Well, that was an entertainment I didn’t need. As I think most of you are aware by now, I’m relocating, and going through the usual shuffle of changing phone and internet providers. Here in Rhode Island, my service was via Cox, and I made the mistake of giving them advance warning about shutting off service, via an online chat today. I asked them to shut things down on Jan 30, but they proceeded to shut down my internet and phone service the moment the chat was finished. Attempts to make contact with them got exactly nowhere.
Two comments for the moment:
First, for the next few days I’ll have very limited access to the internet. I’ll be online to put through comments once a day or so.
Second, I don’t recommend Cox as an internet provider. Their customer service is very poor and their service in general is shoddy. Almost any other firm would be a better option. Just saying…
I’ll have more connectivity later this week and will be settling into my new digs next week. Stay tuned!
Happy New Year!
Happy New Home!
Happy New Internet Provider!
Wishing you Happiness!
Hey JMG
Sorry to hear about all this, it sounds like “Cox” is the perfect name for that company, if you know what I mean.
Also, good luck on the move. I’ve moved quite a few times before, so I recall how tedious and frustrating it can be.
Congratulations on the move. Alas, customer service peaked decades ago; the best anyone can hope for these days is to be overcharged for the bare minimum. Watch for them to keep billing you for the cancelled service; that’s happened to me before, too.
In an unrelated note, but a datapoint you may find interesting, this paper from the Boston Univesity School of Law about “How AI Destroys Institutions” shows that not everyone in the PMC is moving in lockstep on the ‘AI’ front:
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5870623
(Of course, laywers are on the list of professions the LLMs think they can gun for.)
JMG,
Would it be uncouth to start a no-money betting pool here in the commentariat to guess the location of your new domicile? We could each make a guess as where you have moved , one per customer of course. Then, when you revel the news, in the secret envelope, the winner would receive the eternal respect and acclaim of the World Wide Ecosophia commentariat.
Unfortunately this isn’t the first time I’ve heard of an ISP pulling this exact kind of nonsense. It’s kind of hilarious how consistent they all are in their terribleness, you’d think they were doing it deliberately. Sorry to hear about that JMG, hopefully the rest of your week goes more smoothly.
John,
Sorry to hear about this! It adds to any frustration a move might have. I experienced something similar when moving house in the Chicago area a couple of years ago. Not Cox but XFinity – part of Comcast.
I called them a few days before moving and let them know I needed the internet shut off, but keeping the same the same phone so that would be left on. They turned off both so I had no way of connecting with movers or other relevant people that day, that in addition to double billing and billing and address issues repeatedly led me to the horrors of XFinity’s Automated Voice vague directives. The customer service reps were kind (when I finally got one) but the information was consistently lost in translation and the holds were endless. I now drive the 40 minutes to the XFinity store when I need anything.
Yeah. Cox. Tell me about it. I’m paying for Cox Internet, and every time the wind blows, or a line goes down, I’m cut off and it takes a lot of trouble to get back on it. The alternative here is AT&T, and *their* users have as many complaints as I do. !#$%^!!!!!!!@*! My deepest sympathies, and I am truly warned., just in case.
Good luck in your new location, and the gods of home and hearth be with you.
Big empathy Archdruid! I myself have been struggling w post-industrial american vaporware these past months.
JMG – 1st, I couldn’t agree more about Cox (we usually spell it the other way). Our town is putting in its own internet service and we can hardly wait to switch.
More importantly, we wish you the very the best of luck with the rest of your move, and much happiness in your new home.
Hello JMG (and commentariat). Good luck, John, in your relocation and return to have full online access. I understand your current situation isn’t easy, so I’m going to take into consideration your warning. If you’re going to have a limited access to the internet, I’ll have patience (and I hope the rest of commentariat will have it, too).
I know from experience what you are going through, and send you all the best as you navigate the frustrations of moving. May you be well and settled soon.
Hope the move goes well. Cox is truly awful now…used to be a decent company but like many that got bought out it didn’t (or wasn’t allowed to) scale up well.
Looking forward to see where you land; as informative and hilarious as it would be I hope you won’t be our man in Minneapolis. Best, G.
Well Mr. Greer… it appears those Cox are real ukkers, no? Here’s to wishing you good fortune in the move to new digs! Can’t wait to hear about the adventure to be. Just be careful to dodge any AWFUL Karen’s, learing somalis, and especially .. Demonrat pols .. ad infant-items (one needs to say that term at a fast clip, to achieve the proper effect). ‘;] oh, and be sure to give your friendly ice agent a hearty thumbs up.
May you groove on the move.
Interested to see where you put down roots this time. Also enjoy being off line for a few days even if not by choice. As for phone and internet providers, there are no good ones just less bad ones.
Let me guess – they’re the only ISP in the area? It’s amazing what even a little bit of competition can do to adjust the attitude of a business..
Moving always sucks. Sometimes staying sucks more though.
My feeling about next general elections disaster for our “loved” woke coallition parties is confirmed by facts, and it goes on adding more and more personal examples, near me. The lower class is the people, the most they leave the woke echo chamber and start flirting with the far right speech (and thinking to vote the far right party). Last example between a heck of them: yesterday, I met a person from the working class, who always has worked in low qualified industrial jobs. She told me suddenly she felt “a foreigner in her own country”, in her job and her neighbourhood. She doesn’t enjoy very much the “wonderful” multicultural environment in which she usually works and lives. She was complaining some of her migrant job fellows were victimists and not friendly with the native workers. I bet which party will vote soon…
Well, it’s evident in this world there’s good and bad people everywhere, but stupid woke idealization of migrants, as a whole, as “beings of light”, crashes against the human nature (nobody is perfect).
Working class people in my country is going fast toward a harder right vote, because they have noticed, in addition to have met real migrants with their personal dirty side, that the native low class people is in a “Darwinian” neoliberal competition against migrants to get jobs (with lowering money pay thanks to the excess of workers offer) and social public subsidies; they’ve realized the cultural shock of hearing every day another languages and customs during and after their job day, too.
These problems don’t affect to the dwindling middle class who can belief and vote our woke central govt: PMC, bureaucrats and universities teachers. They don’t have to live everyday with the nastiest side of one of their “holy cows”.
Of course, I don’t think a future populist right govt is going to fix the many problems we’ve got here (in addition to the massive migration “elephant in the room”), because for example, we’re too dependent of unelected Brussels bureaucracy, and right parties will be even more neoliberal in economics than the current govt; but a lot of people doesn’t notice that hard fact.
Just a warning as you’re getting new internet (and anyone else who is). I developed electrosensitivity from having full fibre broadband installed (despite it supposedly being very low emission etc, etc). It creates a sensation in the head and neck that can be best described as being very gently Force-choked by Darth Vader.
A rare example of understated journalism.
“The WSDOT vehicle sustained reportable damage…”
Now admire the picture. Apparently no serious injuries but the semi driver is in a heap of trouble.
https://www.yoursourceone.com/columbia_basin/wsp-releases-more-details-about-dui-crash-between-semi-and-snowplow-on-i-90-near/article_7d2d90bb-d64a-4a46-a546-fa7185f364b5.html
Are you leaving Rhode Island for another state?
JMG
Have you ever revisited Dark Age America? I’ve listened to the audio book multiple times. Great listen and of course muy insightful as usual. It’s almost 10 years old. And if you have is there a link I can find? I’d love to hear your reflections on the topics you present to us.
Thank you, everyone, for your good wishes! The interruption in service isn’t turning into any great inconvenience; I’m sitting right now in a coffee place a block and a half from my apartment, sipping green tea while a bunch of old Azorean men gossip in Portuguese at the other tables. When it’s not a federal holiday, I can also use Ariel Moravec’s favorite dodge and get an hour of free internet access at the public library, which is a pleasant three block walk from my place.
The whole thing has also brought into focus some of the reasons why the corporate-bureaucratic system is self-defeating and ultimately self-terminating. I’m probably going to do a post on that quite soon, entitled Evil Makes You Stupid: A Case Study. If all goes as planned, that will go up on Wednesday, January 28, and from that point on I’ll be back online full time.
The thought of a betting pool intrigues me. By all means have at it. One clue: I’m not moving to Unknown Kadath in the Cold Waste. 😉
So far, everything’s going very smoothly. For once in my life I can afford to have a moving company pack and ship everything for me, so all I’ll have to worry about are a couple of suitcases of clothing, valuables, and a few things I’d regret losing.
As for Cox, yeah, I probably should have paid more attention to the name. Maybe it would have been obvious enough if they’d called themselves Dorx. I also find that in the new place, I’ll be getting the same service for 3/4 the cost.
J.L.Mc12 at #2: I think that even better name than Cox for that company would be Kant’s!
To everybody:
Just saw in Youtube this half an hour document about Paul Ehrlich and Kingsley Davis (by the Australian ABC):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqnI1UTwZtM
The quote from 24:34 onward is quite interesting.
OK, I’ll bite. Mr. Greer will be relocating to – Drum Roll Please – ..DAVOS.. I’ll wager 1000 quatloos on that, um, ‘soon to be former’ bastion of snotty elite neoliberalism .. once tKoO TOTALLY deflates their flimsy deathboat! Imagine seeing our gracious host kick that next-in-liner ‘The Rat FINK’ out onto the rocks and snow, as he really lays it on heavily to the vonderlyins.. the lit’ll boneys .. pinkbikinied starmers .. sparklesockes of the now ‘build back betternots’!
Llewna #6 (and advice for any other current or future Xfinity/Comcast customers): My experience was the same: trying to resolve billing or account problems over the phone with them is maddening, so now I just go directly to the Xfinity store to resolve them, and that’s worked well so far. It’s worth a drive (even a long one)! The exception is issues with connectivity; their technical people are usually helpful, and it’s not that hard to get technical support.
Ok I’ll give it a shot! My guess: You are staying in the states. The west coast is out, as is the entire western half of the country. You love the east coast but want to get out of New England. New York is vibrant, but maybe not a long term choice. Perhaps you are moving to the Great Lakes region? Michigan, Indiana, Ohio.
Best of luck with your move!
Congragulations on making the move! I expect it’ll be to a medium-sized American city, because you’ll keep free speech rights and avoid the craziness that happens in the big cities like New York & Minneapolis. It cannot be to a mere town or rural area since they are dependent on cars for transport.
JMG # 21:
“Evil Makes You Stupid: a Case Study” is a good title, me think. It’s a wrong opinion to think evil bad people must be smart; it’s more common the mix between evil and stupid human behavior and attitudes alike: in individuals and human groups.
I’ll wait with patience your next post.
———————————-
If you don’t mind I comment more or less shortly the Iranian thing, I’ll write first that unsurprisingly there’s been online a lot of self proclamed “Iranologists” who are saying this or that theory about last evident regime change attempt by the usual geopolitical powers. Like the old style “Kremlinologists”, these supposed experts usually don’t have much accuracy in their opinions (indeed, I bet they don’t have it because they usually don’t understand a word of Persian language nor have more knowledge of that Asian country than me). I don’t want to comment (by now) the recent events within the mysterious and opaque Iranian theocracy, but I’m going back in time to point Persia had its own (failed but real) secularization attempts. There was a Nationalist government, not very Islamic, during the ‘50s, opportunely wiped out by western powers (if I’m right about it). Oil is oil…The Shah ruled the country with steel hand until the last ‘70s, first with the West support. However, it’s interesting to point he supported or at least tolerated some secularization in social customs, to the Islamic clergy dismay. Last years before the “Revolution” which got him out as Head of State, the Shah became relatively “rebel” to the western “advices”, maybe after the ‘70s oil big crisis (he maybe thought he could be stronger thanks to the expensive oil prices). The Iranian Revolution was first a mess of different ideologies against the Shah regime (even Commies were engaged in it), but finally in a cruel historical irony, Khomeini theocratical dictatorship project succeed finally, so evidently secularization tendences stopped abruptly in Iran. Why? There are several facts, but I’m not an “Iranologist”(ahem), so I won’t point clear reasons for it, I’m going to have caution in this historical past event.
Well, I’ll bite.
– I suspect our host is most comfortable in an urban setting that is not too gentrified and not too blighted, so that leaves an honest working class neighborhood with an ethnic community that tends to be respectful and quiet.
– He enjoys fine music and art, so some world class venues would be welcome.
-He wants to be near some esoteric lodges.
-He wouldn’t mind a small private yard for some gardening.
-Close to major airports is a plus.
Did I mention a noble and august library system? God bless “patience ” & “fortitude “.
So my two cents is for the Big Apple, New York but not Manhattan. I throw my vote for Flushing Queens or there abouts.
I ruled out Brooklyn because it is either nauseatingly hipster or lock step religious with the orthodox communities.
Cheers to all and I wish you, JMG all the best in your new abode.
Courtney
@JMG wrote:
“One clue: I’m not moving to Unknown Kadath in the Cold Waste. 😉”
Far from it! Picture this: Sitting on his lanai, JMG pecks away at the computer, working on his next book or essay. The only distracting sounds are the rustling of palm fronds and the distant surf. Wearing a loud floral shirt and a bathing suit, he pauses now and then for a refreshing sip of his fruity tropical umbrella drink. From a coconut shell.
Yes, JMG is relocating to the beautiful Garden Island of Kauai in Hawaii! Amirite? 🙂
All kidding aside (?), best wishes for a smooth move. I live in NH, and it was nice having you in New England. I even got to meet you and Sarah at the first Potluck, which was a great party. (Thanks for hosting those, Peter)
Looking forward to hearing where you really end up…
Dear JMG,
I wish you peaceful moving and joyful and blessed time at your new place!
With regards,
Markéta
Re move: Okay – I’ll take a guess: Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
Re: Just came across a the term “En****tification” that talks about the degradation of the internet, internet services, and just about everything else. Less and less for more and more.
@ Clay “Would it be uncouth to start a no-money betting pool here in the commentariat to guess the location of your new domicile?”
$10 on Kugluktuk in very far noth Canada! It is 100,000:1 odds but if it pays off, I’m set up very nicely. 😀
“Dorx” is hilarious, JMG. I’m so looking forward to next week’s essay.
Please add my good wishes on your relocation to the already long list of them from the esteemed Commentariat. It delights me that you can sip tea and use some free WiFi while others earn a good living packing up your stuff.
May your new home exceed your expectations!
OtterGirl
My guess for JMG’s new location – Upstate New York.
My bet is Florida, aka the land of the free and the home of the entrepreneurial. Besides, the man has gathered the years and the funds to live comfortably among the genteel retirees, and the guts to live cheerfully among the gator-wrestling rednecks. Not to mention all the gray-haired single ladies in that part of the world.
Someone mentioned Lower Slobbovia in the last post, and if one goes far enough inland in Florida I imagine one would find the conditions apt enough. High enough above sea level to avoid annoying interruptions to writing, far enough into the woods to rub shoulders with the local hoodoo practitioners.
All the best to you wherever you land, JMG.
Congrats on the move. Never had a good experience with Cox, which I’ve had a couple times in the past…I move around a lot. Spectrum, which I have at my company, is no better. I am considering putting in a Starlink terminal at the office as a backup. AT&T, which I have at home, has never had any downtime or an issue.
Cheers,
Off grid cabin in a small town. Southerly so winter isn’t too harsh. No looney pmc/woke . Amish neighbors would be nice. Ocean or large lake. A small boat gaff rigged for fishing and just messing about.
We have a terrible internet and phone provider, but very good connection, because the current provider ate the previous quite good provider. If you recollect a regional western ISP/Phone company that refused to give up customer data without a warrent post 9/11 . . . they also were amazing on maintenence. Alas, they got eaten, but all of us on the legacy network effectively have a VPN because all network addresses resolve to the physical server location.
Considering several factors, I’m going to guess NH for relocation.
Chuaquin #16
Are you sure about tha:
1) COPs and militaries don’t vote for right wing parties ?
2) The official results of the elections reflect exactly the votes of the people ?
I bet JMG is relocating to Sedona, “America’s most mystical place”.
I bet 23 reality tokens on Red Hook.
Wherever you are settling I wish you the best in your new environment and prosperous, peaceful, productive times ahead.
Hi JMG,
I am going to guess what region you have moved to. All mentioned here are northern state; thereby, cold.
USA
Direction A-NO-New England
Been there, done that. You don’t speak particularly highly of New England. New England has a bad reputation of having hazardous dump sites, still, at this late date. I am sure you would prefer no state tax, or low state tax, so that means New Hampshire, and you would be near the coast, on a cliff.
Direction B-possibly
Heading north to Nova Scotia, then west – hugging northern coast around Maine hooking west along the Saint Lawrence river. Maine gorgeous but gubbermanches turning it into cesspool. North to Nova Scotia. Newfoundland region has great traditional music. Continuing on north then west in maritime Canada. Nice area. Tends to have underlying black market of smuggling.
St. Lawrence River
Montreal
Across the river in USA, some of my people spent a generation or two there,being canalers and farmers, and points south down Lake Champlain way, to Albany and New York City. Most speak English these day. There are ‘Thousand Islands, but I don’t how expensive they are.
NO-New York State, anywhere
Anywhere and everywhere, downstate New York City sucks the life out of upstate. Guvmints are terrible and getting worse. High taxes. Upstate New York in a slow death so that I left there in the early 1970s. NYS has no future.
NO-Points south of the Mason-Dixon line.
Global warming. Vipers’nest.
stop, Pennsylvania. Forever wedded to Chesapeake waters which I understand still have numerous toxic dump-sides not cleaned up. Expensive taxes. Wedded to Wash DC. Too liberal.
stop
Ohio
Cleveland or Toledo
smack dab in Middle America
stop
Michigan
Does not have a stable state govt structure.
Detroit
Interesting place, has been gutted, but it is coming back.
stop
Mackinac, Michigan
Top of the world.
stop
Sault Ste.Marie
A town on Lake Superior. Pure water. North woods ethos, hunting, ice fishing, cigar smoking, plaid shirts, boots, etc. Great place for lumberjacks.
Points south
Wisconsin has stable state govt
Green Bay & Door Peninsula. Door Peninsula (Door County) interesting. Geologically, the area is related to Niagara Falls (escarpment).
Milwaukee
Chicago
Madison is downright boring. I wish we had moved further east towards the western shore of Lake Michigan like Sheboygan, or north to Sturgeon Bay on Door Peninsula. ***In hindsight.***
Along the Great Lakes’ are hundreds of small working fishing harbors. I conjecture you looked for picturesque towns, strong bus lines, strong train industry, plentiful water, strong city govmint, art colony, edge of countryside, edge of small city. Maybe there was a place where several druids already live. One needs to bird- and animal-watch to thrive here in Wisconsin.
Well, I lied. I can’t guess. Too many potential places. I am dying to know where you went, and what stuck out as to why it was a good place to plop your carcass.
Good luck…
💨🚛🌊🌆🏠👨🏼🌾💨Northwind Grandma
Dane County, Wisconsin, USA
Dear JMG:
Glad the move is proceeding well (with the exception of Cox). My move bet: I had hoped Trenton, but I don’t think so.
Drumroll please: Toledo Ohio!
As an alternative: Kingsport!
Cugel
I was trying to suggest you, in my last comment, (as a History “dilettante”) that maybe the West didn’t want directly to get rid of the Shah regime finally, but it didn’t weep much sincerely for his fall, neither. Persian Shah maybe wasn’t such an useful puppet anymore, during last ‘70s.
