CBDCs, Ripple = XRP, GreenPeace and Bitcoin

There’s a lot a hubbub going around the interwebs (again) about XRP and their situationship with bitcoin. I hope for this write-up to serve as an aggregation of information and nexus of source material for those wishing to both gain understanding of what XRP (“Ripple”) was, is, and how the crypto token and the company have a relationship with Bitcoin.

Genesis

A friend of mine from Clubhouse and Twitter, who also happens to be a lawyer with explicit and long-standing experience in the crypto space, Preston Byrne, has discussed the Ripple XRP topic ad nauseam. As many have. And yet the facts and evidence continue to go unacknowledged.

Ripple Labs Inc.,” (2013) previously named “Opencoin Inc.,” (2013) which was previously named “Newcoin Inc.,” (2012).

As noted by Preston,

“Anything done by Newcoin/Opencoin/Ripple Labs (CA) was done by a direct predecessor of the current Ripple entity that runs the business. All those names refer to the same company. For the sake of [this] analysis, therefore, each of the four names should be treated as if they refer to the same enterprise.”

The Ripple Software

The Ripple software was gifted to Newcoin/Opencoin/Ripple Labs/Ripple by Arthur Britto. With a statement that any future contributions by Britto (or others) would be done so in an open-source format.

The number of tokens in existence (referred to as “credits” in the paperwork), were agreed to be anticipated (as pointed out by Byrne, did not exist at the time of the agreement being drafted and signed) as totaling to be 100 billion in count. With an agreement to allow Britto to maintain a 2% ownership of the total supply, accounting for potential increased dilution in the future. At the time of writing the XRP token was not conceived but was later named XRP.

Preston has put together a phenomenal deepdive on the ownership and business relations of Ripple/Ripple Labs, Inc./Opencoin, Inc./Newcoin, Inc. and I do not want to risk even the slightest confusion of who has done the work. For the nittygritty on the topics such as Copyright and the like, I suggest visiting Preston’s own writing by clicking the image above or following the hyperlink here.

XRP IS Centralized

80% of the total supply of the XRP token was provided to the company for use at the company’s discretion — what is known as a premine. With 55% of the allocation getting locked up into escrow accounts that release every month.

“The escrow consists of independent on ledger escrows that release a total of one billion XRP each month over the next 55 months.” [Source]

If XRP were truly decentralized, why are over 30,000 blocks missing??

Ripple’s Use Case

According to this 2014 article published in The Banker, Mr. Larsen suggests that Ripple would be a “currency agnostic” system for transferring ‘conventional’ fiat currencies. That XRP would be the basis for an ‘internet of value.’ Unfortunately for Ripple, in 2023 the Federal Reserve announced FedNow going live.

What Larsen couldn’t have expected at the time was the development of the Lightning Network to facilitate the ‘internet of value’ and was the enabler for the development of NOSTR — which has multiple social media functions, including streaming. The Lightning Network went live in 2018, with gains in use and popularity growing between 2020 and 2021.

CBDCs — Ripple’s New Use Case

“Moving money on the CBDC Private Ledger will be cost-effective, reliable and close to instantaneous. Transactions can also happen at volumes required by Central Banks. The CBDC Private Ledger will handle tens of thousands of transactions per second (TPS) initially with the potential to scale to hundreds of thousands TPSs over time.

Transactions on the CBDC Private Ledger are verified by the same consensus protocol used by the XRP Ledger, which is far less energy intensive, and therefore less expensive and 61,000 times more efficient than public blockchains that leverage proof-of-work.

In addition to leveraging the XRP Ledger technology, the CBDC Private Ledger is also supported by RippleNet technologies, and the Interledger suite of protocols to enable ultra-high throughput use-cases such as micro-payments.

The CBDC Private Ledger meets even the highest of security standards for Central Banks with each having complete sovereignty and ability to customize based on their own unique privacy and policy requirements. The core technology behind this new CBDC Private Ledger has been running for more than 8 years without incident and with billions of dollars of value transacted everyday.”

Then Ripple partnered with Palau to pilot their CBDC program starting in 2021, 7 months after the above posting. With Phase 2 of the Palau Project progressing in 2023.

Ripple claimed to have 10 countries onboard with its CBDC project during summer of 2024.

I have had numerous conversations with individuals on Twitter over the years that claim to be against CBDCs and the over centralization of financial power and economic surveillance YET THEY LOVE XRP AND RIPPLE. I mean are you insane, or just re[dacted]? I have provided evidence, from the horse’s mouth, that Ripple is pushing the development of CBDC’s forward. A patently anti-liberty initiative.

Political Interference

My man Pierre Rochard popped a shot at Garlinghouse and Ripple recently stating that regulation is being held up, not because of bitcoin but because of Ripple’s obfuscation of understanding via their tomfoolery with political lobbying efforts. On a similar point is Ripple’s funding of blockchain research at prominent universities to the tune of $50 million — an effective manipulation tactic made evident by revelations over actual climate and environmental data challenging activists that have been screaming for decades that we would most assuredly be burning up (or drowning) due to ‘Global Warming.’ A story that has persisted since the 70s but has not yielded any actual evidence that holds water.

Ripple Labs — Energy and Climate Experts?

Ripple has been attacking bitcoin for years in a clever, but still laughable, strategy — climate change and climate catastrophists.

“Larsen said Bitcoin’s power consumption issue could be fixed via a soft or a hard fork — both changing the network’s code to make Bitcoin less power hungry. A soft fork would preserve Bitcoin as a single blockchain. A hard fork would split Bitcoin into two separate networks, one supporting miners and the other running different code — perhaps Proof of Stake.”

Too bad Bitcoin’s energy consumption is a boon for a number of reasons: (1) the energy consumption is a strategy for securing the network, the energy cost of maintaining attacks against the network disincentivize offensive strategies; (2) the energy consumption of the Bitcoin network provides an opportunity for power producers to establish a line of revenue that is separate of societal power demands; (3) these power demands allow for bitcoin miners to act as power arbitrators, enabling them to reduce consumption in order to protect the integrity of the grid in times of need (acting as cannon fodder to take the hit so Ma & Pa can keep the lights on); (4) the energy consumption allows for oil production operations to consume the energy yield of associated natural gas rather than venting or flaring — both being negative impacts on methane emissions.

GreenPeace

GreenPeace has been trying and failing, abysmally, for years to attack bitcoin over it’s supposed negative impacts on the environment. These attempts have fallen flat on their face over the years as meme campaigns like the famous skull sculpture were reversed by the bitcoin community and truth-seekers like Daniel Batten have come out to bat for bitcoin mining.

