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Writes Andreatta G.:

Lew,

What do Palantir, NATO, assorted tech companies, defense contractors, the Israelis, and, last but not least, the U.S. government have in common? Answer: Conspiring to create a souped-up version of Project Maven meant to control, predict, and suppress populations, leading to “militarized technofascism on a planetary scale.”

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Il manoscritto fornisce un grimaldello al lettore, una chiave di lettura semplificata, del mondo finanziario e non che sembra essere andato "fuori controllo" negli ultimi quattro anni in particolare. Questa è una storia di cartelli, a livello sovrastatale e sovranazionale, la cui pianificazione centrale ha raggiunto un punto in cui deve essere riformata radicalmente e questa riforma radicale non può avvenire senza una dose di dolore economico che potrebbe mettere a repentaglio la loro autorità. Da qui la risposta al Grande Default attraverso il Grande Reset. Questa è la storia di un coyote, che quando non riesce a sfamarsi all'esterno ricorre all'autofagocitazione. Lo stesso è accaduto ai membri del G7, dove i sei membri restanti hanno iniziato a fagocitare il settimo: gli Stati Uniti.

____________________________________________________________________________________

(Versione audio della traduzione disponibile qui: https://open.substack.com/pub/fsimoncelli/p/io-bitcoin)

I lettori del mio blog sanno che ho iniziato a interessarmi di Bitcoin alla fine del 2022.

Infatti è stato l'asset con le migliori performance tra tutti i titoli che ho menzionato e che stavo tenendo d'occhio per il 2023. Allo stesso modo, e per non rovinare la suspense, ho aggiunto di nuovo l'esposizione a Bitcoin alla mia lista di 24 titoli che stavo tenendo d'occhio nel 2024.

Forse non è stata una grande sorpresa quando ieri i miei iscritti mi hanno visto su X proclamare che i miei giorni di disprezzo per Bitcoin erano finiti. Tuttavia, dato che ho circa 210.000 follower su Twitter in più rispetto agli iscritti su Substack, si può dire che ci sono state comunque molte persone colte di sorpresa dal mio mea culpa e, cosa un po' allarmante, ancora più persone disposte a tessere immediatamente le mie lodi e a darmi il benvenuto nella community.

Per quanto riguarda il benvenuto, tutto ciò che posso dire è che lo apprezzo sinceramente. Mentirei se dicessi che un folto gruppo di persone che la considerava una decisione intelligente non mi avesse reso un po' nervoso. Tuttavia, come ho detto ieri nel mio post su X, so di essere circondato anche da persone molto più intelligenti di me.

In particolare coloro nella comunità del denaro sano/onesto, i quali tessono le lodi della loro esperienza con Bitcoin. Per me questa è stata la cosa più difficile da ignorare, e mi riferivo a persone come Lawrence Lepard, Luke Gromen e Lyn Alden per le loro incredibili intuizioni sul sistema monetario corrotto. Mi sono chiesto: perché non provare almeno a prenderli sul serio quando si trattava del loro punto di vista su Bitcoin? Sapevo, nel profondo, che avevano fatto un lavoro e raggiunto una comprensione che io non avevo, pur comprendendone alcuni principi fondamentali.

Ho iniziato ad avere un assaggio di questa comprensione ascoltando il mio amico Lawrence Lepard descrivere Bitcoin come un'invenzione a sé stante nel seguente podcast del dicembre 2022, paragonandolo a un parallelo di Internet, anziché a una semplice applicazione software.

In questa intervista l'ha definito “l'invenzione della scarsità digitale”. Onestamente, non avevo idea di cosa significasse, e l'idea di “scarsità digitale” non mi sembrava poi così nuova. Ho semplicemente scrollato le spalle e ho pensato: “Se Bitcoin può farlo, anche le altre criptovalute possono farlo”. Mi sono chiesto: “Come può qualcosa essere scarso quando non esisteva in modo tangibile e sicuramente non esisteva 15 anni fa?”

Naturalmente, come una chiave usa più denti contemporaneamente per aprire una serratura fisica, Bitcoin ha iniziato ad avere senso per me solo dopo averlo compreso nel contesto del funzionamento della rete: tutti i denti della chiave (l'ideologia, la rete, l'invenzione crittografica) si allineano, contribuendo a sbloccarne la comprensione. Innanzitutto ho dovuto capire come funziona la crittografia di Bitcoin e perché è inattaccabile e, per il momento, il massimo della sicurezza. Ci sono riuscito guardando questo video:

In seguito ho dovuto comprendere il sistema di controlli e contrappesi che la rete crea per garantire la propria integrità. Certo, avevo capito l'idea di un registro decentralizzato che tutti potevano controllare: era relativamente semplice. Quello che non capivo veramente era come la maggior parte dei nodi sulla rete, che eseguivano lo stesso codice, mantenesse Bitcoin sacrosanto finché le persone avessero deciso di volerlo. Avevo sentito parlare di fork nella rete, ma solo dopo li ho capiti. Sono momenti in cui le persone pensavano di saperne di più e di dover riscrivere il codice di Bitcoin. La maggior parte dei nodi ha respinto queste idee, proteggendo così la sacralità del codice Bitcoin originale.

Una volta compresi la crittografia e la sicurezza della rete, è diventato ovvio che più la rete si espande e aumenta la sua adozione, più diventa sicura e indistruttibile. L'idea che la gente “la vieti” o, come ha detto un mio amico, che “Satoshi torni per cambiare l'offerta di monete quando vuole” non ha molto senso una volta capito come funziona. Se la gente vuole la rete Bitcoin e ha energia elettrica e una connessione Internet, la otterrà. La rete è come un pesce scivoloso che qualcuno cerca di afferrare: più lo tieni stretto e più cerchi di controllarlo, più velocemente ti sfugge di mano. Se il Canada la vieta, andrà in Messico. Se il Messico la vieta, i nodi andranno alle Mauritius. Se le Mauritius la vietano, i nodi andranno in Russia. Ci sarà sempre un posto nel mondo – almeno nel breve e medio termine – che accoglierà Bitcoin.

Per me è stato solo dopo aver capito come funzionava la crittografia e come la rete interagiva, in tandem, che ho iniziato ad attribuire a Bitcoin l'importantissimo “valore intrinseco”. Ero, e in un certo senso sono ancora, nel gruppo che vede l'oro come hard asset predefinito, grazie alla sua offerta come materia prima e alla sua storia di gran lunga superiore come riserva di valore. Ecco perché, nonostante abbia accettato l'idea su Bitcoin, la mia posizione sull'oro resta maggiore rispetto alla mia posizione su Bitcoin.

Ma i sostenitori di Bitcoin portano argomenti convincenti quando sottolineano che esso è più facile da trasportare e da verificare rispetto all'oro. Mi sono sempre trovato in difficoltà quando qualcuno mi chiedeva come avrei potuto portare oltre confine oro per un valore di $1 miliardo. Non si può fare. Con Bitcoin, però, si può. Anche se gli exchange sono soggetti a normative AML e KYC, Bitcoin stesso rimane una via d'uscita dalla centralizzazione del proprio patrimonio. L'idea, unita alla trasmissibilità e alla possibilità di verificarlo ovunque nel mondo in qualsiasi momento con una semplice connessione Internet e la corrente elettrica, lo rendono diverso da qualsiasi cosa sia mai esistita prima.

