FLASHBACK: G20 Rules Make Bank Bail-ins a Reality (2015)
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FROM 2015: Last month’s G20 Summit in Australia came and went without the protests and riots we’ve come to expect at the summit in recent years. But as author and researcher Ellen Brown notes, the real fireworks happened behind closed doors, where the group rubber stamped new regulations that will make Cyprus style bank bail-ins a worldwide reality.
FLASHBACK SHOW NOTES:
Original video on GRTV
Original post on CorbettReport.com
Complete audio-only interview with Ellen Brown
James Corbett and James Evan Pilato cover Silicon Valley Bank on New World Next Week
FDIC Systemic Resolution Advisory Committee meeting Nov 2022
What Will Happen When Banks Go Bust? Bank Runs, Bail-Ins and Systemic Risk
ORIGINAL SHOW NOTES:
New G20 Rules: Cyprus-style Bail-ins to Hit Depositors AND Pensioners
The Global Bankers’ Coup: Bail-In and the Shadowy Financial Stability Board
Russian Roulette: Taxpayers Could Be on the Hook for Trillions in Oil Derivatives
Adequacy of Loss-Absorbing Capacity of Global Systemically Important Banks in resolution
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I think I have shared this on here in the past but given the focus of this flashback episode and recent events I feel compelled to re-share.
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The article linked below offers a comparative analysis of conventional economics vs gift economics through a thought experiment involving investing in a bank vs ‘investing’ in the Earth (via planting/saving/sharing heirloom seeds).
https://gavinmounsey.substack.com/p/the-best-investment-on-earth-is-earth
Here are select excerpts from the article that I feel are particularly relevant to today given how recent events have illuminated the flimsy and malleable nature of the centralized fiat currency banking system.
“While sorting and packaging the heirloom kale seeds I had saved from last year’s garden it occurred to me that not only is investing in the earth more nutritionally, spiritually, and emotionally rewarding than investing in a bank, it can be more fiscally rewarding as well.
The fact is when you invest in a garden you end up with an abundance of not only crops with more than enough to share with friends/neighbors but also the abundance of seeds that can be saved from each harvest. I began to contemplate what the latent money value of these seeds were (if they were all to be grown and harvested from a garden), and then proceeded to compare my original investment in the package of organic kale seeds (less than $5 ) which I “deposited” into the earth to what kind of return I would have gotten had I invested that five dollars into a bank.
Here’s what I came up with:
Investment of less than five dollars on kale seeds (about 20 heirloom “red russian” seeds) result/return after one year :
Ten healthy adult kale plants which I harvested semi-daily from June until November ( We ate about ten dollars worth of kale at local store prices a week from the garden, so after 6 months they produced about 240 dollars worth of organic kale). So from less than a five dollar investment (along with time spent every few days on watering and tlc) I got $235.00 return from investing in the earth (a 4800% increase)!
Now how much return would I have gotten if I invested 5 dollars in a bank after one year? Well let’s say the savings account has an interest rate of 3% (which is being generous for most banks) after one year from my original 5 dollar investment I would have a whopping 15 cents return!
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After that first year of investing in the earth by “depositing” the kale seeds and letting the plants go to flower (on top of my steady harvesting) I was able to save well over a hundred seeds from each plant at the end of the year (which will amount to over one thousand viable seeds achieving maturity/full harvest).
Since with gardening (“investing in the earth”) there is always abundance and more than enough to go around, I will share many seeds with friends, family and neighbors. I then decided I wanted to project this investment comparison further in compounding it over multiple years. I will give about ten seeds to each person/family and all I will ask in return is that they save seeds from their kale plants and share them with others.
I wondered how much actual money value in kale could be grown, harvested and enjoyed after seven years of this “pay it forward model” of gardening kale, saving seeds and sharing the next year. In the interest of making a fair calculation I wanted to be very modest with my estimates for projected harvest yields and seeds able to be saved each year (considering not all plants will grow in great soil under ideal conditions). So I estimated that for others each ten kale plants would yield a minimum of 10 pounds of kale annually (amounting to 30 dollars worth of organic kale at $3.00 a pound). And instead of assuming they will be able to save 1000 seeds like I did, I estimate they will save well over one hundred (amounting to one hundred viable seeds that grow into harvestable mature plants.
So let’s recap; with my 1000 seeds (from my first harvest) being given to 100 families/gardeners, after the second year a total of $3000.00 worth of organic kale would have been grown, harvested and enjoyed by those people (“collective beneficiaries” of my investment in the earth). That means, from my original money spent (less than 5 dollars) invested in a pack of seeds, some water and tlc, and sharing the resulting seeds after only two years a return of $2995.00 would be collectively accessed and enjoyed. While that same five dollars invested in a bank would have earned me you guessed it! A colossal 30 cents! ?
With an original investment of five dollars After seven years continuing this ‘pay it forward model’ investing in the earth compared to investing in a bank you would have this:
???? ????? (money value accessible by one) $?.??
????? ????? (latent collective money value worth of nutritious food accessible by many) : $??,???,???.??
