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Feral Finster's avatar

We are ruled by sociopaths, just as every system eventually comes to be ruled by sociopaths.

This is because sociopaths are the people who will do whatever it takes to get power.

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Forest's avatar

So the answer is, get rid of sociopaths.

The only way to do that is a very non sociopathic programme of democide and eugenics.

And we better hope the experts get it right this time when they diagnose the sociopaths to get eliminated. Not get blinded by hubris or self interest or their own narrative they made up for themselves or the propaganda narratives they may have internalised.

Because the history of getting rid of Troublemakers I Don't Like is not giving me much hope.

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Feral Finster's avatar

What I wrote was descriptive and not prescriptive, for some of the reasons you mention.

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Forest's avatar

Absolutely - but just showing up the eternal problem - if it weren't for Group X we'd have utopia.

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Feral Finster's avatar

It's funny that we're recapitulating the basic theme of "Lord Of The Rings". Power both corrupts and attracts the corruptible, but power also is What Gets Things Done. Give me power and I will destroy the bad guys, but also will turn into a bad guy myself in the process.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Nietzsche was of the same mind.

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Feral Finster's avatar

I wasn't planning on mentioning that. Sheesh.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

But Nietzsche was both crazy and wrong.. and had piss poor standards of personal facial hair grooming. It is possible to be a leader of people and not be some stereotypical philosph .. plus he fucked Wagner's wife on the sly.. the dirty dog... scoundrel ..whore probably begging for it.. what was it with these 1800 artistic crowd ? If they were so clever and good at that shit why didnt they see WWI coming down the pike?

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Feral Finster's avatar

A lot of people can both be radically wrong, and at the same time offer valuable insights. In fact, the standard for a good villain is that he thinks that he's the hero. A *really* good villain actually sort of has a point.

Edward VII in "The Crown" is a prime example. He's manipulative, unscrupulous, scheming and ambitious, a flatterer who is disloyal to just about everyone but Wallis, herself another piece of work. A shitty son, a shitty brother, and he did a shitty job as king. But he was treated unfairly by his family, and his bitchy remarks on the Royal Family hit home, precisely because they are entirely accurate.

For that matter, I may quote Goering or Goebbels, but that doesn't mean that I endorse either.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Word is he probably had syphilis .. ever wonder why the Victorians were so crazy about marital fidelity?

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Yup and I could be 13 years old again and my family has wild rabbit for dinner.

Sorry to be so Black Pilled.. My Wife hates it when I say "we will be OK Baby" and so do I because what else can I say?

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Mark Bolton's avatar

I really hate to post this because it is neither descriptive nor imaginative. "Ever fired an AK? " No and why would any one want to ?

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Lovely piece of machinery .. I learned as a youngster puttin meat on the family table with my .22 .. Iron sights .. the Kalasknikov is much the same but wont put food on any table.. Iron sights .. Does what you want to what you point it at... but not , ultimately contributing to the common good...

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Landru's avatar

Several paragraphs, deleted the word guillotine is to triggering.

I still have my .22 I carried on my shoulder while ridding my bike to target shoot ha. No one even looked my direction, hardware store box of 500 long rifle, shoot for a few hrs. ride home hahahhahaha. Can't say I wouldn't look hard at myself today : ) I paused even hitting the post button, shame on me.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

But for fun I loved my .22 Iron sights..."nothing like getting youre eye in" I use to shoot the pegs off the next doors clothes line. Now It seems like shit to handle a side arm. With my glassses I can see the iron.. but not where I am suppose to direct the fire. Fuck mate !! The Older we get the better we were!!

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Mark Bolton's avatar

You are going to hate my guts for this boring reminiscence , but I learned to hit stuff with a machine that looks like gun .. with an air rifle.. I must have put 5 kilograms of slugs through that thing until I wore the spring out.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Love your kindly and expansive post...

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Mark Bolton's avatar

As a young bloke I went at "sun up" to get food. My .22 was just another tool. probably the least risky. I had implements to go hard with fish. Even my fishing rod (gay I know) was less risky than my fire arm. With me it was mostly spearfishing. And I never used a speargun .. fucking pieces of shit.. and dangerous as all buggery.. the hand spear is a proper way to put a fish on the family table.

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unwarranted's avatar

I believe that if we are observant enough to see how we are systemically caged, then we need to be honest enough to see that our jailers are neither evil nor unlike ourselves. I sometimes cringe at the hyperbolic language folks throw around to express their utter disgust for people who grease the wheels of the oppressive system. Most of us are the greasers because the system is co-opting and unsparing. This, I think, is when love for our brothers and sisters is most difficult. And most needed.

