A quick note to thank everyone who sent us some bucks last month. EPautos survives because of you – and in spite of Google. 
Traffic has also rebounded – again, in spite of Google’s kick to the nuts. We’ve had 100,000 “uniques” (or close to it – and sometimes, more than that) a month since October.
Again, thanks to all of you.
We’re still working hard to develop partnerships with advertisers. My goal is to only work with companies (and individuals) whose products or services I personally feel good about and would buy or use myself. For instance, Talon Knife and Austin Coin. The knives are pretty cool – check them out. And Austin Coin’s prices are very fair.
If any of you own a business – or know someone who owns a business – that might be interested in advertising with us, please drop us a a line ([email protected]). We’d be happy to discuss options with you.
For new people interested in supporting EPautos: The link to our “donate” button is here. You can also mail stuff our way – if you prefer to avoid PayPal. The address is:
EPAutos
721 Hummingbird Lane, SE
Copper Hill, VA 24079
Meanwhile, we’ll continue stomping Clover – wherever it sprouts up!
Ayn Rand may be a bit like Bob Dylan. Bob is the voice of his generation. Ayn was the voice of the early libertarian movement.
But in both cases. Once they write the songs/novels, and make their lyrical/philosophical fodder available. Almost anyone else sounds better doing a cover version. Or expanding upon their insights. Or doing something tangentially related or in a similar vein.
Without the god-awful voice of the originator.
Proof Bob Dylan Wrote Every Popular Song of the Last 40 Years
I had no idea, so much of today’s music is just a rehash of Bob Dylan’s genius.
Dear Tor,
Yeah. I know what you mean.
Sometimes the original creators are not necessarily the most polished interpreters.
I remember listening to two performances of Aaron Copland’s symphonies. One was conducted by Copland himself. The other was conducted by Leonard Bernstein.
Guess which one was better? More nuanced? More subtle? It was Bernstein’s.
The same general principle sometimes holds true in other areas as well.
In Rand’s case, I think the problem was something else. Rand was deficient in her ability to translate philosophy into fiction. The result was a philosophical treatise masquerading as fiction. It was good philosophy, but bad story telling. It was a good plot/theme, but a bad characterization, at least for some of her characters.
The worst, oddly enough, was her favorite. John Galt. The best was Hank Rearden. Howard Roark was somewhere in between.
Icelanders Overthrow Government and Rewrite Constitution After Banking Fraud-No Word From US Media
http://guardianlv.com/2013/12/icelanders-overthrow-government-and-rewrite-constitution-after-banking-fraud-no-word-from-us-media/
Galt’s Gulch Chile Announces Partnership With Bitcoinschile
http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/galts-gulch-chile-announces-partnership-175538363.html
Did the Chinese Govt Just Admit Bitcoin Poses a Risk for the Financial System?
http://dollarvigilante.com/blog/2013/12/6/did-the-chinese-government-just-admit-bitcoin-poses-a-risk-f.html#6130
Icelanders Overthrow Government and Rewrite Constitution After Banking Fraud-No Word From US Media
Created on 08 December 2013
Written by Rebecca Savastio
Can you imagine participating in a protest outside the White House and forcing the entire U.S. to government to resign? Can you imagine a group of randomly chosen private citizens rewriting the U.S. constitution to include measures banning corporate fraud? It seems incomprehensible in the U.S., but Icelanders did just that. Icelanders forced their entire government to resign after a banking fraud scandal, overthrowing the ruling party and creating a citizen’s group tasked with writing a new constitution that offered a solution to prevent corporate greed from destroying the country. The constitution of Iceland was scrapped and is being rewritten by private citizens; using a crowd-sourcing technique via social media channels such as Facebook and Twitter. These events have been going on since 2008, yet there’s been no word from the U.S. mainstream media about any of them. In fact, all of the events that unfolded were recorded by international journalists, overseas news bureaus, citizen journalists and bloggers. This has created current accusations of an intentional cover up of the story by mainstream U.S. news sources.
An “iReport” on CNN, written by a private citizen in May 2012, has questioned the reasons why this revolution has not been widely covered in the U.S., suggesting that perhaps the mainstream media is controlled by large corporate interests and thus has been unwilling to report on Iceland’s activities. That report is currently making its way around social media. CNN today placed a statement on its website saying: “We’ve noticed this iReport is being shared widely on Facebook and Twitter. Please note that this article was posted in May 2012. CNN has not yet verified the claims and we’re working to track down the original writer.” It is interesting to note that CNN’s European version, CNN Europe, already covered the story of the protests and the government’s resignation, leading many to question why CNN would now need to “look into” the claims.
Besides CNN Europe’s own coverage of the scandal, the events in Iceland were widely covered by international media and are easily verified by a simple search on Google which leads to a variety of reputable international news sources that ran numerous stories on the Icelandic revolution. A whole documentary has been made on the governmental overthrow called Pots, Pans and Other Solutions, and now, the conversation is focused on whether or not the citizens’ actions actually worked to make Iceland a more equitable nation.
