Then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth: and he said Sibboleth: for he could not frame to pronounce it right. Then they took him, and slew him at the passages of Jordan. Judges 12: 5-6, KJV
This is an amazing article. It kind of saddens me that this is the kind of thing that could be coming out of academia if the institutions hadn't been captured and ruined by ideologues. One main difference I see is the prevalence of gun ownership and proficiency in the US. When there are people mostly interested in peace around every corner on every street with weapons that can put effective rounds on target at up to 500 meters, I think it puts a kind of ceiling on the extent to which any potential conflict could escalate, in spite of other factors that might otherwise align to produce the types of violence seen on the African continent.
Thank you for compliment. I am trying to offer what I miss not only from academia, but from journals and magazines like Foreign Policy, the Atlantic, and more. I can remember when we had something other than justifications for a failing yet predatory elite class.
I agree the 2A community is vastly law-abiding, pro-civilization, and provides a check against outright state abuse of power. But I look at the Soros DAs, the climbing murder and violent crime rates (which do directly result from political decisions and let's not pretend otherwise), and the general daily insecurity that more and more Americans are experiencing. We have a de facto arrangement where a small percentage of the population is being permitted -- if not encouraged -- to terrorize and do harm. That harm disproportionally affects urban working-class and middle-class communities. But we now see the violence travelling. We're moving towards the necessity of neighborhood watch groups, and more. Does this not escalate at some point to a Purge? I hope not -- but the possibility seems real.
Weber claimed -- among other things -- that a monopoly on violence is what makes for a functioning state. I am angry with my neighbor -- but I can't just assault him or shoot him because I am angry. Only, increasingly, people do just that. I lost a basketball game. My fries were served cold. This woman I just met refused to sexually service me. Let me respond with violence, knowing that the state might well prioritize my rights over those my intended victim. That culture results from policy and practice -- not accident or personal pathology. Part of the State, at least, has turned against a majority of its own people. This is not sustainable in terms of governance, at least in the West and certainly not in the USA. I wish I had answers. I will try to share your optimism.
I think you're actually plenty optimistic. You're focusing on what can be controlled and the best ways to forestall the worst contingencies. Even though we don't know what the future holds, it isn't unreasonable to think that some kind of black swan event could go our way. It is impossible to predict the future, and it is certainly possible things could work out favorably. Likely? I don't know, as long as it is possible that is what optimism is all about. It has to be realistic. It is realistic to think that good outcomes are possible, regardless of how likely. We improve the chances of having good outcomes by taking purposeful action, which you're doing in spades. You wouldn't bother if you didn't have any hope.
Well said! The "it can't happen here" attitude is so pervasive because people will look for any intellectual excuse to justify laziness. It's much easier to believe that a party or a candidate will fight for us than it is to fight for ourselves.
I don't think we should panic, but we should be aware of history and look for constructive steps to preserve our individual freedom. Voting alone isn't enough. We have to fight back with lifestyle choices.
Agree 100% on the lifestyle choices. Not calling for panic. But when I speak with brainwashed blue family back in the USA, I am concerned truly. Democracy needs to be empirical not judicial. Local first. Participation in communities -- not just ritual voting in state-wide and national elections. And one could go on.
Absolutely. I do see a lot of substackers (not you) panicking though. It seems like most posts are about terrible situations that are completely outside our control. I'd like to see more of a focus on things that we can *can* control. Too much negativity is paralyzing.
Lifestyle is the key. The foundations for political freedom are widespread ownership of capital, savings in a currency that functions as a reliable store of value and the lived experience of personal autonomy. Without those, democracy is a sick joke.
We all need to rethink the culture at a micro level (individuals, families and grassroots communities). People who don't think for themselves as a matter of course cannot function as citizens. And this requires less use of infotainment technology, less consumerism, education in things of substance (maths and languages) and valuing practical skills.
Oct 21, 2022·edited Oct 21, 2022Liked by Data Humanist
Data Humanist, this is very good and there is much to discuss. Re the tragic condition of people on big Pharma/zombie land, the central means of control in the post-liberal West is the normalization of dysfunction. The established order generates chaos, decay, and both psychic and somatic morbidity as a means of control. I would call this Sado-Malthusian governance. It is about the state and its allies treating much of the domestic population as enemies subject to a regime of malicious dirigisme camouflaged by therapeutic and eudaimonic rhetoric.
The current wave of post-liberal modernity and its curated dysfunction is struggling to contain the breakdown of the post-Cold War social peace that was enabled by consumer credit and cheap imports for the household sector, mass media and the promise of future upward social mobility by education.
