Censorship – Page 10 – Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise

Deception: The Media Is Soaking In It

“Theatricality and deception are powerful weapons, Alfred. It’s a good start.” – Batman Begins

Thankfully he wasn’t expecting the Spanish Inquisition.

I’m certain that few had any idea of how the Internet would change the world. Oh, sure, some did. In one of the zillion versions of Ender’s Game (or the never ending stream of sequels) Orson Scott Card wrote about the Internet, in the 1980s, I think. In his version, people could make carefully reasoned arguments and other people would listen to them and be swayed.

Ha! Instead we have Twitter® with its 280 character limit, and meme warfare.

I actually don’t mind meme warfare being the place where ideas are injected into society, primarily because the Right memes pretty well, and the Left can’t meme at all.

That is, of course, what the Left is worried about. When the Internet began to gain popularity in the mid-1990s, it was a Wild West. It was first created, page by page, by people who were passionate about something. The programming was easy, and the hardest thing was to get noticed, since the search engines and directories were rudimentary. I used at least three, depending on what I was searching for, because one was good for technical stuff, one was good for “normie” stuff, and the last one, as I recall, wasn’t good for much at all.

On the Internet, you can be whatever you want to be, so why do so many people pick “stupid”?

Then came the Media®. At first, they didn’t really know how to use it, so they’d just put their written stuff out there, since video would swamp most dial-up connections. But everyone knew it was going to be big, which is why AOL© merged with Time-Warner™ even though all AOL® presented was just a single way to get to the Internet.

But the problem for the Media™ and .GOV was that the Internet had shattered their ability to carefully script a single narrative. It had also destroyed their ability to memory hole or gloss over big stories. Now those passionate people could chronicle entire events that the .GOV would rather you forget, or, better yet, never even know about. The carefully crafted defamation of everyone who believed in something outside of the Approved Narrative as a Conspiracy Theorist began to crumble.

People say it’s a small world, but I know I certainly wouldn’t want to paint it. And in that small world where communication had drastically lowered the time for information to come out, and also made it harder for the information to be erased. The Genie of information, once out of the bottle, couldn’t be put back in.

Does anyone know what an ink blot test is? I Googled® it, but only found pictures of my parents yelling at me.

The Wild West continued. Google® had a corporate slogan of Don’t be Evil® and Amazon™ would sell most any book that was it was legal to sell. And the established Media© and .GOV still had no real understanding of how to control what people see and hear and remember. The Internet was built to be decentralized, and hard to control.

I think, from what I see so far that the strategy has been to do at least five things:

Throw Lots of Content Out

Oddly, even though the major news sources keep firing journalists, they keep making more stuff. What kind of stuff? Clickbait, really. Stories with little informational content, stories about celebrities, top 10 lists of best/worst/etc. (fill in the blank). These aren’t news – they’re entertainment. Heck, one browser I have on my phone has (it looks like) computer-generated compilations of posts from Reddit®. The idea is to distract. And if the algorithm is good enough, heck, maybe that person will forget what they were looking for in the first place.

Marginalize and Trivialize

This is one that’s carried on from the past. If I had written a post about MK-Ultra (where the CIA essentially acted like the worst possible mixture of Jeffrey Dahmer and the DMV) in the 1960s, it would have been dismissed as a “conspiracy theory” at best. The idea isn’t to contradict, it’s to hit the person making the accusation with personal attacks, and make it sound like they’re a nutcase. And when the facts come out? Minimize them – make them sound unimportant, “Oh, that tear gas we used at Waco? Well it may be flammable, but only in super-high concentrations. We won the war. Go back to sleep.”

So, Alex Jones was right again, eh?

Control Discussion

How many people that you interact with are . . . real?

I’ve recently gotten robocalls that are very sophisticated, so much so that they nearly get through the uncanny valley of sounding right. But what if the sound wasn’t an issue? In a Twitter® comment it isn’t. It is known that a significant percentage of Twitter® users are bots – programmed to interact. Why would anyone go to that level of trouble? Because they want to sell you something – an ideology, a candidate, or PEZ™. They’re also useful to make it seem like there’s a consensus.

People are wired as pack animals, and generally want to be a part of the group, to not be left out. Plus, a group of bots can drown out viewpoints and ideas and bury them in a sea of text. On a related note, how many conversations are taking place on the Internet that are nothing more than one bot talking to another?

Control Access

Most people come to this website either directly or from other blogs. The web search traffic I get is amazingly low – most days less than 3% of my traffic. That’s new. I used to get more traffic from search engines (20%+) but after July or so of 2020, Google™ shut the valve, and traffic dropped. Likewise, I know that this site is banned by corporations. Why? Maybe my ideas are considered to be . . . dangerous.

A related question is this: just how many website hits does Google® really have? I searched for Civil War Weather Report and noted I wasn’t on the first page. I jumped ahead to page 18. If you’ll note, on an earlier page, Google© claims that there are 34,800,000 results. But when you get to page 18, well, there are only 174 results. I know I’ve written nearly 40 Civil War Weather Reports. Funny that I didn’t see ‘em all in this list . . .

Note that Amazon®, which for a long time would not ban any legal book, now bans hundreds if not thousands of books merely because Amazon™ disagrees with their ideas.

Just Keep Lying

It seems to work for the FBI, Bill Clinton, and the CIA, so why not expand it to the Media®? That’s just what they do. These pictures will help illustrate the problem:

So, in the end, it has been established that the Media© wants to control you. The only remaining question so that we can put the pressure where it needs to be is this: who controls the Media™?

Yes, Your Leftist Friends Are Mentally Ill. You’re Not. Share This Post With Them To Trigger Them.

“Snap out of it! You’re Krusty the Clown! One of Look Magazine’s Hundred Most Promising Clowns of 1958!” – The Simpsons

I told Pugsley that Aristotle taught us that, “We are what we repeatedly do.” So I told him I was his mother.

A Dutch dude named Erasmus of Rotterdam (who died in 1536) made a famous quote that I’m sure you’re all familiar with, namely, “In regione caecorum rex est luscus.” Presumably, Erasmus said this before he died. I was going to follow this up with a joke about the Dutch, but then I looked at my site statistics, and found that the Netherlands is number 5 on the countries that come to visit here at Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise.

So, my conclusion is this: people of the Netherlands are amazing people who have impeccable taste in fine writing and I’d be glad to give them all a free bikini wax, but I’m pretty sure that they’re so tall, blonde, disciplined and perfectly proportioned that they’ve trained their bodies to not grow hair where they don’t want it. Go Netherlands!

I’m pretty sure they have flying cars in the Netherlands now.

Anyway, what Erasmus was saying was originally in Latin, but Latin isn’t a dead language – it’s still Roman around. My initial translation was, “Near the gas station in the skanky part of town, never pick up women after 3am.” These are wise words, but what Erasmus really meant was, “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.”

That’s one of those phrases that sounds really cool. In fact, I imagined being able to see in a country full of blind people. I mean, the only actor that would be able to play Batman would be Christian Braille. And, using my crazy superpower of sight, I’d be able to break into their houses at night and steal all of their PEZ®.

But that’s not the way it would work.

I would probably try to explain to them that I could see – a sense that they didn’t have at all. The concept of photons and colors and would sound crazy to them. In fact, they’d probably think I was crazy and come at night while I was sleeping and give me blanket parties or worse until I shut up or left.

In the modern world, it’s similar, but it’s what’s commonly referred to as “Clown World” where everything is inverted. Things that are beautiful are corrupted, and people are expected to applaud the bravery inherent in people reveling in the corruption. I’ll let Stonetoss lead the introduction of the topic at hand.

