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In the end, predictably, the Circus Ringmaster went TACO (“Trump Always Chickens Out”).

In the end, predictably, the Circus Ringmaster went TACO (“Trump Always Chickens Out”).

He was terrified by three crucial reality-based developments.

1. The Iranian message on preparing to close the Strait of Hormuz. The CIA had warned Trump that China was viscerally opposed to the Strait being blocked. That’s one of the reasons, according to a Deep State old hand, that Trump decided to go ahead anyway with his “spectacular” (sic) theatrical op on Fordow. But when the specter of a blocked Hormuz destroying the global economy became real, he went TACO.
2. The Iranian warning conveyed by the bombing of the Al-Udeid base in Qatar, the military jewel in the imperial crown in West Asia. Even Atlanticist sources in Doha confirm the damage to the – evacuated – base was “monumental”, with at least 3 missiles hitting their targets. Tehran was unmistakably saying we can hit you anywhere, anytime, with anything we want. And your GCC lackeys will blame you for it.
3. Arguably the key reason: the genocidals in Tel Aviv are running out of interceptors – fast; in fact their whole – porous – air defense network is in trouble. In the last substantial Iranian missile volley on occupied Palestine on Monday morning, interception rate fell below 50%, and Iran started targeting Israel’s electric grid. Iran’s new directive – strategic offense, not patience – was meant to completely paralyze the Israeli economy. On top of it the genocidals had already begged Tehran to “end the war”. Tehran answered the time had not yet arrived. So the genocidals begged Daddy Trump to rescue them.

The chain of events leading to the ceasefire remains murky. A key accelerating factor was Putin’s personal meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi at the Kremlin on Monday.

Speaking on behalf of Ayatollah Khamenei, Araghchi may have asked for a solid supply of weapons and most of all defense systems; but these will take time, especially considering that the strategic partnership recently approved by both the Duma and the Majlis in Tehran is not – officially – a military alliance.

Yet according to sources in Moscow who were informed about the meeting, Putin did position Russia at the center of a possible resolution, thus displacing Washington. Team Trump 2.0 was incensed. Trump boasted that both Iran and Israel had called him almost simultaneously to arrance a ceasefire. Nonsense: only Tel Aviv did. As Putin made it clear, once again, that Russia would back Iran, he indirectly offered Trump an off-ramp.

True to character, the Circus Ringmaster jumped on it, marketing his own, branded ceasefire, reality show-style. And this only two days after gloating that the Iranian nuclear program was “obliterated” (he insists on it even as U.S. intel admits the program may have been set back for only a matter of months).

A supreme taboo has been broken

Iran has learned a few important lessons the hardest way, paying a horrendous price. Tehran was way too transparent and reasonable dealing with a bunch of gangsters: from allowing IAEA nuclear monitoring that turned out to be a process of amassing precious intel for Israeli targeting; and believing in diplomacy and honoring agreements that were unceremoniously ditched.

There’s no diplomacy when it comes to dealing with the imperial Leviathan/Behemoth – especially as it contemplates, in horror, its frootprint being reduced all across the Global South.

Domestically though, Iran is going to the next level. There are at least three factions in confrontation: Ayatollah Khamenei and his close circle plus the IRGC; the reformists, embodied by the meek Pezeshkian presidency; and what could be construed as secular nationalists, who want a strong Iran but not as a theo-democracy.

The IRGC now has all the power. Defending the homeland against the deadly Zionist axis, Empire included, crystalized a widespread sentiment of national unity and pride. All sectors of the Iranian population – 90 million, someone tell pathetic Marco Rubio – rallied around the flag.

Conceptually, the ceasefire – nobody knows how long it will last – is adverse to Iran, because its increasing deterrence capacity is now lost. Israel will have its air defenses feverishly replenished while Iran, alone, will need months and even years to rebuild.

The imperial modus operandi remains the same. The Circus Ringmaster saw that a monster humiliation was at hand –something like Israel’s Vietnam: so he announced a one-sided ceasefire and fled.

Yet the configuration for the next battles has changed. If Washington decides to escalate again, or resorts to the certified practice of using terror proxies, Iran as the de facto leader of the Resistance will resolutely counter-attack. The myth of genocidal invincibility has been shattered forever. The whole Global South has seen it, and now takes it in serious consideration.

It remains open to serious discussion whether Tehran will finally opt to follow a DPRK model to counteract the – failed, so far – imposition of a Libya and/or Syria model. Uranium enrichment will continue. With an added film noir plot twist: nobody knows where the uranium is.

The Empire of Chaos, predictably, will never stop. Only when the whole Global South unites with an iron will and force it to stop. The conditions are not in place – yet.

As it stands, the real ceasefire would be between the U.S. and the Global South, led institutionally by Russia-China, BRICS and several other multipolar organizations. The chance of the U.S. ruling classes honoring such a long-lasting ceasefire, if it ever happens, are less than zero.

