The Despicables

Geez, yep, real winners. They live their entire life as a lie, but somehow we are supposed to believe they really care about what happens to America. 😡

A John McCain advisor, no less.

Hi Anarchyst,

This scenario seems delusional to me – almost pathetically so. I hope I am proved wrong. I truly do.

One can hope there is a 5kT nuke under the capital building on a timer for January 20, around noon. Better yet, timed for whenever the full house gathers next.

I can just see Trump with that smug grin. “Impeach this!”.

I am afraid that is a pipe dream, anarchyst. As Old Joe says, we are in for a long “dark winter”, unfortunately, it will go on for years.

Plus, I am not quite sure if I could look favorably upon a military regime and a Dictator Trump scenario either. None of the options present themselves to be very good ones.

Interesting. But cleverest judo is practiced in the dojos of solo minds.

And by cleverest I mean too clever…at least when it bleeds out all over the place…but especially when it bleeds out onto me & mine (figure of speech, I freed all my slaves last week).

Like the schizo martial artist depicted in Fight Club. And like all the skit bit followers that were depicted as coalescing around those “twins” of Left jabs & Right crosses to bear.

Voting is theater. Way off Broadway theater. A bad movie. Something to do…divert…distract…for those who have nothing better to do & whose identities are the i•do•ntities that have been poured into them by this or that perfect fit bartender.

“I do therefore I am.”

Gold stars, participation ribbons & trophies for everybody that prostrates themselves via the enjoining predisposition to join in.

Yes, we have no bananas, but we got loads of banana daiquiri buttressed self-esteem, civic/national/ideological pride…of lie-ins & tigers & bears – oh, my!

Nobody had to vote, for either “candidate.” Nobody needs to attend the inauguration part of the act, either. Dispensing with the illusions that those “actions” seem to make so Figh Club real – “I want you to hit me in the face” – does not, will not, cannot change the fact, the reality, that control freaks have the power they have been gifted.

Nation-states, transnational states, the one world state wet dream that seems to have just about got the bedsheets laminated now…ain’t going nowhere, whether the Cecil B. DeMille cast of extraneous extras shows up, or not.

From da La Boétie, The Politics of Obedience – The Discourse of Voluntary Servitude:

“It is indeed the nature of the populace, whose density is always greater in the cities, to be suspicious toward one who has their welfare at heart, & gullible toward one who fools them.”

Well, higher density seems just to fractionate the portions more – including Sybillizing those solo dojo brains that can’t get enough of hitting themselves in the face. Cecil B. de Mille didn’t do Gilligan’s Island, so the concentrated cast just encompassed & exemplarized more roles between them. But no matter the density of this or that City of Wo/Man that would be gods, the practice of suttee remains the action & the (blazing burial) plot.

Here is the water surrounding that da La Boétie island:

“This method tyrants use of stultifying their subjects cannot be more clearly observed than in what Cyrus did with the Lydians after he had taken Sardis, their chief city, & had at his mercy the captured Croesus, their fabulously rich king. When news was brought to him that the people of Sardis had rebelled, it would have been easy for him to reduce them by force; but being unwilling either to sack such a fine city or to maintain an army there to police it, he thought of an unusual expedient for reducing it. He established in it brothels, taverns, & public games, & issued the proclamation that the inhabitants were to enjoy them (institutional NYT state media et al didn’t exist in those days, else that would have been proclaimed “enjoy it” too…give most just a little rope, or even merely paper chains, & they will do the rest). He found this type of garrison so effective that he never again had to draw the sword against the Lydians. These wretched people enjoyed themselves inventing all kinds of games, so that the Latins have derived the word from them, & what we call pastimes they call ludi (as in ludicrous), as if they meant to say Lydi. Not all tyrants have manifested so clearly their intention to effeminize their victims; but in fact, what the aforementioned despot publicly proclaimed & put into effect, most of the others have pursued secretly as an end. It is indeed the nature of the populace, whose density is always greater in the cities, to be suspicious toward one who has their welfare at heart, & gullible toward one who fools them. Do not imagine there is any bird more easily caught by decoy, nor any fish sooner fixed on the hook by wormy bait, than are all these poor fools neatly tricked into servitude by the slightest feather passed, so to speak, before their mouths. Truly it is a marvelous thing that they let themselves be caught so quickly at the slightest tickling of their fancy. Plays, farces, spectacles, gladiators, strange beasts, medals, pictures, & other such opiates, these were for ancient peoples the bait toward slavery, the price of their liberty, the instruments of tyranny. By these practices & enticements the ancient dictators so successfully lulled their subjects under the yoke, that the stupefied peoples, fascinated by the pastimes & vain pleasures flashed before their eyes, learned subservience as naively, but not so creditably, as little children learn to read by looking at bright picture books. Roman tyrants invented a further refinement. They often provided the city wards with feasts to cajole the rabble, always more readily tempted by the pleasure of eating than by anything else. The most intelligent & understanding amongst them would not have quit his soup bowl to recover the liberty of the Republic of Plato (well…Plato was a commie punk, supported in a grand leisurely style by slaves, but still, point is made…). Tyrants would distribute largesse, a bushel of wheat, a gallon of wine, & a sesterce: and then everybody would shamelessly cry, “Long live the king!” The fools did not realize that they were merely recovering a portion of their own property, & that their ruler could not have given them what they were receiving without first having taken it from them. A man might one day be presented with a sesterce & gorge himself at the public feast, lauding Tiberius & Nero for handsome liberality, who on the morrow, would be forced to abandon his property to their avarice, his children to their lust, his very blood to the cruelty of these magnificent emperors, without offering any more resistance than a stone or a tree stump. The mob has always behaved in this way – eagerly open to bribes that cannot be honorably accepted, & dissolutely callous to degradation & insult that cannot be honorably endured. Nowadays I do not meet anyone who, on hearing mention of Nero, does not shudder at the very name of that hideous monster, that disgusting & vile pestilence. Yet when he died – when this incendiary, this executioner, this savage beast, died as vilely as he had lived – the noble Roman people, mindful of his games & his festivals, were saddened to the point of wearing mourning for him. Thus wrote Cornelius Tacitus, a competent & serious author, & one of the most reliable. This will not be considered peculiar in view of what this same people had previously done at the death of Julius Caesar, who had swept away their laws & their liberty, in whose character it seems to me, there was nothing worthwhile, for his very liberality, which is so highly praised, was more baneful than the cruelest tyrant that ever existed, because it was actually this poisonous amiability of his that sweetened servitude for the Roman people. After his death, that people, still preserving on their palates the flavor of his banquets & in their minds the memory of his prodigality, vied with one another to pay him homage. They piled up the seats of the Forum for the great fire that reduced his body to ashes, & later raised a column to him as to “The Father of His People” (& a few centuries later another supplanting cabal of criminals had “Founding” added to that phrase by the same sort of suckling pigs/hites…). (Such was the inscription on the capital.) They did him more honor, dead as he was, than they had any right to confer upon any man in the world, except perhaps on those who had killed him.