In Conclusion

Ripple XRP is not a good faith actor in any sense of the crypto space. Not that there are many of those in the sector to start with. But Ripple and Garlinghouse are amongst the worst transgressors. Ripple XRP is not an ally to anything bitcoin or freedom related and is not in the best interests of any individual that values either, or both. They are an organization that preys upon the inexperienced and uneducated pleb that is hoping to invest in the future.

We have opportunities to invest in great projects and scrape together a little generational wealth for our loved ones, but XRP is not it. It is my position that anyone that is hoisting the flag of XRP on the social media platforms is a bad actor and their opinions over anything in the crypto space is not to be trusted, as Ripple XRP is one of the oldest projects in the space (alongside Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, and Litecoin) and lacking understanding of any (and all) of these stories makes them an ignorant source of information.

A Few Other Interesting Sources:

• Ripple CEO responds to accusations of lobbying against Bitcoin reserve
• Ripple Claims Bitcoin Is ‘Chinese-Controlled’ While Announcing New Lawsuit From SEC
• Greenpeace, Ripple co-founder campaigning to change Bitcoin code
• XRP is the next Bitcoin if we solve a multi-trillion-dollar problem, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse
• According to Brad Garlinghouse, mining Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) consumes a lot of energy, leaving too much carbon footprint, and this should worry climate change activists. Do you share the view of Ripple CEO
• Brad Garlinghouse vs the energy consumption of Bitcoin
• Ripple’s Garlinghouse disses Bitcoin’s energy use in advance of Biden administration
• Brad Garlinghouse Disagrees with Coinbase’s New Apolitical Stance – InsideBitcoins.com
• Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse Says Bitcoin Maximalism Hurting Crypto Industry’s Lobbying Efforts: Report – The Daily Hodl

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Assessing The Potential Of Bitcoin Mining In Energy Monetization

If trade is considered the lifeblood of an economy, then surely energy would mark the essence of life itself. Without energy, then trade has no foundation to stand upon. And yet, some seem intent on diminishing the capacity for the world to generate this very essence of an economy and of the world. Thankfully, it seems that some are waking up and facing the music.

Woe Is We, Thx ESG

During the week of August 7th ratings agency S&P Global announced that it would no longer be using ESG scores to determine credit quality of public companies. A spokesperson for S&P Global also (quoted by Bloomberg) stated that their move to ‘not rely on ESG scores in credit ratings’ will not affect the company’s philosophies towards ESG goals, or how the organization assesses a firm’s creditworthiness.

This comes at an interesting time. After years of consistent aggravated PR campaigns against specifically oil and gas. With publicly stated concerted efforts to attempt to hamper O&G production and processing operations reality, it seems, is starting to finally set in. Time will tell what this pivot ultimately leads to with regards to the heightened polarity around ESG and the fixation on emissions and their implied impact on climate change.

There is one thing that I cannot help but get off my chest…

How boorishly cliche; to not be capable of seeing how irrational a tact may be, ignoring data and logic, until failure and mark-ed difficulty are staring us in the face. If there is a silver-lining here, I suppose it would be that this serves as evidence that we are still clutching on to our humanity. This capability of making silly mistakes that yield outlandish consequences proves that (at least so far) we haven’t completely turned into cyborgs yet. So… go us.

Now we not only need to undo all of the damage to public understanding that has been inflicted upon oil & gas, but we also need to explain how important hydrocarbons are to the production of renewables, and why a shortage in black gold is bad for everybody and has significant impacts on all forms of energy generation. Which it seems we are approaching more rapidly than we want to admit.

Choppy Waters for Oil

What really drives this point home is the report produced by Goehring & Rozencwajg (referred to as “G&R” going forward) on May 31st, 20233. Conventional non-OPEC oil production has markedly declined, while nonconventional non-OPEC (that basically means US Shale) production has stalled out, globally. The problem is that, according to G&R, the Permian Basin accounted for 75% of all nonconventional supply growth since 2016, globally – of the 7.4mm b/d the Permian supplied 5.4.

“Well, Mike, that’s just for non-OPEC production. You’re making it sound like it’s all doom and gloom, there’s still the OPEC producers.”

Yes you are correct. However, G&R are of the opinion that OPEC production has turned negative, an opinion that I have now heard from multiple different sources and also share (take that with a big helping of salt). This gives two reasons to be concerned about the previously stated production numbers:

1. If the majority of global supply growth was due to expansion in the Permian, and that has now passed, that suggests that supply and demand will continue to invert, and begin to pick up steam. Because, as G&R elaborate on, oil demand was forecasted to diminish after 2019 and instead has smacked back with a vengeance. And this isn’t just a “return to normal” situation, that demand is continuing to expand4. Meaning: energy prices should explode in such a scenario, making for the costs of quite literally everything more egregious. Ergo: the return of inflation and nauseating discussion volume over how real those measures are. Prepare yourselves.

2. If the supply growth stall is only on the non-OPEC side of the equation, that places America in a not-so-great tough spot. Our oil production has contributed to our prowess, and if we were to no longer be capable of continuing to expand access to our supply of oil, that removes a tool from our shed. And if you know anything about politik (and trade) you want every advantage at your disposal when things come to the negotiating table. NOW, lucky for the US is that (from my elementary understanding) we still have basins that we can lean on between California, Alaska, Louisiana, etc. However, these are much much smaller than Texas, and all together suggest by my back-of-the-napkin math ~20-25 billion barrels of potential production.

This leaves behind implications for everything as I stated with regards to the prices. But not just in the prices of goods like your food or the gasoline at the pump. This also has impacts on the expansion of all energy sources, both renewable and oil & gas. Solar panels and wind turbines require significant hydrocarbon inputs, let alone their batteries. The same goes for the production of transmission infrastructure – what brings the electricity to our homes and businesses. This further complicates the conversation around energy sourcing diversification as wind & solar have a problem with economics: they produce their greatest amounts of power outside of the peak demand window. This demand typically floods in between 2pm-8pm when families and individuals are returning home at the end of the day and powering on central air systems, TVs, computers, charging devices, video gaming systems, and various appliances.

Nuclear does not get away from this conversation either without taking some licks. Reactors require significant upfront investment, not just in capital but also in land and water. While reactors may not require nearly the amount of space as their solar and wind counterparts, they are still preferred to be built near water sources. As the power production does not come from the radiation from the fuel rods themselves, but by using that radiation to heat water and produce steam, which spins turbine blades, and those turbines generate the electricity. Oh and that water assists with heat dissipation. So yeah, you’re gonna want a lake or river nearby for that reactor… and building a manmade body of water is a feat that most would prefer to avoid.