To understand the enormity of what happened in Iceland, it’s best to draw parallels between the initial banking fraud that caused Iceland’s economy to collapse and the banking fraud in the U.S. that caused the mortgage crisis six years ago. In Iceland, unscrupulous bankers had inflated the value of Iceland’s banks internationally which in turn caused the “bubble” to eventually burst in 2008 and saw most of Iceland’s banks going bankrupt.
More… http://therebel.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=721143:icelanders-overthrow-government-and-rewrite-constitution-after-banking-fraud-no-word-from-us-media&catid=135:news&Itemid=1229
Dear Tor,
It must be vestiges of Iceland’s market anarchist heritage asserting themselves.
Admittedly it’s not all the way to market anarchism, but at least it evinces a comparatively non-servile attitude towards “The Government.”
It is encouraging, for sure. Iceland median net worth is at number 7 in the world. Whatever the name for their system, it’s one of the best.
Anarchist Writers on Iceland
http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/append139.html
In short, Medieval Iceland nicely illustrates David Weick’s comments (as quoted in section 6.3) that “when private wealth is uncontrolled, then a police-judicial complex enjoying a clientele of wealthy corporations whose motto is self-interest is hardly an innocuous social force controllable by the possibility of forming or affiliating with competing ‘companies.'”
This is to say that “free market” justice soon results in rule by the rich, and being able to affiliate with “competing” “defense companies” is insufficient to stop or change that process.
Country Median Wealth Per Adult
1. Australia $193,653
2. Luxembourg $153,967
3. Japan $141,410
4. Italy $123,710
5. Belgium $119,937
6. United Kingdom $115,245
7. Iceland $ 95,685
8. Singapore $ 95,542 (non-OECD)
9. Switzerland $ 87,137
10. Denmark $ 87,121
20. Spain $ 53,292
21. United Arab Emir. $ 47,998 (non-OECD)
22. Taiwan $ 45,451 (non-OECD)
23. Germany $ 42,222
24. Sweden $ 41,367
25. Cyprus $ 40,535 (non-OECD)
26. Kuwait $ 40,346 (non-OECD)
27. United States $ 38,786
http://www.indexmundi.com/iceland/demographics_profile.html
Anarchism in Iceland
http://www.alpineanarchist.org/r_i_iceland_english.html
Dear Tor,
Market anarchism is going to require that old 60s era concept known as “consciousness raising.”
Any society that aspires to an NAP based anarchist order, is going to require either a majority or at least a critical mass with a political consciousness above a minimum requisite level. What that level is exactly, I can’t say for certain. But it’s going to be a lot higher than what it is in today’s Idiocracy.
There is simply not going to be any way around it.
Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.
Getting ready to watch the three new Nikita episodes: Wanted. Dead or Alive. Set-up. Hope they are good ones.
Nikita tribute: You can’t really save people, can you?
Nikita – Maggie Q – tribute
Nikita – Run this town
Dear Tor,
Re: Nikita
Me too. I can’t get the shows live here on Taiwan. But fortunately they are accessible through other avenues.
So sad that there are only three episodes left. On the good side, at least they are quitting while on top, instead of doing a “Dexter.”
By the way, a great write up on The Hunger Games at LRC .
May the Odds Ever be in your Favor – The Reaping
By Jim Quinn
The Burning Platform
December 10, 2013
http://www.theburningplatform.com/2013/12/08/may-the-odds-ever-be-in-your-favor-the-reaping/
Excerpt:
In keeping with the classical roots, I send my tributes into an updated version of the Roman gladiator games, which entails a ruthless government forcing people to fight to the death as popular entertainment. The world of Panem, particularly the Capitol, is loaded with Roman references. Panem itself comes from the expression “Panem et Circenses” which translates into ‘Bread and Circuses’.”
– — Suzanne Collins
Pretty explicit declaration of intent on the part of author Suzanne Collins! Pretty impressive philosophical underpinnings for the author of a novel specifically aimed at Young Adults. I just bought her books and I can tell you that stylistically she is vastly superior to Ayn Rand. None of Rand’s heavy handedness.
She is more worthy of respect than Stephenie Meyer of Twilight fame, and waaay more worthy of respect than J.K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame.
Metaphysical vs. Man-Made
Any natural phenomenon, i.e., any event which occurs without human participation, is the metaphysically given, and could not have occurred differently or failed to occur; any phenomenon involving human action is the man-made, and could have been different.
For example, a flood occurring in an uninhabited land, is the metaphysically given; a dam built to contain the flood water, is the man-made; if the builders miscalculate and the dam breaks, the disaster is metaphysical in its origin, but intensified by man in its consequences.
To correct the situation, men must obey nature by studying the causes and potentialities of the flood, then command nature by building better flood controls.
Libertarians must be fluent in dealing with other systems, because vital things like dams are controlled by socialists, fascists, and other systems that employ the use of force. Most of mankind has triumphed over nature. What remains, is to triumph over the man-made.
Things of human origin (whether physical or psychological) may be designated as “man-made facts”—as distinguished from the metaphysically given facts.
