By Bill Collier- A reader sent us pictures they took of Pershing Square on October 12, almost a month before the purported Antifa/Leftwing “Resist Fascism” demonstration planned on Saturday. The reader was concerned because the sign on the hate group’s tent made it clear: they want to kill white people.
While a story ran recently in which a post alleging to be Antifa and calling for the killing of white people and Trump supporters, which proved to be a hoax meant to troll the alt-right. this is not a mere social media post. This tent was set up in Pershing Square in our nation’s capital. It stretches credulity to the breaking point to imagine this is mere “trolling” or that this is staged by some right-wing group to smear the left.
You wull observe in this picture the sign that forbids setting up camp in the park, as these leftist activists have done. There is no crowd therefore dispersal and removal of this group by the DC police would not be problematic. No doubt the DC police knew such activities were planned, as these groups have broadcasted their intentions to do this. But there are no police present and the person who sent us this did not observe any.
Now we go to what was on the tent that should raise serious concerns.
What you can clearly see here is that it says “kill whitey.” This is an illegal encampment making terrorist threats against a substantial number of people who live in, work in, or just visit DC every day. It is unmistakable hate speech, but, beyond that, it is actually a direct call to take the lives of people merely because they are white.
There is no defense of this.
Here you can see the whole illegal encampment with just a few people. Now imagine you are walking through here alone as a white person, are you going to feel safe?
Evidently the local police were not concerned that a group of people set up an illegal encampment in a public space in order to promote a call to kill white people.
CORRECTION: I originally said this was on Friday, before the big protest was planned, but I was mistaken. The picture was taken October 12th. This dispels the myth that these groups were not making such threats.
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How did President Trump overcome all the odds and obstacles and both attract and maintain a large and passionate following? The answer is charisma, in fact, hypnotic charisma. Now, the author of this article is an associate of mine and we work together on a project involving selling hypnotic charisma secrets, and audio sessions you can use anywhere. More on that at the end of the article.
Even President Trump’s opponents can acknowledge his very real hypnotic charisma, and while he may not have had any formal training or hypnotic charisma sessions, you can access such sessions, listen to them, and actually start to naturally tap into your own hypnotic charisma.
Donald Trump, Political Mass Hypnotist?
By Ralph Benko
Dilbert creator Scott Adams plausibly claimed that Trump is a “Master Wizard” using hypnosis on us. As one of “us” I considered this theory worth examining. The evidence shows that Trump is, in fact, using technique indistinguishable from hypnosis.
In a recent interview with Reason TV, Scott Adams, “prolific author, blogger, and creator of the massively popular comic strip Dilbert:
[T]he media are being trolled by a skilled manipulator, or in Adams’s parlance, a Master Wizard. …
“What I [see] in Trump,” says Adams, is “someone who was highly trained. A lot of the things that the media were reporting as sort of random insults and bluster and just Trump being Trump, looked to me like a lot of deep technique that I recognized from the fields of hypnosis and persuasion.”
One such technique is what Adams describes as a “linguistic kill shot,” in which Trump uses an engineered set of words that changes or ends an argument decisively. According to Adams, when Trump describes Jeb Bush as low energy, Carly Fiorina as robotic, or Ben Carson as nice, he’s imprinting a label you already feel about these people. They’re not random insults, but linguistic kill shots that you can never get out of your mind.
Similarly, where the media see random insults, Adams sees Trump creating a significant polling gap between those who attack him and those who compliment him, resulting in chilled aggression from his opponents. Trump, says Adams, uses “anchors,” which are big, visual thoughts that drown out any other argument.
A group targeting former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold has a new ad out portraying him as hypnotist trying to make the public forget his past votes.
The ad by the anti-Feingold Wisconsin Alliance for Reform shows him dangling a stopwatch as if he were hypnotizing viewers to forget his votes for tax hikes, immigration reform and … Obamacare.
There is no hard evidence that Donald Trump (or Russ Feingold) received training in hypnosis. Pace Adams, it is far more likely that Trump, especially, has a natural gift, developed by his work in reality television. As the Washington Post’s Frances Stead Sellers recorded in What Trump Learned On The Apprentice:
“I’ve never had lessons,” Trump said. “I’ve always felt comfortable in front of a camera. Either you’re good at it or you’re not good at it.”
The show’s climatic boardroom meetings, he said, in characteristically boastful form, were a reflection of his natural talents.
“It was 100 percent ad lib,” he said. “Directly from me.”
Some who got to know Trump through the show say they have not been surprised in recent months to watch him perform in similar fashion on different stages. Trump, for instance, regularly holds forth before packed auditoriums with seemingly stream-of-consciousness speeches that captivate his audiences.
Just how does Trump “captivate his audiences”? Hypnosis would explain it to perfection.
Hypnosis has absolutely nothing to do with a swinging pocket watch. The swinging watch is an obsolete device — and cultural cliché — for inducing a hypnotic state. Hypnosis simply involves gently inducing a reverie, a state like a daydream: deep relaxation coupled with heightened alertness, while engaging the faculty of the imagination and softened analytic faculty, coupled with the power of suggestion. First rate politicians routinely employ this technique.
Hypnosis is a lot like yoga and meditation. In fact it historically is related to these, the word itself having been coined by 19th century Scottish surgeon James Braid, the father of modern hypnosis, whose work clearly demonstrates his close study of both. Like yoga and meditation hypnosis is moving through the “Rogers production adoption curve.”
Hypnosis, like sushi, is moving out of “fringe” or “risky” into “new” and even “hot.” Hypnotism was placed under a dark cloud in popular imagination by George du Maurier, in his 1894 novel Trilby. This book now is long forgotten but was an international sensation, a Harry Potter of its era.
