[bombthrower] I’ve been reading Peter Turchin’s "Ages of Discord", which tries to look at patterns of societal strife that he found in previous, pre-industrial civilizations such as Rome and France, and examine how it holds up in a post-industrial era. It bears some resemblance to other cycle theories like Strauss and Howe’s "Fourth Turning" or other long-wave models like Kondratiev Waves (K-Waves). The basic premise behind these ideas are that societies undergo cyclical or pendulum-like dynamics between relatively steady states of prosperity and stability, the internal dynamics of which then produce the conditions that precipitate reversions into turbulent periods of strife and chaotic change.
The important thing to keep in mind is that to that the likes of Turchin and other historical statisticians, the periods of societal discord that they try to map may look like this:
If there’s one thing in this highly polarized world that everybody probably does agree on it’s that we are almost certainly already in one of these periods of discord right now.
What I’m finding most interesting from Turchin’s take on this isn’t that periods of stability are not terminated by resource depletion (a la the climate alarmists), or any other "limits to growth" per se. While population growth in pre-industrial societies may bump up against "neo-Malthusian" limits, it sets up a counter-cyclical decline in population growth. How these forces interact in a transition from stability to chaos is that an over-abundance of elites creates a situation of the political class splitting into factions and fighting over the spoils of what is now a shrinking pie in terms of real economic wealth:
#2
I've always thought the crash of civilizations came about when a critical point was reached by too many people "gaming" the system. A new civilization is invested in it's rules, laws and culture. As time goes by, various actors advance their own interests by evading, manipulating or ignoring those standards. When enough people do enough damage, faith in the civilization is lost and it ends.
#4
I don't believe our civilization will collapse, but I do believe half is going to flop hard making it difficult for the rest and forcing the rest to cleanup the mess.
#5
This was addressed in Brave New World and why those in control limited the number of those to be endowed with position and authority. I blame the student loan program with removed the process of acquisition of a higher education via the GI Bill that imposed a degree of sorting out among the 'herd'.
#6
I also blame the student loan program, at least for accelerating our problems.
It allowed kids to go into debt with no balance on the value of the degree on the other side. It also allowed universities to suck up government money, give the kid bigger loans and universities sucked up more. This encouraged universities to chase the money instead of providing value.
#8
I've seen that, when former students kicked out for trumped up and bogus charges sue the 'institution of higher learning' in court. Then its mumble time from the defendants.
#11
Communication seem to be the flexion point, The modern age was considered to have started with the invention of the printing press. The telegraph, the telephone, radio, television, each of these brought change. With cheaper communication satellites the choke points installed by central interest will start to fall , and things will get " interesting ."
[Washington Examiner] Planned Parenthood CEO Alexis McGill Johnson acknowledged that the abortion giant’s founder, Margaret Sanger, was a proponent of eugenics but stopped short of labeling her a "racist."
"We will no longer make excuses or apologize for Margaret Sanger’s actions. But we can’t simply call her racist, scrub her from our history, and move on. We must examine how we have perpetuated her harms over the last century — as an organization, an institution, and as individuals," Johnson wrote in an op-ed for the New York Times on Saturday.
"Up until now, Planned Parenthood has failed to own the impact of our founder's actions. We have defended Sanger as a protector of bodily autonomy and self-determination, while excusing her association with white supremacist groups and eugenics as an unfortunate 'product of her time,'" she wrote. "Until recently, we have hidden behind the assertion that her beliefs were the norm for people of her class and era, always being sure to name her work alongside that of W.E.B. Dubois and other Black freedom fighters. But the facts are complicated."
Sanger founded Planned Parenthood in 1916 when she and two others established the country’s first birth control clinic in Brooklyn. Sanger was a noted supporter of eugenics, a movement based on improving human civilization through selective breeding, and published an article in 1919 titled "Birth Control and Racial Betterment," among other published pieces and speeches.
In some of her writings, she referred to black Americans, immigrants, and indigenous Americans as "human weeds," "reckless breeders," who are "spawning ... human beings who never should have been born."
#1
OK, then let's talk about her eugenics program for improving the human race by eliminating what she thought of as the undesirables... still going strong, hey?
[Glenn Greenwald] Just as with the Russia Bounty debacle, they will never acknowledge what they did. Their audience wants to be lied to for partisan gain and emotional pleasure.