If you’re not familiar with what Stonetoss is writing about, there is a “teacher” in Canada who decided, apparently, to wear comically large and obscene fake breasts to shop class. How do we know they’re obscene? YouTube® banned them.

But, yet, these Z-cups are allowed because a “teacher” showed up to work wearing them, and the school board is apparently afraid to confront the dude. When a parent tried to bring the subject up, the local school board shut down the meeting rather than confront the amazing amounts of silicone (or foam rubber??) being paraded in their classrooms. In fact, they say it’s illegal to criticize the “teacher”.

In my assessment of the situation, there are two possibilities. The first is that the “teacher” is so mentally insane that allowing him to dress like this is similar to allowing him to claim that he’s made of string cheese and now has a mouse phobia. That’s the first possibility.

The second is that the “teacher” is gaming the system and seeing how far he can push things so he can get mental disability payments and not have to show up to work, or not be graded based on his job performance. I actually consider this more likely, but, hey, it’s 2022 so he just might be bonkers.

This was actually the plot to a South Park® episode where a teacher became more aggressively, explicitly gay in front of his students in an attempt (I recall) to get fired. Instead, the people celebrated his inappropriate behavior because of his bravery. So, yeah. Blame Canada. I’m sure that this is what the Canadian troops were thinking about when they hit the beach at D-Day, the freedom for shop teachers to don Z-cup fake breasts.

Women are, oddly, not at all good with this. Not all women, of course. I use The Mrs. as a sounding board for this sort of insanity, and she (more or less) notes that it’s offensive for (at least some) actual women to see men parading around pretending to be women. But Canada says it’s okay. And companies will ban you for “hate” if you dare to not say that this is completely normal.

In 2022, it’s now accepted that teachers indoctrinated in Leftist institutions should be allowed free access to your children. And there’s nothing bad that can come of that. Because teachers have shown themselves to be so stable.

The problem really does start with Leftism. I know I drone on and on about this, but it’s true. Leftism is a mental illness rooted in victimhood. How can I prove this? THEY TELL US THIS WHENEVER THEY CAN. It’s worse than being stuck in a room filled with vegans who do Crossfit®.

I sometimes think it’s a competition on how many mental illnesses that they can have, like they all want to be the Georgy Zhukov of mental illness and be the (she/they/them/it) with the most medals.

Part of the idea is that Leftists are incapable of harboring thoughts that are counter to their programming. Scott Adams found this out and after this cartoon strip, he was canceled from 77 newspapers.

Here are a few examples of why.

Yup. Martha’s Vineyard. Importing millions of people across the border is amazing, right? Well, no. Not when they show up in near the beach bungalows of the rich and famous. Obama lives on Martha’s Vineyard, and his house alone could have housed every illegal alien that was transported there. But, no.

They booted all the illegals in 44 hours. Who needs a wall when you invade the territories of Leftist lawyers?

But the damage of Leftism is real. It destroys families. And it stops families from even being made.

But it leaves some really important questions to be asked.

And it makes you wonder what Biden is really after, when it turns out that “Right Wing Extremism” is actually less deadly than riding lawnmowers. Really.

Seriously, though, this isn’t the battle the Left should push, because when real Right Wing Extremism hits? Continents burn.

I guess that works for me. I’ll continue to be a Right Wing Extremist.

And if they want Clown World, that’s fine. They can soak in it.

Me? I think this next picture works better than anything they can come up with.

Erasmus would certainly agree with me. And? Go Netherlands! You guys rock!!!! (Yes, I know Ariel is Danish, but you Danes have got to get your pageviews up.)

Civil War 2.0 Weather Report: They Hate You

“Hell, you boys is in the occupied territory. You’re 40 miles behind enemy lines. That’s smack dab in the middle of World War III.” – Red Dawn

Why do angry clocks only tok? They’re tiked off.

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, though tensions are certainly increasing. 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 – Naming The Enemy: You – Violence And Censorship Update – Biden’s Misery Index – Updated Civil War 2.0 Index – Shocks To The System – 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 710 other people and get every single Wilder post delivered to your inbox, M-W-F at 7:30AM Eastern, free of charge. Most of today’s memes are free-range, and not originals. The crop was really good this month.

Naming The Enemy: You

Since Biden was sworn in, the relationship between citizens and the government has fundamentally changed. Trump was like a game show host. Biden is like a character from a Stephen King novel, and not one of the good ones.

The sheer hate shown by the Left, though, has replaced every bit of pretend love. Biden has set himself up not as the President of the United States, but, at best, the President of the Democratic Party. And that party, as well as all of the Left has let the mask slip. How far? This far:

Yes. That is a governor of a state, indicating that people who live in the state she is supposed to represent, should move. Admittedly, she looks like she’s auditioning for the role of Morticia for the “couldn’t get a date in high school players”. But since she (presumably) hasn’t (yet) Cuomo’d her staff, well, she’s the governor. And she hates you. You are her enemy. She has made that clear.

And so did Biden’s press secretary:

Merely voting for the “wrong” candidate makes you the enemy. You, too, can be a “threat to our democracy” if you don’t vote the way that Big Biden wants you to vote. I’m not sure why that upsets them, since the voting isn’t how they win elections, it’s the counting that wins them elections.

But I guess it sets you up to be an extremist. What’s an extremist?

Anyone who doesn’t believe what (they) the Leftist “majority” believe. Simple, right? Don’t like chocolate? Extremist. Think that owning guns might be a right?

Extremist. Biden even said so. Again. Last summer, he threatened his own citizens. Apparently, he liked the results so much that he did it again.

I think Joe might have forgotten something:

But, seriously, he really, really, might have forgotten something:

And I thought he was on Ukraine’s side? But, regardless, he has this really weird view on weapons, and I think it can be summarized by this one meme:

And all of this nonsense was before his ill-advised 1930’s totalitarian aesthetic national speech. What did he want to talk about with his background that would have been appropriate at a May Day parade at Red Square in 1936?

Well, he had a lot to say. About inflation? No. About Russia? China? Ukraine? The energy crisis? The economy? No. Really just about how much he really, really hates anyone on the Right.

People on the Left were quick to join in:

So, you’re the Enemy of the Left. Congratulations! But I’m not so sure about Biden’s comments . . . .

Violence And Censorship Update

Just like the segment above, I had more censorship this month than I can work through. In many cases, it is actively impacting writers like me, with (apparently) Google® doing quite a bit to throttle traffic. This is nothing new, but as far as I can tell, it’s accelerating and becoming more brazen at all levels.

But on the bigger stage, “Gays Against Groomers” was shut down. The person running “Libs of TicTok” was doxed as well, but still maintains their presence. Why shut them down?

I’m guessing a narrative violation, since “Groomer” is now officially a hate word.

But that’s just a Twitter® account. It’s not like big tech is actively trying to shut down speech from the Right, is it?

Odysee® has been threatened by Apple® to not allow their app in the Apple© Appstore™ unless they strip voices on the Right from their content. Odysee™ has, so far, told ‘em to buzz off. That normally works pretty well until they come after the bank accounts. Which they will.

The FBI has done its best to join in:

Remember, the FBI searched Barron Trump’s bedroom before they searched Hunter Biden’s. And they leaked photos of Trump’s place, but not photos of the Epstein investigation. That probably tells you all you need to know about how political the FBI is.

But at least big tech is doing this on its own, right?

No. They colluded with the Biden Administration on a regular basis on “what to censor”, which in any real world would be a big deal. But who controls what’s on the net? Big tech. The idea that independent voices can get a large following is something they’re working desperately to control.

