No Easy Way Out of This

The recent decision, last week, by a typically corrupt judge, to dismiss the first lawsuit filed by slandered Kentucky teen Nicholas Sandman, hammered home again just how absolutely corrupt America 2.0 has become. The idea that any judge could look at the nature of the biased, inflammatory, and inaccurate coverage of the teen’s actions and character by the Washington Post, and then basically give it a stamp of approval, should stun any of the few remaining civil libertarians out there.

The Post, like all the mainstream media, totally distorted and mischaracterized the encounter between a group of Catholic school kids on a field trip, and a Native American “elder.” They cast the white teens in the clear role of “bad guys,” with Nicholas Sandman, in particular, portrayed as an aggressive, disrespectful and entitled example of “white privilege.” And they, again like everyone in our state-controlled press, totally ignored the real instigators of the incident; a group of loud, profane, and wildly racist Black Hebrews.

I keep in contact with Sandman’s attorney Todd McMurtry, and he told me in an email a few days ago that, while disappointed, he remains hopeful that they will prevail in lawsuits against other huge mainstream outlets, and perhaps some of the hateful celebrities who smeared the young teenager on social media and on television. I said at the time, and continue to believe, that these lawsuits hold the potential to be a real Lexington and Concord moment, in terms of fighting the systemic tyranny that has all but destroyed this country.

At nearly the same moment, another corrupt judge (are there any other kind?) ruled that the Democratic National Committee basically had a perfect right to rig their primaries in 2016. I don’t expect the one who got screwed by the DNC in that process, Bernie Sanders, to complain. He has never uttered a peep of protest about the outright theft of the party nomination from him, in order to benefit the Queen of Corruption, Hillary Clinton. Sanders is so deluded he now publicly chants the “Russia! Russia! Russia!” line. Sorry, Bernie, it wasn’t “Russia” who robbed you.

I’ve nearly finished my book on show business, tentatively titled On Borrowed Fame. My next project, it’s becoming clear, must be an expose of our monstrous injustice system. The disparities in sentencing alone mimic the disparity of wealth that I wrote about in Survival of the Richest. Throw in unbridled, unlawful cops who have shown no hesitancy in planting evidence to frame the innocent, ambitious, unprincipled prosecutors, and unknowledgeable, often stupid jurors, and you have our brutal, ugly adversarial system of “justice” in all its glory.

The courts have ruled that ignorance of the law is no defense. For a common citizen, that is. If you’re a police officer, whose job it would seem is to be an expert on the laws they enforce, it is perfectly okay to be ignorant about them. The same courts have ruled that our draconian asset forfeiture laws are not only legal, but parties totally unconnected to the suspected (not proven) violations of law can have their property confiscated, too. And remember, if you somehow run into an honest judge, or an empathetic jury, and are exonerated, you could still fight for years to get it back. Utah passed a law in 2017 that required property be returned to those who were found not guilty of the charges that resulted in the forfeiture. But Utah is just one state. A man in Minnesota, for example, was acquitted of burglary charges, but still had to forfeit his car.

No politician, in either party, is talking about the maddening inconsistency of our courts, or the unconstitutional overreaching of power by judges at all levels. How many talk about the onerous asset forfeiture laws, which have become an essential part of our disastrous policing for profit system? It was refreshing to see Tulsi Gabbard confront the putrid Kamala Harris for her own authoritarian record as California’s Attorney General during last night’s Democratic Party debates. For her efforts, Gabbard is being depicted by many sheeple today as a tool of Russia.

From my own personal experiences over the past year, in trying to find justice over the most unfair job termination imaginable, I understand now more than ever that our courts are not the answer. We cannot seek a redress of our grievances there. And eighty percent or so of Americans have quite a lengthy list of grievances. This list make Thomas Jefferson’s “long train of abuses and usurpations” look like child’s play in comparison. The tyranny present-day Americans face, every day, from government and big business, would cause our Founders to call for the most enthusiastic Boston Tea Party the world has ever seen.

So if the courts aren’t the answer, what is? The electoral process? Every election, American voters return some 96% of the worst criminals in this country, to office. Very few of them have “represented” their constituents even occasionally during their lucrative careers of “public service.” I recounted the yeoman efforts of the late Collier brothers in Hidden History. Their work on voting fraud, detailed in their book Votescam, proved beyond any doubt that our votes aren’t being counted.  And if they are, that would actually be worse; it would mean that our fellow citizens, with a vote just as significant as any of ours, actually believe that the Nancy Pelosis, the Mitch McConnells, the Chucky Schumers, etc. are worthy of reelection.

Clearly, then, the ballot box isn’t the answer, either. When you are returning your awful “representatives” back to office at an average rate higher than the Politburo at the height of the Soviet Union, you aren’t going to change anything. Whether it was Emma Goldman or Mark Twain, the sentiment is appropriate; if voting made any difference, it would be illegal. We aren’t going to vote ourselves out of this.

A second actual revolution is also bound to fail. The most powerful military force in the history of the world would be the enemy, not some naive and proper British redcoats. Don’t for a minute think the military would side with the people. Individual members, certainly. But the ones controlling the bombs, the missiles, and the tanks would all be die hard members of the Deep State.  Police forces would be aligned against the people, too. The kind of mindless thugs who brutalize the public, and seem to intimidate their more reasonable peers as much as they do the citizens who pay their salaries, are not likely to sign up for anything opposing tyranny.

But the biggest obstacle here is the apathy of the public. Most people have been frightened into conformity. The campaigns to even get people to not buy gasoline on a particular day have all been failures. The average American is so docile, so submissive to his corrupt and incompetent leaders, that he is unwilling to even make what is essentially an anonymous, risk-free attempt at protest. One cannot envision these folks ever donning yellow jackets, or effectively standing up to even the most egregious abuses of power.

All we can do, ultimately, is set the best example possible in our daily lives. To “send forth tiny ripples of hope,” in the words of Robert F. Kennedy. To awaken one slumbering American at a time, to the giant elephants and naked emperors roaming all over this crumbling country.

 

 

Celebrating Fifty Years of a Giant Hoax

Fifty years ago, our government and its state-run media tell us, Americans sent men to the moon. Neil Armstrong said “One small step,” and all that, and the photographs of the event were startlingly clear. Well, except for all the shadow anomalies, and lack of stars in the sky, that is.

As a twelve year old, and a huge astronomy junkie, I followed the Apollo program nearly as closely as I memorized Major League Baseball batting averages. I knew all the astronauts’ names, and even had a favorite; Jim Lovell, who would head the ill-fated Apollo 13, denying him the honor of walking on the moon.

At the time, I remember being a bit disappointed. I guess I expected the kind of world-wide attention that was depicted in a film I liked as a child; 1964’s The First Men in the Moon. The reaction on Earth just seemed kind of subdued to me in contrast, considering it was the most monumental achievement in human history.

I first started questioning the moon landings in the late 1980s, when I heard about a self-published book from 1974, We Never Went to the Moon, written by Bill Kaysing. I ordered it through the mail; obviously, it was not going to be in any bookstore or library, and that was the method I used to obtain much of my controversial reading material in those pre-internet days.

Kaysing made some great points. I was particularly intrigued by his tale of a disgruntled NASA employee who testified before Congress, and then was found dead, along with his family, in their car which had been conveniently left on some railroad tracks. That seemed pretty standard conspiratorial fare to me, and reminded me of so many similar unnatural deaths I’d read about during my research into the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

In 2001, the documentary Did We Land on the Moon aired on the Fox Network. It was a remarkable program for a major television network. Included were interviews with the widow and son of Virgil “Gus” Grissom, dean of the Apollo program who was actually scheduled to be the first man to walk on the moon. Grissom became a vocal critic of the Apollo program before dying in a launch pad fire with two other astronauts.

