Page added on December 21, 2020
Virtually everyone agrees that 2020 was an abomination. An entire industry of opinion writers is busying itself with end-of-year handwringing, scouring every online thesaurus for adjectives to express just how horrible the last twelve months have been. But what facet of the awfulness to focus on? For the appalled chronicler, the most obvious starting points are the coronavirus pandemic, which has left illness, death, shuttered businesses, and lost jobs trailing in its wake, and the chaotic US presidential election, in which the soundly defeated incumbent has attacked and seriously weakened the very foundations of democracy on his way out the door.
These two baskets of grim news (pandemic and election) have been accompanied by a shift in the national (and, to some extent, global) zeitgeist—a shift that’s been obvious to anyone paying attention, but that’s nevertheless challenging to capture in words. Let’s call it the fracturing of consensus reality. While it won’t be the top story of the year according to most news roundups, it may end up being just as impactful as anything else that’s happened during our latest orbit of the sun. And that’s saying something.
As social and linguistic creatures, we humans—operating in groups—create shared mental worlds. We perceive sensory data, then we verbalize and conceptualize those perceptions, and finally we check our verbalized and conceptualized accounts of reality with other people. Over time, a consensus emerges.
This language-mediated reality-building process is hardly new; it’s been going on since we all lived by hunting and gathering. Then, everybody within their little groups shared the same stories and the same basic mental map of the world. After we adopted agriculture, social classes and full-time division of labor ensued. With slavery, kings, and a dramatic reduction in the social power of women, consensus reality became more of a Venn diagram, with the king having the final word in defining the overlapping region on the diagram representing consensus. Later, the emergence of writing and Big God religions enabled reality to be codified for empires, and elements of the dominant consensus (e.g., Roman law and Christianity) could be spread among alien cultures. For most Europeans, even as dynasties came and went, reality remained essentially whatever the Bible, the church, and the king or emperor said it was.
Consensus reality was never consistent or complete and never a correct map of what it purported to represent; it was always an approximation skewed by power relations. Some people’s realities were privileged, while other people’s were marginalized, excluded, or intentionally destroyed. And there were always blind spots—actual trends, vulnerabilities, and consequences that nobody noticed or talked about, such as the gradual depletion of natural resources—that only became “real” when they could no longer be ignored.
The modern era (from roughly 1500 on) brought new sources of diversity to the consensus-building process. As Europeans conquered societies around the globe, “reality” began to reflect the sounds and flavors of these diverse cultures; the result was everything from jazz to fusion cuisine. Meanwhile, the power of commerce greatly increased, reducing the influence of church and aristocracy.
Increased diversity and a shift toward commercial primacy were accompanied by new integrative trends in the process of collective reality-building. Principal among these was the emergence of science—a self-correcting method for discovering objective truth. Of course, science had its blind spots, too (for example, it was often subject to commercial influence—witness the long lags in recognizing the nasty side effects of tobacco and pesticides), but it was persuasive: assertions could be tested by controlled experiment. Over the decades, science built formidable structures of knowledge that most people lacked the expertise or temerity to question, but that could be verified by anyone with the necessary resources. Reality became “enlightened.”
Another integrative trend consisted of the development of new communication tools—the printing press, and later radio, movies, and television. Increasingly, through these media, nearly everyone was exposed to common facts, ideas, and images. The wealthy banker and the destitute farmer uprooted by the dust bowl were marinated in the same Hollywood imagery, and the same civics homilies taught in compulsory public schools.
The emerging global consensus suffered a couple of serious ruptures during the modern era. In Europe, fascism brought more than a new set of political power relations; it created a mental universe so dominated by notions of racial and national superiority that it demanded the rewriting of textbooks. And in Russia, communism built a narrative in which the dictatorship of the proletariat—under constant attack by the forces of capitalism—must ultimately prevail, leading to a workers’ paradise. Both fascists and communists used new mass communication tools (radio, movies, and newspapers) to give their consensus realities force and credibility.
Even science could be repurposed to support alternate realities. In the Soviet Union, the state decided to back an alternative to natural selection and science-based agriculture. The originator of this heterodox set of views, Trofim Lysenko, became Director of the Soviet Union’s Academy of Agricultural Sciences, where—with Stalin’s approving help—he rooted out the study of Mendelian genetics and taught instead the theory that characteristics acquired by parents can be directly transmitted to their offspring. Opponents of Lysenko were accused of “mysticism, obscurantism, and backwardness,” then banished to Siberian work camps. As a result, biological science in the Soviet bloc was set back decades.
After the defeat of fascism in WWII and the fall of the Soviet bloc, the West’s consensus—shaped largely by the US—seemed to become reunified and stabilized. Political scientist Francis Fukuyama called it “the end of history.”
But blind spots persisted and grew. Some of these profoundly shaped not just the dominant worldview itself, but the contours of daily life for multitudes. One telling example: the so-called science of economics codified for nearly everyone the false assumption that perpetual growth in industrial activity is possible, and denied all evidence to the contrary. Economics concealed other blind spots as well, as it continually ignored widespread signs that the “free market” does not in fact benefit everyone, and that people do not actually behave like idealized rational self-interest-maximizing robots.
Some persistent and periodically worsening cracks in the consensus ripped along economic, ethnic, or political fault lines: especially during the Jim Crow era, African-Americans and European-Americans in southern US states inhabited sharply different realities, and stark inequities have persisted to the present. Other cracks, fed by suspicions that powerful people were manipulating the consensus to their own benefit, led to what came to be known as conspiracy theories—including doubts about the official accounts of the JFK assassination and 9/11, as well as misgivings about the safety and “real” purpose of water fluoridation and vaccination.
Meanwhile, communications media were evolving still further. While radio and television had a largely unifying effect during the 20th century, the internet and social media are proving to be disintegrative to consensus in the 21st. Algorithms capture users’ interests and prejudices and feed them news and opinion articles that lead them to have ever-more-extreme views. “Do you think the government is suppressing information about space aliens? You don’t know the half of it! Read this!”