In the other hand, the Islamic “revolution” tryumph could be partly explained by the geopolitical games during Cold War, maybe a “lesser evil” for the West than an hypothetical Nationalist/Communist regime, which could be influenced by the USSR. Maybe the USA and its vassals thought Khomeini regime would be short, because he would be incapable to keep alive his regime, thanks to the inner contradictions of the new regime. And they were wrong. Then, an opportune war between Irak and Iran kept the western illusion of ending the Khomeinist theocracy; but in spite of a well supplied Iraq, Iran didn’t collapse. Economic sanctions by western countries haven’t managed to ruin the country, so the Iranian regime has more resiliency than the West thought first. We’ll see what happens next after last events, but I’m skeptic about a fast regime collapse tomorrow thanks to Trump and Israeli “wisedom”, or about the magic mistical Iranian elites being in power forever. I don’t know much about Iran real situation, but I think “Iranologists” don’t know it much better than I do (ahem).
Polecat #13 sez:
> Just be careful to dodge any AWFUL Karen’s,
Yes, certainly dodge those AwFuL kArEnS!
By the way, yes it does hurt.
On to more fun things. No takers on the betting pool so far? I’ll throw in an idea. If I discovered that I actually liked NYC (giggle, snort) but would want something a little less pricey, I might pick… Staten Island. I hear it has something of an old-neighborhood feel and more green space than the rest of the town. I’ll be shocked if that’s it though.
JMG
Never heard a good about Cox, and well – never heard a good word about Cox. Here, I have Frontier, and I believe it has been purchased by Verizon. Since starting my net needs with them, it has nearly double in price, and the quality of the service becomes more and more variable. To call is to wonder just what will be study. The actual people who come to the house are always wonderful, able and tell of better days – in the past.
Like I said – never heard a good word about Cox. Hey – are you staying in the land of my forebears? Or can we look for new digs?
Congrats on your move, JMG! I hope everything else goes better than your experience with Cox.
As for the betting pool, I want to put in my guess for Garden City, Georgia, the blue-collar town just outside Savannah. Pattern-matches to what I think are JMG’s main desiridata: walkable, blue-collar, right next to a city with a train station, and Savannah itself is walkable and known for its slightly odd/esoteric culture; also strikes me as unlikely to be a major battle-ground should political violence break out.
Get your mentat tablets today! Brought to you by the Situationist Intergalactical…
https://imgur.com/a/YBKsOyg
As for “evil making you stupid,” here is an analysis by Harrison Koehli at the Ponerology Substack:
Snakes in the Grass (Incompetence breeds malevolence)
https://ponerology.substack.com/p/snakes-in-the-grass
He postulates a kind of “feedback loop” where incompetence breeds malevolence, which, in turn, “selects” for conformity and incompetence.
@Justin Patrick Moore #41:
Oo, reality tokens! I’d lay mine on the table too with my wager, but they’re locked up in the vault down in Raswashingsputin. Or at least I’ve been told that’s where they are.
Instead I will offer to the winner a personal performance of a little ditty I wrote, entitled ‘Wait For It…’ Since the song is composed entirely of Promissory Notes, its overall effect is a lot like total silence, but with less payout. I mean payoff.
You’re relocating, John? Oh my stars – please tell me you’re NOT going to Greenland!!
Where in the world is our esteemed host going to land next.? Mention of a moving van suggests probably not Hawaii nor the Caribbean Is. There needs to be an Amtrac station. Things moving fast suggests the NYC real estate market. My daughter lives in Queens and describes apartment hunting as “insane”. A guy whose sympathies are with the current administration might be a bit more comfortable in a reddish area. All that does appear to add up to Staten Island. 2nd. possibility is Portland, Maine. 3rd possibility is Canada, which might also explain the things moving fast remark. I do get the distinct impression that Americans are not going to be well liked to the north, no matter how meritorious their character nor impressive their accomplishments.
Hey, I can find Iran, formerly Persia on a map and I have even read a book or two about ancient Persia. How comes I can’t get one of those expert gigs?
OK, I will throw my guess in to the pool. My criteria is that for easy travel with a car-free lifestyle our host will not be willing to give up on the Acela Rail corridor. Since he seems to be looking for a location with a more philosophically diverse population than Providence that really only leaves Boston and NYC if we rule out DC and the South.
JMG will eliminate Boston because it is the epicenter of both the higher education industrial complex and the health care industrial complex. That leaves the NYC area. While he may be wary of the NYC government, there is no choice if one is going to take advantage of the subway system.
So if our host is to live near a subway, yet have the potential of a place with a garden, then my guess is Forest Hills, in NYC. This is a wild guess as these same criteria could be applied to spots like Yonkers or outmost Brooklyn. But I will stick with my guess.
For the Mentat in a hurry, Synthesis Now!
https://imgflip.com/i/ahvyfq
My guess is Japan, either Nara or Kyoto. All that talk about Cox is just to put us off the track.
JMG
My guess would be the great lakes region or Ohio river valley: somewhere in the area you expect the great American civilization to arise in the future.
polecat #23
I bet Davos gets superb Internet service: the main one and two backups. Can’t tolerate Davos-duffuses getting blackouts.
💨💾👨🏼💻⛰️Northwind Grandma💨
Dane County, Wisconsin, USA
BeardTree #34
Oh God, no, no, not upstate New York (NYS). I grew up there. It is a gorgeous state but New York Cityhas sucked, continues to suck, and will continue to suck the life out of any part that is not associated with NYC, historicaly going back to Erie Canal days of the 1820s. NYC is a major🤮parasite. Check out the Ashokan Reservoir as a flagrant example; I have dead relatives down there.
The only places worth moving to would be Lake Champlain (but which side?) or the Finger Lakes regions. I suppose the Catskill mountains due to its artist colony at Woodstock, or the Adirondack mountains due to its grandeur.
Guvmints in all NYS extract ahuge amounts of taxes.
💨💸Northwind Grandma💨
Dane County, Wisconsin, USA
I’ve read some comments by some commenters, trying to guess where can be JMG relocating. I don’t want and I don’t know what town is going to be John home; I can only to bet JMG isn’t going to go beyond US borders, it’s a feeling I’ve had.
—————————
Anselmo # 39:
Answering your questions:
1-Military and police force tend to vote right wing parties everywhere, due to their fondness to “order” speeches, between another reasons. I don’t deny it, in my # 16 comment I was only pointing how many working class people who voted left is turning toward hard right politics and politicians, in addition (implicitly) with the typical right wing traditional voters (which also includes a lot of businessmen and rural people). I thought this typical Conservative tendence was evident for everybody in this blog, so I didn’t remember explicitly.
2-Are you suggesting every election here (or at least the last ones) could have suffered any kind of electoral fraud? Well, if you really mean that, you’ve opened a can of worms, so I hope to see some real reasons and some evidences of it to suspect that thing, because that’s a very serious accusation.
I ran across this hymn today – https://inv.nadeko.net/watch?v=HkTjUiZQ5zI
An ode to the M10 hex bolt. The internet provides. Perhaps not what you were looking for, but still, it provides.
Greenland – obviously! 😉
For those who are placing him way up north – he said it’s not “Unknown Kadath in the Cold Waste.” So much for the Great Lakes. And Florida is right out for several reasons, the largest of which is the rising seas, followed by our rigidly Catholic and power-grabbing governor, and in 3rd place is that insanely overcrowded Orlando/Disney/wall-to-wall cars in midstate. I can see upstate New York; I can also see certain areas of Greater Appalachia. Won’t bet, but I’m glad you’re doing well.
To the one whose ISP got bought out by Verizon – ouch! My daughters took one look at my Verizon bill and got me an android phone with a very low cost, albeit the one often sold to seniors as an easy phone to use.
I’ll vote for Hershey, Pennsylvania! It really is the sweetest place on earth and the air really does smell like chocolate. We’ve got far more services and options than a typical township our size (25,000 people or so) thanks to Hershey Park and the Hershey entities!
We have roller coasters on our skyline.
We also have tidal waves of humanity begin flowing in around mid-March (Springtime in the Park), peaking over the summer, and then they begin ebbing in the fall, and disappear on the first business day after New Years Day, when Candy Lane ends.
I was trying to get Direct TV to remove the no longer needed satellite dish from the house. The customer service operator asked how I knew it was theirs. Duh, because Direct TV is printed on the disk. Or maybe there are bands of rogue squirrels out there forging your company name on equipment. But the company won’t remove it.
In 2020 I was returning my deceased mother’s iPhone to Verizon. They wouldn’t just take it over the counter. Instead, I had to take a voucher and drive to the nearest FedEx to ship it. The phone rattled in the box and the FedEx lady asked if I wanted to pay extra for padding. I told her I didn’t care if she took it out back and jumped up and down on it. Earlier I had sat on hold for customer service for Toyota company for over an hour before the recording finally revealed that the phones were down because the Cedar Rapids office had been flooded out. Okay, you get a pass on that. Acts of God.
Rita
“Madison is downright boring. I wish we had moved further east towards the western shore of Lake Michigan like Sheboygan, or north to Sturgeon Bay on Door Peninsula. ***In hindsight.***”
Not further west into the Driftless area? Clifford Simak wrote a couple books set there. I’ve been through it a couple times. It’s not a place you can rush through. As they say, you can’t get there from here unless you go somewhere else first.
Given that John Michael always seems to be trailblazing a few steps ahead of the general herd, I have to place my bets on Nuuk, Greenland, the brand spanking new capital of the 51st state of the good old US of A. They may have limited public transportation, but, boy oh boy, do they ever have dogsleds! Go Greenlanders!
Recent train accidents here in Spain (with several deaths), during last days, maybe aren’t casuals. Yesterday I met with a friend who told me the repetitive derailments and crashes news were caused (according his opinion) by the lack of enough money invested lately in railways. When I asked him if he had hard data to support his idea, unluckily he said he hadn’t them. However, more expert people could easily find data about more or less money inverted in railways here, me think. Of course, the main opposition party boss (Conservative) has complained bitterly about these train accidents (what predictable!) and he has put the blame to the current “Socialist” central government. So it’s possible (and I hope it too), that hard data about possible degrowth in railways funding by the govt would be told to the audience soon. Of course, opposition parties and their friendly MSM are eager for eroding a weak govt, so if they find shameful data, they will say them. By the way, in Spain since some years ago, trains management belongs to several private corporations, but railways and rail facilities works belong to ADIF, a state owned corporation. So do the math: who is responsible for the supposed railways problems if they’re showed clearly after the accidents? We’ll see it…
Hi John Michael,
Good luck with the move, and green tea = yum!
Your interweb service is perhaps: Slip, sliding away. Yes, the nearer your destination, the more it slip, slides away! 🙂
Cheers
Chris
In addition to my last comment about the “casual” two near consecutive train accidents here in less of 3 days, I’ll tell you all that main trade union within spanish train drivers has said there’ll be a strike soon, to protest against the declining quality in machines, railways and another train facilities. Well, these angry railways workers, at least here, aren’t usually right wing biased (maybe they’ve got the opposite tendence), so I think our woke government has more trouble…By the way, I don’t know if you know the first accident happened in a high speed line, and the second in a low speed one. Since high speed trains started to run in the ‘90s Spain, these lines have been the most well funded by the State, and lower speed lines have had been less funded. If the poster boy of spanish trains (high speed) has maintenance problems in its railways due to lack of enough funding, I think the govt cannot pay it well, or it doesn’t want to do it. A big can of worms has been opened here: The two hypothesis (waiting now for hard data about a supposed lack of investment in it) are shameful and worse for our “loved” woke govt, which is responsible not for the trains (privately owned) but for the lines hardware in itself (state owned company ADIF).
I am in the process of getting all my Cheap Thrills essays up on to my website as I also work on new material for readers… the latest upload is now online, The Artist as Something Else. It looks at the trickster energy of concept artists, and explores the role of the artist as ecologist, and the role mental synthesis may play in the arts of the futures.
https://www.sothismedias.com/home/the-artist-as-something-else
and on my substack mirror where you can also subscribe to and follow my work for free:
https://justinpatrickmoore.substack.com/p/the-artist-as-something-else
—
I shared many of the same ideas as for JMG’s new digs as Courtinthenorth, which is why I suggested Red Hook as a possible neighborhood… don’t really know NYC so that was my best guess for most tentacled spot ; )
My 23 reality token bet still stands.
…oh yeah, and the artists as magician too : )
Meanwhile this week at Davros:
https://imgflip.com/i/ahyef5
I’ll throw in my nickel (Since pennies are no longer made by the government) on where our August host will show up next:
Cumberland, MD. He knows the area (having lived there already), it has Train service (that comes through during the day, no less), and he actually enjoyed it there (if I remember right, it was his wife’s health issues that caused his move to Providence). Extra points if he moves into the house he lived in last time, doubled extra points if the mortgage picks up from when he moved out.
(Note that I’m specifically standing by the move to Cumberland, the rest is just being thrown out as a humorous aside).
Speaking of Davos, must we?, Business Insider reports some 157-160 private jets descending on the Magic Mountain.
https://www.businessinsider.com/map-davos-private-jets-rich-powerful-across-the-globe-2026-1?op=1
Just sayin’.
You know, on second thought, I think I’m going to have to nix Davos. Perhaps our host has been secretly making C O N T A C T with extraterrestrials … and thus chose a heavenly destination on which to relocate: “We Put It Smack In The Middle” .. “VEGA”. Let’s hope Mr. Greer is current on his wormhole-transport insurance policy. As for the assigned movers .. Who knows!
I second the recommendation from Michael Martin @ 49. The following passage is, I think, particularly appropriate for our nation(USA) and time:
As a society’s norms and values decline during the end of a civilizational cycle, bad behavior becomes more prevalent. The upper classes in particular become more hysterical. They lose their common sense, their worldview becomes bereft of even basic psychological understanding, they become prone to emotional displays, and their decisions are increasingly motivated by emotion rather than reason. They become increasingly hedonistic, arrogant, and self-centered.
It would seem that step one for those who aspire to decent, or virtuous, or Godly lives is NOT to be imitating the tastes, behavior or manners of the rich. Say no to advertising.
“During January 2026, five leading PV companies – LONGi Green, Tongwei, JA Solar, TCL Zhonghuan and Aiko Solar – have successively released their annual performance forecasts for 2025. All five companies are projected to post a deficit, with total losses ranging from RMB28.9-32.8 billion (US$4.1-4.7 billion)”
But they make it up on volume. 🙂
https://www.pv-tech.org/five-chinese-pv-giants-anticipate-combined-2025-losses-of-us4-1-4-7-billion/
Locally Dunkelflaute now in day 8.
https://transmission.bpa.gov/Business/Operations/Wind/baltwg.aspx
The extremely boring line at 1100 MW is the nuclear plant. The difference between that line and the green one is why people are looking at nuclear again. As a reminder combined wind and solar (the green line) has a nameplate rating of about 3000 MW.
Ahead of the herd JMG is moving to Reykjavik, Iceland, capitol of the 52nd state of the US.
I will add to my previous guess of Ohio river valley/great lakes small city with cultural amenities and agricultural , if possible on a rail linehinterland
I meant agricultural hinterland. Not sure how the computer jiggled that around.
In my entry for the “Where is JMG moving to?” sweepstakes, I proffer: he’s moving to where his new Significant Other is presently living! Our beloved Archdruid Emeritus is a master of the 4th precept, after all: “To Be Silent.” 😊
I had thought to go on writing now about the trains disasters here, but after having seen previous comments, I’ll write something about the most interesting comments IMHO:
******
Michael M # 49:
Yes…Maybe it’s a bidirectional thing between the two terms: evil attitudes lead to stupid attitudes, and stupid attitudes lead to evil attitudes. You can compare this two way view with the current mess named EU, for example: I’m unable to differenciate which attitude led to the another one…
——————————
Old Steve # 51:
I bet JMG isn’t relocating to Greenland, but I also think that big North island will be a good place to live…after every glaciers on it have eventually melted, thanks to the climate change (more or less in a century?).
———————————
Mary B # 52:
Well, you’ve read books about ancient Persia and you’re able to find Iran in a map. Congrats! You can start your online apocryphal career as an “Iranologist”. I read when I was younger a spanish book written in late ‘80s, titled “Khomeini, the Prophet of War”. It can be counted as a minimum level to the current “Iranology” fever, me think (ahem).
——————————
Northwind Grandma # 57:
Oh, these days is being “celebrated” the Davos circus. It’s an Spectacle in itself (of course, in the Debordian sense). I’d like to tell you I watch sometimes a TV comical show here which depicts a parallel Davos, whose characters (a cheesy “rich” couple) explain “neoliberal” economics (Conservative/Libertarian economics) to the middle class. Unluckily, its humor is too spanish situation-centered to be exported beyond our borders…
————————
Justin P. # 72:
Thanks for your link!
I’ll throw my guess in: Pittsburgh, PA
Reasons:
1. Wishful thinking
2. It’s off the eastern seaboard but still arguably “East Coast”
3. Culturally similar to Cumberland but has more amenities
4. Rail line to NYC
5. Decent public transportation and many neighborhoods are self-contained and walkable
6. Pierogies
I’m going to write now trying to depict you the current railways mess here, after the last accidents. Travelling by train now isn’t easy, thanks to the new safety measures ordered in a hurry (for example lower speed limits).
I think the seek of the cause(s) of those trains who derailled has been buried by tons of the current political and polarized politics here. So the right wing opposition and their MSM pets are eager to show the government is responsible for it (even without real hard data yet), and the woke govt and its “leftist” minion MSM are doing everything they can to avoid being pointed as a guilty govt.
For example, opposition accusations about lack of enough investment in railways have been followed by right wing MSM pointing the “Socialist”
govt has invested too much in Arab countries railways, but…pro-govt MSM have answered them that those investments to foreign countries are fake news. Who lies and who tells the truth?We live in a democracy (cough cough): Each group of “political hooligans” can read “news” manipulated to satisfy their confirmation bias.Well, since the COVID Spectacle, I think every MSM from every biased tendence tell more lies than before it, so…Can I trust by now in them? I doubt it. President Sánchez govt has lied to the citizens before today too, and it isn’t strange right wing zealots have been making up fake news in social media for years.
Spanish govt is saying there isn’t evidence of lack of investment in railways (in spite of the near continuous denounciations by railways workers about the hardware repair decline), and it also says the second accident was due to a land slide (and I guess land slides could be prevented by an adequate previous work to find and avoid them before they happen).
It’s interesting to point the current “left”
govt economical politics have been the boring “neoliberal” orthodoxy (indeed, the Conservative economical politics whose hegemony has been complete during decades in the West and another countries). This economical politics have been half hidden by the “fig leaf”: the woke Spectacle (cultural wars included) and the terminal wellfare state helps from the govt to the people; so, though it hasn’t been showed with hard data yet, the investments under the current govt maybe have dwindled; it’s a reasonable work hypothesis. However, right wing accusations of this lack of enough investments seem to me quite hypocrital. Indeed, when they rule the country, Conservatives do the same rehashed “neoliberal” recipes, with a more happy attitude than their political enemies; between those recipes, the public investment usually goes down…
So we’ll see what happens then, if we’re able to find some truth in this controversial topic, but I’m quite skeptical. Last news I’ve heard say President Sánchez and his govt members want to meet ASAP the train drivers trade unions leaders to avoid their next national strike. What can the govt show to them, the carrot, the stick or the two things alike?
I refuse to guess where he moved to. If he wants to divulge, that’s his business. East Coast could mean anything from Maine to Florida. I’m going to be maximally perverse and “guess” he’s moving to Little Havana in Miami. Ay yay yay.
—
People don’t get car dealer mentality wrt to Greenland and The Orange One. He starts with a lowball bid just to see how they’ll react and then he raises it to where he wanted it in the first place. This isn’t the first time he’s put someone on an easy payment plan. Probably won’t be the last. He loves haggling, to him it’s a sport.
