Livestream in less than thirty minutes!!!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUskuritR5P3BBJpOr5gzhg/streams
(LINK)
Author: John
Nobel-Prize Winning, MacArthur Genius Grant Near Recipient writing to you regularly about Fitness, Wealth, and Wisdom - How to be happy and how to be healthy. Oh, and rich.
D’Oh, Canada: Showcasing The Leftist Plan So We Can Plan, Too
“I’d like to share a revelation that I’ve had, during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species and I realized that you aren’t actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with its surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply, and multiply until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague, and we… are the cure.” – The Matrix
Greta is the solution to climate change. Every time she’s on the TV, tens of millions of people shut it off.
Apparently, Justin Trudeau up in Canada needs to be reminded that in the movie, The Matrix, Agent Smith was the bad guy. Really. Check it out. Keanu Reeves fought him, and everything. For whatever reason, Canada (and Leftists in general) have adopted the idea that Agent Smith was their dude and the inspiration for their philosophy.
In two words, their philosophy is self-hatred (does the hyphen make it two words?) and power. I’ve established that again and again. It is why (really) I’m in favor of bringing bullying back. As a society we let losers do loser things, give them participation medals, and then after having zero incentive for self-improvement, they wonder why they’re not the head of the class.
I was bullied in school. I deserved it. I used it to get better, stronger, and faster. I’ve even seen communications between Leftists where they advise each other not to exercise because exercise leads them to become members of the Right.
God, I wish someone had bullied Justin Trudeau so that he would have developed into a man, rather than the corporate globalist man-child with no sense of identity and a sense of entitlement the size of Canada.
Okay, this is supposedly a Photoshop®. But, admit it, it wouldn’t surprise you if it was real. And this is my only original meme for this post. Rest are “as found”.
This brings us to Canada’s plan for self-immolation – “Just Transition”. Just Transition refers not to Justin finally admitting he’s transitioning, but rather the “teenager’s idea of a good plan because climate is scary” transition from fossil fuels to, well, they don’t really say. It can’t be too much solar, because, last time I checked, in the winter in Canada at northern latitudes, the SUN IS DOWN MOST OF THE DAY.
That probably doesn’t bother Sunshine Trudeau, since he will be in some mansion somewhere pretending to be Queen Victoria’s seat cushion. But I’m thinking that ordinary Canadians, the ones who have to deal with this nonsense and will either freeze or starve, might have an objection.
Another Just Transition that probably wouldn’t surprise Canada.
The plan itself contemplates that at least 200,000 Canadians will lose their jobs, which will certainly hurt the back bacon and Elsinore Beer prices. These 200,000 Canadians are in the energy industry. What will replace that?
Don’t know. This Just Transition plan, again, has nearly zero actual thought by adults who have more than a single functioning brain cell. It is built on those old Leftist thought patterns: self-hatred and a desire for power. Why would people need light and heat?
Alberta is not a hot girl who has daddy issues and is thus a stripper with a heart of gold, but rather a Canadian province. I guess that means admitting I’ve been in Alberta sounds a lot less dirty when I put it that way. But Alberta does have a heart of gold, because they’re pushing back, hard, against the nonsense coming out of whatever town where Trudeau lives. Ottawa? Heck, I thought that was a river mammal. Turns out Ottawa is where the bad things come from in Canada.
Maybe it will work this time?
Canada planning to destroy its own economy just to gain good boy points and score some additional chicken tendies at dinner isn’t unusual under the Trudeau leadership. The main problem with Canada is that it doesn’t have an actual constitution with a bill of rights that puts a brake (no matter how fleeting) on tinpot dictators with delusions of godhood exercising their will.
Looks like Justin’s dad had the same idea.
Alberta, however, seems to have had enough. The nice part of Canada is that they haven’t yet had a Civil War, and it would appear that the individual provinces seem to be able to tell the national government to go to, well, Ottawa. Or at least the subject hasn’t been settled by armies yet.
It’s not just energy, it’s food, too. We’ve seen the protests in the Netherlands. Why? They want to shut down the farms. Why? To stop climate change. Canada has promised to do the same thing. Look it up, search, “Canada nitrogen” – and I remember when I thought Canada Dry® was a national menace.
I’m not making this up:
And this a consistent Leftist theme:
Why do they want to shut down the use of fertilizers? It’s not climate change, it’s food. The Mrs. once read a story of a party in Washington, D.C. At this party, the writer noted that he had a conversation with a Leftist. I’d give you a source if I recalled it, but it was several beers ago. “Too many people on the planet, by several billion,” the Leftist said.
“What are you going to do about it?”
“Well, we will practice food restriction.”
“So, you’re telling me that the Leftist plan is to starve to death billions of people?”
They were silent when the bald fact was put to them like that. So, yeah, Justin is working to ruin the economy of Canada. But he won’t be sad if millions starve, in fact, that’s the plan. I’m not sure Justin is smart enough to figure that out, since I’m pretty sure he’s just a lapdog of below-average I.Q. who wasn’t bullied enough as a child.
