Easternization and Economist Irrelevancy

(Updated 2016-07-04)

An eastern driven paradigm is emerging dominant to supplant western control of all things economic, but I don’t want to call this a mere paradigm shift—that would be giving too much credit to the western way of life that only knows how to get high on credit, in the process destroying its credibility and its ability to evaluate itself and others. The title, rather, hopefully connotes the emergence of something substantive (a paradigm) filling a multi-hundred year vacuum of cross-dressed imperialism. The artificially floating island that has been loosely anchored is now encountering severe waves on vibrational planes in which its narrow ideology overlooked or lacked the capacity to factor in: it’s a 2-dimensional object about to learn for the first time that it exists in a 3-dimensional world. The ensuing “Economist Irrelevancy” that I chose for the title over the original and unjustly impartial place holder “Economic Relativism” will see the conclusions drawn from this vacuous field of thought now appropriately overlooked and disregarded.
I mention the impropriety of utilizing the concept economic relativism, which I mean here as something akin to cultural relativism, because the notion that neither the eastern mixed economies could say anything valid about our western economics and vice versa is not the case at all. The eastern economies won’t need to say anything, their proof of success will be that they endure, and the western economies and their economist ideologues won’t be able to say anything because they’ll be drowning in their own blood from their tongues they self-severed. To put it another way, the East not only has something valid, it’s very validity is in the process going to invalidate the peculiar western mode of monetizing and destroying every natural resource we define as such—water, timber, herds, grains, humans, metals, the fossil fuels to move them… The western lack of a paradigm has done such a poor job in our interactions with the rest of the world that it is surprising there is still an element in the world with enough energy and courage to blaze a slightly less destructive path, and this is taking in to account the smoggy horrors of eastern industrial cities, the topless mountaintops, and the autocratic ruling elites who occasion massacres on their own people. With such horrors from the eastern theatre being accounted for and its still being a hope for the world is testament to how low the West has dug itself: endangered is always preferable to extinct.

Economist irrelevancy—like the return to a multi-generation household—is going to be a creeping reality that will see growing percentages of the public sphere paying less and less attention to the unveiled charlatans. There has been little to no science behind the mainstay economist “scientific” theories, and there is only poor insight warranted from historical analysis as supplement, so it should be no surprise that the enterprise is failing on its own accord, sped along now by more sensible (eastern) approaches to society. I say society, and not economics, because the very notion of economics as an individuated and separate domain (a western notion) from the domains of culture, governance, and biology, is itself a predestination for ruination. It is true that there have been brilliant and important insights offered by economists from time to time, but these concepts or methodologies they have arrived at almost always travel abroad in to other academic territories, and are strengthened the further away they get from the isolated economics sub-field, and the more interdisciplinary their content and applicability becomes. It’s worth being fair and should be mentioned, also, that our well-known economists do have a handicap, namely that they are partisans that must toe the party line rather than bear integrity, and they are generally sycophants hoping for promotion with fool knowledge they offer nothing tangible—save delusions and convenient propaganda—to the larger society. We can choose to weep for these unfortunates put in a difficult spot with an education that is premised on serving an ideological system that is constantly in need of first aid, or we can arrive at tears from a life-enhancing hysterical laughter.

The above three paragraphs are reason enough that anyone reading reports from the western press that say China specifically is in trouble because of such and such an economic indicator, or say some new statistic signals a downturn, has the right to be highly skeptical (or outright dismissive). It’s absurd that a failing western economy would produce economists that could know how to analyze whether or not it was a good thing for an ascending economy like China to orchestrate a synergy of nations to begin adopting precious metals backed currencies. This mixed economy (for lack of a better term) is way out of their league, and China might be viewing itself as an exporter nation in much more significant ways than mere tacky consumer goods. They may be viewing their emerging position to be producing finished goods for themselves (as opposed to the European colonial model of colonies as markets) with a refocus of their major export to no longer be consumer goods, but to be a currency, itself a finished good, that took the raw materials of gold and legitimacy, and fused them together to sell to a world hungry for security from western destabilization. It is foreseeable that China at some point will give particular industries a break in some cases, as they have to be aware of the externalities of severe pollution; this is something that would never happen in a western corporate capitalist model where externalities are never factored in proactively, only reactively when they directly affect the principle business efforts; China has the advantage of potentially caring for their own people despite a contrast with profit motives.

Unemployment, a positive indicator in a smarter paradigm.

At basis, before the layers of confused thought are piled on top of it, unemployment signals a surplus that must exist, enough of a surplus so that there can be people that aren’t working that are still able to be fed and kept alive entirely without a physical need to contribute within the monetized economic sphere; either that alone, or in combination with a situation where the monetized economic sphere is overly narrow and neglects being the measurement of real value, is what is really happening when looking at a society from a bird’s-eye view. Surplus in these situations can then translate either in to several individuals having no jobs or a greater number having easier jobs that might be loosely thought of as “underemployment”. Higher unemployment is thus a compliment to the interaction that a society is having with the natural world, that there is enough abundance for the human peoples dwelling there produced by less than the effort of all the individuals combined. Job creation, on the other hand, is a sign that the economy is slipping in production, so that additional help is needed whereas it previously was not. The hiring of more hands means at base that the hands you already had are getting weaker (or the load of work is getting heavier and more daunting).Yet the highly distorted western ideological framework has these two concepts—not analogous but akin to “Orwellian speak”—completely reversed! Such an individual focused mindset stemming perhaps from consumer capitalism (¿rather than producer capitalism?) feels it is a great value to have everyone of age be working, regardless that such a large number of the jobs are actually counter-productive and cause a further wasting-away of the commons. People being miserable at their jobs is not factored in at all, though it may be the most important intrinsic indicator of how sick a society, let alone an economy, really is. An economy that grows at the expense of the society in which it is embedded, given enough time will be no economy (or society) at all.