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Michael's avatar

So it’s not the ‘Power Corrupts’, but more likely the corrupt seek power

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Feral Finster's avatar

I have seen it phrased thusly: "power attracts the corruptible".

I would say that it's some of both. Even if you aren't corrupt, once you get power, will have to learn to be corrupt if you want to keep that power.

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Joe in Missouri's avatar

Or perhaps because the global ruling system (Illuminati) CHOOSES sociopaths to head all of the hierarchical and compartmentalized institutions

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Forest's avatar

No, I don't think that's how it would work.

No matter how perfect the system, sociopaths would exploit it for their own individual gain. Even the non sociopath, the ordinary person with ordinary levels of greed or ambition or glory seeking will do that to a lesser degree.

The founders of the US were aware of bad actors and tried to design a system full of checks and balances to hinder them.

Communists thought their system would stop people 'having to be' greedy and selfish, but that didn't work either.

Smaller scale efforts such as communes with their non hierarchal ethos ended up scattered and broken too.

No system can de designed that's foolproof against human nature.

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The Society of Problem Solvers's avatar

You can NEVER rid ourselves of the psychopaths. They are about 2% of the population.

What we should be doing instead is making better parallel systems. As Naval Ravikant likes to say, "A good system you should be able to turn over to your enemies to try and have them corrupt it. They won't be able to if the system is good."

We are SO happy that you are talking about this Caitlin.

We Don’t Need to be in this Abusive Relationship Anymore with the People Corrupting Our Systems. Let's Demand Better, Fearlessly, Together.

We have plans. Let's unite.

https://joshketry.substack.com/p/whats-happening-might-seem-scary

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Fran's avatar

I don't see Russia as the aggressor in this war, but the US, and it has been every since it supported the coup in 2014. I believe what we are experiencing now was very predictable. Had Clinton won it would have occurred during her reign, but she didn't, so she and the democrats created a bridge with the lie of Russia-gate tied to Trump which was nothing more then propaganda created in great part by the democrats and media including too many on the left. So it's no surprise that under Biden, very much involved in the 2014 coup, he just picked it up were he left off. As recently revealed by Merkel the Minsk accords were never meant to go forth, but only provide time for Ukraine to prepare for war.

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russian_bot's avatar

They certainly didn't waste any time due to Trump hiccup. They were able to ramp up Russophobia incredibly well.

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Fran's avatar

They made themselves so obvious when they attacked him for the very thought of getting along with Russia, and his visit was met with harsh criticism. I use to be a registered democrat, but didn't always vote, but now I would never give them my vote. Four years of trying to oust him from office, so is it any wonder he might think the election was stolen, and maybe it was.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

The "election" in America was fictional. Three reasons why Orange Man Bad ... went .. 1 He asked the Military to get out of Afghanistan ..they saluted "Yes Sir " and promptly didnt.. 2. Get the troops out of Syria.. again a crisp "Yes Sir" and heels clicking and promptly didnt. 3 Why are we sending so much money to NATO .. If it is so important how about they pay for it... "Yes Sir..Mister Commander in Chief" looking into it right now..

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unwarranted's avatar

I think your recent history is spotty. The fraudmeister named Donald was mocked and played and overtly hounded by his “peers,” because he made it so damned easy. He is the reigning king of mendacity. He was a fan of Hilary before he sought political office, just like he was a champion for women’s rights before he saw how rabid and gullible the Christian Right was. The Right, many of whom are closet racists, loved him from way back when he paid for full-page ads in the NYT advocating a just cause verdict for the subway vigilante, and advocating indictment and capital punishment for the black youths that were suspects in the Central Park rape and assault. Those youths were convicted and imprisoned until DNA evidence proved they were innocent of the charges.

