#which is just...a brand new invented crisis by a political movement

[shinobicyrus]

Hey, yanno how Climate Change is a real thing that is tangibly, at this moment, affecting our world?

Well it turns out, the wealthy and their investment firms have been seeing the mounting evidence that oil companies have had for decades and are slowly starting to think more long-term about their portfolios in the face of rising sea levels, more extreme weather, and the myriad of ways climate crises are affecting...well. Everything. Maybe this means they invest more into sustainability, green energy, building more resilient infrastructure, or carbon offsets. Some of it, of course, is simple corporate greenwashing, but there are those that are taking this trend and packaging it into something called ESG (Environmental, Social, and corporate Governance).

Now some people would say this is predictable, even sensible. Just the good ol’ Free Market(tm) rationally responding to market forces and a changing world.

But those people would be fools! Insidious fools! For conservative sorcerers have come out with a new cursed phrase to explain this new market trend: Woke Investing.

What makes this investing “woke?” Well, much like how conservatives normally flounder when trying to define a word they stole from black people, “Woke Investing” essentially just means any kind of capital investment that they, the fossil fuel billionaire class and their sycophants, don’t personally profit from.

One of these aforementioned sycophants is Andy Puzder, conservative commentator, fellow at The Heritage Foundation, and former fast-food CEO. He calls this kind of so-called woke investing “socialism in sheep’s clothing,” further explaining in leaked audio of a closed-door meeting:

“My father's generation's challenge was the Nazis, who, by the way, were, of course, very proud socialists[citation fucking needed]. The challenge of my generation was the communists, who were, of course, very committed socialists. The challenge of your generation is ESG investing, and it's more insidious than communism or the Nazis.”(source)

You heard it here first, folks. Not investing as much in fossil fuels is more insidious than the Third Fucking Reich.

As usual, the Heritage Foundation is putting their petro-chemical donor’s money where their mouth is. Bills are being proposed to blacklist banks that don’t invest in key state industries, such as West Virginia coal or Texas oil. Fourteen states have already passed bills to restrict ESG-type investing, with Florida Governor Ron “Bullies Kids for Wearing Masks” Desantis leading the charge.

In other words, Climate Denial has reached such a point that so-called Free Market Conservatives who claim to hate big government are trying to make it illegal for banks, investment firms, and financial institutions to make any financial decisions that acknowledges Climate Change is real.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Pluralistic: 22 Mar 2020 (Preppers in times of crisis, work-from-home vs smart speakers, scientist's coronavirus painting, DNA Lounge needs help, City Council showdown, Tlaib's trillion dollar coins, plutes are hoarding pandemic supplies)

Today's links

How prepper media is coping with the crisis: Fantasy meets reality while grifters pick up the pieces.

Law firm tells work-from-homers to switch off smart speakers: Bugging your own house is not compatible with attorney-client privilege.

Gorgeous painting of coronavirus from a molecular scientist: Free to use, too.

Slim's is shut, but DNA Lounge needs your help: It's not a business, it's a community.

Florida mayor ducks accountability for threatening power disconnections during the pandemic: Mayor Pam Triolo has permanently disqualified herself for public office, and commissioner Omari Hardy has the receipts.

Rashida Tlaib proposes minting two trillion-dollar coins: A people's covid bailout.

How "concierge doctors" supply the "worried well" with masks, respirators and tests: Pandemic capitalism is guillotine capitalism.

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

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

How prepper media is coping with the crisis (permalink)

I just listened to the most interesting coverage of the pandemic I've heard so far: On The Media's deep reporting on how preppers are coping with the Current Situation.

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/why-preppers-werent-really-prepared-pandemic

I admit I felt some schadenfreude when I heard prepper media trying to reconcile their hair-trigger belief in the apocalypse with blind loyalty to Trump and his deny/spin tactics. Not to mention some smugness when I heard about all the scammy products grifters are pimping out to preppers. There's even a fucking Kardashian flogging own-brand prepper gear.

But what made the segment amazing – and not just amusing – was the interview with Richard Mitchell, an ethnographer who embedded with preppers for years.

http://people.oregonstate.edu/~mitchelr/

He wrote the canonical book on the prepper movement, Dancing at Armageddon: Survivalism and Chaos in Modern Times.

https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/D/bo3637295.html

As Mitchell explains it, prepping is NEVER about actual preparedness. It's about imagining a scenario in which you will uniquely be poised to thrive, irrespective of the likelihood of that scenario. For example, a chemist he profiles in the book is totally prepped for a future in which terrorists poison the water supply and has stockpiled antidotes, water purification chemicals, etc.

The most important thing about this possibility is not that it's likely, but rather than he'd shine if it were to come to pass.

Prepping is a way of playing out a fantasy in which you are elevated to savior status, not an exercise in disaster-mitigation. And the thing is, coronavirus is not a thing anyone can individually prepare for. Individuals in bunkers don't invent novel viral therapies, vaccines, or field-expedient ventilators. That's done by society: labs, research institutes, universities, makerspaces.

The problem with actual prepper-level crises is that they demand social responses, not individual ones. The prepper's quest for individual meaning and supremacy means that he can never be actually prepared, because the way to solve a crisis is run towards it, not away.

Cowering in a luxury bunker trying to unstick the pages of your beloved copy of The Turner Diaries is a hell of a way to while away the end of the world.

Law firm tells work-from-homers to switch off smart speakers (permalink)

Mishcon de Reya is an elite UK law firm whose partners are – like so many others – working from home. The company has issued guidance to staff about shutting down their "smart" speakers while at home, to avoid leakage of sensitive client information

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-20/locked-down-lawyers-warned-alexa-is-hearing-confidential-calls

The guidance – to power off these devices – comes from Joe Hancock, the partner in charge of the firm's cybersecurity, and covers all IoT devices with cameras/mics, including baby monitors, smart speakers, Ring doorbells, etc.

Gorgeous painting of coronavirus from a molecular scientist (permalink)

David S. Goodsell is a molecular scientist and artist at the Scripps institute. His latest "Molecular Landscapes" piece is "Coronavirus".

http://pdb101.rcsb.org/sci-art/goodsell-gallery/coronavirus

You can tune into some of the process notes here: "he emphasizes that molecular processes in our body don't stand on their own (despite how they're usually shown in textbooks), but that all these components are part of a crowded environment."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/evaamsen/2020/02/10/what-does-a-coronavirus-look-like/#2b4337f03c7f

Goodsell has declared it "free to use." You can get a high-rez here:

https://cdn.rcsb.org/pdb101/goodsell/tif/coronavirus.tif

Slim's is shut, but DNA Lounge needs your help (permalink)

Two years ago, the billionaires who operated San Francisco's beloved blues club Slim's flogged it off to the predatory venue operator Golden Voice, who have now shuttered it.

https://www.dnalounge.com/backstage/log/2020/03/21.html

As JWZ points out, the fact that Slim's wasn't operated to turn a profit is in no way exceptional. Clubs are labors of love, "We facilitate the creation of culture: You push money in, turn the crank, and what comes out the other side is art, community, music and stories."

He knows. He's run the wonderful DNA Lounge for 30 years: "It isn't some whim of dilettante plutocrats. It's not some hobby I toy with when I'm not private-jetting off to my luxurious doomsday bunker. This is all I do. I didn't expect this to be my life's work, but it is."

He's just about run out of his tech money, and he's had to close during the pandemic, but he's still paying staff and still wants to continue providing a service to his community. He's seeking donations:

https://www.dnalounge.com/donate/

"The 'two or three rich dudes' model is not sustainable, because two or three people, billionaires or not, are not a community."

