#hopping around and forming a democracy

[ddarker-dreams]

ruan mei leaves you on read for an hour so she can keep working on a lifeform that shares both of your DNA

[exit-babylon]

The New Normal Left

April 5, 2023

So I went to London to speak to the Left… no, not “Left” as you are probably thinking of. Not the Left wearing masks and waving Ukrainian flags. Not the outspoken, segregating Left. Not the WEF, WHO, FBI, CIA, DHS and MI6 loving Left. Not the world capitalist New Normal Left. The Other Left, (...) writes CJ Hopkins .

We were about 150 people. Our "thing" was a conference loosely based on the Left's opposition to the WEF and its dystopian visions of our future... you know, eating bugs, owning nothing, being happy, that sort of thing. I was invited by the Real Left group to speak on a panel with Fabio Vighi , Professor of Critical Theory at Cardiff University. We didn't talk much about the WEF. We mainly talked about global capitalism, totalitarianism and “New Normal Left”.

These are the broad outlines of what I said at the conference.

To understand what happened to the Left (i.e. how the Left became the New Normal Left), you need to understand the history of global capitalism over the past 30 years.

Actually, you have to go back a little further, to the beginning of the 20th century, when the Great Ideological Game was still going on. Then capitalism, which had overthrown the aristocracies, was on the rise and the world turned into one big marketplace. It was challenged by two opposing ideologies, fascism and communism. They fought it out. Long story short, capitalism won.

World capitalism (“GloboCap”) was born. It is now one big global capitalist world. It has been that way since the early 1990s. GloboCap has no external adversaries, so it has nothing to do but Clear and Hold, ie root out internal resistances and introduce ideological uniformity. That is what it has done for the past 30 years, first in the former Soviet bloc, then in “The Global War on Terror”, and finally in our so-called “Western Democracies”, as we have just witnessed up close during the shock-and- awe phase of the New Normal rollout, and still going through it, albeit a little less dramatically.

In other words, GloboCap is going totalitarian. That's what the New Normal is. It's not your grandfather's totalitarianism. It is a new, global capitalist form of totalitarianism. It has a number of familiar features – suspension of constitutional rights, government propaganda, goons, censorship, ubiquitous symbols of ideological conformity, unfounded restrictions on freedom of movement and other aspects of daily life, hatred and persecution of official ��Untermenschen”, segregation, criminalization of dissent, mafia violence, book burnings, show trials, etc. – but no one will be hopping around in jackboots screeching about “the master race”. It's not that kind of totalitarianism.

Hypocritical globalists eat culinary flesh while forcing a diet of insects on the rest of us

To understand it (and that would do us good), we need to understand world capitalist ideology, which is not as simple as it sounds. Global capitalism has no ideology… or rather, its ideology is “reality”. If you don't have ideological opponents, you don't need an ideology. You are in fact God.

The “reality” is what you say it is, and whoever disagrees with it is a “science denier”, or a “conspiracy theorist”, or a “disinformation purveyor”, or some other kind of deceptive “extremist”. You don't need to discuss ideology with anyone, because you have no ideological opponents. Society is divided into two fundamental groups, (a) "normal people", who accept "reality", and (b) the "deviants" and "extremists", who do not.

Your political and ideological opponents are pathologised, deliberated preventively. After all, who would go against “reality” except liars and the clinically insane?

Yes, of course there are intramural political and ideological conflicts within the confines of so-called “normality”, just as there is intramural competition between global corporations, but challenging the ideological system itself is impossible, because there is no basis from which to launch an attack. undertaken. This is probably the hardest for most of us to accept. There is no ideological field outside of global capitalism. There is no "outside". There are no external opponents. There are only riots and anti-riot operations.

The rest is intramural competition.

And here's another thing we need to understand about global capitalist ideology, and it's not going to make my conservative readers, or my libertarian readers, or my left-wing readers happy. But it is essential to understand the New Normal Left and the shape of the current ideological landscape. I'm going to try to keep this as simple as possible and not get lost in a bunch of post-structuralist mumbo jumbo.

Finished? OK, here we go.

Capitalism is a value decoding machine. It strips society of despotic values ​​(i.e. religious values, racist values, socialist values, traditional values, all values ​​that stand in the way of unfettered capital flows… capitalism does not discriminate). This is how capitalism (or democracy if you are hypersensitive) liberated us from a despotic "reality" in which values ​​came from the aristocracies, kings, priests, the church, etc. In short, it displaced the broadcasting and maintenance of values ​​from despotic structures to the market, where everything is essentially a commodity.

So, hooray… capitalism has freed us from despotism! I am grateful. I'm not a big fan of despotism. The problem is that it's just a machine. And it has no power button. And now it dominates the entire planet without any significant opposition or restriction. So it does what it was designed to do: it strips societies of their despotic values, turns everything and everyone into commodities, establishes and enforces ideological uniformity, and neutralizes groups' internal resistance.

Looking at what is happening, it seems clear to me that there is a coordinated destruction of entire countries and their economic sectors

The vast majority of that resistance is reactionary. I don't mean that in a pejorative sense. Most of the opposition to the New Normal comes from the traditional political right, from people who try to preserve their values, ie avoid being decoded by the GloboCap values-decoding machine. Many of those people don't see it that way because they don't want to face the fact that what they're opposing is global capitalism, so they call it other names like "crony capitalism," "corporatism," or "cultural Marxism." I don't really care what they call it unless they call it "communism" which just makes them sound extremely stupid.

The point is that these people are a reactionary force that opposes the rise of world capitalism and its ideology, whether they know what they are opposing or not. Russia, too, is such a reactionary power, at least insofar as it tries to defend what is left of its national sovereignty. Syria and Iran are two other examples. All these reactionary forces are integrated into the GloboCap system and at the same time resist their inclusion in it. The dynamics are complex. It's not a cartoon or Hollywood movie with "good guys" and "bad guys".

Anyway, the battlefield looks like this… you have GloboCap running its Clear-and-Hold operation, and you have the reactionary (“populist”) response to it. And that's it. These are currently the only major forces on the battlefield.

Which brings us to the plight of the Left.

The Left – and I mean “Left” in a broad sense, meaning liberals and serious as well as Brooklyn Leftists – are in an ideological dilemma. Either they join an increasingly totalitarian GloboCap or they join the reactionary resistance against it.

They can't join the reactionaries because a lot of them are... well, you know, somewhat bigoted, or they believe in God, or they object to drag queens rubbing themselves on kids. Many of them own multiple firearms and fly giant American flags outside their homes (or whatever flags they fly in Britain). Many of them have voted for Donald Trump, or Brexit, or the AfD here in Germany, or the National Rally in France, or The Brothers of Italy. These are not BBC/NPR listening people. These are not LGBTQ pronouns folks. These are scary working class people.

So the left has joined GloboCap, which after all still decodes all those nasty despotic values ​​(i.e. racism and other forms of bigotry), opposing dictators and religious fanatics, and spreading “democracy” all over the planet. You may think I'm funny. That is not true. Global capitalism still does. Which I support, just like all liberals and Left parties anyway.

Covid and Putin are not a threat to your freedom; people like Schwab, Gates and Trudeau are

The catch is that while global capitalism continues to do so and make a big show of it, it is also becoming totalitarian. It does not decode those despotic values ​​out of the goodness of its heart. What it does is bring about ideological uniformity. The problem is that it has no ideology. All it knows how to do is decode values, turning societies into markets and everything in them into worthless commodities. And she does so in a totalitarian way. The Nazis called this process “Gleichschaltung”, the synchronization of all elements of society according to the official ideology. That is what is currently happening worldwide.

GloboCap has begun to move from a “reality” of competing ideologies, sovereign nation-states, cultures and values ​​to a new, supranational, post-ideological, ultimately transhuman, globalized “reality”, and the message is: “You are either with us or against us.”

New Normal Left is clear for GloboCap. The New Normal Left will furiously deny this, clamoring for more censorship of dissent and cheering for real Sieg-healing Nazis.

Just as the “populist” right cannot accept that what it opposes is a form of capitalism, the New Normal Left cannot accept that it is joining a new form of totalitarianism. It is literally unthinkable for them. You can show them screenshots of their posts and Tweets calling for "the unvaccinated" to be locked up in camps, and pictures of when they formed fanatical mobs and threatened people who wouldn't chant their slogans, and they'll look at you like you are crazy.

And so we're in a bit of a bind. That's basically what I told the conference in London. I wish I had a brilliant plan of action. Unfortunately I don't. Probably no one has at this stage. The New Normal has only just begun.

One thing I do know for sure, if you don't want to end up eating the bugs and owning nothing and be happy in your AI-guarded 15-minute city while you wait for your social credit app to update your vaccination record, so that you can access your CBDC account and make another minimum payment on your deepening credit card debt, it's probably a good idea to try and understand what's actually happening.

Or maybe not. What do I know? I'm just an old "far-right Leftist."

Copyright © 2023 translation by Frontnieuws. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and direct link is given.

[genevievemd]

head scratches e and g

Confessions

Book: Open Heart: Third Year Pairing: Ethan Ramsey x F!MC (Genevieve McClure) Word Count: 1399 Rating: G Category: fluff, hurt/comfort Trope(s): and they were in the office

Summary: MC has been feeling unsteady, and Ethan has finally noticed. 

No Warnings

A/N: this turned into a post ch 4 (bk 3) fic. Because I’m a little disappointed that PB didn’t let us talk to Ethan about the weird shit he was doing with Harper. Also look at me, once again using a one word title, because I suck at titles and its 3 am and I’m too tired to try to come up with something better. 

The sun sets outside the floor to ceiling windows, casting the diagnostics office a dance of shadows and lights. Ethan gets up from the desk, walking over to shut off the fluorescent lights leaving the room in growing darkness. He rolls his neck as he returns to the desk, turning on the lamp on the wooden surface. 

He’s felt a migraine forming all afternoon, since Leland’s bombshell that Ethan’s rival would now be joining his team. The sense that all control is steadily slipping through his fingers, growing by the day, by the hour it seems. 

What was promised to be a democracy was now nothing but a dictatorship disguised in new equipment and pay raises. 

Ethan closes his eyes, leaning back in the chair, desperately trying to cling onto the thoughts of the one good and stable thing he has left. 

Genevieve. 

“How are you feeling?” 

A soft voice breaks through the silence, Ethan opening his eyes to see the very thing he was thinking of standing in the doorway. A pleasant warmth runs through him, he’s not a man that believes in fate, but there is something utterly divine in the way she appears at the very moment he needs her. 

Genevieve walks to the desk, every step that brings her closer settling the anxiety and rage boiling inside him. She smiles sweetly at him, perching herself on his desk.

“Like I’m slowly losing control.” Ethan sits up, a hand coming to rest on her knee, thumb tracing circles on her skin. “It’s bad enough we have to deal with Bloom, but now I have to contend with Tobias as his lapdog, as well.” 

“You have me, though,” Her green eyes fill with warmth as she leans forward, holding his cheek delicately in her hand. “And I’ll always be on your side.” 

“I know. I’m incredibly thankful for that, believe me.” 

They share a smile, that four letter word swirling around his head for the umpteenth time as they get lost in each other. Gen breaks the spell, hopping off the desk and settling in his lap. His arms come around her without a second thought, pulling her impossibly closer. 

“How can I help?” Her words are nothing more than a whisper as her fingers trace his jawline. 

“There’s nothing you can do, unfortunately.” 

“I can at least try and alleviate some stress. It’s what girlfriends are for, after all.” 

The word girlfriend sparks something inside him, setting his heart into a rapid beat. They haven’t discussed terms, which is mostly his fault. In the moments when he has Gen alone, he spends the time doing everything but talking. The need to make up for the months he had spent pushing her away taking precedence over defining what they are to each other. But he knows they need to have that talk soon, he can see her growing impatient and hesitant with each passing day. 

Gen takes off his glasses, tossing them onto the desk. She threads her fingers in his hair, scratching lightly as she goes. He closes his eyes again, forehead coming to rest on her shoulder as her fingers continue to weave through his hair.  

“I meant what I said at lunch, G. Just having you in the room makes me feel more at peace.” 

“Should I stop then?” 

“Absolutely not.” He kisses the side of her neck, nuzzling sweetly. “I will take any and all forms of affection from you.” 

“Quite the difference from last year, Doctor ‘We Need a Reset’.” 

“We all have a lapse in judgment from time to time.” 

“Mhm.” He can feel her giggle, his arms tightening around her. 

They settle into an easy quiet, drawing comfort from a shared space. 

As much as he wants to get lost in her touch, he can’t help but fall back to the thoughts of Gen’s newfound uncertainty. Ethan’s half sure it has something to do with him, but he hopes more than anything that it’s not. Praying instead that it all falls to the new easy comradery of the team and the ever growing changes their employer makes. 

He wants nothing more than for Genevieve to confide in him, lean on him in the same way he leans on her. 

“Are you going to tell me what’s been bothering you lately?” 

“It’s not important anymore.” 

“I beg to differ, Gen.” He presses a kiss to her shoulder before lifting his head to look at her. “You’ve been tossing and turning every night for a week. Something is wrong.” 

“I don’t want to ruin the moment or make you feel more stressed.” 

“So it’s me?” 

“I didn’t say that.” 

“You didn’t have to.” His brows furrow at her lack of honesty, she’s never been this closed off before. Its unnerving and so unlike her. Fear settles deep in his bones as their eyes meet, the need to find a solution growing with every second that passes. “I can’t fix it if you aren’t forthcoming.” 

“It’s already fixed, kind of.” She sighs, adverting her eyes from him again. “Harper more or less set things straight.” 

“Harper?” Ethan tilts his head, face scrunched in confusion. 

“I was... feeling unsteady, about my place on the team and with you.” 

“With me? The team I can understand, but I thought things were fine between us.” 

Her face drops, taking a breath. “You really have no idea?” 

Gen gets up from his lap, moving back to her previous spot on the desk. The distance she places between them is small, but enough to make his heart ache fiercely. 

“Let’s put it this way, if my ex joined the team and I spent more time reminiscing about our history - weddings and flamenco lessons and dates at some intimate bistro named after a freaking Disney character - and you had to sit here, constantly interrupted, looked over and forced to listen to every second of it, how would you feel?”

“I was doing that to you.” The pain he feels is instant, regret following quickly after. “I didn’t realize.” 

“Which, if I’m being honest, Ethan, makes it hurt ten times more. Because that says that you didn’t think of me or my feelings at all.” 

He wants to jump up and dispute her claims. She’s the only thing he thinks of on most days and it kills him that he’s somehow made her feel the opposite.

“I don’t care that you’re friends with your ex, Harper is wonderful. But when you sit here and talk about dates you went on and veer off topic to bring up some inside joke, it makes me feel like you don’t respect me or our relationship. Like this is a casual fling you could quickly let go off and not a committed relationship. Like I’m an afterthought and that isn’t fair to me.” 

Ethan stands from his chair, unable to cope with the distance between them any longer. He steps in front of her, holding her face in his hands. “This isn’t causal, Gen. Far from it. And you’re not an afterthought, you never have been.” 

“Yeah, well actions speak louder than words and half of your actions lately say otherwise.”

“You’re right. I was being inconsiderate and tactless” He can see by the way she pulls away that his words aren’t enough. If he’s going to really set things back into place, Gen is going to need a real apology. 

Ethan lets out a breath, holding her gaze for a long moment. “It was wrong of me to do that to you, even worse that I did it without realizing. Your thoughts and feelings are important to me, they take precedence. I’m sorry, Genevieve. Truly. It won’t happen again.” 

“Thank you.” She reaches for his hand, interlacing their fingers. 

“Not that there’ll be a next time, but should I do something this imbecilic again, feel free to call me out on it sooner rather than later.”

“Trust me, I will.” 

Her smile returns, brighter than it was when she’d walked in ten minutes ago. Ethan leans forward, pressing his lips to hers in a bruising kiss. He gets bolder when she sighs, as she opens up to him and threads her fingers through his hair. 

“This is teetering towards a pg-13 rating.” Gen mutters against his lips, their foreheads pressed together as they catch their breaths. “Take me home.” 

“Whatever you want, Rookie.”

a/n: it took me all week to get this to a point where I liked it enough to post it. But we did it and I like it enough. 

Tag Lists: 

Perma: @terrm9 @potionsprefect @iemcpbchoices @archxxronrookie @coffeeheartaddict @queencarb @lucy-268 @custaroonie @maurine07 @gryffindordaughterofathena @ohchoices @choicesaddict5 @fireycookie @wingedhairstylemusicweasel @oldminniemcg @sizzlingcashherohumanoid @taniasethi @mrs-ramsey @shanzay44 @aussieez @stygianflood @uneravine @openheartfan @fayeswiftie @stateofgracious @sophxwithers @estellaelysian @mm2305 @withbeautyandrage @udishaman @mercury84choices @silma-words @headoverheelsforramsey @iloveethanramsey 

Fic: @overwhelminglyaquarius @me-and-my-choices @schnitzelbutterfingers @crazy-loca-blog @a-crepusculo @drakewalkerfantasy @adrex04 @drariellevalentine @openheartthot @caseyvalentineramsey @aworldoffandoms @dulceghernandez @elwetritsche75 @emotionalswift2 @thegreentwin @starrystarrytrouble @utterlyinevitable @angela8754 @jooous @3riche @open-heart-ramseyy @xxsugarplumfluffsxx @alexabeta @smilex1104 @arnikki-2406 @jamespotterthefirst @openheartfanfics

[newstfionline]

Friday, May 7, 2021

60 years since 1st American in space: Tourists lining up (AP) Sixty years after Alan Shepard became the first American in space, everyday people are on the verge of following in his cosmic footsteps. Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin used Wednesday’s anniversary to kick off an auction for a seat on the company’s first crew spaceflight—a short Shepard-like hop launched by a rocket named New Shepard. The Texas liftoff is targeted for July 20, the date of the Apollo 11 moon landing. Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic aims to kick off tourist flights next year. And Elon Musk’s SpaceX will launch a billionaire and his sweepstakes winners in September. That will be followed by a flight by three businessmen to the International Space Station in January.

