By Steven Yates
December 27, 2022
I recently encountered a nice, hefty list of the converging crises of the 2020s:
- The aftermath of the plan-demic
- The war in Ukraine
- Supply-chain problems caused by both of the above
- Energy scarcity caused by the second of the above
- Scarcity of farming necessities such as fertilizer caused by the second of the above
- Roaring inflation (caused by relentless money printing, but aggravated by both of the above)
- Labor shortages (people who can do so are opting out)
- A mental health crisis
- Polarized politics (made worse by both social and legacy media)
- Doubts about the legitimacy of the Bidenistas
- An epidemic of mass shootings; worsening violent crime generally
- A looming recession (which Federal Reserve policy will doubtless cause and aggravate)
- Multiple hot spots of civil unrest
- The rapid growth of technologies of surveillance and control, moves toward vaccine passports and central bank digital currency, among other trappings of globalist technocracy, or techno-feudalism.
The plan-demic 2020-22 was the biggest global-scale power grab I’ve ever seen! It still looms like a colossus over a more fearful world.
The Russian incursion into Ukraine last February was the inevitable long-term result of the CIA-backed coup that took place there back in 2014. A democratically elected but Moscow-sympathetic government was overthrown and replaced by an autocracy sympathetic to NATO and hostile to Moscow, and to Russians more broadly.
The two governments, Kyiv and Moscow, were on collision course from that time forward, especially after Ukrainian forces started brutalizing ethnic Russians in the two breakaway regions. Putin doubtless waited to annex those regions into the Russian Federation until he saw the weakness of the regime in the Asylum on the Potomac.
The war in Ukraine and the “opening up” of the world are doubtless the top two stories of 2022. Inflation probably runs a close third. The Federal Reserve just raised interest rates. This will dampen spending and guarantee a recession in 2023. Does anyone really believe these things aren’t planned? At the very least, I have trouble believing people with a minimal ability to think really believe in modern monetary theory. If creating money out of thin air brought wealth, Zimbabwe would be the richest nation in the world!
We see unrest everywhere except perhaps Antarctica. Most readers probably know about the anti-lockdown protests in China, the product of Xi Jinping’s zero-covid policy. Having been unable to leave their residences for months at a time, people have literally starved to death. The protests were triggered by a fire which burned a dozen or so people alive when they couldn’t get out and rescuers couldn’t reach them in time.
The technocrats in Beijing thus saw the worst protests since Tiananmen Square, and interestingly, they’ve started reopening. Predictably, we’ve seen a wave of illnesses. I say predictably, because we know — from reputable scientists whose views were suppressed — that lockdowns do harm! Immune systems get compromised. People get sick who otherwise wouldn’t have.
South America has its share of unrest, with a fresh upheaval in Peru which has seen several years of political instability. Pedro Castillo, elected president 17 months ago, tried to dissolve the Congress, which retaliated by having him arrested. He has plenty of support, and some of that support took to the streets of Lima. Over a dozen people have been killed in clashes with police. Castillo, who says he’s a Marxist, has support from leftist governments in Bolivia, Argentina, Colombia, and (a bit surprisingly) Mexico. Interestingly, Chile has stayed out of it, with leftist Chilean president Gabriel Boric stating that Castillo violated his country’s constitution when he tried to dissolve its Congress.
Castillo’s opponent last year was Keiko Fujimori of the Fuerza Popular — whom global corporate media denounced as a proto-fascist (where have we heard that before? these people really need some new material!). They never failed to note that her father Alberto Fujimori was imprisoned — as was she, briefly.
Meanwhile, over in Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro voiced suspicion of fraud against the recent election that by the narrowest of margins put corrupt leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (whom everyone calls Lula) back in power. While this may seem like November 2020 – January 2021 in the U.S. all over again, unlike Trump Bolsonaro has strong backing within the Brazilian military. A coup in South America’s largest country in the foreseeable future is not impossible.
These are just the situations I’ve been watching. There are others, too many for one person with no staff to keep track of. One thing seems certain: if corporate media denounces a candidate as an incipient (or proto) fascist, or an autocrat, or a threat to democracy, that person is probably worth supporting. He or she may have a track record of standing up to globalists, whom corporate media serves.
Globalism is the enemy, folks. The visible enemy, anyway.
Bringing us to the corruption and unreason at home. The Bidenistas are riding high following Election 2022 and the “red wave that didn’t happen.” Corporate media keeps spinning this as voter rejection of “election denialism” and “MAGA extremism.”
But what really happened? I doubt we’ll ever know for sure. I have two friends, Arizona residents (one in Maricopa Co., the other elsewhere), who are convinced that Kari Lake was robbed in broad daylight.
Other outcomes make no sense, such as the victory by a man who can barely articulate a sentence against a popular doctor (Pennsylvania).
