Why It Always Ends in Exasperation

Every tyrannical government in history has ended in a whimper. This includes the first French revolution that ended with Robespierre getting his head chopped off. The violence of this act doesn't alter the fact that people were fed up to the point of being apathetic. Exasperated with the constant stream of edicts emanating from Robespierre's office, his guards finally had enough. Instead of following orders, they pulled him out of his chair and into the guillotine. The guards knew full well that the people at large were as exasperated as they were. There was little real danger in staging their coup.

This same sort of thing happened to Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife in Romania in 1989. They were taken out behind the shed and shot as if they were little more than two sick dogs. However, the end of tyranny is not always accompanied by violence. Soviet Union collapsed without any politicians being executed, and China has made a seamless transition from Maoism to Crony Capitalism. But exasperation was no less of a factor in these cases. People were fed up, and from that fact alone came changes for the better.

The underlying reason for this is that tyranny invariably adds complexity to our lives, and complexity has but one solution, namely a complete disregard for the complexity itself. While tyranny may be exiting to start with due to the tyrants ability to create excitement and commotion, it's tiring in the long run. The complexity of the rules and regulations emanating from the tyrant's office comes in addition to our day to day struggles. They bog us down. They come at a tremendous cost, both economic and mental.

This has all been on full display this year, with much excitement surrounding the flu this spring. There was a sense of urgency and danger. But this excitement has since given way to anger and frustration. We are currently at the stage where some people side with the tyrant, insisting that we must all comply, and others side with liberty, insisting that we must resist. We are caught up in politics, with both sides convinced that the solution is to be found through petitions and demonstrations. However, this is not where it will end. The end comes when people stop caring about politics.

The end to tyranny comes when people no longer care about the rules being issued. This is not the same as defiance, which requires a knowledge and a passion about the rules. It's more like apathy. It involves a vague understanding of the general rules, but no detailed knowledge. Central to this is a desire to make life simple. We long for simplicity and harmony in our lives, and tyranny is incompatible with this, so we ignore it.

The danger in this for the politicians is that the backlash will be severe. Once people realize that they can live their lives freer and more harmonious by disobeying tyrannical rules, they soon discover that they can disobey other rules as well. People will seek to escape the grip of the state altogether. Imagine the great relief it would be to avoid it. I've escaped, and I can assure my readers that it has been a great enhancement to my quality of life. I fill in no forms, I pay no taxes, I have hardly any bills to pay, and I pay very little attention to what the rules are. I live by the golden rule, and that's all I've ever needed.

My hope is that this latest overreach by government will prompt more people to do as I've done, and I'm optimistic about this. Everywhere I look, I see exasperation taking hold. This has not yet translated into the sort of constructive apathy that marks the end of tyranny, but it's on its way. We will soon see people ignore rules completely, to the point where people simply don't know what the rules are, and then we'll see people move farther towards liberty, not necessarily because they love liberty in itself, but because they realize that liberty is the system with the least amount of complexity associated with it. Overburdened by complexity, people will move towards liberty.

Execution of Robespierre

By Unknown author - This image comes from Gallica Digital Library and is available under the digital ID btv1b6950750j, Public Domain, Link

Moronic Behaviour of Epic Proportions

These are truly historic times. Moronic behaviour is on full display, with people eagerly begging to be tortured. They listen non-stop to propaganda, they wear their masks without objection, and if anyone steps out of line, they'll happily stand up and shout at them. It's as if we're willingly embracing in our own lives what we quite recently protested when done to terrorist detainees.

What makes this all the more shocking is the scope of compliance. There's hardly a dissident to be seen. It appears that the overwhelming majority of our fellow men are complete morons, unable to see the flu scare for the scam that it is.

While the flu looked like something to be feared back in February, it was clear from evidence available by early April that this was in fact a pretty harmless flu, not much different from the average seasonal one. With so much more evidence for this available today, there's no excuse for not knowing how harmless this flu is. Anyone still scared by this flu is therefore an unthinking moron, unable to separate propaganda from facts. 

Seeing the vast majority of my fellow men submit so willingly to propaganda is truly saddening. People I once held in esteem for being intelligent and learned have revealed themselves as little more than parroting drones. However, there's also a silver lining. It's now abundantly clear who's a moron and who's not. While some of my friends disappoint, others shine. There's definitely hope.

What's also clear is that those who spend their time out with friends rather than huddled down in front of the TV are by far the most sane and well reflected. This is irrespective of IQ and formal education. The biggest morons are just as likely to be well educated people as so called simpletons. In fact, my impression is that many simpletons are a great deal harder to convince of the supposed existential danger of this flu than are the learned.

Guantanamo Bay detention camp

By Shane T. McCoy, U.S. Navy - (copied from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Camp_x-ray_detainees.jpg so that the image can be used on Wikinews.), Public Domain, Link

The Complexity Solution

The solution to complexity is simplicity. However, many people fail to seek simplicity, so they get bogged down in needless complexity, which can in turn lead to all sorts of mental illnesses, as explained in this short YouTube video by Jordan Peterson.

Having gone through a deep depression myself back in the winter of 2016/17, I could immediately relate to Jordan Peterson's explanation. I had arranged my affairs in such a convoluted manner that it seemed close to impossible to sort it all out.

