political | Sep 30, 2025
“If you catch 100 red fire ants as well as 100 large black ants, and put them in a jar, at first, nothing will happen. However, if you violently shake the jar and dump them back on the ground the ants will fight until they eventually kill each other. The thing is, the red ants think the black ants are the enemy and vice versa, when in reality, the real enemy is the person who shook the jar. This is exactly what’s happening in society today. Liberal vs. Conservative. Black vs. White. Pro Mask vs. Anti-Mask. Vax vs. Anti-vax. Rich vs. poor. Man vs. woman. Cop vs. citizen. [Etc.] The real question we need to be asking ourselves is who’s shaking the jar… and why?”
Sep 16, 2025
Years ago, Doug Casey stated that, “When empires die, they do so with surprising speed.” At the time, that comment raised eyebrows, yet he was quite correct in his observation. Ernest Hemingway made a similar comment when a character in his novel The Sun Also Rises was asked how he went bankrupt. The answer was, “Gradually, then suddenly.” Again, this sounds cryptic, yet it’s accurate. Any empire, at its peak, is all-powerful, but the fragility of an empire that’s in decline is hard to grasp, as the visuals tend not to reveal what’s soon to come.
Sep 10, 2025
In 1906, Alfred Henry Lewis stated, “There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy.” Since then, his observation has been echoed by people as disparate as Robert Heinlein and Leon Trotsky. The key here is that, unlike all other commodities, food is the one essential that cannot be postponed. If there were a shortage of, say, shoes, we could make do for months or even years. A shortage of gasoline would be worse, but we could survive it, through mass transport, or even walking, if necessary.
Sep 2, 2025
Newton’s first law of motion states that an object at rest tends to stay at rest. Therefore, if a tablecloth is spread out on a table and an object, such as the fishbowl above, is placed on that tablecloth, the fishbowl will tend to “want” to remain right where it is. If the tablecloth were to be yanked away quickly, the fishbowl would move very little. Inertia would have been overcome by the tablecloth, but the fishbowl, already at rest, would tend to remain right where it had been before – on the table.
Jul 29, 2025
In 1929, Ford sold 1,507,132 cars. Chevrolet sold 1,328,605. Then came the stock market crash. Sales dropped dramatically each year until 1932, when sales bottomed at 210,824 for Ford and 313,404 for Chevrolet. But, during that time, a small new market came on stream for the two foremost budget brands—the rich. Although literally millions of people were hit very hard by the crash, those who had invested wisely retained their wealth. Those who steered clear of the stock market bubble and/or invested in assets that would survive the crash, such as precious metals, were able to continue to live well. However, they did find that when they drove down the street in their luxury cars, they stood out and became the objects of anger and scorn.
Jul 22, 2025
Fast-forward to the 21st century and we see the fractional reserve concept as the norm, with banks having a host of means by which to lend out multiples of the money they actually have on deposit.
Jul 17, 2025
Generally speaking, the citizens of most countries would prefer to avoid war. After all, they rarely benefit from it. But then, the impetus for war is almost never generated by the people of a country. Unless a nation is actually attacked, in nearly every case, the people need to be talked into going to war.
Jul 3, 2025
It is difficult for us to grasp today that, at the time the new Republic was created, it was viewed by the rest of the world as an experiment. Not even the framers of the Constitution were convinced that the Republic would last. After all, the country was broke from having fought a major war, they had no currency of their own and none of them had previously held political office.
Jun 12, 2025
You then present the two parties as having opposing views on governance. It matters little what the differences are. In fact, you can have the differences be as obscure and arbitrary as, say, gay rights or abortion and they will work as well as any other differences. What matters is that your two parties object to each other strenuously on the declared issues, working the electorate into a lather.
May 28, 2025
I stated in a recent article, “I cannot emphasize too strongly the importance of this (a possible shortage of food). History is filled with examples of cultures that would endure most anything and still behave responsibly….Nothing will cause greater, more unpredictable nor more violent behaviour in a people than a lack of food.”