The radicalizing propensity of social media was a factor in the sudden political ascendancy of Donald Trump, who acted as both symptom and driver of consensus breakdown. As a real estate developer and reality TV personality, he seemed an exceedingly inexperienced and unlikely candidate for the top political office in the country, and arguably the world. His intellect and ethics were widely suspect. But he had the ability to give utterance to the grievances of a sector of the populace that feels left behind—people of mostly European ancestry in low-density towns and rural areas across the nation (in recent decades, most of America’s wealth and cultural attention has flowed to high-density, multi-ethnic cities). Even if Trump could not change the material circumstances of small-town families, he could make them feel as though they had a voice. Ironically—and perhaps therefore somehow even more fittingly—it was the voice of a gaudily privileged New Yorker. But it was an angry voice, and it spoke in words of few syllables. He was the first Twitter President. The Trump team’s communication strategy, in the immortal words of former top adviser Steve Bannon, was to “flood the zone with shit.” Disruption of consensus reality wasn’t a regrettable side effect of their efforts; it was a central goal.
In short, prior to the year now ending, consensus reality in the US was already starting to crumble. But 2020 delivered two sledgehammer blows: a pandemic and a polarizing presidential election.
First, the pandemic. As many observers have pointed out, COVID-19 has greatly varying infection and death rates by nation, and countries with higher levels of social cohesion have generally tended to do better at combatting the disease. The United States has fared the worst of all countries in raw numbers, with over 17 million total cases so far and over 300,000 deaths (about a dozen smaller countries, including Belgium and San Marino, have suffered higher per capita rates of infection and mortality). Currently the US is seeing over 200,000 new cases each day and roughly 2,500 deaths. Unless the trend changes, total mortality for the country may eventually begin to rival that of the 1918-1919 influenza pandemic, in which about 675,000 died (though the per capita death rate will almost certainly not be as grim, given today’s far larger population).
Why has the US suffered such a horrific outcome? Much of the blame certainly must be borne by President Trump and his political appointees and allies in the federal government. They mounted almost no coordinated national pandemic response; instead, states were left to formulate their own policies and to compete with each other for medical supplies. Messaging from the executive branch was likewise unhelpful or downright counterproductive: in the early weeks, when the virus was largely just a distant menace and preparations could have made a huge difference, the President dismissed the need for concern (on January 22, he told a CNBC interviewer, “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China, and we have it under control. It’s going to be just fine.”). Then, when it became clear that sickness was spreading and people were dying, Trump invented the term “China virus,” evidently seeking to deflect blame while still failing to forge a national response plan. Later in the year, as economic and political concerns took the spotlight, Trump returned to almost completely ignoring the disease, even omitting attendance, for weeks at a time, at meetings of his coronavirus task force.
With no clear messaging from the President, it was essential that the appropriate federal agencies step in. But here again the response faltered. The Centers for Disease Control at first advised the public against mask wearing, despite clear evidence that masks were effective at stopping the spread of the disease. Only later, once masks became more widely available, did the CDC change its recommendation. But this self-contradiction had undercut the agency’s credibility. Many people continued to believe that mask wearing is ineffective, while the President encouraged his followers to see mask mandates as government overreach.
Conspiracy theories immediately filled the vacuum of leadership and consistent government messaging. Millions of people, stuck at home under lockdowns, were spending more time than ever on social media and Google, exploring ideas and opinions about the coronavirus. A pair of YouTube documentaries titled “Plandemic” became instant sensations. Many people adopted the view that there simply is no pandemic, and that the “fake news” media ginned up the story as a way to enable globalist liberal elites to exert more control over citizens and the economy.
Now that vaccines are on the horizon, the conspiracy mill is cranking harder and faster than ever. While the anti-vax movement has been slowly simmering for decades, its current leaders’ books are suddenly among the top-sellers on Amazon. Up to a third of Americans say they will likely refuse to take a vaccine when it is available. While many people hope that the advent of vaccines will halt the pandemic in its tracks, anti-vax fervor, along with the soaring rate of infections, may mean that the disease will continue to spread and kill far into the new year.
If Americans were divided prior to the pandemic, their tribalism only intensified as the decision about whether to wear a mask became an instantly visible expression of group identity. But division was deepened also by the fact that 2020 was a presidential election year.
Elections are always polarizing. That’s the point: each voter must choose one candidate or another; “all of the above” is not an option. But this election season pushed the polarization needle far into the danger zone. Democrats steeped themselves in books and articles detailing accusations that Donald Trump presents all the clinical symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder, and that he is an authoritarian, a rapist, a tax cheat, a business fraudster, a Russian puppet, and a traitor. At the same time, followers of QAnon (who is supposedly a patriotic government insider) spread the notion that leading Democrats are Satan-worshiping pedophiles running a global child sex-trafficking ring, while Trump—a messiah sent by God—heads a heroic behind-the-scenes effort to preserve decency, freedom, and Christianity (QAnon believers now occupy seats in Congress and many state houses).
The election outcome was unequivocal. Biden bested Trump by 7 million popular votes, with electoral votes stacked 306 to 232. Even Republican election officials in swing states said the balloting went off with scarcely a hitch. But Trump, evidently unwilling to be seen as a loser (or perhaps wishing to avoid prosecution for financial crimes once he leaves office), claimed that the election was rigged and that he had actually won. A flurry of almost 60 lawsuits followed, two making their way to the Supreme Court; all were dismissed. No convincing evidence of widespread irregularities was produced. Nevertheless, Trump’s followers adopted the narrative that millions of dead people had voted for Biden, and that suitcases full of illicit Biden ballots had been surreptitiously delivered to vote tabulators. According to one poll, only a quarter of Republicans think Biden was legitimately elected. A steady drumbeat of evidence-free assertions resounding through right-wing media channels and parroted by Republican elected officials (who fear retribution from Trump’s base) has created a formidable alternate reality in which Trump won fair and square, while Biden is being falsely elevated to the highest office.
Cognitive dissonance—the holding of contradictory thoughts or beliefs—makes people miserable. And when a person’s own interpretation of reality runs counter to the consensus reality, some degree of paranoia or depression often results. Alternatively, a person unmoored from the dominant consensus may become a dedicated paradigm warrior intent on converting others to their own views, sometimes even by violence.
