My White Picket Fence

The American dream as it was sold to us involved a big cubic structure largely composed of wood with a white picket fence for a perimeter indicator. Inside of these cubic habitation modules, reaffirmation in success required a large metal vehicle reliant on fossil fuels for propulsion. If you had those things and perhaps a few more, then you had reached the American dream and you could be happy. And indeed, it seems that such a lifestyle was in the past not only normal, but also seemingly moral. 

However, if the 21st century has shown us anything, it is that a fossil fuel-reliant, resource-gobbling economic model is ultimately unsustainable. To survive in the 21st century, America needs to move to a new economic model, one where the country's mass appetite for fossil fuels is tempered with self-sustaining homes, renewable energy, and electric-hybrid vehicles that will allow the global economy to disassociate from tyrannical regimes currently in control of dwindling energy resources. Those resources will continue to dwindle, as the world imitates the Western model.

The world wants to emulate Americans, but we are only 5% of the population yet 25% of the energy consumers. The problem with everyone wanting a white picket fence in the suburbs is that the Chinese and Indians also want the same. The Chinese middle-class alone is larger than the population of the United States. It is only natural for people to want what makes them and their families comfortable, even if to the detriment of the common good.

Detriment to the common good is the result of blindness, and it is leading the world to an ecological apocalypse at the hands of a massive resource war. The answer to our current economic problems is not a patching of the current economy, but rather a rebooting of our entire economic model. There are more slaves alive today than were alive during the American civil war, and they make many of the products that are produced in the blind corners of the world. There will eventually be a war over slavery; it is inevitable. It will not be between countrymen, however, but rather the developing signatories of free trade agreements. The world cannot survive half slave, half consumer. 

It remains to be seen whether the developed economies of the world will eventually become energy independent and largely import independent due to 3-D printing technology, but these are the two technological developments that can most prevent massive resource wars in the 21st century. Even vast, renewable energy levels and on-demand printing of objects will not be enough to temper the appetite for precious metals and the invisible elements that drive our high-tech consumer goods. The war for precious metals promises to wreak havoc in Africa as China and America tear it apart in their quest to establish spheres of influence. I can't foresee a replacement for metals, so swords and bullets will be made for many more decades to come.

The Legal Illusion

Of what use is the law if it is only an illusion? I sometimes wish I were living in an illusion, for it would make the absurdity of America's laws all the more easy to swallow. It seems, however, that believing the illusion is easier on the heart: you don't have to stress about unpleasant truths. 

We used to be told that we had a Constitution, that we were entitled to certain protections. The Constitution goes short of saying that God gave men certain rights that cannot be taken by other men. One of those rights is the rights to be safe in your possessions, or to be allowed the privilege of your name being read out in a kangaroo court. There is increasingly more limited access to these kangaroo courts, unfortunately. You see, if you go to the border, you lose your constitutional rights, and the government can confiscate your belongings or rummage through your computer at-will. 

This is somewhat reasonable, and most governments around the world do it in one way or another, but the tyrants in Congress have decided to extend the definition of the word "border" to include nearly two-thirds of the United States. Today, there are close to 200 million Americans living within 100 miles of the border, the distance at which your rights become arbitrary privileges under control of Homeland Security.

According to a source, a national event of significant magnitude will trigger plans declaring the 100 mile Constitution-free zone into a virtual police state. The technology has already been developed and extensively tested on Muslims, who most certainly have put up a harder fight than can be expected of any American population.

Let's look at the story of the Brossart family in North Dakota-- who lived within 100 miles of the border -- and ran into some good ole' trouble with the sheriff because of 6 cows, and eventually were all apprehended using a Predator drone. Yes, the alleged theft of six cows escalated into a Predator drone and a SWAT team. DHS has gotten so many requests for drones, that soon they will start a billing system of sorts. Homeland Security has also recently purchased 2,700 MRAPs, the tank-like vehicles used in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It seems that the pipes have been laid, and soon the steam of tyranny will violently make its way around America. We can in the future expect more drones and DHS checkpoints along America's massive "border." In some good news, the state of New Jersey is by federal law considered in its totality what it rightfully is: a border town.

America 2015: Homeland Security Fugitive

Homeland Security has today released a picture of Michael Viter, the insurgent who escaped last week's raid in Austin, Texas. The police found Al-Qaeda material in Viter's home, but did not specify what type of material they seized. However, it most likely pertains to drone evasion, especially considering Viter's dramatic escape in the middle of a fire fight.

"He's most likely wearing clothing lined with specialized shielding, which has made him extremely difficult to detect from the sky. I guess were are gonna have to rely on dogs and good ole' fashioned police work," said DHS Chief Snader.

When asked how the insurgents in Viter's compound were identified, Chief Snader said, "at the moment that remains classified, but it's pretty obvious to me from the Al-Qaeda material we found and from Mr. Viter's willingness and capacity to evade the law, that he constitutes a threat to public safety, and that he has prepared to be a public threat for as long as we search for him."

 

When pressed for details on the relationship between the individuals in the compound, Chief Snader stated that he was not authorized to diclose whether the insurgents were or were not of close kin affiliation. "I think the very question itself is irrelevant. What's relevant here is the safety of the American people," he added.

 

Police also found 3-D printer files for high-capacity ammunition clips in Viter's hard drives. "It's pretty clear that Viter was willing to produce felony contraband to aid him in his terrorist enterprise," further added Snader.

 

Homeland Security is offering a reward to anyone who provides information leading to the capture or targeted killing of Michael Viter.