One of those friends told me in an email, “I don’t trust any of it!”
I’ve no idea how widespread this sentiment is — but millions of Americans no longer consider American elections to be honest.
Lake has file suit. Dr. Oz has struggled to get his older career back on track and has found himself blacklisted, which can happen when you’ve gone up against approved narratives, or been endorsed by someone the Establishment hates (e.g., Trump).
I’ve never been a fan of Twitter — which has been enabling gnat-length attention spans for over a decade now. I figured that when Elon Musk bought the platform I had no dog in the fight because I don’t trust the man. He’s a technocrat and definitely on board with transhumanist types even if he seems to enjoy triggering lefties, who blew a few gaskets apiece the other day because of the lefty European journalists Musk unloaded.
Be that as it may, the Twitter Files have definitely brought some revelations! It is now crystal clear that the platform suppressed information on Hunter Biden’s laptop back in 2020 that could have revealed the Biden family’s connections both in Ukraine and to the Chinese. I recall that Facebook was suppressing claims, then backed up with evidence in the form of the now-memory-holed 3 am vote spikes, that Election 2020 was stolen.
We also know that Twitter suppressed reputable scientists such as Stanford’s Jay Bhattacharya when he criticized covid lockdowns as ineffective and likely to do more harm than good.
The plain truth is, platform owners, hired moderators, “fact checkers,” and algorithm programmers have all they need to control the online visibility of scientists, investigative journalists, writers such as myself, if we express an opinion or present information that goes against approved narratives. Countless people were deplatformed off YouTube, kicked off Twitter, or “shadow banned” on Facebook, because they wrote something disapproved of by a “fact checker.”
This is especially troublesome for those for whom writing is their primary source of income. Downgrading income is one of the ways technocracy punishes dissent. Medium writer (at least that is where I see her articles) Tessa Schlessinger thus writes:
It doesn’t matter who you are, if you express an opinion contrary to the status quo, the owners, or even a moderator, you will have the reach of your work limited.
The outcome of that is that it’s fairly difficult to trust any site for any length of time….
In order to protect income, it has become necessary to widen one’s reach. This means that one has to work on several sites, use multiple skills, ensure that you are on multiple payment platforms, plus be serious about becoming an expert at SEO — search engine optimization.
Schlessinger recommends writing for sites like SmashWords, Post.News, and Vocal Media, all of which are recent and small but growing rapidly as writers struggle for the right combination of visibility and free speech (and income).
My view, for whatever it’s worth, is that we need our own platforms!
The press is free only if you own one.
The downside: there are probably too many platforms now. The Internet is clogged with conflicting voices, incommensurable truth claims, and information overload. In our attention economy, those who can keep you on their sites — and then use it to hock stuff — will be the victors. Sadly, that long ago ceased to be those with truthful content (if it ever was). The masses naturally gravitate to what is titillating, exciting, and above all, easily consumed, so they can get on to the next bit of entertainment. I don’t expect this to change anytime soon.
Those of us trying to present broad perspectives on how we got into our present mess, as a prelude toward finding strategies that might get us out of it, are at a structural disadvantage.
My most recent contributions to Medium include this, this, and this: a three-part series, the point of departure for which hearkens back to a series done for this site — here, here, and here — integrating insights from this.
It’s doubtless demanding, and readership (especially of the hefty third segment) has been negligible. The truth about Medium: those who can write fluffy inspirational self-help pieces or colorful “listicles” tend to reap its windfalls.
We do what we can….
Looking ahead to 2023 (and beyond), which will be here in less than two weeks even if we don’t especially care to look:
Expect the recession I mentioned.
Expect more irrational Deep State provocations against Russia, which as everybody knows has both tactical and long-range nukes. Given that we are probably closer to nuclear war than at any time since the Cuban Missile Crisis, I have to wonder, What are these lunatics thinking? I don’t know, but the American Deep State is probably just following orders. There is no telling how long the war in Ukraine will drag on, and no way to predict how it will end.
Realizing that the globalists have their underground bunkers will doubtless help us all sleep better at night!
Expect more fearmongering over Variants. Because if your aim is to control behavior on a mass scale, fearmongering works. Those who think the plan-demic is “over” are probably kidding themselves; the same is true of those harboring doubts that the elites will find some other excuse to lock down populations in the future. (Think: climate, carbon footprints, etc.)
Earlier this year I wondered if we might see a major cyberattack that would turn out the lights for several weeks over a substantial geographical region. This hasn’t happened, but the possibility remains … if the globalists believe they are losing control, whatever the circumstances.
We can be sure they will do whatever they can to prevent a second Trump term.
Expect vaccine passports and central bank digital currency to continue to inch forward quietly. Those considering international moves probably better make them no later than this year, especially if you are unvaxxed (or if you are but aren’t “boosted”).