Florida mayor ducks accountability for threatening power disconnections during the pandemic (permalink)

The city of Lake Worth Beach, Florida was brutally slow to recognize the seriousness of the pandemic. Not only did the Mayor Pam Triolo fail to take action to limit the spread of the virus, her administration also continued to send power disconnection notices to the city's poorest residents.

https://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/20200320/watch-coronavirus-florida-lake-worth-beach-meeting-gets-ugly-and-heated-about-emergency-powers

Her administration refused to agendize or properly debate the response for far too long, provoking commissioner Omari Hardy to call her and city manager Michael Bornstein out for their inaction and their cruelty to the city's poorest.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bgCCXSrwHA

The commissioner's righteous – and technically excellent – intervention during a council meeting is a masterpiece, as he bulls through cack-handed attempts to silence him using mishandled parliamentary procedure, while dogging the mayor as she ducks responsibility.

Forcing people in the worst economic downturn in living memory to choose between spending their last check on power or food, during a once-in-a-century pandemic, is an act of permanently disqualifying depraved indifference and mismanagement.

Rashida Tlaib proposes minting two trillion-dollar coins (permalink)

Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib has revived an idea from the 2011 debt crisis to finance the stimulus, pulled from the #ModernMonentaryTheory playbook: having the Federal Reserve mint two "one trillion dollar coins" and deposit them in its Fed account.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/economy/tlaib-proposes-minting-two-1-trillion-platinum-coins-to-finance-monthly-coronavirus-debit-cards

Doing so would avoid federal debt strictures and immediately give the USG $2T to spend on reviving the economy, which it would do by sending every person in the USA a $2K prepaid credit card that would receive $1K/month until a year after the crisis's end.

Each person – children, adults, documented, undocumented, rich, poor – would get the card and the deposits, and progressive taxation would rake it back from those who don't need it (far more reliable than means-testing, which is a persistent failure).

Trillion-dollar coins are a well-theorized and documented proposal. You can read more here:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3536440

(Image: Merrick Mint)

How "concierge doctors" supply the "worried well" with masks, respirators and tests (permalink)

One big difference I observed between my life under Canadian medicare (30 years), and UK NHS (13 years) is that in the former, there is no private option, so rich people have to advocate for everyone's care in order to improve their own. I think the relative fortunes of the NHS and OHIP can be largely explained by this difference. Allowing the rich to opt into a private system reduces the political costs of slashing the public system.

In the US, this process proceeds on steriods. Those in the USA lucky enough to have "insurance" find that their massive premiums buy them little-to-no healthcare, with endless bureaucracy and denials.

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1240411901055492097

Meanwhile, wealthy Americans buy their way out of the system altogether with "concierge doctors." In good times, this is merely an injustice. During the pandemic, it's an invitation to start building guillotines.

https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2020/03/19/nelson-schwartz-coronavirus-inequality

Concierge services have finagled all kinds of pandemic unobtanium: respirators, tests, swabs and masks. These are not going to unwell people, they're going to the "worried well": rich people who just want to be on the safe side.

This could make us all much sicker. We need tests for exposed people, masks for health-care workers, respirators for emergency cases. The fact that these are piling up in mansions in the Hamptons and other wealthy enclaves is proof that markets are not efficient allocators.

We're supposed to tolerate inequality because it is an unavoidable consequence of efficient market allocations, making us all better off in the long run. But when inequality allows plutes to hoard pandemic supplies and endanger every human on Earth, the pretence runs thin.

There's a great book about this, The Velvet Rope Economy: How Inequality Became Big Business, by Nelson Schwartz: "In every realm of daily life–from health care to education, highways to home security–there is an invisible velvet rope that divides how Americans live."

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/561374/the-velvet-rope-economy-by-nelson-d-schwartz/

This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago EFF appeals Apple versus Online Journalists https://web.archive.org/web/20050323164233/http://www.corante.com/copyfight/archives/2005/03/22/eff_files_for_appeal_in_apple_v_does.php

#10yrsago Delusional EU ACTA negotiator claims that three strikes has never been proposed at ACTA http://www.michaelgeist.ca/2010/03/eu-acta-consultation/

#10yrsago Teacher's heartbreak and anger at No Child Left Behind http://lilysblackboard.org/2010/03/nclb-science-of-making-up-stuff/

#5yrsago Taxonomy of theme park narrative gimmicks <a href="https://passport2dreams.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-theme-park-trope-list.html>https://passport2dreams.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-theme-park-trope-list.html

#1yrago Gollancz has published its first anthology of South Asian Science Fiction https://factordaily.com/gollancz-south-asian-science-fiction-anthology/

#1yrago After fatal crash, Boeing reverses sales policy that locked out some safety features unless airlines paid for an upgrade https://apnews.com/140576a8e9d4449eae646c8c479fdc3a

#1yrago Philadelphia city council candidate says his secret AI has discovered disqualifying fraud in the nominations of 30 out of 33 candidates https://www.inquirer.com/politics/clout/council-at-large-petition-challenges-devon-cade-allan-domb-nick-miccarelli-20190322.html

#1yrago This Could Be It: Key Polish Political Party Comes Out Against Article 13 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/03/could-be-it-key-polish-political-party-comes-out-against-article-13

#1yrago Unnamed stalkerware company has left gigabytes of sensitive personal info unprotected on the web and can't be reached to fix it https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/j573k3/spyware-data-leak-pictures-audio-recordings

#1yrago Wireless vulns in Medtronic's implanted defibrillators allow remote shocks, shutdown, denial-of-service battery attacks and data theft http://www.startribune.com/750-000-medtronic-defibrillators-vulnerable-to-hacking/507470932/

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Slashdot (https://slashdot.org/). Hugh D'Andrade (http://hughillustration.com/), Late Stage Capitalism (https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/), Naked Capitalism (https://nakedcapitalism.com/).

Currently writing: I've just finished rewrites on a short story, "The Canadian Miracle," for MIT Tech Review. It's a story set in the world of my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation. I've also just completed "Baby Twitter," a piece of design fiction also set in The Lost Cause's prehistory, for a British think-tank. I'm getting geared up to start work on the novel next.

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: The Masque of the Red Death and Punch Brothers Punch https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/16/the-masque-of-the-red-death-and-punch-brothers-punch/

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

[jamescurcio]

White Lines, Black Magic

This came up on various public groups when I was doing my research for Masks. I wanted to share it with you, because I think it’s an interesting, and generally good, take. 

David's Dark Doings - And How He Escaped To Tell The Tale David Bowie's Station To Station and the "Berlin Trilogy". By Ian MacDonald

"I ran across a monster who was sleeping by a tree. And I looked and frowned and the monster was me" (David Bowie, "The Width Of A Circle", 1971)

EMI's latest batch of mid-price Bowie reissues, discs released at full price in 1990-1, consists of the 1976-8 sequence, Station To Station, Low, "Heroes", and Stage. It might have been truer to his career to have made a foursome of Low, "Heroes", Stage and Lodger - the "Berlin Trilogy" plus their complimentary live album - and to have corralled Station To Station with his other "American" albums, David Live and Young Americans. Never mind. As it happens, EMI's decision highlights a little-understood juncture in Bowie's development: the transition between the two The Man Who Fell To Earth albums, Station To Station and Low. Bowie's modus operandi during the Seventies was transformation, acting out the suburban dream of escape into glamorous "otherness" - hence his popularity among a very specific audience  segment (and the total blank he registered with those for whom escape was not an issue). This method held good until Young Americans, even though that album's associated transformation - white boy on Soul Train - was less the usual Brechtian device than an identity-crisis on the part of the artist (or the Actor, as he then referred to himself). Uprooted from his native context in the cultural artifice of Europe, isolated in a largely unironic and cultureless alien land, Bowie was forced back on himself, a self he didn't much like. Weary of the artistic transformations which were now getting too close to home, he fended off self-examination with mental diversion, reading obsessively from a portable library and deadening his growing sense of emotional emptiness with cocaine and booze. David Live is, in effect, a station-stop in this journey on the old Oblivion Express, an evening's snapshot of Bowie's deepening malaise.

