John – Page 30 – Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise

You Are The Rebellion

“This will be a day long remembered. It has seen the end of Kenobi, it will soon see the end of the Rebellion.” – Star Wars: Episode IV, A New Hope

What’s red and smells? Rudolf’s nose.

I still regret going to the Star Wars™ movie that came out in 2015. It was bad enough I had to look up the name – The Force Awakens. I did wonder about one thing – it was clear after the first trilogy that the rebels won. The Empire® was defeated, the Emperor© was dead, and people were partying on all the planets that the tyranny had been defeated, even if they had way better uniforms.

No, according to this movie, clearly the rebels had spiked the ball in the end zone at the buzzer and . . . lost. In The Force Awakens, the Empire™ was in fine order, except run by a teenager with mommy issues who ran a galactic empire despite the fact that he was an observable and miserable moron. The movie was awful. The only thing that could have been worse is if the Rebellion® had been made up of Han Solo clones because someone said “Many Hans make light work.”

Why did James Dean cross the road? Because he wasn’t wearing his seatbelt.

But Leftists seemed to love this awful movie. Why?

Because they have the pathological need to be the victim, like the Rebellion in the original Star Wars©. And who is more the victim that the righteous rebel, working against a monolithic government composed of evil people?

That’s still what Leftists think in 2023 when they have already consolidated power over:

Electoral College voting rules,
Most federal bureaucracies,
The FBI,
The CIA,
Academia,
The general officers of the military,
Most Fortune® 500 companies (Disney™ isn’t an exception), and
The executive branch.

If the voting irregularities from 2020 are repeated in 2024 (and there’s no reason to expect they won’t be) then the presidency will, forever, be owned by the Left and they could put a rutabaga named Timmy into the Oval Office. If they can get a crook with fake hair, fake teeth, and no idea what day it is “elected”, then the Left owns the presidency.

I will admit, most Democrat candidates look like they could use a hand.

And justice? Anyone from the Left who faced federal charges for the George Floyd riots had their charges dropped, yet some people who went into the Capitol building, our Capitol building, are facing thirty years in the federal slammer while murderers regularly get off with a dozen years or less. That’s justice in 2023.

Yet the Left still wants to be thought as the rebels.

Why?

Deep inside the mind of a Leftist is someone who hates success. They hate people who have achieved, and they hate anything that is good, anything that is strong. Even the Leftists in America hate America and want, at their core, to bring it all down, to watch it burn. They say they love science, but that’s a lie – they like certain small numbers of group-think “science” when it aligns with their ideology – Climate Change® for example, and less so when it involves utterly obvious things like biological sex.

Do they hate sexism? No. They revel in it as long as it comes from a culture that’s weak, like the Islamic world. Do they hate violence? No, they love it when it happens in some third-world hellhole. I could go on and on, but one of the things that they really hate is success, which is why they reacted so strongly to Trump’s “s**thole country” comment – they idolize failure as if it were a sacrament.

It’s nice being in Antifa – their people never have to take time off of work to protest.

I could try to psychoanalyze this victim mindset further, but, why? Leftists are weak, and worship weakness. There’s a reason for that:

They hate themselves, and are miserable. Why do they lay down on the road during protests? They want people to run them over.

The people who manipulate the Leftists aren’t the same as the Leftists – they really don’t hate themselves. Nope, instead they just love power. Think the Clintons believed in anything they said? The same people who, when leaving the White House, stole the drapes? They believed in one and only one thing – power. And, apparently, nice drapery.

The reason that the Leftists are so easy to manipulate into being followers is that, for them, their victimhood forms the replacement for what would otherwise be their religion. In Leftists, the game is to be the farthest Left. This is the reason that, like a flock of birds that have been startled, they keep saying “True Communism™ has never been tried”. Why hasn’t True Communism® ever been tried? Because it wasn’t far Left enough.

You know what never gets old? Russian and Ukrainian tank crews.

I recall reading as a much younger Wilder that the Soviets had a plan for when they took over the United States. All of the True Believer® Leftists would be the first up against the wall. The people on the Right? They could deal with them because they weren’t hopeless traitors like the people on the Left. I have no idea if this is true, since I read this when I was just a pup, but, really, it makes sense. Would you ever trust a Leftist if the Soviets didn’t trust them?

So, that’s the Left. They want to be seen as the rebels because they want to be seen as weak. They even compete for victim points with a pronoun and disability Olympics®. How many more points does a lesbian in a wheelchair score versus a black Moslem man with turbo-AIDs?

One thing most people missed about the Right is there is a significant difference. Trump was popular because he talked about the things that we believe in. Illegal aliens? The wall just got 10 feet taller.

That line got cheers.

But this line?

“But I recommend taking the vaccines. I did it. It’s good. Take the vaccines.”

It got booed by those faithful enough to attend a Trump rally. Never forget this – for the Left, the Current Narrative is gospel. For the Right, the idea is that their values matter first.

And that leads us here.

In this weird twist, the Left, who thinks they’re some sort of tough rebel group, isn’t, unless the definition of rebel is “supported by virtually all government entities and major corporations”. The Leftist band Rage Against the Machine should really change their name to Rage Against Those Against the Machine. Yeah, not very catchy, I know, but true.

How much cocaine did Charlie do? Enough to kill two and a half men.

So, who are we?

We’re what the Leftists always wanted to be, the real rebels. We stand our ground in a world that says that our values are out of date, our principles are unpopular, and that real human freedom comes from something other than a dedicated group making it so.

Something tells me the Left is going to be jealous, since we’re the real rebellion. Oh, wait, they are already jealous; that’s why they hate us.

I must admit, it does feel good to be a rebel. Because I know we’re going to win, if for no other reason than we are so very, very pretty.

All You Will Ever Need To Read About How To Be Happy* (*Most of the Time)

“Happy premise number three: even though I feel like I might ignite, I probably won’t.” – Bowfinger

This is a common phrase when something goes wrong around Stately Wilder Mansion™. After the cussing is over, I mean.