I was amazed to hear Grissom’s loved ones basically accuse NASA of murdering him. It was even more astounding to hear such claims aired on network television. Grissom had even hung a lemon over the NASA emblem on the lunar training module, and notably was recorded as telling NASA officials, “You expect me to go to the moon and you can’t even maintain telephonic communications over three miles.” Privately, Grissom had been increasingly dubious of the Apollo program.

Still, I remained somewhat on the fence regarding the legitimacy of the moon landings. Perhaps it was my childish affinity for space travel that kept me half wanting to believe, despite all the good questions that had been raised. Then I read the late Dave McGowan’s “Wagging the Moondoggie” series. Wagging the Moondoggie  All doubts disappeared in my mind. We never went there. Period.

McGowan analyzed the absurdity of providing men on the most difficult and challenging flight in history with what amounted to a amateurish-looking, very unstable craft, lined with only a few inches of aluminum foil. Yes, you read that right; our astronauts were protected from the deadly risks of outer space by something we all use to wrap up hamburgers and hot dogs. The craft also seemed far too small for such a momentous trip.

Leaving aside the incredibly cramped quarters for the human occupants, where did all the batteries fit? Just imagine what kind of battery power was needed here; the craft had to be provided with oxygen, and once it landed on the surface of the moon, it had to furnish both heating and air-conditioning. We are told by science that the temperature varies wildly on the moon; when the astronauts stepped into the shade, they instantly encountered temperatures colder than any found on Earth, and when they stepped back into the sunlight, the temps would have been hotter than the middle of the Sahara Desert. That must have been quite a cooling-heating system in those spacesuits.

The size of the batteries required to provide all the power the astronauts needed must have been quite large. And heavy, of course. Not to mention the batteries needed for the magical temperature control they enjoyed. If you’ve seen the craft they are alleged to have flown in, you will find it hard to believe that huge batteries fit in their somehow. And on the last few trips, NASA added in the dune buggy vehicle we saw the astronauts cavorting around in on the moon’s surface.

How could they have fit this vehicle into that tiny craft? When NASA has even addressed questions like this, the answers don’t leave one feeling confident. In this case, they have claimed that the vehicle was folded up, ala Jetsons-style, and unfolded on the lunar surface. A reasonable person might ask; if we had this amazing technology in the early ’70s, what happened to it? To my knowledge, there has never been a folding car available to the public.

NASA has admitted, in recent years, that the original tapes of the Apollo 11 moon landing were erased inadvertently. You read that correctly; the documentation for the greatest achievement in the history of mankind was accidentally erased. Recently, it has been acknowledged that a sample of moon rocks collected during the Apollo 14 mission actually came from….Earth. That didn’t stop the true believers, however, who merely said it was “very unusual” that the chemical composition was common to Earth.

Speaking of those moon rocks, how did they account for the added payload on the trip home? Since they’d never been to the moon, they had no idea of just how heavy these rocks might be. NASA supposedly factored in every pound of weight, and designed everything to fit tightly, making every inch of space count. So how does a wild card like this fit in?

There are a multitude of other reasons to doubt this story. Richard Nixon supposedly telephoned the astronauts and spoke to them live on the lunar surface. What? Exactly what kind of magical phone line would have been used for that? We lose cell phone coverage today in certain spots on Earth. We’re talking 1969 here. If such fantastic technology existed then, it has been lost to history.

Speaking of fantastic technology, the power of computers in 1969 was akin to what you’d see today in a handheld calculator. And yet, NASA officials have admitted we aren’t technologically ready to go back to the moon today, with infinitely superior computer capability. An astronaut recently admitted, “We don’t have the technology to go to the moon anymore,” because NASA allegedly “destroyed” the technology. What? Does that make any sense whatsoever? Is it the least bit believable?

And how about that shot from the lunar surface of Apollo 17 taking off? What amazing technology- even getting the camera to pan upwards along with the craft. So what happened to this wonderful video camera? Was it a one-shot deal? Why didn’t they continue to  use it? As many have noted, at this juncture, we ought to have a live view of the moon available to Earthlings 24/7.

Then there are the views of Earth from the lunar surface. Well, there aren’t very many of them.  And the Earth seems smaller than it should be; considering it is much larger than the moon, why does it appear to be about the same size the moon does here on Earth? As a child enamored of astronomy, and later as a critical thinking adult, I expected more. I expected breath-taking views of planets and constellations in those Apollo pictures, with no atmosphere to filter them out. We should have witnessed a sight never seen in any planetarium or on the clearest night on Earth. Instead, we saw zero stars or any other astral bodies, just a few glimpses of Earth.

As Dave McGowan asked, at what point do Americans, and Earthlings in general, start to question this? Here we are on the 50th anniversary. If we haven’t returned by the 100th anniversary, will the majority of people start to wonder why? Progress and technology don’t work this way. Imagine if the Wright Brothers flew a plane a half dozen times, then no one else did for fifty years. Considering the trajectory we were on in the 1960s, we should have traveled to Mars, Venus and beyond by now. We should have bases on the moon, complete with lunar McDonalds and other vestiges of predictable corporate exploitation.

Is it unpatriotic to question this? Am I a “kook” for doubting this amazing alleged accomplishment? Is it unfair to ask how Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins appeared over a week later on their return to Earth clean shaven? How did they factor in shaving in that situation? And in their initial press conference, they certainly appeared nervous and very un-heroic like, considering they were being lauded as the greatest explorers the world had ever seen.

Neil Armstrong, especially, maintained a very private existence after the moon landing. He granted few interviews, and seemed noticeably uncomfortable when asked about his fantastic experience. That just doesn’t ring true to me. As they age, people normally grow even prouder and if anything attempt to justify the things they’ve done in their lives. If what we’re told is true, Armstrong had no reason to justify anything, and should have been as proud as anyone could ever be.

Knowing what we know of our government’s tendency to lie and cover up, is it really a reach to think that NASA would lie about something this momentous? Regardless, no “investigative” reporter is going to look into the matter, because our state-run journalists don’t investigate anything. They will instead join in the chorus of derision directed at naysayers like me. They are only skeptical of skeptics.

This is not only the greatest hoax, but the most essential cover up in America’s history. After all, would we really expect our reflexively corrupt leaders to admit they engineered such a gigantic fake, and have continued to lie about it for half a century? Look at the evidence, and judge for yourself.

 

 

 

Customer Service in America 2.0

I am beginning to understand, a little more each day, the quaint term “grumpy old man.” But I honestly believe I’m not like my parents, or grandparents, in naively believing that “the good old days” were simply better, and that all this “newfangled” stuff has ruined what was a perfect world.

I am online constantly; I spend more time there and interact with more people in a cyber sense than I do in a tangible physical sense. When I do have to confront the real world outside of cyberspace, I almost always end up disappointed and frustrated. Some of us have coined the term America 2.0 for a good reason.

Just in the past few months, I have had to deal with situations that shouldn’t happen in a sane rational country. And I have experienced the corrupt marketplace I called out in great detail in my book Survival of the Richest. There is no free enterprise in this country now, if there ever really was. It is crony capitalism, and it’s horrific.

When a home appliance breaks, in my area I have basically a few companies to choose from. Home Depot. Lowe’s. Best Buy. I have had nightmare experiences with all of them. Because I, like the vast majority of Americans, cannot install my own new appliance, or cart away the old one, I have to rely on their team of outsourced installers. And they all outsource their installations. I can’t remember the last time I had a successful, problem-free installation from any company.

Last year, Lowe’s outsourced delivery team installed a new washing machine that had no power. Think about that; somehow, a new product rolled off the assembly line in whatever foreign factory it was built in, and the quality control was such that no one caught the essential fact that the machine wouldn’t turn on. After a relatively minor bit of aggravation, we got a working washing machine installed. I think they knocked $200 off my credit card bill.

