Guest Contributor – ArthurinCali – 21NOV2023 – Looted Nation

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It appears that those in the know up in the corridors of power understand the eventual direction this rudderless ship of a country is taking. The overall mood of the public that pays attention to the DC twaddle see the writing on the wall. With unsustainable government debt officially tallied at $33 trillion and unfunded liabilities topping $400 trillion (SS, Medicare, etc.), they see the gathering storm on the horizon. By 2030, another 80 million Boomers will be eligible for SS, and that is estimated to cost $5+ trillion per year alone. This is why we see trial balloons released in the media about raising retirement ages, restrictions on benefits and an overall lowering of living standards. The “Will to Power” to correct any of this trend is just not there. Look at all the solvable issues they allow to fester and grow; illegal immigration, crime, societal decay, et all.

The sad reality is that we are on the downward trajectory of empire with all the pitfalls that entails.

Everyone should be preparing as needed for the lost American century.

How Stupid is the Evil Party and How Evil is the Stupid Party?

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Many people describe the Democrats and the Republicans combined as the Uni-Party.  Essentially it is alleged that because the main business of all congressional office holders is to make as much money as possible off of peddling their influence that there really isn’t much difference between the goals or actions of either.  As an example, is the support in both the House and the Senate for the Ukraine War.  It would be impossible to prove that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell was any less enthusiastic than Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to send another hundred billion dollars to Ukraine.  Or look at the Democrats and Republicans who sit on subcommittees overseeing the FDA.  I’m sure that lobbyists from Pfizer know each of them by first name and routinely wine and dine them while informing them which bills need to be passed and who at the FDA is giving them grief about their latest “wonder drug.”

So, there is a lot of truth in this characterization.  But there is still a fierce rivalry between the two parties for control of the Congress.  After all, the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader have enormous power to set the agenda in their respective legislative bodies.  The Speaker especially has complete control to block any bill from ever seeing the light of day in the House.  And if for no other reason than to acquire this power the two parties are constantly at war to overtake each other in the number of seats they control.

So, the question I think about is how badly do the Democrats have to screw up before the Republicans recognize the situation as more momentous than just allowing them to steal more than the Democrats.  Put another way, if the country became so disgusted with the multiple crises that Joe Biden’s crime family has sparked that they gave the Republicans very large majorities in both the House and Senate would the Congress have the patriotism or at least the common sense to use the opportunity to try and save the country from the impending crash landing that we are surely headed for?  Or would they just use the opportunity to steal more stuff as fast as possible before the end?

I believe there is a little bit of hope out there.  Recently we saw the Republicans in the House of Representatives sack the Speaker of the House; an unheard-of thing.  And there have been grumblings against Mitch McConnell in the Senate.  Now granted, the Senate is a lot more bought and sold than the House.  Even if McConnell were replaced as Leader by someone who hadn’t yet reached his two hundredth birthday it would still be one of McConnell’s cronies.  But maybe the same forces that got rid of Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney are working to build a more representative party out of the Stupid Party.

I think given enough time we could get enough somewhat honest people into the Congress to begin changing the direction of the laws in this country.  The real question, the only crucial question is whether we will do that before we run out of time and the whole mad house collapses and crumbles to dust.

Will the Democrats get bounced by the voters?  Will the Republicans seize the moment to fix things?  What do you think?

21NOV2023 – Quote of the Day

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If … we meet a man of acknowledged mental superiority, whether generally or in his special department, it is our social duty by intelligent questioning, by an anxiety to learn from him, to force him to condescend to our ignorance, or join in our fun, till his broader sympathies are awakened, and he plays with us as if we were children. Indeed this very metaphor points out one of the very remarkable instances of social equality asserted by an inferior—I mean the outspoken freedom of the child—which possesses a peculiar charm, and often thaws the dignity or dissipates the reserve of the great man and woman whose superiority is a perpetual obstacle to them in ordinary society.

John Pentland Mahaffy

The Truth is Out There

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Every man has a different version of the truth.  We, each of us, look out at this world through different eyes.  And each of us only can discern a small piece of the truth.  The old story of the six blind men and the elephant is a folk tale that illustrates this idea.  And that is why we band together and try to come up with a consensus account of how things “really” are.

And that was why when the country was essentially united after World War II the news networks were highly respected and at the same time took seriously their responsibilities to appear objective.  Well, that’s a different planet than the one we live on now.  Can you imagine trusting the version of the news that was read by a “reporter” from ABC or NBC, never mind MSNBC or CNN?

Now you might say, “What does it matter if the news is accurate?  There’s nothing we can do to change what goes on around us.  Why not just go with the propaganda version?”  And sometimes, I almost feel the same way.  Why bother?

But there is a good reason to scratch out the facts.  In the Bible it says, “The truth shall set you free.”  And this has a very specific meaning that relates to the soul of the believer.  But the statement is also true in the broadest sense too.  The truth is another way of saying objective reality.  It is a claim about the nature of the universe we live in.  It is the belief that if we could know definitively the truth of a particular claim then that truth would define reality for anyone and everyone.

So, if you lived in Hiroshima or Nagasaki and even if you did not believe in the atomic theory of matter, sometime in 1945 you would still have been constrained by that objective reality to experience the onslaught of the atomic bombs dropped on those cities.  And if you had believed in the reality of those weapons, you might have gotten out and survived.  And if you lived at ground zero and stayed you would have died even though you did not believe in the possibility of those weapons.

Now granted, being aware of things like the motivations of RINOs or the willingness of the FBI to use their agents to instigate incidents to harm their political enemies is hardly equivalent to knowing that an atomic bomb is headed for your location.  But the difference is one of degree not of kind.  Always and everywhere having or lacking accurate information is the difference between rational planning and blind luck.

All those people who listen to Fox News and NBC and hear what a great candidate Nikki Haley would make in the general election and believe it, will never understand why she would be John McCain or Mitt Romney in a dress.  They haven’t bothered to educate themselves on the facts concerning Haley and the positions she espouses.  And they don’t understand that whether she wins or loses we lose if she is the candidate.  Because if she is the Republican candidate then all the candidates are leftists.

And the same goes for the other facts that are out there.  People claimed that Paul Ryan or Mitch McConnell wanted to enact a conservative agenda but even when a conservative president was in office, they did nothing.  This should have been enough to prove these claims false.  Bill Barr assigned a special prosecutor to investigate Russia-gate and after four years not a single person was convicted of a felony.  That should have shown that the Deep State doesn’t allow its people to be subject to normal justice.

So, this knowledge is mostly of a negative type.  It mostly tells you what won’t happen.  But sometimes it’s the opposite and in those cases, it could also save your life.  I’d say the January 6th event is one of the best examples of that.  Ashli Babbitt probably never imagined that a federal agent would shoot and kill her for trespassing in the Capitol building.  She was unaware of the truth.

As discouraging as the current reality is, understanding the important facts is crucial to surviving and thriving in this complicated and deceptive environment.  But don’t despair.  There is plenty of ignorance of the facts on the other side too.  And one day it will have its consequences.  So, hang in there.