Reprint – August, 2019.

I’m travelling for business again this week. The upside to business travel is that it allows me to break my normal routine. I almost feel guilty. Almost. The work this week is light, and my travel has been fun, the food has been great, and the work I am doing has given me a lot of new ideas to think about, and I like that. My toenails also seem to grow faster when I’m on the road but might be imagination. Or, maybe it’s my feet shrinking?

The other advantage being on the road is that it breaks routines. In this case, I found myself eating at the bar at Applechilies®. Eating at the bar makes sense when you’re travelling alone: it seems a bit less pathetic, and you can talk to the bartender if it’s not too busy on a Tuesday night by Interstate 3.14 in Upper Midwestia. This night, the bartender was a young lady of about 22, I’m guessing. We talked a bit. As often happens to me when I meet a stranger, (I have no idea why) pretty soon she was pouring out her entire life story. Seriously.

For the record, as far as you know I only had one drink.

I’ll skip the really wild parts, since the point relevant to this post is that she had dropped out of college.

“That’s fine, and you shouldn’t go to college just to go to college. What is it that you want to do, though?” That question seemed to be really tough for her. And it is a big question, but as I’ve noted again and again, people fail most often because they don’t act on their dreams, not because they can’t achieve them.

After some considerable thought, she answered. “I guess . . . I guess I just want to be happy.”

“Happy? Is that all? Happy is the easiest thing,” I replied.

And it is. Being happy is so easy to achieve it is almost trivial. Note: being happy every minute of every day is impossible. Bad things happen. Professors put your computer program up on the screen to show what not to do. Your pants split at the crotch during a presentation. You walk into a glass door going to a party with people you just met and you get McDonald’s® Hot Mustard© sauce all over the door in a big yellow blob about chest high. Oh, did I say you? Those were all me. And the computer program did do what I intended it to do, though I was surprised it did bring down a mainframe. I guess infinite loops are powerful things.

Remember, no matter what they say, failure is an option.

Warning: this advice probably won’t work for people who are clinically depressed because their brain chemistry is all messed up. That’s wiring that this advice probably won’t fix – they need to see a doctor.

But I learned to be happy when I was relatively young. It’s wickedly effective. As an example, one company I was working for was experiencing huge financial difficulties. Everyone was working to make sure the business stayed open. I was, too, but I wasn’t letting it get me down. I had a new son (The Boy) and was pretty happy at home even though the bank account wasn’t all that full.

Yes, this was on my performance review. “Employee is too optimistic and believes that the business will ultimately succeed if we work hard and solve our problems.”

In my performance review I was docked for being too happy. Apparently being angry and pissed off increases profitability? Spoiler, the company survived. Bonus points? It’s at least partially due to some changes I made – while I was in a good mood. I don’t know if they still have the “don’t be happy at work” policy.

But being happy is simple. In order (more or less) here’s what works for me.

Be close to someone – like physically close. Touching them close. Or get a pet. It’s hard for me to have a bad day when I know that someone loves me. People are herd animals (those that aren’t bears) and physical touch works wonders at making people happy. No sex with the pets, no matter how much they’re asking for it.
Have a friend you can call when something good happens to you. For bonus points, have a friend you can call when something awful happens to you – that’s rough, because only a good friend is willing to share in the bad things that happen. If you don’t have friends? Make some. I know that some people say that Jesus’ biggest miracle was having a dozen close friends after the age of 30, but it is possible. And these need to be friends in real life. FaceBook® friends are nice, but it helps to have physically known the friend for the friendship to be solid.
Exercise. Do something: Walk on the treadmill. Go for a run. Lift weights. Run through a cave being chased by a giant stone bowling ball. I’m fairly fanatical about working out every lunch hour to the point I’m a jerk about not skipping it for (nearly) anything – it really improves the quality of my day. There are times I come back from working out and feel awesome and happy for no reason at all. The harder I worked out, the better I feel.
Eat right. Avoid carbs – they screw with your emotions, especially in quantity. Don’t eat too much. Yes, I’m still fasting on a weekly basis, and some of my happiest days are while I’m fasting. Besides vegans, who is sad when they’re eating a steak? Eat steak. If you’re a vegan, pretend it’s a bacon, since bacon comes from plants, right? Meat may be murder, but it’s tasty murder that makes you feel good. But I have learned if The Mrs. is eating ice cream straight from the carton to NOT ask how she’s doing.
If you are sad, don’t drink alcohol. It’s a depressant. I refuse to drink on those rare days I’m sad. It helps. You can’t find happiness at the bottom of a beer bottle, because who’s happy when they run out of beer?
Get enough sleep. I advise people to sleep as consistently as possible, especially if they have problems getting to sleep. If you can’t sleep consistent hours, at least get enough sleep even if it’s not the same sleep every night. Since I blog after work, and often after everyone at home has gone to bed, this is the rule where I’m the biggest hypocrite.
As much as possible, avoid crappy people. Sure, everybody has a bad day and needs to share. That’s okay. But if you’re constantly complaining about bad news to your friends? Expect that they won’t pick up when you call, so try to give more than you take.
As much as possible, feel good for other people that have done well. I worked with a guy who put up a bulletin board with stories about how much the CEO of our company made. He called it the “Wall of Shame” since he didn’t think the CEO was worth that much. Me? I want the CEO to make a lot of money, that way my check looks smaller the rent for the place he rents for his mistress.
As much as possible, avoid envy. See above. If something good happens to someone, feel genuine joy for them, even if it didn’t happen to you. Envy is a wasted emotion.
As much as possible, when bad thoughts slip into your brain – sad ones, mean ones, anything Hillary Clinton would think – get them out. Think of something positive, like the fact that you don’t have to drink alone because your cats are alcoholics, or that you can be the person to put the “fun” back in funeral.
Keep things in perspective. Most things you do aren’t memorable to other people, and most mistakes you make will be forgotten in a week, unless you were the guy running the test at Chernobyl, then people just won’t shut up about it.

