One Cheer For Post Modernism

     I am going to raise one cheer -- only one -- for Post Modernism.  And it is for this reason: it is replacing Modernism.  Modernism?

     Modernism.  It is a mindset that has dominated the West for most of the past two centuries.  In natural philosophy, it became Scientism.  In moral philosophy, Relativism.  In economics, Consumerism.  In religion, Unbelief.  In psychology, soulless Behaviorism.  In domestic politics, Bureaucracy.  In world affairs, Globalism.  In art, the Absurd.

     It is the offspring of the unholy trinity of Mammonism, Mechanism, and Moloch. It demands our tribute.  It claims to be our Source and our Reason for Being.  It compels our worship of its idols of  iron, clay, and stubble.  Why defend Modernism, on any grounds?

     If it were a ship, it would be the Titanic.  If it were a computer, it would be HAL.  If it were a continent, it would be Atlantis.  If it were a book, it would be 1984.

     I could go on.  In fact, I will go on.  But not with modernism, insofar as I can help it.

     The Post-Moderns may, or may not, have found Truth.  They may not even be looking for it.   But I'll agree with them about this much:  Modernism is a Big Lie.  And that's a pretty big truth right there.

     So for that, I give them one cheer.  A big one.

James Altucher: Lies We Tell Ourselves

     This link by James Altucher, "Lies We Tell Ourselves," was recently reposted by Lew Rockwell.  I found it interesting, humane, and thoughtful.

     James Altucher regularly posts at his website, Altucher Confidential.

Looking Behind The Curtain Of Obamacare

     Since the New Deal began in the 1930s, about 90% of all federal laws are "administrative," meaning that they are manufactured, published, and enforced by bureaucrats.  Congress is kept in "idle" mode, and the job of the federal judiciary is to sort it all out and make sense of it all.  And the responsibility of the Supreme Court is to "ratify" it all as "constitutional." (Remember Chief Justice John Roberts' crucial fifth vote on Obamacare?  He knew what he had to do.)

     Obamacare was conceived in some obscure think tank somewhere; and here we all are.  And how are we going to shut down a think tank?

     Actually, this way of generating federal law was all old hat even in the late 60s, which I remember.  The system was set up and put in place long before my generation, the Baby Boomers, were even born -- in fact, before my parents' generation was even old enough to fight in World War II.  So far as I know, nobody has figured out what to do about it -- as in, how to stop it, let alone reverse it.

     By the way, I'm not mad at anybody who hasn't "taken the Red Pill" yet.  Most people don't even know that there is a Red Pill.  But this is "The Matrix," folks.

     If you doubt the truth, or significance, of what I am saying, I refer you to the ever-growing "Federal Register."  See what laws you are responsible to obey in this country, and see who promulgated them.  Good luck and happy reading.  I'll bet your eyes glaze over.  I'll bet you won't be able to make sense of even half of it.  I bet you'll say, "I can't believe anybody has time to even read all this stuff."  And I'll bet you're right.

     Not really trying to make excuses for my generation.  Just saying. YMMV.

Linking To The Mendeleyev Journal

     When I find a very interesting link, or website, I like to pass it on to the readers of Sycamore Three.  I just found another one.  (The website has been in existence about five years, and has received hundreds of thousands of hits; so I'm late to the game, as usual.)

     If you are interested in historical, cultural, or religious affairs in Russia, Ukraine, and Eastern Europe, I think this is a great resource.   Hosted by an American journalist who has been in "the former Soviet Union" for some years, and who has been privileged to travel regularly, as a member of the foreign press, with the very top recent Russian leaders, Medvedev and Putin, the information given is of good quality.

     This link will get you to the "About" page of the Mendeleyev Journal.  Take it from there.

Will Grigg's Interesting Discovery

Will Grigg posted this personal story on Facebook, and has generously allowed me to repost it here.  Will regularly posts at his own website, Pro Libertate, and often contributes to the libertarian website, Lew Rockwell.

--

"I'm trying to find Vonda Bentley," I explained to the small woman who answered when I knocked on her door in Pocatello, Idaho.

"I'm Vonda," she said, treating the large, brown stranger in her doorway to a look that contained a small measure of skepticism but not a trace of fear.

"My name is Will Grigg, and I live with my family in Payette," I quietly explained. "I was born in Burley in February 1963."

