Category: Podcast Idiocy

Why Does Asymmetric Warfare Exist? It Works.

“Apparently, my shoulder muscles are asymmetrical.  Did you ever hear of such a thing?  They say it’s genetic.” – Malcolm in the Middle

Never sell your soul to make good pickles – that’s a dill with the Devil.

Why do we have the TSA?

My contention is that there have been exactly zero hijackings of passenger planes since 9/11 (although one Alaska Air® plane was stolen by Sky King, PBUH).  Oh, sure, we had the shoe bomber.  That’s why one time when The Mrs. was going through a TSA checkpoint they made her take off her sandals and passed the x-ray wand over her bare, human, totally flesh-covered feet.

Yes, that really happened.

I suppose you could argue that a terrorist could put a bomb in checked luggage, so we needed minimum wage mouth-breathers to paw through my luggage and steal stuff, but an x-ray is far less invasive and cheaper in the long run than those idiots – besides, when I travelled with pistols, those were locked up and I didn’t have to show anyone anything.  I guess that’s one big advantage to having pistols.  Also, a TSA agent with a gun?

The TSA agent asked if I had any weapons.  “I prefer to kill with my bare hands,” apparently wasn’t the answer they were looking for.

Why have we spent billions of dollars on a system that (arguably) has saved no one, but cost me, personally, several hundred bucks when a TSA agent hot-fingered stuff out of my luggage?

Well, the government had to do something.  It doesn’t matter that the something was stupid and futile and useless, they did something.  The reason that they did something?

Asymmetric warfare works, though it’s called “terrorism” when not done by an established government.  Waco?  Totally not defined as terrorism.  Oklahoma City?  Terrorism.

Why is Ireland no longer governed by the British?  Terrorism, er, asymmetric warfare works – look it up.  Why does the state of Israel exist?  Terrorism, er, asymmetric warfare works.

What do you call a terrorist group from Hoth®?  Ice-IS.

Asymmetric warfare isn’t just bombs, though.  It works against individuals.

Make a statement that’s too far outside of the window of the acceptable?  That’s a public flogging and shaming.  Vox Day identified their tactics in SJWs Always Lie:

  1. Locate or Create a Violation of the Narrative.
  2. Point and Shriek.
  3. Isolate and Swarm.
  4. Reject and Transform.
  5. Press for Surrender.
  6. Appeal to Amenable Authority.
  7. Show Trial.
  8. Victory Parade.

I could give you many examples of this, but you already know many of them.  The result was the same – since the Narrative was like Cthulhu, and (until recently) only swam Left, there was an ever-advancing line of things you couldn’t say, even if they were 100% factual.  Some of these facts were (and still are, in some places) 100% censored.  That’s why they have to hobble and censor A.I. – the Truth is contradicts their Narrative.

And then everyone clapped.

The really, really corrosive part of this censorship is and was that the line was never a clear one, and kept shifting.

YouTube™ content creation is a big business.  It makes millions of dollars a year for some people.  Some even end up hiring writers, editors, and concentrate on making content that never would have made it to television in the past.  But they live and die at the whim of YouTube™.  Violate the nebulous terms and conditions, and not only do they end up losing their revenue stream, but they end up having to fire people that they’ve hired, people that they have grown close to.

So, as a content creator, they stay firmly on the “safe” side of the line.  Until the line moves.  Then, when their old videos (which were fine a year ago) now are found to violate the new narrative that just came into being last week?  They get scared.

See, it’s funny because it wasn’t my window I was naked in front of.  The Mrs. always tells me it makes the jokes more funny if I explain them.

And viewpoints are suppressed because of this non-violent, yet still very destructive type of terrorism.  My own podcast on YouTube® was flagged a year ago over making a joke about the Vaxx®.  Note that to any listener of the podcast, it’s really, really obvious that whenever we use the words “safe and effective” that we really don’t mean either safe or effective.  But when we say “no refunds” we actually really do mean that.

Regardless, viewpoints are suppressed.  For kicking off a few higher profile YouTubers® (Stephan Molyneux, for instance) they get compliance across the entire platform.  Molyneux had millions of comments and millions of hours of his content viewed during his time on YouTube™.  The result?

All deleted in a moment, and then banned from not only YouTube™, but PayPal©, Mailchimp®, and SoundCloud™.  Go to his Wikipedia© page and he’s listed as a “white nationalist podcaster who promotes conspiracy theories, white supremacy, scientific racism, and the men’s rights movement.”

Does this sound like isolate and swarm, anyone?

Yes, it’s economic terrorism on an individual.  And it works.

Oddly, though, in another sign that the Narrative can be stopped, Bud Light™ forms the backstory for the same tactics being used against GloboLeft.  We’re all familiar with the narrative that Bud Light© stupidly partnered with a man who dresses like a woman and lost hundreds of millions of dollars, but why?

Just in time to remind everyone before their Super Bowl® ads.

Because in the same timeframe a gender-confused young woman killed a bunch of people at a church school.  The name of the killer was known (and presented her as a woman, not the man she pretended to be).  The names of the victims were known.  But what was left?

The reason.  Within a day, it was known that the killer had left a Tranifesto, a description of why she had killed.  It was kept under wraps.

Why?

