Amerika

• Democracy is a Lie

  I have come to understand that bi-partisanship is a great evil not a great good. It is portrayed as the defusing of an explosive political issue. In reality it is a way to disguise the fact that issues are not being debated. That the big decisions are all made in secret behind closed doors.

  Politicians get power by saying things that make large groups of people feel safe and united; these have nothing to do with reality. Then politicians must, like any other bureaucrat, work within the system. This provides permanent employment for those who work for a large corporation called Government which true to bloated form is inefficient, giving everyone even more excuses for avoiding the necessary and focusing on that which distracts the groundlings. We will never get anywhere with democracy. Farage and Trump, by appealing to the spirit of the people instead of the will of the people, have shown us the first steps toward limiting democracy and moving toward stronger leadership. If we are smart we will skip the dictators — the Hitler, Stalin, and Mao type people — and go right to aristocracy.

• Tech Giants Have Hijacked the Web. It’s Time for a Reboot.

  Capitalizing on the oceans of data produced by the web has turned Facebook Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google into empires, but it hasn’t made the internet a more open place, said Christian Fuchs, a media professor at the University of Westminster in London. “The internet is a corporate monopoly today,” he said, “and monopolies are always a danger to democracy.”

  Google determines what pages get high ranks; this determines how profitable they are. Everything else flows from that. We need search engine diversity. As far as threats to democracy go, the internet itself was a threat to democracy, since it made it clear that a tiny percentage of people understand the issues, the vast majority are inert, and a small minority of radical Leftists have hijacked media, government, science, and academia by getting into those fields and refusing to hire anyone else who was not a radical Leftist. These people then pipelined into Big Tech, turning its companies from Wild West pioneer entrepreneurs to calculating manipulators.

• Homeowner Association Problems and Solutions

  If society’s intention in setting up associations is to encourage the formation of undemocratic Gulags ruled by unaccountable boards and for the enrichment of those who profit from owner ignorance or impotency- we have succeeded completely. Alternatively, if the intention is that associations be formed as microcosms of democracy in which informed owners collectively wield power, maintain their freedoms and are honestly served by their neighbors and trades people- we have failed miserably.

  Spend a bit of time in the world and you see parallels and epicycles. HOAs are parallel to democracy itself, or even human group interactions, and have the same problems; the smaller cycles of revolution, conformity, tyranny, and insurrection blight HOAs even as the bigger cycle of the same plays out in our governments. Humans have to learn to work together, and “playing nice” does not cut it because it addresses the audience and not the task.

• ‘Moral stain’: Ilhan Omar vows to enact law to ‘guarantee a home for everyone’.

  I understand that recycling large, cardboard refrigerator boxes is important, but now people are getting ridiculous.

  Rep. Ilhan Omar said she plans to introduce a “Homes For All” bill that she hopes will guarantee a home for every person in the U.S. “It is a moral stain on our country that we have half-a-million or more people facing homelessness,” the Minnesota Democrat said Thursday at a congressional town hall for women of color. “In a few weeks, we are going to introduce our ‘Homes For All’ legislation, which will, hopefully, guarantee a home for everyone.”
  

  So let’s get a little more serious and address the stupid here the way a golfer addresses the ball before a Tee-shot at the driving range. Our first problem starts with theoretical demand. The demand of a product is mathematically dependent upon a ration of the value of that product to the cost. Make a valuable product free and unless you don’t quite grasp the error message your calculator gives when you divide by zero; you quickly realize that theoretical demand approaches t a mathematical limit of infinity.

  Next, we detect a pretty significant reality problem. There is a non-negotiable, reality-based difference in cost and price. Price is what you require from someone to deliver a good or service. Cost is what you had to forego to acquire the good or service in the first place. A lot needs to be foregone to build a house. All of that will have to be recouped from somebody. If we make the builders work for no remuneration, they’ll stop building and demand that CongressIncestrix Ilhan build the houses for them.