With Station To Station - its title partly suggested by Bowie's 1973-6 touring schedule which, due to his fear of flying, mostly consisted of travel by train-the Oblivion Express reached another halt. But, this time, Bowie, rarely one to repeat himself, refused another David Live stop-over. Instead, he got off the damned train. A sonic "dark night of the soul", Station to Station is to Bowie what On The Beach is to Neil Young's album, rooted in the folk-blues tradition of American "authenticity", remains too musically raw for wide appeal, whereas Station, if only superficially, is one of Bowie's most glamorous discs. However, the superficial view of Station to Station doesn't tell half the inner story of the album, a recherché work which, despite being recorded at Cherokee Studios in the hyper-American suburb of Hollywood, is essentially European.

The key to the transition between Station To Station and Low (whose covers both employ images from Nicolas Roeg's the Man Who Fell To Earth) is that it does not coincide with Bowie's usual sort of artistic transformation: the persona swap. Bowie's final mask, the Thin White Duke, travels no further than Station to Station. There's no mask, no persona in Low. Just a rather gaunt young man in a "styleless" dufflecoat, looking sideways to the viewer as if in a police mugshot. Some would say that this is merely because Bowie then ceased touring for a while (appearing live only as Iggy Pop's keyboard player), and consequently had no need to invent a new stage character. In truth, Bowie's temporary low profile, coded in the cover of Low itself, was forced on him at a time when an interlude of retreat for recuperation and regrouping was the only alternative to a full-scale crack-up during the recording of Station to Station, a period of which he claims to recall almost nothing. Mental breakdown still appeared to be impending in May, 1976 when, returning to Britain from his sojourn in America, a seemingly stoned Bowie acknowledged the British press corps at Victoria Station with what most of those present took to be a Nazi salute.

Britain was then witnessing the electoral rise of the neo-fascist National Front, and Bowie's proclaimed ambition to be the country's fascist dictator was naturally, those of us who were fans chose to read Bowie's stance as ironic. Neither was wholly correct. Like Neil Young's republicanism, Bowie's brand of fascism, while it embraced irony, was basically serious; or was taken seriously by a certain hermetic compartment of his mind, wherein it dwelt. The rest of him - what passed for the normal lad from Brixton - was deeply uneasy about it; so uneasy that he included on Station To Station a song open to God in case the demons evoked elsewhere in the album should get out of hand. Bowie's fascination with Nazism was never conventionally political. Rather, it was one aspect of a personal cosmology traceable in cryptic songs like "Cygnet Committee" (Space Oddity, 1969), "The Supermen" (The Man Who Sold The World, 1971), "Big Brother" (Diamond Dogs, 1974), but most explicitly in "Oh! You Pretty Things" and - particularly - "Quicksand" on Hunky Dory (1972): "I'm closer to the Golden Dawn/Immersed in Crowley's uniform/Of imager/I'm living in a silent film/Portraying Himmler's sacred realm/Of dream reality." Eagerly absorbed from the omnivorous reading with which the self-taught Bowie, insecure in his intellect, then shored up his self-esteem, this personal cosmology was rooted in the Gnostic myth of the Fall, viz: we human beings are born into this world from a higher dimension ("heaven") which we forget upon entering the sphere of material existence. Hence, homo sapiens is a half-finished thing living in a state of waking sleep he calls reality, but which is actually a kind of delusion. Only those "awake" on the physical plane, the "enlightened" ones, see reality as it truly is. As such, they are supermen. Now that "home sapiens have outgrown their use", such mental supermen are set to inherit the earth. As a young man, Bowie was impatiently obsessed with the inefficiency of our unenlightened minds ("We're today's scrambled creatures, looked in tomorrow's double feature"). As a result, he viewed the majority, unaware as they were of their plight, with a blend of tolerant irony and frank contempt ("the mice in their million hordes"). Elaborating on the Gnostic myth, he cross-bred Nietzsche's Superman - "The Wild-Eyed Boy From Freecloud" is a sort of pop Zarathustra - with esoteric motifs in the writing of Madame Blavatsky and the teaching of the American mystic, Gurdjeff. Both allude extensively to mysterious "Masters": enlightened super-beings who supposedly guide human affairs from mountain fastnesses in Tibet and the Hindou Kush ("the men who protect you and I"). Blavatsky's writing, along with those of Eliphas Levi, gave birth to the late 19th-century Occult Revival which in Britain produced the magical society called The Golden Dawn, whence Aleister Crowley emerged, and which in Germany created the occult basis of Nazism, epitomised in Himmler's vision of his SS as an Arthurian company of immortals, incarnated to bring order to the physical plane. Though he made plenty of pro-Hitler statements around 1975-6, Bowie ultimately remained sane enough to distinguish the ideal of an order-bringing élite from the Nazi reality. He was, he would occasionally claim, a Nietzschean, his "fascism" being conceptually benign (if nonetheless arrogant). He favoured a New Order not of domination, but of enlightenment: rule of the "asleep" by the "awake". The main snag was that he was doing too many drugs. Imbibed along with piles of prime Colombian, books like Pauwel and Bergier's The Morning Of The Magicians (1971) and Trevor Ravenscroft's The Spear Of Destiny (1973) had, by 1975, led Bowie into a remote headspace where even UFO's were part of the plot.

During the LA sessions for Station To Station, the Fuhrerling (as Bowie drolly refers to himself in a demo of "Candidate" on the 1990 reissue of Diamond Dogs) was archetypally "torn between the light and dark". At one point the journalist, Cameron Crowe, found him burning black tapers in the seeming aftermath of some ritual magic that had gone wrong. "Been having a little trouble with the neighbours," said Bowie, evidently not referring to the people in the apartment next door. Michael Lippman, a friend of Bowie's during this period, remembers him describing strange nightmares. Lippman gave him a gold cross. Bowie later asked him for a mezuzah (a parchment in a glass tube, inscribed with the divine name Shaddai, which Orthodox Jews keep nailed to their door to ward off evil). The title track of the album is packed with occult references and allusions to the Gnostic myth of the Fall. A mention of White Stains, Crowley's very obscure first book, shows how deeply Bowie delved into the golden Dawn background; indeed, the lyric suggests that he also studied The Tree Of Life by Crowley's pupil, Israel Regardie, a brilliant treatise on the magical use of the 13th century Jewish mystical system, Quabala. In Quabalistic language, the Gnostic myth of the Fall can be expressed as "one magical movement from kether to malkuth" (Kether being the sphere of the Godhead, or Crown of Creation, and Malkuth being the sphere of the physical world, aka the kingdom). These spheres (sephiroth) lie at opposite ends of the glyph known as the Tree of Life, which Bowie is seen drawing on the back of EMI's reissue of Station to Station. Seems he thought of the sephiroth as stations - "standing places", as in the Stations Of the Cross (which have their own occult interpretation). Sadly there are 14 Stations Of The Cross but only 10 sephiroth. (The Christian sign of the cross, though does "map" onto the Tree..) The song, "Station to Station", also has a Shakespearean resonance. Prospero the magician (and incognito duke) in Shakespeare's most mysterious play. the Tempest, surrounds himself with books, among which is his occult grimoire. At the end of the play, he abjures magic and "drowns" his book of spells. In "Station To Station", the Thin White Duke - Bowie as a cocaine-frozen Prospero lost in his (magic) circle, tall in his room overlooking the ocean (Prospero's Island "cell" transported to the coast by Los Angeles) - despairingly reviews his repertoire of illusions. "Such is the stuff from where dreams are woven," he muses, not quite quoting Prospero ("We are such stuff/As dreams are made on"). Clearly, illusion is no longer what he wants. Station to Station - like Plastic Ono Band, like Todd, like On the Beach - is an exorcism: an exorcism of self, of the mind, of the past. By 1976, Bowie had nearly had enough of his "magic" - the theatrical "grand illusion" by which he'd lived since 1972. Thus, he "flashes no colour" - another magical allusion, this time to the so-called Tattva symbols which use "flashing" complimentary colours to after consciousness, ushering the magical aspirant into the Astral Plane of heightened vision. Decoded: Bowie has travelled the Astral (or ascended the tree Of Life); now he wants to come down o earth, to love. (Hence the cover image of the soundproof chamber in The Man Who fell to Earth.) One could easily continue for another thousand words in this vein about "Station To Station". (Let alone the rest of the record. Bowie; "It's the nearest album to a magical treatise that I've written"). Yet none of this symbolism would matter if the artist were not in control of it; and if it didn't crack, via the desperate drunken grandiloquence of the song's bridge ("Once there were mountains on mountains"), into the naked-and-wired stamped of its epic, up-tempo release, driven by that magnificent late Seventies rhythm section of Carlos Alomar, Dennis Davis, and George Murray, and lit by the elemental fire-scream of Earl Slick's hysterical guitar. Those who accuse Bowie of lacking feeling should listen closely to this transition: the quavering, hopeless-to-hopeful vulnerability of the couplet, "It's not the side effects of the cocaine/I'm thinking that it must be love." This is a deeply unhappy human being, harried by his own incandescently gifted mind.