Recent reports lambasting China’s economy from the unemployment angle are therefore bunk, if they are not to be utilized as a supplement to some other point that goes beyond just a narrow statistical dipstick. Again we must speculate, but perhaps the growing unemployment in China is already or going to be translated in to a 30 hour work week, or an increased level of leisure time for vacationing and cultivating cosmopolitan sensibilities in a people that are poised to take over the global economy with a powerful currency that will facilitate their travel. Perhaps China has a powerful enough spine now that they can go-alone the introduction of a gold-backed currency, shut down the factories and stop exporting for two full years because they aren’t dependent on those profits, and buy 100% of their goods from foreign makers because of their highly valued non-fiat currency. This unlikely but mathematically possible scenario could also greatly benefit their usurpation of the global reserve currency status because they will be seeding their money all over the globe, driven by meeting the wants and needs of 1.3 billion people. If that’s not conquering I don’t know what is, yet western economists would call it an economy in shambles: 100% unemployment, no industrial output… yet doing the best ever and breathing clean air! What a clear view of our inversion predicament that would be! China could be unbelievably powerful because of the global historical fascination with gold as a store of value, yet I’m sure they still feel the need to tread lightly with extremely dangerous military powers still lurking, ones that have proven they will use nuclear weapons to further their aims; such potent adversaries on the game board of the global economy are sure to give pause to China if not cause them full impotency.

Focusing in on the coming trend of Chinese vacationing out in the world with a powerful currency in their wallet, I think many tourist destinations will start (or already have) to easternize in their favor ahead of their arrival. Places will compete to be eastern and as it happens, more nature friendly: the McDonalds in the Bahamas will be gutted and replaced with perhaps a Chinese water garden and some other traditional nuances that I have no clue of, because they’ll no longer be fishing for dollars that had the silver lining wear off, but for big catch RMBs that beneath the plain scales have flesh made of gold.

Anyways, times are changing and so are the parameters by which we can hope to evaluate that change. Such an odious place that could genocide an entire continent’s people (the Native Americans) and not admit it to itself is not a very self-honest or thoughtful place, so I doubt much of intellectual value could emerge that allows an honest look at foreign societies let alone at down-spiraling internal dynamics.

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3 Predictions plus a four-cast: European Vandalism, Treasury Piratism, Cersei’s Death, and Eastern Goldbacked Elasticity

Ahead of the equinox I wanted to float some far fetched futurecasts, laden with bombast. The first two are predictions for western/eastern civilization, while the last one is a prediction for Westeros/Essos of Game of Thrones (spoilers if you haven’t seen through season 5). These three can be thought of as an appendage to my 2016 predictions. [edit: on 2016-05-02, I am adding a fourth prediction regarding the reintroduction of the gold standard by Eastern nations]

1) There is a high probability that next winter European temperatures will be far below average (they are due in the context of this new deregulated climatic cycle, if not next winter than the following), and whatever the normal human systems existing to remedy such cold contingencies, efforts are sure to fall grievously short of meeting the needs of the increased population. Population is, of course, the number one factor leading European events towards a 2017 winter culmination that will be reminiscent of 406AD in the Roman Empire. The cultural conflicts already existing will be greatly exacerbated when the long night(s) come, and don’t expect either side to simply acquiesce to the needs of the others. History shows that people do not typically just lay down and die (though they do lay down and stop living, evidenced by contemporary consumerist trends). Expect all the foresight that was mocked as ad absurdum speculation to be made viscerally real, a new and twisted self-directed jingoism becoming governmental policy. If the Arab populations moving in (or being intentionally herded) to Europe are as vulgar and criminally apt as they are purported to be—a great prison unloading—there is no telling what the series of reaction-reaction-reaction-reaction will spiral in to. Certainly every ideologue—and Europe has been home to plenty—will try to spin the situation to their own benefit, and to “the other’s” detriment; a demagogue such as Trump would really be in his element when all this shit goes down (but clogs the swelling toilet on its way). My own spin to it has to be ironic: karma is the boomerang you eventually forgot you threw. Imperialism eventually cycles back.

2) While the Donald is on the mind, the next prediction may involve Trump as a spokesperson, but it could be any collection of oligarchs and minions that generally adhere to the Oceania-neocon agenda. There is no specific time frame on this—the timing will depend entirely on the elite/governmental perception of a critical point in which to unveil yet another stopgap measure to constipate a full blown financial collapse. I feel the need to build the context before unveiling the details of this prediction:

The recent trend of investors hunkering in to treasury bonds, specifically United States treasuries, is going to be fully exploited by the always-Machiavellian banker/governmental elites that have access to the financial policy levers. All this foreign wealth still flowing (and even accelerating during market cascades) in to the endemically-corrupt-treaty-breaking nation of the United States really shows a great deal of denial and/or ignorance-driven trust of people/countries towards the bereft banker cartel. It’s true that many countries have not been so reckless as to buy in to American debt, but they will still feel the pinch nonetheless. The economic will become political in its highest expressions, for this is 2016 and the eight year cycle of the changing of the guard in America is to have widespread entwinings.