But you could claim that you were late to work because of a flock of wild teacup poodles.

Scott Adams, of Dilbert® fame has a very similar list – I know because after I talked to the bartender and decided to write this post, he did a video on . . . being happy. He’s in the video below discussing it. Adams is much more of the “people are sacks of chemicals” and he uses that model to make sure that he’s maximizing the brain chemicals that show up when you’re happy. It works for him and he does it without ever attempting to control his thoughts. But if you are someone who drains him of happy because you’re a complete tool? He’ll cut you out of his life. Since he’s a multi-millionaire and more-or-less self-employed, he can do it.

Me? If Ted is a tool at work and I need the job? I have to deal with Ted. Though, honestly I’ve only ever worked with one guy named Ted, and he was super to work with and one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Unlike Scott, I don’t go for the “sacks of chemicals” theory. They do make a difference, but mind matters, too, at least for me. The one time in my life I was profoundly unhappy, I learned to manage my mind first, while finding all the other little tips and tricks of “sacks of chemicals” management more or less independently of Mr. Adams.

I think this was from the pilot of that new series, Breaking Bras®. And you can’t make a mask like that without silicone . . . .

And that’s it. Those are the secrets. Nothing mystical, nothing difficult.

Again, I’m not happy every second of every day, but when I follow just over half the steps above, I’m happy 95% of the day. I have it good. There’s no reason to not enjoy being me.

For 80% of people reading this, happiness is easy. So, choose happiness if you want it, unless there’s a workplace policy at your office, too. In that case? Become a loner, drunk, vegan insomniac that spends your free time at Antifa® meetings. And have another doughnut.

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Global Warming Is For Losers

“I’m a man, but I can change, if I have to, I guess.” – The Red Green Show

Remember to always ask yourself what you can do to make Leonardo DiCaprio’s life better.

I remember one Twitter® exchange I had way back in the past. It was with a Leftist, and I made the statement, “Don’t you see, the only ethical path is to be against illegal immigration, and immigration of any sort. Since Americans emit nine times the greenhouse gases of countries like Mexico or Guatemala, the only thing we can do to protect the climate is to keep them there or send them back.”

There was a pause on the response. “Not sure if you’re really concerned about the environment or just don’t like illegal immigrants.”

That was one of my favorite trolls, since they had to think about conflicting narratives in their programming. In many cases, the Left ignores this, but my major message is never to the Left, since they are not on a rational mission, but on a religious one since Leftism isn’t a political system at heart, it is a religious one. Look at it when a Leftist talks about Trump – it’s like someone on the Right being forced to think of Satan in the Oval Office – it’s religious, not ideological.

The Sun never went to college because it has thousands of degrees.

One of the sacraments of this religion is abortion. The other? Global Warming, er, Climate Change.

This summer has been hotter than the last few here in Upper Lower Midwestia. I’ve seen stories where it was hot in lots of other places, mostly places that you’d expect, like Phoenix. Some of the hottest places this year are the places where people are only there because there’s oil there, like Saudi Arabia, Iran, or the place they make French fries at McDonald’s®.

But that’s why we always see Global Warming, er, Climate Change stories trotted out in the summer and never when it’s -20°F (-273.16°C in metric units) in winter. How bad is it? The propaganda of the sacrament of Global Warming, er, Climate Change is trotted out on weather forecasts to nail down the idea that things are getting worse when in reality, they’re not a whole lot different. Want an example? Here’s Sweden:

Are illegals in Sweden known as “artificial Swedeners”?

Yup, 36 years later, the biggest change has been that they changed the color of the map to a scary color. Why? To celebrate the sacrament of Global Warming, er, Climate Change.

How bad is it? I’ve pointed out again and again how the people in charge of defending our country are fundamentally not serious people. They want, well, I’ll let them tell you:

If she succeeds, everyone will know how to stop an American tank: shoot the soldiers pushing it.

It has even become a death cult, of sorts. The doom that has hit country after country across the world has been staggering. The big part is propaganda – starting at the schools where teachers, predominantly taught Left-leaning curriculum by Left-leaning professors at Left-leaning colleges are the ones in charge of the indoctrination. What does that lead to? Students that don’t want to have children because they believe that they’re part of some sort of Original Sin just by breathing. Notice that China is utterly ignoring the nonsense.

Looks like the Germans and the French are finally equal at something.

The other part of this equation is that people are ignoring the elephant in the room: a volcano last year put an additional 13% water vapor into the Earth’s atmosphere. 13%. And water is a very, very potent greenhouse gas. That’s huge, but I don’t see Greta wanting to sacrifice virgins to the volcano god to stop those from going off, or Joe Biden wanting to make water illegal.

Soon enough the water will drop out of the atmosphere, but Joe Biden will still have to live with being Hunter Biden’s dad.

And I will say, again and again, that this has nothing to do with Global Warming, er, Climate Change. It has everything to do with Leftist ideology and nothing to do with the temperature or the weather or any sort of solution. Again, listen to them when they talk:

What’s the scariest word in nuclear physics? Oops.

The Left is adamantly against nuclear power, because, properly implemented it solves a whatever Global Warming, er, Climate Change problems there are. To be fair, the plants need to be idiot proof, because idiots have a really great track record of screwing everything up, and hiring anyone but actually competent people to design and run the things is an absolute must.

Never let a cat run your nuclear power plant.

Nuclear power is clearly a part of the plan, but keep in mind that the plan is created by people whose idea of nature is a strip of lawn in a park a half a mile from their house. The people crafting the plans to create the “new world” have no more real appreciation of nature than Mark Zuckerbot.

Remember, these are people that get scared when they’re more than 20’ from asphalt.

I think we need to move away from fossil fuels, and quickly. Not at all because I hate them, no, but because we need to save them for the really useful things they do. It will take decades and trillions of dollars of investment to move the world to a new power source. And we only have so much time to do it before that opportunity expires.