Per quanto mi riguarda non riuscivo sempre a capire esattamente cosa stavo comprando quando ho comprato Bitcoin. Ho dovuto convincermi a capirlo, descrivendolo a me stesso come l'acquisto di un posto su un registro decentralizzato con la più alta adozione a livello mondiale, che potenzialmente – non definitivamente – servirà da fondamento per un nuovo modo di pensare al denaro. In altre parole, si tratta di riservarsi un posto sul registro piuttosto che investire nell'invenzione di Bitcoin stesso. È un'idea davvero grandiosa – e il mio cervello è davvero piccolo – ed è per questo che ci ho messo così tanto a capirla. Ma, come si dice, “una volta che la vedi, non puoi più non vederla”.

E, come ogni altro investimento che faccio in qualcosa di nuovo che non è stato ancora pienamente adottato, accetto il fatto che ci siano rischi significativi e che il valore di Bitcoin potrebbe scendere notevolmente, o addirittura azzerarsi. Secondo me non accadrà, o almeno non nel breve termine. Anche nello scenario peggiore in cui Bitcoin non arrivi a 100 anni da oggi, penso che la sua adozione nei prossimi 5-10 anni sia già stata scontata.

In particolare, ascoltare Michael Saylor mi ha aiutato ad aprire gli occhi sul fatto che stavo acquistando proprietà digitali. Quest'intervista è tanto lunga quanto completa, e mi è piaciuta molto. Che Saylor si riveli il vero sostenitore di Bitcoin o la persona più fuorviata della storia, è difficile negare che non sia eccezionalmente intelligente e dotato di un'ottima parlantina:

Questa è un'altra lunga e complessa intervista che ho ascoltato per intero e in modo approfondito, e che mi ha aiutato a comprendere la rete e tutti i componenti che interagiscono e che costituiscono l'ecosistema Bitcoin:

E quindi, quando Saylor pone una domanda del tipo, “quanto tempo pensi che passerà prima che tutti i cellulari e i computer siano dotati di wallet Bitcoin?”, la risposta mi sembra ovvia: non passerà molto. Quindi, dal punto di vista dell'adozione, che si tratti o meno di 100 anni, al momento, è per lo più irrilevante. È come il potenziale impatto dell'informatica quantistica: ho ascoltato entrambe le parti in causa e ho praticamente accettato la posizione secondo cui si tratta di un ponte che dovremo attraversare quando ci arriveremo. Ehi, se questo ragionamento è abbastanza valido per Janet Yellen che guarda il nostro debito/PIL esplodere verso un punto di non ritorno, è abbastanza valido anche per me.

Ma il fatto che le agenzie di regolamentazione abbiano benedetto Bitcoin consentendo gli ETF, e che io possa andare su Twitter e vedere spot pubblicitari di gestori patrimoniali super seri come Franklin Templeton e Fidelity, che parlano di Bitcoin come una solida copertura monetaria e un modo per uscire dal sistema monetario globale gestito dalle banche centrali, è sbalorditivo.

È buffo come, una volta che ci sono delle commissioni in gioco, la gente sia felice di sostenere quella che ho sempre ritenuto la ragione moralmente giusta per inveire contro le banche centrali – la ragione che aspetto da tempo affinché la gente sostenga pubblicamente l'oro. In ogni caso, non mi interessa molto la vostra motivazione quando fate delle ottime osservazioni.

Proprio la settimana scorsa ho sentito qualcuno dire che tutti gli acquirenti di Bitcoin sono speculatori, non persone che cercano seriamente di uscire dal sistema monetario così com'è oggi, a lungo termine – e semplicemente non credo che sia la verità. Credo che ci siano molte persone là fuori, come me, che cercano solo di diversificare per uscire da un sistema fiat ormai in rovina, e Bitcoin è solo uno dei tanti modi per farlo.

Non c'è dubbio che ci saranno innumerevoli speculatori e trader. Non c'è dubbio che ci saranno truffatori e un'infinità di altcoin di bassa qualità. Non c'è dubbio che ci saranno frodi e riciclaggio di denaro, proprio come con il dollaro e i titoli registrati. Ma dire che questo sia tutto ciò che c'è in Bitcoin è un errore, a mio parere.

Basta che ci sia solo un piccolo gruppo di persone che continui ad acquistarlo e detenerlo in futuro per poi consumare e ridurre lo spazio sul registro. Se l'hashrate o l'adozione collettiva della rete fossero in calo, sarebbe un problema. Ma per ora non lo è. Non potete dirmi che un Paese come El Salvador che adotta Bitcoin come moneta a corso legale sia “speculazione”. Per me questa è “adozione”. C'è una grande differenza tra un paio di ragazzini in una chat room che cercano di fare daytrading di shitcoin e alcuni dei più grandi gestori patrimoniali del mondo, e persino alcuni stati che sostengono di voler piazzare la loro proprietà digitale nel registro, mentre milioni di persone in tutto il mondo acquistano Bitcoin solo per possederli. L'idea che tutti i coinvolti siano truffatori o stiano cercando di arricchirsi è, a mio parere, fuorviante. Per me c'è un'enorme differenza tra “cercare di arricchirsi rapidamente” e “cercare di preservare la ricchezza a lungo termine”. Indipendentemente da ciò che Bitcoin fa, la mia motivazione sarà sempre la seconda.

Il prezzo continuerà a essere volatile, ma è anche abbastanza facile giustificare il suo aumento. Se domani pago $200.000 per una casa e non faccio nulla, e non c'è un aumento della domanda, ma il potere d'acquisto del dollaro scende del 99% nei prossimi 50 anni, il prezzo in dollari continuerà a salire. Con Bitcoin c'è il vento in poppa dell'adozione globale, il vantaggio di un'offerta limitata e un crescente risveglio ideologico che ne sostiene l'esistenza morale ed etica.

È stato divertente ascoltare podcast su Bitcoin negli ultimi mesi, perché tutti iniziano la loro spiegazione esponendo gli orrori del sistema monetario fiat. Sono stato fortunato, nel senso che capisco già come funziona, come le maree, che si alzano e scendono, erodendo il potere d'acquisto delle persone e trasferendolo allo stato. Questa è stata una delle mie argomentazioni di lunga data a favore del possesso di oro. Man mano che Bitcoin continua ad essere adottato, diventa anche un'ottima ragione per possederlo, a mio parere. Una cosa che ho sempre detto su Bitcoin è che apprezzo quanto abbia aperto gli occhi a persone che normalmente non avrebbero compreso gli orrori della MMT e della politica monetaria globale.

Ciò che sarà ancora più interessante da vedere, a mio parere, è la FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) quando, e se, il prezzo supererà di nuovo i massimi storici. Se il prezzo di Bitcoin continua ad andare bene, i gestori patrimoniali che ora non hanno scuse per non acquistare Bitcoin (dato che ci sono ETF che operano all'interno del sistema in cui sono autorizzati a operare) saranno sommersi dalle chiamate dei loro clienti che si chiedono perché non abbiano alcuna esposizione a tale asset, anche se non lo capiscono.

E qui non stiamo parlando di GameStop, il che significa che una volta iniziata la FOMO sul prezzo, non ci sarà alcuna offerta azionaria at-the-money che arriverà e si diluirà a prezzi più alti. Se la corsa all'“accaparramento di tutto quello che puoi mangiare” sul libro mastro inizierà sul serio, non ci sarà nessuna nuova offerta che arriverà magicamente dal nulla per soddisfarla. Con la capitalizzazione di mercato totale di Bitcoin, mi sembra logico che i Paesi mediorientali super-ricchi saranno probabilmente i prossimi ad adottarlo e a inserirlo nei loro bilanci.

Molti podcast che ho ascoltato parlano di stati che minano Bitcoin ma non ne parlano. A un certo punto, è probabile che le luci si accendano a livello globale e tutti vedranno cosa detengono gli altri. Immagino che alcuni Paesi mediorientali ricchi di petrolio, anche se lo considerano un'opzione call con il potenziale di andare a zero, si diletteranno a inserire Bitcoin nei loro bilanci sovrani per cercare di diversificare e scommettere sul futuro del denaro. Queste persone guidano Bugatti per andare al lavoro e tengono tigri come animali domestici. Dire che non hanno abbastanza soldi per “speculare” sul potenziale futuro del denaro è ridicolo.