Chuauin#59 – 2
I have presenced, in two consecutive times , the public event of addition of the votes registered in each of the records prepared by each polling station of the spanish province in wich I live. This public event is celebrated five days after the elections day. And I can say that this addition is not made really because the public servants responsible of this procedure prefer to trust in the data obtained in the elections night by IT procedures.
I can not say this IT results are a fraud, but I can not say the contrary.
“I bet JMG isn’t relocating to Greenland, but I also think that big North island will be a good place to live…after every glaciers on it have eventually melted, thanks to the climate change (more or less in a century?).”
Greenland needs to warm up enough for trees to grow. After the oil runs out it’s back to wood for heat unless you have hydroelectric power. Greenland’s river system will probably have to reform from scratch given the glaciers reworked the landscape.
My tip is JMG caved in to the allure of no winter and has gone the classic old man route and bought coastal beach front property in the the Miami area or even perhaps the Florida keys.
But in all seriousness although this would be a hilarious zag, it’s far more likely something around Maryland/Pennsylvania, even Lancaster county itself.
Knowing our host’s appreciation of a fine malted beverage, I thought craft beer accessibility might be a location consideration.
These are the top 10 US cities with the most breweries per 100,000 drinking-age residents:
https://www.joinhomebase.com/blog/best-beer-cities-in-the-us
Portland, ME – 53.73 breweries per 100k
Asheville, NC – 49.15
Burlington, VT – 35.46
Bend, OR – 31.47
Wilmington, DE – 27.74
Boulder, CO – 27.41
Fort Collins, CO – 27.14
Cincinnati, OH – 17.67
Charleston, SC – 17.53
Pittsburgh, PA – 17.20
But I’m sticking with mystical Sedona, AZ.
Hmm! To move or not to move is a big decision, especially in uncertain times! When the rubble stops bouncing, maybe in a year or so, I’d be interested to hear how you came to the decision to move now– Was it just a sense that ‘now is the time,’ divination, an opportunity? No worries if you’d rather not share–
As for where moved, hopefully not Lost Carcosa–
My wild guess is Ithaca, NY. Close proximity to a major university (Cornell), rural, yet with good transportation. I can totally see you at the Ithaca Bakery, with their astounding coffee, bagel at the ready, and a book in hand. Wishing you every happiness in your new digs!
Pittsburgh would be a good choice, although I don’t know about the astrological implications. Or the movers are shuggoths and JMG is headed to the Plateau of Leng…
@ Siliconguy # 77
This is a classic example of the Law of Constraints – any improvement to the flow rate of a pipeline except at the bottleneck has no effect on the overall flow rate of the pipeline.
The bottleneck with renewables is no longer generation, it is storage. These cells can generate an awesome amount of combined watt-hours over the course of a sunlit day, but most of this energy is not generated because enormous parts of the PV circuit need to be disconnected to avoid excess production (which can damage the overall circuit with excess current). After all, the average load requirement is rarely so high.
The surplus power is basically wasted, instead of being stored for darker and foggier days. This is because we do not have any reliable means of long-term storage for such large quantities of energy.
May all who lie in the path of the forecast “Major Winter Storm” find themselves in good company with ample stores and warm shelter. Many blessings to all.
Jesus in the digital age:
https://imgflip.com/i/ai1rig
During last days, there have been appearing in spanish MSM and social media a heck of “train-ologists”, after the train accidents here. Unless a few good exceptions, I see too much political bias in their opinions, and not much serious economics and technological knowledge in them.
More recent news: Right wing MSM have pointed some “leftist” pro-government MSM have broadcasted the last audio radio message recording by the high speed train driver which derailed in the South, like the rest of media have done…but editing the most uncomfortable parts of the train driver words; obviously, uncomfortable for the pro-govt echo chamber (cough cough). The worker said mainly he was noticing his train was derailing; then the high speed train crashed with the other train. In addition to this, the Minister who rules over ADIF state company (Mr. Puente), said yesterday with some reluctancy but high and clear, that maybe the Cordoba high speed accident was caused by a weak steel section within the railway. Of course, he’s going on denying whatever guilt the right wing opposition is throwing against the “Socialist” govt, but I guess if there are technology and workers crews enough to detect and replace damaged steel pieces, that accident could have been avoided. I doubt this possible “rotten” steel section couldn’t be detected by ADIF workers, so the “not predictable” govt mantra could be as weak as the supposedly damaged steel piece…The same reason can be applied to the Catalonia slow speed train accident: if land slides are more probable in some parts of lines than in another ones, then to some extent, could be detected in due time and fixed.
Govt guys keep on trying to bribe…I mean, to have a deal with train drivers trade unions leaders to avoid the next national railways strike, which evidently would harm Spain prestige around the EU, and it would be bad for the current Spectacle of a “progressive govt”; it’s evident trade unions (more if they’re of railways workers) protesting against a woke leftist govt would be a big cognitive dissonance for the leftist voters in a near future.
Finally, some railways workers have complained about problems with slow collapse of soils under some parts of the Madrid-Barcelona high speed line. This problem has been reported since some years ago in railways workers and “train friends” forums, but authorities used to ignore it; so it isn’t new to me. I think the s**t is hitting the fan.
I write this comment admitting I don’t deserve the true “trsin-ologist” title, because I’m only a “dilettante” who likes trains, so let’s wait better for more technical opinions maybe less ideologically biased soon…
Why not relocate to Malaysia? Being an author, you can work from anywhere in the world.
Malaysia is very expat-friendly, and locals are very hospitable. The cost of living is much lower than in the USA. Cyberjaya is a modern city with nice modern apartments. We have fast internet at a fraction of US prices.
And I can keep you company and talk about occult, sci-fi, and fantasy all day long.
Excuse me, due to my last comments about “train-ology”, but I like very much railways world to not find these last accidents in my country as pitiful, not only for human losses, but for the prestige loss to this way of travel, too.
This morning (local time) I’ve argued in civilized terms with another friend. He has some scientific/tech education (unlike me), and he’s pointed the Madrid-Andalusia line was the first line to be opened, in 1992, so it’s the oldest one. I agree. Maybe the older is a line, the most possible is that line could have more and more repairing problems, even counting with an adequate well funded hi tech and manpower inspection and repairing. I can connect this possible aging hardware cause with the Puente Minister confession about a possible failure in a steel rail section (“materials fatigue?”). My friend also says high speed lines have been very crowded with the several private corporations who manage the trains, so do the math: aging hardware plus much (ab)use by high speed trains equals to…disaster. My friend final idea is spanish high speed railways are dying due to their own success. He points none of the different governments since the late ‘90s (Socialists or Conservatives) have noticed this hard fact, or maybe they didn’t wanted to notice it. Well, I’m not completely convinced by my friend reasoning, but I think at least he doesn’t seem very politically biased, and he’s told me a more technically oriented view than usual MSM and social media b**t. He’s maybe better than average contending Spectacles here. By the way, I think Spain is the second country with more high speed railways built (in km) after China.
Heritage apples, a solution to the problem where apples don’t breed true. Saving the seeds does no good.
https://www.yoursourceone.com/columbia_basin/wa-lawmakers-propose-heritage-orchard-program-to-preserve-rare-apple-varieties/article_942c8311-a35a-437f-afec-abdca82d2116.html
Evil hides among Stupidity. Stupidity shields Evil from Order. Evil promotes Stupidity as it allows moving in silence. Evil and Stupidity are 2 faces of the same coin.
On a more fun note: my bet for relocation for our most esteemed host is to one the metropolises of the future Lakeland republic. Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Toledo, Cincinnati or even Detroit.
Defiance/Hicksville, OH (or Fort Wayne IN) may be the wild card here.
I don’t think you can abide the current state governments of MA or CT, which rules out a lot of otherwise promising nearby places, river towns with rust belt histories (e.g.. Norwich, CT or Fall River, MA, or my own neck of the woods off Buzzards Bay.) I also don’t know whether you have any interest in acquiring estate property that can survive climate trends; if not, why not rent Rosecliff? (Okay probably not available, but something nice on the Newport shoreline.)
Many of my relatives have been looking (and actually moving) toward greater Nashville, the North Carolina piedmont, and similar climes. I’d be concerned about the tropical diseases working their way northward, and whether transport corridors are natural or dependent on the interstate highway system, but there’s a bigger agricultural base in that region than in New England. New York State has many great places but the political weight of NYC causes problems.
An actual guess out of all this? Waterville, Ohio.
@Rashakor #99
Your comment reminded me of a joke: in the 1980’s, a politician allegedly made the following comment to a Soviet diplomat:
“In America, we have two political parties, the Evil Party and the Stupid Party. I’m a proud member of the Stupid Party. Sometimes the parties get together and do something that’s both stupid and evil. We call that bipartisanship.”
Been reading “progress-head” blogs, out of a sense of “perverse curiosity” you might call it. Mr. Brin in particular seems to have sunk fully into insanityregarding many of things of which the the Don of America is but one– apparently ICE and Greenland are just distractions for Trump’s plan to place himself into cryo-sleep at which point he will awaken to rule over a future of plutocrats such as himself– in order to counter this (ethereal) plan, Brin writes up an ultimatum threatening the safety of the imaginary Don-sicle!
In the same “perverse” spirit, I have decided to plunge back into the fetid trenches of reddit, where progress-heads are now blaming the humanities as a “repository of technophobes and ingrates” who are clearly the reason why America is falling apart. Spluttering diatribes all around it seems, but I joined mostly just to kepp in contact with a few acquantainces.
CROWS
JMG,
I hope all is going smoothly.
Firstly, I definitely have an affinity for wind. At my rural place—an exurb—, the wind is blowing the snow we got last evening. It was heavy on the light snow. That is wispy snow but a lot of it, enough to cause whiteout while driving. The wind is kicking up the wispy snow, but at 15º F. (–9 C.), I am glad to be inside. The wind is putting on quite a show. Like earlier this winter that I wrote about, this wind and snow twirls around feeling very much like dead spirits getting distributed to all corners of the earth, so to speak. The snow is the illustrator, letting one to actually see what usually is invisible.
This is a west wind, that is, from the west.
When I step outside onto the porch in no more than a sleeveless shirt, I get reminded that each person is made up of a built-in furnace. If I stay outside a tad too long, I feel the fire going out, and that is the feeling I will feel, perhaps, at my death—a cold that keeps coming, until my brain no longer registers anything.
Secondly, crows, a murder of, a few dozen, have settled in, and adopted, the fir trees around our house. They keep busy, that’s for sure. At times, it seems they are doing things simply to keep warm—maneuvers that have no other meaning than to keep entertained while keeping the blood flowing. It is windy but not enough where the crows have to take cover. What do crows feed on? I read that they will prey on songbirds in a pinch. I don’t like the idea, but whatever. It is what it is. Like trying to keep hawks away.
In any case, I feel honored that crows are around, at least for this immediate season. I hear that crows are a good omen. Hope do I communicate to the crows that I am “friend”?
💨🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛ 🐦⬛
💨Northwind Grandma
Dane County, Wisconsin, USA
@Emmanuel Goldstein,
I very much considered Ithaca as a new location for JMG. It is one of my favorite places in the world, is cost effective and has good transportation internally. It also has the most sustainable of the Ivies as it’s anchor. Cornell can provide its own power, water, and and has huge amounts of agricultural land and dairy farms.
But I am afraid the denizens of Ithaca would be much the same as the ones in Providence given the dominant positions universities hold in both towns. This would not give JMG the change of local associates he seems to be looking for. But the big kicker, that took Ithaca off my short list, was Intercity transportation. The town lost its passenger rail back in the 1940’s and now buses are the only non-car and non-air way to get to the rest of the world. JMG’s old digs gave him the option of a 2.5 hour train ride to NYC while Ithaca is a grueling 5 hour bus ride to the Port Authority Terminal in Manhattan. You have to root for a place who’s unofficial slogan is ” 5 square miles surrounded by reality”.
I’m guessing Pittsburg, PA, and that was before I saw others guessing it, or remembered the Cumberland, MD connection.
First, I’m sorry: in my last “trainologic” comment(# 97) I was finishing to write it in a hurry, so I didn’t checked well my last phrases, so my English quality should have been better…Of course, Spain is the second country in high speed railways (in km) BEHIND China globally (it sounds better than “after”).
——————————
Anselmo # 86:
I’m very puzzled by your revelation about that public action of real votes addition from polling stations being not counted at provincial level, more when you say you’ve seen it times. If you’ve witnessed personally that behavior in public servants (and I tend to believe your witnessing of it), you should denounce them to the Justice.; better if you have more witnessed of it. I’m not really sure this lack of a necessary part of after elections procedure is indeed an electoral fraud: maybe not. However, I’m quite sure it would be a symptom of corruption between the bureaucracy responsible for counting finally the votes, and it could promote an hypothetic fraud. I don’t know which crime(s) could be depicted around that negligence, but it’s not a legal thing. If you haven’t denounced it yet, why are you waiting to do it?(if you don’t mind my maybe blunt doubt).
——————————
Siliconguy # 87:
Yes, trees need a time to grow well in Greenland: a warmer climate and a bit of fertile soil too…Indeed, there are today some midget little trees in the south of Greenland, which offer a tiny shadow and not much wood for the scattered local population. There’ll be also a rivers mess during the final melting down of big glaciers in that island. I agree. I’ve written before “in a century” as a more or less cautious time period…
——————————-
Rajarshi # 92:
You’re right. Renewables energies, especially solar energy for the electric grid, have a real problem with (lack of) storage and irregular production. Some analysts say the last big blackout here in Spain last year was at least partly caused by electricity corporations problems to “throw” renewables peak production on the electric national network.
—————————-
Felix C. # 96:
It’s evident I’m not JMG, so I can’t write in John name about his relocation. You’ve pointed the advantages of moving to Malaysia, they sound well. However, I’ve got some doubts about relocating to that Asian country. Well, part of its population is Muslim. I’ve been told they usually are mild and tolerant Islamic people, but: is there any politized Islamic Malaysian group? If there are Islamists: how much popular support they’ve got? Another question would be how climate change could affect Malaysia agriculture and another activities there. By the way, I’m able to point with my finger where’s that country in a map, but I won’t dare to proclame myself as a “Malaysi-ologist”. I’m sorry for my ignorance about it. I hope not to have been too rough with these doubts.
—————————-
Rashakor # 99:
I agree. What was first, evil or stupid behavior/attitude? (like egg or hen dilemma) I think it’s impossible to know it exactly, due to their mixed relation. I’ve met personally during my life much more stupid and evil people alike than smart and evil people (by luck).
—————————-
Slithy T. # 101:
By disgrace, your old joke about American politics and politicians could be told without big changes about my own country today situation, and I’m afraid maybe it could fit to the current political madness in EU high spheres and its members countries probably too…and another countries of the world outside Europe.
—————————-
Northwind Grandma # 102:
Oh, crows…I’ve seen a couple of crows, sometimes some more, eating a rabbit or fox carcass at the road side, in my town outskirts. Another crows like to
harass smaller birds to hunt them or eating their eggs; even if there are enough crows, they occassionally can dare to fight bigger hunter birds (even eagles) for a chunk of dead meat (I’ve seen it only in TV documentaries shows until now, not my real environment yet).
Dear John and commentariat,
I have nearly reached the age when I can no longer hitch a ride off of my parent’s health insurance. Now, looking at the outrageous costs and poor coverage in the United States I’m starting to wonder whether its even worth the trouble. Open to any and all advice/opinions/gripes from anyone.
@Northwind #102 RE: Crows
It has been said that the saying ‘It is a Dog eat Dog world’ is very wrong. In reality it is a ‘Bird eat bird’ kind of world. It is estimated that for every adult bird you see, they have eaten approximately 50 other younger/smaller birds. But that is the way of nature.
@Chuaquin # 106
Indeed, Malaysia has its fair share of problems.
We do have Islamists and Islamic parties.
However, their targets are non-Islamic locals, not expats.
They work more on imposing their religious sensibilities on non-Islamic locals.
Dressing, restricting liquor, pork, gambling, and singers.
They also try to infuse Islam in government schools.
Restrict non-Islamic places of worship.
All of which do not affect expats much.
There are a lot of expats in Malaysia. We also do not have much xenophobia (there is always some xenophobia, but not much). Since Malaysia was colonised by the British, the locals tend to treat whites well. So Americans or Europeans will not face any discrimination here.
(This is not always the case with Africans, sadly.)
The cost of living is much lower than in the USA.
For benchmarking: A Big Mac full meal set costs the equivalent of USD 4.
Our public healthcare system charges double the rates for foreigners, but even then, it is still cheaper than healthcare costs in the USA.
Chuaquin # 106 Law don’t allow that a common citizen ( better a subjet,….or better a servant) could denounce this.
The “bypassing” of a part of a bureaucratical process during the after elections which was told me by Anselmo is a motive of serious concern to me. I’m a “dilettante” in legal things (like in another knowledges, I know a little of everything), but I can point public civil servants in Spain (like it must happen in every democratic country) must respect every step in bureaucratic processes. They’re compelled to do it according not only to laws (starting with our Constitution, which forbids “arbitrariety” of public powers, so they can’t do everything they want to do), but also according the reglaments and ministries orders. I can only name the behavior depicted by Anselmo as a “corruptela”, a bad practice. What worries more about this topic is how spreaded could be that trick within the State. Please Anselmo, I hope you don’t mind to answer my following question, if you have any idea about it: Do you think this bad practice is spreaded in more spanish provinces?(of course, you can answer it if you want to do it).
———————————
It’s a pity the recent train accidents have made people here afraid to get on trains by evident reasons. Last speed limits and lines chaos don’t help, neither; though I think they’re partly necessary for safety reasons. I love trains as a “dilettante”, too; so I mourn this mess, in addition to the deaths, for the damage to the railways prestige. It’s interesting to point that thanks to the accident in the South high speed line, bus and Uber cars as alternative travel ways, have gone recently more expensive in their prices, which is logic in economic terms (by evident reasons, business is business), but ethically doubtful.
————————————-
Nephite # 107:
I’m sorry, I can’t help you because my European reality is different than your American situation. However, I can tell you my personal situation to compare with your situation and others too.
In my country, a lot of people (including my old parents), have a private health insurance which complements the public state health system. Which is blamed by some people as crappy and slow. The more right wing oriented is the people, the more they complains the public service, and correlatively they praise private health insurance. A heck of advertisement is made everyday in MSM
about how good is private health insurance. I guess if it was so good, do they would need so much advertisements? (Ahem) I’ve had always been only in the public state hospitals service, partly because my personal economy can’t afford a suplementary private insurance, partly because I think I’ve got the right to “enjoy” a public system which I’ve paid with my taxes to the government. In addition to this, I also think public state hospitals aren’t so bad, at least until today; though economic “neoliberalism” within main parties in my country has been doing its best to worsen and even try to dismantle the national health system. In the other hand, I see everyday the private insurance corporations aren’t as good as they sell themselves, at least watching how the thing “works” with my parents. They usually don’t have to wait so much time to see a doctor, as it happens with the govt hospitals and “health” centers, but…when real serious problems happens, the public state system has more technology and staff to try solving them. And some medical specialities usually have more doctors available in public health than in private one, for example psychiatry. Of course, the Long Decline will affect the situation I’ve depicted, but nowadays that’s the current situation here.
Oops! In my last comment, I’ve forgotten to point that, in addition to the growing bus and Uber prices thanks to the high speed disaster here, travelling by plane to Andalusia has become more expensive than before the trains accident…
Chuaquin#111
I have evidences about this bad practise is extended to all provinces without excepción.
Mr. Greer .. be careful out there, wherever you are. The meteorological word .. as I’m sure you know .. is that this extended weekend will be a Chiller of biggly proportions over much of the South and Eastern Seaboard! Stay warm & dry. If you absolutely have to tread outside, be sure to wear your crampons..