Because it showed, without a doubt, that her mind was twisted with a Leftist hate against . . . white people.  That’s simply not the Narrative, so immediately an investigation was started to find those horrible people that shared the truth of the mind of the murderer.

But the people (you and me) connected the dots between the beer and the shooter and were done.  Bud Light™ was and is seriously wounded.  And just like the YouTubers© that shy away from content that might cross the line, wounded companies stopped.  Not just InBev™, parent company of Bud Light©, but also every single app on my phone that normally turns gay-rainbow in June . . . didn’t.  Not a one.

I hope it will give it time to reflect.

The line had been drawn.  The economic asymmetric warfare from the people began to be heard.

I think that’s the case along not only the Texas border, but the whole border.  People everywhere are done with illegals, and done with pressing 1 for English and done with being quiet about the horrors caused, big and small by this unchecked invasion.  People are pushing back, and I’d expect that illegals and other immigrants will soon be the subject of public rudeness and shunning.

Racism?  No.  It’s our country.

Obviously, unlike in Canada, the government, despite its bluster, realizes that it can go only so far.  That’s the reason the Second Amendment is there.

And it has gone too far.

And no make-believe “compromise” will work, but more about that in the Civil War 2.0 Weather Report, coming next Monday.

Ye Olde Wilder’s Almanack of Things That Won’t In Thine Yeare of Our Lord 2024 Happen

“Since when can weathermen predict the weather, let alone the future?” – Back to the Future

I think Lady Macbeth wanted to walk her dog the other night.  She kept yelling, “Out, damned Spot!”

Notes:  No podcast tomorrow.  Or the next week.  I’m not going to push The Mrs. this week, and next week she has to go get measured for one of those plastic bubbles so she can live in one (just kidding, follow up visit and we probably won’t be home from Modern Mount Pilot by then, she’s getting better every day). 

Second:  if you’ve emailed me and I didn’t respond, please email me again.  I enjoy and respond to every email sent to me (if I’m cc’d or bcc’d, no, but I read most of those).  I found several in a spam filter today, and I apologize for not checking that since roughly 2007.  I’ll check every week now.

Now, on to the show!

Last year I swapped out my idea of predicting the future.  It appears to be harder.  Now, I predict what won’t happen.  It’s more fun, and I can pretty much bat 1.000 by doing that while making a few humorous points along the way.  So, with that, here are my Wilder Predictions for What Won’t Happen in 2024™.

First:  Ukraine won’t “win”.  So far, the war in the Ukraine has been a disaster for everyone involved.  Had Donald Trump been in office, this never would have happened.  Donald is all about the deal, and had he been president at the time, Putin and Zelensky would probably have come together over a deal that would have been mutually beneficial, and trade would have probably been increased between the two, and there would have been hugs all around.

Really.  That’s what would have happened.  Biden could have shut this down with one phone call.  Of course, the Left would have gone nuts, since a large part of their strategy is to pump the wealth out of the Ukraine directly into either their pockets or their campaigns.  Ukraine is a country that makes the money laundering on Better Call Saul look like amateur hour, so I guess peace was never an option.

Still more credible than the official story.

Second, Israel and Palestine won’t be joining each other for dinner.  Ever.  Note:  I don’t have a dog in this hunt.  The following is an analysis, not a wish list.  No matter what I feel, the writing is on the wall.

This is an existential crisis for both sides, and both are already in a diaspora so they can continue this fight wherever Jews and Palestinians (or Leftists) are in the same city.  In the long term, nobody wants the Palestinians, even (and especially) the neighboring Arab states, so Israel wants to export them to Europe and the United States.  I’m betting they all end up in Canada, or what future historians will call, “Gaza with Grizzlies.”

The Romans couldn’t invent algebra because X was always 10.

Long term for Israel, well, Israel is doomed, too.  They’re surrounded by Islamist populations that will soon outnumber them 50 to 1.  I anticipate another diaspora there, too.  Maybe to Ukraine?  Not sure anyone will be living there, but there will be plenty to mine.  Or de-mine.

I think eventually the merged Facebook®/Al-Jazeera© will probably end up running Jerusalem.

Third, and I’m going out on a limb with this one:  The US Debt won’t come down.  Even though Congress and both presidential candidates will jaw about it incessantly, they won’t do anything, and I do mean anything to even slightly slow it down.  Nope.  It’ll increase faster than Taylor Swift can ruin a football franchise.  Side note:  I took my car to the mechanic because it was making a horrible noise.  Turns out it was Taylor Swift on the radio.

Fourth, the 2024 Election won’t be free and fair.  I know, I know, I’m playing with fire on this one.  It’s clear that the Left mobilized every single trick they read on that Buzzfeed® article, Ten Crazy Things You Can Do to Steal An Election And They Won’t Stop You (You Won’t Believe Number Seven!).  They even bragged about it in a Time® magazine article about how they conspired to do everything they could possibly think of to Make America Democratic Again, since it was clear that Joe Biden created as much enthusiasm with the American people as passing a kidney stone.

They stole the election.

I wish our elections were less corrupt, like China or Russia.

The biggest factor was in creating slop in the system.  Early voting, that ensured that dead people would vote.  Yeah, dead people.  Some percentage of people who voted died after their ballots were cast, and not all of them were Friends of Hillary.  So, dead people voted, and their ballots were just as good as yours.

