Open Thread - 04-25-25 - What Comes After?
Democracy in the West is withering on the vine. European political parties are jailing their opponents and banning opposition parties from elections. How soon will that happen here in the US?
Democrats put up candidates that no one voted for. Republicans fight to restrict voting rights. Does that even matter when we essentially have a uni-party anyway?
Both sides champion restricting free speech.
Government corruption is rampant and ubiquitous.
The law is used as a weapon. Does anyone really think that the Republicans wont use the same lawfare tactics to stall the function of government against the Democrats when they regain power? If so, then what good is democracy?
If democracy is on life support, what comes after?
I can't speak for you in this regard, I can only speak for myself.
It's rather obvious to me that we're headed for a jackbooted totalitarian future of some sort. The US is lagging behind the rest of the West, probably because of that pesky Second Amendment, but I think that too will be addressed as we march towards a locked down society.
The Right and the Left will continue their dance of La Différence that they play, feigning a false choice for the voters that we/they have a say in our/their governance. The end game will be the same, perhaps, with just a slightly different bicameral flavor.
You want an example of what I mean? Remember Trump's announcement of his Stargate Project with several of the tech bros surrounding him just a couple of days after his inauguration? One of the tech bros, Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle, talks about AI-powered surveillance to monitor police and citizens. That's where we're headed. A technology driven lock down powered by AI and, most likely, a programmable CBDC.
Why?
Why did everything change so drastically around 2020 or so with the advent of covid? The world you and I grew up in seemed to disappear. What happened? It happened so suddenly that it couldn't possibly be an evolutionary process, could it? If it didn't evolve naturally, then who's behind the sudden change and why?
In my humble opinion, decades of greed and mismanagement of government has finally caught up with the thieves. They've run out of road and cans to kick, and they know it. The debt ridden West is close to economic collapse.
To what end?
To save the monied classes' asses. They know well the history of class warfare down through the ages and how it ends for the oppressors. But now, with the advent of technological advances, they see the opportunity to control the masses that will inevitably turn against them. It's the totalitarian's wet dream, total control. It's a chance for them to hold on to their misbegotten wealth and power and to continue their reign as masters of the known universe.
I know at times I come off as a gloom and doomer, but I cry out in the wilderness with hope. Hope that if enough people become aware of their future that a non-compliant citizenry can change the anti-democratic trajectory we find ourselves on at this point in time.
When the time comes, if enough people will just say no to the technological chains that are being built for us all, we can, once again, thwart the greed and avarice that dwells in the heart of every totalitarian despot.
Comments
Good morning Free Rangers...
on a much lighter note:
We've had some spectacular birds visit our feeder this spring. Along with the resident cardinals, woodpeckers, blue jays, mourning doves, chickadees, titmouse, house finches, and some I'm sure I'm leaving out, we've had some migrates pass through. The other day we saw a rose breasted grosbeak and a baltimore oriole, that were most likely just passing through so if we weren't watching we could have easily missed them.
The biggest surprise is a family of black headed grosbeaks that have taken up residency here. We noticed a female black headed grosbeak visiting our feeder last fall, I think otc mentioned that in one of her open threads back then. That is uncommon because that female was about two hundred or more miles east of their general region. We thought that it was a fluke, that she had gotten off course and would return back to her range come spring.
Well, to our surprise, we just recently spotted a male and a fledgling at the feeder, so it appears we have a mating pair of black headed grosbeaks that have taken up residency here in southeast Texas, two hundred or so miles beyond their eastern range. Very cool!
Hey JtC!
Hi all, Howdy fearless leader!
Thanks for the OT and bird news!
I see all the power and money grabbers, grubbers, and freaks in hypersurge mode at levels never seen before. So it seems like THEY must think it is going to crumble or crash and are moving to be best positioned for that, grabbing all they can, viciously. There is no way such can end well for most people. They seem to be in panic mode, so should I worry now?