They’re trying to understand why you would avoid taking the science juice into your veins. Testing and actual data are too much to ask. Keep in mind that one statistic I saw showed that 44% of pregnant women who were in the science juice trial miscarried. And that it’s still recommended for pregnant women.

Even Bill Maher, who is no real friend to the Right, is stunned at the hypocrisy. Me?

Not so much anymore.

Biden’s Misery Index

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

Yup, up again.

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 upward this month, though not to previous levels. I think it continues to be muted because the Left has kept their dogs on a leash.

Political Instability:

Up is more unstable, and it dropped a bit. We’ll see what impact Biden’s speech has.

Economic:

Economic indicators ricocheted down this month. Not promising, but this is a strange election season.

Illegal Aliens:

It set a new record for this time of year. But it was down. Must still be hot out. And Elon had something to say, too.

Shocks To The System

When the Russians invade Ukraine, I was mainly worried about the impact of losing the things that Russia and Ukraine made that would impact the outside world – things like wheat, or fertilizer. I really didn’t expect the West to collectively decide, “breathing isn’t important” and cut off their own oxygen. They did. Natural gas is very important to the European economy, and without it, whole segments of what they produce have to get shut down – like COVID-level impacts, but because they decided not to buy natural gas.

Oops.

Whether intentional or not, it certainly has given a lot of data about shock testing of the economy of Europe:

Now it’s created such imbalances in the European energy market that electricity bills are skyrocketing. How do girls decide who they’re going to date?

Collectively, the governments are deciding that they want the ability to do (spins wheel) whatever they want to do in response to the crisis. Really.

Meanwhile, electricity shortages are showing up elsewhere. In Colorado, I think users got a credit for installing the remote-control thermostat plus an annual payment ($25?) but lose the ability to choose how warm their house is. Not horrific, but a sign, potentially of stresses to come.

As the interest rates go up, another stress goes up, too. Housing prices drop and the housing market starts to lock up. We’ve seen this before.

Economic stresses, especially energy stresses, have the ability to be incredibly destabilizing to a society, pushing it from near war to over the edge. Beware as the economy falls apart.

LINKS

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

Bad Guys

https://twitter.com/LAPDHQ/status/1560387842873757697

https://twitter.com/i/status/1554292158684794882

https://twitter.com/i/status/1565820292827586561

https://twitter.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1558877210231984128

https://breaking911.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/XRdD_4cG-ZgMyeke.mp4?_=1

https://twitter.com/Breaking911/status/1562787749291106312

Good Guys

https://twitter.com/i/status/1554279913519136769

https://twitter.com/i/status/1556399786948976640

https://twitter.com/i/status/1565078355267170304

https://youtu.be/NuenlBlzPPg

Body Count

https://www.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/BcIggWPF0Th-png__700.jpg

https://www.unz.com/jtaylor/more-murders/

https://www.naturalnews.com/2022-08-19-usa-has-3rd-most-murders-in-world-subtract-five-democrat-cities-189th.html#

https://vdare.com/articles/41-black-on-white-homicides-home-invasions-including-a-boat-invasion-really-are-a-thing-july-2022-another-month-in-the-death-of-white-america

https://www.fairus.org/press-releases/border-security/fair-analysis-49-million-illegal-aliens-have-crossed-our-borders

https://amgreatness.com/2022/08/16/report-44-percent-of-pregnant-women-in-pfizer-trial-lost-their-babies-fda-and-cdc-recommended-jabs-for-expectant-mothers-anyway/

https://uncoverdc.com/2022/08/19/correction-eleven-mrna-subjects-suffered-spontaneous-abortions/

https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/you-are-25x-more-likely-to-be-injured

https://expose-news.com/2022/08/09/1-in-246-people-die-shortly-after-covid-vaccination/

https://expose-news.com/2022/08/09/mortality-rates-lowest-among-unvacinated/

https://twitter.com/i/status/1555940645985890305

https://twitter.com/backtolife_2023/status/1562718083747196928

https://www.skirsch.com/covid/HealthcareStories.pdf

https://twitter.com/DrEliDavid/status/1563848349777887234

https://twitter.com/afshineemrani/status/1564000788107513856/photo/1

https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/this-one-graph-tells-you-everything

https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/do-you-know-how-many-people-have

https://markcrispinmiller.substack.com/p/in-memory-of-those-who-died-suddenly-4f6

https://twitter.com/GBNEWS/status/1562529247826165760

Vote Count

https://amgreatness.com/2022/08/29/what-is-to-be-done-2/

https://emeralddb3.substack.com/p/what-i-learned-at-the-summit-of-truth

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/los-angeles-soros-da-gascon-recall-fails

https://www.12news.com/article/news/politics/elections/decision/some-pinal-county-election-precincts-run-out-of-in-person-ballots/75-93414e02-3830-4979-8153-48c7c5af69f8

https://uncoverdc.com/2022/08/16/ny-citizens-audit-finds-hidden-infrastructure-in-voter-rolls/

https://emeralddb3.substack.com/p/georgia-secretary-of-states-office

https://nationalfile.com/mail-in-ballots-from-2020-discovered-at-baltimore-usps-facility/

https://twitter.com/bennpetersen/status/1554672205472022529

https://youtu.be/dwbzDr1WrOQ

https://chroniclesmagazine.org/recent-features/when-mules-go-ballot-trafficking/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/13/california-san-bernardino-secession-november-election

https://twitter.com/loganclarkhall/status/1562942569876946947

https://www.valleynewslive.com/2022/08/10/fargo-school-board-votes-7-2-no-longer-recite-pledge-allegiance/

Civil War

https://www.unz.com/isteve/who-drove-the-great-awokening-the-news-media-or-academia/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/aug/29/us-civil-war-fears-poll

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/americans-are-too-pampered-and-neurotic-to-fight-a-civil-war/ar-AA10BUHx

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/civil-war-2-0-not-on-techno-totalitarians-watch/

https://www.journal-news.net/are-we-headed-for-a-civil-war/article_5c22ca4c-5b81-5874-bbc0-7171035458b0.html

https://amac.us/are-we-headed-for-a-civil-war/

https://amgreatness.com/2022/08/17/civil-war-porn/

https://unherd.com/2022/08/americas-tribes-are-ready-for-war/

https://www.governing.com/now/no-america-is-not-on-the-verge-of-a-new-civil-war

https://www.theonion.com/conservatives-explain-why-they-are-preparing-for-a-civi-1849414130

https://www.foxnews.com/media/civil-war-here-thanks-maga-mob-msnbcs-tiffany-cross

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-us-civil-war-wont-look-like-last-one-historians-2022-8

https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-supporters-want-a-civil-war-after-fbi-raid-of-mar-a-lago-2022-8

https://english.elpais.com/usa/2022-07-27/fear-of-a-second-us-civil-war-ignites-debate.html

https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2022/8/11/23301922/republicans-are-rooting-for-a-civil-war-mona-charen-column

https://www.dailydot.com/debug/trump-supporters-tiktok-civil-war/

https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/3591492-the-gathering-political-storm-in-america/

https://www.peoplesworld.org/article/republicans-join-in-with-white-nationalist-attacks-and-civil-war-threats/

https://www.vice.com/en/article/5d39zq/trump-supporters-civil-war-fbi-search-mar-a-lago

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/why-america-is-in-such-a-mess-gvb25p0tj

https://chroniclesmagazine.org/web/how-when-do-we-come-together-again/

https://legalinsurrection.com/2022/08/msnbc-host-civil-war-is-here-with-republicans/

In Summary….

https://twitter.com/i/status/1557482526536515584

https://twitter.com/raqrockyjones/status/1557756532221218817

E, S, G: The Leftist War Against The Economy

“You dirty double-crossing limey fink! Those damn diamonds are phonies!” – Diamonds are Forever

Copernicus wondered where the Sun went at night. Then it dawned on him.

