I don't have time to write much right now but I'll offer brief comments on your assertions about vaccine efficacy -- you and your sources are dramatically wrong.
A 2023 peer-reviewed paper with Peter Doshi, BMJ editor, as senior author, showed that the choice to define "fully vaccinated" in vaccine trials as people 14 days after their last shot led to a finding, based simply on this definitional choice, of 48% vaccine efficacy compared to non-vaccinated people. In other words, this choice of definition gave the vaccines a 48% efficacy rate "for free" and was almost by itself enough to reach the FDA's required 50% efficacy rate.
Another paper by British cardiologist Malhotra describes just how much the initial published clinical trial papers cooked the books to make the vaccines look effective, and in his reanalyis of that same data concluded that the vaccines were far more dangerous than Covid for the vast majority of people.
Last, we continue to see massively elevated "excess deaths" rates in highly-vaccinated countries. Studies have found a strong correlation between higher vaccination rates and higher excess deaths rates -- long past any Covid spikes and the vast majority of these ongoing excess deaths are not listed as connected to Covid. The reasonable conclusion is that vaccination itself is causing ongoing very high rates of deaths in these countries.
You have to do some digging past the almost complete MSM and medical industrial complex CYA operation, but the science is there to show what I'm suggesting: vaccines were massively damaging and continue to be so. All in all, the pandemic policy choices were collectively the biggest public policy backfire in the last century and we really need to absorb this lesson --- and ensure it never happens again. The vast majority of the harm from "the pandemic" was actually from the one-two punch of lockdowns and the vaccines.
Thanks for your contributions, Tam. The thing is, this was novel and experimental technology, not a normal vaccine. You simply can’t rush things like that, especially when we’re dealing with novel medical attempts at something. I can easily believe the vaccines, given how fast they were fast-tracked with Operation Warp Speed, caused negative reactions and even deaths in many individuals, even those who would’ve experienced no negative repercussions from a regular vaccine.
Novavax is/was a normal vaccine, but they don't/didn't get the same preferential treatment from the FDA as Pfizer/Moderna. As a result, it seems like nobody knows or talks about Novavax.
Yes, exactly. That's the whole point of comprehensive clinical trials and what happened was a travesty -- we are now paying the price, collectively, for a massively mis-guided "vaccine uber alles" campaign that has had global repercussions at an unprecedented scale.
I agree the vaccines were rushed and the situation was murky, with a lot of different interests at play. I think both Democrats and Republicans MAGA were seeking to deal with this. I don't think the Dems deserve the blame for a fascist totalitarian project - that is where we go into deep conspiracy. As I have been presenting, the MAGA Vance/Trump Right is going to institute all of those things that you fear Dems would do but haven't done.
Peter Thiel - Palantir and use of LAvendar AI in Gaza, killing suspects and civilians.
the Dems allow for mess, different voices. etc.
go back to what I wrote. about Vance and Trump blurbing UNHUMANS:
I point you to the book UNHUMANS which both Trump and Vance praise as a good plan for America. The book supports Franco and Pinochet and even says Pinochet's helicopter murders of his political opponents was a good thing. Both Franco and Pinochet imprisoned, tortured, and killed their political opponents with no justice or rule of law. Trump has had 7 calls with Putin -- also a psychopath who tortures and kills his perceived enemies and seeks to remake the Russian Empire by taking back Europe - since leaving office. Trump is a fascist and a traitor and you have been programmed by mind-control social media coming from Putin, Heritage, the Koch brothers, etc, who want we Americans to voluntary give up our freedoms for an elected dictatorship They have told us directly who they are. Why are so asleep that you can't see how you have been programmed. And once again, I am not saying the Democrats are awesome or amazing. They are mediocre in many ways and have run a poor campaign. But they are all that stands between us and a very dark fate.
Expert Putin mind-war has twisted the minds of smart people and they can't find a way to back themselves out of the labyrinth. But Tam I think you can. Try please.
hi Daniel, I addressed your perspective in my first comment -- I certainly agree a 2nd Trump presidency would be awful (but probably not as awful as you fear) but every presidential election I've taken part in over the last 30 years is always the big one and here we are still with an absurd and evil duopoly (I don't use that word lightly) that serves corporate interests and empire. I'm done with that. I am going all in on creating a viable 3rd party challenger and working on ways to break the back of the duopoly.
“The book supports Franco and Pinochet and even says Pinochet's helicopter murders of his political opponents was a good thing.”
It sounds awful. I’m not going to bother reading it (life is too short), but I get the sense the paranoid authors think they’re fighting fire with fire: since they see communist subversion everywhere, they seem to think fascism is preferable to the Gulags they believe “the commies” are planning for them. If their enemies are like Stalin, it must be okay to be like Franco.
‘Personally, I am always willing to change my mind when I find better evidence that supports another point of view. I hope they share that openness.’ I have read enough of you now to know that though you believe this to be true - and you are very well meaning, this is not actually your position. Like everybody else, you believe what you believe and find the relevant information from whatever source to back your beliefs. Every writer currently screaming in these silos needs to step back, connect with the physical reality of their lives and have a nice day. A quiet day, love those you love, nurture a plant, rest. Including me of course, which I am going to do now. Turning off all media. Take care of yourself and go easy. 🌸
Thank you BroMumsy. I appreciate dissenting voices like yours. Yes, it's true that human beings are fundamentally not rational, dispassionate or logical -- and life itself is not that way. You raise a legitimate point: "Like everybody else, you believe what you believe and find the relevant information from whatever source to back your beliefs."