Expect political polarization to continue, with sporadic outbreaks of violence when one side can gaslight and use lawfare to suppress the other without consequence.
Mass shootings and other violent crime, most of it apolitical, will continue as more and more people “snap.” White male shooters will be denounced as such. If there is no mention of race in corporate media reporting, you will know that the shooter is black, Muslim, or some other protected ethnicity.
Expect the culture war to continue, since although the cultural left / abortion death culture axis controls academia, corporate media, and most of government except the Supreme Court, it has been unable to suppress conservative voices completely. There are simply too many of us, and it remains to be seen what happens when Republicans assume control of the House in January (given their performance in the past, though, I wouldn’t get my hopes up).
But where is the person many of us have put our writing careers on the line defending for almost seven years?
Trump may have announced, but his effort seems to be floundering amidst reckless ventures such as the dinner with Kanye West and Nick Fuentes, or other gestures that are simply embarrassing, the most recent as of this writing being these NFTs or “digital trading cards” depicting The Donald as a cartoon superhero (not especially good quality from what I hear, but sold for an absurd $99 a pop).
This followed a promised “major announcement” (Thurs, December 15).
A few Jan-6ers have been quoted as saying things like, “I went to prison for this?”
Even Steve Bannon, about to accept four months of political prisoner status for having gone to bat for Trump, is now saying, “I can’t do this anymore….”
Trump has not held any rallies, and has none planned that I know of.
He’s done other dumb things recently. I just happened to be a student at the University of Georgia when Herschel Walker was the resident football hero there. Details aside, I can certify — no doubts whatsoever on this point! — the man is dumb as a brick! He proved this in a statement before the Georgia election when he said he didn’t know what a pronoun was.
What was Trump thinking when he endorsed this clown?
Not that Walker’s opponent in the Party of the Death Culture was a viable alternative. Voters in Georgia simply didn’t have any options this year. Were I still a resident there, I would have gone fishing.
It is as if Trump is giving the globalists what they want: someone not electable. To be sure, he has plenty of time between now and the next round of primaries to get it together. But we need more from him than we’ve seen so far: much more.
And he’d better stop wasting time. Some of his supporters are casting about for another standard-bearer: Trumpism without Trump. I have said from the get-go that the idea of Trumpism is larger than the man. It’s not hard to see why Trump supporters might be looking elsewhere. The country needs real leadership and a vision for the future, a clear and viable alternative to what World Economic Forum globalists are prepared to shove down our throats. It needs to be able to get people on board in large enough numbers to make a difference.
Trump did this back in 2015-16. He does not appear to be doing it now.
I have no idea whether Florida Governor Ron DeSantis will challenge him for the GOP nomination. Corporate media is pushing him, hard — countless articles read almost as if he had already announced.
Obviously, should DeSantis run and claim the nomination from Trump, these same legacy outfits will turn on him like wolves. Much of his thinking, after all, is too close to Trump’s for comfort, and he’s considerably more focused. He has the woke cult’s number. He has Big Pharma’s number as well. His new state-level grand jury might help determine how much long-term damage the mRNA shots can be expected to do.
DeSantis could easily become the standard-bearer for conservative populism and economic nationalism, and potentially, therefore, a bigger threat to the globalists than Trump was.
But as I’ve also said, I don’t know that he wants the job. He’s not stupid, and he has to know what it could cost him and his family, personally as well as politically.
Lastly: Sleepy Joe has been kept in the Oval Office longer than I anticipated, possibly because he’s been a really good boy (so to speak), doing the bidding of his real owners, and possibly because VP Giggles would be an even bigger disaster than he has been. Everyone knows that. Should Biden be replaced in 2024, though, whatever the stated reason, it will likely be by someone even further to the left than he is. Think: California Governor Gavin Newsome.
Imagine the entire country looking like San Francisco by 2028!
Newsome can cobble sentences together, though, and make them sound intelligent. I doubt he dozes off in meetings. He doesn’t look and sound like an idiot. These all put him ahead of Sleepy Joe and VP Giggles.
In the end, though, if nothing is done to ensure that no more elections can be stolen, period, it probably won’t matter which party runs which candidate, because the globalist-approved candidate will be the one to “win.”
© 2022 Steven Yates – All Rights Reserved
E-Mail Steven Yates: freeyourmindinsc@yahoo.com
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Steven Yates’s latest book What Should Philosophy Do? A Theory (2021) is available here and here. His earlier Four Cardinal Errors: Reasons for the Decline of the American Republic (2011) is available here.
While admittedly the real world can be scary enough, he has also written a novel of cosmic horror. The Shadow Over Sarnath will be published early next year.
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Thank you, “Joe Biden”!
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