Outstanding you got Rose-breasted Grosbeak and Baltimore Oriole at your place! They are both stunningly beautiful birds. Lots of migrants move through our yard in less than a minute. If you are not out there watching you do not see them go by. If we had a game cam on the birdbath here it would scare us to
know what is coming in to it unseen. Migrants are on the move, and on a mission. Often one minute wonders. Like the Cape May Warbler singing in our yard this morning.
Amazing you collected a male Black-headed Grosbeak to go with the female. Though migrants occur in central Texas, they are `east of the species normal range. Yes a few occur annually, but as a breeding bird, i s breeding range eastmost areas are far west Texas in the Trans-Pecos region. West of the Pecos in the Chisos, Davis, and Guadalupe Mountains. FIVE hundred miles west of you! As a breeder it arrives in later March generally, females in April. I would say mid to late April is when nesting begins, and young do not fledge until May. At the earliest. So, I would suggest you are seeing something else besides just-fledged young in April. A good picture would go a long way.
Maybe it is a second female?
Adult male birds will feed adult females, to show what a great provider they are (like, oh, I dunno, people). Some species bring food as pair bond behavior, or, to copulation. Especially the cuckoo family, wich includes Ani and Roadrunner. I watched the Roadrunner give a female a lizard after the act. An Ani gave a big cicada, a cuckoo gave a fat wooly bear caterpillar. They held the food item in beak until AFTER copulation took place. In what seemed like clear cases of bribery or coercion.
Is the 'young' bird smaller than the adults?
Happy trails all!
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein
Few positive aspects to offer
.
Attended a "democracy" discussion yesterday in the basement of a local church.
About 30 attended, mostly from a different village. Average age about 70.
It was disappointing that most words were spent on parsing red versus blue.
Guess I am too radical as I reminded them voting doesn't really matter in a uni-party.
They were somewhat shocked by my rocking the boat. It was set-up in a round robin
format where everyone could add their piece (which is somewhat democratic).
Counter arguments were not encouraged but didn't prevent me from an occasional
surprise outburst. Perhaps if I could organize a subgroup to challenge preconceived
notions, would see some value in the venue. It was good to see the folks showing a
token interest in a functioning democracy. The lack of grasp for bigger issues was telling.
Thanks for the OT!
Zionism is a social disease
That's a great...
anecdotal example of how difficult it is to see through the veil of choice that we've been taught since indoctrination throughout our early school years and subsequent years of media promulgated efforts to just vote harder.
You saw the walls go up when you had the audacity to rock the boat. Older folks are set in their ways and are harder to move from their their preconceived notions of democracy. I think the younger generations see through that veil more easily, which is encouraging since the future belongs to them.
Kudos for planting the seed, maybe it will sprout in some of the participant's minds.
What's next?
More authoritarian clampdown, followed by more war, followed by more clampdown, followed by more war. Eventually, some complete watershed event will occur- nuclear war wiping out major population centers, a massive natural disaster like the Yellowstone supervolcano, the New Madrid or San Andreas really waking up, whatever- something that the tatters of the remaining "government" will be completely unable to control or mitigate. Once the resulting collapse afterwards is complete, then anarchy, followed by feudalism among the survivors.
I personally hope to go out at the beginning of that process, not at the end. Only one thing is certain- and that is Bernie and AOC fundraising for the Uniparty. They'll be out there among the ashes, explaining to the cockroaches how their half of the Uniparty wasn't responsible, and holds the only possible solution to whatever problem is the most troubling that day...
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
Yup...
I often wonder if the clampdown will be incremental or sudden and full blown. If the system really is a uni-party then I'll go with incremental. If there truly is a difference between the parties then I'll go with full blown because it will be in the best interest of the party in power to shut down the other party to prevent them from regaining power. I think either option is a possibility.
I think that economic collapse is the impetus for the current drive to authoritarian rule, but any of your scenarios is certainly a possibility.
Heh, cockroaches gonna do what cockroaches do:
That's hilarious!
Hubble Space Telescope
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/overview/hubbles-35th-anniversary/ Even tho the beginning was a complete fiasco.