The U.S. birthrate is falling; other countries have faced the same problem (Washington Post) With the U.S. birthrate declining for the sixth year in a row and undergoing its largest drop in nearly 50 years, according to provisional data released Wednesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the United States is facing a dilemma with which many wealthy nations in Europe and Asia have long grappled. Instead of trying to ramp up immigration, some governments have tried subsidizing fertility treatments, offering free day care and generous parental leave, and paying thousands of dollars in cash grants to parents. But there’s little evidence that these policies have been effective on a large scale. South Korea, for instance, spent roughly $120 billion between 2005 and 2018 to incentivize having children, but its birthrate continued to fall. Singapore began offering new child-care subsidies, more-generous maternity leave policies and grants for new parents that today amount to $7,330 per baby. But those interventions didn’t reverse the trend: Singapore currently has the world’s third-lowest fertility rate. And Japan, Russia, Estonia and other nations have similar problems.

Protest road blockades halt Colombian coffee exports, federation says (Reuters) Road blockades connected to anti-government protests in Colombia, which marked their eighth day on Wednesday, have halted shipments of top agricultural export coffee, the head of the grower’s federation said. The protests, originally called in opposition to a now-canceled tax reform plan, are now demanding the government take action to tackle poverty, police violence and inequalities in the health and education systems. Twenty-four people, mostly demonstrators, have died. “We are stopped completely, exports are stopped, there is no movement of coffee to ports nor internally,” federation head Roberto Velez said in a phone interview.

20 dead in Rio de Janeiro shootout (Reuters) At least 20 people, including a police officer, died on Thursday in a shootout during a police operation against drug traffickers in Rio de Janeiro’s Jacarezinho shanty town, O Globo newspaper reported on its website. Two passengers on a metro train were also wounded in the shooting in the northern Rio neighborhood, the newspaper said.

Gunboats and blockade threats as U.K., France clash over fishing (NBC News) The U.K. and France were engaged in a naval standoff on Thursday as a long-simmering dispute over post-Brexit fishing rights escalated in the English Channel. France deployed two maritime patrol boats to the waters off the British Channel island of Jersey, its navy said, after the British Navy dispatched two of its own vessels to the area late Wednesday. The dueling moves came as a flotilla of French fishing trawlers sailed to the Jersey port of St. Helier to protest over fishing rights. The French government has suggested it could cut power supplies to the island if its fishermen are not granted full access to U.K. fishing waters under post-Brexit trading terms. Clément Beaune, the French secretary of state for European affairs, told AFP on Thursday that Paris will “not be intimidated” by the British. On the other side of the Channel, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson pledged his "unwavering support" for the island after he spoke with Jersey officials about the prospect of a French blockade. Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands with a population of 108,000, is geographically closer to France than Britain. It sits just 14 miles off the French coast and receives most of its electricity from France via undersea cables.

Ukraine wants aid, NATO support from Blinken’s visit (AP) U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with his Ukrainian counterpart in Kyiv Thursday, telling him that he was there to “reaffirm strongly” Washington’s commitment to Ukraine’s “sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence.” Blinken also assured Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba that the U.S. was committed “to work with you and continue to strengthen your own democracy, building institutions, advancing your reforms against corruption.” By visiting so early in his tenure, before any trip to Russia, Blinken is signaling that Ukraine is a high foreign-policy priority for President Joe Biden’s administration. But what he can, or will, deliver in the meeting later with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is unclear.

India hits another grim record as it scrambles for oxygen supply (AP) Infections in India hit another grim daily record on Thursday as demand for medical oxygen jumped seven-fold and the government denied reports that it was slow in distributing life-saving supplies from abroad. The number of new confirmed cases breached 400,000 for the second time since the devastating surge began last month. The 412,262 cases pushed India’s tally to more than 21 million. The Health Ministry also reported 3,980 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total to 230,168. Experts believe both figures are an undercount. Eleven COVID-19 patients died as the pressure in the oxygen line dropped suddenly in a government medical college hospital in Chengalpet town in southern India on Wednesday night, possibly because of a faulty valve, The Times of India newspaper reported. Hospital authorities said they had repaired the pipeline last week, but the consumption of oxygen doubled since then, the daily said.

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid gains chance to form government, oust Netanyahu (Washington Post) Yair Lapid, a former news anchor and leader of Israel’s centrist opposition, was picked to negotiate a new governing coalition Wednesday, opening the possibility of Israel getting its first government not led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in more than a decade. President Reuven Rivlin tapped Lapid to make the next attempt to form a government one day after Netanyahu failed to assemble a parliamentary majority after 28 days of effort. Under Israel’s system, Lapid also has four weeks to craft a power-sharing plan. If he falls short, the president could open to the process to any member of the Knesset or call for Israel’s fifth election since the spring of 2019. Lapid will face a stiff challenge in trying to find common ground among the range of anti-Netanyahu parties elected in March. As a bloc, they would control enough seats to secure a majority. But ideologically, they range from the far right to the far left of Israel’s political spectrum. They also include Israeli Arab parties that traditionally play no part in supporting governing coalitions but that may be needed this time.

Instagram fuels rise in black-market sales of maids into Persian Gulf servitude (Washington Post) The advent of Instagram in recent years has helped create an international black market for migrant workers, in particular women recruited in Africa and Asia who are sold into servitude as maids in Persian Gulf countries. Unlicensed agents have exploited the social media platform to place these women into jobs that often lack documentation or assurances of proper pay and working conditions. Several women who were marketed via Instagram described being treated essentially as captives and forced to work grueling hours for far less money than they had been promised. “They advertise us on social media, then the employer picks. Then we are delivered to their house. We are not told anything about the employers. You’re just told to take your stuff, and a driver takes you there,” said Vivian, 24, from Kenya. Domestic servants sold on the platform described encountering threats, exploitation and abuse. The agencies which marketed them, meanwhile, made thousands of dollars. In response to a request for comment last month, an Instagram spokesperson asked for the list of accounts identified by The Post so company officials could investigate. Instagram has since deleted these accounts.

Nonuplets: Woman From Mali Gives Birth To 9 Babies (NPR) A Malian woman has given birth to nine babies, in what could become a world record. Halima Cissé had been expecting to have seven newborns: ultrasound sessions had failed to spot two of her babies. "The newborns (five girls and four boys) and the mother are all doing well," Mali's health minister, Dr. Fanta Siby, said in an announcement about the births. Professor Youssef Alaoui, medical director of the private Ain Borja clinic in Casablanca where Cissé gave birth, said the babies were born at 30 weeks. The newborns weighed between 500 grams and 1 kilogram (about 1.1 to 2.2 pounds), he told journalists. The clinic has deployed a team of around 30 staff members to aid the mother's delivery and care for her nine children.

Nigeria reels from nationwide wave of deadly violence (The Guardian) Nigeria’s president Muhammadu Buhari has come under mounting pressure from critics and allies alike as the country reels from multiple security crises that have claimed hundreds of lives in recent weeks. An alarming wave of violence has left millions in Africa’s most populous country in uproar at the collapse in security. Attacks by jihadist groups in the north-east have been compounded by a sharp rise in abductions targeting civilians in schools and at interstate links across Nigeria. Mass killings by bandit groups in rural towns, a reported rise in armed robberies in urban areas and increasingly daring attacks on security forces by pro-Biafran militants in the south-east have also all risen. In April alone, almost 600 civilians were killed across the country and at least 406 abducted by armed groups, according to analysis by the Council on Foreign Relations. The violence has left much of the country on edge and Buhari facing the fiercest criticism since he took office.

[acciostorian]

hort: the sge marmite

(you either love him or hate him)

now, i’m making this post because it has come to my attention that the fandom’s opinion(s) on hort are very mixed.

you either love him: from what i have seen (from instagram and tumblr) a good majority of the fandom adore/stan/love hort. but why? (i am keeping my personal opinion out of this until the end.)

let’s start with the school years (sge, awwp, tlea)-

sge: hort is first introduced straight off the bat as creepy, skinny and a weasle in general. the first interaction we have with hort as a character is him asking to touch sophie’s hair the moment they arrive at the school for evil.

literally the first mention of hort is to do with one of his biggest character flaws, being a sophie simp. now, i’m going to be honest, i don’t remember anything to do with hort for the first book for the most part. i thought hort was going to be a small/side character that’ll be mentioned once or twice - kind of like how kiko was mentioned as agatha’s friend in sge.

horts love confession in sge, this is a scene i didn’t see coming. as i said, i didn’t really pay attention to hort i kind of forgot his presence until it was towards the end of the book when sophie was getting jealous of agatha (and blossoming tagatha) and she was researching evil shit in the common room with hort for the circus of talents.

so hort on the toilet trying to turn into a man-wolf without shitting himself and sophie is like evilly rambling about agatha and tagatha and she slips something about ‘love’.

hort offhandedly says, “i know evil cant love but if i had to love someone, i’d love you.” and then just fucking falls asleep?!! like okay, hort, you drop probably the cutest and most heartfelt comment that has ever bounced off the walls of the school for evil.

this was the first signal, at least for me, that hort was going to be a recurring character. everything goes down hill from here.

before we start on awwp, an honourable mention:

the nevers’ no ball where sophie whispered something into hort’s ear. SOMAN I NEED TO KNOW WHAT SHE SAID.

awwp: this is where we start to see hort’s crazy, obsessive side. hort studied tedros from afar, taking in his movements and mannerisms to try and steal his ‘style’. so sophie would love him because she ‘loved’ tedros.

what i find so funny about awwp is that hort unknowingly simped over sophie’s boy form. like he didn’t have the faintest clue that filip of mount honora was in fact the girl who keeps him up at night.

if you think he wasn’t simping than let me remind you, he practically begged castor for filip to be put in his room, he sacrificed his own grades to help filip do better than everyone else, he stuck to him like a piece of gum, he can to confirm every other day wether or not filip was still his best friend because he didn’t want to loose him. heck, he made filip his best friend without even knowing what filip was like!

anyway, before we shall hop into tlea let me just say: personally i think in the first two books hort is a sweet, cute, funny-ish character.

tlea: tlea is like where we see how fucking far hort would go for sophie. so hort gets absolutely swol like tedros and starts ‘focusing on himself’ by getting his grades up and being the best in the school for new evil.

the only reason he did this is because he was pretty sure sophie was becoming evil’s queen and marrying a man that could kill hort without a second thought.

once rafal allows sophie a tour around the school hort is there to silently show out his new form. (you can’t convince me he was just ‘there’ for the hell of it).

like rafal is being the aladdin and practically singing ‘i can show you the world- that is dark and twisted and completely controlled by me, this is not a democracy,’ and hort is leaning up against a wall, waiting for sophie to pass so she can see how he’s evolved.

even fucking rafal knows his game, literally says, “wow, you’re the top student- well done. anywayyyy, shouldn’t you be working?- she’s out of your league.”

then we have the classic hot tub espionage. they have a bath together yarda, yarda, yarda soman love it.

in the book hort at least becomes self aware of his sophie obsession and kind of takes a moment to have small breakdowns about what the fuck he’s doing with his life.

okay so it’s cannon that hort’s tedros impersonation was so good that he could even fall sophie who was basically in love with him back then. like c’mon, that’s fucking weird.

now for something i can’t process and hate:

*inhales heavily* HORT FUCKING LEFT SCHOOL, HIS STUDIES AND HIS SAFTEY TO BE WITH SOPHIE! LIKE HE LITERALLY LEFT THE ONE PLACE HE’D SORT IF BE SAFE IN TO JOIN THE MOST WANTED GROUP IN THE WOODS BECAUSE SOPHIE WAS WITH THEM. AND THEN WHEN SHE PLAINLY SAID THAT SHE DIDNT WANT HIM THERE HE STILL PROCEEDED TO WALK SEVERAL PACES BEHING HER LIKE A CREEPY SHADOW. HE WAS HER BODYGUARD EVEN THOUGH SHE FRANKLY DIDNT NEED ONE BEING EVIL’S QUEEN! THEN LATER ON WHEN SOPHIE IS CLEARLY NOT INTERESTED AND IS BEGGING FOR TEDROS TO TAKE HER HORT FINDS SOME WISH FISH AND PLAYS AROUND WITH THEM! AND YOU KNOW WHAT HIS FUCKING DEEPEST TRUEST WISH WAS??? IT WAS TO MARRH SOPHIE— I CANT WITH THIS FUCKING MAN. that’s all i have to say on tlea.

[gemi-fool]

a journey starts, a journey ends

jam buds week day 6: journeys end

(ao3 will be added in rb)

Steven sat in what used to be the Bubble Room, now empty. Every single corrupted Gem they’d found had been healed. Every bubble had been popped. The Gems were still working to track down some that were missing, but out of the ones they’d already found, no one was left behind.

He heard the Temple door opening, turning back to see the Gems walking in with Connie.

“We thought you’d be in here,” Garnet said simply. Connie walked over and sat beside him, the Gems following suit.

“You got all of them,” Connie smiled. “All of the corruptions you and the Gems found, you healed them! All of them!”

Steven smiled, nodding. “We got all of them.”

“We should celebrate,” Pearl said. “You should celebrate, Steven. If it weren’t for you, stars, who knows if this ever would’ve happened!”

“C’mon, man!” Amethyst said. “We can order pizza! Or cake! Or anything!”

“And my parents said I can stay the night,” Connie said.

Steven thought for a second. “Yeah. Yeah! We should celebrate!” He stood. “An actual celebration for the start of Era 3!”

Connie and the Gems stood beside him.

“I’ll order the pizza,” Garnet said.

They headed out of the Bubble Room, into the beach house (which the B-Team was going to help rebuild), and outside into-

Steven stared, before a smile slowly formed on his face.

Healed Gems stood along the beach, all talking amongst themselves before they noticed Steven and the others watching.

Then it was a sea of Gems shouting Steven’s name, shouting thank yous, shouting praises.

One journey was over.

---

Steven was standing across from the Diamond’s thrones in the ballroom.

“Gems deserve a say in how they’re ruled,” he stated. “The Diamond Authority-- well, it isn’t that? Gems should be able to vote on who their leader is, and they should get to have other choices than the Diamonds.”

White stared down at him. Steven still wasn’t used to it. He was barely 15, he still looked like a little kid, but he’d stepped up to do what he did best: fix things. This was just on a larger scale.

“Pi-- Steven,” she said. (At least he hadn’t had to correct her this time.) “This is how our society has worked for thousands of years! Is changing it now really necessary?”

“Yes!” Steven said. “Yes it is! Because things are already changing!” He took a deep breath. “Gems have free will. If you’re going to give them more freedom-- they deserve freedom to choose, too.”

“She does have a point, White,” Blue said.

“He,” Steven corrected.

“He does have a point. Sorry, Steven.”

“He does, but… How would we even set that up?” Yellow asked.

“Well, Dad tried explaining it to me when I was younger, and it was kind of confusing? But the way it works on Earth-- or, in America, at least, is basically, each state has a certain amount of votes? Everyone votes, and then whatever the majority voted for is what they vote for, and whatever or whoever gets the most votes wins or… something like that.” Steven shrugged. “But it doesn’t have to be that? It can just be majority of everyone.”

Yellow nodded slowly. “I see.”

“But I just don’t understand how any Gem would be better at running the Empire than us!” White said. “We’ve been doing it since the Empire began.”

“I could probably think of a few better candidates,” Steven mumbled.

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing-- They can learn. The foundation’s already there, I mean-- Gems with any political experience can probably work with it.”

Steven’s phone beeped. He pulled it out of his pocket-- he was supposed to head back to Beach City soon.

“Aw, crap. I have to go.”

“Steven, we’ll talk to White,” Yellow said. “Your body needs food and rest. Go get it. We can sort this out ourselves.”

Blue nodded. “I like this voting idea. Thank you for showing it to us, Steven.”

Steven nodded. He stepped onto the warp pad, warping back home. He walked into his room and down the stairs, finding Connie sitting on the couch.

She looked up at the sound of his footsteps. “Hey, Steven! How’d it go?”

He sighed, sitting on the couch and slumping down it, ending up with most of his body not even on the couch. “It was tiring,” he said, before sitting himself back up. “But Blue and Yellow liked the voting thing.”

“So the Empire is going to become a democracy?”

“Hopefully! White wasn’t really into the idea,” he said. “She still thinks they’re the only ones really fit to run the Empire.”

Connie nodded. “Yeah, I’m not really surprised.”

“So…” Steven said. “Where do you want to go for dinner?”

“Well, I know you like Fish Stew Pizza,” Connie replied.

“Yeah, but we can go anywhere! We just have to call Lion!”

“Hm… Well, there’s a new burger place in Ocean Town?”

“Yeah! That sounds great!” Steven near-shouted. “Hold on, let me call Lion.”

Steven found out the next day that White had been convinced. They were going to instate democracy.

Another journey was over.

---

Steven patted Lion awake.

“C’mon, bud, I promised Connie we could hang out at her place,” he whined. “C’mon, get up!”

Lion yawned, grumbling a bit, but stood up. Steven hopped on his back. He roared a portal into existence, and next thing Steven knew they were outside of Connie’s house.

He walked up to the door and knocked.

“Coming!” he heard Connie yell.

She opened the door, and paused for a second, staring.

“Steven! You-- you grew!”

“Yeah!” Steven said. “And it’s not forced this time! I grew!”

“You do age,” she said with a smile, stepping out in front of him. “Aw, come on, you’re taller than me!”

Another answer.

Another journey was over.

---

Steven looked up at the hill behind the Temple from the beach. The grass and flowers had finally regrown.

He walked through the town, stopping for bits from Beach Citywalk Fries. The town had been repaired.

He could see Little Homeworld from here. They were almost done building it, including fixing the damage from Spinel.

Connie had gotten to go to space camp, in the end. After Spinel left.

Spinel was in Homeworld, with the Diamonds. She could heal. She was safe.

Another journey was over.

---

Steven laid on the top of his car, staring up at space above him. Sadie and Shep’s song played from his car radio. No one else was around.

He wondered if Lars and the Off-Colors were in the section of space he could see right now.

