Us, At the Gate a Guest Post by Thomas Kendall

Posted on by accordingtohoyt

Us, At the Gate a Guest Post by Thomas Kendall

           I was talking to Sarah yesterday and I had a revelation I think is worth sharing.

           Let’s begin at the beginning. About a month ago, Instapundit posted this.

           Now, I’ve been thinking of the rise and fall of civilizations lately. I can’t think why it’s been on my mind. It’s a tale as old as time—a civilization emerges, establishes a new worthwhile order, the good things brought forth by said order soften up the people maintaining it, the softening turns to decadence, and the decadence gives way to the barbarians, who clean the slate. Where would you say things are lately?

           Here’s a hint. A friend and I were discussing another observation that someone made in an article recently (I wish I could find the original. I’d give credit if I could find it). The basic idea is—

           In short—the federal government of the United States of America has become impotent at almost all good things.

            Expanded out—There is no start to its talents. It cannot maintain its borders. Since the “election” it doesn’t even try. No surprise there. It cannot maintain friendly relationships with allies—as our recent screwing of Britain on our way out of Afghanistan shows. The “leader” of the “free world” could not be bothered to pick up the phone for our closest ally. Speaking of Afghanistan, it can’t win a war. It can’t even lose gracefully. In fact it fucked up leaving so badly some people are entertaining that it intended to fuck it up, because how the fuck does somebody above the age of six not notice that pulling the military out first and the civilians out second is not even a remotely workable strategy? Resulting in leaving millions of dollars of equipment—and—excuse me, what? Millions of dollars of dollars in the desert? Fantastic.

           It makes self sabotaging and idiotic choices to stymie its own domestic oil industry, while accepting a pipeline not from Canada, but one that’s a joint Russian-German venture instead. Which means the problem, contrary to any environmentalist whining, isn’t the pipeline—it’s the pipeline with a friendly country. Big surprise— its only true interest in the environment lies in international agreements that hamstring us while doing nothing to China, the world’s largest polluter. It either can’t be trusted on energy production  and the environment, or is trying to get it wrong.

            It can’t manage its economy. What could have been a “V” shaped recovery has been turned into an “L” shaped one. What could be contributing? Paying people to do nothing? Rampant inflation? Meanwhile all the dumbasses running the country can think of is spending several billion more dollars that don’t exist. The country has infrastructure problems for a fact, but they’ll only acknowledge that to the extent of cynically plastering the word on an “infrastructure” bill which is in fact just a far Left wishlist that largely ignores actual infrastructure, in the hopes people will be dumb enough to support it because it has the right label.

           And on.

           And on.

            And on.

           What aptitudes does it have besides taking money, trampling civil liberties, and ignoring constitutional laws at gunpoint? News flash, dummies: We don’t need peaceful protestors incarcerated without a trial. We don’t need the weight of the federal government turned to the problem of violating states rights because Texas passed a law Biden doesn’t like. We need military egresses that look like they weren’t planned by Bozo the clown and an economic plan better than something China would design for us as an attempt to permanently sink the country. Is there anyone at all in DC who can provide that? If not, is there anything useful they can do? I’ll wait.

           And if you want to understand what decadence really means watch this. It’s been making the rounds for good reason. Behold, our advanced civilization!
           *shows a picture of a urinal*

           For this shit, shit that makes even most Americans roll their eyes, which nobody at all takes seriously except dipshit Leftists who have reached the form of retardation accessible only to those with PhDs—for this we have spent 20 years sending American farm kids to their death in the sandbox? Did anyone tell them that before they signed up? I wish I could go back in time and do it. These were the ideals we were supposed to be standing for this whole time? These were the things we were going to inculcate in orthodox muslims? While giving them semi-automatic rifles and training on how to use them? Are you fucking kidding me right now?

           This is what decadence looks like. When the government stops even attempting competence because nothing and nobody that currently exists can replace or displace them so who cares about results? When comfort and plenty have become so common, been taken for granted for so long, that the question of utility or even basic sanity isn’t even distantly considered. When it’s assumed that self-harming policies that will obviously damage the country won’t really matter because nobody has ever known a world without America and fundamentally has no idea how the present day came to be. When the country’s most educated start chasing bizarre and unimaginably stupid ideas on economics that boil down to “inflation won’t happen if you double the monetary supply by printing money, if only you just believe hard enough”. In fact, when education stops being a means to greater insight, more useful abilities, and a better life, and becomes a cult devoted to the kind of idiocy that can survive only with strenuous censorship, the tenets of the cult being treated by the indoctrinated as a collection of sacred mysteries and deeply-thought paradoxes— while to those not similarly trained it is self-obviously a collection of contradictory and self-serving lies.

           Verily, decadence is here. We can infer that what comes next is the barbarians. And we have options. Mexican illegals? A heady mixture of poverty-stricken Marxists who have never known a system that wasn’t corrupt, functionally lawless, and devoted to the tenets of voting oneself rich; and outright criminals with lives like “a demon’s resumé”? Perhaps radical Muslims? By sheer numbers worldwide they’re the most likely option. The Taliban just got a huge infusion of cash and a big boost in morale. In a few short days we’ll know whether they’ve arranged a thank you gift for Zho Bi-Xen and his kleptocrat marching band to commemorate his intended pull-out date. But even if, and God I hope, they have not, we can expect an uptick in terrorism and quite shortly. Or perhaps China? The Middle Kingdom would laugh at being called barbarians, but I call genocidal communists like I see them. Mao was morally three steps below a pig and Xi has enough power to aspire to greater depths. As is I wouldn’t dream of feeding a pig Mu Shu Xi due to the great risk of poisoning the pig.

            But there is a barbarian group not considered. Us.

           Hang on. Before you balk, listen. Look again at what these idiots are selling as the fruits of civilization. Defenses of pedophilia and urinals as art. And more, too—sterilization and disfigurement of teenagers in the form of sex changes. Black supremacy as a panacea to made up threats of white supremacy. Books nobody reads, movies nobody watches, paintings that exist only to launder money—even the ones not made by Hunter Biden.

           What good person would not be proud to be considered a barbarian by these miserable, over-decorated Faberge people? I’d be mortified if they agreed with me! So they think I’m a sexist or a racist or whatever. Fine. They do not use these words to mean the same things I mean, so it’s a pointless argument, and they are now officially beneath my explaining myself to them. When the people who are calling me names are so morally opaque that the Taliban can make devastating critiques of them just by referencing the foundational works of their own gender studies programs, I’m done caring about the names. Fine. I’m what you think is a racist. I’m what you think is a sexist. But you think a lot of very stupid things, and as the curtain continues to draw back on the carnival of madness that’s been behind the scenes the entire time it’s occurring to me that what you think and reality overlap so seldom that the only time not to ignore you is when I can ridicule you. If that is your civilization, someone hand me a pointy horned helmet.

           So you disagree with the conservative standpoint? Fascinating. From your track record that means it’s probably correct. Also we did the Pepsi challenge. We’ve tried turning the spigot of Leftist bullshit on, off, and recently on again. The results correlate closely with you being full of shit. So blow it out your ass.

           Yes, this is a moment of peril, but also opportunity. See in your country what every hostile group listed above sees in it—the makings of great civilization, along other, less stupid lines. All of it guarded by weak, fat, stupid people with no will and no self-belief. Take that mindset and go forth.

            Get involved in your local systems. There is an old prayer for God to make ones enemies ridiculous. Congratulations to whomever was still praying it. Your prayers have been answered. Will you tell me that you cannot defeat these people? People who lose casual debates to terrorists not on principle but on basic facts?

           Emulate those who are taking back their school boards. The educational system was the place where the corruption started, it’s fitting it’s the first place to start getting won back. It’s defended by fluffy fools whose highest moral value is their own paycheck and the accolades of equally soft idiots on Twitter. They’re rooting for COVID in the hopes they can maximize their time to not teach your kids while getting paid, and the worst part is that given what they were probably teaching your kids that would actually maybe be a win-win.
            You can’t reason with them so don’t bother. Recent events have made it clear you may as well try to talk sense into a three-day-old mackerel. Just confront them with their own stupidity so that people who see the inevitable video understand what this is about, and don’t feel that you are too good to shout them out of the room. You’re the barbarian, remember? Not like the nice civilized people with their gender-queer Tik-Tokers pushing vaccine propaganda. That means you’re excused from conversations with morons. Don’t bother trying to find common ground. Look at where they’re standing! Do you want to try to find the midpoint between that and reality? Silly. Pointless. Send them back to their walled online gardens to whine to their equally stupid friends about the barbarians.

           Can we take it back from the ground up? I don’t know. But hey, it’s got to be worth a shot. Join the fun! Find some friends and locate a low-hanging political event to raid. When was the last time you went to a town hall for your town? Isn’t just a part of you curious to know whether your local county commissioner starts by declaring her pronouns? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to see someone like that made very uncomfortable? You can make that happen. You can probably do it within the next month. Bring a few friends! Or a few dozen. Some of the people reading this probably were afraid to do that kind of thing for fear of losing their job. The Biden economy might have freed up some of your time. What have you got to lose now? More importantly, the way things are going, are you going to lose it anyway if things continue as they are? Think on it.

           And consider this—the odds are in our favor, in that we’re well positioned. All the other barbarian groups have to come over here. We just have to drive down the block. The engine of our government is undoubtedly and unquestionably corrupt. But it’s also begging to be rendered irrelevant. There are more of us than them, and more than that, there are more of us than they can imagine.

           You can certainly be assured that they will not win. That’s not at issue. Their entire goal is to lose. If you ever doubted, you’ve had the better part of a year of their stupidity to reflect on. You can quit wondering. They will lose. They want to lose. The only question is who they lose to. They want to lose to China, but I think losing to the radical Islamic world is their consolation prize.
           Let’s spoil their day. Let’s make them lose to America.

*Now read it again, while listening to this, for mood music: We ARE Odds, we ARE not gas-lit, we are the barbarians. And yes, to these pampered jades (not of Asia though paid by it) being rendered irrelevant and ridiculous is worse than being physically killed, so let’s shoot for that. And if you think the “metaphorical” battle needs less courage? You have no idea. Let’s go. Yeah, this might all tip in the kaki earlier than not, but until then, let’s fight by other means. Put your helmet on, and the wings too if you wish. (Hey, we’re odds and they’re cool. Our fabulous detachment will appreciate them.) Let’s go. – SAH*

259 thoughts on “Us, At the Gate a Guest Post by Thomas Kendall”

  3. Apologies to all of you who are Catholics, but it’s time for an American Reformation. Time to scrape off the cruft and get back to the Constitution. Time to become fundamentalist-Americans, or maybe American Fundamentalists. Or USAians. Ooo-rah!

