post. Once you get free of the US, you turn around and say, "How did I ever get trapped there for decades?"! Way back around 1970, Philip Slater referred to America as a 'spiritual slum'. No shit.
mb
Joe-
ReplyDeletePls reduce by 50%. Thank you.
mb
More mass shootings. Louisville in a park; and at a teenage birthday party in Alabama.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.cbsnews.com/news/chickasaw-park-louisville-shooting-kentucky-gun-violence/
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/16/us/dadeville-alabama-mass-shooting/index.html
Forget about thoughts & prayers. How about a song parody to the tune of John Mellencamp’s “R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A.! It’s called “AR15’s in the U.S.A.! “
They kill in the churches
And they kill in the grammar schools too
They carry automatic rifles
And they shoot to kill, a dozen’s too few
AR15’s in the USA. AR15’s in the USA
Boom! Boom! Murders in the USA
There was Stephen Paddock, Devin Kelley, Nicky Cruz. They were killin’
Sandy Hook, Columbine, El Paso, They were killin’
Virginia Tech, Orlando, & don’t forget dumb Kyle, Murders in the USA
AR15’s in the USA!
AR15’s in the USA!
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/4/16/ukraine-reports-unprecedented-bloody-battles-in-bakhmut
ReplyDeleteI feel for the people of Ukraine. What a horrible outcome for their country and the soldiers on both sides who are just caught up in the forces beyond their control.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/videos/world-news/putins-wagner-fighters-advance-north-and-south-of-bakhmut-allies-losing-faith-in-zelensky-101681581498473.html
Reports like this show that its going counter to their narrative that Ukraine is beating Russia.
https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/2023/04/15/ukrainian-soldiers-await-oklahoma-trained-patriot-missile-batteries/70117824007/
Its time to talk peace and yet here comes another report about weapons that aren't going to make a difference.
The USA is finished. Get your lifeboat ready, here comes the rough part
Torreblanca—
ReplyDeleteI agree: keep trying to “think through” your position. But it would help if you stopped using labels like “intellectual dishonesty,” to explain your reluctance to engage with folks like Tucker Carlson. You say he’s “lying to his audience for money” and that’s “intellectually dishonest.” If anything, Carlson’s views are quite “consistent” and “coherent.” How does “lying to make money,” (eg. hustling) figure into your argument here? Ask yourself how it’s possible that the so-called radical right, folks like Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene (the Jewish Space Laser lady) continue to provide a coherent—and rather sane—assessment of the Biden administration’s Ukraine policies? I’d argue that we’re not getting anything close to this kind of “honest,” (eg. consistent and coherent) assessment from the so-called establishment “left.” I’m talking about folks like The New York Times or NPR. Click on the link that MB just posted from The Guardian. I’m pretty sure that neither the NYTIMES nor NPR will ever speak up as vociferously—or as assuredly— in defense of whistleblower Jack Teixeira as Carlson, and Greene have already. Also research “Eric Hoffer True Believer.” Don’t continue down that wrong path: you’ll want to avoid being labeled a“true believer” around here! Good luck.
Ro-
ReplyDeleteGd pt, altho consistency and coherence do not nec. = honesty; these are different logical categories (one can be consistently full of shit, for example). Carlson's record reveals tons of dishonesty, by omission especially, along w/heavy distortion and bias; but yr rt abt the rt-wing criticizing this phony war in the Ukraine, while the MSM gives us little more than (consistent, coherent, and dishonest) gov't propaganda. BTW, what have Carlson and Greene said abt Julian Assange, and how is he different from Jack Teixeira? Finally, Torre hardly comes off as a true believer, imo.
Joe-
Fact is, this stuff is hardly news anymore. When I click on cnn.com or other media web sites, I *expect* to be reading abt the latest massacre. The US is not only a bad joke; it's also a sad joke. On both the micro and the macro level, it is deeply engaged in self-destruction.
mb
Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteScholarly article below on history of British colonialism in India. There is much here that you and Wafers would not be aware of: British empire killed 165 million Indians in 40 years: How colonialism inspired fascism: https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2022/12/12/britain-100-million-india-deaths-colonialism/
Key points:
“This figure is larger than the combined number of deaths from both World Wars, including the Nazi holocaust,”
This study found that British colonialism caused approximately 165 million deaths in India from 1880 to 1920, while stealing trillions of dollars of wealth. The global capitalist system was founded on European imperial genocides, which inspired Adolf Hitler and led to fascism.
"This is among the largest policy-induced mortality crises in human history. It is larger than the combined number of deaths that occurred during all famines in the Soviet Union, Maoist China, North Korea, Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and M
engistu’s Ethiopia."
Genocidal colonialist Churchill "expressed admiration for Mussolini" Churchill's own hagiographers admitted, "if forced to choose between Italian fascism and Italian communism, Churchill unhesitatingly would choose the former"
Railroads in US:How was it possible for Britain to export so much capital—which went into building railways, roads and factories in the U.S. and continental Europe? Its BoP deficits with these regions were being settled by appropriating the financial gold and forex earned by the colonies, especially India.
Will BBC or any Western (Anglo) media make a documentary on this?
Himanshu
Unknown-
ReplyDeleteSorry, I don't post Unknowns.
Himan-
Here's a bk you might enjoy:
https://www.amazon.com/Gandhi-Churchill-Rivalry-Destroyed-Empire/dp/0553383760/ref=sr_1_8?crid=13DEFVRMG3ZNR&keywords=arthur+herman&qid=1681701580&s=books&sprefix=arthur+herman%2Cstripbooks%2C2569&sr=1-8
mb
Oops-
ReplyDeleteBe sure to send messages to latest post. No one reads the older stuff. Thank you.
mb
Greetings MB and Wafers,
ReplyDelete1. What's the problem here?:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/17/texas-teacher-fired-students-fight
2. As MB usta say, "Pence Schmence, that's all I got.":
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/mike-pence-booed-nra-convention-home-state-rcna79794
3. The future of America dept.:
https://www.businessinsider.com/photos-show-young-kids-handling-guns-nra-annual-conference-2023-4
Jeff
ps:
America is completely filled w/violent morons:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/04/us-extremism-portland-george-floyd-protests-january-6/673088/
Economist fears ‘end of capitalism’ amid ‘Greedflation’ | Fortune
ReplyDeletehttps://fortune.com/2023/04/05/end-of-capitalism-inflation-greedflation-societe-generale-corporate-profits/
You love to see it. Trying to get a job in NZ working on the royal albatross colony. Get the hell out.
For multiple reasons, seems like a safer bet:
7 February 2023, NZ one of few island nations with potential to produce enough food in a nuclear winter , News, University of Otago, New Zealand
https://www.otago.ac.nz/news/news/otago0240823.html
Jeff-
ReplyDeletePeople say I exaggerate, but I don't.
mb
ps: re: teacher who encouraged kids to fight. W/o guns? This is not a true American.
ReplyDeleteWafers-
ReplyDeleteSome things that wd seem to be abs. certain:
1. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/17/black-kansas-city-teen-shot-wrong-address
This sort of thing will keep happening until the final days of the nation. We will simply never solve our race problem.
2. We will also never solve our gun problem. No amount of massacres will lead to significant gun control legislation.
3. A bumper sticker I saw in DC, shortly b4 I moved to Mexico in 2006: YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID
4. On the whole, we are totally and utterly fucked. Our way of life is sick. Shitbags in gov't, shitbags in the street.
mb
Black, white, mixed race, armed Americans don’t care. They’ll shoot first and ask questions later.
ReplyDeleteA Saratoga County woman (New York State) named Kaylin Gillis who was going to visit a friend along with three companions was fatally shot when the car’s driver mistakenly turned up the wrong driveway and the homeowner fired two shots at the car.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-65307556
Jas-
ReplyDeleteWell, this is quintissentially American, a no-nonsense approach to life.
mb
Honduras and the Jerusalem Embassy: How Netanyahu Backed Arms and Cocaine Deals - Israel News - Haaretz.com
ReplyDeletehttps://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2022-05-01/ty-article-opinion/.highlight/honduras-and-the-jerusalem-embassy-how-netanyahu-backed-arms-and-cocaine-deals/00000180-989b-d20e-adb5-dc9f50230000
Wow, since this was published he was re-elected and has committed a series of fresh scandals. How do these guys do it? Also v exemplary to how cozy Netanyahu is w American politicians; this is their M.O.
https://open.substack.com/pub/paulkingsnorth/p/the-universal?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
ReplyDeleteHis most recent post isn't about the decline of America per se, but rather about a more unknown existential global danger due to the revolutionary rise of digital technology.