Let’s go on a thought experiment:

Pretend that, having conquered the colleges, having infiltrated the leadership of the military and being 95% of the members of most government agencies, and jetting from place to place on private planes, the Left wasn’t done. No, there was still one goal remaining, and it wasn’t finally getting a date or being able to benchpress more than the bar. Nope. The remaining group which they hadn’t managed to completely own was all of corporate America.

But how would they do that? I mean, the Left has a lot of money for taking over Portland, Oregon again and again, but that’s hardly a challenge nowadays. What if the Left decided that they wanted to only invest in companies that shared their political leanings, and create some sort of bogus reason to make other people do it, too.

Enter ESG.

What does ESG stand for, Entitled, Stupid, and Gutless? No, that’s Antifa®, silly. ESG stands for the three criteria that the Left wants to use to decide if a country or business is sufficiently Leftist: Environmental, Social, and Governance. That seems, at first blush, to be relatively safe. I mean, who wants a bad work environment? And social, well, maybe that means good customer service. And governance? Maybe that’s how efficiently the company is run?

Nah.

I got into Harvard®. You’d think they would have better security.

Not even close. So, ESG, does it really mean? I’ll quote from the fine folks at Harvard®:

The “E” captures energy efficiencies, carbon footprints, greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, biodiversity, climate change and pollution mitigation, waste management and water usage.
The “S” covers labor standards, wages and benefits, workplace and board diversity, racial justice, pay equity, human rights, talent management, community relations, privacy and data protection, health and safety, supply-chain management and other human capital and social justice issues.
The “G” covers the governing of the “E” and the “S” categories—corporate board composition and structure, strategic sustainability, oversight and compliance, executive compensation, political contributions and lobbying, and bribery and corruption.

Certainly, there is some Mom and Apple Pie-level stuff in there. There has to be otherwise they couldn’t sell it. It’s not like people look at a company and say, “Gosh, I wish Google® was even more corrupt with their search results” or “I wish Facebook™ had done more to dishonestly influence the election by censoring even more news unfavorable to the Left”.

In his spare time, Mark Zuckerberg likes to do normal human things, like drink water, consume calories, update circuitry.

Most of the ESG metric, however, is right out of the Left’s playbook. The parts in bold above are things that, mostly, don’t have anything at all to do with actual profitability or performance of a company. How can I tell this isn’t serious? The Left isn’t going after the NFL®. Even though I haven’t watched a game in years, they keep playing the games. So let’s pretend the NFL© wanted to maximize its ESG score:

For instance, to improve its ESG, the NFL could focus on climate change by eliminating stadiums and all the wasteful use of gasoline to get to the games. There’s more:

They could reduce their carbon footprint by using all natural, sustainable cotton fibers instead of wasteful nylon in their uniforms.
They could have opposing teams take electric cars to the games.
They could replace the plastic in their helmets with sustainably harvested weaved plant fiber.
They could replace the uniform types of grass on the field by using native plant species. Think of it – in Arizona you could have cactus and sand instead of lush lawns (that use far too much water!).

That takes care of the E! What about the S?

Workforce diversity? The players on the team could easily be selected so that they strictly follow the demographics of the United States, including half of them being women, and some being senior citizens. The handicapped would need to be represented as well, and not just as placekickers like they usually do.
Pay equity could be easily taken care of by having no member of the team or of the management staff make a time more than 20 times what the guy selling sodas in the stands makes each season, which would mean the CEO pay would be capped around $80,000. And if the starting QB got money from promotions, he’d have to split it equally with everyone in the organization. Equity, after all.

Maybe he can put that on a slogan for the endzone?

That takes part of most of the S, especially after the owner is forced to give up 90% of his team ownership to random citizens of the world, so a Sri Lankan goat farmer can understand the joy of owning an NFL™ franchise.

What about governance? Well, we could appoint people from every country in the world to the board of each NFL® team. And no more cozying up to local, state, and federal officials for more tax bux.

So why don’t people talk about applying the ESG metric to the NFL™? It’s simple.

People take football seriously.

All of the nonsense the Left loves to spout falls apart when it comes to one, simple business that everyone can understand and easily see the idiocy of the ESG metric.

Sri Lanka couldn’t believe it was riot season already! They still had their “I support Ukraine” banners up.

In real life, Sri Lanka was ranked by ESG score. They scored a 99 in Environmental, an 88 in Social, and a 47 in governance. Sri Lanka is facing its “worst economic collapse in its modern history” according to some economist somewhere that you can Google® search for if you’re bored. But its ESG was so good, right? They only used natural fertilizer, and lowered their carbon footprint! They also were starving and had to import lots of extra food.

It’s that same environmental rating that countries like the Netherlands and Canada are chasing when they are preparing to mandate that their farmers have fewer cows and use less fertilizer. Both of those things, you see, hurt the carbon footprint and thus make the environmental score of the country go down. If it causes people to go bankrupt to buy Cheetos® or starve, I guess ESG is a way to make sure that everyone in the world has the same chance to be hungry, poor, or exposed to social unrest as the least developed nation. It could happen here. Oops. Forgot about Chicago.

It is happening here, at least with the ‘S’ part of ESG. Looks like we’ll have Equity soon with countries that riot over it being (rolls dice) Tuesday soon enough.

When he fires an employee, he fires an employee.

Because of this fantastic success at the national level, Wall Street™ is pushing ESG at the corporate level. The aptly-named Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock™ which currently controls over eight trillion dollars in investments is a big fan. Eight trillion dollars? That’s almost enough to buy two full tanks of gas in Biden’s America. Think a man who controls eight trillion worth of cash has some pull?

The aptly-named Larry Fink certainly does. Individual shareholders don’t vote, so the aptly-named Larry Fink’s eight trillion in stock probably controls two or three times that level of shareholder votes. Alone. The actual ESG rating process is so murky and subject to manipulation that the ESG for a company can be as fraudulent as Joe Biden’s hair plugs.

So, yeah, the Left has constantly used corporate America for funding, and now they’ve figured out a way to make business support whatever crazy policy that the Left wants to use to turn the United States into the next version of Sri Lanka.

Thankfully, he planted a tree to offset his carbon emissions.

The aptly-named Larry Fink has a private jet, and houses everywhere, and burns more carbon in a week than most people will burn in a lifetime. Won’t you please reduce your carbon footprint so he can continue to do this? I mean, it would up your personal ESG score . . . .

The Backlash Against Journalists Begins

“Let them have the cabbage. We here at I.N.S. will feast on journalistic filet mignon.” – The Night Stalker

An honest journalist walked into CNN®. The network head asked, “What are you doing here?”

I guess Trudeau had enough of people being mean to journalists. I mean, we know that Justin Trudeau is the most tolerant person in Canada, right?

But he’s the most qualified person to be prime minister, right?

Huh. Perhaps not. But certainly, he has the best in mind for his people.

Well, thankfully the vaxx is helping people stay alive. I mean, it’s not like mortality is up by double (or nearly double) in the ages from 25-55. Oh, wait . . . .

I wonder how people will react to that?

Certainly, that didn’t happen, that journalists and the press wanted awful things to happen to people that had a different opinion. I mean, is there any evidence of that?

I guess after that, I’m getting the subtle hint that they might not like folks who were somewhat suspicious of a new technology unleashed with minimal testing.

But at least the vaxx works.

I’ll let Sam Hyde have the last word.

Civil War 2.0 Weather Report: The Divide Grows

“We can take whole by force what they propose to divide.” – Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

The book I ordered about clocks finally came in. It’s about time.