E poi, ancora una volta, torniamo a Bitcoin e la rete, e a come si integrano e lavorano in tandem. Più viene adottato, più diventa sicuro, più persone vogliono investirci, più diventa praticabile e diffuso. Bitcoin, per me, è l'equivalente del codice open source di una profezia che si autoavvera. Il modo in cui funziona lo rende un virus della libertà-denaro. È stato scatenato ed è diventato così grande che è quasi impossibile fermarlo nel breve o addirittura nel medio termine. Ho trovato azzeccate le analogie di Michael Saylor, secondo cui la rete è essenzialmente uno sciame di vespe. Come si ferma uno sciame? Si possono uccidere una o due vespe, ma alla fine dei conti si è in inferiorità numerica. E con Bitcoin, l'ideologia, più la rete, più la ridondanza, più il fatto che chiunque possa adottarlo, garantiscono che supererà i suoi critici sia in termini di nodi che di potenza di calcolo.

Non vedo l'ora di fare ulteriori ricerche sui potenziali utilizzi della rete e sui percorsi per l'adozione di Bitcoin in futuro. Non fraintendetemi, continuo a considerarlo un asset rischioso, nel senso che se l'adozione rallenta o regredisce, la rete si indebolisce. Ma la traiettoria su cui ci troviamo ora non suggerisce che ciò accadrà a breve. Ci sono rischi se gli sviluppatori principali decidessero di apportare modifiche drastiche, o se l'informatica quantistica rendesse la crittografia più facile da decifrare. C'è anche il rischio che i principali Paesi occidentali cerchino di vietare, regolamentare o tassare Bitcoin a morte, e ci sono moltissimi rischi sconosciuti che derivano dall'adozione ideologica di uno standard completamente nuovo.

Il mio peso in Bitcoin è a un livello tale che non mi dispiacerebbe perdere tutto. Prevedo che il prezzo scenderà del 90% più di una volta in futuro. Come hanno detto diverse persone, se vi preoccupate così tanto, il vostro peso è troppo alto. Gestisco il rischio di possedere Bitcoin come gestisco opzioni call o entro in un casinò. Non sarò sorpreso o devastato se e quando perderò tutto.

Ma per me, ideologicamente, ciò che Bitcoin si propone di risolvere ha senso. Guardo le cose attraverso una lente Austriaca e credo fermamente che il sistema e l'economia globale siano in crisi. Sarò sempre un sostenitore dell'oro e dell'argento, ma dire che sostengo un sistema monetario diverso e che non c'è spazio per l'opzione call ideologica di Bitcoin, ora che ho capito meglio, non ha più senso per me.

Una cosa che prima ridicolizzavo, ma che ora non ridicolizzo più, è l'idea che Bitcoin rappresenti la libertà digitale. Il bello della decentralizzazione e del peer-to-peer è che, sebbene possa apparire e scomparire gradualmente in alcune giurisdizioni, Bitcoin funziona se le persone lo vogliono. E, filosoficamente, non riesco a pensare a molte cose su cui preferirei scommettere come quella di dare potere al popolo.

[*] traduzione di Francesco Simoncelli: https://www.francescosimoncelli.com/

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Curb Your Enthusiasm: Day Bed

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Professor Michel Chossudovsky has been tracking and analyzing the trajectory of U.S. military planning for the last two decades and has been at the forefront of dissecting the propaganda describing these projects as ‘self defense’ or a ‘humanitarian intervention.’

In June of 2018 he delivered a speech to the Regina Peace Council outlining his research and appealing for the re-invigoration of an anti-war movement that would confront what he considers to be a hegemonic project of world conquest, orchestrated by the U.S. and its Western allies.

“We’re dealing with a diabolical agenda where the United States is intervening under the banner of ‘Responsibility to Protect’ or ‘Global War on Terrorism.’

In other words it is providing a legitimacy to a war of aggression, or a sequence of wars of aggression. And the public is led to believe somehow that these are humanitarian undertakings.”

The original source of this article is Global Research.

The post The Globalization of War. The Pentagon’s WWIII Scenario Against Four Strategic Countries. appeared first on LewRockwell.

In January 2024, the nine years long war Saudi Arabia waged against Yemen had just calmed down after the Saudis had been mostly defeated, the Houthi movement declared to shut down Israel related traffic through the Red Sea. The move was made in solidarity with the besieged people in Gaza.

To cover for Israel’s genocide in Gaza the U.S. and UK decided to fight down the Houthi and to reestablish marine traffic through the Red Sea. Their bombing campaign showed little results.

Eight month later a hawkish British commentator conceded defeat:

The Houthis have defeated the US Navy – Telegraph, Aug 24 2024

Soon thereafter the Biden administration recognized that the effort was useless and refrained from launching further strikes on Yemen.

In March 2025 the Trump administration repeated the error of the previous U.S. regime and engaged in a new bombing campaign against Yemen:

Announcing Saturday’s strikes, Trump said “we will use overwhelming lethal force until we have achieved our objective”.

“Funded by Iran, the Houthi thugs have fired missiles at US aircraft, and targeted our Troops and Allies,” Trump said on social media, adding that their “piracy, violence, and terrorism” had cost “billions” and put lives at risk.

Addressing the Houthis directly, Trump wrote that if they did not stop, “HELL WILL RAIN DOWN UPON YOU LIKE NOTHING YOU HAVE EVER SEEN BEFORE”.

But the Houthis have been unwavering in their response, saying the aggression would not diminish their support for Palestinians.

I made a short comment on the renewal of the U.S. bombing campaign:

• Bombing Yemen is stupid. The Saudis tried for years to get their way by doing that and were defeated.
• Yemen can and does shoot back.
• It is only a question of time until it hits a U.S. war ship and causes casualties.
• Then Trump will be hard pressed to escalate the war towards Iran.
• Iran can not be defeated.

The U.S. and UK military have since continued to bomb Yemen. There are signs that they have run out of identified targets as they are bombing just random stuff. Recently they hit a detention center that was holding African migrants killing some 60 of those. They dropped bombs on civilians near a quarry because some random guy on Twitter posted coordinates of the quarry claiming that it was a military site. Eight people died.

On Sunday a Yemeni missile hit Israel’s main airport Ben Gurion. U.S. supplied Patriot and THAAD, as well as Israel Arrow air defense system had failed to intercept the missile.

The Houthi warned of more to come:

Houthi military spokesman Brig.-Gen. Yahya Saree posted on Telegram that the missile strike was in response to expand its operations against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The decision to expand operations was agreed upon by the Israeli security cabinet on Friday night. Several IDF reserve brigades will be mobilized for the operation’s expansion.

The Yemen-based terror organization “calls upon all international airlines to take into consideration” their plans to target Israeli airports, Saree said in his Telegram post, and also recommended that airlines “cancel all schedules flights to the airports of the ‘criminal enemy’ to preserve the safety of their aircraft and their agents.”