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Emergency preparedness does not have to be something involving fear, stress or obsessing.. if we choose to do things that help us align with natural localized cycles for providing our basic survival needs (like gardening, seed saving and preserving) we are increasing our emergency preparedness in a joyful and healthy way.
Saving up money for a ‘rainy day’ is not a solid way to prepare for emergencies because money has no innate value. Seeds, good soil, gardening skills, increased health/immunity, preserving experience and the symbiotic relationships and friendships we forge with neighbors and the broader community we are a part of (through sharing our abundant harvests and helping others to grow regenerative gardens) are however things that have innate value.
Even if money had some intrinsic value and dependable stability (which it doesn’t) basing one’s life around constantly striving to acquire and horde more of it (capitalism) is not healthy. Capitalism is an unnatural human concept (that is based on an inaccurate and outdated view of life and evolutionary processes). It is a model based on the inaccurate view that in nature competitiveness, ‘survival of the fittest’ and adversarial relationships are the norm. Modern science and ecological studies have shown us (that when we take a closer look) symbiosis, interdependence, and cooperation are in fact the norms when it comes to relationships between various organisms in nature. Capitalism (and its ugly offspring “consumerism”) are systems of thought that do not align with natural law. They amount to ways of perceiving and interacting with the world that result in parasitic and not symbiotic relationships with each other (as humans) and with the rest of nature as a whole. At the foundation of capitalism in today’s world is Fiat Currency (a monetary system that perpetuates debt and forever expands the gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’.)
Let’s invest in a future where food, health, and happiness are abundant and common place. We can make the choice to truly care for our body and in the process give back to the earth that gives so much to us. Each of us can do this by planting and maintaining a regenerative food garden of our own. Thank you to those who care enough about the Earth and your fellow beings to do this without any hope for quantifiable rewards for yourselves, but for those of you who need to measure the reward in quantifiable metrics, the numbers don’t lie, even within the constraints of the flimsy, fraudulent and unreliable fiat money system, choosing a bank over the Earth is clearly a poor investment choice.”
Hey Gavinm,
How you doing?
When I read this post, as I do many of your posts, I come away feeling that you really have a perception of life and purpose consistent with someone blessed with an acute level of understanding and conscientiousness. I mean that sincerely. Not that I agree with all of your viewpoints on every topic, but, for what it’s worth, on fundamental, core values, I not only agree with you, at times I find you to be edifying.
I’ve given much thought to your question regarding the concept of violent coercion as being integral to current, as well as historical, societal structures. It is ubiquitous, indeed, and historically has played a crucial role in molding, modifying, policing and controlling human behavior – you’ll have to excuse me if the foregoing terms seem redundant, but they are.
The phrase “violent coercion” is by definition an oxymoron. The word “coercion” connotes violence, or the threat of impending, inevitable violence. Therefore “coercion” embodies “violence” and thus is defined by it. Can there be coercion without violence? That would be persuasion, perhaps?
Years ago, I was given a thought to ponder: In a court room, a judge (in this case, a US Federal judge let’s say) hands down a decision that the party subject to this decision must abide. The question to ponder was, what is there to uphold the judges decision? The police, right? Usually, one thinks of the police going hand in hand with law, judges, and courtrooms. At least I did. However, in actuality, the backing and power behind the judge’s ruling is ultimately none other than the combined power of the entire United State military. That level of power and the threat of its violence, in essence, stands behind each and every judicial ruling however big or small. So, talk about violent coercion? It doesn’t get anymore violent than that!
But, is violent coercion antithetical to the human condition? Or, rather, antithetical to human conditioning? To modify certain unwanted behavior, some parents might paddle an infant’s, or a toddler’s or a young child’s behind, which equates to violent coercion. In the classroom, a child might be told to sit alone in the corner, face the wall, put a “dunce” cap on, or whatever. Isn’t that a form of violent coercion against the child’s psyche, in the hope said coercion will modify the child’s behavior? In this sense, violent coercion has been universally endemic throughout history in one form or another. As such, coercive conditioning may not be so unnatural as you might think, and not necessarily unique to humans. I once witnessed a mother cat who seemed to “scold” or “yell” at her kittens who ventured into a baited trap apparently to warn them to get out, which they hurriedly and immediately did. After the kittens ran out of the trap, the mother went in to get the bait, whereupon she, herself, got trapped. The mother hadn’t engaged in gentle persuasion, she screeched at her kittens. What would be next, a claw? So, maybe coercion, violent as it is, is a manifestation of survivalism across species, including humans, an indication that it is innate and natural as can be.
In another post, which I’ll link – https://www.corbettreport.com/february-open-thread-2023/#comment-147686 – you were wondering if I was interpreting “state” or “statism” in a way that would allow “for communities, societal organizing structures/principals and forms of leadership to exist that do not involve violent coercion.”
The answer is no and yes: No, because I am not aware of any presently existing organizational structures (“state”) that do not involve, in one way or another, violent coercion. Violent coercion takes on many forms, however harsh or subtle, as I noted above.