A skyscraper is a man-made fact, a mountain is a metaphysically given fact. One can alter a skyscraper or blow it up (just as one can alter or blow up a mountain), but so long as it exists, one cannot pretend that it is not there or that it is not what it is.
Nature, i.e., the universe as a whole, cannot be created or annihilated . . . it cannot come into or go out of existence. Whether its basic constituent elements are atoms, or subatomic particles, or some yet undiscovered forms of energy, it is not ruled by a consciousness or by will or by chance, but by the law of identity.
All the countless forms, motions, combinations and dissolutions of elements within the universe—from a floating speck of dust to the formation of a galaxy to the emergence of life—are caused and determined by the identities of the elements involved. Nature is the metaphysically given—i.e., the nature of nature is outside the power of any volition.
Man’s faculty of volition as such is not a contradiction of nature, but it opens the way for a host of contradictions—when and if men do not grasp the crucial difference between the metaphysically given and any object, institution, procedure, or rule of conduct made by man.
It is the metaphysically given that must be accepted: it cannot be changed. It is the man-made that must never be accepted uncritically: it must be judged, then accepted or rejected and changed when necessary.
Man is not omniscient or infallible: he can make innocent errors through lack of knowledge, or he can lie, cheat and fake. The manmade may be a product of genius, perceptiveness, ingenuity—or it may be a product of stupidity, deception, malice, evil.
One man may be right and everyone else wrong, or vice versa (or any numerical division in between). Nature does not give man any automatic guarantee of the truth of his judgments (and this is a metaphysically given fact, which must be accepted). Who, then, is to judge? Each man, to the best of his ability and honesty. What is his standard of judgment? The metaphysically given.
The metaphysically given cannot be true or false, it simply is—and man determines the truth or falsehood of his judgments by whether they correspond to or contradict the facts of reality.
When a hurricane breaks a New Orleans levee it is not only a metaphysical event, which nothing can be done about. It is also a man-made event, which everything can be done about.
The metaphysically given cannot be right or wrong—it is the standard of right or wrong, by which a (rational) man judges his goals, his values, his choices. The metaphysically given is, was, will be, and had to be. Nothing made by man had to be: it was made by choice. The levees didn’t need to be compromised to build shipping channels.
A man-made product did not have to exist, but, once made, it does exist. A man’s actions did not have to be performed, but, once performed, they are facts of reality.
The same is true of a man’s character: he did not have to make the choices he made, but, once he has formed his character, it is a fact, and it is his personal identity. (Man’s volition gives him great, but not unlimited, latitude to change his character; if he does, the change becomes a fact.)
[One must] distinguish metaphysical facts from man-made facts—i.e., facts which are inherent in the identities of that which exists, from facts which depend upon the exercise of human volition.
Because man has free will, no human choice—and no phenomenon which is a product of human choice—is metaphysically necessary. In regard to any man-made fact, it is valid to claim that man has chosen thus, but it was not inherent in the nature of existence for him to have done so; he could have chosen otherwise.
For instance, the U.S. did not have to consist of 50 states; men could have subdivided the larger ones, or consolidated the smaller ones, etc.
Choice, however, is not chance. Volition is not an exception to the Law of Causality; it is a type of causation. Further, metaphysical facts are unalterable by man, and limit the alternatives open to his choice.
Man can rearrange the materials that exist in reality, but he cannot violate their identity; he cannot escape the laws of nature. Water behaves as water, wherever it is encountered. Chinese water is no different than Australian water.
In regard to nature, “to accept what I cannot change” means to accept the metaphysically given; “to change what I can” means to strive to rearrange the given by acquiring knowledge—as science and technology (e.g., medicine) are doing; “to know the difference” means to know that one cannot rebel against nature and, when no action is possible, one must accept nature serenely.
What one must accept is the fact that the minds of other men are not in one’s power, as one’s own mind is not in theirs; one must accept their right to make their own choices, and one must agree or disagree, accept or reject, join or oppose them, as one’s mind dictates.
The only means of “changing” men is the same as the means of “changing” nature: knowledge—which, in regard to men, is to be used as a process of persuasion, when and if their minds are active; when they are not, one must leave them to the consequences of their own errors.
To deal with men by force is as impractical as to deal with nature by persuasion.
Words
In order to be used as a single unit, the enormous sum integrated by a concept has to be given the form of a single, specific, perceptual concrete, which will differentiate it from all other concretes and from all other concepts.
This is the function performed by language. Language is a code of visual-auditory symbols that serves the psycho-epistemological function of converting concepts into the mental equivalent of concretes.
Language is the exclusive domain and tool of concepts. Every word we use (with the exception of proper names) is a symbol that denotes a concept, i.e., that stands for an unlimited number of concretes of a certain kind.
The first words a child learns are words denoting visual objects, and he retains his first concepts visually. Observe that the visual form he gives them is reduced to those essentials which distinguish the particular kind of entities from all others—for instance, the universal type of a child’s drawing of man in the form of an oval for the torso, a circle for the head, four sticks for extremities, etc.