The emerging regime requires the management of intensifying austerity and insecurity. Disabling a significant minority of the subaltern population reduces the risk of opposition from below. It is a low intensity civil war waged by deindustrialisation, pauperisation and malefic social policy. Its effects fall hardest on those elements of society most exposed to anomie and atomisation.
Well said! I agree. I think it can't be over-stated that we are being conditioned on many fronts.
And I'd say the CIA is keeping very busy doing their usual mind fuckery...
It's no secret that saying something over and over and over (such as, "America is veering toward civil war," and similar) works to implant ideas and attitudes into the populace... which then become beliefs, and/or "facts."
And I would add, too, that in a way that doesn't have to be religious, but certainly could be, EVIL is very much among us, actively, strongly, and we must be alert and on guard, and not allow it to take over our hearts.
Full spectrum harassment. There is a coalition of interests behind this co-ordinated campaign of menace: everyone who stands to profit from perfecting the system of control. The great danger is that people look at it through worn-out, conventional, perspectives developed under very different circumstances. IMO we are in very new territory and dissenters, dissidents and the constituencies for potential opposition are misdirecting ourselves with archaisms (everything is explained away as 'Cultural Marxism' or 'socialism' which strikes me as silly).
The Lebanonisation of once-civil communities is very sinister indeed as is the normalisation of drug use on a mass scale. There is too much at stake for North America to risk a full civil war, but a low intensity, carefully managed, wave of campaigns that utilise crime, political extremism etc, may be sustainable over the long term.
Before I read your next comment, I'm curious as to what you mean by "campaigns that utilise crime, political extremism." If you are hesitant to spell it out on this post, email me. But if you're talking about violent opposition, it's very likely that we are David and they are Goliath, and one story about the little guy overwhelming the big guy (and his extremely sophisticated and lethal weaponry) is ... ONE story. Just sayin, but... you have my attention.
Oct 22, 2022·edited Oct 22, 2022Liked by Data Humanist
No mystery: campaigns waged by the state involving crime would involve covertly green-lighting criminal activity from shop-lifting through to riots. A wave of mayhem imposes burdens on targeted communities and creates an environment in which all manner of mischiefs can be accomplished. The green-lighting can be done through local officials, selective non-prosecution or defunding law enforcement. Criminal gangs often operate under de facto license from the police, they can be utilised easily enough by the state as enforcers.
Political extremism is very easily managed by the state. Radical groups are typically heavily infiltrated and are used as fly-paper to identify troublemakers. The riots that resulted in the Rittenhouse prosecution were pretty obviously stage-managed...the FBI had drones with state of the art video surveillance capacity in the air on the night Rittenhouse discharged his rifle, yet they never passed on the imagery to local police to charge any rioters. It is pretty obvious what was going on.
Crime by dissidents is insane, but dissenters need to understand how criminals operate because covert organisation skills are essential.
Oct 22, 2022·edited Oct 22, 2022Liked by Data Humanist
Okay. It seems to me that this kind of behavior gets a lot of dead protesters.
Seems to me something more like sabotage, quick things and then gone again, would be better.
I don't even have a handgun. The idea of going up against armed and experienced mercenaries seems like suicide, to me. I'm not trying to shut you down, just part of my conversation on this...
It is called predictive programming. Whatever happens, it will be heavily televised and theatrical...like the FBI managed spectacle of Jan 6 which was all about managing perceptions.
IMO there will be nothing like a traditional civil war. Washington lacks troops that it can rely upon. It lacks senior officers who are capable of inspiring the sort of loyalty necessary for anything like it. It most certainly lacks the political leadership capable of managing a war. The combat wing of the military is simply not turning its guns on mainstream America. Who would risk violent death to suppress the domestic opponents of anyone like Biden, Harris, Obama or either of the Clintons?
Washington does enjoy an abundance of malice and ambition. The regime will certainly direct violence against the people, but this will come from SWAT teams employed by agencies within the civil administration itself and by de facto irregulars and parodic paramilitaries such as ANTIFA.
Washington already covertly sponsors criminal violence on a widespread basis to ethnically cleanse key cities of whites. This serves the usual suspects with a long term political or financial interest in the eventual gentrification initiatives. But the flight to relative safety strengthens the resolve of the surviving regional forces of sense and order.
The regime also already incites lethal violence against critics and dissidents in selected areas. At least two MAGA supporters were murdered, one in Portland and another in (I think) Denver. In the case of the former the authorities did not bother to investigate, in the latter charges were reduced.