It doesn't matter what politics you espouse, none of us is intrinsically rational, but rather impassioned and irrational (this is what Schopenhauer and NIetzsche were driving at with their vision of a remorseless and irrational Will to Live or Will to Power underpinning everything, and Freud with his vision of the individual Unconscious and Jung with his Collective Unconscious). What we call Reason and Rationality is just the tip of the iceberg of our psyche, the bulk of which is the realm of our unconscious drives and instincts.
I get the feeling Daniel has been so (legitimately) repulsed by the smug word salad rhetoric lately issuing from some of his former allies and friends -- Charles Eisenstein and Russell Brand in particular -- that he's become much more harsh, violent and polemical in his tone as a reaction to that lofty, smug, and mostly hypocritical "spirituality." I think the most important thing is we need to be able to have civil debates and discussions all across the political divide. Eisenstein SEEMS to be advocating for this -- but in practice, all he does to promote "peace" and "reconciliation" is to flee debate and discussion altogether, he just publishes one word salad missive and sermon after another and only is willing to speak with people who already agree with his opinions on everything. We need to bring people into a room to have discussions who have sharply divergent and rival views. I don't know why Charles thinks he's being so "compassionate" and "spiritual" by showing up regularly on Podcasts hosted by people who already agree with 95 to 99% of his opinions. That's not "mature." That's not being "spiritual." It's easy as pie to maintain an even keel and not lose one's cool when one surrounds oneself solely with fellow travelers, admirers and acolytes!
Well argued, no doubt too reasoned and well sourced for your detractors to be considered in a serious, good-faith dialogue. The US, with help from the manipulators you accurately identify, is becoming a splintered hyper-individualistic society with ever-diminishing common cause: a nation of shit-hoarders [compulsive acquisitionists] and individualists, as per Jim Morrison.
Longtime Democrat Bill Ackman says the Democratic Party's policies are so destructive that they're indistinguishable from what our worst enemies would do to "destroy America from within." I ask for your comments on Ackman’s 33 examples:
I’m a military guy so I can speak some truth into Afghanistan. You can say whatever you want to say but the absolute stone cold truth is- that was hands down no contest the single most successful large scale military withdrawal, all time best, in planetary history.
The equipment left behind was never intended to leave. You wouldn’t want to pay to have it extracted either. It would break you like Chernobyl broke the ruble.
Bonespur negotiated with the terrorists, something that is supposed to be morally and ethically repugnant, but he did it to score points to get the withdrawal going. As part of that deal Bonespur agreed to release a bunch of prisoners who turned out to be Isis Korison, who struck the airport checkpoint and murdered the 13 troops. Bonespur did that, not Biden.
Bonespur also jerked the rug out from under the Kurds, a wonderful beautiful nationless borderless people holding their own with a little help from the west. Tragic what happened to them, courtesy of Bonespur’s shortsighted stupidity.
10. Support for riots. What? You don’t like freedom of dissent? Peaceful people holding signs chanting “this is what democracy looks like.” That threatens you? You support cops running into them assaulting them? Right.
Why don't you pick one or two, rather than trying to flood the zone with nonsen se objections? Most of these are at least equally applicable to the Republicans. Anybody lying about the candidates mental health lately? You think DT is an advocate of healthy food policies? Choosing inferior candidates (Hershel Walker ring any bells?)?
1. Open borders? I dare you, double dare, TRIPLE dare you to go down to the southern border into Mexico, and then walk back in. I dare you. It is a pain in the keester and the border is not remotely “open.” See how long it takes you to get though our “open” border. It is a myth my friend. A myth and a lie, and you have fallen for it I assure you. Did you contact your rep and urge them to back the bill? No? Ok then, we’ll just mark you down as a “no” that prefers to complain about the border without doing anything. Maybe you’re just preserving the issue for some odd reason. Hmmmm….
30. Cuts both ways. Do you want your cake or do you want to eat it? RFK would have pulled votes from ya boi whether he’s on the picket or the ticket. It’s a wash.
All of these are assertions. There are about three cases a year of voter fraud. Requiring expensive ID to vote is simply a Republican tactic to reduce the working class vote. Like their reprehensible ban of giving water yo voters queuing in the hot Georgia sun. This is a content free list of nonsense. .
22. To be fair are you willing to deliver kudos to Biden for the masterful prisoner exchange? That shit was amazing and historic and NObody could have pulled it off but him.
32. I hate it when the RNC does that, especially now with the prez and vice decision. Inferior doesn’t begin to describe that lot. Couldn’t agree with you more.
Thanks for this Daniel. I can feel your feelings of urgency from the other side of the planet. (I live in Thailand). I seeyou diligently trying to light a fire under our asses and I also see you chiming in on Eisentstein, Brands, etc.'s accounts and not simply staying silent. I fear I, like many, have become too tired to engage as much as I use to. Modernity has in many ways simply taken it out of me. Its depressing as hell to admit this, but its true. And I assume this is also true for many of your readers. We are tired, jaded and with no real leaders to inspire us, unmotivated and unsure of what to do. I plant flowers and trees. I make art and pray. I'm not sure what else to do.
To you who don’t want to vote for Harris because of this, I ask, What do you think will happen to Gaza if Trump wins?
I’ll tell you…..
Jared Kushner already has plans to turn Gaza into an Israeli Riviera. The Palestinians will be wiped out if Trump wins! Not to mention, this will bring about WW 3! And he will deport Muslims from our country!
And if Trump wins, all of you protestors will be put in prison! Check out Project 2025!!
Harris provides an opportunity for Middle East peace through negotiations.