      1. What, you don’t want us imitating the Roundheads in the English Civil War?

        Let’s get off task and have a slap fight, calling each other liberal squishes!

        XD

        1. Is this really a surprise. Anything which asserts that individuals have rights that are inalienable and that are not at the grant and sufferance of the grace of government is offensive to the political nobility, and they are the ones that run the national archives.

          1. I think it’s probably more that it uses the word “slave” and “Indian”. Oh my, what horrors!

            1. It’s the 3/5 clause that is so terribly terrifying and wounding. *eyeroll* Because the various activists don’t already go on, and on, and on, and on, and . . . about the 3/5 clause and misusing it and abusing it and grinding it into modern faces. Riiiiiiight.

            2. “Slave” isn’t a word used until the 13th Amendment. (“Slavery,” actually.)

              The article that I read, the writer looked a bit further through the Archives, finding the materials on Jim Crow. The “N” word all through those documents – and no trigger warnings.

    4. For this RC at least, no worries. A reformation was necessary to cure the abuses by the hierarchy and the discipline of the clergy. There had been a number of reformations before. Alas, the politicians, and I include the bishops, broke the unity of the church in their greed for power and church lands.

      Calvin now, and apologies to any reformed or Presbyterians, is another matter. Luther’s objections could have been, and probably would have been, incorporated. Calvin, not so much.

      1. Luther and Calvin are my faith’s founding fathers, and you may rail against them as you like!
        I quit trying to go to organized church this year. I’d be Orthodox Presbyterian but for that.

          1. Naw, it’s the PCA church I used to belong to. The OPC church I found was orthodox and fine, but weird as hell. I may look for them again, or I may start my own congregation in the park.

            And yes yes yes to the Solas.

        2. The big problem that I have with Luther is that he was a raving anti-Semite, and his hatred of Jews has influenced the Lutheran Church for centuries.

          1. Actually, he wasn’t an anti-Semite. His habit of raving madly was at anyone who did what he didn’t like. He called for massacre of peasants, and when it happened, and people questioned him about it, he blamed God.

            Jews wouldn’t do what he wanted. Out came the rants — which were, to be sure, useful for anti-Semites, but I do think you have treat Jews differently to qualify as an anti-Semite.

            1. He was a lot more “anti-anyone who doesn’t agree 100% with me at all times” than anti-Semite. I dearly love a one-woman play/short-story entitled “Bist du sischer, Martinus?” [Are you sure about that, Martin?]. Katarina von Bora is cleaning up after Martin, her husband, and sighing about his hang-ups and insistence that he’s always right about whatever he’s talking about. Among other things.

          2. He was a Jew hater, so yes, can’t agree with him there. I can imagine that Lutheranism is still feeling the affects.

        3. As I used to joke, “I belong to no organized religion I’m a Congregationalist”. These days I’m Baptist (essentially Congregationalists who only do Believer baptism). Also all for the Solas, and basically of the TULIP (https://www.theopedia.com/tulip) flavor of things. Sadly both the UCC (Congregationalists) and ABC (Northern Baptists) went off into the depths of heresy and Unitarianism long ago.

      1. Pretty much. I want to be left alone to believe as I choose without having someone else’s heresies shoved down my throat by the .gov. [Yes, Marx, I’m looking at you.]

    1. As fun as it sounds to be hacking down the Prog-Soc bad guys and gals, I’m not sure I’d last real long wielding a broadsword or battle axe through the Halls of Congress.

      “This is not an insurrection. I’m not here to overthrow the government. I’m here to cut out the cancer killing it,
      and allow it half a chance to heal.”

        2. 4’11”, 114 lbs. I volunteer as the first warrior hurled over the wall from the trebuchet.

        3. Shield walls never went out of style. That’s what the riot police use. Of course they’d be more effective if backed up with 16 foot pikes.

      3. I to cannot wield a sword or axe for very long. I know how but I am old FAT and lazy, though I COULD get my armor in condition and ready. I am lazy, I prefer to just stay back a ways and send bullets to make my points. Less messy, all that running around, it is so tiring. Though it is FUN. I’ll stay back, setup and cover all those young energetic fighters. Have a cold one (Mtn Dew, diet of course) from the ice chest. You might think me a coward unwilling to fight but I am not. Unable to effectively fight is what I am. I also know that if it should happen that the day doesn’t go OUR way, I plan to stay where I am, cover the Retreat and slow the pursuit. Just as I am too Old, FAT and out of shape to fight for long, I am also unable to retreat fast enough, so why bother. You just die tired.

        The young energetic fighters don’t realize how useful US old farts can be in certain conditions. It’s not like we have a lot to lose. I’ll need more servants in Valhalla anyway.

      4. >> “This is not an insurrection. I’m not here to overthrow the government. I’m here to cut out the cancer killing it, and allow it half a chance to heal.”

        Where’s this from?

    2. “It is impressive how quickly the Biden-Harris fiasco made the wheels come off, indeed.”
      One would almost think it were planned except that they are so grossly incompetent.

        1. A Tragedy of Errors, where things were set in motion only without the ‘right’ wrong people at the controls, so it’s an even bigger mess and things have gone positive-feedback, or are about to?

          1. Thing is, some of the dynamics here were already positive feed back.

            CRT is an obvious example, they eliminated the negative feedback, and due to positive feed back, became very extreme. Or in this metaphor, running at a high speed, or very energized. Last year, due to either the arson conspiracies, the remote schooling, or both, the mechanism representing CRT was suddenly coupled back into machinery that still had negative feedback. What we’ve been hearing since is the machinery protesting.

            This is were the metaphor breaks down, because machinery would have broken apart and come to rest over a wide area. Humans have memory. They don’t necessarily move immediately when the force or the voltage suddenly increases to a very high value.

            BGE, last post, was talking about a potential financial collapse, stating that it was the same equations as an electrical supply breakdown when over loaded. Which may be true. But, at fine enough time resolution, the collapse of such an electrical system is actually a series of events. You have some equipment with more existing defects, so when the load goes high, they heat up and fail first, and can no longer carry load. So the load shifts elsewhere, and takes out the equipment with slightly less defects, etc. Maybe the transient effects are the same, maybe they are not, but economic failure might have the transient effects of a failure take place over a slower time scale.

            Here, with political failures, we are not certain to have anything that matches an electrical or mechanical metaphor, either in transients, or in time scale of failure.

            Some of the problem is feckless, reckless sorts who will change their behavior, but who will not change the assumptions and understandings that their behavior is based on.

            But we also have people quietly changing their minds about who they trust, and who they obey, and this is invisible.

            I’ve been expecting things to hit a point of rapid motion, and immediately proceed to visible evidence. I now suspect that I’ve been thinking in terms to metaphor too much, and too incorrectly.

            1. When a network is above critical load, the failure of a single component can cause the next component to overload and fail, which causes the next to fail, and then the next. You get cascading failure where the network fails seriatim at very close to the speed of light. The failure goes on until it reaches a break in the network.

              if you know the topology of the network and the load you can calculate the probability of failure. You cannot calculate any probability of when. You just know that, eventually, if put over the critical level it will fail.

            2. What we’ve been hearing since is the machinery protesting.

              There is nothing *quite* like the horrible collection of howls, screams, and groans of an artifact about to die.

    3. John C. Wright has been reviewing the Conan ouvre on his blog. I think he’s near the end of the original Howard stories now. He’s examining the stories as they originally appeared in the pulps, not the ones that got edited and/or rewritten by de Camp, Carter, and others.

      There are good reasons why those stories have been popular for going on eighty years… I don’t remember if Wright linked to the originals, but you can use Howard’s isdfb page to get the publications and dates, and then go to the originals on archive.org.

    4. I’ve certainly been thinking of this quote from “Beyond the Black River” quite a bit lately:

      “Barbarianism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is the whim of circumstance. And barbarianism must ultimately triumph.”

      I hope he’s wrong. But I wonder.

        1. C.S. Lewis commented that barbarism is the normal state of humanity, that civilization takes a lot of hard work and that many people don’t tealize just how fragile civilization is.

      2. In a similar vein, the Heinlein “Bad Luck” quote is pretty close. Just got enough caffeine to find it for the record:

        “Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.

        This is known as “bad luck.”

        RAH, Time Enough for Love, from Lazarus Long

  5. Oh hell yes. This is the only answer.
    And I have my first pair of waders and river boots coming, baby, so look out.

    Let’s Roll.

  6. Now, this makes a weird kind of sense. Let’s have all the idiots-on both sides-lose to America. We have a few on the Right, but it’s the Left ones that we really have to worry about…because there’s more of them and they have far too many ways to spread their crap all over the place.

      1. So, we take the institutions back. Either the way they are with the school boards (i.e. getting these insane people OUT) or going around and under and through (i.e. indie publishing and probably indie movies soon enough and indie miniature gaming…).

        The world doesn’t turn on a dime (and thank GOD for that), it takes a lot of things to make that turn. But, it doesn’t meant we can’t get started turning that wheel away from the minefield.

        1. Home schooling and selective private schools (nonCRT) are surging. Hillsdale College’s charter schools are doing very well. There’s a lot of changes in the institutional wind. Now, to keep the changes going in the best-for-America direction . . .

        2. Don’t need indie miniature gaming (yet, anyway). Yes, some miniatures games are woke. But a lot of them aren’t. And that includes much of the great bulk of Historicals, which are largely immune to the idea of obsolescence.

          1. We might be getting close to an indie miniature game revolution, regardless. 3D printing costs have gone down and quality has gone up remarkably over the last 5-10 years. Games Workshop is systematically pissing off the fanbase because they’re trying to get into the “Wider General Audience” by making the IP more marketing-friendly. Outside of Games Workshop, there’s a few indie darlings that are kind of drowned out by the sheer size of Games Workshop and the massive up-front costs you need to produce miniatures for that kind of gaming.

            It’s leaving space open for a company that sells a damned good set of rules, and makes it easy for people with 3D printing to not sail the high seas to find sculpts.

            1. There are plenty of good rules sets out there. The problem is getting a group to agree to play them. One of the reasons why GW has survived as long as it has is because no matter where you live, you can be assured that someone nearby probably plays one of their games. Further, as much as GW sometimes plays havoc with the rules, there tend to be limits to how much they wreck things. Warmahordes – Privateer Press’s flagship game system – was *extremely* popular at my FLGS for a very long time. It’s not anymore, and the blame appears to lie pretty much exclusively with the publisher for screwing up the game. The GW games, in contrast, have had their ups and downs. But they’ve never completely disappeared.