All of this is sinister and it is likely that Washington will escalate. We are seeing a post-modern parody of the Reconstruction era when a handful of Scallywags and Carpetbaggers, supported by the Freedmen's Bureau, presided over widespread low intensity violence to subdue the civilian population via a form of anarcho-tyranny.
We shall also see further mass immigration, legal and illegal, to secure the political interests that seek to create an Afro-Saxon version of Brazil across North America: zones of functional and productive society surrounded by slums, favelas, No-Go Zones and a rural and Rust Belt hinterland constrained by the threat of state violence and a form of surveillance capitalism designed to control the helots.
Yet the threat of real military force per se is political theatre. Ugly. Thuggish. But such threats are a sign of desperation and abject weakness. Lincoln had a burgeoning industrial behemoth and a loyal army at his disposal...Dark Brandon has a hollowed out service economy in decline and an armed forces burdened by affirmative action, feminism and gender diversity.
The real danger is from the intelligence community. Until that splits, with a least a portion turning on the regime, we shall see escalating levels of violence, applied to more and more of the USA, but it will stop short of actual civil war.
Phillip: Excellent comments, thank you. My point above also is that we will likely not have anything like "a traditional civil war." But enough low-level conflict on a daily basis, which is the new norm, becomes the equivalent. People afraid to go grocery shopping, to go for a jog, etc. The Soros District Attorneys are real -- the damage done by their agendas to lives and property, likewise real. People being targeted for violence because of their perceived group membership, and so on.
You mention the "real danger is from the intelligence community," and Big Tech in collusion with them, and the Medical Establishment defining new definitions of emotional and mental disorder with the appropriate medications, and the IRS, and etc.
Oct 22, 2022·edited Oct 22, 2022Liked by Data Humanist
I so would like to engage you, Phillip, and some others that also have the same kind of thinking apparatus, in a weekend camping trip, or something akin, where we could engage IRL, without anyone snooping and sneaking and such...
I long to find a group of people to do that, NOT online, but where we can speak freely, without censorship or spying.
I am intrigued by what you're saying.
I am not a soldier. What I have is a good brain, a powerful need for autonomy and freedom, a few other potential assets of personality type, and Nothing To Lose.
You are out of luck: I am writing from overseas and I have no experience that would be remotely relevant. My views are simple: people who think for themselves need to assume the worst and prepare for the day when covert organisation skills of all sorts will be necessary to maintain any privacy, dignity or freedom. The first step is to build cohesion and trust locally. The personal is political. And all signals-based communications (like the internet) are unreliable and dangerous. Best of luck.
Philip and I are both currently ex-patriate, it seems. When you look at the USA the way you might look at any other nation in the world, it does seem very different than being on the inside so to speak. I hate to say this, but I do see American expat communities forming up in South America and elsewhere for precisely reasons you -- JC, the Word Herder -- mention. Might be worth your look. Your health and sanity must come first.
Thank you, DH, for writing this opaque dump on the wall of our imagined heritage in order, with depth.
Also appreciate comments citing a group known for its international internecine intrigues which look like civil war, on TV or in print, but up close smell like red tide, or that squishy pile stuck to the sole.
Well I just ordered Uber eats and drinks and drugs while watching reruns of ‘Friends’, and complain curtly into my cell phone connected to the Blink lens/speaker door monitor “Just leave it there. I’ll get at the next HIV commercial; got it covered.”
Rainbow revolution: not with a bang, but wine & whining.
With wine and whining. Until someone you or I know becomes the victim of a car-jacking or worse. I know people in Portland who were complaining about police response times, and claiming that the officers were hanging back too much -- "sandbagging." I pointed out all the new restrictions, and the reduction of the police force by 20%. The response I got: "it's a 20% reduction in white supremacy." Really? And talking about having it both ways -- or trying to. The Portland people I know are not as wealthy as the Martha Vineyard crowd, although they identify or rather aspire as such. But with the homeless encampments now taking over the sidewalks near their expensive houses, and the rise in property crime and violence, the disorder unleashed by enabling 100 days of Antifa riots is now finally directly affecting their lives. Following the news, I find a number of people with families -- with school-aged children -- have left the city to escape the hassle and potential violence. They packed up and ran away. Smart move. But you can't run forever, and not everyone is in a position to pack up and go. So you adjust to the new normal and allow yourself to be terrorized in your formerly safe neighborhood. Or? Or what? That is the question that too many Americans are now asking themselves.
