Extinction: Peace

"Whoopie, we're all gonna die"

Tom Engelhardt asked the question: "Is America Hooked on War?"

I think that the answer to his question is that some percentage of Americans are hooked on war (warmongers, "Dick Cheney, John McCain").

Others romanticize war (the "war is peace", "my warrior hero" trance).

Or the profits made from war by those who control the weapons and materiel making  corporations ("war profiteers, Daddy Warbucks").

Yet, another percentage of Americans have heeded the words of one of the founders;  specifically the one who wrote the "Bill of Rights," and the one who is called "The Father of the Constitution."

His words were pointed out in a Toxins of Power Blog post in November of 2009:

An answer from the sages in our past who we are very fortunate to have had, but sages which we have ignored to our great demise in recent times.

An answer that seems today to be totally and completely at odds with the conventional wisdom-hype and propaganda, which is composed of the glorification of the greatest source of the toxins of power.

Our founders were well aware of the question and the answer hundreds of years ago.

They spoke the answer with unmistakable words and with certain clarity:

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied: and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals, engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. Those truths are well established.

(James Madison, emphasis added). The visionary who made that statement was the 4th President of the United States, Bill of Rights author, Congressman, Cabinet Member, and who was also called the "Father of the U.S. Constitution".

The above quote is from his "Political Observations," April 20, 1795, in Letters and Other Writings of James Madison, Volume IV, page 491-492.

Notice, in the quote above, how Madison equated or associated the toxins of power with disease epidemic concepts, saying that the war toxin "develops the germ of every other" anti-freedom toxin.

(The Greatest Source Of Power Toxins?). One would be remiss to not notice how much the empire today is utterly infected with the war germ we were warned not to catch.

Other sources of vision saw what would happen if we stumbled into the emotional quicksand of the madness of our more recent leaders:

There were Senators like Byrd, and House of Representative members like Pete Stark, in the year 2002, who had vision.

But vision was discounted as a kooky thing, and those that had vision were discounted by the dementia congress was suffering from then, and still is.

Where there is no vision the people perish, and the leaders supplant vision with "excuses" and whining.

The Honorable Pete Stark said this about the "AUMF Resolution" before the Iraq disaster happened:

(The Stark Truth). Even some of those who one would not expect to be as politically saavy, the comedians, also got it (The Onion, 2003).

But, here we are again, with the war whores all lathered up about more war (The War Whores Ride The War Horse - 2).

They are utterly unaware of the invasion taking place on every mile of our national shoreline. or that our national psychology is the same as the Don Quixote diagnosis (Why The Military Can't Defend Against The Invasion, American Feudalism - 3).

Peace has gone extinct from the thinking of the powers that be.

---

The hunt for invading terrarists:

---

The Methane Hydrate / Clathrate Controversy - 2

Fig. 1 Source: NOAA ESRL

In this series we ponder the almost inexplicable dearth of long-term scientific research associated with atmospheric methane (CH₄).

The sources of CH₄ in the atmosphere are not as well known as the sources of CO₂ are (Fig. 2), nor are the records as extensive for CH₄ (Fig. 1).

The watchers at Moana Loa observatory, in Hawaii, keep records for both of those green house gases (GHG) and are considered to be a standard source of information (Moana Loa CO₂).

Fig. 2 Source NOAA

In the first post of this series, it was pointed out that methane (hydrate, clathrate, etc.) research in the Arctic is in its infancy:

Currently, scientists do not have a tool to say with certainty how much, or if any, atmospheric methane comes from hydrates.
...
No one can yet say with certainty how the methane release in the Arctic will develop with global warming, either in the ocean or on the land. This research is still in its in­fancy.

(The Methane Hydrate / Clathrate Controversy, quoting experts). The official keeper of GHG levels at Moana Loa indicates that it is a ho-hum compared to CO₂:

Methane was steadily increasing in the 1980's, it's growth rate slowed in the 1990's, and it has had a near-zero growth rate for the last few years.

(NOAA ESRL). At this time competent researchers use inexact language in several categories:

"In this paper we present 2 years of data obtained during the late summer period (September 2003 and September 2004) for the East Siberian Arctic shelf (ESAS). According to our data, the surface layer of shelf water was supersaturated up to 2500% relative to the present average atmospheric methane content of 1.85 ppm, pointing to the rivers as a strong source of dissolved methane which comes from watersheds which are underlain with permafrost. Anomalously high concentrations (up to 154 nM or 4400% supersaturation) of dissolved methane in the bottom layer of shelf water at a few sites suggest that the bottom layer is somehow affected by near-bottom sources. The net flux of methane from this area of the East Siberian Arctic shelf can reach up to 13.7 × 104 g CH4 km− 2 from plume areas during the period of ice free water, and thus is in the upper range of the estimated global marine methane release. Ongoing environmental change might affect the methane marine cycle since significant changes in the thermal regime of bottom sediments within a few sites were registered. Correlation between calculated methane storage within the water column and both integrated salinity values (r = 0.61) and integrated values of dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) (r = 0.62) suggest that higher concentrations of dissolved methane were mostly derived from the marine environment, likely due to in-situ production or release from decaying submarine gas hydrates deposits. The calculated late summer potential methane emissions tend to vary from year to year, reflecting most likely the effect of changing hydrological and meteorological conditions (temperature, wind) on the ESAS rather than riverine export of dissolved methane. We point out additional sources of methane in this region such as submarine taliks, ice complex retreat, submarine permafrost itself and decaying gas hydrates deposits."