I found it a long but thought provoking piece that left me with the same sense of unease as watching Dr. Strangelove as a teenager - the unease that humans are creating monsters beyond their control.
His long answer to his Question 3 "What if it is not a metaphor" will I think resonate with many of this blogs readers.
Anjin-
ReplyDeleteI've been thinking the same thing for years, quite honestly. Check out WAF ch. 3, and the Turing chapter of Eminent Post-Victorians.
Chazzy-
They don' come skuzzier than Bibi.
mb
Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the Bk suggestion.
One of the main conclusions of the link I sent is:
Hitler is made bigger villain so that crime committed by British Royals can be white washed. They made Hitler bigger villain. - a retweet by Tarek Fatah: https://twitter.com/nitkgpian/status/1647497530647908353?s=20
Speaking of MK Gandhi: Here is an alternate perspective in a 20 min video:
Juxtaposing #AbrahamLincoln and #MohandasKaramchandGandhi both of whom lead their nations in a time of existential crisis,
@AbhijitChavda asks, who came out better, who kept his nation while & in the drivers seat & who failed?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lBYbf18IiI
Himanshu
Attention Doctor & Wafers: Potatoes perhaps have replaced chicken sandwiches when it comes to USAins trying to kill each other. Ha.Ha.Ha.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.wral.com/story/man-arrested-accused-of-stabbing-coworker-at-food-processing-plant-in-nash-co/20817728/
And here’s the latest education rule: Don’t try to confiscate a student’s cell phone. After all, we never want them to learn anything in class, especially ("No. You did not keep nobody else phone," said the student.) when it comes to proper grammar. LOL!
https://www.wral.com/argument-escalates-into-fight-when-substitute-teacher-confiscates-cell-phone-at-rocky-mount-high/20815241/?version=json&image_sizes=400x300
Ya gotta love the total disintegration of this angry violent wasteland!
U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!
Joe-
ReplyDeleteEverywhere you look: buffoons! We live in a BRE (Buffoon-Rich Environment).
mb
Thank you, Dr. Berman. I will be looking out for the books. Between 2018 and now what is happening in the US, I can't believe this country was once bragging to be the greatest. The amount of violence and sheer stupidity is appalling. I can't even imagine the US existence beyond 2025. The collapse is increasing in momentum by seconds. 300 hundred-something morons put in the same place what can go wrong. The saddest thing is the kids are buffoons from an earlier and earlier age. Also, why do immigrants stay in this super violent, stupid, and crazy country? They know deep inside something is very wrong with the way of life in America but they just close their eyes and continue with the nonsense.
ReplyDeleteLiv-
ReplyDeleteImmigrants know that the US is a cash cow, and that, for them (often understandably), is what matters. But the evolution of America into complete buffoonery is no surprise. In the 18C, "pursuit of happiness" was a code phrase for "go out there and hustle." So everything became abt economic and tech expansion; abt profit and commodification. The result was a soulless, empty, superficial civilization. Go to the White House, and you will see buffoons. Go to Congress: same thing. Walk down the street, any street in any city, and what you will see are buffoons. Shd there be any surprise that we are finally going down the drain?
mb
Mr Berman has been saying this since Day 1
ReplyDeleteTrump’s Real Crime Is Opposing Empire | Compact Mag
https://compactmag.com/article/trump-s-real-crime-is-opposing-empire
He is a vandal, but as Chief was a vandal against empire [thumbs up]
Pal pointed out to me that although one should be appalled by the Russian gov't giving Vladimir Kara-Murza 25 years for pro-Ukraine and US statements, the US gov't has just charged 3 guys in St Louis for pro-Russian statements:
ReplyDeletehttps://news.stlpublicradio.org/government-politics-issues/2023-04-18/three-st-louis-residents-indicted-on-charges-of-illegally-pushing-pro-russian-propaganda
There's a long, awful history of the FBI going after Black nationalists on spurious grounds. Nothing in the news coverage gives confidence that this isn't happening again.
https://www.africanews.com/2023/04/19/usa-african-american-nationalists-accused-of-acting-for-russia/
We're quite an aberrant national creature
Pen-
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure 'aberrant' is quite the rt word...
Ron-
On the other hand, Schmiden stands for war and empire.
mb
Hey fellow WAFers and Dr. B,
ReplyDeleteIF you haven't seen this movie, it's a MUST-WATCH.
"The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford"
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443680/
It's a portrait of our earlier years as a nation of violent hustlers and frauds.
As Dr. B has stated, the problem is, and always has been, Americans themselves.
Xen-
ReplyDeleteHere's more of the same:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/apr/19/texas-cheerleaders-shot-parking-lot-wrong-car
Once again, there is only 1 answer: Americans need to gun each other down like dogs in the street until there's no one left.
mb
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteCheck out the killer's face:
https://ktla.com/news/local-news/his-family-is-not-prepared-for-this-teen-killed-in-ventura-county-violence-spree-remembered/
Business as usual in the land of the stupid: an Ohio teen died after doing a TikTok Benadryl "challenge". Some of the articles I've seen also covering this issue a warning to parents, in case other morons try to Darwinize themselves. As if the parents weren't brain-dead as well. Perhaps a new epithet is needed for those foolish enough to carry out these "challenges"?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.cnn.com/2023/04/18/us/benadryl-tiktok-challenge-teen-death-wellness/index.html
Hello Mr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteThe greatest country on Earth coming up with the greatest “zombie drug”, lol.. Addicts had to undergo amputation cause of the drug’s effects but still wont stop using it..Hard to imagine a more depressed and soulless civilisation than this..
“The flesh eating drug taking over America”
https://youtu.be/mRICAFzPDHs
“Philly’s zombie drug already in NYC”
https://youtu.be/9XHoBsNgKm8
Nam-
ReplyDeleteMetaphorically spkg, I think most Americans *are* zombies. They move thru life in a clueless, mechanical, zombie-like condition. Even w/o drugs. In some ways, the history of the US can be read as the history of increasing zombification. We need a song by Irving Berlin, perhaps:
"We're having a zomb wave
A tropical zomb wave
The numbness is rising
It isn't surprising
We're going down the drain, douche bags!"
mb
More than half of “crime guns” recovered and traced in Central America are sourced from the United States, according to U.S. gun control agency ATF.
ReplyDeleteInterpol-led LatAm swoop seizes thousands of weapons, $5.7 billion in drugs
America is the main source of illegal weapons around the world. These weapons are then used by cartels to smuggle drugs back into the US, where thousands die a year from fentanyl overdoses. America has caused incredible amounts of misery around the world. If America were to collapse, the cartels would no longer have a steady supply of weapons, causing crime to go down around the world.
Greetings MB and Wafers,
ReplyDeleteOkay, this shit is getting ridiculous dept.:
A North Carolina man opened fire on a six-year-old girl and her parents after children went to retrieve a stay ball that had rolled into his yard. I've suddenly realized that I could be taken out in a hail of gunfire over a trivial circumstance in this nation:
https://apnews.com/article/north-carolina-shooting-ball-girl-parents-61dda7685d1b0a9bcfde5655f753be1c
Jeff
Hi Dr. Berman and Wafers:
ReplyDeleteThe following article (link below) reports on a study done by the environmental consultancy, Trucost, for the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity Program sponsored by the United Nations Environmental Program that counted the costs of economic inputs normally referred to as externalities - costs that top industrial sectors pass on to the public sphere. The estimated value of these resources is 7.3 trillion dollars/year and the study concludes that if the industrial sector had to pay for these 'free' resources such as a stable atmosphere, clean water, land, pollution, etc. the industrial sector would NEVER PRODUCE A PROFIT! (Paul Craig Roberts said this but didn't present any data to support his claim). The report also has links and attached documents as references.
https://grist.org/business-technology/none-of-the-worlds-top-industries-would-be-profitable-if-they-paid-for-the-natural-capital-they-use/
Inter-
ReplyDeleteThe American gun supply is what is fueling the narcotraficantes down here in Mexico, the round of turf wars and massacres.
Jeff-
Let's face it: having a basketball roll into yr front yard is an incredible insult, not to be tolerated.
Michael-
That says it all, n'est-ce pas?
mb
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteIf you just step back for a moment, and look at the US as a whole, what you see is hard to believe. I was a child and teen in the 50s, and never did I imagine it wd all come to this. To paraphrase Tennyson:
Buffoons to the right of us!
Buffoons to the left of us!
Buffoons rt in front of us!
And still the brave Wafers pressed on toward the truth!
mb
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteJust look at that FACE! This is America in a nutshell.
