Well, ok, it’s a pie chart – but the point is the same. We’re way low, with only about ten days left in the month. I know these occasional appeals are not your favorite thing about EPautos, but they are necessary if you want EPautos to keep on sticking it to the Clovers.
You’ve probably noticed I’ve been doing regular radio stuff lately. None of these are paid gigs. They are enjoyable and I think important in terms of trying to spread the word or at least get people curious about Libertarian ideas. But – so far – it hasn’t done much to support the site materially.
That’s where you guys come in.
You’ve got my back; you make it possible for me to do the radio and the rest of it. I hope you’ll continue to do so – and thank every one of you who’ve already chipped in. It has helped more than you probably realize.
Now, I want to put something on the table. An inducement, if you like. Those who step up with a $50 or more donation will enjoy direct/personal access to me (if it’s wanted) to ask my opinion about whatever topic they like, be it cars or politics. This will be private, one-on-one communication (not posted on site). I’ll be your personal on-call resource. Several of EPautos’ most generous supporters have been doing this with me informally for some time. I herewith make it official.
I also plan to offer signed copies of the new book for those who’ve already gone above and beyond – or who do so in the future.
Meanwhile, please consider supporting EPautos.
Endless Cyber Summertime, and Freeegan living is easy. Our
Phish are jumpin’. And the cotton dipstick is high…
Our daddy’s rich. And our virtual pr0n mama’s good lookin.’ So hush little babies. Don’t you cry…
– – – – – –
I Still Have No Mouth, and I Still Must Scream
My main “sustenance” comes from the Googuhl Fiber Food Stamp Beams. My arms hang limply at my sides in a state of neglected flaccid uselessness, except for my fingers and thumbs, which are hyper-flexible and possess super-soldier-strength and astounding abilities.
I “live” in an NFH (near field hallucination) Cybersection 8 Housing Project (Apartment #17), in the greater Viva Las Vegas Neon Sprawl
My means of communication is only the moving my thumbs within the Great Googuhl Motion Capture Grid which converts to mass hallucinatory audio, text, or video according to my
by Harlan Ellison and the Cyber Cuckoo Tor Libertarian
posted to my Lifenet Lord W.W.W.W. – (Woody Woodpecker’s Worldwide Woods) – In exchange for a year’s supply of Googuhl WiFi Breakfasts, Lunches, Dinners, and Virtual Pornstar Girlfriends
Limp, the body of Domister hung from the pink palette; unsupported—hanging high above us in the computer chamber; and it did not shiver in the chill, oily breeze that blew eternally through the main cavern. The body hung head down, attached to the underside of the palette by the sole of its right foot. It had been drained of blood through a precise incision made from ear to ear under the lantern jaw. There was no blood on the reflective surface of the metal floor.
When Domister joined our group and looked up at himself, it was already too late for us to realize that, once again, AM had duped us, had had its fun; it had been a diversion on the part of the machine. Three of us had vomited, turning away from one another in a reflex as ancient as the nausea that had produced it.
Domister went white. It was almost as though he had seen a voodoo icon, and was afraid of the future. “Oh, God,” he mumbled, and walked away. The three of us followed him after a time, and found him sitting with his back to one of the smaller chittering banks, his head in his hands. LindaBot knelt down beside him and stroked his hair. He didn’t move, but his voice came out of his covered face quite clearly. “Why doesn’t it just do us in and get it over with? Sweet-Ask-Jeebus, I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this.”
It was our one hundred and ninth year in the computer.
He was speaking for all of us.
I think, therefore I am.
(SPOILERS!) The Walking Dead – Glenn’s Death (From the Comics). Glenn is shockingly executed during the group’s first confrontation with the dastardly villain Negan. Issue #100.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6WrmTRzH3o
Glenn is my family’s favorite character in TWD. He doesn’t have any authority. He’s always on the spot though, often before you even know you need him. He just does the right thing on his own. And he’s especially instrumental in instructing and encouraging so many fellow survivors on how to do the right thing as well, even when everything we know has suffered a complete sea change.
Even in a SHTF Zombie Apocalypse, Glenn manages to maintain his humanity, integrity, friendships, and family.
Glad to see him alive (for now anyway) in the TV series version, and not too far outside the walls of the city.
http://www.aroundme.com/locations/8945/19-walking-dead-locations-you-should-actually-visit/#page=1
Ohio: Great Roads and the Best Haunted House Ever
Postby Rick F. » Mon Jun 24, 2013 5:19 pm
A tour of the best driving roads in Ohio was long overdue. The weather looked perfect for May 30-June 1, so I pointed the ever-willing BMW Z4 westward and set off in pursuit of driving fun and historical exploration.
Not to mention a visit with my college roommate Buzz (of “A Nice Morning Drive” and “Red Barchetta” fame) and his wife Linda.
http://www.bmwbmw.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=20424&p=267565&hilit=red+barchetta#p267565
As I was driving to my next destination, I went around a blind corner and “Suddenly, ahead of me, across the mountainside, a gleaming alloy air-car shoots toward me, two lanes wide.”
No, I hadn’t suddenly transported into everyone’s all-time favorite Rush song—Red Barchetta—it only seemed that way.