You may never have heard of Trilby. You have heard of its anti-hero, the sinister hypnotist Svengali, a fictional character devised by du Maurier. “Svengali” entered, and still haunts, the popular imagination.
Hypnosis’s sinister characterization was perpetuated by Hollywood as a fantastic trope. Consider such classic films as The Manchurian Candidate. (Happy 100th, Ol’ Blue Eyes!)
Believing in Hollywood myths of hypnotism is akin to believing in Dracula, werewolves, and zombies. These make for a great pulp entertainment. As often is the case with Hollywood (as in Washington) dramatic license trumps facts.
So? Are Trump (and Feingold) really using hypnosis?
What is hypnosis? What’s its relevance to politics?
Short answers: Trump is using something indistinguishable from hypnosis. Feingold, perhaps, too. Understanding hypnosis is relevant if it is being used, in this political campaign, on us.
What is hypnosis? Dilbert creator Scott Adams blogged about hypnosis, in which he was thoroughly trained, a decade ago in his Dilbert Blog:
I describe the state of hypnosis as acquiring a power. The subject has all of his regular faculties operating plus he gains some more, if he has no objection to those new powers. For example, a subject under hypnosis would get a little extra power in one or more of these areas:
Extra relaxation
2. Extra imagination
3. Extra focus
Those extra powers don’t sound like much, but they are. …
About one person in five can experience what hypnotists call “the phenomena.” For those people, their powers of imagination become so strong it is almost indistinguishable from reality.
Key word: Imagination.
Ben Franklin, long ago, was made a royal commissioner in France. He, among other leading savants, was appointed by King Louis XVI to a royal commission to investigate a precursor to hypnosis, Mesmerism. The Commission’s report disposed of the claim that it was based in an invisible force called “animal magnetism.”
The Commission concluded that “the chief causes of the affects are contact, imagination, and imitation.”
Key word: Imagination.
We need not go back to the 18th century. One of the most esteemed psychologists of the 20th century was Stanford professor Ernest Hilgard. Hilgard and his wife founded, and directed for over 20 years, the Laboratory of Hypnosis Research at Stanford.
The American Psychological Association named its Lifetime Achievement Award for Hilgard. This rather neatly offsets hypnosis’s sinister reputation. Hilgard once succinctly defined hypnosis as “believed-in imagination” (personal communication to Michael Yapko, PhD).
Key word: Imagination.
When a political figure appeals to our imagination that is indistinguishable from hypnosis.
What a thing is imagination! Here are men who don’t know me, who have never seen me, but who only knew of me, and they are moved by my presence, they would do anything for me! And this same incident arises in all centuries and in all countries! Such is fanaticism! Yes, imagination rules the world. The defect of our modern institutions is that they do not speak to the imagination. By that alone can man be governed; without it he is but a brute.
Donald Trump, in his presidential (and perhaps Russ Feingold in his senatorial) race speaks directly to the voters’ imagination. This is nothing more, or less, than political hypnosis. The “hypnosis hypothesis,” even better than Byron York’s “brief theory of Trump’s outrageousness,” may explain Trump’s persistence as the Republican front runner.
Imagination is powerful. That said hypnosis may not be sufficient to carry Donald Trump all the way nomination or to election.
“Believed-in-imagination” — hypnosis — can be used to great political effect. Still, political hypnosis has limits with which Napoleon ultimately failed, and with which Donald Trump may yet have, to reckon.
Yet hypnosis is a force very much to be reckoned with. As Napoleon said, more than once, “Imagination rules the world.”
Charisma Can Be The Difference Between Wealth and Happiness On One Hand, Or Poverty And Sorrow On The Other Hand
Whether you are a sales professional, a business manager, a lawyer, a civil servant, a first responder, a bank teller, an aspiring actor or model, or even a barista — whatever you do — having charisma is like money in the bank.
Socially, charisma is what will gain you that seat at the cool kids’ lunch table.
And charisma is what will make you stand out as the perfect romantic partner (whether you are already married — rekindle the honeymoon! — or single and looking for your breathtakingly handsome Prince Charming or staggeringly lovely Snow White to notice you and fall in love with you).
Welcome. We are here to offer you some simple “life hacks” — safe, simple, easy ways to “hack” your own mind — to unleash the latent charisma hiding deep within you and bring it out, and gain all that charisma will brings to your life.
Pssst! Very few people know is that charisma is something that can be developed by anyone. Now you are one of them. Yes, some people are born with charisma. Most — like actress Marilyn Monroe, who started out as a very mousy Norma Jean Baker — develop it.
You can develop it too! You’ve come to the right place, where developing your charisma is inexpensive, fast, easy, and delicious. Follow along.
We – my professional partner and I — are two international experts in training people to do just that. More on that shortly. First things first. What is charisma?
Charisa is a Thing. It is not something mysterious or amorphous. Your latent charisma — “compelling attractiveness or charm that can inspire devotion in others” — can be cultivated and quickly unleashed in simple, easy, practical, affordable steps.
We know how. And our recordings available here will easily, effortlessly, unleash your latent charisma.
But how?
Little known fact. Charisma experts — such as psychologists — have absolutely proven that charisma come from some basic building blocks.
These blocks are: social and emotional expressivity, sensitivity, and poise.
We’ve taken it beyond the theory into practice.
Together, let’s set free your inner super-hero, as you discover and use your hidden charisma.
Charisma comes from very specific qualities of your presentation.