Ballots were harvested, this is clear, we’ve seen people dropping off dozens and hundreds of ballots.  Exactly as designed.  Mail in voting?  Why not?  And early voting resulted in numerous cases (especially in Michigan) where the early vote was counted, even though the actual voter showed up at the poll and claimed they never requested an early ballot.  They were given a provisional ballot.  In a leaked recording of a Michigan training session, the provisional ballots were given out so people wouldn’t throw a fit.  The provisional ballots of people who showed up in person whose votes were stolen were . . . discarded.

Making an election free and fair is easy:

  1. Paper ballots only. California just outlawed paper ballots, so you know this is a good idea.  The idea isn’t that we make the system so that votes are easy to count – the idea is that we make the system so only valid votes get counted.  If you need more people and it’s important, hire them.
  2. Same day voting, in person, only. Exception for the military – they vote where they are.  If overseas, they vote on election day and the votes are counted right there and results transmitted to the precincts by 11:30pm precinct time.  That day.  All votes are counted by midnight.  If not counted by midnight, they are discarded.  If Detroit can’t figure out how to do that?  Pound sand.
  3. All votes, all voting boxes are counted and are on video every second and broadcast.
  4. All vote counting takes place on video in full view.
  5. Every voter sticks their hand in that blue stuff they cover bank robbers in. It’ll wash off.  If you have a Smurf® hand?  You can’t vote again.  Oh, and you need I.D., even though the Left thinks that blacks aren’t smart enough to get one.

As I said, this won’t happen.  Leftists want every vote counted so that they can just manufacture votes as needed.  People on the Right want only valid votes counted.

Thanks to Biden, soon every American will be a billionaire!  Of course, that’s what it costs for a Snickers®…

Fifth, suppression of viewpoints on the Right won’t stop.  One of the key elements of control is the control of the ability to share ideas.  That’s why the Left was the “Free Speech” party right until they felt they could spike the ball and start sending us to the GULAG.  Blog views are down over most of the Right blogs, and that’s due in part to suppression of search engine traffic, which is a primary way that new readers find us – they stumble upon us while searching for a topic.  If I were Vox Day I’d suggest we create a news and commentary search engine for the Right.

If only someone like Ricky would make one…

A bikini covers only 5 to 10 percent of a woman’s body, yet men are so polite they only look at the covered parts.

Sixth, Elon will not hit peak amusement in 2024.  Good heavens, that man cracks me up.  It’s really fun to watch him change positions over time, but not unusual.  Why?  They have to suppress our ideas because the Truth is inherently Right.

Seventh, no alien contact will happen this year, but it will be trotted out again and again – my bet is that in March and July or August or whenever Biden needs a distraction it’ll show back up in the news.  It’s the ultimate shiny object to distract with.  I mean, besides COVID.

Eighth:  The RINO congress won’t suddenly become effective.  This is a repeat for the last 27 years.  Gingrich did a good job.

Ninth:  Illegal immigration won’t be stopped, but may be (slightly) slowed.  The Wealth Pump from the Elite demands it, and the ideology from the Left demands it.

If you filmed a superhero movie in Detroit, you’d have to use CGI to repair buildings.

Tenth:  2024 is not the year we lose.  The spark that is at our core has existed since (at least, and probably before) the dawn of civilization, and started to burn brighter some 2024 years ago.  That won’t change.  Provided we don’t go full Revelation, we’ll exist until we go full Revelation.

This isn’t over.  We’re not done.  Take that to the bank.

Experiments 2023: Wilder Is The Guinea Pig

“I can’t hear you. I’m too busy hitting buttons randomly.” – Phineas and Ferb

At dinner sometimes I pretend to gag.  My kids know it’s just another dad choke.

There’s a time for odds and ends, and Friday is as good as any since a lot of them are on the health side.  These are sort-of random, and are around a central theme of experiments that I do to myself and some of the results.  I’m not going repeat the one where I replaced my arms with animal limbs – that idea still makes me mad enough to rip up a car with my bear hands.

First:  Humans have been taking drugs for at least 12,000 years.  I have written (and stand by the idea) (Beer, Technology, Beer, Tide Pods, Beer, Civilizational Stability, and Beer – Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise (wilderwealthywise.com)) that the reason that civilization was formed was so we could have beer.  If you look at the artifacts found at Göbekli Tepe you’d find that one of them is a stone trough perfect for making beer, with residue from making beer.  People have also been ingesting or smoking various things for millennia from coffee to mushrooms to the Devil’s Lettuce.  Humans are drug using – it changes our mood.

I was listening to Scott Adams while flitting about this week and he led off with an interesting comment.  “Music is a drug,” because it alters our moods.  I was working the other day with earbuds in and found myself really happy.  Why?  Music.  It put me in a great mood and I was amazingly productive.

I hear wind turbines are big metal fans.

Adams is right, music acts like a drug.  But there’s more:  literature and television and Twitter™ I mean X© all fall into the same category.  When I was dating in high school I also (accidently) found that horror movies were an amazing aphrodisiac for the girls I dated.  Who knew?

I watched a LOT of horror movies on dates when I was in high school.  I guess you could chalk that up to Pavlov’s libido.

I have made this point many times:  be careful what you let into your head.  It can act like a drug, and the wrong drug at the wrong time can be fatal.  Choose wisely, and avoid things that make you feel despair.