"I had a baby in Burley in February, 1963," Vonda said, a smile beginning to creep across her face.

"Then I would be your son," I replied, returning her smile.

"I've been trying to find you for a long time," she said. "I actually tried to get you back after you were born, but I was too young and I couldn't take care of you."

"I know -- my adoptive parents explained that to me," I told her, struggling to retain my composure. "I've been trying to find you for a long time, as well -- to say, thank you."

"For what?" she inquired.

"For having me," I responded with a tiny chuckle.

"That's good -- sometimes things like this don't turn out this way, sometimes the children feel as if they were abandoned --"

"I want you to know that my adoptive parents, Dick and Angie Grigg, told me when I was very young that my adoption wasn't an act of neglect, or rejection, or abandonment -- but rather one of sacrificial love," I assured Vonda. "They also told me that you did want to take me back, but that you couldn't take care of me."

"That's true -- I was too young and didn't know what to do," she explained. "Your first crib was a dresser drawer, and I knew that I had to find someone to help. So you were originally being cared for by an aunt, but she couldn't give you what you needed." Vonda eventually explained that she took me to a Dr. Sutton (she doesn't remember his first name) in Burley, who could help arrange an adoption.

"How did you find me?" Vonda asked.

"Well, when I was about four or five, I went through my Dad's files trying to find my adoption papers," I recounted. "I learned that my birth mother's name was Vonda Bentley, and for decades I tired to find you and contact you. A few months ago, a very kind friend of mine who is a private investigator, and has access to specialized databases, generously offered to help me track you down."

I told Vonda that my curiosity about my adoption was triggered by the recognition that I "didn't look anything like my parents."

"You didn't look anything like them -- well, you're Hawaiian, you know."

No. I hadn't known that.

Nonplussed, I turned to my friend Scott Watson, who had come with me to Pocatello (after a trip to report on a horrible story of police abuse in Idaho Falls -- watch for details in Pro Libertate).

"I'm not Mexican?" I said, stunned by this revelation.

"No, you're Hawaiian and Spanish -- and Cherokee -- as well as Irish on my side. You have grandparents named Watson --"

"Watson?!" Scott exclaimed. "That's MY name!"

"I was born in Alabama, and lived in Chicago and then California," Vonda continued. "My folks were from Georgia, and their grandparents owned a plantation -- but they didn't have slaves."

Pausing for a second, Vonda said: "Yes, you have Jerry's build."

"`Jerry'?" I said in puzzlement.

"Yes, your brother -- well, your half-brother. He's inside sleeping."

Vonda went into her apartment and roused a fellow who didn't seem particularly eager to come out. (I would later learn that Jerry had worked the graveyard shift, and was able to get only a few hours' sleep.) A few minutes later a very broad man came out and shook my hand. Jerry is 44 years old, Vonda's son from a marriage that ended tragically in 1972 when her husband was killed by a drunk driver. Twenty years later, my half-sister, Lee (or Lea -- I didn't get the spelling) was killed the same way in an accident in Las Vegas.

This might explain why one of the first questions Vonda asked me was: "Do you drink?"

"No -- never, not at all; alcohol makes me nauseous," I assured her.

"Good," she said, nodding her head in satisfaction.

We spoke for about a half-hour, discussing Korrin and our children, my adoptive parents and family, and Vonda's experiences growing up in a home ruled by a very intelligent man with a severe drinking problem. I discovered that my biological father was Hawaiian and, from Vonda's description, most likely Basque ("He wasn't Mexican, but he was Spanish, and he was dark-skinned with a very unusual last name that sounded French or Italian").

Antony, the biological instigator of my physical existence was also -- no other word is adequate -- a gangster.

"He was into some bad stuff," Vonda recalled. "I knew I had to get away from him. I would sleep in a room with lumps under the carpet, and when I'd lift it up I'd find rolls of money, and large numbers of checks, and a stamp with 'bonded' on it so he could cash them, and he was burying furs and other things in the yard outside our house. I knew he was going to wind up in prison, and that if I didn't leave I would have wound up there as well."

Vonda asked what I do, and I explained it to her. As I described my work in reporting on civil liberties issues and police abuse, she nodded in weary, familiar acknowledgement.

We hadn't chatted for more than fifteen minutes before she mentioned the Constitution and the right of self-defense. A few minutes later she lamented that "this country is turning Communist."