Leftists oppose it:

“Environmentalists” don’t understand it:

But true Chads know that’s where we’re going:

And if we ignore it, the actual aliens (not the illegal ones) will never stop giving us crap:

Exclusive: Hunter Biden’s Secret Diary

“Look, you’re corrupt, we’re corrupt. There’s one difference. We’re honest about it.” – Get the Gringo

If Hunter ever goes to jail, I hope he names his prison memoir Biden Time.

We here at Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise® have come across a huge scoop: we have found the diaries of Hunter Biden from grade school all the way up to last week. They were left on the doorstop of our law firm, Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe with a note that said, “Too hot for James O’Keefe! Good luck, Johnny, I’m your biggest fan! – J.”

Cataloging the material was difficult, and there were times where I became concerned. Later pages were covered with powdery substances, and I wasn’t sure if I was going to be in trouble with the DEA if they raided Stately Wilder Manor. No problem – my dog, Foreshadowing, ate them and then ran around the house 43 times. Then all of Foreshadowing’s teeth fell out and checks from Ukrainian mobsters started showing up in my mailbox.

I’ve skipped much of the information in the diaries, since it’s probably good to keep what happens between a man, his dog, seventeen Filipino hookers and a jar of peanut butter private. Of course, none of that happened, which is why I’m grateful the word “parody” exists.

July, 1977

I wanted my dad to take me to see starwars agin but he said know because dad said that he was woried we’d grow up in a raciall jungle. I like jungles! I talked with Beau, and Beau told me to shut up because I was too stupid to understand. I said, no, Im seven so I know wat a jungle is, but Beau said I had brain damage. I think I wanna coke.

June, 1988

Holy cow, boys, having your dad running for president is just friggin’ awesome! I was busted in Jersey with a bunch of drugs. I just flashed my driver’s license. Biden, bitches! It cracks me up that the old man is all “let’s get tough on drugs” but when I get bussssted, nada happens. Old man says that he’ll make a phone call. Cracks me up when dad says in speeches that all drug users should be held accountable. Ha! Unless your name is Biden. Bitches!

In a dictatorship in Africa, we’d call this corruption. Here? We don’t talk about it.

June, 1994

So, dad explains it this way. My grades at Georgetown were crap, but he pulled strings and got me into Georgetown law, which sucks, because Georgetown is so low rent. Of course, Beau had to go to dad’s alma mater, Syracuse. Today, it all changed! Apparently, dad had Bill Clinton call the dean, Guido Calabresi (seriously Goodfellas vibes) at Yale, and I can transfer from Georgetown to Yale! Dad says that since I’m a Biden, well, “don’t worry about grades, son” and I won’t! Woooo! Yale! It’s awesome to have the name Biden, bitches!!!

May, 2001

So, here I am at a law firm. My law firm! It’s called Oldaker, Biden and Belair. Join the firm, get your name on the door! How awesome is that? I think it’s because . . . I’m a Biden, bitches! Partner in one. The other thing is that absolutely no one here cares about how much you drink or how many drugs you do. Drink after lunch to take the edge off? Fine. My name’s on the door. Parties? Plenty of those, and the booze and, well, other things flow freely. I think I’m in heaven.

I love putting on warm underwear, fresh from the dryer. I then look around the laundromat and wonder who it belongs to.

September, 2008

Dad says I have to quit working as a lobbyist because Obummer said so. Dad said that being vice president was way better than being senator, so I have to stop doing God’s work, lobbying for online gambling, biotechnology companies, and colleges wanting federal funds, I mean, the most needy and moral people. I’m so sad.

February 19, 2014

Kicked out of the Navy Reserve today. Dad and I had a discussion, which means he yelled at me. “You idiot, you understood you were getting a drug test, right? And that coke is only detectable for a day or two, right? The head of the Joint Chiefs said that, and I quote, you had enough cocaine in your urine to qualify your urine as a controlled substance.” Yeah, it was bad. Not bad? My company, Rosemont Seneca Thornton, just got $3,500,000 sent to us from a Russian dude! Why? We’re not sure, but all I have to say is . . . Bidenz, Bitches!!!!

2014 was a very good year.

April, 2014

New job, new job, new job! This one has me being on the Board of Directors of some company in Ukraine. I think they make chlorine gas or helium gas or something. The best part? My salary. $1,000,000. A year! Bidenz, Bitches! Ha! Best part? I’m not sure I have to do anything!

April 14, 2017

My life has kinda been a haze since I got the job at Buriisma. Or however you spell it. A million bucks a year, but they cut my salary to half after dad was no longer veep. Dammit. Why couldn’t he have beaten Aunt Hillary? I think dad was scared, something about, “Don’t cross Hillary, that’s worse than the Chicago Mob.” But today I finally got divorced. Kathy was always upset about the cocaine and the crack and the Filipino prostitutes, but I think it was the video of the dog that got to her. She said, “Hunter, that’s enough. We’re done here.” I didn’t mention that Beau’s widow was looking pretty fine at the funeral . . . I wonder if that’s what finally put her over the edge? Or the fact that I was bangin’ Beau’s babe was on the front page of Page Six®?

Hunter’s date didn’t like bottles, she only liked it in the can.

August, 2018

Stripper? Arkansas? My kid? Jeez, how much crack did I do that night?

April, 2019

So, my laptop is broken. I think I dropped it off to get fixed, but I was so high that I’m not sure I did that or maybe the laptop ran away. I think the running away part was a dream. Regardless, what bad could come of that?

May, 2019

Met a girl, six days later we’re married. This will turn out well – Biden, Bitches!

October, 2020

Guess they found the laptop. Thankfully, all the CIA dudes signed a thing that said it wasn’t really mine. Whew! Dad would be mad about that if it was. I guess I believe the CIA guys, except a lot of those pictures look really familiar.