In fact, Bowie didn't cast his grimoire into the ocean after station To Station. He hedged his commercial bets by mixing the album "big", and made plans to tour it in Europe. He was still half in his mystic-fascist Thin White Duke persona when he "returned", like some parallel universe Duke of Windsor, to Britain in May, 1976 (and he would certainly have been aware that the Nazi salute is identical to the occult sign of the Zelator grade in the Golden Dawn system). Yet he went on, soon after this, to move to a roughhouse Turkish suburb of Berlin, there to kick the white powder, clean up his mind/body, and start a new career in a new town. The artistic transformation between Station to Station and Low was an inner one, not a career move, it happened to Bowie himself, not to Bowie the Actor. In Berlin, the sons of real SS men sorted his head out. In Berlin, he saw neo-nazis beat up Turkish immigrants. In Berlin, low in the aftermath of heavy drugs and Hollywood glamour, he forced himself to live like an everyday person, buying his own groceries. The nightmare of the Thin White Duke faded, chased away by hours of laughter with his new cohort, Eno, the first person Bowie worked with who could keep up with him. He finished Low (another album one could write thousands of words about) and mixed it, as he claims he intended to mix Station To Station, "dry": close, compressed, and with a gate on the snare so vicious that it became the first drum-sound people outside the studio-world actually noticed. What happened to the private cosmology, to the magical Nietzschean? Bowie has lately conceded "a need to vacillate between atheism or a kind of gnosticism". On his 1997 tour, he played, of all things "Quicksand". Think on, secret thinkers."

[sunlitneon]

Brenda Ridgewell and the Contemporariness of Moveable Space

Introduction

"Jewellery has a which means of its personal. Whether it's far tribal jewellery manufactured from bones and shells or exquisitely crafted jewel-encrusted crown, jewelry depicts memories and transcends messages. The author elaborately places big meanings in all jewellery pieces which includes its detail and comprehensive concept. The meanings are as though spiritual dimensions which the network can without difficulty and profoundly understand...Like silent however resonant sound," stated Brenda Ridgewell, Australian famend jewellery artist whose paintings in jewellery artwork is diagnosed within the worldwide platform.

In July 2007, Brenda Ridgewell general the invitation of the Department of Jewellery Design, Faculty of Decorative Arts, Silpakorn University to be an exchange visitor lecturer and maintain a joint exhibition with the 4th year students (Graduates-to-be this year), allowing us as art aficionados to look the connection of time from the past, present and future, in addition to locations of various cultural origins thru a classy aspect of a cloth attached on human frame. This fabric echoes the voice of identification, representing its foundation.

During the communication with the writer, Ridgewell shared her point of view to modern-day jewellers and/or students who were approximately to graduate and serve the network that it is the obligation of artists or jewelry designers to test material potentials, layout tactics, manufacturing methods, art additives, and many others as a way to master gear so that it will reflect the society of their times Remodelling jewellery. Besides, they need to take into their attention different factors that can give idea to people of the brand new century through this aesthetic means and with severe dedication. Her paintings: Moveable Space

Brenda Ridgewell's work portrays perfect combination of concepts and related art additives proven thru the interaction of shapes that move interactively. Ridgewell is interested in area and the search on human body to locate area which embodies and embraces the connection like intimate area. For instance, a number of her jewellery pieces explore the gap normally reserved for a lover or formative years since this day this type of space is hard to be set aside to preserve our experiential secrets and techniques. Thus, we should shield and keep this area.

Jewellery is therefore the exceptional medium to articulate these ideas because it extends past the frame floor and needs to be seen from the close distance within the intimate area. It is as although we need to input the wearer' personal space in order that this personal space thing created will reveal tales. The area is just like the wearer's cage affirming her goal. Although this area: dependent jewellery is robust, the shape can exchange to help the twist following the strain. We can listen the sound of this flexible space whilst it movements. The tender sound reminds us of the significance of this space in our lives. Even if the motion association can evoke chaotic trembling of the shape for the reason that each detail can move freely from the others, the connected shape can deliver the piece back to order with the aid of shaking, twisting or transforming it.

The elaborate neckpiece comprising coiled silver and stainless reasons movement feeling. Each of the wearer's motion creates new possibilities starting up new area in the authentic geometric design. Likewise, the linked structured piece is like high-rise towers constantly jostling around each other, bringing approximately new relationship and releasing itself from constant geometric shape.

These jewelry portions are created to be worn and constitute area which showcases aspectual possibilities and courting after they move and engage on the frame. The rectangle bracelet linked across the wrist creates various diamond areas each in open and near manners, like drawing photos in an empty space. Its extending coloration make the item stand out, developing larger visual and real space.

Though the distance created may appear empty, it does incorporate memories due to the fact it is designed to acquire intimacy, stretching the air of opportunities which are ready to be grasped or saved thru the open twine. In the identical way, existence experiences are kept and connected in intimate space. They have an effect on human thoughts, recollections and goals which we bear in mind within the forms of imagination and fable via aesthetic approach. Therefore, Ridgewell's space is a traceability device, a memory reminder, and serves to protect and preserve the core of humans.

For Ridgewell, every other crucial detail of human beings is our potential as a race of favor items. We are searching for substances to meet the pleasure of creation and revel in the designed products as well as the jewellery manufacturing procedures along with steel alloy techniques, melting, casting uncooked materials and other techniques. Raw materials should be carefully selected. Ridgewell specifically employs sterling silver and stainless due to the colors and strength. Another cloth used is cubic zirconia, which is finished on the twine give up and may be magically visible most effective while one appears cautiously. Dazzling gold incorporated in lots of portions enhances heat smooth glow. The preciseness and details of each joint, the jewellery form crafted from inspiration, all of those elements affirm the importance of the overall structure. These new systems emerge from complex thoughts, abilities and reports as in advance stated, visualizing the artist's abstract thoughts.

Her production innovation, for example the advent of technical additives and such innovative concepts, has put Ridgewell and her colleagues within the global highlight. Ridgewell advised the author that her decision to paintings out of doors metropolis metropolitans like Melbourne and Sydney or London and New York has resulted in her independence. She needed to search for the ability of life-style which developed into characteristics of particular visions regardless of residing in a much less opportunistic vicinity in terms of presenting herself and her paintings. Optimistically, selecting to live in a faraway vicinity is much less restrained and gives more possibilities of factors. Meanwhile the artist remains able to seize up with new stuffs that take place within the international. With this and her problem fixing has encouraged folks that guide her work and lots of neighborhood artists who've fewer possibilities to emerge at the forefront of the global cutting-edge jewelry platform.

Ridgewell's work is widely identified in the global stage, even more famend in London than West Australia. However, the Artist and the author mainly agreed that any jewelry portions need to be supplied and first usual among local target market who proportion the identical culture. It is an extremely good evidence that we and neighborhood target audience who percentage the equal origins recognize, consider, appreciate and may connect to this cultural size of communications thoroughly. This is the toughest element and yet it is greater proud than being supported in lands of different identities considering that to carry out in a specific area, the work is already greater distinct.