The loss of consensus is therefore also problematic for society as a whole. People who have left the consensus behind may disregard or flout norms (such as longstanding informal rules with regard to elections and Congressional procedures). Society then becomes less capable of solving problems; and so, if economic, social, or environmental crises materialize, societal collapse of one sort or another becomes a real possibility. As individuals find themselves not just disagreeing on politics or religion, but living in different and directly conflicting mental universes, they individually experience cognitive pain and anguish. Families are torn apart, friendships severed. But the collective risks of consensus breakdown go deeper, and include the possibility of widespread rage, pushing society toward civil violence, coup, or state failure. If, as is often the case, the fracturing of consensus results in (or is caused by) strong feelings of grievance among one group against another, a cycle of retribution may ensue. Recent brain research by James Kimmel, Jr. at the Yale University School of Medicine shows that the brain on grievance craves retribution in much the same way a brain addicted to heroin craves more heroin.
Is the fracturing of consensus reality a symptom of societal decline due to other factors (such as economic crisis or limits to vital resources), or is it an independent variable, capable of causing collapse by itself? In my view, the former is more likely the case: if a society is doing well economically, it is usually able to resolve occasional cognitive contradictions over time. A polarizing demagogue (like Joseph McCarthy or George Wallace) may appear, but the status quo eventually reasserts itself. However, if a society is experiencing an economic, political, or social emergency, consensus breakdown may contribute to a self-reinforcing process of collapse.
People’s views of reality don’t diverge arbitrarily and without cause. They do so because people’s self-interests (which may differ by income, status, region, religion, or ethnicity) are becoming further divided. The divergence of worldviews is thus a secondary problem. But once consensus begins to shatter, people’s interests are likely to diverge even further as bifurcating worldviews create economic and social islands. People may even separate geographically, moving to be closer to people with whom they share values and views. Further, if an increasing majority people in a given community are espousing a new shared belief, others may feel compelled to alter their previous beliefs in order to belong.
The fragmentation of consensus reality isn’t just a war of ideas. It is a more profound and disturbing process both psychologically and socially. People who have abandoned, or who have been abandoned by, the consensus may find dubious new beliefs to cling to; but they may also become keenly aware of cultural blind spots that others continue to ignore. They feel themselves flung into a new universe; the experience can be either terrifying or thrilling, or both.
One of the effects of loss of consensus is the lowering of social trust. Trust is the basis of cooperation, and high levels of cooperation are required for modern complex societies to function. According to surveys by Pew Research Center, 71 percent of Americans think interpersonal trust has weakened in the past 20 years. There is a strong correlation between low trust and Trump voters—which could be an explanation for why the pre-election 2020 polls were inaccurate: people who are distrustful not only disproportionately voted for Trump but also refused to participate in polling surveys.
Because the costs to society of loss of consensus are obvious and considerable, societies invest heavily in maintaining a shared worldview. But if there are severe and growing flaws in that consensus, keeping it whole may not be an option.
When consensus fractures into two directly competing narratives, some people may seek to resolve cognitive dissonance by claiming that the two narratives are equally valid. But this is a difficult stance to maintain, as the narratives are usually mutually exclusive. Take the current case with regard to the US presidential election: the main competing reality claims are not on equal footing with regard to facts or outcomes. The “Trump really won” claim is simply fantasy; the “Biden really won” claim is backed by clear evidence that will result in the actual inauguration of a new President. But, in a way, facts are beside the point. Over a third of Americans are so alienated from the consensus that they prefer to believe obviously fabricated lies rather than to acknowledge demonstrable proof. The new Republican “reality” is tenable not because it is based on anything physically verifiable, but because it is emotionally satisfying for people who refuse to accept the dominant narrative. In the post-Trump era, traditional Republican ideology (low taxes, states’ rights, limited government spending) becomes entirely expendable. Any argument that “owns the Dems” is good, regardless how specious. Democracy itself becomes an impediment to the goal of wrecking the consensus.
Defenders of the dominant worldview can’t understand why anyone would be so upset with it. Isn’t it based on science and established values and traditions? Doesn’t the alternative represent a devolution into pseudoscience, conspiracy theories, and deepening dissension?
To a certain extent, the fervor of the disestablishmentarian faction is traceable to economic and social trends mentioned earlier (the flow of wealth and power to coastal urban centers and the slow demographic shift of the country toward multi-ethnicity). The upholders of the mainstream consensus accept those trends, which their elites use to their own advantage, but they fail to take account of those left behind, or to see the holes and blind spots in the consensus they defend.
Perhaps the deepest blind spot in the current US consensus is that it has no satisfying and unifying vision, no coherent ideology; its main guiding value is simply “more.” Its implicit message: we must keep on doing what we’re doing (producing more wealth by turning more of nature into waste) because to do otherwise would result in economic Armageddon. The best we can do is to somehow avert catastrophic climate change and reduce extreme wealth inequality with technical work-arounds, even as we continue to do the very things that cause those problems.
The central lie of the consensus is that the rising tide of economic growth will lift all boats . . . eventually. But eventually never seems to come. As the folly of expecting endless economic growth on a finite planet starts to reveal itself—via the need for ever more drastic measures to maintain the appearance of growth and to prevent widespread destitution—something has to give. People who feel unfairly treated as the impossible perpetual-growth machine decelerates begin fleeing the consensus, even if doing so leads them to curse imaginary scapegoats and believe obvious fictions.
Joe Biden is central casting’s answer to the call for a tried-and-true figurehead to restore the old consensus. Anyone who’s not swept up in anti-elite fervor probably finds it easy to sympathize with his exhortation to bring America back together, and his intention to be President of all the people, including those who voted against him.