Enter Bitcoin Mining, Stage Left.

Nuclear Mining

This is where the big orange “B” comes in with force. First, we will touch on the nuclear discussion as we were literally just there. Nuclear reactors can be limited in project viability as their prime locations can be quite the distance from communities and cities. Meaning that said operations would require significant transmission infrastructure investment to “tie in” to the grid and supply power. Which also means that it could be some time, and many hundreds of millions of $’s invested before the project is capable of earning a return, if the goldilocks environment is not available.

Bitcoin miners are uniquely positioned for this precise predicament. While a young reactor project is waiting for transmission infrastructure to be completed and connected, reactors could partner with bitcoin miners to “move in” and bunk-up on their operation by providing virtually immediate demand. Better yet, is that nuclear generation is consistent. Bitcoin mining’s energy demand is consistent. When operations are properly managed, and equipment is maintained, there is very little downtime required from either side of this equation.

What this provides is an avenue for rapid monetization of future nuclear projects. Things get even better when the grid gets tied-in to our generator; bitcoin miners can either be selected as persistent partners providing consistent demand and serving as a load balancer (like Riot and Marathon have been performing in Texas), or they can be asked to move on. Miners are effectively energy demand mercenaries.

CleanSpark (CLSK) serves as a great example of the success that is possible to an already established nuclear project that incorporates bitcoin mining as a service augmentation. Recently the CLSK team held their earnings call boasting great returns on the production of the bitcoin asset and their fully funded expansion project that will result in a 77% expansion in hashrate bringing the total forecasted hashrate to 16 EH/s5.

For those that are not versed in bitcoin mining terminology “hashrate” refers to the number of attempts that a bitcoin mining machine spits out in an attempt to discover the necessary solution to the current block of transactions. The vast majority of bitcoin miners utilize mining pools, a service that allows any number of mining organizations or individuals to dedicate their resources (hashrate) to work in a coordinated effort to discover that next fabled block. Because these services aggregate so much hashrate, and the likelihood of receiving a bitcoin subsidy is so much greater than working purely as individuals, these pools function by divvying up bitcoin returns according to the % of work done by each participant6. Providing a likelihood for a relatively consistent stream of income for the miners plugged in to said pools.

Now, another interesting aspect of CleanSpark’s latest earnings call was their numbers reported on their all-in power costs, coming in at a mere $0.041 kWh, which was an 11% reduction in their power costs from the prior quarter. CLSK attributes this cost reduction to their “active power management strategy.” Now, I do not know what that strategy could be in technical terms, but I am going to guess that it is a strategy that is effectively load balancing for the cities in which they operate; it only makes sense. That strategy would effectively reduce their cost of energy by not consuming during peak demand hours, also allowing for power prices to be reduced for the community during such timeframes.

CleanSpark even went so far as to further improve the quality of life for the community they have partnered with in Georgia. Matt Schultz, Vice Chairman at CleanSpark, shared that Washington, Georgia’s budget increased from $16 million to $30 million based solely on CleanSpark’s business activities7.

Wind & Solar Mining

There is little that actually needs to be said here. These energy sources are capable of benefiting from incorporating bitcoin mining in a very similar manner to nuclear. The difference being that, rather than responding strictly to demand, these renewables need to be capable of earning revenue outside of the peak power demand window. When your window of peak production is not matching up with the peak demand, additional strategies need to be sourced for revenue in order to cover the delta. Bitcoin mining covers that delta, and can go offline in response to any demands by the grid. Allowing the wind & solar operations to continue earning a solid revenue well outside of their locality’s peak demand window.

Conclusion

Look, I get it. Bitcoin has been an awfully cringe topic for almost everyone for the entirety of its existence. The community largely doesn’t help with that marketing and PR either. I get it. But we have to face the facts here, the world is changing and we are heading into a series of difficulties and complications that are going to require an upgrade to the incentivization of energy. I believe that mining bitcoin accomplishes that in ways that will change America, and the world, for the better. As I briefly described, mining the great orange asset provides a monetization strategy for all forms of energy generation, including oil and gas (which I have already touched on here). I very truly do not care if you call yourself a “bitcoiner.” I’ve never cared for tribalism or dogmas. But what I do care about is societal advancement and pushing towards a future of cheap and abundant energy.

It’s a world that I was promised as a child. And the world deserves its actualization. It may not be a “perfect” solution in your eyes, but I’ll be damned if it isn’t a better solution than everything else that is on offer currently.

Generate more energy, improve the condition of the world. Make some money while you’re at it.

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For decades fathers, uncles, brothers and sons sat idly by as men were publicly insulted and berated without providing refutation or challenge. Yet, we all bear the burden in these unfortunate outcomes. In our willful complacency weakness and fragility have festered and society has since progressed further with rot. Every battle that we choose not to fight, is a battle left for our children to be forced to toil with. We have set our children up for a most troublesome conflict with the self, society, and the soul of America.

We have run aground onto the shores of simp culture. Before we continue it would be best that we define what this term “simp,” and the culture entails. A simp refers to one who expresses undue or excessive affection, sympathy, and attention towards one that does not reciprocate these feelings. With explicit focus on the “undue” aspect of this relationship, the receivers of this behavior do not provide actions or evidence that would justify such admiration.

For this discussion I’m not just speaking on the men that are purchasing OnlyFans subscriptions. I am also commenting on the general public’s approach to celebrities, politicians, influencers, and public figures. People seem to have become so disgustingly obsessed with the lives of their favorite, pedestalized, humans that they hang on their every word, and take their words as gospel, without challenge. Effectively outsourcing critical thinking (and thought in general) to those that have been propped up to a higher perceived status than their own. As if the numbers of Followers or Likes one accumulates is a representation of their intelligence or work performed. While this may be true for some I can most certainly tell you, with a hefty amount of experience engaging with individuals of comparable stature on forums such as Twitter Spaces, that many of these individuals are putting forth just as much (or as little) effort and thought as you or I.

Society the world over demands better from all of us. Your children deserve better. In order to achieve this we must correct this abomination that is simp culture.

We are in the midst of a simpdemic.

In order to do so, we must fix the imbalances in the development of our youth. Here in America this cannot be accomplished while we have an average number of jobs per household greater than 2, ideally with that number being closer to 1.5 (let alone lower). We need the nuclear family to return back to an attainable reality for the average citizen. Today it is not. Without the availability of time parents cannot provide the proper guidance necessary to teach the lessons that produce effective, well-rounded members of society. Without the availability of savings as a strategy the average parent cannot work towards building meaningful generational wealth. Otherwise they have to sacrifice a 2/20 over scraps to “save” their purchasing power in assets on the stock market, where their nest-egg is at risk to human fallibility and incompetence – which would require further investing of time and effort in order to understand where they are putting their hard-earned capital. Assets that they are already radically short in. The only other option is to pay for an individual to manage their funds, which increases the likelihood of unfortunate outcomes due to human incompetence, while these managers still pocket their fees.