In May of this year, we went back to Lowe’s because our dishwasher broke. To say this has been a nightmare is a severe understatement. The installers managed to damage my kitchen counter top, forgot to put a metal flap on the bottom, and left a huge mess behind them. They claimed we had to have some of the wooden floor shaved in order for the unit to fit properly (they left it jutting out into the kitchen). After several more phone calls, someone from the installation team came out and shaved enough wood for the unit to slide in, albeit not very well.

After this second installation, we noticed that the door of the dishwasher wasn’t opening properly- it would stick and you had to force it down. So we had to have them come again, after the warranty team checked it out (we also paid for the extended warranty), and determined that the door issue was because the bottom flap, when it was finally installed, was sitting too high, and the door was catching when you opened it. So they removed the bottom flap to make the door work.

At this time, we had also discovered some water under the kitchen sink, and the appliance guy ran the dishwasher and saw that the slow leak was coming from there. He guessed that the initial crack team of installers that had damaged my counter top had leaned on the pipe or something to cause this.

Since the first point of contact is supposed to be the store where you purchased the product, I tried phoning the Fairfax, Virginia store numerous times, but a manager was never available. When I called Lowe’s customer service, they tried phoning the store and couldn’t get a manager, either. Incredibly, I have visited the store in person twice, and neither time was a manager available to talk with me. This is, of course, incomprehensible to me, but it seems to be standard operating procedure for this company.

Then, last Friday, the dishwasher stopped working completely. Now this might have been due to the fact we had a new refrigerator installed the day before. I say this because there was also a crack team of installers sent by Best Buy, where we purchased it from, and the dishwasher was at least working prior to that. However, I haven’t told Lowe’s about this, as I’m certain they would instantly attribute it to Best Buy’s outsourced installers’ incompetence, instead of their own outsourced installers’ incompetence.

I have called Lowe’s laughable customer service more times than I can remember. Even for the severely lowered standards in America 2.0, their “customer service” is practically nonexistent. No one you talk to is understanding or empathetic, or cognizant of how poorly their company is functioning at all levels. I know from past experience that Home Depot is just as bad. And Best Buy once took three separate delivery dates to actually deliver my new television.

Yesterday, I went to start my 2017 Subaru Forester, and it just cranked without the engine kicking in.  So I attempted to have it towed by Subaru’s road side assistance program this morning. It was a marathon battle, but I finally was able to break through their automated menu from hell to talk with a real person. It is also very difficult to ever get the Farrish Subaru service team to answer their phone. At least whatever is wrong should be covered by the warranty.

But why is a highly rated car like this experiencing such problems with low mileage, only a few years after it was built? I would expect this kind of thing with American cars, but Japanese technology is supposed to be better. I guess I could ask the same question about our refrigerator; I think it lasted about ten years. Maybe I’m wrong to expect something better than that. Maybe I should learn to lower my expectations, and bring them in line with the realities of America 2.0.

Corporate America has become as unresponsive and as bureaucratic as any government agency. The annoying automated menus alone- which every business uses- are enough to frustrate anyone. Or at least anyone who lived in America 1.0, when human receptionists used to answer the phones. No politician- left or right- mentions how impersonal and uncaring all businesses are now. And it is an issue all can relate to, because these companies are screwing everyone, with their pathetic customer service and inferior products.

Of course I factor in the extremely low-paid nature of those who work in customer service at all companies. I try to be understanding in light of that. But they are usually the only point of contact for consumers. They are unfortunately the face, or more aptly voice, of their respective companies. The public doesn’t have the ear of the clueless CEO who is ultimately responsible for the systemic dysfunction, and for which he or she is paid millions in undeserved compensation.

Last week, I was in Panera- an incredibly overpriced place that has a strange appeal to every female in my life- and witnessed a bizarre scene. An irate customer was complaining, in a raised voice, that he had been waiting over half an hour for his soup and piece of bread. I think he had a legitimate complaint. But the manager was unresponsive, causing him to understandably become even more upset. Instead of giving the guy a free cookie or pastry to pacify him, or even just apologizing, this ridiculous manager called the police. And no one in the crowded restaurant batted an eye.

All of this, while part of my own personal experiences, is entirely normal for America 2.0. All oldsters like me can do is grumble quietly and fondly recall America 1.0, which was corrupt to the core, but at least a competent country.

 

 

In Defense of Naomi Wolf

I’m someone who still considers himself a populist, a classical liberal who should be able to find a home on the far left of the political spectrum. As my writing and public comments have made all too clear, what passes for the “left” these days is anathema to me. Their “inclusiveness” doesn’t include civil libertarians or genuine reformers.

Naomi Wolf is one of those rare, truly liberal voices left in America, with any kind of public platform. She’s also one of the few prominent people from the “left” who praised and promoted my book Survival of the Richest, which should logically have been of great interest to real liberals everywhere.

In May of this year, Naomi Wolf was interviewed by Matthew Sweet on BBC Radio, to promote her latest book, Outrages: Sex, Censorship, and the Criminalization of Love.  During the course of the interview, host Sweet abruptly confronted her about the meaning of the nineteenth century legal term “death recorded,” a term she quite reasonably believed meant that a particular prisoner had been executed. Inexplicably, apparently it actually meant the opposite.

In what I consider to be a shameful display of unprofessionalism, Sweet sandbagged Wolf with his own research into the term. I certainly would expect anyone interviewing me to confront me about any mistakes or alleged mistakes beforehand, instead of springing it on me during a live broadcast. Sweet was able to pull up articles and Old Bailey prison records, so clearly he had done some real work on the subject.

What would cause a radio host to delve deeply into a term like this remains an intriguing question. When writing about sentences and executions of those charged with sexual offenses in previous centuries, few logical people would assume that “death recorded” somehow referred to those whose lives were spared. I know I would have made the same mistake Naomi Wolf did. Was Matthew Sweet so educated on this subject that he was privy to something that both Wolf and her editors at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt weren’t? If this was really a point of common knowledge, how did her publisher overlook it?

Sweet had the details at hand when he sprung this on Wolf, declaring that the term referred to “a category that was created in 1823 that allowed judges to abstain from pronouncing a sentence of death on any capital convict whom they considered to be a fit subject for pardon. I don’t think any of the executions you’ve identified here actually happened.”

To her credit, Naomi Wolf handled this about as graciously as anyone could have. I doubt very seriously that I could have showed such class in that kind of situation. Refraining from criticizing Sweet for his heavy-handed bit of “gotcha” journalism, she tweeted out that she would be reviewing “all of the sodomy convictions on Twitter in real time so people can see for themselves what the sentences were and what became of each of these people.”

Wolf’s publisher adeptly attempted to shift the blame squarely on her with the following statement: “While HMH employs professional editors, copyeditors, and proofreaders for each book project, we rely ultimately on authors for the integrity of their research and fact-checking. Despite this unfortunate error we believe the overall thesis of the book Outrages still holds. We are discussing corrections with the author.” I think that an author with Naomi Wolf’s pedigree, with New York Times bestsellers and countless mainstream media appearances on her resume, deserved a bit more respect, and a much stronger defense, than that.

The American edition of Outrages has yet to be released, as it was pulled by the publisher in order to make necessary corrections. In a recent appearance at New York’s Strand bookstore, Wolf explained, “I had read death recorded as meaning death recorded The death penalty was the law of the land until 1861, [but] I misunderstood the phrase. Sweet pointed out an 1823 act that allowed judges to report a death without actually sentencing the person to death.”