Voting for Harris doesn’t mean you give up any of your political beliefs or concerns. It’s a pragmatic action to get you four more years to actually promote what you want and protest what you don’t want. Your vote is not a Valentine’s card. It’s a chess move. It’s just a move to get you to a better place!
It’s either Trump or Harris. It is Russian propaganda that tells you not to vote or vote third party.
“If something on one side is deemed to be “bad” or “wrong,” then the other side must somehow be “good” or “right.” It is very difficult for us to handle ambiguity and complexity: To remain in gray areas, acknowledging imperfect shades of morality and amorality.”
This speaks to why I and many others won’t be voting. There simply is a tremendous amount of complexity and ambiguity here. You may be falling into the “Trump is ‘bad’ so therefore other side is ‘good’” trap more than you think, even though you repeatedly say you don’t like the Democrats. It simply is not clear which choice is worse.
“Pick your poison. Destruction by corporate power or destruction by oligarchy. The end result is the same. That is what the two ruling parties offer in November. Nothing else. “ CH
So tell me: when has there ever been, or could ever be, a candidate that “perfect enough” to vote for?
I already know the answer thus the rhetorical framing. It’s simply not possible for one person or one party to attain to all your moral (let alone ethical) needs. That’s why the Europeans form coalition governments. Maybe we should try that.
Jamie - really appreciate your comments here and also how you have been trying to talk people back off the ledge in Charles Eisenstein comment sections. I am completely at a loss to understand what has happened here... definitely brings Carl Jung to mind, that there is a deep instinctual pull toward the "dark waters" of the unconscious, the irrational... the desire to surrender control to a Fascist leader who will solve your problems for you, one way or another... Also we seem to be dealing with Thanatos, the death drive, on some massive collective level... like a collective willl toward subjugation, collective suicide... I don't know how else to explain it, honestly.
I think you'd appreciate this project by my friend Brian Gruber https://medium.com/electric-memories/what-is-fascism-a-conversation-with-dr-robert-paxton-14a487101e44 who spent the summer travelling from Portugal to Turkey exploring Europe's history of fascist disasters with a view to heading off the possible American one. The book is My Fabulous Fascist Action: A Journey Through Europe's Hearts of Darkness. He's giving it away free till the election. This excerpt is an excellent, US-focused interview on the nature of fascism. MAGA is absolutely a fascist movement. Trump is amoral and has no ideology other than increasing wealth and power and avoiding jail. Tempermentally he's an authoritarian - fascism is the political expression of narcissism.
Thanks brother. I really appreciate your tireless service to this. I agree around the deep psyche stuff you mention. I also suspect that in the next year or so an unprecedented level of Cambridge Analytica micro-targeting will be revealed. This is the only way I can understand the number of African American men who are proTrump for example. And supposed hippy planet and unity consciousness people who are being hypnotized by false narratives
While I’m still considering voting Democrat, I am also still angry about how the democrats closed down small businesses, stressed everyone out with lockdowns, and decimated children’s education in service of unfounded boomer paranoia.
Kids forced to go virtual will never get those important years back and many parents almost went mad with stress from suddenly having to juggle shut down businesses, kid’s virtual home schooling, or remote work on top of virtual school in small homes.
I also can’t forgive them for how they damaged relationships and caused division during Covid.
Because I was skeptical and pushing back from Day 1, some of my family and friend relationships will never recover from the fear and moral superiority spread by California democrats during Covid.
A very interesting analysis, and while I personally agree and I would vote blue no matter who..
It’s hard to vote for someone who actively provides the weapons that destroy your friends and family. Even if hypothetically the other person would do worse, it’s just not going to happen for some people and I truly fully respect that principled stance.
And it’s hard to believe a middling country like Russia has any influence on the richest, most powerful techno-empire that ever existed. There’s a deeper corruption that enables what is happening and possibly enables these actors to have any influence but I doubt the causality is as simple as Russia + NRX internet “thinkers” are driving this phenomenon. They must have some influence but likely they are just accelerating the underlying decadence of this system
information warfare is asymmetric warfare. They have done a massive amount of damage, but also there are the fossil fuel right wing billionaires like the Koch brothers and their allies who have also used PsyOp tactics... I very highly recommend the book Dark Money for a thorough analysis of how they organized themselves to win the long war for the American mind.
Not my point though. The US has been doing information warfare all over the world for decades quite successfully, in Russia and everywhere else leading to this established order. My point is that there’s only an opening because this system we have is already in the process of collapse, all these pressures always existed it’s nothing new
We are the citizens of a country that was once a series of small colonies, then it takes over a continent of indigenous people wages a war against it's neighbor, takes 50% of their territory, pushes out hundreds of military bases across the world and has puppet regimes taking over indigenous lands. We overthrow governments like it’s flipping pancakes. Spy on our allies, actively support and push right wing movements across LatAm and the Middle East. No foreign power can interfere in our hemisphere. but Russia "expansionist" and is going to win our elections.. O K
Russia is one of the three top oil producers in the world. They have around the same number of nukes as we do and the capacity to launch them at us. They have a history of recent mass genocide (Stalin) and expansionist tendencies (Eastern Europe). They have a proven history of active, global psyops that far outstrips our own in scope and capability.
But still so confusing that you go to bat for these far-right Dems when they are so blatantly corrupt, murderous, anti-democratic (3rd cycle in a row where the candidate was selected not elected), aligned with malefics like the CIA, Mossad, Big Tech, the Arms Industry, the Prison-Industrial Complex, Big Ag and Big Pharma amongst others, Pro-War, and equally if not more effective in undermining civil liberties and general societal health than the would-be idiot emperor and his flock.