Among these qualities are:
your body language, how you stand or sit;
the tenor of the sound of your voice;
your very specific choice of words for their implicit suggestions;
your ability to radiate “grace under pressure,”
your ability to validate your own gut instincts;
your ability to be present-in-the-moment and really connect with people; and
your power to use the Power of Yes to overwhelm negativity.
Why believe us? We are two of the most recognized charisma specialists in the world. We have taught hundreds of people and have thousands of followers in our virtual community around the world. Now, having proven it in practice, we wish to take hypnotic charisma to the next level and bring it to millions of lucky people.
Hypnotic charisma is not a clinical process but it is a professional one. I am a Registered Nurse and my partner in this practice is a retired White House lawyer.
And we are two of the most highly trained, accomplished, hypnotists in the world.
We have distilled the charisma techniques that will powerfully and quickly unleash your inner charisma. We have distilled these into seven self-hypnosis recordings. Hypnosis isn’t kooky or spooky any more. It’s been studied extensively by places like Harvard University Medical School, Stanford University, and the Mayo Clinic (none of which are we affiliated with but you get the idea). It has been proven to be a powerful, safe, modality to engage the mind-body connection and the superpowers that come with doing that.
Modern hypnosis no longer involves “trance.” It induces a pleasant state of reverie — like a daydream — in which your consciousness is in no way diminished and you never surrender control of your mind to others. Listening to our self-hypnosis recordings is like listening to a guided meditation.
But it’s not metaphysical. It’s practical. Its benefits are powerful and tangible. (Like helping you get that raise you deserve!)
Modern hypnosis uses the powers of your imagination to transform your presentation of your natural self in a charismatic way. Don’t confuse “imagination” with “imaginary.” It is a sleeping superpower inside you. Hypnosis, according to one of its greatest researchers, is, simply stated, “believed-in imagination.” Very cool, very safe, stuff. The right stuff.
Hypnosis can help anyone, and that includes you.
Believed-in imagination — hypnosis — is so powerful! As Napoleon once said, “Imagination rules the world.” Using his imagination this short, unprepossessing, provincial solider of humble birth made himself an Emperor.
Just imagine what you can do with this power!
Why believe us?
We are internationally recognized as two of the top ~100 hypnotists in the world by the National Guild of Hypnotists, the oldest (67 years), largest (~20,000 members), and most respected (mentioned in the Congressional Record) professional association of non-clinical hypnotists in the world. (Documentation upon request.) Each of us has appeared on the cover of its flagship magazine, The Journal of Hypnotism. We are on the faculty of its annual worldwide convention and present intensive certification trainings at its annual Summer Institute. We’re experts.
Hypnosis is a state of reverie, and in this state your mind and body can be awakened to your inner charisma
Developing your charisma is as simple as sitting down, turning on your MP3 player, and listening for 20 or so minutes to each of our MP3s, each specifically designed to unleash another aspect of your charisma. Nothing to learn. Effortless. Just let my voice go with you and guide you into a state where your own personal charisma is unlocked and unleashed.
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The Introductory Hypnotic Charisma audio will let you experience yourself as the natural, authentic, charming, charismatic person that you are.
What are some of the other simple, easy, delicious “mind hacks” that will make you charismatic, exuding “compelling attractiveness or charm that can inspire devotion in others?”
“Power Poses.” This recording that will let your mind train your body to stand or sit or hold yourself in a compelling, attention-getting, attractive way.
“Per Sona.” This recording will cause you to tune the tenor of your voice so that people love to listen to its sound.
“Subtext.” This recording will attune you to the hidden meaning of your words, guiding you to choose just the right word to impart the power of suggestion to inspire people to find you, and your value proposition, compelling.
“Mono No Aware” (Pronounced mohno-no-awaray). This recording gives you a simple, failsafe, way of coming entirely into the present moment, and, thereby, really connecting with others at a whole new level that will touch, move, and inspire them to want to support you and work with you.
“Radical Self Validation.” This recording will train you to “check in with yourself” and thus present with a compelling level of authority and authenticity.
“Self-Soothing Skills.” This recording will make you capable of retaining and regaining poise in the face of stressful experiences, keeping your cool, a dramatically charismatic quality. Think James Bond facing down Goldfinger!
“The Power of Yes!” This recording will teach you how to overwhelm the negativity around you and use your charismatic positivity to generate immense appeal and devotion from others.
What will unleashing your charisma require from you?
That’s the beauty of the HypnoticCharisma.com program! Unlike charisma specialists who charge tens of thousands of dollars, and require scores, or even hundreds, of hours of direct tutoring to train top executives, and others, to develop their charisma, we have used the “mind hack” of our expertise with hypnotic reverie to distill all that is needed into seven ~20 minute recordings. At a tiny fraction — less than 1% — of the cost of getting such training elsewhere.
All you need to do is download our recordings, put aside a few very pleasant minutes several times a week — or even, if you are eager, once a day — and listen. My voice in your ears does it all. There is nothing to memorize, nothing to learn, no laborious exercises.
My voice will go with you and automatically rewire your mind, while you are fully conscious of every word, every evolution in your psyche, to develop all the qualities necessary for you to transform yourself into a charismatic personality. That’s what it will require from you.
What will you get in return? These are simple “life hacks” that will transform your life into exactly what you’ve always dreamed it could be! How great is that?
All you need to do — right now! — is to click here and download one or more of our hypnotic charisma recordings. Then open them up in your iTunes library or the MP3 player on your PC (or transfer them to your iPhone or Android device) and sit back and listen. Couldn’t’ be easier.
Listen several times a week, or even every day, and you will quickly see the charismatic effect you are having in your business, profession, social or even romantic life!
Listen. Let charisma rise up within you. That’s all there is to it.
Charisma is a Thing.