Most excellent...
it puts things into perspective.
In the grand scheme of things, don't you feel small?
Thanks la58.
This explains a lot
Yes it does...
explain a lot. I encourage everyone to watch this video.
In the almost 250 years of existence of the US, those leaders that show political competence and worthiness of leadership are few and far in between and when they do rise to power have a tendency to be taken out of power by extraordinary means (if you catch my drift), although, in my opinion, there are a few exceptions.
Thanks, g, great video.
This is a good video
I was going to post it this am, but I had to do some business, inspect the house, buy some parts, talk to one of the contractors, etc. The Prince was required reading at a seminar in college, and I read it one more time after that. At first, I wasn't completely aware of the competence issue, or at least it's full ramifications because in the aviation community where I worked, it was understood, if you weren't competent, you were dead. This forced one to honesty evaluate themselves. I was not cut out to be an aviator, and I met others who tried in spite of their shortcomings in this respect, some were wise enough to find another path, others died instant untimely deaths. On the basis of this initial career experience I mistakenly assumed that government was a competency based culture.
Later I found out I couldn't be more wrong. There is competence, and then there is what I now call noon-chi, get along and go along, follow the not so subtle social signals that what the situation requires in professional terms, and what people actually do or what is actually expected by the organization, is entirely different. This is where the moral or ethical issues arise. I found this out at two federal departments, and in one state agency. I found that following that rigid adherence to law, regulations or professional guidelines (what is the right thing to do?) was a career killer. I even received death threats on two unrelated occasions in different agencies but that isn't what persuaded me to give up on government service. So I learned this from professional experience the hard way and gave up on government two decades ago. Slow learner.
There is a common belief that only the incompetent work for the government, especially the federal government. I don't entirely believe this generalization but certain career paths are more susceptible to mediocrity, bs artists, and manipulators rising to the top. There are some very competent immoral manipulators, and there are other competent people who just keep their heads down and try to get by. Then as described in the video, there are those perceived as leaders, because they forge ahead, without understanding everything that is implicated, ethically and factually, in the witless decisions they are inclined to make. These people succeed because they are not held accountable systemically, they are promoted to the top.
In my later life, from my observations of Korean dynastic culture and descriptions of succession politics, I found that the nobles at court, the so called factions, typically wanted their relatives in power, regardless of their inabilities or lack of qualifications. In fact, if that cannot be arranged, put a child on the throne, or an idiot. Then the manipulators at court, can do whatever they want.
fwiw
語必忠信 行必正直
Technology has already run amok
bringing its own tyranny to The End of Everything.
Last week I had a dentistry appointment here in LaLa Land. The dentist's office is on the eighth floor of a building I had never noticed before at the corner of Hollywood Blvd. and La Brea, a couple of blocks west of the tourist Mecca of Hollywood and Highland. There was a parking garage around the corner from the front entrance of the building with my dentist's office. I drove in and was amazed to see half or more of the parking slots empty. I took one and then saw the signs saying "Pay By Phone."
It turned out that you can only pay by phone, as there was nobody in the little booth at the exit. A random guy happened to be walking his dog around the garage was nice enough to explain to me about the pay by phone regime. Surreal, huh?
Since I had and still have no intention of ever learning how to "pay by phone," I thanked the guy for his offer. He then told me that there is a security guy who could help me out. OK. I went to my dentist appointment, utterly unsure of how I would get home or ever drive my car again.
After a frustrating hour of filling out forms and getting X-rays, I took the elevator down to the ground floor where I found a guy behind a desk under a sign that said, "Pay your parking by phone." I asked him if there was any way to pay with cash or debit card. Nope.
"So, I guess that I'll never get my car back."
After snarking off like that I left the building to go around the corner to the garage I naively entered an hour and a half before. But at least now there was a guy in the exit box. I told him about my predicament, and he very politely said he would let me out. I got my car and came to the exit booth, and the guy got out and went to the gate apparatus, bent down and opened the casing to flip a switch and the arm came up and I escaped with my 2017 Ford Fusion.