Such drawings are a visual record of the process of abstraction and concept-formation in a mind’s transition from the perceptual level to the full vocabulary of the conceptual level.
There is evidence to suppose that written language originated in the form of drawings—as the pictographic writing of the Oriental peoples seems to indicate.
With the growth of man’s knowledge and of his power of abstraction, a pictorial representation of concepts was deemed no longer adequate for the breadth of his conceptual range, and was replaced by a fully symbolic code.
Chinese and Egyptian pictorial writing, though having limited numbers of pictures, retains a superior feature to symbolic code. It is not susceptible to propaganda and manipulation. Each concept must be faithfully rendered visually, there is no mechanism for double or triple meanings in this type of language.
Whether using childlike honest pictoral language, or duplicitous adult symbolic code, the process of forming a concept is not complete until its constituent units are integrated into a single mental unit by means of a specific word.
The first concepts a child forms are concepts of perceptual entities; the first words he learns are words designating them. Even though a child does not have to perform the feat of genius performed by some mind or minds in the prehistorical infancy of the human race: the invention of language—every child has to perform independently the feat of grasping the nature of language, the process of symbolizing concepts by means of words.
Even though a child does not (and need not) originate and form every concept on his own, by observing every aspect of reality confronting him, he has to perform the process of differentiating and integrating perceptual concretes, in order to grasp the meaning of words. If a child’s brain is physically damaged and unable to perform that process, he does not learn to speak.
Learning to speak does not consist of memorizing sounds—that is the process by which a parrot learns to “speak.” Learning consists of grasping meanings, i.e., of grasping the referents of words, the kinds of existents that words denote in reality.
In this respect, the learning of words is an invaluable accelerator of a child’s cognitive development, but it is not a substitute for the process of concept-formation; nothing is.
Words transform concepts into (mental) entities; definitions provide them with identity. (Words without definitions are not language but inarticulate sounds.)
It is often said that definitions state the meaning of words. This is true, but it is not exact. A word is merely a visual-auditory symbol used to represent a concept; a word has no meaning other than that of the concept it symbolizes, and the meaning of a concept consists of its units. It is not words, but concepts that man defines—by specifying their referents.
“The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies “something not desirable”. The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another.”
– George Orwell
Ed, while reading a new book Where Have all the Soldiers Gone, I was surprised to see Thoreau mentioned so much(haven’t determined his true intent as yet) as I was to find Orwell was a big war supporter. It would appear from his writings he finally “saw the light” sometime after WW1.
Morning, Eight!
Orwell was also a socialist – and (apparently) never noticed the coercive violence that underlies that system while criticizing the totalitarian nature of Stalinism/Leninism/Marxism. Like all-too-many people who operate from good intentions, Orwell was able to blank out the coercion and violence of socialism because it was less obvious, less immediate. Instead of people summarily lined up in front of a ditch, as in Stalin’s Russia, in the socialist democracies, you get a letter in the mail advising you that you “owe” such and such a sum. Actual violence is rarely used; the implicit threat is sufficient.
Hi Eric, et al,
Serendipitous mention of Orwell….I just mentioned him elsewhere. You are correct to mention the implied violence of socialism and that it is seldom actually used. However, the other side of that coin is that peoples’ wills are crushed through institutions like public education and use of drugs like Ritalin for the unruly…(think Soma in Brave New World). Once the majority has been brainwashed in a “democracy”, individual liberty becomes a rarity and respect for civil rights becomes optional. At this point, anybody who objects to the rape of his or her rights can be dismissed as a nut job to be derisively hooted down. The problem with the socialist dream is that it cannot be implemented longterm…..a country cannot redistribute wealth and piss away real resources on endless war very long before everything of value disappears. Expect a bumpy ride in 2014……P.S. I will send some shekels your way in a week or so…might as well spend ’em while they can still do some good….
eric, it would appear the majority of thinkers back then(beginning of 20th century)were either socialists, some form of communists or fascists. The distinctions weren’t often easily discerned. It appears the least offensive govt. back then was monarchies of the benign type and they all were not benign.
Guiseppe, think Soma. I’m trying to remember if this was late 70’s or early 80’s but I had been working about 20 hours a day or more in bad heat, not getting much rest even when I did sleep and drinking a lot of beer any time I could. I showed up at a friends house one morning after downing a bunch of coffee, something I had never been able to tolerate because of caffeine intolerance. I was shaking like a leaf and said something about how bad I felt. This buddy says You want a Soma? Huh? I must have mis-judged him, he was more of a scholar than I thought. I laughed and said, Yeah, that would do it I guess. Next thing I know he’s holding a pill out to me. What’s this? Soma he says, wife has a script. Then my head really starts reeling? Is this MY reality? I had no idea Santoz or somebody was churning out “soma” as fast as they could. Turns out I must have been one of the few people not being treated with it. My head continued to spin. I did eventually take one for a strained back. One was enough. Wicked stuff.