Before election, after election, after inauguration… at some point, a political person and/or party, being heralded as the ultimate patriots, will unleash a formal policy that disallows the investors of the world from redeeming their treasuries. To my knowledge such an act is unprecedented, and it could only realistically be done by a government that presides over the global reserve currency and holds the “kingbreaker” cards in its military as well. Expect presages and all sorts of domestic propaganda—before, during and after—to corroborate with this move, even a lame educational outreach to reassure the financially literate people of the legitimacy of the government to act in such a way to secure national interests. Of the propaganda efforts, the leader will address the American people with something akin to this:

“The American nation is exceptional because of our greatness. It is because of that greatness that we have long been a target by others: I’m not just referring to our known enemies, but by all who harbor jealousy and have a penchant towards being leeches. The rest of the world has been riding our good times up, but now they are bailing out on us, trying to take us for all we are worth. In stockmarket terms, they are all trying to short us. We are not a nation that allows ourselves to be sold down the river. They have confused our kindness with weakness. It is they who are acting weak, and we cannot allow such weak peoples to one second use our juggernaut economy for their own purposes, and the next try and throw it away. We cannot allow that… and it is not just for our country’s own good, but for theirs. Though the world may not realize it, as they attempt to rob us, they need us a lot more than we need them. We allow their goods to be sold in our country. Where would the world be without American ingenuity? We gift the world our cutting edge technologies at a fair price, enabling many countries to effectively emerge from poverty. We build highways both literal and figurative, networks that allow trade to effortlessly move throughout the globalized world. Until this act, we have always allowed and encouraged the free flow of money between individuals and nations. But for myself, as your president, I will not let our ship be threatened by the boats trying to sink us. This is my highest charge, and on my watch I will not allow the rapid redeeming of treasury bonds by countries trying to cash in on our first class economy. It is wrong, and it has to be stopped.”

Such is a taste of what tactics will be used to pirate the money that was invested in the dollar. Why wouldn’t “they” do it? The oligarchs know they can get away with it because of their kingbreaker position (that threatens China and Russia from gaining full hegemony). As for the morality of such a potential action, or if it is in any way reprehensible, I’d like to export a modified Bushism to the world: “fooled by us twice [or a hundred times], shame on you!”

A political cartoon condemning the action would picture the president and have the caption:

“Ha, ask for a debt jubilee? Let’s just give ourselves one!”

3) I glimpsed a possible pattern in the “GoT Season 6 Official Poster” that, if true, reveals Cersei to be dead by the time the season is over. Please consult the poster (below) to better understand the following written pattern. The pattern for the six characters represented in the Hall of Faces characters starts from the upper left, then moves “south–south-eastward” by a 1:2:2:1 rhythm and symmetry. In the upper left is Jon Snow, who by being brought back from the dead could be considered “twice-alive”; the two after that—Daenerys and Sansa—are both once alive, having been saved, narrowly escaping death; the two after that—Oberyn and Robb—are once dead, killed by complete surprise. The last face—Cersei’s—has to be twice dead, to complete the pattern. How can someone be twice dead? Suicide—the killing of that which was already dead. Her storyline heretofore would support her attempting a suicide. She has already been publicly shamed, she has lost her son and will find out she’s lost her daughter, and not to mention she was ready to kill her third child before he could be captured (Battle of the Blackwater). In the Hall of Faces poster, she is also looking down which I think goes to signify many things, including her downfall and suicide.

[May 2, 2016 edit-in:]

4) Jim Willie and Andrew Gause are two economically-minded thinkers (not sycophantic bullshitters) who expect to see precious metals skyrocket in value as people and nations around the world reject insolvent and corruptible fiat currencies along with their corresponding bonds and treasuries. The former (Willie) predicts a China-centered reintroduction of the gold standard, while the latter (Gause) thinks such a move on the part of China would be impractical because of the inelasticity that would hamper their global economic conquest. While their two thoughts on the matter may seem mutually exclusive, I predict China to maneuver a middle ground that will only be visible to one with a diachronic eye.

The ever patient eastern dragon—not to be confused with a Targaryen—is very well organized and able to act with great subtlety, orders of magnitude more minute than the blundering western nations. They will reintroduce a precious metals backed currency over time, either as a singular nation or conglomerated with other tight trade-partners. With gold set to rise many fold, they will choose a ripe time when gold’s new legitimacy is unquestioned and that they have also accumulated enough during the years of relative suppression. The new Shanghai Gold Exchange and fix, itself a viable entity to restore realistic physical gold trading, is also serving as a stratagem to display China’s trustworthyness to global investors seeking a safe harbor: it is a lead up to their offering a currency that will have everyone flocking to their gates. So far things look to be very much in align with Willie’s predictions…

When China does hit times of inelasticity, as Gause thinks they would were they to back their currency with gold, China will employ their option: release yet more gold to back their currency needs. Their initial backing will be large and substantial, but it will be in part a feign and a trial balloon. The key is that China will not back their currency with all their gold all at once; they will keep a large quantity (in the tens of thousands of tons) waiting in reserve. They will do it in stages as necessary, winning enthusiasm each step of the way, diluting/concentrating as needed, and thwarting all the major problems that western economists delineate a goldbacked currency would bring. Their employment of a creeping normalization with their currency has other precedents that run parallel, such as their taking on the role of being the largest industrial manufacturer in the world. There should be know doubt that these people know what they are doing.