Conclusion

The creator chose to offer and examine the paintings of Brenda Ridgewell, of all due recognize, in hope that this newsletter can function creative givings to all college students who are approximately to graduate, not handiest college students inside the Department of Jewellery Design on the grounds that art isn't any distinctive to westerners or easterners. All folks can understand the essence of creations profoundly, irrespective of what paperwork or functions, due to the fact all of them come from the equal roots. Furthermore, the discipline of conceptualization which calls for relentless research, analysis, synthesis and hassle solving will be the absolute statement in its own and this ray of natural information shall be unfold and extended to others. By this matter, the spiritual development via collective aestheticism will get up correctly.

Thus, we, representatives of today and the future cannot overlook to relieve pains of Thai folks that be afflicted by bodily crisis, weak minds or desolate spirits when they come across loneliness. Even although humans claim that the sector has end up smaller, the cyber society has precipitated us to lose this human interplay. The globalization, the politics whether or not it is the unfaithful democracy or capitalism have lessened space of the poor, etc. Through the continuation of inventive substance or the efficiency of design, with sturdy creative production and the consistency in presenting conceptual essences, we will maintain and reinforce Thai ways of existence, outlooks and focus to the next era. Ultimately, inventive objects have the cost to uplift bodily and spiritually, beyond being merely wearables, in particular in Thailand, which has its roots in religions, arts and cultures because the vintage days.

[attredd]

Defeating the climate crisis is just the beginning of the struggle – and tough political choices will have to be made Will 2019 be remembered as the year in which climate change denial was defeated? The global climate strike, Greta Thunberg’s meteoric rise to international prominence, as well as several high-profile international conferences and reports – all contributed in putting climate skeptics on the back foot.Even Donald Trump, who previously claimed that the climate crisis was a “hoax” invented by China to hold back American industry, has recently begun to brag about all his administration has done to address it. Following suit, the rest of his party is scrambling to develop a coherent environmental platform, more in line with their electoral base’s shifting views.But the next steps in the global fight against the climate crisis remain far from clear. In the speech she delivered to US Congress in September, Thunberg maintained: “No matter how political the background to this crisis may be, we must not allow it to become a partisan political question. The climate and ecological crisis is beyond party politics. And our main enemy right now is not our political opponents. Our main enemy is physics.”While Thunberg’s intention was evidently to preserve the environmental movement’s unity and common resolve, this may paradoxically soon start to look like a new form of climate denial. As the issue rises to the top of everyone’s agenda, several difficult questions which were previously kept in the background – or indeed actively suppressed – by the environmental movement are becoming impossible to ignore.> The environmental movement is going to have to become more, not less, politicized, to keep up the momentumFor one, no one seems quite clear what is the ultimate goal of the global fight against the climate crisis. Is it merely to enable constant economic growth in a sustainable way, or is it about imposing limits on humanity’s ambitions, in pursuit of a more harmonious relationship with nature?Even assuming that question can be settled, it remains to be determined what is the relationship – and whether there are any tradeoffs – between environmentalism’s overarching goal(s) and other potentially desirable ends, such as personal freedom, distributive justice and respect for established traditions and ways of life.Then there is the issue of means. Whether humanity chooses to fight the climate crisis through centralized, state-based efforts, decentralized market mechanisms, or individual and community-level changes in lifestyle has profound political and distributional consequences. So, it matters what decisions are made in this respect.Finally, even the relevant temporal horizon remains open to disagreement. Should we care about what happens in 10,000 years? A few generations? Or the immediate 20 years?Far from having straightforward answers, all these questions are inherently political, since they point to deep conflicts in values and interests. They delineate the contours of a new “politics of environmentalism” that is beginning to take shape as climate change rises to the top of humanity’s present concerns.We already see this new politics taking shape in emergent debates over competing proposals for addressing the climate crisis. Bernie Sanders’ and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s respective versions of the Green New Deal are very different from the proposal for a European Green Deal recently put forward by the new president of the European commission, Ursula von der Leyen.The first approach wants to connect the issue of the climate crisis with social justice, and advocates for a massive expansion in the role of the state to manage the transition to renewable energy. The second approach treats the issue of the climate crisis in isolation from other social and political issues, and proposes market rather than state mechanisms to address it.Nor are these the only two options on the table. Another prominent strand of contemporary environmentalism is the one heralded by Pope Francis in the 2015 encyclical letter Laudato Si, which folds the struggle against the climate crisis into a broader critique of the “modern myth of unlimited material progress” on the basis of a religiously inspired conception of the inherent rights of the “natural order”.While this chimes with radical ecology’s longstanding commitment to the idea of “de-growth”, it is also compatible with classical conservatism’s critique of modernity, which has traditionally stigmatized the hubris in humanity’s dream of complete domination over nature. Several ideas contained in the pope’s encyclical have in fact been taken up by more conservatively minded political and religious organizations, in an attempt to give greater resonance to the conceptual affinity between political conservatism and natural conservation.Even some strands of the nativist far right have begun to develop their own brand of environmentalism. The French Rassemblement National’s leader, Marine Le Pen, has sought to connect the problem of environmental degradation with her party’s broader opposition to globalization and immigration. This translates into a form of “green nationalism” focused on the protection of local cultures, products and traditions.This growing diversification of environmental positions is a sign that the movement as a whole is maturing. Environmentalists of all stripes are realizing that there remain important political decisions to be made even after climate crisis denial has been defeated.These decisions cannot be taken by purely technical or scientific means. On the contrary, the fact that the environmental movement has so far remained the preserve of a small technocratic elite has done more to invite populist backlashes than to further its own goals.It is a good thing that all the available options are now being laid bare, in order to better assess their relative merits in an open and democratic way. Whether we like it or not, the environmental movement is going to have to become more, not less, politicized, to keep up the momentum it has acquired so far. * Carlo Invernizzi-Accetti is associate professor of political science at the City University of New York – City College

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2Q8BuxR

[watchilove]

The bronze age returns –  Oris celebrates the uniquely historic role of its signature Big Crown Pointer Date by casing it in solid bronze and using a bespoke finish that makes each bronze dial a one-off: Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date.

It can be hard to explain why one design has power and value over another. How can it be that a millimetre here or a pen-flick there could have such a significant and lasting impact on a design’s relevance and longevity?

Oris’s Big Crown Pointer Date first entered the Oris collection in 1938, more than eight decades ago. Its creators made a watch for glove-wearing aviators – hence the oversized crown and clear Arabic-numeral dial – but they also made a beautiful object.

‘Beauty drives our decisions,’ says Rolf Studer, Oris Joint Executive Officer. ‘In beauty we find attraction, love even, which drives us to invest. We buy what we love. With a watch, that’s particularly true. Most often, the heart rules the head.’

Bronze patination

The Big Crown Pointer Date’s continued relevance owes much to the original design. But it’s also a reflection of its role in Oris’s revival after the 1970s Quartz Crisis, and in the revival of the Swiss watch industry.

‘The role of the Big Crown Pointer Date in Oris’s decision in the mid- to late 1980s to rebuild the company with only mechanical watches was critical,’ continues Mr Studer. ‘It had a story, a purpose and an emotional value that the quartz-powered novelties of the day simply couldn’t compete with. It became an Oris signature and a symbol of the Swiss watch industry’s dramatic revival.’

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR

Today, more than 30 years later, Oris is introducing the Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date. The bronze case and dial symbolise Oris’s industrial philosophy and the eternal value of a Swiss Made mechanical watch. The solid bronze dial is chemically treated and coated with a transparent matt lacquer  to create a unique finish for every piece (see right), another symbol, this time of the unique status of the watch’s design.

One of the men behind that decision in the 1980s, Dr Rolf Portmann, has just marked his 90th birthday. Now Oris’s Honorary Chairman, he shares his remarkable story below.