I’m uncertain whether the name chosen for marketing Soma in the U.S. was deliberate, but it definitely is ironic. Soma is prescribed as a muscle relaxer and increases the effect of opium related drugs, hence their use by recreational drug users. I saw this prescribed in the 70s, soon after reading BNW and it gave me a chuckle. For me, there are a lot of parallels between Ritalin in the “real world” and Soma in BNW. I feel lucky to have been born before the public education junta ever started chemically lobotomizing young boys (predominantly) for just being boys. Oh well….un po piu cafe.
Yeah, 8. Orwell was fucked up as a football bat. He saw some of the evil of totalitarianism, and seemed to think that socialism was possible without a totalitarian government. He must have been huffing glue to believe that.
Ol’ Henry David lived by sponging off of his fellow yankee writers. I think he built mimself a house one time and called it a life’s worth of manual labor. Look up some pictures of him. Fucker had a beard on his throat and nowhere else. It looks like he would start shaving and just give it up as a bad job once he got to his jaw line. Guess he thought he could just think for a living.
The Six Peace Warrior Principles – You are currently in the valley, and greatly vulnerable, you must arm yourself mentally and ascend to the safe and secure mountaintop.
Principle 1: Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people.
It is a positive force confronting the forces of injustice and utilizes the righteous indignation and spiritual, emotional, and intellectual capabilities of people as the vital force for change and reconciliation.
Principle 2: Your Communities are the framework for the future.
The nonviolent concept is an overall effort to achieve a reconciled world by raising the level of relationships among people to a height where justice prevails and members attain their full human potential. Nurture your existing community, seek out new ones both in real life or in the virtual emerging communities.
Principle 3: Attack forces of evil not persons doing evil.
The nonviolent approach helps one analyze the fundamental conditions, policies and practices of the conflict rather than reacting to one’s opponents or their personalities.
Principle 4: Accept suffering for your principles without retaliation for the sake of the cause to achieve a goal.
Self-chosen suffering on principle is redemptive and helps the movement grow in a spiritual as well as a humanitarian dimension. The moral authority of voluntary suffering rather than surrender of principle when chosen as a goal communicates the concern to one’s own friends and community as well as to the opponent.
Principle 5: Avoid internal violence of the spirit as well as external physical violence.
The nonviolent attitude permeates all aspects of your life. It provides a mirror type reflection of the reality of the condition to one’s opponents and the community at large. Specific activities must be designed to maintain a high level of spirit and morale during a nonviolent action and struggle.
Principle 6: The Universe is on the side of justice and self-fulfillment.
Truth and self-fulfillment are universal throughout and human society and each human being is oriented to the just and best sense of order of the universe. The fundamental values in all of the world’s great religions include the concept that the moral arc of the universe is long but it bends towards justice and self-fulfillment. For the nonviolent practitioner, nonviolence introduces a new moral context in which nonviolence is both the means and the ends.
6 Steps of Peace Warrior Campaigns
Step 1: Information Gathering
Coming together to determine the facts, the options for change and the timing of pressure for raising the issues of freedom is a collaborative process.
Step 2: Education
Is the process of developing articulate leaders in your life, who are knowledgeable about the issues at hand.
Step 3: Personal Commitment
Means looking at your internal and external involvement in the nonviolent community and preparing yourself for long-term as well as short term action.
Step 4: Negotiation:
Is the art of bring together your views and those of your opponents to arrive at a just conclusion or clarify the unresolved issues, at which point, the conflict is formalized.
Step 5: Direct Action
Occurs when negotiations have broken down or failed to produce a just response to the contested issues and conditions.
Step 6: Reconciliation
Is the mandatory closing step of successfully transforming a situation through non-violence, when the opponents and proponents celebrate the victory and provide joint leadership to implement the change.
Following the Path of the Peace Warrior
Now is the time, to stretch your soul and strengthen your spirit.
Most of our lives are spent, in one form or another, in the pursuit of happiness. And we find it, too, in temporary forms – a new experience, relationship, purchase.
Yet a lasting sense of fulfillment and satisfaction may continue to elude us as we learn what doesn’t make us happy. Still, the dreams persist: “If only I’d gotten a college (or graduate) degree. . . if only I had a soul-mate, or a better relationship (or career) . . . if only I’d had children . . . if only I hadn’t had children . . . if only I made more money or had a nicer home . . . if only I traveled more. . .” But even if we get those things, we continue to search.
Should you choose the Peace Warrior path. You will find authentic and lasting fulfillment. You will learn that there is nothing you have to add to your life, but rather, it involves removing unseen obstructions you have faced in twelve different areas of life. And you will learn how to overcome each of these obstructions to experience genuine happiness.
Has your life sometimes felt like a puzzle with pieces missing? Is self-worth a missing piece for you? How about self-discipline – or trusting your intuition in making important decisions? Or facing your fears?
Becoming a force for non-violent change provides the opportunity to inspect your life in relationship to the twelve key facets of spiritual growth. As you learn how each piece of the puzzle fits for you, a complete picture of the path to your potential emerges.