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. Tensions are still high. 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 – The Divide – Violence And Censorship Update – Biden’s Misery Index – Updated Civil War 2.0 Index – Growing Farther Apart – 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 700 other people and get every single Wilder post delivered to your inbox, M-W-F at 7:30AM Eastern, free of charge.

The Divide

One thing that hasn’t changed, at all, since Biden was installed in the White House is that the tension hasn’t dropped. It’s a matter of Team Blue being in charge, and is looking at every way that they can stick it to Team Red. It’s not a new story, but it is a continuation of a fundamental divide in the country, about nearly everything.

When Donald Trump allegedly tossed hush money to a tramp, it was nearly grounds for impeachment. Joe Biden allegedly funds tens of thousands of dollars for Hunter’s periodic chemical and biological safaris?

Not a word. So, it’s an offset, right?

Not really. The Left has a deep hold on the institutions of this nation, who will, apparently, actively run cover for the Left, no matter what they do. Which institutions? Not big ones. Just the FBI and the major news media. The mere fact that CBS® is now running the story that the Washington three-letter agencies are all-in for Biden shows that the Left is getting ready to ditch Biden, or at least sending him a warning. I mean, it’s not like he’d notice.

The cultural divide is far worse that that would indicate, though. Let’s take the children. No, really, that’s the slogan of the Left: “Let’s take the children™.” They want them desperately, and are dedicated to doing whatever they can to indoctrinate them. Case in point:

As near as I can tell, this defines a lot of what’s going on with kids, but it’s not just schools, it’s media as well. There is a reason they want unfettered access to kids – it’s not about education, it’s indoctrination. What proof?

Imagine what the world would look like if teachers were secretly trying to make kids moral and Christian. The ree and cry would come from the usual sources, and then all the Left would dress up in Handmaid’s Tale outfits and pretend the United States was near to becoming a theocracy when it is farther than it has been, ever and the danger to kids isn’t coming from the Right. And the biggest fairy tale is coming from the Left:

Violence And Censorship Update

First, the Left wants to create conformity, and make sure that if your opinion differs, that you’ll feel left out. Their bots are Legion:

So, your opinion isn’t valid. But neither was the past opinion of the Left, if it was inconvenient. Left is always the direction of the Censor. And one of the biggest goals of the censor is not only to censor your current views, but it’s also to censor their past views. Why?

Because only the current view is valid. If the past view (for example) was that it takes an actual man and an actual woman to get married, why, that view is very uncomfortable now. So, any view that contradicts the New Truth® is forbidden. And when people try to use your own views against you? That’s hate speech, right?

It was Winston Smith’s job in the novel 1984 to make facts inconvenient to the Left disappear from the record. That job continues: the Left cannot accept the idea that the economy of the country is in very bad shape – and is in a technical recession. It hasn’t been long enough for Google® to take the previous definition down:

But at Wikipedia®? The Leftist editors are all too happy to change the definitions in near real-time just to make the Left happy. They do it for nothing but Good Boy™ points.

I think Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There had it right:

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.”

“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”

“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master: that’s all.”

Biden’s Misery Index

Last month’s inaugural edition inspired Aesop (LINK) to come up with his own version.

That’s a lot of Kamalas!

But when we look at the reason behind the graph, it’s simple: this is the pain associated with a planned Leftist transition.

Here’s the current graph. I suppose the good news is that even though things are getting worse, they’re not getting worse as fast as they were?

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 downward again this month. I think it continues to be muted because the Left has kept their dogs on a leash.

Political Instability:

Up is more unstable, and it dropped a tiny bit in June. Elections are coming up – I’m wondering if we’ll see more?

Economic:

Economic indicators ricocheted upwards this month. Looking at the reasons: the markets stopped falling, the interest rates stopped shooting up – this is related to the Misery Index being slightly less awful. This is an instantaneous look, and things aren’t as awful as they were last month.

Illegal Aliens:

It set a new record for this time of year. But it was down from last month, for the first time in ages. Must be hot out.

Growing Farther Apart

The first story was the divide – the second is that the divide isn’t getting better. People are making choices to move to areas that match their ideology. And what about the people there?

They’re ready to check out. Red State Secession (LINK) conducted a poll at the end of June and released the results at the beginning of July. The result?

People are talking about breaking up. In the eight states they polled, (HI, TX, LA, MS, AL, FL, and SC) the results were fairly similar: They felt that if California were to want to leave the Union, that 56% felt there should be no penalty, 41% felt that there should be economic sanctions. Only 5% were willing to use military force to keep California in the Union.

The numbers were pretty similar if Texas wanted to leave. Texans, on the other hand, were ready to go to the next level. 69% of voters want to hold a referendum on separating from Texas, including a majority of Democrats and independent voters.

In Arizona (not part of the study) you can see that the Democrats don’t much care for the United States, either:

And the showing of a Revolutionary War flag on a coffee cup. It wasn’t me, even though I own one myself, which I bought at a United States National Park:

People are sorting themselves based on ideology, as long predicted:

And I’ll leave this Tweet® for the last word on how close we are to being one country:

Sounds like someone is a bit butthurt?

LINKS

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

Bad Guys

https://twitter.com/i/status/1544768644244049920

https://twitter.com/i/status/1542746999245549568

https://twitter.com/i/status/1545705450703912960

https://twitter.com/i/status/1546007176002408449

https://twitter.com/i/status/1546000131744759808

https://twitter.com/i/status/1545917339467661312

https://twitter.com/CrimeWatchMpls/status/1544240651734228994

https://twitter.com/CPD1617Scanner/status/1543577251681390597

https://youtu.be/SVDWQv5lWPM

https://twitter.com/CPD1617Scanner/status/1553032236760535041

https://youtu.be/Vz4r8nNWOHA

https://www.foxnews.com/us/video-shows-utah-child-4-shoot-police-outside-mcdonalds-drive-thru

https://www.revolver.news/2022/07/the-hidden-agenda-behind-new-york-times-desperate-ray-epps-puff-piece/

https://www.insidebidensbasement.org/

Good Guys

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pg7q00OczIU

https://twitter.com/iamyesyouareno/status/1550500701465452545

https://twitter.com/i/status/1544337951332655110

https://twitter.com/i/status/1545874643994787840

https://twitter.com/Tr00peRR/status/1544619495100145664

https://youtu.be/ELDO8tJx0iY

https://www.fox5ny.com/news/off-duty-correction-officer-hailed-hero-after-shooting-man-who-pointed-gun-crowd

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fourth-of-july-mass-shooting-richmond-virginia-thwarted-police-tip/

https://abcnews.go.com/US/mississippi-teen-hailed-hero-helping-rescue-girls-officer/story?id=86300178

https://abcnews.go.com/US/93-year-man-shoots-home-intruder-fends-off/story?id=85991432

https://www.star-telegram.com/news/state/texas/article263351778.html

https://donsurber.blogspot.com/2022/07/even-if-it-saves-but-one-life.html

https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fcrimeresearch.org%2F2022%2F07%2Fuber-driver-in-chicago-stops-mass-public-shooting%2F

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/miacathell/2022/07/27/10-times-a-good-guy-with-a-gun-saved-lives-n2610406

One Guy

https://heavy.com/news/elisjsha-dicken/

https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/19/us/eli-dicken-indiana-mall-shooting-bystander/index.html

https://www.wthr.com/article/news/special-reports/greenwood-mall-mass-shooting/armed-citizen-was-not-the-only-one-with-a-gun-at-the-greenwood-park-mall-shooting-the-first-victim-killed-had-one-too-indiana-elisjsha-dicken/531-e5f3c8db-8f58-4c62-b8b0-acaab48ec4d1