Where our viewpoints diverge is that you have the conceptualization that systems of belief can and do remain static and unchanging. On the other hand, I believe nothing goes unchanging, including conceptualizations. Therefore, my answer is also “yes” because I believe that even statist, organizational structures built upon immoral foundations are not necessarily static, and can give way over time. The point being is that over ions, perhaps, as people evolve, so will their institutions. What does exist. however rooted it is now, is the potential for violent coercion to one day, believe it or not, be a thing of the past.
If I’m being too optimistic, please let me know. 🙂
@candlelight
You make some interesting points about “violent coercion” and I appreciate your question regarding whether or not violence is an inherent aspect of coercion or not.
I suppose if one defines violence in a strictly physical sense, than I would say that there are methods to engage in what I would describe as coercion that are not violent (blackmail being one such example). Though I imagine some would argue that there are non-physical forms of violence worth considering as well, and while their arguments may be well founded I do think it is a slippery slope to step onto when we start creating a big gray area in what can be defined as “violent” as there will be nefarious interests in various governments and corporations looking to hijack such vaguely defined terms in the interest of paving a “legal” ground work for their hyper-centralized imperialistic totalitarian systems and other oppressive regimes. The Canadian government re-defining blockading roads, bridges and borders as “economic violence” in order to justify their use of a martial law type emergency framework is one such example.
Getting back to the core of this issue (statism) and its use of what I describe as violent coercion (and other forms of coercion as well) yes, your description of the military and its ties to the judicial system is certainly a good example of violent coercion.
With regards to your question “is violent coercion antithetical to the human condition” I would say that depends on how you define what a human being is, and what qualities are intrinsic (that which we are all born possessing within) in a human being.
Some people that frequent the comment threads here believe that humans are all prone to stealing, raping, dominating and just generally being nasty pieces of work (and the only thing that keeps most of us behaving in a semi-civil way is the constant threat of some cosmic punishment of eternal hell fire or some government enforcement mechanism threating everyone with kidnapping, otherwise known as incarceration. From those people’s perspective I would imagine they see violent coercion as totally natural, necessary and helpful.
I do not see human beings in that way and I do not share those views.
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Could you please elaborate on what you mean by “antithetical to human conditioning”? I feel like there are several interpretations I could approach that from and each would yield a different answer. In any case I will do my best to answer you based on what I think you mean.
Yes the examples you provided regarding physical punishments and shaming /restraining children would be accurately described as violent coercion.
I am not a parent so I cannot speak from experience with regards to infants but I did take care of many kids (3 year olds to teenagers) when I was working as a ski teacher on Whistler mountain for several years. I personally did not use shaming or physically unpleasant stimulus (violence) to attempt to modify behavior, rather I sought to show them that I could teach them things that would increase their ability to experience joy and perceive beautiful things in nature (providing tangible examples) but this would only be possible if they respected my instructions, their classmates and nature (otherwise they would not be allowed to stay in the class).
I think there are other ways to encourage an infant and/or child’s behavior and psyche to develop in a healthy way (which involves respecting others, being kind, curious and courageous) which do not require violent coercion so in my opinion violent coercion is not required for “conditioning humans”.
That is an interesting example regarding the kittens I will have to contemplate that further before commenting on that in depth, but the first thing that comes to mind is that usually cat mothers use the loose skin at the back of the neck of their kittens to remove them from danger (which does not hurt them) not a claw which would hurt them.
Also, I feel that we as humans are capable of using our minds to continually improve ourselves and enrich our communities consciously, and to me, that is a path that does not involve threats of violence being used to modify behavior. Thus, even if you could give me a bunch of examples of what you might describe as violent coercion being used in the animal kingdom to illicit behavior that is favorable to survival, this does not necessarily mean that humans should adopt or emulate that specific trait or tendency. There are many things our fellow species in the more than human world have to teach us, but that does not mean we should strive to emulate them down to the minutia of all their ways of living. We are capable of discerning which ways of living, seeing and interacting are compatible with cultivating a more favorable, abundant, integrous, compassionate, honest, equitable and hopeful future for our human family that we can glean from our elder species and which are not.
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Now lets say (for the sake of argument) violent coercion is necessary for “conditioning” human children to choose favorable behavior patterns (though I personally do not think it is) when we are talking about statism, we are talking about situations that often involve adult human beings asserting that they know better than other adult human beings what is best for them (pointing to some words written on paper claiming this gives them the right to have a monopoly on force) and then forcing those other adult humans to do something against their will (under the threat of kidnapping, maiming and/or murder aka “incarceration” and a law enforcement officer discharging a firearm to deal with someone they are trying to arrest that is resisting).
Many have subconsciously put governments, judicial entities, military soldiers and police into a parental role in the back of their mind, but in my opinion, that kind of infantilized and stagnant worldview and self-image of the perpetual child-adult which many statists adopt (seeing themselves as being in need of being protected and told what is right and what is wrong etc) is not healthy nor is it conducive with embarking on a path that leads to the enrichment and/or improvement of our species or civilization.