That is a lose-lose for the average American family.

Taking Corrective Action Against Simpdom

In order to correct this swelling of simp culture we have to empower and embolden the individual. The individual needs to be capable of standing on their own, both the single individual as well as each individual family. Through the lens of genuine freedom and individual sovereignty, we can bring the value and strength back to the nuclear family structure. And we can return to proper child-rearing practices and raising effective members of society, rather than those that spout the latest headline that has been pushed by the mainstream media. Producing citizens that are hard thinking, hard working, and capable of checking authority is how we maintain a true America. The government was never intended to be the arbiter of truth. This land was founded on the principle that The People will be a checks & balance on the governmental body just like the governing body is structured to be checks & balances on each of the three systems that make up said governing body.

What is the most effective way to produce a populace of such capacity? Or… perhaps “most effective” is incorrect here. Perhaps I mean what is a very effective tact that we can rely on currently, that is actionable today. What allows for the individual to be capable of standing their ground? For a family to withstand social pressures? For an individual to work toward changing their destiny through hard work and tenacity? That allows the elementary teacher, the doctor, the nurse, the plumber, or the soldier to be capable of standing up for what they believe in without a daunting fear of their standard of living going into the shredder? I believe that bitcoin provides an avenue that alleviates some of these fears.

The ₿-Word

Bitcoin, when custodied properly – outside of the nefarious claws of a financial system that is dictated by the BlackRock’s and JPMorgan’s – can provide a paradigm shift to our most cherished citizens; those that lie outside of the unproductive class or the 1%. Saving a small amount of excess into an asset that can avoid seizure when the seedphrase is securely stored, and is uncensorable, allows for an accumulation strategy that can effectively not be stopped. Saving a small amount of excess in an asset that is still very much in the early stages of its understanding, let alone its adoption, provides an avenue for wealth generation tantamount to early investment opportunities previously only made available to participants that held an “accredited” status. Where one had to already boast a networth in the range of 6 to 7 figures before being deemed “safe” enough to invest.
While we are witnessing the likes of BlackRock and banks having done the work to provide investment vehicles to allow their customers the access to investing in financial products that enable exposure to the price discovery of this asset. Not out of desire by these entities neither, nay, by the demand of their customers. All while the energy industry has been learning their very own lesson with regards to the wildly synergistic relationship that bitcoin mining provides for both incentivization of energy generation beyond that of societal demand. A relationship that has never existed for our species before (that has been economical), while also providing a positive for the environment as well via greenhouse gas reduction strategies in the ways of flare gas mitigation on oil production operations. A relationship that I have personally witnessed first-hand while working in the Bakken Basin (psst: that flare mitigation allows for American producers to also pump more oil in the regulated markets like North Dakota and Colorado).

Conclusion

America is sick. Sick with simps. Sick with confusion. She needs a healthy dose of quality American stubbornness. That stubbornness can not be allowed to stand without catching a breath. That breath has to be provided via money, because money provides opportunity. Opportunity to chase our dreams or stand our ground for what we believe is right, just, and what is moral. In the information age, money that cannot flow as freely as the information itself effectively prevents the propagation of freedom and incentivizes tyranny.

Give yourself a foundation to stand upon so that we can tear down these pillars of simp culture, take a stand and simply say “No. I can not comply.” Is there a more American thing one can do?

Resist the simps. Build families. Question authority. Workout. Eat meat. Own guns. Say what you believe. And say with ya chest. Freedoms that can be enabled by a money of individual sovereignty and freedom; bitcoin.

Subscribe to the Bombthrower mailing list to get these posts as they come out (plus The CBDC Survival Guide when it’s ready), and follow Mike Hobart via his Substack and Twitter.

I hope everyone has had the time to properly appreciate their first days of summer. If you did not, then I hope your efforts have gotten you closer to being capable of doing so soon.

Today’s writing is inspired by my many conversations over the current state of our United States of America, and how far we have fallen from the Tree of Freedom that our Honored Fallen sacrificed their lives for. How Americans have lost sight of what truly matters, and how our uneducated & unfit masses continue to make decisions that enable their complacencies over doing what needs to be done in order to save the future of our country, for ourselves and for our children…

Failure Teaches. Victory Confirms.

Taking the path of immediate gratification, and especially selling-out the futures of our children, alongside the soul of our proud nation, is inextricably not American. Providing products of shite quality is inextricably not American. Choosing to do the easy thing over that which is more difficult, and that which is right, is inextricably not American. Sacrificing our own steadfastness, our own resilience, and going back on our promises and debts is not American.

Simple vs Easy

The steps required for correcting this egregious path are simple but they are not easy. This brings us to the first true step (Step 0.1) towards course-correction, of any kind. Conflation of something so basic as simple & easy is a problem that we as Americans must identify, acknowledge, and work to correct. A task can be simple; “do [x] in order to get [y] outcome,” but that does not mean that the task will be easy; “man doing [x] required so little effort to so I could get [y].”

Ignorance of Failure

Admitting that we have gone awry is the other 90% of Step 1, that we have made a series of mistakes and poor decisions is necessary. Because it is okay. It is okay to make mistakes, to be wrong. It is not okay to make mistakes, to be wrong, and not own-up to them. Not accepting that we have made wrong/bad decisions is extremely dangerous as there is no learning or growth that is allowed to occur when we choose to ignore our failures. Failure teaches. Victory confirms.

The Average American is the one who holds the power in the coming years — as this is a situation that will take years to correct and get back on “the path.” I have a few simple suggestions for the everyday American to follow if you would like to be on the right side of history.

First

GET OFF YOUR LAZY ASS

America is not well. Between those already diagnosed with diabetes, and those that are prediabetic we are looking at 49% of the Us adult population being affected, alone. According to data from 2017 (which is 6 years old mind you) the US population was looking at an obesity rate of 42%. Keep in mind that this does not include the concoction of chronic metabolic syndromes and diseases that accompany obesity; heart disease, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, atherosclerosis, osteoporosis, neurodegenerative conditions, cancers, and so on.