However, Biden faces daunting if not insurmountable challenges. These arise not just from fervent, defeated, and angry Trumpists, who may attempt to run a “shadow” presidency, countering every action of the new administration. There are also hurdles inherent in the taming of the pandemic and the stabilization of the economy. Less widely acknowledged but perhaps most formidable of all is the challenge of finally coming to terms with the blind spots and lies embedded in the worldview that still runs the machinery of our economy and government. Consumerism—a way of organizing the economy that is fundamentally at odds with nature’s limits—is so deeply and implicitly woven into the warp and weft of modern America that only a cathartic collapse and renewal is likely to expunge it. The best Biden can likely do, even if he has the strategic brilliance to propose a Rural New Deal, is to be a competent placeholder.
The perplexing fact is that we don’t know what kind of new consensus may emerge, or when. Indeed, it is entirely possible that, in the context of energy and economic decline, the human ideasphere will remain fragmented from now onward.
However, I’d like to think that a new consensus is indeed possible, and that it will comprise the best of what we humans have learned so far. And, though what follows is entirely speculative, it seems appropriate to close this essay with an exploration of what that consensus might look like.
Science would be an obvious candidate for inclusion, blind spots and all: its self-correcting mechanism tends to deliver improving approximations of truth with regard to physical reality. Of course, in a world with a smaller and slower economy and much less energy available, only comparatively small and simple experiments might be possible, but it’s the method that matters.
Science can’t tell us much about values and goals. For those, knowledge is less important than wisdom. And wisdom comes from intelligent self-control. As sages have always taught, it is in the taming of selfish urges that we find compassion and contentment. After the environmental and social mayhem that our two-century fossil-fueled consumerist mania will ultimately and undoubtedly unleash, I think we are likely to develop a strong and healthy collective skepticism regarding the aggregation of power for its own sake.
A sustainability-oriented worldview would acknowledge the ongoing need for a low and stable population relative to environmental carrying capacity. And it would prize sufficiency, equity, resilience, and happiness above accumulation and ostentatious display.
Our remarkable human capacities for language and tool making have gotten us into plenty of trouble over the millennia, never more so than now. A healthy consensus worldview would channel those outsized abilities away from geopolitical dominance and the production of wealth for the few, and toward the democratic (rather than just elite) production of beauty in all its possible forms—including poetry, literature, movement, music, art, drama, and architecture. And it would guide aesthetic appreciation toward the enhancement and emulation of nature.
Finally, a future consensus would take account of varying human needs, proclivities, modes of expression, histories, brain chemistry, and more, seeking reconciliation and community rather than exploitation and dominance.
Such a consensus reality, such a culture, is far from where we are now. Between here and there sits a valley we must cross. If we travel together, we have a better chance of arriving safely on the other side. That requires healing the divisions among us, if and when we disagree.
Have a peaceful holiday season.
37 Comments on "2020: The Year Consensus Reality Fractured"
makati1 on Mon, 21st Dec 2020 3:37 pm
Have to read this one later, but Heinberg gets my vote, even if he goes a bit Unicornish. LOL
Theedrich on Mon, 21st Dec 2020 11:06 pm
Anti-Trumpist Heinberg is at it again. All evil is due to Trump. We need Stalin back to impose uniformity of thought and action, and send deplorables (mainly Whites) to Gulags and re-education camps. Never mind that the White population is dwindling drastically and the numbers of unWhites (especially Africans and Allahlanders) are exploding.
Biden, in Heinbergs view, will be hampered by Trumpites. The poor geezer (sniff, sniff) just has no power. But we that is, you, Whitey will have to design a new Disneyland which does all things for all people (except Whites). Everybody must reconcile with and submit to the new God-man and his vice-Goddess-woman and their forces. Joey is going to give every loyalist a good, high-paying union job. Making windmills and solar panels and other perpetual motion machines.
And the Washington DC swamp will engulf the nation. Thanks for the advice, Richard.
Go Speed Racer on Wed, 23rd Dec 2020 6:03 am
Ho, Ho, Ho. MA Christmas Present for all…
A green recliner on fire in
the backyard … Merry Christmas
to all, and to all a good night !!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeFJXGkMnbA
Go Speed Racer on Wed, 23rd Dec 2020 6:23 am
Santa Claus has ONE MORE
Christmas Present ….
Watch the FedEx Truck in the snow
get broadsided by train and ALL
those parcels for good girls and
boys get launched into the snow!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD89wPiicCg
Merrrry Christmas !!
KEEEP the FAITH because a scam biden
fake presidency will DESTROYYYY AMERICA,
Trump can STILL overturn the FAKE ELECTION
and latest rumor is he will TAKE THE
NUCLEAR FOOTBALL with him back to TRUMP
TOWER and launch against various liberal
democrat and other communist targets, while watching from
his top floor !!!
Merrrrry Christmas !!!!
Dont be a LIBERAL — video …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ud5z9rUOfOI
Benjamin Goldstein the hook nosed yid on Wed, 23rd Dec 2020 6:48 am
Yes Biden is mostly a collection of Hair plugs in search of a brain.
Dredd on Wed, 23rd Dec 2020 8:42 am
The Ghost Plumes – 14 survived 2020 …
Theedrich on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 12:25 am
The mainstream media are pure hate. They are run by the same crowd of Communist Yids and other freaks that submerged Russia into the bloodbath of Communism in 1917 and started the world on a path of global insanity. That crowd defecates its lies and its covert dialectical materialism onto TV screens all across the Western world, especially America, and the viewing ignorami slurp the gibberish up.
The masses are diverted with countless clips of laughing children (usually diverse), and/or of young White women happily face to face with Negroid males implicitly ready to copulate with them and produce mulattoes of low IQ. These scenes are interspersed with sports pics showing apelike Afroids smashing into one another on some football field or engaging in some other infantile anthropoid activity calculated to impress woke Whites.
The undertone of it all is the depiction of White males as vastly inferior to the spooks in every way. That way they can be made to accept the overlordship of the global superrich who bribe our politicians and control the media. Hitherto, the only speed bump to takeover by the globalists has been President Trump, who must be, and has now been, destroyed. It now looks as though the elites are about to succeed, having inserted election-altering software into the internet-connected Dominion machinery used to count the votes of the November 2020 election.