It was crucial for liberal sectors of the media to invent and disseminate a harrowing lie about how Officer Brian Sicknick died. That is because he is the only one they could claim was killed by pro-Trump protesters at the January 6 riot at the Capitol.
So The New York Times on January 8 published an emotionally gut-wrenching but complete fiction that never had any evidence — that Officer Sicknick's skull was savagely bashed in with a fire extinguisher by a pro-Trump mob until he died — and, just like the now-discredited Russian bounty story also unveiled by that same paper, cable outlets and other media platforms repeated this lie over and over in the most emotionally manipulative way possible. Just watch a part of what they did and how: [video here]
As I detailed over and over when examining this story, there were so many reasons to doubt this storyline from the start. Nobody on the record claimed it happened. The autopsy found no blunt trauma to the head. Sicknick's own family kept urging the press to stop spreading this story because he called them the night of January 6 and told them he was fine — obviously inconsistent with the media's claim that he died by having his skull bashed in — and his own mother kept saying that she believed he died of a stroke.
But the gruesome story of Sicknick's "murder" was too valuable to allow any questioning. It was weaponized over and over to depict the pro-Trump mob not as just violent but barbaric and murderous, because if Sicknick weren't murdered by them, then nobody was (without Sicknick, the only ones killed were four pro-Trump supporters: two who died of a heart attack, one from an amphetamine overdose, and the other, Ashli Babbitt, who was shot point blank in the neck by Capitol Police despite being unarmed). So crucial was this fairy tale about Sicknick that it made its way into the official record of President Trump's impeachment trial in the Senate, and they had Joe Biden himself recite from the script, even as clear facts mounted proving it was untrue....
Posted by: Jack Dark Lord of the Hatfields3424 ||
04/20/2021 12:12 Comments ||
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#4
Liars gotta lie. I think they prefer to lie by omission meaning the leave important detail out of their reports while focusing on the aspects that advance their narrative. But when that's not enough they have no qualms with the invention of pure fiction.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
04/20/2021 13:17 Comments ||
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#5
Amazing how stupid and obvious their lies are.
Trump's not just a conservative whose policies we hate, or a bad man and a boor, he's actually an agent of the Kremlin.
Kavanaugh's not just a conservative judge whose views we hate, he's actually a gang rapist.
Capitol trespassers are insurrectionsts and killers.
These assholes are so dishonest they can't tell you the weather without making up ridiculous lies.
Posted by: Hupomomp Spawn of the Esquimeaux8016 ||
04/20/2021 14:52 Comments ||
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#6
To TW's comment (#1) - So crucial was this fairy tale about Sicknick that it made its way into the official record of President Trump's impeachment trial in the Senate, and they had Joe Biden himself recite from the script, even as clear facts mounted proving it was untrue....
Posted by: Bobby ||
04/20/2021 18:31 Comments ||
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#7
Thank you, Bobby. I should have read to the bottom of the article.
#8
These assholes are so dishonest they can't tell you the weather without making up ridiculous lies.
We are long past the point of "In Truth there is no news, in News there is no truth". We know they are lying. The question now is what do the lies mean.
#9
We know they are lying. The question now is what do the lies mean.
The lies mean:
"We are above the law. We ARE the law."
and
"We are going to grab as much as we can-- grab your job, grab your wealth, grab your children's future, grab your ancestors' past. It's OUR country now, and you serve us."
(Reuters) -The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.
PHYSICAL INACTIVITY TIED TO HIGHER COVID-19 RISKS
Patients with COVID-19 who have been consistently physically inactive have a significantly higher risk of severe outcomes than patients who were getting at least some exercise or regularly met physical activity guidelines prior to the illness, researchers found. Among the 48,440 patients in their study, 14.4% were consistently inactive in the two years before their COVID-19 diagnosis, 79.1% had some activity, and 6.4% consistently met recommended physical activity guidelines of at least 150 minutes per week. Compared with those who consistently met activity guidelines, people who were consistently inactive were more than twice as likely to be hospitalized and to die from the virus, according to a report in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. Consistently inactive patients also had worse outcomes than patients who got some exercise without meeting the guideline-recommended minimum. "It is well known that immune function improves with regular physical activity, and those who are regularly active have a lower incidence, intensity of symptoms and death from viral infections," said coauthor Dr. Robert Sallis of the Kaiser Permanente Fontana Medical Center in California. "Regular physical activity is associated with improvements in lung capacity and cardiovascular and muscular functioning that may serve to lessen the negative impacts of COVID-19 if it is contracted," he added. (bit.ly/3wVU8wx)
[France24] The damning report, commissioned in 2017 and running to nearly 600 pages, labels France a "collaborator" of the extremist Hutu regime that orchestrated the pogrom of some 800,000 people, and outright rejects the position that Paris was blind to their genocidal agenda.