              And, again, historicals are much more resistant to many of these problems. Further, since any miniatures manufacturer can make a group of Roman legionnaires, such figures also tend to be less expensive as there is actual *gasp* competition in this particular market. This also gives you the freedom to shop around for different quality figures. If you don’t like Plastic Soldier Company’s M1 Abrams tank, you can buy from Battlefront, instead. If you decide you’d rather play with figures that approximate the scales involved on the typical game table, you can buy from GHQ.

              1. Privateer Press also seemed to hit that point where a lot of miniature game companies hit-they can’t hit the tier of memetic breakthrough that Games Workshop occupies on that lonely hill that they own. I’ve seen a few game companies come pretty close, but nobody quite does. And, that means that they hit market saturation and never quite push past it. I think the next game that’ll hit that roadblock is Infinity, as Corvus Belli seems to be trying to sell more gaiden games than the actual Infinity game itself.

                (It doesn’t help that Privateer Press also seemed to relegate the Warmahordes line to a second-tier status to try and cash in on the European-style board and card game market. AND they screwed up the second edition rules…and didn’t do well with the third edition. Hell, I don’t even think you can BUY the rule books with game stats in them these days, it’s either a separate set of cards or a “live” service of some kind. I know that Fantasy Flight Games went to a “live service” app for X-Wing Second Edition when I was last interested in following the details.)

                WH40K also had that kind of gonzo crazy that appealed to the autistic sort of people that would actually collect and paint miniatures for fun. You could find people that played. Before AoS, there were always people playing Warhammer Fantasy at one of the FLGS that was near me. It had staying power because the game fluff was flexible enough to allow for a wide choice of options of who the “good” (for values of “good”) guys were.

                It’ll be curious to see what happens. I know a lot of people haven’t liked the newest version of the Kill Team rules, and 9th Edition seems to be trying to clean out several of the more…problematic…factions by slow releases of new books.

                It’s going to be an interesting time, I think. I’m glad I can just watch and I have no real skin in the game.

  7. Why would someone who is probably getting more money in unemployment (what with the $300/wk [$1200/mo] “COVID bonus”) and being relieved of paying rent (since they can’t be evicted) want to go back to a boring, tedious job rather than staying home binge watching whatever strikes their fancy and buying stuff they used to not be able to afford? Fortunately those extra dollars just ended, as did the eviction moratorium, so maybe people will realize that the party’s over and they need to get back in the traces. Even Lenin knew “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.”

    2. For me, there is such a glut of white-collar professionals that I’m usually the first person kicked off the island in the game of Human Resources Survivor. Assuming I can even make it past screening that is more interested in key words and marking EEOC checkpoints than giving someone a chance.

      If you go down to San Francisco…let’s be fair. Your health care is better on Covered California than most lower-end jobs (and that is a sad state of affairs). You’re making a little bit more in general (and should be paying at least an honorarium to the landlord, if not you’re an ass). And, you’re not dealing with a city that is going insane, won’t stop petty theft, the chemical set is roaming the streets, etc, etc, etc at most lower-end jobs.

      It also ties into the conspiracy theory idea that I had about the sudden effort to enforce SESTA and similar anti-sex-traffic laws on OnlyFans and their ilk. Quite a few women realized that they could make as much money-if not more-catering to some slightly niche fetishes and they would be able to make their own hours, not have to commute, not smell of burnt grease or deal with casual unwanted sexual abuse, that kind of thing. Which is why just about every restaurant and fast food place is trying their damnedest to hire-offering higher starting wages, starting bonuses, and a whole lot of other things.

      It’s going to be an interesting few months. Fingers crossed.

    3. My sister points out that with so many jobs going begging… right now you can pick your position. Those who wait will wind up with the dregs, or find themselves replaced by automation.

      1. I think those who wait might be able to work in person without being forced to take the mRNA injection, or stuff their face in a slave muzzle.

        There is little advantage to finding a new job right now. The idea that only the “dregs” jobs will be available seems fanciful.

        1. Flyover Falls isn’t known for a lot of protests, not until the issue is pretty close to life and death. (See protests against arbitrary irrigation water cutoffs). Yesterday I saw a polite but loud demonstration against Despicable Kate Brown’s (Communist, Oregon) mandate for health care workers (and police and firefighters) to take the not-Vax by Oct 18th. Pickets around the busiest intersection in town, late morning. They weren’t disrupting traffic, and I didn’t notice any disagreement from the motorists.

          I’ve heard rumors that the only hospital in the county is going to be missing a large (30% last I heard, but anger is building) number of nurses. I suspect the PAs, CMAs and the other support people are going to walk, too. No idea if the complex (affiliated clinics share resources) can stay in business if it happens.

          I get my flu shot at a tiny practice run by an FNP. I want to see if he’s staying open. In theory, I need to have my prothrombin time checked every couple of months, and I’m not certain the hospital-affiliated clinic will be open for business. I’m also getting sick of my regular doctor with the “90% of the people in hospital with COVID are unvaccinated”. That statement might have been believable the first few dozen times I’ve heard it, but the “90%” number never seems to change. Curious in light of Israel’s experience.

          1. Heck. Even here in deep blue Lane County RiverBend Peace Health alone has had 100+ nurses walk because of the medical jab or else mandate. That is just what was reported on. No percentage, no mention of other medical personnel, like doctors, aids, techs, etc. Nothing about the other smaller hospital McKenzie-Willamette (since state mandate, they had to have lost medical personnel too). To the point that the NEXT article on all this was that the Oregon National Guard has been deployed to RiverBend because the hospital is being overwhelmed due to lack of personnel. Really? Would never have guessed. (/sarc off).

    4. The problem is that THOSE people still have back rent to pay. They made NO effort to pay any rent. Spent ALL they got and NOW are faced with reality. WHO do they rent from? WHO is going to rent to those like them??? Where will they go? Most likely into the streets demanding the Government DO SOMETHING!!!!
      WHAT??? Maybe Government guaranteed Rent?
      How many people plan to stop renting out places as soon as the current Renters are gone???

      Still waiting for the BOOM, when reality hits them up side the head and they go nuts. No place to live, to little money from the Government, no place to store their stuff that they bought, where is their next meal coming from, Getting a JOB with no home address, ect. THOSE people EXPECT the Government to take care of them and will DEMAND it. When it doesn’t happen or doesn’t happen FAST enough “BOOM”.

      People refusing to leave, courts jammed with eviction cases. Oh what fun. Have your popcorn ready.

      1. How many people plan to stop renting out places as soon as the current Renters are gone???

        –
        Every single landlord that can. Guarantied. Homes will be sold to owner occupied owners, for a huge profit (or not, might be absentee foreign agents). Apartments will go condo, or university student housing only (locally). There might be some bigger players that will stay with it. But most? Any smaller landlords? Their out. I would be. Not that I would consider owning a place and renting it out. Once was enough, and our experience was benign to down right pleasant compared to the current mess.

        1. Decades ago I conidered buying income property, and decided that the potential hassles outweighed the benefits. I’m sooooooo happy I passed on it. $SPOUSE’s parents had a rental quite some time ago, with a much younger her living in one of the units. I gather it was not a happy situation for those involved.

          1. If they were doing the management and maintenance themselves? Guarantied. We finally turned the house over to a maintenance company, with (more or less, full control). Gave the renters notice we were doing so. Rent immediately more than doubled (we warned them, repeatably before we researched and pulled the trigger). Made out financially very well after that. Could have kept it forever that way, but by then we were thoroughly soured on the concept. Then housing became limited (building had come to a screeching halt) and we could sell for slightly more than we paid for it. On paper we lost. Actually we came out slightly ahead. Didn’t help that the IRS took exception to our 22 year *depreciation schedule. Thoroughly soured doesn’t come close. Never, ever, again.

            * Apparently the unstated rule for personal homes turned into rentals is # of years of mortgage – years lived in, so 30 – 6 years = 25 year depreciation (couldn’t do math either, and resented having that pointed out). Also please note, if the mortgage had been 15 years – 6 = 10 years (remember the guy couldn’t do math), was “unreasonable” depreciation schedule, even though it followed their rules to a T. Fought that one for 3 years. Finally got out by taking the entire thing to Defazio (this was over 30 years ago) who got the whole thing assigned to someone else. I walked in to the meeting with two things: We’d sold the house, had the numbers on how that changed on current years taxes, that we’d come out ahead overall, even with interest owed (can’t have that); AND I walked in with a sleeping newborn. With other things (hey if we’re being audited lets add all the stuff we forgot, which we wouldn’t have filed on if we hadn’t been audited), she agreed we were correct. We got money back from the IRS, with interest, on the other items. Honestly? I think it was the sleeping newborn. Agent wanted me out before baby woke up!

        2. There are a lot of people who are also requiring MUCH bigger deposits up front; I’ve heard up to a year in some cases.

          1. Landlord’s market. Don’t blame them a bit. Just means we’ll keep our frugal roommate even longer. What he should do is buy. But even small ex-apartment condos are ridiculously expensive. I’m thinking wait until new build costs drop (it is coming*), find our desired property, take our desired plans, modify it so we have an “Inlaw Suite” with kitchenette. Give that to roommate. Eventually rolls will switch and one of us becomes the roommate using the inlaw suite, and roommate takes over the house. Eventually we want grandchildren. It’d be nice if the prospective spouse thought roommate had own apartment …

            * It’ll be a push on selling our home. I’ll be happy to get enough to “pay” for the build + moving expenses. Things will have to get horribly bad before we are upside down on our loan, and even worse, before values dropped below what we paid in ’88. Right now custom new builds are all but impossible. Not cost. Because same sell/buy dynamics. Availability of people and supplies, across the building trades, is the issue.

            Main goal would be to get out from any possibility of Eugene clutches. Maybe from Lane County. But not Oregon.

      1. And not where I live (Texas…). They’re going to Sheeple only really in the places that the Dems fully control- and it’s not going to go nearly as nicely as they hoped there.

        1. Not around me either. Local Supermarket chain (the only big one in the area, but that’s a rant for another time) reinstituted “mandatory” masking for everyone regardless of vaccination status about a month ago. Had to run in over the weekend, and I’d guestimate that while all employees were masked, maybe only 1/3 of the customers were, and nobody was saying ‘boo’ about it.

          1. Same here. Despite the statewide mask mandate being reimposed for everyone in public indoor places two weeks ago, compliance in most places is about 1/4 if that. I go unmasked everywhere, and nobody has bothered me about it (they’d better not; I didn’t get vaccinated for nothing, and I ain’t playing no more).

            1. Sounds like all of you live in the fun places. Where I am even if the diaper sign is covered or nonexistent there’s still about half the people in stores muzzling up and this isn’t one of the blue spots down here in GA. *Sigh…*

              1. I could be wrong about the mask-wearing numbers; I’ve mostly stopped paying attention to what other people are doing, and I don’t get out much. Could be that others are complying, but I’ve just been unaware. Yesterday I was surprised to notice that I was literally the only one in Rite Aid that was unmasked.