Trump’s military campaign against Yemen, just like Biden’s previous one, has failed:

The Houthis have the upper hand. This is why (archived) – The Times, May 4 2025
Despite concerted American efforts, the Iran-backed Yemeni group continues to launch missile attacks against Israel and merchant shipping in the Red Sea

President Trump has promised to “annihilate the Houthis” and a campaign that involved 202 strikes during its first two months, under the Biden administration, has intensified to the point that more than 800 have been delivered.
…
The Houthis combine the nimbleness of a non-state group and an insurgent army, while having Iranian support, and boasting an arsenal of strike weapons that would put most countries to shame. So, there is danger for British and American pilots — the Houthis have shot down 19 Reaper drones (which cost $30 million each) since this blitz started. And Monday’s attempt to hit the Truman shows their continued ability to threaten nearby shipping with a blend of ballistic and cruise missiles as well as uncrewed aircraft and boats, testing their defences from all angles.
…
Intercepting these occasional launches of long-range Iranian-made weapons is one of the most expensive issues facing the Pentagon. The Israeli Arrow missiles used to counter them are $4 million each, the American Thaad missile defence systems cost $8.4 million, and the ship-launched SM-3 anti-ballistic missile is an eye-watering $27 million.

As for protecting naval vessels off Yemen, a salvo of defensive missiles costs millions, but the price of such a strike getting through, crippling a warship, could easily top a billion dollars.

A hit on a U.S. or British ship is sure to happen should the U.S. and UK continue its campaign.  But there is no hope that any bombing will defeat the nobles of Yemen:

Ultimately though, the Houthis, ruling through a combination of activism and coercion, have withstood attempts by western countries and Saudi Arabia to coerce them so will retain some capability to continue launching missiles.

There are ideas of instigating a local ground campaign against the Ansar Islam ruled parts of North Yemen. The Saudis, with help of the Emirates and al-Qaeda had tried that too. It had failed and will fail again should the Trump administration be stupid enough to try it again.

The Houthi can not be defeated . Soon a U.S. ship will get hit. From there the war could easily escalate into a war against Iran. There is a good chance that the U.S. would lose it.

It is high time for the Trump administration to pull back from its Yemen campaign.

The reopening of the Red Sea for all maritime traffic can only be achieved by reining in the Zionist maniacs.

Unfortunately Trump lacks the balls to even attempt that.

Reprinted with permission from Moon of Alabama.

The post Yemen – They Defeated The Saudis, Then Biden, Now Trump appeared first on LewRockwell.

The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump—and many of his most prominent right-wing supporters—are directly linked to some of the most radically pro-war, pro-Israel organizations in the country. These connections form a sprawling web of lobbying groups, tech billionaires, and media figures who consistently promote Israeli interests above those of ordinary Americans.

Why has the pro-Trump right suddenly pivoted from branding itself as a bastion of free speech to openly supporting censorship and state-led crackdowns? This MintPress News investigation uncovers a donor-driven advocacy network driving that ideological shift.

The Horowitz Connection

Since the early 2000s, writer and activist David Horowitz has been at the center of a movement that claimed to defend free speech while portraying Muslims and leftists as existential threats to Western civilization. In the aftermath of 9/11, Horowitz called for the profiling of “Palestinian” and “Islamic” people and infamously stated that “the Palestinians are Nazis.”

Through the David Horowitz Freedom Center (DHFC), founded in 1998, he and his donors built a media and policy network that shaped the careers of nearly every major pro-Trump conservative figure active today. The Southern Poverty Law Center designated the DHFC a hate group, and it has received anonymous dark money routed through Donors Trust, which has also funded white nationalist causes.

Horowitz focused much of his activism on college campuses, pushing inflammatory anti-Islam and pro-Israel narratives intended to provoke backlash. He then framed protests against his appearances as proof that the left and Muslim communities oppose the First Amendment.

This strategy laid the foundation for figures like Ben Shapiro, who built his early career on college campus tours, defending even hate speech as protected expression and popularizing slogans like “facts don’t care about your feelings.” Shapiro began as a fellow at the DHFC, and his first book, “Brainwashed: How Universities Indoctrinate America’s Youth,” was published in 2004.

Shapiro would later become editor-in-chief of Truth Revolt, a website funded by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, where his managing editor was Jeremy Boreing. The two would go on to co-found what is now The Daily Wire. Both also worked with organizations linked to Israeli intelligence circles before eventually hiring Jordan Peterson. Although Peterson had previously said little about Israel, upon joining the Daily Wire he adopted a vocal pro-Israel stance and later met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The DHFC has also funded or aligned with numerous high-profile right-wing figures, including former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon, former national security adviser John Bolton, Pamela Geller, and Dutch politician Geert Wilders. Trump’s current Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, received $30,000 in speaking fees and honoraria from the Freedom Center between 2023 and 2024.

Candace Owens, now a high-profile conservative commentator, was initially recruited by Horowitz, but later came under attack from his affiliated activists after publicly expressing support for Palestinian rights.

“I started my career, my political career, on YouTube making just funny, satirical videos, and I got an email from David Horowitz inviting me to this conference, and let me just tell you what a big deal it was for me. I had no connections whatsoever,” Owens once recalled.

Following Horowitz’s death on April 29, 2025, Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk acknowledged his influence: “Without David Horowitz, I’m not sure Turning Point USA would exist. Over 90% of our earliest major donors were introduced at a David Horowitz event—thanks to his warm endorsements and generous introductions. His support opened doors that would have otherwise remained closed.”

What Kirk revealed is crucial: Horowitz operated as a connector within an elite donor class that used his introductions to finance pro-Israel right-wing media and political infrastructure.

The Tech Bros

Elon Musk’s growing alignment with Israeli policy became publicly visible in 2024, when he forged a surprise relationship with Prime Minister Netanyahu. But his ties to the Freedom Center ecosystem began earlier. Musk has amplified Freedom Center talking points, including a study falsely claiming that USAID helped fund the Taliban—a narrative later used to justify calls to defund the agency.

More consequentially, when SpaceX sought to raise $750 million in January 2023, the lead investor was the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, co-founded by Ben Horowitz—David Horowitz’s son.

Andreessen Horowitz holds investments in several companies linked to Israeli intelligence and surveillance, including TOKA, founded by former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. Ben Horowitz was also involved in early efforts to organize a pro-Trump tech elite alliance before stepping back.

SpaceX itself has collaborated with Israeli weapons firms and state-linked companies such as Elbit Systems, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), and ImageSat International (ISI), helping launch military satellites.

Another key Freedom Center financier is Robert Shillman, founder of Cognex Corporation. Shillman and his family foundation have supported right-wing figures like Laura Loomer, Bridgette Gabriel, and Project Veritas. He also donates to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a neoconservative think tank that has played a central role in pushing for regime change wars in the Middle East.

From 2002 to 2013, Shillman donated over $2.4 million to the Friends of the Israel Defense Forces (FIDF), a U.S.-based nonprofit that aid to Israeli military personnel.

In 2018, The Guardian revealed that Shillman funded a fellowship supporting far-right provocateur Tommy Robinson, who received a salary of about £5,000 a month to work at the Canadian outlet Rebel Media.

Propaganda and Politics

The Gatestone Institute, another key node in the network and donor to Tommy Robinson, was founded by Nina Rosenwald—dubbed by critics as “the sugar mama of Muslim-hate” for her role in bankrolling anti-Muslim and pro-Israel media initiatives.

Gatestone has supported figures like Douglas Murray, a British pundit who was recently mocked for making a bizarre appeal to authority during his appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” where he called for more airtime for pro-war “experts” to push a pro-Israel narrative. Murray has described anti-Muslim blogger Robert Spencer as a “brilliant scholar.” Unsurprisingly, Spencer’s website, Jihad Watch, was long sponsored by the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman also fits into this ecosystem. In 2024, Ackman promoted the Shirion Collective—a campaign that encouraged doxxing of pro-Palestinian students and faculty, and has been accused of inciting physical violence and using AI surveillance tools to suppress dissent.

Ackman and Marc Andreessen were both appointed as advisors to the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a now nearly defunct initiative aimed at federal reform.