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR

Making its point

A bronze watch that shows the time and date? Yes, but for many reasons, the historic Oris Big Crown Pointer Date is far more than the sum of its parts

Where would watches, and particularly wristwatches be today without aviation? The dawn of air travel heralded a sea change in industry, global politics, social mobility and many other areas of life. It also fuelled a need for a wrist-worn device that could keep track of time, and therefore other critical navigational measurements, such as position, fuel economy and average speed.

Early wristwatches designed for pilots had to be highly legible, so that every calculation could be done quickly – at a glance. They also had to be easily adjustable, and they had to be robust and reliable, built to withstand the in-flight fluctuations felt in the cockpit.

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR – Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date

Oris was founded in 1904, and around 1910 made its first watch for pilots. Louis Blériot had flown across the English Channel in 1908. Shortly after, Oris created a pocket watch with an image of a Blériot plane engraved onto the case. That was followed in 1917 by the company’s first pilot’s wristwatch, a clever piece that could only be adjusted when a button above the crown was activated. Two years ago, Oris created a centenary edition of this landmark watch.

War spurred advances in watch design as in aviation. In 1938, Oris produced a watch that would become known as the Big Crown Pointer Date. It had an oversized crown that could be easily operated by a pilot, even when wearing gloves; large Arabic numerals, so the time could be read quickly; a fluted, grippy bezel; and a central hand with a pointer tip that indicated the date. It was simple, logical, useful – and it worked.

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR – Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date

More than 80 years later, the same design principles continue to inform the Big Crown Pointer Date. Over time, it’s been refined with material and mechanical improvements, but its timeless pioneering spirit remains.

Today, the new Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date continues the narrative. Its cased in solid bronze, a material that recalls Oris’s industrial roots and that over time will patinate so it comes to tell its own story. It also celebrates the role the Big Crown Pointer Date has played in Oris’s history. It has never been out of production and has become Oris’s signature piece. Some have even said that without it, Oris might not enjoy the reputation as a high-quality independent Swiss watch company it has today. In short, it sums up the Oris story.

“The Oris Big Crown Pointer Date has remained in constant production. It sums up the Oris story”

The man who saved Oris

As he turns 90, Oris’s Honorary Chairman Dr Rolf Portmann looks back to 1956 when he joined the company, and to the big moments in his career that set Oris on the path to becoming the independent Swiss watchmaker it is today.

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

Tell us about your career with Oris. I started my career at Oris as a solicitor in 1956. My intention was not to pursue a career in the watch industry at that point. I was hired to fight the protectionist federal resolution known as the Swiss Watch Statute that prevented Oris from building lever escapement watches. It was interfering with the development of the company and really the whole industry, too. It was my job to convince the Swiss politicians to get rid of this legislation. After I’d achieved that, I was promoted to become executive secretary. Mostly, that meant working in manufacturing, human resources and property management.

“I was convinced Oris was a great brand, but we needed to rescue it.  We needed to survive.”

What was the health of the company and the industry like when you bought Oris? In 1971, Oris was sold to General Watch, part of the ASUAG Group. At the same time, I became Oris managing director. The group was naïvely buying up watch companies without thinking how all the pieces would fit together and what their objectives were. At that time, political unrest was shaking up a lot of markets around the globe and some of them collapsed. At the same time, the Swiss franc suddenly strengthened after the United States quit the Gold Standard. And on top of that, quartz watches from the Far  East emerged. These combined led to great difficulties for Swiss watchmaking. The banks consolidated the industry by creating ASUAG and SSIH as the two key holding companies. After restructuring, ASUAG planned to close Oris down. But in 1982, they left me the chance to take it over, with its sales administration, inventory and production facilities. I took that chance.

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

What convinced you to do that? My strong belief in Oris. I was convinced that Oris was a great brand, that we had a solid position in some markets and that the quality was right. Additionally, I was personally very involved with the company. But I was aware I wasn’t a ‘marketing man’. I was an all-rounder. I was very dependent on skilled people who would help me to turn my vision of regrouping Oris into a reality. I found them in a handful of employees – particularly in Ulrich W. Herzog, who would go on to run the company. With them, we managed to put Oris back on a successful path again.

What vision did you set for the company? It was very clear: we needed to rescue the brand. We needed to survive.

In the mid-1980s, Oris decided only to make mechanical watches. Why? We were convinced we were mechanical through and through and didn’t want to have anything to do with quartz watches. We knew we understood mechanical watches. We were positive there was a global audience that still appreciated the value in hand-crafted, tangible products that transmitted history.

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

“Fundamentally, the Oris Big Crown makes sense. That’s the Oris way, and consumers like it.”

How important has the independence you secured been to the company? Regaining our independence was essential to us. Because of our place in the group, we had been limited in what we could develop technically. To revive the spirit of invention the company had been built on, we had to get our independence back.

What is it about the Oris Big Crown that continues to make it relevant? Although we don’t need a watch we can use wearing gloves any more, the idea is romantic, which I think people like. And a simple, handsome design that’s easy to read will always have relevance. In a way, I’m surprised it’s still here, but fundamentally the Big Crown is a design that makes sense. That’s the Oris way, and consumers like it.

Why choose bronze for the new model? In a world of clinical perfection and digitalisation, people appreciate objects that tell their own story. As this watch patinates, that’s what it will do.

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

What is your proudest Oris memory? Securing the company by creating something new out of that huge conglomerate. That was by far my biggest satisfaction.

Congratulations on your 90th birthday! What are you doing to celebrate? I will celebrate my birthday with my family in Basel. We’re going to have a nice lunch and my grandchildren have prepared a small performance.

Which watch will you be wearing? My golden Calibre 110 (made in 2014 for Oris’s 110th anniversary and powered by an in-house calibre). It tells the story of Oris’s revival as a movement creator, it’s proved to be incredibly precise, it’s beautiful, and I won’t ever take it off – unless someone gifts me another watch, that is…

Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date

Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date Technical Specification

This new version of Oris’s signature watch has a bronze case, bezel and crown, and a bronze dial that’s chemically treated for a finish that’s unique to every watch.

Case

Multi-piece bronze case

Size: 40.00 mm (1.575 inches)

Dial: Bronze dial

Luminous material: Indices, numbers and hands printed with Super-LumiNova®

Top glass: Sapphire, domed on both sides, anti-reflective coating inside

Case back: Stainless steel, screwed, see-through mineral glass

Operating devices: Bronze screw-in security crown

Strap: Brown chamois deer leather, bronze buckle

Water-resistance: 5 bar

Movement

Number: Oris 754

Functions: Centre hands for hours, minutes and seconds, date centre hand, instantaneous date, date corrector, fine timing device and stop-second

Winding: Automatic winding, bi-directionally rotating Red Rotor™

Power Reserve: 38 hours

Swiss retail price CHF 1,900 Available December 2019

Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR – Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR – Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR

01 754 7741 3166-07 5 20 74BR

Bronze patination

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

Oris Portrait Dr Rolf Portmann, Honorary Chairman

Oris Big Crown Bronze Pointer Date The bronze age returns -  Oris celebrates the uniquely historic role of its signature Big Crown Pointer Date by casing it in solid bronze and using a bespoke finish that makes each bronze dial a one-off: …

[melindarowens]

The Corporate Media Continues To Torch Its Reputation

Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

Last December, I noted the following in the post, ‘Then We Will Fight in the Shade’ – A Guide to Winning the Media Wars:

It is when you get desperate, scared and panicky that you make the biggest mistakes, and the legacy media is currently desperate, scared and panicky.  As Napoleon Bonaparte allegedly said:

 “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

 Whether or not he actually said them, those words still ring true. We mustn’t get in the way of the legacy media’s inevitable self-destruction. Part of this means that we do not self-destruct in the process. We need to recognize that there’s a reason independent, alternative media is winning the battle of ideas in the first place. For all the warts, mistakes and bad actors, the emergence of the internet is indeed the historical equivalent of the invention of the printing press on steroids.