                As for this being one of the “fun places,” the once-great state of WA seems determined to go full progtard, so it’s not likely to stay that way. There’s a good reason why the eastern 2/3 (which is where I live, thank God) wants to separate itself from the mentally diseased horde west of the Cascades.

                1. THIS.
                  I’m “staying,” but not on this side.
                  Cle Elum, Ellensburg maybe. Too much sun on that side, but it’s largely MAGA.

                  1. Too much sun? What?! More sun here than there, but still, there’s never enough. (Born and raised in the high mountain desert, so anything less than 300 sunny days per year is too few as far as I’m concerned…seasonal depression is real.)

                    1. >> “seasonal depression is real”

                      But it can vary by person. I’m one of those freaks that actually likes winter. Cool temperatures, a good breeze, an overcast sky and the smell of wood smoke makes me happy. As long as the roads aren’t blocked by ice or snow, anyway…

                    2. Ack! I hate winter.

                      Maybe not enough to move to someplace that doesn’t really have it, because I value its role in keeping spiders down to a manageable size and killing off cockroaches…but I don’t in any way enjoy being cold (or worse, cold and wet), and the lack of sunlight is a big problem.

                      I’ve been fantasizing for quite a while about moving back to the high desert, where even if it does sometimes get colder than a witches t!ts, at least the sun still shines.

                    3. I like living in a place that has four distinct and roughly equal seasons, which is why I like the Pacific Northwest. But as I get older the winter SAD gets worse and worse. It just turned gray and cloudy today in Seattle, and I had that “here we go..” feeling.

                2. Crap, right, forgot some of you are still in blue states where that sort of thing is done more in rebellion than anything. Sorry about that. In my area it’s just a feeling of disappointment that the theater is going on in a state that never saw too crazy restrictions. Of course, once mysterious counting shutdowns in Atlanta and Savannah next year give us a “stunning” blue wave we’ll make up for it in ’23, I’m sure. I hope to be well clear of here by then, too (and hope I don’t run into family problems or other complications that sink these plans). Good luck to all of you still in those places, whether you’re staying willingly or not!

                  1. Where I am, it’s like a red state that’s trapped inside a blue state. And I’m in a blue-dot college town inside that sea of red. The whole situation is kind of a microcosm of America itself, come to think of it.

    2. They mostly are up here in NW Washington. Interestingly I have been out to five big chain stores (grocery, building supply, hobby) and was the only person not wearing a mask, but no one actually said anything. I keep hoping I’ll start seeing more people resisting but so far it’s been slim pickings.

      1. South Central Oregon, it’s spotty. Seems to be settling down to an average of 50-70% masked up at the groceries (OTOH, the Kroger affiliate was Senior Tuesday, and the Olde Pharte cohort is slightly more likely to mask up, barring reprobates like me.) Home Desperate is somewhat lower, especially among the worker bees getting materials for a job.

        Zero mask-Karens. FWIW, the Chinese restaurant had a sign last week: No Mask–No Service. No enforcement, either. Put a mask on before entering, and it came off when I realised I was surrounded by fellow free-breathers. I think the sign is to placate the OR-OSHA types doing an expedition to Flyover Country. “See, we tried, but those MAGA people won’t pay attention!”

  9. As the old saying goes: eventually one reaches the point where it’s time to hoist the Jolly Roger and start slitting throats.
    And as Rudyard Kipling so eloquently pointed out, if you think barbarian warriors are bad, save that last bullet for yourself on the off chance that they will turn you over to the barbarian women.

  10. Yeah.

    I identify as a monster, precisely there are people whose standards of ‘not a monster’ are not worth abiding by.

    The feckless ‘experts’ who have shepherded the Gu jar of vicious morons are not worth esteem, and will fail.

    We win, they lose.

  11. Yeah. I’m expecting a major economic crash some time in the next 0-3 years.

    I don’t see how that cannot happen when the people running the printing press think money is magic.

        1. Figure an increasing probability curve. I can’t show a precise case/cause that Economic Bad Things happen (or are finally revealed) more oft in October or November, but it seems the case – and I am not looking just at 1929.

          1. September through November Is a real thing, End of quarter and end of fiscal year are part of it but no one really knows. 29, 87, 08.

          2. because I’m a nerd. the top 10 monthly declines in the S&P from 1871 to the present

            Nov 1929
            Apr 1932
            Oct 2008
            Mar 2020
            Dec 1931
            Sep 1931
            Sep 1946
            Oct 1957
            Sep 1932
            Oct 1932

            1932 was the nadir when all the banks failed.

            Nov 1987 was 16th and October 1987, which contained the biggest one day decline ever was 19th.

            Make of that what you will.

        2. Not so far. The odds are not good and things are getting steadily worse but the band plays on. Im really worried, but then I’ve predicted 7 of the last three downturns. Non linear phenomena are a stone cold b-tch.

          2. Well another factor right now is the branch covidians are probably going to start going kinetic when the wave comes this fall.

            I’m seeing more and more noise on Twitter about them wanting to kick down doors for grab and jab. Expect that’s going to go hot once they get the green light to stick the under 12 population.

            1. Twitter is sometimes interesting, but is possibly more a reflection of dreams than reality.

                1. One small difference. Or maybe 393 million small differences…

                  (By most recent estimate I could find, so almost certainly lowballing. The Assterisk is proving to be an even better salesman than Obama.)

                  1. *MASSIVE* lowballing.

                    More reasonable attempts to calculate come up with numbers in the 450-600mil range. That was before the Great Peaceful Year of Peacefulness.

                2. The thing is, if I have a moment to think, these days I’m paranoid about everything. Including the narrative about what is going on in Australia. (Okay, sure I think the Australian government is nuts. But, a lot of people may be overhyping the level of effective control that government has.)

                    1. Yet. Bloggers I’m reading have heard rumbles. Rope/lamp-post and canoe-accident recovery rumbles.

                      The firearm confiscation “buyback” wasn’t as successful as TPTB would like to think.

                  2. The guy who does the tech articles at Ace of Spades is Australian. Courtesy him, yesterday’s (our time, anyway) attendance at the beach in Sydney:

                    Sadly, that massive truckers’ strike seems to have been more talk than action. However, remember Gell-Mann amnesia: the media doesn’t tell you the truth about anything else, they’re not going to tell you the truth about the real Resistance.

                  1. She’s still posting on Twitter, at least. Mostly retweeting what appears to be manga artist postings.

                    1. Well, I can tell you exactly why she’s not posting here.

                      https://www.rt.com/news/533645-victoria-lockdown-australia-police-data-hack/

                      “The new conditions for easing lockdown were revealed a week after Australia passed a controversial bill giving police the ability to secretly seize and alter internet accounts.

                      Known as the Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) bill, the legislation allows the Australian Federal Police (AFP) to take over, and modify or delete, the accounts of cybercriminal suspects. “

                4. Pixie Misa (who maintains Ace’s site, and puts up a post every morning in the wee small hours) lives Down Under, and iirc, he’s stated that there’s a lot more non-compliance than the media shows.

            2. There was also the security guard up in Chicagostan who shot someone for not wearing a mask.

              Being a member of the enemy side he turned out to be a pedo-rapist. Because of course he was.

                    2. HMMM, stealing from RAH I should like to conjure the shades(or persons in some cases) of Jeffrey Dahmer, Ted Bundy, Samuel Little (he’s still kicking), John Wayne Gacy, Randy Kraft and maybe 1/2 a dozen others from this list (https://www.bestattorney.com/blog/most-infamous-deadly-serial-killers-top-40) and lock them in a room with the various instructors who make that claim for a few hours. We’ll see what they think when and if they come out of the room.
                      With Kudos to W.S. Gilbert “My object all sublime I shall achieve in time, to make the punishment fit the crime the punishment fit the crime”

                2. “Reset the clock!” -something that got posted on Twitter a lot when some “male feminist” turned out to be a sexual harasser and/or assaulter. Especially the ones who railed most mightily against the Gamergate movement.

              2. Saw a news short about a ‘trans gender female’ on the womens’ side of a spa in a…stimulated condition. When a couple of women complained, they, of course, were the ‘trans phobic haters’.

                The ‘trans female’ turned out to be a registered sex offender with multiple convictions. Sounds more like a common perv than a ‘civil rights crusader’ to me.

                2. This was in Los Angeles.

                  Protestors showed up at the spa within a week. Antifa showed up and attacked the protestors. Initially, the cops looked on passively. But iirc, on the second or third day of this, the cops (who I *think* were LA County Sheriff’s Deputies – and yes, that distinction IS important in Los Angeles right now) intervened against Antifa.

                  Also, the “trans” individual in question is affiliated with Antifa.

                  1. Can we borrow our Hostess’ shocked face? Admittedly the modern world over works it badly…

                3. Seen Twitter accounts by two activists who were all in for it — one of them literally said that the girl should have been taught it’s rude to stare at other people’s genitals — and both of them DOUBLED DOWN.

            3. How many DEAD home-invading grab&jabbers will it take for them to get the point that home invasion is a BAD IDEA?

              (As if it would get beyond wanking daydream….)

        1. By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes.
          Open locks, Whoever knocks!
          [Enter Macbeth]

        3. California’s recall election next week. Maybe.

          In theory, it shouldn’t be. But there are a lot of people with strong feelings about it on both sides. Under those circumstances, it could easily turn into a flashpoint, particularly if something “interesting” happens, such as a truck overturning on the freeway, and spilling out a massive load of suspicious ballots, and the state government blatantly ignores it.

          1. Inheritance from what little was paid for the wreck of a house. For which I went through 6 years of hell, and I doubt in some ways I’ll ever recover. So. Yes.

            Now I need to worry about bringing in a steady income. One step at a time.

          1. Theoretically, I could liquidate about 25% of my 401k and pay off our house here. I’m starting to wonder if that’s a good idea.

            1. If they succeed in getting some inflation then you’re better off with a mortgage. Inflation lowers real interest rates, If there’s deflation, youre better off paying it off because deflation raises real interest rates. I have no idea which way it will go.

              I don’t give investment advice and this isn’t but I usually suggest comparing your mortgage to the rate on Treasury bills. if your mortgage has a higher rate then you’re better of paying it down quicker, if the Tbills is higher then not. The works because the Tbill price is a good gauge of deflation/inflation. Currently, 1 year Tbills are at 7 bp and 10 year notes at 1.37%. I know people think this is a sign of loose money and inflation but it’s not, exactly the opposite in fact.

              I would only do this from income not savings and 401k are special tax deferred saving because saving is hard and liquidity, the availability of cash, may be vital. Paying up your mortgage makes a fairly liquid asset fairly illiquid. if you need cash in a hurry you’re SOOL.