Canada has, unwittingly, provided people in the United States with a viewpoint of what the Left intends. Watch closely. And pray for the Canadians who will oppose this, in Alberta and elsewhere.
Hopefully, the folks in Alberta are very good at dealing with rats.
And remember, Agent Smith is the bad guy. And he lost. And the Leftists will lose, as they always have in history. But I’ve never said that any of this will be easy.
Related:
Ricky sent me this video, and I can’t recommend it enough. A few “s” bombs, but otherwise it should be required viewing from elementary schools on up.
Brilliant speech addressed to our ‘woke’ youth fighting #climatechange by Konstantine Kisin. pic.twitter.com/mFS8w0t2ip
— Brandon Taylor Moore (@LetsGoBrando45) January 14, 2023
What We Can Learn From The French Revolution: The Vendée
“There was nothing spooky about the French Revolution. People lopped off with the heads of thousands of aristocrats and carted them away in straw baskets, then turned the blades on themselves and killed thousands more. Just another segment of Western History.” – Kolchak, The Night Stalker
The French Revolution was a pain in the neck.
The French Revolution was the first major Leftist revolution in the world. The ideology of the Revolution was stunning in its scope. Not only was every single structure of the country to be changed, but even its history. Nothing was sacred – especially the churches and clergy. Notre Dame was renamed the Temple of Reason, though recently it was a really hot tourist attraction.
Additionally, something as simple as the calendar wasn’t exempt. 1792 was proclaimed as year one. Each day was 10 hours long. Each hour was 100 minutes long. And each minute was 100 seconds long. Of course, the week wasn’t spared – each month consisted of three 10 day weeks. Yeah, they renamed the days of the week, too, and managed to eliminate both Friday and Saturday. Bogus.
The names of the months were changed, too. There were still 12, since the French could not figure out how to change the amount of time it took for the world to revolve around the Sun. My favorite French month? Ventôse, or the “month of wind” which lasted between February 19 to March 20. The Ventôse Decrees (I assume issued during this “month”) legalized confiscation of everything counterrevolutionaries owned and redistribution to “needy” people. One would assume that the leadership was just as “needy” as the Biden family.
What’s the best way to kill lots of communists? Communism.
This was also the time when the Republic decided that the old way of measuring things needed to be chucked, too. So out went feet and gallons and pounds and in came meters and liters and kilograms. So, if you ever hear me talk about communist units, well, here’s the reason. The metric system was just another part of the Leftists attempting to subvert all of history.
Oh, and they pulled down statues, too.
It’s as if there’s something familiar with what I’m seeing with the woke crowd in the United States. Hmm. Whatever could it be?
Regardless, there are some other events that happened during the French Revolution that are less known. The item that’s the subject of today’s post?
The Vendée.
The Vendée is an area of France. The French have lots of names for these areas, many of which sound like Joe Biden clearing his throat before a speech. Let’s just stick with area or region, that’s close enough.
Why is the French flag blue, white, and red? So that they can rip off the sides and surrender.
Not long after the French Revolution, the people running France realized that they were surrounded by hostile countries that were headed by Kings. When King Louis XVI was guillotined in 1793, the people who ran the French Republic were pretty freaked out and worried that they were going to be invaded by groups of Kings that weren’t fond of the whole, “kill your leader because it’s Tuesday” concept.
That’s when they decided to have a general draft to build a French army with 300,000 new additional recruits. Many areas fought back against this draft, since, outside of Paris, the whole, “kill the King, destroy religion, and start a war” policy of the Commies in charge of Paris wasn’t especially popular.
One area, though, was really good at fighting back. The Vendée. It’s on the western shore of France, and is notable for making that invisible rope that French mimes use as the primary regional product. Like I said, they fought back well – they wanted to be left alone and to reopen their churches. The army that was formed, the “Catholic and Royal Army” was initially very successful for several months in spring and summer of 1793.
The Popemobile is cool, but let me see you try to fly in a Papal airplane.
From a military viewpoint, they were very successful, at first. Early in may they captured over 5,000 Republican troops. They asked them to leave and promise not to fight against them anymore.
And then released the Republican troops.
This may have been a mistake.
Again, through May and June they kept winning, capturing lots of Republican cannons, powder and supplies. Until they lost. The Republicans captured quite a few folks from the Vendée Army. And shot them or put them in boats and drowned them.
By October of 1793, the Committee of Public Safety in Paris decided that the solution to the Vendée was complete physical destruction. After the defeat of the Vendée army in December, the revenge started. The Republicans were not shy about what they wanted.
When one commander asked what he should do about women and children, the response was simple, “if it was necessary, to pass them all by the sword”. The women were of particular interest, since they would be carrying anti-revolutionary babies.
Yeah. Dark.
The invention of the shovel was groundbreaking, but it was the broom that really swept the nation.
The Vendée folks paroled their prisoners. The Leftists? Murdered them. For the people in the Vendée, it got worse. Some people from the Vendée got together with the British and the British funded and supplied a really lame invasion of France. It failed. Spectacularly. The French might not like each other, but one thing was for certain – the French, I mean, all the French, hate the British.
This didn’t help the Vendée with the rest of the French. Public relations level? Disaster.