As for the Iran-Israel ceasefire, that’s not the end of the war. On the contrary; it’s the – dubious – end of just the first hot battle. The dogs and hyenas of war will be back, sooner or later. There will be blood – over and over again. Yet at least a supreme taboo has been broken: that death cult in West Asia can indeed be mortally wounded.

The views of individual contributors do not necessarily represent those of the Strategic Culture Foundation.no auth

The post The Ceasefire Kabuki appeared first on LewRockwell.

The way some Christians idolize President Trump you would think he was the fourth member of the Trinity. I wonder how they feel about their man dropping F-bombs whenever he talks about Iran. I guess it is okay because Iran is a Muslim country.

The post F-Bomb Trump appeared first on LewRockwell.

Former Congressman Matt Gaetz Secretly Recorded on Flight — Private Texts to His Mom About Trump, Iran, and Media Gig Leaked

The Gateway Pundit

The post Yet another reason to love Matt Gaetz appeared first on LewRockwell.

Thanks. John Frahm.

The post Thomas Massie | This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von appeared first on LewRockwell.

Tim McGraw wrote:

Hi Lew,

I’ve been to Las Vegas dozens of times, to Hollywood four times, and once, for six months to Belem, Brazil (which is named after Bethlehem), in the Amazon River delta. What truths did I find?

In Las Vegas, I found the most Libertarian city in the USA, if not the world. Anything goes in Vegas. It’s a fantasy city in the middle of the desert that relies on Hoover Dam and Lake Mead for its existence.

Hollywood is another fantasy city in a desert that also relies on water from elsewhere, like Las Vegas. Los Angeles, to me, is the most interesting city in the world.

Belem is reality. The equatorial sun, rain forest, heat and humidity, disease, poisonous this and that, nothing is man’s friend in Belem except man (they don’t even have dogs or cats).

Belem is the truth.

The post Vegas, Hollywood, and Bethlehemy appeared first on LewRockwell.

According to press reports, President Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff is back in touch with Iran after the ceasefire with Israel. Will a deal still be possible? Is Iran still interested?

The post After Trump’s Bombs, Is Peace With Iran Possible? appeared first on LewRockwell.

The post After Trump’s Bombs, Is Peace With Iran Possible? appeared first on LewRockwell.

Synopsis:

“Cold War is a twenty-four episode television documentary series about the Cold War that aired in 1998. It features interviews and footage of the events that shaped the tense relationships between the Soviet Union and the United States.

“The series was produced by Pat Mitchell and Jeremy Isaacs, who had earlier in 1973 produced the World War II documentary series The World at War in a similar style. Ted Turner funded the series as a joint production between the Turner Broadcasting System and the BBC, and was first broadcast on CNN in the United States and BBC Two in the United Kingdom. Writers included Hella Pick, Jeremy Isaacs, Lawrence Freedman, Neal Ascherson, Hugh O’Shaughnessy and Germaine Greer. Kenneth Branagh was the narrator, and Carl Davis (who also collaborated with Isaacs with The World at War) composed the theme music. Each episode would feature historical footage and interviews from both significant figures and others who had witnessed particular events.

“For both altruistic and self-serving purposes, the United States provides massive grants of aid to the countries of Europe in the form of the Marshall Plan. Stalin, concerned that the intent of the Marshall Plan is to weaken Soviet influence in Europe, prevents countries in its orbit from participating, and establishes the rival Council for Mutual Economic Assistance. Communists come to power through a coup in Czechoslovakia in 1948. Tito, while originally aligned to the Soviet Union, adopts a more independent foreign policy and eventually switches to receiving Marshall Aid Assistance. The CIA and the Catholic Church conspire to help oust the Italian Communist Party and its coalition allies in the 1948 Italian election. The Marshall Plan has the effect of modernising European economies and societies, bringing Western Europe closer together, and closer to the United States. Interviewees include Vladimir Yerofeyev, Gianni Agnelli and Giulio Andreotti. The pre-credits scene portrays the squalor in post-war Italy, and Truman delivering his Truman Doctrine speech of 1947.”

The post In The Beginning. . . Italy 1948 appeared first on LewRockwell.

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/lintelligenza-artificiale-ci-rendera)

Gli aspetti dell'intelligenza artificiale sono assolutamente affascinanti, persino sorprendenti. Abbiamo a portata di mano un numero di informazioni mai visto prima e i migliori strumenti disponibili ci consentono di accedere a una vasta letteratura.

Sembra essere successo tutto all'improvviso e incredibilmente. Mi ritrovo ancora ad adattarmi a questo nuovo mondo. Non c'è dubbio che abbia migliorato la mia vita e sto sviluppando l'abitudine di “chiedere a Grok” qualsiasi cosa.

Non tutte le risposte sono perfette (a volte ho passato parecchio tempo a discutere con questo cervello finto), ma dà alla mente una spinta nella giusta direzione, fornendo suggerimenti per chiunque sia curioso su quasi ogni argomento.

Dieci anni fa avrei potuto facilmente prevedere un mondo molto più intelligente che sarebbe emerso da questa tecnologia. Mi fa davvero sentire più intelligente. Forse l'aspetto migliore dell'IA è come ha superato e probabilmente spodesterà la moltitudine di falsi esperti trincerati nel mondo accademico, nelle organizzazioni non profit e nelle aziende.