By the time their capturing of the global reserve currency status (utilizing the gold standard method) is a few years in, not just media punditry but entire cultural systems will be normalized to Chinese economic prowess, and western economic schools of thought will largely be bankrupted, nobody left who can read English will be able to afford to spend their time reading the antiquated and off-based notions of a bygone peculiar age… they will be too busy working for their Chinese bosses! I am no economist, but I think possessing a plurality of the world’s gold will give China and its allies the flexibility to move their pieces forward on the game board of economic conquest.

[minor grammar edit (see comments below) made on 2016-05-12]

Globalisation Chinese’sway: Housing Bubble or Future Hegemonic Infrastructure?

There was no place to comment on Charles Hugh Smith’s blog post that pointed out a major potential fault line in China’s economy, namely their scores of empty apartments… so I thought it best to write a response here:

These Chinese city flats and other housing constructions (maybe a suburban phenomena as well? I don’t know enough about China’s current urban developments—it’s doubtful even China does) are sitting brand new, completed, but as of yet unsold. The fear of the short-sighted analysts (I don’t necessarily number CHS as one of them, he’s just pointing the issue out) is that this bubble of bad investment will crash China’s economy as well as the global economy. I’m guessing their fears are at least in part because of the illiquidity being literally built in to China’s economy with such permanent and potentially wealth-sucking blackholes as uninhabited buildings.

Whether or not China intends it—but I think they do—these housing options will be where some of the new non-Chinese moneyed elite will be flocking to as China remains one of the few economies left standing; they will certainly be the strongest country (financially) left after the financial and energy markets wreak havoc, so long as things don’t go terribly wrong militarily. These notions of far reaching global shifts in power don’t generally enter into the minds of most western analysts, especially given the fact that their “macro” analyses were built of (soon to be) antiquated western worldviews that preclude such thought. I think that is why I am probably relatively alone in seeing what seems to be such a “metaphysical” problem (because economics these days are truly pejoratively, metaphysical) as really a grand physical opportunity. Just because liquidity can dry up and prove to be really valueless, doesn’t mean that illiquid goods won’t have a great deal of value. To have a surplus of housing is quite a good thing to be holding on to, as opposed to a load of worthless federal reserve notes.

Indeed, China will become a global host, opening up to be a more modest cosmopolitan country (in comparison to a whored out Manhattan) so long as the benefits are mostly to the mother country. China has to be anticipating its interception of the globalized world and it is certainly doing all in it’s power to not intercept a candle that will in short order be blown out. They will want to keep as many national thermal generators burning and how better to do that than housing some of their leaders to inspire them with residency in a still “functioning” (in terms of industrialized capitalism) economy. They know they will need to cheerlead and put forth great amounts of energy—much like the US did after WW2 with the Marshall plan—to keep their new satellite states orbiting around their dense sphere of interdependent dominance.

This will prove to be just one in several concurrent chess moves that will put Eurasia back in the seat of prominence.

Solstice 2 Solstices: some forecasts for the Earth’s next revolution

1) The oligarchs of global power and finance will continue to constipate the shit from hitting the fan until they feel it is an opportune moment to start releasing some of the floodgates (Yellen’s raising of the rates was one such vanguardian release—a chess move that will serve to build momentum for other future domino releases). The opportune time for the crisis—which the elites will try set the stage for though they lack the complete control and might not succeed—will be July or August. This timing will work well in conjunction with the many political turmoils foreign and domestic that surely will be occurring. It can all be neatly and succinctly arranged just as today’s movie editors do with thousands of video takes to be spouted out of Hilary, Jeb, and/or Ted’s mouths as if it were historical fact. The general public resultantly will be swayed to believing the packaged campaign pitches which will all be eerily similar to one another’s despite their supposed partisan differences.

2) Multiple medium to large US cities will have a debt default similar to Detroit in 2013, and possibly a county or state will declare some sort of imminent financial crisis.

3) Following an acute crisis (perhaps a debt default) with the Japanese economy and loss of confidence in the yen, after the dust has  settled the IMF will announce its removal from the SDR basket, allowing other currencies, particularly the RMB, to grow from its current predicted allotment of 10.9%.

4) Trump will be a rightwing version of RFK in 1968. I was guessing at this well before his recent Muslim comments, but that just solidifies my thinking of how things will be opportunistically set up and played out. Putin’s recent endorsement of Trump are just goading such a situation along, increasing its likelihood. Somehow ISIS will be implicated in this specific spectacle, and more widely involved in shaping politics at a larger, more general scale through the 2016 campaigning season due to the aforementioned politicians fitting ISIS in to their false narratives.

5) Game of Thrones Season 6 will be the last season distributed widely on the HBO network; season 7 will be filmed but by spring of 2017 things will be so out of sorts it won’t be aired in the previous modes.

Added post solstice, (on December 22) —

6) The United States military will start an ad campaign overtly utilizing the “Call of Duty” pre-propaganda to enlist young peoples; this will be the full circling of a readymade, glamorizing theme that has done all the work of building a mindset that favors a military lifestyle among the youth (and young middle aged). Look for there to be some student loan debt forgiveness deals if one opts for the military track.