Regarding your comments about how I have the conceptualization that systems of belief can and remain static and unchanging, I was talking about dogmatic belief systems, which are by definition, unchanging. I see involuntary governance structures as dogmatic belief systems. If governance / societal contribution structures changed over time to become voluntary, then I would not describe that as Statism any more, it would be something else that would need a new name. No I do not think you are being to optimistic. Optimism is like the spring rain falling on dormant seeds full of potential so I am glad you choose to embody and share it.
Thanks again for the thoughtful and kind comments, I hope you have an enjoyable remainder of your weekend. 🙂
HELLO Gavinm,
Gosh, you wrote the above post replying to my post back on March 25th, and I just noticed it now! From time to time I check to see if you’ve replied by looking below what is now your penultimate post. I don’t get email alerts, so I’m behind the times – but, that’s not to say that I haven’t been reading some of your posts now and then.
First, I wanted to say that uncle of yours, Mushroom Mark, man, is or was out-of-this-world super cool! I’m wondering like, why did I not have any uncles like that? 🙂 He, along with your parents, naturally, informed to a very great extent your way of being, to be sure.
Which comment, of course, is a segue of sorts into the question of nurturing which was brought up in our posts. I whole hardheartedly agree with you that any and all definitions of violent coercion is unnecessary in terms of nurturing, and not only is it unnecessary, it is maleficent. Perhaps in the way I go about making my arguments I may have a tendency to be misconstrued, whereby the points I make may seem to sound like blanket statements; but, I certainly don’t advocate violent coercion. When I questioned whether or not it may be intrinsic to our human nature, I think the operative word here would be “conditioning”. In other words, in Western societies, at least, we are to a lesser or greater degree, by and large, conditioned and or exposed to violent coercion, and as such, it becomes a part of our early nurturing and learning processes, thus it becomes normalized and manifests in many sundry ways in our society, unfortunately, yet this maleficence was not always the case. You happened to have made a really good point in your “The Rise of Anthropocentrism” article, about violent coercion being a rather unnatural and unnecessary state of affairs when you described the indigenous Blackfoot tribes as organized on a “non-hierarchical” basis wherein they practiced “collaborative decision-making.” Not only was this conducive for generating respect among themselves, apparently to fostered respect for all of nature, as well.
It’s so funny that as matter of course, after discussing violent coercion, and reading your article, as well as thinking of “psychonautic pilgrimages” (ha ha), I somehow managed to surf over to a very interesting Canadian physician, Dr. Gabor Maté, who specializes in neurology, psychiatry, and psychology, and has a really insightful understanding of trauma, especially when it comes to child rearing. Basically, he’s saying that Westerners have it all wrong in general on how we bring up our children in what he believes is very detrimental in developing a healthy psyche in the individual. He compares the unnatural Western methods and ideology to the much more intimate and natural ways of indigenous peoples. I listened to a few of his very informative interviews, which were, uncannily, quite apropos to our present posts.
Here’s the first link I checked out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9B5mYfBPlY
On another subject – though, it happens to be part and parcel of Western society’s disastrous disconnect – I do want to express how goddamned awful it is about the plans they have to cut down the old growth on Vancouver Island. About the emanating spirit and history you felt as you stood along side them…. Trust me on this, those trees are way more intelligent than we are. Of that I have no doubt.
Be good.
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You make an interesting point about the danger of overusing the term “violence” by actors and governments who would apply such a term for nefarious political and economic pursuits, as the Canadian government has done attributing peaceful protests, such as putting up road blockades – which by themselves are not violent, per se – and calling such protests acts of economic “violence”. Yes, that’s a good way for them to use their “terrorist” card and justify furthering imperialist policy. Obviously, road blockades put up in protest are, pointedly coercive. But, to attribute violence to it as an aspect, the government must be arguing that a blockade can, theoretically, lead to actual physical deprivation, whereby, potentially, people may not be able to put enough food on their plate and or suffer other deprivations, leading to actual physical harm, thus providing the rationalization of their use of the term “violent”.
Though, such a definition is certainly a stretch and does constitute embarking down a slippery slope, as you say. It’s also representational of a really shameful and cowardly political body that would stoop to concoct such a cheap ploy. For those individuals in that governmental chamber (of horrors), who would or did confirm such a measure, dubiously equating ostensibly peaceful protesting as acts of violence, I have nothing but a long string of expletives, including the phrase – a bunch of sons-of-bitches!
I realize why you brought up the idea of the slippery slope and overuse of the term. While I was writing, it did occur to me that I was being pretty loose coalescing violence and coercion, ascribing the two as inseparable. But, in a way, they really are inseparable. Maybe it should be defined that if there’s violence, then it’s coercion. If there’s no violence, then it should be considered a matter of persuasion, being a kinder, gentler term, and less hard-edged. So, perhaps it’s more accurate to refer to the road blockades as being pointedly acts of persuasion, not coercion…. Sounds better, anyway. Is this simply a matter of semantics? Perhaps it is. Yet, words do have different flavors even when their overall meanings are the same.
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You’re probably right about the mother cat. She probably would never harm her kittens with a claw, though threaten she might, or simply bat them with her paw. Cats within a clowder don’t normally physically harm each other much, no matter how high the fir seems to fly at times. However, things can get very viscous when it comes to protecting territory from felines from the outside. At times, the innate, spine-tingling guttural moans and cries of two such diverse cats threatening imminent violence upon one another is certainly an act of coercion, an attempt to coerce each other to back down.