Sono stati a lungo pagati per essere depositari di informazioni. Sicuramente percepiscono che possono essere sostituiti o, quantomeno, che il loro primato nella leadership intellettuale è messo a dura prova. Prendete in considerazione anche che siamo solo all'inizio. Il divario tra la conoscenza d'élite e ciò che può essere appreso istantaneamente da chiunque si ridurrà ulteriormente.

Le implicazioni sono notevoli e porteranno sicuramente a una ristrutturazione di molti settori, tra cui quelli specializzati nella diffusione della conoscenza.

Ripenso a ciò che sappiamo di Sant'Isidoro di Siviglia del VII secolo, il quale lavorò con una numerosa squadra di amanuensi per scrivere le “Etymologiae”. Fu un tentativo di registrare tutto il sapere conosciuto, la prima vera enciclopedia. Fu un progetto che assorbì la sua vita e quella dell'intero monastero.

L'ambizione di accumulare, assemblare e diffondere il corpus della conoscenza umana è stata una delle aspirazioni trainanti di molti progetti letterari.

Dopo che la stampa e la carta divennero più accessibili, il mercato delle biblioteche domestiche si aprì negli Stati Uniti tra il 1890 e gli anni successivi. Un tempo prerogativa esclusiva dei ricchi, possedere grandi biblioteche divenne il sogno di molte famiglie della classe media.

Gli editori erano pronti a soddisfare la domanda. Nel 1917 fu pubblicata l'enciclopedia “World Book”. Nacque un'industria con vendite porta a porta e servizi di abbonamento. Innumerevoli altri editori si impegnarono nel grande compito di arricchire la base di conoscenza americana. Era una parte fondamentale del programma progressista, un mezzo per elevare la popolazione, educare le persone a valori più elevati, promuovere l'alfabetizzazione e un vivere civile.

Gli americani erano tutti entusiasti e i libri arrivavano per posta in continuazione. Particolarmente attraenti erano queste grandi raccolte di più volumi, non solo enciclopedie, ma anche romanzi, discorsi, documenti presidenziali, ampie cronache storiche e, naturalmente, i Grandi Libri. Ancora oggi questi libri sono meravigliosi e costituiscono la base di un'ottima istruzione. È possibile acquistarne raccolte su eBay a prezzi molto bassi.

Quando è arrivato Internet, la speranza più grande era che diventasse l'equivalente moderno di tutta la conoscenza umana. Mio padre era scettico. Fin da piccolo gli ho mostrato nuovi strumenti interessanti e lui li superava subito in astuzia grazie alle sue conoscenze altamente specializzate su una serie di argomenti specifici. Lo faceva per dimostrarmi che, sebbene questi strumenti potessero essere preziosi, non avrebbero mai potuto sostituire un serio lavoro intellettuale, la ricerca, la disciplina mentale, la concentrazione e una profonda comprensione.

All'epoca pensavo che fosse antiquato, ma eccoci qui, un quarto di secolo dopo la diffusione di massa della conoscenza via Internet attraverso ogni portale immaginabile, e dobbiamo porci una domanda fondamentale: siamo, come cultura, nazione e mondo, più intelligenti oggi di quanto lo fossimo 25 anni fa?

Ci sono molti modi per rispondere a questa domanda. Sì, abbiamo più accesso, ma questo ha anche ridotto l'incentivo ad apprendere e ricordare. Questa caratteristica agisce in modi insidiosi. Ad esempio, ho un pessimo senso dell'orientamento. È debilitante. In una nuova città sono senza speranza. L'avvento del GPS ha cambiato completamente la mia esistenza, liberandomi da una vita di ansia per l'orientamento e permettendomi di muovermi come una persona normale.

Detto questo, il GPS ha decisamente peggiorato ulteriormente il mio senso dell'orientamento. Senza, sarei più disperato di prima. È così che funziona. Più dipendiamo da fonti di informazione esterne, meno alleniamo il nostro cervello a trovare le risposte da solo.

È proprio per questo motivo che sospetto che Internet in generale non ci abbia resi più intelligenti, ma, per molti versi, esattamente il contrario. Ci fornisce più dati ma ci priva della necessità di imparare a reperire informazioni da soli.

È strano quanto io ritenga preziosi quei giorni lontani, quando trascorrevo ore infinite, giorno dopo giorno, in una biblioteca vecchio stile, rovistando tra gli scaffali, scoprendo nuove idee, leggendo incessantemente di storia, filosofia, teologia, economia o qualsiasi altra cosa riuscissi a trovare. Mi sentivo sopraffatto ed elettrizzato dalle informazioni e dalle idee a portata di mano e divoravo il più possibile nel tempo che avevo a disposizione.

Le persone lo sentono o lo sperimentano oggi? Non ne sono così sicuro. Leggo spesso di professori che si disperano anche solo per convincere i loro studenti a leggere un solo libro. Hanno inventato ogni sorta di trucchetto per incentivarli e metterli alla prova per assicurarsi che non usino scorciatoie. Sembra del tutto inutile.