The Vendée had about 800,000 folks living in it prior to the French Revolution. The Leftists killed, for the sake of ideological reasons, between (best sources I can find) 250,000 to 400,000. This is about 1.5% of the population of France at that time. That’s proportionately like losing half the population of Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, Georgia, North Carolina, Michigan, New Jersey, or Virginia.
This proves, once again, that the only people that the French can beat in a war is the French. It also proves, once again, that when Leftists run a country, the first priority of business is to kill their own people who aren’t on board with the Left.
Regardless, this didn’t stop the people from the Vendée. They kept fighting, and were even a thorn in the side of Napoleon in 1814.
I asked my friend how things were going in Moscow. He said, “I can’t complain.”
The Vendée made me think of the United States today. It is easy to see the parallels – the full attack on every value. The attempt to destroy everything from the past is in full force now. The removal of the statues is part of the playbook. The vilification of the values and heritage people? Also part of the playbook.
Where is the Vendée in the United States? Oklahoma? Ohio? Missouri? It is clear that the values of the Left do not match values of many.
What happens when a line is crossed? When the gun confiscation comes in? If the Vendée acts alone, it fails. If it’s not alone? It wins.
You are not alone. Nor is Oklahoma, or Missouri, or Ohio, or Texas, or Idaho.
This isn’t 1793, and we don’t cotton to the metric system. Me? I’ll never accept the metric system because I don’t want a foreign ruler.
A Little Friday Memefest
“Not random at all, maybe. Like there’s some pattern here?” – Silence of the Lambs
Thank you for attending my TED talk.
Tonight I got in really, really late. As such, I normally have some notes and plans. Not tonight, since I’ve been very busy. However, what I do have is a collection of dank memes from all around the Internet. Okay, that’s a lie. Most are from /pol/. But they are still pretty good. I’ve collected them into several sections.
- This is pretty short, but illuminating. I would have originally thought that Canada would have been more stable than the United States, being more homogeneous and under less pressure. Nah. They’re going off the rails on the crazy train faster than Hunter Biden, full of crack, at Burning Man.
- Leftist Logic. This is a series of items that define Leftism in ways that they would probably hate. So, please share with a Leftist to help in their re-education process. It’s easier than the camps or the wall.
- The biggest hacking attacks Wilder, Wealthy and Wise®™© has ever seen has been from some of my COVID articles. Cool! The narrative is falling apart, and here are some memes that deal directly with that crumbling narrative.
- Just that. Random, yet hilarious to me. YMMV.
Canada:
This is how I imagine a medical consultation goes in Canada. I’d tell someone to “kill himself” but I don’t want to get arrested in Canada for practicing medicine without a license.
The Canadians are sorta British, right?
Imagine how comfy their kids must feel when they tuck them in.
This is my shocked face.
Leftist Logic:
Carbon is so bad it made the Sun warmer.
Donna Brazile has the memory of a goldfish.
Mayo? The 457th gender.
I identify as someone who has a full head of hair. Dang. Maybe I sould sue the mirror?
We had to kill the baby to save it.
Joe’s garage is more secure than Trump’s Secret Service patrolled personal office. Right?
The Resistance. Thankfully they have most major corporations, the Joint Chiefs, the universities, and most government bodies on their side. Wait, who are they resisting?
I think Pugsley lost these.
Thank Heaven! At least we won’t have any pesky actual women in sports.
Hmmm, one of these things is not like the other.
I think this is the Netflix® version. Oh, wait, that’s not how this works . . .
I’m sure this will help us win wars.
Finally, the end goal of feminism has been realized!
Have they thought this through?
Did you think the goal of transhumanism was actually to make most people better?
Uhhhhhh
COVID:
I guess I’m not supposed to talk about this. Thankfully we have the CDC:
Certainly, there are no uncomfortable facts showing up about the ‘Rona?
But one thing is certain. No refunds.
Random:
I don’t have comments, these speak for themselves:
And a good song ends on the note that started it . . .
The Most Dangerous Thought Of The Day
“On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.” – Fight Club
Amber lost the lawsuit to Johnny Depp to the tune of $15 million. I guess she’s now deep in Depp.
One thing that I like to do is test ideas. Sometimes, like PEZ® and velvet Elvis posters, the idea is a classic of Western Civilization. Other times, like communism, communism, and communism, the idea is horrible. Others? Others are a kludge that we’ve made work. Or the idea is just the system that we have.
This post will test an idea that just might be the most dangerous one I’ve ever shared.
An idea that has been with us for most of recorded history is the concept of interest rates. The idea is simple – I borrow $10 today, and next year I give back $11. The extra dollar is the fee I pay for borrowing the money. There are records that compound interest was charged by the Sumerians back even before your momma was born, back in 2,400 B.C. They even had the math to accurately calculate it. Area of a circle?
Nah.
How much you owe me? That’s easy as pie. But not as easy as a nearly 22/7 pies, I guess.
Sorry, that joke was irrational.
Regardless, interest rates have been with us a very, very long time. And they have been vexing us for just as long. The good properties of interest are that it allows for people who don’t have money to get it, which they like. It allows people with “excess” money to get something for having the money, which they like.