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/04/20/us/neighbor-child-shooting-basketball-singletary/index.html
Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteI used to be such a fan of yours, for years. I lived by your sage advice via your books. But you calling Ukraine a "phony war" and that the U.S. should not be involved stuns me. It is a moral imperative to intervene. The Russians have systematically targeted civilians committing mass rape of kids and teens, murdering families,torture. etc. I am incredibly disappointed in you for suggesting repeatedly we should not defend these people. Esp.as a fellow person whose relatives were incinerated in the Shoah. Shanda. How you've changed. So bitter and right-wing.
http://aol.com/news/january-came-survivors-ukrainian-prosecutor-001548485.html
Adam-
ReplyDeleteWell clearly, you've fallen for the American propaganda. The MSM reports on Russian atrocities; it conveniently is silent on the Ukrainian ones (have you not noticed this?). I'm not bitter or rt-wing at all; I'm just interested in the truth, and it is certainly not on the American side. Will you also condemn Scott Ritter, John Mearsheimer, John Pilger, Col. Douglas Macgregor, and a host of other critics who really know the score (and who get ignored or marginalized by the media)? Are they also bitter and rt-wing? Such a conclusion wd be laughable.
If you admire(d) my work, you know that I try to look beneath surface appearances. What is really going on here? Putin is doing no more than JFK did in 1962, w/the Russian missiles on our doorstep. He understands what America, and NATO, are trying to do vis-a-vis his borders. This is basically a resurrection of the Cold War, wh/, in terms of foreign policy, is all America knows how to do. If you read my work carefully, you know all abt 'negative capability' and our endless need for an enemy. So instead of trying to broker detente between the Ukraine and Russia, which is probably what we'll hafta do, in the end, we pour billions into this war, from wh/American corporations are profiting enormously. On a psychological level, it enables us to be self-righteous; which is what has happened to you. You beat your chest; you call me a monster. Shame, shame. It's the easy path to take; it feels good; but it doesn't have much to do w/reality.
You fail to see that whenever Putin opens his mouth, it's 'propaganda' and an 'alternative universe', whereas apparently when Biden opens his, it's the unvarnished truth. The US has been playing that game for a very long time. It never occurs to us that maybe it is *we* who are living in an alternative universe, and that it is our opponents who are speaking the truth. Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan...it's a long list, this kind of bullshit, and you've fallen for it. Your condemnation of me is part of the mass delusion that America propagates, endlessly. Our enemy is always Hitler, always the Ultimate Evil-- until we lose, and then blindly go on to find yet another target, having learned, as Gore Vidal usta say, absolutely nothing.
Mon cher, open your eyes. Go back and take a closer look at my work, inasmuch as you failed to understand it. You are being led astray by surface phenomena--no matter how horrible they are. It isn't I who have changed, amigo; rather, it's you who have been had. (And it seems like you are the bitter one, no?) I'm sure you can do better than declaim from your high horse.
mb
Go Idaho! Check this out. Perhaps we can call it “Hustling, Kyle Style”! LOL! Any possible way to make a few bucks here in this angry capitalistic land of amorality/immorality. And to top it off, as a perk these Idaho buffoons got this functionally illiterate killer’s initials on rifles. They even gave this stupid dirtbag a standing ovation after he spoke the usual inane conservative drivel. It was hilarious.
ReplyDeleteNow, Doctor, please excuse me here for violating the rules and giving an opinion. But I definitely feel this idiot—a la ancient Rome that in its downfall who had child emperors— should be the president. I love seeing him go state to state. I’m telling you. Killer Kyle is the GOP’s diamond in the rough for 2024! Forget Don Trump and DeSantis. What better role model for the dumbed-down USAins to have than an AR15-toting/real life immature doofus killer leading the way!
https://www.thedailybeast.com/bonneville-idaho-gop-auctions-trigger-time-with-kyle-rittenhouse
https://digg.com/the-daily-beast/link/idaho-republicans-auction-trigger-time-with-kyle-rittenhouse-aNh1urgtsM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouH02BPMJx8
Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteIt looks like the level of stupidity in the US has reached infinite levels based on the first 2 links below. The "Yankee Knowhow" that was once applied to American inventiveness can now be firmly applied to all the NEW crimes we're inventing to make life disgusting and degrading in this country. I hold my head down in shame to the mayhem, anarchy, and lack of civility that plagues this refuse dump called America.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/20-year-fatally-struck-large-rock-driving-1/story?id=98749175
https://www.axios.com/local/austin/2023/01/25/austin-police-data-shows-spike-in-jugging-incidents
On a another note, while I was reading about the Oklahoma Land Rushes in the 1880/90s, I came upon a fascinating article about the not-so-minute influence of the American governments treatment of its native peoples and Nazi race laws. Word of warning the article is 68 pages long, but well researched:
https://scholarship.law.stjohns.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=7173&context=lawreview
Trumpi did a podcast
ReplyDeletehttps://youtu.be/bJomPd9oj9I
In an old comment I said that Trump is the right man for the wrong reasons. Here you can tell that he's doing politics as a megalomaniac businessman and not as a warmonger. If warmongering was profitable he would probably opt for it, but there is no profit in it. Honestly, in this podcast he seems to be the most sane american (especially about the denuclearization).
Victor David Hanson's latest article describes America's fast decline and has many good points. He suggests some fixes to the system but his tone suggests that although they are straightforward, they are not feasible, perhaps he harbors some secret rational thoughts such as the irreversibility of the empire's decay. One snapshot of this decay is the current trans stupidity going on, including a Washington bill that would allow minors who want to switch genders to do that without parental consent. So chopping off confused children's healthy body parts and sterilizing them for life is now considered "care", in their Orwellian doublespeak as they call it gender-affirming "care". What kind of country does this to its own children with such messianism, exuberance and unhinged aggression?
ReplyDeletefrench-
ReplyDeleteWarmongering is enormously profitable, in fact, tho perhaps not for Trumpi.
Joe-
Opinions are fine, if they are substantiated. Kyle won't make it to the W.H., but there's a gd chance Kamala will. Having a turkey at the helm when the ship goes down...as we say on this blog, Bad Is Good.
mb
I called our country an aberration the other day w my submission to the blog but our author disagreed w the use of the word.. I guess I still stand by it.. So... here you have a Democrat on the House committee investigating whether the gov't has been "weaponized" against critics of the gov't threatening a critic of the gov't with perjury charges.
ReplyDeleteIn what country do you have so much potential for propensity peace and intellectual integrity, and instead you get daily massacres and this stuff?
https://www.mediaite.com/news/journalists-defend-matt-taibbi-after-house-democrat-sends-him-letter-warning-of-five-year-prison-sentence-for-perjury/
Pen-
ReplyDeleteNeed something stronger, I'm thinking.
mb
U.S. Cuts Itself Off From Future Chinese Profits
ReplyDeletehttps://www.moonofalabama.org/2023/04/us-cuts-itself-off-from-future-chinese-profits.html
Another example of our idiot leaders (elected by idiot voters, of course) shooting to the foot.
Unless my kid hurries up and buys mum and dad a getaway home in Mexico I'm fucked as the US tanks... but it's so much fun to watch the absolute stupidity everywhere. It's like Beavis and Butthead 24/7.
comrade-
ReplyDeleteThere is, oddly enuf, something amusing abt watching the nation commit suicide. Jesus, what goofballs.
mb
MB,
ReplyDeleteHere is, maybe, a good demonstration for Pen on how propaganda works in the US of A with the full cooperation of the MSM:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HW6HKRIEROc
I know people, supposedly well-educated people, who couldn't even imagine that there's something not quite right with what's going here. This is where Russiagate has led the country. This and the war in Ukraine. And most of my academic colleagues are oblivious to the reality of what's going.
Saving Time DISCOVERING A LIFE BEYOND THE CLOCK By Jenny Odell
ReplyDeletehttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/672377/saving-time-by-jenny-odell/
"This dazzling, subversive, and deeply hopeful book offers us different ways to experience time—inspired by pre-industrial cultures, ecological cues, and geological timescales—that can bring within reach a more humane, responsive way of living. As planet-bound animals, we live inside shortening and lengthening days alongside gardens growing, birds migrating, and cliffs eroding; the stretchy quality of waiting and desire; the way the present may suddenly feel marbled with childhood memory; the slow but sure procession of a pregnancy; the time it takes to heal from injuries. Odell urges us to become stewards of these different rhythms of life in which time is not reducible to standardized units and instead forms the very medium of possibility.
Saving Time tugs at the seams of reality as we know it—the way we experience time itself—and rearranges it, imagining a world not centered on work, the office clock, or the profit motive. If we can “save” time by imagining a life, identity, and source of meaning outside these things, time might also save us."