Body Count

https://youtu.be/aakhNFhbhWk

https://twitter.com/townhallcom/status/1550526039234908164

https://thepostmillennial.com/52-shot-in-new-york-city-over-july-4-weekend

https://news.wttw.com/2022/07/05/68-people-shot-8-killed-shootings-across-chicago-over-july-4th-weekend-police

https://www.yahoo.com/news/chicago-4th-july-weekend-violence-160718752.html

https://www.informationliberation.com/?id=63182

https://www.unz.com/article/28-black-on-white-homicides-counting-white-hispanics-middle-easterner-unspecified-juveniles-etc-june-2022-another-month-in-the-death-of-white-america/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-10976437/How-Californias-legal-cannabis-dream-public-health-nightmare.html

https://goodsciencing.com/covid/athletes-suffer-cardiac-arrest-die-after-covid-shot/

https://markcrispinmiller.substack.com/p/in-memory-of-those-who-died-suddenly-17d

https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/vaccinated-english-adults-under-60
https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/will-physicians-ever-speak-out

https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/the-safe-and-effective-narrative

https://twitter.com/ElectionLegal/status/1549833362919112704

https://cms.zerohedge.com/s3/files/inline-images/color%20map.jpg?itok=NWg8Tskj

https://news.gallup.com/poll/394262/fewer-bible-literal-word-god.aspx

Vote Count

https://emeralddb3.substack.com/p/voterga-uncovers-massive-election

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/nyc-election-sites-had-no-republican-ballots-primary-election

https://dnyuz.com/2022/07/05/on-conservative-radio-misleading-message-is-clear-democrats-cheat/

https://thenationalpulse.com/2022/07/07/poll-majority-of-americans-believe-midterm-elections-will-be-tainted-by-fraud/

https://www.kawc.org/news/2022-07-04/biden-administration-to-sue-arizona-over-law-requiring-proof-of-citizenship-to-vote

https://apnews.com/article/2022-midterm-elections-biden-donald-trump-wisconsin-supreme-court-05166e3f3ef970b5cde8ac15cd30e18b?taid

https://uncoverdc.com/2022/07/01/u-s-supreme-court-takes-case-that-could-impact-future-elections/

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/supreme-court-case-voting-rights-experts-say-bring-chaos-elections-rcna34033

Civil War

https://news.gallup.com/poll/394202/record-low-extremely-proud-american.aspx

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10971195/A-QUARTER-Americans-say-ready-arms-against-government.html

https://www.science.org/content/article/half-of-americans-anticipate-a-us-civil-war-soon-survey-finds

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/contributors/2022/07/03/americans-divided-civil-war-unlikely/7767742001/?gnt-cfr=1

https://mises.org/wire/avoid-civil-war-learn-tolerate-different-laws-different-states

https://english.elpais.com/usa/2022-07-27/fear-of-a-second-us-civil-war-ignites-debate.html

https://dnyuz.com/2022/07/02/spurred-by-the-supreme-court-a-nation-divides-along-a-red-blue-axis/

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/on-the-campaign-trail-many-republicans-talk-of-violence/ar-AAZTYhP

https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2022/07/11/are-we-looking-at-another-civil-war-n2609990

https://thecarousel.substack.com/p/theres-gonna-be-a-war-in-montana

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/5/31/the-civil-war-that-is-here-and-the-one-that-may-yet-come

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/07/04/50-year-attack-right-wing-corporate-forces-leading-us-back-towards-civil-war

https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-bidens-washington/a-president-asking-for-civil-war

https://www.businessinsider.com/civil-war-expert-barbara-f-walter-us-heading-toward-insurgency-2022-7

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/07/jeff-sharlet-on-the-martyrdom-of-ashli-babbitt-and-whats-to-come

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/washington-secrets/experts-make-case-for-the-ar-15-only-defense-in-civil-war

Progress

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6tOAafAJCA

Mr. Jones And The Lies Of Communism (And Communist Tools)

“Good morning. My name is President Taft and this is my brother-in-law Lee Harvey Oswald. This is the 35th season of our Oscar-winning radio series Prune Farming in the Ukraine.” – Penn and Teller

What sound did Stalin make when he drank water? GULAG, GULAG, GULAG

Some subjects for these columns seem to select themselves. An example is today’s topic – the movie Mr. Jones. Mr. Jones came out in 2019, and I had never heard of it until the screen saver on my television said I could watch it for free even though it did not feature James Spader. Or was that why it was free, because it was Spader-less?

I was already familiar with the titular (12-year-old me snickered) character of Gareth Jones. I was actually sort of shocked that this film was made. It was released in 2019, and is a very anti-communist film, showing that the Soviet Union was totalitarian and homicidal in a way only exceeded during Mao’s China in the twentieth century. The fact that anyone was putting money down to fund a film, especially in 2019, that was this anti-communist surprised me.

The subject of the film is Gareth Jones’ discovery and reporting of the Holodomor. I know that many of you are already familiar with the Holodomor, but a brief recap is required for context for those that aren’t familiar with it. The Holodomor was, essentially, the Soviet government giving the farmers of the Soviet Union a “going out of business” sign so he could create collectivized agriculture.

No Leftist idea is so bad that Justin won’t try it again.

Lenin had tried to corral the farmers, but he discovered fairly quickly that the Revolution doesn’t run on good intentions, and had to back off. Farmers were allowed to farm so that the Revolution could be fed. But after Lenin died, Stalin took over and decided to make a “kinder, gentler” nation.

Just kidding. Stalin started purging right and left. And as poor as everyone in the Soviet Union was, a hardscrabble farmer (wink) that made a few extra bushels of grain was considered very wealthy. They called them Kulaks. Who was a Kulak? Well, anyone with just a little more than the average peasant.

So, Stalin decided to go to war against his own people. He mobilized factory workers, gave them guns, and sent them out to root out the real enemies of the revolution. Keep this in mind when you hear about the war on farmers in Canada or the war on farmers in the Netherlands.

How does one get rid of millions of farmers but not starve the rest of the nation? Take all of the food the farmers have. All of the food. From all of the farmers. Then let them die.

I guess they won’t be having any Holland Oats anytime soon.

Yup, that was it. That was the strategy. And it worked. Bodies were collected on a regular basis, and all across the Soviet Union, millions died. Many were shipped off to the GULAG system, too. This is yet another reason the Soviet Union wasn’t the inspiration for many theme parks.

This is where Gareth Jones comes in – he was a British writer/reporter who talked himself into the Soviet Union, and talked himself into visiting the Soviet countryside, specifically in the Ukraine. What he saw wasn’t good – it was exactly the mass starvation that I wrote about in the paragraph above. If only he had read that, he could have saved himself some time and a whole lot of trouble.

But the main reason we know about the Holodomor is that Gareth Jones wrote about it. He told the outside world, so we owe him. The movie, Mr. Jones, depicts this journey across the Ukraine in a pretty unfaithful way – meant to shock the viewer, and also meant to particularly show that Ukraine was the victim. In reality, Ukraine was hit particularly badly, but millions of farmers across the U.S.S.R. outside of the Ukraine were also treated in a similar fashion.

But it will be different this time, right?

That’s one of the beefs that the Jones family had with the film – Jones never ate nor witnessed the items on the menu that the film depicts. They were also a bit miffed that they felt that his memory was used to be anti-Russian, rather than anti-Soviet. You can see a bit more here (LINK) on how the family felt. In one sense, it looks like this movie was made not because of the anti-Soviet theme, but because of the anti-Russian propaganda value. Maybe because of Trump and muh Russia collusion?

Who can say?