2013: The End of the Nixon Era

Richard Nixon did two things: he opened up China and he started the war on drugs. We are now seeing the end of the war on drugs with the legalization and decriminalization of cannabis in many parts of the United States, as well as more interest in a clinical as opposed to a police approach to drug problems. The battle is far from over for many victims of the war on drugs, but for the first time in decades, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

 

The end of the Nixon tunnel also seems to coincide with the end of the Chinese-American buddy road trip. The Obama administration has so far remained largely mum about Chinese cyberattacks, but it would be foolish to presume that the US has not initiated any cyberattacks against China. All the evidence seems to indicate that the two nations are already in a Cyber Cold War.

 

Like two supernations already in tension, there must be a threat of physical confrontation in a proxy state. And indeed, Japan and China are in an increasingly escalating game of brinkmanship over the Senkaku islands. Uninhabited rocks have the two historical Asian rivals at each other's throats, with the US supplying a knife and an arm.

 

The Chinese have recently moved missiles, and the Japanese have started quoting Thatcher on the Falklands. Meanwhile, American generals are calling for further vengeance over China's unit 61398's intrusions into America's institutions. All three countries, with bloated economies and dissatisfied populations, somehow know that the people need a great external foe to rally them together and distract them from the harsh economic reality.

 

Face it, America is full of debt and its infrastructure is crumbling under the weight of a corpulent, decadent middle-class. The only thing that can prevent an implosion is a great awakening. Bush tried to give it to us with 9/11 and Al-Qaeda, but he failed for reasons too numerous to detail. Sure, an economic extrication will be devastating at first, but it is best when the people can blame an outside agent for economic tribulations. There is no fixing the current economy: you can't reglue shattered glass.

 

Don't think that out leaders have not foreseen this or prepared; to do so would be extremely foolish. All indications make it clear that the Chinese have been stockpiling resources and that the Americans have been stockpiling bullets, seemingly preparing for total economic collapse and mass dissent.  Only a great new foe will be enough to distract the masses and quash dissent. American needs a new evil empire to justify its own existence, but we shouldn't underestimate a 5,000-year-old culture that produced the Art of War.

Advice to a Friend on Choosing a Mistress

So, Benjamin Franklin was even more of a genius and hound dog than most of us would like to accept from one of America's founding fathers. During the 19th century, the below letter was never published and kept almost a state secret. Franklin was a cougar hunter, and he outlined his reasons for believing that older women were better. And his observations are indeed very accurate, but perhaps the importance of marriage as an institution has changed. People today are a lot more independent and self-focused.

Franklin wrote this letter to a friend who asked him for advice on how to control his sexual urges. Were Franklin alive today, he probably would have suggested a little Porntube too. Franklin says there is no hazard of children with older women, but technology has made it a hazard; so, this reason probably hasn't fully withstood the test of time.
 

My dear Friend:

I know of no medicine fit to diminish the violent natural inclinations you mention; and if I did, I think I should not communicate it to you. Marriage is the proper remedy. It is the most natural state of man, and therefore the state in which you are most likely to find solid happiness. Your reasons against entering into it at present appear to me not well founded. The circumstantial advantages you have in view by postponing it are not only uncertain, but they are small in comparison with that of the thing itself, that being married and settled. It is the man and woman united that make the complete human being. Separate, she wants his force of body and strength of reason; he, her softness, sensibility, and acute discernment. Together they are more likely to succeed in the world. A single man has not nearly the value he would have in the state of union. He is an incomplete animal. He resembles the odd half of a pair of scissors. If you get a prudent, healthy wife, your industry in your profession, with her good economy, will be a fortune sufficient.

But if you will not take the counsel and persist in thinking of a commerce with the sex inevitable, then I repeat my former advice, that in all your amours you should prefer old women to young ones. You call this a paradox and demand my reasons. They are these:

1. Because They have more knowledge of the world, and their minds are better stored with observations, their conversation is more improving and more lastingly agreeable.
2. Because when women cease to be handsome they study to be good. To maintain their influence over men, they supply the diminution of beauty by an augmentation of utility. They learn to do a thousand services small and great, and are the most tender and useful of friends when you are sick. Thus they continue amiable And hence there is hardly such a thing to be found as an old woman who is not a good woman.

3. Because there is no hazard of children, which irregularly produced may be attended with much inconvenience.

4. Because through more experience they are more prudent and discreet in conducting an intrigue to prevent suspicion. The commerce with them is therefore safer with regard to your reputation. And with regard to theirs, if the affair should happen to be known, considerate people might be rather inclined to excuse an old woman, who would kindly take care of a young man, form his manners by her good counsels, and prevent his ruining his health and fortune among mercenary prostitutes.

5. Because in every animal that walks upright the deficiency of the fluids that fill the muscles appears first in the highest part. The face first grows lank and wrinkled; then the neck; then the breast and arms; the lower parts continuing to the last as plump as ever: so that covering all above with a basket, and regarding only what is below the girdle, it is impossible of two women to tell an old one from a young one. And as in the dark all cats are gray, the pleasure of corporal enjoyment with an old woman is at least equal, and frequently superior; every knack being, by practice, capable of improvement.

6. Because the sin is less. The debauching a virgin may be her ruin, and make her for life unhappy.

7. Because the compunction is less. The having mad a young girl miserable may give you frequent bitter reflection; none of which an attend the making an old woman happy.

8th and lastly. they are so grateful!!

Thus much for my paradox. But still I advise you to marry directly; being sincerely

Your affectionate friend,

Benjamin Franklin