7) Though it’s a longshot that they even get in to the playoffs—and I apologize to make sports predictions—I am making the following prediction: The Giants will defeat the Panthers in the playoffs, make it to the Superbowl to continue their quadrennial cycle there, but go on to lose to the Patriots unlike the previous 2 victories over them (2008, 2012).

Pole Reversal: Syria as Venue For The Sino-Russo Coming Out Party

As many media outlets either offer their own context or are lacking entirely in that respect, I thought I would offer my own humble understandings. I am no expert in the regional conflict in Syria nor in the Russian state apparatus and its subtleties, nor in all the intelligence shadow war bullshit that keeps everything as a smoke and mirrors game in that poor shelled-out area of the world. The same is true for me with regards to information bytes, where everything I know as far as specifics is provided to me via a tainted media-ted information system with it’s own exclusive interests. In the face of all these restrictive channels off which to base an educated judgment, I have adopted as a view-world (not to be mistaken with my peculiar world-view) the outlook of Jim Willie, faute de mieux. So, to the events of Russia openly bombing positions in Syria we turn:

I think what JW would say about tonight is that this is the coming out party for the Sino-Russo global power shift. Russia openly involving all public channels to let it be known that they are taking a stance in this conflict as a sovereign power, not beholden to US or EU oversight; they are posturing on the big stage where the hapless masses are their audience. In a moment of naivete I would maybe have said they were campaigning for public opinion, but I think the more cynical view is the correct one: they are conjuring the public opinion that will match the already existing geo-political realities. These realities are that China and Russia are already in the driver’s seat as much as there can be said to be a driver in this insanely apocalyptic ride where the entire Earth’s ecosystem down to small bacteria are no longer assured survival. Leaving that aside (which too often it is left aside!), much has been under way for a Eurasian trade zone to command global commerce long before tonight, with perhaps the most notable trend being the Russia and Chinese accumulation of gold in contrast to the west’s squandering of their gold supply.

To summarize, what happened today in Syria is just one of many pretexts to come that will be publicly legitimating the phasing out of the dollar’s dominance as the foreign reserve currency, to be replaced by some yet unknown BRICS backed modality for global commerce. Better re-orient (de-occident) your future orthographic projections:

notes 4 today: 2015-09-04 – Thoughts On Patriarchy, Colony of China, Sedentarism

Title: Patriarchy and its Other Others: Ageism Against the Young is Invisible to Us

Keep it a short post, but basically saying that whether a society is matriarchal or patriarchal, either way the adults overlook the needs and the intrinsic rights of the child who has more time yet to be on the planet than they. Patriarchy, matriarchy, or perhaps “archy” in general, are all oppressive and stacked against those born into such a time

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Title: Update Your Text Books: North American Colonial History is 1607-1776, 2014-present

The years of “sovereign independence” may have faded long before now, and it depends what you want to choose as the point at which we “escaped from freedom”, collectively falling in to the Frommian theory. Around the year 2000 the outsourcing really picked up, and our consumerist addictions were to be managed by a different care provider: China and friends.

Corporations have been allowed to rape and pillage our land within the confines of our laws, but they have mostly been raping and pillaging the lands of other nations within the confines of our laws for the limits of our own foreign imperializing.

I think it was safe to call us a colony of China some time in the mid 2000s when a larger plurality of our goods started to come from there, and they started to credit an ever larger chunk of our debt. I do think it’s useful to look at ourselves as a colony of China, in all realms not just economic (because the other realms would be sure to follow).

We were an “unhostile take over” for the better organized Chinese State (buttressed by Russian backed resource support)

China with the BRICS and Eurasian resource axis is looking to build a future of domination. This might be aloof (and naive), but if I am to be oppressed and can choose the lesser of two evils (which I can’t), I’d rather have it be by a civlization that is several thousand years old and not run by Americans than this techno-oppression and alienation I feel today in some perverted WASP bureaucratic state. I won’t sit around waiting for Chinese water gardens, but to know that my oppression at least serves somebody somewhere high up in the oligarchic chain to have the free time to meditate in a beautiful spot, is better than dwelling on what the old guard American oligarchs do with their pleasure time.

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Title: Classroom rules set in stone: working and moving bifurcation

Early childhood education is essentially about taking that which wants to run around and play and engage mentally and bodily to form the habit of sitting down. If you’re looking for someone to blame for other people sitting around, look to the availability of seats and the classroom rules becoming set in stone. Classroom rules are all about taking volatile lifeforms and setting them in stone.

“The recession (or receding?) of recess”

Nature wants us to work hard because nature worked very hard to build us. This means using all of our levels of bodily energy engaged actively in motion with the rest of the eco-system atmospheric level we find yourself naturally born in to. Sitting is not work, that’s why it hurts us so bad. It’s very hard to do at first (think of young children), but it becomes very easy as our bodies get used to doing only that and other motions become difficult (not to mention the sedentarism encouraged by muscle atrophy drugs such as statins… what a name choice, huh?).

Nature wouldn’t want to see you squander away the elaborate skills and inclinations that it worked very hard to embody in you, which leave us as we cut corners and then cut ourselves down on the sharp edges we litter around our environments.

—

MEME:

IT’S THE SAME BAD LESSON BEING TAUGHT

(juxtapose picture of kids sitting in a classroom with picture of kids sitting playing videogames)

MADE DIFFERENT ONLY BY THE CONTENT

OR,

teachers should be happy, their lesson of sitting is now being applied outside the classroom!