Michael G. # 108:
Indeed, crows like another opportunist scavengers (with feathers or hair) usually feed from a lot of birds eggs, which they like very much.
———————————
Felix C. # 109:
Thank you for your honest answers to my questions about Malaysia. What I see about your Islamist politicians activities depiction isn’t very appealing to my feelings, but if they aren’t interested in expats life there, and they don’t go beyond their social control attempts on local people, like you’ve pointed; they can be “pardoned”. I think your depiction maybe could be compared (with some cultural and political differences) with today Morocco; where there’s some Islamist politicians but they’re under some cynical but smart control by the State, so expats and tourists usually aren’t disturbed by them. But ironically, Moroccan King’s the Head of Local Islam there: this leads to State confusion with beliefs, but also to control over religion, which maybe doesn’t happen in Malaysia. I don’t know it. Is Malaysian government controlling local Islamists?(if you don’t mind to answer it).
The cheaper than US system maybe would be interesting for USA citizens; indeed, a lot of countries can have cheaper health systems than the American one; another countries seem to have more expensive systems, or to be huge national health services, funded with state taxes (like some EU members), but I think they’re better in their services than US health services. With all the respect to the USA commenters, American health system isn’t modelic in prices nor in protection…
——————————-
Anselmo # 110:
I’m even more puzzled than some comments before this one. I’m not a lawyer, but I thought every illegal act could be denounced by a citizen or some citizens together supported by a lawyer, to send into trial that people who commited supposedly that activity towards a court. Are you sure of it? What kind of legal tricks prevent those not very right bureaucrats acts/“omisions” to be judged properly?(answer these questions only if I don’t put you in possible trouble).
Chuaquin#115
The spanish electoral law (LOREG) only permits to the so called ” citizens” to be present like public during the act of addition of the votes( General Scrutiny). In the case of a citizen would make any coment, he could be acused of electoral crimen and detained .
In memory of one of the courageous heros of the medical research world, Peter Duesberg (1936-2026), who recently passed away.
The webpage https://www.immunity.org.uk/ currently features an obituary on its cover page. The obituary also links to some of Peter Duesberg’s articles here: https://www.immunity.org.uk/articles/peter-duesberg/
If you read about him on Wikipedia, you will (of course) find out that Peter Duesberg was a wicked AIDS denialist who nobody in their right minds should pay attention to. However the likelier way of telling this story is that Mr Duesberg, who, at the time that the AIDS story was breaking into the news was one of the world’s handful of experts on retroviruses, could never “buy” the ginned up story that HIV was a cause of AIDS. Despite warnings to tone down his rhetoric and stop writing articles casting doubt on this hypothesis, he decided to stick to his truth – and he paid the consequences. Loss of funding, and reputational damage quickly followed. He could not be fired, as he had already achieved tenure, and so he continued his work, quietly, but courageously, without funding and without reputation. A brave man, and in my eyes, a hero.
May his path into the mystery be blessed.
Eagerly awaiting your Saturn-Neptune analysis. I’ve done quite a bit of work on it myself – we’re seeing real-time dissolution of societal structures – but still very interested in your take., when do you expect to release it?
“With all the respect to the USA commenters, American health system isn’t modelic in prices nor in protection…”
Boy there is an understatement. Although both sides agree, neither side has a plan to fix it. The graft is just too rich to give up.
Two actual plans that might fix health care are Denninger’s
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=231949
Or the second one, implement Medicare for all paid for with a 20% VAT. All prices except basic foods go up 20% but health care is now covered so maybe you’ll break even? This also solves the tariff problem because according to WTO rules the VAT on imports are Not tariffs.
Well, I’ve just known the “Fiscalía” (legal organ which can ask for a trial to the Courts in the name of public/state interest) hasn’t found enough legal
motives to go on the real accusation against Julio Iglesias, who supposedly molested and brutalized two women when they worked in one of the several mansions the crooner has outside Spain. This is the legal interesting thing: Julio nor the supposed victims lived nor live now under spanish sovereignity, so the denounciations (made by the women with the supposedly humanitarian help of a NGO) won’t go to a Court (the “Audiencia Nacional”, our centralized Court for big legal mess). There’s no competence to judge under spanish laws and courts the supposed crimes commited out of our borders: to hurry up for blaming a rich and famous guy without knowing well national laws is usually wrong. I predicted this big scandal would have a short legal path, and it wouldn’t be accepted into a Court due to formal/processal reasons. I think I was right. I also said Mr. Iglesias would have an economical deal with the women (and their lawyers too) to avoid being in a trial, but I haven’t found news about it yet, so I was wrong in that prediction (by now). If an organ like the “Fiscalía” (which indeed depends partly of the Ministry of Justice, so it’s under the government, but it’s compelled to respect our laws), hasn’t wanted to challenge our legal formalism to keep on such an ideologically biased Spectacle, maybe the noisy woke hordes who were so sure of the singer guilt, must apologize for their malevolous ignorance of pressumption of innocence and the rule of law (cough cough) in their previous and paralel mediatic trial.We can wait and wait for that…we won’t see it.
———————————-
Anselmo # 113:
If you’ve got frank evidences of this bad practice in every province, you should denounce it with even more reason. Maybe it’s legally impossible for a “John Doe” citizen to do it under nowadays circumstances, but I don’t think you couldn’t tell it to a legally qualified person or group to send it to the Justice, like a trade union or a deputy…There should be a window in law to send that corrupt behavior to a trial. Even in the worst case, you could write to the “Defensor del Pueblo”(our Ombudsman) as last measure.
—————————————
Returning to the trains accidents mess, I think this disaster teaches us again a hard lesson about current political tendences, in my country and very probably, in every western democracies, whose democratic real quality is going down faster than we could think, especially the real and reasonable democratic debate (more and more limited to the polarized and tensioned echo chambers competing for the spectacular hegemony). Last train accidents and last Valencia floods show us again and again that today politics and politicians (it doesn’t matter how they self-label themselves) don’t help to fix problems, like it would be desirable in a real democratic context, but they worsen the problems; because themselves they’re a problem. Parties which are ruling now my country are dysfunctional because their agenda is only to keep themselves on the power (with their MSM pets and political hooligans supporting them). And opposition parties own agenda is evidently to reach power, whatever price they want to pay (with their correlative mediatic serfs and political hooligans). By the way, I also think that if I could count every zealots from one and the other side, maybe political hooligans wouldn’t reach half of Spain population; but they make a lot of noise in social media. I see most people around me usually has mild political ideas or they’re simply apathic about politics. Finally, I think left parties are a void container since some years ago. Behind the “fig leaf” of their noisy woke doctrine (with their correlative cultural wars), and their social subsidies culture, there’s no much…or nothing. An empty shell. They’re toothless against “neoliberal” economical factic powers.
In the other hand, right wing parties in their simetrical Spectacle version, are approaching fast to the empty shell level, like their apparent leftist enemies; due to their correlative “fig leaf”(their own cultural wars for reaching power), which is hiding their ugly and dirty face: economical “neoliberalism”, slightly more aggresive than the economics allowed “de facto” by our “Progressive” government. Finally, economics have eaten real politics, me think.
One more meme, if you even want to call it that, for the weekend… for some of us, the Christian Nationalism seems to connect right back to the era of televangelism, ugh.
https://imgur.com/a/sbCwldk
Pentagon & prayer services, sounds like a contradiction to me…
https://publicwitness.wordandway.org/p/hegseth-shares-war-psalm-he-prayed
Instead of the spiritual warfare of prayer, why not that weird training manual
https://archive.org/details/FirstEarthBattalionManual
Nephite #107
I’ll sugest you to move to an European country excepting Spain because fading public medical insurance and low salaries. Italy ? Could be. France is heading to civil unrest for inmigration, Germany, Switzerland ,Norway and Finland, the same and too near of Russia. Swiss ? Dificult to remain there. Good look !
@ NephiteNeophyte #107
You know people get hung up on methods of paying for “healthcare” – whether private, via insurance, or public, via taxes, or some combination of the two. What seldom gets discussed is the merits of the product known as “healthcare”.
The thing is that what will be called “healthcare” (and also, what canNOT be called healthcare) is increasingly decided by bureaucrats whose decisions are “guided” by vested interests. Said interests have actually become very acclimatised to a situation in which they do NOT have to sell their products to individual people. It is quite a few decades since they had to bother to market them to individual doctors, even.
To them, there is little difference between marketing their wares to an insurance company executive, and marketing their wares to a public health board executive. In both cases, “public” or “private”, their marketing pitch (together with any off-script incentive offers) is made to a tiny group of individuals whose decisions will subsequently impact the specifics of the “healthcare” that will be administered to millions of patients.
To my mind it is worth beginning with a thorough inventory of your own actual health, and from there decide what your health needs are likely to be, and from there, begin to shop – not for whatever “healthcare” SAYS it thinks you need, but for what you decide that you ACTUALLY need.
In my humble opinion ** there are a few things that standard “healthcare” still does very well. In emergencies, they are very good at stabilising people who are grievously injured or collapsed, getting their systems re-started, their bleeding stopped, their bones re-set, and so on. Please note, the vast majority of this type of medicine still entails the practiced application of *skills* which are best learned on the job, through some of the few remaining hands on “apprenticeship” style areas of medical training occurring in places like Emergency Departments. Personally, I would be happy to see this kind of healthcare – little of which is routine, much of which happens to people unexpectedly out of the blue – together with a robust emergency response service publicly funded, in order to supply emergency healthcare to all who need it when they need it.
However standard “healthcare” is really not doing so well with the epidemics of chronic and debilitating conditions we now suffer, which arise from a cocktail of the kinds of toxic exposures that our industrial societies specialise in, and indeed, some of which are either caused or exacerbated by the pharmaceutical products that are now the *other* 90% of what “healthcare” consists – by far the most corrupt, and bureaucratically controlled, part. Personally I would like to see both public and private mass purchasing organisations (private insurance companies and public health departments) banned from being involved in this market, because of the extent to which they degrade and discredit it. They are not helping!
(Not that I have any great ideas of HOW to accomplish this up my sleeve – 😉 )
I am now 65, and it is ten years since I have seen a doctor. I do not see a need to maintain any kind of health insurance cover under current circumstances. However, I do live in a country (Ireland) where the kind of basic emergency response that I mentioned above is still either fully publicly funded or publicly subsidised. Therefore, when I fell off my bike 10 years ago, I’m happy to say that I was scooped up off the road and delivered to hospital by ambulance at no charge to me. The emergency department scanned every part of me, determined which bones were broken (only one rib, it turned out), and where I was bleeding (a nick to my kidney and my spleen, it turned out) and kept me under supervision for five days until the internal bleeding had stopped. The only charge to me, as a public patient, was the subsidised rate of EUR80 per day of hospital stay. No charges were levied for any of the emergency response, or the emergency scans, examinations, etc. I recovered, and continued my recovery at home with the help of some of the comfrey from my garden, and have not needed a doctor since then. Not that I am never sick. But I have never been sick enough not to be able to ride it through with my own home resources.
So, since you asked, my basic advice is, if you can find a very basic barebones plan that covers emergency response (accidents, falls, injuries, sudden collapses, kind of thing), that should cover you in states that lack any public emergency response care. After that, unless you suffer already from a chronic illness for which you need continued treatment that is too expensive to pay for, look into all of the ways to support your daily health using your own resources. Be very suspicious of any enticements to get regular checkups or tests – these are often used as gateways to bring you within the ambit of drugs you don’t need, and which may harm you. (This is my personal opinion, and you are entitled to take it with heaps of salt, if you wish). 🙂
May your health be blessed!
** disclaimer – I am a practicing licenced acupuncturist whose patients pay me out of pocket for my services as and when they need them… I make sure to keep my prices so low that even poor people can afford them, which means my patients can afford to pay me out of pocket for my services as and when they need them.
Chuaquin #120
There is a political party (“Iustitia Europa”) involved in It , without sucess.
@ Darkest Yorkshire, have the symptoms you describe been checked out medically? Could they not be a blocked carotid artery? – surely more common than electrosensitivity.
Scotlyn @123
One area where modern medicine has been a blessing for older people has been joint replacement. I have had a hip. Various friends have had hips, knees, shoulders done in CA, US, Aus, Jap, Mx: different systems but all great results. I have also had friends achieve great results with heart surgery: pacemakers and bypasses and with thrombosis in the leg. It would be nice to be able to retain this without all the pill pushing, but I’m not sure how that would be accomplished.
Stephen
Reading about Julio Iglesias reminds me of the Justin Baldoni fracas. Anybody here keep up with that? Blake Lively (wife of Ryan Reynolds) is suing Baldoni over alleged sexual harassment on the set of the movie “It Ends With Us,” directed by Baldoni and co-staring Baldoni and Lively (as a in with a troubled marriage). Baldoni is counter-suing (he claims Lively and Reynolds tried to take control of the movie), and has financed a small army of PR people / bots out there trying to influence internet opinion. Complicating the dispute is the fact that Baldoni and his main financial backer are Baha’is (Baldoni says he can’t be sexist, because his religion is totally against that), so now it is possible to read quotes from Deadpool about how the Baha’is are a cult. (They’re about even with the Mormons IMHO.) If anybody saw “Deadpool and Wolverine,” the character of “Nicepool” was apparent;y inspired by Baldoni. Anyway, I’m sure the courts can sort this out, the Baha’i Faith can fend for itself, and the various actors will be fine.
On living in Malaysia: foreigners can do this through the “Malaysia My Second Home” (MM2H) program, which requires a substantial deposit / investment and gives you a ten-year residence visa. (There is no realistic path to citizenship.) This is mainly attractive to ethnic Chinese, but some Western digital nomads and such also participate. The program hit a hiccup a couple of years ago when it was suddenly discontinued, then relaunched with different conditions, causing distrust among potential participants. Islam is not a major issue for foreigners there. The main complaints from local Chinese and Indian groups have to do with affirmative-action quotas that award various preferences to (Muslim) Malays as indigenous–you can’t start a business and hire ten ethnic Indians, for example, and universities reserve most of their places for the relatively non-performing Malays. But there are nice beaches, and the general quality of life is at a Western level. At certain times of the year there is high pollution from farmer’s burning their fields (a problem common to several SE Asian countries).
Anselmo (no. 122) “I’ll sugest you to move to an European country excepting Spain because fading public medical insurance and low salaries.”
The same is broadly true of Greece. Yes, there’s a European-style health care system, but good luck getting a doctor to do anything without under-the-table payments.
Emmanuel Goldstein (no. 90) “My wild guess is Ithaca, NY.”
Nice little town–the slogan used to be that “Ithaca is gorges”–but winter lasts half the year there. If you’re worried about a collapse (I realize it’s supposed to be slow), then you may want somewhere south-er, where heating is less of an issue, and you can grow food for more of the year.
The burnt-over district does seem apropos, though. Ithaca even has a house where Mme Blavatsky stayed in. Also, the Dalai Lama has spent a couple of extensive stays there.
As for where JMG is going to move to, I’ll guess Virginia Beach. It’s got the 700 Club, it’s got Edgar Cayce and a couple of other New Age-y groups like that, it was one of several beach towns that inspired the cartoon “Steven Universe.”
Scotlyn #117 – Thank you so much for the links re: Peter Duesberg. Decades ago, I remember reading a library book that challenged the idea that HIV caused AIDS, discussed lifestyle factors, and, IIRC, disputed the conclusions of a certain powerful scientist (who’s name became linked to a more recent epidemic/scare-demic). I had wanted to track down & reread the book, but simply was unable to recall the author’s name or the book title. Now, with the info and links you provided, that mystery may now be solved. It was a very interesting book and well worth a re-read.
Justin #121: “Pentagon & prayer services, sounds like a contradiction to me…https://publicwitness.wordandway.org/p/hegseth-shares-war-psalm-he-prayed”
Then again: “He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one.” (Luke 22:36)
Yavana, there is also the Gospel acoording to Twain:
“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle — be Thou near them! With them — in spirit — we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; …
We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
— Mark Twain, War Prayer, 1905
Yep, Yavanna #130 If you want to be a pacifist or peacemaker the Bible has verses for you. If want to be or need to be a stalwart warrior or law enforcement or have to be ready for self defense or defending others there are verses for you also. Reality is complicated not simple, calling for wisdom and discernment in application and actions. Godliness is a varied state of being.
To Chaquin and Ambrose
The full story of how Malaysia got to where it is today is long and requires a full essay to discuss.
If you are interested, we can discuss this privately.
Suffice it to say that Malaya was envisioned as a secular, liberal democracy at its founding.
Unfortunately, one of the drafters of the Malaysian constitution inserted a clause, “The official religion of the Federation is Islam, while other religions may be practised”.
It was a sop to the Malays (Muslim) community. At that time, the Malay population was 48%, the Chinese 43%, the Indians 8%, and 1% others (Eurasians, Aborigines (the true natives of Malaya), and Siamese.)
But events happened.
Malaya was joined with Singapore, which was 80% Chinese. A combined Malaya-Singapore would mean the Chinese would be a majority. This upset the Malays. So a compromise was made to join North Borneo and Sarawak to Malaya and Singapore to form Malaysia.
The reason was to dilute the Chinese votes. However, North Borneo and Sarawak are Christian-majority states.
This then upset the Malays, who then decided Islamise North Borneo and Sarawak.
A political coup was launched against the Christian Premier of Sarawak and thereafter until today all Sarawak Premiers have been Muslim despite Christians being and still a majority.
A similar event happened in North Borneo/Sabah. This time, the government gave citizenship to Muslim Filipinos fleeing the conflicts in Sulu and Mindanao. This changed the demography of North Borneo from a Christian majority state to a slight Muslim majority.
The Malays also wanted to dominate the politics of Malaysia, which they have done to this very day. This led to a crisis with the Chinese majority Singapore and Singapore left the Federation of Malaysia.
At the same time, the birth rate of Malays is very high and so fast forward to today, Muslims are a majority of 60% of the population of the combined Federation.
Many Chinese and Indians migrated. So you may meet former Malaysians in the USA, Australia, UK, Canada, NZ and mostly to Singapore.
Malaysian citizenship is exclusive. So anyone who wants to be Malaysian has to give up their existing citizenship which will not appeal to most Westeners.
@Scotlyn #123 Re: Paying for Healthcare
Perhaps without meaning to, you have suggested a healthcare plan likely to be stable for the future–
Barebones insurance against catastrophic (and moderately rare) illness, publicly-funded emergency services, and cash payment for health maintenance that goes directly to the provider.
In my part of Canada, government controls healthcare costs by preventing or discouraging doctors and nurse practitioners from diagnosing illnesses. This may be partly because of few doctors and fewer specialists, but the end result is that (for example) many cancers go undiagnosed until people are terminally ill, and diabetes undetected until it’s necessary to amputate a limb.
Critically important medical care may be delayed for years. A 45-year-old in our town broke his hip in a motorcycle accident, and had to wait two years to get a hip replacement. During that time, he hobbled around on crutches (wearing out the hip joint on the other side), lost his job and went on welfare, and acquired a narcotic addiction due to chronic pain. How is THAT any sort of healthcare, or cost savings? Early detection and management would be cheaper, but we haven’t figured out how to do that. Emergency services are very good. On the other hand, hospitals are closing, or in some cases, only open 9-5 M-F because of staffing issues.
Naturopaths and other alt-health practitioners are allowed. You pay cash to see them, and you can see them right away. People come see me in the pharmacy for illnesses, because there is no one else who can look them over on the same day. I can often set them up with tele-doctor services, give them a tetanus shot or an Epinephrine (EpiPen) for life-threatening allergic reactions. I can prescribe for urinary tract infections and other routine conditions.