They didn’t even neglect, these Roman emperors, to assume generally the title of Tribune of the People, partly because this office was held sacred & inviolable & also because it had been founded for the defense & protection of the people & enjoyed the favor of the state. By this means they made sure that the populace would trust them completely, as if they merely used the title & did not abuse it. Today there are some who do not behave very differently; they never undertake an unjust policy, even one of some importance, without prefacing it with some pretty speech concerning public welfare & common good. You know quite well, O Longa, this formula which they use quite cleverly in certain places; although for the most part, to be sure, there cannot be cleverness where there is so much impudence. The kings of the Assyrians & even after them those of the Medes showed themselves in public as seldom as possible in order to set up a doubt in the minds of the rabble as to whether they were not in some way more than man, & thereby to encourage people to use their imagination for those things which they cannot judge by sight (like viruses…). Thus a great many nations who for a long time dwelt under the control of the Assyrians became accustomed, with all this mystery, to their own subjection, & submitted the more readily for not knowing what sort of master they had, or scarcely even if they had one, all of them fearing by report someone (&/or those someones’ proclaimed somethings…) they had never seen. The earliest kings of Egypt rarely showed themselves without carrying a cat, or sometimes a branch, or appearing with fire on their heads, ***masking*** themselves with these objects & parading like workers of magic. By doing this they inspired their subjects with reverence & admiration, whereas with people neither too stupid nor too slavish they would merely have aroused, it seems to me, amusement & laughter. It is pitiful to review the list of devices that early despots used to establish their tyranny; to discover how many little tricks they employed, always finding the populace conveniently gullible, readily caught in the net as soon as it was spread. Indeed they always fooled their victims so easily that while mocking them they enslaved them the more.

What comment can I make concerning another fine counterfeit that ancient peoples accepted as true money? They believed firmly that the great toe of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, performed miracles & cured diseases of the spleen; they even enhanced the tale further with the legend that this toe, after the corpse had been burned, was found among the ashes, untouched by the fire. In this wise a foolish people itself invents lies & then believes them. Many men have recounted such things, but in such a way that it is easy to see that the parts were pieced together (like/as Frankenstein’s monster…Mary Shelley’s another female that, even while still just a girl, could read the table…not that many males can do it, either) from idle gossip of the city & silly reports from the rabble. When Vespasian, returning from Assyria, passes through Alexandria on his way to Rome to take possession of the empire, he performs wonders: he makes the crippled straight, restores sight to the blind, & does many other fine things, concerning which the credulous & undiscriminating were, in my opinion, more blind than those cured. Tyrants themselves have wondered that men could endure the persecution of a single man; they have insisted on using religion for their own protection &, where possible, have borrowed a stray bit of divinity to bolster up their evil ways….”

Stick-a-fork-in-him-he’s-Donne, John Donne. No man is an island, said her majesty’s 007 murder-agent. But Thomas wasn’t just crying Wolfe when he corrected: “Every wo/man is an island.” Including even the messianic ones what would be kings (rip, Sean Connery…burn in hell, bill gates) & with all their horses, & with all their men, would sew Pangloss’s Pangaea back together again.