Everyone was leaving, it felt like. He hated people leaving. He hated saying goodbye. He was all about change but-- this was a kind of change he didn’t like.

He had quit Little Homeschool to avoid graduations. To avoid this.

He went to text Connie.

Another journey was over.

---

Steven was so used to saying, pretending, and thinking nothing was wrong.

Adverse childhood experiences. Childhood trauma. Dr. Maheswaren telling him all of this. Connie saying that them being there was making things worse.

Something was wrong. He couldn’t think that it wasn’t anymore.

Another journey was over.

---

Steven wasn’t sure how long he’d spent sobbing into Lion’s mane, but eventually the Cluster had put everyone back down on shore, gave a thumbs-up, and had gone back into its bubble. The Diamonds and Spinel had left. Steven had gone inside, thought about taking a shower, then thought about the shards and the diamond essences and my diamond and decided not to, and got dressed. Bismuth and Peridot went straight to work fixing the front of the house, that was him, that was his fault.

Connie sat with him in his room after he got dressed.

“Steven,” she said, softly. “It’s gonna be okay.”

He blinked back the tears that were welling up, that threatened to spill out of his eyes again, he was definitely dehydrated.

“It’s not,” he whispered.

“I know it feels like that,” she said. “But it will be, because we-- your dad, the Gems, and I-- we’re not going to let you keep doing it alone. You’re not going to go through this alone, Steven.”

And he didn’t feel like he deserved it, but he knew they would anyways. He was done travelling alone.

Another journey was over.

---

Just a little time, just a little something else instead.

Steven waved goodbye to the Gems, to Dad, to Connie teary-eyed as he drove away. The residents of Beach City held up signs, waving goodbye as he drove through the streets of the town.

Just a little time, just a little something up ahead. I’m dreaming of…

Another journey was over, but only so a new one could start.

---

Steven set down another stack of boxes, Connie carrying in two more behind him. Rings shined on each of their left hands.

He’d finally found where he wanted to settle down-- and it wasn’t too far from Beach City, in Empire, a little past Empire City.

Connie pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Alright, those are the last ones,” she said. “I’ll order takeout while you start putting things away.”

He nodded, pressing a kiss to her lips (it sparkled just the tiniest bit). “Alright, babe,” he said.

His final journey was over.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Pluralistic: 24 Mar 2020 (Nebula Awards move online, Make America Well Again stamps, Data is the new toxic waste, Stock Jump, Grandparents Optional Party, Quarantine Book Club, the Party of Death, financial stability vs economic stability, quarantine vs workforce automation, bailouts and moral hazard, MIT's open source ventilator)

Today's links

This year's Nebula Awards will be held online: It's $150, and raising funds to bail out corona-shattered writers.

Make America Well Again stamps: from the artist who brought you the Trump Zero Cents stamp.

Data is the new toxic waste: It never was the "new oil" (my latest podcast).

Stock Jump: A ski-game that lets you play the stock charts of cratered businesses.

Murdering 20% of elderly Americans is bad strategy for the GOP: Terrified old people are the turkeys who vote for plutes' Christmas every four years.

Join me on the Quarantine Book Club: April 1, 3PM Pacific.

The Party of Death: It's a good time to buy exterminism futures.

Financial stability vs economic stability: Debts that can't be paid, won't be paid.

Quarantine reveals the falsity of the automation crisis: Augmentation isn't replacement.

Bailouts and moral hazard: If we never teach big business, it won't ever learn.

MIT's ingenious manual/automatic open source ventilator: Now in FDA testing.

This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019

Colophon: Recent publications, current writing projects, upcoming appearances, current reading

This year's Nebula Awards will be held online (permalink)

This year's Nebula Awards weekend is moving online, thanks to decisive action from SFWA and Mary Robinette Kowal.

https://www.sfwa.org/2020/03/22/announcing-the-transformation-of-the-2020-nebula-conference-and-covid19-relief/

It'll include "panels, solo presentations, conference mentorships, workshops, forums, chats, and virtual room parties (including a dance party hosted by John Scalzi)." Part of the proceeds will go to relief for sf writers who are in covid-related financial distress.

It runs May 29-31, including a livestream of the Nebula Awards banquet. Registration is $150 and comes with a year of access to archived materials and the SFWA Bulletin.

Make America Well Again stamps (permalink)

I bought some of Ben Hannam's Trump No Cents stamps in 2017 and never looked back. I still put 'em on letters.

Now he's got a Make America Well Again stamp, which you can lick (if you dare) and stick for the duration. Remember, USPS is profitable and unsubsidized and Trump's swamp-dwellers want to shut it down and replace it with donors like Fedex and UPS!

Data is the new toxic waste (permalink)

My latest podcast is a reading of "Data – the new oil, or potential for a toxic oil spill?" — a column arguing that data was never "the new oil" – instead, it was always the new toxic waste: "pluripotent, immortal – and impossible to contain."

https://www.kaspersky.com/blog/secure-futures-magazine/data-new-toxic-waste/34184/

Data breaches are inevitable (any data you collect will probably leak; any data you retain will definitely leak) and cumulative (your company's data breach can be combined with each subsequent attack to revictimize your customers).

Identity thieves benefit enormously from cheap storage, and they collect, store and recombine every scrap of leaked data. Merging multiple data sets allows for reidentification of "anonymized" data, and it's impossible to predict which sets will leak in the future.

These nondeterministic harms have so far protected data-collectors from liability, but that can't last. Toxic waste also has nondeterministic harms (we never know which bit of effluent will kill which person), but we still punish firms that leak it.

Waiting until the laws change to purge your data is a bad bet – by then, it may be too late. All the data your company collects and retains represents an unquantifiable, potentially unlimited source of downstream liability.

What's more, you probably aren't doing anything useful with it. The companies that make the most grandiose claims about data analytics are either selling analytics or data (or both). These claims are sales literature, not peer-reviewed citations to empirical research.

Data is cheap to collect and store – if you don't have to pay for the chaos it sows when it leaks. And some day, we will make data-hoarders pay.

Here's the podcast:

https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/23/data-the-new-oil-or-potential-for-a-toxic-oil-spill/

Here's the MP3:

https://ia801406.us.archive.org/9/items/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_334/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_334_-Data-_the_new_oil_or_potential_for_a_toxic_oil_spill.mp3

And here's the link to subscribe to the podcast:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/doctorow_podcast

Stock Jump

Stock Jump (permalink)

Last week, those of us lucky enough to have retirement savings joined the rest of the world, because our 401(k)s all cratered and all the promising stocks (teleconferencing, guillotines) are all way, way overpriced thanks to panic buying by Republican Senators.

But when life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla.

Enter Stock Jump, a ski-jump game whose courses are procedurally generated by the stock charts of shares from around the world.

It's really fun! If you can see through the tears.

http://stockjump.sos.gd/

Murdering 20% of elderly Americans is bad strategy for the GOP (permalink)

A thread by Patrick Nielsen Hayden on Making Light crystallized a thought that literally had me tossing and turning all night, about Trump's decision to risk the lives of ~20% of elderly Americans to goose the stock market.

https://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/016643.html#4402672

The thing I find baffling is how short-term this thinking is.

Not for Trump, of course, who is legendary for his view of life as a game of running across a river hopping from the back of one alligator to another before he can get his leg bitten off.

But for the right-wing establishment, whose whole schtick is "rationality" and "long-term thinking" and "self-control" (think of the gleeful repetition of the discredited Marshmellow Test and the rhetoric about the "poor life choices" that lead to single parenthood, addiction, and inadequate retirement savings or health insurance).

How is it that these self-congratulatory long-game-players can't see that murdering one in five American seniors is a self-limiting move when frightened old white people are the primary source of turkeys who can be counted upon to vote for Christmas every four years?

The right has an antimajoritarian, elitist agenda. Right-wing thought is essentially the belief that some people are destined to rule, and others are destined to be ruled over by their betters, and the world is best when the right people are atop the pyramid. Splits in the right are about who should rule: Dominionists want Christian men in charge; libertarians want bosses in charge, imperialists want America in charge, racists want white people in charge, etc.

Antimajoritarian projects struggle in democracies, for obvious reasons. When your platform is "only 1% of us should be making decisions" it's hard to win 51% of the vote. That's why the right focuses so hard on gerrymandering and voter suppression, and why the otherwise untenable coalitions — finaciers and young-Earth Creationists, say — persist.

But the biggest source of ballots in support of rule by elites is frightened people, especially frightened bigots who think that the elites will promote their interests ahead of the disfavored minorities (think: Dixiecrats).

So murdering 20% of the most reliable source of votes for elite rule is a farcically shortsighted thing to do.

I am terrified of a Biden candidacy not merely because I think his policies are poor, but because I think he is really bad at being a candidate, and will struggle to win.

But Trump murdering 20% of his base might just be enough to make him lose. It may be that while he could murder someone in the middle of 5th Ave and get away with it, he can't sentence 20% of US pensioners to gruesome deaths and get away with it.

I'm not gleeful at this prospect. I am totally aghast. I barely slept last night, waking up dozens of times with this genocide playing out in my imagination.

But I am incredibly surprised. How does the self-declared Party of the Long View not see that this is going to destroy it?

The stock market is circling the drain and obviously this is very distressing for the donor class, but almost no Americans own any significant stocks, because most Americans have NO savings. The idea that rescuing share prices by killing the elderly will get the turkeys out to vote for Christmas is clearly wrong.

For more on antimajoritarianism and the right, read Corey Robin's outstanding book, "The Reactionary Mind."

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1234117673316782082

Join me on the Quarantine Book Club (permalink)

I'm going participate in a session of the Quarantine Book Club on April 1 at 3PM Pacific, where we're discussing my book Radicalized. Tickets here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/quarantine-book-club-cory-doctorow-tickets-100931360416

If $5 is a burden for you, you can get in free with the code ALLAREWELCOME.

Hope to see you!

The Party of Death (permalink)

In his 2017 book Four Futures, Peter Frase uses science fiction to sketch out four ways our society could go as capitalism ruptures, from communism to exterminism, this being the expression of bosses' fear and dependence on workers.

https://boingboing.net/2017/01/06/four-futures-using-science-fi.html

Frase posits a possible mass-automation event that makes workers superfluous (I'm skeptical of this: climate change guarantees 2-3 centuries of full employment, e.g., relocating every coastal city).

But in light of the Current Situation, he imagines a different form of exterminism.

https://jacobinmag.com/2020/03/coronavirus-economy-public-health-exterminism/

It's not just the GOP's willingness to murder 20% of seniors in the hopes of rescuing the Dow.

Plutes and their bootlickers have been calling for mass-deaths as a preferable alternative since the crisis first manifested, as when Tea Party founder Rick Santelli suggested "Maybe we'd be just better off if we gave it to everybody."

And of course, there was Boris Johnson and Dominick Cummings' plan to infect all of the UK to create "herd immunity." As Cummings said, "if that means some pensioners die, too bad."

Now Trump wants to potentially murder 20% of American seniors to rescue share prices, and the GOP is going along with him.

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1242444277264740353

The Republicans have become the Party of Death, with establishment figures like Thomas Friedman providing ideological cover (""let many of us get the coronavirus, recover and get back to work").

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/22/opinion/coronavirus-economy.html

Frase: "The ghoulishness of this strategy will become apparent when it is too late, when the hospitals fill and the health care system and the economy both collapse."

"Those in power will be held blameless, and those with wealth will sadly lament the foolishness of the lesser orders."

"Socialists have always insisted that human needs should take precedence over profit, that the stock market is not the economy, and that we need to utterly transform an economy that is immiserating working people and destroying the planet. That message will only become more urgent as our opponents across different parts of the ruling class come to the conclusion — mournfully for some, gleefully for others — that in the contest between loss of profit and loss of life, they choose death."

Financial stability vs economic stability (permalink)

Michael Hudson is a fascinating thinker, an expert in the history of debt and debt-forgiveness. See, e.g., this:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/23/tacocat-vs-dog-prostates/#jubilee

In a new interview, Hudson delves into that history: interest-bearing debt was invented in the third millennium BCE, and quickly kings learned that they had to have periodic debt forgiveness, or compound interest would render all debts unpayable.

https://digitalfinanceanalytics.com/blog/debt-and-power-with-michael-hudson/

Greeks and Romans did away with the practice, and so had to live with six centuries of debt-revolts, as ever-larger fractions of their populace ended up in a form of debt slavery.

Greek Democracy was created to allow commoners to serve in government and so vote to cancel debts. Roman emperors conquered Greece and did away with debt-cancellation, creating an increasingly unstable oligarchy.

That's not far off from where we are today. 90% of debts are held by the richest 10%, and these oligarchs own the political process and refuse to countenance debt-cancellation.

Obama promised to write down mortgages, but instead he bailed out finance, who kicked us all out and bought our houses out from under us, and then rented back to us. Since then, the Fed "has created $4.5 trillion of credit to support prices for real estate."

"The aim has been to make housing more expensive, enabling the banks to collect on their mortgages and not go under. Credit keeps the debt overhead in place, thereby keeping the financial system afloat instead of facing the reality that debt needs to be written down."

Trump's gonna do it again, giving $50b to airlines/Boeing. Since 2008, Boeing has spent $45b on buybacks. Trump's message: "Spend 92-95% of your income to buy your own hares, and the government will print money so you can do it again, because our priority is stock prices."

"Financial stability" is incompatible with "economic stability." Financial stability means never writing down debts so that the bad loans oligarchs made never turn into bad debts. Economic stability requires debt write-downs so that people can be productive.

Obama's bailouts increased big banks' Too Big to Fail status. That's why since 2008, "GDP per 95 percent of the American population is actually shrunk. All the growth in America's GDP has occurred only to the wealthiest 5% of the population."

Today, plutes "hope to use the crisis not to revive the economy, but to just pound it into debt deflation, leaving the debts in place while bailing out the banks and the landlord class."

Here's what "financial stability" looks like: "you have to pay this exponential growth in debt, [and] have less and less to buy goods and services."

Quarantine reveals the falsity of the automation crisis (permalink)

Automation-based unemployment has always been overhyped. Any work that robots take over merely frees up human workers for the 2-300 year project of climate remediation, including relocating every coastal city in the world.

But automation is also vastly overhyped. Take the oft-repeated claim that "truck driver" is the most common job in America, and first in line to be automated. It's just wrong.

First, because the BLS "truck driver" category includes long-haul truckers, delivery drivers, couriers, and dozens of other subprofessions, most of which are far, far away from being automatable.

https://hbr.org/2019/09/automation-isnt-about-to-make-truckers-obsolete

(More importantly, though: the most automatable category is long-haul driver, and an automated long-haul truck in its own dedicated lane is just a shitty train).

The overhyped nature of technological displacement is on perfect display during the pandemic quarantine. As many "low skilled" (which is to say, "low waged") workers withdraw from the workforce, the economy has ground to a halt.

So much so that the right is now prepared to throw 20+% of seniors into the volcano to appease the market gods.

The category error committed by automation-fretters is to confuse "automating a job" with "augmenting a worker."

"We know that robots are great at repetitive work. they can do that forever. What's not so great is anything with a human-centered context, a cultural context." -Julie Carpenter

https://www.wired.com/story/robot-jobs-coronavirus/

Bailouts and moral hazard (permalink)

It's been barely a decade since the USG bailed out big businesses and the fact that we're here again reveals some of the glaring failures in the last bailout. Any new bailout should correct those errors by putting restrictions on bailed-out companies.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/19/gb-whatsapp/#peoples-bailout

There have been some good proposals on these lines, like those from AOC and Stephanie Kelton:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/21/most-dangerous-ghost/#peoples-bailout

(whenever I write about this in public, I'm inundated with angry tweets from sociopaths with "investor" in their bios)

We're running out of time to get this right. DC is so filled with money-hungry lobbyists that they can't practice adequate social distancing, and they're collectively seeking trillions in string-free public money for their paymaster.

https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/blog/rule-number-1-for-government-bailouts-of-companies-make-sure-voters-and-taxpayers-share-in-the-upside

At a minimum, any bailouts should come in exchange for convertible corporate bonds that let the USG take an ownership stake in any business that fails to repay its public debts. That's a minimum, as is a ban on stock buybacks for bailed out companies.

We need very strict limits on lobbying by bailed out firms: "If we are not to finance our own bamboozlement, any company receiving bailouts must be required each month to file full reports on political contributions and lobbying expenditures to candidates and parties."

This goes for dark money contributions, including 527 funds, and corporate/exec contributions to trade associations and other lobbying fronts, think-tanks, and other political influence vehicles.

"Unlike last time, when Hank Paulson, Tim Geithner, and Ben Bernanke failed to give the public a serious share of the upside, the bailed out firms should be compelled to issue convertible bonds to the government."

"Those bonds should make the government the senior creditor to the firm for the value of the principal as long as the debt is unpaid…As firms and the economy recover, the shares can be sold on the open market, yielding a handsome return to the Treasury."

The right likes to harp about "moral hazard" as an excuse for cutting aid, to, say, single mothers ("It only encourages them"). But what about businesses that needed trillions in 2008 and now need trillions more? What lesson are we teaching them?

(Image: Alex Proimos, CC BY)

MIT's ingenious manual/automatic open source ventilator (permalink)

At the end of last week, a crowdsourced design for an open-source hardware ventilator entered testing with the Irish regulator, a week after work began on the project.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/20/pluralistic-20-mar-2020/#oshw-breathing

Now, hot on its heels, an MIT open source hardware ventilator team has submitted its design to the FDA for testing and approval, under the Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) authority.

https://e-vent.mit.edu/

It eliminates many possible sources of failure by replacing an electric pump with a manual one, which can, in turn, be operated by a separate, very simple, Arduino-controlled system (which can be readily swapped out for a human hand if it fails).