In reality, it was a gigantic John Deere harvester of some kind, with gleaming bright green paint and occupying the entire width of the rural road. It was trying to slow down, fairly unsuccessfully, so it was expedient for me to dodge off the road onto the adjoining grassy field.
No harm done, although it certainly got my attention. (Oh, and if Red Barchetta isn’t your all-time favorite Rush song, well, it should be!)
A BMW Tour of Fall Colors (and Haunted Houses)
http://www.bmwbmw.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=21477&p=274134&hilit=rush+barchetta#p274134
I’m praying for a miracle, Eric.
http://thumbs.dreamstime.com/x/praying-australian-money-9885220.jpg
More from Taleb’s cloistered social media discussion group:
RELIGION vs ATHEISM: Religious people are largely atheists, depending on the domain & why the discussion is largely flawed.
—
Some philosophy now. One brilliant contribution by economists is the concept of “cheap talk”, or the difference between “stated preferences” (what you say) and “revealed preferences” (from actions).
Actions are louder than words: what people say (in opinion polls or elsewhere) isn’t as relevant, as individuals reveal their preferences with hard cash or, more generally costly action, or even more generally risky action (which, invariably, brings us to *skin in the game*). This is why opinion polls are considered largely BS. I also believe that the notion of “belief” is largely misunderstood.
Likewise I consider the difference between “believer” and “atheist” as mere verbiage unless someone shows difference in action.
—
In Chapter 1 of SILENT RISK, the notion of “probability” is shown to be verbalistic and empty (probability maps to “degrees of belief” mathematically, is ~ belief), largely INCOMPLETE, while revealed preferences via decisions is what matters (more technically probability is something deeply mathematical, useless on its own, an integral transform into something larger, and cannot be “summarized” in words). And decisions and decisions ONLY can be a metric for RATIONALITY. [Footnote 1]
—
In our paper Rupert Read and I wrote that the “belief” content of religion is epiphenomenal (“pisteic” not epistemic), it is merely like believing in Santa Claus makes Christmas a more colorful event.
Belief is cheap talk (to oneself). Western society, particularly the U.S., has managed to marry deep religiosity (in talk) with total atheism (in words). What matters in the West, is the action by the state never impacted by religion. In rational decision-making it has a small cost.
—
If you want to know if someone is a believer in words not in action, just observe whether he relies on some supernatural force to get him out of trouble or if he’d rather rely on the laws of physics and the logic of biology.
An individual who goes first to the doctor and as a mere luxury to the priest (without paying for immediacy) is technically atheist though nominally a religious believer. So it looks like religion is something left to the spiritual, socio-ritualistic.
—
The idea hit me when I saw a joke of a cleric who said “I throw charity money in the air, letting The Lord take what share He wants and I keep the rest”. People have adapted to the idea for millennia.
—
Finally “Christianity” has evolved since the Middle Ages to become “atheistic in decisions and Christian in beliefs”.
—
Some unrigorous journalists who make a living attacking religion typically discuss “rationality” without getting what rationality means in its the decision-theoretic sense (the only definition that can be consistent). I can show that it is rational to “believe” in the supernatural if it leads to an increase in payoff. Rationality is NOT belief, it only correlates to belief, sometimes very weakly (in the tails).
******
[Footnote 1]
See in Silent Risk the paradox of the trader who makes a bet against the “probable” though he believes it will eventually happen.
——
SILENT RISK(S) is at:
http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/FatTails.html
We’re inching closer to a critical mass. Meaning, the point at which the site has a large enough audience that even if only 5 percent actively support the site, it’ll be enough.
My sense of it is a site needs to average a monthly readership that’s equivalent to about 150,000 subscribers of a daily (print) newspaper.
Message From the 23rd Dear Leader of America
http://image.slidesharecdn.com/benjamin-harrison-1234458676957304-3/95/benjamin-harrison-1-728.jpg
“I pity the man who wants a coat so cheap that the man or woman who produces the cloth will starve in the process.”
– Benjamin Harrison (1833 – 1901)…
…was the grandson of the ninth President, William Henry Harrison.
Before ascending to the presidency, Harrison established himself as a prominent local attorney, Presbyterian church leader and politician in Indianapolis, Indiana.
During the American Civil War, he served the Union as a colonel and on February 1865 was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as a brevet brigadier general of volunteers to rank from January 1865.
After the war, he unsuccessfully ran for the governorship of Indiana. He was later elected to the U.S. Senate by the Indiana legislature.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Harrison
Due in large part to surplus revenues from the tariffs, federal spending reached one billion dollars for the first time during his term.
The spending issue in part led to the defeat of the Republicans in the 1890 mid-term elections. Harrison was defeated by Cleveland in his bid for re-election in 1892, due to the growing unpopularity of the high tariff and high federal spending.
He later represented the Republic of Venezuela in an international case against the United Kingdom. In 1900, he traveled to Europe as part of the case and, after a brief stay, returned to Indianapolis. He died the following year of complications from influenza.
United States presidential election, 1840
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1840
The United States presidential election of 1840 was the 14th quadrennial presidential election, held October to December 1840.