The last line’s sums a seeming paradox…the paradox of paradise. It isn’t paradoxical, tho. It just feels better to miscast it in that incorporated & “living constitution” strawman way – denial – than to tell the truth: most are incapable or paradise, so hate paradise, so destroy paradise & so keep the prospect of paradise “alive.” Oz never did give nuthin’ to the tinwo/man that s/he didn’t didn’t already have. The real affliction is the wishers themselves. Here’s Don Henley & the boys singing the song that most will never truly hear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIVB7q4nvA8

And Twain’s Island line: “It’s easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.”

Psychology’s an unbreakable tautology, folded over on itself: ∞ No offensive defeats the cognitive dissonance-denial defenses of self-destruction.

Eric,

What is it that one DOES with a rabid animal? Well, that’s what needs to be done with the left too. Listen, it’s either them or us; if you’re paying any attention at all, they want to KILL us…

Right-on, Liberranter! Having a “dialogue” with the left would be like inviting the guy who’s robbing you to tea to discuss what he’s going to do with your stuff. Although that’d be a better analogy for voting- only both the D’s and the R’s are the robbers, and they just go to tea by themselves with your credit card to discuss how they’re gonna divvy-up your stuff.

Anonymous – do you think its true people are trying to get their shots quick, or are they trying to create the impression ? Here in the UK they have numerous cases of people not turning up, vaccines being wasted, and even the other day doctors were giving vaccines to homeless people – presented as these hero doctors who are prioritising homeless people as they are at risk of illness…. ie they were testing vaccines which no sane person is taking on homeless people !!

The Civil War wasn’t even a civil war. The South had no desire to take over the national government. They just wanted to divorce what they considered an abusive spouse. It was a war against self-determination, a fundamental of any just and free society. For decades the US federal government had been collecting tariffs on imports, which the South had a lot of, being an agricultural economy, but the South received no benefit from these tariffs. The proceeds were all funneled to the North, building infrastructure for the benefit of the Norths industrial businesses. Just before the “civil war” these tariffs were increased, radically. Which the South vigorously opposed, including seceding from the union. The Northern States were fine with the South’s secession, until they realized it was going to cost them money that wasn’t theirs in the first place. They would lose the tariff revenue from the South, and the South’s free ports would wipe out the North’s heavily taxed ports. So, the North, under the guidance of Saint Lincoln, proceeded to kill at least 600,000 Americans to secure their confiscated at gunpoint revenue from the South. More than all other wars combined. And once the South was defeated, did everything necessary to keep the South from recovering. Ever. The issue of slavery was a byproduct of war propaganda.

Hi BaDnOn,

Fundamentally, the war between the states was about antipathy – as now – and regional (as now). The Southern people – generally – had a different worldview than the Northern (as is true today of urban people vs. country people) and the Southerners wanted to “form a new union” . . . among themselves. They had come to regard the North as an alien country, a different culture and people and that there was insufficient commonality of interest to permit a reasonable coexistence – again, as now. They hoped to secede in order to be free of the dominion of that alien culture and people.

The slavery issue is a bogey – the means by which an aggressive war of conquest and subordination was justified and by which the right of self-government was eviscerated.

Much like today; so many issues were involved- from taxation (The South had essentially become the piggy-bank of the North) to the question of who was going to benefit from the cheap and plentiful cotton of the South (Including Britain and the shipping companies), to political jurisdiction. But of course, since Joe Sixpack isn’t moved to fighting for those things, a “better cause” had to be proffered, and that cause was slavery (Even though slavery had been established and maintained by the North/Federal powers).

Here is a good 28-second summary: 😀
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Q–iGgtRn8

^This. If I were going to start a site, I’d use a domain in Malasia or someplace like that.

Amen, lib!

The only thing the Left understands is force. Give in to them – or force them to shut up and back down. That’s the choice.

The whole “left vs. right” paradigm in US politics is a false dichotomy. They are just two sides of the same coin- political theater. No matter which “party” is dominant at any time really only comes down to the words they use and the segment of voters they seek to court- but overall, the same agendas continue unabated.

Hi Rich,

I expect it’ll shortly be a “hate crime” – or “insurrection” to criticize Biden or anyone in power who is a Leftist. Precedent exists for this sort of thing.

It’s not “statism” to insist that the internet, being paid for by the American taxpayer be free and unfettered.
Actually it is the domain name administrators and social media owners who are acting like commies…
Allowing private companies to be domain name administrators opens the door to the situation that now exists.
Bring back ICANN
Yes, libertarianism should be the goal, but those with ulterior motives who control the flow of information must be brought to task…
If you have a better solution than to declare them “common carriers”, that must accept all comers, I’m all ears…

im not sure where your argument is going. yes the governments one true role is to protect your rights. not go “full commie”. and “nationalizing” these companies has pretty much already been done. same with the banks. we live under corporate fascism.