Americans need to get up off the couch and out of their desk chairs and push, pull, and breathe their way into individual fortitude. If the worst of the worst were to happen today, the amount of human life that would be lost simply due to intermittent access to power, let alone food, would be daunting and egregious. Through complacencies afforded the modern era we have become more fragile than ever in history. Yet we have access to the best technologies, methodologies, sciences, and access to more food and information than in any other prior empire in the history of our planet.

As Americans it is our duty and our privilege to become the baddest motherf*ckers that we can become. We are in the Land of the Free. Where you can be free to be a fat, lazy, complacent pile of shit all you want. I don’t know about you… but me, I want to be the most fit, well-rounded, capable, educated, understanding individual that I can be because I am free to do so. Because when shit-hits-fan, which is a virtual certainty (on any scale), I want to be capable of providing the strength and clear-headedness to be capable of providing protection and support to those I care about. Being comfortable means f^ck-all when life deals you a powdered backhand and you are not capable of being an effective force in times of adversity or fear — regardless of whether you are a man or a woman.

If you are not capable to react to the plethora of known knowns as far as potential negative outcomes, then you cannot even hope to be capable of handling those unknown unknowns. Of which are infinite. Fitness and sound health makes the individual far more capable of handling adversity, and during moments of historical shifts in the balance of power adversity is commonplace. Fill the gyms and run the trails, become the embodiment of strength that your neighbors, loved ones, and peers need.

Second

GET ack-tually EDUCATED

America today has been taught to demonize coming incorrect, and pedestalize being correct. To the extent of where people are attributing their being correct as a part of their identity. This poses a slew of problems for a society as the search for what is true and what is right gets lost. As the discussion [inevitably] turns towards pushback, these individuals tend to fall into defensive mode. In these moments their identity comes into question as a relation to their correctness, like when Anthony Fauci made the claim that to question him was to question science. Science, as is every other aspect of knowing & understanding, is and should always be under question. We do not know everything. In fact, we actually know very little about quite literally everything that we observe in our reality to-date. Therefore an individual’s identity should never be tied to their tendency to be accurate or correct in matters of fact; when we know so little, we are all guaranteed to be wrong much more often than we are right.

The American Education System has played a pivotal role in this degeneration of our countrymen’s and countrywomen’s capabilities to practice critical-thinking and original thought. Robert A. Burton, M.D., does a great job of crystalizing my point in his book On Being Certain in one very succinct sentence towards the end of Chapter 8 found on page 84;

“Memorizing facts doesn’t require logic, cause-and-effect, or any significant ability to reason.”

which is precisely what our entire “educative system” is structured around. Memorization. The antithesis to learning.

American schools have failed, abysmally. There is no such thing as a template for learning. Every single soul will learn differently from another. Just like with nutrition and physiology; every single body is different, so why is it that we think that the mind could operate by any other rule? This is also what has contributed to the mislabeling of a large portion of the “mental disorders” today. In a recent essay I argued my position for believing that conditions such as ADD/ADHD, anxiety, and depression are, for the vast majority, not diseases but misidentified signals by the body & mind. Leading to responses to treat the symptoms rather than address the sources of the signal(s). Culminating in continued dysfunction that grows in severity the longer the dysfunction goes unanswered. The dysfunction of the education (indoctrination) system is contributing to the misinterpretation of these states of mind, while also leading to a misidentification of the solutions due to the erosion of logic, cause-and-effect analysis, and erosion of the ability to reason.

So, American schools have not been teaching our children how to learn… what about what they have been memorizing?

This is where things get fun and a little scary at the same time. The textbooks and curriculums pushed in front of us through our scholastic syllabi (and those of our children) are poised to be treasure-troves of truth… but are they, truly? Below I have provided 2 videos that I have been recommending to now thousands of individuals across the twitter spaces & podcasts I have been graciously invited to be a part of, and in private individual discussions over the past 3 years. The perspectives are daunting, that there could be so much to history that got brushed under the metaphorical rug, forgotten about, and then pretended like was never the case.

I call on all of you to make it a point to watch these videos. Go in with a position that you (and I) do not know every individual thing that has transpired across history that was covered in our textbooks. And consider how then (as now) there were many multiples of developments and strategies all playing-out simultaneously. With little-to-no awareness that they were occurring. Events that have transpired over the past 36 months should serve as adequate testimony to this very reality.

That’s It.

Between just these two points, we can see dramatic changes in America’s populace for the better. These changes can begin to bare fruit in a mere handful of years… Consider how much smoother healthcare can become when the system is alleviated of the deadweight of a complacent and unhealthy populace. Consider how much more effective teaching and lecture can become when we have a populace that is critically thinking and capable of effectively challenging anything and everything with logical and rational bases. This is how we improve… EVERYTHING. You want better innovation, better ideas, better leaders, better policies, better technology? We need new, original ideas that can only come from strong & healthy children raised on logic and reason.

A Bitcoin Discussion

With this rebel’s education approach we have to talk about two aspects that are touched on in both videos. Keep in mind that both were produced very much independently of each other, yet share a common thread: private & central bankers have continually acted against the best interests of their constituents in order to maintain their grips on power. From breaking away from the rule of a queen over taxes to only end up copying the precisely same system once independence was achieved… to funding both sides of a world war… something has to change. That’s not even including the capability to print currency (not money, there’s a difference) on a whim or a desire. Providing a vertically-integrated system of power that provides influence beyond that of any single individual or organization when these systems are also based out of the jurisdiction that holds the position of Global Reserve Currency.

This is a power dynamic that must be disrupted. In my opinion it does not need to be totally done away with as there will always be a percentage of the population that desires the services provided by banks. The point is to particularly disrupt the vertically integrated stack that these parties have developed. This is where bitcoin plays an important role, and where I am proud to shamelessly plug my efforts in working with a few passionate individuals to put together a call to separate money from the state. One can argue as much as they want that the state is separated from the process of money formation & banking, on paper, but when we are dealing with human incentives and human policy that is all at the whim of human influence via politics… all roads converge on the two becoming inextricably linked. Creating a true monster. One could say a “creature from Jekyll Island.”

Going further, bitcoin provides an avenue of game theory (hat tip to John Nash) that provides an incentive mechanism that is far and beyond anything that is available thanks to any other technology to-date. With properly custodied bitcoin, the individual, organization, or country is afforded a strategy that has never been available in history, ‘til now. With bitcoin a party is capable of holding value that can ultimately avoid seizure even after death. Meaning that vaults can escape plunder, and something as ludicrous as a death tax becomes a distant memory. Resulting in an environment where, in order to accumulate economic/monetary value, one must provide product or service that is worthy of said value being directed towards their project. If the market does not deem the product to be worthy of their economic power, then there is no other way of accumulating it. Incentivizing cooperation, innovation, and efficiency… a polar opposite incentive mechanism than today where computers and textbooks make marginal improvements (if any) and selling of a “new” flashy product at the expense of the consumer.