Making your immediate world a slightly better place can be the foundation of a happy, abundant and truly satisfying life filled with meaning and purpose and connection. Each issue you consider and attempt to influence brings you closer to your higher self with new revelations about how you can live with your head in the clouds and your feet on the ground.
Discover Your Worth: Open yourself to life’s blessings
Reclaim your Will: Find the power to change; transform knowing into doing
Energize your Body: Seek out the keys to health and vitality
Opening to Abundance: Rewire your relationship to money
Tame Your Mind: Make peace with the nature of your thought
Trust Your Intuition: Learn how to make wiser choices for youself
Accept Your Emotions: A healthier alternative approach to feeling good
Face Your Fears: Turn fear into power, overcome anxiety and self-doubt
Illuminate Your Shadow: Gain the courage to meet your authentic self
Embrace Your Sexuality: Explore intimacy and channel creative energy
Awaken Your Heart: Connect with others and with your higher self
Serve Your Community: Find deeper meaning, purpose and connection
One a week, take the opportunity to look back (as from a mountain top) and appreciate how your perspectives have expanded, your wisdom deepened – and how you finally understand what it means to live with a peaceful heart and a warrior’s spirit.
Are you still in the valley? Are you taking the path to the mountaintop? Are you attempting to climb and claw your own way to the mountaintop?
Pursue your personal development, be prepared to battle every obstacle you are likely to encounter, embrace every setback and all facets of personal growth.
“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost. Now put foundations under them. The time is now. The Path is open. Your destiny awaits!”
– Henry David Thoreau,
Tor, thanks. I see now I haven’t read near enough Thoreau. I really enjoyed that and believe what he says. I have lived my life according to the NAP which I think is basically at the heart of what he says. Good words for good men for good life.
8, I think that only the closing quote was by Thoreau. Tor can tell you for sure, though.
Reading this makes me wonder why Thoreau was so supportive of John Brown, a mass murderer. Is it possible that maybe ol’ Henry D was a little bit full of shit? Maybe he was non-violent himself, but enjoyed having nutjobs like Brown kill people who weren’t up to yankee standards.
Admit it, he was a known fuckoff and freedloading sponge. His writing just never grabbed me, y’know? We were assigned “On Walden Pond” in my high school literature class. I dropped out of High School to avoid reading it.
Kenyan Sentenced To 10 Years In Prison Over Goat Sex
http://k24tv.co.ke/?p=17085
Where is the victim of this crime? They had to bring the goat into their circus, errr courtroom, to serve as their plaintiff. “The female goat watched quietly in the corner of the court room as her attacker was jailed for bestiality.”
http://metro.co.uk/2013/12/03/katana-kitsao-gona-kenya-goat-sex-attacker-faces-victim-in-court-4211564/
Children Forced To Drop Out Of School Due To Jigger Infestation
http://k24tv.co.ke/?p=17420
“Children Forced To Drop Out Of School Due To Jigger Infestation”
I guess that’s what they call chiggers there. Chiggers will ruin your life for a couple of weeks if you get “eat up with them ” as we say in the South. Chiggers damn near whipped the union army in Virginia. Virginia is “The Land of Ticks and Chiggers”.
TBP’s ok. I haven’t looked in on it for years until just now. Funny, but there doesn’t appear to be any way to register or to login with the WP login form, and there are no reply buttons under comments. Also, the main page runs 3 different Google scripts, one after the other, so Maybe Jim didn’t dump Google after they blacklisted him.
WP screen name links are dead, as well. There’s an article there where a few people, including the Admin (which I would assume is Jim Quinn) saying that they just now switched from IE to Firefox…..Now that’s odd. I would have thought that people who are still using IE aren’t capable of rational thought. 😉
Ed, three google scripts eh? Yeh, he’s deep in bed with them and maybe that’s why nothing is live. I have a friend who took computer courses must be over ten years ago and thinks he knows computers but when I mentioned FF he just looked blank. My wife bitches about the computer he set up at work since it’s all that busy IE nonsense and there isn’t a quick history to bring up something like weather. Most Visited is my mainstay. Everybody who uses IE is severely computer retarded.
I can’t use IE myself. The kindest thing I can think of to say about IE is that it sucks. Out Loud. For a fat man’s ass.
“Handome” Jim Quinn’s site has an Alexa rank of #20,000 in the US. (epautos is at #40,000 rank fwiw)
http://theburningplatform.com.w3snoop.com/
Yet his site’s googul page rank is 0/10. He says he was blacklisted a few years ago as well.
His site also posts “hard truths” or whatever you call articles that explore the reasons soldiers commit suicide in the USSA every 80 minutes and other outside the mainstream articles sprinkled with profanity and jabs at the thugs that be.
If googul was ever merely an honest pageranking algorithm search engine, it sure isn’t now.
Googul This
http://www.theburningplatform.com/2013/08/23/google-this/
Suicide
http://www.theburningplatform.com/tag/suicide/
Tor,
“handsome” jim quinn, hahahahaha. he would surely get a kick out of that. his site and epautos are my 2 favorites.