Always -- ALWAYS -- good to hear from you, Will B. Thank you for stopping by, and contributing, and being part of this small community.
This is an amazing article. It kind of saddens me that this is the kind of thing that could be coming out of academia if the institutions hadn't been captured and ruined by ideologues. One main difference I see is the prevalence of gun ownership and proficiency in the US. When there are people mostly interested in peace around every corner on every street with weapons that can put effective rounds on target at up to 500 meters, I think it puts a kind of ceiling on the extent to which any potential conflict could escalate, in spite of other factors that might otherwise align to produce the types of violence seen on the African continent.
Thank you for compliment. I am trying to offer what I miss not only from academia, but from journals and magazines like Foreign Policy, the Atlantic, and more. I can remember when we had something other than justifications for a failing yet predatory elite class.
I agree the 2A community is vastly law-abiding, pro-civilization, and provides a check against outright state abuse of power. But I look at the Soros DAs, the climbing murder and violent crime rates (which do directly result from political decisions and let's not pretend otherwise), and the general daily insecurity that more and more Americans are experiencing. We have a de facto arrangement where a small percentage of the population is being permitted -- if not encouraged -- to terrorize and do harm. That harm disproportionally affects urban working-class and middle-class communities. But we now see the violence travelling. We're moving towards the necessity of neighborhood watch groups, and more. Does this not escalate at some point to a Purge? I hope not -- but the possibility seems real.
Weber claimed -- among other things -- that a monopoly on violence is what makes for a functioning state. I am angry with my neighbor -- but I can't just assault him or shoot him because I am angry. Only, increasingly, people do just that. I lost a basketball game. My fries were served cold. This woman I just met refused to sexually service me. Let me respond with violence, knowing that the state might well prioritize my rights over those my intended victim. That culture results from policy and practice -- not accident or personal pathology. Part of the State, at least, has turned against a majority of its own people. This is not sustainable in terms of governance, at least in the West and certainly not in the USA. I wish I had answers. I will try to share your optimism.
I think you're actually plenty optimistic. You're focusing on what can be controlled and the best ways to forestall the worst contingencies. Even though we don't know what the future holds, it isn't unreasonable to think that some kind of black swan event could go our way. It is impossible to predict the future, and it is certainly possible things could work out favorably. Likely? I don't know, as long as it is possible that is what optimism is all about. It has to be realistic. It is realistic to think that good outcomes are possible, regardless of how likely. We improve the chances of having good outcomes by taking purposeful action, which you're doing in spades. You wouldn't bother if you didn't have any hope.
Well said! The "it can't happen here" attitude is so pervasive because people will look for any intellectual excuse to justify laziness. It's much easier to believe that a party or a candidate will fight for us than it is to fight for ourselves.
I don't think we should panic, but we should be aware of history and look for constructive steps to preserve our individual freedom. Voting alone isn't enough. We have to fight back with lifestyle choices.
Agree 100% on the lifestyle choices. Not calling for panic. But when I speak with brainwashed blue family back in the USA, I am concerned truly. Democracy needs to be empirical not judicial. Local first. Participation in communities -- not just ritual voting in state-wide and national elections. And one could go on.
Absolutely. I do see a lot of substackers (not you) panicking though. It seems like most posts are about terrible situations that are completely outside our control. I'd like to see more of a focus on things that we can *can* control. Too much negativity is paralyzing.
Lifestyle is the key. The foundations for political freedom are widespread ownership of capital, savings in a currency that functions as a reliable store of value and the lived experience of personal autonomy. Without those, democracy is a sick joke.
We all need to rethink the culture at a micro level (individuals, families and grassroots communities). People who don't think for themselves as a matter of course cannot function as citizens. And this requires less use of infotainment technology, less consumerism, education in things of substance (maths and languages) and valuing practical skills.
I couldn't have said it any better myself!
Data Humanist, this is very good and there is much to discuss. Re the tragic condition of people on big Pharma/zombie land, the central means of control in the post-liberal West is the normalization of dysfunction. The established order generates chaos, decay, and both psychic and somatic morbidity as a means of control. I would call this Sado-Malthusian governance. It is about the state and its allies treating much of the domestic population as enemies subject to a regime of malicious dirigisme camouflaged by therapeutic and eudaimonic rhetoric.
The current wave of post-liberal modernity and its curated dysfunction is struggling to contain the breakdown of the post-Cold War social peace that was enabled by consumer credit and cheap imports for the household sector, mass media and the promise of future upward social mobility by education.