As society progresses, new approaches to old problems are behooved. Money & currency is a problem as old as time that has been iterated on to further improve the cooperation and cohabitation of the human species. To think that we are beyond this natural need is a hubris of the utmost.

Personally, I Don’t Care…

I don’t care whether you are interested in the bitcoin mission. Your money is your power and your responsibility. Everyone has the freedom and the right to do what they desire, or deem proper, for their accumulated wealth and purchasing power. But what I do care about is strong, healthy, and capable Americans and American children.

At the very least… if you are a parent you are behooved to provide your child(ren) a proper role model. A strong mother and father that continually work to improve the condition of their family leaves a healthy mark on their offspring regardless of whether they believe their children are watching intently or not. Parents that continually seek improved understanding teaches multiple lessons to their little ones, paramountly that education never stops. Parents that deploy this kind of hustle (if we’re being fair, this isn’t even hustle this is simply staying an efficacious human), not only improve America’s future by rearing up strong & intelligent children but also make for a healthier, stronger, better informed voting populous. Our parents simply need to stop engaging in degenerative behaviors like binge-consuming the plethora of non-informative streaming services, and get back to education being the past-time. Like the days of olde of the cable era with such heavyweights as Animal Planet, the Discovery Channel, and the History Channel — oh how I long for those days to return.

Those of us that are not parents, we hold the very same responsibilities. As uncles & aunts, cousins, brothers & sisters, sons & daughters, and family friends; we hold powerful influence. We can act as a confirming force for what those hustler parents are doing is the proper thing. We can act as a challenge to those parents that choose not to better themselves, showing those children that there are better ways of getting the damn thing done. Children are not dumb.

We all have power to influence; residing in the decisions we make on a daily basis and the lifestyles we choose to adopt. You don’t need to be an influencer with a 5 digit follower count in order to leave a strong, positive mark on those around you.

You may feel stuck. Know that your improved future stands on the other side of your improved health & wellness, and your improved understanding of the world. Your own path out of your rut will become easier to see once you climb that first hill.

Is AI the Beginning of The End, Or Just A Beginning?

By Mike “Dr. Doom” Hobart via the Just Hear Me Out Substack

So, here we are… it’s 2023 and the world seems to believe that we are on the verge of both World War 3 AND a terminator-driven apocalyptic nightmare from which there is no escape. I’m sure that the most tempting reaction is to simply throw your hands high into the air, quit your job(s), stop by the store on the way home, purchase copius amounts of alcohol, marijuana, psilocybin, whatever drug of choice you have and just party and f*** your way to the next aspect of this game that we call “life.” If that’s the way you want to go heading into the end, I wouldn’t blame you, but I will judge you. I prefer to take a more adult, intelligent tact at viewing our current landscape. With a particular focus on this thing we call artificial intelligence.

We’ve all heard it at this point – if you haven’t then I both commend you for being insulated from the nonsense for so long as well as have questions for where the rock is located that you have been so successfully hiding under. “Artificial intelligence will lead to the demise of the human species.” Or some derivative of this claim. It is nearly impossible to hear at this point. But we have heard this song & dance before. We heard it with the automobile and with electricity (both occurred at roughly the same time). We heard similar levels of discountenance with regards to the development of the internet, “why would I need to read the newspaper on the internet when I have the perfectly good physical copy delivered to my doorstep every morning?” I know what you’re saying, as it has been shouted at me plenty of times already, “this is different.”

Believe me, I understand the difference that artificial intelligence poses with regards to dissolution of the employment market. But there is a problem, rather a few problems.

1. Technological development takes time. Artificial intelligence is not disintermediating the job market *checks watch* tomorrow. In the macro view it can be claimed as such, but on the scale of months or years, you can rest assured your job is likely safe for at least the near future. That doesn’t mean you just throw any and all concern for your future out the window, you’d have to be an idiot to live that way. This just means there is time to hone skills and hobbies with the aim of turning your skillset and passion into a monetized venture. So crack-on.
2. Health. It may be difficult to grasp but artificial intelligence stands to present some serious potential in the realms of healthcare. By this I do not mean the perversion that is the “healthcare system” today, but actual health care. Today is just an addiciton factory, an assembly line of pharmacological masking of symptoms without any actual treatment of underlying sources of problems that are advertising themselves via symptoms. For an example of this I recommend my thoughts over anxiety, ADD, and depression here. Artificial intelligence can be deployed to help identify more complex patterns in enzyme structure, biochemical pathways, protein folding, and so on… which can then be used for processes such as to identify irregularities or cross-reference for abnormalities/bifurcations in neural signaling pathways (as some larping examples).
3. Population. Did you forget about the population replacement and fertility problems? I did not. With issues in rapidly diminishing fertility, in both men and women, and an already slowing population replacement rate that is now negative, developed nations stand in the face of rather… not great forward outlooks. A shrinking population means a shrinking consumer base. Making for (generally) slowing economies. This is one reason why Japan doesn’t produce at home, they produce their products within the countries and jurisdictions in which their products sell. Like, for example, automobiles being sold by Japanese companies but built in America.

If the currently developed world(s), let alone America, want to stand a chance at staying relevant going into the future, they will need artificial intelligence in order to produce products and services that remain competitive. As shown in the above below: Asia, Africa, and Latin America still have substantial room to grow as far as population density is concerned. North America stands a bit different here as immigration is a big player in population growth, both legal and illegal immigration that is.

This also does not consider that here in the US we have a significant liabilities and balance of workforce problem already on our doorstep. There are 10,000 Boomers hitting retirement age every day of 2023. These are individuals that will be transitioning from producing consumers to strictly consumers.

This also doesn’t take into account an aspect from Point #2 above; health of the average workforce participant. Not only are the average American workers overworked as is, which is certainly contributing to the fertility and population replacement problems, but Joe & Jane are also not well. Placing a heavy burden on employers both in the costs of providing benefits, as well as the risks that come along with having employees and subordinates that are lacking in fortitude. A fragile workforce is a costly workforce. Both in capex as well as opportunity cost and risk management. Meanwhile so much of the population is buying-into these fanciful 007-esque story arcs of an invisible hand that is guiding this grand world against them in an elaborate scheme for world domination. This is very important as a consideration as it can cause individuals to feel that they have little-to-no power over their lives; a very important contribution to mental health and confidence. Which also ply-out effects on fertility and an individual’s physical health.