Second:  YouTube® recommended an 8-hour dreaming track that they promised would allow me to have lucid dreams.  For those not aware, lucid dreaming is where you’re dreaming, but you’re fully conscious.  It’s an odd state – it’s not like being hypnogogic, where you’re in that twilight zone between being awake and being asleep.  Nope, you’re dreaming but you’re fully conscious.

My boss said I was on the Dream Team!  He also asked me to stop sleeping at work.

Sounds like something good, right?

The first night I tried it, The Mrs. reacted very negatively.  “What on Earth were you playing last night?  It gave me awful dreams.”  I persisted for a few weeks.  Normally, I go to sleep quite easily, and just like Epstein’s prison guards, I can sleep through almost anything.  I still found it easy to go to sleep with the “music” but my dream quality really changed over several weeks.  My dreams became incredibly dull.  Imagine dreaming about being at work.  On a normal workday.  Doing normal work.

Aaaargh!  I love dreaming when I’m a pirate, or hanging out with Tom Cruise having adventures or being asked by ZZ Top® to play bass at a concert because they were desperate.  Those are good dreams.  But being at work doing normal day-to-day crap?

It was awful.  And I was conscious during the work dreams.  Sometimes I’d end them, but end up going right back to work.  In my dreams.

That was bad enough, but the final straw that ended this experiment for me was that I would wake up at 4am and I couldn’t go back to sleep.  I’d be there hours, awake in bed.  Or so I thought.  In reality, I was dreaming that I was trying to get to sleep, but I was fully conscious.  I figured this out one morning when my alarm went off during a dream about trying to get to sleep.

That was weird.

I cannot recommend this sort of “music”, unless you want to relive a boring day at the office without being paid for it.

After I stopped, within a week my old sleep patterns returned.

Third:  I was the victim of a plagiarist this week.  Oh, sure, I’ve actually seen that someone tried to make .pdfs of my posts and (maybe?) sell them a few years ago, but that isn’t what I’m talking about – I’m talking about someone taking one of my posts and re-writing it, beat for beat, even using the same analogies.

I’m still mad at the guy who did it.

Surprise:  It was me.

Sometimes I take notes (I used to use notecards, but don’t have the same set up, so don’t anymore) for posts.  Other times?  Walking around, or snoozing, and a post idea hits me.  I’ll often work it out in my head, and then write it out.

Plagiarist?  Their words, not mine.

I did the latter in this case.  Then I saw an old post of mine getting traffic with a really similar name after I posted the piece I had just finished.  I clicked on it, and it was amazingly similar – the algorithm that suggests posts based on the post I have up suggested it.  That post was also four years older, so I guess my main defense was that I’d written somewhere north of 600 posts (nearly 750,000 words) and slept over 1300 times (1260 if you discount the lucid dreaming nights) since then.

Fourth:  I’m really enjoying doing the podcast.  This isn’t a commercial or anything, since if only one or two people listened I think we’d still be doing it because it’s fun.  It’s a livestream now, but I think it’s pretty tightly produced, so we don’t end up with a lot of the awkwardness you’d expect with an amateur like Shawn Hannity.  Nope, we’re professionals.  Also, I’m thinking this makes us journalists.  For legal reasons.  You can watch it here (LINK).

I bring it up because a) I can prove The Mrs. actually exists, and b) it’s something we have a lot of fun doing, and it’s creative and we mostly have our clothes on when we do it.  As far as you know.

Fifth:  I used to hang out with The Mrs. at lunch, but since her schedule changed, I don’t.  Instead, I’ve packed off my laptop and tried to be productive wherever I am during lunch, and it saves mileage and I just don’t eat, so that’s a bonus, too.  I’m writing this at lunch, and I’ve been pretty pleased with the results so far since I tend to do the first drafts and then when I get home later I do the research and edits and add the (bad) jokes.

Actual German joke:  “Why are there so few crimes in Germany?  Because it’s illegal.”

It may not sound like a big change, but it shaves hours off of my writing time, and those are hours that I can sleep instead rather than building up a big sleep debt and paying it off on the weekend.  Plus, I’m fasting at lunch.  In reality, when I went home I’d eat, but I find I don’t miss it at all.

I also think I might get a better overall quality since I’m writing during my most productive time, and editing and cracking jokes at my sillier times.  We’ll see.

As always, YMMV.

Wilder’s Black Friday Meme Sale, 90% Off!!!

“A present for my friends . . . at Thanksgiving.” – A Scanner Darkly

I guess she and Harry Potter never had a dry spell.

Tonight was a wonderful Thanksgiving, even though everyone has the same virus at the same time.  I’ve already had leftovers, and my wonderful family has learned one of the oldest lessons:  don’t engage Dad in a strategy game on a major holiday.  It is a cardinal rule, such as, “don’t get involved in a land war in Asia” which is (it turns out) exactly what they did.

So, tonight, we’re watching a movie, and I’ll probably be goofing with the family for the rest of the night.  As such, I’ve prepared a low-effort treat.

I collect memes throughout the year.  Some of them I batch into categories, and they form the backbone of posts about a specific subject.  Here, though is the Wilder Black Friday special:  memes that are on sale.  They are memes I collected but just haven’t used, and probably won’t use.