On the subject of war and Russia, it was no secret that the LSOS had long sought to expand his financial holdings in Moscow. And he envied Putin’s leverage in dealing with social issues like gay rights and transgender rights and all minority rights,,,to the LSOS they’re all wrong. But that didn’t stop him from leveling the harshest sanctions against Russia. up to that point, and upon hearing from the spooks that he couldn’t con (that is their job) that poison gas was deployed in Syria, the LSOS authorized a missile strike on a Syrian Air Base...with no corroborating evidence that Assad was behind it. It killed six Syrians. He opposed the alliance that held the Iranian nuclear program in check, and why? Because the LSOS craved the Jewish money that daily pours into Israel. He scuttled the JCPOA because that was what Israel wanted, he moved the American Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem because that was what Israel wanted. It was an investment in his own bottom line. He had no problem with the Saudi genocide in Yemen using the American weapons that he, like Obama, like Bush, etc sold to them. And don’t forget how the LSOS arbitrarily named a new President of Venezuela, who was not even on the ballot in that country’s most recent election. He then authorized the spooks he couldn’t con to stage a coup in that country that was easily put down because the leader there has much more legitimacy and popular support than the LSOS who hates socialism, which would be ironic if it wasn’t so self-serving. He’s for no regulatory constraints on HIS ability to bilk the public. He has beggared thousands of investors over decades that bought into his schemes. He’s a transparent huckster, and that rubs many oligarchs and corporate heads the wrong way. There is nothing moral or constructive that the LSOS did as POTUS that sets him apart from his predecessors. If peace is your thing, you’d be better off voting for Sanders imo.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Yes you are tottally right but as Barnam said "always leave them wanting less" or perhaps he didnt. I am sure you will correct me there too ..Yes Trump was a disaster an utter fool .. but a lesser disaster than the other? Who knows? .. the whole world is in flames. I used to be a firefighter but now I just reach for the toasting fork and the marshmellows...

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unwarranted's avatar

It wasn’t my intention to lecture, sorry if I came off that way, and my rationale for always challenging the slightest compliment to Trump is simply that, as an injured animal can not be trusted to not attack, his damaged psyche can never be given the benefit of the doubt. He will only say what serves his immediate purpose. His psychiatrist niece outed him as the lifelong fraud that he is.

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Society's Stinky Parts's avatar

Moral evaluation is a waste of time. The salient thing about Trump is that, as a result of his election, a very long-term, hybrid program to rearrange Asia according to Western property interests was interrupted, poking holes in the Western professional-managerial class' comprehensive, coordinated, multi-theater, multi-front coup against the world.

The retreat to the USA's own sphere of influence could be viewed as a step in the construction of a multipolar order. TBF, nobody guaranteed the new order was going to be a nice order.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

In case I didnt make myself entirely plain "you nailed it" ..and I salute you for doing so .. no reservations..

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Upon re reading your post you are far less cynical than I am...

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Mark Bolton's avatar

I wont try to be as historically accurate as you were .. Trump spent his entire "Presidency" getting (Australian bar lingo) "fucked up the arse" and pretending to enjoy it.. out of his depth entirely and willing to go where every stray breeze wafted him...

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Mark Bolton's avatar

No perhaps it was Andy Warhol... ? but never the less the picture you painted tells the entire Truth .. and It pains me to read it because I know it to be utterly true. Just I cant face it again. But plaudits to you for having the strength to stare Suron in the eye. I grow weary ..

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Sorry if that came across as dissmissive and smart alecky. Evey thing you wrote was "bang on" .. and I am glad you had the time and passion to paint the entire picture. ~salute ~ to you..

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Fran's avatar

Trump did some things that weren't good, but most went along, like his sanctions and breaking the Iran deal, but no new war. New wars under Bush/Cheney, wars under Obama, war under Biden. Interesting that Chomsky said shortly after the the war in Ukraine got underway that the only statesman who could stop it was Trump. When Trump wanted to get along with Russia he was vilified and they made sure he was, since getting long with Russia was not an option since other plans were already in place.

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unwarranted's avatar

My point wasn’t to argue that Trump was averse to getting along with Putin, but only to show his motivation. He did want to contradict the anti-Russian propaganda, not because he sought to promote truth, but to smite his critics, expand his portfolio, and learn from Vlad how to keep the queers and trannies and blacks at bay. Saying he started no new wars, I think, is overlooking all of his opportunities to end the ones we have been in all of our lives. Our embargo on Cuba, our clandestine activities in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Peru, our agitation against China, our military presence in Africa to quash any indigenous rebellions against draconian dictators. Are you really going to applaud the schmuck for not making things worse than they are? If so, I hope I can count on your vote in the next election.