È questo il mondo che Internet avrebbe dovuto costruire? Non proprio. Mi ricorda come i primi sostenitori della televisione prevedevano che la maggior parte della programmazione sarebbe stata composta da professori universitari che tenevano lezioni, perché credevano che fosse ciò che il mercato richiedeva.

Il celebre studioso della comunicazione, Wilbur Schramm, affermò nel 1964: “La televisione può portare l'istruzione a casa di ogni famiglia, e può farlo con una potenza e una vividezza che nessun libro di testo può eguagliare”.

È accaduto il contrario e molto rapidamente.

Se volete sapere come i giovani usano i loro smartphone, guardate alle spalle chiunque abbia meno di 30 anni nelle stazioni ferroviarie o negli aeroporti. Vedrete scorrere sconsolati app popolari che non offrono assolutamente nulla in termini di istruzione superiore. Davvero, è un disastro.

Spiegatelo a un membro di questo gruppo e vi risponderà tipo: perché dovrei imparare cose che sono già a mia disposizione se mai dovessi averne bisogno?

È proprio questo atteggiamento che ci ha resi molto più stupidi. Lo si può capire dal vocabolario dei podcaster e di altri commentatori su Internet oggi. Anche 30 anni fa qualsiasi lingua parlassero non sarebbe stata riconosciuta come inglese. Qualcos'altro l'ha sostituita. E non solo negli Stati Uniti, in tutto il mondo. Il francese è in declino, così come il tedesco e lo spagnolo.

Il vocabolario è un segno rivelatore: rivela ciò che abbiamo in testa, ciò che ci sta a cuore. Se quello che esce fuori è un inglese pidgin, questo vi dice tutto ciò che c'è da sapere sulla mancanza di pensiero dietro le parole.

Se questo è vero per la televisione e Internet, quanto più lo sarà per l'intelligenza artificiale e i modelli linguistici di grandi dimensioni? Come strumenti di archiviazione e recupero delle informazioni, al confronto fanno sembrare tutto ciò che c'era prima un disastro. Ho smesso di usare qualsiasi motore di ricerca, se non per compiti specifici. Tra 10 anni dubito che i motori di ricerca avranno ancora una quota di mercato significativa.

Non voglio lasciarvi alla disperazione. Ci sono modi in cui l'intelligenza artificiale è straordinaria e non tornerei mai indietro. Detto questo, ci sono valide ragioni per temere che questo nuovo strumento non farà altro che accelerare il declino del linguaggio, della cultura e dell'apprendimento in generale.

Questi sono i paradossi della tecnologia: a volte ciò che è progettato per salvarci in realtà ci distrugge.

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

Supporta Francesco Simoncelli's Freedonia lasciando una “mancia” in satoshi di bitcoin scannerizzando il QR seguente.

Andy Thomas wrote:

Great book, IMO. Highly recommended.

The post Searching for Truth in Vegas, Hollywood, & Bethlehem appeared first on LewRockwell.

Thanks, Saleh Abdullah. 

https://www.globalresearch.ca/samson-option-illusion-threat-israel-us-iran/5891844 

https://x.com/AFpost/status/1936784897538187392

https://x.com/disclosetv/status/1936434968139272467

The post The Samson Option and the Illusion of Threat: Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal, U.S. Complicity, and the Iran Narrative appeared first on LewRockwell.

Thanks, John Frahm.

Zero Hedge

The post Global Fertilizer Market Thrown In Chaos After Mideast War Shutters Iran Urea Production appeared first on LewRockwell.

Thanks, John Frahm.

Gateway Pundit

The post President Trump Unloads on Rep. Thomas Massie Over Iran Attack Opposition, Says He’ll Campaign “Very Hard” Against Him in Midterm: “MAGA Doesn’t Want Him” appeared first on LewRockwell.

Click Here:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-thomas-massie-criticism-us-strikes-iran-kentucky-maga-rcna214387

https://twitter.com/RepThomasMassie/status/1936952561489379560

and especially https://twitter.com/MassieforKY/status/1936863008174616881

The post Trump launches major offensive against America First Massie appeared first on LewRockwell.

Thanks, John Frahm.

Gateway Pundit

The post Pope Leo Seemingly Rebukes Trump Over Strikes on Iran — Urges Leaders to Prevent ‘Bloodstained Conflicts’ appeared first on LewRockwell.

The cat is outta the bag, to coin a phrase. It’s semi-official. El Presidente is going for regime change in Iran. Just like his nincompoop predecessor, G.W. Bush, who enforced regime change in Iraq utilizing the WMD cover story. Essentially the same formula. And why would the MAGA “Peace President” go off in this direction?

Simple. That is what PM Netanyahu told Trump he wants. This is what America’s Israel Lobby wants. You see, the nuclear issue was a hoax. Iran had no nuclear weapons or a weapons program. The USG and Israel know that. Iran has or had a nuclear energy program, like many other countries who are members of the IAEA.