Cats are in a certain class of animal. They’re carnivores – they kill other animals to survive, and sometime simply for sport – they’re hierarchical, clannish, territorial, competitive with one another. And are known or thought of as being conceited, entitled, feline-centric …. Sound familiar?
Is there any wonder, then, why cats be been admired, if not worshiped, for thousands of years? Is it that they can seem so human? Or, is it because we’re so cat?…. Albeit, a very screwed-up variety of cat (see Dr. Gabor Maté for a good explanation of this).
But, there is hope, as in the poetry of your words, in the rain, in the seeds, in life springing forth.
I still say nothing is static. Even dogma. From whence did dogma come? It’s not eternal.
But, the dogma, as you put it – which is a good way of putting it – of organizational Statism, is, for all intents and purposes, static and unchanging. You are right about that. And, as we can see from history, through millennia, such Statist organizational structures, tend to lead eventually to their own destruction.
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Where hope lies, is connected to what you said about our capability – and I would add, our “potential” capability – of using our minds to consciously improve and enrich our lives, both on an individual and community level. I believe the potential for consciously driven improvement can take place from within. From within oneself, and also from operating within the “State”, itself, that is, engaged with it, not disengaged from it, but rather acting as a catalyst within. I’m not advocating some sort of subversion plot, blah, blah,blah. No, I think that, ironically, the system, the idealized system, the system that it’s supposed to be – “the fair with liberty and freedom for all system” – actually has good bones, or potentially has good bones. In this I know you don’t agree. You’re a purist when it comes to the concept of Voluntaryism; that a governmental power structure claiming jurisdictional control, using coercive power, is immutable. But, what if, by some magical twist of fate, such a governance did become fair to all, and with liberty and with justice, for all? What then? That there might not be a need for any coercion, violent or otherwise, within such a just governance would seem logical.
Yeah, I know. Magical thinking meets optimism on steroids. But, at least I know you won’t find fault. 🙂
There is one very big aspect about this rosy picture of idealized Statist governance where I feel stymied. There’s a gap to be bridged in terms of a Voluntarist’s concept of governance, and that of a democratic form of Statist governance, which lines I would think, ideally, it would run along. Normally, in a democracy, it’s understood accepted that decisions are consummated by the majority. This concept is not only universally known and accepted, it is the very definition of democracy. However, from your Voluntarist perspective, you consider this to be governance by mob rule.
Is there anyway to bridge these diverse points of view? They seem so diametrically opposed to one another.
In a Voluntarist community, how would decisions be made?
In the Blackfoot community, of yore, which was non-hierarchical, are there any clues to how decisions were arrived at?
I’d be curious to research that question.
Well, maybe I’ll get to that.
Happy Easter!
continued….
Very briefly, what I’m trying to say is, potentially, we may be able to rise, on a conscious level, hopefully, somewhat above the level of our feline friends….eventually. LOL
Have a good one!
@candlelight
Just wanted to swing by let you know that I know you took the time to write me the above and below thoughtful and thought provoking comments and I will reply when I can.
I am going 7 days a week planting trees right now so I am tight on time for being on the computer.
I hope you have a pleasant remainder of April.
@candlelight
I am still finding my self tight on time (doing the 7 days a week spring working marathon) but I wanna at least try to respond to your comments so it may have to be in sections (as I have time in the mornings before work and/or if I have enough energy/time after work).
Yes Mushroom Mark was pretty awesome in his glory days. He is still with us on Earth (and still a maverick of sorts living a pretty interesting life) but since my family did that whole thing where they excluded my wife and I from a family reunion that they held in Nicaragua (at my uncle “Mushroom” Mark’s little beach/resort) I have had mixed feelings about him. I mean to be fair, he did try to reach out to me and tell me about some stealthy ways I could sneak into Nicaragua under the radar and avoid the injection status checks, but I am not really interested in hardcore smuggling run type cross border speed boat missions (where I may or may not be captured by corrupt police/government officials and held as prisoner) just so I can get to a family reunion without having to inject my self with synthetic mRNA genetic slurries.
I think I related/relate to my uncle and my dad’s dad the most of anyone in my family (my dad’s dad ran that restaurant near Vancouver Island that only served seasonal homegrown/local/foraged food and he protested the old growth logging).
My parents seem to have let their moral compasses get rusty and bent in recent years in order to “fit in”, keep their “friends” and be able to continue travelling/attending concerts etc, but I do still have many fond memories of a time when my father chose to keep his moral compass in better shape and we spent lots of time in the wilderness.
Your comments about violent coercion being something that is prolifically exposed to developing minds in Western societies is sadly accurate in my opinion. Normalized is a also an apt way to describe it, though that brings to mind a quote that I think Mr. Corbett shared recently that says
“It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”
I would like to explore the indigenous Blackfoot tribes “non-hierarchical” societal organization structure further when I have time. I will see if I can hunt down some books and also make some inquiries with friends who have a related lineage to hopefully illuminate the dynamics of how that worked with greater clarity so that we might glean some wisdom for visualizing and planning future hypothetical cultures and communities that we may endeavor to plant the seeds for now.