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Fran's avatar

Smite his critics when it came to Russia? He was talking about getting along with Russia when he was campaigning. He had nothing to gain on that point, and that should be obvious to anyone since he was then plagued by the lie of Russia-gate perpetrated by Clinton which no doubt kept Russia-hate alive. As far as keeping the gay, trans-sexual, and Blacks at bay, well, how does Vlad keep them at bay, and how did Trump implement his methods? I see you bought into a lot of propaganda BS. Many say the Blacks did better under Trump financially then they did under Obama, and what exactly did he do that harmed the gay community? Yes he should have made greater efforts, and done more in bringing our dirty war in Syria to an end, a war that began under the Obama/Biden administration. No doubt there was little he could do to stop the black slave markets that arose after the Obama administration knocked off Gaddafi , another lie of a war. You're whole commentary is nothing more then Trump hate and propaganda. He did things I disagreed with, like the sanctions he imposed, and overturning the Iran deal, but the democrats supported both. You say things are a lot worse then they are now, so I guess you missed it after reading this article that we may be on the road to extinction in a nuclear war.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

What can I say but "Yup" .. If I were your High School tTeacher I would give you and A + and tell you to "fuck off to someplace where you might actually learn something". Which clearly you have.

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Feral Finster's avatar

Did not Frank Zappa teach the masses thusly, that one goes to college in order that one might get laid, but that one goes to the library in order that one might get an education?

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Mark Bolton's avatar

A brilliant mind that we lost far too soon. I have seen interviews with the session musos who "got the call" their hearts were bursting out of their chests and not only was it the gig of their life but it was immense fun and Frank knew what he wanted and could explain it in technical terms. My field is Science and I can appreciate blokes like Hamilton and Maxwell ... although I am really not clever enough .. But Music was Zappa.

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unwarranted's avatar

Ich bin der chrome dinette!

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Mark Bolton's avatar

To summarise it; Zappa just made it "look easy" .. when in reality it was probably easy for him..

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Fran's avatar

THANKS!!!!!!!!!!!!

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The Revolution Continues's avatar

So many great quotes to choose from this time! (I tweeted a half dozen or so.)

I think you've hit the nail on the head when you say, "Nobody actually believes western proxy warfare in Ukraine is about saving Ukrainian lives. You don't save lives by ramping up escalations, you save lives by negotiating peace, which would require concessions from the US empire. Empire simps just don't want those concessions to be made." Some recent polls have shown this to be true. Even Americans aren't supportive of this continued bloodshed. But when will Americans rise up and march in the streets like the French have this past week? Time will tell, but I hope it's soon. Power to the people!

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Mary Wildfire's avatar

Americans don't march in the streets for peace because we've done so, so many times, and it has no effect. I'm done driving the 6 or 7 hours to DC to protest anything but especially war because IT HAS NO EFFECT. I think we could force change with a general strike but we'd have to get a hefty percentage of the population onboard and that isn't easy when the other side has 98% of the media people tune in to. That Dore clip was rather amazing--the stuff he got said--but on Fox News?!

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Landru's avatar

Mary, we are going to be out locally in solidarity with those at the front steps. I agree Jimmy said what was necessary for all audiences to hear. I am done be divided, I think was Jimmy's message. Much love to you, Solidarity.

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Society's Stinky Parts's avatar

No offense to the massive amount of effort it takes to pull such a thing together, but ultimately you're doing a dance number to beg the ruling class to diverge from the real, actual values (as opposed to the ideological emotional crap) of liberal capitalism.

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Literally Mussolini's avatar

I'm ready to march and volunteer my time and skills.

Just waiting for someone with more charisma and organizational experience to take the lead.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Mate it's you...

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Landru's avatar

Feb. 19th we will be in the streets. Start a march locally.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

It's either the streets or the grave.. I am accustomed to both... See you there. ;-)

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GreaterIsrahell's avatar

......, or you could check this out. You have 16 days to prepare.

https://www.corbettreport.com/solutionswatch-rageagainstwar/

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Tereza Coraggio's avatar

Synchronicity! I had just written elsewhere that as long as the system rewards ruthlessness, the most ruthless will be in power. To be replaced by someone more ruthless when they falter.

And I'm so glad you're making it known that Abstract Expressionism was a CIA psy-ops.

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Marquis's avatar

Ultimate, most people buy into the bullshit of one of the two parties of the US empire and are loyalty to it because the oppose the other side. Yet the thing is the loyalty is blind and they won't dare be independent in terms of thought. That's why there is no real antiwar position because both sides propagandize the Ukrainian war as good, ironic? Just like they did with the Iraq war, the Gulf war, and many others.

We could make up any system we wanted and it could work if people wanted. Yet in the US everyone is essentially raised to think our country is the best and that our economic system is the best. If you disagree you are wrong or an enemy. This despite massive evidence proving otherwise.