The years-long investigation by US law firm Levy Firestone Muse said France knew a genocide was coming but remained "unwavering in its support" of its Rwandan allies, even when the planned extermination of the Tutsi minority was clear. And Billy Jeff was getting Jiggy and didn't care
"It is our conclusion that the French government bears significant responsibility for enabling a foreseeable genocide," states the Muse report, which drew on millions of pages of documents and interviews with more than 250 witnesses.
It found no evidence, however, that French officials or personnel directly participated in the killing of Tutsis.
France has long been accused of not doing enough to halt the massacres, and the Muse reports follows the publication last month of a separate inquiry into the same events commissioned by French President Emmanuel Macron.
The Duclert Commission, named after the historian leading that investigation, concluded that France bore "overwhelming responsibilities" over the genocide and acknowledged a "failure" on its part, but no complicity in the killings.
Follow the link for photos of the event:
[Regnum] On the territory of the coastal battery complex of the Kronstadt fortress, a military-historical reconstruction of the tragic events of 1921, which was called the Kronstadt mutiny in historiography, took place . The event was organized within the framework of the project “Kronshtadt. 1921 - 100 years in the memory of the city and citizens ”.
Let us remind you that in February 1921 the Kronstadt sailors, who were one of the main driving forces of the October Revolution of 1917, opposed the policy of "war communism" and the established dictatorship of the Bolsheviks. The teams of the battleships Sevastopol and Petropavlovsk demanded re-election of the Soviets, the abolition of the institution of commissars, and permission for the activities of socialist parties. Many residents of Kronstadt and Petrograd also supported the insurgent sailors.
Regular units of the Red Army and volunteers were sent to suppress the rebellion. Ten days later, as a result of artillery shelling and the storming of the Kronstadt fortress, the anti-Bolshevik uprising was suppressed. The captured participants in the rebellion were brutally dealt with. More than two thousand people were shot, about 6.5 thousand were sent to the camps.
... The organizers of the reconstruction, before the start, staged an exhibition of weapons of the late 19th - early 20th centuries. It was also possible to get acquainted with the uniform and civil suit of that era, said the TV channel "St. Petersburg".
In total, about 50 people took part in the one-hour reconstruction, using blank shots from rifles, machine guns and cannons. In real events, several thousand fighters from each side took part.
“This is our story. All periods are interesting. Some are more tragic, some are less. Everything belongs to us. And they belong not only to us, but also to our descendants , ”said Konstantin Petrov, a participant in the reconstruction.
[Sierra Sun Times] April 19, 2021 - Last week, U.S. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and U. S. Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Gillibrand Kirsten senatorBill Pascrell (D-NJ), and Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) called on Congress to implement postal banking pilot programs in rural and urban communities across the country as part of the Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) Senate and House Financial Services and General Government Appropriations (FSGG) Appropriations Bill and eventual final conference agreement. The lawmakers also pushed for $6 million in funding for USPS in FY22 to carry out the pilot programs to expand non-bank financial services offerings.
(Left) Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY)
"Mainstream financial institutions and predatory lenders often take advantage of underbanked Americans with high fees and interest rates that keep them in a cycle of poverty. As families across the country try to recover from the economic crisis, establishing postal banking pilot programs would ensure these communities have financially safe and reliable banking services," said Senator Gillibrand. "Expanding basic financial services at post offices in both rural and urban communities would help families who know just how expensive it is to be poor in America. This pilot program takes important steps to help struggling Americans and reintroduce widespread postal banking. I am proud to work alongside my colleagues to ensure it is included in the FSGG Appropriations Bill."
Posted by: Chris ||
04/20/2021 9:26 Comments ||
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#5
They do it in Europe, you see, which automatically makes it desirable to a certain segment of the population. Mostly the segment that isn’t aware that the US Postal Service has been closing and consolidating post offices, putting drop-off satellites in shops, and so forth. And equally unaware that banks have been putting satellites in grocery stores for years, in addition to on-line bank options.