I absolutely loved her prev book "How To Do Nothing" and in fact I might have learned about it from MB's recommendations. Regardless, this is Wafer literature for sure, finding the experience of time at the human and spiritual level.
ccg-
ReplyDeleteThis clip from Jimmy Dore is very impt, because it reveals what the US gov't is now doing: criminalizing dissent, i.e. making it illegal to voice anything that does not go along with the dominant national take on the war in the Ukraine. We are drifting toward fascism. Altho it's a long shot, I hope my friend Adam (above) will watch this clip. Also, how long will it take the gov't to round up Ritter, Mearsheimer, Pilger, Doug Magregor, and--me! Some democracy we've got here. Will I be spending my senior years in Guantanamo? Your colleagues, like Adam, have drunk the Kool-Aid, from which very few recover. There's no snow job like the American snow job.
cave-
Thanks for yr post. I've been saying this stuff for decades. The only Americans who realize that the American Way of Life is actually a Way of Death are Wafers and Native Americans. Meanwhile, check out my "Eminent Post-Victorians" for relevant examples of swimming against the current.
mb
Dr Berman, perhaps what is needed and would indeed be more thought-provoking would be for you to speak to other aspects of American demise that are less obvious, which an incisive mind such as yours can surely access.
ReplyDeleteFor example a concept I read about both in Robert Pirsig's "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" as well as in Alan Watts "the Book" is that we each and all live according to a map we've constructed in our heads to help us make sense of our multi-dimensional world. This map is based on a person's values and prejudices, rather than truths about the world and themselves. This map is the lazy man's way of apprehending a complicated reality that contains paradoxes and dilemmae. Too often, as Watts points one's adherence to their personal map allows the non-reflective amongst us to identify solely with just certain qualities of themselves, while projecting their shadow parts onto others who they can then dislike for having those attributes. A perfect example lies in the fact that while many MAGA folk rail against Democrats as pedophiles, more and more of their own are turning out to be the real pedophiles.
Rich people complain about socialism, ignoring the fact that the subsidies and tax breaks are examples of socialism. So they often resent poor and middle class folk getting any breaks from the govt at all, claiming these people's lack of money is proof that they're lazy, when the laziness they see is often themselves.
There are many interesting complexities to this period in our history. Claiming you know how things will end seems merely reductive, and a yadda yadda type response.
Justin-
ReplyDeleteTalk abt coincidences. I recently wrote a book on this very topic. Not on America per se, but abt the problem of the 'map' you refer to; what we might call scripts, or narratives. It's called "Healing," and hopefully you'll buy dozens of copies and distribute them to your friends. :-) I expect it will be available on Amazon in 2 or 3 months, possibly sooner.
BTW, I didn't appreciate your closing insult. I have never claimed that I know how things will end. All I've claimed is that they will end. An apology on your part wd not be outta place.
mb
Sounds exciting, Doctor Berman. I'm currently re-reading "Coming to our Senses". What a gem! It coincides with a project I'm currently doing. Thank you for the heads up on "Healing". I know others who will feel the anticipation I do.
ReplyDeleteI apologize for that comment, though I didn't intend it as an insult. That said, I understand intentions don't make the insult. Effects do. I'm sorry.
jmw-
ReplyDeleteI appreciate the apology, thank you. I'd also like to alert you to another bk that will be coming out this yr, perhaps a month or 2 after "Healing." It's in the series of 'cameos' I've done: previously the Italians, then the Brits, and now, the Russians. Title: "The Soul of Russia: From Pushkin to Tarkovsky." I'm very happy w/it; it represents some of my best writing to date. As you can see, it's been a rather busy year.
mb
Sounds interesting, Dr.
ReplyDeleteI have several people who WILL appreciate hearing this too.
Would you like me to say anything about "Healing" on Twitter, Post, Mastodon?
While there are many at these sites who suffer terminal myopia, many do not.
One expression I really like from Alan Watt to describe what the American culture is quickly losing is common sense. By this he means a basic way of making sense of the world we can at least approximately agree on. An image I apply to the American breakdown is that of a malignant cancer where the cells have forgotten the job they're designed to work in concert to do and gone haywire. Even though I left long ago I grieve for America.
j-
ReplyDeleteLater on, maybe, when it's available.
mb
Dr. Berman,
ReplyDelete21st April, 2023 Biden Signs Order Enforcing Social Justice “Credit Scores”:
https://trendingpoliticsnews.com/breaking-biden-signs-order-enforcing-social-justice-credit-scores-mace/?utm_source=knab&utm_medium=twitter
This was predicted by an Indian foreign policy and security observer:
https://twitter.com/ankitatIIMA/status/1649643976172134405?s=20
The tweet says:
Russia & China will shed & pass on Communism to the West/US and
Gulf will shed & pass Radicalism to the West/EU.
Himanshu
Rossini meets Tennyson.
ReplyDelete“The Trooper Overture”, 2 Cellos and a Drummer, Live at the Roman Amphitheatre, Arena di Verona, Italy, May 11, 2016
Bruce Dickinson Weighs in on “The Trooper”… and War, May 20, 2008: “[I]t’s looking at the dichotomy – yeah, war is senseless, it’s stupid, and in the end you could end up dead, and there’s no point in that… but at the same time, in some ways it is glorious… It represents human beings driven to extremes, doing extraordinary things that they would never, ever be able to do in any other circumstances. And it also represents huge waste and stupidity. And you need some way eventually to resolve those things – and maybe give human beings the opportunity to exercise their passions, as they do in war time, but in a more productive way.”
The Story Behind Iron Maiden’s ‘The Trooper’: “[T]he song is based on the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava 1854, which took place during the Crimean War. And inspired by Lord Tennyson’s poem of the same name.” — Original song and video at the bottom of the article.
https://youtu.be/bJomPd9oj9I
ReplyDeleteLong-form interview w Trumpi. It's amazing how much more "sensible" he sounds than our elected officials on most of these subjects. Perhaps less sensible and more relatable, he isn't speaking as an elite. He might be faking it, but it works...
420-
ReplyDeleteThis was already posted. We urge you to stay abreast of the blog, center of all wisdom and greatness. :-)
mb
Possible future events: I call this The Magic 10:
ReplyDelete1. Schmiden is reelected
2. A few mos. later, Schmiden croaks
3. All hail VP Kamala Schmamala!
4. Schmamala delivers an incoherent inaugural address; every 5 minutes, she laughs; finally she starts drooling
5. The address is mocked and mimicked across the nation
6. Across the world, Schmamala is declared a buffoon
6. Someone shoves a pie in her face
7. Schmamala delivers her now-famous "I am a buffoon" speech, and resigns
8. The Secretary of State, now president, declares that the US is over, and that all American institutions will henceforth be closed
9. Across the planet, people are dancing in the streets
10. I am named Chief of Mop-Up Operations; as I work, I sing "These Boots Were Made for Walking"
Dr Berman you've forgot the most possible event of them all: The state starts distributing guns and possibly mustard gas for free and the secretary of state declares that it's the duty of all citizens of all ages to hunt down every other citizen.
ReplyDeletefrench-
ReplyDeletePart of the Mop-Up, actually. That's why I'm doing the Nancy Sinatra thing.
mb
Ha!Ha!Ha! The ongoing Republican Comedy Show also now has Democrats joining them and making laughable buffoons of themselves. The latest comedy special: Elected politicians playing make believe war games. When a lot of us were kids we played with small soldiers. It’s obvious our “adult” elected officials never grew up! LOL!
ReplyDeletehttps://wtop.com/government/2023/04/lawmakers-war-game-conflict-with-china-hoping-to-deter-one/
But fear not. Our made up imaginary god will protect us in our de facto Christian theocracy. That great conservative state of Texas is placing the Ten Commandments in public schools. And the Bible-thumpers down there also will get a chance to say a prayer or two to, as George Carlin liked to say, their “Invisible Man up in the sky.” LOL! Ya gotta love it!
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/texas-senate-bill-10-commandments-school-1234721156/
U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!
Dr. Berman,
ReplyDeleteThe below clip (3 mins) of a novelist (of Nigerian origin) is also reflective of my experience in US:
https://twitter.com/RajivMessage/status/1649758833248460800?s=20
Its abt having a nuanced perspective of other cultures. Question is: even if it was offered would most people in US even listen?
Re: US drifting towards fascism: Recent experience of a journaslist at WH press briefing: https://twitter.com/RajivMessage/status/1649941864600985600?s=20
"As I keep pressing for answers, she keeps protecting the President.