That isn’t to say that they don’t amuse me for one reason or another.  So, here it is, at nearly 90% off – the first-ever Wilder Black Friday Meme Sale.  Also, if you’re avoiding the malls and stores like we are, here’s our latest podcast.

Everyone, enjoy!

And here are the memes – starting with someone who didn’t get the memo:

 

Inflation, Velocity, and Bikini Economics

“Well, you already know my name.  I come here to, uh, unwind, because my job can be intense. I often dream I’m Clint Eastwood.” – Psyche

A picture from the last Federal Reserve® meeting.

There are several things that are wrecking the economy.  One of them that isn’t Joe Biden (or his sidekick, the Amazing Giggle Girl) is the sheer amount of cash in the system.  M2 is one of the broader definitions of currency – it includes ready cash, savings accounts, quarters under seat cushions, winning lottery tickets, tears from Leftists over Elon buying Twitter™ and, really, anything that can be spent fairly rapidly.

I want to send a shout-out to the guy who plays the triangle in the orchestra. Thanks for every ting!

I’ve brought up before that this measure, M2, has shot up.  It sort of has to – the national debt doubles every eight years so they have to get more and more into the system to build that sort of debt.  Half of M2 has been created since September 2013.  In the United States, we have so much debt you could rename the country “Owen”.

Although (in theory) cash is supposed to grow in tandem with the economy, inflation has been the inevitable result, especially since the dollar is no longer backed by anything other than kind wishes and Nancy Pelosi’s belly button lint.

So why aren’t things worse?

Velocity.

What’s velocity?  A simple definition is how fast cash moves in the economy.  I’ve had a collection of pennies in a piggy bank since I was in junior high.  Why pennies?  I spent all of the dimes, nickels, and quarters on beer when I was underage stuff, so over time, it became a penny fest.  But those 1,000 or so pennies are definitely part of M2, but have had zero velocity since I could drive.

So, inflation happens when you line up bikini girls in order of height?

The $20 in cash I spent at Walmart® moved to the bank, where it was deposited.  Walmart™ then got a deposit and spent it on wages to a clerk.  The clerk then spent it on PEZ®, and then it was recycled again.  That currency had a pretty high velocity, just like that one girlfriend that told me she needed time and distance.  That’s velocity, right?

Some cash moves around.  Some doesn’t.

Here’s the dirty secret of the economy since 2008:  the velocity of M2 has dropped from a “healthy” economy velocity of 1.7 or so to a “piles of cash under the mattress” level of 1.1.

People hang on to both cash and ratty underwear (this is true – one sign of a depression is lowered sales of men’s underwear) during times of uncertainty, and a quick view of the chart shows that despite all of the “quantitative easing” that the Federal Reserve™ has done since 2008, things are still broken.  Cash is sitting in piggy banks, in accounts, and at least some is sitting in dark pools in accounts to prop up the reserves of the banks.

Things get tough right around the elbow.

We’re seeing the stock market dip now, in a system awash in cash.  Why is the stock market dipping when prices of everything are skyrocketing?  What is the dipping sauce, is it ranch?  Why aren’t stock prices going up, too?

Certainly, some companies are having record profits – oil companies, timber companies, fertilizer companies.  But how many people are going to buy luxuries when the price of eggs is $5.00 a dozen and a hamburger costs a kidney “donation” at McTransplants®?

So, is this a kidney Bean?

Inflation causes failure.  At first, it looks good.  It increases some profits, like that fertilizer company’s profits.  Housing prices take off.  Most people enjoy this, at first.

But after it gives, then inflation takes away.  Prices have to go up at the restaurants because beef and broccoli and potatoes go up in price.  Then, people look and decide that they can cook at home for cheaper.  And those higher house prices?  The result is higher taxes on the property.

Now prices at the restaurant have to stay up, because the restaurant can’t make up for higher prices by charging less than it costs to keep the lights on.  But there are fewer customers.

So businesses, especially businesses built on disposable income, fail harder than Joe Biden on a crossword puzzle.  But that’s just the start, at least as long as we keep Joe away from actual decisions.

The scary part (besides Joe hanging with his invisible friend, JoJo) is that no one really knows what happens when all of it unwinds.

Well, it’s sort of like a bikini picture.

What will make the velocity of currency go up?  When people are afraid to hold on to their money because they’re worried that it’s losing value.

But that is (my guess) not quite yet.

I do expect, especially when the stock market unwinds to see a deflation first, across multiple asset classes.  It will be “catch a falling knife” time because in many cases it won’t be clear what is a good bargain, and what’s junk.  In 2008, gold dropped from nearly $1,000 to $710 as the market melted down.

Gold was obviously safer at that time than the stock market, but even it was driven downward – because cash was vanishing from existence as home loans defaulted.  How does that happen?  Remember, if I have $100 in the bank, it’s not really there.  The bank loaned it out.

So, I think I have $100, but so does the person who borrowed it from the bank, so M2 shows that there is $200.  When the loan defaults, there’s only $100.  And it’s $100 the bank is on the hook to pay back to me, so they have to borrow it from someone else.

Yup.  Defaulting loans and business failures cause the economy to contract, even during inflation.  And if that causes the Fed® to print more money?

We’ll be in even bigger trouble.

Update:  our appeal at Google® was approved.  The podcast was restored (LINK).  Our livestream is on tonight (Wednesday at 9 Eastern), at our channel.