July, 2022

My art has done awesome! I must be good at art! My paintings have sold for lots of money! So far it’s over $1,300,000 for like 11 of them. It’s not as good as Buriisma money, but it’s still pretty good. I mean, some of those paintings took me hours to make. One person bought almost $900,000 of them. I’m not sure if she’s the one that dad appointed to that special commission, but, whatever. I’m an artist. Biden, bitches!

Shooting down the Chinese balloon is the only thing Biden has done to stop inflation.

June, 2023

My lawyer says I’m not in any trouble anymore. Turns out that he knows the DOJ guy and they have a deal worked out for special people like me that I can just claim I’ll pay my taxes in the future, and won’t buy anymore guns while all coked up. Excellent deal, plus they said they put in a sweetener – gets me immunity from essentially anything I’ve ever done up to now. Bidenz, Bitches!!!!

August, 2023

That stupid judge threw out my special deal. Dad says it will be fine, though. The same guy who negotiated it for the DOJ is now a “special prosecutor” which means that he “especially” won’t be prosecuting me for anything. And I have a child support deal that makes sure that Arkansas stripper’s kid gets some of my paintings. Sure! I can do about sixty of those a day!

You know, sometimes I like to reflect back on my life. I wonder if I would be an asset to society if I were living a clean, sober, honest life and financially supporting my children while not snorting enough drugs to paralyze Robert Downey, Jr while getting into less trouble for federal felonies than the average man would if they were arrested for jaywalking.

Nah.

Memes And Your Mind

“No, for God’s sake! You’ve got it all backwards! AIDS, the Ebola virus? On an evolutionary scale they are newborns. This virus walked the planet long before the dinosaurs.” – The X Files Movie (‘98)

Greta has made a real difference in electrical usage – every time she’s on the TV, I turn it off.

One of the more interesting ideas that I ran across was when I was first exposed to the idea of a meme. It’s really short for mimeme, which means “imitated thing”. Richard Dawkins described it as the idea that ideas would be faced with the same sort of pressures that biological entities face in the world – they either reproduce, or they die.

Regardless of how I feel about Dawkins’ other ideas, this one has always intrigued me, because it’s about the fundamental relationship between people and information and ideas. It’s the place where ideas propagate and are passed on.

Or not. An idea that’s passed on, lives. One that isn’t passed on, dies.

The doctor said I had Peekaboo virus. He said that sends most people to ICU.

Now, that really may not have any relationship with the truth of an idea. Let’s take a meme that has been artificially boosted to the point where it’s known by virtually everyone:

“Diversity is our strength.”

Well, not so much. It turns out that diversity is our diversity, but probably not our strength in that when you have a bunch of people living together that don’t share a common ethnicity, “social trust” drops. It turns out that if you want to live in a society with high trust, it’s probably more reasonable to say, “Diversity is our weakness”.

What about another great meme, this one from our Founding Fathers, “All men are created equal”.

My hairline would beg to differ.

Now if the meme had been, “All men have the same rights” I would have been right on board, and I think that was the original intent. But people are decidedly unequal. Some are short, some are tall. Some are smart, and some are Leftists. All men may have the same rights, but all men aren’t the same.

Why are all the corporations hiring female Equality Officers? They’re cheaper.

How about this one: “majority rules”?

That’s one I remember having been well drilled into the brains of fourth grade kids when I was one, typically when I lost the vote on the movie to watch in class. Why wouldn’t a bunch of fourth grade kids not want to watch Tommy?

But “majority rules” is a horrible way to run a society. Doubt me? Look around. The idea that has been the most stable (outside of Kim’s Best Korea Solution) has been a constitutional republic, not a democracy. But, hey, who needs a constitution when people might have bad thoughts? Majority rules is mob rule, and that defines the worst of us, a place where the passion of the moment takes over from the rights of all of us.

The ideas here are simple, and the phrases have an amazing lifespan even when they are observably false. There is a place for Truth, and it isn’t in a meme. Just as a virus doesn’t have to be virtuous, neither are ideas that are spread by memes. What they are though, is excellent persuasion material.

Oh, Garfield! And here I thought you just wanted to be Nermal.

But just like all people aren’t created equal, all memes aren’t created equal, either. One could make the argument that Trump’s victorious election in 2016 was partially due to fun memes. I’m sure that you saw some of them. Remember The Deplorables meme?

I’m sure Hillary would like to forget it.

Memes are often effective persuasion material, and effective propaganda, true or not. Advertising, for instance, is entirely made to try to create memes and pump them directly into the heads of consumers. How many ad jingles can you think of in the next sixty seconds? I’m lovin’ it®, and I’d be happy to give you Helping Hands™ to Bring Good Things To Life©.

It’s not a mistake that these are memorable.

The Internet has not made this better. In many ways, the websites (especially social media) are created to be addiction pumps by manipulating your emotions – and brain chemicals.

The good news is that we aren’t simply blank slates for corporations, government, and universities to imprint on, we have free will, and most importantly we get to choose what goes into our heads, what information we watch, and what thoughts we consume.

As Garfield® taught us, we aren’t immune to propaganda.

But realizing it’s there is the first step to understanding it, to taking a step back, and to evaluate what I think.

I asked my librarian if they had a book by Shakespeare. “Yes,” she replied. “Which one?” I asked. “William.”

Is that my thought? Did I put it there? Is it consistent with what I know? Is it consistent with the truth?

Is it consistent with the Truth?

When I think about just what a meme might be imitating, I keep coming around to the same idea: the Truth. And what is propaganda, but an idea imitating the Truth?

Wilder Live – Podcast at 9EST, or Catch It On Replay!

Livestream in less than 30 minutes!!!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUskuritR5P3BBJpOr5gzhg/streams

Funniest News On the ‘Net.

In this episode:

Indictment #4690
Illegal Aliens . . . on the East Coast
The fall of ESPN
Grave Thieves . . .
ThinkRealFast.

Catch it live or on replay!