As Hackaday points out, "Almost as interesting as the device itself is the comments people are leaving about the design."

https://hackaday.com/2020/03/23/mit-ventilator-designed-with-common-manual-resuscitator-submitted-for-fda-testing/

This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago Record sales up, P2P sales up — RIAA's story doesn't add up https://web.archive.org/web/20050822053404/http://news.com.com/2100-1027_3-5631698.html

#15yrsago Octopuses dressed up as sea coconuts sneaking on two legs https://www.nature.com/news/2005/050321/full/050321-14.html

#10yrsago Pooh vs Alien: Webcomics realize their full potential at last http://godxiliary.com/alienvspooh/

#10yrsago Airport worker caught photographing screen as female worker passed through naked scanner https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2010/mar/24/airport-worker-warned-body-scanner

#10yrsago UK record lobby: democracy is a waste of time https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2010/corporate-lobbyists-no-need-for-democracy

#5yrsago How medical abortion works https://www.ohjoysextoy.com/medical-abortion/

#5yrsago ACLU sues TSA to make it explain junk science "behavioral detection" program https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/nyclu-and-aclu-sue-tsa-records-discredited-behavior-detection-program

#5yrsago Randomized dystopia generator that goes beyond the Bill of Rights https://www.harihareswara.net/dystopia/

#1yrago Man stole $122m from Facebook and Google by sending them random bills, which the companies dutifully paid https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/lithuanian-pleads-guilty-to-stealing-100-million-from-google-facebook/

#1yrago Chelsea Manning is being held in prolonged solitary confinement, a form of torture https://xychelsea.is/?page_id=28

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Tor.com (https://tor.com), Naked Capitalism (https://nakedcapitalism.com/), Slashdot (https://slashdot.org/).

Currently writing: I'm getting geared up to start work my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation.

Currently reading: Just started Lauren Beukes's forthcoming Afterland: it's Y the Last Man plus plus, and two chapters in, it's amazeballs. Last month, I finished Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs"; it's a magnificent history of the Kushner and Trump families, showing how they cheated, stole and lied their way into power. I'm getting really into Anna Weiner's memoir about tech, "Uncanny Valley." I just loaded Matt Stoller's "Goliath" onto my underwater MP3 player and I'm listening to it as I swim laps.

Latest podcast: Data – the new oil, or potential for a toxic oil spill? https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/23/data-the-new-oil-or-potential-for-a-toxic-oil-spill/

Upcoming appearances:

Quarantine Book Club, April 1, 3PM Pacific https://www.eventbrite.com/e/quarantine-book-club-cory-doctorow-tickets-100931360416

Museums and the Web, April 2, 12PM-3PM Pacific https://mw20.museweb.net/

Upcoming books: "Poesy the Monster Slayer" (Jul 2020), a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Pre-order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627?utm_source=socialmedia&utm_medium=socialpost&utm_term=na-poesycorypreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781626723627

(we're having a launch for it in Burbank on July 11 at Dark Delicacies and you can get me AND Poesy to sign it and Dark Del will ship it to the monster kids in your life in time for the release date).

"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother book, Oct 20, 2020. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531

"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583

[themagicianshea]

From now until November, we’ll be spotlighting one of our MHHE registered authors every week. Want to be featured? Just fill out this form!

MHHE Author Spotlight: prettyclever & charlotteschaos

What piece of work best represents your writing style, and how would you briefly describe it?

The work that most exemplifies our writing style is probably "It's Never Over," a season 5 AU in which Eliot's marginally less afraid of commitment, Quentin is less clueless than he used to be, & Margo is a sassy alpha bitch. There's sex magicky shenanigans, a giant turtle, talking pegasi, and a plot to overthrow the Dark King and reclaim Fillory, all done Queliot-style.

Basically it's smutty, fluffy, cracky, intense, and full of pure love between Quentin and Eliot.

Excerpt:

Quentin frowned but hopped up to follow, squeezing past Eliot to stand behind Margo, probably so he wouldn’t have to manage the door. It was a little strange. Eliot was about to ask why, but it suddenly got a lot strange when a giant turtle head zoomed at Eliot, hooked mouth open.

“Whoa! Prince of the Mud, we talked about this! No!” Margo cast a massive spell, blowing back the fifty-foot snapping turtle.

“You said there would be food,” the giant turtle—Prince of the Mud?—wheezed.

“You ate five goats on the way!” She turned toward Quentin and Eliot with her hands up as if exasperated. “And not all of them were the non-talking kind, either.”

Eliot had ducked and covered, instinctive, but he slowly stood as the turtle no longer seemed hell-bent on devouring him.

“I am not a goat,” Eliot pointed out, looking between Margo and the Prince of the Mud. “In fact, we are all deposed Fillorian royalty, as I’m certain Margo has informed your highness the Prince of Mud.”

Sidling closer to Quentin, Eliot ran his hands over Q’s shoulders, making certain he was still solid and okay. Standing behind Q, he looked to Margo and said, “You don’t do anything by halves, do you, Bambi? Find a turtle, we say, and you bring us goddamn Turtlezilla.”

No wonder she’d been so proud of herself.

She nodded, smiling to herself with her hands up. “Right? You say bring back a big turtle, I brought a fuckin’ big turtle.”

“I said old turtle.” Quentin seemed bit tense. He’d jumped toward Eliot when the Prince of the Mud had made his move, but apparently the Prince didn’t see him. Or couldn’t grab hold. “Old. Has to—”

“It’s been a thousand years,” the Prince interrupted. “I was a hatchling when this world was born. Ember and Umber—”

“And how did he get through the wards? He could’ve eaten Eliot!” Quentin was trembling, with rage or fear, it was hard to say.

“All right, so I didn’t think he could walk through them. Sorry I didn’t think to ward off house-sized talking reptiles. I thought you were the Fillory dork who knew these kinds of things.” Margo’s eyes flashed as she approached Quentin, but Eliot knew she was probably about as angry with herself as Quentin was.

“I—” Quentin turned to appeal to Eliot. “Did this turtle even vote?”

They all turned to look at the Prince of the Mud, who had sneaked back toward the cottage and was slowly stretching his head, mouth open near Eliot again. He stopped when everyone looked at him and slunk back.

“I consider myself apolitical.”

“Do you also consider yourself expendable?” Eliot glared and twisted his fingers through some preliminary battle magic, just in case. “Because if you keep trying to eat me, you’re going to end up very dead. Ember and Umber aren’t going to save their little hatchling this time around. It’s every royal for himself.”

The Prince of the Mud huffed, then pulled his head into his shell. “I was told there would be snacks.”

Margo gave a little shrug. “He’s got us there. El is a snack.”

Quentin started to pace. “A thousand years? Fillory is much older than that. Democracy was just three hundred years ago! How were you here at the dawn of Fillory?”

“I might be unclear on what a year is, exactly.” The Prince’s legs emerged from his shell, and he started to back away. “This seems like a bad time. I’ll go back to the Northern Marsh.”

“The hell you will!” Margo charged toward the Prince. “Listen, you overgrown amphibian wannabe. You came with me from that stinking marsh to help me persuade the talking animals to my side, and that is what you’re going to do!”

What piece of work are you most proud of and why?

We're most proud of "It's Never Over" because it's been so popular and touched so many people. We got so many beautiful comments from people hurting over the season 4 finale and needing to feel good and see a fix-it, and finding that sense of community with others who were feeling like we did really made it memorable.

Excerpt:

Eliot shifted to nuzzle into Q’s face, kissing the corner of his eye and down his cheek. “I was so afraid to invest in you that I made you think I didn’t even want to. I’m… I’m sorry for that, Q.” He exhaled against Q’s lips and kissed him softly before opening his eyes to look at him. “That first day, after we… When we’d been here a year, and you wanted to talk about it… I thought you were going to freak out on me, and I shut it down because I couldn’t deal with your regrets and identity panic. It had been so good for me, and I just wanted it to have been good for you. So when you let it drop, I was just…so relieved I never wanted to talk about it again. But that—”

Eliot bit his lip and searched Q’s face. “That doesn’t mean I didn’t want to do it every day before that and every day after. It doesn’t mean I didn’t think about you all the damn time, or that I wasn’t fighting so hard not to fall for you that it took up every ounce of my strength. And when we were finally just…just us, and we were experimenting and doing everything I’d ever wanted to do with you, I maybe exerted my will on the idea of us as… You know.”

Though Q hung on every word, Eliot couldn’t bring himself to just say it. “It’s too stupid to even put words to, even now, but….” He breathed deeply, glancing again at Q’s rapt expression.

Q deserved to hear it, didn’t he? To know what he’d meant to Eliot?

“Without Margo, I was… She’s like my platonic life partner. And that position’s, you know, it’s filled. It was filled before you met me. But this… Q, this”—Eliot gestured between them—“has never been platonic. I wanted you the minute I laid eyes on you. And if Margo’s my platonic life partner, then you’re my true love. That’s what I put into that magic we worked here. That’s what was in my heart.”

Quentin closed his eyes, seeming to glow softly even beyond the bright sun shining on him. He cupped the side of Eliot’s face and gazed up at him, drunk on emotion.

“What I wanted from you was unrealistic. It—I think it played out how it had to, painful as it was.” He moved to his toes and kissed Eliot tenderly, then nuzzled his face. “It was what was in my heart, too. I just didn’t want to scare you away being so intense. That doesn’t scare you anymore, does it?”

Eliot inhaled deeply and shrugged a little. “I’m still scared shitless, but I’m… I’m gonna be brave for you, Q. Like you were brave for me.”

What tropes can we look forward to in your MHHE fic?

Friends-to-lovers, Mutual Pining, 12 Days of Christmas, Winter Wedding. Dramatic Christmas Presents, Domestic Fluff, Magical Holiday Baking, Christmas Shopping, Childhood Home, Protective Father, Sibling Rivalry

Fuck, Marry, Kiss (under the mistletoe) with three Magicians characters of your choice!

Char: Fuck Penny, Marry Margo, Kiss Eliot pc: fuck Eliot, marry Kady, kiss Penny 40

[adityatodi]

New Orleans

October 6, 2019 Sunday

On my way back to Boston from New Orleans.

I arrived in New Orleans late Thursday night (midnight) on the same flight as Angel Saez. We took an Uber to our AirBnB in the French district.

Friday morning started with breakfast at Bear Cat Café with Ben, his wife Ilkania, Akash, Dana, Jaclyn and her boyfriend Blake, Rebecca, Macy and Kumiko. The huge portion sizes served as a welcome to the city. We then headed to the Whitney Plantation to get a tour of the plantation and learn about the history of the plantation and more about slavery. Some of my takeaways/learnings:

Often when we think of slavery, we think of slaves working in plantation or house maids. But system of slavery also included skilled Black labor and craftsmen whose stories are often not ones told

The first form of dehumanization in this whole process was stripping the recently arrived Africans of their African name and giving them French name

While in 1808 Trans-Atlantic slave trade ended, it continued to flourish within US boundaries until 1864 and beyond

When we talk about colonialism, often large portions of blame is assigned to British. Why do we not put same blame on the French, Belgian or the Portugese, who were actually the ones who were “pioneers” of Trans-Atlantic slave trade

Often times when we talk about humans doing bad things to other humans the reference is Holocaust. Slavery was brutal, why are these analogies not made—because they are Black lives?

Why are the rebellions that slaves fought, e.g. there was one in 1811, not given the same heroic importance as the Revolutionary Wars for American Independence?

After the tour we head to the historic Café Du Monde to get coffee and the delicious beignets. Walk around the area, head home to do some work, drinks at Cane and Table and 3-course dinner at Sylvain. We then go to a bar playing Jazz on Frenchmen street (really good music), then a handful of us (Kumiko, Dana, Liz, Akash, Zubby and I) go bar hopping along Bourbon Street.

Saturday morning starts with brunch at Ruby Slipper with people in my AirBnB (Kuba, his girlfriend, Tory, Claire, Graciela, Eren and Katie). I then join a group from the other AirBnB to do a walking tour concentrating on the musical and artistic history of New Orleans. Thankfully the weather is bearable and not too hot. The guide carried a speaker and iPad with him to show us pictures and take us through the evolution of music starting with Armstrong Park dedicated to Louis Armstrong. I had first heard of Armstrong in college when I heard “What a Wonderful World” and was blown away by the melody and the tune. Some learnings

Urban slavery was different than rural slavery (e.g. plantation). In New Orleans given the influence of the Catholic Church, Sunday was a holiday for all including the enslaved. There were Sunday market gatherings at Congo Square where enslaved people could buy and trade for money it this became a step towards emancipation

Jazz originates from the confluence of traditional European music, particularly brass band with the Afro beats that African slaves brought with them

Armstrong received very little formal music education. It was a total of 18 months that he spent in jail because of firing blank bullets during a celebration when he was 11. In a crazy coincidence, his first wife dies of a heart attack while playing the piano at Armstrong’s funeral

After the tour we walk around, go to a café and then I head to the AirBnB to get some work done. At 7:45 Zubby, Kumiko and I go to the Spotted Cat Bar on Frenchmen street to hear some jazz. This was certainly the highlight of my trip. It’s a small bar and we’re all gathered around the stage. The band of 7 plays amazing amazing jazz—probably the best live jazz performance I’ve heard. Band name—Panaroma Jazz Band. The vibe of being in this small bar in New Orleans, drinking beer and chilling with a couple of friends on a wonderful evening with great music. This is the sort of stuff one imagines doing in New Orleans and I’m glad I got to do this. Zubby and I then head to get some Cajun food at Pierre Maspero’s. We strike a deep conversation on race, sexuality, and how often times those who complain of being oppressed are oppressors in other situations. After our meal we find ourselves walking back to Frenchmen street and somehow end up doing Karaoke on the way and improvising and just having a great time singing, making things up, being complimented by passerby’s on our skills, goofing around. The karaoke session continues at the AirBnB with the culmination of Louis Armstrong’s “What a wonderful world”. Ah! Grateful for such moments of pure joy. Zubby has an early morning flight so he heads to bed. I head out to Blue Nile to join a few others who are there. Some more jazz performance and back home for the night.

Sunday morning—late wake up, pack-up and get ready. Brunch at Satsuma Café and then I go to explore the WWII Museum. Takeaway/Learnings/Thoughts:

WWII was framed as a fight for democracy and democratic ideals. If today the US does not stand up and defend these ideals abroad, can one not say that WWII was fought in vain

Good to see a portion of the museum devoted to Japanese internment and the treatment of African Americans as second class citizen along with Native Americans and Latinos. However, the section seemed very small and I would have liked they spent more time talking about the implications of war on minorities

• I was able to better understand the significance of D-Day and the heroic efforts of the troops to capture Normandy. I especially enjoyed learning about the detailed deceptions that were devised to trick Nazi Germany to believing that the Allied Troops would instead attack Calais. The sheer number of tanks, planes, ships, boats and troops used for this battle was mind blowing

I found myself eager to see how this museum would talk about the dropping of the atomic bombs especially since the Hiroshima Peace Museum left a lasting memory on me. I was disappointed (but also not shocked) that only a very small small portion is devoted to it. Basic narrative---the Japanese were not willing to surrender->Americans dropped the first bomb->Japanese still not willing to surrender->Americans drop second bomb->Japanese finally surrender->Pictures of some devastating effects of the bomb->This evil was used to stop a greater evil of losing more people through conventional fighting

This narrative and the fact that the human impact and after affect of the dropping of the nuclear bomb was not covered thoroughly left me deeply frustrated. You have devoted 90% of the museum on technicalities, on how brutal war was for soldiers, how industry and Americans mobilized to fight the war, but how the f*** can you not talk about the bombing in a more sensitive way. War is not glorious. Let’s engage with this issue

Would Americans have given it more of a thought if they had the option to drop the atomic bomb on the German population? Of course, definitely yes. Because these were “Japs” who are supposed to be brutal and animal-like according to all the propaganda you spread, you find ways to justify killing civilian population and use mathematical logic of numbers to explain a war crime. Had Germany dropped nuclear bomb on U.S. cities and lost war, would the planners and executors of it not been tried for such an atrocity? Of course they would have. F*** this sh** and this convoluted logic. The U.S. needs to issue a blanket apology for what they did. It is a war crime and the American leaders who made this decision should have been tried—yes Truman should have been tried.

Step back. New Orleans.

Glad I came for this trip and was able to see this part of the U.S. Amazing food and music—such a touristy New Orleans thing to say. But honestly, that evening in the Spotted Cat bar was magical!

[rarestereocats]

After musing over the terrible fashion choices of nobles on Basilla,  we're all asked to wait in the sitting room so Sunyeros can go over some stuff with us.  While she tends to guests in the other room,  I eavesdrop on their conversations and learn that the common catfolk plan to revolt against the nobles soon.  The guests seem worried,  but Sunyeros doesn't seem all that concerned.  With her finally emerging to speak to us,  she tells me that she wants to instate me as the proper heir and when she goes over some of the stuff I'll be in charge of,  I get cold feet.  I'm not exactly equipped to run an entire nation,  especially one on the brink of a revolution,  but Industria thinks it's a good idea.  We decide to take in more of the island and potentially reach out to the rebels before I do anything.

But rather than find any rebels,  we manage to get ourselves caught up in stopping a potential crime ring.  We're pointed to a dog fighting ring far from any prying eyes and Industria loses it on these people after setting all of the dogs free (and adding another problem to deal with later!).  We get the information on their leader,  Juliana,  and once we teleport to her;  it appears her boyfriend already beat us to the punch.  She panics and teleports away,  so with our magic,  we trace her teleport and give chase.  But once we pop in,  she teleports away a g a i n  and thus begins our Scooby-Doo like chase to stop her.  We reach her again,  but as Industria goes to use her magic to hold her,  Elathera times a dispel poorly and ends up dispelling Industria's magic;  letting Juliana slip through our fingers yet again.

This goes on for a few more times before Juliana and her boyfriend finally run out of spells and proceed to sprint off into the surrounding jungles.  A poor move on their part because we catch up to them with no problem now,  but rather than drag them off to the guards or kick their asses around a little,  we give them a stern talking to and tell them to get lost.  Fighting crime is fucking exhausting and we still haven't found any rebels,  so I suggest we hit up the local bars and find us the perfect one!  It's artsy and pretentious,  so surely there's gotta be some anti-government folk here.  It's slam poetry night and after a few drinks,  I hop on stage to drunkenly deliver poetry about hungry cats while my friends all die a little on the inside.  After,  we're approached by a drunk ass rebel who thought my poem was very deep and starts rambling about how it's totally similar to the issues common catfolk face today.