[American Thinker] For over fifty years, it has been a recurring promise of conservative candidates running for election that they will stand up for our constitutional rights and support the appointment of judges and Supreme Court justices who will uphold the Constitution.
Yet time after time, the left seems to win both ideological and legal battles on monumental issues such as abortion, marriage, gun control, immigration, racial preferences for minorities, and the ever-expanding size and scope of government — no matter what the text of the Constitution actually says.
In The Age of Entitlement: America Since the Sixties, (2020; ISBN 978-1-5011-0689-7) author Christopher Caldwell advances the thesis that the Constitution of 1788 has been effectively nullified by our elites and supplanted with a "new constitution" that originated in, and reflects the values of, the "Civil Rights Era" of the 1960s. Though the civil rights movement began as a reformist movement within the old order, it evolved into a "revolution" that has nearly triumphed over the polity created in the 18th century:
The changes of the 1960s, with civil rights at their core, were not just a major new element in the Constitution. They were a rival constitution, with which the original one was frequently incompatible[.] ... Much of what we have called "polarization" or "incivility" in recent years is something more grave — it is the disagreement over which of the two constitutions shall prevail: the de jure constitution of 1788 ... with centuries of American culture behind it ... or the de facto constitution of 1964, which lacks this traditional kind of legitimacy but commands the near-unanimous endorsement of judicial elites and civic educators and the passionate allegiance of those who received it as liberation.
Caldwell argues that the new "de facto constitution" has been used to supersede the Bill of Rights and the black-letter law of the traditional Constitution. Forced busing and forced integration violated the First Amendment right to freedom of association, as did affirmative action for blacks and women. Racial and sex-based preferences offend the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. These policies were enacted despite opposition from most Americans. Speech codes and political correctness designed to cater to the sensitivities of minorities infringe on the right to freedom of speech and freedom of the press. The "right" to an abortion, which existed nowhere in the traditional Constitution and was opposed by a majority of the people (with limited exceptions), was essentially created by the Supreme Court.
#2
Presidents? I blame an out of control judiciary which assumed purview and powers never intended by the founders to reside with anyone sitting for life and unaccountable by the people, yet dare call it a republic.
#5
That definitely true, Procopius, but it's impossible to ignore Congress simply vacating virtually all of it's responsibilities to simply yell inflammatory crap at one another that engages their respective bases.
[ENGLISH.AAWSAT] The worst thing that can happen to causes and their wars, be they righteous or not, is for them to turn into traps for their advocates, whereby they cannot achieve the causes’ goals within a particular timeframe and cannot, on the other hand, leave them and turn the page on them. They thereby fall captive to wars for wars’ sake and causes for causes’ sake, while the depletion of resources and squander of reason become inevitable consequences.
When its legitimacy is weak, a political regime’s tendency to hit this chord prevails in the hopes that this will compensate for its limited supply of legitimacy. However, we can't all be heroes. Somebody has to sit on the curb and applaud when they go by... the issue soon turns into a sacred doctrine that the regime which had established it cannot control. Here, the nation falls into the trap of the cause instead of the cause being a source of empowerment for the nation.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
04/20/2021 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11131 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
Yitzhak Rabin did the same with the 1993 Oslo Accords. ... Rabin was assassinated.
#2
...And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
04/20/2021 10:53 Comments ||
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#3
this article is opinion, not news
also, the opinion is poorly written, filled with useless repetition and irrelevant references
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
04/20/2021 18:46 Comments ||
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#4
this article is opinion, not news
Which is why it is filed on Page 4: Opinion.
We see similar word salad op-ed writing from many of our international local news sources, working hard to display erudition instead of making the points succinctly and logically, supporting each by a few well chosen facts, what the late French journalist-philosopher Jean-François Revel (Anti-Americanism, Without Marx or Jesus) called the Time Magazine style that he happily adopted.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
(Reuters) -The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.
[Sierra Sun Times] April 19, 2021 - Last week, U.S. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and U. S. Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Gillibrand Kirsten senatorBill Pascrell (D-NJ), and Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) called on Congress to implement postal banking pilot programs in rural and urban communities across the country as part of the Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) Senate and House Financial Services and General Government Appropriations (FSGG) Appropriations Bill and eventual final conference agreement. The lawmakers also pushed for $6 million in funding for USPS in FY22 to carry out the pilot programs to expand non-bank financial services offerings.