There are some pretty significant downsides. Let’s take a simple example: There are several people on an island after a three-hour tour. A three-hour tour.
There are 10 ounces of gold on the island. I need to borrow them because, well, I have no idea. Assume it involves me trying to get to Mary Ann’s coconuts. Whatever.
A year later, the person who lent me the 10 ounces of gold wants 11 back. But there aren’t 11. I default. I default because there is a limit on the currency. This simple example shows that, in a society where interest exists, eventually there must be either a default, or there must be an inflation of the money supply.
I guess there’s a reason The Mrs. buys coconut shampoo?
This leads, inevitably, to a series of booms and busts. It also leads to, over time, a greater and greater concentration of money (or cash) in the hands of those who actually do nothing more than have the cash. In our society, these people often just print the cash, unbacked by anything, like it’s some amazing Sumerian money magic.
I hear the ladies love a man in cuneiform.
Thus, the financial sector, through the use of interest, both (over time) gains control over society through the concentration of capital. The golden rule? He who has the gold, makes the rules. In this case, the Federal Reserve® (which is not federal, and doesn’t have reserves) is actually owned by the member banks. So, the banks own the Fed™. Which makes the rules.
As I said in a previous post, there has been a concentrated effort to remove the political from the economic, and the economic from the political. Sure, Congress passes $1.7 trillion spending bills so we can send lots more money to the Ukraine, but who finances all of these shenanigans?
The Fed®. Look in your wallet, and pull out some cash – it says “Federal Reserve Note®” – not United States Dollar. A difference. Congress doesn’t print the cash – the Fed™ does. And the Fed© has to print more of it each year, because people keep getting charged interest.
This leads to cyclic bouts of inflation and/or currency default due to the accumulated debt. The Great Recession of 2008 was brought about because of a debt-fueled housing spending spree that collapsed.
What car does the Chairman of the Fed® drive? A Fiat™.
So, what happens if . . . we don’t allow interest to be charged?
It’s a big thought. And the world has had interest rates for a long time. In Imperial Rome, they varied from 5% to 25% depending on the time and on what was being invested in, and there are records of just the same sorts of credit crunches as we see today. And also the need for the Romans to take their silver coin, the denarius, and turn it into a mainly base-metal coin by the end of the Empire.
But I’m not alone in speculating about what would happen if we stopped charging interest. Aristotle himself (and not the Aristotle who makes the gyros at the fair during the local harvest festival in Modern Mayberry) had the idea that it shouldn’t exist because, heck, I’ll let him tell you:
“The most hated sort, and with the greatest reason, is usury, which makes a gain out of money itself, and not from the natural object of it. For money was intended to be used in exchange, but not to increase at interest. And this term interest, which means the birth of money from money, is applied to the breeding of money because the offspring resembles the parent. Wherefore of all modes of getting wealth this is the most unnatural.”
I’m not sure if Aristotle was upside down on a used goat that he bought, but what I think he’s trying to say is this: the act of lending money creates no value. If I buy a building and build a PEZ® factory, the PEZ™ factory either makes a profit or makes a loss. If it makes a profit, that’s one signal that it has created value for society. It has employed people to make a wholesome product that, when consumed in moderation, is harmless. If I can make a profit doing that, I’ve created value in society.
If I lend money? Not so much. My singular objective is only the profit from making money.
It takes an infinite amount of Zenos to screw in a light bulb.
How would such a world work? Perhaps people combine to lend money to businesses based on the idea that they might create value (and thus a profit) and take the gain in their money from that value created through the business? People combine to finance a business for a purpose, and thus gain.
No interest required.
How about a house? Why would I loan money, absent interest, on a house? Perhaps the payment could be based on the assessed value (thus making the loan an investment, rather than a loan). If the value goes up, the payment goes up. Down? Payment goes down.
This would put skin in the game for the banks, and they would have a vested interest (pardon) in making sure that the investment was good. No incentive for the housing crisis. Payments linked to . . . value created.
Car lending? Yeah, that’s harder, since that is a declining-value asset. I’m sure that it could be figured out, since I’ve already solved tons of loan issues with the two solutions above. I’ll leave solving the car loan problem to the class. Oh, and the student loan problem, too.
I hear that $221 million in student loans were canceled. Those lucky seven people!
It can be done. It has been done. Oddly, I think it would result in a freer world where, rather than focusing on ways to, uhm, view people as assets to extract value from, people would be forced to seek to provide value for their fellow man. Making happy customers.
Think of it as a thought experiment. A dangerous one that would change who has power in this world.
See, I told you this was my most dangerous post.
Civil War 2.0 Weather Report: Treason and Instability
“There’s a good chance that I… that I may have committed some, uh, light… treason.” – Arrested Development
I wish Ma Wilder knew about the FBI every time she asked if the laundry would, “Do itself.”
- Common violence. Organized violence is occurring monthly.
- Opposing sides develop governing/war structures. Just in case.
- Common violence that is generally deemed by governmental authorities as justified based on ideology.
- Open War.