My Concerns

The reason I bring these points up is that I cannot help but grow concerned that America is likely to charge headlong into shutting down innovation in artificial intelligence over raw fear of our own demise without thinking things through rationally.

Keep in mind, we took the exact same approach to COVID-19 and all that accomplished was a series of numbskull, stupid decisions, all based on fears that were largely misplaced.

So, I ask

Are we on the precipice of shooting ourselves in the knees (or gonads at this point) by shutting down development of artificial intelligence right before we are about to need it most?

Our world as we know it can end in a fashion that does not involve a third global conflict, or the demise of our species. It will take stoic leadership, and intelligent guidance in order to achieve such a possible task. We cannot afford to be driven by such foolish whims as emotions like fear & hate.

Through strength of the individual, and unification in a mission to build a world that is better than today, so that we may provide a better platform for our children to stand upon, is how we get this done. It’s how our grandparents did it, it’s how their grandparents did it, and it’s how we need to do it now.

This post is via Mike “Dr. Doom” Hobart, via the Just Hear Me Out Substack. Subscribe to Bombthrower and get a copy of my next e-book “The CBDC Survival Guide” when it drops.

The True ‘Invisible Hand’ Is Not Borne of Evil, Not The WEF, Or Some Grand Malthusian Conspiracy

The current economic, geopolitical, locally political, and technological environment has resulted in many individuals having taken to a way of thought where they believe in an unknown & shadowy hand guiding our world toward ruin. I am here to provide a counter argument to this position. Bear in mind, I will not be using the c-word that gets so flippantly thrown around, as I am most interested in this being a thought exercise. This argument will be based on a few points-of-view that I have already written about previously as well as those that I personally have not written. I will provide links to those individual arguments as they arise in relevance, so that you—the reader—may visit them independently of your own volition.

What is this position that I speak of that seems to be gaining in popularity? That is that the developments in local and national government decision-making are rooted in nefarious intent. That the reason for these developments is a shadowy intent to sacrifice the many for the sake of the few, and particularly with the intent of weakening or destroying individual states, or America as a whole. That a significant, meaningful number of the participants are acting in a manner that represents intent for self-destruction—or in the very least achieving a greater state of weakness. The justifications used tend to be the headline events that have occurred over recent years; the responses to a particular infectious virus, the actions of a broader pharmaceutical industry, the nature of the symptom management industry (aka “healthcare), the precarious events around food, meat and poultry processing plants, the list can go on and on.

I aggressively disagree with this view.

Without further ado… let’s get into it.

Can It All Really Be Mere Coincidence?

The question: “How long before so many of these failings in deduction and reasoning can occur until they become a statistical impossibility to be mere coincidence? How is what is occurring not a ‘controlled demolition’?”

First, before we get started on my elaborations here, to make sense the reader (you) must have an understanding of what a complex adaptive system (CAS) is. If you do not, I will have multiple writings on this topic, the first of which is here. For those that do understand what a CAS is, we must acknowledge that such a system represents what looks like intelligence as more and more variables are accounted for and inputs (resources) are consumed to maintain its operations (life). Now, when it comes to a CAS, we are dealing with any number of independently motivated actors that are all acting as nodes of the broader system (the CAS)—yes like a neural network or blockchain network. Think of these “nodes” as cells, or individual people; being a part of a large operating system like an economy or a country. Then we must also acknowledge that these individual actors are not going to be of the highest intelligence or capability, simply for the fact that they will not be required to have such standards to maintain a life cycle of relative comfort while abiding by the rules governed by the CAS in which they occupy. Most individuals simply want to be comfortable and capable of reproducing and seeking their own happiness, whatever that may mean.

This is important to understand as this effectively establishes the standard of quality of the average participant (node) of said CAS, as well as the incentives that drive those individual actors. Both of which are very, very important for consideration when judging the actions of individuals and the systems & mechanisms that are made up of actions by those individuals. Like… businesses… and governments. Essentially every human being as a part of this world is independently motivated to seek out their own success, and the success of their kin first (discard ideologues here, as they are outliers), over the success(es) of an other. Meaning: these individuals are not incentivized to engage in activities that necessarily benefit the system, but themselves—survival comes first. Furthermore, this also means that the individual is not incentivized to consider the consequences or ramifications of their movements for success as they would affect other participants within the broader system. A drug dealer is not incentivized to consider how negatively impacting his product is as that would deter him from seeking his own success, no differently than say… a large pharmaceutical corporation would be.

So, what’s the point of all of this? My belief is that we are dealing with a complex adaptive system that represents an intelligence, due to the amount of variables accounted for, that is on a trajectory towards negative outcomes that appears to have malignant intent (because it produces a negative feedback loop) but it is actually powered by incompetence in the individual actors due to the incentives acting upon their lives. Not that there is some master plan to bring about the mass death of large portions of the population, nor an active strategy to bring about the downfall of their own country.

For example, I do not believe that our food quality was destroyed in order to feed the big pharma industry—that’s nonsense. I believe that big pharma, and the symptom management industry (calling it a “healthcare industry” is a joke and an insult to the average citizen), have benefited as a downstream effect. I believe that we learned how to produce highly potent, easily replicable, and very efficient mechanisms to produce processed foods due to a natural inclination for businesses to seek profits, and at the hands of a modernized industrial country. I believe that individual actors bought these foods hand-over-fist because they are delicious (due to their high carbohydrate, fat, and salt content) and cheap. I believe that the ramifications of such foods takes YEARS to observe and identify, all the while their negative effects on public health gain momentum as bodies, like economies, exhibit compounding results (as discussed in this essay). And that’s without any actual nefarious activities by corporations; liiike taking advantage of the bureaucratic system on the side of corporate lobbying and funding “scientific” research that makes their products look healthy and safe—I placed scientific in quotes because when the studies are not allowed to report the actual science due to the relationship of their funding, then it’s simply *marketing* and not actual science.

To put a bow on this one; I do not believe there is some grand cabal steering America towards ruin—in my opinion that would be giving these implicated groups, organizations and individuals far too much credit. To pull something like that off requires far more intelligence than I believe they are capable of. And yes, this includes an organization that was unelected and incorporates the letters W-E-F in their acronym. I believe that we are witnessing a cascade of failures brought-on by a system driven by high time-preference incentives, stupidity, and greed.

The Sociopathic Magnet

Then there’s the issue of this system “attracting sociopaths.”

This argument does not hold water in any sense. Human beings as a species are natural gamers. We are literally built to poke, prod, and produce strategies that not only allows us to seek out success within a ruleset, but the more clever members of our species devise strategies to use the ruleset of the system in which they abide by to work for them, catapulting them towards success at a rate faster than their peers, as we are also naturally competitive. If you would like an example of this, all you need to do is simply watch children at play with each other. You will witness many instances of the most clever children using the rules of their games to their advantage so they may seek out victory faster than their peers.