(Sharkova). Arctic methane research is increasing rapidly, so tools and methods should improve over time, so that more exact language can be used.

The research into this potentially dangerous area is not as mature, by any stretch of the imagination, as sea level change (SLC) research is.

Tidal gages have been used for over a hundred years, satellites of all sorts (e.g. GRACE, Cryosat-2, etc.) have measured the sources of sea level rise (SLR) and sea level fall (SLF), and they are well known without controversy.

Those who rant on about the "non-issue" of SLC but "the human species destroying methane danger" will be seen, and should be seen, as kooks by public infrastructure managers.

That is because SLC is a known clear and present danger (a must-read for that perspective: You Are Here - 5).

An expert on SLC addresses those issues (which are relatively hidden in plain sight) in one video below (Mitrovica), and an expert on Arctic methane release does the same in the other video (Sharkova).

The previous post in this series is here.

---

---

---

---

The Methane Hydrate / Clathrate Controversy

Methane Hydrate / Clathrate

I. Background

Observers of the warming oceans have considered many impacts which that warming will have.

On one issue, their are two camps, one saying hydrates will substantially contribute to human extinction, and the other saying it will not.

In other words, the verbal battle lines are well defined.

However, we have to look closer if we want to understand the issues.

So let's take a look.

I am not ready to conclude in this post, rather, I am only laying the issue out on the table for consideration at this time.

II. Basic Views of the Two Camps

A. The Clathrate Catastrophe Camp

The Nature Bats Last blog sets forth the near term human extinction (NTHE) position:

By 15 December 2013, methane bubbling up from the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean had sufficient force to prevent sea ice from forming in the area. Nearly two years after his initial, oft-disparaged analysis, Malcolm Light concluded on 22 December 2013, “we have passed the methane hydrate tipping point and are now accelerating into extinction as the methane hydrate ‘Clathrate Gun’ has begun firing volleys of methane into the Arctic atmosphere.” According to Light’s analysis in late 2013, the temperature of Earth’s atmosphere will resemble that of Venus before 2100.

(Nature Bats Last). The "clathrate gun" reference is sometimes called a hypothesis (Clathrate Gun Hypothesis).

B. The "Nothing To See Here, Move Along Folks" Camp 

This camp has some formidable members too, who plainly say that the other camp is a bit over the top:

News stories and Web postings have raised concerns that climate warming will release large volumes of methane from gas hydrates, kicking off a chain reaction of warming and methane releases. But recent research indicates that most of the world’s gas hydrate deposits should remain stable for the next few thousand years. Of the gas hydrates likely to become unstable, few are likely to release methane that could reach the atmosphere and intensify climate warming.

(USGS: Why a Methane Catastrophe Is Unlikely). Ok, we see that distinct debate lines, on a very important subject, have been drawn.

III. The Admitted Unknowns

A. How Much

The USGS indicates that there are no tools with which to determine which source current atmospheric methane comes from:

The atmospheric concentration of methane, like that of carbon dioxide, has increased since the onset of the Industrial Revolution (fig. 5). Methane in the atmosphere comes from many sources, including wetlands, rice cultivation, termites, cows and other ruminants, forest fires, and fossil fuel production (fig. 6). Some researchers have estimated that up to 2 percent of atmospheric methane may originate with dissociation of global gas hydrates. Currently, scientists do not have a tool to say with certainty how much, or if any, atmospheric methane comes from hydrates.

(USGS: Gas Hydrates and Climate Warming, emphasis added). Of the "2 percent" of atmospheric methane in the air we breathe, it is not known how much of it comes from methane hydrates that have broken down and released their caged methane.

B. Lack of Research and Data?

A lot of attention is being paid to the matter, however, some say the science has not yet matured:

In the field of methane emission research today, the Arctic is one of the most important regions worldwide. It is believed that methane occurs there both in the form of gas hydrate in the sea and as free gas trapped in the deep-frozen permafrost. Methane deposits in permafrost and hydrates are considered to be very sensitive in the expansive shallow-shelf regions, because with the relatively low pressures it would only take a small temperature change to release large amounts of methane. In addition, new methane is continuously being produced because the Arctic regions are rich in organic material that is decomposed by microbes in the sediment. The activity of these microbes and thus the biological release rates of methane are also stimulated by increases in temperature. Hence methane emissions in the Arctic have multiple sources. International scientific consortia are now being established involving researchers from various disciplines – chemists, biologists, geologists, geophysicists, meteorologists – which are intensively addressing this problem. No one can yet say with certainty how the methane release in the Arctic will develop with global warming, either in the ocean or on the land. This research is still in its in­fancy.

(World Ocean Review, p. 2, emphasis added). How such an important issue leaves scientists in the dark because of methane clathrate research immaturity is troubling.

C. Jury Still Out?

One good place to observe the dynamic back and forth is a Guardian piece:

Can scientists overcome huge uncertainties to pin down how close, or far, we might be to a tipping point?

About a week ago, climate scientist Michael Tobis wrote a critique of my 'Seven facts about the Arctic methane time bomb' following a twitter exchange with him and Chris Colose, author of an article at Skeptical Science arguing that the core scenario of a new Nature paper by Gail Whiteman et. al on the economic costs of Arctic climate change is extremely unlikely.

Much of this debate kicked off because the said Nature paper advances a hypothetical scenario for an abrupt Arctic methane release over either a decade or several decades of about 50 gigatonnes (Gt), and argues specifically that such a scenario is "likely." My own attempt to understand the literature convinced me that the scenario should be viewed as a serious possibility.