  Or, you know, “the rich” could pay to build them. Then we hit the implicit problem with an infinite demand. You’ll quickly run out of rich before you run out of infinite. Then you start taxing the kinds-sorta rich, and then the comfortable, and then you wind up redefining rich to equal anyone stupid enough to lawfully report actual income. We’re soon back to my original suggestion. Everyone can have a slightly-used refrigerator box. The “rich” can afford a whole lot more of those.

• How democracy made us dumb

  The proof of the foolish, violent and cruel nature of the crowds is that the crowds, not the judges, insisted on making Socrates the first martyr of philosophy. He drank the poison at the behest of the people.

  The “wisdom of crowds” turns out to be an ability to find the average, not the actual facts and logic of a circumstance. If you need to design a burger for a cosmopolitan low-IQ population, that lowest common denominator works; for questions of policy, it always fails. Remember that the crowd wanted diversity, equality, and other illusions. Politicians just served that need, and remembered to ask if we wanted fries with that.

• Astros Fire Assistant GM Brandon Taubman Over Clubhouse Incident With Female Reporters

  Sports Illustrated reported he repeatedly yelled toward a group of female reporters about closer Roberto Osuna, who was suspended for 75 games last year for violating MLB’s domestic violence policy before being traded from Toronto to the Astros. Taubman shouted, “Thank God we got Osuna! I’m so (expletive) glad we got Osuna!” according to SI, which said he made similar remarks several times, punctuating them with a profanity.
  

  Why are these professionally-offened, perpetually-aggreived, useless twatlings allowed anywhere near a locker room? They had no value to anyone’s economic supply chain whatsoever. They need to be banished from any point of geography where people do anything useful. For firing this man who spoke truth to Wokeness, the Astros now deserve a 4-0 loss in this year’s World Series. Halfway there, Baby. Go Nats!

• The Culture of Critique: Some Notes and Quotes

  The great assault on the Darwinian evolutionary approach to human societies means that now all cultures are regarded as equal. The concept of race is now said to be meaningless. We are no longer allowed to speak of three stages: savagery, barbarism, and civilization.

  Crowds deny reality because reality requires us to see how beauty can come from conflict, and crowds are held together by fear and greed, not a desire to strike out and create the beautiful.

• Is ‘Hate Speech’ Dangerous?

  Trying to ban speech that is offensive, or may cause another to become upset, is a slippery slope which causes more risk than the “overall good” intended. There are very clear laws in place that hate crimes are illegal and punishable. These crimes involve bodily injury to another person based on race, creed, religion, sex/gender, etc. Hate crimes also include vandalizing property. Governance over words is an inherently dangerous activity to a healthy, and ultimately free society. Take away the right to voice an opinion, no matter how vile it may be, and you are ever closer to totalitarian rule. However, that seed has been planted by very vocal left-leaning groups who do not want hate speech protected. When a group vocalizes repeatedly about how hate speech is a danger to society, that poison pill has been placed. Many who are not very politically active hear the side that makes the most “chatter” and tend to agree with the popular opinion instead of researching the situation on their own.

  The Left uses civil rights to get whatever it wants. The goal is to make you helpless, not to lift up the downtrodden; that is merely the excuse that they use. Censoring speech is their latest battleground, but one that they have always undertaken. Remember how language was redefined after the French Revolution, and those who used the wrong words faced the guillotine for being enemies of the State…

• Harry and Meghan Join the Woke Victimhood Circus

  When Democracy collapses like a popped colostumy bag, these people won’t be anywhere near the throne room.

  With the marriage between Markle and Harry, wokeness has spoiled the royal family. Markle was already woke, and when they married, Harry went along for the ride. It’s made royal-watching intolerable as a result.

  When the documentary clips dropped, the hashtag #WeLoveYouMeghan trended and both were applauded for their “bravery.” I’m sorry… what? I cannot fathom that lack of self-awareness, to stand in Africa after doing a humanitarian mission and complain about your very, very privileged life. Our culture has warped over the last decade or so, applauding and cheering on weakness, promoting self-pity instead of self-reliance. It’s yet another reminder that the kids aren’t alright.
  

  Modern “royals” are like Modern “intellectuals” and Modern “Professionals”.