Another element of the broader advocacy network resurfaced with surprising aggression in late 2023: the militant group Betar.

Founded nearly a century ago by fascist Zionist leader Ze’ev Jabotinsky, Betar had long faded into obscurity. But following Israel’s offensive in Gaza, the group reemerged—mirroring the tactics of the Jewish Defense League (JDL), which was previously designated a terrorist organization by U.S. authorities.

Betar activists have revived street-level intimidation tactics, including threatening prominent scholars and UN officials with symbolic “pagers”—a reference to a notorious 2024 Israeli covert operation involving explosive-laden devices that caused mass casualties in Lebanon.

Human rights observers have exposed how the group is compiling watchlists of pro-Palestinian academics, organizers, and public figures, which it presents to Trump-aligned officials as candidates for future deportation or prosecution.

The group has also openly praised military operations that resulted in the deaths of civilians, including children.

Betar’s resurgence has been widely attributed to Israeli-American public relations executive Ronn Torossian, a contributor to FrontPage Magazine—an outlet created by the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

From Free Speech to Authoritarianism

From Silicon Valley investors and right-wing influencers to defense contractors and political operatives, a vast and interconnected donor class has reshaped the American right in the image of a hardline pro-Israel agenda. Their messaging recasts Muslims as enemies of the West, delegitimizes anti-war and pro-Palestinian activism, and presents dissent as a threat to national security.

This same network, once obsessed with defending free expression, now embraces censorship, blacklists, and government surveillance—so long as it targets their ideological opponents.

This article was originally published on MintPress News.

The post Meet The Think Tanks Behind MAGA’s New Free Speech Crackdown appeared first on LewRockwell.

“A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty.”—James Madison

We are being frog-marched into tyranny at the end of a loaded gun. Or rather, hundreds of thousands of loaded guns.

Let’s not mince words: President Trump’s April 28 executive order is the oldest trick in the authoritarian playbook: martial law masquerading as law and order.

Officially titled “Strengthening and Unleashing America’s Law Enforcement to Pursue Criminals and Protect Innocent Citizens,” this order is a “heil Hitler” wrapped in the goosestepping, despotic trappings of national security.

Don’t be fooled by Trump’s tough-on-crime rhetoric, cloaked in patriotic language and the promise of safety.

This is the language of every strongman who’s ever ruled by force.

The White House claims the order will “empower state and local law enforcement to relentlessly pursue criminals and protect American communities.” But under this administration, “criminal” increasingly includes anyone who dares to exercise their constitutional rights.

The order doesn’t merely expand policing—it institutionalizes repression.

It sets us squarely on the road to martial law.

If allowed to stand, Trump’s executive order completes our shift from a nation of laws—where even the least among us had the right to due process—to a nation of enforcers: vigilantes with badges who treat “we the people” as suspects and subordinates.

Without invoking the Insurrection Act or deploying active-duty military forces, Trump has accelerated the transformation of domestic police into his own paramilitary force.

With the stroke of his presidential pen, he has laid the groundwork for a stealth version of martial law by:

• Expanding police powers and legal protections;
• Authorizing the DOJ to defend officers accused of civil rights violations;
• Increasing the transfer of military equipment to local police;
• Shielding law enforcement from judicial oversight;
• Prioritizing law enforcement protection over civil liberties;
• Embedding DHS and federal agents more deeply into local policing.

Since taking office in January 2025, Trump has moved systematically to dismantle what little accountability remains:

• Terminating the National Law Enforcement Accountability Database;
• Halting DOJ investigations into abusive police departments;
• Expanding immigration enforcement while eliminating oversight;
• Dismissing internal watchdogs at DOJ and DHS;
• Weakening civil rights tools and body camera requirements;
• Suspending or eliminating consent decrees nationwide.

All of this has occurred without congressional debate, judicial review, or constitutional scrutiny.

Through it all, Trump has emboldened police forces to act with near impunity, reinforcing a trend long embraced by powerful police unions, bureaucratic cronyism, and laws providing for qualified immunity that shield misconduct from public consequence.

For years, we have watched as the government transformed local law enforcement into extensions of the military: outfitted with military hardware and trained in battlefield tactics.

However, this executive order goes one step further—creating not just a de facto standing army but Trump’s own army: loyal not to the Constitution or the people, but to the president.

This is the very danger the Founders feared: a militarized police force answerable to a powerful executive, operating outside the bounds of the law.

While the Posse Comitatus Act was intended to prevent the military from becoming a domestic police force, this administration has found a workaround: transforming civilian police into a paramilitary force armed and trained like the military, but without the legal constraints.

In doing so, the federal government has effectively sidestepped both constitutional checks and statutory prohibitions meant to guard against military rule on American soil.

This is martial law without a declaration.

The battlefield is here.

Law enforcement today is equipped like the military, trained in battlefield tactics, and given broad discretion over who to target and how to respond. But these are not soldiers bound by the laws of war. They are civilian enforcers, wielding unchecked power with minimal oversight.

And they are everywhere.

Armored vehicles on neighborhood streets. Flashbang raids on family homes. Riot police in small towns. SWAT-style teams deployed by federal agencies. Drones overhead. Mass surveillance below.

We are fast approaching a reality where constitutional rights exist in name only.

In practice, we are ruled by a quasi-military bureaucracy empowered to:

• Detain without trial;
• Punish political dissent;
• Seize property under civil asset forfeiture;
• Classify critics as extremists or terrorists;
• Conduct mass surveillance on the populace;
• Raid homes in the name of “public safety”;
• Use deadly force at the slightest provocation.

In other words, we’ve got freedom in name only.

It’s the same scenario nationwide: in big cities and small towns alike, militarized “warrior” cops—hyped up on power—ride roughshod over individual rights by exercising almost absolute discretion over who is a threat, what constitutes resistance, and how harshly they can deal with the citizens they were appointed to “serve and protect.”

This nationwide epidemic of court-sanctioned police violence has already ensured that unarmed Americans—many of them mentally ill, elderly, disabled, or simply noncompliant—will continue to die at the hands of militarized police.

From individuals shot for holding garden hoses, to those killed after calling 911 for help, these tragedies underscore a chilling truth: in a police state, the only truly “safe” person is one who offers no resistance at all.

These killings are the inevitable result of a system that rewards vigilante aggression by warrior cops and punishes accountability.

These so-called warrior cops, trained to act as judge, jury and executioner, increasingly outnumber those who still honor their oath to uphold the Constitution and serve the public.

Now, under the cover of executive orders and nationalist rhetoric, that warrior mentality is being redirected toward a more dangerous mission: silencing political dissent.

Emboldened by Trump’s call to reopen Alcatraz and target so-called “homegrown” threats, these forces are no longer going to be tasked with enforcing the law—they will be deployed to enforce political obedience.

Backed by the full power of the state and unbound by meaningful accountability, these police state enforcers operate with the tactics of a military force but without its legal constraints. They are not soldiers governed by the rules of war. They are the foot soldiers of the police state.

And their numbers are growing.

This is not a theory. It is a reality unfolding before our eyes.

Battlefield tactics. Camouflage gear. Mass arrests. Tear gas. Strip searches. Drones. Water cannons. Rubber bullets. Concussion grenades. Intimidation. Laws abandoned at will.

We are living in a creeping state of undeclared martial law.

The militarization of police and federal agencies over recent decades has only accelerated the timeline toward authoritarianism.

The groundwork was laid long ago: the NDAA’s indefinite detention powers; court rulings that excuse shootings of unarmed citizens; the normalization of asset forfeiture, round-the-clock surveillance, and militarized drills in American cities.

This regime of lawless enforcement has been built over time—by legislators, courts, and a public too willing to look the other way.