Tobis on the other hand is the latest amongst several scientists offering scathing criticisms of that scenario, which in his own words is "as close to impossible as anything in earth science; actual geophysics refutes it."

He begins with my first point, 1. The 50 Gigatonne decadal methane pulse scenario was posited by four Arctic specialists, and is considered plausible by Met Office scientists.

Tobis writes that the Review of Geophysics paper I cite says

"Arctic thawing may release in excess of 50 GT of C [Carbon], a very serious matter... But Ahmed refers to the paper in support of a very different assertion, that 50 GT of methane would be released... But the paper to which he points says nothing of the sort. I conclude that he doesn't really know what he is talking about. Specifically he has already shown that he is confused about the distinction between methane releases and CO2 releases."

However, the carbon release scenarios from permafrost explored by the paper include both methane and carbon. Here's what the paper says:

"The most important determinant of whether release of frozen carbon happens as CO2 or CH4 [methane] is whether decomposition proceeds aerobically or anaerobically... In anaerobic conditions, a greater proportion of soil organic carbon decomposition is released as CH4, although not all of it necessarily reaches the atmosphere."

Following this paragraph, the paper cites several scenarios for large-scale releases from permafrost carbon, including the 50-100 Gt carbon release I mentioned.

(Why The Jury's Still Out). The jury is out for some people, but not out for others it would seem.

IV. Some Other Scientists Speak Out Boldly

An expert on the Siberian Arctic methane hydrate scenario has published some papers indicating that a serious condition exists:

Extremely high concentrations of methane (up to 8 ppm) in the atmospheric layer above the sea surface along with anomalously high concentrations of dissolved methane in the water column (up to 560 nM, or 12000% of super saturation), registered during a summertime cruise over the ESS in September 2005, were analyzed together with available data obtained during previous and subsequent expeditions to distinguish between possible methane sources of different origin, potential, and mobility. Using indirect evidence it was shown that one such source may be highly potential and extremely mobile shallow methane hydrates, whose stability zone is seabed permafrost-related and could be disturbed upon permafrost development, degradation, and thawing. Further immobilization of stored methane could cause abrupt methane release and unpredictable climatic consequences.

(Geophysical Research Abstracts, by Shakhova et al., PDF; cf this). I will refer to one other scientist before closing:

Paul Beckwith, a climatology and meteorology professor at the University of Ottawa, Canada, is an engineer and physicist who researches abrupt climate change in both the present day and in the paleoclimatology records of the deep past.

“It is my view that our climate system is in early stages of abrupt climate change that, unchecked, will lead to a temperature rise of 5 to 6 degrees Celsius within a decade or two,” Beckwith told me. “Obviously, such a large change in the climate system will have unprecedented effects on the health and well-being of every plant and animal on our planet.”

(The Methane Monster Roars). This year is still struggling to become the record year, by having the lowest Arctic sea ice extent of all other years.

That is, the lowest since the recent record was set in the year 2012 (Arctic Ice Extent: 2015 Struggles For First Place - 2).

V. Conclusion

The Obama Administration's allowing Arctic area drilling to find more of the poison that is threatening civilization was a deadly event, all their promises to cut poison GHG emissions notwithstanding.

---

Dr. Shakhova camp:

---

ObamaCare: Good Foreign Policy - 4

A Heart Grown Cold

Background

In this series I have been looking at aspects of the inexplicable word storms crossing America from left to right and from right to left.

While, as usual, the world is watching.

That is why I used the word "inexplicable."

Some of our conversations and deeds perplex the humane minds of the world because those conversations exhibit the crass, careless, brazen, and psychopathic aspects of a culture that cares nothing about anything else except their own exceptionalism.

Even though:

"Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness."

(Martin Luther King Jr.). As Senator Bernie Sanders points out:

“The Affordable Care Act has made modest improvements in American health care since it took effect. Twenty million Americans have gained insurance under the law, including young people who can stay on their parents' policies and others who may no longer be denied insurance because of pre-existing conditions. The law also has expanded access to primary care to some 4 million more Americans through community health centers that also provide dental care, low-cost prescription drugs and mental health counseling.

“But the United States remains, shamefully, the only major country on Earth that does not guarantee health care to all its people as a right. And because of the profiteering of the pharmaceutical industry and private insurance companies, the United States spends almost twice as much per capita on health care as any other nation, while our life expectancy, infant mortality and preventable deaths are higher than most other countries. If our goal is to provide high-quality health care for all Americans in a cost-effective way, we must move toward a single-payer system.

“The health insurance lobby and other opponents of single-payer care make it sound scary. It's not. In fact, a large, single-payer system already exists in the United States: It's called Medicare. People enrolled in the system give it high marks. More importantly, it has succeeded in providing near-universal coverage to Americans over age 65.

(Medicare for All). What Dr. King and Senator Sanders are expressing is their hurt due to U.S. policy that is:

"A disregard for human suffering in the pursuit of profit."

(David Puttnam). This is the core lack of values that is at the heart of the demise of American reputation (Decline of U.S. Reputation - Why?).

Supreme Court Decision In King v. Burwell

Yesterday's U.S. Supreme Court decision in King v. Burwell was the talk of the town, but so much of that talk was more evidence of the dumbing down of the U.S. public.

It was a simple case of statutory construction, that is, the strange way of saying one government branch interpreting a statute written by another branch of government must do so with intellectual honesty and respect:

It is ... the Court’s task to determine the correct reading of Section 36B. If the statutory language is plain, the Court must enforce it according to its terms. But often times the meaning—or ambiguity—of certain words or phrases may only become evident when placed in context. So when deciding whether the language is plain, the Court must read the words “in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme.”