Well I have to go make my lunch for work and water my heirloom seedlings in the window sills (still getting frosty nights here till next week) but hopefully I can continue this with you soon.
Hope you have a week filled with opportunities for revealing the answers to mysteries you have sought to uncover, moments of peace, inspiration and the discovery of yet more mysteries that add beauty and richness to this experience we call life.
Gavinm,
I have to say your doubling up on metaphors made me smile, describing your dad’s moral compass as having gotten rusty as he’s aged. Quite clever. I have a suggestion for you for his next birthday, gift giving holiday, or simply out-of-the-blue – together with a note of explanation, I’d send him a small can of either Liquid Wrench or WD-40…. You can even tell him it was suggested to you by a fellow Corbett Report subscriber, and see what he says. 🙂
You definitely made the right decision to blow off the family reunion in Nicaragua. Somehow the idea of getting caught smuggling yourself to or fro in order to avoid the hassle of customs agents and police demanding your vaccination papers – the ones you don’t have – and having to hire lawyer(s) whilst sitting in a somewhat less than pristine jail cell awaiting a hearing before a Nicaraguan judge…. well, it just doesn’t seem like it would have been worth the effort. Good call!
Meanwhile, if I understand you correctly, the idea of your uncle having set up a little beach resort in Nicaragua of all places, set my mind a wandering! So, I spent some time on google maps doing just that – wandering around the country. From what you know of your uncle’s life down there, does it seem viable to you? Meaning, for all intents and purposes, can he go about his life with peace of mind, without feeling any particular need to watch his back, or feeling insecure about his well being, any more so than any other place?
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It’s been years since Nicaragua had been thrust into the news cycle – in a first and foremost way – with its political upheavals and international interventions and intrigue. At the time, Daniel Ortega was the peoples’ socialist choice in his anti-imperialist routing out of dictatorial government corruption, etc., etc. Though, presently, depending from where or from whom one gets their information, it seems Ortega may have become in the intervening years a bit of a despot, himself. However, I have no clue as to how people are actually living their everyday lives down there. That’s why it sort of jumped out at me hearing that your unconventional uncle (to put it mildly) established a lifestyle there, that on first thought sounds pretty nice, as in pretty chill. My question is, if your very chill uncle is chilling, how can the country be as repressive as we are told it is, or is that just manipulation and propaganda that we’re sold in the States, and it’s actually a relatively cool place to be? Out of curiosity, how does Uncle Mark describe it?
continued….
The quote that JC recently repeated is an old one, and is attributed to J. Krishnamurti, who, in turn, was quite an interesting spiritual philosopher. There’s another quote of his that also rings so true which I’m sure you’d appreciate, and it also reflects our discussion of violence inherent in society, and in a sense, very astutely, he takes it even further, encapsulating it, so to speak, in a nutshell:
“When you call yourself an Indian or a Muslim or a Christian or a European, or anything else, you are being violent. Do you see why it is violent? Because you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. When you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, it breeds violence. So a man who is seeking to understand violence does not belong to any country, to any religion, to any political party or partial system; he is concerned with the total understanding of mankind.”
― Jiddu Krishnamurti
That’s what I call brilliant! In the same way that your heirloom seeds make for excellent food, the above quote makes for excellent food for thought.
Next up – a study of true, original, indigenous tribal governance!
Though, for now, I need to refill the midnight lamp.
Cheers.
On a similar note, someone else once wrote:
Spirituality unites,
Religion divides,
by definition.
@candlelight
I like the compass gift idea (especially considering since last time I saw him I noticed how much my dad has abandoned his old park ranger skills and tools to use fancy subscription apps and satellite dependent gps units etc) I think the gift (and metaphor behind the gift could offer a double meaning as well). I don’t know if i`ll explain the rusted compass part, I suppose I will re-assess when I see him later this year at my little sister’s wedding.
Yes having to bribe my way out of a Nicaraguan holding cell due to my attempt to avoid the mRNA injection paper gestapo would have been ridiculous.
I should also mention that my little brother (the computer whiz) did offer to connect me with someone that was selling high quality forged (which were legit in the sense that the info was entered into the system manually by sympathetic doctors/nurses) mRNA injection passports but I did not want any part of that either.
To me, forged injection passports, being sought out in the context of those just trying to keep on enjoying the comforts they had before the scamdemic (and the ensuing fascist mandates) were initiated seems (to me) to be an action that fed/feeds into the tyranny, perpetuating and normalizing the insanity.
Thus, I refused to play their games by getting fake injection passports. To me, getting a pretend clot shot passport (for convenience/entertainment or wanting to ‘fit in’ reasons) would have served to legitimize (and would have helped to add momentum to) their tyranny. In my eyes, getting a fake “vaccine” passport is like the equivalent of if you were a black person living in the 50-s in the southern states and you painted your face white so you can use the white people bathroom or go to a restaurant.. it perpetuates the tyranny. Segregation is wrong, we need to act like it, whether its for coerced injections, skin color or anything else.