Simply possessing the desire to succeed does not automatically make one a sociopath. Sociopaths hold no stock in empathy or valuing of human life, let alone working to avoid the suffering of others. Any system that provides a capability to achieve greater levels of power over their peers will attract sociopaths of every make and model. The greater the honeypot of power; the greater the sociopathic magnet. There is no getting around this reality.

Power Dynamics and Sociopaths

The issue of the temptations that a fiat currency brings.

Through my studies and observations I have adopted a philosophy: a society or civilization takes on the philosophies incentivized by the currency with which the average individual transacts on a regular basis.

What this means is that I believe that a fiat currency, that is capable of being produced flippantly at whatever fleeting whim of whatever individual or group that claims authority over it, will eventually cause the character traits that such a whimsical authority system promotes to bleed into the incentives of the average citizen. For example, following the 2008 GFC bailouts of American banks and industry, the average American (as well as citizens across the world) learned quite a few lessons all at once: (1) from that point on, the name of the game was to become “too big to fail,” doing so meant you could f*ck up at nearly any level and the US government would protect you to avoid mass job loss, (2) the average American would always get sacrificed before anybody in the upper socioeconomic rungs would ever see a day of prison time, regardless of how much loss had occurred across society-broader, and (3) in the race to become “too big to fail,” do whatever it takes to win over your peers; make as much money as fast as possible, rules and consequences be damned.

What these result in is an incentive structure that rewards frauds, cheaters, liars and thugs. This also results in, yes, attracting sociopaths. So, with this in consideration, it does make the broader system an ample magnet for sociopaths (as discussed previously). *It was very important that we distinguish that a hierarchical or success-rewarding system is not enough to place blame for attracting sociopaths.

As this CAS continues chugging along for longer and longer periods of time, that is driven by incompetence and short-sightedness of individual actors, and is perpetuated by this tainted fiat currency system as laid-out following the GFC, it accumulates higher and higher saturation levels of sociopaths and incompetent short-sighted thinkers. What results is an ever increasing number of negative effects, negative events, and a continuously worsening macro picture… ultimately leading toward a climax—but this is not a fun climax. At which point the system fractures, and cascades of corrections begin to wash back across the system like waves.

Do you think we’re beginning to witness those cascades? I believe we could be, as I have also described how I believe that this very economic system has been a leading contributor to the cascades in human fertility and public health, which I wrote briefly about with—a specific focus on male health in particular—here.

More Regulations Only Create More Opportunities To Take Advantage

The next question is, “Well shouldn’t we be able to regulate this kind of activity out of our society to prevent these kinds of outcomes?”

The short answer is No. You’re ultimately asking to regulate-away the human condition. We are gamers, we are schemers, and we are greedy. You cannot regulate-out human characteristics with manmade rules or regulations. All that establishing new rules, or more rules, does is allow for fewer and fewer individuals to be capable of taking advantage of the ruleset and the system itself. Resulting in an inevitably ever-increasing wealth inequality gap. This wealth gap doesn’t just include monetary wealth, but educational wealth (real education, not indoctrination), wealth in time, wealth in mental & physical health, and wealth in family & loved ones.

In my opinion, the only effective regulation of CASs is that of natural selection and free markets. In these systems, as in nature, what survives and thrives works. There’s no coddling, or holding back of those experiencing outsized gains over their peers, and there’s certainly no manipulation of the rules to allow one individual or party to survive against the odds outside of shear tenacity & capability.

This also does not mean I am a Libertarian, or some purist Austrian economist. I am simply stating the reality of our situation.

The Reality Of The Human Condition

Now bears the question, “Is this just a reality of the human condition, is humanity doomed to always reach this failing point?”

The short answer here is Yes. However, it doesn’t have to be quite so doomish. We have to look back into history to understand why these failing CASs develop and then charge headlong into the ground like flight MU5375 in the first place. For examples we can look at the long history of The Church, or my personal favorites would be looking at how society at the time reacted to individuals like Galileo or Copernicus. These men pushed forth very revelatory ways of thought, and these new ways of thought challenged the established power of the “elites” of their time. Those elites were incentivized to defend their positions of power, as are all who attain it, and therefore chose to discount the new ways of thought in order to facilitate an ignorance within the populace and their subordinates so that their positions of authority and value could be maintained. Our species is no more evolved now than it was then.

In honest reflection humanity is doomed to repeat this sigmoid progression of success and failure, yes. History doesn’t repeat, but it does rhyme. However, what doesn’t have to be continued is the potent ignorances that allow these systems to get to such aggressive, widespread, catastrophic failures.

In Conclusion

I believe that what we are witnessing is a complex adaptive system that is made up of independently motivated actors, acting on short-sightedness and incompetence, that is producing negative outcomes, in which other aspects of the adaptive system benefit from (thereby entrenching the effects), and is rewarding further short-sightedness and incompetence, that is also driven by a fraudulent & broken economic system, which attracts greater and greater numbers of sociopaths and fools, which further entrenches the negative effects as well as further attracts more fools and crazies.

Then, to make matters worse, those that hold positions of power within this parasitic and flailing system are incentivized & motivated to build moats around their hills of success—preventing the march of disruptors that approach with new & innovative ways of thought. Which could provide solutions to the problems & inefficiencies that these individuals’ own success may have created, let alone enabled. Giving it a guise of malfeasance, or willful malignant intent and design, when in reality it is simply a mechanism of incompetence, greed, and high time preference that gets labeled with some great Malthusian Cabal.

That viewpoint is much easier to conceptualize and grab hold of as it requires less consideration & contemplation than my theory laid bare for you here. Not to mention that very theory is also represented over and over again in Hollywood films, like 007’s Spectre or the Jason Bourne story arch. Making it more “fun” to believe in, if that’s the proper word to describe such a thing. I personally believe it is, as the individuals that detail such theories often approach the concept with excitement as if they are getting the “opportunity” to partake in some videogame or film storyline or plot, wrought with excitement and where they get the chance to position themselves as the hero for identifying a secret plot.

This system continues until it breaks under its own weight of stupidity and greed, as intelligence and honor are not rewarded by this system whatsoever. When it does come time to break, the individuals of a high intelligence and honor are ultimately the ones that end up acting as support, as they bear the weight of the cascading society in an attempt to prevent a total loss.

This post was contributed by Mike “Dr. Doom” Hobart – check out his Substack here. Sign up for the Bombthrower Mafia mailing list here.