 Only a clueless self-important elitist actually believes that the smartest, most informed people in America are the pundits on tv and the journalists employed by the mainstream media. With a handful of companies and a few oligarchs in charge, you’d have to be the most naive fool on earth to not understand that legacy media is driven by well defined narratives, and that these narratives are not in your best interest. The rest of us understand that the Internet has served as a much needed countervailing force, and has been an incredible blessing to human knowledge, connectivity and the marketplace of ideas. Just because some people can’t distinguish truth from fiction, doesn’t negate the incredible progress that decentralized information dissemination provides. It is only those who do not wish to engage in public debate on the issues themselves who want to censor stuff. The rest of us are more than happy to have an open discussion.

In a pathetic attempt to reinflate the discredited and failed neoliberal/neocon status quo bubble it supports, corporate media has been relentless in its attacks on anything or anyone that offers an alternative vision. These attacks more often than not focus on Donald Trump, but it’s important to note that contempt for Bernie Sanders and his supporters is not far behind. It doesn’t matter what the alternative vision is, if it falls outside the neoliberal/neocon status quo, it must be demonized and destroyed by the likes of billionaire-owned media properties such as The Washington Post and The New York Times.

The alarm bells really went off for me regarding the hatred of Sanders by the New York Times upon reading the paper’s nonsensical endorsement of Hillary Clinton during the primary. You should read the entire article, but here’s some of what I wrote at the time:

One of the biggest trends of the post financial crisis period has been a plunge in the American public’s perception of the country’s powerful institutions. The establishment often admits this reality with a mixture of bewilderment and erroneous conclusions, ultimately settling on the idea people are upset because “Washington can’t get anything done.” However, nothing could be further from the truth. When it comes to corruption and serving big monied interests, both Congress and the President are very, very good at getting things done. Yes it’s true Congress doesn’t get anything done on behalf of the people, but this is no accident. The government doesn’t work for the people.

 With its dishonest and shifty endorsement of Hillary Clinton, I believe the New York Times has finally come out of the closet as an unabashed gatekeeper of the status quo. I suppose this makes sense since the paper has become the ultimate status quo journalistic publication. The sad truth is the publication has been living on borrowed time and a borrowed reputation for a long time. Long on prestige, it remains very short on substance when it comes to fighting difficult battles in the public interest. Content with its position of power and influence within the current paradigm, the paper doesn’t want to rock the boat. What the New York Times is actually telling its readers with the Hillary Clinton endorsement is that it likes things just the way they are, and will fight hard to keep them that way. It is as much a part of the American establishment as any government institution.

Truth be told, the paper continues to act just as upset about Sanders as it is about Donald Trump. What really seems to get under the skin of people of who write there is that her highness, Hillary Clinton, had her coronation disrupted. As such, the paper’s writers seem to be throwing daily temper tantrums filled with lies and misdirection at anyone who doesn’t swallow status quo neoliberal/neocon garbage.

Earlier this week, I highlighted one recent case in the post, Lee Camp Explains How The New York Times Manufactures “Hit Piece Propaganda.” Then yesterday, we had yet another embarrassing example. Here’s the title of the much maligned, and utterly shameful article, written by Yamiche Al Cindor.

If that title doesn’t betray that what’s to follow is a piece of unabashed propaganda, I don’t know what does. Then here’s how the piece begins…

WASHINGTON — The most ardent supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders have long been outspoken about their anger toward Republicans — and in some cases toward Democrats. Their idol, the senator from Vermont, has called President Trump a “demagogue” and said recently that he was “perhaps the worst and most dangerous president in the history of our country.”

 Now, in Mr. Sanders’s world, his fans have something concrete to grapple with: James T. Hodgkinson, a former volunteer for Mr. Sanders’s presidential campaign, is suspected of opening fire on Republican lawmakers practicing baseball in Alexandria, Va.

My lord, where to begin. First of all, the vitriol and conspiracy theories directed at Donald Trump have been far worse from Hillary cultists and NeverTrump neocons than from Sanders supporters. In fact, the Sanders supporters are far more focused on taking over the Democratic Party and pushing aside discredited neoliberals than they are about demonizing Trump. If any group of people is singularly obsessed with removing Trump from office it is establishment, corporate Democrats, not Sanders supporters. As such, Sanders fans have absolutely nothing unique to grapple with, and to suggest otherwise is shady and dishonest. Then there’s this.

That shooting on Wednesday, which wounded four people, may prove to be an unexpected test for a movement born out of Mr. Sanders’s left-wing, populist politics and a moment for liberals to figure out how to balance anger at Mr. Trump with inciting violence.

Again, this is ridiculous. While I do think the political dialogue in this country has descended into a dangerous gutter and must be reexamined, the notion that this pertains particularly to Sanders supporters is simply preposterous. But it gets even worse.

But long before the shooting on Wednesday, some of Mr. Sanders’s supporters had earned a belligerent reputation for their criticism of Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party and others who they believed disagreed with their ideas. Sanders fans, sometimes referred to derogatorily as “Bernie Bros” or “Bernie Bots,” at times harassed reporters covering Mr. Sanders and flooded social media with angry posts directed at the “corporate media,” a term often used by the senator. 

Sorry, what’s wrong with accurately describing corporate media for what it is. This clearly seems to have gotten under the author’s skin. Meanwhile…

The suspect in the shooting in Virginia put a new spotlight on the rage buried in some corners of the progressive left.

 Mr. Hodgkinson filled his Facebook page with photographs of the senator and quotes from his speeches. Mr. Hodgkinson also wrote messages filled with expletives directed at the president, and a post in March said: “Trump is a traitor. Trump has destroyed our democracy. It’s time to destroy Trump & co.”

Perhaps we should ask the question, which wing of the Democratic Party tends to use this sort of language most often, Hillary dead-enders or Bernie supporters? The answer is obvious.

Next we have this gem.

On Tuesday, Mr. Hodgkinson posted a cartoon on Facebook explaining “How does a bill work?” “That’s an easy one, Billy,” the cartoon reads. “Corporations write the bill and then bribe Congress until it becomes law.”

 “That’s Exactly How It Works. ….” Mr. Hodgkinson wrote.

 That is not far from Mr. Sanders’s own message. 

But that is exactly how it works. Are we supposed to pretend that’s not the case just because some lunatic went on a shooting spree?

Recall: Citigroup Written Legislation Moves Through the House of Representatives.

Remarkably, it isn’t until the final two paragraphs that the truth is finally able to peak its stubborn head above the drivel.

RoseAnn DeMoro, the executive director of National Nurses United, a union that campaigned heavily for Mr. Sanders and continues to work with him, said some were hoping to discredit Mr. Sanders to slow down the continuing success of his brand of politics. She called it a “boldface lie” to connect the shooting to Mr. Sanders’s push for opposing Mr. Trump’s proposals.

 “He’s the most popular politician in America,” Ms. DeMoro said of Mr. Sanders. “That doesn’t sit well with establishment Democrats or Republicans. They are trying to delegitimize and discredit anyone who is speaking out for a better society. That’s what’s happening.”

Winner, winner chicken dinner. This is the real issue. A lot of very powerful people are extremely concerned that Sanders might dare run again in 2020, so the attacks must escalate to bury him ahead of time. It won’t work.

Finally, I think the following tweet sums it up perfectly.

The NYT is uncomfortable because some psycho took their Russophobia at face value, so their shining the spotlight elsewhere.

— Brian Eppert (@BrianEppert) June 15, 2017

source http://capitalisthq.com/the-corporate-media-continues-to-torch-its-reputation/ from CapitalistHQ http://capitalisthq.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-corporate-media-continues-to-torch.html

[everettwilkinson]

The Corporate Media Continues To Torch Its Reputation

Authored by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,

Last December, I noted the following in the post, ‘Then We Will Fight in the Shade’ – A Guide to Winning the Media Wars:

It is when you get desperate, scared and panicky that you make the biggest mistakes, and the legacy media is currently desperate, scared and panicky.  As Napoleon Bonaparte allegedly said:

  “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

  Whether or not he actually said them, those words still ring true. We mustn’t get in the way of the legacy media’s inevitable self-destruction. Part of this means that we do not self-destruct in the process. We need to recognize that there’s a reason independent, alternative media is winning the battle of ideas in the first place. For all the warts, mistakes and bad actors, the emergence of the internet is indeed the historical equivalent of the invention of the printing press on steroids.