              This is a good thing to do in almost all situations if you can afford it.pay ahead when prices are high (rates are low) and pay the minimum when prices are low (rates are high). Interest rate prices are high when rates are low and vice versa.

              This assumes we’re not in a revolution but the thing about revolutions is debt collection becomes chancy, debt jubilee is often the outcome, and the mortgage and 401 k would be the least of your problems.

              Again. not investment advice I don’t know your facts and circumstances well enough to give you any but that’s the advice I give to people who’s facts and circumstances I do know.

              1. First of all, I’m not looking for an advisor; if I were we’d be signing paperwork and I would have paid for it. 😎

                However, I’m mostly checking my thinking process. The joker (or Joker) is FICUS and the hints his party keep dropping about taxing 401ks. At which point it will be use it or lose it.

                2. FICUS and the hints his party keep dropping about taxing 401ks

                  –
                  After all they went through to make it harder for people to OPT out at least minimum? Because saving is soooo important. Rolls eyes. Not only that, the people they hit, will be the middle class and poorer economic levels. Because the higher the compensation, the lower the amount that can be socked away. Be it 401(k) or IRA/Roth. So, taxing the people that Biden said wouldn’t be taxed. (I called BS then on his promise.) The maximum ceiling isn’t that high either. Neither of us hit it singly, but as a married couple we hit it more than a few times; mostly when the ceiling was a lot lower in the early years of the programs.

                3. Tax it suggests “take the liquidation loss NOW and get it over with, and fsck the bastages bitching about it.”

                  Yes, with a chainsaw. A rusty one. Sidewises. And twice on Sundays.

                  After that, maybe get mean about things.

                1. Sustained prices? 1932. Prices blipped down in 2008 and again during WuFlu in 2020. but didn’t sustain the drop. Money supply deflation, which is real, genuine deflation is a bit more difficult to get at since the monetary statistics, um, suck. What’s more common is what they call disinflation, that happens all the time and was what happened in 74, which was the worst downturn between the war and 2008.

                  Lot of ruin in a nation and they haven’t managed to break it yet. Give them time and they will but not quite yet.

    2. It might be a strange way out of this mess, if an apocalyptic one. The power of these people begins to slip when the dollar does. The debt they have us all enslaved with (most of which was made “in our name”) becomes worthless when a loaf of bred costs $100,000. It may reset the valuation of things towards people who are actually doing useful work, and away from paper trillionaires who get to print their fortunes or have them rain from the government.

      1. That brings up something that I am sure HAS been analyzed and all, BUT it’s not been made Common Knowledge (well, not common enough… ) Places HAVE had hyperinflation disasters. And recovered. What ARE the paths (I presume more than one, some more painful/treacherous than others, some .. convoluted) to a good, or at least not stupidly lousy end to all that mess?

        1. I can’t think of any soft landings from it. Usually it ends with an economic collapse. After the collapse, a new currency, traditionally backed by gold, is introduced — recently it’s been the US Dollar. It’s also usually connected to a change in regime. Credit means, literally, belief. Hyperinflation is the loss of belief in a currency and, usually, the regime that issued it.

          Unfortunately Andrew Mellon had it mostly right, liquidate capital, liquidate labor, burn out the excess and start over.

          I don’t think we’re going to have hyper inflation in the US., I don’t think we’re going to have sustained price inflation either. I’ve written on this here before. The much more likely problem is stagnation, not stagflation but decline and deflation. The increases in prices are the outcome of political stupidity and the lockdowns that have caused problems in the supply chain, Once those base effects are over, price inflation will ease. Lumber and used car prices, which were headline in June, have crashed.

          The underlying issue is demographics. US demographics are not good but the rest of the world is horrific.

          Hyperinflation could result from the stagnation as “the experts” scramble to find a solution to a problem of their own creation that has no solution, The thing to watch for is the treasury monetizing the FRB balance sheet. Right now the FRB cannot issue money directly into the economy. If they get their Crypto Fed currency, they can and hyperinflation is actually here.

          The FRB cannot create money, banks create money, ex nihilo, through loans. Bank reserves are not money. Most of their money creation is done offshore so the Fed has no jurisdiction and so bank reserves are meaningless anyway. Right now, there is a shortage of money. I know this sounds nuts, but the banks are hoarding good quality collateral. There is a shortage of credit worthy borrowers who want to borrow. Lending is down year over year. they’re all just pushing on a string.

          Should they get the ability to create money they will do so because they are fools, lost in theoretical illusions. We’re being saved because the banks, whilst they might be fools, are not lost in theoretical illusion. The bank’s know and they’re not playing.

          1. Interesting. I recall reading one of the issues with the Great Depression was the banks often simply vanished overnight, yoinking all your savings but leaving all the debts.

            Given the modern system we’ve ended up in is using the credit cards for purchases, and paying it off out of the checking account at the end of the month, that could easily leave us in a big lurch.

            The thing that keeps me up at night is not having any idea of which ways to prepare. Things could go dozens of ways at any moment, and quickly, and I know my reaction time is poor.

            1. I think it was the banks failing a destroying life savings was what made the depression great. That didn’t happen till 1932. They did everything wrong and then Bailout Ben Bernanke drew the wrong conclusions and did everything differently wrong in 2008. What they should have done was leave the damned thing alone rather than imposing disastrous policies. Kind of fits in with this post, though I don’t think the authorities ever got it right, so think their scope used to be smaller.

            2. That’s where I am, too much uncertainty to plan, and with the black dog making me hesitant to own a gun things aren’t looking good for me in most Certain REM Song scenarios.

          2. Had not heard lumber prices had crashed. I’d started getting stuff set up for woodworking at the beginning of the year, but held when prices when nuts. I’ll have to check things again.

            The demographics are going to be an issue. I’ve heard elsewhere that is a leading indicator of big crashes; no room for growth in the economy, so people don’t get married and don’t have kids. Looking at my immediate family, there are two surviving parents, five adults and right now one, soon to be three children, but they’re very young or due in the next few months. There might be one more in the next couple of years, but those of us that got married, all got married late.

            We can make things work in the near term and support our surviving paretns, but the children will not be able to support us when we age out of our productive years.

            1. Futures anyway. I don’t know about retail though I’m about to find out because I have reconstruction to do after the ida flood. Raw lumber prices never went up, finished lumber did. More COVIDacy.

              lumber futures peaked at $1600 back in May. (For a 73 foot carload, about 11,000 board feet) Down to about $500 now. over the longer term it has fluctuated between $250 and $500 ish, drawn with a crayon is what we say. It’s still on the high side of normal and supply is coming online which should drive prices down.

              I’m not a specialist in it, so that’s all I know. the symbol is LBS.

              Lots of prices peaked in May and the inflation impulse looks to have peaked in February, there’s a clear discontinuity . China’s property firms started to sell assets at that time. Coincidence?

              I’m told plywood is still expensive since a lot of it comes from Canada and Canada is ruled by Justin so retailers have had to find alternative sources.

                1. They’re running out of money. when you’re running out of money you sell whatever you can, not what you want. It’s what drives the prices of good assets down. Today is a perfect example. Everything but Apple and Tesla were down. I have no idea how this will turn out but I’m worried

                  What really frightens new though is the silence in the English language Chinese press. SCMP has nothing and it’s the primary paper in HK. They’re owned by alibaba now

                  1. Links are in moderation but short summary is apparently one of China’s biggest real estate developers, Evergrande, is about 300 billion in the hole and has been missing debt payments.

                    What can’t go on won’t. Fun times ahead…

                    2. So, does the PRC bail out the company in return for increased CCP control, bail out the company and execute everybody, or let the company fail and take the economic hit from the resulting chaos? If they bail them out without executions, doesn’t that just make other big risky enterprises figure they can be even riskier?

                    3. All the world wonders. The money is on China taking the property portion, keeping the employment — 220,000 employees and taking over the buildings. The losses will be forced onto private investors and foreigners. Evergrande is interesting since its funding doesn’t come from the big state banks and 40% of it is direct placements to private lending trusts. An Evergrande default would be a triple win for Pooh bear. they’d get the property, keep the employees, and wipe out his rivals. China is going through one of those banging down higher nails phases. This would eliminate some more potential rivals and strengthen the security forces who run most of the state sector, which is in dire need of money since its hugely inefficient. The economic generals don’t like the coastal cities making all the money. This is a repeating topos in Chinese history and never underestimate the power of envy.

                      I remember reading that one of the the drivers of Hilary Clinton’s fraud when they left office was her having to fly in someone else’s private jet. How could they have one and she not?

                      On the other hand, he’s playing with fire since he doesn’t know who those private lenders have borrowed from. If the wrong one fails in the wrong place at the wrong time you would get cascading failure in China and the Chinese state is quite brittle. unwinding a pyramid scheme, possibly the largest pyramid scheme ever, successfully will take a great deal of luck.

                      I’m actually hoping they get away with it since the human cost of their failing would be immense. Even so, if they succeed, I’ll take a small loss. If they fail, I’ll make a boatload of money. Such is the power of options.

                      Sorry to everyone for going on so long today and yesterday. I chatter when I’m afraid and I’m very afraid right now.

                    4. You and me both. It’s good to hear I’m not the only one feeling it.

                      So much of the optimism I’m hearing right now seems to be either based on assumptions of both what entities’ best interests are and that they will act in them, or simple whistling past the yard.

                      Neither make me very comfortable right now.

                    5. Speaking for myself: The chatter is fine.

                      I’ve been there.

                      And, I’m learning some stuff. I’d never heard of ergodicity before, and it was something that I needed to hear about. I was going to ask about pointers to textbooks, but wikipedia seems to be enough for the basic concept now, at least for me.

                    6. Glad to be of service. 😀

                      Ole Peters is your pathway in. he has the basic papers on his website ergodicity economics. The original paper is by Peters and Murray Gel Man, it’s floating around and worth the read. When you finish those, have a look at the Kelly Criterion as that’s the way this concept gets applied in the real world. Kelly is, of course, the math behind card counting in blackjack. if you don’t play, card counting is really about managing bet sizes. The counting and bet size are trivial. Not getting caught counting cards is not trivial. I’m fairly sure I’m not banned anymore but I don’t play anymore — too much effort.

                      I played a lot of poker and vingt et un when I was a young man. I was poor and they were rich and it’s only fair they should share with me 😇

                    7. Last one and then I’m for bed. Evergrande stock opened down 25% in HK this morning it’s bounced to unchanged. Debt isn’t trading. You can buy the dip for $0.44 US per share — if you’re mad.

                      Speaking of my canary companies, TSLA was up big today. Word is that it was people fleeing from Evergrande’s electric car subsidiary, which is down $80B US so far this year. The mind boggles.