They have power RIGHT NOW. If they are less evil, where is the evidence? Two proxy holocausts happening on their watch. A Supreme Court imbalance THAT COULD BE FIXED WITH THE WAVE OF A PEN (adding two more justices). Record drilling, record police and military budgets, record deficits, record inflation.
And, worst of all, the complicity in genocide and the brazen provocation that very well could lead to WWIII.
One bloated and semi-useful IRA bill in 4 years of misrule won’t cut it.
this is not about loving the Democrats but preserving what we can of our flawed democracy and our institutions, Constitution, etc. If the Right had a better agenda than "drill baby drill," cut taxes on the rich, cut social services, give Israel a freer hand, cut the IRA, get rid of environmental regulations for corporations ... but they don't. That is their actual agenda .
We get the lessons we need. If Trump is elected, the ones to suffer the most will be the disenfranchised part of his electorate, those who are not part of his electorate and chose to vote for him for all these reasons, including a belief that a major shake up is needed to break us out of our shared stunned paralysis. Of course the rest of us who did not want it will also suffer, and maybe that’s the lesson of this time - we need a critical mass of people to realize that this paralysis, paranoia and powerlessness is part of the trick. We need more people to wake up to the trick, before any change is possible. I’d love for Harris-Walz to win, but I’m also not at the edges of this society where real pain has been ignored for far too long, and people are voting from a place of deep pain. That Trump-Vance are animals that feed on this pain and only grow bigger, is apparent, and kind of the natural consequence. The opioid crisis map and the counties that went for Trump can be laid on top of each other and the whole story is there to be understood. I can say that having compassion for those who vote for them is difficult and uncomfortable because of the bile they have unlocked in their base, but I do believe the only way back is through. We can and will ride out the terrible wave that comes, but instead of being stunned into submission, we will continue to believe in the basic human goodness that exists in all of us. That we can find our way back to eventually. Our democracy is about to be deeply changed, and maybe that is also what needs to happen to decolonize, wake up and be more present. He may just be the bad trip we need to realize how much this democracy means to the world. As an immigrant I want to believe that the United States is not the Empire it first chose to defeat, however, even as I remember, the United States has forgotten, and instead behaves like the very Empire it was born to free us from. More breakdown perhaps before we truly begin the transformation?
Thanks Daniel. You've clarified what the rDNA vaccine did and does not do; I was unclear on this. I experienced a very intense, even traumatic side effect from the vaccine, in fact, I believe I experienced some degree of myocarditis, although I did not go to a hospital. I was wiped out for many weeks, very low energy. I suffered two nights of excruciating head aches that were uniquely different, and pretty horrendous. Then a 3rd night, 4 days after the 2nd shot, in which I felt a very heavy weight on my chest, and my inner dialogue repeated the phrase "Something is about to burst." It was coincidently the next morning that I read about myocarditis being reported among young men. I'm not in that demographic, but I thought: "That's exactly what I was experiencing." Anyways, I'm not anti-vaccine, but I was upset about the experimental nature of the Covid-19 vaccine. You have shed light on this and I'm not as disturbed about this as I was. Thank you.
Thank you, David, for this ongoing project of - issue by issue - bringing clarity into the confusion(s), from an empirical supported point of view. Looking forward to reading the subsequent chapters. Kindly!
I don't have time to write much right now but I'll offer brief comments on your assertions about vaccine efficacy -- you and your sources are dramatically wrong.
A 2023 peer-reviewed paper with Peter Doshi, BMJ editor, as senior author, showed that the choice to define "fully vaccinated" in vaccine trials as people 14 days after their last shot led to a finding, based simply on this definitional choice, of 48% vaccine efficacy compared to non-vaccinated people. In other words, this choice of definition gave the vaccines a 48% efficacy rate "for free" and was almost by itself enough to reach the FDA's required 50% efficacy rate.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36967517/
Another paper by British cardiologist Malhotra describes just how much the initial published clinical trial papers cooked the books to make the vaccines look effective, and in his reanalyis of that same data concluded that the vaccines were far more dangerous than Covid for the vast majority of people.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9557944/
Last, we continue to see massively elevated "excess deaths" rates in highly-vaccinated countries. Studies have found a strong correlation between higher vaccination rates and higher excess deaths rates -- long past any Covid spikes and the vast majority of these ongoing excess deaths are not listed as connected to Covid. The reasonable conclusion is that vaccination itself is causing ongoing very high rates of deaths in these countries.
https://www.apjhs.com/index.php/apjhs/article/view/3017/1610
It may be. I really don’t know! I am not sure we will ever know.
You have to do some digging past the almost complete MSM and medical industrial complex CYA operation, but the science is there to show what I'm suggesting: vaccines were massively damaging and continue to be so. All in all, the pandemic policy choices were collectively the biggest public policy backfire in the last century and we really need to absorb this lesson --- and ensure it never happens again. The vast majority of the harm from "the pandemic" was actually from the one-two punch of lockdowns and the vaccines.
Thanks for your contributions, Tam. The thing is, this was novel and experimental technology, not a normal vaccine. You simply can’t rush things like that, especially when we’re dealing with novel medical attempts at something. I can easily believe the vaccines, given how fast they were fast-tracked with Operation Warp Speed, caused negative reactions and even deaths in many individuals, even those who would’ve experienced no negative repercussions from a regular vaccine.
Novavax is/was a normal vaccine, but they don't/didn't get the same preferential treatment from the FDA as Pfizer/Moderna. As a result, it seems like nobody knows or talks about Novavax.