Of course, this does not include Israel itself, which is special. It has hundred of nuclear warheads and does not allow any inspections by the IAEA. This means that all the weapons and money Washington has sent to Israel over the years is illegal since no American aid can be sent to a nuclear weapons rogue state. It’s illegal according to U.S. Congressional law.

No matter, Trump the Chump is dancing to Bibi’s tune. That should now be obvious. Am I surprised. No. Is this MAGA or is it just the continued decades-long subordination of American foreign policy to that of Israel? It is the latter.

Of course I can understand why Bibi and his fellow war criminals would want regime change. If the Iranian regime is left intact it will continue to tell the truth about Zionism and the Palestinians. Tel Aviv does not want that.

No Arab country does that anymore, because they have learned their lesson. They will be sanctioned and/or smashed. The flunky, feckless Arabian oil princelings know they are an easy target. And Jordan and Egypt have been bought off by America.

In addition, if the Tehran regime stays in power, it will have the ability in the future, even next month, to shoot more rockets into downtown Tel Aviv in response to Tel Aviv sending rockets and jet bombers all over Iran and assassinating anybody it pleases.

Bibi & Co. would much prefer to have Iran be a free-fire zone, like Lebanon, Gaza, and Syria. Tel Aviv does not want to deal with a country that can actually fight back. Trump the Chump has his marching orders.

The post Trump the Chump goes for Regime Change In Iran appeared first on LewRockwell.

It seems likely that various forms of collapse are in our near future—nuclear war, global overheating, ocean flooding, political dysfunction, civil war, pandemics, the “Great Unraveling”—and that behooves us to contemplate ways of surviving, whether as individuals, families, or groups.  Survival, of course, may not be possible, but it would seem wise to hope that it is possible and to prepare for it.

There are professional survivalists among us already, of course, those people who have laid up emergency food kits and built bunkers and such—maybe 150 million according to one survey–and as many as 74 million preppers, those who have made simple preparations to weather a storm or power outage.   Those are largely individualists, preparing for themselves and their families, and the serious ones are mostly aiming for self-sufficiency, uninterested in friends, neighbors, or what polity might surround them.

It is the rest of the world I’m concerned with.

For nearly 2 million years the human animal lived in small communities, cojoining extended families, dependent on each other for mutual survival, nomadic, scavenging and foraging, with common property and shared resources, non-hierarchical, with political and economic self-sufficiency.  Anthropological evidence suggests that the usual size of such groups—tribes we call them—was around 500, which John Feiffer in the Emergence of Man calls a “magic number” because it recurs so often in scholarly studies from around the world.

That number is important because it’s of sufficient size to provide for a modest self-sufficient economy and polity, probably self-defense.  It is larger than a commune, that would be say 20 to 50 people, larger than a “social network” as defined by Robin Dunbar as around 150 people you know well and whose addresses you have. At between  350 and 750, averaging at 500,  it lasted so long because it was an efficient size, large enough to satisfy individual and familial needs, small enough to maintain an efficient government and easy resource (food, clothing, fire) distribution.  It was, in anthropologist Marshall Sahlins’ words, “the original affluent society… in which all the people’s material wants are easily satisfied.”

A  pertinent fact about these eons of tribal existence: it has played, as Justin J. Kennedy has written, a “significant impact on brain function,” or as is fashionable to say these days, humans are “hard-wired” for tribal living.  It is a fact of our human neurology no matter how outward conditions have changed, and that inherent longing for group living continues on in that ever-present desire for community that persists in even populous cities today.

Some psychologists have narrowed this down.  There is a hormone produced by the hypothalmus in the brain that, in addition to stirring sexual functions promotes social bonding, trust, cooperation, and empathy, and these can be instigated by group conditions.  Tribal societies spur the creation of this hormone and obviously contribute to the successful operation of the group.  Our brains are specifically wired to group living.

What I am describing here is not the “tribalism” political scientists are talking about these days, by which they mean the tendency of people to prefer the opinions and politics, and media, of one party’s extreme or another.  They imply a kind of backwardness of these people, suggesting that they are like the kinds of tribes that lingered into modernity—semi-naked, impoverished, war-like, uncivilized.  It has nothing to do with the human condition I am pointing to.

Given the perils we face, then, and knowing what our human nature has fitted us for, might in not behoove us to start now to figuring out how humanity can be divided up and survive the way we once lived for so long. The 14,000 years we have been driven into cities and kingdoms and empires and global supply chains have not changed the reality of our bodies and the basic drives and pleasures that are common to all humanity.  It cannot be that hard to create what is natural to our bodies and to our multi-millennial experience.

I feel I must add a note to free-marketers.  Of course you have not had a free market for many centuries and it’s unlikely that, even with a diminished state, you would.  But it would obviously be anathema in a tribal world, for that economic system is based on mutual “ownership” of resources and unfettered distribution of resources, on a small human scale, and morally forbids individual accumulation of wealth.  There is, basically, no market, free or otherwise.