Unfrozen Caveman Interview

“Hey, business is business. You use a gun, I use a fountain pen what’s the difference? Let’s put it in my terms: you’re in a hostile takeover, you snatch us up for some green mail, but you’re not expecting some poison pill to be running around the building, am I right?” – Die Hard

Sorry I edited out Worf. He was such a prima Dorn-a.

I’m here with my friend, Coroc. Coroc was frozen in an accident in the year 5000 B.C. which may or may not have been related to the first recorded time a man said, “Oh, yeah? Hold my beer.”

Coroc was thawed after his body was found while a construction crew was excavating the foundations for a McDonald’s® that was being built in Kharkov. Coroc has since gotten a degree from Harvard® Law and an MBA from Wharton© and has also killed an elk with a pocket knife in the parking lot of a Wendy’s™. I’ve asked him for an interview so I could get in a few questions about his unique experiences in dealing with business and economic situations.

John Wilder (JW): Coroc, I image the world is much different than when you were frozen into a block of ice near Kharkov 7,000 years ago. What’s the best new invention that you’ve seen?

Coroc IceBeer (CI): PEZ®. It is a light and fruity brick of flavor that explodes in your mouth like Magorthath’s axe explodes the skulls of his feeble enemies. It makes me laugh, but not too much, for that is womanly.

JW: Your last name is IceBeer. Did you have beer back then?

Coroc: If we didn’t have beer, there would have been many maidens left unplowed, if you know what I mean. So, yes. Beer is, how you say, awesome, although I can assure you we would not have had any of that Bud Light™. We would rather have consumed the flat body of a badger that had been walked on by many horses and then left out on the ground for a week.

A crying Möbius strip walks into a bar, crying. The bartender asks, “What’s wrong?” The Möbius strip says, “Where do I even begin?”

JW: Whoa, that escalated quickly! Let’s change the subject a bit. When dealing with a middle manager that didn’t give you the appropriate chance for advancement, what did you do back then?

Coroc: This happened many times. When a leader was too old or feeble, we would simply say, “You, you are not fit to lead! Go and gather berries with the women or I will split your skull with my axe.” Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t.

JW: What happened if you fought?

Coroc: Well, depends on if you win or lose. Lose? No problem, since you were dead. Win? No problem, since you took his women, took his hut, and took his things. Only a real problem if his women were named Karen.

JW: Sounds violent.

Coroc: Yes, it was the original hostile takeover.

I don’t like sweeping. Floors are beneath me.

JW: Did people ever not have jobs?

Coroc: No. Everyone had a job. Need someone to go hunt? Yes. We always needed that. Need someone to go and fight the idiot tribe next door that wouldn’t turn their music down after eleven? Yes, men needed. Need someone to fish and drink beer? Yes. Always needed.

JW: What if someone didn’t want to help out?

Coroc: I don’t understand. I already told you about the hostile takeover.

JW: Let’s shift gears. Here in 2023, we have a complex economy that uses electronic ledgers to keep track of the movement of goods and services and the payment from one country to another. This is enforced with many central banks working together to balance the flow of currency from one country to another. How did you do that, Coroc?

Coroc: Crom. I thought 7,000 years would have made you people smarter. In my time, in Scythia, we had horses. We had women. Fiery, lusty women with big manes of blonde hair, massive thighs that they could crack walnuts with. Strong, birthing hips. We rode our horses, took our axes, and made piece with other tribes.

JW: Don’t you mean “peace” instead of “piece”?

Coroc: No. They gave us a piece. Simple. And no problem with Human Resources, since we treated every tribe exactly alike. And there was no corporate debt to worry about.

What do you call a heavy metal band with financial problems? Megadebt.

JW: When it came So you didn’t have to worry about interest rates?

Coroc: The only interest I had was in the rate my enemy would die so I could hear the lamentation of his women. I think that was our major metric on our KPI, the relative volume of the lamentation of the women.

JW: What about your stock market?

Coroc: It was pretty stable. You can only eat so much steak per day. We kept a close eye on our stocks.

JW: What was your retirement like?

Coroc: Retirement meant, mostly, hanging out with the gods once you died in battle. It was a pretty good plan, leave 5% of your lootings in a plan, get 2.5% tribal match. And there was free healthcare! If you had poor health, we didn’t care. See? Free. Simple.

JW: So, were you ever plagued by guilt over your colonizer attitude?

Coroc: (Sadly) Yes, we were sometimes feeling guilty of our ability as colonizers. There are only so many men that we could use to fight, so our ability to conquer even the feeble toothless enemies we had was limited. Why, some years we would only vanquish a few kingdoms and petty princelings.

Is the sculptor of his statue a Khan artist?

JW: Was there much poverty in your tribe?

Coroc: We had a great poverty prevention program. It was called starvation. Worked wonders.

JW: Last question, what about inflation? Did your tribe ever see inflation?

Coroc: Only under one leader who tried to make smooth round rocks currency. Worked horrible, pretty soon everyone was strong, though, infinite amount of small round rocks back in Scythia, so it was great leg day.

JW: What happened to that leader?

Coroc: Hostile takeover.

Civil War 2.0 Weather Report: Corruption And The End Of An Age

“Only a cynical man would call what these people have “lives,” Wayne. Crime, despair, this is not how man was supposed to live. The League of Shadows has been a check against human corruption for thousands of years. We sacked Rome, loaded trade ships with plague rats, burned London to the ground. Every time a civilization reaches the pinnacle of its decadence, we return to restore the balance.” – Batman Begins

“If I were American, I’d vote Trump. But I’m an illegal alien, So I’m voting Biden.”

Those who have an opposing ideology are considered evil.
People actively avoid being near those of opposing ideology. Might move from communities or states just because of ideology.
Common violence. Organized violence is occurring monthly.
Common violence that is generally deemed by governmental authorities as justified based on ideology.
Opposing sides develop governing/war structures. Just in case.
Open War.

Volume V, Issue 3

All memes except for the clock and graphs are “as found”.