I was lucky, having the opportunity to interact with people from other countries, that expanded my world view. Then eventually learning about other countries, how some do things, like the Nordic theory, I was intrigued. Then I saw the political parties do things against their ideology, rather frequently. I rejected the mainstream political positions, because I saw that they weren't working.

I am glad you speak out against the United States empire, people defend the wealthy and the politicians when they cause death and suffering, nothing good comes of it and our political systems merely gives us the choice between two assholes. Choosing either changes nothing, because as you said, the asshole system benefits the assholes.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Yes I used to think so myself untill I visited Montana. As an Australian tourist I demanded to meet some "Ugly "Mericans " they could provide me with kindness, intelligent conversation, great food, bars where you could speak your mind and didnt get immediately shot or punched, you got a fair hearing ... and a place I might want to call "Home" except for the snow in Winter thing..

I sent them scurrying to find me an "Uggly "Merican" to complete my travel experience , but they came up nix.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Caitlin I wish I were in a finacial position to spot you a few bucks. Sadly I am under the heel of the lap of luxury but ... I can send you my love and admiration. Which is worth more far more than mere filthy lucre. I love it that you are probably Australian and from your husbands accent I am guessing Melbourne.

We will win this... !!

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Fran's avatar

Are you ever asked if you are related to John?

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Mark Bolton's avatar

No but sadly the Micheal jape was often used. Not so many people have seen Office Space lately so that is dwindling. Mercifully I couldnt handle so much laughter and the jolly slapping of the knees, dont you know? But as to John... ? I hope my life was as guilt filled as it probably was and I meet my reward in Hell because ..I have a bone to pick with Old Mustache guy ...

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Literally Mussolini's avatar

I'd take a thousand Michaels for one John.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

At the risk of being melodramatic. If you're house is on fire a Mark Bolton ( firefighter) might put it out. And is singed grubby and exhausted as a result. A John Bolton is probably the reason your house is on fire. A Micheal Bolton is snorting coke in a mansion.

Which Bolton made the better career decision?

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Literally Mussolini's avatar

I think you did, Mark!

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Why thank you.

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Literally Mussolini's avatar

It never gets old.

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Yuri Bezmenov's avatar

War is good for ESG! It reduces carbon emissions by killing people. Send $100 billion more to Ukraine! https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-raise-your-esg-score

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Kojo's avatar

Well going by that train of thought humans are on the verge of completely reducing carbon emission to zero, by dragging themselves into a nuclear war that will destroy us all.

Presumably this is why a tiny handful now have personal space rockets.

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kristofarian's avatar

"A healthy human is one who has shifted into a functional relationship with mental narrative where thoughts are experienced as tools to be picked up when they are useful and set down when they are not, instead of being believed and clung to and dominating our lives. A healthy humanity will look much the same."

thank you

for Locating

the tool shed.

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kristofarian's avatar

"... the people . . . are able to keep everyone else too divided and distracted to notice that we vastly outnumber them and could literally just force change to happen anytime we want."

.

a good thing to keep

in the back of our

minds for now

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The Revolution Continues's avatar

Yes, we vastly outnumber those who are keeping us in the dark, oppressed, and beaten down. We've got to encourage each other to stand tall and speak out. We need to be marching in the streets today. Let's all forget the distractions and forgive our neighbors and get out there and make the positive change we want to see in the world. Power to the people!

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Feral Finster's avatar

It has ever always only been thus.

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William Paul's avatar

Some good lines; some bad lines. Helping people realize that the Ukrainian war is just a sham to help Biden, Romney, and other deep staters launder money for themselves, and impoverish the rest of us, and keep us living in fear, is excellent.

Advocating that we cut off little boys scrotums and chop off teenager girls breasts because they have predictable teenage identity angst (see the story of Chloe Cole and Kristen Bell) might be well meaning, but it is sadistic, sick, and goes against 2,000,000 years of evolutionary biology. Hard sell. How do you know "gender affirming" mutilation isn't just another psy-op to destabilize people's humanity, and their families, so our sociopathic overlords like at the WEF can't just force you to obey? If they can disfigure and sterilize your children, what can't they do?

I think we need a human alternative to the current system, not vague words about how we're all transitioning and evolving. Here are some proposals from a world-famous clinical psychologist who is creating an alternative institution. That's what we want, right? An alternative?

How to get “energy and resources at the lowest possible cost, as rapidly as possible, to the largest number of people around the world.”

Engaging in a “pro-human view” of earth stewardship.