Yes, exactly. That's the whole point of comprehensive clinical trials and what happened was a travesty -- we are now paying the price, collectively, for a massively mis-guided "vaccine uber alles" campaign that has had global repercussions at an unprecedented scale.
I agree the vaccines were rushed and the situation was murky, with a lot of different interests at play. I think both Democrats and Republicans MAGA were seeking to deal with this. I don't think the Dems deserve the blame for a fascist totalitarian project - that is where we go into deep conspiracy. As I have been presenting, the MAGA Vance/Trump Right is going to institute all of those things that you fear Dems would do but haven't done.
Clearly stated here: https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/15/politics/russ-vought-project-2025-trump-secret-recording-invs/index.html
Clearly stated here by Trump mega-donor Larry Ellison: https://www.businessinsider.com/larry-ellison-ai-surveillance-keep-citizens-on-their-best-behavior-2024-9
Peter Thiel - Palantir and use of LAvendar AI in Gaza, killing suspects and civilians.
the Dems allow for mess, different voices. etc.
go back to what I wrote. about Vance and Trump blurbing UNHUMANS:
I point you to the book UNHUMANS which both Trump and Vance praise as a good plan for America. The book supports Franco and Pinochet and even says Pinochet's helicopter murders of his political opponents was a good thing. Both Franco and Pinochet imprisoned, tortured, and killed their political opponents with no justice or rule of law. Trump has had 7 calls with Putin -- also a psychopath who tortures and kills his perceived enemies and seeks to remake the Russian Empire by taking back Europe - since leaving office. Trump is a fascist and a traitor and you have been programmed by mind-control social media coming from Putin, Heritage, the Koch brothers, etc, who want we Americans to voluntary give up our freedoms for an elected dictatorship They have told us directly who they are. Why are so asleep that you can't see how you have been programmed. And once again, I am not saying the Democrats are awesome or amazing. They are mediocre in many ways and have run a poor campaign. But they are all that stands between us and a very dark fate.
Expert Putin mind-war has twisted the minds of smart people and they can't find a way to back themselves out of the labyrinth. But Tam I think you can. Try please.
hi Daniel, I addressed your perspective in my first comment -- I certainly agree a 2nd Trump presidency would be awful (but probably not as awful as you fear) but every presidential election I've taken part in over the last 30 years is always the big one and here we are still with an absurd and evil duopoly (I don't use that word lightly) that serves corporate interests and empire. I'm done with that. I am going all in on creating a viable 3rd party challenger and working on ways to break the back of the duopoly.
“The book supports Franco and Pinochet and even says Pinochet's helicopter murders of his political opponents was a good thing.”
It sounds awful. I’m not going to bother reading it (life is too short), but I get the sense the paranoid authors think they’re fighting fire with fire: since they see communist subversion everywhere, they seem to think fascism is preferable to the Gulags they believe “the commies” are planning for them. If their enemies are like Stalin, it must be okay to be like Franco.
Wow! The plot thickens.
The state of our public health…
https://open.substack.com/pub/tobyrogers/p/public-health-is-to-actual-health?r=68e03&utm_medium=ios
‘Personally, I am always willing to change my mind when I find better evidence that supports another point of view. I hope they share that openness.’ I have read enough of you now to know that though you believe this to be true - and you are very well meaning, this is not actually your position. Like everybody else, you believe what you believe and find the relevant information from whatever source to back your beliefs. Every writer currently screaming in these silos needs to step back, connect with the physical reality of their lives and have a nice day. A quiet day, love those you love, nurture a plant, rest. Including me of course, which I am going to do now. Turning off all media. Take care of yourself and go easy. 🌸
Thank you BroMumsy. I appreciate dissenting voices like yours. Yes, it's true that human beings are fundamentally not rational, dispassionate or logical -- and life itself is not that way. You raise a legitimate point: "Like everybody else, you believe what you believe and find the relevant information from whatever source to back your beliefs."
It doesn't matter what politics you espouse, none of us is intrinsically rational, but rather impassioned and irrational (this is what Schopenhauer and NIetzsche were driving at with their vision of a remorseless and irrational Will to Live or Will to Power underpinning everything, and Freud with his vision of the individual Unconscious and Jung with his Collective Unconscious). What we call Reason and Rationality is just the tip of the iceberg of our psyche, the bulk of which is the realm of our unconscious drives and instincts.
I get the feeling Daniel has been so (legitimately) repulsed by the smug word salad rhetoric lately issuing from some of his former allies and friends -- Charles Eisenstein and Russell Brand in particular -- that he's become much more harsh, violent and polemical in his tone as a reaction to that lofty, smug, and mostly hypocritical "spirituality." I think the most important thing is we need to be able to have civil debates and discussions all across the political divide. Eisenstein SEEMS to be advocating for this -- but in practice, all he does to promote "peace" and "reconciliation" is to flee debate and discussion altogether, he just publishes one word salad missive and sermon after another and only is willing to speak with people who already agree with his opinions on everything. We need to bring people into a room to have discussions who have sharply divergent and rival views. I don't know why Charles thinks he's being so "compassionate" and "spiritual" by showing up regularly on Podcasts hosted by people who already agree with 95 to 99% of his opinions. That's not "mature." That's not being "spiritual." It's easy as pie to maintain an even keel and not lose one's cool when one surrounds oneself solely with fellow travelers, admirers and acolytes!
Well argued, no doubt too reasoned and well sourced for your detractors to be considered in a serious, good-faith dialogue. The US, with help from the manipulators you accurately identify, is becoming a splintered hyper-individualistic society with ever-diminishing common cause: a nation of shit-hoarders [compulsive acquisitionists] and individualists, as per Jim Morrison.