Then Wolf, for the first time publicly, politely gave her rebuttal to Sweet. “There’s questions about his definitions. Some people disagree. Some things he said in the interview I don’t agree with. The bottom line is that he did me a favor by identifying a misreading that I corrected.” Wolf noted that “There’s been a lot of coverage on these two inaccuracies, and there have been inaccuracies in the coverage as well.” She specifically cited oft-reported quotes about her “long awkward silence” after Sweet showed her a newspaper clipping, which he obviously had prior to the interview, to buttress his argument.

“The internet interpreted that as my humiliation, my shocked horror,” Wolf stated. “In fact, I was pausing because his newspaper clipping had anomalies where the ages of the youths and the trial dates were different. I was pausing because I was trying to understand what those anomalies were.” She is also utilizing the research of three noted scholars on historical sentencing for sodomy offenses, which may well contradict Sweet’s claim that Wolf’s description of “several dozen executions” for sodomy was incorrect.

“I don’t feel humiliated but I’m grateful for the correction. I feel great responsibility and humility about this history.” Naomi Wolf declared. “The history of the freedom to love is everybody’s fight…. I do feel a great sense of responsibility for getting it right. We’re in a time of spin and fake news, endless lies from people who are not supposed to be lying to us, like press secretaries and politicians. Journalism is losing its ability to correct itself, as I saw with so many stories not correct about this. It’s my job.”

Arguing for gay rights is hardly an issue I’ve spent much time researching or writing about. But this story is about disrespecting an author who granted an interview in good faith. Of course, criticism is fine and should be welcomed by every writer. But this was about a completely understandable misinterpretation of a hardly common historical term, and how a journalist attempted to discredit a best-selling author’s book in the middle of a live interview. Certainly Matthew Sweet is a lot better known than he was before talking with Naomi Wolf.

A caveat here; Naomi Wolf has published my work on  her Daily Clout web site. She wrote a nice blurb for Survival of the Richest, and told me she didn’t understand why it hadn’t made the front page of the New York Times Book Review. So, yes, I am prejudiced. Having spoken with Naomi, she’s just as nice as I thought she was. I admire her work, and her courage in going against the prevailing authoritarian mindset of the politically correct present-day American left.

I know Naomi Wolf will bounce back- she really already has. I just wanted to express my support for her, for whatever that’s worth.

 

America- Dumb, Dumber, and Dumbest

I’m taking the gloves completely off here. I’ve inferred that Americans collectively are pretty gullible and naive. I’ve invoked comparisons to Mike Judge’s movie Idiocracy. But it’s time to simply tell it like it is: the majority of present-day Americans are stupid beyond belief.

This doesn’t include all the increasing number of “awake” people out there, but it certainly does include the newly coined “woke” folk, who seem to be sleeping more soundly than the average American dupe. Ironically, a lot of these “woke” Americans are “mad as hell” but their anger is focused exclusively on Donald Trump. They figure if they can just get him to go away, things will be back to normal. “Normal” being the kind of nonstop corruption I wrote about in Hidden History. 

My bleak assessment has some scientific evidence to back it up. Even mainstream sources report that IQ scores all over the world have been dropping for decades. Some estimates put the IQ drop at about 7 points for each subsequent generation born after 1975. These studies were centered in Norway, or other parts of the western world. My guess is that the average American IQ, if anything, has decreased more sharply than that.

There are plenty of factors here. The increased consumption of processed foods, poisonous preservatives, GMO products, and the constant stress everyone is subjected to by the modern world have all contributed. Insipid and offensive films and television shows, dishonest state-run media, and wrong-headed public school systems were even more crucial in dumbing down the populace. Nonstop propaganda- really brainwashing- has turned many Americans into unthinking, unquestioning sheep who lack both empathy and a moral compass.

Consider all that Americans have permitted over just the last thirty years. They fell for the “invasion” of Kuwait nonsense, and were ready to send their children to die in a place they wouldn’t have been able to locate on a map the week before. They parroted the mainstream media line about Saddam Hussein being a “brutal” madman, when they previously wouldn’t have been able to identify him. They fell for the “babies in incubators” line from the crying young girl, and didn’t blink when she was exposed as the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador lobbying for war.

Enough Americans bought Bill Clinton’s obsequious “I feel your pain” charade to elect him president twice. They ignored the growing body count and the outrageous corruption that began in Arkansas during his tenure as governor, as studiously as the fawning mainstream media did.

We crossed one of those important moral lines in the sand when the majority of Americans stood by silently as armored tanks demolished a home (smeared continuously in the media as a “compound”) and poured deadly gas banned by the Geneva Convention inside, killing civilians that included a large number of children. What happened at Waco should have garnered impeachment charges against Bill Clinton, with criminal charges to follow. Instead, the inventor of identity politics was re-elected, and continued to garner almost 100 percent support from Hollywood.

Americans accepted the ridiculous magical fertilizer bomb theory at Oklahoma City, and cheered when patsy Timothy McVeigh was executed in record time. They swallowed the “JFK Jr. was reckless” accidental death theory in 1999, and no one exposed the truth about this latest Kennedy assassination until I investigated and wrote about it in Hidden History. 

On September 11, 2001, we crossed a line that will be very difficult to step back from. Up until that point, no steel frame high rise had ever collapsed from fire. On that day, three did- including Building 7, which was not struck by any aircraft. Since then, no building has. A magical day indeed, and one which exposed the new collective stupidity of Americans, as they stared transfixed at their television screens, as military “expert” after military “expert” told them that the “terrorists” had done this, and nothing would ever be the same.

The majority of Americans accepted that nineteen crazed Arabs, who admittedly were not qualified to fly planes, executed this terrorist plot flawlessly, led by the new bogeyman, Osama Bin Laden, from his secretive cave lair. The odious, unconstitutional Patriot Act was quickly passed, with virtually no opposition from any public figure, and the unconstitutional Homeland Security Department was created. “Free speech zones” became all the rage, without a peep of protest outside the world of “conspiracy theorists.”

Before 9/11, the majority of Americans accepted the results of the dubious 2000 presidential election, which featured the first widespread mention of “hanging chads” and suggestions of voter fraud. I exposed the long history of American electoral corruption in Hidden History. The ballot box lost any significance it had long ago. Even if they counted the votes honestly, no honest candidates are ever permitted to run for president in either “opposing” party. As Huey Long said before they killed him, you have a choice between Tweedledee and Tweedledum.

Dubya Bush, despite severe deficiencies as a politician, was elected twice by the American people. He continued to dismantle what some of us call America 1.0, a job Bill Clinton did yeoman work on. Unbridled illegal crossings from the southern border, expanded Visa worker programs, unprecedented corporate greed, and the further weakening of unions contributed to a glaring disparity of wealth, lowered wages and decreased benefits for the poor and working class.

The election of Barack Obama represented a politically correct coronation. Bill Clinton’s “feel your pain” mantra found full fruition in the election of a half-black man with little personal history and monumental secrecy surrounding his past. Obama’s election first exposed the now massive cultural gap in the country. Half of America was ecstatic to see someone who wasn’t white elected as president, for no other reason than the fact he wasn’t white. Any criticism of Obama, who continued the dastardly nonstop war, corporate welfare policies of his predecessors, was instantly branded as “racist.”

Obama infuriated that segment of the population who bought into Donald Trump’s populist rhetoric. Many independents like myself were attracted to Trump’s often revolutionary comments as well. Obviously, over halfway through his first term, Trump has further divided the country, and become a lightning rod for all political discourse. The same people that loved Obama for being nonwhite and nothing else, despise Donald Trump because he seems so much like the old white guys who used to run this country.