Putting forward a “vision on the family policy front to facilitate the encouragement of and the maintenance of long-term, monogamous couples who are child-centered.”

And discovering our “story,” specifically as it relates to “voluntary play” rather than “the spirit of power” ruling.

There is more, but the key aspect is a human future, not one ruled by propaganda, fear, and fascist overlords.

This post = not brought to you by Pfizer.

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Society's Stinky Parts's avatar

If you want a human alternative, you have to erase values. That means replacing meaningless voodoo like "How to get “energy and resources at the lowest possible cost, as rapidly as possible, to the largest number of people around the world.”" with "nobody gets play time until everyone eats".

That means shoving the Austrian mythology and its fetishization of exchange back up Mises' vent port where it came from.

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Doris Wrench Eisler's avatar

True: first comes the asshole system put in place by a minority of greedy rich or alternately, sadistic assholes, and then all the assholes come out of the woodwork. I'm not sure about the abstract expressionist theory: It isn't vapid sterile and empty like Nazi art, and Nazis hated the genre - which says something good about it - but the rule is, you can't define art, it is what it is, but whatever lasts through generations is true art, and Pollack lasts. Art is intimately entwined with the time it is created, and you can't extract it from it's time. It's like fashions: wearing silk leggings or hoop skirts is just- not there. Ukraine and the demonization of Russia boils down to the biggest and cruellest con game ever perpetrated -since the last not so Great War - in favour of the filthy rich. Money is accumulating faster in dirty hands than Ukrainians are leaving Ukraine - or would like to.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

I only found this BB a few minutes ago. It reminds me of what the Internet was like when it first emerged. They cant shut us down because we are everywhere. Or so we thought. But the power will come back to us once the youngsters learn to code. Decentralize.

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russian_bot's avatar

Hitler loved dogs, was a vegetarian, and built Autobahns. If I advocated that and admitted I loved speeding on those fine roads - would I be "repeating Hitler's talking points"?

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GreaterIsrahell's avatar

Don't forget his brain child the VW.

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GreaterIsrahell's avatar

It's easy to say "Those assholes at the top need to go." It's much harder to say "Everything I'm familiar with needs to go."

Anyone who is waiting for the current assholes to disappear so that decent and humane people can replace them are what I call hopium addicts.

The system we are living under now is getting worse and more intolerable every day. It needs to be destroyed.

The answer is here: https://www.corbettreport.com/qfc095-voluntaryism/

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Another boring anecdote; ... I remember with horror a WWII vet that used to go to the local pub every day and even if he wasnt "pie eyed pissed" could be found starfished in the car park screaming in terror as he was hallucinating about being bayonetted by Japs. Folks just left him to it. After he had hung himself those same folks were all" We didnt need trauma councelling back in our day ... we just Got on with it"

An now he is a War Hero...

Yes you stinking cunts just let some other poor bastard do all your self righteous News Paper politics and philosophy..."another cup of Tea My Dear?" and all your dieing for you whilst you cheerfully ignored the consequences of your smugness..

Oh Fuck I hate those people !!

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John Iversen's avatar

The White Swan - Beyond Occam’s Razor

Part II.

“What we call here a White Swan (and capitalize it) is an event with the following three attributes. First, it is ex-stasis, as it begins within the realm of regular expectations, because something in the timestream – past, present and future - convincingly points to its possibility. Second, it carries an unconditional holistic resonance; it thrills the soul. Third, in spite of its ecstatic status, human nature makes us aware of its occurrence as a foreshadowing, making it intrinsic and desirable.”

~JSI

“For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.”

~ William Blake

William of Ockham is said to have written “Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem”, or, “Plurality must never be posited without necessity”, although the actual phrase has never been discovered in his writings. This has been used as an epigraph by thinkers since as a dictate to use the one to quantify the multitude rather than the multitude affirming the one. It is the basis of all modern scientific thought and, as such, the basis of Western culture.

It is estimated that about one hundred billion neurons of several differing varieties and their accompanying axons, dendrites and synapses coexist in the human brain - an order of magnitude beyond our comprehension – and that each neuron is capable of firing every five milliseconds, also an order of magnitude beyond our comprehension. These numbers beggar any concept of plurality that we think we are capable of, yet . . . . it is indisputable that they are present inside the vaults of our skulls and account, as an example, for the writing of this sentence.