I’m starting to suspect that Trump is a loss leader for the tech bros, and those who desire dominance, war, and overly large assets. PS: They cheat.
I applaud you for facing this stuff and not shying away from the controveries.
Longtime Democrat Bill Ackman says the Democratic Party's policies are so destructive that they're indistinguishable from what our worst enemies would do to "destroy America from within." I ask for your comments on Ackman’s 33 examples:
1. Open borders, unvetted immigrants.
2. Inflationary spending, rising deficit.
3. Chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal, loss of life.
4.Excessive regulations stifling business.
5. Release of violent criminals without bail.
6. Decriminalizing shoplifting, promoting lawlessness.
7. Anti-fracking policies, rising energy costs.
8. DEI ideologies dividing society.
9. Gender fluidity education, harm to children’s health.
10. Support for riots, school closures for COVID-19.
11. Anti-American, anti-Israel protests unchecked.
12. Exploding antisemitism, no action.
13. Vaccine mandates, censoring scientific dissent.
14. Censorship of free speech.
15. Legal attacks on political opponents.
16. Defunding police, loss of public safety.
17. Subsidizing inferior tech, hurting innovation.
18. Government overreach in private sector solutions.
19. Banning gas-powered cars and stoves.
20. No response to terrorist attacks on Americans.
21. Withholding arms from key Middle East ally.
22. Lifting sanctions on adversaries, bad hostage deal.
23. Removing terrorists from watchlists.
24. Lying about president’s cognitive health.
25. Ignoring unhealthy food policies.
26. Proliferation of risky vaccines for children.
27. No liability for pharma industry, excessive vaccines.
28. Convincing minority youth they are victims.
29. Inadequate protection for alternative candidates.
30. Blocking alternative candidates from ballots.
31. Backroom selection of Democratic nominee.
32. Choosing inferior candidates over better options.
33. Opposing voter ID and citizenship proof.
I’m a military guy so I can speak some truth into Afghanistan. You can say whatever you want to say but the absolute stone cold truth is- that was hands down no contest the single most successful large scale military withdrawal, all time best, in planetary history.
The equipment left behind was never intended to leave. You wouldn’t want to pay to have it extracted either. It would break you like Chernobyl broke the ruble.
Bonespur negotiated with the terrorists, something that is supposed to be morally and ethically repugnant, but he did it to score points to get the withdrawal going. As part of that deal Bonespur agreed to release a bunch of prisoners who turned out to be Isis Korison, who struck the airport checkpoint and murdered the 13 troops. Bonespur did that, not Biden.
Bonespur also jerked the rug out from under the Kurds, a wonderful beautiful nationless borderless people holding their own with a little help from the west. Tragic what happened to them, courtesy of Bonespur’s shortsighted stupidity.
10. Support for riots. What? You don’t like freedom of dissent? Peaceful people holding signs chanting “this is what democracy looks like.” That threatens you? You support cops running into them assaulting them? Right.
#8 Yeah, let's go back to affirmative action for white cis-gendered men. That worked out great for centuries.
Why don't you pick one or two, rather than trying to flood the zone with nonsen se objections? Most of these are at least equally applicable to the Republicans. Anybody lying about the candidates mental health lately? You think DT is an advocate of healthy food policies? Choosing inferior candidates (Hershel Walker ring any bells?)?
I’m sorry, that list is pretty weak and reads more like right wing propaganda than an actual critique. .
They muddy the waters to make you think it’s deep.
Nice phrase
Bonespur’s tax cuts have as much to do with inflation as the emergency spending during the emergency.
1. Open borders? I dare you, double dare, TRIPLE dare you to go down to the southern border into Mexico, and then walk back in. I dare you. It is a pain in the keester and the border is not remotely “open.” See how long it takes you to get though our “open” border. It is a myth my friend. A myth and a lie, and you have fallen for it I assure you. Did you contact your rep and urge them to back the bill? No? Ok then, we’ll just mark you down as a “no” that prefers to complain about the border without doing anything. Maybe you’re just preserving the issue for some odd reason. Hmmmm….
30. Cuts both ways. Do you want your cake or do you want to eat it? RFK would have pulled votes from ya boi whether he’s on the picket or the ticket. It’s a wash.
All of these are assertions. There are about three cases a year of voter fraud. Requiring expensive ID to vote is simply a Republican tactic to reduce the working class vote. Like their reprehensible ban of giving water yo voters queuing in the hot Georgia sun. This is a content free list of nonsense. .
22. To be fair are you willing to deliver kudos to Biden for the masterful prisoner exchange? That shit was amazing and historic and NObody could have pulled it off but him.
24. Bonespur is one step away from a rubber room. Dude needs more medication than he’s obviously on, and retirement.
20. Huh? Are you serious?
33. Yeah they were forced to remove Ted Kennedy from that list. You think that was wrong?
27. Very disappointed that Reagan did that at the urging of Pharm and the RNC.
32. I hate it when the RNC does that, especially now with the prez and vice decision. Inferior doesn’t begin to describe that lot. Couldn’t agree with you more.
Thanks for this Daniel. I can feel your feelings of urgency from the other side of the planet. (I live in Thailand). I seeyou diligently trying to light a fire under our asses and I also see you chiming in on Eisentstein, Brands, etc.'s accounts and not simply staying silent. I fear I, like many, have become too tired to engage as much as I use to. Modernity has in many ways simply taken it out of me. Its depressing as hell to admit this, but its true. And I assume this is also true for many of your readers. We are tired, jaded and with no real leaders to inspire us, unmotivated and unsure of what to do. I plant flowers and trees. I make art and pray. I'm not sure what else to do.