                    8. It’s done. Evergrande is delaying interest payments to banks and suspended payment to several funds. Unless a bailout comes, Evergrande has defaulted.

                      Evergrande stock finished up on the day.

                      I don’t understand the world anymore,

              2. I glanced at the pile of 19/32s OSB, and HD had it around $30 a sheet. A week or two ago I saw 7/16″ OSB running at $20ish. That’s about 3X the pre-covidiocy rate, but about 1/3rd the peak prices around here. I priced a quarter-sheet of birch-veneer ply at Depot, and 3/4″ x 3′ x 4′ was $3. I could get away with melamine covered particle board for half that, so that’s what I got.

                Lumber peaked about 2X the original price. Haven’t bought any normal stuff lately but I got pressure treated and 2 x 4 x 12′ cedar. Prices were a bit high, but not insurmountable. OTOH, I didn’t need much. Concrete mix never got very high.

            2. That last is what I’m looking at too. I’m the eldest of four, and we could probably see to Dad, but the next generation after us has exactly two members, both with significant developmental disabilities that will probably mean they will need lifelong care. When the four of us age out of our productive years, who takes care of us, and them?

              1. Well, ideally a lot of unmarried people join religious orders and also get medical degrees, or just join religious orders and do good works. But whoops! We got rid of most of the religious orders and charity hospitals, back in the Seventies.

            3. Specifically, dimensional lumber and structural plywood/OSB have crashed*. Cabinet grade plywood and hardwoods have different supply chains and have stayed high for now.

              *(2x4x8 at West Seattle Home Depot is $3.42 down from $8.something a few months ago)

          3. Dumb question, BGE — I know I have this wrong, but I’m not sure where.

            When the Fed does “open market operations”, it buys T-bonds for cash. I thought that “cash” came out of nowhere, that the Fed had the (exclusive) right to create “cash” for the purpose of buying T-bonds, in whatever quantities it felt were necessary. I thought that was how “printing money” to create inflation / hyperinflation ultimately happens: the Government issues T-bonds to fund its operations, the Fed buys them with brand-new cash, and (eventually, at equilibrium) all that new cash fractionally lowers the value of outstanding dollars.

            If the Fed is doing its assigned job, it’s usually fighting the market, and therefore (presumably, in the long run) is operating at a loss. The “right to issue cash” was supposed to fund the losses, as I understand it.

            I know I have this wrong, but where? Help, Professor!

            1. I’m no professor, I work for a living. 😀

              What you’ve described is, more or less, what’s in the Money and Banking textbooks. It hasn’t actually worked that way since Greenspan, again more or less this is all very squishy. It’s also very complicated in the details and I do go on, especially when I’m frightened, like now, so I apologize. I’ll just ask that you follow me here because what I’m writing is not what the textbooks say, but it is what is.

              Today, when they’re talking about money printing by the FRB, they’re talking about Quantitative Easing. Quantitative Easing has been around for a long time, Japan started it back in 92 ish, though the FRB did something called Operation Twist in the 50’s that was similar. Spoiler. It doesn’t work and won’t work now.. The reason, other than paper cash , the Fed doesn’t creat money, banks do by lending. Nothing backs the bank lending except the willingness of other banks to lend each other money. before 2008, you found some of this done unsecured, and much more done with collateral. Since then, the acceptable collateral has essentially been reduced to on the run US TBills that is the most recent Tbilll issue,

              All the bankers remember what happened in 2008 when whole classes of collateral were no longer accepted and they had to liquidate everything to raise case or they’d be gone in a day. The career risk of being wrong like that is always in the back of their minds and only career risk matters. They’re more afraid of BofNY than they are of the NY Fed, trust me. BofNY is the bankers’s. bank, they process the margin calls.

              What the FRB does in QE is buy assets from banks and pay with what are called bank reserves. These bank reserves are counted as base money so the M’s increase. The notion is that these bank reserves are The hottest of money and the banks will do whatever is necessary to get them off their balance sheet. in fact, what you actually have is an asset swap where US Treasury bills are swapped for bank reserves. This accomplishes precisely nothing except the substitution of a very liquid asset, like Tbills, for some other asset called bank reserves. You can do what you like with Tbills, you have to go through the Fed with bank reserves, The upshot has been a reduction in quality collateral as witnessed by the FEDs special Repo facility. I know this sounds crazy, but this is what is.

              The basic problem is demographics and the level of debt. The textbooks assume there’s an unlimited supply of creditworthy borrowers willing to borrow. That’s simply false. Hence, the banks don’t lend. What has happened is a massive balloon in cash on bank balance sheets and a rise in asset prices as the banks speculate with a very small amount of the cash. The debt/bond market is huge compared to stocks so a little can go a long way in pumping prices.

              Why do they do it? The economists don’t know what to do. something must be done, this is something, so we’ll do that. central Banking is a long con like all the “nudge” things. They try to “manage expectation”. The thought is that if people think the Fed will bail them out or print money or whatever then they’ll go,out and buy risky assets. The Fed can’t really do these things but they don’t have to, they just have to make people think they can.

              Like I said complicated in the details. if you keep in mind that it’s all smoke and mirrors and nudging you won’t go far wrong.

              If you’re a masochist, you can go over and read more on this by Jeff Snyder at Alhambra investments, he’ll go into far more detail than any sane person would wish for. Or search for Eurodollar University on the tubes of you. There are many others, while not common knowledge, this is well known in the trade but this is his special subject.

              The basic data are under the commercial banking tab on FRED, the St. Louis FED data site. look for cash assets on bank balance sheets and Business and Real Estate lending. cash assets have exploded while business and RE lending are down YOY.

              Hope this helps.

          4. “recently it’s been the US Dollar.”

            The irony, of course, being that if our own country plays havoc with its currency, we can’t exactly peg ourselves to the US dollar as a way of recovering…

            And further, every last country that pegged its own currency to the dollar is going to be in bad shape in such a situation.

        2. Similar high level theory to BGE, possibly different conclusion.

          Wealth is an artifact of worker productivity, plus market.

          Currency stuff is an artifact of the market, and maybe screws up the market.

          Just in time has downsides, but one benefit is that little investment in stocks of parts means that it cheap to switch to making a product using different parts.

          I don’t think corporations are necessarily flexible enough to cope with a massive currency shock.

          Individuals spending time ‘productively’ might be more powerful here than the historical models might suggest.

          Whole lot of ‘dunno’.

          I’m not arguing ‘must’ for the nicer possibilities, I’m arguing ‘not impossible’.

          This is again a case where important adaptations might have been happening for some time, invisibly.

    1. Only works if there are panem et circenses to distribute.

      And they have to be distributed at *least* as much as they were up to the current time, so it is a never ending upwards spiral until the mechanism fails.

    2. It’s actually “The worse, the better.”

      They want to create a crisis so that they can come in on the proverbial White Horse and offer to fix the crisis for the low, low cost of our freedom. That’s part of the reason FICUS is in the White House, he’s the sacrificial piece that will be tossed aside to solve the crisis.

    1. To be fair, I’m over 60, working on my second cancer fight (all signs look positive for a no surgery, no chemo, recovery), my employers are deathly afraid of either “Winnie’s Lung Pox” or not genuflecting humbly enough to the Mask-urbators and Evangelical Atheist Vaxxers.

      Heck. Even some at my church behave as if they don’t believe God was serious when he had those holy men of old (2 Peter 1:21) write the stuff that became our Bible.

      Whether you do, Gentle Reader, or not, is between you and God.

      But! Psalm 91:5-8 is good stuff. Read the whole psalm for context; but that’s where I stand vis-a-vis the “Sino Sinus Syphilus”. Read Daniel 3:16-18 for where I’m eventually headed, unless they make a real vaccine that block infection and spreading the disease, unlike the mRNA stuff that apparently does nothing good. And may make us far more susceptible to other pathogens.

      Your mileage may vary. Not valid in all 50 States. Void where taxed or prohibited by law. All rights reserved.

  15. A few thoughts:
    Rights are individual not group – EVER!
    Collectivists are the enemy regardless of how they portray themselves-anti- pick one: color, religion, political viewpoint, language, city, village, county, country, tribe, weave – you get the idea.
    Make sure y’all get zero aggression pacts among you and be sure everyone means it and isn’t crossing their fingers.
    Go status yellow at all times until orange or red becomes appropriate.
    See http://www.frfrogspad.com/for much useful information on self defense and other interesting topics. Make sure you’re aware the site is not https secure.

  17. Unfortunately, most of Robert E. Howard’s poetry is still under copyright. Even though he died nearly a century ago, single, and without issue.
    So you get a dramatic reading, rather than text. (And my first choice was not availible.)

  18. Well, here in the Demented Dominion people were throwing stuff at the Shiny Pony yesterday in London Ontario. Finally, after decades of bullshit… pretty much my whole adult life my friends… some of the sheep have finally looked up. Enough to beat the Margin of Fraud? I guess we’ll see.

    1. The reason why, late at night, past my bedtime, I thought you were too pessimistic on Canadians goes as follows:

      Somebody, maybe you, or maybe Paladin, ranted about the falsehood of the “Canadians are nice” impression, stating that Canadians were three things, and that Americans misinterpret this as nice. The two I remember are reticent and polite.

      The way I read the entrails, now? American rudeness, etc., is functional, it is one way we warned each other off, back before the universities pushed so much wrong information about what behavior means. And Canadians aren’t necessarily /that/ different from Americans, so reticent and polite kinda means that ‘you’ collectively, will go from ‘I have no plan to kill you’ to ‘I am working on killing you’ without even stopping smiling*.

      Add in, you are a weird Canadian. My thought was that you might well miss some subtlety of communication that the other Canadians are using for their decision process.

      So, I thought it was too strong for you to say that you knew the Canadians would do nothing.

      Then, after I got some sleep, and reread your comments later, I decided I had too little of a case to be worth bringing it to you. (This was after the comment at MGC.)

      I am now feeling that the theory that you might underestimate degree of Canadian disquiet has a bit more support.

      *There’s this thing I’ve been rereading, obsessively. A line from that came to mind. “Amid the stories of a man who like to socialise, had many friends and female admirers, who was a gambler and philanthropist in equal measure, it was possible to find the iron core of a someone who would keep smiling right up until they snapped your neck without blinking when they had finally had enough.” Character thinking this is a relative good guy, working for one of the bad guys**, who has recently pissed off the relative good guy that he is describing. Story is probably not your cup of tea. Anyway, the comparison probably amounts to a wild overstatement.

      ** Spoilers: Bad guy betrays good guy one, sends him out to die. Good guy two’s aunt actually rescues good guy one, with the help of her adoptive sister.