But one other thing to note is that the Soviets aren’t the only bad guy – there’s another: Walter Duranty. Walter Duranty is one of the scummiest people to have ever lived. The fact that he enjoyed a life of power and debauchery was only part of it.

For an example of how degenerate Duranty was, he was best buds with Aleister Crowley. They did magic together as well as drug-fueled orgies with participants of all varieties. This, of course, made him the perfect hire for the New York Times©. Duranty wrote such a glowing portrait (“there is no famine or actual starvation nor is there likely to be”) that he received a Pulitzer Prize® for his work denying the Holodomor. Duranty’s writing about the Soviet Union was influential in getting the Soviets accepted and into a cozy sleeping bag with FDR.

Some things never change . . . .

So, given that his hands are stained with the blood of literally millions of farmers, you can understand that this is probably one of the few times this sentence has ever been written in the English language: In retrospect, Duranty’s drug-fueled pederasty might be the nicest line I can write about him. Oh, wait, he’s dead. That’s something positive I can write about this vile leach that stained the lives of millions.

In the movie Mr. Jones, Duranty is depicted as just the depraved greasy worm I sketched above, so it’s got that going for it. And the family of Gareth says they got his character spot-on, that’s two for two of the main cast. Oddly, they have Jones meeting George Orwell, when in fact during all of Gareth Jones’ life Orwell was still an avowed socialist who had yet to become disillusioned by fighting with the commies in the Spanish Civil War and there’s zero evidence the two ever met.

Overall, the movie made $2.8 million at the box office, so unless they made mad bank from Blockbuster™ rentals, they ended up losing lots of cash. Again, it was an art-house anti-commie movie released into the woke world of 2019. What did they expect?

My birds were stuck together. I took them to the vet – he said he couldn’t help – it was toucan fusing.

So, do I recommend it? Dunno. It wasn’t bad. I probably wouldn’t watch it again because it’s a “one-time” movie and did not have James Spader in it.

Victimhood And Guilt: Tools Of The Left

“Guilt was created for what reason? For man to enslave himself?” – Borgia

You can stop saying Amber Heard wasn’t a victim – her acting school clearly failed her.

What’s the easiest way to defeat a people?

You make them do it themselves.

That’s been the motif for quite a while from the Left. In reality, this is a playbook that has been used for decades by Leftist groups like the Frankfurt School (I’d look it up for you but I’m lazy), and it’s difficult to explain some of the things that we’re seeing in the world right now without thinking through the tactics that they’ve employed.

The first thing Leftist groups tried was to exploit a class difference in America. That didn’t work very well, since unlike Europe, we’d rather firmly out the King generations ago without letting it turn into a Leftist bloodbath, like in France (memo to self – the French can win a war, but they have to be fighting other French people). We were self-governed, and there was sufficient freedom so that (if Homer Q. Citizen worked for someone rather than just doing his own thing) Homer could tell them to take this job and shove it.

I hear in France on Halloween the kids go out Trick or Retreating.

So, class was out. What was the next lever to pry?

The Leftists thought about it quite a bit, since they were doing nothing but being paid for hating America while working at universities like Columbia® and Harvard™ and attending fancy faculty parties while they plotted to destroy the country. Their big breakthrough was in understanding the American psyche in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s.

What was the vulnerability of the nation at that time?

We’ll take Victimhood© first. The Victimhood© was crucial, because if there isn’t a victim then the scam won’t work. Don’t have a ready victim? Manufacture one. All of the social movements in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s were based on attempting to drive a culture into turmoil, and for that, one needed a steady stream of victims.

In the year 2022, what’s more relevant? Women’s Lib, or Mad Libs®?

I’m not saying that some of the movements didn’t have actual problems and valid concerns at their root. Regardless of that, there’s no way that I’d ever try to base building the character of one of my kids by telling them, “Oh, Pugsley, you got a bad grade in math (he didn’t) because that teacher had it out for you!”

If I do that, I ruin a kid. Similarly, when Victimhood™ is assigned to an entire group of people, that group is morally crippled. Instead of the group taking the issue and working ways to actually solve the issue, those afflicted with Victimhood® simply must perpetuate that Victimhood©.

Microagressions™? Really? Cultural Appropriation®? The length that people have to reach in 2022 to whip up a frenzy is amazing because of the lack of real problems that don’t also involve the behavior of the group. The war against statues? Critical Race Theory© is a playbook straight out of the Frankfurt School.

No matter who wins a race in Bangkok, it’s still a Thai.

Similar things happened with the Women’s Liberation Movement in the 1970s. The result of turning a little over 50% of the population in the country into a group of victims was astonishing and horribly negative. The divorce rate in the United States spiked along with the Women’s Liberation movement, removing social cohesion, and creating yet another victim class, and now it’s waaaay harder for some guys just to get a sandwich.

But creating the victim is only half the equation, and perhaps less powerful than the other weapon: Guilt®.

Let’s return to the American psyche in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. The American psyche was long built on openness and fair play. Why don’t we cut in line? It’s been shown in study after study that Americans from that time period would go out of their way to not allow free riders – people who don’t contribute to the system. Line cutters are just one example.

Studies have shown that this level of dislike for free riders and those who treat others unfairly is so ingrained that individual Americans will work to stop that unfairness. Individuals will work to stop free riders even if it requires them to do something uncomfortable, or if it causes them financial loss.

“What if,” thought the Frankfurt School, “we could convince the American people that they were immoral? That their system is awful?”

“Well,” I imagine they responded, “now you’ve got something.”

What happened when John Galt took too many sleeping pills? Atlas Drugged.

The Frankfurt School was collectivist, and believed in collective, not individual punishment. They hated the individual ideas and nature of Western Civilization, and the United States in particular. To put this in perspective, it is exactly the burning hatred for these ideas that spurred the Frankfurt School on. These ideas live on in exactly the hatred that every Leftist (and many “conservatives”) hold for the “flyover” states and the “red states”.

They are the Americans who say things like, “I’ll never have a child,” and “I hate America,” and “I can’t stand the sight of the American flag,” and pick any and every opportunity that they can to tear down the country. Sadly, people who say that are at the heads of infotainment companies, the executive and legislative portions of government, the military, and are all over in the academic world.

They hate those that they are supposed to lead and govern.

To put it simply, this Guilt® has turned a large portion of the people who are at the levers of power into people that hate America. And these people suffering from Guilt, are people that also hate you because you are getting in the way of their planned suicide of our country.

So, if one way to defeat a people is to have them defeat themselves, then that must mean that the Left is very, very afraid. They’re afraid of you and the power that Americans inherently possess. That’s why they hate you, and that’s why they want to tear down everything that you love and leave a smoking crater.

I feel like we should talk about the aliens.

The great news is that in the midst of the economic and social crisis that has been engineered to create more control, people are waking up. The Guilt® is lessening as people push back against the vilification of people like Thomas Jefferson and George Washington while granting sainthood to the designated felon high on lethal amounts of fentanyl victim of George Floyd. The Guilt© will, I think, begin to fall apart as the crisis continues.

Will we be the same America as in the past? No. But I do believe we will win, because independence and truth usually triumph over Victimhood® and Guilt™.

Plus, you know, it’s not like they’re fighting the French.

Joe Biden: Tasting Your Frustration Edition

“I can taste all the flavors from the past sixty years. I can taste the Korean War.” – Bob’s Burgers

I have the memory of an elephant. I recall seeing one at a zoo once.

Yesterday, thankfully, Resident Joe Biden indicated he was really in tune with modern Americans. During a press conference, Joe stated, “I understand the frustration. I can taste it.”

Taste it. Yes. Normally, I goof on Joe about being a bit addled, but here he’s nosing in on my gig. “I can taste it.”