This is a moving situation, and things are changing quickly. The advice remains. Avoid crowds. Get out of cities. Now. A year too soon is better than one day too late.

In this issue: Front Matter – Watch The Bugs Scatter – Violence and Censorship Update – Biden’s Misery Index – Updated Civil War 2.0 Index – The End of an Age – Links

Front Matter

Welcome to the latest issue of the Civil War II Weather Report. These posts are different than the other posts at Wilder Wealthy and Wise and consist of smaller segments covering multiple topics around the single focus of Civil War 2.0, on the first or second Monday of every month. I’ve created a page (LINK) for links to all of the past issues. Also, subscribe because you’ll join nearly 800 other people and get every single Wilder post delivered to your inbox, M-W-F at 7:30AM Eastern, free of charge.

Watch The Bugs Scatter

When I was a kid growing up near Wilder Mountain, we’d often go hiking during the summers. Whenever we’d stop, I’d do kid things, one of which was picking up a rock. Why?

To see what was on the other side of it, silly.

Whenever I’d pick one up and see a batch of bugs, the one thing they’d do is run and hide. They were, I suppose, fine under the rock, or maybe out at night, but the light of day scared them and they would run so they could start hiding.

Biden rhymes with hidin’ so that makes sense. As the Congressional review of Biden Shenanigans continues to show up more and more smoking guns, the pattern remains the same: get Trump.

June 7: FBI releases the FBI form where it’s alleged by an informant that the Bidens took a $10 million bribe.
June 8: Jack smit indicts Trump for having similar sorts of documents that every president has retained.

July 26: Hunter goes to court and gets the sweetheart deal that gave him, essentially, blanket immunity pulled by a judge who decided not to rubber-stamp the thing.
July 27: Jack Smith adds more charges to Trump on the documents thing.

July 31: Hunter’s former business partner testifies that Joe was on more than 20 calls with Hunter’s clients, and that Burisma pressured Joe to use his power to get the Ukrainian prosecutor fired.
August 1: Jack Smith indicts Trump again. This time? For speaking on January 6.

I’m thinking the more dirt that comes out on Hunter, the more dirt they’ll have to come up with on Trump, up to and including trying him as a witch under some obscure 1670 statute from Ye Olde Commonwealth of Virginia for “flying in a most terrifying way” in his jet.

The Bidens have (allegedly) created a crime family that works without any sort of (to this point) review. It is, at this point, established fact that the Bidens used the full force of the “intelligence community” including the FBI and the CIA to help Joe get elected by suppressing the Hunter laptop story, and controlling the items showing up in social media.

Congress has done something moderately useful for once: they’ve shown us that Washington, D.C. is exactly as corrupt as we always thought it was. And now we have proof.

Violence and Censorship Update

For whatever reason, CNN® decided that people shouldn’t go see the new movie, Sound of Freedom. That’s odd, because the movie is mainly about child trafficking. Why would the Left be in favor of child trafficking? Guess that’s just a mystery.

The need to scrub history of everything, well, historical has gone into overdrive. Washington and Lee decided that they could no longer have (spins wheel) the headstone of a horse that, apparently, owned slaves and was the cause of the Civil War. Now that the horse has been erased from history and censored, I’m sure that the Left is done and will stop now.

A recent Pew® poll (LINK) showed that 55% of Americans think that the government should restrict speech. Which Americans? The Left, and the speech is whatever they disagree with, which is called, “false”.

Just before his wife told Justin to take a hike, he took time to blame the Right in the United States because “Canadian” Muslims are against LGBTQ curriculum in schools. Guess we won another one, guys.

Bankman-Fraud (how did they not see that coming?) has just had Biden’s DOJ drop tons of felonies. Odd since Ukrainians took our tax dollars, gave them to Bankman-Fraud, and then he gave millions to Democrats for elections. Nothing to see here.

And a reminder, looking into your bank account is patriotic, looking into the money we ship to Ukraine is treason.

And, to call something racist should no longer require proof, say people who are definitely not racist against whites.

Finally, Leftists who create propaganda for the Left are needing money because not enough people are going to see the Leftist propaganda. Expect to see Hollywood here soon enough.

Biden’s Misery Index

Let’s take a look to see how we’ve done this month . . . .

Yup, up again, but not as steep. But people aren’t getting fries with that, anymore.

Updated Civil War II Index

The Civil War II graphs are an attempt to measure four factors that might make Civil War II more likely, in real time. They are broken up into Violence, Political Instability, Economic Outlook, and Illegal Alien Crossings. As each of these is difficult to measure, I’ve created for three of the four metrics some leading indicators that combine to become the index. On illegal aliens, I’m just using government figures.

Violence:

Violence is down – I was expecting more during a long, hot summer. Perhaps August, or perhaps the endemic violence of the cities doesn’t even register anymore?

Political Instability:

Up is more unstable, and it was down a bit.

Economic:

Economic numbers are swinging back down. The numbers look fairly unstable from month to month, which isn’t good, but the stock market popped up in July, regardless if the cities look like a dystopian science fiction predication.

Illegal Aliens:

The border numbers are down, and I’m a bit surprised, since the infiltration continues. Suppressed numbers?

The End of an Age

Tim Pool, podcaster, called his summary for July, 2023 on August 1:

I think he’s right. The full power of the DOJ has been weaponized against half, but only half, of the citizens of the country. Laws have been passed in state after state to allow irregularities in voting that Enron® wishes were allowed in accounting.

There are active purges of people with classical values and beliefs from the military and even from the corporate world as weird, Leftist struggle sessions are required for employees and soldiers. Failure to enthusiastically take part results in firings.

Another sign of the end of an age is when a billionaire spends $171,000,000 of his own money to become governor of Illinois and then, in 2023, signs a bill into law that allows illegal immigrants to . . . go home? No. Become police officers.

Yes. We live in a nation where we have foreign mercenaries who are here illegally who now have the responsibility to enforce the law. I don’t even thing Rome fell to such a low.