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Cascadian Independence: A Change Before the Crisis

I often live under a rock (a fertile place, see below*) with the Cascadian Independence Movement just entering my narrow radar screen. After some investigation, however, it seems the movement itself also dances between rock-roofed dormancy and active assertions of the human striving for freedom from unnecessary shackles. There are many humans in social media circles that give off revolutionary vibes, standing atop the rock as one would a soapbox, exuding that something big politically will be happening very soon; who am I to cast doubt and preclude such a future? I have a taste for their revolutionary energy, and all I wanted to do when I first realized this was a real movement within the American continent I occupy—where the political imagination is generally as fluid as a desert—was go hug the nearest conifer and have someone take a me and tree selfie, and photoshop that onto a Cascadia flag with the words “Solidarity With Cascadia”.

The Cascadian nation’s coming into existence is important beyond just those that it will include (I wouldn’t say “contain”, as that has a statist connotation and I think Cascadia is far more a free and open nation), as it could serve as both a model for emerging nations and a further disintegration of the overgrown, malnourished, obese post-imperialist empire euphemistically labeled “the United States”. Cascadia is another front against the sprawling Empire to help take it further off balance; another stronghold of a mountainous island to not be drowned out when the real threat to it’s residents—the one to its east (District of Columbia) not west—topples from within. Cascadia has a deep enough of a foundation in place that it cannot be faulted as being a mere reaction to the politically and economically decadent times. Cascadia is full of insight and foresight that put it in a different league of nations than most that have arisen in the last century; it will prove to be a one word poem, prompting other nations to arise before such a possibility is precluded. Cascadia is yearned for by the people within, not a convenience contrived by people without!

A blogpost on Cascadia could go into many different tributaries that wouldn’t lend itself to the linear writing style here employed, so I will return to the rock metaphor, as a matter of course. On this theme, the vanguard revolutionaries need to be prepared psychologically and not lose their far-sighted visions, when another winter comes and they need to migrate back underground to warm and nourishing places. Their thrusting efforts to birth a new sovereign nation may likely be averaged-out and watered-down by their spermicidal, prudish, conservative “let’s stay put” neighbors that don’t have the same lust for an open-ended Cascadian future. However, I have a sense that the number of winters between their hopes of an unoccupied Cascadia nation and its reality, are quickly thinning. The most important reason for this is the revolutionary zeitgeist: Cascadian pride is a phenomenon that might be comparable to a vine spiraling upwards, clinging to a cliff-side at times, but only to return and reveal more of its glorious self higher up, daringly exposed and awe-inspiring. The vine has deep roots that I cannot appreciate, that are larger and more fertile than Ecotopia even understood, though that book was immensely important in its current growth strides. For me, I am gazing up at the vine, rooting it on. I see more hope for it still because what might be the most important inhibition barring the Cascadian nation from bearing its first fruit (a fir cone baby) is a negative that may soon be negated. The Cascadia nation’s biggest natural predator averred to above—the United States, along with its global reserve currency status—is going to be having organ failures of all sorts that will put it in a hospital bed before too long. In such a state the federal government might become too impaired to grasp at a fledgling nation. One must wonder if FEMA’s imminent deployment in response to the fault line is a pretext for federal presence, “reminding” residents that they are not free to self-determine. In any event, at some point this governmental force will release the Cascadian land from its grip, enabling the people to put on full display the beautiful ideas informing their struggles.

Change before the Crisis: “Get ahead of the times with silver ParaDimes”. One triage tactic the region can take up (if it hasn’t already begun to do so) to further ensure it isn’t as injured by any American economic collapse, would be the encouragement of converting dollars into physical silver and bartering with it for trade. This transition to a silver backed currency will allow a more seamless transition when the need arises, as well as becoming another social glue between the Cascadian people. Even more to the revolutionary side of things would be a continued push for an organic economic method of sharing and mutual aid, which I know already exists locally in many different places over Cascadia where people are even further ahead of their times.

*I admittedly couldn’t figure a way to put in this further elaboration without further confusing the text, so I thought I would say it here. With regards to living in proximity of a rock: there is much bio-activity that happens during all seasons, as permaculture profounder Sepp Holzer has displayed in his “symphonies of nature”. A man ahead of his time is surely not unheard of in a place that is ahead of it’s time, and those familiar with his love of rocks would know that they regulate temperature, increase moisture to dry areas, clean and mineralize water, among many other talents known and unknown such as creating an appropriate pH for a fir tree sapling to grow strong and tall!

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Related:

https://cascadiablogs.wordpress.com/the-cascadian-independence-project/

https://freedomcaravan.wordpress.com/2013/10/13/cascadia-freedom-caravan-to-the-tear-down-the-walls-national-gathering/

http://www.seattlecascadianow.org/

China’s town, or, All your base are belong to us

China, first in line to inherit the globalized world markets, wants to protect its kingdom for a smooth transition, and allowing the United States to completely fall apart and destroy the structure is not a viable option. The Chinese have been too clever and patient to allow a full meltdown of the United States to fall too deep and put out a gravity wave that whirlpools down other strategic partners. That’s not to say the United States won’t be allowed to fall down, but it will be in a controlled, systematic way that doesn’t threaten Chinese interests. Now that the strategy has been laid out, the question now focuses in on tactics. The Chinese asked themselves: what do you do with a rabid animal that is too dangerous to shoot?