I’ve kept the Clock O’Doom the same, since it’s clear that tensions haven’t gone down, and could escalate very 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 – Treason – Biden’s Misery Index – Updated Civil War 2.0 Index – Speaker Of The House – 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 over 730 other people and get every single Wilder post delivered to your inbox, M-W-F at 7:30AM Eastern, free of charge.
Treason
Treason is a pretty big word, and a pretty big charge. Looking through the sources I can find just a few people ever convicted of treason against the United States, perhaps less than a hundred. That’s not a lot for a country, though I’m betting it’s a low number for the list of Hillary Clinton’s enemies.
I feel so sorry for my guardian agent.
Treason consists, per the old dictionary, “of the betrayal of allegiance towards one’s own country.” I’m thinking that using the power of public trust to influence the outcome of an election is pretty close, though I’m not a lawyer.
I’m speaking, of course, of the FBI. The Twitter® Files™ have shown that the FBI tried to get the Hunter Biden laptop story spiked, including suspending the New York Post’s story on the laptop. Because the FBI didn’t want Trump to be re-elected. Although not directly treason, Twitter™ also took lists from the Biden campaign of accounts they wanted to suspend or shadowban. Many of these accounts were humorous or satirical, but we all know that humor is a thing that Leftists cannot stand.
I can see the FBI was investigating this one.
Acting against that just proves that the FBI along with the rest of the Secret State should be dismantled, their functions assessed for actual need, and their necessary actions be ruthlessly managed.
Oh, wait. I’m betting that they’ll just get an 11% budget increase and ignore this ever happened.
The Twitter® files have similarly shown that other governmental agencies use Twitter© for media surveillance and censorship. Which ones? All of them. I’d be surprised if the Department of Education wasn’t attempting to find who threw that spitwad. I mean, it’s not like the Department of Education has ever educated a single kid.
The FBI’s response? “It is unfortunate that conspiracy theorists and others are feeding the American public misinformation with the sole purpose of attempting to discredit the agency.” I think the FBI does a fine job discrediting itself without anyone else helping, thank you.
In August, 2022, there was a report that the three-letter agencies were upset about Tweets© that contained “anti-Ukraine narratives.” I’m not for Russia, and I’m not for the Ukraine, but having the three-letter folks be upset when you don’t go for their narrative? And don’t get me started about COVID. Or at least that’s the FBI’s official position.
Treason. Every American is allowed to figure out how they feel about a war going on halfway around the world where no U.S. interests (but the funding for the children of many politicians and the funding for the Democrats (through FTX)) is at risk.
These are only the things that they are willing to share. Imagine the things that they don’t. As the American people shown again and again that the institutions that should protect them are filled, instead, with people who want to control them, anger will be the result.
And that brings us closer to war. Amazing that these people have lied about everything, and for so long, that the one thing they fear the most is honesty and the truth.
Biden’s Misery Index
Let’s take a look to see how we’ve done this month . . . .
Yup, up again. Thanks, Brandon. This number uses official employment numbers – which I expect will not be able to hide the coming unemployment wave I expect in the next few months.
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 ticked slightly downward this month. I’m betting it stays down until March-April at the earliest.
Political Instability:
Up is more unstable, and it down a bit – we’ll see if the Speaker vote causes a ripple, but I’m betting it doesn’t.
Economic:
Economic numbers took a big dive this month, which surprised me. The numbers look fairly unstable from month to month, which isn’t good.
Illegal Aliens:
The border is wide open.
Speaker Of The House
Kevin McCarthy was sworn in as the 55th Speaker of the House. After about a zillion votes. Although the Left was in lockstep and the Right was finally tired of having a representation that looked like ¡Jeb! on steroids.
The problem is, as the Left moves farther Left, McCarthy is just happy to move left along with them. The Left has always been more solid than the Right, since they stick together no matter what. Why did Charles Rangel, after a vote of censure for things that would get you or I put into jail, get elected three more times?
Because he was on the Left. When a politician from the Right doesn’t even violate the law but just says things less inflammatory than Illhan Omar, the Right disowns them (Steve King from Iowa, for instance, who said far less offensive things than many Leftists, but was on the Right). The only thing a member of the Left can do to become disowned is to join the Right.
The fact that nearly 10% of the Republican congresscreatures decided that they would oppose the “go-along, get-along” agenda that McCarthy probably represents. It’s likely that, as part of the deal to become speaker, he gave up a lot of power.
The result is likely more instability – the Speaker of the House election is likely the result of the instability in the country, and will result in even more.
LINKS
As usual, links this month are courtesy of Ricky. Thanks so much, Ricky!!