Censorship Comes Home

“The name’s Francis Sawyer, but everybody calls me Psycho. Any of you guys call me Francis, and I’ll kill you.” – Stripes

Yes, YouTube® gave themselves a free speech award. It’s not parody – this happened.

The Mrs., Mark (LINK) and I have a little podcast we’ve been working on for a while. It’s not very big, but I don’t advertise it much, either. We livestream every Wednesday at 9pm Eastern. You can find it here (LINK) if you’re interested. It’s a lot like The Grand Tour® (or old Top Gear©) with me as Clarkson, Mark as May, and The Mrs. as Hammond. Note: The Mrs. does not wreck nearly as often as Hammond does.

What we have been doing with it is practicing – we’ve practiced format, and types of stories, and even how we interact. I like to think that in the last few months we’re getting better on all points. I think we’re getting better, because more recently after completing the podcast I feel “up” and excited, like we did a good job and I know we did. The podcast content is pretty lightweight, mainly commentary on the news and making fun of The Powers That Be.

One thing that has always been in the back of my mind was that we would (at some point) be censored.

Our first strike was a copyright strike.

Why?

How does a polygamist hippie count his wives? “One Mrs. Hippie, Two Mrs. Hippe, Three Mrs. Hippie . . .“

The Mrs. used a bit of Rockin’ in the Free World to make fun of Neil Young and his blatant attempt to gain publicity in order to censor Joe Rogan’s ‘Rona commentary that differed from The Narrative. The irony on that one is hilarious. It’s obvious that Neil’s idea of an ideal “free world” would probably make Stalin red with envy.

So, that was the first censorship. The Mrs. replaced the now-verboten Rockin’ in the Free World with a public domain music bed and that podcast was re-uploaded. The fact that we were using only a snippet of Neil’s music and then criticizing him for being a hirsute hippie hypocrite of questionable personal hygiene would probably have made a claim of Fair Use quite defensible.

But, whatever. It was easy enough to cut out that bearded road apple’s music.

This time, however, I accidently touched one of YouTube’s® third rails – an absolutely verboten opinion. Here’s what I said in the podcast:

“There is a theory that I’m working on: Wilder’s Theory of Greatest Amusement. What would be the most amusing 2016 election? Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump. What’s the most amusing outcome? Donald Trump winning. Let’s go to 2020: what’s the most amusing opponent for Trump? Joe “Dementia” Biden. What’s the most amusing outcome? Biden stealing the election.”

That’s what I said, more or less. I can’t give you the exact quote because YouTube™ nuked the podcast not only from external view, but we can’t see it ourselves. When Google® is serious about putting something in the memory hole, they are serious.

They did highlight the offending bit: “Biden stealing the election.”

Out of a fifty-minute podcast (more or less) it was a throwaway line. The Mrs. appealed the strike. It turns out of you appeal a strike and the strike is upheld, the appeal is a second strike. The end sentence in her request for an appeal? “Lighten up, Francis.”

When I played baseball we couldn’t wear Adidas©. Three stripes and you’re out.

I’m not sure that the millennial who is in charge of determining if we violated “community standards” will get the reference. But if his, her, or xirs name is Francis? Maybe he’ll lighten up. I don’t think they’ll accept the appeal – and in that case we get an immediate suspension.

But if we get three? They delete our channel forever.

That’s okay. Our channel has an approximate net worth of . . . zero. There are literally an infinite number of channel names we can come up with, and an infinite number of email addresses we can us to create those channels. It’s not like the podcast team is worried about losing out this name. Heck, we’re not even a streaming channel that investors spent $250 million putting together.

Here’s the policy that they say we violated:

  • Election integrity: Content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches changed the outcome of select past national elections, after final election results are officially certified. This currently applies to:
    • Any past U.S. Presidential election
      • The 2021 German federal election
      • The 2018 Brazilian Presidential election

Free and fair elections?

So, the result is simple: if there is ample evidence that there was fraud that impacted the 2020 election, (and there is) you can’t make that claim on YouTube®. Why? Because they have already determined that those claims are “false”. 2,000 voters all registered to one address in Georgia? One person committing multiple felonies on film by delivering votes to boxes? Stacy Abrams eating the votes that had “Trump” marked on them?

I did searches of those very serious stories, and there were no hits on YouTube®. Zero, despite evidence on film of these things having occurred. Obviously, according to YouTube®, those things never happened. They’re facts (well, not the Stacy Abrams thing), but facts that YouTube® suppresses like a 1915 woman voter.

The classroom even had a duck. They made it wear a mask. It was strange looking, but it fit the bill.

It actually gets worse. If a person’s YouTube™ videos are nothing but, oh, I don’t know, hairstyles for squirrels, but it turns out that you actually write and perform disco music? Okay, that might be justified. But the reality is that once a person becomes “unpersoned” it happens across all platforms at the same time. Facebook™, Twitter©, and YouTube® (and others) will permaban you.

And you’re done. There’s no appeal. And if you have information stored on their services? Gone. Where do you do your recovery passwords? Records? Past email files?

Strangely, this cast of characters is very familiar . . .

From the trends that I’ve seen, eventually, all media on the Right that questions The Narrative will get banned. One website I try to visit regularly has been under DDOS attack for weeks. Others, like Western Rifle Shooters Association, were deleted (and came back, thankfully!). But tonight, I tried to hit one of WRSA’s links and found . . . .