"I'm of the opinion that we've already arrived," I said, turning to Scott and commenting that this conversational turn somehow seemed appropriate, if not inevitable.

Vonda is 69 years old. She is youthful, perspicuous, well-spoken, and not intimidated by anybody. She gave birth to me exactly one week before her 19th birthday. She is also very eager to meet my wife and her grandchildren. This is going to happen, very soon.

As we left, I asked if I could give her a hug. She smiled and reached up to me, and we clung to each other for several seconds. Then she caressed my cheek, and urged us to drive carefully back to Payette.

When Vonda last saw me, I was a six-week-old infant named Kevin. She immediately accepted the 50-year-old man who is now called Will. In the intervening decades, she never gave up trying to find me.

I woke up this morning believing that I was half-Irish and half-Mexican; I drove home to inform Korrin that she had married a man who is actually Hawaiian/Cherokee/Basque/Irish -- and who had just been blessed to meet the woman who loved me enough to give birth to me under very trying circumstances, then to find others she could trust to raise me when she realized that she couldn't.

America's Masked Men

     "Supporting al-Qaida" can get you in trouble.

      People in America have been prosecuted for contributing to Muslim charities, even "government approved" ones, on some legal theory that they are really funding "terrorists,"  like Al-Qaida.

      "Ties to al-Qaida" was public justification enough to decide that Saddam Hussein must be overthrown by war.

     On the other hand, the CIA can covertly, or even openly, send money and ship weapons (including WMDs like poison gas) in support of the very same al-Qaida.  They cut deals, and break deals, with whomever they want, with no respect to any law.

     But speaking of law,  US federal law makes it a crime to even reveal who they are, to common citizens such as ourselves.  High government officials are liable for serious prison time if they should dare to name names.  (Remember "Scooter" Libby, the guy in the Bush Administration who got prosecuted for that?)

     Don't be surprised to find out that they can threaten journalists, congressmen, presidents, and private citizens who get in their way.

     Who are these masked men?

   

   

Vladimir Putin's Impressive Op-Ed

Guest post by Ben Carmack

My sense of history in the making is roughly as poor as anyone else's but I wanted to record here Vladimir Putin's op-ed in the New York Times. The Russian president made a number of excellent points, and showed himself to be a true world leader, appealing to international cooperation and international law as the key for solving problems of violence and warfare, rather than aggressive American military intervention in other countries.

For most Americans I suspect (though a lot of people have been waking up lately, and reacting strongly against the proposed Syria strike) Putin's observations about how America is perceived abroad will come as an unpleasant surprise, which they may or may not accept. What remains is that Mr. Putin's observation is simply true. The world tires of America's intervention in other nations' internal affairs. They tire of "American exceptionalism." They seek nuclear weapons, and other weapons of mass destruction, in order to be free of the fear of being invaded and messed with themselves.

Putin observantly, again probably surprising his American readers, points out that the poison gas used in Syria was likely used by the Syrian rebels to make it appear as though the Syrian government used it, in order to provoke an intervention from the U.S. to topple Bashar al Assad's regime. Unlike most Americans, Mr. Putin is aware that "false flag operations" exist. He is aware that international intrigue is a "real thing." He saw, and the world saw, though America in her media fog did not, that the people of America were being suckered into another foreign conflict for trumped up concocted reasons. Mr. Putin acted to stop it.

Putin began his first term as president of Russia in 1999, when he took over for Boris Yeltsin. Early in his presidency, I recall George W. Bush meeting with Putin and saying something to the effect of "I look into his eyes and can see he is a good, God-fearing man." Mr. Bush was made fun of for his naivete, but I think there was something to it. I think George W. Bush, before 9/11, before the neocon handlers in his administration completely took over, had a pretty good read of the world. It was Bush, after all, who promised a "humble foreign policy" when he first ran for president in 2000.

Mr. Putin has shown himself the good man in this drama, but I think there's more going on here than meets the eye. The United States has been prevented from doing something that, for over 20 years now, it has taken for granted: the right to strike or invade any country at any time. Could it be that after years of a bad economy, crippling debt and deficits, unwinnable foreign conflicts and suchlike, America has been weakened, while Russia and China have been growing stronger? Could it be that the old unipolar world is giving way to a multipolar world? We will see. But the winner of "the hearts and minds" this week was clearly Vladimir Putin, with Obama coming in far behind.