The façade of American democracy has collapsed, soon to be followed by the countrys economy. The Chinese virus is playing a major role in the demise, along with cyber hacking of every sort. Never mind the almost universal spread of brain poisons of every sort among the populace a spread accelerated by deliberate inattention and profiteering by the politicians at the head of the country. In short, the physical, cultural and moral fiber of the White backbone of America has been dissolved by the filth governing us. Life no longer has any meaning for the addicts, the destitute and the woke professoriate besides fun and games, bread and circuses.
Hence, after us, the deluge.
Duncan Idaho on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 9:53 am
This Steaming Pile of Filthy Pardons Stinks Just Like the Fat Boy
https://www.thedailybeast.com/this-steaming-pile-of-filthy-pardons-for-paul-manafort-roger-stone-and-charles-kushner-stinks-just-like-trump?ref=home
Duncan Idaho on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 11:23 am
More than 3 million people died in 2020 – the deadliest year in US history
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/12/22/2020-deadliest-year-united-states-coronavirus/4006270001/
Apneaman on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 12:50 pm
Theedrich, yes hate, including FOX news, the most watched MSM news station in America & Rush Mad Dog Limbaugh, the most listened to man in America @ 15 million listeners per day.
Whoops, there goes your ‘liberal media’ narrative out the fucking window.
What’s the definition of Trump’s ‘speed bump’?
You Trump worshipers never shut up about, swamp draining & speed bumps & deep state wounding, but it’s all so vague.
Given y’all study your super daddy’s every move, you’d think just one of you would be able to provide some specifics. Like data & the names of dead swamp rats & the ‘for the people’ saints that Trump replaced them with. Nope. Never seen any of you provide those details….because there is none…..because it’s just theater.
My how cheaply y’all sell your loyalty. All Trump had to do was tweet your hates & grievances & you dropped trou & bent over. No different than Obama, cept boma uses an adult level vocabulary.
Trump loud. Obama slick. Public dupes.
“All sides pretended that Trump was a radical deviation from the norm, and so did Trump, when all he actually did throughout his entire time in office was protect the status quo just like his predecessors did. As writer and activist Sam Husseini recently put it, “Trump is the opposable thumb of the establishment. He looks like he’s on the opposite side, but he just helps it grab more.”
Everyone Was Wrong About Trump
“….a Trump pardon for Assange and Snowden is almost certainly not in the cards. Trump has done nothing but protect the imperial status quo the entire time he’s been in office and a pardon for either of those heroic government transparency advocates would be a deviation from his established patterns unlike anything he’s ever once demonstrated while in office.”
“To this day, even after four years of evidence to the contrary, Trump supporters still believe their president has been ending the wars, draining the swamp, and fighting the Deep State. They believe he’s fighting the Deep State even after he imprisoned Assange. They believe he’s ending the wars even as he’s ramped up cold war aggressions against Russia, killed tens of thousands of Venezuelans with starvation sanctions, vetoed attempts to save Yemen from U.S.-backed genocide, is working to foment civil war in Iran using starvation sanctions and CIA ops with the stated goal of effecting regime change, occupied Syrian oil fields with the goal of preventing Syria’s reconstruction, greatly increased the number of troops in the Middle East and elsewhere, greatly increased the number of bombs dropped per day from the previous administration, killing record numbers of civilians, and reduced military accountability for those airstrikes. They believe he’s draining the swamp after packing his cabinet with establishment swamp monsters.”
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2020/12/23/everyone-was-wrong-about-trump/
Dupes dupes dupes dupes dupes dupes
makati1 on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 3:36 pm
Duncan, 2020 is not over. How can you know the death toll? USATODAY numbers? Pure propaganda! Can’t you smell the bullshit? LMAO!
The US population is also the largest in history, so the deaths will be higher.
Just like testing millions more for the ‘flu’ will give you higher numbers of “cases”. If you tested all 326 million Amerikans today, odds are that at least 100 million would test positive. (Although we all know that the tests are bullshit also.) When the deaths started to decline, they switched to “cases” to keep the fear factor up in the uneducated Amerikan serfs. Dumbed down Amerikans cannot think for themselves anymore, even with all the world’s info on the internet.
The flu has nothing, directly, to do with higher US deaths, but the lock-downs have caused more suicides and deaths from untreated causes, for sure.
BTW: ‘Lock-down’ is a prison term. That is a deliberate word use and very accurate for what TPTB are doing to you. Getting you adjusted to a prison life outside the iron bars. Papers Please! LMAO!
Happy, whatever you celebrate this day. We are having some beautiful weather where I live. Still summer here. ^_^
makati1 on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 3:40 pm
Amerika needs more Trumps. I hope he runs again in 24′ and wins BIG. That is, IF there is an Amerika in 24′. But the Demoncrats will probably have destroyed it by then. Glad I don’t live there. Pass the popcorn. The action is heating up.
FamousDrScanlon on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 4:33 pm
mak what’s the difference between winning the election & becoming POTUS & winning the election BIG & becoming POTUS?
Does BIG pay more & come with supersized fries?
I hope Trump’s dead by 2024. Trump & the rest of the degenerate fuck up Boomers.
Waste of resources keeping y’all alive.
makati1 on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 5:28 pm
Famous, BIG is what Trump actually won the election by this time. HUGE (and very obvious to the rest of the world) is the corruption that is trying to take it away from him.
You have ZERO freedoms left. You will soon be required to have ‘PAPERS’ to just survive. What is it like to be living in a Banana Republic? I live in a country that still has laws and freedom.
Biden will be dead and/or sidelined long before 2024. The bitch will be the Prez and take down what you have left of your freedoms and lifestyle. Be patient.
Trump may run again in 2024 and try to pick the pieces of what is left of Amerika. Or, there may be no ‘elections”, just government whores and the elite running the debris once called Amerika.
Dead is Amerikan Democracy, forever. So be it. Well deserved. Couch potatoes and Snowflakes do not deserve freedom if they will not fight for it. Amerikans are now going to experience the RESET, big time. It will make Amerika more like the old USSR or Mao’s China than a five star resort.
You can be the first to go, Famous. It is obvious you have no reason to continue to be an excess “eater”. Just another brainwashed troll.
