The Collapse

[pan]

OK, I'm an idiot - how do you upload video?

Watch this

[waldopaper]

I find the 10% figure (and have no reason to doubt it) to be a wonderful, hopeful sign.

As near as any retrospective demographers can tell, this is about the percentage of "abolitionists" present in the US in 1863. A good sign fer shure!

[pan]

Arthur Silber nails it. The Democrats or the Republicans make no difference when they all support the evil that is done in our name.

[BO]

Well, it appears Al Gore is out there fighting evil. Here's an advance copy of his speech to the Nobel Prize committee--heavily spiced with with references to the 'all-mighty one.' Oh, the fucking irony. I wonder if god-fearing Al realizes that most scientists are atheists? Al, your fucking credibility is in the tank...

SPEECH BY AL GORE ON THE ACCEPTANCE
OF THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE
DECEMBER 10, 2007
OSLO, NORWAY
Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Honorable members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen.

I have a purpose here today. It is a purpose I have tried to serve for many years. I have prayed that God would show me a way to accomplish it.

Sometimes, without warning, the future knocks on our door with a precious and painful vision of what might be. One hundred and nineteen years ago, a wealthy inventor read his own obituary, mistakenly published years before his death. Wrongly believing the inventor had just died, a newspaper printed a harsh judgment of his life’s work, unfairly labeling him “The Merchant of Death” because of his invention – dynamite. Shaken by this condemnation, the inventor made a fateful choice to serve the cause of peace.

Seven years later, Alfred Nobel created this prize and the others that bear his name.

Seven years ago tomorrow, I read my own political obituary in a judgment that seemed to me harsh and mistaken – if not premature. But that unwelcome verdict also brought a precious if painful gift: an opportunity to search for fresh new ways to serve my purpose.

Unexpectedly, that quest has brought me here. Even though I fear my words cannot match this moment, I pray what I am feeling in my heart will be communicated clearly enough that those who hear me will say, “We must act.”

The distinguished scientists with whom it is the greatest honor of my life to share this award have laid before us a choice between two different futures – a choice that to my ears echoes the words of an ancient prophet: “Life or death, blessings or curses. Therefore, choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.”

Blah blah bah continues....

[curt]

OK, I too am an idiot, but this Gore Guy, God and pass the potatos ! The asswipe backed down and took on the job of PUSHING the CO2 scare. Presently, I cannot say which is worse ; Bush & War or Global Farting with Gore. Soooo full of shit, this guy.

[Mouse]

Oh tut now.

http://www.bestcyrano.org/THOMASPAINE/?p=137#more-137

[BO]

Good article, EM.

Recognize reality, internalize the pain, then split for Panama.

'Bout sums it up.

[waldopaper]

ya Bo... that does sum it up.

I betcha you're having as much luck with "split for Panama" as I am. As the fam does the holiday booyah... i'm gonna try talking about the collapse and all. O course the "collapse" is already here. You can see it when the SA is busting heads for being there... or you can deny it until you're on the train to Camp Toast-R-Oven... and it doesn't do much good to mull about when it "officially" started... because for most folk the collapse won't exist until their own pink ass is in a sling.

Thanks for the link, EM... glad somebody else notices "America is a society of manic doers. Before we have even understood the problem, we are frantically rushing to find a solution." If you cut the word "solutions" off of every sign in the US and burned it, everybody would have a nice warm weenie-roast for an entire winter... if there were any weenies. other than the ones who write "solutions." roast them.

The reactions I got (I aint talkin to strangers about it any more) polarized to either "tut tut pooh pooh" or "what are we spozed to DO?" Sooner or later, it's going to be either escape or hide for just about everybody. Perhaps when enough of us have gathered where "they" aint, warm-dry-hydrated-fed-clean will keep the manic doers "busy."

THEN what?

[waldopaper]

Reading Carolyn Baker's stuff today... especially the "Greater Depression." She has a much more practiced response to people who want "solutions" that illuminate the entire question. For one thing, most people who ask for "solutions," says CB, really don't want to hear any. That explains the "yazbut game" that has driven meself up many a wall. Options, she sez, not "solutions." The options and flexibility will play as the collapse continues.