@PressSec Karine Jean-Pierre dislikes me 99 percent of the time, and likes me 0.0001 percent of the time. The worst part is when we meet at that restaurant outside the White House. After a big fight in the briefing room, what do we say to each other? It's always awkward. The next day in the briefing room, she calls on the person on my left, the one on my right, the person right in front of me and the one right behind me. Then skips me as I raise my hand. She makes it clear that she is calling on everyone around me except me. "
Himanshu
Das Fest des Huhnes (The Festival of the Chicken) (1992) is an essential ethnological investigation of the Cult of the Chicken. Researchers from the Congolese capital of Kinshasa travel to the mysterious, virgin lands of Upper Austria (Southern Bavaria) and analyze the strange, primitive behavior of the natives. With Das Fest des Huhnes intrepid scientists share a potentially foundational document in Wafer studies.
ReplyDeleteWatch the documentary with English subtitles via the link.
I've noticed that doctors & counselors tend to treat depression & anxiety as a personal problem rather than looking at the wider issues going on in society. If you go to a doctor and tell them you're having a hard time dealing with life, they will ask if you want a pill (e.g. SSRI), or they recommend supplements (e.g. SAM-e), counselors, or books. One popular default is to tell everyone to try out mindfulness:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/jun/14/the-mindfulness-conspiracy-capitalist-spirituality
Doctors don't care whatsoever about your life & what's contributing to your frustration. The social aspects of suicide have been well-known for over a century, so why are depression & anxiety treated as personal problems?
The way professionals (e.g. doctors, lawyers, judges, counselors) treat anxiety & depression is just another sign of our failing society.
mind-
ReplyDeleteVery few Americans have been taught to think historically or sociologically. Plus, our entire orientation is based on radical individualism. There is another way of saying this, and it includes most mental health professionals: we are buffoons. Simple and straightforward and bottom-line accurate: we are buffoons.
I was just watching clips from Bill Maher's Friday nite show, and I can't help thinking: with topic after topic, Bill skewers it: he shows that we are failing (and usually in a comical way). And yet, he never draws the obvious conclusion: America is finished. It's one big dysfunctional joke. Bill, boychik: r.u. seriously not seeing this?
mb
Great Sage of the Western Hemisphere, it is long since I posted here, and for this I grovel in mortification. For now I just want to share this recent video by Gonzalo Lira, a Chilean-Mexican-American journalist who lives in Ukraine and has often commented on the situation in that country, among other matters:
ReplyDeletehttps://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HkGj0UwyikU
In this case his remarks chiefly address the topic of American censorship, saying that it will only get worse and will never end, because our civilization is decaying. At about 11:47 he says:
“For those of you in the United States, I reiterate my statement: get the hell out. There’s no future for you there.”
Or words to that effect.
Kevin
One of the points Alan Watts makes in "The Book" is that Western culture misses so much when we rely exclusively on analysis to provide us insight into events and actions. Dissection alone gives us a very limited view of what's occurring. Without a wider vantage point we're like the guy who has one shoe nailed to the floor and continues to go around in circle after circle without genuinely realizing there are alternatives.
ReplyDeleteIndeed context provides a much more multi-dimensional view of what's going on. Our surroundings influence what we do much more deeply than do the inner workings afforded by analysis. Stealing to satisfy hunger is a fundamentally different act than stealing for profit. Failure to factor in context ignores our interdependence and provides only a severely truncated view how and why we act.
Watt takes this deeper when he says that we kill a person by separating them from their context. Context equals environment and it's what gives life its meaning, its vibrancy.
We wonder why people sentenced to long prison sentences come out worse than when they went in. Their prison environment doesn't support the lessons they're presumed to have when they re-enter society. As a wise man once said: you can't grow ferns in the desert".
Kev-
ReplyDeleteIn future, pls do not check in as Anonymous, or terrible things will happen. As for Gonzalo's advice: 99% of Americans will ignore it. Why? Because they are buffoons.
jmw-
Always provide links for yr refs. Thank you.
mb
Fucking Impressive Dept.:
ReplyDeletehttps://edition.cnn.com/2023/04/23/politics/meek-mill-auschwitz-antisemitism-robert-kraft/index.html
jmw-
ReplyDeletehttps://www.amazon.com/Book-Taboo-Against-Knowing-Who/dp/0679723005/ref=sr_1_2?crid=P55V761BAC9L&keywords=alan+watts+book&qid=1682343900&s=books&sprefix=alan+watts%2Cstripbooks%2C772&sr=1-2
Rocket science!
WhileI was out of the country (best two weeks in some time) I didn’t post. However I was impressed with the generally friendly and considerate people that I met.
ReplyDeleteThe decline we see is totally unnecessary. Too much hustling
https://www.jasonhickel.org/blog/2023/3/18/universal-public-services
Hairy Palms-
ReplyDeleteFor Americans, hustling = praying.
mb
Unknown-
ReplyDeleteSorry, I don't post Unknowns.
mb
This from "Fight Club," 1999:
ReplyDelete“Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need…. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our great war is a spiritual war.”
In the intervening yrs since then, things have gotten *worse* in that direction.
mb
Here is an interesting exerpt from Christianity and the New Age by Christopher Dawson, published in 1931.
ReplyDelete"Now the social effect of Calvinism and of American Protestantism in general is to create an immensely strong moral motive for action without any corresponding intellectual ideal.
It is a culture of the will rather than of the un-derstanding—a purely ethical discipline which neglects intellectual and aesthetic values. This attitude remains characteristic of American civilisation even in its secular development.
Thus the ideals of humanist democracy, which were received from France in the revolutionary period, were stripped of their intellectual element and moralised as a justification for the 23 CHRISTIANITY AND THE NEW AGE unregulated activity of the ordinary man. This led, on the one hand, to the individualistic cult of material success and, on the other, to a humanitarian idealism that is in reality nothing else but the same ideal in a socialised form. No doubt these ideals still preserved some of the moral inspiration that derives from the Puritan tradition, just as European liberal-ism retained something of the humanist tradi-tion. But when this religious inspiration has evaporated, American civilisation without Cal-vinism, like modern European civilisation without humanism, becomes a body without a soul. And it is this dead civilisation which is apotheosised in the mythology of Hollywood and which is invading the Old World with all the prestige of its vast material achieve-ment"
From the No Shit Department, this:
ReplyDelete“American Teens Are Unwell Because American Society Is Unwell”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/02/15/teen-girls-mental-health-suicide/
Parts of the ruling elite in the U.S. are a tad bit concerned these days. In the video roundup referenced in the link below to a commentator named Simplicius the Thinker, Senator Marco Rubio bemoans that U.S. sanctions will have little effect in five years as much of the non-West world moves away from the dollar as the predominant international exchange currency. Coincidentally, in a Telegram post yesterday, the founder of the Russian aluminum corporation Rusal, billionaire Oleg Deripaska, claimed the same 5-year timeline for the end of dollar dominance.
ReplyDeleteThis 5-year window is very close to MB’s conjecture of 2030 as a year of destiny for the U.S. as we have known it. The sanctions escalator of the DC Blob is doing a very fine job of accelerating the process. I recall a recent blog comment I read somewhere: “Every escalator eventually comes to an end.”
The Simplicius roundup is also worth watching for a glimpse at the state of the U.S. proxy Ukrainian military in the words of a captured Ukrainian officer.
https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/video-roundup-42423?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email#play
https://www.rt.com/business/575230-deripaska-dollar-dominance-over/
Jack, Jas-
ReplyDeleteI'm impressed by the American commitment to beating off even when it is obviously going nowhere. I'm also impressed by the vigor of the beating off. The country is so stupid, one can only gasp.
Piotr-
Good quote. In future, provide links to bks you cite. Thank you.
mb
V. Harry Palms is more amusing than being the Flabster, which is no longer appropriate as I am less flabby. It’s also more relevant to collective, symbolic beating off.
ReplyDeletehttps://theweek.com/russo-ukrainian-war/1022965/western-diplomats-slam-russias-sergey-lavrov-during-un-meeting
What exactly is the point of this? Are the Russians going suddenly quit and go home?
"For the first time, we've invented something that takes power away from us", says the Israeli historian and author of Sapiens.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/04/23/yuval-noah-harari-i-dont-know-if-humans-can-survive-ai/
I think corporations preexisted artificial intelligence. I don't get this AI doom and gloom... Seems v a-historical
The MSM is falling all over itself in delight with the firing of Tucker Carlson. I've seen CNN and the New York Times refer to him as a far right extremist. But here is a nuanced take on the Tucker Carlson firing, one that will never been seen in the MSM:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjw9m1cG5S8
I know first hand that someone opposing what we're doing in Ukraine is going to be scorned as a far right extremist by people who believe themselves to be on the left.
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteIt's time to put buffoonism at the center of analysis of the US. For example:
BRE = Buffon-Rich Environment; i.e., the ethos of America
BOOC = Buffoons Out Of Control; i.e., American citizens
BI = Buffoon Index. For example, here are the results of a recent scientific study. The BI for Denmark is 0.6. For America, 183.8. What conclusions can we draw from this?