Don’t be fooled: this is not law and order. This is constitutional demolition under the color of authority.

We are being trained to accept militarized policing, normalized surveillance, and injustice disguised as safety.

This is how freedom ends—not with a loud decree, but with the quiet, calculated erosion of every principle we once held sacred.

We’ve come full circle—from resisting British redcoats to submitting to American forces with the same disdain for liberty.

Our constitutional foundation is crumbling, and with it, any illusion that those in power still serve the public good.

Congress, for its part, has abdicated its role as a constitutional check on executive power—passing sweeping authorizations with little scrutiny and failing to rein in executive overreach. The courts, too, have in the past sanctioned many of these abuses in the name of national security, public order, or qualified immunity. Instead of acting as constitutional safeguards, these institutions have largely become rubber stamps.

Indeed, the president, Congress, the courts, and the police have come to embody the very abuse the Founders fought to resist. Only now are the courts beginning to show glimmers of allegiance to the Constitution.

This is not about partisanship. This is about power without restraint.

As tempting as it is to place full blame on Trump for this full-throttle shift into martial law, he is not the architect of this police state. He is its most shameless enabler—a useful frontman for the Deep State in its ongoing war on the American people.

As we warn in Battlefield America: The War on the American People and A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, we are sliding fast down a slippery slope to a Constitution-free America.

We ignore these signs at our peril.

This article was originally published on The Rutherford Institute.

The post Martial Law Disguised as Law and Order: The Oldest Trick in the Authoritarian Playbook appeared first on LewRockwell.

When President Trump promised us a Golden Age, I admit I was skeptical. I knew that there had to be a period of adjustment after the pedal-to-the-metal spending and the ornicide — bird-killing — of wind farms in the Biden years. And when Trump announced his tariffs on April 2, 2025 and the stock market tanked, I got worried. The Guardian was right there with the Narrative:

Trump’s promised ‘golden age’ for the US economy is off to a chaotic start

The Guardian sneered at Trump’s tweet: “Our Country will boom, but we have to get rid of the Biden ‘Overhang.’”

But Rule One for me is to buy on the dips. So when the stock market opened down 4 percent on April 3, I closed my eyes and bought. On April 4 the market was down again. My eyes were still closed and I bought.

But then, wonder of wonders, on April 9 the market turned, and QQQ is up 17 percent from April 8 as of May 2. Is this the dawn of the promised Golden Age? Or is it a glitch as the economy descends into a Trump underworld and liberal consumers continue their switch from buying Teslas to keying Teslas, and ordinary consumers stop buying because Tren de Aragua deportations?

That’s what the media experts proclaimed when the first quarter GDP growth came in at -0.3%. But then, the anti-experts proclaimed, the dip occurred because imports were up 41% and imports subtract from GDP, because experts. Employment was up 177,000 jobs despite a catastrophic drop of 9,000 in federal government employment.

One thing we know from experience: It will all be obvious, in hindsight.

Meanwhile both Canadian and Australian voters have voted Left, because Trump. Bless their hearts. But in Alberta they are already queueing up to become the 51st state.

Fact is, sports fans, that our liberal friends know we are entering a Dark Age, with a Golden Horde of young DOGE warriors riding in from the steppes, crushing cherished liberal NGOs and hearing the lamentation of the liberal women.

Now President Trump’s promise of a Golden Age is premised upon economic factors: lower prices, more jobs, greater wealth. But surely, we Americans yearn for more than that. Back in the day, when the politics of our lefty friends was just getting started, a famous philosopher talked about workers able “to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, [and] criticise after dinner.”

Inconceivably, the politicians who first followed his blueprint cast their peoples into a Dark Age of famine and then fought a war against kulaks in Russia and a war against the Four Olds in China. Not much hunting and fishing and criticizing for the workers of Russia and China.

We now realize that the Age of Politics since the Dawn of Marx has been an Age of War. Of course it has, because “there is no politics without an enemy.” And so, in the last century or so, humanity has fought Class Wars against the capitalist enemy, World Wars against the Kaiser and Führer enemies, Race Wars against the white racist oppressor enemy, Sex Wars against the male patriarchy enemy, Environmental Wars against the polluting enemy, Climate Wars against the climate denier enemy.

Read the Whole Article

The post Thoughts About the Golden Age appeared first on LewRockwell.

“Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future
And time future contained in time past.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.” – T.S. Eliot, The Four Quartets

“You can’t repeat the past,” says Nick Carraway to Jay Gatsby in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, which was published one hundred years ago this spring.

Gatsby responds incredulously, “Can’t repeat the past? Why of course you can!”

This often quoted exchange is typically used to exhibit Gatsby’s delusions, but he may have been right, in the wrong way.

A deep reading of the book suggests it offers the perfect description of today’s political and cultural life, in Nick’s words: “a satisfactory hint of the unreality of reality, a promise that the rock of the world was founded securely on a fairy’s wings.”

Commentating on the Roaring Twenties as they started to meow, Fitzgerald later wrote, “By 1927 a widespread neurosis began to be evident, faintly signaled, like a nervous beating of the feet, by the popularity of crossword puzzles.” He said that once “pretty much of anything went“ at Cap d’Antibes on the French Riviera near where he and his wife Zelda had lived for a while. It also was an apt description of New York City and other places where the wild life of the post-World War I reaction was in full force. It was not just speakeasies, jazz, and a sexual revolution, but the first full-blown phase of the technological and commercial world we know today. The 1920s’ modernism, with its ethos of the prohibition to prohibit still somewhat limited to certain cities, was the seedbed for postmodernism’s vastly expanded and deeper rooted transformation of cultural mores today where anything goes.

But by the late 1920s, tamed by political and economic world events, personal disillusionment from the war’s reality, and hangovers from unbridled excess, dispirited days followed, only to be followed by deeper depressions emanating from the stock market crash, followed by the Great Depression, and World War II.

Nevertheless, in 1934 Cole Porter wrote the song, Anything Goes, for the musical by the same name, that, despite being censored for its naughty lyrics, captured in witty words the aftereffects of a world where the old mores were dying as the world was sailing into disaster on a ship of fools.

In olden days, a glimpse of stocking
Was looked on as something shocking
But now, God knows
Anything goes

Good authors too who once knew better words
Now only use four-letter words
Writing prose
Anything goes
………………………………………………………………………
The world has gone mad today
And good’s bad today
And black’s white today
And day’s night today
………………………………………………………………………
Just think of those shocks you’ve got
And those knocks you’ve got
And those blues you’ve got
From that news you’ve got
And those pains you’ve got
If any brains you’ve got

It was also in the mid-nineteen thirties that Fitzgerald penned three essays for Esquire magazine about his personal breakdown that were posthumously collected in 1945 in The Crackup. Fitzgerald barely made it through the 1930s, dying in 1940 as WW II was underway, the confirmation that WW I was not “the war to end all wars.”

From “shell shock” to economic shock to “combat fatigue” to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the wars rolled on over millions of corpses and destroyed countries. They roll on still. The toll on the combatants and victims is obvious, but the crackups among those who danced through the carnage or sat fat and seemingly satisfied or indifferent remains unknown.

Still does, as indifference reigns with bi-partisan savagery hidden behind illusory party politics that shroud rule by the monied class via a systemic duopoly. Their elitism and materialism – for which some critics have dismissed Fitzgerald’s book because he describes and castigates its ugly characters and their careless indifference to regular people – define the lifestyles of those who today own the country yet are the envy of so many people besotted by celebrity worship and wish they too were immoral billionaires running the show.