All of this is precarious at best. Despite socialized healthcare, it costs $500 to $1000 to be taken to hospital by ambulance, and (even without any public health emergency) our small local hospital is so full that, when you get there, you may be put into a bed or stretcher in a hallway. There is pressure to allow private-pay healthcare. Some retired physicians are offering limited treatment for cash payments, as a side-hustle. In the pharmacy, we can now offer testing for strep throat for payment. You can still get strep testing free at lab services in the next town, but a prescriber has to prescribe it. Tele-docs can’t look down your throat, and your wait to see a ‘walk-in’ doctor is next business day, with an appointment, or 4 to 6 weeks to see your family doctor–if you have one. Waiting to treat a strep infection for 6 weeks risks damage to heart valves. Bacteria do not follow healthcare delays.
I can see Canada going to catastrophic health care insurance with a deductible, modeled on travel insurance plans that cover us when visiting other countries. We could continue with publicly-funded emergency care, and allow private-pay medical care where the payment goes directly to regular doctors, as it now does to naturopaths, acupuncturists, chiropractors and others.
While the nation has failed to solve the question of how to pay for health care in the US, a second problem has emerged. The prices themselves are extremely high – regardless of who pays and how – because of the intervention of private equity and the like into healthcare. This also seems to have generated a third problem, that health care – regardless of how pays and how and regardless of price – has deteriorated because the entire system has been restructured to maximize profit rather than health.
Fixing the health insurance problem wouldn’t by itself fix the other problems.
Siliconguy # 119:
Well, my paragraph was an idea about the American health system which isn’t strange to find between USA expats here and online. Of course, I didn’t want to teach lessons to US people from Europe; and even less to export our national health system, which isn’t really perfect nor free (indeed it’s public funded by taxes). I think, like JMG does, we must avoid to give advices for commenters out of our respective countries, about how should be politics, economics and so on, in their countries. And I agree.
I’ve read your comment and your link. The link proposal seems to me reasonable within the American context. No argument here. However, I guess whatever attempt to reform every country health system seriously means to open a can of worms; it’s even worse when there’s an evident bipartisanship and high political tension in USA. I won’t say more (good luck!).
——————————
Anselmo (your last comments):
I didn’t know the LOREG (an ugly name IMHO!) real text was such as “draconian” as electoral law. If you also say some attempt to better that situation has been attempted but without success yet, I won’t write more about it.
———————————
Train-ology news:
Under the current spectacular “war news”, some interesting hard data have appeared about high speed train accident. A new attention focus for journalists here are now the “checkers” trains. ADIF, our state controlled railways corporation, has some special hi tech trains which periodically check the rails. How periodically? In this point the competing Spectacle between government and opposition prevent the cautious reader to go beyond that.
However, we can ask rethorically to authorities: If those hi tech trains check periodically the railways, why didn’t they detect the damaged steel? According a research center, the steel section was broken (micro-broken) before the high speed train went over it and eventually derailed. Although definitive cause(s) of the accident won’t be really known until the ongoing metalographic studies will finish, about steel rail sections found in the accident place. If it’s showed that metal was too old (so it had to be replaced), or too used, there would be bad news for ADIF bosses, and for the Minister, and for the President of spanish government. We’ll see.
————————-
It’s a wry irony I’ve had to defend (like a few others here) the pressumption of innocence (within the rule of law) for Julio Iglesias, against the infamous mediatic trials, paralel and previous to his legal trial. A trial that it won’t be made in
Spain, like I’ve said before this current comment, by processal motives.
I don’t like his music, I’m not rich, nor a Conservative, I’m not a playboy. However, I don’t like deep envy nor an ideological doctrine against him, like his haters like too much…
———————
The current debate in this blog about health care: well, public funded health care systems seems to me slightly better in general terms than private insurance systems, because for serious problems, I can witness they work better. However, the state public system is too huge and burocratized to survive the Long Descent, and before this descent worsens, “neoliberal” economical politics are eager to dismantle it slowly (or not slowly) to give that health cake to the private sector. Many of the real problems of public health at least in
Spain, like long waiting lists and crappy facilities, come more from the lack of enough funding (often derived into the private sector by Conservative politics) than from bureaucracy in itself. I think in the long term, the best and only solution
to the health predicament would be the self-management by citizens of their health, it’s maybe an utopia, I don’t know…
————————-
Ambrose # 127:
Your writing about Baldoni and his financial backer being Bahais, reminds me what a person told me some months ago. She had worked time ago with Bahai people, and she found them too arrogant, in a sense of moral supremacy against another people outside their religion. I don’t know this opinion was too biased against that belief, but it makes me think.
****
Relocation to Malaysia:
Well, your personal depiction of that country seems interesting to me, but not enough to start the adventure to relocation in a very different cultural, social, economical and political context, from my European view.
@ Stephen Pearson #126
The thing about health and caring for health is that one size definitely does not fit all. Certainly joint replacement has become very popular, and in my experience (my clinic is a very general rural practice so I meet people of all ages!) it works extremely well for some, and also fails catastrophically for others, with a largish middle group who gain some and lose some but can continue muddling on, as we all must do.
Again, the discussion of *how to pay* very often eclipses the discussion of *what you get for what [whoever] pays*. I would surely like to get the discussion going further into the second, and also, opening up more alternatives to people.
On the matter of joints, I will share my own perspective in relation to my own body. (And I would like to say that since I see every patient who comes to me as the chooser and disposer of their own body, I do not ever “recommend” that anyone else adopt my perspective on their body. People are differently placed in all sorts of ways. My job is simply to support whatever they are doing to the best of my skill and capacity).
Firstly, I realised the strength with which I object to the notion of ever allowing a foreign “joint” to be inserted into my body during a random conversation about stiffness in our hips that I was having with another woman I do Tai Chi lessons with. When she suggested that I might need to consider having my hip evaluated for a replacement someday, my unconsidered response was unexpectedly (to myself) vehemently negative. Therefore I realise that I have firmly closed off this avenue for myself, and even though I do suffer from perennial stiffness and tightness and sometimes pain in my hips, I believe that my gut decision is still the right one for me.
So, what to do? I am continuing to use the lessons of Tai Chi to work on posture, gait and other habits, and am beginning to notice real gains in the past couple of months since the issue became crystallised for me in this way. I am learning more about joint health, and playing with herbs, with acupuncture and other treatments. And, I am personally laughing at my devils.
For what it’s worth. 🙂
Scotlyn #117:
This idea that HIV doesn’t cause AIDS is new to me. If not HIV, then what? I’m not necessarily averse to the idea, but as I said, it’s new to me.
@ PatriciaT #129
There is a whole bunch of “dam*ned” (in the Fortean sense of the word) history to be unearthed there – although it may well be a couple of centuries before anyone dares… 🙂
One thing I will mention, since I found it out recently, but did not see it mentioned much in Duesberg’s work, is that (it turns out) an experimental Hepatitis B vaccine was trialled during the years 1979 and 1980, in a specifically targeted study population. The trials sought to enroll members of the specific demographics then considered to be most “at risk” of contracting Hepatitis B – to wit, injectable drug addicts and promiscuous gay men.
This is a link to one of the early reports on the trials https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/hep.1840010502. And here is a link to one of the early “what’s causing this AIDS thing” articles, which actually mentions the speculative possibility that Hepatitis B might be a cause. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/hep.1840010502
However, as soon as the CDC announced by press conference in 1984 that HIV had been determined to BE the cause of AIDS, all such speculation became verboten. Peter Duesberg, who was among those who continued to question that hypothesis, when asked what *could* have caused the genuinely horrific illnesses that were killing promiscuous gay men and drug addicts in the years 1980-1984 completely absolved sex from the equation (we’ve been doing that for millions of years, he said, and we should not let this health crisis put us in fear of human sexual contact), but put his focus on the high intake of both recreational and prescription drugs that a promiscuous homosexual lifestyle might entail. He also pointed out that AZT and other anti-retroviral drugs which are all cytotoxic, and which, after 1984 were increasingly administered to asymptomatic HIV-positive people, essentially became “AIDS by prescription.” (His term).
However, such highly drug-fuelled lifestyles were ALSO being lived by some in American cities through all the decades of the 20th century, and, although the health hazards of high drug intakes were well known, the first wave of AIDS illness WAS different, WAS horrific, and remains unexplained solely by drug exposure levels which were already high for small, urban populations well before 1980. So, my personal take on this, is that the coincidental timing that links the enrolment of “high risk for Hep B” demographic members in 1979, and the emergence of AIDS as a specific syndrome in that same demographic, in the same cities where the trials were run, in 1980, is worthy of more study at some future time when scholars are far enough from the exigencies of today to go unearth the relevant materials.
Chuaquin #119
LOREG (Art. 147) from 3 to 12 months of prisión.
@ Karen #138
Of course you haven’t heard of this possibility. It is not allowed to be part of normal discourse in respectable circles, and therefore the people who tend to hear of it, venture to look into it, and/or share it, tend towards the slightly disreputable, or have little or nothing to lose. 🙂
Still if you want to find out more than what I myself have said in the comments here – including the comment immediately below yours (#139), then you could do worse than poke around this old, but still interesting website. https://www.virusmyth.com/aids/
Best wishes, and never let anyone dissuade you from “doing your own research”… 🙂
re my own of #139
To clarify – I should have specified “….drug exposure levels which were already high for small, urban-BASED SUB-CULTURES well before 1980.” Obviously, no urban area ever hosted a *whole* population given to very high drug intakes, however small sub-cultures given to doing so have certainly existed within many urban parts of many countries for centuries.
Felix C. # 133:
It seems modern Malaysia history is made of some unstable balances between religions, ethnic groups and territories. I’m not by system against multiethnic and beliefs plural countries, but I also see they’re more difficult to rule with governments which respect democracy and fair game. However, I think (according your depiction), Malaysia hasn’t done very bad, if we compare it with other (majority) Muslim countries.
——————————
Emmanuel G. # 134:
It looks like, according your description, that Canada health system isn’t a motive for envy for another countries…
————————-
Scotlyn # 117:
I don’t want to argue wether Mr. Duesberg was right or not about HIV and AIDS relation (or its possible lack of relation). My relative ignorance about medical topics prevents me to write possible not accurate ideas. What I can tell you, with all my respect, is Mr. Duesberg life story, as a lone scientist against the system, sounds very much to me like a Faustian time story. He could be right (or not), I only point this personal impression.
——————-
Train-ology:
I’ve been thinking about how fragile are complex systems. The more complex is a technological system, the more catastrophic can be its failures. Another topic related with high speed: first spanish line was opened in 1992, a year in which the government wanted to show Spain as a modern country, far from the dictatorship times. It was the year of Seville Expo (500 years since first Columbus journey) and Barcelona Olympics. High speed trains models then were France and Japan. The ‘90s and the current century first decades a lot of high speed lines were built, they had become a Progress symbol for near everybody, under the “reasoning”: more speed, more progress. Only a few ecologists broke the sociopolitical consensus, pointing high speed high electricity consumption, and another dirty secrets of those trains: railways had to be closed to human and animal interferences for evident reasons, so the lines indeed cut wild areas in several “islands” which wildlife can’t trespass. High speed lines eats a lot of money, so conventional trains are less funded and they decline. New lines usually connects big towns, but not smaller towns, which isn’t very fair to those ones. It’s interesting to notice that in the current “debate”, the two Spectacles ignore the environmental and social hidden price of this Progress icon.
As an esotericst I accept that war is part of the human condition. As an esotericist I can also do my part to promote peace and peacemaking, the art of diplomacy.
Sometimes I have to question the theological perspective of the people in power and how that influenced their actions. Dominionism seems to be a clear influence in this administration.
As a polytheist dominionism doesnt make much sense to me. But there are other Christian theologies that I can understand much better – the universalist strand descended from Gerard Winstanley for instance, and Gnostic strands on the other. As well as a lot of other variety…I grew up in a fundy Christian house and I still hang with family & friends whose views I dont share. I know the Bible, but Im rusty in some areas of it, because I have found a better home personally in other texts from other traditions… The I Ching has really “changed” me these past few years of study,for instance, and the powers in the Mabanogion continue their call…
So I think there is room for different religions and practices in America. The dominionists however, not so much.
How those views, and various Christian prophetic beliefs about the destiny of America, and how those lead to escalation of military adventurism is something I will continue to question.
@ Emmanuel Goldstein #134
I suspect that any “healthcare plan likely to be stable for the future–” will be one that will be cobbled together (and may already be BEing cobbled together) by ourselves. I think that skills will be more future-proof (and also more AI-proof) than drugs, and hopefully the really skillful doctors and other practitioners – like the one who put my neighbour’s shoulder back into its socket just last week – will both practice and apprentice others to practice these skills.
From your own point of view, it may be worthwhile to collect pharmacopia and materia medica texts from previous centuries… I suspect that some of those outdated prescriptions may prove to be useful, and the skills of actually compounding the medicines, as well as purveying them, even more so. But one of the biggest skills is attentiveness, and it sounds like you are already well-versed, and playing your own part. 🙂
Be well, stay free!
Re: AIDS
I read some Duisberg maybe 20 years ago and thought that excluding HIV as cause of AIDS might have been somewhat defensible in the 1980s in the USA, but didn’t make any sense anymore since the end of the 1990s and worldwide.
The anti-retroviral drugs were specifically designed to inhibit HIV enzymes (not human nor hepatitis B enzymes) and prolonged the life of AIDS patients immensely. In countries like Brazil, the epidemic was never mainly among men who have sex with men or among drug users – it was becoming widespread among the general heterosexual population and on the point of exploding in numbers until the health minister broke the patents of the anti-retroviral drugs ca. 1998 and started distributing them widely and freely (plus other measures like campaigns for preservatives).
In countries like Lesotho or Botswana, a considerable part of the young adult population died ca. 1995-2005. There was no hepatitis B vaccine campaign nor sudden widespread drug use that I know of. I find it hard to see any other explanation than the run of the mill one – HIV causes AIDS and can be suppressed (though not eliminated) by anti-retroviral drugs.
@Karen 138: The latter half of RFK Jr’s book on Fauci is about this notion/theory. Quite informative, to the point of being long-winded. Of course you need not believe any of it.
As JMG has said the 70’s was the decade when the beginning of a decades long transition to living within biospheric and ecological limits needed to begin. The requirement for that transition was a widespread understanding of and acceptance of that change on the part of people guided by wise legislative and executive actions on the part of the governmental and regulatory organizations. Sigh, what a pipe dream knowing the weaknesses of humanity. The next century or so will be doing the transition the forced and hard way. In the meantime various tempests in a teapot hold people’s attention while hard limits are approaching.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/border-patrol-agent-shoots-armed-suspect-minneapolis
This is coming within millimeters of what I would call Bleeding Kansas 2: Electric Boogaloo. Not there yet but very very close. It took about 6 years for the country to slide into civil war once it got going.
“I am learning more about joint health, and playing with herbs, with acupuncture and other treatments.”
I have recurrent tendinitis and other unhappy ligaments. Boswellia helps me. The resin is what is left after they distill off the frankincense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boswellic_acid
In bottled form it’s listed as boswellia serrata and available from the jungle river or probably from a good health food store. I’ve personally have noted no side effects. It does take five to seven days to take effect, then I noticed it didn’t hurt any more.
Given your increased frequency in approving comments may I assume you are settling in at your new digs and will be updating your About JMG sidebar soon with a city other than East Providence?
Regardless, I hope you’re doing well and not about to get punched in the teeth by the weather.
I realize now I was skipping over the solar eclipse on 17 February i.e. before the Saturn-Neptune conjunction on the 20th. I thought it was going to be no biggie for the US as it’s an annular eclipse over Antarctica. Wrong! It’s slap-bang on the Ascendant as seen from DC so sure to be significant. Of course, that new moon is also the start of the Chinese new year – the fire horse. Interesting times await!
Scotlyn, thanks for your comments on HIV and health care. All of it is most interesting.
Emmanuel Goldstein #134:
“Barebones insurance against catastrophic (and moderately rare) illness, publicly-funded emergency services, and cash payment for health maintenance that goes directly to the provider.”
That’s more or less what American health care used to be, 40 years ago or more. Health insurance was intended to cover unexpected large expenses such as hospitalization. People paid for office visits directly to the provider and for most prescriptions out of pocket, because they didn’t cost much and nearly everyone could afford it. My dad owned a small business and had to provide health insurance for his few employees. He called it “major medical” or “hospitalization” because that’s what it was for.
A few notes as the wind rattles the windows…
I am still in transit, but due to the timing of the several phases of professional moving, I’m currently staying in regular commenter Peter Van Erp’s AirB&B room, and will be here for several days — interestingly enough, during precisely those days when we’re supposed to get heavy snow. So I’m fine, and have unimpeded internet access during this time. (Also plenty of time to work on the latest writing projects.) So far everything’s going very well for me.
I’ve finished the next regular post, “Evil Makes You Stupid: A Case Study,” in rough draft, and so should have no trouble posting it this coming Wednesday. If all goes well, I’ll be online regularly from then on, so should be able to resume blogging promptly. The analysis of the upcoming Saturn-Neptune conjunction is also well under way, so should be posted in early February. All in all, then, things are moving ahead well, and the end of this year’s hiatus is well within sight.
Oh, one other thing. The Goobers from Germany are back, attempting to post scores of identical comments to the same post of mine, and it’s possible that some comments are getting accidentally flagged as spam while that goes on. (My spam filter tends to go on the “gobble ’em all, let my digestive tract sort ’em out” principle when the spam gets too thick.) With any luck, I’ll be able to liberate your comments from durance vile, but some may get lost. It’s not you, it’s a bunch of incompetent search engine optimization firms from Germany.
JMG, glad to hear your move is going smoothly and may it continue to do so.
Commentariat, I hope you all hang in there during this weather event.
If anyone has some brief spare seconds to spare in sending me and my house a blessing /prayer during the upcoming weather; I would appreciate it. I’m having some furnace trouble that can’t be fixed until it’s warmer.
@ JMG 154
Well, that’s great news! I miss you when you are gone, and it does seem like there is much to talk about. Many things I would like to hear your take on.
It’s always nice to have something to look forward to!
@ Aldarion # 146
“The anti-retroviral drugs were specifically designed to inhibit HIV enzymes (not human nor hepatitis B enzymes)…” These drugs are cytotoxic, and interfere with human cellular replication. They destroy human cells (whether they happen to be occupied by a virus, or not).
“…and prolonged the life of AIDS patients immensely.”
I wonder what is the basis of comparison you are working with – which AIDS patients’ longevity are you comparing to which AIDS patients’ longevity? Or, have you succumbed to a bait and switch, whereby the comparison you are citing is *really* between the original sufferers of the genuine, and mysterious, illness that presented to hospitals between 1980 and 1984, and the later group of totally asymptomatic, but very frightened, people testing HIV positive, who were given “prophylactic” prescriptions of anti-retrovirals, whose cytotoxic effects were then ascribed to the development of the AIDS syndrome they were already “fated” to suffer, rather than to the known, and pernicious, effects of the drugs?
The proper comparison, which is also the highly censored comparison would be the one between groups of people who tested positive for HIV and opted NOT to take antiretrovirals, and groups of people who tested positive for HIV and opted to accept the anti-retroviral drugs.
What you risk discovering (if you can bear to go looking beneath the layers of relevant censorship to find out) is that there are still many people who tested HIV positive decades who are still alive and perfectly healthy, but what they have in common is that none of them opted to take antiretroviral drugs.