He invites us to a meeting of the minds at the beach tomorrow,  but unfortunately,  Sunyeros is planning a dinner for us to attend at the same time.  The rest of us will join her,  but Industria plans to sneak off to the meeting.  Once back at the manor,  I reluctantly take my place as the true and rightful heir to Basilla,  but don't worry;  we have a plan.  I'm gonna act as an inside agent to feed information to the rebels and eventually,  we'll all help kickstart the revolution and overthrow the families of power.  We plan to put in some form of democracy if we succeed,  but it appears that Sunyeros knows something's wrong.  With Industria stating she has business to attend to tomorrow,  Sunyeros insists that she stay for the dinner and with how hard she's trying,  we realize she's been scrying on us throughout the day.  Not good for our plan,  but hopefully she didn't catch everything.

With my status as the heir recognized,  I now have to spend the day learning of the family businesses,  but no family secrets...y e t.  I'm allowed into the secret record room though,  where it has confidential information on the Kociaks through the centuries;  including other possible family members that may be among the undead now.  While I tend to that,  the rest of the party has a Sunday Funday and hits up the casino and a fight club without me.  Jordeira and Industria do pretty well in the fight club,  but unfortunately both of them meet their matches.  Their opponents are offered a place among the Order,  to which they both happily accept.  And as that all happens,  Sunyeros explains to me that my marriage to Rikius should be voided as I'm to marry one of the family's rivals for power.

But after pushing on my part and insistence that I'm not about to leave my husband under any circumstance,  Sunyeros relents almost too easily...but it's very obvious she isn't happy about that.  I warn the others that that might become a potential in the future too as the others start heading back to the manor for the dinner.

[berniesrevolution]

NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE

Second Platoon did not hide its dark mood as its soldiers waded across the Korengal River in the bright light of afternoon. It was early in April 2009 and early in the Pentagon’s resumption in earnest of the Afghan war. The platoon’s mission was to ascend a mountain slope and try to ambush the Taliban at night. They were about 30 men in all, riflemen and machine-gunners reinforced with scouts, a mix of original platoon members and replacements who filled gaps left by the wounded and the dead. Many of them considered their plan foolish, a draining and dangerous waste of time, another example of a frustrated Army unit’s trying to show activity for the brass in a war low on focus and hope. They muttered foul words as they moved.

Specialist Robert Soto had been haunted by dread as the soldiers left their base, the Korengal Outpost. His platoon was part of an infantry unit that called itself Viper, the radio call sign for Bravo Company, First Battalion of the 26th Infantry. Viper had occupied the outpost for nine months, a period in which its soldiers were confined to a small stretch of lower valley and impoverished villages clinging to hillsides beneath towering peaks. Second Platoon had started its deployment with three squads but suffered so many casualties that on this day even with replacements it mustered at about two-thirds strength. With attrition came knowledge. Soto knew firsthand that the war did not resemble the carefully considered national project the generals discussed in the news. He had enlisted in the Army from the Bronx less than two years before, motivated by a desire to protect the United States from another terrorist attack. But his idealism had turned swiftly into realism, and the war had become a matter of him and his friends surviving each day as days cohered into a tour. He was doubtful about the rest, from the competence of the war’s organizers down to the merits of this ambush patrol. There’s no way this works, he thought. The valley felt like a network of watchers who set up American platoons, relaying word to those laying traps.

Soto sensed eyes following the patrol. Everybody can see us.

He was 19, but at 160 pounds and barely needing to shave, he could pass for two years younger. He was nobody’s archetype of a fighter. A high school drama student, he joined the Army at 17 and planned to become an actor if he survived the war. Often he went about his duties with an enormous smile, singing no matter what anyone else thought — R. & B., rap, rock, hip-hop, the blues. All of this made him popular in the platoon, even as he had become tenser than his former self and older than his years; even as his friends and sergeants he admired were killed, leaving him a burden of ghosts.

He faced the steep uphill climb, physically ready, emotionally spent. We’re just trying to get out of here in two months, he thought. He and his fellow soldiers had been in the valley long enough that they moved in the sinewy, late-deployment fitness of infantry squads seasoned by war. Sweat soaked his back. His quadriceps and calves drove him on, pushing him like a pack animal for the soldier beside him, Specialist Arturo Molano, who carried an M240 machine gun. The two fell into a rhythm. One soldier would get over a hard patch, turn around and extend a hand to the other. “Hey, man, you good?” Soto would ask. Molano would say he was fine. “You want me to carry the gun?” Soto would offer. Molano declined every time. Soto considered Molano to be selfless and tough, someone who routinely carried more than men of much larger size. He liked being partnered with someone like this.

After a few hours, Second Platoon reached the crest, high above the valley. The soldiers inhaled deeply, taking in the thin air. Away from the outpost’s burning trash, the air tasted clean.

(Sgt. First Class Thomas Wright, Specialist Robert Soto and Second Lt. Justin Smith in April 2009.)

A few soldiers went forward to check the trail before the rest of the platoon moved to the ambush site. With little more than whispers, the soldiers arranged themselves in a triangle astride a mountain footpath. Second Lt. Justin Smith, their platoon leader, put Molano at one corner and a second man with an M240 at another, with their machine guns angled back toward each other so their fire could create an interlocking zone of flying lead. Other soldiers set claymore mines on small stands.

Everything was ready before dark. The air was chilly and the ridge raked by gusts. Soto was shivering. He pulled a dry undershirt and socks from his pack, changed clothes, ate a protein bar and washed it down with water. He saw his company’s outpost below, across the open space, and realized this must be what it looked like to militants when they attacked. A distant call to prayer floated on the mountain air.

In early October, the Afghan war will be 17 years old, a milestone that has loomed with grim inevitability as the fighting has continued without a clear exit strategy across three presidential administrations. With this anniversary, prospective recruits born after the terrorist attacks of 2001 will be old enough to enlist. And Afghanistan is not the sole enduring American campaign. The war in Iraq, which started in 2003, has resumed and continues in a different form over the border in Syria, where the American military also has settled into a string of ground outposts without articulating a plan or schedule for a way out. The United States has at various times declared success in its many campaigns — in late 2001; in the spring of 2003; in 2008; in the short-lived withdrawal from Iraq late in 2011; and in its allies’ recapture more recently of the ruins of Ramadi, Falluja, Mosul and Raqqa from the Islamic State, a terrorist organization, formed in the crucible of occupied Iraq, that did not even exist when the wars to defeat terrorism started. And still the wars grind on, with the conflict in Afghanistan on track to be a destination for American soldiers born after it began.

More than three million Americans have served in uniform in these wars. Nearly 7,000 of them have died. Tens of thousands more have been wounded. More are killed or wounded each year, in smaller numbers but often in dreary circumstances, including the fatal attack in July on Cpl. Joseph Maciel by an Afghan soldier — a member of the very forces that the United States has underwritten, trained and equipped, and yet as a matter of necessity and practice now guards itself against.

On one matter there can be no argument: The policies that sent these men and women abroad, with their emphasis on military action and their visions of reordering nations and cultures, have not succeeded. It is beyond honest dispute that the wars did not achieve what their organizers promised, no matter the party in power or the generals in command. Astonishingly expensive, strategically incoherent, sold by a shifting slate of senior officers and politicians and editorial-page hawks, the wars have continued in varied forms and under different rationales each and every year since passenger jets struck the World Trade Center in 2001. They continue today without an end in sight, reauthorized in Pentagon budgets almost as if distant war is a presumed government action.

As the costs have grown — whether measured by dollars spent, stature lost or blood shed — the wars’ architects and the commentators supporting them have often been ready with optimistic or airbrushed predictions, each pitched to the latest project or newly appointed general’s plan. According to the bullhorns and depending on the year, America’s military campaigns abroad would satisfy justice, displace tyrants, keep violence away from Western soil, spread democracy, foster development, prevent sectarian war, protect populations, reduce corruption, bolster women’s rights, decrease the international heroin trade, check the influence of extreme religious ideology, create Iraqi and Afghan security forces that would be law-abiding and competent and finally build nations that might peacefully stand on their own in a global world, all while discouraging other would-be despots and terrorists.

Aside from displacing tyrants and leading to the eventual killing of Osama bin Laden, none of this turned out as pitched. Prominent successes were short-lived. New thugs rose where old thugs fell. Corruption and lawlessness remain endemic. An uncountable tally of civilians — many times the number of those who perished in the terrorist attacks in the United States in 2001 — were killed. Others were wounded or driven from their homes, first by American action and then by violent social forces American action helped unleash.

(Continue Reading)

[michaeloneillwords-music]

Brexit, Global Governance, Perception Management and Freedom

       Democracy. Democracy. Democracy. I thought by saying it three times whilst staring into a mirror, just like the Horror folktale the Candyman, that I might be able to bring it into reality, however I knew my attempts at ritual linguistic and conscious magic would fail. As Democracy, the idea that Government is controlled by the majority of its members representing the majority will of the population, may very well have existed in primitive forms of smaller Government years ago, but it has never existed under the British Parliamentary system, as this system has always had at its very core a conflict of interests, between Monarchical interests, intrinsically tied up with Aristocratic and Financial Interests, and the interests of the public. Thomas Paine writing in his perpetually relevant critique of the British State and the dangers of Political corruption and cronyism in ‘Common Sense’ first published in 1776, understood this conflict and suggested that at the heart of the British political system lay “two ancient tyrannies”, monarchy and aristocracy, and given the growth of the global banking system since his time of writing, we can now add Financial Power, that lest we forget was co-constructed by these perfectly described ancient tyrannies. Indeed Paine goes on to offer an extremely pertinent description of what the Westminster model was designed to do, and is still  doing in the age of transnational governance and in relation to the current political theatre of Brexit, Paine (1776 ,p9) “the constitution of England is so exceedingly complex, that the nation may suffer for years together without being able to discover in which part the fault lies, some will say in one and some will say in another, and every political physician will advise a different medicine”. The just rejected commons vote anyone? In all honestly, I couldn’t care less for the concept of democracy that our political physicians keep espousing, as I have always believed it to be a construction of and means to ‘effective governance’, a governance that defends the interests of Monarchy and global finance over the interests of societies.  Furthermore, since the time of Paine’s writing, this type of governance has been able to implement its ideological agenda ever more effectively with the aid of the mainstream media, something which is being used extremely effectively in the current political skullduggery of ‘Brexit’. The following paper will examine the motivations and objectives of the nation state, the European state and the Global state. It will unpack the British State and Mainstream News Media’s use of propaganda relating to Brexit, in particular its use of the ‘Far Right’ to shape opinion and manufacture consent. It will also look at what offering such a ‘once in a lifetime’ referendum offered in terms of State political capital and the capacity for effective governance, by diverting and focusing collective attention. The paper will throughout engage in conjecture relating to British Secret Service involvement in the current state/media propaganda machine. Finally, the paper will examine what political engagement is ultimately supporting, and look at the politics of selfhood and purpose, in relation to societal change and freedom. Now let me contextualize the current political news media climate.

Please Note: This is not an academic essay, although it does use academic referencing. This piece was written for the value in the process itself, and for the value the writer places on self-sovereignty. It is free from the restrictions of institutions and their biases, and from economic compromise - it has not been monetized.

Brexit and the Mainstream News Media

       So, over the past fortnight or so we have seen the big four British Mainstream News Media outlets the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Sky News, set up camp in Parliament Square, to cover what they say is every minute of the ‘Brexit’ negotiations, commons votes, counter votes, further negotiations and so on and on and on and on… . . . . . We have long known that the mainstream news media, at least since Herman and Chomsky’s Manufacturing Consent (1988) - (I am not a Chomsky fan, I believe him to be a compromised academic political puppet) and long before, Bernays, Vance, etc (media as propaganda has a long history), that mainstream news media receives its information (or script) from Institutional press releases, Whitehall, Scotland Yard and other state institutions, but to create Broadcast hubs at Parliament square is another gear in the state/media propaganda machine. Do we really need such centralized (almost around the clock) coverage of what is essentially a behind closed doors process, except say for the commons vote result on Mays proposal, or the odd press conference that is held? Does the bureaucracy of the political establishment really warrant Big Brother (no pun intended) like screen time? Do we need to see political automaton after political automaton, getting out of their chauffer driven cars, walking through the door of deceit, or prostituting themselves to one or all of the four MNM platforms via their convenient broadcast hubs? Personally I’d rather stare at a tree… . . . . there’s more honesty in it. What we have here is just a project to ‘manufacture consent’ or as may be more exacting, perception management. It is political theatre to shape public perception, a form of propaganda easily as nefarious in its aims as previous forms of fascist propaganda, and far from just involving members of parliament, the cast is wide, and the narrative is deceptively insidious. Let me now turn to one of its brightest stars, Owen Jones, and examine the skeleton of the narrative, the ‘so called’ growing Far Right.  

Owen Jones: A Platform to Opinion Shape

     Jones, fresh out of Oxford, worked as a researcher for a trade union, and then went on to write and secure a publishing deal for his book, Chavs: The demonization of the Working Class (2011) which was hugely successful, and rightly so, I thought it was a good historical account of the perception of the working class through the eyes of the establishment and more so the treatment of the (overly homogenized) working class in mainstream culture and media. In the wake of his success Jones was seemingly elevated by the very establishment influenced mainstream media he had just critiqued to become the go to political commentator of the left, and went on to write ‘The Establishment’ (2014), a piss poor investigation into how established power in Britain works that does not go  anywhere near deep enough into where the real bed of power is, that being the British Monarchy, he daren’t, at this point he was compromised, he had a career, a platform and a healthy income, he had too much to lose in letting his ‘straw critique’ go too far. Since then Jones has been a regular commentator across all major news platforms, and on his own popular Youtube channel, fighting for as he claims ‘social Justice’ (when does rallying for social justice become social engineering?) and aligning himself with the progressive liberal left, and all the issues that the manufactured collective political identity of the new left is supporting. He has become the ‘wet dream’ of the young left, and has taken on a morally righteous messiah complex, aided and abated by the mainstream news media at large. Such ubiquity and perpetual access to such far reaching mainstream platforms should ring alarm bells in any political spectator. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is elevated to such a position of influence based solely on merit, and certainly not if there position, politically, socially or philosophically is a threat to the very established power that the mainstream news media is controlled by, nobody. Now, it has been suggested that I am obsessed with Owen Jones by a much welcomed critic of an earlier post of this paper. However, I would have to argue and restate my point, that it is the Mainstream News Media (MNM) who are ‘obsessed’ with Jones. I am merely interested in their obsession with him, and the platform they give him to establish ‘subject position’ (please refer to the work of culture and media critic Stuart Hall 1932-2014), to shape political identity and with it shape left narrative, in the left/right political theatre we are seeing. The effect being that those with less critical faculties, those with less cynicism and skepticism for the power relations at the heart of the Nation State and its capacity to use the MNM to shape mass public perception, simply adopt Jones’ subject position, political identity and narrative, in what has become a culture of ‘copy and paste’ political identity. And indeed, in can be said that Tommy Robinson serves the same purpose on the right, his subject position, political identity and narrative potentially being adopted by the less critical. The comparison is solely based on their roles, wittingly or unwittingly in the political propaganda playing out in the Mainstream News Media.  

         Jones is on a payroll, most likely multiple, and it’s my suggestion given the way he has been issue hopping on command, like some pre-pubescent political court jester that he is most likely on the payroll of the British Secret Services, probably MI5 whose intelligence operations are widely known to be deeply embedded in the British mainstream media. Robinson certainly is. Jones and a litany of political media whores are employed not to engage in honest investigative journalism and debate, but instead to shape the narrative and thus the nation’s perspective in relation to the national, European and Global political agenda, with the focus right now being the European Union. In the wake of Mays commons rejected deal and long before, the name of the game has been to destroy any consensus in the UK to leave the European Union, and this is why we have seen in the past fortnight these platforms outside parliament used to parade a so called ‘Far Right’ who are framed as Brexit supporters, and thus creating a connection and/or association between ‘Far Right’ perspectives and a skepticism or rejection of centralized European control through the super state of the European Union. Please allow me to digress for a moment to discuss why such an operation is taking place, and why our own state (not mine) is complicit, as I briefly discuss the European Union and Global Government.

The European Union: History, Objectives and Process

         As professor of political geography John Rennie Short (1993, P62-67) discusses in the 2nd Edition of his Introduction to Political Geography, Europe was in terrible shape after the 2nd World War, battered from a war funded by US capital, with many of the individual European countries involved now facing bankruptcy. The political project that was to come, born out of the OEEC, OECD and NATO, was indeed the brainchild of US political and economic strategy, as the USA emerged out of this period as the new global political superpower. One must note and remember at this juncture, whilst the British State may have been economically and politically weakened, its monarchy, which heads the state, and was connected to the German Nazi party retained its wealth and power. Returning back to the European project, as Short (1993, p63) documents, the OEEC  drawn up by the USA was concerned with maintaining peace and co-operation within Europe, but this was secondary to and necessary only for the USA’s real objective, that of resuscitating (and thus indebting) European Economies , and establishing a European trading block. The beginning one may argue of the real consolidation of wealth into the few hands that hold it today, and the projects of increased national and societal debt. Later, in 1958 the European Economic Community (EEC) was established, bringing with it the common market and the free movement of capital, goods and people – or as we would later be referred to as ‘human resources’. Then in 1992 the single market was established - furthering internal economic control, in 1993 the Maastricht Treaty  brought in a single currency and tighter control over sovereign states security and foreign policy, greater restrictions  and centralizing of power coming  again in 2009 with the Lisbon treaty, essentially creating European Law and a European constitution.