I wonder, what exactly frustration tastes like? Is it like the dinner I made last month when Pugsley asked, “Was it supposed to taste like this?”

I wonder if, to Joe, our frustration tastes like something exceptionally expensive. A fine Bordeaux or, say, gasoline?

Thankfully, Joe is willing to devote all of his senses to solving our problems. I wonder if Biden smells our bank accounts? Probably not, though I heard that Joe took an interest that the supply chain issues have made stores run out of Pantene® – Joe said he’d personally sniff out the situation.

What’s the difference between The Mrs. and I? When she says “sniff this” it’s usually pleasant.

Thankfully, in the very same press conference, Biden also said, “. . . inflation is our strength . . .” Yes. He said that. Pretty quickly, Nina Jankowicz (the Jerry Springer of government officials, except Jerry would kill for her jawline) got up and echoed that thought: “Inflation is our strength, and war in Ukraine is peace.”

Okay, I’m making fun of these people, but in truth, they aren’t serious people. They’re an administration that might actually think that Robert Downey, Jr., is really Iron Man® and really might come and save them after he stops the Russians in Kiev. And that’s me being charitable in my assessment.

When it comes to government, one of the Leftist talking points was that, with Biden in the White House, we’d have the “adults back in charge”. In this case that’s an apt description, but only if the adults in question are a collection of diversity hires unable to get a job where an IQ greater than room temperature (Fahrenheit, not the meter thing). Oh, and they are in favor of The Current Thing, whatever it is.

Pictured: White House security badge.

Rachel (formerly Richard) Levine dresses and calls xirself a woman. Xir also dresses like and calls xirself an Admiral.

As the assistant secretary for health, Levine told NPR that “there is no argument among medical professionals — pediatricians, pediatric endocrinologists, adolescent medicine physicians, adolescent psychiatrists, psychologists, et cetera, about the value and importance of gender-affirming care.” It’s no wonder that Biden appointed a Supreme Court Justice that said she couldn’t define what a woman is. How ever did she decide what to put on her driver’s license?

So, that leads me to several options when it comes to the economy. The first idea is that we have left the equivalent of a group of dim-witted glue-eating children in a room filled with razorblades, poison ivy, cyanide, and whatever hellish creature that Australia might produce that I haven’t had a nightmare about yet. Carnivorous, poisonous koala bears that fly and have scorpion tails, perhaps?

Why did the koala drop out of the tree? It was dead.

Regardless, these idiots were saved from being Marxist perma-baristas by vote harvesting and have somehow gotten the keys to the economy. Of course, never having heard of debt, inflation, or Zimbabwe, the best idea that they had is “make everyone rich by printing more money”. Really. That’s it.

That’s the first option, actual idiocracy.

But what if this is the desired result?

Thus, the second option. The Cloward-Piven Strategy dates from the 1960s and was based around breaking the system through welfare. Cloward and Piven were two married professors that decided that since they were making money from the public for doing essentially nothing, that everyone else should be able to get a piece of that action, too. Economies aren’t based on people being productive, right?

The end idea of their strategy was bankrupting the country through increased pushing of social programs. Why do that, to help people? No, the aim was revolution in the United States. And this wouldn’t be a revolution like the French one (which was a head of its time) which proved that the French can win a war, if it’s against the French.

What’s a good way to start a revolution?

King George was only 11 inches tall – he was unfit to be a ruler.

Doing exactly what the current idiots are doing. It used to be just the commies like Cloward and Piven and their cousins Pol Pot and Stalin who wanted to change man, to make him perfectible. Now, the World Economic Forum (LINK) is on with the same old idea that’s caused so much grief over the past century and change. They have an agenda to make man a global economic cog in a machine where only one culture, one set of ideas is acceptable – in the world.

Strangely, the outcome of the “toddlers in charge” plan looks a lot like the outcome of the “Global Commie Power Grab” plan.

So, was Joe being stupid when he said “inflation is our strength” or was he just slipping and sharing the quiet part of the plan that he wasn’t supposed to say?

Civil War 2.0 Weather Report – Ministry of Truth, and Socially Coming Apart

“Remember, all I’m offering is the truth. Nothing more.” – The Matrix

TEN

My day was great until noon. Then I woke up.

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 Clock O’Doom at the same location. For now. 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 – Ministry of Truth – Violence And Censorship Update – Updated Civil War 2.0 Index – Abortion and Conflict – 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 690 other people and get every single Wilder post delivered to your inbox, M-W-F at 7:30AM Eastern, free of charge.

Ministry of Truth

We now have a Ministry of Truth. Oh, I’m sorry – it’s the Homeland Security’s Disinformation Governance Board. Why? Presumably because people say things the Leftists don’t agree with.

I’ve heard that calling a groomer “groomer” really makes them mad.

The leader of the board that determines what is true and what isn’t?

Nina Jankowicz.

Nina, if you’re unaware, is the poster child for insufferable Leftist blather. She is, first, a low level, stooge for the Left. Her expertise in all things disinformation allowed her to opine that Hunter Biden’s laptop was expressible only in the holy high words of the Left: Russian disinformation. Russian disinformation was, according to the legend of the Left, the only reason that St. Hillary wasn’t elected.

Sadly, this Nina has no luftballons.

Now, ordinarily I don’t mind such creatures – their trajectory is predictable – they write a book, take a position washing dogs for their political masters, and then gracelessly drift away. These sorts of political vampires are what make writing fun.

But Nina’s different. Nina wasn’t hired by the political bits of Washington, she was hired by Homeland Security. What’s the difference? The Department of Homeland Security is primarily a law enforcement agency. It’s (sort-of) okay having a reptilian partisan hack at the cabinet level, but infesting law enforcement with Leftist partisan robots is a step too far, especially when Resident Biden is talking about Ultra MAGA, or whatever the voices in his head were telling him that afternoon.

At least, though, the mask is off.

Violence And Censorship Update

It’s been fairly quiet on the political violence front, at least recently. We do have plenty of Censorship news.

Okay, this isn’t real.

For the first time ever, got some good news up first:

Twitter®. If you had a wheelbarrow, you could have made a fortune mining salt from Leftist tears. The very same Leftists that were overjoyed that they controlled Twitter® aren’t exactly thrilled by the idea that they won’t control this platform. Here’s some salt to share:

It’s even better to mine the salt from a famous person.

Twitter isn’t done censoring, though. They censored info about the FDA containing info from the FDA.

DuckDuckGo® had to counterbalance the loss of Twitter© – they decided that the only news sources they would handle would be trusted. I’m betting Nina will love that.

And never forget that having an opinion that the Left doesn’t like is punishable by violence.

Updated Civil War II Index

Violence:

Violence is again flat. Perhaps turning back up in May or June – Antifa® seems primed?

Political Instability:

Up is more unstable, and it went up a little in April. Much more in June?

Economic:

I had bet the economic numbers would be worse, and I was wrong. If the stock market slide continues, though . . . .

Illegal Aliens:

This data was at record levels for this time of year. All-time record levels. Again.

Abortion and Conflict

The draft abortion decision by the Supreme Court is out. It shows a huge divide in the country. An example of the salt to be mined is here:

There were even a few words from Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

The United States is hopelessly divided. An example?

This was thought of as a negative result that would make people on the Right mad, rather than the desired result. Tinder® and all of the rest of the hook-up culture has been horrible for the people involved, especially women. I spent some time watching a YouTube® of a pro-life march at a college in some city. The pro-life folks were kind and polite, but the people on the other side of the issue were mean, angry, and wouldn’t listen, at all.

The idea of a rational discussion and debate with the Left is nearly impossible. The objectives are 100% out of sync.