The TBP comment section gets pretty hilarious, you would be a great addition there.
Hi Harry,
Ol’ HJ is an odd duck… and I like odd ducks (being one myself). I just can’t figure out what he’s all about.
that he is, but i like odd ducks too, the regular ones are boring. he is definitely a minarchist as opposed to being a pure anarchist.
the typical hoi polloi would use a word slightly different than “duck” for most of us.
being odd is better:
“Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.”
― Mark Twain
Harry, good quote by Twain. Here’s one from another Southern writer, James Lee Burke:
” If everyone agrees on something, it’s bound to be a lie”
TBP is where I read this dreadful, yet compelling piece:
It is time, boys, to give them a taste of war. (from a letter written by an estranged Father before self-immolating himself in Keene, NH)
There are two kinds of bureaucrats you need to know; the ones that say and the ones that do. The bridge between them is something I call The Second Set of Books.
I have some figures of the success of their labors. You and I are in these numbers, as well as our spouses and children.
But first let me tell you how I ended up in this rabbit hole.
My story starts with the infamous slapping incident of April 2001.
While putting my four year old daughter to bed, she began licking my hand. After giving her three verbal warnings I slapped her. She got a cut lip. My wife asked me to leave to calm things down.
When I returned hours later, my wife said the police were by and said I could not stay there that night. The next day the police came by my work and arrested me, booked me, and then returned me to work.
Later on Peter, the parts manager, asked me if I and the old lady would be able to work this out. I told him no. I could not figure out why she had called the police. And bail condition prevented me from asking her. So I no longer trusted her judgment.
Almost two years after the incident, I was talking with her on the phone. She told me that night she had called a mental health provider we had for one of the kids. Wendy, the counselor told my then wife that if she did not call the police on me, then she too would be arrested. (Wendy is the tip of the spear, the unseen enemy)
Suddenly, everything made sense. She is the type that believes that people in authority actually know what they are talking about. If both she and I were arrested, what would happen to our three children, ages 7,4 and 1? They would end up in State custody.
So my wife called the police on her husband to protect the children. And who was she protecting the kids from? Not her husband, the father of these children. She was protecting them from the State of New Hampshire.
Labeling someone’s action as domestic violence in American in the 21st century is akin to labeling someone a Jew in Germany in the 1930’s. The entire legal weight of the state is coming down on him. But I consider myself lucky. My family was destroyed. But that poor bastard in Germany had his family literally annihilated.
On one hand we have the law. On the other hand we have what they are really going to do: -the policies, procedures and protocols. The rule of law is dead.
We have 50 states with legal systems as good as any third world banana republic. Men are demonized and the women and children end up as suffering as well.
So boys, we need to start burning down police stations and courthouses. The Second Set of Books originated in Washington. But the dirty deeds are being carried out by our local police, prosecutors and judges.
These are the people we pay good money to protect us and our families. And what do we get for our tax money? Collaborators who are no different than the Vichy of France or the Quislings of Norway during the Second World War.
All because they go along to get along. They are an embarrassment, the whole lot of them. And they need to be held accountable. We’re going to need to burn them out.
The easiest way of burning a building is with the Molotov cocktail. You fill a bottle with gasoline and stuff a rag in the end for a wick. You light the wick and throw bottle, It shatters on impact spraying gas everywhere and the wick ignites the gas. Simple, readily available, and effective. And only two things to remember.
First, use a glass bottle. Thinner glass is better than thicker glass. You want it to shatter on impact. Second, you need to tie the rag to the bottle. Nothing worse that throwing a Molotov cocktail, landing where you wanted it, and having it shatter perfectly. Then you noticed the wick had fallen out on the way to the target. No wick-no fire.
Some of these building will have brick faces and metal roofs. Just break a window and throw the Molotov cocktail inside. Carpets, furniture, computer plastic, even paint on the walls will burn. It is okay if the sprinkler goes off. I wonder if you can get hip waders over a gun belt?
We had a kid in my hometown that burned down the old junior high school. He walked up to the front door one night with a can of lighter fluid. The applicator on the end squirts the lighter fluid out. He squirted under the door and along the seams and lit a match. The kid took out the entire old part of the building. Why are only kids so competent? This is something that men should be doing.
There will be some casualties in this war. Some killed, some wounded, some captured. Some of them will be theirs. Some of the casualties will be ours.
Now, nobody wants to get killed. But look at your life. You are broke after paying child support. She and the kids are not doing any better. None of you are middle class any more.
You have no say in the kids education, their health treatment, you may not even have visitation with your sons and daughters. And everything you thought you knew to be true-the rule of law, the sanctity of the of the family, the belief that government was there to nurture your brood-all turned out to be a lie.
Face it boys, we are no longer fathers. We are just piggy banks. So you are not losing anything by picking up the Molotov cocktail. It may be too late for us. But without something changing, your kids will have double the odds of it happening to them.