But it still would make for a delightful world.

The post Tribalism: A Way of Life whose Time Has Come appeared first on LewRockwell.

And so the global-capitalist empire’s destabilization and restructuring of the Middle East continues.

Yes, I’m referring to Israel’s “preemptive attack” on the Islamic Republic of Iran, or “World War III,” or whatever the establishment media and social media influencers are trying to get you to call it at the moment.

You’ll forgive me if I don’t engage with either the official “Israel is defending itself from the nuclear weapon that Iran has been days away from developing for the last twenty-five years” narrative, or the unofficial “the evil Zionists who control the US government are trying to draw Trump into a war for Israel” narrative.

The global-capitalist empire, not “America” or “Israel,” has been destabilizing and restructuring the Greater Middle East since the end of the Cold War. It is going to continue to do that until every nation in the region is playing ball with the empire.

“America” is not the empire. “The Zionists” do not control the world. The USA and Israel are components of the global-capitalist empire. Israel is the empire’s Middle East HQ. The US military-industrial complex and its international partners are the empire’s muscle. The empire is conducting a global clear-and-hold op, neutralizing internal resistance, “restructuring” the territory it conquered and now occupies.

That is what is happening in the Middle East. In Gaza. In Iran. In Israel. Look at a map. Note which countries are playing ball with the global-capitalist empire. Note which ones are not playing ball. Note which ones have already been “restructured.”

Or don’t do that. Switch off your mind and consume whatever cartoonish narratives the corporate media and influencers are peddling to you. The evil Iranians and their nuclear weapons! The evil Zionists that control the world! Netanyahu duped Trump! Trump tricked MAGA! The Rothschilds! The Deep State! The Jewish Supremacists! The Return of the Neocons! World War III!

The global-capitalist empire would prefer that you do that. And it doesn’t matter to the empire which narrative you consume. The empire doesn’t care whether you’re a liberal or conservative. It could not possibly care less who you voted for. It does not care whether you’re a multi-gendered pronoun-using anti-Trump progressive or an Elon-loving MAGA conservative. It does not care whether you’re a Waymo-burning Mexican flag-flying illegal immigrant or a race-baiting crypto-fascist creep. It doesn’t care whether you’re a Zionist or an anti-Zionist. It does not give a shit what you think about vaccines.

Whoever you are, whatever “side” you are on, the empire has a readymade narrative for you. A narrative that has nothing to do with the global-capitalist empire and its global clear-and-hold op.

And that’s one big advantage the global-capitalist empire has over earlier totalitarian systems. Unlike the Communists and the National Socialists, global capitalism has no ideology, so it can morph into anything it needs to morph into, including any potential opposition to it.

Which is what it has been doing for the last few years, more or less since the end of the Covid era. Just as the Obama “Hope-and-Change” show captured and neutered the growing opposition to the War on Terror (i.e., the original version of the global-capitalist empire’s destabilization and restructuring of the Middle East), the “Make America Great Again” show (with assistance from the Musk Cult) has captured and neutralized the “populist” opposition to the New Normal Reich (i.e., the new global-capitalist form of totalitarianism that was rolled out during the “Covid pandemic”).

I explored this in the introductory essay of Fear and Loathing in the New Normal Reich, my latest book. Here’s an excerpt…

This is also a key feature of the New Normal Reich, the capture, conditioning, and commodification of opposition forces that cannot be eliminated. (Remember, this is global-capitalist totalitarianism, not the ham-fisted 20th-Century version.)

Any internal resistance to the empire that cannot be annihilated, or otherwise silenced, can be commodified, branded, and marketed back to its members as a simulacrum of itself. Ultimately, it can be instrumentalized, like ‘the Brotherhood’ in Orwell’s 1984. It can be molded into a ‘resistance movement,’ which simultaneously exists and does not exist, because it only exists as a simulacrum (i.e., a copy of a thing that no longer exists, which conceals the fact that it no longer exists), and deployed to lure political opposition into an endless war against other simulacra, a war that is itself a simulacrum (i.e., a copy of a war which is not being fought, and was never fought, and will never be fought, because it was already over before it began).

‘Free-speech X’ is a prime example.

The ease with which Elon Musk and a consortium of serious global-capitalist behemoths, Saudi royalty, and assorted other oligarchs purchased the platform formerly known as Twitter, rebranded it as ‘The Bastion of Free Speech’ (despite the fact that X continues to collaborate with the empire to censor dissent), corralled the majority of the ‘populist’ opposition to the emergence of the New Normal Reich, and transformed it into a global personality cult, is a testament to the versatility of capitalism, and to the advantage of having no official ideology. When you don’t have to conform to any specific ideology, you can wear whatever mask you need to wear. You can play whichever role is called for.

It’s all just marketing, advertising, branding. It’s about selling images. The images don’t mean anything. They’re just Pavlovian stimuli designed to trigger a reaction in the target consumer.

The transformation of Twitter/X into the Musk Cult and its merger with (or takeover of) the MAGA movement has been fascinating, if extremely depressing, to watch. At the moment, it appears to be on the verge of morphing into exactly the official enemy that the empire has been desperately simulating for years.”