The emerging regime requires the management of intensifying austerity and insecurity. Disabling a significant minority of the subaltern population reduces the risk of opposition from below. It is a low intensity civil war waged by deindustrialisation, pauperisation and malefic social policy. Its effects fall hardest on those elements of society most exposed to anomie and atomisation.
Well said! I agree. I think it can't be over-stated that we are being conditioned on many fronts.
And I'd say the CIA is keeping very busy doing their usual mind fuckery...
It's no secret that saying something over and over and over (such as, "America is veering toward civil war," and similar) works to implant ideas and attitudes into the populace... which then become beliefs, and/or "facts."
And I would add, too, that in a way that doesn't have to be religious, but certainly could be, EVIL is very much among us, actively, strongly, and we must be alert and on guard, and not allow it to take over our hearts.
Thank you. We are unquestionably being targeted on many fronts.
Full spectrum harassment. There is a coalition of interests behind this co-ordinated campaign of menace: everyone who stands to profit from perfecting the system of control. The great danger is that people look at it through worn-out, conventional, perspectives developed under very different circumstances. IMO we are in very new territory and dissenters, dissidents and the constituencies for potential opposition are misdirecting ourselves with archaisms (everything is explained away as 'Cultural Marxism' or 'socialism' which strikes me as silly).
The Lebanonisation of once-civil communities is very sinister indeed as is the normalisation of drug use on a mass scale. There is too much at stake for North America to risk a full civil war, but a low intensity, carefully managed, wave of campaigns that utilise crime, political extremism etc, may be sustainable over the long term.
Before I read your next comment, I'm curious as to what you mean by "campaigns that utilise crime, political extremism." If you are hesitant to spell it out on this post, email me. But if you're talking about violent opposition, it's very likely that we are David and they are Goliath, and one story about the little guy overwhelming the big guy (and his extremely sophisticated and lethal weaponry) is ... ONE story. Just sayin, but... you have my attention.
No mystery: campaigns waged by the state involving crime would involve covertly green-lighting criminal activity from shop-lifting through to riots. A wave of mayhem imposes burdens on targeted communities and creates an environment in which all manner of mischiefs can be accomplished. The green-lighting can be done through local officials, selective non-prosecution or defunding law enforcement. Criminal gangs often operate under de facto license from the police, they can be utilised easily enough by the state as enforcers.
Political extremism is very easily managed by the state. Radical groups are typically heavily infiltrated and are used as fly-paper to identify troublemakers. The riots that resulted in the Rittenhouse prosecution were pretty obviously stage-managed...the FBI had drones with state of the art video surveillance capacity in the air on the night Rittenhouse discharged his rifle, yet they never passed on the imagery to local police to charge any rioters. It is pretty obvious what was going on.
Crime by dissidents is insane, but dissenters need to understand how criminals operate because covert organisation skills are essential.
Okay. It seems to me that this kind of behavior gets a lot of dead protesters.
Seems to me something more like sabotage, quick things and then gone again, would be better.
I don't even have a handgun. The idea of going up against armed and experienced mercenaries seems like suicide, to me. I'm not trying to shut you down, just part of my conversation on this...
It is called predictive programming. Whatever happens, it will be heavily televised and theatrical...like the FBI managed spectacle of Jan 6 which was all about managing perceptions.
IMO there will be nothing like a traditional civil war. Washington lacks troops that it can rely upon. It lacks senior officers who are capable of inspiring the sort of loyalty necessary for anything like it. It most certainly lacks the political leadership capable of managing a war. The combat wing of the military is simply not turning its guns on mainstream America. Who would risk violent death to suppress the domestic opponents of anyone like Biden, Harris, Obama or either of the Clintons?
Washington does enjoy an abundance of malice and ambition. The regime will certainly direct violence against the people, but this will come from SWAT teams employed by agencies within the civil administration itself and by de facto irregulars and parodic paramilitaries such as ANTIFA.
Washington already covertly sponsors criminal violence on a widespread basis to ethnically cleanse key cities of whites. This serves the usual suspects with a long term political or financial interest in the eventual gentrification initiatives. But the flight to relative safety strengthens the resolve of the surviving regional forces of sense and order.
The regime also already incites lethal violence against critics and dissidents in selected areas. At least two MAGA supporters were murdered, one in Portland and another in (I think) Denver. In the case of the former the authorities did not bother to investigate, in the latter charges were reduced.