You cage the beast…

… and confuse its muscles’ abilities to function in unified coordination through methods of tranquilization and hitting it from all different angles at unexpected intervals. The cage, however, is the capstone of the Chinese efforts and is being built in plain sight for all of us to see or not see, we just need an appropriately contextualized lens in front of our eyes. The Chinese are buying up controlling interests of major cities like New York in the form of property assets. The purchasing frenzy is not due to private Chinese individuals trying to escape China and invest in the United States; nay, it is part of the Chinese global economic policy to control and divest the remaining wealth from the United States. New York will be one of several major bases of operation for the Chinese to sift out important resources for its mega-population such as food, one of the most obvious. For energy purposes, I wouldn’t be surprised if they buy up a few bankrupted fracking operations (there are sure to be plenty to choose from soon) and start testing out experimental (and controversial) fracking methods, too destructive and environmentally unfriendly even for the thick-lunged inhabitants of the coal smog Shanghai sphere; remember, these are the people who blow up mountains to get at their coal. If there is to be an accurate global history text written in a few hundred years, it will not speak of North America as having a colonial period followed by a time of flourishing sovereign nation states; it will speak of the continent as an ongoing carving ground for power thirsty empires to keep fueled, much the same way as Africa has been treated since at least as far back as the Berlin conference of 1884. What is going from 13 states in 1776 to 50 states by the mid 1959 if not colonization?

The degree to which the USA didn’t effectively isolate itself is the degree to which China (along with some oligarchic Wall Street allies) will further isolate us. Control of the seas and the ports allows them the ability to truly block or deter residents to enter or leave the country, an option they may use in the future if they sense some threat to their overarching continental dominance. The colonists of the 18th century used to sneak in and out of the country to evade British patrols and blockades, but I think it would be an insult to them to assume we have afforded to us the same skills and grit to get more than a mile from the coast without being disoriented about where we were actually trying to escape to. Further, Chinese technology is sure to catch us if it needs to, and our primitive use of consumer technology is sure to be ineffective in the face of this—I hate to be hopeless but we don’t stand a chance if this scenario develops, at least as Chinese power is waxing. If they truly want us trapped, we will truly be trapped. Who knows how bad it could get? We might have to start producing papers when an armed guard requests them of us whilst entering New York through the Holland Tunnel. We do have our own arms, but they are sure to be factored in to a containment policy where we are “free to shoot” each other on purpose or by accident allowing our munitions to wane.

The role of imports/exports, and control over the internal political and economic life by a Wall Street oligarchic group that I sometimes mention, I will leave to an adjacent, upcoming post.

Not a Hyperbole but at Hypo-bully: the United States Becoming the World’s Biggest Reject

The American Empire’s ship might be sinking, but fortunately-or-unfortunately there is only enough sea to fill up the lower cabins; a demobilizing anchor is increasing in weight—a permanent drag that will keep the empire stuck close to home. In certain regions it used to serve as a stabalizing agent, but now the “sea tide” turning against its foreign legitimacy can be painted in three broad strokes: 1) the coming into question of its multi-decade trend to abuse the privilege of being a global “umpire” in matters of responsibly issuing the global reserve currency, the misuse of which is currently undergoing exponentiation (and diffusion to Japan and the Eurozone) 2) a lack of restraint and caution when using military force, that would be tolerable, if disagreeable, to the other powerful nations, but for the fact that the war policy decisions are actually not rational or predictable, bringing the potential for danger to new levels; 3) oil is running in quantities lower than the full American juggernaut was upgraded and designed to run smoothly on, so a series of downgrading obstacles that the wasteful empire has an inability to jump over are leaving it stuck behind in the race. The ship is going to putter out right as it hits shoal bottom. I intentionally don’t say shale because before the literal bottom of shale deposits could be reached, the operations will be foregone as too costly for the coming meager times.

Why else has the United States lost its global hegemon stature? It has become camera shy before the very global media apparatuses it paved the road for. It probably fears the dreaded global public opinion and so time and again it has been indecisive and reluctant. In particular is the indecisiveness in war decisions that if gone astray might put a blotch on its image (don’t worry USA, there are already huge blotches); it bullies everybody 3/4’s of the way, but hasn’t gone past that point, and all those different 3/4’s add up to a lot of common resentment, but unfortunately for the USA not a lot of fear. It is an antibiotic in many senses of the word, that stops itself short so that resistant bacteria can evolve and develop their own antibodies to help with future deterrence.

In this post, the United States has been regarded as a whole entity acting in unison, but of course this is never the case, and should be elaborated on… more later, but a bit now. Fractures are and will continue everywhere, but one fracture in particular may appear visible in the elite/oligarchic class that is so much to blame for the empire lost. Some of its members will flee the ship and test out their cosmopolitanism in other parts of the world they became familiar with during their profiteering and plundering. I fear the majority, however, will choose to stay local and make the best of the new game of recolonizing America and try to be kings of the smaller ponds available to them.

The United States in America: Geopolitics of the New, Old, New-World Order

“You may have won the cold war, but you have lost the cold peace”

As the world continues to slowly (or rapidly) decouple the rotting tentacles the United States deployed back when it was an effective imperial power, it will leave the shadowy Wall Street power players that remain with fewer options for destruction and accumulation than they are used to. However, to say no prospects remain for them and that they’ll give up the game is not a safe conclusion for those of us who choose (or are forced) to still dwindle here. As the BRICS+ sphere consolidates its power more and more, the shortsighted American policy makers will start to learn from their repeated frustrations that its useless to intervene in Eurasia, then Africa, and then finally even much of South America (don’t mess with Brasilia, you crazy gringos). What, then, is left to tinker with and torment?