The link below is a very short – 10-minute – video telling the story of a film that won multiple awards and yet was cancelled from being shown in venue after venue because its content was considered to be too “sensitive”. What was the film? “Positive Hell”, 2016, telling the personal stories of five Spanish individuals who defied their doctors, and very often their family members, by refusing the “prophylactic” anti-retroviral drugs you are talking about, and who have lived on for nearly thirty years with a diagnosis of imminent death.
https://youtu.be/e2klid3bhio
“Everything is held together with stories. That is all that is holding us together, stories and compassion.” – Barry Lopez
Aldarion # 146:
Thanks for your view about AIDS epidemics in several Third World countries. It seems that even a relatively ignorant on medical science like I am, I can understand it. If anti-retroviral drugs against HIV enzymes work preventing early death within AIDS infected people, there’s a clear cause-effect relation between that retrovirus and the disease. So no argument here. “Dissident” view is contrafactual.
By the way, I think freedom of speech is important to sciences too, to debate different theories…before near every scientists reach a consensus.
——————————
Beardtree # 148:
Yes, the ‘70s could have been an optimum start to the transition beyond business as usual to an ecological society around the world. It wasn’t made then, so of course we can easily do the math now and looking to the future. Your reference to the “tempests in a teapot” which distract people from hard limits approaching to them (and us) reminds me one more time the Spectacle term. Well, Spectacles. Bread and circus.
——————————
JMG # 154:
I’m glad to read you again after doing it less times lately. I see you’re fine and you’re planning to resume writing posts again. Very good!
(In the other hand, it’s a pity the German nightmare has returned its “attacks” again).
———————————-
I’ve known recently that some people who protested against far right Israeli government politics (attacks against Palestinian civilians in Gaza) during the bike race “Vuelta Ciclista a España”), have been heavily fined, according the current law against illegal demonstrations. Which was approved by last Conservative spanish government, but it was kept by the following and current “Progressive” govt. Maybe because that law with its highly expensive fines can be useful
to disuade right wing people to protest without our woke govt permission…I remember President Sánchez and another members of the ruling leftist coallition cheered, or at least excused, the demonstrators rage during the incidents, during the last year race. I think the fined demonstrators can learn (if they want to do it) a hard lesson about the cognitive disonance: a central “Progressive” govt which praises demonstrations against Israel but then it ruthlessly fines some of the demonstrators (who, ironically, I guess they often are far leftists, like some of the parties which support the “Socialist” govt., for example the Commies). After the Spectacle of apparent support to Palestinians, everyday reality has come.
Here in Western Oregon we may have Portland crazies, a nutty governor, summer fires and the future prospect of Chinese Pirates. But for now we have the most beautiful, sunny, clear dry weather imaginable, and it has been going on for two weeks now while the rest of the country freezes under near Blizzard conditions.
What was our host saying about the dangers of “mindfulness” meditation? Seems like it’s going around:
https://jamesgmartin.center/2026/01/the-mindfulness-degree/
> Willoughby Britton—who runs a support group for people who have experienced psychological and physical harm from meditation—has described potential side effects in stark terms: “People describe a loss of emotion beyond what they wanted, and loss of motivation or enjoyment of things.”
Chuaquin (no. 136) “She had worked time ago with Bahai people, and she found them too arrogant, in a sense of moral supremacy against another people outside their religion. I don’t know this opinion was too biased against that belief, but it makes me think.”
I like most of them as people, and there’s a lot to like about their theology (like the anti-racism / “world civilization” aspect). The thing is, a key principle of the religion is “progressive revelation”–the notion that the major religions of the world all represent genuine messages from God, with later ones updating earlier ones (so Jews should have become Christians, who should have become Muslims, etc.). The Baha’is are the most recent update, so if everybody else thought about the question fairly (and had heard of the Baha’is), they’d surely join. Alas, religions tend to degenerate after their original prophet, divide into sects, and develop corrupt priesthoods who persecute the next prophets. Fortunately, this can never happen to the Baha’i Faith, since God has guaranteed that it will convert the whole world and last for thousands of years more. (No new prophet can arise for at least 1000 years, in case you’re wondering.) All this encourages a certain “Lo is us!” attitude (as one wag put it). Combined with the relatively authoritarian nature of the religion–there have been infallible leaders and interpreters, and now a supreme council whose decisions are guided by God–this has discouraged the kind of alternative (often liberal) interpretations or openness to historical criticism that you see in other religions.
All that said, individual Baha’is are usually not this triumphal, and well recognize (for example) that the religion is not actually growing, and that world peace is not actually on the verge of being established. (In my younger days, one often heard that this would happen by the year 2000.) Many will, if pressed, confess to doubts about the teachings against homosexuality, or the exclusion of women from that supreme council I mentioned (even though equality of the sexes is otherwise a major principle). One liberal writer and ex-believer, Juan Cole–he’s a Middle East historian, you may have seen his op-eds–thinks that “fundamentalists” took over the religion and forced out what used to be a big crowd of countercultural types. There are also noticeable differences in the attitudes of ethnic Persians (who have a big presence in many countries) and other, more local ethnicities.
See? This is what I grew up learning instead of Situationalism!
PS. You made me remember an incident from a decade or so ago. Wild paraphrase:
Me: Do you realize that your main speaker (a Canadian psychiatrist) lost his license for abusing his patients?
Baha’is: That’s deeply unfair. He voluntarily gave up his license since he was about to retire anyway. It wasn’t an adversarial hearing, so there was no question of guilt. He gave up his license in order to protect his (delusional) patients, whose psychiatric fragility would have been upset by a formal hearing.
Me: But…but…
There are lots of stories along these lines, I’ve found. Of course, the same is true for almost every human grouping, religious or otherwise.
Mayhem in China, apparently a continuation of previous “anti-corruption” measures.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/shockwaves-beijing-xi-targets-his-own-top-general-longtime-confidant-elite-purge
“Another significant military purge appears underway in China, as Saturday morning the West woke up to news that China’s most senior military officer, who is second only to Xi Jinping, has been put under investigation over alleged “grave violations of discipline and the law.”
Gen. Zhang Youxia is a vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, the Communist Party body that controls China’s armed forces, and this comes as somewhat of a major shock given he is widely regarded as President Xi’s closest ally within the military – or at least prior to this.
Another member of the commission, Gen. Liu Zhenli, has also been placed under investigation, according to the Defense Ministry on the same day. He’s in charge of the PLA military’s Joint Staff Department.”
“This is the latest ‘anti-corruption’ purge action since the October news of the expulsion of nine senior generals, which marked one of the largest such crackdowns of top military officials in decades. “
Mr. Greer, I’m glad that you’re snug, as a bug, on a rug. Does you host have backup should the power go out, sufficientcies for heat, etc. ??
PSS Here’s RationalWiki on the Baha’is:
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Bah%C3%A1%27%C3%AD
(Like Wikipedia, but more jokey, and not controlled by Baha’i editors)
Scotlyn, I always appreciate your voice and your thoughtful comments. What I am writing is in no way an attack on you personally. You told Karen that everybody should do their own research, and I did this: I read a long text by Duisburg and came out unconvinced.
Just to get this out of the way: I know very well that the drug cocktails prescribed for HIV-positive persons (and especially for those with AIDS symptoms) are cytotoxic and have all kinds of nasty side effects. I am very glad I am not in the situation where I would have to decide if I took them for the rest of my life or not. That said, I do know personally somebody who has been living a rather normal life for several decades taking these drugs.
The existence of a subgroup of people who can live for decades with HIV without severe symptoms has been well known since long before specific anti-HIV drugs were designed. They were intensely investigated to elucidate what helped them survive the infection and to transfer that knowledge to the majority of people who weren’t that lucky.
The most valid comparison for the effect of anti-retroviral drugs on overall mortality would be a randomized trial over several years. This is of course anti-ethical once the designers of the trial and the patients become convinced that the drugs save lives. When the comparison does not involve randomization, there is a very obvious and strong bias in that the people with the strongest symptoms at baseline will take the drugs, while asymptomatic persons at baseline will be more likely not to take any drug.
Like I said in my first comment, I found Duisberg’s account very much centered on North America and Europe. I seem to recall him claiming (writing in the 1990s) that if HIV had come out of Africa, we should be seeing strong impact on population growth, which (at the time of Duisberg’s writing) did not happen. Duisberg’s argument was overturned by the skyrocketing mortality in several countries in Southern Africa, especially Lesotho and Botswana. In Brazil, mortality in HIV-positive persons, deemed to be from AIDS, was rising quickly until the distribution of free drugs (plus condone campaigns and other actions) at the very end of the 1990s, well beyond your description of a deadly disease restricted to period “between 1980 and 1984”.
I think your comments have also centered on North America and Europe, and I would like to know how you integrate what happened in South America and Africa into your account.
A further thought on the Chinese leadership shuffle. Is Xi worried?
Maduro was betrayed by his vice-president and part of the military.
Iran recently discovered the Mossad had thoroughly infiltrated the country when that fight with Israel broke out and now it’s in an uproar again.
Then in Africa in 2025, “Following the coup in Madagascar in October, West Africa experienced, in November and December respectively, a coup in Guinea-Bissau orchestrated by the incumbent to prevent electoral defeat and an attempted coup in Benin. ”
Xi’s generals probably aren’t any more corrupt than usual, so is the sudden crackdown due to paranoia?
Possible downsides of mindfulness meditation
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22630210-500-panic-depression-and-stress-the-case-against-meditation/
A quote – “But happiness and de-stressing were not what meditation techniques, with their Buddhist and Hindu roots, were originally developed for. The purpose of meditation was much more radical: to challenge and rupture the idea of who you are, shaking one’s sense of self to the core so you realise there is “nothing there” (Buddhism) or no real differentiation between you and the rest of the universe (Hinduism). So perhaps it is not so surprising that these practices have downsides”
Nephite,
Have you looked at medical sharing (or health sharing) plans?
They do not cover all health care a person might desire, but they are considerably less expensive and if your personal will-nots line up with their won’t-covers, you can find a decent deal.
@ Scotlyn #158
You can watch the forbidden documentary “Positive Hell – International Cut” on YouTube. Posted on March 9, 2018. I was the 914th viewer
“Positive Hell is the story of five individuals who have defied their doctors and lived on for nearly thirty years with a diagnosis of death. The film highlights a network of people diagnosed HIV Positive in the province of Galicia in Northern Spain.”
Some quotes from the transcript give you the general tone:
0:25 Narrator: It was in the early 1980s that people, some of them very young, began to be told they were going to die very soon. This was because the antibodies in their blood had tested positive to a so-called deadly new virus called HIV, Human Immunodeficiency Virus. Imagine the sudden announcement of a plague and a death sentence with no real science to support it. It doesn’t seem possible, does it?
4:20 Could it be that this death sentence had been mistaken all along?
7:50 Were they the victims of a colossal medical and scientific blunder?
12:54 Suso (in Spanish): And I think they take advantage of all that story about the test just to create ill people in order to sell antiretroviral drugs, full stop. It is all a business that is perfectly oiled and set up at world level, and as for Africa — well it goes without saying…
14:xx Two participants say they have had unprotected sex with their partners for years and the partners stay negative.
16:50 Positive mother says her daughter was born HIV positive, they got no medication and were followed up for 18 months and her daughter became negative. The daughter had no health problems and is now 27 with six children.
21:00 Suso (in Spanish)They started giving people AZT. Now I see it all with absolute clarity. Of those of us who said we didn’t want to continue the treatment, we are the only ones still alive. And of all of us in the follow-up unit at the time who took the treatment, there isn’t one left alive. They all died.
ENDPIECE: Suso died at 54, 27 years after his positive diagnosis, of chronic lung disease, anemia, and a gastric ulcer causing severe malnutrition.
Doctor: He was a heavy smoker, with intravenous drug use for many years, you can’t blame HIV. Many people with the same problems die. HIV is an old disease with a new name.
Remember that the participants in the video were infected in the 1980s when AZT, promoted by Anthony Fauci, was the only drug that seemed to have some effect against HIV. AZT was a dreadful drug with serious side effects that could lead to death. Antiretrovirals are much better these days.
Remember too that HIV is an RNA-based virus and has probably mutated to a less virulent version these days like Covid has, but I am not sure of this.
Note that in some parts of South Africa up to 30% of women of child bearing age test positive for HIV. Duesberg would say it’s due to gay sex, or drug use, or malnutrition. Most medical personnel blame a sexually-transmitted virus for which antiretrovirals are the recommended therapy, along with a healthy lifestyle.
These days HIV infection is a life sentence, not a death sentence, provided you take your antiretrovirals. But some choose not to, or stop taking them after a few years. Their choice.
Dear Archdruid and readers:
I have found a review about the book of Ion Culianu, wich I think that could be interesting for you.
The author of the review is a schollar in geopolitics called Aleksandr Goudunov, who makes a interesting interpretation of several of the principal ideas of the Culianu’s book. And links to Giordano Bruno with the British alchemist John Dee, the Elizabeth I Queen, and the British and Usanian talasocracies. Adding an interesting reflexion about the faustian feature of the western civilization.
I- https://share.google/ocYM8ADzObnuVNedt
II- https://share.google/DbrLNxKo4p3JnwQ9n
Ambrose # 163:
Thanks for your brief depiction of Bahais main beliefs and attitudes. In my town there are a few Bahai people, but I haven’t met personally with them in my everyday life yet. It seems to me they’ve got some positive attitudes in theory better than other monotheist religions, but a lot of their believers (like the guys who worked with the person who talked me about them), have become too arrogant to see themselves as morally superiors to the “infidels”. It’s a pity, because I’ve also read Bahais in nowadays Iran aren’t very comfortable under the theocratic Islamic regime…
——————————
Siliconguy # 165:
It doesn’t surprise me. In a totalitarian One Party regime, they’re always different trends under the apparent monolithic ideology, so purges happen. They can weaken the government, but indeed they can strenghten it too. I’m not a “Sinologist”, so I won’t point which one option is right about current purge in China.
In spite of being (relatively) ignorant about medical science topics, I want to add my personal and humble apportation to the HIV/AIDS debate, with I know about this epidemics in my country. In Spain during the ‘80s and first ‘90s there were really two twin epidemics which indeed were holding their “hands”: heroin and AIDS. There were some gay men infected by AIDS then, but most of infected people during ‘80s were heterosexual men addicts to heroin. Shared needles helped to spread the disease between straight men addicts here. The worst thing is they infected their girlfriends (and eventually their children, after having let pregnant their partners) later, because they usually didn’t have protected sex with women. Heroin addicted men which didn’t die by an early overdosis died finally every of them with advanced AIDS symptoms during the ‘80s and early ‘90s. However, people who was infected and HIV detected during ‘90s, and who was lucky enough to take the first modern anti-retrovirals, they’ve survived near all without AIDS ugly symptoms until today, and relatively in a good body shape. Of course, every drug has secundary effects, but modern anti-retrovirals have had less bad effects than early treatments. So I’d say “dissident” view is a bit contrafactual compared with AIDS history in Spain. By disgrace AIDS patients have become chronic patients without a real cure (they’ve got VIH yet), but treatment seems to them better than suffering of advanced AIDS symptoms.
@ Aldarion # 168
Thanks immensely for coming back to me on this topic. I also appreciate your contributions, always! 🙂 I do not want to drag this comment thread down with an enormous tit-for-tat. There is a great deal of material available to people who care to look, and, of course there are a million voices.
What I propose to do instead is tell a story, first… outlining a pattern, and then leave a couple of questions that I do not aske to be answered, but instead, place here in the hope to spur ongoing thinking and wondering in anyone, including yourself, who might have a mind to go there.
This is the story of how a modern myth happens. We have a simple assertion, presumed – but never shown – to hold the key to large truths, observable everywhere:
HIV –> AIDS
On top of this equation rests a very, very large and profitable worldwide industry:
– producing costly, and also toxic drugs
– testing people and finding HIV positives (some sick of many previously known diseases, some healthy) who can be persuaded, bullied or frightened, into taking them
– AND, finally, persuading other compassionate people to fundraise, and keep urging governments to pay for said drugs.
But, what does this assertion
HIV –> AIDS
rest ON? What evidence? What demonstrable causation pathway? What set of proofs?
Well, the answer is… nothing. There is zero scientific credibility to this assertion. (I will not endeavour to prove this to you, because the burden of proof actually goes the other way, it is the assertion which must prove itself, and any such proof is entirely lacking. Many have looked).
So, what we now have is an assertion which, on one side is an Emperor parading around wearing no clothes, but (and this is crucial) on the other side is a Golden Goose which has laid some enormously large golden eggs and is still laying them.
So, when you have a golden goose laying golden eggs, the last thing you want to ALLOW is for people to notice that the emperor holding the goose is wearing no clothes.
And so, I have noticed, over the years the growth of a mythic crust by means of which this wonder protects and perpetuates itself. Part of it is fuelled by fear, because disease is fearful, and dread disease is dreadful. Also it is fuelled by the “courtier” reaction – small boys who notice the emperor not wearing any clothes are promptly taken around the back of the woodshed and beaten until their vision “improves”. This will happen to you even if you are the President of South Africa, and you decide to convene a large, scientific conference dedicated to asking and answering the question of where the emperor’s clothes are at. 😉
(Lots of material on this question here: https://www.altheal.org/toxicity/debazt.htm)
There are three questions I would ask you, Aldarion.
1. You state that in “In Brazil, mortality in HIV-positive persons, deemed to be from AIDS, was rising quickly until the distribution of free drugs” and I will ask you how you know this? (I have not looked into Brazilian figures, but the South African “HIV mortality” figures that I did look into were largely based on modelling exercises that presumed the assertion to be proved was true – which is circular).
2. you have a friend “living a rather normal” life for decades on these drugs. Before this person began to take the drugs were they actually dreadfully ill – persistent fevers, anorexia, weight loss, opportunistic infections? Did these drugs help a previously diseased person to heal?
3. You mention the idea that it is unethical to run properly controlled randomised trials comparing people who do or do not take a drug, once the designers of a trial become convinced that said drug “saves lives”. Do you see how this “ethically based reluctance” might be part of the mythic structure which is actually working to protect the emperor holding the golden goose from being exposed as wearing no clothes?
Finally my answer to your question, “How you integrate what happened in South America and Africa into your account?” I answer thusly: I think this golden goose needed bigger horizons. I think it funded a great deal of research into questions of how to further feather the golden goose (such research questions are permitted), by means of which it found ways to expand the application of the equation HIV –> AIDS, to other countries and other places where there are so many more available customers. And third world governments, which can be easier to bully into submission. (Although, for a few years, South Africa resisted, in my humble opinion, heroically).
Siliconguy # 169:
It wouldn’t be strange the Chinese leaders have fallen into paranoia, but some mild level paranoia, when it has at least some real relation with real facts and feelings, indeed can have its advantages…At least to me personally has often worked. It’s when paranoia rampages individual and group minds, when it leads to self-deception and bad choices. I repeat, I don’t know which one is the Chinese big bosses case. If you don’t mind to answer my following question: how we can be sure China rulers have a good or bad paranoia now?
———————————-
Train-ology:
I read in a right wing newspapers (so I warn you it’s evidently biased against spanish government) that “checkers” trains had checked the high speed accident railways…near two months ago. Real news, not fake, which have led to an argument about who are saying there’s enough safety in that checking period, and who says it’s an scandal (I let you to guess their correlative ideologies). In the other hand, a “leftist” TV channel interviewed a railways engineer to support the govt Spectacle (denying every possible guilt in the disaster). The engineer said he recognized the accident rails were the original 1992 steel sections yet (like some more another sections in Madrid-Seville line), but it didn’t mind for that line safety, it’s an usual situation within high speed lines. WTF? I think atmospheric and use slow damage of rails steel cannot be small after more than 30 years!(cough cough).