This is merely a sampling of the tyranny Americans have permitted, just in recent times. I could have mentioned the ultimate corporate giveaway, when despite 95 percent of them opposing it in every poll, the biggest banks- those dubbed “too big to fail” by our state-run media, were bailed out by taxpayers after the 2008 economic crisis. If the banks want to be bailed out again, Americans will stand by politely. There will be no yellow jackets in the streets of America 2.0.

A movement like Brexit would not be possible in America, because a majority of our citizens still buy into the collective narrative, that there are no conspiracies, and our leaders are basically decent people with good intentions. Iceland threw their bankers in jail. I have tried to get Americans to even understand the counterfeit nature of our criminal fractional banking system, but most just don’t care.

I live in one of the richest counties in the country. Our roads are Third World quality, and our power grids are a joke. Power goes out here in a mild wind or simple rainfall. Many members of Congress drive the same roads I do, and yet they do nothing to upgrade them. Our infrastructure has not effectively been updated since the Eisenhower years. At least Trump talked about that, but again nothing has been done. Blame it on “partisan politics.” That’s what our state-run media does.

It’s not pleasant to call people stupid. After all, you wind up essentially calling yourself superior, and sounding elitist. But what else can you say about people who bought into the state-sanctioned, mainstream media driven “Russian collusion” conspiracy theory? The same Americans who can’t accept that 9/11 was an “inside job” believe that “the Russians” somehow “hacked” our election and denied us all the wonderful opportunity a Hillary Clinton presidency would have represented.

We’ve known the facts about the lack of intellect in our country for quite a while. All those “person in the street” interviews, done by everyone from Jay Leno to “conspiracy theorist” Mark Dice, demonstrate all too clearly just how ignorant the average American is. Many Americans seem to revel in their stupidity.

If Mike Judge’s film Idiocracy is now seen as an unfortunate prophecy, what does the huge popularity of the movie Dumb and Dumber demonstrate?

The Politics of Personality

The election of Donald Trump planted a loud and divisive lightning rod into the middle of our political discourse. Everything in American politics now is channeled through this billionaire/reality TV star, and how one feels about him. It is not about issues now, not even the limited issues Americans are allowed to discuss.

The social justice warriors have won; all politics in this country are emotion driven now. There is no reasoning, no flexing of the intellect. It is all about how you feel,  and the larger, timeless principles America was founded upon have become irrelevant to a public that is basically ignorant of them anyway.

The laughable establishment “left” has collectively lost their minds. Just this week, they trotted out the trillionth or so example of “racism,” when they complained that weddings are “too white.” Can snow be next? The fact that these unbalanced, childish complaints are taken seriously tells us all we need to know about America today, and the disgraceful leaders we’ve allowed to destroy it.

Donald Trump takes to Twitter as naturally as any fifteen year old girl, and is just as concerned with what others think of him. All that’s missing are the continuous selfies. His misspellings and grammatical errors are fitting for a populace that is already historically illiterate, and is monstrously uninformed about everything outside of our ridiculous Kardashian/transgender culture.

Social media provides the best barometer in regards to the collective American mindset. It doesn’t give one much cause for optimism. People react constantly, with great passion, to all the hot button cultural issues that have always been relentlessly promoted in order to divide the masses. Thus, most women now are on the verge of revolting because of Alabama’s anti-abortion law. Many urge a boycott of sex.

The opposition to Trump has consisted of angry, often violent diatribes about him “destroying the country,” and demands that he be impeached for….well, just about anything will do. Videos exist of these eligible voters screeching like banshees, with inhuman expressions on their faces. They want Trump to simply go away. They hate him, and that’s all that matters. He makes them feel bad. This is the absolute essence of identity politics.

And Trump’s mindless cult reacts only marginally less emotionally to his constant tweets, and honestly seem satisfied with this trolling behavior in lieu of actual policy proposals. Just last week, Trump tweeted out his typical tough talk on immigration, at the same time his ICE was instituting a truly insane new policy of flying over 200,000 migrants all over the country, to shelters, instead of ushering them back to their own countries.

Also this week, the most preposterous of all our preposterous presidential candidates, Pete Buttigieg, joined the campaign to erase Thomas Jefferson, the most enlightened leader America has ever had, from our civilization by changing all the schools, roads, etc. named after him. This is our dying country in a nutshell; an obscure mayor, promoted for the highest office in the land exclusively because he’s married to another man, criticizing one of the greatest men in history.

American politics has become impossible to satirize. If one of my favorite shows, SCTV, was on the air now, they would have a very hard time coming up with material. How do you spoof a Donald Trump? How do you spoof his politically correct enemies? Our cultural reality is now more absurd than anything the greatest imaginations could ever invent.

Earlier this year, it was announced that the cartoon series Family Guy would be curtailing their frequent gay jokes. The only reason for that show to exist is to skewer sensibilities, and like all of our modern fart-fueled comedy, gay references are an essential part of their arsenal. Identity politics requires this. A particular group complains, and no matter how powerful the institution in question is, they summarily submit to their demands.

That assumes, however, that the group or individual in question comes from one of the acceptable demographic groups. In the world of political correctness, this means black people, first and foremost, but gays, feminists, Hispanics and other nonwhites can also successfully apply pressure. White males need not apply here. The fact that they may be “offended” doesn’t matter; in the world of virtue signaling politics, not everyone has a right to be equally offended. Suck it up buttercup and all that.

This new, touchy-feely kind of politics should logically result in some good. This passionate “caring” should mean a decrease in homelessness, an increase in wages, a more equitable distribution of wealth, an end to wars, and a decrease in the prison population. Unfortunately, the social justice warriors care nothing about any of these issues. They are content with the shameful disparity of wealth, our nonstop wars, and huge numbers of poor immigrants driving down wages.

No, these virtue signalers are all about “racism,” and ending “white privilege.” The fact that they are white themselves doesn’t make them hesitate for even a second. They have endured years of brainwashing via Hollywood and our educational institutions, without having the slightest inkling they have been brainwashed.

It was hard, in the past, to try and reason with an ideologue who was misinformed by typically dishonest mainstream sources. But it is impossible to reason with a fired up social justice warrior, who has been drinking the kool-aid served up by corrupt screenwriters, television programmers, and arrogant tenured professors.

Donald Trump has killed any potential independent political movement, because a large chunk of his base continues to support him regardless of how many promises he breaks, and how closely he resembles any other neocon Republican president. The opposition to Trump hates his personality so much that they are willing to accept the most thoroughly distasteful, pro-war, pro-bank candidates imaginable, in an effort to remove him from the White House.

Bill Clinton started all this with his “I feel your pain” nonsense. The leaders we’ve allowed to misrule us aren’t feeling any of the real pain out there in the heartland. They are, however, inflicting it regularly upon the clueless American population.

The Contrived Assange Debate

First, let me make it clear; I consider Julian Assange to be a heroic figure, a true journalist in an age when there aren’t many of them left. The fact that anyone considers him to be a traitor, and that he faces possible imprisonment, tells us all we need to know about the level of tyranny and corruption we face.

But Julian Assange isn’t perfect. He has said publicly that “I’m constantly annoyed that people are distracted by false conspiracies such as 9/11…” For someone who has exposed a good amount of deep state chicanery, Assange evidently hasn’t expended much effort at researching the absurd fairy tale of 19 crazed Arab hijackers.

Donald Trump, in yet another of the incalculable examples he’s provided to show that he’s a certified member of the swamp, laughably reacted to Assange’s recent arrest by saying he “knew nothing” about Wikileaks, and that it was “not my thing.” Trump claimed to “love Wikileaks” during his 2016 presidential campaign, and some have tabulated that Trump in fact mentioned it nearly 150 times.

Trump is the maverick “outsider” who blasted Bradley/Chelsea Manning as an “ungrateful traitor,” and previously claimed another whistleblower, Edward Snowden, should be executed. He certainly doesn’t sound very different in regards to these courageous souls than Hillary Clinton, the Bushes, or any other card-carrying member of the swamp he promised to drain.