"Grow our own food and protect ourselves with guns," said the boy as we discussed the collapse today. Well, sezeye... I know fucking narthing about growing food... and I know enough about gunplay to tell you this... it's a really bad fucking idea. There's going to be enough of that shit going on... there already is now. Like the old pilots... you gotta use your superior judgment to avoid using your superior skills. There are no old bold pilots.

Used aeronautical metaphors several times today... but here's the best one: you're the pilot, and you just heard the engine quit.... there's the noise that pulls you through the air... and then it's not there. I don't know exactly when the engine quit... it's not important. I was absolutely sure months ago when I heard young people going "tut-tut yas-yas" about fucking TORTURE... that the engine that had pulled the "USA" had quit for sure. The passengers don't notice anything. When you are at such a high altitude... like the US is... you don't notice the rate of descent until you're much closer to the ground.

Few people outside the "financial services industry" realize how deep and embedded the mortgage traunches are in every single financial instrument. Suppose you got all yer "bucks" in the widget industry. What does that have to do with houses? Well, the suits at Widgets Inc. can't "create shareholder value" in the rapine fashion expected these days with the chump margins they get off widget sales. The "real money" is in usury-level debt rates where you can milk the chumps until they're bone-dry... then take their houses... because you can ALWAYS sell those at a profit, right? um... not now. Turnover option gone. Now it's "buy-and-hold" for anybody who has capital. And how do you "hold" when people are freezing in the streets? Back to the guns thing. Ugh.

History seems to indicate that mercenary forces quickly switch "sides" when up against groups that have nothing to lose. If the loot you get from the peasants dries up, take it from the princes. Who will try to stop you except other mercenaries? That will be the tipping point. Always has been. We are used to offering the carrot to the mercenaries... as times tighten, the mercs will see the stick. So the use of force aint "protecting" the beet -patch. It's making it cost-ineffective to seize the house next to the beet-patch for the bank.

That's where it;s going to get tough.

[pan]

Manager at the county job really likes those motivational management seminars. At annual review I got a favorable and reccommended for a step increase but the county require a professional development plan. Easiest thing to do is sign up for some courses. Spent the last two days watching affirmations, goals and plans as preached by Bob Moawad via video projection. This is televangelism for the First American Church of the Market and I am a heretic who will surely burn in hell.

We were greeted by two management facilitators who seemed full of the spirit and given attache cases embosed with the Edge logo filled with fortune cookie cards for daily affirmations, a glossy workbook, a carrying case for our own personal affirmations (view 3-5 times per day for a minimum of 28 days if you want to change), and several CDs of the sermons we were about to hear. The professional videos were filled with shots of Bob's audience laughing, responding, writing notes, and mostly listening to Bob with reverent intent. Over two days I saw my co-participants gradually give in to the doctrination, going from a cynical distance to willing participation. The facilitators were deacons to the Church of Bob, taking us through the motions and ensuring that there were no heresies. I tried to stay quiet (knowing that using logic against the Borg is futile) but did speak up a few times. T

The reaction was consistent each time: a yesbut followed by a firm restatement of dogma, when I did not submit but increased my logical dispute of the faith, Sister Mary Affirmation walked closer to me so she could stand over my chair, raised her voice a notch and became much more insistent. She isn't my manager or in my agency so the implied threat was not enough to shut me up and she "agreed to disagree" when it became clear that my heresy only going to infect the other parishioners if she continued.

The other participants were all bus drivers, not corporate desk jockies. They really had no stake in supporting the faith. The propaganda worked though and, at the end, I was the clear alien of the group.

[BO]

Very entertaining post. Thanks Pan.

Gotta love that corporate pop psychology which of course, underlies the giant denial factory that's gotten us into this mess in the first place. Everybody a salesman. No truth-tellers. Endless happy talk and capitulation. Stuff the depression that's a natural response to a world gone awry and put a smile on your face.

When I encounter those types, I shudder with repulsion.

Everything they promote flies in the face of standard practices in therapeutic psychology. It's like trying to cure heart disease with a steady diet of cheeseburgers.

I commend you for surviving it without getting thrown out. Or killing them. Which would have provided proof that you indeed, were sporting the right attitude.

[curt]

First off, bon ami, I like aliens. 10 points for Pan.