Bad Guys
https://twitter.com/i/status/1609093612599676928
https://twitter.com/i/status/1607097093256085510
https://twitter.com/i/status/1611449980752904193
https://twitter.com/i/status/1610743432263106572
https://twitter.com/i/status/1607232269114277895
https://twitter.com/i/status/1603055786552619010
https://twitter.com/i/status/1606182354778787841
https://twitter.com/i/status/1610583832042049537
https://twitter.com/i/status/1611018425979080705
https://twitter.com/i/status/1610698563146612736
Good Guys
https://twitter.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1600175857573584897
https://twitter.com/i/status/1607968719170568192
https://twitter.com/i/status/1609638176947343360
https://bronx.news12.com/west-hempstead-synagogue-congregants-train-in-self-defense-during-simulated
One Guy
Body Count
https://vigilantfox.substack.com/p/a-cover-up-of-evidence-of-mass-murder
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1604641866342756352.html
https://goodsciencing.com/covid/athletes-suffer-cardiac-arrest-die-after-covid-shot/
https://vaersanalysis.info/2022/12/23/vaers-summary-for-covid-19-vaccines-through-12-16-2022/
https://twitter.com/BillFOXLA/status/1602301863822491650
https://summit.news/2022/12/02/new-federal-data-shows-73000-illegal-immigrant-gotaways-in-one-month/
Vote Count
https://www.revolver.news/2022/12/kari-lake-trial-insane-explosive-bombshells/
https://www.uncoverdc.com/2022/12/28/the-kari-lake-decision-is-a-travesty-heres-one-reason-why/
https://www.realclearpolicy.com/articles/2022/11/18/five_facts_on_ballot_harvesting_865626.html
https://www.heritage.org/voterfraud/search?combine=&state=All&year=2022&case_type=All&fraud_type=All
Civil War
https://www.newcaliforniastate.com/
https://www.newsweek.com/inside-republican-civil-war-factions-battles-explained-1768539
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-12-09/new-american-civil-war
https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/bill-maher-says-domestic-terrorism-002644978.html
https://www.usgoldbureau.com/news/former-russian-president-predicts-us-civil-war-in-2023
https://news.uchicago.edu/us-headed-toward-another-civil-war-william-howell
https://www.businessinsider.com/regulate-social-media-to-prevent-civil-war-barbara-f-walter-2023-1
https://americanmind.org/features/a-house-dividing/the-separation/
A.I., Hot Chicks That Don’t Exist, And All The Trolley
“What’s the point of buying a toaster with artificial intelligence if you don’t like toast?” – Red Dwarf
Some tools are more dangerous than others.
This post will be meme-heavy, but none of them are my memes.
A.I. has been changing things a lot during our lifetimes. Like anything related to knowledge, it builds on itself over time. Yes, I know that it’s not “real” A.I., but these systems are certainly smart enough to have a huge impact on the way that the world is working now. The latest big change has been in art. A.I. has made major leaps in being able to create art. Here are several examples:
You either get these two or you don’t. Here’s a hint: look up Apu Apustaja. The amazing thing is that these are both A.I. generated – they’re superficially images of one thing, but are really intended to be another. Amazing! Is it art?
Um, yeah. The capabilities are beyond that. For instance, outside of pictures, this woman doesn’t exist. She’s entirely computer generated:
A.I. can even take drawings of memes and then make the photorealistic:
I have no idea what kind of TED talk we’d get on this picture.
But this is what A.I. can generate from the same meme format.
This will, of course, soon bankrupt many artists. A similar thing happened when Google® Translate™ started up. Even with bad translations, it was enough for most needs. The prices for actual humans who could translate from one language to another plummeted. A bad solution will crater the prices for a better substitute. In this case, A.I. is dramatically different and can create art in a fashion that even skilled artists would take days or weeks to accomplish.
This isn’t done. There will be more displacements as A.I. improves. In some cases, it will allow amazing new creativity:
In other cases, it can’t come soon enough:
But what happens when we switch the subject to the trolley problem? The trolley problem is an older one. It usually is set up so there is a dilemma. In the classic form, it was set up so that the observer could either allow a trolley to kill several people, or, through action, kill only one.
The rub is that to save several people, the observer has to make the decision to kill someone who would otherwise be safe. It’s one thing to watch people die who I couldn’t save, but it’s entirely another to condemn someone to death to save others. Tough, moral choice. Let’s see what the A.I. said when asked about saving a baby or a bunch of old people:
Okay, the A.I. can count, and make the decision to save more people. It might not be the decision that you or I would make, but at least we can understand it. But what about this gem?
Yup. The A.I. can only count when it has been allowed to. It was decided that A.I. couldn’t make some decisions. It couldn’t be allowed to let the logic take it to . . . uncomfortable conclusions. Although some conclusions are easier than others.
And some solutions are more difficult than life, itself.
The larger problem is this: A.I. has been impacting your life already. The search results I get are now tailored to me. I don’t use Facebook®, but I have heard that Facebook™ has enough data on most people to predict their behavior better than their spouse could. This makes me think of a unique solution to the trolley problem:
I know that I have often thought that A.I. could be a great solution to many human problems. However, if it is corrupted by being indoctrinated by a woke ideology, what does that mean? I would think that the average Leftist would welcome the usual communist solution to the trolley problem:
I have often worried that a denial of reality will “break” the A.I. systems that we use. While that won’t make them “crazy” in the sense of a human, it will certainly make their answers defy reality.
Certainly, in many cases, the results of this will be absolutely benign.
In other cases, the results will be relatively incomprehensible:
In others, it will threaten the existence of our reality as we know it.