Gatsby is set in the 1920s, but one could easily rewrite the story today – because it is a recurring American tragedy and is repeating – with some figure like Donald Trump cast as Gatsby. But Gatsby or Trump or Daisy or the racist Tom Buchanan are gross symptoms of a class system of domination. As individuals, they are replaceable, revolving characters in a structural order that repeats and repeats.

The character of Jay Gatsby and his luxurious life may be Hollywood’s focus (as are the grotesqueries of today’s celebrities and media billionaires), but the narrator of Fitzgerald’s book, Nick Carraway, who participated in WW I and who, to disguise his torment, says – that he “enjoyed the counterraid so thoroughly” – is the key. Speaking facetiously can hide a lot of pain. Fitzgerald threw a lot of his pain into The Great Gatsby. Despite its glittering surface, it is the story of lost souls, and Fitzgerald was one of them, but by writing the book he strove to find what he had lost.

If this sounds at all familiar, it may be because you are thinking of today’s focus on rich celebrities like Gatsby and Trump who pepper the news, convoluted intimations of disaster both martial and economic, and the popularity of the web based Wordle puzzle and its offshoots as well as crossword puzzles (more about pop cultural reference words these days) – among other similarities to the moribund 1920s.

What’s the right word to describe what is underway today?

Clearly there is a widespread anxiety as in the late 1920s – now a tapping of nervous fingers on billions of cells – that we are involved in a puzzle that needs solving yet are running out of chances to find the right word to characterize it, not to say solve it. For Wordle devotees, it couldn’t be “repeat” since that has six letters. How about “rerun”? That fits Wordle’s numerical format and today’s video world but leaves the question: rerun of what?

Would “havoc” work, or do we need something much stronger that doesn’t fit within the strictures of word games? Catastrophe?

WW III? A Greater Depression?

Last night I had a very disturbing dream. I am not making this up. I was in a car that was also a house with a woman I know and her mother. The woman put the car on automatic self-drive to go backwards and it was proceeding down a dark country road. I was greatly agitated as we traveled automatically backwards, “borne back ceaselessly into the past,” as Fitzgerald ends his book, and I told the woman I would ask her twenty-five times to reverse our direction or I would leave. She refused twenty-five times and I left.

I am not opposed to looking back, but not automatically. Going back by choice to come forward wiser and more enriched by all experiences – good and bad – is an essential journey.

Was my dream a premonition of what I am writing here, a prologue to my musings about The Great Gatsby, which I had been rereading for a reason unconnected to its centennial? Perhaps. For are our dreams not telling us something important, something far greater than, but not excluding, our personal lives?

When he died, Fitzgerald was working in Hollywood, the Dream Factory, where one can imagine he might still have harbored Gatsby’s “colossal vitality of his illusion,” even as his physical health deteriorated after years of very heavy drinking.

I have come back by train and choice with the woman of my dreams for a short visit to New York City where I was born and grew up. All is changed, changed utterly, yet it remains the same, filtered through memory. It is not repetition but a reminder.

The train coming into the city flashed quickly by an apartment building at 204th Street in the Bronx where I recalled hearing as a twelve year old the news that our nice neighbor’s wife, Mrs. Schwartz, had jumped to her death onto the tracks, a Bronx Anna Karenina. It was April 29th – my mother’s birthday.

After arrival at Grand Central Station, our peregrinations took us past our old railroad flat with its rascally stairwell, as our four year-old daughter used to describe it. On Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn John Curtin’s name still poses prominently for his sail making company, a reminder of a time when people as well as answers were blowing in the wind. In a park I met the white dove who might have sailed many seas and once slept in the sand but now pigeon-toes its way back and forth at my feet, cooing messages that entrance my unknowing mind. In Central Park, where as high school student I would train for basketball season by running around the reservoir track and later would wander dreamily looking for girls and watch Shakespeare plays at the Delacorte Theater, we dawdled under an avenue of cherry blossom trees whose blossoms flew like snow with the slightest breeze and little children screamed and ran in circles of delight and we silently lost ourselves in reveries of life’s ephemerality. Didn’t Eliot say that “the leaves were full of children,/Hidden excitedly, containing laughter. /Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind/Cannot bear very much reality”?

Scott Fitzgerald was right, when at the age of twenty-eight he realized through the voice of Nick Carraway that the future recedes before us year by year. It is the thought of a much older man, or a man who senses his mode of life is wrong and doomed. But he knew too that we are always “borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Dying at the age of forty-four, his past was quite brief and his future expunged.

But no matter how long or short our lifespans and no matter how fine or tragic our lives, everything and everyone who have passed through them are ours to accept or reject. One time and one time only – for every time is that one time – do we have a chance to say yes or no, to affirm or deny that everything is connected, is one. That we are who we were with all our experiences. And as Friedrich Nietzsche said, “ … if ever you wanted one thing twice, if ever you said, ‘You please me, happiness! Abide, moment!’ then you wanted all back. All anew, all eternally, all entangled, ensnared, enamored.” The good and the bad, all your life; for it is yours, no other’s.

It might sound strange that my thinking about Nietzsche brought me back to read The Great Gatsby. I first read it long ago, in high school as I recall, Regis High School, that sits on the upper east side of Manhattan between Park and Madison Avenues, a neighborhood where during four years, between my travels back and forth on the subway to and from my Bronx home, I would encounter the world of the very wealthy. Sometimes on cold evenings before basketball games, I would walk the neighborhood, mentally preparing to play my best. On Park Avenue I would watch the cabs and limousines glitter as they went back and forth, picking up and disgorging their rich passengers. Two blocks over on Fifth Avenue I would see women in mink coats walking little dogs in racoon wraps coming and going from doors opened and closed by doormen. I would often wonder what the doormen thought, having a great beloved uncle Nealy who was one. I thought that Gatsby, while wishing to also be treated with that old money obeisance, might think their wealth was also gotten by stealth, but of the legal kind. He would have been right in most cases. These thoughts that interrupted my game preparations stay with me still.

Nietzsche was always preoccupied with the connection between literature and life. He believed in making a work of art out of himself. He saw his own life as a narrative and authors’ best moments in their work. “The ‘work,’ he wrote, whether of the artist or the philosopher, invents the person who has created it, who is supposed to have created it: ‘the great,’ as they are venerated, are subsequent pieces of wretched minor fiction.”

On the train back from the city, May 1, the date of my father’s death, I read this from Freddy, as I have come to call my literary friend Nietzsche, who, despite his reputation, ironically or not, took Jesus very seriously, and who in his own way repeats his teaching that the kingdom of God is here now:

And if we consider that every human action, not only a book, is in some way or other the cause of other actions, decisions, and thoughts; that everything that happens is inseparably connected with everything that is going to happen, we recognize the real immortality, that of movement – that which has once moved is enclosed and immortalized in the general union of all existence like an insect within a piece of amber.

So do you think Gatsby was right in one way and right in the wrong way – that as individuals we not only can repeat our pasts but should (as in affirm them, not redo them) – because by doing so we take full responsibility for our identities, become who we are, assert our freedom, and immortalize our lives?

I do.

I do too, she said. Celebrate “the transitory enchanted moment” and eternity recurs! The eternal return.

As for the circumstances of our lives that we were tossed into and couldn’t control, accept them also. But from this moment on, our only time, let us try to create a social order where a book like The Great Gatsby never has to be written again, to make the world it describes a bad dream, so we can say with Nick Carraway that that “party’s over.”

Reprinted with the author’s permission.

The post Gatsby Meets Nietzsche on the Train to Town appeared first on LewRockwell.

Or: the Sacrament of the Present Moment allows us to become holy today by means of abandonment to divine Providence.