When read in context, the phrase “an Exchange established by the State under [42 U. S. C. §18031]” is properly viewed as ambiguous. The phrase may be limited in its reach to State Exchanges. But it could also refer to all Exchanges—both State and Federal—for purposes of the tax credits. If a State chooses not to follow the directive in Section 18031 to establish an Exchange, the Act tells the Secretary of Health and Human Services to establish “such Exchange.” §18041. And by using the words “such Exchange,” the Act indicates that State and Federal Exchanges should be the same.
...
The Court ... must do its best, “bearing in mind the ‘fundamental canon of statutory construction that the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the over all statutory scheme.’”

(King v Burwell, 576 U.S. ___ , 2015, emphasis added). The inability to read in context is a problem of reading comprehension.

Good reading comprehension is composed of being able to comprehend the totality of a text and the proper impact which subtextual components should have.

The rabid myopia which engendered the notion that Congress' use of those four words should mandate the destruction of the health care of thousands or millions of Americans is shameful and violent.

Blowhard Presidential Candidates

One has to wonder about how much the American reputation has suffered in the eyes of the world since psychopaths have chosen to make their way into public life (When You Are Governed By Psychopaths - 2).

Country after country has called in the U.S. Ambassador for an explanation as to why a "freedom loving" country has to disrespect its own citizens as well as the citizens and governments of "its friends" by spying on them.

Oh, I get it, "the constitution is so quaint" in the U.S.eh?

Conclusion

Today the murdered are being honored in Charleston even as others debate whether the flag of the hatemongering and warmongering racists of long ago should be honored by flying their battle flag today (Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 10).

The previous post in this series is here.

---

Senator Sanders:

---

Barry & Oil-Qaeda vs Arctic Wilderness - 2

The Drilling Goes Viral

Introduction

This series has been about the folly of the Obama Administration's concept for their "planned" Arctic drilling.

Add to that the admin's folly of subjecting itself to Oil-Qaeda.

It is a plan that will rape and pillage the Arctic Environment of the Earth in the pursuit of the poison that they know is destroying civilization (Oil-Qaeda & MOMCOM Conspire To Commit Depraved-Heart Murder, Civilization Is Now On Suicide Watch, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8).

While they do this, they claim to be climate change believers, but at the same time they are the driving force of "drill baby drill" psychopathology of the pathogenic toxin producers.

In other words, a psychopathic hypocrisy is their overarching policy, while they want to be

"I said hard a starboard"

seen as cool climate change dudes and dudettes.

The first post in this series detailed the results of their first attempt to implement the policy folly (Barry & Oil-Qaeda vs Arctic Wilderness), which of course ended in a disaster.

But, at least the disaster was not an environmental disaster of any great proportion, because they only had to make an emergency exit from the Arctic, and an emergency grounding on Kodiak Island in the Gulf of Alaska.

It was a policy disaster as well as being a policy of psychopaths (When You Are Governed By Psychopaths, 2, 3, 4).

All of the studies, drilling on site, recording of dangers lurking in the deep, and printing and storing of the scientific data did not prevent the greatest environmental disaster in U.S. history (Saga of Deepwater Horizon Continues).

Worse Than Deepwater Horizon Pathology

In the years that led up to the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, which we will never recover from, at least there were serious studies with which to ascertain the dangers involved in deep water drilling there:

That research focused on the dangers inherent in the deepwater drilling in the GOM as a result of methane hydrates commonly found there, including substantial analysis of various sorts (the index is 163 pages):

NOTE: This document contains a listing of all published reports and professional presentations relating to work supported by DOE’s Methane Hydrates R&D program. While many of these reports are “shared” publications, with support being obtained from several funding sources, we have endeavored to include only those reports in which the DOE's contribution was meaningful and substantial.

(Index To Research Papers,  page 163 [Wayback Machine copy, they "lost" it]). We could spend years reviewing all the material, so I chose to focus on only a few issues, issues related directly to the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe.

(Danger Lurks In The Deep Water, cf. 2, 3). Of course you may be thinking, "it is a no brainer" to study-up before venturing into danger.

But the permitted Arctic drilling is being done without any studies I know of specifically on the bottom of the Chukchi Sea, where Shell Oil is being allowed to drill again.

The studies I know of have been done on the North Slope, on land, and perhaps shallow water near shore (USGS, Hydrate Resources on the North Slope).

So, "hi ho hi ho it's off to work we go" in a potential mine field.

Other Dangers At Sea Level Are Still There

The reason Shell Oil abandoned the drilling attempt a couple of years ago was because of an ice attack.

Yes, "old ice" formations moved in threatening to assault the drilling rig, so they had to get out of there pronto.

This is still a grave danger to ships of any kind, including oil drilling rigs or even ice breakers.

Other dangers are large waves that have not been seen before (Swelling Waves Could Hasten Demise of Arctic Sea Ice).

Conclusion

I will have to keep it short today.

But I will keep an eye on the developments, hoping against hope that they will come to their senses.

UPDATE: Shell poison rig leaves Seattle (Guardian).

The previous post in this series is here.

---

---

Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 9

Good looking psychopath?

I. Foreward

I began this series, on April 28, 2014.

Like you of course, at that time I had no idea that the Ferguson phenomenon would begin some months later on August 9, 2014.

In fact, by the time of the Ferguson phenomenon, I had already posted about half of the posts now contained in this series (Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8).