     I hope you can see with this trajectory, that the European Union is a political and economic project of Western financial power spearheaded by the USA, one that has used the union of European Nation States as a means of consolidating its wealth, and as by result of its trajectory, and ultimately its overarching objective, has replaced the sovereign nation state with a European Super-state. The state lest we forget has long been merely an administrative system for established national power – monarchical, aristocratic and financial, operating as a ‘so called’ democratic body. Indeed, we as a nation have never and will never be able to influence the mechanics and objectives of the European Union, this is solely left to the ‘European Commission’ (EU,2019), a body of 28 unelected, yes unelected, officials, or if you would prefer to put it another way, self-appointed officials presiding over our future (in material terms at least!). Now, we can send our delegates over to Brussels (like we did with the New Right’s political saviour and supposed anti-globalist Nigel Farage), to put forward our desires and ideas, our likes and dislikes, but this process is merely a pan European Political Pantomime, attempting to imitate a European Democracy. In fact the reality of the ‘European Commission’ headed by the fat necked, red faced piss pot that is Claude Juncker, is that it is  the utter inversion of democratic process, it is more akin to a ‘European House of Lords’ (albeit collectively less wrinkled!) who are there to  protect the interests of the global project. It is through ‘The Commission’ that all national European ‘democratic delusions’ must pass, and thus it becomes a sort of last stop for these delusions, they are noted but ignored, as they do not fit with the Global political project that the European Union is an important part of and stepping stone to. Even the political super villain that was Margaret Thatcher, surely one of the greatest actors to ever grace the stage of political theatre (personally I would have given her an Oscar for every year she was in Office!), eventually saw first-hand what the European Union really was, an undemocratic Super State (Thatcher, 2017). Indeed, in the late 1980’s it can be said that there was cross party skepticism of the European project, as in the form of Tony Benn Labour and the left had one of the European Union’s fiercest critics. However, he was sidelined, as was Thatcher (replaced by Major), no doubt for their positions, with Labour choosing instead the then luke-warm Europhile Neil Kinnock, followed by the boiling hot Europhile Tony Blair, and so with time the skepticism and dangers of the European Union as a Super State receded.

The United Nations and Global Governance

     In addition to the project of the European Union, we have the United Nations, another pack of un-elected or if you prefer self-appointed delegates working in the interest of global finance. The UN in its own words is “an international organization founded in 1945.  It is currently made up of 193 Member States… . . .that brings together its  member states to confront common challenges, manage shared responsibilities”(UN,2019). The UN was another post 2nd world war large scale trans national political project, that has long been concerned with implementing through political coercion and sleight of hand the agenda of global finance. The UN have since their inception been controlling trade and development around the globe with the setting of the UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) and pivotally in 1974 working to establish a ‘New International Economic Order’ (Short, 1993, p32). However, their most integral contribution to the project of global governance is the official UN Agenda 21 (UN,1992), and Agenda 30 documents (UN,2015), which claim to be concerned with a sustainable global future, but which go far beyond ecological concern into the realm of large scale global human and resource control, Agenda 2030 is especially revealing  (and sinister) in its desire to control the human experience. Indeed, these documents outline the need for its guidelines to be implemented at a local and not national government level by its member states, to ensure no doubt, that its more questionable at best, and extremely sinister at worst, guidelines do not enter into the public consciousness through national political debate. Furthermore, they are documents that have pretty much been ignored by the Mainstream New Media – to be expected really, with the hopefully soon to be out of print shit rag of the progressive left, the guardian claiming it to be a loose and benign set of guidelines, that has merely stirred the interest of ‘conspiracy theorists. Ha! Well if the sustainable smart cities that we have seen constructed across the West (and China), sort of urban high-rise digital concentration camps, soon to be augmented by the introduction of the ‘extremely dangerous’– words of 350 scientists who have collectivized against its roll out, are invisible to you in the UK, from London to Manchester, Liverpool to Bristol, then you should really visit your local opticians, or if you listen to the ‘conspiracy theorists’, check your wrist and neck for a microchip!

The EU Referendum: The Vote That Keeps on Giving

     Now, before returning to the current political narrative of a growing ‘Far Right’ led by its leading man, the cherub faced Marxist Owen Jones (I’m sure you’re a nice chap Owen, just lost like so many others, in a sea of political and mass media filth), I’d like to talk about the other political advantages of holding a (now increasingly unlikely) once in a generation vote, the great 2016 referendum on the UK’s membership to the European Union, that has resulted in the ongoing political theatre we call ‘BREXIT’! I did not vote in the Referendum, as I believed then, just as I believe now that the Establishments decision (and it was an establishment decision) to offer a so called people’s vote, had a number of other – national and geo political motives. Firstly, one must remember that this decision came in the wake of what should have been a watershed moment in British political and cultural history, the establishment pedophile scandal, that had the ‘Knighted by the Queen’ Sir Jimmy Saville at its centre, a man who held frequent company with, and had very close ties to, our lovely and benign Monarchy, and the ‘servants of the people’ our political elite. Are we to really believe that a man who was welcomed in to these closed circles and elite institutions had not been vetted by British Secret Services? Really? Are we to believe that? The Monarchy and political establishment knew then as they know now who Saville was and what he was involved in. Indeed, our Secret Services and intelligence agencies are the most far reaching, well connected and sophisticated on the entire planet (think of GCHQ, MI5, MI6, and include Canada, Australia and other former commonwealth countries, that are still controlled behind the scenes by British power and finance). Nevertheless, the Establishment paedophile scandal and subsequent piecemeal, toothless and repeatedly derailed public inquiry have long been forgotten in the wake of the all-consuming Brexit, by both the complicit Mainstream News Media and in the minds of the collective public. In addition, we all but ignored the information presented in the Chillcott Inquiry, documenting the illegal and unjust (there has never really been a just war) war that the State waged in Iraq, which should have seen the Fabien fuckwit Tony Blair tried for War Crimes, but has since seen him somehow exonerated for his role, and placed at the forefront of the European and Global political propaganda machine, rolled out to sway public opinion, just as other European and global governance enthusiasts, like Michael Hesseltine and John Major have (you’ve all served your purpose, so please shut up and fuck off back to the Cotswold’s, where I’m sure you can arse rape a fox with impunity, or fuck a pigs head until you heart’s content!). It is a form of what can be considered ‘Effective Governance’, it uses the state apparatus – in this case a referendum to divert public attention, or redirect flak, and it drags out process slowly, ever so slowly, so to ensure that we have collectively moved on from any events or uncovering’s that are potentially damaging to the Established power in question.

     Ultimately, the result of the Referendum vote was irrelevant to the long term geo-political plan, whatever the outcome the National, European and Global power co-operating in the construction of this potential (if not already actual) Global prison could use the result to their advantage, and ultimately reach their objective. A vote to remain would have taken us to where the aforementioned power desired us to go, straight into a seemingly final tie with the European Union, and thus further down the line connecting with the other political zones that have been and are being formed. A vote to leave, as we supposedly got however opened up a myriad of national political and trans-national political possibilities, such as those I have just discussed and those that we have seen. It increased the capacity to divert all attention away from National Austerity – which we should not forget was the result of the European Union’s Maastricht criteria, calculations of government debt and budget deficits against GDP, in the wake of the 2008 Financial Crash (The European Institute, 2019). Indeed, this is the lunacy of the Labour supporting progressive left, they perpetually demonstrate and march against Austerity, yet they (in the main) are seeking a 2nd referendum and realignment with the very institution whose Fiscal Policy proposed our National Austerity Programme. In relation to this, political and social debate also been diverted away from addressing the growing homelessness crisis, and paradoxically the continued building and implementation of Smart Cities (Neo Yuppie Penthouses doubling up as sky rise digital prisons) at a time of austerity. In addition, there has been the globalist attack on Syria and the migrant crisis that have been reported but relatively skimmed over, we have also had an absolute explosion of mental health diagnosis, here and across the west, alongside the criminally ignored dangers of Vaccinations, Artificial Intelligence and the soon to be implemented and scientist labelled highly dangerous 5G technology (5G Appeal, 2017), and on and on and on. It is no coincidence that such important issues have taken a back seat to the political doublespeak of our vapid and deceitful public servants perpetually discussing Brexit, alongside propaganda straw figures such as Owen Jones and Tommy Robinson et al.

Brexit, The EU and the road to Global Governance

     Indeed, when political power on behalf of its Royal and Financial seniors, offer something like the European referendum vote, it is not to hand power to the people (these people see you as a human resource to ‘debt the fuck out of’ – see Baudrillard’s brilliant Debt Economy) so we can decide our own destiny, or to adhere to the tenets of democracy (talk of a 2nd Referendum Vote all but undermines this greatest of political fallacies), but instead to further the agenda of the established national and global power structure towards  Global Governance. Global Governance I hear you say, New World Order? Sounds like ‘Conspiracy Theorist’ stuff to me mate! Well, as Professor John Rennie Short (1993, p52/53) points out, “In 1990-1 a new term was heard in International diplomatic circles: The New World Order. Like all ‘new’ terms it was not that new, as politicians have been predicting a New World Order for at least a couple of centuries”. Surely not you say, a couple of centuries? Well, think on it, we are willing to accept, and seemingly happy to digest the fact that the worlds wealth has slowly been concentrated into the hands of the elusive 1% (I really hate the phrase), yet we seem completely unwilling to accept that this concentration of wealth, and with it power, influence and control, may have risen from meticulous long term planning, using all the state and financial institutions available by a global elite based in Monarchies and Finance banking. Was it chance? Pure luck then? Please, if you believe we are where we are by an unplanned set of random events, happenings and accidents, then I worry for you, and where you ignorance and naiveté may lead you and others like you. Ultimately the referendum was handed to the people (and if power ever hands you anything be very suspicious!) to take us, the British State and all other European Nation States trapped in the undemocratic European Union into the next phase of the Global Governance project, or as  global politicians and diplomats have themselves referred to it as, The New World Order or the even more sinister Global Village. It puts to bed the EU question in Britain and it also acts to send an emphatic message to all other European Countries where there may be a rightfully placed distrust of the European super state, attempt to leave and we will financially destroy you, offering you a deal so bad you will be economically in a worse place than before, and as we are now seeing, we will ultimately gain control of you by your own consent.

The ‘Far Right’, Manufacturing Consent and the Fascist Reality of the Nation State

     I would like to repeat once again, the assertions by a mainstream media that the ‘Far Right’ is on the rise in the UK is pure political propaganda  and shaping of collective public perception to manufacture our consent for their global political project. It is the politics of fear from a mainstream who are increasingly shifting towards the political left – “only our support for a progressive liberal left government united with our European comrades can stop this Fascist rise”. However, evidence of this Far Right rise, is not, to me anyway, visible or tangible in Manchester where I live, and have always lived. I just don’t see it. I do see Owen Jones and Anna Soubry being attacked on the new Broadcast Hubs of Mainstream Media, by what to me looks like a ‘hired in’ pack of supposedly Brexit supporting Far Right protestors. By making the connection on Mainstream News Media between Brexit voters and Far Right Fascists, the powers that be are shaping the narrative, and public perception, as well as risking the increase of serious societal division and prejudice. Only weeks ago a similar objective was sought when the Mossad funded, British Secret Service operative Tommy Robinson (not his real name, but hey, marks for such a British moniker!) it was widely reported was joining Ukip, the party who we’re told propelled us into the leave vote, led by Nigel Farage and who have repeatedly been accused of being Right Wing. As a result of these falsified connections, there would have undoubtedly been left in the minds of all of those who voted to leave on the (completely reasonable) grounds of the impact that unfettered migration has had on our public services, most notably the strain on GP and NHS services, alongside school places, unemployment, housing, and in the minds of all those who own small businesses, whose growth ‘is’ restricted by EU regulations, an instant sense of fear that they are now being unjustly grouped in with, or labelled as ‘Far Right’. It is classic group psychological manipulation, it has created an ‘undesirable’ sub-group linked unjustly by association to leave voters, and thus has generated the power to produce conformity in large numbers to the desirable position of remain. It is straight of the Tavistock Institute of social engineering. The current media melee down at Parliament Square is precisely an exercise in shaping public perception, it is established power seeking the public’s consent - by means of fear, fear of being labelled a ‘fascist’ and not through autonomous informed choice - for closer alignment to a European and in turn Global Government. The Ultimate form of centralized power that has openly been discussed by diplomats, financial power and monarchies for decades now, if not centuries.

     I have seen the ‘Far Right’, marching in Manchester a few years ago now under the moniker the English Defense League, they were, and still are if the BBC footage can be trusted, a bunch of toothless, amphetamine addled, bomber jacket wearing clichés (equally as lost in some collective political identity as the new progressive left) from some of England’s most disenfranchised provincial towns. I don’t despise them, just as I don’t despise the new left, I feel sorry for them, how they have been called to service by their masters and played their required role, pawns in a game of a continuing political, financial and now ever more technocratic agenda. The mainstream news media and Jones’ repeated assertions that the ‘Far Right’ in England is gaining support and momentum is at best an over exaggeration and at worst, further evidence of national State propaganda through the corrupted mouthpiece that is the mainstream news media. However, as I have just stated, the idea that a real ground level ‘Far Right’ is capable of organizing itself into a tangible political Body that will appeal to Britain’s electorate, and thus steal the reign’s of power from the two main parties in our undemocratic political system is absolute nonsense, absurdity personified, utter bollox. I imagine they could collectively barely organize a sock drawer. The only way that these extremely fringe views could ever perceivably be consolidated into some tangible organization, and galvanize support  is with the help of British Secret Services, and historically they have been, not to steal the reins of power, but to once again manage public perception and manufacture political consent.  

         The real farcical nature of all this and the revealing of its true motives come when you examine the new progressive left’s and Jones’ position on how to deal with a supposedly authentic, rising and politically charged ‘Far Right’. They, headed by their self-appointed Guru Jones and assisted extensively by his and the New Lefts access to Mainstream Media platforms, is to deny the ‘Far Right’ a platform (although as discussed it has been given one in very suspicious circumstances through these broadcast hubs at Parliament square), and to deny this groups right to freedom of speech. Through this very act of proposed censorship, we are seeing an attack on the Freedom of speech. Now I do not agree, with the stereotypical views that have long been associated with the Far Right, but I will, yes I will, defend its right to freedom of speech, because I too value my right to freedom of speech, and I understand that if you do not defend the right to freedom of speech for all then there is no such thing. This position of attempting to deny the right for this supposed rising ‘Far Right’ to have its voice heard, is an idiotic and dangerous one to take, and here’s why I believe it to be such. At a basic psychological and philosophical level, at the micro subjective level of the shadow self and at the macro level of the collective shadow, one, or we, must never deny the reality of darkness. Just as we must face the light we must face the dark, for it is the only way to individual and collective consciousness evolution. The danger is that if we collectively deny this shadow (if we are to believe that this fascist Right is authentic) then it will no doubt fester and grow in the shadows. For all shadow or darkness not faced down by the individual or the collective, will eventually come screaming out of the unconscious, for we are all one, and we must deal with the shadow as such. Indeed Carl Gustav Jung 1875-1961 writing on these concepts and the archetypes that must wrestle with them (2001, p156) comments “A consciousness sharpened by experience knows the catastrophic consequences that disregard of this entails for the individual as well as the society”. Thus, drag it into the light, make it visible, face it and diminish its power. The irony here is this, that there is nothing more fascist than the nation state, the framework in which all of this is taking place, aided by its media. Can you think of any greater form of fascism than one which wages wars, builds arms, kills millions on foreign soil, sends its own youth to death in battle, imprisons for profit, surveils its people, drugs entire populations, indoctrinates instead of educates? We have been living under fascism for decades if not centuries, it is only that we are too comfortable under the system of sense pleasure reward it has created for us that we tolerate it. Indeed, by actively engaging with this political machinery, either by voting, joining or canvassing for any political party, you are supporting a system of tyranny and albeit indirectly, supporting all of the above abuses and thus breaking natural law. Greater still is the geo political financially backed march towards global governance, that the European union is a bridge to that if most terrifying, surely a global super state is the apex of fascist possibility, and one that we are sleepwalking into the final stages of, and by engaging with the political machinery you are actively supporting it.

     Let me state again, as it truly needs it, the events that we are seeing unfold in Brussels and Westminster are not the levers of democracy in motion, but instead the institutions of national and global, political, financial and monarchical power shaping the minds and material realities of the mass public, to manufacture our consent, as they lead us from A to B in a manner which on the surface presents democracy in action. Again, British Secret Services are not merely employed to counteract Terrorism as the official narrative goes, far from it, they have long been deployed to surveille their own people, infiltrate and control the mass media and to employ or compromise those with considerable influence, from politicians to authors to musicians, from Tony Blair to Owen Jones to Russell Brand (remember that slimy momentarily ‘new age’ sex pest!), they all have a price or a skeleton in the closet. The current level of political theatre surrounding Brexit at Parliament square is just the ratcheting up of public perception shaping, it is the collusion of the political establishment, the mainstream media and British secret services. It is the leading of the public to conclusions and opinions which secure their position, it is an exercise in how to obtain hegemony through deceit. I am afraid dear reader, it is once again working a treat.