You can easily, quickly, safely and inexpensively develop your own charisma.
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What are you waiting for?
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PS Don’t worry if you’re tech-challenged. My business partner is too and even he could do it. Ordering is easy, online delivery fast and automatic, and our tech support people are here for you if you need guidance and will courteously guide you through finding the recordings if it’s not immediately obvious to you where they went on your computer. Your charisma is just too great to let a little tech-phobia stand in your way!
Questions? We are a small business that cares about every single one of our customers. If you email me at [email protected] I will write you back personally.
We have been truly blessed in our lives by developing our charisma by using these techniques. We yearn to share those benefits and those blessings with you.
The Catalonian Parliament has declared independence, after the government ministers failed to act with firm resolution in the matter, thus making all members of Parliament vulnerable to the Spanish state, which promises retribution.
“We hereby constitute the Catalan Republic as an independent, sovereign, legal, democratic, socially-conscious state“, reads the declaration in part. It was passed 70 to 10 with 2 abstentions. The Parliament has 135 members, so 53 had to have not even bothered to show up.
Meanwhile, the Spanish Senate has voted to suspend the region’s autonomy and given Mariano Rajoy, the nationalist Prime Minister, extraordinary powers to seize control of the region by force if necessary. The Spanish Prosecutor plans to bring the “rebels” up on charges, with 30 year prison sentences in the offing.
Bill Collier- The current government of the autonomous region of Catalonia has asked for, and called a referendum in support of, nothing less than independence from the Spanish crown. In its bid for total independence, the government has been strident and seemingly uncompromising, but when the time came for words and rhetoric to be followed with resolute action and resistance, the very men and women, led by one Carles Puidgdemont, who started this crisis offered indecisiveness and made no decision at all.
Given two choices, to call snap elections or to declare independence, and having called a meeting of the regional parliament with some fanfare, Puigdemont gave words, passed the entire matter to the parliament to decide, and did nothing. While the Spanish minority government under Rajoy and company has railed against the government ministers, including Puigdemont, even its invocation of Article 155 by which it means to administer the region directly and turn out Puigdemont and company, did not envision turning out the elected regional government. But thanks to the buck-passing of Puigdemont, the Parliament itself must now decide whether to declare full independence or to surrender, leaving every member vulnerable to repercussions they could have avoided if Puigdemont had been decisive.
Regardless of the aspirations of the people of Catalonia, which are in dispute, their government ministers, especially Puigdemont, have proven they lack courage and conviction. Yes, they are in a tight squeeze with no good answers, but their own actions and rhetoric have placed them in this squeeze. They walked up to this precipice on their own, and now they refuse to make a choice, to back off or plunge into the conflict. Instead of being leaders who shield the people they lead, namely Parliament and the citizens, they have pushed this crisis forward and then stepped aside and pinned the tail, as it were, on others.
When pushing for independence from a political state it is always necessary to count the cost first. One would have thought these so-called leaders would not have precipitated a crisis of these proportions, affecting so many millions of people without having done so.
Did they secretly arm and prepare the Mossos, their own regional police, to defend their new republic? Do they have other means of doing so? Do they have other foreign allies who will help them or recognize their new state?
We have heard they plan to resist the Spanish “invasion” and takeover in some Ghandi-esque manner. This is a bad misreading of Ghandi. His tactics of non-violence only worked because the British were unwilling and unable to use force, his opponents did not have the moral certitude that they even should be ruling India! The Spanish state, which has not truly and completely severed its fascist roots, is quite willing to use force and has no lack of moral certainty with respect to its rule over Catalonia.
Unlike the British, who faced increasing international pressure regarding their colonial empire, the Spanish state has, at worse, tepid reactions against and, overall, support from the EU and the world community for retaining control over Catalonia. Sympathy for Catalonian independence is blunted by the lack of certainty as to its popularity in the region, its potential economic and political impact on the EU, and the lack of moral certainty on the part of its instigators (as evidenced by their lack of firm actions).
It is a crime to foment a crisis which has serious negative impacts on your own people and then be unwilling to make decisive choices or take firm actions to resolve it. Puigdemont could have called snap elections, he could have attended the Spanish Senate session to potentially negotiate a compromise, or he could have agree swiftly on the referendum and ordered his regional police to protect his new Republic. Instead, he instigated a crisis and at the critical hour passed the buck to others, making people he could have shielded from repercussions vulnerable now to either the Spanish authorities (who were limiting their threats to him and his ministers) or to the populace who are clamouring for independence who might turn on a parliament that Puigdemont has saddled with a choice that was his to make.
In the end, Catalonia has been fomented into a thirst for independence and its leaders are refusing to either temper the thirst they have stoked or to finally take decisive action and declare independence. They have put the crowds on the streets and the regional parliament on the firing line, they are forcing them to both make this hard decision and face the full consequences, which the actions of the leaders who started this crisis could have shielded them from.
Puigdemont could have fallen on his sword, having realized the choice is violence or retreat, and called for snap elections or he could have resolutely declared independence and called on his Mossos and the people in the streets to back this up. In the first case, he could have taken the blame and prevented this crisis from going forward without betraying the aspirations of the pro-independence elements. In the second case, be could have followed through on his commitment and if the Spanish authorities really did act with force and prevail, he could have taken the blame and shielded others from consequences.
Were I to be Puigdemont, I would have counted the cost first. But even if I realized that I had miscalculated, I would have declared independence. Assuming this resulted in Spanish occupation and my arrest, at the least I would have kept the hope of independence alive and delegtimized the Spanish occupation, knowing that history has a way of providing improbable opportunities to seemingly lost causes. But I would have mobilized the Mossos and the people on the day after declaring the final results of the referendum, I would not have let this drag on.