We now need to launch a journal to keep tabs on all this. What shall we call it? Why not: Buffoons!
mb
ps: Or maybe, Buffonic Review.
ReplyDeleteGreetings from Cascadia, Wafers everywhere. I am personally very excited about the new "Buffonic Review". Buffonic research could offer the lifeline of new degree curricula that our local Evergreen College has been desperately searching for to arrest enrollment decline. Total Evergreen enrollment has fallen during winter quarter 2023 to 1,952, compared to 2,116 for Fall 2022. A new Masters program in Professional Studies organized around the Buffonic Review, bolstered by weekly tele-seminars from the Great Seer of the Western Hemisphere and invigorating Tulsi workout tapes, might be the jumpstart Evergreen needs.
ReplyDeleteAlas, the only innovation at Evergreen for 2023 appears to be its wrestling program. Yes, Evergreen will become the only 4-year college in the state of Washington to offer wrestling in its expanding athletics program, made possible by “entrepreneurs” Kim Kaufman and Jimmy Goldsmith giving $150,000 to the college to support new wrestling and cross-country teams. The Evergreen administration projects that expansion of athletics programming will add 100 students over the next 3 years. The turd-polishing continues.
www.univstats.com/colleges/the-evergreen-state-college/student-population/
https://www.chronline.com/stories/evergreen-enrollment-falls-again-board-of-trustees-learn,284064
https://www.evergreen.edu/news/post/2023/evergreen-continues-going-distance-expanding-athletics-teams-hiring-cross-country
Jack-
ReplyDeleteExcellent example of BOOC!
mb
ps: we need to get some entrepreneurs to fund a Chair of Buffonic Studies. I wd be first to hold the Chair. Focus of our initial investigations into buffoonery wd be the faculty and admin of Evergreen.
ReplyDeleteHow hard it is to get the truth out, in America:
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/JosBtrigga/status/1650978643567423494?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1650978643567423494%7Ctwgr%5E57cd43f57688d732dca7309208fcc0aa70c99e46%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nakedcapitalism.com%2F2023%2F04%2F200pm-water-cooler-4-26-2023.html
How full of shit the Establishment is, eh wot? And meanwhile, Americans are little more than sheep.
How reliable is this?:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.hindustantimes.com/videos/world-news/putins-fear-how-u-s-stopped-ukraine-s-zelensky-from-bombing-moscow-details-101682450589428.html
Dr Berman
ReplyDeleteA dear friend Jim Sniechowski who's been my friend and mentor for 40 years was one person I informed about your upcoming book "Healing". He would be very interested in getting in touch with you. Jim introduced me to Reenchantment back in the 80s and we both were quite moved as well by Coming to our Senses a few years later. Weive both read "Twilight..." and others. Jim has several books on Amazon so you can check him out if you like. Here are a few of his books among many more.
https://www.amazon.com/What-Really-Killed-Whitney-Houston-ebook/dp/B00AIHSPZM/ref=sr_1_2?crid=C39LRDNGDWYF&keywords=Jim+Sniechowski&qid=1682575170&sprefix=jim+sniechowski%2Caps%2C413&sr=8-2
https://www.amazon.com/Worship-Hollow-Gods-Leaving-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B07CNWV4CH/ref=sr_1_7?crid=C39LRDNGDWYF&keywords=Jim+Sniechowski&qid=1682575226&sprefix=jim+sniechowski%2Caps%2C413&sr=8-7
https://www.amazon.com/Ambition-Belong-Leaving-Home-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B07CPDY81Y/ref=sr_1_9?crid=C39LRDNGDWYF&keywords=Jim+Sniechowski&qid=1682575226&sprefix=jim+sniechowski%2Caps%2C413&sr=8-9
https://www.amazon.com/When-Angels-Leaving-Home-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B098844Q1K/ref=sr_1_8?crid=C39LRDNGDWYF&keywords=Jim+Sniechowski&qid=1682575226&sprefix=jim+sniechowski%2Caps%2C413&sr=8-8
jmw-
ReplyDeleteMany thanks for the info. Jim can reach me at mauricio@morrisberman.com, but note that "Healing" won't be out on Amazon for probably another 2 mos. BTW, in future, be sure to observe half-pg-max guideline; yr a bit over. Thank you.
mb
Apparently, in the US, blatantly falsifying history is the politically correct way to go.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-65322821
Netflix is making a documentary with a black Cleopatra. And everyone who said that was a lie was called a racist. This is an issue that I've observed in some US minorities. They will appeopriate whatever culture they want in the name of their legitimate struggle. They are "colonising" and appropriating others in the name of decolonising themselves. I have even heard some say that all North Africans were historically black, Cleopatra, Hannibal, St. Augustine etc. and all the non-black falks there are invaders. Tell that to the Kabyles of Algeria who are mostly blond and who've been there since before the Sahara was a desert.
Everything in America is absurd. Even the legitimate struggle of minorities to exist is a fucking hurtful joke.
french-
ReplyDeleteHere's what I'm concerned abt: What if Hannibal was a cannibal?
mb
Go Georgia moms! High on heroin while driving to McDonald’s with their babies inside. And according to the cops, folks being high are such common occurrences that they carry Narcan inside their squad cars.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.wsbtv.com/news/local/cobb-county/cobb-mom-arrested-after-passing-out-mcdonalds-drive-thru-line-with-baby-car/V2T52LYNFJGZNGGUWINZHBZ6VU/
And the newest obesity drug should further aggrandize our drug industry. So look for it, Doctor & Wafers, the next time you turn on your television sets and immediately see, as usual, this latest drug advertised on the very first commercial that pops up.
https://apnews.com/article/mounjaro-wegovy-ozempic-obesity-weight-loss-bd0e037cc5981513487260d40636752a?utm_source=homepage&utm_medium=TopNews&utm_campaign=position_01
U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!
Joe-
ReplyDeleteLemme give it 2u straight: we live in degradation. This is not hyperbole. We are living in degradation.
mb
So I came across this little gem of an article today. It captures the greed and power-lust of those in charge of our current capitalist state. The madness of a thousand small kings of this type will surely hasten the decline. More, more, more, the mantra of our time. If I had one 1/10000th the wealth of this man, I would have quit long ago and simply enjoyed my life.
ReplyDeletehttps://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/capitals-militant
MB, What's your opinion on "cultural appropriation"? You'll typically hear PC types cry foul when someone wears a piece of clothing from another culture, for instance. There's also the example you gave of the college students who held a Mexican-themed party, where they wore sombreros & played Mariachi music. Or when someone dabbles in a music genre created by a different race. I feel a lot of this supposed "appropriation" is just telling folks what to do. Isn't showing interest in other cultures just the result of the world becoming smaller?
ReplyDeleteFly-
ReplyDeleteI just see it as virtue-signaling, wanting to show that u.r. better than the non-PC folks who serve tequila at a 'Mexican' party. When I see some goy eating chopped liver, I applaud. In general, woke folk are douche bags.
Hairy-
He staked Facebk, so you know he's a shmuck.
mb
Unknown-
ReplyDeleteSorry, I don't post Unknowns.
mb
Celebrating John Gray on the week of his 75th birthday.
ReplyDeletehttps://thecritic.co.uk/prophet-of-the-end-of-liberalism/
Always appreciate his Wafer pts of view, I finished his book on seven types of atheism last month, fascinating stuff! And I'm reading he has a new book coming out on the death of the leviathan of liberalism...
This war is so full of shit.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2MaeM5tdCA
Be sure to check out the comments.
mb
Doctor,
ReplyDeletePlease excuse my absence. As you know I published a book and got caught up in all the marketing and advertising, which led essentially no where. But I write art for arts sake and notinng gives me greater satisfaction that a well-crafted sentence or short story. I read the masters-Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Capote and I'm marvel at their talents. Poor Scott, in his last years he made around $20 in royalties and had to become just another hack writer in Hollywood. Budd Schulberg's recollections of Scott are fascinating, by the way.
Anyway, I thought I had retired in 2015 but here I am substitute teaching everyday to, as Gerald Ford said, "Whip inflation now!" Yes, here I am at 71 have to substitute to maintain the American Dream (lousy apartment, used car). I usually work at an inner-city high school. Dangerous you say? Absolutely not. All the students are allowed to bring their phones and all they do is play with them the entire period. Any discussion of current events? Are you crazy? I see that the students are required to read Gatsby. Actually, they are required to watch the Leonardo DiCaprio movie since I saw that the test is on the movie and not the book. I'm off to Asia this summer to complete book 2. It's tentatively titled "Never Lose Sight of the Dark." Like it?