This leads me to deduce that we self-censor or redact very nearly all that we are aware of, or at least it would appear that way, until I think about Aldo Leopold and his critique of flood control with respect to the natural rhythms of any given ecology. He wrote of the insanity (I use this word literally) of the Army Corps of Engineers and their program of straightening the sinuous curves of natural river channels to greatly improve the flow of – in the Corps’ opinion – an unneeded and unwanted abundance of water, then putting dams on those ruler straight channels to “control” the flow they just had created. “Flood Control”, they called it. “Prevents Erosion”, they intoned. That a river should be allowed to “flood” and run outside its banks was a very bad thing; a “good” river flowed exactly where the Corps told it to run, and when, and how. Leopold pointed out the obvious; that the Corps’ efforts did neither, and that they actually damaged the geomorphology and hydrology of the living organism of the land. In short, this infliction disrupted the land, the watershed, and the communities of life that lived there, sometimes terminally.

As above, so below: the vault of our skull contains the watershed of awareness and the cognitive rivers that flow from it. To put it another way, the net of interactions of billions of neurons – if perceived as the billions of molecules of water residing in a geological watershed - becomes the cognitive watershed, and its resultant rivers of awareness, each singular as a sentence. That these rivers will flood and run outside their banks is the condition of ex-stasis, and, as I stated in the definition of a White Swan event, beginning “within the realm of regular expectations”.

The cognitive discontinuity introduced during the Neolithic was the beginning of straightening the channels of our perception and as time went on, placing the dams of hierarchical thought along these new, linear constrictions. The monoliths of politics, economics, organized religion and warfare were imbedded in these straightened channels to control the flow even further. Perceptual stagnation set in – not only unnoticed for what it was, but pursued as a charismatic ideal of perfection – becoming the sine qua non of the human species. I recognize these forms of thought as the type specimens of what I’ll call Homo sapiens sapiens novus. Man had shuttered the doors of perception. Awareness had been civilized; all that remained were the narrowing “chinks of his cavern”. The rivers had been channeled, the flow multiply dammed.

The celebration of pluralities, the seeing of one/ness in all/ness and all/ness in one/ness, and the renewal cycle of ex-stasis intrinsic to the previous two hundred thousand years of human cognition was deemed unnecessary. What was necessary was to straighten ever more cognitive channels, build more cognitive dams. Those populations of humans who persisted in the primal, unregulated cycle of cognition, and the renewal of ex-stasis, were driven out, marginalized or killed.

This is nowhere more evident than in the contrast between the Neolithic extractive economies and the Shamanic symbiotic economies and the history of the Neolithic rise to dominance. Neolithic man, Homo sapiens sapiens novus became the apex predator of the entire planet in a geological nanosecond, the most successful invasive species we know of. What he did with his cognition, so did he to his physical environment. In human time, this did not take overnight but, as I said, over a dozen or so millennia; now, the last remnant fragments of the aboriginal Shamanic populations persist as a curiosity, an exhibit, on reservations set up for them by their keepers. Equally, the last remnant fragments of the uncut, unmined, unbulldozed, undammed, unharvested, unoccupied original landscape are set aside as “wilderness”, whether as a signal reminder – as decapitated heads of the enemy were impaled on pikes and displayed on castle walls – or as a bittersweet nostalgia, I do not know.

And so we come to the forty third Hexagram of the I-Ching, Kuai (break-through or resoluteness), as expressed in the Wilhelm-Baynes translation of the I-Ching:

The Image

The lake has risen up to heaven:

The image of BREAK-THROUGH.

Thus the superior man

Dispenses riches downward

And refrains from resting on his virtue.

Wilhelm and Baynes write, “The hexagram Kuai actually means a break-through as when a river bursts its dams in seasons of flood. The five strong lines are thought of as mounting from below, resolutely forcing the weak upper line out of the hexagram.”

For all the channeling and dam building done to our awareness and cognitive process, it must be realized that the original perceptual landscape is the bedrock of mythos upon which the Neolithic constructed its artifices of logos. An irrevocable result of the straightened channels and dams of rivers subjected to flood control is that the water’s impoundments silt up until the channel is no longer a channel and the dam is no longer a dam. The water then finds its own way again, true to its nature no matter how long previously confined.

This is true . . . . whether we speak of the watersheds and rivers of the planet or the watersheds and rivers within the vault of our skull, the cognitive universe; partly planet and partly person.

In precisely this sense, the White Swan events of our lives herald the bursting of the dams erected to constrain our actual, original cognitive gifts and the recognition of the return of the Shamanic river of perpetual return.