Well if you aren’t willing to fight for liberty you lose it, which is what seems to be happening here. Anyone with kids should be deeply concerned about the long term impacts of the rise of dictatorship coupled with increasingly powerful AI. Here is something you can use over the next weeks as a means of supporting the better outcome: https://theconnector.substack.com/p/one-last-thing-to-win-lets-go-relational?r=1mhh1&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true
To you who don’t want to vote for Harris because of this, I ask, What do you think will happen to Gaza if Trump wins?
I’ll tell you…..
Jared Kushner already has plans to turn Gaza into an Israeli Riviera. The Palestinians will be wiped out if Trump wins! Not to mention, this will bring about WW 3! And he will deport Muslims from our country!
And if Trump wins, all of you protestors will be put in prison! Check out Project 2025!!
Harris provides an opportunity for Middle East peace through negotiations.
Voting for Harris doesn’t mean you give up any of your political beliefs or concerns. It’s a pragmatic action to get you four more years to actually promote what you want and protest what you don’t want. Your vote is not a Valentine’s card. It’s a chess move. It’s just a move to get you to a better place!
It’s either Trump or Harris. It is Russian propaganda that tells you not to vote or vote third party.
“If something on one side is deemed to be “bad” or “wrong,” then the other side must somehow be “good” or “right.” It is very difficult for us to handle ambiguity and complexity: To remain in gray areas, acknowledging imperfect shades of morality and amorality.”
This speaks to why I and many others won’t be voting. There simply is a tremendous amount of complexity and ambiguity here. You may be falling into the “Trump is ‘bad’ so therefore other side is ‘good’” trap more than you think, even though you repeatedly say you don’t like the Democrats. It simply is not clear which choice is worse.
Have a good weekend Daniel 🌊
lesser of two evils is good enough for me right now... https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/15/politics/video/project-2025-russell-vought-lah-digvid
“Pick your poison. Destruction by corporate power or destruction by oligarchy. The end result is the same. That is what the two ruling parties offer in November. Nothing else. “ CH
https://open.substack.com/pub/chrishedges/p/the-choice-this-election-is-between?r=68e03&utm_medium=ios
So tell me: when has there ever been, or could ever be, a candidate that “perfect enough” to vote for?
I already know the answer thus the rhetorical framing. It’s simply not possible for one person or one party to attain to all your moral (let alone ethical) needs. That’s why the Europeans form coalition governments. Maybe we should try that.
Europeans haven't elected someone like Trump since the 30s. Electoral reform is needed. And only Dems are talking
Jamie - really appreciate your comments here and also how you have been trying to talk people back off the ledge in Charles Eisenstein comment sections. I am completely at a loss to understand what has happened here... definitely brings Carl Jung to mind, that there is a deep instinctual pull toward the "dark waters" of the unconscious, the irrational... the desire to surrender control to a Fascist leader who will solve your problems for you, one way or another... Also we seem to be dealing with Thanatos, the death drive, on some massive collective level... like a collective willl toward subjugation, collective suicide... I don't know how else to explain it, honestly.
I think you'd appreciate this project by my friend Brian Gruber https://medium.com/electric-memories/what-is-fascism-a-conversation-with-dr-robert-paxton-14a487101e44 who spent the summer travelling from Portugal to Turkey exploring Europe's history of fascist disasters with a view to heading off the possible American one. The book is My Fabulous Fascist Action: A Journey Through Europe's Hearts of Darkness. He's giving it away free till the election. This excerpt is an excellent, US-focused interview on the nature of fascism. MAGA is absolutely a fascist movement. Trump is amoral and has no ideology other than increasing wealth and power and avoiding jail. Tempermentally he's an authoritarian - fascism is the political expression of narcissism.
Thanks brother. I really appreciate your tireless service to this. I agree around the deep psyche stuff you mention. I also suspect that in the next year or so an unprecedented level of Cambridge Analytica micro-targeting will be revealed. This is the only way I can understand the number of African American men who are proTrump for example. And supposed hippy planet and unity consciousness people who are being hypnotized by false narratives
While I’m still considering voting Democrat, I am also still angry about how the democrats closed down small businesses, stressed everyone out with lockdowns, and decimated children’s education in service of unfounded boomer paranoia.
Kids forced to go virtual will never get those important years back and many parents almost went mad with stress from suddenly having to juggle shut down businesses, kid’s virtual home schooling, or remote work on top of virtual school in small homes.
I also can’t forgive them for how they damaged relationships and caused division during Covid.
Because I was skeptical and pushing back from Day 1, some of my family and friend relationships will never recover from the fear and moral superiority spread by California democrats during Covid.
In 2020 the Congress was split, the Pres was Republican and SCOTUS was strongly rightwing.
Why do you place blame on Dems for the lockdowns?
Talking about State governments and governors, local parties and school boards, not federal.
As someone who had to live through that, with two kids in school in a Democrat state, I completely understand where you’re coming from.
However, I do not think the outcomes in Republican states were any better. If you do, I’m open to seeing that data.
The US was in the top 3 for excess mortality worldwide and did far far far worse with countries that locked down harder and quicker.
Keep Going Daniel Pinchbeck!
Ok, I think it's like painting with water. Surrender and do it. Do it even though it will evaporate. It still is 'worth doing'... it still is "there"
A very interesting analysis, and while I personally agree and I would vote blue no matter who..