• Red Flag Gun Laws Are Rooted In Communist Methods Of Oppression

  The method of using “mental health” or social disruption as an excuse to silence dissent was not actually mastered by China, however. It was standardized in communist Russia during the reign of the Soviets. The mental health excuse was exploited on a regular basis in order to quietly sweep government critics and dissidents under the rug never to be seen again. The metal hospitals where these deplorables were kept were called “Psikhushka”, an ironic diminutive label. The hospitals worked hand in hand with the Cheka secret police and their vast networks of civilian informants.

  Ideology serves as a philosophy of everything. It explains the good life, and the bad people who impede it; it excuses failures, and explains that a Great Victory lies in the future. People when weakened — whether exhausted, bad genetics, prole origins, mental health problems, or low self-esteem — gravitate toward this idea. People in groups want simple answers that make them feel good so do the same. Civilization, if not held in check by the exceptional, always gravitates toward this point. Ideology then declares what is good, and everything else must be considered bad, evil, and crazy. That enables them to do whatever they need to in order to serve in perpetual power.

• GOP Senators Introduce Legislation to Move 90 Percent of Federal Jobs out of DC

  “Every year, Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars fund federal agencies that are mainly located in the D.C. bubble. That’s a big part of the problem with Washington: they’re too removed from the rest of America,” Hawley said. “The HIRE Act will move policymakers directly into the communities they serve, creating thousands of jobs for local communities and saving taxpayers billions of dollars along the way.”
  

  The HIRE Act does two things well.

  1) It reveals how little the piggies at the Federal trough really care about serving Amerika. They intend to serve themselves, at taxpayer expense, via Federal Employment. Making them move out of Panem and into the provinces shows how much contempt they have for those people. Critics claim this will make it hard to recruit a Federal workforce. What was the downside again?

  2) It puts an absolute lie to any claim by the Leftist Elite that they really care about economically blighted areas. They could go live there. They could go work there. They could rejuvenate the tax bases. Heck, everyone would just rejoice at their swell and terrific presence among unwashed simple folk. Oh, wait…

  Most of these odious slugs would rather die in a battery plant fire breathing acid gases than share much of their lives with the common Amerikan taxpayers who pay for their lifestyles and benefits. Civil Servants my ass.

• Is democracy a dying species?

  Yet, one wonders: Why are these outbursts of violent protests and rioting taking place in stable, free and prosperous societies?

  If the beneficiaries of freedoms and democratic rights come to regard them as insufficient to produce the political, economic and social results they demand, what does that portend for democracy’s future?

  Yet, one wonders: If the “end of history” and worldwide triumph of democratic capitalism thesis has, as most agree, been disproven, is it possible that the Age of Democracy is itself a passing phase in the history of the West and the world?

  The ancients regarded democracy as a sign that a civilization had passed its good years and was dying. They pointed out that it could reboot at any time by removing democracy and finding a sense of transcendental purpose instead, but that this happens with the best, not with the masses. For that reason, removing democracy is necessary for our survival.

• Liberalism, Conservatism, and the End of History

  My point was that if you consider the bedrock principles of liberalism — that we are all equal in the eyes of God and government, that we have inalienable rights, that government derives its authority from the consent of the governed, etc. — then any movement away from those principles is not progress forward but retreat backward.

  All of these things translate to “the judgment of our worst is equal to the judgment of our best,” and explain why all egalitarian systems implode over time.

• The Day the Trump Boom Died

  Paul Krugabe is cute little puppet. I say that not just because of his diminutive stature. In writing his premature death certificate for The Trump Boom; which we all know from the narrative was totally impossible, he shows us his typical phallus dance in full partisan rhetorical flourish. He cannot admit that tariffs serve exactly the purpose Trump intended them to serve. He cannot admit tax cuts encourage economic activity. He cannot admit economic regulation strangles innovation and risk-taking. He therefore has to declare the Trump Boom dead without ever acknowledging that it existed or why. Academic expertise is the mentally and morally paralyzing state where you cannot ever admit that you were personally or professionally wrong. This is why experts never seem to learn a darn thing.

Tags: linkpost, outliers