        1. That’s sort of what they were: the cheer team would shout at one side “Fuck Joe Biden! and that side of the stands would respond… F Joe Biden!”

          It was like a march, one, two, one two. Beautiful.

        2. Imaginos1892 said
          “Ewwww, who’d want to?”
          Dr Jill seems to have at some point. Of course that presumes the Children are the FICUS’. Certainly it seems like Hunter has not fallen far from the tree. Perhaps Dr Jill closed her eyes and thought of Social Justice ?

            1. No, Joe likes women fine if they either cannot physically resist him, or psychologically will not resist him.

              Hair sniffer, remember?

              He probably likes men if they are the right flavor of vulnerable.

            2. OK that is an image I did not want. Maybe his previous boss might have had those issues, but FICUS seems to be a garden variety Dirty Old Man.

              1. In theory, there’s an argument that Obama would have been willing to appoint someone as VP who didn’t have a pedophilia grade concealed character flaw. Not strong, given how careful someone has been with Obama’s other appointments, but an argument.

                For Biden to be picked for the current gambit, someone is pretty comfortable about what they have on him, and on Edith.

                1. The issue I was referring to was that Obama was rumored to also be fond of the male of the species.
                  Though given his spouse it MIGHT put you off females. The FICUS clearly likes females (at least sniffing them) and seems to be only lightly constrained in the age range. That could just be part of his on going dementia, impulse control is one of the first things to go south or it could be a character flaw. All in all it was clear when Obumbles chose him he was chose so he would not upstage Obunbles. They really had to scrape the bottom of the pot to get that result. The FICUS used a similar strategy (or perhaps Dr Jill Did) and this presented even more of a challenge. Kind of like running mate choice limbo dancing.

                    1. That’s the issue… Hey when he was at Columbia, No Michele so much for that theory 🙂 .

          2. Hunter is not Jill Biden’s son, he’s the son of Zhou Baiden’s first wife. Jill and Zhou did have a daughter, Ashley. As far as I can see neither of them are good parents.

            1. I missed that. I had thought that Naomi (killed in car crash) was the only issue of that but Hunter and Beau were older siblings. That still leaves at least one time Dr. Jill “interacted” with Xhou Bai Den. (begins to feel a bit like the Protestant/COE couple in Monty Python’s “Meaning of Life”…

  19. Heh… Good stuff. I do like the thought of them ultimately losing to us Odds and others looking to bring some actual sanity back. And when it’s up to us Odds to do it, well… It certainly says something about how decadent (it coming from the root decay being more obvious these days) things have gotten. What that looks like for me yet, I don’t know… Even without the black dog around my skill set is painfully limited and my area may very well be lost to insanity. I guess we’ll see how things go.

  20. Thanks, BGE! That was very helpful. Leads to another question:

    One of my know-it-all relatives has been griping for years that the Treasury should take advantage of historically low interest rates and issue fewer T-bills and more long-term debt, even 50-year or 100-year bonds. From what you just said, it sounds like the practical effect of that would be a collateral squeeze due to a shortage of fresh T-bills. But it sounds like it’s merely current custom that makes fresh T-bills the only acceptable collateral, so perhaps custom would change (as it obviously has before)?

  21. Other people have issued 50 year notes and a I think some hundreds, The UK consols used to be perpetuities and a I think there might still be a few of those around, don’t know anymore.

    The thing is it’s not enough to issue them, you have to get someone to buy them. leaving aside the possibility that the dollar won’t be around in 100 years and only the British pound has been around as long as the dollar, and leaving aside inflation, I suppose there’s someone somewhere who needs yield enough to buy them; but at current rates I won’t touch 10’s never mind anything longer, though 10’s still have an expected positive return adjusted for risk. Anything longer than that has a negative return adjusted for duration risk.

    So there’s your answer. You can’t sell ‘em if no one wants to buy ‘em at that price and only a fool would buy.

    Let me know how that turns out.

  22. This can NOT be won by elections. The elections are rigged, and it takes too long. Also the will not remove the bureaucracy, it will not remove all those corrupt federal workers.
    This can only be won by a civil war.
    The system has to be torn down, to its very roots, and rebuilt from scratch.
    Nothing else will work.
    Period.

    1. Oh, it can be won by elections. It might not be, but it’s hardly impossible. Vote fraud is not an infinite source of votes, at least not realistically. 2020 scared the crap out of the Democrats. They thought they had it sewn up, that’s why they didn’t risk sending Biden out to do anything. Then election night came and Trump was winning handily, so they panicked, shut down the counting long enough to get rid of the observers and print up more ballots, and stole the election. And 1/3 of the country noticed. And another third saw that there was skeevy things going on but couldn’t quite bring themselves to say that the election was stolen. If they try the same thing in the midterms more of that middle third will realize that it wasn’t just a fluke and that the people in power have no legitimate claim to that power. Moreover, it won’t work. 2020 relied on fraud in half a dozen cities, that’s enough to swing the Electoral College but it isn’t enough to keep the House in the midterms. Hence HR1 and now HR4, they need to make fraud easier so that it’s less detectable, but they don’t have the votes in Congress to actually make that happen and the states are making fraud harder. FiCUS’ Mierdas touch hasn’t helped them at all.

      It’s not enough for them to win an election, they have to win an election in a way that the majority of the country believes is legitimate.

      1. They believe they got away with the fraud, which proves to them that they will always get away with the fraud, which is why they’re trying to pack even more fraud into all future elections. They’re trying to nationalize election fraud while screeching “RRRAAACISSST!!! at anybody trying to reduce election fraud. It’s a clown car with no brakes about to ram into a dumpster fire at 120 miles an hour.

        1. If they believe they got away with it they wouldn’t have surrounded the Capitol with a division of light infantry. If they believed they would always get away with it they wouldn’t have bothered with HR1 or HR4.

          1. No, I would argue that those bills are a veneer for the people who saw odd things, and aren’t quite believing it, and if bills pass will be able to put that nagging feeling away out of their minds.

          2. They surrounded it because they, as democrats, would have sent in their army (antifa) which is heavily armed and well trained with professional leadership.
            So they projected. They thought the ‘right’ would do the same. But the Republicans can’t be bothered to do anything to protect the constitution or their membership. They thought people would get upset over the political arrest and political trials of the people from Jan 6th, who have had ALL of their constitutional rights flushed down the crapper.
            But again, republicans can’t be bothered to protect their own.
            But then, they NEVER HAVE.
            The Democrats sell out our Allies.
            The Republicans sell out their own.

            1. The question we should be asking is why the fuck you and people like you are expecting anything from the gopes. You should have figured out they were the enemy by oh, about 2018 or so.

              In the meantime Americans are quietly flowing around and infiltrating all the centers of power they ca reach. But that doesn’t make headlines for the whiny brats in the audience so I guess it isn’t happening.

              1. Boom.

                I’m working on identifying propaganda sites, specifically medical propaganda. The mods on those sites are fragile tiny boy-monkeys. It took only two hours to get banned on one. 🙂

                Truth truth truth.

              2. I don’t expect anything from them. Because a couple of decades ago I ‘joined the fight’ against Bill Clinton.
                I got put on lists. Lots of them. I was followed around by federal agents who were taking my picture (I confronted them, badges came out). I had my phone tapped, and was denied work in my chosen field from then on.
                Oh, and the IRS came after me. Twice. For shit they made up. Fun that.
                And that paragon of virtue, GW, didn’t purge those lists. Nope, kept all of us from the Clinton years on it. You don’t even want to knw what my life was like after 9/11.
                So yeah, I tried, and everybody on the right laughed at me when I did. Then ignored me when the hammer dropped.
                I will NEVER risk my life and welfare for my fellow citizens again, unless THEY have already taken the first several steps and there is open fighting in the streets.
                Because losing everything, having the government up your ass, and having to start over, from scratch, in your thirties because you took a stand against the ‘government’ (non-violent mind you) Sucks.

            2. Antifa isn’t an army.

              They have a lot of political indoctrination, and a deliberately diffuse organization and cell structure, but at best they’re motivated brawlers. In Portland, where they are strongest, in their latest rumble with the Proud Boys, they got chased off by half their number. Any serious opposition, like the police or National Guard, with permission to crack heads would disperse any Antifa riot in minutes.

              That’s not the real problem. The problem is that they would disperse and re-form somewhere else. They need to be in prison, but until we can replace DAs and AGs that won’t prosecute we’re stuck with them.

              1. When they roll with their leadership structure, who are all experienced military officers, oh they’re an army, trust me.
                The brawl with the PB’s just shows what happens when their leaders aren’t there. But they still rule Portland and Seattle. Probably a few other cities as well. The leadership got what it wanted, but if it needs them again? Those brownshirts will be back in a heartbeat.

              2. There are multiple levels to Antifa. The front-line types aren’t even really members. They’re local rowdies brought in via word of mouth that a fun ruckus will be held at a certain place and time. They’re completely expendable if something goes wrong

                The actual membership starts at the tier above that, and appears to be increasingly well-trained and organized the further up the chain you move. But those guys appear to try and stay out of sight, aside from instances in which Antifa feels a need to make an example of someone.

          3. They also wouldn’t feel the need to freak out when a state starts to talk about auditing the vote.

        2. I don’t think they do think they got away with it. Businesses and anyone invested in the structure have been pushing extremely hard to shut up anyone asking any questions about the vote. The statisticians are avoiding the conversation like it was death.

      2. Until the shooting starts, nobody is bought in enough to support any kind of ‘vote’ actions. We’ve gone too far. The LAST election PROVED that.
        And even though it was blatant, in your face, we’ve even admitted in the newspapers we did it, FRAUD – NO ONE did ANYTHING.
        Voting is a waste of time. Thinking you can cause any change or even start a revolution by voting never works. Until people actually start shooting – nothing will change. History has shown this to be true time and time again.

        1. Voting is pointless, barring being able to conclusively prove several remedies.

          Talking to people, locally, about process fixes is not pointless. It is an excuse to push at people, see how they respond.

          It is also not the correct option for everyone.

        2. Ah yes, how can we forget General Gandhi’s great war to end British India, or Colonel King’s bloody March to Selma that killed Jim Crow.

          Nobody did anything for the same reason a lot of people don’t do anything when there’s a massive accident. Confront people with a reality too far outside of their normal experiences and many of them will rationalize it away or even refuse to see it. 2020 isn’t the first time the Democrats have cheated to win elections, it’s probably been the only way they’ve been able to keep the power they’ve had for decades, but each election they have to cheat more and each election more people catch on. In 2020 they had to cheat so blatantly that one third noticed. Unfortunately, one third of the populace isn’t enough to change things. But it is enough to make noise and raise awareness.