It’s hard to vote for someone who actively provides the weapons that destroy your friends and family. Even if hypothetically the other person would do worse, it’s just not going to happen for some people and I truly fully respect that principled stance.
And it’s hard to believe a middling country like Russia has any influence on the richest, most powerful techno-empire that ever existed. There’s a deeper corruption that enables what is happening and possibly enables these actors to have any influence but I doubt the causality is as simple as Russia + NRX internet “thinkers” are driving this phenomenon. They must have some influence but likely they are just accelerating the underlying decadence of this system
information warfare is asymmetric warfare. They have done a massive amount of damage, but also there are the fossil fuel right wing billionaires like the Koch brothers and their allies who have also used PsyOp tactics... I very highly recommend the book Dark Money for a thorough analysis of how they organized themselves to win the long war for the American mind.
Not my point though. The US has been doing information warfare all over the world for decades quite successfully, in Russia and everywhere else leading to this established order. My point is that there’s only an opening because this system we have is already in the process of collapse, all these pressures always existed it’s nothing new
Rings true to me
We are the citizens of a country that was once a series of small colonies, then it takes over a continent of indigenous people wages a war against it's neighbor, takes 50% of their territory, pushes out hundreds of military bases across the world and has puppet regimes taking over indigenous lands. We overthrow governments like it’s flipping pancakes. Spy on our allies, actively support and push right wing movements across LatAm and the Middle East. No foreign power can interfere in our hemisphere. but Russia "expansionist" and is going to win our elections.. O K
Russia is one of the three top oil producers in the world. They have around the same number of nukes as we do and the capacity to launch them at us. They have a history of recent mass genocide (Stalin) and expansionist tendencies (Eastern Europe). They have a proven history of active, global psyops that far outstrips our own in scope and capability.
And you can’t believe they can’t “influence us”?
Useful to debunk anti-vax hysteria.
But still so confusing that you go to bat for these far-right Dems when they are so blatantly corrupt, murderous, anti-democratic (3rd cycle in a row where the candidate was selected not elected), aligned with malefics like the CIA, Mossad, Big Tech, the Arms Industry, the Prison-Industrial Complex, Big Ag and Big Pharma amongst others, Pro-War, and equally if not more effective in undermining civil liberties and general societal health than the would-be idiot emperor and his flock.
They have power RIGHT NOW. If they are less evil, where is the evidence? Two proxy holocausts happening on their watch. A Supreme Court imbalance THAT COULD BE FIXED WITH THE WAVE OF A PEN (adding two more justices). Record drilling, record police and military budgets, record deficits, record inflation.
And, worst of all, the complicity in genocide and the brazen provocation that very well could lead to WWIII.
One bloated and semi-useful IRA bill in 4 years of misrule won’t cut it.
this is not about loving the Democrats but preserving what we can of our flawed democracy and our institutions, Constitution, etc. If the Right had a better agenda than "drill baby drill," cut taxes on the rich, cut social services, give Israel a freer hand, cut the IRA, get rid of environmental regulations for corporations ... but they don't. That is their actual agenda .
We get the lessons we need. If Trump is elected, the ones to suffer the most will be the disenfranchised part of his electorate, those who are not part of his electorate and chose to vote for him for all these reasons, including a belief that a major shake up is needed to break us out of our shared stunned paralysis. Of course the rest of us who did not want it will also suffer, and maybe that’s the lesson of this time - we need a critical mass of people to realize that this paralysis, paranoia and powerlessness is part of the trick. We need more people to wake up to the trick, before any change is possible. I’d love for Harris-Walz to win, but I’m also not at the edges of this society where real pain has been ignored for far too long, and people are voting from a place of deep pain. That Trump-Vance are animals that feed on this pain and only grow bigger, is apparent, and kind of the natural consequence. The opioid crisis map and the counties that went for Trump can be laid on top of each other and the whole story is there to be understood. I can say that having compassion for those who vote for them is difficult and uncomfortable because of the bile they have unlocked in their base, but I do believe the only way back is through. We can and will ride out the terrible wave that comes, but instead of being stunned into submission, we will continue to believe in the basic human goodness that exists in all of us. That we can find our way back to eventually. Our democracy is about to be deeply changed, and maybe that is also what needs to happen to decolonize, wake up and be more present. He may just be the bad trip we need to realize how much this democracy means to the world. As an immigrant I want to believe that the United States is not the Empire it first chose to defeat, however, even as I remember, the United States has forgotten, and instead behaves like the very Empire it was born to free us from. More breakdown perhaps before we truly begin the transformation?
Thanks Daniel. You've clarified what the rDNA vaccine did and does not do; I was unclear on this. I experienced a very intense, even traumatic side effect from the vaccine, in fact, I believe I experienced some degree of myocarditis, although I did not go to a hospital. I was wiped out for many weeks, very low energy. I suffered two nights of excruciating head aches that were uniquely different, and pretty horrendous. Then a 3rd night, 4 days after the 2nd shot, in which I felt a very heavy weight on my chest, and my inner dialogue repeated the phrase "Something is about to burst." It was coincidently the next morning that I read about myocarditis being reported among young men. I'm not in that demographic, but I thought: "That's exactly what I was experiencing." Anyways, I'm not anti-vaccine, but I was upset about the experimental nature of the Covid-19 vaccine. You have shed light on this and I'm not as disturbed about this as I was. Thank you.
Thank you, David, for this ongoing project of - issue by issue - bringing clarity into the confusion(s), from an empirical supported point of view. Looking forward to reading the subsequent chapters. Kindly!