Dan-
ReplyDeleteGd to hear from u, and gd title for yr next bk. In general, writers don't have a pot to piss in. My very used car just broke down, and I've got my back to the wall, having to buy another. Who reads my work? I make practically 0 in royalties. I've got 2 new bks abt to come out, after which I'll hafta stand on a street corner w/cup and guitar. And yet, as you've found out, life is gd...
mb
ps: Ya know what I'll be saying a year from now? "I published 2 bks last yr, and ya know what I made from them? Bupkis!"
ReplyDeleteMore downright callousness of USAnis: A road rager kills someone for moving over to let an emergency vehicle pass. Murderous windshield rock throwers take a picture of the incident and keep it as a momento. Teachers make a special needs student eat his own vomit. Using leaf blowers is a no no; it will get you blown away. Age isn’t a factor; grannies are violently angry. And of course in our great conservative 2nd Amendment loving state of Texas, mass executing neighbors is hip, especially when their “freedom” to shoot guns comes under attack.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/crime/colorado-road-rage-murder-webster-b2329190.html
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/crime/colorado-rocks-bartell-murder-photo-b2329142.html
https://news.yahoo.com/5-charged-indiana-special-needs-221514901.html
https://abcnews.go.com/US/illinois-man-leaf-blower-shot-killed-neighbor-driveway/story?id=98914523
https://abcnews.go.com/US/grandmother-charged-attempted-murder-after-7-year-stabbed/story?id=97378418
https://abcnews.go.com/US/5-dead-texas-shooting-suspect-armed-ar-15/story?id=98957271
But we’re “the greatest country in the world”!
U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!, U.S.
Retelling U.S. History With Native Americans at the Center
ReplyDeleteA new account by the Yale historian Ned Blackhawk argues that Native peoples shaped the development of American democracy while being dispossessed of their land.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/23/books/review/the-rediscovery-of-america-ned-blackhawk.html?smid=tw-share
Failing to recall when I last saw a university press book on the front pg of the NYT Book Review. Alan Taylor reviews Ned Blackhawk's book The Rediscovery of America. Book looks fab too!
Hemp-
ReplyDeleteAlso check this out:
https://www.amazon.com/Restoring-Kinship-Worldview-Indigenous-Rebalancing/dp/1623176425/ref=sr_1_2?crid=RJ51KY7VBTIV&keywords=darcia+narvaez+phd&qid=1682790539&s=books&sprefix=darcia+n%2Cstripbooks%2C1790&sr=1-2
mb
The Romanian writer E.M. Cioran wrote that "History is irony on the move." The following article spells it out in tragic terms for one American citizen :
ReplyDeletehttps://www.yahoo.com/news/homeless-city-where-once-mayor-140800579.html
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteHere is an interesting optimistic take on our future:
https://www.noemamag.com/religious-imagination-as-the-future-unfolds/
For a critique of Axial Age theory, see the Appendices to my bk on Japan. In addition, the author completely overlooks the Buffoon Factor (BF), brilliantly portrayed in the film "Idiocracy," and currently positioned, at least in the US, to overwhelm everything.
mb
Sang-
ReplyDeleteIn future, be sure to provide a para or 2 of commentary on your links. We strive to be a discussion forum, not just a bulletin board. Thank you.
mb
I recommend everyone search "housing crisis" in whatever news source to see just how widespread the problem is. It's gotten far worse since 2020 with both the increase in interest rates & house prices. One of the factors I see is that NIMBYism continues to go unchecked.
ReplyDeleteNew York Officials Failed to Address the Housing Crisis. Now What?
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/27/nyregion/nyc-housing-crisis.html
There's also the collapsing public transit system. DC started to really go down the shitter around 2015, now Boston's MBTA is falling apart. The signs of collapse are everywhere.
Over half of Washington, D.C., Metro rail cars pulled after derailment
MBTA in ‘Crisis’: Mass Slowdowns Frustrate Riders, Add to T’s Woes
Dr. Berman—
ReplyDeleteI find it interesting how the media are trying to dismiss RFK Jr. as "fringe". The Kennedy's are a fringe family? Surely anyone with an IQ over room temperature can see through that. But we're talking about America...
Around 9 minutes into the CNN interview below, Smerconish keeps trying to get Kennedy to apologize for saying that the new surveillance tech would make flight from oppression worse than what Anne Frank faced hiding in an attic. Kennedy refutes the reference and makes clear how the media distorted his words, but Smerconish keeps pushing it, hoping Kennedy will insert foot in mouth.
Polling at around 20% is a new definition of "fringe". Will Kennedy turn this ship from circling the bowl? Get real.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL5w9g0ReQI
housing-
ReplyDeleteBe sure to spell out acronyms. Thank you. Good info, tho.
Oops and housing-
Keep in mind 2 impt pts:
1. Country is a shit pit
2. Population of country largely consists of buffoons.
W/these 2 items as yr political framework, u can never go wrong.
mb
Well, this is shocking: In public, the folks at the Pentagon say one thing about the war in Ukraine, but privately say something quite different:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v3PRfMOITQ
I can't help but think that Lloyd Austin is doing Colon Powell proud here, doing his duty to support establishment war mongers.
The comments of White House spokesman John Kirby are unintentionally hilarious.
ccg-
ReplyDeleteImpt post, thanks. Pls refer to advice I gave Oops and housing, above, but let me add a #3: Our likely next president, Kamala Schmamala, is little more than a clown.
mb
ps: I've said this b4: When the US gets its ass kicked in Nazi-filled, corrupt, and certainly not democratic Ukraine, it will downplay the whole thing, put a positive spin on it (more than half of Americans believe we won the Vietnam war), and move on to China as our next enemy, while the American public will then be encouraged to get excited abt Taiwan. When that fails, Chad will be the next target, followed by the penguins in Antarctica, who are actually communists.
ReplyDeleteNone of this wd be possible if the BI (Buffoon Index) of America was not thru the roof. Also more than 50% believe Russia was our enemy in WW2, and Germany our ally. The verdict is in: You can't fix stupid. (No amt of slapping, no amt of urine...)
mb
ps2: I also want to weigh in on the upcoming coronation of King Charles III. Many yrs ago, when everyone in the UK was excited abt Brexit, I delivered my verdict regarding what it wd amount to: Brexit, Schmexit. In the fullness of time, I proved to be rt. Now the Brits are all agog abt the coronation. Brits, let me save you some time. Here's what it amts to, and what you need to know abt it: Charles, Schmarles.
ReplyDeleteOr to put it another way, Coronation, Schmoronation. Note that the word 'moron' is at the center of the latter epithet.
ReplyDeleteWashington teenagers ride tank to prom
ReplyDeletehttps://www.newsnationnow.com/us-news/west/teenagers-ride-tank-to-prom/?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=t.co&utm_campaign=socialflow
Sheesh you cannot get much more American than this! In fact, this sort of fetishization sort of makes me want to vomit..
Well it also seemed like fodder for the blog!
Fly-
ReplyDeleteA perfect event/symbol for a nation in decline, esp. when carried out by the country's young people. Thank you; we Wafers like to vomit.
mb
Hempton it is worse than just the Book Review not featuring things from university presses, here in Kansas our "flagship" university is trying to cut the University Press from it's wing and focus on a $350 million football stadium rebuild, a $50 million redo of the basketball field house and build a deep state campus complete with apartments and shopping! Certainly don't want books like this floating around
ReplyDeletehttps://kansaspress.ku.edu/9780700610273/rediscovering-the-democratic-purposes-of-education/
And when you discuss this with fellow Kansans they are so clueless about what is going on in the world that when one makes a comment that the Russians still honor their dead from WW2 is enough to get banned from their page because yet again, it is just more Ruskie propaganda! It is just so bizarre and more bizarre to me is my friend who introduced me to Dr Berman is a diehard Democrat who now thinks the idiotic Ukrainian war is worthwhile because you know, Putin is evil.
America Fails the Civilization Test
ReplyDelete"Imagine I offered you a pill and told you that taking this mystery medication would ... increase your disposable income by almost half, [but] it would double your odds of dying in the next 365 days. To be an average American is to ... take the pill."
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/america-fails-the-civilization-test/ar-AA1a8Ouw?utm_source=nextdraft&utm_medium=email
Harvey, Avalo-
ReplyDeleteScroll back, see advice I gave to Oops and housing.
mb
Jeffrey Epstein’s Private Calendar: CIA Director William Burns, Goldman Sachs’s Top Lawyer, Noam Chomsky - WSJ
ReplyDeletehttps://www.wsj.com/articles/jeffrey-epstein-calendar-cia-director-goldman-sachs-noam-chomsky-c9f6a3ff
"When asked about his relationship with Epstein, Mr Chomsky replied in an email: 'First response is that's none of your business. Or anyone's. Second is that I knew him and we met occasionally.'"