          No one did anything? Were you in a coma January 6? Have you been living under a rock as state after state tightens up election integrity?

    2. My view is, yes and no.

      Pushing back on the elections is battle space prep for the civil war, and it is something everyone can do, not just the people who can shut up and think quietly about targets.

      Direct action has a problem, in that, while there are crooked Democrats everywhere, most with very poor security, the obvious targets are further away, or have better security. Frankly, the psychology may also be wrong for being the best way to build the winning coalition.

      The opposition thinks they have perfect fraud, because of voting machines, vote by mail, ID/voter rolls, the people they have in place in key voting areas, and some sort of scam in the federal courts that may involve compromising the computer that assigns cases to judges. Thing is, this part is also a soft power fight, and the courts are not important. Soft power fights are easier to do in a way that we can recruit neutrals, and also an area where the Democrats have a vulnerability that they are not aware of, and cannot easily cover. In areas they haven’t packed with election officials in their pocket, we can get rid of electronic voting machines by demonstrating that a correct procedure to allow them would be hugely expensive, and thus hand counts of paper ballots are cheapest. Since the ‘court’ that we are fighting that in is members of the public, they can’t use legal crookedness as an “I win” button. It is a fight they are not expecting, a soft power fight that they would have to win everywhere, and it is a fight that just about anyone can take part in. By winning there, we de-legitimize the corrupt ‘results’ provided by the courts.

      That’s the ‘no’ case.

      The yes case, is that the escalation towards civil war is driven by opposition leadership, who are insane would be mass murderers. I don’t have a theoretical explanation of a way to avoid the boog, but a central part of the left heresy is thinking that their theoretical models completely predict the future.

      I’ve long thought that the theoretical model of how to win the boog is let opposition insanity drive neutrals into supporting us.

      I dunno. If I thought I had a good answer about something I should be doing, I would have decided to shut up at some point. My basic theory of how I can contribute is only talking to people on the net.

      1. There is no ‘Prep’ for a civil war. Pushing back just shows you really don’t give a damn and aren’t committed enough to do anything when the cattle cars show up.

        When the war comes it’ll take about 2 to 10 days from the first shot to the total collapse of our society. It will be fast. The only question is, who is going to start it? I’m betting on the hundred million illegals and other recent immigrants from third world shit holes who want to turn this country into the one they fled. Just like they have every other time in history.

        The complete lack of ANY response but the republicans to the most blatant fraud in the history of this nation shows, that they’re never going to do anything but what they’re told to, by the democrats.

          1. He’s not really a doomer so much as a pseudo-glowie.

            Apparently, he hadn’t really lot his illusions about the GOPe, and Afghanistan was the straw that broke the camel’s back when it came to overlooking exactly how bad it seems to be. So he is angry, and still processing things.

          3. Yes, stop beating your gum and get off your ass and DO something. And Support those who ARE doing something. Me? Last time I was out there ‘leading the charge’ I got fucked eight ways from Sunday. I tried, none of you helped.
            I’m done.
            Your turn in the barrel.

            1. Having fought and taken damage is fine. Well, not fine, it shouldn’t have happened that way, but it is nothing to be shamed of.

              So long as you don’t then sabotage the people who *do* step up to fight.

        2. Of course civil wars can be prepared for. The Democrats have been trying to prepare for decades, and their apparent successes are what make the thing seem in question at all.

          Look at how excited they got over every spree killing in a school, sure that this was the one that was going to pay off for them. They clearly thought that they were engaged in an activity where they would convince people to let them take the guns away, and that then they would have an opportunity desperately longed for.

          It is just that their predictive theory has holes, so they’ve picked measurable goals, and are wildly overconfident that they have it in the bag.

          They identified courts, cops, military, and Republican ‘leaders’ as people to suborn, set out to suborn them, and apparently have. Courts look fixed, Federal LEOs look fixed, military leadership seems fixed, and definitely the would be Republican leaders are crooked, and think they are rid of competition from Trump.

          (When Laura Bush compared the Mexico border situation to the Pacific War against the Japanese, it was clear that she was an enemy, had always been an enemy, and that so had 41 and 43 been enemies. She knew enough to keep her gob shut if she did not have her husband’s and father-in-law’s approval of her political statements. The Bushes have been working for the Democrats from the beginning, worked their way into ‘leadership’ of the GOP, and are more concerned about losing that business than they are a bunch of would be mass murderers, because their sympathies are with the would be mass murderers.

          People like Raffensperger, who are knowingly complicit in the fraud, are Democrat assets that the likes of the Bushes cultivated within the GOP. They are not a representative sample of Republicans or of Americans.

          43 may have been happy about being in office, but he was willing to have Republicans be cheated out of office by fraud in favor of weak or insane Democrat candidates. McCain and Romney were out right willing to turn a blind eye to the fraud that put Obama in office. In hindsight, even the 1992 election is pretty suspicious. )

          The Republican Party has been run as a long con, and information sources run by nominal Republicans with any large financial backing are mostly compromised and being run as an information operation by someone.

          These information sources are the Democrat success that most has you feeling isolated and perhaps even helpless.

          The flaw in all of these information operations, is that they have misunderstood the armed force that has caused the relative peace in recent American history. They think it is all top down, and since they have control over the top down forces, they have won, and can act decisively.

          Stuff like the flawed communist theory of revolution, and their mistaken understanding of the end of segregation feeds into this misunderstanding. The Feds still do not have the manpower to rule purely by force.

          For any sort of mass murder in your area, they have to be able to rely on your neighbors. Otherwise, it gets expensive fast. Now, I do not know your neighbors. But, if they could rely on everyone’s neighbors in a fight, then they could have just won this directly instead of messing around with all of this complicated shit.

          Their calculation is that if the police will only act on their say so, then the criminals can do the heavy lifting, and it is all very deniable and under their control. Fundamentally, your neighbors, my neighbors, and everyone’s neighbors are a lot scarier and more dangerous than the criminals are. They absolutely need to have our neighbors ready to do the heavy lifting, and unwilling to oppose them. And, they do not have our neighbors so ready, because that is not a top down organization, and so they haven’t checked whether it is measurably reliable.

          The soundest historical predictive model, is that when a fight breaks out among Americans, they do not always know in advance who will be on whom’s side. Sometimes, people pick sides after the fight starts. Other countries, well, you can predict that ethnic groups that dislike each other may fight against each other. You will rarely get Serbs, Croats, and Albanians forming one faction to fight another faction of Serbs, Croats, and Albanians. So, you can often predict the sides of the fight in advances from the population numbers, and not worry that burning out a village of Albanians will piss off your Serb and Croat allies.

          We are dealing with m(%^er f@$*ers who believe that foreign style predictive models are true, eg, all whites hate all blacks, etc. These people strongly believe that there is a homosexual political faction, and since Pelosi from San Francisco and Schiff from West Hollywood represent homosexual support for their would be mass murdering faction, that no homosexual could be opposed to mass murder in America. So, they are not doing this calculation, and not trying to prepare appropriately.

          But, every American who looks at the coming fight according to American custom for fighting, instead of following a theoretical model, is doing this calculation of ‘who is on my team, who is on the other teams?’, and looking for the favorable time and place. Because the Democrats have made sure that we have access mostly to theoretical models that either tell us to surrender, or tell us to go out and do stupid violent things. To win the civil war in the best way, we need a coalition that can force peace after victory. We will obviously never get that if we ever let ourselves jump to the conclusion that homosexuals, blacks, or catholics are all the enemy, and need to be killed. Less obviously, there are academics, bureaucrats, etc., who are on our side, or who can at least be persuaded to neutrality.

          Democrat assets in Federal LEO organizations are definitely looking carefully for nutcases on our side who can be persuaded to be good little propaganda examples. This isn’t so much about turning our neighbors against us as it is about the pushback the Democrats are getting within their ‘suborned’ organizations, by people who would potentially be carrying out orders at the sharp end. The people at the sharp end are less interested in theory, so believe it less, and are more influenced by custom. Those people are doing the calculation that is influenced by the uncertainty about our neighbors.

  23. “Who told you that, the same people who told you that Biden was competent?” is my go-to response to anyone spouting Leftist idiocy.

    1. Or that Biden is a foreign policy genius. When everybody can see the FICUS can’t stumble through a coherent sentence with teleprompters and cheat sheets, and probably doesn’t know what day it is.

  24. I would recommend finding a copy of Take Back Your Government by Robert Heinlein for instructions and insights on how to involve ourselves in government at the grass roots level.
    Best I can tell he wrote it shortly after WWII so parts are definitely dated as our entire governmental structure was quite different in those days, but still worth a read.
    Looks to be out of print, but there are copies floating around including e-book.

  25. Posted this today on FB (Not in the Diner, I can’t afford any more black marks for potential politics on my record)
    Things in our society today are disturbed. Everyone seems disgruntled. (If you find out what it is to be gruntled in the first place, please let us know.) There is a segment of the public who says we are headed to distopia. Well, friend! Let me tell you that is not the problem. The real issue is some people have come to believe in DATOPIA. You know it: The world and society that idealists believe can be wished into existence. Dat place where each one is cared for and no one must take responsibility for themselves. Unfortunately for us all, Datopia cannot exist in the physical world. It violates the laws of physics, Now, I’m in no way a science denier, so lets go to the Laws and see what they say.
    1. A body at rest stays at rest. This should be obvious to anyone who has raised a teen-ager. If you have no reason to get off the couch and work ie, someone else pays for the groceries and Internet, you ain’t going nowhere. Unfortunately for the idealist, if all the bodies remain at rest, nobody grows the hamburger trees that provide the Big Macs. Problem there.
    2. The acceleration of a body is equal to the force acting upon it divided by the body’s mass. Simple math. The teen gets off the couch a lot quicker when you take off your belt that they do when you ask pretty-please if they would take the garbage out. The harder the force, the faster they move. In DATOPIA they dream about everyone contributing to the common good out of their sense of community and shared objectives. The Pilgrims tried it, they starved.
    3. The third law states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Human nature is a bitch for DATOPIANS. When you ask someone to do something they don’t want to, they don’t do it. If you force them to do it anyway, they do a crappy job. If you really, really force them to do it, it becomes sabotage. Eventually it gets to the point where the DATOPIAN rulers must resort to ever sterner punishments to keep the lights on, up to and including death.
    Are we having fun yet? So the idealist pays for DAT, but they get DIS.
    And all the rest of us, if we allow this stupidity to continue, will get it in the neck.
    So the moral of the story is, for the idealist, be careful what you wish for as you just might get it.
    The rest of us, Push back now while the tools are still merely words. your grandchildren will thank you for it.

  26. I’d like to point out the rifles they were trained on and were left in afghanistan were most assuredly not semi-automatic.

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