Let’s be clear: Puigdemont instigated this entire crisis. He was its architect and designer. It is now obvious he did not count the cost, nor did he make serious preparations for the worse-case scenario. One suspects he knows he lacks overwhelming popular support, hence his reticence. But he should have known whether he truly has widespread popular support or whether he has the means to resist the use of force. He seems never to have even asked such critical questions, and he definitely has no answers.
It is still possible Puigdemont could take actions that change this current assessment, but regardless of that, his handling of a crisis he instigated has so far been meandering and indecisive and has only weakened his cause. He has done long-term harm to his own cause and he has disrupted millions of lives in a failed bid whose failings were caused almost totally by his own incapacity as a leader.
WHEN THE CENTER CANNOT HOLD
You Must Find Another Way
Bill Collier- Trust in leading American institutions has dropped from a high average of 43% in 2004 to a low of 32% now, according to Gallup. What is more telling is the low approval numbers for institutions such as education, the media, and leading politicians. Only the military, with 73% trust, remains a stable institution with broad respect. For instance, while the US President enjoys approval ratings of 36% to 42%, hardly a resounding vote of confidence, Congress has an approval rating of 9%. This means 91% don’t trust the institution that makes its laws.
We could cite examples of public officials and institutions, academia, and the news media all day. Across the board, people don’t trust the gatekeepers and opinion shapers whose judgments in time past were respected. It used to be, for instance, when major news anchors declaimed on something or someone, they were finished. Walter Cronkite could make or break an issue or a politician.
But what happened, perhaps, is that holders of such influence abused it for partisan or parochial gains and, gradually, the general public caught wind of what was happening. It was realized that the Walter Cronkite were really just working to advance their own agenda. Truth and facts were never the goal, despite the claim, but only controlling your perceptions to manipulate you into acting or voting in a certain way that might help the manipulators and not you.
In this scenario, the center cannot hold. In the long term, perhaps next year or in twenty years, such a situation can lead to such upheavals that total collapse of major institutions, including governments, occurs. This is history repeating itself, of course, as it always does, in the endless cycles of the rise and fall of nations, empires, and whole civilizations. It is not possible that our nations of people, our empires (political states) or our civilization will escape these cycles any more than you can escape death.
When you live in a time of such dissolution of public trust in the institutions that normally center a society, you have to find your own center. Throughout history, the people who lived in such times and yet held their own center often became the most successful, prosperous, and powerful people in their day.
Consider the monastic orders of the 5th century. These created their own center, both physical and spiritual. They became the progenitors of our current civilization in the West. They became very wealthy and influential and it took centuries to break the power of their institutional grip.
It can be argued that the nobility and royalty that emerged in every society throughout history were the people who had their own center during times when the center could not hold in a dying society. If one traces the roots of most royal and noble families it should not be surprising to see they emerged even from humble roots because of this ability to hold their own center.
In the late 1990’s the book “The Sovereign Individual” sold tens of thousands of copies. It proposed a time of collapse in which the new nobility, my words not theirs, would emerge from sovereign individuals, people who could exist and thrive outside the limits and control of the welfare state, which, while it reached its peak in the late 20th century, would not survive the 21st century. While the tenacity of that now archaic model for organizing a society may have exceeded expectations, events have more or less tracked with that book’s prescience.
What we are witnessing cannot be seen or understood outside of an understanding of the cyclical nature of history, and the rise and fall of civilizations. Whoever understands these things knows the times in which we live and realizes that trying to preserve the old forms and structures is foolhardy. The structures and forms of a mature and now dying civilization will not fit or work in a new civilization, for instance. The ancient monastic communities which emerged at the end of the Classical Civilization were suited to the new civilization, which became the Western Civilization.
The range of possibilities is not limited only by creativity, it is limited by creativity, logic, science, and historical necessity. That which is not historically necessary will not be possible, and it will not succeed. If you to try to re-create or perpetuate the old forms and structures of a mature civilization during a time when the old civilization is in decline and the seeds of new civilizations are necessary, you will fail.
The center cannot hold in a declining civilization any more than a human heart can beat forever. Death is what follows life, even as life follows death. But each new generation begins during the previous generation, and each new civilization emerges in seed form during a preceding civilization.
Here then is where you and I have to find our own center, just as the monastic communities did, when it seems the barbarians have overrun civilization from within and from without and on every front. The ancient monastic communities may have preserved the knowledge and memory of the Classical world, but they did not preserve the culture of their day, they created the seeds of a new culture, which became Western Civilization and which is now as morally and spiritually bankrupt as was the Classical world in the 4th and 5th centuries.
Each national people and whole countries could theoretically escape the deluge that attends the collapse of a civilization into its final phase of caesarism, but usually they don’t. But the emergence of new structures and forms, suited to the genesis phase of a new civilization, occurs during this decline. This becomes the new center for the few who won’t merely be swept along insensibly in the currents of spiritual, sociocultural, economic, and political decline. Most people will be swept along, few will find the new forms and structures, and these few along with their heirs, according to the historical record, generally become the progenitors of the first nobility and royalty of the next civilization. (New noble and royal families usually emerge even after the new civilization is established, which is a different dynamic.)
I’m not arguing for monarchy or anything like that, I’m arguing that this is the historical reality. Regardless of the nomenclature, however, the heirs of those who hold their own center during a decline scenario will tend to fair better than everyone else.