Meanwhile, the sun is shining, it will go up into the 80s this afternoon and the flowers are blooming on the trees and bushes. What is it like there in lock-down land? Not Summer, I bet! LOL
FamousDrScanlon on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 7:26 pm
What is it like to be living in a Banana Republic?
I don’t know because I’m not an American.
I’ve told you that before, but that redacting marker in your brain blanked it out because that fact ruins your narrative. Same as many other facts.
You are American born & bred & you can’t escape how it’s shaped you.
Do you really think relocating to an apartment in Gook land freed you of your exceptional bias?
That American delusion y’all share. Your opinions & ‘feelings’ are the only truth.
Ya mak, the P’s are known the world over as land of freedom & tolerance. I just can’t understand why millions of Filipinos have migrated to western nations given how awesomely free you say it is there.
More than 7,000 killed in the Philippines in six months, as president encourages murder
https://www.amnesty.org.uk/philippines-president-duterte-war-on-drugs-thousands-killed
Mak the ex Mormon & expat American. Is running away a habit of yours? Flee when things stop going your way? Flee from reality.
makati1 on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 8:50 pm
Famous, you act like, sound like, and are as dumbed down as an Amerikan, therefore, you fit the mold and can be lumped in with the deluded, brainwashed Amerikans. It does not matter what country you claim to be from, you are “Amerikan”. Those of us who are intelligent would never post the bullshit you post.
My “exceptional bias” is freed by seeing the US for what it really is and for adapting to local customs and lifestyles. You have chosen to side with the exceptionalism retards, obviously.
Sorry, but millions have NOT migrated to Western nations for freedom, but for $$$. Most, if not all, come back here to retire and live. They buy condos here to do just that. You do zero research and have zero knowledge of the real Philippines, just Western MSM propaganda. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have moved and retired here. I am not alone.
BTW: You think the US is murder free? LMAO!
https://www.statista.com/statistics/191134/reported-murder-and-nonnegligent-manslaughter-cases-in-the-us-since-1990/
2019 = 16,475 murders in the US. 2020 will be even higher, wait and see. You did not mention the suicide levels growing and they are also a sign of the decline of Amerika.
“Numbers released Thursday from the (US) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show 48,344 people died by suicide in 2018, up from 47,173 the year before.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/01/30/u-s-suicide-rate-rose-again-2018-how-can-suicide-prevention-save-lives/4616479002/
Can’t you find a real, honest, non-propaganda, site to point to? You are obviously a hypocrite, just like most Amerikans, pointing a finger to deflect reality about your own country.
I am safer than you are. I am more comfortable than you ever will be in the future. I am TOTALLY independent, healthy, have a secure home and a close network of friend here. Not to mention no wild weather changes like most of the northern countries. Always summer here. Americans are liked and respected, especially older ones like me. They still respect their elders unlike Amerikan, snowflake, eternal children. I have to roast a Butterball turkey for our get-to-gather. Mashed potatoes with gravy and filling, asparagus, and pumpkin pie. A real American feast for friends and neighbors. Laterz! ^_^
makati1 on Thu, 24th Dec 2020 9:05 pm
Oh, and BTW: Amerika has had a “War on Drugs” for 49 years so far, and there are more drugs in Amerika than ever.
Most Filipinos support Duterte’s drug methods, as they are working. If he were allowed to run again in 2022, for another 6 year term, I have no doubt he would win by a large margin.
At least 80% of Filipinos support him and his works. No US president has ever come close to that percentage.
FamousDrScanlon on Fri, 25th Dec 2020 1:02 pm
Mak, my my aren’t we touchy about our new gook homeland & gook dictator.
Duterte = Mak’s Gook Trump Daddy.
Murdering citizens is totally the best way to address societal problems. Just ask Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin, Hitler, etc etc.
You better hope an Anti American dictator never becomes boss & tells his death squads American expats are the new Jew.
Besides Mormonism & it’s magic underwear how many other religions/cults have you joined?
Mak do you still believe in the invisible man in the sky?
God = sky daddy. Duterte = earth daddy.
People never forget an injustice. Muzzies still hate the Christian west & the Mongols for invading their way back ancestors.
Duterte takes potshots at US anew
MANILA, Philippines – Still hurting from US criticism of his administration’s human rights record, President Duterte has again taken potshots at the Americans, reminding them of their slaughter of thousands of Muslims in Mindanao in the early 1900s.
“There was this historical injustice committed against the Moro people. The Americans may want to know that during their campaign in Mindanao they slaughtered 600,000 Moro people,” Duterte told troops gathered in Davao Oriental for the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Eastern Mindanao Command last Friday.
https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2016/08/28/1618037/duterte-takes-potshots-us-anew
If you’re still breathing when the shit hit’s the P’s or when the US empire of bases crumble, the P’s will tear you & the other expats to shreds.
People Never forget
FamousDrScanlon on Fri, 25th Dec 2020 1:24 pm
Happy Birthday Geebus!
https://youtu.be/scnqePfFpa8
makati1 on Fri, 25th Dec 2020 4:05 pm
Infamous: Do the drugs you are taking for your mental illness not work anymore? Maybe you should see your favorite shrink and get something stronger? But, I don’t think they have anything to cure brainwashing, as you cannot accept the truth, the only cure.
Yes, I prefer Du30 to the government whores who live in the White House and those who call themselves Congresspeople. There has not been an intelligent one since Ike.
I guess murdering hundreds of thousands of foreigners in the name of ‘democracy’ is better than killing drug pushers? Actually the number of foreigners, Amerika have killed since WW2, are in the millions, and all in the name of greed so you can live a comfy lifestyle.
Well, that is over for you now. Thank the ‘Reset’ for finally bringing terrorist Amerika down, along with it’s toady countries like the UK, Australia, and most of the EU. With real unemployment in the US at over 25% and inflation at 10%, there is nothing but pain in the US future for the tax slaves/serfs.
Do you want to know why this is happening to Amerika? Because TPTB have been dumbing down the serfs for decades and now they have them believing everything poured into that empty head 24/7/365 by their propaganda mills. WaPo, NYT, CNN, MSNBC, etc.