So at least two of the garages on that block are now Phone Only.
Trivial anecdote? Certainly.
Us Baby Boomers are now Geezers, pretty much aliens in the Geek World of this Century.
Geeboomzers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose, period.
I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.
The first time...
we ran into that was when we visited The Alamo in San Antonio a few years ago. It took about a half an hour to figure out the code and to finally make the payment. There was no alternative parking.
We've since encountered the same thing at several music venues we've gone to in Texas.
It's a pain in the ass and a harbinger of what's to come. If we geeboomzers don't unite soon we're all doomed, old age notwithstanding.
Actually
I am possibly hopeful, too. If only that it happened so fast. No slow drift year after year of things getting worse. No trying to tell someone far younger things could have been different if only.
This is all the republicans got, barring martial law. It's who they are. And the dems, those dems, other than a 27 hour blah blah fest, nothing. That's all the dems have, so far.
Best is, it happened fast. It will be in every ones recent memory, something in common. If we can keep from turning on each other we might have a chance. There is also the matter of population decline. Capitalism relies on growth for "prosperity". Everything else is rent, extortion or confiscation. At a certain point, it comes to what's the end game? What does the end of capitalism look like?
I'm an equal opportunity...
non-believer, I don't believe anything the Republicans or Democrats say. It's what they do that defines them.
I think it's pretty important that we old folk tell our stories, when we're gone what we've lived through and witnessed goes with us, for surely the history we lived will eventually be rewritten.
So far the end of capitalism looks a mess. The question is, what comes next?
Before pointing out some of the problems,
perhaps I can describe one of the projects I have going on. Like so many other people these days of tech and smart cell phones I have a drawer with different obsoleted equipment. Since I am old school, coming from an impoverished family, the rule of thumb was to use all but the squeal. And if a tool was not available and funds were not available to obtain one, I would build it or modify and existing one to work.
Enough of that... the phones in question were 2 LG Stylos and a Moto G. None of these phones had sim cards and all had been thru at least 2 carriers. When I had looked to use them with a new carrier, none were compatible with their networks that had been upgraded to the super-duper newest astronomical 10G speed. At this point none can be used as cell phones except by doing wifi.
But... each could be used as an offline tool to do personal functions, like reading a book, calendaring, calculator, etc. All needed to do was break the link between the phone and its plantation master, the one whose overseer listened at the slave quarter's doors and who had spies everywhere. Funny how this analogy fits so well... not funny hah, hah.
The LGs are coming along. I suspect that soon I will be able to read pdf novels and journals if I can get past the enshittification of our right to intellectual property (thanks Clenis). They will also function well as cameras, etc. As it turns out they run an earlier android version and I can zap the wifi hook.
The moto is different. The plantation master came up with a better oversight. Just turning off the wifi works only works until the next boot, then wifi is fired off, the play store starts doing its thing and the next thing I know it's bricked. I looked into looking for a new bootloader but not worth the effort. I don't want a career fixing one phone. I can't even get the beast cleaned up enough to recycle it.
This surveillance you fear has been with us for a long, long time. What was that room next to the old phone switching room? Hell, the latest appliances report your nighttime snack and probably pass on a picture of you in you tidy whitey. My comment on that is... if seeing an 80-yo naked guy appeals to you, agent mike, you've got bigger problems than my choice of ice cream.
OTOH I could just give in to Zuck, Bezos, and Ellison, and let my cell phone do my finances and control my car. I do a flip now that runs a different O/S.
In closing this project descrip, I've always been a what, why, where, when guy, not a who. I am a firm believer in the Sagan truth rules. I can't remember the link or where I heard it but it's currently in vogue on a number of sites.
Be well, all. This too shall pass.
I too...
am a repurposer and a bit MacQyverish. Planned obsolescence is a stalwart of capitalism. I commend your ingenuity.