You know we've hit late-empire plutocracy when the country's voice of conscience is bumping elbows w the Epstein along side the CIA director. I'm sure Noam isn't into sex slaves but how out of touch can ya get?
I know S Pinker (another eminent linguist) has got caught up w this stuff too..
Low-
ReplyDeleteKnock me down w/a feather. Well, I guess Noam is human, like everybody else. Still, hard to imagine...
mb
ReplyDeleteIt’s getting to be one no longer safely can play the national pasttime. Shots are a breezin’ in the bullpen in ( where else) that gun loving state of Texas.
https://www.kget.com/national-news/texas-baseball-player-hit-by-gunfire-during-game/
Here’s the newest callous gimmick done by thieves. They pretend they’re stranded motorists. So like playing baseball in Texas, acting like a good Samaritan is at your own risk in N.Y.C.
https://www.audacy.com/1010wins/news/local/good-samaritan-robbed-by-stranded-motorist-in-queens
And of course driving or being a passenger anyplace here always is a daily risk, even if you’re a teenager. Here’s today’s mugshot of a typical scruffy, unshaven angry bully USAin.
https://truecrimedaily.com/2023/04/28/alabama-walton-county-florida-thomas-keebler-attacked-juvenile-road-rage-child-abuse-assault/
Just a few typical normal daily occurrences here in the “greatest country in the world”, the U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!, U.S.A.!
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteI find this meditation serves to relax me. Suggest you all try it. Sit in a quiet corner of yr house, close yr eyes, and think abt how utterly stupid America is. Think abt how it is disintegrating; that nothing can be done abt it; and that ultimately, that will be a gd thing for the planet, and humanity at large. 5 mins/day shd do the trick.
Om shanti
As Kamala Schamala is frequency derided on this blog, I thought, well, it might be worthwhile to offer more fuel for this derision. To that end I offer this video
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OUWNYPq2Q0
which features some of her cutting-edge remarks at a college or university somewhere in the US, I guess.
As an added bonus, Kamala's performance is contrasted with that of Nancy Pelosi during her visit to Taiwan. Is there really any fundamental difference between these two women? Both spew inanities, but Nancy P. sounds as if she's drunk. And she apparently believes that Ben Franklin was once president.
ccg-
ReplyDeleteYrs ago I said I wd believe in god if I were allowed to take Obama and Hillary and bang their heads together for 20 mins. on nationwide TV. That offer still stands.
But now, a new offer: I'll believe in god if I'm allowed to waterboard Kamala 185 times on nationwide TV. As for Nancy: Jesus, what a joke. Clearly, gallons of urine are called for.
Yes, these 2 gals are pathetic, but seriously: who in the American gov't isn't? The gov't is absurd, the country is absurd, and the people are absurd. And don't dismiss this as hyperbole. Just look at the front page news now, on any random day. Tragic, of course, the massacres and everything else, but what do you expect from shmucks? Is it some sort of accident, that we are going down the drain? Is it an act of god? When pigs fly, amigos.
mb
Your epitaph echoes H.G. Wells', who after the outbreak of WW2 chose the words: “I told you so. You damned fools.”
ReplyDeleteAnd his final book, published just before his death, titled "Mind at the End of its Tether" echoes much of your own ideas about the human race... I suppose because we haven't made much progress since he wrote it!
Check it out : https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.33876
Pizza-
ReplyDeleteThanks. I never read much of Wells, actually.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassandra
mb
I don't know why they arrested her for starting a fight club at her class. She should be given a medal or something and fight clubs should be adopted at every school. Later generations would come to recognize her as a great hero.
ReplyDeletehttps://cbs12.com/news/local/fight-club-angel-footman-florida-teacher-griffin-middle-school-leon-county-rules-of-april-12-2023
https://nypost.com/2023/04/30/us-conducts-1st-evacuation-of-its-citizens-from-sudan-war/
ReplyDeleteWhere there's fighting for political power going on, one can't help but wonder, how involved is the US gov't in all this? Can we just assume 80%-90% is directed by the CIA?
french-
ReplyDeleteWhere were the guns? This woman is not a true American.
mb
Wafers-
ReplyDeleteI urinate on King Charles and his disgusting coronation. Also on the Met Gala. The elite are trash.
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/05/02/business/cost-of-living-doncaster-coronation-gbr-cmd-intl/index.html
mb
You can tell a civilization is cracking up when someone makes a tweet telling parents not to allow kids to ring ppl's doorbells, unless they wanna eat lead. A Texas girl rang the doorbell of a weatherman, looking for her lost kitten. Amerikkkans are so paranoid & miserable that some are willing to slaughter a kid who's searching for a missing pet.
ReplyDeleteCheck out this gold nugget from the comment section. Cowards indeed:
"Another moron from Texas with a gun. What are these cowards afraid of?"
https://nypost.com/2023/05/03/texas-weatherman-slammed-after-warning-kids-from-ringing-doorbells/
Satchmo-
ReplyDeleteAs a confirmed declinist, I find stories of our degradation strangely inspiring!
mb
ps: I note a # of new killings in the news. Why bother to post them anymore?
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, remember that song from "Hair"? (my generation; I saw it onstage in NY)
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare.
In a salute to our future president, let me adapt that:
Kamala Schmamala Kamala Schmamala
Schmamala Schmamala, Kamala Kamala.
The ship of state goes down, with a complete moron, a bag of rancid douche fluid, at the helm!
mb
I've been reading a pretty good book called "Growth Fetish," by Clive Hamilton. https://www.amazon.com/Growth-Fetish-Clive-Hamilton-ebook/dp/B00CBOH4I4/ref=sr_1_1?crid=9P6HQ4267T5U&keywords=growth+fetish&qid=1683177363&sprefix=
ReplyDeleteIt has a very Bermanian perspective, which could be summarized as "the problem of growth is growth." The second part of the book, I'm finding especially insightful. His main thesis is that the principal contradiction of modern capitalism is not in the sphere of production, but in consumption. There is a bit of Chomsky's "manufactured consent" here, but it goes beyond that. His idea is that our newfound affluence has made our "identity through work," much less relevant than our "identity through branding and our consumption choices."
I also just finished another great book called "The Uninhabitable Earth." https://www.amazon.com/Uninhabitable-Earth-Warming-Adapted-Adults-ebook/dp/B0BS35LY7N/ref=sr_1_1?crid=J0Q6VHYLFRO1&keywords=the+uninhabitable+earth&qid=1683177731&sprefix=the+uninhabi%2Caps%2C121&sr=8-1
This has to be close to the best book on climate change, though I have only read a few. At any rate, it makes one think that the whole Industrial Revolution, and all of its supposed "progress," might turn out to have been a giant illusion, in light of the climate horrors that await. This is something that Pinker is virtually blind to, with all of his "techno-optimism."
Megan-
ReplyDeleteI always appreciate yr references, thank you. "Growth Fetish" might more accurately be labeled "Growth Addiction," or something suggesting runaway pathology. The issue of identity thru branding is clearly on display at events like the Met Gala. While millions of Americans ooh and aah, the fact is that these people are empty, filling their lives up w/crap (wh/is also true of the adoring Americans). In any case, just a heads-up: I discuss identity thru branding (as opposed to authentic identity), and what $ *really* means, in my forthcoming bk on Healing, wh/I'm hoping will be out on Amazon by the end of the month, if not sooner.
Speaking of consumer fetish: this bk is selling on Amazon for $85 (mine will be for $12), altho there is a cheaper paperback available, thank god.
As for Pinker (who needs to be vigorously slapped), W.H. Auden once remarked that the whole constellation of techno-capitalism needs to be mercifully swept away. By now it's a snake that's biting its own tail. Progress my tushie.
mb
ReplyDeleteUSAin anger everywhere. A pregnant woman denied boarding goes berserk at the airport.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12042059/Shocking-moment-pregnant-passenger-beats-Spirit-Airlines-manager-wouldnt-allow-fly.html
In NYC it’s best to avoid eye contact. Someone may punch you.
https://www.audacy.com/1010wins/news/local/brooklyn-subway-rider-punched-slashed-for-looking-at-2-men
Its street hustlers selling candy in the $trillion underground economy fly off the handle easily.
https://www.audacy.com/1010wins/news/local/candy-seller-attacks-teen-on-bx-subway-near-yankee-stadium
And what better bizarre way to honor one of the many murders here in this wasteland than to have a sign on a highway named after a convict.
https://www.audacy.com/kmox/news/local/the-sign-is-down-though-its-not-clear-who-removed-it