I do hope I did not offend my little brother by turning him down, I know he meant well, but I refuse to bow down and pretend to be something I am not for corrupt systems and/or individuals (those who enforce such rules and in my case, those who organized the family gathering in a place that would exclude certain individuals, on purpose).
(continued..)
(continued from above..)
But getting back to Nicaragua, I do not know much of the nitty gritty details about my uncle’s day to day life in Nicaragua aside from what a few old friends and some family members have told me (having visited him there multiple times now) and from what my Uncle Mark himself has told me.
I believe he ended up sharing ownership of a little slice of beach there after meeting a wealthy investor type person at one of the high end resorts he used to work as a chef in out west. The guy found a good deal on a little beach in Nicaragua but wanted someone on the ground to make improvements and set up some living structures and a place to eat and drink. My uncle pitched in some of his Mushroom/Cheffing savings and became a Nicaraguan beach co-owner (I think my uncle has bought out that other guy since and it is just his now).
From what I have heard it can get pretty dicey in Nicaragua for a lone white guy in certain areas. The Narcos, corrupt police and random scary dudes with guns and machetes sometimes frown upon (and or see an opportunity to mug gringos). He said he has had guys try and jump him in other towns near where his beach is located. My uncle is pretty agile and adept with martial arts skills so he seems to have done pretty well.
In the community where his little slice of the beach is located the locals refer to him as “Don Marco” (apparently he established a reputation with the locals by helping them with some infrastructure issues and teaching some of the locals how to build a spring loaded spear gun using supplies from the hardware store for easy snorkel fishing). So it sounds like within the bubble of that little community, it is pretty chill, but outside it, one has to be on their toes.
I know very little about Nicaraguan politics but vaguely remember it being mentioned in a book I read years ago called “Confessions Of An Economic Hitman”.
Not sure how much of the news is propaganda (regarding Nicaragua) as I have never been.
I really appreciate you sharing that J. Krishnamurti quote, at first glance it really speaks to something that I have known innately and strove to live by for years now (though I have never heard it put it into words so well). I shall contemplate it further as I help people set up their gardens and plant trees at work today.
Thanks for the thoughtful comments.
@candlelight
Well I just started back at my day job doing long hours (landscape installation, digging out soil from half frozen garden beds and mulching, tree planting etc) after a long winter of too much screen time doing tedious computer work (editing my book to deal with software issues so I can get it printed) so tonight I am feeling muscles I forgot I had. But that is a good thing, its just what the doctor ordered. Though my muscles are screaming at my brain I am grateful I can do work in a way that gives back to the Earth and improves my physical health. What is that old phrase? “the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak”.
Thanks for asking 🙂 How are you?
Now I have three different mushroom cultivation projects, 72 heirloom veggie seedlings and 7 wild apple tree seedlings to check on, water and harvest from (if some mushrooms are ready) as well as heirloom seeds to sort and package for sending out to people in the mail, then I have to make my wife ginger tea, make my lunch for tomorrow’s work day, feed our animals and wash my work cloths, so my time on here is short tonight (this will likely be the case for the foreseeable future). This means I will not have the time to properly respond to your thoughtful comments at this time but I wanted to let you know I saw them and will respond when I can.
I will contemplate your statements and questions, thanks for the comments.
Gavinm,
“…a long winter of too much screen time…” made me laugh (yes, indeed, out loud). 🙂
What is that other old catch phrase, when someone has a ton of work to do? – “They’ve got their work cut out for them”, eh? And yours is dizzying. So, not only are you very conscientious as I mentioned, you obviously have excellent organizational skills to match!
Well, I’ll let you get to it. But, if you falter, and can’t resist replying to dozens more posts in the meantime, by dozens of subscribers, no worries. That would still represent but a fraction of your usual output!
I do want to leave you with this, and I’ve been meaning to mention it. It’s to do with one of the observations you related regarding the beach dwellers which really resonated with me in a very profound way, and was literally struck by the infinite truth of your experience…. It’s odd that I’d use the term infinite as a descriptive, normally it would be something like absolute, etc. But, in this case, infinite seems better in describing the feeling I had as I read your words, which I’ll quote and italicize within your parentheses – “(without any property deeds and without taking more than they needed to survive).
“without taking more than they needed to survive” rang so true. It brought me right back inside the beach dweller’s shelter. His home. I remember looking around in complete amazement. First, that he created this dwelling out of available drift wood, which was dug partly into the sand, yet was able to shelter him from the elements. And, there in his dwelling, where he lived for months on end, were but just a few possessions. He had a make-shift counter to place some things on, which was across from a table of sorts where had a stove to cook, and on the opposite side from the entrance was his place to sleep with some blankets and such, some gear, some pots and pans, and a small assortment of dry goods. But, what I remember vividly was that big bag of oatmeal he had and the idea that here is this guy living on the beach with his staple bag of oatmeal with not much else – living so incredibly sparse! I was really taken by it, and amazed in the way he wanted to purposely experience his life. The stoicism I witnessed was why your words rang true, in the very absolute sense of that word….