The northern two-thirds of the “old” new world, specifically Costa Rica up through the United States, with Canada in the fold as a junior partner to the degree that it isn’t beholden to Chinese and Russian influences.

Why is this a plausible outcome in the coming years?

As averred to above, the powerful oligarchic class or group of people that together have control of most of the levers in economic-political-energy-military affairs at home, but less and less abroad—I believe the “other 99%” have some power, but only a minor minority—will come to “rediscover” opportunities at home as their levers don’t move any affairs East of the Prime Meridian. The east is building its own dollar free zone that is somehow conquering geographical boundaries (Eurasia is full of mountain ranges) with pipelines. China is known for large, awe or fear inspiring projects: a great wall as a historical attribute, more recently the blowing up of mountains to get at the juice inside; and so it shouldn’t be that surprising that they will build (or finance) the large part of the new silk highways that are being woven by mechanical wereworms. This new old world is underway, and there is no amount of bonds or paper the United States can throw at it to stop it; in fact, the less paper it throws, the better chance it will have of playing at least a marginal role in its future. But the US is in denial, though sooner or later they’ll get the memo, or the meme, of a cost benefit analysis that they can no longer resist to act on. Mike Tyson, if you will, will retire to a seniors’ boxing league where he can build up some self esteem to enjoy his golden years (ironically ungolden for the USA). Or, if you’d rather, a man would rather piss in a puddle and watch mosquitoes die than piss in the ocean and be frightened of attracting sharks.

Three of the five oceans—if you subscribe to the multi-ocean concept—the Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic, will prove to be durable backyard fencing, enough to keep America separate from other MAD (mutually assured destruction) nations, which would make all the groups happy in a new multipolar world. China and Russia, finally obtaining the commanding heights from America to control the global economy, will surely not want a rabid and dangerous United States to spoil the prize for everyone through erratic WMD wars, despite the fact of their (C&R) growing strategic advantage to likely “win” such extremely cost prohibitive conflicts. They have long been mastering the patience game, and are content to let the United States die in its own hemisphere, having after repeated buy-ins finally folded keeping a small stolen stash, leaving the ongoing game where China is all-in with the winning hand. Perhaps a ways down the road the East will look to settle old debts, but I think time will prove to be a long protective barrier for the United States as the wise 5,000 year old culture errs on the side of caution. (this last point may seem to be open to negation as after many years of selling to the United States the Chinese have gained a taste for buying the United States; however, as may be explained in a later post, they are buying strategic, containment installations—it is arguable that they are retiring us rather than our choosing to retire; they are playing the game of risk ever so carefully, perhaps in direct inverse correlation to the increasing sloppiness of the United States, so that they don’t suffer the “winning risk irony” whereby the game ends when its obvious there is going to be a winner, and everybody goes home with the winner feeling somewhat unsatisfied)

In the “Empire’s Workshop” of Central America there are already a disproportionate amount of military bases and other convenient historical memories that leverage hierarchical style compliance out of the militarily feeble and dependent nations that make up the “bull’s tail”. But for those forgetful wretches—or to learn the new generations—some demonstrations will surely be performed. This plays in to that the backyard is the perfect place to let off some steam from too much military industrial complex initiated stockpiling of equipment replete with pretty, useless bells and whistles (added on to raise the price of the Raytheon contract which gouged yet more tax-payer money). Why not see if the toys we paid ourselves for and bought for ourselves was worth it? The military equipment—not sold off during the denial-of-losing-the-game-of-global-domination-stage, when things of great value would be collateralized to buy a few months of status quo—will partake in Colosseum style gladiator battle ship games, where teams of unfortunates are sure to go at it; and why not film and edit the whole event for an IMAX 3D release later that summer (without mentioning to the viewers the reason for the extreme genuineness on the screen)? Such fiestas will be saved for the weekends; to pass the dull weekdays the navy can have self-challenge games to see how many submarines and carriers can be fit in to the Gulf of Mexico and El mar Caribe without there being an accident. All of this, of course, will be happening against a background of tightening energy supplies that can not afford acts of such infantile hubris. But time and time again should teach us that there is no shortage of shortsightedness.

Most of the central American nations will not dare to do much of anything, visibly at least, and even some South American nations, rare to experience a hurricane, will have to deal with the brunt of a sustained late season category 3 Hurricane, the Sea Bitch UrSAla that is a falling power with a lot of vengeance. Venezuela particularly stands out to me, as it has just too much coast smiling north and too much easy petróleo. I fear such a place will be too much to resist when the washed out abusive father returns home looking for a place to disperse the pent up military energies. The pretexts for such endeavours are sure to get ever more creative and ever more pathetic, as the 21st century public relations teams put out trial balloons and surveys to probe the degree of ineptitude of the public.

There is one war of conquest that is sure to happen, whether or not there is a puppet in office and a humbling people quivering with fear, and that is a war with Mexico.

Note: I edited a couple of unnecessary vulgarities  2015-01-09

More on Recuerde el álamo: A Pretext to a war with Mexico, next time.