National and European Political Structure: A Conflict of Interests and Lack of Accountability

         We have seen with Brexit, the hardening of Political Identities and increased conformity to them by the general public, positions with deeper divisions than ever before between them, all reinforced by the mainstream news media, political rhetoric and even commercial marketing. We have been individually and collectively psychologically kettled into position by these institutions in the most nefarious of manners. As Thomas Paine rightfully (1776, p5) observed many moons ago “government is at best a necessary evil”, so the idea that collectively we would seek to add another layer of governance to the already compromised and corrupted one we have in Westminster is to this writer anyway, is some form of collectively confused madness and a gross rejection of the greatest virtue of all, freedom. It is proof enough to me that our perceptions, thoughts and actions as a society, are truly not our own. My position is this, and I have already stated I hold no hope in political systems or arms of the state for change, I hold these institutions in contempt, and have as little to do with them as I possibly can (save for examining them and understanding them). Unless you remove the unelected layer of centralized governance that is the EU, you will never truly be able to hold Westminster to account. It will always be able to excuse its actions or non-actions by claiming that it is hampered by EU regulations, which in the coming years will no doubt become all-consuming for the Nation States involved. However, if you remove it (I hold no hope that this is actually possible) then at least you can point the finger solely at your own (not mine) Nation State, one that you must not forget has historically repeatedly lied to you on behalf of those who it really serves, but at least one where you can elect those who are involved to some degree in the passing of legislation, unlike the EU. No body politic should be unelected, nor should it be unaccountable, yet the EU and its globalist big brother the UN are exactly that. Even if we left the EU on WTO rules (the obvious thing to do!), paying the EU nothing in severance and instead investing the saved severance package in the democratically savaged NHS, we would still be faced with a political system unfit (as it always has been) to serve the public. Our Westminster model works on behalf of and answers to The Queen, and thus the Monarchy as a whole, its connected aristocracy, and finance , most notably The City of London (the trading district – not London). Anyone who believes that the British Empire’s (headed by our Monarchy) power, control, influence and wealth diminished long ago, I suggest you they watch The Spiders Web: Britains Second Empire by Michael Oswald (Oswald, 2018) or read Nicholas Shaxson's book Treasure Islands. The British Monarchy and its Empire merely transformed its wealth and power into more esoteric form, but that is something to be discussed at another time. I predict that one of two things will happen. First, the whole political theatre will be dragged out until the death, extracting as much political attention out of the whole saga as possible, keeping the public’s attention for as long as possible, then, eventually we will have a 2nd Referendum and the UK will vote to remain in the European Union. The second possibility is exactly the same as the first, except once all of the political propaganda has been squeezed out of the process, we will have a deal that see’s the UK leave the EU in name only.  

The Reality of Political Participation and the Politics of Purpose and Self-hood

          Change, real change, not change engineered by the vested interests of established power through institutions such as the Tavistock Institute, or more openly party political affiliated groups such as Momentum (towards what I ask?), or lest we forget the Mainstream Media and Culture machines, will come with the evolution of consciousness, of knowledge, of self-understanding in individuals, one by one, and the sharing of this knowledge, the change will be internal and as a result reflected externally. All other work then, other than the evolution of the self and the sharing of self-knowledge, a knowledge which takes in our connectedness to all consciousness, encompassing all nature and beyond can be seen as useless toil. Indeed, all other work may be understood as work we are doing on behalf of our unjust masters, and thus the work of our own domination and enslavement. For the system of mass consciousness control with politics at its beating heart is vampyric in nature. As the Psychoanalyst and Social Psychologist Erich Fromm 1900-80 (2001, p112) points out “like the effect of advertising on the consumer, the methods of political propaganda tend to increase the feeling of insignificance in the voter… . . . Confronted with the power and size of the parties as demonstrated in their propaganda, the individual voter cannot help feeling small and of little significance”.  Indeed, it drains us of our natural internal energy, it robs us of our creative potential, it engineers self-loathing and it implements a framework of psychic subordination within us, one where we are always less, and never as we should be, that being equal and free to enjoy the magnificent subjective sensory experience of consciousness. Instead we have our consciousness’ reduced to shouting and screaming at one another based on manufactured political identities, or material identities in general, we are left watching change agents such as Tommy Robinson on the so called ‘Right’, and his equal on the so called left Owen Jones vie for our attention. We, in our ‘mugged off’ state of consciousness end up screaming and shouting in support or contempt of these ‘straw figures’, who are merely agents of the state, employed to shape our perceptions and manufacture our consent. One should only ever engage with such a 3rd rate pantomime, to recognize it as such, and acquaint oneself with the mechanisms and processes that propaganda machines employ. Any other type of engagement must surely be in ignorance, delusion or willing self-deception, positions I have no sympathy for. Either that, or as Erich Fromm (2002, p112) also points out, political propaganda can seduce the individuals desire to appear intellectual “All of this does not mean that advertising and political propaganda overtly stress the individual’s insignificance. Quite the contrary; they flatter the individual by making him appear important, and by pretending to appeal to his critical judgement, to his sense of discrimination. But these pretences are essentially a method to dull the individual’s suspicions and to help him fool himself as to the individual character of his decision”. Something I would like you to bear in mind as we move on.  

         In addition and in relation especially to my peer group and the younger generations, any notion that the ‘Red Team’ - The Labour Party will either lead us to a collectively better place or be a ‘stepping stone’ (Marxist clap trap on the use of the state apparatus as a phase towards freedom!) to a collectively better place, are without doubt to my mind delusional, and if I didn’t understand the depraved, sinister and futile field of Pharmacology so well, I would suggest you go to see a psychiatrist. For let me put in the terms of ‘the common’ of which I belong. Whether Manchester United or Manchester City win the Premier League is ultimately irrelevant, as the real winner in this domain will always be the Trans National Corporation that is SKY, or if we refer back to the political domain, the established Monarchical and Financial power it serves. For this my friends, is how the game was constructed to be. Even academics are now (belatedly I might add) conceding to the illusion that democracy is, with the term ‘post democracy’. I would have to argue that we have never really experienced democracy in the UK at all given its conflict of interests (Paine,1776), and furthermore, global governance as is esoterically handed out by the UN and the unelected European Union are obvious examples of governance without even the illusion of consent. Yet we still, like a grieving widow, unwilling to accept her husband’s death, cling to the notion that democracy is alive and well. Furthermore, to my peers and anyone caught up in this political hyper reality, ask yourself this. Are you wanting to change, shape, control and master the material world, the political realm and all of its influence based upon your political identities doctrine of ‘the good’? Then surely you must first be able to shape, control and master you own mind and consciousness? Have you? I know I haven’t. I am not advocating silence here, but instead the communication and sharing of knowledge outside of institutional contexts, free from their restrictions and power relations, where knowledge can lead you where it may. As I have previously stated, change can only come through the development of self-hood, with the understanding of the conscious and unconscious self, for this manifests in the collective, every other preoccupation for all intents and purposes is a diversion. Why then you may ask, am I even writing this essay at all? Well, as I have stated I do not care for party politics, nor the British State (both of my parents are Irish Republicans, my grandfather fought as a member of the Irish Republican Army against British State Occupation, and I am a 2nd Generation Irish Immigrant), but I do care for personal freedom, the right to autonomous thought and the right to self-sovereignty, all in relation to natural law (a law that forbids the infliction of pain and suffering, mental or physical on any other being). And I also believe, as I think this piece has brought to light, that these aforementioned values are under serious threat from global political forces and financial power, who are more and more shaping our reality and human experience. However, one must remember that in times of grave political, cultural and ever increasingly technological deception, that ‘power’ in all its guises from the micro individual to the macro systemic, only has the power that we give it. Indeed, it is power (through wealth accumulation) that has been amassed through our engagement with politics and the economic market, and that is simply the reality of it. Furthermore, this Global structure and its political machinery can never give us what is already ours, that being the freedom of both thought and expression, but it can my friends, as it is attempting to do, take those freedoms away.

Written by Michael O’Neill 23/01/2019

(Notes from the Margins)

References

Chomsky, Noam & Herman, Edward S, 1995, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, Vintage

EU, 2019, https://europa.eu/european-union/index_en

EU, 2019, https://europa.eu/european-union/eu-law/decision-making/procedures_en

The European Institute, 2019, https://www.europeaninstitute.org/index.php/112-european-affairs/special-g-20-issue-on-financial-reform/1180-austerity-measures-in-the-eu

Fromm, Erich, 2002, The Fear of Freedom, Routledge Taylor and Francis Group

Jung, Carl Gustav, 2001, On the Nature of the Psyche, Routledge

Oswald, Michael, 2018, The Spider's Web: Britain's Second Empire, Patreon, Accessed via Youtube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=np_ylvc8Zj8

Paine, Thomas, 1776, Reprint 2004 – Common Sense, The Penguin Group

Short, John Rennie, 1993, An Introduction to Political Geography, Routledge

Thatcher, Margaret, 2017, On Europe, Harper Collins Publishers

UN, 2019, http://www.un.org/en/index.html

UN, 2019, https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/milestones/unced/agenda21

UN, 1992, https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/Agenda21.pdf

UN, 2015, https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/21252030%20Agenda%20for%20Sustainable%20Development%20web.pdf

5G Appeal, 2017, https://ehtrust.org/wp-content/uploads/Scientist-5G-appeal-2017.pdf?fbclid=IwAR1KaWdcnbtR2pYrHriBhzWfvcfzRAgfUR8SWiaogxcrRA5P9WHJi77hGyM

[sol1056]

(3/3)his brings me to the question of how much the Galra people even know is going on? Zarkon is TEN THOUSAND+ years old. he's probs like a god to his people. how do the deal with his death? how terrified are they of Voltron now? i feel like the 'victory or death' is the only reason the Galran commanders aren't surrendering to voltron. i mean i guess the writers realized they couldn't kill the entire Galran empire and made Lotor the ruler, but its the general Galran population i keep thinking of

This is a crucial aspect of worldbuilding: other people exist. It’s another form of empathy, in a way. Even if they’re just people on the street, they will have an opinion, whether good bad or indifferent. 

Way back in S3, I was already frustrated with the opening scene where Blue and Yellow sweep in – with the Marmora – and apparently free an entire planet by taking out one military base? It wasn’t clear. What was clear was that a) it didn’t look like the people themselves were doing anything, and b) everyone was, apparently fine with passively being freed. Well, until they decided to complain because they hadn’t gotten the entire giant robot show. 

me:

There is no such thing as an amicable split when a civilian population is involved. Some would welcome their new overlords, but some percentage – rarely the majority, but always much louder – who want one or more of the following: no more overlords, the excuse to wreak havoc on their neighbors, to take advantage of the chaos to make it worse, the chance to shoot anyone who looks at them funny, or just to run around in a panic. This will bring out some of the first group in defense or retaliation. Expect riots, fighting in the streets, and if there’s a local/native militia, also some firefights or bombings.

After that, a third group would also be unhappy but moving quickly to ingratiate themselves with the new regime. They were doing just fine under the old overlords, and the last thing they want is a democratic government that might punish them for their lovely corruption. That third group – we call them collaborators – are the most likely to take over power in the wake of such an event, because they’ve got the resources stockpiled from years of cooperating with the old overlords. 

Some amount of the first two groups are then going to turn around and riot again, this time in protest of allowing collaborators to remain in charge, with the system basically unchanged except for the colors on the flag, at best. That usually prompts martial law, and serious clamp-downs, and next thing you know, the new political system (if things don’t hop right to dictatorship) might look democratic but the cards will be stacked against anyone but the collaborators being in power. 

Historical case in point: after the US ended its administration in South Korea, in 1948, there were five Republics. The first was autocratic, and collapsed in 1960. The second pretended to be democratic and slid into autocratic military rule, collapsing after a year. After three years of military rule, the Third, Fourth, and Fifth said they were democratic, but were mostly more of the same. South Korea didn’t achieve a stable and functioning democracy until 1987. In short, it took South Korea 39 years to recover from war preceded by occupation preceded by the fall of its monarchy. 

Second historical case in point: same deal, but this time Taiwan. In 1949, the KMT relocated to Taiwan as its last stand against the PRC. It also declared martial law, and that order was not lifted until 1987, and for  38 years that order was used to keep the populace down, silenced, and unable to do a damn thing about the KMT comfortably ensconced in power. In this case, it was a reformist president who started introducing policies that reversed a lot of the KMT’s previous stances. The process of democratization still took over a decade. 

Empires do not go down easy. Collaborators who benefited from the previous systems do not go down easy. In any system – including colonial, occupied or left at arm’s length – there will be people who benefited enough that their lives weren’t all that bad, people who benefited enough that change will end their cushy existence, and people who’ve been ground under the heels of the previous two. All of them will have something to say about any new regime, and none of it’s going down easy. 

And that’s just a single planet. When Zarkon died – or even just fell off the radar for too long, leaving some unknown kid as emperor pro tem – some chunk of the populace should’ve broken into panic. Maybe in isolated spots, but it’d grow, calm, rouse up again. When Zarkon died for reals, the only way you’d get relative easy change is if the people have been through it at semi-regular intervals, enough to know it’s not the end. But Zarkon’s ruled for 10K years, which means (well, we assume, who knows how long Galra actually live) this might be the first time there’s been anything like this in living memory. 

The only thing VLD got right was the dissolution into factions. What it missed is that this will happen at all levels, from those high-up generals battling it out in space, to people on the street, trying to take back (or keep hold of) whatever power or goods they possess. Basically, the entire empire should’ve exploded into a shit storm the likes of which have never been seen before and never would, since. Utter chaos, dogs and cats, living in sin, the whole nine yards. 

And from there, Voltron could’ve made its merry way along, working with the rebels, picking off one planet after the next. Of course, there’s a huge risk that the so-called leaders who come out to greet Voltron are actually collaborators looking to stay on top of the system – who in turn will go autocratic to make sure they stay there – and that’s how it’ll stay for a decade, two, or longer. Voltron will have freed the planet from one overlord, and abandoned its people to the despotic rule of the next one.  

I can hear some of you already protesting that’s too much for a children’s show. Maybe it is – but in that case, don’t write a goddamn war story as the basis of your children’s show. Do a story about a bowling team or something. But war is not pretty, and it’s not bloodless, and sometimes, no one wins. 

[you-guys--are-losers]

Lost Enough

Summary: Junior year has just begun, and MJ is more excited to get back to school than she would care to admit. She may act like she hates school, and she does regularly protest the corruption of the American education system, but going to school gets her out of the house and gives her something to focus on... And occasionally, someone, though she would not admit it if someone held a gun to her head. Slowly but surely, MJ finds herself drifting closer to Ned Leeds and Peter Parker outside of decathlon, even though they’re total losers and she definitely isn’t at all flattered when they start inviting her to things. MJ is hoping that maybe this friendship will finally strangle the lingering obsession thing she’s had for Peter for a while, but it only seems to intensify as the pair forms a fairly unlikely and dysfunctional friendship. However, MJ’s whole world is turned upside down when she manages to catch Spider-Man off guard-- and maybe blackmails him a little. With the promise of an exclusive interview after Spider-Man manages to expose the cause of a series of child abductions, MJ finds herself more involved in the superhero-ing than either of them expected. But they can’t continue this treacherous game forever without someone getting hurt, especially with MJ’s suspicions about Spider-Man’s identity becoming stronger and stronger.

Word Count: 2,281

Warnings: Swearing, MJ being a Problematic Fave™

So, blackmailing the Spider-Man is a lot easier than it should be.

MJ stares up at the figure above her as he quickly peers from side to side, trying to see if there is any way out of his situation. She can hear him muttering under his breath. MJ focuses on listening, grateful for the particular knack for eavesdropping she possesses as an aspiring journalist. If it were not for her keener than average ears, she would not be able to make out, "Karen, initiate... Voice distortion... Software."

"Something you'd like to share with the class?"

The Spider-Man stiffens at the sound of her voice, and his head turns sharply to look at her.

"Okay, okay, so here's what we're gonna do," the hero begins. His voice is deep, much deeper than it was a moment ago. Granted, MJ could not have recognized much from a single expletive, but the change is drastic enough to be noticeable.

"What's with the Morgan Freeman thing you've got going on now?" MJ questions, arching an unimpressed eyebrow.

"Well. it's- wait, I don't sound like Morgan Freeman."

"I hate to break it to you, but you definitely sound like Morgan Freeman."

"The software wasn't designed to sound like Morgan Freeman!"

"Hmm, well, maybe I've got it wrong. You'll have to keep talking, maybe recite, I dunno, your age, address, secret identity-"

"Nice try."

"-the lines of every role played by Morgan Freeman-"

"Please, say Morgan Freeman one more time."

"Anything for you, Spider-Boy," MJ retorts. Anyone who does not know MJ would think she is just being standoffish. However, though she does not smile, there is a hint of a smirk on her lips and a glimmer of excitement in her dark irises.

Her reply seems to catch the Spider-Man off-guard. He blinks several times with those large, animated white eyes, and MJ's amusement only grows. She does not mind the moment to examine the hero further, taking in the suit and the way that the eyes seem to be mirroring whatever facial expressions are underneath. Yeah, the powers are one thing, but the suit is another... It means that Spider-Man somehow has access to extremely advanced tech, or he knows someone who does.

"You still with me?" she presses him.

"Huh? Oh, yeah," stammers the hero. She has to admit that the deepness of the voice combined with the hero's sentence structure is a bit strange. MJ decides he must be young, simply based on the way he talks. Another odd thing she notices is that he is always moving-- tapping the wall that he clings to with a finger, at the moment, until he stops in favor of slowly hopping down to stand in front of her. "Alright, so... You can have your interview, okay? I promise. But now is definitely not the time."

"See, that sounds great, except for the fact that once you leave I have no way of contacting you and you have every means of avoiding me," MJ replies, and there is no joking around now. All banter aside, MJ is a hound dog, and she is closing in on exactly what she wants. She needs a story, and if she is going to get that, she needs him.

The Spider-Man is making a strange expression, MJ can even tell through the mask. She is sure that if she took it off, she would see a grimace.

"Right..." he says slowly. "But that isn't going to be an issue, because... Um..." His mind is clearly whirring as he glances around the empty alleyway, almost as if he is turning to the dumpster beside them for ideas. "Oh, right!"

Before MJ has a chance to protest, her phone is being yanked from her grip by a thin stream of web. A startled, indignant exclamation leaves her lips, but the Spider-Man does not leave with her phone. Instead, he is typing in it-- punching in a number.

"There," he says, satisfied as he passed the phone back to MJ. She immediately snatches it back and checks to make sure he has not deleted the recording. If he has, she will have to ask one of the Midtown tech geeks to get the files back for her, and it will be quite a hassle to do that and still keep her independent reputation. "The number I put in your phone links to a burner I have. I'll text it within the next few days with a meeting place, alright? I promise. But seriously. This place isn't safe right now, and it's already almost nighttime."

MJ glances up at the sky, and her eyes widen in surprise. The masked hero is right. It isn't sunset, exactly, but it is the time of day where the sun's light comes down golden from a tilted angle, and shadows are beginning to lengthen. "Shit," she mumbles, brushing aside a lock of hair that is falling in her eyes. "I am gonna be so late for work."