I wrote that in December 2024, just after the election that ushered in a “new golden age of America,” or whatever. And now … well, here we are. The destabilization and restructuring of the Middle East is proceeding apace. Israel and Iran are officially at war. The Gaza Strip has been reduced to rubble. The Assad regime is gone, replaced with a gang of global-capitalism-ball-playing Al-Qaeda thugs. The Trump regime is renditioning people with suspicious tattoos to Salvadoran gulags, arresting students for writing editorials, unleashing masked goons to round up “illegals,” and generally “making America great again.”

X is now a cesspool of algorithmically-boosted racial hatred, mindless rage, Musk and MAGA propaganda, widget ads, and miscellaneous idiocy. Palantir is assembling a master database of Americans’ personal data. People are shrieking for “mass deportation.” Stephen Miller is channeling Joseph Goebbels. Elon Musk is accusing Trump of degenerate acts on Epstein Island. No one is being prosecuted for lying to everyone about “Covid,” but Bobby Kennedy fired a bunch of bureaucrats, and Trump’s military birthday parade … and so on.

Basically, the global-capitalist empire has morphed into the opposition to itself, or a simulacrum of the opposition to itself, and is now simultaneously instrumentalizing and disassembling the opposition to itself (as it markets itself and the opposition to itself to itself and the opposition to itself).

The global capitalist empire is able to do this because it has no ideology or values to uphold. It doesn’t need to make sense or be consistent. It can wear whatever mask it needs to wear because there is no face behind the mask. There is nothing, no values, no ideology, no beliefs, no principles, nothing to defend or betray, nothing to stop it from becoming anything … and then becoming the exact opposite a moment later.

Sorry, I went all philosophical there, and probably bored a lot of my readers to death. Forget about the global-capitalist empire, and the nothing behind the masks, and all that.

I’m pretty sure I’m overthinking this stuff, and it’s really just that the Jews own everything, or that the Muslims hate us for our freedom, or that we’re being replaced by illegal Mexicans, or Trump is Hitler, or Saddam has weapons of mass destruction, or, I don’t know … I’m sure there’s a corporate-media pundit or a dissident podcaster who can explain what’s really happening and tell us who we’re supposed to root for.

This article was originally published on OffGuardian.

The post World War III and Other Simulacra appeared first on LewRockwell.

Any moment now I am expecting John Cleese (a veteran of Monty Python) to jump out of the bushes and announce the creation of the Ministry of Silly Wars, with Donald Trump as the deranged leader. For you youngsters out there, Monty Python’s skit, The Ministry of Silly Walks, helped make the members of MP legends. I had to reference Monty Python because the line of bullshit the Trump administration is feeding the American people and the world about the amazing, obliterating US attack on Iranian nuclear sites on Sunday morning, is more ridiculous than all of the silly walks pictured in this video.

My hopes that Donald Trump would finally act like a responsible adult are dashed. He’s a dangerous buffoon. While the team around him are working frantically to maintain the fiction that Trump has a vision and is calling the shots on the foreign policy front, he is careening around the globe like an out-of-control cue ball on a billiards table. It started a week ago… first, he claimed to know everything about the timing of the Israeli decapitation attack, and then, within 48 hours, denied knowing anything. He insists he wants peace but did nothing to stop Israel from launching an unprovoked attack on Iran on the eve of negotiations in Oman between the US and Iran.

Now comes the Sunday morning bombings of Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. The White House insists that all were obliterated and that Iran’s nuclear program waswiped out. Only one teeny, tiny problem… none of the satellite imagery supports that claim. Before Sunday, we knew where Iran’s enriched uranium was located and IAEA inspectors had access to the three sites. Now? Iran removed the enriched uranium to a classified site and is moving to end IAEA inspections of Iran’s nuclear program.

The national security committee of Iran’s parliament approved the general outline of a bill meant to fully suspend Tehran’s cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog, semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on, citing committee spokesperson Ebrahim Rezaei.

Rezaei said that according to the bill, installing surveillance cameras, allowing inspections, and submitting reports to the IAEA would be suspended as long as the security of nuclear facilities is not guaranteed. Parliament still has to approve the bill in a plenary.

Way to go Trump!! Instead of ending Iran’s quest for a nuclear weapon — which Iran shelved 22 years ago — Donald Trump has given Iranian hardliners more proof that the only way Iran can be secure in the future is to manufacture nuclear warheads.

Then, today in Washington, DC around 6 pm, Trump announced a ceasefire between Iran and Israel. Following his meeting in Moscow with Vladimir Putin, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, issued the following statement:

The military operations of our powerful Armed Forces to punish Israel for its aggression continued until the very last minute, until 4 am.

Together with all Iranians, I thank our brave Armed Forces, who remain ready to defend our dear country until the last drop of blood and who responded to any enemy attacks until the very last minute.