All of this is sinister and it is likely that Washington will escalate. We are seeing a post-modern parody of the Reconstruction era when a handful of Scallywags and Carpetbaggers, supported by the Freedmen's Bureau, presided over widespread low intensity violence to subdue the civilian population via a form of anarcho-tyranny.
We shall also see further mass immigration, legal and illegal, to secure the political interests that seek to create an Afro-Saxon version of Brazil across North America: zones of functional and productive society surrounded by slums, favelas, No-Go Zones and a rural and Rust Belt hinterland constrained by the threat of state violence and a form of surveillance capitalism designed to control the helots.
Yet the threat of real military force per se is political theatre. Ugly. Thuggish. But such threats are a sign of desperation and abject weakness. Lincoln had a burgeoning industrial behemoth and a loyal army at his disposal...Dark Brandon has a hollowed out service economy in decline and an armed forces burdened by affirmative action, feminism and gender diversity.
The real danger is from the intelligence community. Until that splits, with a least a portion turning on the regime, we shall see escalating levels of violence, applied to more and more of the USA, but it will stop short of actual civil war.
Phillip: Excellent comments, thank you. My point above also is that we will likely not have anything like "a traditional civil war." But enough low-level conflict on a daily basis, which is the new norm, becomes the equivalent. People afraid to go grocery shopping, to go for a jog, etc. The Soros District Attorneys are real -- the damage done by their agendas to lives and property, likewise real. People being targeted for violence because of their perceived group membership, and so on.
You mention the "real danger is from the intelligence community," and Big Tech in collusion with them, and the Medical Establishment defining new definitions of emotional and mental disorder with the appropriate medications, and the IRS, and etc.
Yeah, that 85K new IRS agents, ARMED, is chilling...
I have two baseball bats and a hammer.
I so would like to engage you, Phillip, and some others that also have the same kind of thinking apparatus, in a weekend camping trip, or something akin, where we could engage IRL, without anyone snooping and sneaking and such...
I long to find a group of people to do that, NOT online, but where we can speak freely, without censorship or spying.
I am intrigued by what you're saying.
I am not a soldier. What I have is a good brain, a powerful need for autonomy and freedom, a few other potential assets of personality type, and Nothing To Lose.
You are out of luck: I am writing from overseas and I have no experience that would be remotely relevant. My views are simple: people who think for themselves need to assume the worst and prepare for the day when covert organisation skills of all sorts will be necessary to maintain any privacy, dignity or freedom. The first step is to build cohesion and trust locally. The personal is political. And all signals-based communications (like the internet) are unreliable and dangerous. Best of luck.
Hmm.
Philip and I are both currently ex-patriate, it seems. When you look at the USA the way you might look at any other nation in the world, it does seem very different than being on the inside so to speak. I hate to say this, but I do see American expat communities forming up in South America and elsewhere for precisely reasons you -- JC, the Word Herder -- mention. Might be worth your look. Your health and sanity must come first.
I wonder.
Thank you, DH, for writing this opaque dump on the wall of our imagined heritage in order, with depth.
Also appreciate comments citing a group known for its international internecine intrigues which look like civil war, on TV or in print, but up close smell like red tide, or that squishy pile stuck to the sole.
Well I just ordered Uber eats and drinks and drugs while watching reruns of ‘Friends’, and complain curtly into my cell phone connected to the Blink lens/speaker door monitor “Just leave it there. I’ll get at the next HIV commercial; got it covered.”
Rainbow revolution: not with a bang, but wine & whining.
With wine and whining. Until someone you or I know becomes the victim of a car-jacking or worse. I know people in Portland who were complaining about police response times, and claiming that the officers were hanging back too much -- "sandbagging." I pointed out all the new restrictions, and the reduction of the police force by 20%. The response I got: "it's a 20% reduction in white supremacy." Really? And talking about having it both ways -- or trying to. The Portland people I know are not as wealthy as the Martha Vineyard crowd, although they identify or rather aspire as such. But with the homeless encampments now taking over the sidewalks near their expensive houses, and the rise in property crime and violence, the disorder unleashed by enabling 100 days of Antifa riots is now finally directly affecting their lives. Following the news, I find a number of people with families -- with school-aged children -- have left the city to escape the hassle and potential violence. They packed up and ran away. Smart move. But you can't run forever, and not everyone is in a position to pack up and go. So you adjust to the new normal and allow yourself to be terrorized in your formerly safe neighborhood. Or? Or what? That is the question that too many Americans are now asking themselves.
Always -- ALWAYS -- good to hear from you, Will B. Thank you for stopping by, and contributing, and being part of this small community.