That will knock them out of the middle class again, providing they ever get back in. And their kids, your grandchildren, will end up damaged goods before it is over. So it is okay to run. You just need to turn around and run at them. They are not as imposing as they seem. They only do what they do for a paycheck.
Television would make us believe that people get arrested because of fingerprints, DNA, facial recognition, and instruments that can tell where a substance was made and here is the local distributors. It is Hollywood crap.
Most of the people in prison are there for one key reason. They could not keep their mouths shut. They told someone. That someone told others. The cops hear it and start looking at them for a suspect. That how it works in real life.
This need to confess seems to be primeval. Just human nature. But if you cannot keep a secret, do not expect the one you tell to keep their mouth shut. There is only three people I know for certain they will keep their mouths shut. That would be Jesus, Mary and Joseph.
I only managed to get the main door of the Cheshire County Courthouse in Keene, NH. I would appreciate it if some of you boys would finish the job for me. They harmed my children. The place is evil. So take it out. (Don’t give up the fight. Learn to produce things they can’t take. Form a battle plan you can live through, not a death plan. Learn to be invisible. Learn how to burn the evil out of America using only your mind and force of will.)
http://www.theburningplatform.com/2011/06/20/nh-man-burns-self-at-courthouse-in-protest/
http://www.sentinelsource.com/news/local/last-statement-sent-to-sentinel-from-self-immolation-victim/article_cd181c8e-983b-11e0-a559-001cc4c03286.html
“Are you worn down by the continuous public narrative that due to your masculinity, you’re obviously a lesser person, or violent, or criminal, or just fucking guilty?
Quit Whining, Shut Up, and Pay Your Fucking Child Support Payments.”
http://www.avoiceformen.com/feminism/the-organized-silencing-of-a-man-publicly-burned-to-death/
Now, this last one will stretch credulity, but try to picture in your mind – a society so totally indifferent to the pain of humans who happen to be male, that the accounting of a political suicide by self immolation is deleted by the moderators of wikipedia on the grounds that it is irrelevant.
Try to imagine that.
I cant imagine that world. I truly and utterly cannot comprehend it.
To you who belittled the pain or the sacrifice of Thomas ball:
To the members of the media who wrote this man off as a lone nut, or a deadbeat dad:
To the reporters and editors who made decisions not to mention this in your publications and broadcasts:
To ideologues who continue to dismiss the brutality and scorn heaped onto a man until he felt nothing except the agony of his body consumed by a gasoline fire he ignited himself:
And to the wikipedia editor who deleted his article under the horribly disgusting lie that this man’s death by self immolation was irrelevant.
Can you possibly imagine that you’re actually going to silence men so brutalized they burn themselves to death?
Can you actually be so profoundly stupid that you fail to recognize the extremity of rage, that when turned inwards in a last heroic effort to avoid harming others consumed a man in a tower of flames?
Do you, in your pea brains think blanketing the marginalization of men with silence will produce any outcome other than the eventual destruction of your human confinement operation?
Look hard at yourself in the mirror. Sir or madame, have you no fucking decency? And if your answer to that is ultimately no, then beware of what you cultivate by your indifference.
Be prepared, Rome was burned to the ground by angry Christians after all. Christians who decided they had had enough.
Read that before…
There is something SERIOUSLY wrong in Keene….
For such a small town overall, they seem to have an excess of bullies.
Keene is one of those anachronistic places that has yet to fully enter the “Age of Horus.” Now only 45 miles from Greater Boston.
The movie Apocalypto did a good job showing how city dwellers have been rounding up, enslaving and sacrificing country folk for aeons.
Apocalypto
Millions of men are being forced out of the picture or into a cage everywhere you look. It’s just not talked about.
I don’t get how you win the battle by setting yourself on fire, and arson isn’t necessarily plan A. But it should be on the table somewhere towards the back, if the other things fail.
It’s tricky, how to fight them, yet not waste your life dealing with them, which is what they want. Late night covert arson, might be just the ticket. Quick, anonymous, and effective.
Look how easy the Hoodizens have it. “Don’t make us set everything on fire, we’ll do it!”
OK, here’s some more welfare and preferences. Just don’t set everything on fire again, aight?
While certainly I enjoy scholarly analyses of economic trends and whatnot. The fact is, the ghetto dwellers of leisure are far outsmarting everyone in some ways. You can call them names, but it won’t change the facts.
Sometimes the primal response is the best response. Who ever created this system, benefits from this system, or sustains this system, I define them as my enemy.
If I can’t avoid them, outwit, outlast, nor outsmart them, that only leaves outforce them.
Josie “the outlaw” Harris Update – Larken Rose
Mike Salvi’s World – Podcast producer: Josie Harris
http://michaelsalvi.blogspot.com/
Is there a post somewhere explaining what went down with Google? I thought I saw one at the start, but damn if I can find it now. I’m curious about this.
Hi Mark,
Yup – here’s the link:
http://ericpetersautos.com/2013/08/16/epautos-is-deay-ud/
Thanks. I’ll give that a look.
Np, Marcus – good to have you with us!