  Only a clueless self-important elitist actually believes that the smartest, most informed people in America are the pundits on tv and the journalists employed by the mainstream media. With a handful of companies and a few oligarchs in charge, you’d have to be the most naive fool on earth to not understand that legacy media is driven by well defined narratives, and that these narratives are not in your best interest. The rest of us understand that the Internet has served as a much needed countervailing force, and has been an incredible blessing to human knowledge, connectivity and the marketplace of ideas. Just because some people can’t distinguish truth from fiction, doesn’t negate the incredible progress that decentralized information dissemination provides. It is only those who do not wish to engage in public debate on the issues themselves who want to censor stuff. The rest of us are more than happy to have an open discussion.

In a pathetic attempt to reinflate the discredited and failed neoliberal/neocon status quo bubble it supports, corporate media has been relentless in its attacks on anything or anyone that offers an alternative vision. These attacks more often than not focus on Donald Trump, but it’s important to note that contempt for Bernie Sanders and his supporters is not far behind. It doesn’t matter what the alternative vision is, if it falls outside the neoliberal/neocon status quo, it must be demonized and destroyed by the likes of billionaire-owned media properties such as The Washington Post and The New York Times.

The alarm bells really went off for me regarding the hatred of Sanders by the New York Times upon reading the paper’s nonsensical endorsement of Hillary Clinton during the primary. You should read the entire article, but here’s some of what I wrote at the time:

One of the biggest trends of the post financial crisis period has been a plunge in the American public’s perception of the country’s powerful institutions. The establishment often admits this reality with a mixture of bewilderment and erroneous conclusions, ultimately settling on the idea people are upset because “Washington can’t get anything done.” However, nothing could be further from the truth. When it comes to corruption and serving big monied interests, both Congress and the President are very, very good at getting things done. Yes it’s true Congress doesn’t get anything done on behalf of the people, but this is no accident. The government doesn’t work for the people.

  With its dishonest and shifty endorsement of Hillary Clinton, I believe the New York Times has finally come out of the closet as an unabashed gatekeeper of the status quo. I suppose this makes sense since the paper has become the ultimate status quo journalistic publication. The sad truth is the publication has been living on borrowed time and a borrowed reputation for a long time. Long on prestige, it remains very short on substance when it comes to fighting difficult battles in the public interest. Content with its position of power and influence within the current paradigm, the paper doesn’t want to rock the boat. What the New York Times is actually telling its readers with the Hillary Clinton endorsement is that it likes things just the way they are, and will fight hard to keep them that way. It is as much a part of the American establishment as any government institution.

Truth be told, the paper continues to act just as upset about Sanders as it is about Donald Trump. What really seems to get under the skin of people of who write there is that her highness, Hillary Clinton, had her coronation disrupted. As such, the paper’s writers seem to be throwing daily temper tantrums filled with lies and misdirection at anyone who doesn’t swallow status quo neoliberal/neocon garbage.

Earlier this week, I highlighted one recent case in the post, Lee Camp Explains How The New York Times Manufactures “Hit Piece Propaganda.” Then yesterday, we had yet another embarrassing example. Here’s the title of the much maligned, and utterly shameful article, written by Yamiche Al Cindor.

If that title doesn’t betray that what’s to follow is a piece of unabashed propaganda, I don’t know what does. Then here’s how the piece begins…

WASHINGTON — The most ardent supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders have long been outspoken about their anger toward Republicans — and in some cases toward Democrats. Their idol, the senator from Vermont, has called President Trump a “demagogue” and said recently that he was “perhaps the worst and most dangerous president in the history of our country.”

  Now, in Mr. Sanders’s world, his fans have something concrete to grapple with: James T. Hodgkinson, a former volunteer for Mr. Sanders’s presidential campaign, is suspected of opening fire on Republican lawmakers practicing baseball in Alexandria, Va.

My lord, where to begin. First of all, the vitriol and conspiracy theories directed at Donald Trump have been far worse from Hillary cultists and NeverTrump neocons than from Sanders supporters. In fact, the Sanders supporters are far more focused on taking over the Democratic Party and pushing aside discredited neoliberals than they are about demonizing Trump. If any group of people is singularly obsessed with removing Trump from office it is establishment, corporate Democrats, not Sanders supporters. As such, Sanders fans have absolutely nothing unique to grapple with, and to suggest otherwise is shady and dishonest. Then there’s this.

That shooting on Wednesday, which wounded four people, may prove to be an unexpected test for a movement born out of Mr. Sanders’s left-wing, populist politics and a moment for liberals to figure out how to balance anger at Mr. Trump with inciting violence.

Again, this is ridiculous. While I do think the political dialogue in this country has descended into a dangerous gutter and must be reexamined, the notion that this pertains particularly to Sanders supporters is simply preposterous. But it gets even worse.

But long before the shooting on Wednesday, some of Mr. Sanders’s supporters had earned a belligerent reputation for their criticism of Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party and others who they believed disagreed with their ideas. Sanders fans, sometimes referred to derogatorily as “Bernie Bros” or “Bernie Bots,” at times harassed reporters covering Mr. Sanders and flooded social media with angry posts directed at the “corporate media,” a term often used by the senator. 

Sorry, what’s wrong with accurately describing corporate media for what it is. This clearly seems to have gotten under the author’s skin. Meanwhile…

The suspect in the shooting in Virginia put a new spotlight on the rage buried in some corners of the progressive left.

  Mr. Hodgkinson filled his Facebook page with photographs of the senator and quotes from his speeches. Mr. Hodgkinson also wrote messages filled with expletives directed at the president, and a post in March said: “Trump is a traitor. Trump has destroyed our democracy. It’s time to destroy Trump & co.”

Perhaps we should ask the question, which wing of the Democratic Party tends to use this sort of language most often, Hillary dead-enders or Bernie supporters? The answer is obvious.

Next we have this gem.

On Tuesday, Mr. Hodgkinson posted a cartoon on Facebook explaining “How does a bill work?” “That’s an easy one, Billy,” the cartoon reads. “Corporations write the bill and then bribe Congress until it becomes law.”

  “That’s Exactly How It Works. ….” Mr. Hodgkinson wrote.

  That is not far from Mr. Sanders’s own message. 

But that is exactly how it works. Are we supposed to pretend that’s not the case just because some lunatic went on a shooting spree?

Recall: Citigroup Written Legislation Moves Through the House of Representatives.

Remarkably, it isn’t until the final two paragraphs that the truth is finally able to peak its stubborn head above the drivel.

RoseAnn DeMoro, the executive director of National Nurses United, a union that campaigned heavily for Mr. Sanders and continues to work with him, said some were hoping to discredit Mr. Sanders to slow down the continuing success of his brand of politics. She called it a “boldface lie” to connect the shooting to Mr. Sanders’s push for opposing Mr. Trump’s proposals.

  “He’s the most popular politician in America,” Ms. DeMoro said of Mr. Sanders. “That doesn’t sit well with establishment Democrats or Republicans. They are trying to delegitimize and discredit anyone who is speaking out for a better society. That’s what’s happening.”

Winner, winner chicken dinner. This is the real issue. A lot of very powerful people are extremely concerned that Sanders might dare run again in 2020, so the attacks must escalate to bury him ahead of time. It won’t work.

Finally, I think the following tweet sums it up perfectly.

The NYT is uncomfortable because some psycho took their Russophobia at face value, so their shining the spotlight elsewhere.

— Brian Eppert (@BrianEppert) June 15, 2017

from CapitalistHQ.com http://capitalisthq.com/the-corporate-media-continues-to-torch-its-reputation/