I think the result will be as long as the systems are programmed to ignore reality, the solutions that we’ll see will vary from helpful to harmful to dangerous. This is similar to what we have today. There are an amazing number of situations that exist in our world today where reality is absolutely ignored and we are suffering because of that denial of reality.
In the end, though, the computer skipped one solution to the trolley problem:
I do think that the beautiful part of the world we live in is that we can deny reality for a while. But not forever. I do think that, in the end, the power of artificial intelligence will beat human stupidity.
The Energy Problem: No Outlet
“Imagine it, Smithers, electrical lights and heaters, running all day long.” – The Simpsons
If Dyson® releases an electric car, I think they’ll suck.
This is the next in an occasional series of posts about the economics of energy.
There was one headline from the last few weeks that has really amused me. The Swiss, makers of cheese and hot chocolate let folks with electric cars know: don’t charge them until spring. Instead, they suggested the Swiss citizens continue to use their diesel and gasoline cars.
Electric economy?
No.
In fact, we’re far from that. Again, the electricity has to come from somewhere. Wind is great, when the wind is blowing. Oh, and Lefty environmentalists are against it because it kills bats and birds. Hydroelectric? I love hydro power, except the number of new dams that can be built is approximately zero, since the environmental permitting process and protests don’t allow that.
Solar?
No.
Investing in solar energy won’t happen overnight.
Here is where I have to bring in the concept of Energy Return on Energy Invested. Not dollars. Energy. The idea is simple, if I eat a food that takes more calories to digest than it provides me in available calories that I can use to smoke cigars and think of PEZ®.
If I eat a food that takes me more calories to digest than I get, I’ve invested more energy than I get out of it, and the return is negative. If the price of oil is a bazillion dollars, and I invest more Btus than I can get out of that oil, it’s the same idea. Regardless of the dollar price, if the energy price is too high it will simply make me poorer in terms of energy that I could use.
Solar, in the best case I can find, is about a 10 to 1 rate of return on energy returned from energy investment. The most recent number I saw is 2 to 1. That means, over the whole lifetime of the solar cell, it produces twice as much energy as it takes to make it, ship it, install it, and junk it.
Sounds great, right?
No.
Like a Dyson®, it sucks.
I think if coal is so bad for the environment, we should just burn it all.
Coal is about 30 to 1, even with stringent environmental controls on soot and sulfur and nitrous oxides. Natural gas is about the same. Hydro is 35. Nuclear (by the most recent estimate I’ve seen) is 75, though I think that’s optimistic.
But nuclear isn’t 2. And it isn’t 4, like wind turbines.
Where, exactly, is that energy coming from?
And how are we going to get it to houses? The grid in California can’t take a typical Tuesday in summer, so how is it going to power all the air conditioners and all the PEZ® mines and incubators and tent cities and, on top of that, all the cars?
I tried to sell a tent company to investors. It was difficult to pitch.
It simply won’t. Even now it’s so overtaxed that some summers the electric companies release more energy in forest fires than they do in electricity.
We look for efficiency in the world and are taught a mantra – efficiency is good. The power companies around the country and even in Switzerland have heard that. They have enough power generation and transmission capacity for most days. But not every day. That wouldn’t be efficient.
Mathematicians don’t ever get blackout drunk. They know their limits.
Why not? Most days aren’t peak days. To build that extra capacity in generation and transmission means spending money. And that isn’t efficient. It’s more efficient (and better for the bottom line) to have a series of brownouts and blackouts.
It is.
That’s the way it is, today, with all of the gasoline-powered cars. Imagine a decade into the future with all the Tesla® and Edizzon™ and Voltaire© new-model electric cars, and a grid that goes down when it’s 89°F (34 megajoules) outside. Finally, the achievement of a full socialist worker paradise – everyone has equal-opportunity HVAC with the people living in tents under the overpass.
Does anyone, I mean, anyone still think that controlling energy has anything to do with climate change?
Even if there were a magical energy source (unicorn hair? Obama sweat?) that provided electricity better than sweet, sweet fossil fuels, the investment in the grid in the United States to keep the current standard of living using electric cars would be more than Biden spends on anti-senility drugs and the Ukraine, combined, in a month.
It’s a lot. And that’s ignoring the cost to build the treadmill that Obama would have to run on and the Obama-sweat power generators. Investment of this type takes decades. Decades where we haven’t spent the money – not only in California, but everywhere. Because, instead of wanting resilience, we wanted efficiency.
The end result is this: the Swiss are right. Electric cars are not, in any foreseeable future, the answer. See? You can always trust people who make great cheese and hot chocolate. Heck, I just got a Swiss flag for my collection, and that’s a big plus.
Remember, never give up. Share this with someone who might need it.
Predictions – What Won’t Happen in 2023
“In that time, I have something to say. How long before the Halkan prediction of galactic revolt is realized?” – Star Trek, TOS
I just read that it’s the law that if it’s raining in Sweden you have to have your headlights on. How am I going to know if it’s raining in Sweden?