We have to be honest and admit our civilization is in decline and our country has more or less chosen the path of going with the flow of that civilization. While we can seek to divert our country to the path of a new civilization, and we should, the only way to guarantee a secure future for ourselves and our posterity is to find and actualize our own center through the forms and structures of a new civilization. In fact, our chances of diverting our country to the path of the new civilization may hinge on our ability to live lives that are neither controlled and influenced by nor dependent upon the forms and structures of the old civilization.
If we don’t hold to our own center, we must follow the current over the falls.
The passage of a budget resolution for 2018 is the key to getting the Trump tax reforms passed, because it allows for a reconciliation process which cannot be filibustered by the minority party, which opposes tax reform.
After today’s passage in the Senate of the 2018 budget, President Trump had this to say:
President Donald J. Trump applauds the Senate for passing its FY 2018 Budget Resolution today and taking an important step in advancing the Administration’s pro-growth and pro-jobs legislative agenda. This resolution creates a pathway to unleash the potential of the American economy through tax reform and tax cuts, simplifying the overcomplicated tax code, providing financial relief for families across the country, and making American businesses globally competitive. President Trump looks forward to final enactment of the Fiscal Year 2018 budget resolution so we can bring jobs back to our country.
Freedomist Publisher, Bill collier, at the PA rally where the President spoke on his tax reform plan
Unfortunately, the Republicans are prone to follow their own agendas, resulting in a lot of talk but not a lot of action. Every major effort by the Trump administration to fulfill his promises has been resisted or fumbled by the Republicans, with the exception of the Supreme Court nomination and some judges, but even here progress has been slow owing to an unwillingness to overcome procedural obstacles, Indeed, some of the opposition to the Trump agenda has been based on an appeal to “procedure” which some observers doubt is the real cause of the opposition.
In a Friday Twitter exchange with Senator Rand Paul, President Trump called the Senator out saying he supported tax reform, to which the Senator replied that he supported tax CUTS, possibly signalling he might not end up supporting the President’s plan. Such a move is likely to further infuriate the Trump base, which dominates the grassroots of the Party, and could even cause investors to claw back some of their recent investments in the stock market, which has risen to over 23,000.
While step one is to get a budget resolution passed, so they can layer in the tax reform through reconciliation, it also appears the Party is unable to come together and effectively govern, let alone let the President take the lead in delivering a reform that is highly favored by the Party rank and file.
It is now up to the House and Senate to work out a reconciliation, during which time the tax reform plan will be added. All eyes are on the usual suspects, including Olympia Snow, McCain, and Rand Paul, who, for their own reasons, are prone to resist the President’s agenda. Given an option between the Trump reform plan and having nothing pass, most conservatives will favor the Trump plan overwhelmingly. But will they be able to carry their own elected Senators and Representatives over the threshold?
By Bill Collier- My speciality is breaking political and international intelligence and covering major, breaking news live. My vision for Freedomist remains twofold: to promote the creation of a people-powered free press all over thw world and to restore freedom through virtue, liberty and indepdnence based on the UPDR Ideals and the original spirit and intent of the US Bill of Rights.
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William R Collier Jr- In the 1990’s I was vehemently opposed to President Clinton. In the early 1990’s I ran a local newspaper and was guilty of alarmist rhetoric myself which I aimed at the President every week. Eventually, by 1995, I grew up. I moved past that phase, and my headlines, while critical, were more measured. I was among the few who saw the entire impeachment process as undermining the very fabric of our civilization, one stitch and one thread at a time.
We have entered an era of scorched earth politics in which all parties are deluded into thinking the other parties pose an existential threat, even if they don’t. What this has given rise to is the reality that all the major players in American politics and culture, it’s hard to separate the two now, do pose an existential threat to the average citizen’s rights, security, and prosperity. Moreover, they all seem hellbent for leather to undermine our collective sanity.
I am not speaking as one unaffected by this alarmist zeitgeist, and in fact, for me, the trend among Progressives really does pose an existential threat for anyone trying to live out a Christian life and openly share their faith, morals, values, and convictions. If Progressives have their way, based on how they run college campuses and the corporate media, nobody who refuses to embrace their amoral relativism and globalist envirosocialism will be much tolerated to speak, to own a business, or even be employed in a high level job. That is not alarmist, you can go to academia and the corporate media and see this is exactly how Progressives conduct themselves when in positions of power.
But the progressives are making a huge mistake now, one for which we will all suffer. Their scorched-earth campaign against Republicans, which started under Nixon and has only increased, is meant to legitimize every Republican who opposes them. They do this against the Republican Party, against the the Republican caucuses in the House and Senate, against Republican judges, and, of course, against Republican Presidents. They put a microscope to these people’s lives and actions, always concealing the good and exponentially dramatizing the bad.
It isn’t that nobody on the other side does this against Democrats, it’s just that no mass media carries their water and none of the leading figures of the Republican Party establishment use such tone. Certainly you don’t see Fox News, Mitch McConnell, or Paul Ryan sensationalizing the misdeeds of the Democrats. Not even President Trump resorts to the guttural accusations of treason or criminality used by prominent Democrats and their cheerleaders in Academia, Hollywood, and the Corporate Media.
But the Progressives are tearing down their own walls in their own house.
You see, for people like me, we can visualize life without government services or benefits. I am no anarchist, but I tend to think that, given a government collapse, private persons and even local governments could find a way to survive, unless a large portion of the populace was totally dependent on government for their necessities and not equipped to take initiative on their own.
For Progressives, however, the state as an institution is equal to or more important than the family. Indeed, Progressives pursue social policies that seem to indicate they hold little value for the old notion of a father and mother raising their own children together as the ideal and preferred way to propagate the species. Their view of the state is much more defined and precious. For them, the state is the primary agent of social cohesion and the prime mover in human progress. With the right kind of state managing society, human nature itself can be molded to fit an ideal of absolute equality and the absence of all greed or self-interest.