I am safe here. You are not. When Spring breaks, so will the chaos begin. If you think thongs will go back to pre 2020 normal, I have a slightly used bridge, in Manhattan, I can sell to you cheap, but I only accept gold in payment. LOL
FamousDrScanlon on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 12:39 am
So deep Mak. Same boring shit you repeat every comment for 10 years running. So deep dude.
As long as your Ameritards stay on their side of the 49th parallel, it’s just a freak show to me.
Pop pop pop I’m making popcorn.
Mak tell us again how this magic works that makes the P’s, and thus you, impervious to disasters – natural & chimp. Does it have something to do with your Mormon magic underwear?
Duterte pledged a COVID-free Christmas. Instead, cases soar
Millions of Filipinos attend Christmas events in spite of the president’s warnings that these gatherings could drive up community transmission.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/12/24/faith-trumps-covid-as-filipinos-defy-warnings-to-mark-christmas
Magnitude 6.3 earthquake strikes south of Philippines’ Luzon island
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-philippines-quake/magnitude-63-earthquake-strikes-south-of-philippines-luzon-island-idUSKBN28Z00Z
FamousDrScanlon on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 12:56 am
People of the P’s mak says y’all have nothing to fear. Only Americans are vulnerable to the ‘all you can eat’ banquet of consequences that is a direct result of humans being a fucking Cancer.
Typhoon crisis: 305,000 houses wrecked in Philippines
“Kuala Lumpur/Manila/Geneva, 26 November 2020 – Consecutive, devastating typhoons in the Philippines have laid the foundations for a long-term humanitarian crisis as more than 305,000 homes have been damaged or destroyed according to humanitarian assessments.
Typhoons Molave and Vamco, followed by Super Typhoon Goni, shattered the already precarious livelihoods of more than 200,000 farmers and fisher-folk, the social and economic consequences of which will reverberate across these rural and fishing communities for months or even years to come. Millions of people affected by these typhoons already faced huge social and economic hardships due to COVID-19 restrictions”
https://media.ifrc.org/ifrc/press-release/typhoon-crisis-305000-houses-wrecked-philippines/
“Living in a country that is most vulnerable to the impacts of the climate crisis makes me feel so anxious about my future,” Fallaria told The Independent. “How can I live in a country that is visited by storms that are getting stronger year by year?”
“Super Typhoon Goni is about to slam into the Phillippines as about as strong of a storm as the planet can produce
If it landfalls at its current strength (195 mph with gusts to 235 mph!!) it will be the most powerful tropical cyclone on record to make landfall in world history
‘Scientists have reasoned that the growing intensity of storms is likely linked to the climate crisis. This is because tropical cyclones use warm, moist air as fuel and, as oceans heat up, more of this fuel is becoming available.’
https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/typhoon-goni-super-2020-philippines-climate-crisis-b1562346.html
It’s just the flu bro
makati1 on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 1:31 pm
Famous, you are so think headed, some things have to be repeated for it to sink in.
The Philippines has natural events, just like the US.
We do have typhoons/hurricanes like you do.
We also have earthquakes, like you do.
We do NOT have tornadoes like you do.
We do NOT have sudden temperature changes like you do, called “Winter”.
We do NOT have snow, sleet, or ice like you do.
We do NOT have … well, I could go on but you get the idea.
The people here are still sane, unlike in Amerika.
The people here are still sharing, caring, and friendly, unlike Amerika.
The list of plus’ goes on and on. The US is going down the shitter and I am glad I do not live there.
BTW: The “Climate Crises” is mostly bullshit. We will all be dead long before it really matters to humans and when we are gone, Mother Nature will build a new world.
You really should get some new websites to quote if you want to debate with me. The Red Cross is another corrupt US propaganda site and the UK “news” is no better.
No place on earth is perfect, but the Philippines is close enough for me. Don’t forget to take your meds! LOL
FamousDrScanlon on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 3:25 pm
sure mak climate change & the extra pounding the P’s have taken from AGW Jacked typhoons is just the flu bro.
It has to be otherwise your childish narrative – USA bad suffer, P’s good immune, falls to pieces.
““Super Typhoon Goni is about to slam into the Phillippines as about as strong of a storm as the planet can produce
If it landfalls at its current strength (195 mph with gusts to 235 mph!!) it will be the most powerful tropical cyclone on record to make landfall in world history”
Another hoax eh?
BTW, the move has not removed any American stupidity from you. You will never escape it.
“Hi I’m mak & instead of logic & data, all my arguments consist of denial & ad homs like this:
“Don’t forget to take your meds! LOL” (ad hom)
“The Red Cross is another corrupt US propaganda site and the UK “news” is no
better.” (ad hom, unsupported accusation)
“We do NOT have tornadoes like you do.” (tornadoes were not mentioned – did not read article)
BTW: The “Climate Crises” is mostly bullshit.” (Denial)
“Famous, you are so think headed,”(ad hom)
All your comments are like this mak.
You don’t debate. Denial, being contrarian & ad homs are not debating.
clogs a fuckwad of monumental proportions, but he brings data & makes connections & logical arguments – he understands the elements of debate, often wrong, but I can tell he wasn’t educated in a US government school.
Duncan Idaho on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 5:38 pm
Yep–
https://images.dailykos.com/images/792904/large/93088146_10219869333877103_2041073294915928064_n.jpg?1587127726
But it is self explanatory
Duncan Idaho on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 7:39 pm
“The just-world fallacy or just-world hypothesis is the cognitive bias that a person’s actions are inherently inclined to bring morally fair and fitting consequences to that person; thus, it is the assumption that all noble actions are eventually rewarded and all evil actions eventually punished. In other words, the just-world hypothesis is the tendency to attribute consequences to—or expect consequences as the result of—a universal force that restores moral balance. This belief generally implies the existence of cosmic justice, destiny, divine providence, desert, stability, and/or order, and is often associated with a variety of fundamental fallacies, especially in regard to rationalizing people’s suffering on the grounds that they “deserve” it.”