By the way, I will let you in on a little secret as to why my buddies and I were so fortunate enough to be invited into this fellow’s dwelling in the first place…..
Us youngin’s were there to cop some weed. 🙂 🙂 🙂
Cheers!
@candelight
Got rained out at work this morning (my steel toe bloodied feet are thanking Mother Nature for that) but I have a lot of seedling transplants to take care of and book publishing/printing details to work on so responding to you in full will still have to wait.
Yes the temptation to engage in stimulating conversation here in the comment threads and my want to show my substack subscribers that I value their support is significant, but godda put growing food and getting other physical projects as a priority when ever possible right now.
Thank you for that vivid anecdote of your experience visiting a beach dweller near Tofino. My uncle Mark had a similar set up but he lived further back in the woods elevated off the ground and he used his mycological and fishing expertise to eat quite well. He told me a few stories about bears tryna bust into his place when he was cooking cod and shellfish meals and how he had to reinforce the walls with big driftwood beams so they could not bust through the door or walls. It must have been quite an adventure living like that for months at a time.
Haha weed dealing beach dwellers, that is such a quintessentially coastal BC thing, I love it. My uncle had the nickname Mushroom Mark or just “Shroomer” as he was adept at not only identifying and harvesting choice gourmet wild mushrooms (for eating and selling to the restaurants) but also Psilocybin mushrooms which he harvested, dried and sold to the locals, tourists and Psychonautic pilgrims looking to commune with Mother Earth and the ancient forests (which allowed him to make quite a bit of coin if I remember correctly). So it seems that beach and forest dwelling people have a proclivity to peddle mind altering plants and fungi in those parts 🙂
I will continue to contemplate your comments about statism and violent coercion. Hope you have an enjoyable remainder of March.
Cheers
CBDC’s cometh. Total Information Awareness. Imagine the AI the breakaway civilization has just waiting to plug into all that juicy financial data.
@joseph
Do you think that if we actually were able to create a learning (self-improving) machine and we released it in a nascent stage into the literal wilderness to learn from and observe nature (the more than human world) it would end up being more amicable than the scary chatbots people have cooked up today?
(When I say scary chabots I refer to platforms/entities such as Bing’s new chatbot: https://joebot.substack.com/p/mental-jigsaw-how-ai-carves-out-space )
I mean, I am not saying that the current “language model” (internet distillation and regurgitation chatbots they have unleashed) are able to learn, think or improve themselves now but if they are (or become capable of doing so) I imagine learning from humanity by vacuuming up all the ugliness on the internet would not result in the formation of a particularly healthy machine mind.
Thus, though I am not a proponent of developing AGI my self (at least not at this point in the human story), considering the relentless push to create AGI, I contemplate alternative models for how they might learn in way way that might yield more favorable results.
Question for Corbett: MSM have never attempted to mask their contempt for Trump and Putin, and are still peddling the claims that “Russian disinformation” led to Trump’s 2016 election victory — while simultaneously claiming that Biden’s election victory is 100% legitimate. Do the events of the ICC’s arrest warrant for Putin and Trump’s mention of his supposed “impending” arrest coincide, and could the U.S. have influenced or manipulated the ICC into its decision? Could more bank “failures” be planned during the wake of these events?
RE: 3/16/2023 FLASHBACK: G20 Rules Make Bank Bail-ins a Reality (2015)
I am really glad that I watched this.
The information is so relevant as to what is going on.
Wall Street, commodities and the markets are on edge big time.
The ZeroHedge headlines would make any CEO nervous.
The Fed Chairman delivers his sermon on Wed 3/22 about interest rates.
Gold just now broke $2,000 and wavers. Oil broke with its swiggly channel and has been sliding rapidly lower the past two weeks with WTI now kissing $64.
I’m so, so old.
I am used to the conservative suit-dressed banker image.
Now-a-days, the banking industry demands woke filled ethics and Broadway auditions.
Watch the videos in this article.
Would you trust these people with your money?
Watch: Woke Signature Bank Videos Go Viral After Fed Shut-Down
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/watch-woke-signature-bank-videos-go-viral-after-fed-shut-down
USA Today March 19, 2023 headline
Close to 190 banks could face Silicon Valley Bank’s fate, according to a new study
FDIC – Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation
TRANSCRIPT EXCERPTS from FDIC Meeting held 4 months ago…
FDIC Advisory Member Herring:
“…So, I think that your strategy should be to disclose as much as possible to people who professionally need to know about it…
…But I don’t think that you have much hope on reaching a public that doesn’t have a professional need to know….”
(public getting their information in Tweets)
FDIC Advisory Member Cohn:
“I completely agree with that. I almost think you’d scare the public if you put this out. Like, ‘Why are they telling me this? Should I be concerned about my bank?’…
…I think that you have to think about the unintended consequences of taking a public that has more full faith and confidence in the banking system than maybe the people in this room do.”
(Laughter around the boardroom table)
“That we want them to have full faith and confidence in the banking system…
There’s a select crowd of people that are in the institutional side…they’re going to find a way to understand this…
…But I would be careful about the unintended consequences of starting to blast too much of this out to the general public.”