Trump’s new comrade, John McCainiac-style perpetual warmonger Sen. Lindsay Graham, angrily tweeted, “In my book, he has NEVER been a hero.” Another Republican Senator, Ben Sasse, commented, presumably with a straight face, that Assange’s arrest was “good news for freedom-loving people” and that the embattled founder of Wikileaks was “a wicked tool of Vladimir Putin and the Russian intelligence services.”

As always, there is no partisanship within the War Party when it comes to these things.  Democrat Rep. Steve Cohen chided the President over his previous support for Assange, tweeting, “Might Trump pardon #Assange. He loved #WikiLeaks,” and further stated, “There is honor among thieves.” Democratic Sen. Mark Warner exclaimed, “Whatever Julian Assange’s intentions were for WikiLeaks, what he’s become is a direct participant in Russian efforts to weaken the West and undermine American security. I hope British courts will quickly transfer him to U.S. custody so he can finally get the justice he deserves.”

Hillary Clinton, Queen of the Deep State, laughed when asked about the situation, and said, “The bottom line is he has to answer for what he has done, at least as it’s been charged. I do think it’s a little ironic that he may be the only foreigner that this administration would welcome to the United States.” None of the other ridiculous crop of Democratic Party presidential contenders commented on the arrest, including “socialist” Bernie Sanders. Joe Biden went on record when he was vice-president, calling Assange “a hi-tech terrorist.”

Trump’s latest Deep State appointee, veteran Bush acolyte Attorney General William Barr, has declared that Wikileaks stole the DNC emails, and that Russia, not the slain young staffer Seth Rich, was the source. Those waiting for Trump to tweet something about the mysterious and still unsolved murder of Seth Rich need to stop fantasizing. The appointment of someone like Barr assured the Deep State that this is going to be business as usual, despite the loud tweets, and that injustice will continue to prevail.

You know things are bad when you have to look favorably in contrast at the Obama administration on these issues. Obama didn’t prosecute Assange under the Espionage Act, something which may happen now under Trump. Obama also commuted Manning’s outrageously harsh sentence. Obama prosecuted more whistleblowers than any President in history, despite campaign rhetoric that praised their courage. Such broken promises are all too familiar to those who were swept up in Donald Trump’s 2016 populism.

What is noticeable here is the lack of outrage from the Left, who should theoretically defend Julian Assange and be appalled at his persecution. As I’ve noted before, there aren’t many civil libertarians left in this country. Even those who have defended him seem to do so with great reluctance; in one case it was with the caveat that Assange is “difficult to defend.”

Tucker Carlson, who is displaying an increasingly Pat Buchanan-style populist streak, probably spoke out for Assange more forcefully than anyone else with a public platform. “What was Julian Assange’s crime?” Carlson asked. “He embarrassed everyone in power…Assange’s real sin was preventing Hillary Clinton from becoming president.” The feisty Fox News host went on to say,  “The guardians of speech are now its enemies. The people charged with policing power are now colluding with it. There’s a reason you see John Brennan on NBC all the time.”

Which brings us to the false debate. There is no side here trumpeting the complete truth. Even Tucker Carlson hates “conspiracy theories.” Trump has now cast his lot firmly in the War Party camp, and his putrid aides like Bolton and Barr can attempt to tie Assange to “the Russians” just as well as his “liberal” enemies. No one wants to investigate the Seth Rich murder, any more than they wanted to investigate the JFK assassination, 9/11, or other high crimes of the Deep State.

So within the consistently limited parameters of debate permitted on the public stage, Trump and his neocon allies trade juvenile barbs with his “liberal” enemies. They all opt for war over peace, every time. They all use incendiary language to cause senseless division between races and sexes. If it wasn’t obvious before, Trump’s seeming acquiescence to some kind of prosecution of Assange proves unequivocally that he isn’t draining any swamp, or going after any of the career criminals in the Deep State.

Trump’s cult continues to imagine that he playing 8000D chess, with his profaned ignorance of Wikileaks actually some brilliant strategy to get Assange to testify and expose the fact that Seth Rich was the leaker. Whatever one can say about this astoundingly faithful lot, they are true believers if any ever existed.

To those who rely exclusively on mainstream media for their news, for the record Julian Assange, probably through the late Seth Rich, leaked a series of damning Democratic National Committee emails, which revealed conclusively that the party was going to deny Bernie Sanders the nomination, regardless of any inconvenient primary voting process. This was, of course, to benefit establishment favorite Hillary Clinton. Our vaunted state-run press managed to convert that into a scenario where “the Russians” leaked these emails, in an effort to deny Hillary the presidency.

As the great Ron Paul said, “As long as Assange is in prison, we are all in prison.” Paul went on to accurately point out that Assange was every bit as much a political prisoner as the sainted Nelson Mandela was. Assange, Manning, and Snowden all exposed something about our government that our corrupt leaders wanted to conceal. What does it say about our politicians and our professional “journalists” that they overwhelmingly side with those who wanted to keep such information from the public, rather than the whistleblowers who exposed it?

The Julian Assange saga is simply the latest example of a country, and a world, that continues down a dark, austere road. Without that antiseptic sunshine, we are left with an all encompassing tyranny and corruption.

Reparations-Deep State Exclamation Point

I predicted many years ago, when it was first being suggested in quiet corners of our collapsing country, that one day reparations for slavery will become a reality. In recent weeks, a campaign has begun- a predictable type of media driven agenda to those familiar with gradualism- to push a reparations bill through Congress.

Watching white presidential candidates competing with each other to acquiesce the loudest to this ridiculous proposal, it becomes clearer than ever that America is being run into the ground by certifiable idiots. Corrupt idiots at that. Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, whose monumental incompetence I have written about before, introduced something called the Commission to Study and Develop Reparations Proposals for African Americans Act in January. It’s fitting that someone who thinks we won in Vietnam and planted a flag on Mars is the primary moving force behind this ludicrous legislation.

Beto O’Rourke, being promoted relentlessly as some kind of “rock star” by our state- run media, quickly climbed on board the reparations train. “That is something I would sign into law as president of the United States.” O’Rourke told Rev. Al Sharpton, predictably front and center here. O’Rourke proclaimed that we shouldn’t “just celebrate civil rights victories…we also look at the brutality, the violence, the continuing suppression today.”

Andrew Yang, being touted as a new maverick in the Democratic party, called reparations “a logical step.” Elizabeth Warren is a supporter as well, declaring, “We must confront the dark history of slavery and government-sanctioned discrimination in this country that has had many consequences including undermining the ability of Black families to build wealth in America for generations.” Kamala Harris and Corey Booker, two more of the sterling cast of Democratic Party presidential candidates, support some form of reparations.

It was disconcerting to watch video of Elizabeth Warren and others fawning over someone like Al Sharpton. For those unfamiliar with Sharpton’s actual background, he was a drug dealer who was turned into an undercover FBI agent to avoid prosecution. He first burst onto the fake news scene through his close involvement in the Tawana Brawley case. Brawley was a young black girl who claimed to have been raped by bunch of powerful white racists. Her story was proven to be a hoax, a forerunner to the Jussie Smollett extravaganza, but it is never mentioned any longer in polite society. The fact that such an obnoxious race pimp is considered one of the top black American “leaders” tells us all we need to know about the state of race relations in this country.

The idea of paying black Americans who are alive today for something some of their ancestors went through 150 years or more ago is preposterous on the surface. The logistics here don’t seem to matter; all that is important is the emotion-driven, virtue signaling narrative. Who, for instance, would qualify to receive reparations? Would you have to prove that you had at least one ancestor who was a slave in America? What about all those who immigrated to America after slavery had been abolished? Would they still get paid just because of their skin color?