This post today will be an attempt to hold to the concepts I set out to present as stated in the first sentence of the first post of this series: "The subtitle for this post might be 'Symbolic Racism: One Result of Cultural Toxins of Power'."

In other words, to discuss at least some of the cultural dynamics at work, rather than personal individual dynamics, which die with the individual racist.

II. The Purpose of This Series

What this series was designed to get at is that racism is perpetuated by something beyond and/or other than individual racists, as indicated by another sentence in that first post:

Subconscious social dynamics are always at work in cultures, tugging, pushing, and pulling this way or that way, subtly shaping and forming cultural activity and cultural evolution.

(Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science). Often times we hear about individuals who, during their lifetime, want to perpetuate themselves by various treatments.

They do fantasy, hoping in vain to attain some form of perpetual existence, or at the very least to live a lot longer.

This is not a problem for the culture of a nation or civilization, because societies tend to be naturally perpetuated:

"In other words, a society does not ever die 'from natural causes', but always dies from suicide or murder --- and nearly always from the former, as this chapter has shown."

(A Study of History,  by Arnold J. Toynbee). Toynbee was not saying that there are no predators on society, rather, he was saying that the main predator is the culture itself, the society itself, yes, the civilization itself.

The difference we are envisioning, then, was bolstered by the second post, which pointed out that “[t]here is no genetic basis for race” (Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 2), i.e., no scientific basis in terms of genetics.

Race is not what it is cracked up white-washed to be.

III. The Overwhelming Scientific/Historical Evidence

In the third post, I enhanced the notion that racism is a cultural phenomenon (Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 3), much like a meme complex (Comparing a Meme Complex to a Cultural Amygdala).

Racism, like anything else, can become an addiction because the addiction is not a phenomenon generated by a substance, a material, or a thing, rather, it is a mental dynamic, a problem within the thinking (The "It's In Your Genes" Myth).

But, as individuals, we do not tend to know how the culture became so addicted, or how its addiction is tied into cultural racism.

So, let's get some background, beginning with the seed and finishing with the monster:

"It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime. He takes up the trade of a priest for the sake of gain, and in order to qualify himself for that trade, he begins with a perjury. Can we conceive any thing more destructive to morality than this?" [Thomas Paine, 1794]

---

"Now comes “The Barbarous Years,” the next installment. It circles back to a period that most Americans don’t hear much about in school: the chaotic decades from the establishment of Jamestown (England’s first permanent colony in the Americas) in 1607 up to King Philip’s War (the vicious conflict that effectively expelled Indians from New England) in 1675-76. Bailyn’s goal is to show how a jumble of migrants, “low and high born,” sought “to recreate, if not to improve, in this remote and, to them, barbarous environment, the life they had known before.” As the title indicates, the story is as grim as it is fascinating: a group portrait in tones of greed, desperation and brutality. In recent years conservative writers dismayed by historical revisionism have flooded stores with books extolling the character and sagacity of America’s founders. “The Barbarous Years” is not one of them.

“Death was everywhere,” Bailyn writes of Jamestown. The colony was a commercial enterprise, started by the Virginia Company with the sort of careful financial evaluation that in the more recent past was the hallmark of the dot-com boom.

English people kept coming anyway, lured by a discovery that the Crown and company hated: tobacco. Hip, fun, disdained by stuffy authorities and wildly addictive, the smoking weed was an ideal consumer product. Thousands of migrants were willing to risk death for the chance to cash in on England’s squadrons of new nicotine junkies. The Chesapeake Bay became a barely governed swarm of semi-independent tobacco fiefs, owned by families, operated by squads of indentured servants, all squabbling with one another, Protestants against Catholics, English against other Europeans, everyone against Indians." [The Barbarous Years]

---

"The addiction to oil ... at least to the wealth and to the products made accessible to us by oil ... look at the negative consequences on the environment we are destroying the very Earth that we inhabit for the sake of that addiction. Now these addictions are far more devastating in the social consequences than the cocaine or heroin habits of my ... patients. Yet they are rewarded and considered to be respectable. The tobacco company executive that shows a higher profit will get a much bigger reward ... doesn't face any negative consequences legally or otherwise ... in fact is a respected member of the board of several other corporations ... but tobacco smoke related diseases kill 5.5 million people around the world every year. In the United States they kill 400,000 people a year".
...
"And these people are addicted to what? To profit, to such a degree are they addicted that they are actually in denial about the impact of their activities, which is typical for addicts, is denial. And that is the respectable one. It is respectable to be addicted to profit no matter what the cost. So what is acceptable and what is respectable is a highly arbitrary phenomenon in our society. And it seems like the greater the harm the more respectable the addiction" (Dr. Maté).

---

"One of the most important comments on deceit, I think, was made by Adam Smith. He pointed out that a major goal of business is to deceive and oppress the public.

And one of the striking features of the modern period is the institutionalization of that process, so that we now have huge industries deceiving the public — and they're very conscious about it, the public relations industry. Interestingly, this developed in the freest countries—in Britain and the US — roughly around time of WWI, when it was recognized that enough freedom had been won that people could no longer be controlled by force. So modes of deception and manipulation had to be developed in order to keep them under control ..." [Chomsky]

---

"The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society.

Our invisible governors are, in many cases, unaware of the identity of their fellow members in the inner cabinet.