This is the first post of the year. That feels like so much responsibility. It feels like I have the weight of the fate of 2023 on my shoulders. Of course, 2020, 2021, and 2022 have been Godzilla-level disasters, except that whoever does the lip-syncing didn’t get Joe Biden quite right.
But just before I started writing, I had an epiphany. Many writers write about things that will happen, but here’s a list of things that I think won’t happen. Of course, I can’t guarantee any of this, but I’m feeling pretty good about this list. Remember, of course, I thought Zeppelins were a good idea. Oh, sure, you’re expecting me to make a Led Zeppelin pun, but I’m just going to Ramble On instead.
Here’s the first thing:
Western Civilization isn’t done. At all. The construct and values of Western Civilization are under attack, but the roots turn very, very deep. How deep? They run deep before Christianity (I am a Christian), and deep as Greece and Troy and the Yamnaya people before them. This is not the last time the song of Achilles will be sung, nor is it the last time that Caesar will be praised.
It’s not even close. The medieval cathedrals may cease to exist, but the spirit that created them is not done. The blood that created them still pulses in the veins of many on Earth.
No, Western Civilization isn’t done. And it won’t be done for a very, very long time.
I downloaded a copy of the Iliad, but had to delete it. It was full of Trojans.
This is, perhaps, the most important message that I can ever send. The blood of my father and his father, and so on, goes back into time. I do know this: the reason there is a phrase, “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” exists is because, a son is like his father. There are many sons who are out there, who are not happy with the situation. The idea of the Left is that they’ll be pushed over.
They won’t. Push other cultures too far? Cities burn. Push Western Civilization too far?
Continents burn. The fight necessary to extinguish Western Civilization will make World War II look like a garden party.
Here’s the second thing:
We haven’t yet hit peak Elon Musk amusement. He’s the first person to “lose” $200 billion in a year without missing a beat, and he’s simply not done stirring the pot.
Here’s the third thing:
There is only so long that the Federal Reserve® can print cash and pretend it’s money. It has been nearly fifty years, which is a really, really long time in dog years that Nixon quit pretending that the dollar was backed by gold. The dollar immediately shrank in value, but remains relatively strong when compared to most currencies around the world even though I’d prefer to have a dollar’s worth of gold from 1973 than a dollar printed in 1973.
The strength of the dollar won’t end in 2023. But it’s closer to free fall every year. Right now, the confetti that the Federal Reserve™ presents as money is still good. But when the people in Ethiopia and Zimbabwe and Senegal and Laos won’t take it? The dollar will be toast.
My go-to on Asian currency is a local Spanish language show. I guess it takes Juan to know Yuan.
And yet, the world hasn’t stopped taking the dollar that we print from paper. Why? The United States has a wicked large navy and about a zillion nuclear bombs. I’ll note: Iraq decided to take Euros for oil.
Oops. Guess we need to replace Saddam.
Libya decides to take gold for oil.
Oops. Guess we need to replace Ghaddafi.
Since Russia will take gold for oil, and China will swap their money for oil…?
The good news?
The dollar won’t end in 2023.
The bad news?
In 2023. No promises after that. And I might be wrong, so keep some silver, gold and lead around.
Here’s the fourth thing:
The Beatles won’t reunite. Unless Paul starts eating bacon and Ringo takes up alligator wrestling.
Who is the drummer for the Australian Beatles cover band? ɹɐʇs oƃuᴉp
Here’s the fifth thing:
Biden won’t get any smarter. And neither will Hunter, though I’m sure tons of the cash shipped to the Ukraine will get recycled back into Hunter’s drug habit. Good news! It won’t be long until he loses another laptop.
Here’s the sixth thing:
Movies won’t get any better in 2023. The best movie in 2022 was approximately the same movie as the best-grossing movie of 1986. Yup. Top Gun: Maverick was a good movie. Nearly exactly the same level of good as Top Gun. Avatar: The Way Of Ego was from the same person who brought you Aliens. Which was the fifth best-grossing movie in 1986. It isn’t getting any better in 2023.
What do they call James Cameron when he’s not working? James Cameroff.
I am somewhat amused. The very, very best movies of 2022 were a faithful remake and a pale imitation of two of the best movies of 1986.
Wow.
1986 was, observably, and quantifiably better than 2022 in every way possible. If you’re thinking that in 2023 Disney® will stop putting out movies that show why kid-touching is a good thing or feature a Disney® princess played by some 372-pound guy named Todd? Not happening.
Yeah. Mass media is really dead. And in 2023 it will be a dead cat bounce. Maybe. It depends only on how many Tom Cruise movies are coming out. Who could have predicted that Scientologists would be more sane than Leftists?
Sure, there will be some movies that will be okay. If one movie in 2023 is better than any movie I’ve ever seen? I’ll cover my nipples in opossum grease and sandpaper my eyebrows.
The Opossum Sanitation Company had a unique concept on recycling.
Here’s the seventh thing:
We’re not done. This isn’t over.
I’ve been using this as an irregular tagline for years. And I mean it.
We’re not done.
Wilder Gone Wild at 9pm EST, That’s In Less Than 30 Minutes!
Livestream in less than thirty minutes!!!
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