Little do they understand that the average person does not differentiate easily between Republicans and Democrats. When Democrats use lies and exaggerations to delegitimize Republicans in Congress we see overall faith in Congress as an institution slides. The same goes for the Presidency, not to mention the Federal Government itself. They may love the fact they are keeping Trump’s approval rate down and his strongly disapprove rate high by a constant barrage of sensational and alarmist headlines, but the overall net effect doesn’t end with Trump: people are losing faith in the entire system.
What is more, this alarmism is breeding extremism on both sides. I myself really have no defense for modern republicanism. The idea of one-man, one-vote really makes no sense when people are ignorant of both history and our Constitution and when they are making decisions for petty self-gain at public expense based on outright falsehoods and alarmist nonsense. Truly, if republicanism was good it would have been able to defend itself against all of this.
But others on the right are going to feel compelled to go further, they are going to conclude that they have to fight fire with fire. They will conclude that the only choices are an America run by Progressives like they run academia and the corporate media or one run by conservatives with as little tolerance toward Progressives as is shown by Progressives toward conservatives in Universities. Given a choice between “my side” ruling with an iron fist or “your side”, knowing that you have made those the only options, what would the normal person choose? It would be suicide to let the other side rule with an iron fist, especially given we see how unfair and unjust they are where they do actually hold power!
The final possibility may be a collapse in general.
You see, in any civilization trust is the single greatest factor that determines cohesiveness. Whether it is trust in persons who rule, institutions, or just ideas and values, when trust is undermined too far collapse becomes inevitable. What people call gridlock is the inability of a society’s decision-making bodies to create and carry out problem solving plans of action. Disagreement and competition are always going to be present, but when a broad consensus that most people back cannot be created we see this gridlock in a society. And, throughout history, it is this gridlock that predicts the ultimate collapse.
Progressives are undermining civilization itself because they have a narrow view of reality and history. As to reality, they have fantasized about an ideal world that doesn’t match human nature or even the laws of creation, and anything that doesn’t affirm that fantasy is ignored or ridiculed. As to history, they have no sense of the lessons learned from the past or the consequences of undermining people’s faith and trust in the very institutions (the state, academia, entertainment, the corporate media) they wish to use to shape society and humanity itself into their ideal image.
In the event this is unchallenged by Republicans and any opposition capable to offering real resistance, this process of delegitimizing the institutions upon which Progressives depend for their agenda will run its course. The rebellion against human nature and the laws of creation will also carry its own very real consequences, translated into conflict, poverty, loss of freedom, and the such.
In the end, the progressive will tear down his or her or their own house, and, in the process, undermine the fabric of civilization to a point where a major disaster or crises will see the collapse of the whole edifice.
William R. Collier Jr- What is freedom, and what does it mean to be a freedomist, someone who advocates and works for freedom for themselves and their fellow man?
One dictionary definition that seems to depict the spirit of the West reads- the power to think, act, and think as one wishes without constraint.
But another definition would say- the state or quality of being exempt from something onerous.
But what about the power to shape the kind of culture and society in which you live in accordance with your values? What about freedom from privation or injustice?
What we see when the subject of freedom rises is a one-dimensional view of freedom. For instance, the first definition is totally focused on the individual acting by and for themselves alone, it defies the biological and spiritual reality of humanity as social beings who must live and act socially just to survive. Who is born alone and who could even survive the first year in life without other people feeling the need to care for a little one who can offer them nothing in exchange for their sacrifice?
Almost all these one-dimensional definitions contain a kernel of truth but offer a very limited application or an impossible, almost utopian, standard which has never been accomplished and cannot ever be accomplished given human nature and the laws of nature and of God. For instance, how can I do whatever I like if it would tend to harm myself or others, or if it would undermine some societal institution necessary for our very survival as a species? How can I shape my culture in a community in which not everyone has the same beliefs and values?
A more mature and advanced view of freedom is multi-dimensional and develops a matrix of ideas and ideals which one can use to measure whether a general condition of freedom exists generally or whether a less free or unfree condition exists. For instance, we may say that white men in the 18th century may have been more free than they are now, but not everyone in general was so free. And yet today we can say most people are little more free than chattel slaves in that same era, although we have the fiction of voting and a limited free speech, and, also, we tend to choose our slavery as we follow the pop culture ethos that is spoon-fed to us. (In other words, most of us CAN be much more free.)
Today’s African Americans may argue that the legal end of slavery has not given them equal freedom, but it can also be argued that, as with socialism and wealth, the trend is toward an equality in which few of us will be allowed to be free.
As Freedomists we speak of “freedom as defined by the original spirit and intent of the Bill of Rights “, and of course we mean that for everyone, for every member of the human race. But even this has a deeper root, which we find in Acts 17: that men would be able to find God if haply they seek Him, though He is not far from any of us. This also means that men are free not to seek God, and to them and their associations go the consequences!
Freedom also has an expression through four core ideals, we call them the UPDR Ideals, from the first letter for each of the ideals. These are the spiritual constitution of America in its original intent, they embody the original spirit and intent of the Bill of Rights, and they provide an objective standard of measure by which we can declare something more free or less free in its operation.
These ideals include Unity in diversity, Popular sovereignty, Democratic equality, and Rule of law. When we understand them from a JudeoChristian perspective and that they must each balance the others, we gain an insight as to their meaning which is deeper than the cliche’d where they are often presented. You have heard these ideals, perhaps you recoil at one or two because of how they have been used.