They govern us by their qualities of natural leadership, their ability to supply needed ideas and by their key position in the social structure. Whatever attitude one chooses to take toward this condition, it remains a fact that in almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons — a trifling fraction of our hundred and twenty [now 320] million — who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind, who harness old social forces and contrive new ways to bind and guide the world ... It is the purpose of this book to explain the structure of the mechanism which controls the public mind, and to tell how it is manipulated by the special pleader who seeks to create public acceptance for a particular idea or commodity. It will attempt at the same time to find the due place in the modern democratic scheme for this new propaganda and to suggest its gradually evolving code of ethics and practice." [Bernays]

(A History of Oil Addiction - 4). With all the illustrious liars who sit in the pilot's seat like Andreas Lubitz, guiding the culture we fly in, it is no wonder we did not end up on planet Earth as planned (You Are Here).

Not only that, we didn't even end up in the United States, rather, we ended up in the U.S.eh? as it were:

1) Slavery was a key driver of the formation of American wealth.

2) In its heyday, slavery was more efficient than free labor, contrary to the arguments made by some northerners at the time.

3) Slavery didn't just enrich the South, but also drove the industrial boom in the North.

4) Slavery wasn't showing any signs of slowing down economically by the time the Civil War came around.

5) The South seceded to guarantee the expansion of slavery.

(Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 7). Another cultural addiction followed in the footsteps of tobacco and cotton, which eventually grew up to become the Big Brother of all such addictions.

IV. A Lying Racist Petroleum Civilization Evolved

We have seen that, from the machinations and imaginings of the tobacco plantations of the 1600's,  slavery addiction eventually took hold on our society.

It became a cultural addiction to the point that slaves were basic assets of the society (some of our presidents just had to have them).

The reality relating racism and oil addiction is that they are twin cultural addictions, born of the same parental culture, even having similar DNA.

Thomas Paine in 1794, as quoted above, spoke of the seed in a lying culture, which by now has grown into a basic, fundamental, American right:

Saints may always tell the truth, but for mortals living means lying. We lie to protect our privacy (“No, I don’t live around here”); to avoid hurt feelings (“Friday is my study night”); to make others feel better (“Gee you’ve gotten skinny”); to avoid recriminations (“I only lost $10 at poker”); to prevent grief (“The doc says you’re getting better”); to maintain domestic tranquility (“She’s just a friend”); to avoid social stigma (“I just haven’t met the right woman”); for career advancement (“I’m sooo lucky to have a smart boss like you”); to avoid being lonely (“I love opera”); to eliminate a rival (“He has a boyfriend”); to achieve an objective (“But I love you so much”); to defeat an objective (“I’m allergic to latex”); to make an exit (“It’s not you, it’s me”); to delay the inevitable (“The check is in the mail”); to communicate displeasure (“There’s nothing wrong”); to get someone off your back (“I’ll call you about lunch”); to escape a nudnik (“My mother’s on the other line”); to namedrop (“We go way back”); to set up a surprise party (“I need help moving the piano”); to buy time (“I’m on my way”); to keep up appearances (“We’re not talking divorce”); to avoid taking out the trash (“My back hurts”); to duck an obligation (“I’ve got a headache”); to maintain a public image (“I go to church every Sunday”); to make a point (“Ich bin ein Berliner”); to save face (“I had too much to drink”); to humor (“Correct as usual, King Friday”); to avoid embarrassment (“That wasn’t me”); to curry favor (“I’ve read all your books”); to get a clerkship (“You’re the greatest living jurist”); to save a dollar (“I gave at the office”); or to maintain innocence (“There are eight tiny reindeer on the rooftop”).

And we don’t just talk the talk, we walk the walk, as reflected by the popularity of plastic surgery, elevator shoes, wood veneer paneling, cubic zirconia, toupees, artificial turf and cross-dressing. Last year, Americans spent $40 billion on cosmetics — an industry devoted almost entirely to helping people deceive each other about their appearance. It doesn’t matter whether we think that such lies are despicable or cause more harm than good. An important aspect of personal autonomy is the right to shape one’s public and private persona by choosing when to tell the truth about oneself, when to conceal and when to deceive. Of course, lies are often disbelieved or discovered, and that too is part of the pull and tug of social intercourse. But it’s critical to leave such interactions in private hands, so that we can make choices about who we are. How can you develop a reputation as a straight shooter if lying is not an option?

(US v Alvarez). That little cultural seed grew up to outlast all of us, all individual humans.

It is still living on long after we mere mortals die, long after the originators of the society have returned to dust.

Like slavery, propaganda (the art/science of lying) got hold of the culture, from the top officials down to the dog catchers like Alvarez, who faked being what he thought was a hero.

Like I said, from the top down:

Of the first five presidents, four owned slaves. All four of these owned slaves while they were president.

Of the next five presidents (#6-10), four owned slaves. Only two of them

Good looking psychopath?

owned slaves while they were president.

Of the next five presidents (#11-15), two owned slaves. Both of these two owned slaves while they were president.

Of the next three presidents (#16-18) two owned slaves. neither of them owned slaves while serving as president.

The last president to own slaves while in office was the twelfth president, Zachary Taylor (1849-1850).

The last president to own slaves at all was the eighteenth president, Ulysses S. Grant (1869-1877).

So twelve of our presidents owned slaves and eight of them owned slaves while serving as president.

(The Germ Theory - of Government - 7). Recapping, the 1600 A.D. tobacco industry ideology eventually infected cotton and other plantations, and thereby spread the cultural lie that "slavery is good for the national economy."

But, Big Tobacco (BT) did not die out like Big Cotton did, no, BT is still around and still lying about life and death.

BT developed insidious and warped ways of telling people that BT poison is good for all, and that there is no proof that cigarette smoking is bad for anyone.