It saw President Martin Van Buren fight for re-election during a time of great economic depression against a Whig Party unified for the first time behind a single candidate: war hero William Henry Harrison.
Under these circumstances, the Whigs easily defeated Van Buren.
This election was unique in that electors cast votes for four men who had been or would become President of the United States: current President Martin Van Buren; President-elect William Henry Harrison; Vice-President-elect John Tyler, who would succeed Harrison upon his death; and James K. Polk, who received one electoral vote for vice-president, and who would succeed Tyler in 1845.
42.4% of the voting age population voted for Harrison, the highest percentage in the history of the United States up to that time.
William Henry Harrison Quotes
“There is nothing more corrupting, nothing more destructive of the noblest and finest feelings of our nature, than the exercise of unlimited power.”
“I believe that all the measures of the Government are directed to the purpose of making the rich richer and the poor poorer.”
“Of all the great interests which appertain to our country, that of union–cordial, confiding, fraternal union–is by far the most important, since it is the only true and sure guaranty of all others.”
“It is preposterous to suppose that a thought could for a moment have been entertained that the President, placed at the capital, in the center of the country, could better understand the wants and wishes of the people than their own immediate representatives, who spend a part of every year among them, living with them, often laboring with them, and bound to them by the triple tie of interest, duty, and affection.”
“The broad foundation upon which our Constitution rests being the people–a breath of theirs having made, as a breath can unmake, change, or modify it–it can be assigned to none of the great divisions of government but to that of democracy. If such is its theory, those who are called upon to administer it must recognize as its leading principle the duty of shaping their measures so as to produce the greatest good to the greatest number.”
“The chains of military despotism, once fastened upon a nation, ages might pass away before they could be shaken off.”
“It was the remark of a Roman consul in an early period of that celebrated Republic that a most striking contrast was observable in the conduct of candidates for offices of power and trust before and after obtaining them.
However much the world may have improved in many respects in the lapse of upward of two thousand years since the remark was made by the virtuous and indignant Roman, I fear that a strict examination of the annals of some of the modern elective governments would develop similar instances of violated confidence.”
“We admit of no government by divine right, believing that so far as power is concerned the Beneficent Creator has made no distinction amongst men; that all are upon an equality, and that the only legitimate right to govern is an express grant of power from the governed.”
“I contend that the strongest of all governments is that which is most free.”
Maybe Anarchy just isn’t possible. Since we can’t beat’em, maybe we join’em out of spite.
Let’s completely abandon anarchy, and live only by coercion. We’ll be vessels of pure coercion, and give those timid lightweight Statists a taste of what Full Blown Coercion is going to look like.
First thing tomorrow, Eric puts a gun to oooorgle’s head and demands the physical address of all the ip’s that post here.
Then Oooorgle puts a gun to Eric’s head and demands payment for providing him the list of visitors sorted the way Eric demands.
Then Eric goes on a road trip and put guns to as many heads on his list as he needs to until everyone he locates pays him $5 per month for every month they’ve visited this website.
He’ll have enough to keep the lights on, but the down side is each time he gets his money and goes to leave, his newly paying customers will put a gun to Eric’s head and demand he publish articles on the topics they’re interested in.
Which won’t necessarily be the topics he’s interested in.
– – –
That’s might be where we’re heading, to a dark age where every day is a day without anarchy.
– –
A Day Without Anarchy
Posted on Nov, 10, 2015 by oooorgle
This morning, my brother showed up at my place, put a gun to my head, and forced me to work with him all day. At the end of the day, I put a gun to his head and forced him to pay me.
After work, I stopped at the grocery store, put a gun to the cashier’s head, and forced her to sell me the groceries I needed. I then went to a local electronics superstore, where a couple thugs from Apple put a gun to my head and forced me to buy an iMac. But at the register, I put a gun to the cashier’s head and forced him to also sell me a remote keyboard and trackball.
On the way home, I was sitting at a traffic light when a homeless man approached my car, put a gun to my head, and forced me to give him some spare change.
Arriving home, my neighbor came over, put a gun to my head, and forced me to come over to her driveway and help her change a flat tire on her car.
See? This is how society operates on a daily basis. Every interaction between people must be forced at gunpoint, or at a minimum under threat of violence. Otherwise, nobody would be willing to help each other or cooperate, and nothing would ever get done.
This is why anarchists—who believe that all human interactions should be voluntary, without coercion, and free of violence or the threat of violence—are simply crazy.
(Taken via anarchy from oooorgle who took this from Rand Eastwood)
http://oooorgle.com/BeyondTheCorral/
– – –
One day Clover will awaken and realize his entire life has been one giant LARP. (Live Action Role Play). There’s only Medieval Fight Club, or The United States to the degree everyone consents and plays along.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JUv-o4UTv0
– –
Reno-Vegas-Phoenix Interstate 11 construction shut down due to protest by #Sinner’sLivesMatter
http://photos.lasvegassun.com/media/img/photos/2015/04/06/0406BCBypassGroundbreaking01_t653.JPG?214bc4f9d9bd7c08c7d0f6599bb3328710e01e7b