FamousDrScanlon on Sat, 26th Dec 2020 9:51 pm
US leads virus deaths as global COVID-19 case count tops 80 million
https://fox8.com/news/coronavirus/us-leads-virus-deaths-as-global-covid-19-case-count-tops-80-million/
Conservative Twitter users dominate the discussion of fake news about the coronavirus, study finds
https://www.psypost.org/2020/12/conservative-twitter-users-dominate-the-discussion-of-fake-news-about-the-coronavirus-study-finds-58894
Like Conservative climate deniers Conservative covid deniers are on the endangered species list, except it took less than a year of covid consequences to shut them the fuck up vs 30 + years of mounting evidence ever worsening climate consequences (big time the last decade).
How many major things do these people need to get > 99% wrong before they shut up, step back & reevaluate all the shit they are 100% certain of?
Do we not see the pattern?
I would start with the cartoon notion that libtards & their politicians & oligarchs are the only ones guilty of fucking shit up.
If you’re a US libtard or conseveratard & blaming all on the other tribe, you’re not exactly flattering your tribe or yourself.
Post WW2
1945-1953 Harry S. Truman Democratic Alben W. Barkley
1953-1961 Dwight D. Eisenhower Republican Richard Nixon
1961-1963 John F. Kennedy Democratic Lyndon B. Johnson
1963-1969 Lyndon B. Johnson Democratic Hubert Humphrey
1969-1974 Richard Nixon Republican Spiro Agnew & Gerarld Ford
1974-1977 Gerald Ford Republican Nelson Rockefeller
1977-1981 Jimmy Carter Democratic Walter Mondale
1981-1989 Ronald Reagan Republican George H.W. Bush
1989-1993 George H.W. Bush Republican Dan Quayle
1993-2001 Bill Clinton Democratic Al Gore
2001-2009 George W. Bush Republican Dick Cheney
2009-2017 Barack Obama Democratic Joe Biden
2017-2020 Donald Trump Republican Mike Pence
Close to an even split.
If the other tribe is totally to blame for American decline, in spite of your tribe being in power half of the time in the past 75 years & giving their very best effort, then that means you & your tribe are incompetent, ineffectual fuck ups who are unfit to lead.
Left, right – it applies to both.
If, as y’all claim, the other tribe are idiots, that means you can’t beat idiots after 75 years of giving ‘your best’.
It’s a tie. Left idiots = 0, right idiots = 0.
I’d be totally fucking embarrassed to identify as a member of either weak loser tribe.
CONSERVATIVE, n. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.
— Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
Abraham van Helsing on Sun, 27th Dec 2020 8:24 am
Pence could cancel election on Jan 6:
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/12/its_for_mike_pence_to_judge_whether_a_presidential_election_was_held_at_all.html
December 26, 2020
“It’s for Mike Pence to Judge whether a Presidential Election Was Held at All”
Abraham van Helsing on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 2:34 am
peakoil.com is now communist-run.
Cloggie on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 2:37 am
“Open letter from an american coward” – must read
Abraham van Helsing on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 5:54 am
Turkey building huge wall at border Iran
Duncan Idaho on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 10:50 am
The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable.
Duncan Idaho on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 11:45 am
‘Lie the Way Most People Breathe’
https://www.mediaite.com/tv/cnns-tapper-no-value-to-interviewing-people-like-kayleigh-mcenany-who-lie-the-way-most-people-breathe/
Probably lie more often than breathe.
They are repugs.
FamousDrScanlon on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 11:51 am
‘peakoil.com is now communist-run’ & the new regimes first order of business is to line clog up against a wall & shoot him/it in the fucking head.
Bye clog
FamousDrScanlon on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 10:46 pm
People can’t keep secrets: Oxford study uses math to show most conspiracy theories untrue
” An Oxford scientist has used mathematics to make the claim that certain conspiracy theories – like that the manned moon-landing was faked – would have been exposed by now, owing simply to the number of people believing in them.
This has to do with the simple fact that a certain number of people can only keep a secret for a set amount of time.
Dr. David Grimes believes his formula for figuring this out works, and is basically this: a secret that would last over a century can be kept by no more than 125 people. By contrast, one involving 2,521 people would hardly last longer than five years.
READ MORE: Facebook ‘echo chamber’ makes people more narrow-minded – study
By these calculations, the US moon landing of 1969 would long have been exposed, as it involved a whopping 411,000 NASA employees. And given that all it took was one Edward Snowden to expose NSA’s worldwide data-mining practices, the math doesn’t look to be far off.
Grimes assures that his interest is in giving conspiracy theorists a fighting chance against the naysayers who readily dismiss anything offered up as an alternative to the official truth.”
https://www.rt.com/news/330302-conspiracy-theories-oxford-study/
Math is a conspiracy too.
411,000 NASA employees 1969
How many hundreds of millions in on the “plandemic + reset” cartoon conspiracy?
Keep an eye on your dog. He’s probably in on it too.
FamousDrScanlon on Mon, 28th Dec 2020 10:52 pm
Anti-vaxxer hero Dr who was never an anti-vaxxer, but anti 3in1 vax & pro his own single shot vaccine (patent).
Andrew Wakefield’s vaccine patent
“Wakefield MMR research fraud
The secret patent
A key finding of Deer’s Channel 4 investigation was that, even as the public alarm caused by Andrew Wakefield gathered pace – triggered by his calls for parents to shun the three-in-one MMR vaccine in favour of single shots – he’d filed a patent application claiming to have discovered his own, allegedly safer, single shot.
Get Deer’s book: The Doctor Who Fooled the World
Following the programme, Wakefield published a statement denying this – a denial he repeated often. But his 1997 application on this page, below, was obtained exclusively by Deer and (with a 1998 published application) conclusively prove not only this shocking conflict of interest, but that Wakefield has lied about it ever since. The medical school where Wakefield worked said later that Wakefield had filed the patent without their knowledge. He later demanded its transfer to his personal property, as a condition of leaving his post.”
https://briandeer.com/wakefield/vaccine-patent.htm
Abraham van Helsing on Tue, 29th Dec 2020 10:12 am
Macron talks to far right:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/dec/29/emmanuel-macron-under-scrutiny-after-advisers-lunch-with-niece-of-le-pen