But notice each is a sort of ying and yang unto itself. Notice also, we are saying that none of these ideals can contradict the other, but only bring balance. The unity of a shared set of beliefs and values is balanced by the diversity of convictions among individuals and communities within the whole. The popular rights of self-determination and collective self-preservation are balanced by the sovereignty of the individual and their own free associations. The democracy of a common consensus is balanced by the inherit equality of value and standing we all have as individuals before God and our standing together according to our merit. The rule or means of enforcement owned by all and usually practiced through some sort of leadership is bound by the laws of nature and of nature’s God as understood by the people under that rule and for the good of all (although there are objective laws enforced by causality).
(Note: A society or community, even a nation and civilization, of people that orders itself in way that violates the laws of nature and of God will endure causal consequences, but that doesn’t mean any human agency can claim to be the final arbiter or judge of these matters, on the other hand nobody should be compelled to remain under the influence or control of such a society.)
All of this opens the door for each person to find and fulfill God’s best for their life, if they wish. Through this, ideally, every one has an equal and fair chance to make their calling their career and, mostly through free association, shape their own culture and society according to their values but within a broader society in which those ideas can be challenged.
It is not hard to define freedom with one single definition, it is one-dimensional to think of something so grand and vast as freedom in such simplistic terms. If we say freedom is defined as the original spirit and intent of the US Bill of Rights, as applied to every human being and through the practice of the UPDR Ideals, we have something more closely approximating what freedom is. The domain of the free- this is the heart of freedom. Free people are not slaves to debauchery, addiction, their own flesh, the tyranny or control of others, or even the vicissitudes of nature! But we cannkt impose that freedom on them. The domain of the free is a state of mind and a state of being, and if we use the original spirit and intent of the US Bill of Rights, along with a disciplined application of the UPDR Ideals, we make freedom real, accessible, and measureable.
On this Indepdnence Day, let us be free, truly free, not in some shallow or cliche’d manner, but with maturity, intelligence, and discipline. Let us actualize the original spirit and intent of the Bill of Rights in our lives through the daily use of the UPDR Ideals!
How, and why, did the US enter the war against the Nazis and come to the rescue of Great Britain? Lewis E. Lehrman richly unpacks the whole story, centering around the “special relationship” between America and Great Britain. That relationship was born from a personal relationship between Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt, as well as between the men surrounding these titanic figures.
Lewis E. Lehrman applies scholarly yet lucid treatment to complicated relationships. Lehrman is a holder of the National Humanities Medal, one of America’s most distinguished awards. The medal “honors individuals or groups whose work has deepened the nation’s understanding of the humanities and broadened our citizens’ engagement with history, literature, languages, philosophy, and other humanities subjects.” This work certainly lives up to these criteria.
Churchill, Roosevelt & Company is written to be enjoyed by lay readers and scholars alike. It is immediately accessible. Even if you are not a history buff, the drama behind the story Lehrman provides is as compelling as a work of great fiction. As a bonus, if you will, it contains reveal after reveal that helps make sense of contemporary politics, both national and worldwide.
On one side, Lehrman demonstrates the polished political legerdemain of a consummate political operator, FDR, and, on the other, the blunt but persuasive stratagems of a staunch realist, Winston Churchill. On one hand, the new, rising, power — America – was chary to enter someone else’s war, with all the blood and treasure that surely would spill.
On the other hand, Great Britain, and its Empire, was being brutally assaulted by the Axis powers. England seemed on the ropes. The rebel child of the British Empire, America, still had sympathy for its mother country. Also, consider the enemy: Hitler.
America was on the cusp of becoming a greater global power than its progenitor.
This book recounts an exciting time. It easily could have devolved to a much uglier — Nazi and fascist — world order. Churchill laid the groundwork by statecraft, which, when triggered by Pearl Harbor and Germany’s declaration of war on the US, led America to heroically seal the defeat of the Axis powers. Thus, America ended one of the greatest menaces to humanity ever, defeating an evil empire bent on exterminating and enslaving whole peoples.
The story Lehrman reports appears to be the fruit of a lifetime of research. There is hardly a point he makes that is without substantial documentation. His fascinating endnotes encompass over 100 pages. This provides an immediately accessible story that is easy to read and follow. But the endnotes and documentation add further depth of understanding of a formative period of our age.
Churchill, Roosevelt & Company: Studies in Character and Statecraft reveals that Roosevelt also was callous, if not ruthless, toward the British Empire, while naïve about the Soviet Union. FDR’s handling of lend-lease was brutal to the British both in terms of territory and coin. His administration was more generous to the Soviets.
Churchill understood the price of defeating Hitler could entail the end of the Empire. And yet, he did what was necessary. This is the main point I took from reading this revelatory work of history: Churchill’s recognition that unless he could draw a reluctant USA into WWII Nazi Germany would win. Coaxing the US into committing troops was Churchill’s entire purpose, statecraft-wise, even recognizing the high cost — Britain’s loss to America of world supremacy. It was a sobering, although necessary, trade.
I have always believed that great figures in history understand both the real crisis and the price to be paid in confronting it. Nazism was the great threat to human civilization. Churchill understood this and engaged his whole being into overcoming that at great risk and at great cost. He did so with his eyes wide open. This story of this existential trade makes for a compelling one. America had no dream of empire. History records we were, and are, a rare great power who went to war not motivated to create its own empire. But we were determined to dismantle one.
Yes, the story Lehrman tells, with great human interest, documents the events leading America into the war against, and victory over, Hitler. At the same time, it also recounts the cost imposed by America — the destruction of the British Empire — also at the hands of Americans who actively sought to dismantle their rival power, Great Britain.
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Bill Collier- Trust in leading American institutions has dropped from a high average of 43% in 2004 to a l