You're right about surveillance being with us for a long time, but technology grows exponentially and we'd be remiss if we think that it wont be used to it's maximum potential as a spying and control mechanism. Hell, Trump has already promised half a trillion dollars (with a T) for that purpose.
Is this the Sagan rules you reference. It's words of wisdom. One of my favorite authors.
Good morning Johnny. Thanks for the OT. Re lawfare:
big whoop this am about Evil Trump telling DOJ to investigate Act Blue for possible/rumored (but allegedly baseless right wing) concerns that it facilitates foreign contributions to Dems and selected lobbying and also donations to same by charities. All baseless rumor based, but ....
For a couple or 3 years now I have noticed that when I donate to certain worthy charities online,it is Act Blue doing the collecting. Sure, they already have the machinery in place and could be making it available to these organizations out of the goodness of their heart, but that is worrisome, if only because I have never seen any evidence of any goodness or any heart to drive such activity. They could, much more likely be charging a fee for this service, So I give $100 to friends of the friendly or somesuch and Act Blue gets a 23% commission of some such. In effect 1) friends of the friendly is giving 3 bux to the DNC via Act Blue and b) I am being conned out of 3 bux which is not going to charity but to sleazebags unrelated to anything and everything charitable. In short, that outfit does need some serious examination, inspection and audit unless they stop the practice of collecting funds "for charities".
Great use of the fabled Dr, McCoy or whomever that was. Also, too --
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
There are videos...
and testimonies of people that have contribute via Act Blue that later find that their names have been used to make countless surreptitious contributions to Act Blue by someone else and they had no idea they were being made. Supposedly Act Blue is using, without permission, previous contributors names to make numerous contributions that are thought to be fraudulent, including by foreign entities. Those fraudulent entities could be anyone since the contributions are masked using the original contributor's name.
Your example is just one more way to defraud the contributors.
I remember seeing that Monty Python skit when it originally aired, it is timeless, and will never, ahem, die.
The DOGE Rebellion wants you
Even Tom Lehrer had his off days.
https://tom-lehrer.fandom.com/wiki/The_Dodge_Rebellion
In retrospect, even Lehrer’s bugaboo, Wernher von Braun, seems to have been an okay, if flawed, human being with at least some kind of conscience, compared to all the people nowadays unabashedly rejoicing on social media as Palestinian civilians — men, women, children, elderly, disabled persons, even infants — burn, or are buried alive or blown apart.
Unlike PA governor Shapiro and some other politicians and celebrities, at least Von Braun didn’t film himself proudly scribbling snarky, cutesy hate messages on the V-2s that hit London.
Maybe DOGE...
should use a sexy sales person with some bombs, guns and musket in lieu of Elon Musk. Add in some Pride flags to pull in some lefties and the DOGE Rebellion would maybe accomplish something other than exposing fraud, like, oh, I don't know, maybe some arrests and convictions.
The proof of propaganda is in how heartless some people have become, in the name of tribalism.
My thoughts
American society is made up of several layers of privileges and opportunities replicated at each city, county state, national and international level. Many individuals and their extended families stay within their societal layer as they move around through life's path of education, starting new families, career, vacations and retirement. A cocoon of experience all within one layer of society creates the illusion of predictability from one generation to the next.
COVID triggered a compression of all the layers into one unified experience for all Americans. Family connections, money, health status, professional network, location of residence, travel or political connections were not effective at side stepping the experience.
For me personally is was the least disruptive disaster type experience effecting my life, rather a non-event. But I have noticed that for many people of various ages it was very difficult and may be impossible to return to their previous societal strata. In addition many lack the life skills to comfortably live where they find themselves or know how to move upward to more privileged level of society.
The world around me has always changed dramatically about every 20 years. While cycling through known development patterns we can learn to surf the cycles.
Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.
Astute, soe...
I hadn't thought of it that way.
In this piece, I used the covid event and the lockdowns as the possible catalyst for the societal upheaval that the country and world is currently undergoing. The beginning of the end of the old world paradigm, if you will, that ushers in the new system, whatever that will be.
Your take is very interesting, thanks, my friend.