"Work?" the hero says in surprise, and MJ quickly shoots him a glare.

"Yeah, I work. We don't all have time to be running around Queens in glorified red morph suits, some of us-"

"Glorified red morph suits?"

"-actually have to pay rent."

"Well, yeah, but... I mean, you're a kid."

"And yet I'm still taller than you," MJ hummed sweetly, shooting him a faux smile of serenity. "If I don't get a text on the burner in the next three days, I will post the footage online and have it edited into saying some stuff that you don't want the world hearing. I know people."

MJ is surprisingly good at editing video, to say the least. She has a reputation for it around Midtown after a particular video was posted of Principal Morita confessing his undying love for Flash Thompson. The original footage had come from a school news broadcast, but MJ had gotten creative. She will never actually doctor this footage, of course. Editing the footage and publishing it would be circulating false information, and MJ is of the strong opinion that a well-informed electorate is the key to a democracy. However, she is banking on the fact that Spider-Man does not know this.

And she is late, so she is a bit more sadistic than usual. "See ya later, Spider-Child."

"Spider-Man... W-wait, stop!" he exclaims.

MJ had been moving to leave, but she turns around to face him now. "What?"

"Look, this is big. Bigger than it looks, I think. And if you're going to get this story, I'll need your help, okay? I think it's a story that is going to need to be told. But this time, I'm going in alone. No other Avengers. And there are people that I could go to, but I need someone discreet, for help with analytics, all that. And I need to know that you'll back out, for your own safety, if I tell you to."

"And you're going to trust someone whose name you don't even know like that?" MJ hums, surprised. "Trusting a stranger could get you majorly screwed over someday."

"But you're not-" he stammers. MJ felt her own eyes widen, and he seems to realize his mistake.

"Not what?" she says slowly.

"You're not... Like... That," he finishes lamely.

"And you should be thankful for that." And then, before the Spider-Man can say anything else, MJ has turned to begin walking away. "Michelle. It's Michelle, Jones."

She leaves the Spider-Man struggling for a comeback in the alleyway.

The next day at school, MJ pays much less attention than she usually does, and that is saying something.

MJ is better at learning independently, so she usually spends class-time reading the material through herself and then waiting for the class to catch up while she sketches or reads her book. Today, however, MJ is clearly spacing out in Chemistry, not even bothering to look over her classwork. Instead, she is taking messy notes in what appears to be a legal pad. No one notices, and she trusts that no one will. They don't, until lunch.

MJ sits in her usual spot without anything but a bag of almonds in front of her. It is being largely ignored in favor of the notepad, but after a few moments, MJ feels a faint tickle in the back of her mind that tells her something is off, just a little bit, as though the scales of normalcy are slightly askew. It only takes her a few seconds to realize exactly what it is. Every day, MJ sits here while Parker and Leeds jabber about something nerdy and she tunes it out. Today, there isn't anything to tune out, so MJ looks up and finds that her eyes meet immediately with those of Leeds and Parker, both of whom are staring at her like she is currently growing another head.

"Can I help you?" MJ draws out, giving both a glance that is somewhere between annoyed and expectant as she arches an eyebrow.

"Well, um, it's just-" Leeds stammers, his eyes wide and fearful. He glances over at Parker, who looks equally flustered. MJ's heart skips a beat as she catches a glimpse of the boy with the messy brown curls and the wide, startled eyes.

Is that an arrhythmia? She's going to have to get that checked out.

"N-Normally, right, we sit here," Parker starts, gesturing to their table.

"Riveting," MJ deadpans, but before she can turn back to her book, he is talking again.

"No, no, so we're talking, right, and then you always, you know..." He is fumbling for words, and MJ can practically see the gears turning in that brain of his, the one that she can't understand because it somehow is only capable of seeing good.

"Interrupt," Ned finishes. His eyes shoot open wide when MJ shoots him a glare, and then he is stammering again. "N-no, wait, it isn't exactly interrupting, I mean... You normally just sarcasm at us from over there."

"I sarcasm at you," MJ repeats, her other eyebrow shooting up to join its partner the search for her hairline.

"From... over... there..." Ned mumbles. He looks genuinely afraid for his life.

"Not that we mind," Parker interjects, and when MJ looks at him she is extremely grateful for the fact that she doesn't blush. If any other girl were looked at that way, with the dark, round puppy eyes, they would probably just be a puddle on the floor. How the hell was Liz immune to this kid?

She wasn't MJ reminded herself as a pang shot through her chest.

"Yeah, of course not," Ned fumbles. "I mean, your rants about feminism, and the Sokovia accords, and... everything..." Peter shoots him a look that says danger, and Ned quickly pushes forward. "I mean, they're the reason I'm passing history."

"And you know more trivia about Fantasy movies than either of us combined, so it's not like we mind. But you aren't doing it today," of Parker finished.

"It's not like I care what happens in Hollywood," she mutters, looking back down at her notepad. "Celebrities are images of perfection used to entice taxpayers to give their hard-earned money over to the entertainment industry."

"Right..." Peter says slowly.

MJ stares at the both of them for a minute, and then she decides to do something incredibly stupid.

"Tom Felton's pockets had to be sewn shut to keep him from sneaking food on-set during The Prisoner of Azkaban."

"No way, really?" Ned chortles as he moves down to MJ's side of the table, bringing his homemade lunch with him. Peter scoots down to, leaning over on his elbow as he pops a slightly-charred cookie in his mouth. "Malfoy's my new favorite."

"So I've heard that Rowling personally gave Evanna Lynch her role as Luna Lovegood, is that true?" Parker asks earnestly. Part of her knows that he is only trying to keep her talking.

The other part of her doesn't care.

The question about the actress immediately plunges them into an in-depth discussion about how the cast of Harry Potter are essentially the same people as their characters, punctuated with MJ's sarcastic quips and slightly unsure pauses when MJ plunges to an end of the current conversation, only for Peter to pick up a new one. and then lunch somehow ends way sooner than it normally does. By the time it is over, MJ has somehow accepted an invitation over to Peter's house to marathon the movies the following night, which is a Friday.

MJ walks out of the lunchroom feeling a strange warmth in her chest. For anyone else, it might be described as a spring in their step or a glimmer in their eye. For MJ, it does not manifest in any outward manner. MJ would much prefer to keep her feelings pent up inside where they will never see the light of day. But something about this makes her feel buoyant, special. It feels almost sacred because MJ clicks so well with the pair of friends that have just been the two of them forever.

When MJ plops down at her seat in Pre-Calculus, she pulls out the notepad to return to the untidy scrawl of notes from her conversation from the previous night. It then that her phone buzzes in her pocket, and MJ pauses. She only leaves notifications on for news alerts and text messages, and most of the time her mother is too hungover to text. So that doesn't leave anyone else, except...

MJ pulls out her phone and presses the button.

SPIDER-MAN: (1) UNREAD TEXT

meet me at steinway st and 28th tmrw. 10 pm. come alone.

[publishingsolo]

WHAT IS GHOSTWRITING?—PART 1

Have you ever wanted to hire a professional ghostwriter? What is ghostwriting actually? Ghostwriting involves the possibility of a professional writing your book for you. A ghostwriter researches, organizes, and writes your book in your name. Highly successful people without time or skills to write their own book, commonly use ghostwriting. They are inspired with important information to impart, or a dramatic story to tell.

Fulfill the Impossible Dream to Publish a Book by Using Ghostwriting Services

Do you dream of becoming a published author, but do not have the time or know-how? You likely do not want to incur the inevitable rejection of your manuscript by a traditional publishing house. Hop, skip, and jump over the money, time, and rejection game with the help of a ghostwriter (and a ghost publisher).

Understandably, you would not be the only one who suffered the rejection of a manuscript. Many best-selling authors were also rejected before landing publishing deals—as seen in Top 10 Most Rejected Bestsellers. Can ghostwriting help you? Most certainly! With your leadership, a ghostwriter does the heavy lifting while allowing you to continue to work on your day-to-day job. Now, busy professions and celebrities need not be distracted by the procrastination and time consumption involved in writing their book.

Advanced Authorship for Busy & Successful Professionals

With modern-day print on demand (POD) and digital publishing, you no longer need to endure the rejection that comes with submitting a book to a traditional publishing company. Democracy has finally entered publishing—writers may become published book authors without negotiating through the endless constraints of publishing houses. Combining self-publishing and ghostwriting is an advanced way to quickly publish and market your book to Amazon Books.

Increase Your Net Worth & Self Worth by Becoming a Published Author

Consider the small investment necessary for self-publishing using ghostwriting services combined with print on demand. Only one book is printed at a time with POD—and at a small cost. Therefore, with ghostwriting services plus independent publishing, you will be able to increase your net worth by branding yourself as an author. The investment for a small physical book—not an e-book—beings at about 10K.

Traditional publishing houses, by contrast, spend up to 300K for printing alone. Then, when distribution and sales processes start, even more budget is necessary. Therefore, publishing on Amazon Books using print on demand is a relatively small investment. If hounding publishing houses for a book deal does not seem doable to you, hire a ghostwriter and self-publish.

When are Ghostwriting Services Right for You?

Do you have the bandwidth or time to write a book? As a successful professional, you do not have the desire to learn a new career. Perhaps, you are a celebrity, speaker, or entrepreneur unable to interrupt your rising career to publishing a book. However, you know you possess special secrets and need to share them with the world. As a television or YouTube host, blogger, or speaker with previously recorded material, the book content is already done. Ghostwriting services provide you an expert who will reorganize and rewrite your information into proper book form.

Hire a ghostwriter to compile your material while you maintain your successful career without majors interruption.

10 Qualities of a Good Ghostwriter

1. How Much Time Does Writing a Book Take?

A long timeline is required to write a book. Writing a book can take years—no way around it. Yet, the time can be cut in half with digital publishing. You may expect the writing project to go on for at least 5 months—maybe up to a year. Indeed, this depends on the length and content of the book. In cases where the client offers a mountain of material, the ghostwriter will organize, edit, and polish the content. Furthermore, the ghostwriter will help you add front and back matter such as dedications, foreword, testimonials, etc. Depending on the length, difficulty, and initial direction provided, this process may take up to two years.

2. Does the Ghostwriter Properly Price Their Services?

Recognize that when hiring a ghostwriter, this will cost you. Expect to spend, at the very least, $4,000 for a small, 20,000-word book. Writing a book is an understandably labor-intensive, detailed, and time-consuming project. A 6x9 inch (standard size) 100-page book contains roughly 20,000 words. You can ascertain a ghostwriter does not know their craft if they charge less than $0.25 per word. A natural English-speaking writer and college graduate, would not accept less than $0.25 a word—even for their first project. Do not expect your book to be finished if someone is charging too little. Cheap ghostwriters easily become exhausted and run off with your down payment.

A seasoned professional knows their value and understands the work involved, will charge between $0.40 to $0.50 per word. Well-known and experienced ghostwriters may charge up to $1 per word—which is not unusual. Flee from those who charge “by the page.” You will not know the actual price in these cases because a page could include 100 to 500 words depending on the size of the font and book. Therefore, “by the page” services are misleading and ambiguous—avoid these at all costs.

3. How May You Evlavaute a Ghostwriter's Experience?

Look for a ghostwriter with writing experience in the field of your book's subject. Do not hire someone who bites off more than they can chew. Although enthusiastic at first, those without solid writing backgrounds will easily give up. The reality is, writing a book is intense and comparable to having a baby. Seriously. During your first meeting with a ghostwriter, request links to books they have written. I recommend you read the first and last chapters of their works to understand their writing style and strength.

4. What do the Ghostwriter's References & Testimonials Say?

Inexpensive ghostwriters from foreign countries may quickly turn your book project into a nightmare. You must hire a natural-born English-speaking writer with at least three books under their portfolio. Ensure they do not take your deposit without producing by checking their references and testimonials from previous clients. With all of its twists and turns, the digital publishing industry attracts various scammers. Do not let unvetted ghostwriting services trample on your dream to publish a book.

For steps 5 to 10, read WHAT IS GHOSTWRITING?—PART 2

I also recommend reading SELF-PUBLISHING FOR DUMMIES—PART 1 and SELF-PUBLISHING FOR DUMMIES—PART 2 to further educate yourself about the digital publishing process.

Explore Wikipedia's definition of a ghostwriter. Then, read The Exhilaration of Being a Published Author.

[hungrymimigarfield]

Rashaad Newsome (Week 6)

Biographical Information

Born in 1979 in New Orleans, Louisiana, Rashaad Newsome is an American Postwar & Contemporary artist whose work has debuted at many exhibitions at world-renowned galleries around the world, including The Studio Museum in Harlem (NYC), The National Museum of African American History and Culture (DC), The Whitney Museum (NYC), Brooklyn Museum (NYC), among many others. Newsome’s works are produced from diverse practices and in different mediums and forms, from collage, sculpture, video, music, to even computer programming and performance.

He completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Art History at Tulane University in 2001, and in 2004, he completed a certificate program in Digital Post Production from Film/Video Arts Inc. (NYC), and subsequently another certificate in MAX/MSP Programming at Harvestworks Digital Media Art Center (NYC).

He currently lives and works in both Brooklyn New York and Oakland California. His works have received significant acclaim, resulting in significant sales at various auctions, with his works selling for between $3,750 USD to $50,000 USD. His highest selling price of $50,000 USD came from his work Sun King, which sold at Christie's New York in 2012.

Artistic Influences – Artists and Cultural References

Rashaad Newsome’s diverse artistic practices draws from a variety of cultural and real-world sources, modern advertising, Modern and European Art History, Black and Queer culture, African Iconography to create counter-hegemonic work that challenges notions of cultural essentialism.

Combining African American hip-hop culture with European heraldic tradition, Newsome utilizes the gestures, sounds, and symbols from both cultural spheres to highlight the interconnections between themes, imagery, and ideology. For example, quote Newsome: “A coat of arms is really a collage of objects that represent social status and economic status and status as a warrior. Similarly, quote Newsome: “everybody wants to be the king of hip-hop.”

Furthermore, Newsome frequently represents the Black and Latinx LGBTQ+ communities in his artwork and performance pieces by integrating cultural iconography from African American and West/Central African art and performance. His works have become a voice for counter narratives of Black and Brown Queer cultures.

Finally, Newsome draws significant inspiration from his heritage as a native New Orleanian. From the colorful Mardi Gras Indians of the Tremé, to the extravagantly creative custom car community, and the New Orleans style brass bands, color, creativity, movement, and improvisation have been integrated into and explored within his artistic works, especially in his performances.

Artistic Practice – Themes, Topics

Newsome’s works focus on a range of diverse yet interconnected topics such as sexuality and sexual identity, racial difference, and the power of imagery to convey power and status.

For example, Newsome explores how visual and audio imagery in media and pop culture promote distorted concepts of power in modern society. From abstract Baroque-style designs composed of subculture iconography to personified figurative subjects, Newsome explores the theme of agency and status, with a particular emphasis on the interpretations of feminism by trans-gender and cis-gender women of color. Through his performance pieces, Newsome strives to dismantle social and racial hierarchies through performative acts and gestures by strong and heavily decorated female figures, reinforcing the theme of empowerment prevalent through his pieces.

King of Arms Art Ball

Brief Description + Personal Connection + Connection to Broader Artistic Practice

Newsome initially saw the King of Arms balls “as a way to subversively teach art history to the ballroom scene community” and bringing balls to the mainstream as he saw a growing trend in pop culture. Coupled with his consistent advocation and representation LGBTQ+ community of color in his various works, the King of Arms Ball series began in 2013.

The annual King of Arms Art Ball is an annual live performance consisting of pieces from artists, activists, and the gender non-conforming vogue community that is intended to empower the LGBTQ+ community of color. With reference to the vogue and ballroom scene from Harlem in the 1970s which was the original safe space for queer youth of color, the King of Arms Art Ball, quote Newsome, is where “the framework of performing gender binaries or some devotion to capitalism, which is often associated with ballroom, is eviscerated and there is a premium put on the contestants’ ability to imagine Black artists’ work in new ways.” Events have taken place in large metropolitan cities throughout the United States, such as New York City, Philadelphia, and Miami.

The ball includes a performance competition that includes various categories that are inspired by specific artists and art movements each year. Citing a few examples from this year, for the “Old Way,” contestants dress in the colorful, joyful style of a Barkley L. Hendricks painting. For “Commentator vs. Commentator,” contestants are asked to compose lyrics inspired by Arthur Jafa’s video, “Love Is the Message, the Message Is Death.

Artistic Strategies (form medium style)

Newsome effectively utilizes performance art to convey qualities and messages that are repressed by the need for normality in daily life. The ostentatious displays, costumery, and performance confronts the audience, and even the participants, with often unsolicited, contentious messages in a non-mediated and unframed manner. The physically close proximity of the audience to the performers at the ball not only enhances that message delivery but also invites the audience to become a part of the performance through their reactions. This process triggers empathy, or the ability to identify and associate with others’ experiences, whether it be between audience and performer, performer and performer, and even between audience members. Thus, the ball can be considered more of an immersive and participatory performance. Furthermore, the performance medium aligns with Newsome’s promotion of humanitarian values. Performance allows participants to breakdown increasingly common us-against-them dialogue by promoting an avenue to view, explore, and ultimately accept different perspectives that are essential to peaceful democracy.

Finally, the occasion of performance creates physical space and a clear reason for members to engage in dialogue, in an environment where the feelings, thoughts, and philosophies often excluded from regular discourse can be brought into the open. This process nurtures civic engagement and cohesion and awareness and appreciation of culture, which in this case is the black and brown LGBTQ community.

Content:

https://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2015/09/21/t-magazine/rashaad-newsome-s-king-of-arms-ball.html

https://oolitearts.org/the-king-of-arms-art-ball/

https://www.guernicamag.com/freestyle/

https://www.debuckgallery.com/artist/rashaad-newsome/

https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/art-exhibits/dont-ask-rashaad-newsome-to-explain-his-art-its-your-job-to-understand-it

https://www.art-agenda.com/features/318502/rashaad-newsome-s-to-be-real