Just about 3 percent of Americans currently identify as multi-racial. Most of these have at least some portion of black blood in them. Would a half-black person get one half of whatever reparations are doled out? How about someone who had a black great-grandparent? Would they still get something, despite being for all intents and purposes white? How about all the blacks from South America, who obviously had no ancestors on southern plantations? Would they still somehow qualify?

Perhaps even more important is who would be paying these reparations. Simply assessing a special tax wouldn’t work, unless you exempted all black people from paying it. Would white immigrants who arrived at Ellis Island in the early 1900s have to pay for something their parents and grandparents had nothing to do with? How about Asians, middle easterners, and Hispanics? Their ancestors weren’t in America during the slavery era. Why should they pay reparations?

Then there is the inconvenient fact that, while the numbers vary according to source, only a tiny fraction of white people ever owned slaves in the United States. I know for a certainty, having mapped out my personal genealogy, that my ancestors never owned any slaves. Why should I have to pay? Why should any white people living today have to pay for something their ancestors had no connection to?

And then there is the philosophical question of why even descendants of white plantation owners should have to pay reparations to black people who have never been slaves. The sins of the father, and all that. The very concept is madness, and the fact it is being seriously considered reflects the insanity that has gripped much of the population. We expect our depraved cultural icons and corrupt “representatives” to promote awful ideas like this, but the general public ought to know better. After all, they are the ones that will be footing the bill.

Recent polls give reasonable people little cause for confidence. Some 25 percent of Americans expressed support for “financial compensation and government assistance” to the descendants of slaves, while 32 percent supported the notion that descendants of slaves are “entitled to reparations.” 64 percent of blacks supported reparations, while a surprising 37 percent of Asians and 42 percent of Hispanics did. Perhaps they believe they will be exempted from paying for it. Only 13 percent of self-described conservatives backed the idea, while 54 percent of liberals did.

Julian Castro, a former Obama cabinet member who is yet another Democratic party presidential candidate, blasted Bernie Sanders for his reluctance to endorse reparations. Castro told CNN, “I’ve long believed that this country should address slavery, the original sin of slavery, including by looking at reparations. If I’m president, then I’m going to appoint a commission or task force to determine the best way to do that.” Presumably, no “white nationalist” (which has come to increasingly mean anyone opposed to overt racial favoritism) will be on that commission.

Really, reparations is just the logical culmination of the new forms of discrimination, that were given a legal imprimatur with Affirmative Action. Most Americans don’t realize that “race norming” of qualification tests provided unimaginable assistance to blacks trying to get well-paid, benefits-laden government jobs. Quotas and Affirmative Action mandated that race, especially one particular race, was considered first and foremost for virtually every job in the work force. Don’t get caught without your “We are an equal opportunity employer” logo.

As I’ve noted before, slavery was an unfortunate reality all over the world for far too long. Dumbed down Americans, who know little or nothing of their own history, believe that it was a specific product of hissing, drooling, tobacco spitting white southern racists. They seem to care little about slavery outside of this Hollywood- driven fantasy, which explains their silence about the estimated 40 million slaves in the world today. 10 million of these are in India alone. Where are the demands from the social justice warriors for a boycott of India?

The reason why no one mentions modern slaves is because almost all of those enslaving them are nonwhite. That doesn’t fit the narrative. There must always be a white man to blame, and there are no available whites in places like India, North Korea, China, or Pakistan. This is also why feminists are silent about the abominable way women are treated in Muslim cultures, or by female genital mutilation in Africa. No whitey there either. Gay rights groups are just as close-lipped about the third-class citizenship gays enjoy in Muslim countries. Again, can’t blame a white for that.

Reparations will increase America’s divisiveness to the breaking point. This is what elites want- order out of chaos. Divide and conquer.

“Nazi”-The Slur That Everyone Loves

The National Socialist Party died in 1945, at the same time its leader Adolph Hitler was escorted to Argentina. Following the show trials at Nuremberg, some of the last Nazi leaders were sentenced to death. Others were rewarded by being ushered into America under the CIA’s Operation Paperclip, where they helped establish NASA.

Although the Nazis themselves have been gone for more than half a century, the term “Nazi” itself has a universal appeal, and a staying power that appears to be immortal. When someone is called a “Nazi” now, those affixing the label don’t mean a literal member of the National Socialist Party. They mean, instead, whatever they want it to mean. It is the slur that fits all sizes; leftists routinely paint anyone who doesn’t believe in 57 genders with it, and conservatives use it almost as freely.

Alex Jones, de-platformed guru of the conspiracy world, talks about Adolph Hitler and the Nazis more than he talks about Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mao Tse Tung and every “globalist” in the universe combined. Others on the right resort to it regularly. Donald Trump, Jr. and right-wing author Dinesh D’Souza both compare today’s liberals to actual Nazis. Conservative Jonah Goldberg’s 2008 book Liberal Fascism opined that Hitler and Mussolini merely held more extreme versions of the philosophy of Hillary Clinton and other modern liberal icons.

Since the election of Donald Trump, the disastrous two-party system has become emboldened, as those who irrationally hate or love him dig their heels into partisan Democrat or Republican rhetoric. Alex Jones, Dinesh D’Souza and others have taken to focusing on the old Democratic Party’s ties to slavery and segregation, and pointing out that Hitler and the Nazis were hardly Reaganites advocating small “gubmint.” Today’s Republicans do, however, share Hitler’s affinity for building up the military. Can’t cut that gargantuan defense budget.

The Nazi platform also called for universal health care, which is anathema to “conservatives” who cling to fond memories of doctors making house calls, and a simpler medical system that disappeared with Richard Nixon’s creation of the HMO profit-driven nightmare we enjoy today. Leftists argue that Donald Trump, despite being the most pro-Israel president of all our pro-Israel presidents, is somehow a “Nazi,” too. His campaign rhetoric against bankers, for instance, still holds more significance with them than the fact he has surrounded himself with former employees of Goldman Sachs.

There is a whole school of thought out there that holds that it’s perfectly fine to “punch a Nazi.” The web site canipunchnazis.com boasts, “It is always OK to punch a Nazi.” This violent mantra has become so popular that establishment newspaper The Boston Globe headlined an article, “Why you shouldn’t punch a Nazi.” One Ben Ferrari actually started a kickstarter campaign called “Always Punch Nazis,” to finance a comic book anthology “about our country’s battle against racism.”

The web site Neon asked if it was okay to punch a Nazi as well. One Noorhan Maamoon lustfully declared that not only was it okay, but also “white supremacists and members of the alt-right.” Well, in all fairness, you’d have to include them, as it is going to be very hard to find a real Nazi in 2019. Even Rudolph Hess is gone now. They will be running out of extremely elderly former Ukranians and Croatians to prosecute as supposed “Nazi war criminals” soon. Maybe the more vocal members of the “alt- right” can take their place. If it’s okay to punch them, it should be okay to try them in court. Not sure of the charges, but what does that matter? They are “Nazis” after all. As Lewis Carroll said, “sentence first, verdict afterwards.”

In fact, in September 2018, a Charlottesville jury essentially gave its stamp of approval to this “punching” craze, when it fined a defendant all of $1 for hitting a “white nationalist.” Jason Kessler had been attempting to hold a press conference in wake of the events at Charlottesville in August 2017, when he was sucker punched from behind by Jeffrey Winder. Emboldened by the jury’s upholding of vigilantism, Winder declared that Kessler “should never be allowed to show his face in town again.” Guess he was upset with that hefty fine.