—————————
According Czech origin writter M. Kundera, kitsch is the negation of s**t. I think a big part of Debordian term “Spectacle” consists indeed in hiding the own ideas inner s**t. For example woke left at least in my country, says massive migration (legal and illegal alike) is Good, it has only advantages. When somebody points with personal known facts that some migrants have ugly and dirty behaviors and attitudes, and that massive migration worsens native working class people situation, the usual thoughstoppers are used by wokesters (racism, fascism) to ignore the s**t of their Spectacle.
However, I won’t forget the right wing kitsch part of its own Spectacle. They usually complain about massive migration, partly with reason, but when they remember the times before streets were crowded by foreigners, they idealize the ‘80s and ‘90s Spain. A country with very few migrants, but not a happy Arcadia. I lived my childhood and teenager age in that times, and I remember very well: heroin addicts injecting themselves in public parks (and stealing to buy more drug), ETA secessionist bloody terrorism (which lasted until yesterday, in historical terms), the 1981 far right failed coup d’état, and the deadly “toxic syndrome” who killed or disabled a lot of people here during the ‘80s). Oops!
————————-
Yesterday in the evening (local time) I was in a bar with a friend and we ended debating about relation between state and nationalism. He said countries with a centralized state and one nationalist ideology, and cultural/ethnically homogeneous, do it better than decentralized states, with a weaker centralist nationalism and some ethnical/cultural/religious variety. He said as example for the first situation France and Poland, and Yugoslavia and Austria-Hungary empire for the second. Well, French and Polish exist as united countries yet, but the another countries were dismembered by their people a time ago. I think he had a part of reason, but I pointed him monocultural and apparently mono-ethnic French Republicanism bias hasn’t worked very well since decades ago with North African migrant origin people (well, they should put more will in integration, but blunt aculturation isn’t very appealing for them, neither). So he pointed me Poland was a better example for a mononationalist and monocultural country, which has lasted a heck of centuries as one united people. Of course, the restrictions to massive foreign migration has helped the Polish to go on that national character. However, I pointed him that being today a Polish is great…if you’re Russophobic, Catholic and Conservative alike. If you don’t have any of these boring and predictable beliefs, you probably won’t be very happy in Poland.
I proposed him to talk about Malaysia as example of a relative success for a multiethnic/multicultural country, and he agreed. We compared it with nowadays Spain. There are some evident cultural and political differences, but in a lesser way, Spain is a multi”ethnical” and national country…with more regional differences based in local languages than Malaysia, which I think it’s more divided by religions. We finally agreed. A multiethnic/cultural country can thrive for some time, but when things (economy and politics) worsen too much, it’s more probably they end being dismantled. Although monocultural/ethnic countries are more culturally boring, and often his homogeneity comes partly from aculturation commited by the central state or evem worse, from old times ethnic cleaning… We’ll see how the nowadays countries we quoted during our debate will survive (or not) the Long Descent.
>Everything is held together with stories. That is all that is holding us together, stories and compassion
If that’s truly the case, then we’re not going to hold together for long, if MN is any indication. No bullets exchanged yet, but they’ve escalated to biting fingers off. They’re escalating. Someone’s going to start shooting at some point. Closer and closer to Bleeding Kansas 2: Electric Boogaloo.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/lefty-protestor-bites-federal-officers-finger
Scotlyn, I agree that there is not much use in dragging this out. Your link is about the early drug AZT, not the more specific anti-HIV drugs. I never said my colleague was saved by the drug cocktail, only that he has been able to live a more or less normal life, so the drugs don’t kill or cripple all their users. And you still haven’t answered what, in your opinion, caused the sudden and massive mortality in young adults in Southern Africa around 2000, which did not happen in other, equally poor parts of the world and which happened when anti-retrovirals were NOT being given to many patients because of the associated costs.
For Brazilian numbers, see e.g. Fig. 3 of this free paper: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0059768.
We can leave it at this if you want.
For the AIDS/HIV debate: I think an alternative explanation to the “some spanish people diagnosed with HIV who didn’t ended with AIDS without treatment, so HIV doesn’t cause AIDS” could be they were diagnosed wrong so indeed their “false positive” isn’t evidently a death sentence, because they really never were infected and they’re clean…I think this version of that story doesn’t fit with the Faustian epic story of Mr. Duesberg, but I also think the pharma industries don’t have to be always the movie villains. And some South Africans (for a while) the Good People, neither. Some of the heroin addicts girlfriends who were infected by their boyfriends in the ‘80s and didn’t were properly treated ended with AIDS, a lot of them didn’t took illegal drugs but eventually had AIDS symptoms and eventually died too. If you think one man theory and his few followers is a revealed truth against the scientist consensus, well, with all my respects, would approach that view toward one more between the thriving conspiracy theories (ahem). Unless the supporters of “dissident” theory show their medical scientists credentials, if they don’t mind to do it.
@ Martin Bock #172
“Note that in some parts of South Africa up to 30% of women of child bearing age test positive for HIV. Duesberg would say it’s due to gay sex, or drug use, or malnutrition.”
No, you have not understood what Duesberg had to say.
1. What he would say about HIV, speaking from his own deep familiarity with retroviruses, his highly specialised area of research, is that this virus is absolutely harmless to any human being.
2. What he would say – but here NOT speaking from his area of expertise, but from that of an ordinary person, as are we all, trying to make sense of the bigger picture, building out from what he himself knew – about the effects of drug use (not sex, he was took great pains to relieve people of any concern about sexual relations), or malnutrition, is that these are known, and also sufficient, causes capable of injuring a person’s cell-mediated immunity.
He would say this because in public venues and interviews he was often asked the same question that Heather, above, has asked:
If HIV does not cause AIDS (or – anything at all, in Mr Duesberg’s scientifically informed opinion), what does?
Mr Duesberg was not a doctor and the the physiology of cell-mediated immunity was not within his special research domain, and so in that area he was not speaking from positive knowledge of what DOES cause AIDS, only from positive knowledge of what DOES NOT cause AIDS.
That said, our society is full of people willing to opine on the same subject without a deep base of knowledge, and here we all are. 🙂
It may be that no one will ever *positively* know the cause of the original “strange cases” of very ill and dying people described in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly in June and July of 1981. However those cases were the ones that set the pattern of fear which followed and eventually developed into a self-reinforcing cycle of test/fearful prognosis/toxic drugs/sickening and death/rinse/repeat.
PS – in relation to your statistic – 30% of pregnant women who “test positive for HIV” – are you aware of either of the following two medically confirmed facts about HIV tests?
1) there are no tests which do not clearly disclaim on their package inserts, in words more or less as follows: “this test is not capable of determining the presence of HIV”?
2) there are up to 70 medically recognised conditions which may create “positive” results on any of these tests, and pregnancy itself is one of them?
Luke Z, I’ve added your request to the Ecosophia Prayer List. I’ll make this a temporary entry, and remove it once the weather improves. Good luck to you and your house!
Since South Africa has been mentioned… I just want to add another historical link. What might be called a “primary source”. (It happens to speak powerfully to what I’ve called the “modern mythic crust” that accretes around golden geese that happen to be held upon the knees of frankly naked emperors – it is really not my idea – even though here it is spoken of in terms of a self-hypnosis, a voluntary trance).
This is from an article in Continuum magazine (a magazine by and for the members of a mutual support group of HIV positive people who were not taking antiretroviral drugs, or considering coming off them) in the year 2000 – called “THE MBEKI CHALLENGE”, By Michael Ellner © 2000. https://web.archive.org/web/20080311024252/https://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2008/01/11/aids_the_mbeki_challenge.htm
In words that might well have been written in the midst of the Covid pandemic, Mr Ellner writes:
QUOTE
“Conventional Medical Science has become the largest and most powerful religion on the planet. I further assert that we have empowered doctors to help us ignore the harsh realities and (often fabricated) uncertainties of life. The sacred truths of medicine’s high priests can be and are enforced by the full force of the most powerful governments in the world because we all depend on them to lie to us. Please consider these assertions seriously!
“The stakes are very high indeed. The average person takes it on faith that sex=death, poisons extend lives and doctors know best, because people have been socially hypnotized to distrust themselves and believe what they are told. Whenever something doesn’t make sense or a contradiction is exposed, the average person is able to ignore the fact by slipping back into the group trance, and the HIV/AIDS programming fills in the gaps. They know something is wrong about the AIDStory, but they are simply unable to trust their ability to evaluate the evidence. And so, we form unconscious contracts to act out our pre-conditioned roles. Which is why this is so much bigger than AIDS and HIV.
“With a highly respected world leader like South Africa’s President Thabo Mbeki however, questioning the conventional view of HIV/AIDS could actually inspire the people of the world to actually take the time to examine the evidence for themselves. But stand back if they were to actually do it!
“Public Health officials would instantly lose their credibility. If all those HIV-doctors and world class scientists could be so reckless and irresponsible, why should anyone believe that the other doctors and scientists are being any more scientific or trustworthy when it comes to cancer, heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, or even the flu? Why should we fund public health agencies if they can’t be trusted? Conventional medical treatments and modalities would soon be held to the scientific method of validation, and about 80% of it’s standard practice would be immediately discredited. Many government health officials, pharmaceutical executives and healthcare professionals would be facing massive lawsuits, not to mention criminal charges. The financial burden on the giant trans-national pharmaceutical corporations alone would threaten the economies of the world.
“So, defending the dogma that HIV causes AIDS is indeed a matter of both national and international security. It is even a matter of personal security – maybe it’s better not to know just how corrupt conventional medicine is; maybe it’s better to close the door President Mbeki has opened.”
END QUOTE
The capacity people have to ignore contradictions “by slipping back into the group trance” is still with us. This is why I really do not expect scholars to get fully to grips with the “dam*ed” side of this history – or Covid history (in the Fortean sense) for decades, if not centuries. We are still too close, and too implicated, too needy. Hopefully, some of these primary sources will still be accessible then… but, who knows, eh?
https://xcancel.com/JamesOKeefeIII/status/2015260124932448533
Closer and closer.
Aldarion, as I said, I do not ask either for your agreement, nor for answers to my questions. You are a free agent, and absolutely free to come to your own conclusions, for your own reasons, as seems good to you. The questions I’ve posed, I’ve posed only to spur thinking, if that is of interest. And, for many reasons, it may well not be. The HIV –> AIDS hypothesis fills many needs. 🙂
For myself, the overall harms seem greater than the benefits, but not everyone will see it this way.
Still, I want to let you know that I have looked at your PLOS link. Since its whole thesis is that “AIDS-related” deaths showed different trend lines to “non-AIDS-related” deaths, I began to look for what was the basis for the distinction they were drawing between AIDS-related and non-AIDS-related deaths.
And then I found this sentence: “We retrospectively assigned a defined cause of death to 97.7% of the 868 deaths occurring among the 3530 individuals followed at IPEC from 1986 to 2009. We showed…”
…well, whatever “we” wanted to show, is what follows from this sentence. This is because the crucial distinction the whole paper hangs on is derived from “defined cause of death” as “retrospectively assigned” by the researchers.
Meanwhile, may I offer blessings to all your goings and doings. Be well, stay free!
Wer here
Well I have to disagree about some comments in this thread regarding ideas like “democracy” etc. Let’s get this straight most countries in the world are ruled by the uniparties, even those who claim democracy etc. For example Poland after the bancrupsy of the Soviet Union and the collapse there was a group of shall we say “well conected” individuals that were ‘taking care of the country” the so called “Kiszczak group” basically a group of former PZPR operatives got together and decided that they want to live in the new “democratic” Poland just like in the Soviet Union so they decided to simply sell of to Brussels. the deal was simple maintain a modicum of “choice” in Polish politics as long as questioning of bureaucrats in Brussels doesn’t start out loud. This why we have Donald Tusk a man who used to be an: libertarian, far righter, leftist, socialist and recently was dispatched from Brussels to force compliance on polish farmers who are still protesting over Mercosour deal disaster. You didn’t know Poland has large protests in it? I wonder why the MSM in your country did not cover it (perhaps because the protest against the right thinking people?)
Meanwhile in Davos the Ukrainians demanded that Russia pay repariations (because the winners must always obey the side thath lost the war right?) Going nowhere deals and don’t get me started on the idiotic coup attempt in Iran and apparently second round of shooting war that is about to begin there.
In 2014 I watched “democratic” protesters in Kiev burn down the city and kill people when the president of Ukraine finally decided to stop the protestors he was threatened and removed from office by a mob supplied by Victoria Nuland with weapons, the new “free” goverment of Ukraine declared the going to war with Russia regardless of consequences is the only move forward, Ukrainians who did not want a war with Russia went “missing” thanks to the “democratic” goverment so please don’t pretend to claim that what is happening is the “choice” of the people in this country…
Scotlyn, thank you for bringing Duesberg’s skeptical analyses ack to my attention. You are so right that his perspectives seem much less dubious now, after all the blatant medical quackery we got to witness during the great covid sales and marketing push. Whatever actually does cause the immuno-vulnerability that is the hallmark of full-blown AIDS, the fact that one of the top global retrovirus specialists said that one thing it could not be is a retrovirus certainly deserves thoughtful consideration.
Your HepB vaccine correlation is frighteningly interesting in light of the tragic fallout from the covid gene-hijacking that somehow got marketed as a “vaccine”. Did the lab coats tell all the trial participants how “safe and effective” the HepB vaccine was too? While there does seem to be something contagious and transmissible that now leads to the AIDS systemic breakdown, I see no reason why a botched vaccine, rushed to market, could not have been the original source for that unfortunate mutation.
Perhaps the lab coats’ misguided tinkering created a new Frankenstein retrovirus different from all the others. Or perhaps Duesberg’s expertise was right on the money and their “vaccine” created something more similar to a prion. With all their early hysteria about no one touching the young men who were dying and then incinerating the corrupted remains, the lab coats did react surprisingly similarly to the way they do for mad cow disease. With so many interesting options to think about, they had to fixate on just one and sell it for all it was worth.
JMG, good luck with your move. I hope your book collection, kitchen stuff, and ritual equipment arrives promptly and with as little fuss as possible!
I’m going to suspend my reasonable doubts about the narrative which denies AIDS is caused by HIV, which could be a “harmless” and innocent retrovirus. This narrative supporter in this blog is Scotlyn, and his/her main opponent is Aldarion, who keeps on the official narrative. They haven’t shown their expert credentials yet, so I suppose they’re like me, not experts in medical science. So I’ll try to use my own common sense to make my apportation to this imperfect debate. My following step it’s: I’ll suspend my doubts about a story which tells us there was a lonely scientific against the system (though it looked like to me too much to the rehashed romantic myth about lone heroes against the world). Let’s also believe the scientist and his supporters fight in a very not equal battle against the whole medical science consensus, which of course is made of evil scientists who are fooled, hypnotized or bribed by the Big Pharma (believing our heroes don’t have their own biases and agendas, because they’ve got all the Truth too). Let’s think the Galicia people who claims to have been infected with HIV a long time ago, but they don’t suffer AIDS today , weren’t “false positive” tested and are honest too (without any political or another kind of agenda). Now, we’ve got as work hypothesis some people who could show VIH doesn’t equate to a sad end with AIDS. So “dissidents” suppose these cases are an evidence: everybody who’s infected with the “innocent” retrovirus won’t have AIDS. I think this reasoning (?) doesn’t take into consideration another theory which could explain well this cases before doing the big “jump” into the “evidence” that HIV never causes AIDS. It could be perfectly possible some people had a stronger immune system or even had been immunized forever against HIV, but some other people (maybe the most of infected) don’t have such as immunity, so indeed can suffer AIDS if they aren’t treated.
I’d be tempted to suspend my doubts one more time when “dissidents” warn about how much dangerous and toxic are the anti-retrovirals, but it’s too much belief for me: indeed, there are a lot of VIH-positive people who have been taking modern anti-retrovirals here since even 30 years ago and they seem healthy…
———————————
I don’t know wether in another EU countries would happen the same thing as in my country or not (it could be possible me think), but right wing parties, Conservative and Far Right guys, are frantic supporters in their electoral programs and politics behavior, when and where they have ruled here in past times, of “neoliberalism”, which can be pointed mainly as free market, less state bureaucracy and more private corporations power. As an evident part of this doctrine, if you don’t want government economical interventionism in everyday citizens life, you must support ruthlessly less public subsidies to “lazy”
and “not efficient” people and companies. OK, so…how can the right wing parties here explain their fondness for farmers subsidizing? UE subsidies from Agrarian Politics are untouchable to these free market champions. When Brussels threatens to pay less subsidies to farmers and they protest, right wing leaders here complain bitterly (cough cough). I know rural people tend to vote to the right side, but I also know there’s a principle of not contradiction…In addition to this, rural votes are fewer than urban votes, so…why this contradiction? (To EU commenters) Have you seen this behavior in your countries right wing parties?
Siliconguy (no. 169) “Xi’s generals probably aren’t any more corrupt than usual, so is the sudden crackdown due to paranoia?”
I dunno, they have a lot of sudden crackdowns. But rather than Xi being afraid for himself, maybe he’s thinking about starting a war, and concerned that the military has other priorities.
————————
Chuaquin (no.. 174) “. It’s a pity, because I’ve also read Bahais in nowadays Iran aren’t very comfortable under the theocratic Islamic regime…”
Very true. Of course, the regime persecutes a lot of people, but to an Iranian Muslim mind, the Baha’is seem like heretical Muslims–they accept prophets after Muhammad, thereby challenging the very basis of the Islamic state (which governs as regents of the Hidden Imam, a messianic figure who will appear at the end of time–the Baha’is say this has already occurred). So you get these diasporas of Persian Baha’is. It’s kind of like the Tibet cause. The Baha’i leadership actually discourages believers from emigrating from Iran (I *think* the issue is that they’d have to lie about their religion on the exit visa, which is a big no-no–you’re supposed to accept martyrdom before doing that), leading critics to accuse them of exacerbating the problem in order to gain public attention and sympathy. I am reminded of the book on Wicca that referred to the Burning Times as “A Holocaust of Their Own.” Wish I could remember the title. On the other hand, there’s definitely a “blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church” vibe going on too.
BoysMom,
I’ve never heard of Health Sharing Plans before. Seems similar to what I’m looking for. I don’t need healthcare for the little things, I just need the guarantee that if I am injured in an accident that it won’t bankrupt me and my family.
Silicon guy 165#
My guess on Xi’s purge of the Chinese military? They are telling him truths he doesn’t want to hear. That is invading Taiwan will not be a walk over, and that if Taiwan is attacked China will be at war with the USA. Add in that any war with the USA with Donald Trump in command will be full on vindictive.
Dear JMG
Another reason for your rise in income, looking at my old yellowed and well thumbed copies of you books, is that we long time readers need to replace our favourite books of yours.
Money heading your way.
“We’ve never had use for calendars – not the way you do. The cycles of the sun, the moon, the seasons are all we’ve ever needed, same way we always had ‘territories’ instead of owning the land. Property’s something you came up with. Raven says its because you think in terms of boxes. Everythings got to fit in one – you even live in them.
Territory’s a different thing. It’s not permanent. We mark out what we need when we’re mating, when feeding the kids, then let it go. Dont build anything permanent on it, dont leave much of a mark at all. Some raggedy nest, maybe, feathers, scat, nothing the rsin and time wont wash away. And we never keep it just to ourselves, you know, saying that flowers cant grow here, the wind cant blow, foxes cant walk through, spiders cant make its web. Makes no sense to us. Oh, maybe some of us are living in boxes now, but mostly we live how we always did, follow the old ways, walk in the world, tall but leaving only footprints, living on spirit time.” — Charles De Lint, Someplace to Be Flying
I’;d like to echo what Wer (#186) said about the recent Ukrainian history and present situation. (I can read both Russian and Ukrainian.)
About Poland I am less well informed, but what Wer said echoes my own understanding of the history and aims of the EU.