Israel launched a flurry of final attacks on Tehran immediately prior to the 4 am (Tehran time) deadline for the ceasefire to go into effect. Meanwhile, in Iraq, there were several attacks on US bases prior to 4 am by Iraqi groups aligned with Iran:

In central Iraq, a suicide drone struck (https://t.me/PalestineResist/79412) the military airport in Camp Taji, north of Baghdad, targeting a radar unit and fuel tanks (Media 1, 4). No casualties were reported. West of Baghdad, an explosion was reported near the American Victoria base, with reports of power outages. American drones were reported flying over Baghdad.

In northern Iraq, two explosions were heard at the Balad Air Base (Bakr Air Base) in Salah Al-Din Governorate, with flames seem rising from the base.

In southern Iraq, a drone attack targeted the air radar systems at Imam Ali Base (Talil Air Base) in Nasiriyah (Media 2). Moments ago, air defenses also activated at the American Ain Al-Assad Air Base in Anbar in western Iraq, following a reported targeting by one drone.

While Trump is desperately trying to take credit for these developments, the ceasefire happened in spite of him, not because of his actions. I suspect that Russia, with an assist from China, made this happen. The real story is that Israel caved. Notwithstanding the massive pro-Israel propaganda campaign claiming that Iran was crumpling under Israel’s assault, Iran’s bevy of ballistic and cruise missiles wreaked havoc on Israel and caused significant damage. This is a major defeat for Netanyahu. Let’s hope he is quickly ushered out of office.

This article was originally published on Sonar21.

The post Iran vs the US and Israel — Kabuki Theater on Steroids appeared first on LewRockwell.

Decades of ‘The Fog Machine of War’ have jaded the public’s appetite for ‘Narrative Control’.

The Fog of War is perhaps better described as The Fog Machine of War, for everything presented to the public is some version of Narrative Control, the purpose of which is to establish a context and story that’s beneficial to whomever is presenting “facts,” “news,” “information” and “commentary.”

The other motivation for flooding global media with “news,” “information” and “commentary” is to maximize profits via serving the insatiable appetite for “what’s really going on.” What’s really going on is of course a closely held state secret, the very last thing that would ever be released to the public.

Since everything is Narrative Control and exploiting crisis for profit, there’s little value in any of what’s presented to the public other than what it suggests on a meta-level, that is, what isn’t being revealed and promoted as “what’s really going on.”

It seems to me there is only one way to assemble a jigsaw that approaches the goal of discovering “what’s really going on.” The first step would be to obtain fly on the wall unfiltered intelligence summaries (unfiltered meaning not yet massaged for the political leadership) from the intelligence agencies of the three combatants: Iran, Israel and the United States. This is of course impossible.

The second step would be to obtain the unfiltered intelligence summaries from regional players, for example, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, etc., who have their own sources.

The third step would be to obtain the unfiltered intelligence summaries from Major Power players with a keen interest in figuring out “what’s really going on,” for example, China, Russia and the European Union intel agencies.

The fourth step would be to survey mid-level officers conducting actual operations. It would also be helpful to have access to those actually conducting post-operation damage assessments.

You discern the meta-thinking here: valuable information tends to get filtered out (or lost) between each level of information gathering, summary and presentation to the next level of the hierarchy.

At the highest level, the military leadership tends to be under pressure to control the narrative of what’s presented to the political leadership. This can play out in any number of ways: the military leadership might exaggerate the direness of the situation to obtain permission for a risky operation, or it may gloss over the situation to avoid being sacked.

What strikes me as interesting is how long this situation has been brewing. Iran’s nuclear ambitions have been front and center for a great many years, and so intelligence and operational planning have been going on for many years.

In other words, this isn’t a flash-bang crisis that suddenly erupted from conditions that were unstable beneath the surface but superficially stable, for example, a coup d’etat in a resource-rich nation few people can locate on a map.

What’s unknown for obvious reasons is the capabilities in play. In the aftermath of the intelligence agencies scandals of the 1970s, various tell-all books were published, revealing technical abilities long kept secret.

For example, it was revealed that the U.S. intercepted communications between doomed cosmonauts drifting in a failed Soviet space mission and the tearful Soviet political leadership.

We have no way of knowing if this “tell-all” is true or just another subtle form of Narrative Control. But given that the U.S. spends more on signal intelligence, space-based assets, and other information gathering than other nations spend on their entire militaries, it’s plausible.

As for what capabilities are in play today: the public has no idea. We can have fun guessing, but it’s all guessing.

Decades of The Fog Machine of War have jaded the public’s appetite for Narrative Control. Few believe the “official version” of anything, for good reasons. Public trust has eroded, and so the meta-thought here is the Narrative Control has shifted to insiders’ “tell-all” accounts and leaked accounts of “what’s really going on.”

So the dirt revealed by opponents of the conflict–well, perhaps all that should be taken with a hefty grain of salt, too. The truth–if we dare even using that word–is we collectively know next to nothing about “what’s really going on”, and so profitably chasing speculation is all that’s left.

This article was originally published on OfTwoMinds.com.

The post Meta-Thoughts on the War appeared first on LewRockwell.