Videos of “white supremacist” Richard Spencer being similarly sucker punched during a speech, set to riveting music, have been posted online. Proponents of Nazi- punching invoked super heroes like Captain America, especially noted for his Nazi- punching prowess, and Indiana Jones, another fictional foe of these immortal, deadly Nazis. In Hollywood, Nazis never died. Filmmakers continue to lavish negative attention upon them, resulting in horrific performances like Brad Pitt developing some unknown accent while hissing “Natsi” in Quenton Tarrantino’s violently obscene Inglorious Bastards. 

Lovably leftist Mother Jones magazine published an article titled “The Long History of Nazi Punching,” and ParentMap seriously considered the question, “My son wants to punch Nazis- should I let him?” In a Cato Institute survey, while 68% of Americans are apparently still sane enough to disagree that it’s okay to punch a “Nazi,” 51% of self-described liberals thought it was perfectly proper.

Recall that the primary components of the “racist” label firmly attached to Donald Trump are his statements condemning illegal immigrants who had killed Americans, and his refusal to “condemn white nationalism,” whatever that is. The left has been collectively perturbed over this, especially recently. Evidently, if Trump “condemns” this to their satisfaction (an impossibility), then this somehow would….well, not really sure what it would accomplish, but this is identity politics at its finest.

When Trump intimated a while back that there were “good people” among those protesting against Confederate statutes being torn down, it represented the trillionth or so example of modern white racism. Being against the tearing down of historical monuments is “racist,” you see, and almost certainly qualifies those who hold this view as “Nazis,” despite Hitler having nothing to do with the American secessionist movement. In this way, “Nazi” shows itself to be one of the most flexible slurs ever invented, able to circumvent centuries, to be associated with events that took place decades before “Nazis” first appeared on the world stage.

With the invention of “hate speech,” whatever that is, it was inevitable that some views would not be tolerated by our increasingly authoritarian rulers. Flinging “Nazi” at your opponents is fair game, and now apparently punching them is, too. If it’s considered acceptable to just walk up and punch someone because they “offend” you, then we are no longer a civil society. As long as they are “Nazis,” or “racists,” or “neo-Nazis” or “white supremacists,” or “white nationalists,” that is. But don’t shoot a robber- that’s against the law.

Adolph Hitler never had any idea what he created.

 

 

 

 

How I Became a Radical

It’s only been in recent years that I realized that a childhood event ignited the spark in me, which grew into a full-fledged flame by young adulthood. In researching this incident as well as I can, over fifty five years later, I discovered the startling fact that it apparently occurred on the same day as the historical event that most haunts me.

On November 22, 1963, not only was John F. Kennedy assassinated, my older brother’s life was impacted and in some ways ruined by a monstrous injustice. A freshman in high school, he made the mistake of following the suggestion of some older, undoubtedly popular boys, to “goose” the bottom of a particular older girl.

This girl was not only popular, but her father was a military General. When my brother touched her precious ass, in an effort to become popular himself, the entire weight of the high school administration came down upon him. He was ushered into the principal’s office, where this well-paid educator screamed at him, “Do you realize what you’ve done?” so angrily that he wet his pants.

The boys who’d egged him on nevertheless were now irate at my brother, and formed a veritable lynch mob. The situation was so precarious that the police had to be called, to safely escort my terrified brother from the school. The school meted out a punishment that might better reflect a student who had savagely raped, not merely “goosed,” a female peer. He was summarily expelled from the school, and was taken to juvenile court on charges that I have no knowledge of and can’t comprehend.

The girl’s powerful father had a real legal team involved, and it’s fortunate, I suppose, that my hapless brother avoided prison time. He was forced to attend regular mental health group sessions, with youngsters that had truly severe issues. I especially remember him talking about one boy who never removed his hand from covering his mouth. These sessions served to impress upon my brother that he was mentally ill, and set the tone for the rest of his life.

My brother was forced to go to another local high school, and thereafter lived with my married sister and her young family. He would come home on the weekends, and the change in him was startling, especially to an impressionable seven year old like me. He would beat his head against the wall in frustration, started half-laughing and half-crying at times for no reason, and would sometimes approach me with his hands heading for my neck, as if he intended to strangle me.

My parents reacted very curiously to all this. Instead of defending my brother, and lashing out in anger at the wild, punitive overreaction from the school administration, my father grew even more bitter at the world, and my mother wanted no mention of the incident, and lied to everyone about why my brother was no longer living with us. I heard my father rage constantly about the crooked court, the crooked judge, and the very wealthy family that was behind that crookedness.

I didn’t really understand what my brother had done, but it certainly seemed as if “goosing” someone was a horrible crime. I heard that word over and over again, especially from my father, who would rant at my brother about why he’d “goosed” that girl. I began feeling a heavy weight on my seven year old shoulders, as children grilled me regularly about “what happened with your brother?” and “why isn’t he living with you all any more?”

My mother basically pretended nothing had happened, and I was aware of this every time I lied about why my brother had left home. I think “he’s helping my sister” was the line I most often used. I remember thinking the other kids were looking at me, and whispering to each other, about the serious crime my brother had committed.

It wasn’t until after both my parents had passed away that I realized just how significant this one incident had been, not only to my brother, but to me. It directly effected my brother by destroying his self-confidence, immersed him in the putrid mental health world, probably killed any chance he had to become a financial success in life, and is almost certainly responsible for the fact he never married or had children.

Its impact on me was less direct, but just as powerful. Although I was eight and half years younger, for all intents and purposes I became the big brother from that day forward. Combined with the JFK assassination happening at the exact same moment, my young mind became instantly distrustful of all authority. I could tell, at seven years old, that just as Lee Harvey Oswald hadn’t assassinated the president, my brother’s absurd punishment for an offense that should have maybe garnered a few days of detention demonstrated that the authorities weren’t interested in justice.

For decades, I suppressed this incident, and never recognized the way it had helped form my own radical mindset. I often wish I’d questioned my mother about it, but she was just as reluctant as my brother was to talk about it. It was only recently that my brother began opening up at least a bit. Before that, he would become  uncharacteristically angry at the very mention of the subject, and invariably still blamed himself, usually saying, “I can’t believe I did something so stupid.”

The impact on my brother can also still be seen in the fact he has suppressed the name of the girl he “goosed.” Considering that he has an almost “Rainman” like ability to recall the names of even kindergarten classmates, over sixty years later, this is truly remarkable. The fact that he can’t remember the name of the person who had more influence on the direction his life took than almost anyone else can only be attributed to his purposefully suppressing a painful memory.

After he started opening up, I learned other details that staggered me even further. My brother claimed that the principal who’d screamed at him actually followed him to his new school, where he would regularly come into his classrooms, sit near him and stare at him. More incredibly, he would walk up to my brother if he attempted to talk to a girl in the hallway, and ask the girl with great concern, “Is he bothering you?” These incomprehensible tidbits had me thinking I was heading down one of my usual political rabbit holes.

I contacted the juvenile court system, and found people there as interested as I was once I told them the incredible story. But the records were already nearly fifty years old, and there are always privacy considerations for minors, etc. I even tried the high school where the incident took place, but again, too much time had passed. I need to know the truth for myself, if not for my brother. Even with my cynical adult perspective, it is hard to fathom how school authorities acted the way they did.

We are all the sum of our experiences, and early childhood events can set an adult personality in stone. Certainly, those youngsters who are sexually assaulted are impacted forever. The same thing goes for those who were viciously bullied as children. Perhaps my brother’s experience is the main reason I’ve always been so drawn to the side of bullied victims. It was certainly a great inspiration for me in writing my upcoming book The Bullyocracy: How the Social Hierarchy Enables Bullies to Rule Schools, Work Places, and Society at Large.

It felt therapeutic to write this. Sometimes it’s important to step away for a minute from the political and cultural madness that normally preoccupy my thoughts. Self- searching, introspection can lead to important insights for all of us.