Scotlyn, you are suggesting I am arguing the way I am because of emotional needs. I am not suggesting anything about your emotional state. This is frankly not the Scotlyn I have come to “know” over the last years and not what I would be hoping for from you.
In a similar way, you are accusing scientists from a highly respected government institution in Brazil of committing fraud based on absolutely no shred of evidence (and actually, the number of deaths from all causes would be enough to support my argument). Just to make it clear: Big Pharma did NOT support the free distribution of anti-retrovirals in Brazil. They were furious that their patents had been broken and the Brazilian government was producing them in its own labs. So what is your basis for accusing the authors of that paper of fraud?
There is much more that I could say on this matter, but it doesn’t seem productive.
“how we can be sure China rulers have a good or bad paranoia now?”
Good question. Chinese culture is so different it’s even harder than usual. Good paranoia might be “peace through superior firepower” along with deep attention to foreign supply lines that can’t be duplicated domestically.
Bad paranoia is Stalin’s Great Purge. Yeah sure, those generals who beat the Japanese army in Manchuria are too competent and must therefore be killed. Fortunately for the Allies in WW2 Stalin liked Zhukov. After the war Stalin once again began to suspect him.
So, is Xi genuinely removing corrupt generals or is corruption a convenient excuse? I have no idea. Xi’s supply of military age men is dropping rapidly, does he want to do Taiwan now while he can and the generals are too comfortable in their positions to take the risk? I don’t know that either.
As a great man (or at least male alien) said, “Saying would be knowing, do not know so can not say.”
Wer here
Well the reason because of throwing our some of the generals by Xi is simple. Despite what trump like to claim about the “heroic” actions of delta force the truth is more simple. Venezuelan minister of defense was pro US and literally gave the Americans his president after they promised him a position in the new goverment… The fact that the Chauvist movement refused to comply with the Trump administration and the said minister was arrested by the new vice president and a hard on boliviaran Rodringuez that refuses to surrender is proof what will happen if you have a general and officer that is sympathetic to the US in a war like scenario.
The are stories about Russian generals immediately after the collapse of the USSR that loudly proclaimed that they were for years in cahoots with their American friends and now they are assuming Israeli and US citizenship and openly betraying their country in public, one former Russian general (who had an double US citizenship) literally sold NATO uranium worth billions for an Mercedes and a villa in Tel Aviw and immediately moved there and did not went back to his country, he proclaimed that Yeltsin was elected to destroy Russia and dismember it with a laugh publicly (what a great patriot…)
But then a guy named Putin became president of Russia and immediately started a purge of certain Russian generals…. When Putin started a purge of corrupt Russian generals in 1999 there were a lot of people who were screaming about him being a Stalin….. (because keeping people who were openly working or flirting with an mortal enemy of your country is such a “good idea”)
Wer here
About hte Mercosour Frankenstein deal..
Let’s just say that you are a Polish farmer, with each passing year you have to pay larger and larger taxes, you are not allowed to buy cheap fertiliazer from the East because of politics, you expensive fertiliazer from India or Pakistan (despite the fact that in both cases it comes from Russia and you are paying them double for the same thing, don’t mention it out loud there.) suddenly “enviromentalists” from the EU (the ones that fly around in privet jet’s everywhere) proclaim that you must stop raising cattle yourself and we will be importing beef from countries that still raise cattle (how is it possible that when a polish farmer is raising cattle it ios a damage to the enviroment but when a Argentinan farmer raises more cattle in less sanitary way it is not damaging the enviroment at all..)
Not to mention you are forced to sell your products to other EU nations and in order to do so you must obey an telephone book of regulations (at the same time an Ukrainian farmer is selling his half rotten wheat to the EU and faces no regulations and scrutiny). And forget trading with Russia or other nations (a lot of people used to rely on that income for a living in Poland) So basically Polish farmers are forced into an enviroment where they cannot do things and cannot compete and the EU is planing to flood Europe with cheap stuff from abroad….
Train-ology news:
It’s interesting the hard data I’ve “rescued” between the current ideologized b**t here, about spanish high speed accident. Before the train derailed, another train which passed before it was marked in its wheels by the damaged rail steel section. And unfortunately, nobody noticed those marks…
—————————————-
Wer # 186:
Thanks for explaining us in the short form how Poland transitioned from Communism to a “democratic” Capitalism, thanks to what I’d say seems an oligarchic elite. Democracy as an ideal is great, but in real world never is perfect. However, we can see different levels of democratic quality depending of which countries we watch. In my country, “democracy” arrived after Franco the dictator died by natural causes, when the “illegal” democratic opposition reached to a deal with the smsrtest and mildest Franco supporters, to keep the Monarchy but legalize the Commie party too: I give you something so you give another thing in exchange. This deal was eventually so successful that was mitified as the “spanish transition”. Thanks to the democracy, I lived my childhood in a country which it wasn’t perfect (terrorism, a coup d’etat and high crime rates) but I was happy. However, in the last times of democratic decline here, this idealization has finished: more and more people have pointed the ugly and dirty secrets of the ‘70s democratization. Returning to the present, I wouldn’t be as radical as you are when you say most democratic countries live really in a One Party system, but I’m not stupid so I see economic factic powers like big banks presidents and big corporations have an important influence on democratic politicians…Not only in the evil evily Russia exist oligarchs.
Your view about the (fake) democratic Ukraine: I agree. With the left parties opposition illegalized by the subterfuge of being pro-Russians during first war times, and the full
media control by government secret services and police, Ukraine is a “de facto” dictatorship. In addition to this, its democratic quality was already doubtful since the 2014 coup d’état…errr….orange revolution.
———————
According the EU bureaucracy, the Agrarian Politics subsidies to the European farmers are justified, in spite of the theorical economics conservative orthodoxy which Brussels use over its member countries. Why? Because farmers subsidies have several subterfuges: environmental, social helping and saving traditional lifestyles. Well, it’s cool, but in real world those subsidies are a market distorsion and a shameful protectionism, which doesn’t rhyme well with neoliberal
doctrine…
—————————
[snip]
Oops!
Siliconguy # 196:
I’ve near missed your comment…Well, political purges are periodically commited by leaders in totalitarian regimes like China, but of course we can’t know the affect the real “villains” or innocent victims, due to the steel hand censorship and regime inner opacity. You’ve pointed the cultural difference with the West. You’re right. Pretending to be a “Sinologist” without a deep knowledge of Chinese culture isn’t an honest approach to the mysterious Chinese purges.
I was recently listening to a lecture by Prof. Ronald Hutton. He said that the Druids of old were reported by the Romans to be inhabiting caves and other distant , natural venues. He adds that this may not reflect their actual beliefs, but may have been in response to persecution by the Roman state – in other words, that they may have been a mainstream priesthood driven into exile in nature’s lap by persecution.
I am drawing a line, effective immediately, under the discussion about the origins and nature of AIDS, as tempers are visibly rising and the discussion is starting to get personal. Let it rest, folks.
>That is invading Taiwan will not be a walk over, and that if Taiwan is attacked China will be at war with the USA. Add in that any war with the USA with Donald Trump in command will be full on vindictive.
I’d say you can mark the end of Globalization(tm) if China does make a move for Taiwan, successful or not. No more chips for you.
>So basically Polish farmers are forced into an enviroment where they cannot do things and cannot compete and the EU is planing to flood Europe with cheap stuff from abroad
Globalization(tm) so good. We like it so much. Why they getting angry? Why they no like?
Wer # 197:
You’ve written about how was the beheading strike which hijacked…err…arrested Maduro, thanks to a very probable betrayal from one of his circle men, and I think it was a plausible way to explain the apparent complete Trumpian tryumph in it. However, nowadays situation doesn’t let Venezuela new possible protectorate…err…”democratic” government, to be ruling a peaceful and quiet country. Of course, Chavist within the Army, the bureaucracy and the whole population haven’t evaporated yet, so a hidden problem maybe is growing until eventually erupt sooner or later. It’s said crime rates in Venezuela aren’t today better than in Maduro times, but even worse…Maybe it’s a too much subjective view, but I see today the local Venezuelan expats less happy than immediately after the Venezuela “liberation”… Good luck with it.
****
Wer # 198:
Oh, but Polish and other EU farmers have the Brussels subsidies!(I’m ironic here). Well, money is money, but I’m aware the bureaucratic work by the farmers to get those subsidies doesn’t deserve the money they get finally. At least in Spain, farmers have a self-destructive relation with EU subsidies. They complain about how to get them, but indeed they need them too, to balance a rural economy which often isn’t economically sustainable…
Of course, Ukraine cheap and mediocre production has flooded EU countries, but I’d like to remember the Moroccan farm products, which are cheaper than EU ones…but it’s reasonably suspected here that they’re polluted with herbicides/insecticides forbidden by the own EU (cough cough).
—————————-
JMG # 202:
It’s a pity, but…Popper “critical rationalism” theories (alias “falsationism”) can wait for a while. OK, I’ll obey you and I won’t go on writing about AIDS topics (I hope the other people engaged in it do the same thing like me). Well, I think I’ve tried to not get into the personal thing, but I agree. Things maybe were heating too much around this topic (ahem).
Hello again, John. I wonder if I’d write my next comment in your blog (when I’ve got spare time to do it) about Mr. Popper “Falsationism”, of course without references to the AIDS topic, but in general terms; if you don’t mind it. I think it’s a very interesting topic about sciences/philosophy/ideologies and metaphysics relation. Please…Thank you on advance if I get your permission.
https://xcancel.com/Schwalm5132/status/2015470661490057540
This guy is also making the case this is irregular warfare in MN. Sigh, maybe he’s right. It’s starting to fit more and more of the pattern of Bleeding Kansas. Outsiders pouring in to fight. They’re not using bullets in a way I would call warfare – yet. He’s not the only one asking “Who is paying for all of this?”
https://xcancel.com/bluelivesmtr/status/2014692696879755266
Oh this tickles me down to my somethings or others. The bright idea is to “report” ICE agents in MN drinking at biker bars. Soyjaks and bikers, a match made in somewhere. Somewhere funny, if you’re not up close.
Ok, one more tiny one…
@ Aldarion #195 – Please accept my apologies. I am no better than anyone else, of course. I am certainly no better that my words and deeds at any given time. 🙂
I am reflecting on this. Be well, stay free.
@ Wer #198
Speaking as an Irish farmer, I completely concur with everything you have said here.
It is a dastardly deal.
Re: betting pool on JMG’s new location — somewhere in the Seattle/Tacoma area, Washington State.
My approach on back anfd forth internet discussions. I only have a few areas when I feel I have enough knowledge to have a strong view/opinion that I strongly regard as correct.. If I get involved in a back and forth once I have expressed my main points clearly I let the other person have the last word and say no to my urge to respond. (not always easy to do so) Often I just speak once and repondents mmediately get the last word if I think I have already sufficiently expressed my point. with supporting reasons.
Well, this has turned into an Open Post, hasn’t it?
I’ve seriously been missing the only sane place on the internet. Bummed to see downward mobility as a way to freedom get delayed, but any JMG is better than no JMG.
As to the new home, the idea of a return to Cumberland intrigues, as I thought our host was pretty contented there until the health care factor became an issue.
Scotlyn et al
Regardless of the merits or demerits of joint replacement, coronary bypass, etc I don’t think they are things that will survive very far down the slope of decline. The surgical equipment is very high tech. The joints are are a very fancy composite, and probably made in China. There is a question of scale, so the industry may very well not be something that can be scaled down to where only the rich have access to it.
I am sure glad I got my hip done. I was considering checking out early before that instead of dealing with the pain.
Anselmo #173
This review is remarkable. The charges leveled in the second blog post about the mythic origin of the Faustian archetype and the mythic resolution of European culture is fascinating. It is a refreshing take on the work of Culianu, and I find the author’s conclusions sound, mythically speaking.
@ Beardtree #211
You are wise. 🙂
I realise (slowly) that I am not so wise, and, indeed this very exchange has given me much to reflect on… “motes in one’s own eye” and all that…
Be well, stay free!
@ Stephen #213
“I am sure glad I got my hip done. I was considering checking out early before that instead of dealing with the pain.”
If I may, yes, I am glad for you, too.
Be well, and may all your days bring you blessing. 🙂
Chuaquin (offlist), just stop, okay? If you want to write lengthy posts intended to start a fight, please do it somewhere else, such as a blog of your own.
Thank you, John Michael.
Please, everyone. Do not make this community more trouble than our host has time for. I treasure our time here, and would hate to see it go away. We’ve all seen what has happened on this post when John Michael didn’t have extra time to tend the garden.
It’s not my place to tell anyone what to do. But I’m pleading with you to read the italicized message at the bottom of every comment section on this blog.
Courteous, concise comments relevant to the topic of the current post are welcome
I’m not trying to be a toady here. I disagree with many of you often, including the host, and the atmosphere of mutual respect that governs the discourse here is like a fresh breeze on the fetid sewer that is the internet.
John, not to worry. If people get out of line and won’t accept correction, I have a ban hammer. It’s been a little while since I’ve used it, but it’s always available, and those who won’t abide by the rules of this virtual living room (to switch metaphors) can and will very readily be chucked out the door and told to get lost.
The hiatus is almost over, btw — everything’s gone even more smoothly than I’d hoped. Stay tuned for a post tomorrow.
The BBC has an article on the Chinese general demotions.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8d0l0g8yz5o
They don’t what’s going on either.
“Associate Professor Chong Ja Ian from the National University of Singapore also said he was not sure what the real reason was for Zhang’s downfall but that there was a lot of speculation about it.
“Everything from leaking nuclear secrets to the United States to plotting a coup and factional infighting. There are even rumours of a gunfight in Beijing,” he said.
“But Zhang and Liu’s downfall along with the wild speculation highlight two things: that Xi remains unassailable and there are significant limits to information in Beijing which fuels uncertainty and feeds this speculation.”
The official announcement that said Zhang and Liu were “under investigation” also said that they were accused of “serious violations of discipline and law”, which is a euphemism for corruption.”
“The PLA Daily editorial was already speaking of Zhang and Liu as if they were guilty, saying they had “seriously betrayed the trust and expectations of the Communist Party’s Central Committee” as well as “trampling on and undermining the Central Military Commission”.”
That should be vague enough for anyone.
Chuaquin:
If you start a blog, I and I think that other readers will be interested for visit It. In the case that our Archdruid will have no problem about this. Could you to write here the link ?
Raising a glass to you for happiness in your new digs, JMG.
John O’Neil had good words. I come here for the top notch mental stimulation of the essays, even when I disagree, and I often stick around for the conversations which are just as good, even when I disagree.
Being able to talk about a plethora of topics that don’t get much conversation in my day-to-day discourse, outside a few people, is a boon to me, and I am sure to many others here.
Thanks for these many years of blogging Arch-gnostic JMG.
Beardtree # 211:
I understand your view on the internet discussions. My personal view is introducing myself in online blogs as a “dilettante”, not an expert. Of course, I’m not a skilled thinker nor a thought professional, but when I tell the other online people I don’t have real credentials (like an University title, oops!), I think I’m quite honest. However, I recognize sometimes I tend to be pedantic (ahem).
———————————
JMG # 217:
I’m sorry. I see my last comments were too long and politized, so I understand and accept I’ve made you’ve lost your patience. Sometimes in another online sites even I’ve been mistaken with a troll due to my tendence to write too much. I hope to write better and shorter next time.
My take on Trump and Walz, the phone call – what offer did Trump make that Walz couldn’t refuse, I wonder? For Walz to say all those mean things publicly and then proceed to do a backflip and express desire for cooperation with his new pal Trump, it strikes me as just a little bit odd. Teensy weensy strange, I tell you. Like we’re nowhere near seeing the full picture of what’s going on.
My guess is that MN is going to start behaving now. For undisclosed hidden reasons.
Regarding the JMG location betting pool; inevitably it is going to Salem Massachusetts.
My bet for the JMG location betting pool is that he won’t tell us. After all, there is that 4th Magical Virtue involved. He’ll become an international mage of mystery.
@Vitranc #225, my wife used to be a serious amateur witch trials historian. and we spent weekends in Salem and Danvers MA sifting through sites and archives. I cannot describe in words how bad an idea I think JMG living and working in Salem would be! To oversimplify, Salem has two layers: Halloween theme park, and backwater city that has never squarely faced, understood, or recovered from what was done there a third of a millennium ago. I can’t imagine JMG finding either layer attractive or conducive to a pleasant productive residency.
Phutatorius #226, “My bet for the JMG location betting pool is that he won’t tell us. ” – yes, I have been thinking this myself. Maybe just a vague indication of the region. After all, JMG has recently discussed that we are heading into uncertain times. One would not want to be mistaken for the type of mage who calls down storms on their enemies (see discussion on Dreamwidth blog, 23 January).
JMG, I wish you all the best in your new digs. Thank you for maintaining this space even while you are on a break from it! I agree with JPM #222. The regular voices in the commentariat provide welcome mental stimulation on such a large range of topics. I feel almost like I know you all, and my life is certainly better for it.
Silicone # 220..
Ahh! The Dragon Glossamer Invisibility Cloak strikes again!
Siliconguy 2290 – the “guy” part of your moniker got lost in the above ‘translation’ ..
Apologies to you. Note: I FN Hate Hellcheck!!!!!
’22(9)0’… see what I mean..?? ain’t technology grand….
My bet is that JMG moved to New York to support Batman in resolving his binary thinking patterns.
Re the surprise sacking of a Chinese general, and the many surprises from Trump.
I wonder if it’s a ploy to discombombulate AI? I would bet a lot of money that AI, which is so good at cloning images, voices, and writing styles of living persons, is being used by governments to clone the world leaders they have to deal with.
They could then run various scenarios past their clone and get a shrewd idea of how far they could push any particular leader. Would Xi invade Taiwan if we did X? Would Putin settle for Donbas minus Y territory? How much more would Europe be willing to pay to keep us in NATO?
The more predictable your behavior the more accurate an AI clone would get. Being unpredictable would introduce enough uncertainty in the clone that nations would have to allow a bigger margin for error and be more cautious in their international dealings.
Vitranc#225
Probably your wife will be interested about the trial of the witches of Zugarramurdi (Spain), wich was a precedent of Salem’s affaire. I lived some years in the city where she were judged and executed (Logroño) and there was any reference about this historical event, but in Zugarramurdi in the present there are cultural shows in a specific day of the year.
Anselmo # 221:
Thank you for your interest in my possible own blog. However, I prefer not to start a blog in the short term, because my personal situation now isn’t the better to do it. I can also say my natural and near pathologic tendence to “verborrhea”(I don’t know the exact translation of this word) usually leads me to speak/talk too much in real and online world, being sometimes not cautious ( in vernacular Spanish, a “bocazas”). I’ve been blessed and damned alike with this “virtue” since my childhood. OK Anselmo, if/when I can open my own blog, I’d announce it to you and the others in the commentariat.
@Walt: Wow, this sounds interesting. First of thank you for the augment and I see your point. Secondly; growing up in a region ravaged by both the leather fashion and the sickle-hammer worshiping socialists, I have seen what undigested history looks like. Dark humor is one of the results, to explain my joking around. 😉
But seriously, knowing full well, that a blog comment can impossibly either explain, or give the lived feeling of the results. I would really like to spend a prolonged weekend with both you and your wife in Salem. Discussing an being shown the history and the feeling you describe.
Thus I would like to change my location betting to Albany, New York. 🙂
I wonder if JMG is jetting off to an Asian country to avoid the whole mess the Western world is in. I’ve had similar thoughts, and wouldn’t blame him if so. The escalation of the internal Culture War and external confrontation with BRICS shows no signs of slowing down.