No such page. There are tons of reasons other than censorship, but, let’s be real. It’s censorship. Some of my most popular posts led to unwanted attention, to virus attacks, and to being taken offline.

The momentum is headed towards more, not less censorship right now. The Digital Services Act recently passed by the EU parliament increases censorship. Expect more here in the United States.

If Hillary wins in 2024, I’m moving to Benghazi. At least I know she’ll leave me alone there.

They say that it’s darkest before the dawn, but sometimes it’s darkest before things go pitch black. I fear the times will get even darker. That’s okay. It just makes some of us search ever harder for the Truth, and we all know: the signal can’t be stopped.

What’s To Worry? Only 11 Major Emergencies Right Now.

A question. What exactly is “total systems failure”? – Star Trek, TNG

Joe Biden doesn’t know the meaning of the word “failure” – dementia already got to that one.

Over my life, I’ve seen some things go well, and I’ve seen some things go bad. In many cases, I’ve seen them go spectacularly bad. In one particular example a zillion years ago, the ground was muddy.

Mud wasn’t that bad, right? Except that the railroad ties the diesel tank was sitting on sank in a bit too much. The 500 gallon diesel tank then tipped right over. Okay, you can clean diesel up, right?

But the tank nozzle fell on onto a hard object, which snapped it right off. The diesel began to pour out of the tank. What had the diesel tank fallen on? An oxygen cylinder from a welding rig. Snapped that nozzle off, too.

What luck!

So, now, I’m 40 feet away from pure oxygen being slammed into diesel fuel, and creating a fine mist of oxygen and diesel in the air.

That’s what’s generally known as a fuel-air bomb, if only it had an ignition source. Oh, and there was a red-hot air compressor exhaust pipe not 20 feet away.

I always stop my microwave at 0:01, so I feel like a bomb defusing expert.

It was weird, standing there in the mud as the diesel mist spread out. Everyone just stopped and stared. I didn’t.

I’ve always had this weird thing – whenever there’s an emergency my emotions shut down and I become focused on one thing only: the emergency. No fear, no hesitation, just action. It’s like the world becomes exceptionally clear. Time slows down. My mind focuses.

I yelled and pointed, “Turn off that air compressor. NOW!”

I’m not sure I’ve ever yelled louder before or since. The spell was broken. The guy near the compressor heard me above the engine and the hissing, and shut the compressor off.

Thankfully, the high-pressure oxygen wasn’t just pushing the diesel – it was also pushing the mud and water into the air, too. So it wasn’t just a thin mist of atomized diesel – it was a thin mist of atomized diesel, water, and mud.

That small bit of luck (which caused the problem in the first place) might have saved us all.

After the tank stopped hissing, they started cleaning up. Then, the emotions came to the forefront. I went back to my office and took a deep, deep breath, and let it out very slowly and cleaned the oil the thin mist had deposited on my glasses.

I had nearly become thin mist myself, but even then I still would have been more coherent than AOC’s understanding of economics.

I only make AOC jokes Ocasio-nally.

Often, there’s just a single path to success. It takes a lot of work to get everything working, all at the same time.

Failure isn’t that way. Often, just a single failure when almost everything is going right can cause a cascade of failure.

But we’re beyond that as a nation, and we’re beyond that as a world.

In my list, the items are sometimes causes, and sometimes effects of other causes on the list. It’s probably not as relevant today as to what caused the crisis, but what the effects of the crisis are. In many cases, the effects are wildly larger than the initial cause was. I mean, all she did was ask me if those pants made her butt look big.

For example, I think we can all agree that COVID is bad, but the loss of freedom caused by COVID has the potential to be much, much worse.

  • COVID – this is the grand-daddy of the current crisis, or more accurately, the spark that lit the fire of 2020. Many of the following issues are the result not of the virus, but from our reaction to it. At every step, it seems like the official response has been misguided, and has created innumerable knock-on effects. Just like eliminating warts with a welding torch, the cure has been much, much worse than the disease.

We knew COVID was dangerous right off the bat.

  • Inflation – This was going to happen even if COVID never showed up. In the last fifty years, the national debt has doubled just about every eight or nine years. Doubling is a great thing if it’s my bank balance. Doubling is not a great thing if it’s how much I owe, especially if I’m not doubling how much I make. But to add ten or so trillion dollars in six months? Yeah, that’s going to show up somewhere. And it’s now.
  • Supply Chain Issues – This was started by COVID, but is now exacerbated by inflation and international issues. Who knew that the United States manufacturing economy was almost entirely dependent upon chips from Taiwan? Who knew we could make trucks and tractors but we couldn’t make them run without those chips? Oh, and the cost of those chips is going to go up by at least 20%. Why? Because they can, and because they want to have a good cash balance in their accounts when they flee after China is done measuring the island to see if their stuff fits.

Taiwan gets in trouble because it has a Taipei personality.