The Roman Republic, however, did fall to the point where they started using the power of the state to put politicians in prison for purely political reasons. The outcome of that was the destruction of the Republic and then the Caesars.

LINKS

As usual, links this month are courtesy of Ricky. Thanks so much, Ricky!!

Bad Guys

https://twitter.com/i/status/1683999891494785024

https://twitter.com/i/status/1686450113298710538

https://twitter.com/i/status/1680045716427747329

https://twitter.com/i/status/1678170602664763395

https://twitter.com/i/status/1680641692762796032

https://twitter.com/i/status/1681805507428859906

https://twitter.com/i/status/1683261497525321729

https://twitter.com/i/status/1685767050944225280

https://twitter.com/i/status/1684466718234877952

https://twitter.com/i/status/1684619417215193088

Good Guys

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/retailers-strike-back-7-eleven-workers-beat-brazen-mega-shoplifter-stick

https://www.gpb.org/news/2023/08/01/membership-skyrocketing-black-gun-group-touts-inalienable-2a-rights-for-self

https://katv.com/news/nation-world/man-tracks-down-truck-thieves-kills-one-in-shootout-san-antonio-police-department-texas-south-park-village-shopping-center-chief-william-mcmanus-self-defense

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/372412618_Busting_the_Durable_Myth_that_US_Self-Defense_Law_Uniquely_Fails_to_Protect_Human_Life

One Guy

https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1681521615232745472

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/how-jason-aldeans-controversial-hit-song-became-a-cultural-flashpoint

https://www.billboard.com/music/country/jason-aldean-brittany-aldean-try-that-in-a-small-town-number-1-reaction-1235383534/

Body Count

https://news.gallup.com/poll/508886/belief-five-spiritual-entities-edges-down-new-lows.aspx

https://amac.us/newsline/society/10-shocking-examples-of-wokeism-in-the-u-s-military/

https://heartlandernews.com/2023/07/06/air-force-embraces-dei-as-recruitment-falters/

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/diversity-biden-joint-chiefs-chairman-nominee-placed-dei-forefront-air-force-leader

https://www.cfr.org/blog/uncertain-future-us-militarys-all-volunteer-force

https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2023/08/03/of-course-young-patriots-are-rejecting-joining-our-failing-military-n2626500

Vote Count

PAST MONTH: https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19821/tech-companies-manipulating-elections

BACKGROUND: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/15/revealed-disinformation-team-jorge-claim-meddling-elections-tal-hanan

BACKGROUND: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1419828112

Civil War

https://nypost.com/2023/07/29/staten-islands-congestion-pricing-fight-spurs-push-to-leave-nyc/

https://www.sfgate.com/politics/article/scenes-from-el-dorado-state-secession-california-18201138.php

https://www.hcn.org/issues/55.8/north-extremism-oregons-greater-idaho-movement-echoes-a-long-history-of-racism-in-the-region

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/08/02/america-house-divided-political-lawfare-could-lead-violence/

https://www.recorderonline.com/news/showing-up-for-the-next-civil-war/article_78dc73e0-3086-11ee-90ae-ab45c1f4d94f.html

https://theconversation.com/idiots-criminals-and-scum-nasty-politics-highest-in-us-since-the-civil-war-208272

https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/04/politics/american-political-divisions-july-fourth/index.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/08/style/fourth-turning-pop-culture.html

Inversion of Values, Part 2: The Roman Empire

“Yes, sir! That’s exactly who I am and what I am, sir. A victim, sir!” – A Clockwork Orange

What’s black and white and red all over? A victim of an industrial accident at a newspaper printing press. (All memes today are as-found)

The inversion of virtues: I’ve written on this topic recently, but decided I needed to have another go at it. Part of the blogging theme is that my posts are limited in space. No one wants to read a 10,000-word post on PEZ™ on Friday morning as they drink their coffee.

Virtues make a civilization worth living in. I’d rather live in a poor civilization with great values than a rich one with poor values, and both of those sound better than what we’ve got going on now. And I’d suggest that our current free-fall is due to that loss of virtue.

What were Epstein’s last words before he committed suicide? “You don’t have to do this! I promise I won’t talk!”

Let’s compare values at the peak of Roman Civilization, the peak of Western Civilization, and what the Left is shoving down our throats right now. For instance:

Rome: Worshiped gods.
The West: Worshiped God.
The Left: Worship man (atheism) or the State.

See? Inversion. Who did the cultures idolize?

Rome: Worshiped heroes.
The West: Worshiped heroes and Saints.
The Left: Worship victims.

See, that’s not hard, and yet more inversion. What about sin?

Rome: Sin of hubris.
The West: Sin of pride.
The Left: Sin of privilege.

I’ll just quit making inversion comments, because this is a slam dunk. Who are the spiritual leaders?

Rome:
The West:
The Left: Professors, Leftie politicians.

Ideals?

Rome: Ideal was glory, excellence (Areté).
The West: Ideal was holiness, modesty, courage.
The Left: Social Justice, victimhood.

Ideal social class?

Rome: Warriors and those who served their fellow men.
The West: The middle class.
The Left: The lower class, victims, victims, victims.

Even a virtue, charity, has been turned from a voluntary act that provides spiritual growth in the terms of the classic West, to taxation to provide forced “charity” to the (often) undeserving.

I’m thinking I don’t want to know how my tax dollars are spent because I’m afraid all mine went to buy crack pipes in San Francisco.

This inversion bleeds over into all of society. “Drag Queen Story Hour”?

Wonder why they don’t read to old folks in nursing homes, or to the blind? Whenever I hear about that, my mind sees:

And then there are questions that are more difficult to answer:

Inversion, of course, shows up in the obvious things:

Jazz Jennings is a transgender person who feels no need to change with no sense of irony:

And their goal is that you will live and produce and that you should be okay with not being meaningful or having any joy, so live in the pod, and eat the bugs, wagie.