The One is forever the Other: As above, so below.

Or, as William Blake put it: “Energy is eternal delight.”

© Salskov Iversen

3 December 2011

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John Iversen's avatar

. . . Read Part I below . . .

Regards,

John

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Fran's avatar

Perhaps that's the reason he died.

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Nostradamus's avatar

 JFK – 1963: There is a Plot in this Country to Enslave every Man, Woman and Child

https://i0.wp.com/www.elliswashingtonreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/image-13.png?w=519&ssl=1

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Fran's avatar

I've read about this quote and they have totally rejected it, but it doesn't matter since I think Kennedy was assassinated and Oswald didn't act alone, if he did it at all. Such incompetence all around as well. Bringing out the assassin in a room full of people, ignoring the possibility that someone might kill him as an act of revenge, or to bury the truth. It can't simply be attributed to poor judgement.

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Nostradamus's avatar

What they're doing is called gaslighting. They'll never accept that their job is to kill those that won't submit to their diktats or can expose them: Sukarno (Indonesia), Saddam (Iraq), Kadafi (Lybia), Olof Palme (Sweden), Khame Kruma (Ghana), Lumumba (Dr Congo), Epstein (suicided in broad daylight!), Allende (Chile), etc..................................................

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Indeed. A perfectly explicable occurrence of intracereberal lead co positionality due to pie plates in the upper atmosphere. A rare but not unknown natural phenomenon. Nothing to be alarmed about.

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Fran's avatar

I know your kidding otherwise I wouldn't have said it because I loathe him. He doesn't want to risk his life in a war, but all too willing to let others to it.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Oh gosh I do go on and on. As part of my promise back in sheep country New South Wales to old buggers that came for my Mum's piano and my Dad's nascent Communism and smokes and beer and whiskey. And going to sleep with all that racket as a lullaby. I went to Vietnam 2016 as a part of trying to put all the pieces together. I was warned ...Let the Dead Rest ... but Kipling says "Lest We Forget" Truth is; both of those seemingly contradictory themes can stitch together. But you wont learn that at University ... Harvard Delenda Est ...

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Mark Bolton's avatar

I love you're "tail pulling" and dont take it amiss at all. Pull On I say!! THX for Having a clue.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

"Unhand me Madam !! ... War is a serous (lucrative) business that benifits us all. Consider the freedoms that we (your family) fought and died for ...Show some respect (tax dollars) ..." ~silly voice off~ I am old enough to remember WWI diggers..they were a bout older then than I am now... They gave me a narrative to sleep with when I was 6 and had read me Just So Stories and tucked me in to go to sleep, and one I will never forget. "Never go fight for the bosses Sonny... promise me now you never will" ... I nodded off to sleep but I already had accepted the challenge.

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Fran's avatar

That was an interesting tale. In High School I was on the honor roll and when I took world history I was a recalcitrant student and my teacher was very upset by it. I finally told him that I wasn't interested in his kings and his gueens and generals, since they did much more harm then good. If he wanted me to be interested in this subject tell me of the history of people, because I don't like fairy tales. I don't know where that came from, no idea, but I really meant it. An uncle use to tell me that because something is written in the newspapers doesn't mean it's the truth, and it is up to me to determine truth from fiction. It was very disturbing because I didn't even know how to read yet.

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Mark Bolton's avatar

AS to the nub of the question... Kipling is better than moulkdering Kings and Queens but the mechanism... the mechanism... it is something I learnd from readiong Science Fiction. How to distill order from the chaos that is humanity? I contend that a burocracy with thosandsa of eyes and pockets and Three Letter Acronyms is going to degenerate into a back alley mugging. At least with a King he must form aliances and he answers to God (another question to this and irrelevent) but he must sleep. The King must sleep.

"Merica Washington never sleeeps and a thousand fever dreams are allowed to be entertained and not be decapitated by a regional baron... like often happened when the King went mad or fucked up. So KIngs and Queens are worth learning about ..but not the way they pushed it down our throats. ~Salute~

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Mark Bolton's avatar

Do you know what I cant remember not being able to read or to swim... swimming was the Yarra river (Melbourne) and wild snakes.

I just used to wag school and I went where they could never find me... I wasnt at the swimming hole.. or at the river going fishing or hanging out at the local Milk Bar. I was where they could never track me down !! ~maniacal laugh~ In the Library reading books about Science.

Sounds like your Uncle was very like the WWI vets that had such a malign influence on my formative years. How did we emerge sane ... ?? Oh wait..

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