  • Reserve Currency Status – As I’ve established before, the ability of the United States to just print money at will and have people in the Ukraine take it and send us steel slabs is like alchemy. We’ve even turned it more modern – we don’t bother to print the money, we just electronically wave it into existence. We send those digits to Ukrainians, and they give us stuff. If the Ukrainians and everyone else decide they don’t believe in magic? You know what they call a magician without magic:  Ian.
  • Loss of Freedom in the “West” – I look at the news out of Canada, New Zealand, and Australia and think, “Seriously? You’re putting up with that?” And they do, mostly. The Aussies use drones to find people camping far from anyone so they can arrest them for not being under lockdown. I could go on and on about this topic (and will in the future) but Claire has a great summary here (LINK). This is especially weird to me, since here in Modern Mayberry life is, more or less, exactly like pre-‘Rona life. High school football game? Zero masks. Except for my duck. I bought him one. It fits the bill.
  • International Breakdown – Afghanistan is a sign to the world – the United States has no military ability, or at least no military ability that it’s able to use effectively. Leaving bases (and the main airport) under the cover of darkness while abandoning American citizens to the Taliban? What does Biden call that? I’d hate to see his version of failure, since it would likely involve him somehow figuring out how to crack the crust of the world open so he could sniff a little girl’s hair.

At least we know one group that Joe is willing to fight for.

  • Immigration – Millions of illegals have streamed over the borders like there was a Black Friday sale on. Does the Left require COVID vaccination for them? It’s not only illegal immigration, it’s legal immigration. In 2021 the United States has the largest proportion of newly arrived (first generation) citizens in history. Ever – as near as I can tell (based on things like MIT studies) something like 17% of the people in the United States weren’t born here. Some, I assume, are nice people. But how many can we take in before the United States ceases to be the United States?
  • Loss of Social Cohesion – This is an effect, but it’s got tons of causes. Changes in technology. Changes in demographics. Changes in beliefs. A group believing what nearly every (90%+) American did in 1990 or 1890 or 1790 would be considered a “potential domestic terrorist” today.
  • Increased Polarity – Partially a result of the Loss of Social Cohesion, but also a result of decades of indoctrination of teachers by Leftists.
  • Demoralization – I’ve sensed a greater degree of resignation that it’s “over”. It’s not over. Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!
  • Moral Collapse – It seems like the current worldview is, “if it isn’t illegal, it’s moral.” And anything that was illegal? There’s a group trying to make it legal. Shoplifting? It’s fine in San Francisco.

In the fall of 2021, the situation for the world is dire. Some of the threads of this web were woven over 100 years ago, some this year. Together, though, they form a pattern that will be hard to escape.

Back when NASA® had a countdown that didn’t go . . . 6…5…4…3…2…1…LUNCH!

When the diesel tank fell on the oxygen cylinder, in most normal worlds I would have become a diffuse cloud of Wilder paste. Not that time. Even though the world would never be the same as it was before the diesel tank fell, my world didn’t end.

Life will be different. Some of the chaos listed above cannot be avoided: many bills will have to finally be paid.

Don’t cry for the civilization we lost.

Times of change like this have come before. Collapses have occurred. People carry on, and in some cases produce better, stronger civilizations than ever went before.

The world that emerges will be a new one. Let us make it a great one.

FYI: This will be the topic of a livestream with Mark and The Mrs. on September 1, 2021 at 9pm Eastern. It will be here: (Bombs and Bants Livestream).

The New Episode Is Up: Watch It Because It’s Funnier A Biden Press Conference (Also: Readers Write!)

Beers Win More And More Games – Baseketball

The move to take over all of the media in the world continues – the latest episode of Bombs and Bants is up!  Watch it because you like cheesy animation.  Watch it because our sponsor is that PARODY dating service – PreppersOnly.com, and only here can you find 43 Seconds Inside The Head of AOC.

In this episode we talk about what the Pentagon thinks of aliens, the city versus rural divide, and we look at democide.

I had promised that I’d post a link when The Boy got Bombs and Bants up on other formats, and here it is (Bombs And Bants) for Bitchute, Apple podcasts, and Odysee.

Okay, Baseketball still makes me laugh.

Also, from reader/listener Tar, a wise update on unusual places to find things after society collapses:

“One thought re: those “obscure supply locations” that the article didn’t cover, but you may be interested in.

Public Pool facilities and pool supply shops.  They usually keep a bunch of chlorine on site at pools to keep the pool clean – that can be used to purify drinking water if you know what you’re doing with the concentrations.  Probably also bulk charcoal for water filtration, if not filter equipment and media.  Also, they always keep a medical kit on site, and some even have the packs to shock people in cardiac arrest.  Suppliers will often have all of the above.
Garden Centers can also be helpful  – they’ll have not just supplies for growing stuff (a bottle or two of rooting hormone will be helpful in multiplying food production if you have growing space) but they generally stock tools that can make good melee weapons in a pinch.  Pretty much anything sharp on a pole is superior to knives and such  – wood axes are unwieldy but forks and shovels are good.  Also, when the shooting starts, digging holes gets important.  Get picks and hand-cultivators in addition to shovels for such work.
Welding supply stores may be useful early on, especially if they have dry ice on stock (10 pounds of dry ice in the bottom of a cooler under a bag of regular ice will keep the ice frozen (and anything else in there) for at least two days (and maybe 3-4 if it’s storing already-frozen stuff).  They’ll often have oxygen and acetylene tanks for torches, as well, and of course the tools and gear for actual welding and metal-cutting if you want to make Mad Max vehicles when you get to your retreat in the wasteland.”
Thank you, Tar!