BT then passed the baton of using deceiving propaganda on to the oil industry, to Oil-Qaeda (The Exceptional American Denial).

V. A Danger To Many Is Weak Compared To A Danger To All

Today, then, in preparing for a conclusion, I want to go on to show that this cultural racism, i.e. racism built into the public thinking, was built firmly into the original constitution.

It is now perpetuated by cultural dynamics lasting decades and centuries, and thus it is more dangerous by far than individual racism is.

The way I want to do that is to show how the leader of Petroleum Civilization, Oil-Qaeda, evolved from and within cultural trances.

Trances that eventually led, not only to one addiction after the other, but also led to our current predicament.

The deadly addiction that is still with us is far more deadly than those addictions from once-upon-a-time were (Keeping Up With The Jones Addiction).

Now, our culture is addicted to fossil fuels such as dirty oil, lethal gas, and toxic coal, in a way that makes it the worst addiction ever experienced.

But, it sprang from our first cultural addiction (exceptionalism on steroids), which molded cultural thinking both then and now (The Universal Smedley - 2, Viva Egypt - 2).

VI. The Infections Must Die

In a healthy society people ought to innately or naturally know that saying "The Common Good" is also the common way of saying "I've got your back" (The Common Good, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10).

Suicidal societies, which according to historian Toynbee, means most civilizations on this planet so far, have another way of expressing that sentiment (Petroleum Civilization: The Final Chapter (Confusing Life with Death), 2, 3).

VII. Conclusion (The Video)

The devolution, now taking place in our civilization, gives new meaning to "I've got your back."

Officer Michael Slager was indicted for murder (Guardian).

The next post in this series is here, the previous post in this series is here.

---

---

The War Whores Ride The War Horse - 2

The "war is peace" trance is activating in the MSM.

The President, the Pope, and the Pentagon have said recently that global climate change is the greatest threat to national security (Blind Willie McTell News - 5).

The War Whore bosses over at MSNBC (e.g. Ed Show, Hardball, Morning Joe) freaked out.

Big Ed was going to do a thingy on the Gulf because of global warming (high in Australia today is 111F) induced climate change being more of a threat than terrorists (which made the amygdala of Ed's boss hog go hysterical).

So, War Whores, Spielberg's latest film (opens legs wide) is what the presstitute bosses at MSNBC are now doing instead (cf.  War is the Highway 61 of the 1%, Is War An Art or Is War A Disease?, The Goldilocks War Propaganda: Syria is Just Right, Another Spring of Whores of War).

Remember that their Johns invaded and destroyed Libya (MOMCOM And The Sins of Libya, 2) to bring it freedom (America’s Deadliest Export: Democracy), hence the mid-east curse "may the bushies bring you democracy."

Libya is the same country where the warmongers brought democracy and peace recently (before ISIS was created by propaganda and war); and it is that same place (except that now "it is all democratic and stuff") where ISIS is said to have just beheaded 25 Christians (which really pissed off General Jesus, a.k.a. "GJ", Hypothesis: The Cultural Amygdala - 4).

Other leg spreading sources are saying that the book about assholes (On The Origin of Assholes) is surging in sales in other countries that want their foggy streets to be heavily walked too (In the Fog of The Presstitutes, 2, 3).

GJ says those countries must wait in line, until after the peace generating bombing is done, before their souls get laid:

The Lord is a warrior and in Revelation 19 it says when he comes back, he's coming back as what? A warrior. A mighty warrior leading a mighty army, riding a white horse with a blood-stained white robe ... I believe that blood on that robe is the blood of his enemies 'cause he's coming back as a warrior carrying a sword.

And I believe now - I've checked this out - I believe that sword he'll be

"Jesus is coming with an AR-15" - U.S. General

carrying when he comes back is an AR-15.

Now I want you to think about this: where did the Second Amendment come from? ... From the Founding Fathers, it's in the Constitution. Well, yeah, I know that. But where did the whole concept come from? It came from Jesus when he said to his disciples 'now, if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.'

I know, everybody says that was a metaphor. IT WAS NOT A METAPHOR! He was saying in building my kingdom, you're going to have to fight at times. You won't build my kingdom with a sword, but you're going to have to defend yourself. And that was the beginning of the Second Amendment, that's where the whole thing came from. I can't prove that historically and David [Barton] will counsel me when this is over, but I know that's where it came from.

And the sword today is an AR-15, so if you don't have one, go get one. You're supposed to have one. It's biblical.

(Gun-Toting Jesus Will Lead 'Mighty Army', emphasis added). Of course, GJ added that "patience is a virtue, so don't despair 'cause we will virtue the hell out of you in due time."

The previous post in this series is here.

---

Sgt. Ed Shultz's alter ego converts a ho mobile into a democratic dirt saving 'chine to level stuff for freedom:

---

Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 7

Thank you for enslaving us so good.

In this series we have been taking a look at the American race matrix.

A list of major references is included @ Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 3.

Yesterday we considered another aspect of the American matrix (What If There Was No Heaven Matrix?).

The structure of the American matrix is quite complex, so it takes lots of scientific papers, blog posts, and books to cover the subject (cf. the Series Posts tab at the top of any Dredd Blog post).

Anyway, speaking of books, there is one on point that has shaken up the symbolic racism discussion, so I wanted to point some of that out:

1) Slavery was a key driver of the formation of American wealth.

2) In its heyday, slavery was more efficient than free labor, contrary to the arguments made by some northerners at the time.