While with Honeywell, my colleagues and I were 'subjected to' a series of CORPORATE sponsored and directed MANDATORY brainwashing sessions. Much of it was beneficial for the furthering of our 'careers', no doubt. Most importantly, the intended brainwashing effect was so fucking obvious ....due to the long trip over the big pond and the general 'mindset' (not our term but who's gonna kill us for using it against them once the originators find out?) so we sat through weeks of "training" together and -as a group and as part of a group effort...which was part of the lower level brainwashing (backfire)- we helped each other get through the "classes" with minimum psychological damage. I played a large role, as the ONLY USAian in the classes. It was a success. We learned. We suscribed. We signed the dotted line. We saluted Corporatism. We swore allegance to the Double Digit Growth Doctrine. We....skated thru. And, we had fun. Our trainer, a most lovely person from la Estatos Unidos.....homegrown babe, caught on REAL FUCKING QUICK and outed herself as ..............one of us ...as in ....not a real -so to speak- well paid, convinced, homerun corporate brainwasher. We fell in love but nothing came about....which is and was and still is good. I can get soooo wrapped in people, you see. Anyhoo, forgot my dear self there for a sec. All that "training" (BRAINWASHING!!!) did me good ....just like my first polygraph with an ex-FBI agent did. Say what ?! Yes. I did. Yes. I passed. And yes, I got the job.


Minimum wage. Nite shift. Circle-K without a gun.

Some, shine......and some, are drawn to the light.

We have tasted the salt. We are aware. We too, can communicate. And yes, we do.

God save the Team. (Tribe)

Double Digit Growth for la Resistance !! Pro Anum. Eat THAT (this *), you fucking Corporate Fascist Bastards !!!

* flipped bird as in middle finger

[waldopaper]

Good news, pan! when you get to go to meetings and eat cookies, your "position" is fairly secure.

All "managers" like to go to meetings and eat cookies. Or donuts. That's why I call it the dipdunk factor. You can't even BE a manager anymore without a high dipdunk factor... you must go to "meetings," and do powerpoint presentations... and to me they all started to look like the Doug Zongker chicken presentation... except no one laughed... unless they were supposed to. "Change management" is especially fun. Hey- we all gotta eat shit sandwiches. Could we just eat the shit sandwiches and be done with it... without the "training?" Nooooo... because the "managers" had lots of meetings and ate lots of cookies to find the right "consulting firm."

I got to work with one such dipdunk whose mantra was: 1. change is inevitable. 2. it may not be pleasant. 3. YOU are accountable. (caps and underline required) I asked a grizzled veteran what this meant... and without missing a beat, he answered 1. The shit's gonna hit the fan. 2. It's really gonna stink. 3. We are going to find some way to blame it on YOU. As a consultant myself, I went to lots of meetings and dipped lots of dunks. For one project I got to spend six months researching and writing a "report" for "senior management" about "team building, change management and shareholder value." No shit... really. I finally had 10 pages with 2 pages of "references." Had to expand it to 20 pages ("plop" factor, you know) with graphs and charts. The REAL work was the "executive summary," getting all this bullshit down on one page.

After it was all over, I thought... shit... I bet I could get that down to half a page... no... I bet I can get it down to five LINES... so here it is... what I consider my corporate masterpiece. From "9-11" until last year, it was the first writing assignment... for ANY class... I give you:

The Little Parrot Paradigm

I. Be an obedient slave
II. Parrot the dogma
A. Never question anything
B. Help us brutally suppress anyone who does
III. Your reward is in heaven

Fucking brilliant, eh? I thought so. It summarizes not only the secret to corporate success, but the workings of the empire... ANY empire... or "mature" organization... in five fucking lines. Now, being a good mercenary whore... I had no trouble with any of it... EXCEPT... II... subset B. The fatties could never pay me enough to smack down anybody with a good bullshit detector. In the real world, you NEED people with a good bs detector... and they're so goddam rare. It's not only unethical to suppress such folk (especially using brutality)... it's bad business. Besides, I figured the fatties ought to do something for the obscene amount of money they got paid.

Well... the fatties usually realize there are enough brutal psychopaths who will inflict pain for shits and giggles. Don't even have to pay them much. These are the folk who populate at least half of any given "police department." That's the mystery to me right now... when the rich fatties can get psychopathic bullet-heads to inflict misery for almost nothing... WHY do they insist on the rest of us joining in? Maybe there aren't enough psychopaths... or maybe the fatties are afraid of the psychopaths... they should be.

resistance is futile, pan. You WILL be assimilated. haw- in a pigs ass!!!