“As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action: you liberate a city by destroying it. Words are to confuse, so that at election time people will solemnly vote against their own interests. Persuading the people to vote against their own best interests has been the awesome genius of the American political elite from the beginning.
We are the United States of Amnesia, which is encouraged by a media that
has no desire to tell us the truth about anything, serving their
corporate masters who have other plans to dominate us. We learn nothing because we remember nothing.”
Gore Vidal
"In a predatory economy, the rules imagined by the law and economics crowd don’t apply. There’s no market discipline. Predators compete not by following the rules but by breaking them. They take the business-school view of law: Rules are not designed to guide behavior but laid down to define the limits of unpunished conduct. Once one gets close to the line, stepping over it is easy. A predatory economy is criminogenic: It fosters and rewards criminal behavior.
Today, the signature of modern American capitalism is neither benign competition, nor class struggle, nor an inclusive middle-class utopia. Instead, predation has become the dominant feature—a system wherein the rich have come to feast on decaying systems built for the middle class. The predatory class is not the whole of the wealthy; it may be opposed by many others of similar wealth. But it is the defining feature, the leading force. And its agents are in full control of the government under which we live."
James K. Galbraith, The Predator State, May 2006
"Education without values, as useful as it is, seems rather to make a man a more clever devil."
C. S. Lewis
"For the moneyed interests, tragedy is a wonderful opportunity, because it greatly increases the lawlessness which they use as a cover and opportunity for their predations and depredations, bringing greater power and personal increase. Vultures do not produce, but prey on weakness and tragedy. They believe themselves to be the center of all creation, superior and virtually immortal. Their pride makes them blind."
Jesse, God's Eloquent Silence, 28 June 2018
Stocks had a bounce today after a fairly awful decline last week.
The Dollar declined.
Gold had a bit of a pop, silver slid a little further lower.
What we are seeing today is what happens when people think that they can act as they wish without any consequences.
It is as old as Babylon, and evil as sin.
Have a pleasant evening.