3) Slavery didn't just enrich the South, but also drove the industrial boom in the North.

4) Slavery wasn't showing any signs of slowing down economically by the time the Civil War came around.

5) The South seceded to guarantee the expansion of slavery.

(Huffington Post, book review excerpt). The Huffington Post book review is supplemented by the overview at the Barnes & Noble website as follows:

Americans tend to cast slavery as a pre-modern institution—the nation’s original sin, perhaps, but isolated in time and divorced from America’s later success. But to do so robs the millions who suffered in bondage of their full legacy.

As historian Edward Baptist reveals in The Half Has Never Been Told, the expansion of slavery in the first eight decades after American independence drove the evolution and modernization of the United States. In the span of a single lifetime, the South grew from a narrow coastal strip of worn-out tobacco plantations to a continental cotton empire, and the United States grew into a

modern, industrial, and capitalist economy. Until the Civil War, Baptist explains, the most important American economic innovations were ways to make slavery ever more profitable. Through forced migration and torture, slave owners extracted continual increases in efficiency from enslaved African Americans. Thus the United States seized control of the world market for cotton, the key raw material of the Industrial Revolution, and became a wealthy nation with global influence.

Told through intimate slave narratives, plantation records, newspapers, and the words of politicians, entrepreneurs, and escaped slaves, The Half Has Never Been Told offers a radical new interpretation of American history. It forces readers to reckon with the violence at the root of American supremacy, but also with the survival and resistance that brought about slavery’s end—and created a culture that sustains America’s deepest dreams of freedom.

(The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery And The Making Of American Capitalism). Our cultural amygdala, like others, rewrites history to create a matrix of illusion so that we do not know history as well as we could.

Thus, we may become susceptible to repeating the wrongs in our history, and from time to time we can see those wrongs emerge once again to plague us.

The war on voting through errant voter id laws matrix is a current example (Justice Ginsburg).

The warification of the police forces is another matrix hidden in plain sight (Will The Military Become The Police? - 10).

The next post in this series is here, the previous post in this series is here.

Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 6

This scares white racism sufferers

In this series we have been looking at the science which concerns racial impairment in the United States (see references @ Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 3).

There are many things Americans do not know about their country.

One of those things many of us are ignorant about is the degree of racism.

A new study has been published to focus on how symbolic racism impacts our concept of democracy as well as our concept of our national character.

That study shows how symbolic racism affects one of our fundamental concepts about rights of Americans.

We talk the talk about "the right to vote" in elections, but there are growing concerns about whether or not we walk the walk:

A newly published study conducted by the University of Delaware’s Center for Political Communication reveals that seeing a photograph of African Americans using voting machines affected how white respondents answered a survey question about voter ID laws. White survey respondents who saw this image expressed stronger support for voter ID laws than those who saw no image. Seeing an image of white Americans using voting machines did not affect white respondents’ support.

(Nationwide Study: Racial Images Shape Opinion on Voter ID Laws, PDF). Symbolic racism is animated by subconscious circuits in our brains which have been cultivated there by our culture (Hypothesis: The Cultural Amygdala, 2, 3, 4).

I recently pointed out how the current epidemic of voter id laws in various states is the result of an infection of fear-based memes (We Got Your Voter Id Fascist Republicans - 2).

It would seem that cultural ignorance (Agnotology: The Surge, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12) works like a trance (Comparing a Group-Mind Trance to a Cultural Amygdala) which causes wide spread dementia (Etiology of Social Dementia, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11).

This is not the way we put an end to inequality and injustice, rather, it is the way we put an end to civilization itself (Civilization Is Now On Suicide Watch, 2, 3, 4).

The next post in this series is here, the previous post in this series is here.

Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science - 5

"We have a warrant for your freedom."

The Ferguson, MO killing of Mike Brown by officer Darren Wilson, and the subsequent advent of the warrior cops has surprised a lot of Americans.

It has raised a lot of eyebrows around the world too (#Twitter).

Regular readers know that Dredd Blog has been watching the rise of the warrior cops for years (Will The Military Become The Police?, 2, 3, 4, 5), and regular readers also know that this series was dealing with the issue well before the Ferguson injustices were exposed (Symbolic Racism: A Look At The Science).

Further, regular readers also know that Dredd Blog ties these decadent dynamics into a coup of American culture (A Tale of Coup Cities, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12).

A coup that the world can see, whether Americans want to or not.

This is in accord with the historical norm that all societies, so far, either committed suicide (the vast majority), or have been murdered (The Deceit Business - 3).

The seemingly incoherent developments in Ferguson show that racism is seething below the surface, and simmering there in the frying pan of incoherent hatred.

Wrong-wing white Americans have not been shown the way to eradicate racism via reasoned enlightenment, so they have chosen to try to deny it by deceiving themselves that it does not exist.

"Gawd bless Amurka."

This is easier for them when much of that right-wing culture denies science, embraces fundamental ignorance, and is not aware of or not fond of what human rights are really about.

The W Direction, which too many Americans have taken, eventually guarantees the loss of all freedoms for the great majority, which we call the 99%.

It is also guaranteeing the "freedom to oppress" for a deceived minority that we call the 1%, a culture that is diametrically opposed to the common good.

What I am saying is that "freedom" is becoming synonymous with "no accountability" (impunity and immunity from justice).

Racism, warmongering, oppression, and self-serving have always been in the cultural amygdala of the 1% (those whose ancestors sat there celebrating rather than mourning when slavery was sprinkled with holy water in the original primitive constitution).

The next post in this series is here, the previous post in this series is here.

---

---