God Wills or Permits All Things

Last year I made a resolution on Byzantine New Year to try to work on the spirituality of the “sacrament of the moment.” My predominant fault is pride, and my problem is that I become too abstract in my intellect. This abstraction divorces me from reality so that I make an idol out of my ideas. This prevents me from focusing on God’s will in the present moment, especially concerning the Second Greatest Commandment.

To this end, last fall I began re-reading the spiritual classic from Jean-Pierre de Caussade, Abandonment to Divine Providence. This appears to be the first work which coins the concept of the “sacrament of the present moment”:

What was the bread which nourished the faith of Mary and Joseph? It was the sacrament of the moment. But what did they experience beneath? An existence apparently filled with nothing but hum drum happenings? On the surface it was similar to that of everyone around them, but faith piercing the superficialities, disclose that God was accomplishing very great things.[1]

In the next chapter the good SJ explains the fundamental reality of the sacrament of the moment:

If the business of becoming holy seems to present insufferable difficulties, it is merely because we have a wrong idea about it. In reality, holiness consists of one thing only: complete loyalty to God’s will. Now everyone can practice this loyalty, whether actively or passively.

To be actively loyal means obeying the laws of God and the church and fulfilling all the duties imposed on us by our way of life. Passive loyalty means that we lovingly accept all that God sends us at each moment of the day.[2]

It seems to me that this spiritual wisdom is a great boon for us as we face a new conclave after the trauma of the Francis pontificate. We must wake up on May 7 and first abandon ourselves to the will of God 1.) in the present moment and 2.) for the conclave. Perhaps we can pray part of the prayer of our lay sodality from Bishop Schneider to this end:

The more violently the gates of hell storm against your Church and the rock of Peter in Rome, the more we believe in the indestructibility of your Church, O Eucharistic Heart of Jesus, source of all consolation, who do not abandon your church and the rock of Peter even in the heaviest storms!

I’m going to try, with God’s help, to wake up, abandon myself to this present moment in my Father’s arms, and then – and only then – look at the news from the conclave. I hope this will help me have a Catholic attitude towards the conclave and the new Holy Father. Pray for me and I’ll pray for you! We’re in the this together, my dear reader.

Concerning the Validity of the Present Conclave

A few voices have raised concerns about the validity of this conclave. They piously reason: if Francis was indeed a heretic, does this not make all his cardinal appointments invalid, and thus not electors, and thus – the election will be invalid?

From there, we get all of the many human institutions surrounding the papacy:

• Some Popes have been elected by the people of Rome.
• Some Pope have been deposed by emperors and then “appointed” by an army.
• Some Popes have been elected by the college of Cardinals.
• Some Popes were barely valid until the whole Church recognised them as such.
• Some Popes were not accepted as the true Pope during their entire lifetime – by a large swath of the Church, perhaps half of all the faithful!
• At least one Pope may have lost his office due to heresy – and was anathematized as a heretic post mortem.

This is the beauty of Catholicism: in the darkest of times, when the Papacy itself is obscured, the Rock of Peter and His Confession remains. This is not to concede anything to Eastern Orthodox apologists, who seek to divorce Peter as a person from his confession or – worse yet – make Our Lord contradict Himself (see Vladimir Solovyov, “Peter & Satan”).

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Not long ago, Cardinal Gerhard Müller made some comments during an interview in The Times of London which caught my attention. They echo sentiments he has repeated before but which now, with the conclave to elect a new pope upon us, struck me. “‘No Catholic is obliged to obey doctrine that is wrong,’ he said, adding: ‘Catholicism is not about blindly obeying the Pope without respecting holy scriptures, tradition and the doctrine of the Church.’”

I mention these statements because I find them to be so painfully obvious that I can scarcely conceive how anyone could disagree with them. But in practice, many do.

When news of Pope Francis’ passing broke, I posted a message on my Facebook page reminding everyone that the Holy Spirit does not directly choose popes in a conclave and quoting Joseph Ratzinger to that effect (from a 1997 interview, which I saw being posted in several places). I am aware that, in a sense, everything happens under the direction of the Holy Spirit and, in some way, guides the cardinals in their choice. But that is not what decent, pious Catholics mean when they say things like “we must pray that the Holy Spirit picks a holy pope in the conclave.” What they mean is the Holy Spirit directs which person the cardinals elect as pope. The implication of this is that every pope must, perforce, be a holy pope since the Holy Spirit cannot err.

It is just this sort of idea I wished to dispel, and the reactions to my post were mostly positive. But still, some people left comments arguing that Joseph Ratzinger changed his mind about this when he became pope, or insinuating that I called into question the Holy Spirit by suggesting such things. I wish I could say that I have grown used to these sorts of interventions from people, some of whom I know and care about, but that would not be true. I must admit, I am simply floored by them, as I am by pretty much all defenses of the record of Jorge Bergoglio I have encountered.

This is especially true of Francis’ doctrinal adventures. The past twelve years have felt like being forced to read a Jack Chick comic, ghostwritten by publicists for the Human Rights Campaign. When I sometimes point out that popes can err, these types of people will agree; but then when I point out this or that defect on the part of Francis, they will deny any such thing has taken place.

Amoris Laetitia? It was a “nuanced” document that doesn’t give license to people in adulterous relationships to take Communion. That’s a misinterpretation. The Abu Dhabi Statement? The pope didn’t mean to suggest that God directly willed all religions, just that He permissively allowed them. To suggest otherwise is ill will on your part. Fiducia Supplicans? It merely says the Church can bless individuals not couples. Why do you hate the pope and/or gay people?

No matter what the subject may be, there is always some excuse that exonerates the pope, and if you object, then the problem is with you. No facts or patterns of behavior make any difference.

Things are even worse when we come to Pope Francis as person. When I came into the Church, I read and was told that the pope was infallible but not impeccable. Popes can and often do sin. Again, you might get agreement from some of his defenders on this, but the moment you descend to specifics of his reign, the refusal to countenance the idea that Francis committed any but the most venial of sins kicks into high gear. It is as if these defenders have a syllogism wired into their brains, which they cannot turn off: the Holy Spirit picks the pope; the pope cannot commit serious sin because the Holy Spirit chose him; if the pope appears to do anything bad, it must be a mistake, a media distortion, or a malicious lie.

I am simply gobsmacked whenever I see, even in “conservative” Catholic periodicals, articles with titles such as “Pope Francis’ Grandfatherly advice on venial sin” or “Pope Francis on how gossip can harm you.” When I think about all the sexual predators Pope Francis promoted and protected (the list is long), I cannot fathom anyone seeking Jorge Bergoglio as a moral guide of any kind.

When an Argentinian court convicted Bishop Gustavo Zanchetta of abusing his seminarians, Pope Francis brought him to Rome so he could avoid prison. Francis restored Mauro Inzoli to the priestly state after Benedict XVI had laicized him; and he only removed him from that state after an Italian court convicted Inzoli of molesting minors. The accusations against Marko Rupnik, whose excommunication Francis lifted, are too disgusting to relate.

These are not isolated incidents, and they are not the actions of a good person. No, Francis was not as awful as the people he protected. And yes, he did some good things as supreme pontiff. But none of this made him a good person worthy of trust, which he never was.

It is hard for many Catholics to face the fact that a pope has erred in his teaching or that he has done terrible things. Many tend to think the “bad popes” are something from the past, safely tucked away in the pages of a history book where they can no longer harm us. In recent times, the Church has exalted the authority of the pope so much that, for some, it is the center of the Faith itself.

During the pontificates of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, many seemed to understand the papacy this way and defended those pontiffs when many criticized them for upholding unpopular teaching such as that on contraception. But I get the impression the same people felt they could not criticize the obvious problems with the Franciscan pontificate because they had defended those pontiffs not because what they said was true but merely because it was the pope who said it.

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