A big part of this complexity was due to the state and its demand on me as a tax donkey. I had constructed a complex scheme to subvert it. However, things started to unravel, and it was clear that I had to do something drastic in order to get out of the mess. This sent me into my depression at the precise moment I needed to concentrate fully on a permanent fix to my situation.

Luckily for me, I realized intuitively that the fix had to be simple. I gave up on my initial plan to add further complexity to stay out of the taxman's way. Instead, I decided to stand up to him by quickly moving all my assets into the hands of my children. Once this was achieved, my depression lifted, and things have become better ever since.

This experience, while specific to me, has some points to it that can be used by anyone suffering under too much complexity. One thing I realized early was that success could only be achieved through a fearless approach to the problem at hand. I had to play by my own rules, not the rules of others. If that provoked the ire of my adversaries, so be it. Toss me in jail if you have to, but I can't let you have your way with my assets and my life. I'd rather sit locked up a few months than comply.

This approach is not the same as standing up in defiance. The goal was not to provoke a conflict, which would only serve to further complicate my situation. The goal was to save my assets while simultaneously making things simpler for myself.

As it turned out, no negative consequences emerged. The taxman didn't come knocking on my door. What transpired was a radically more simple life.

The lesson from this is that the solution to complexity problems related to government mandates can be found in a quiet subversion of the system, especially in times of tyranny. Don't let others define our daily routines. Live life simply and with little direct conflict, but always in harmony with our desires. Don't add complexity to our lives in order to comply, and don't resist in a way that makes life more difficult. Be the fearless Stoic that lives and let live. If someone comes knocking on our door, let them do so. Never give up on life out of fear. The worst they can do is rarely more than a few weeks in jail, and the chances that they will in fact do this are slim.

Mask of the beast

Why Stocks are Unlikely to Hold Current Gains

The Dow hit 30,000 this week, which I interpret as a sell signal, because there's nothing healthy about the world economy. There's nothing holding this stock market up except money printing by the Fed. The current enthusiasm for stocks look very similar to what we've been seeing in Bitcoin, which appears unable to hold its recent highs, as predicted.

What makes the stock marked particularly vulnerable at this point is the great number of short term speculators currently in stocks. These are people who've been rushing into the market with the intention to make a quick buck on their stimulus checks. However, time is running out for these people. The money will have to be taken out of stocks to pay for more pressing matters, such as food and rent.

Another bad omen for stocks is that it has of late been trailing Bitcoin, making Bitcoin a leading indicator for stocks. What happens to Bitcoin will soon happen in stocks, and Bitcoin is down 15% from its highs a few days back. The reason for this link between Bitcoin and stocks is that Bitcoin and stocks are both risk assets, with Bitcoin being more risky than stocks. When the appetite for risk increases, this is first seen in Bitcoin and then in stocks, and the same happens when risk becomes less attractive. Bitcoin takes a dive before stocks.

There is also a perversity in the current market. Bad news have become good news to such an extent that things have to get even worse in order for stocks to keep their current gains. This is because the Fed's money printing has been driven by bad news. However, money printing results in price inflation if done in parallel with consumer confidence, so it has to stop if things get better. With 2020 being one of the worst years on record for the world economy, 2021 is unlikely to be even worse. Things are as good as they get for stocks at the moment. There's little room on the upside, and plenty of room on the downside, which makes now a good time to take profits.

Train wreck

By Photo credited to the firm Levy & fils by this site. (It is credited to a photographer "Kuhn" by another publisher [1].) - the source was not disclosed by its uploader., Public Domain, Link

An Irrational Fear of Death

Nobody wants to die, not even the suicidal or terminally ill. What everybody wants is life. So much is clear, and it may from this seem reasonable that we should all fear death, that the great scare that we are witnessing is a sign of emotional health, and that all of this is quite natural. However, life is not the opposite of death. It is quite possible to be alive but without life, because a life paralyzed by fear is not a life at all. This insight can be found in all great religions, past and present, and was particularly strong in old Norse mythology. In this mythology, an entire realm was dedicated to the spirits of people who never dared to live. This realm was called Hellheim, or simply Hell, a gloomy place with no joy and no laughter.

Norse mythology is full of fun and adventure, so much so that many react with disbelief when confronted with accurate translations. Where's the stern severity? Where's the gloom and doom? It's nowhere to be found, except in Hell and at the end of time when all Hell breaks loose and there's no alternative but to go out and fight as best we can.

This world view captures the spirit of the Vikings. They lived with adventure, which is in fact the only way to live life fully. But very few people live this way. Most people live in fear. They fear the taxman, they fear the police, they fear job loss, and they fear disease. The result of this is that many people don't actually live. Life is something that they plan to experience on the golf course when they retire. Life is in the future, and this is why so many fear the virus. They are petrified at the thought that they might die before they have lived. But with life always something kept for the future, none of these people will ever live, regardless of what happens, and that means that Hellheim is going to swell its ranks of graceless dead no matter what the virus brings.

Mask of the Beast

How to Retire Early

The problem with retirement is that most of us have no idea what to do with the free time that's suddenly available. This is true whether we retire early or not. However, it quickly becomes an existential issue for those of us who retire early. There's after all an alternative available to us. We can go back to work.

Without a plan for what to do with our time, we end up spending our days watching TV and surfing the net. But this is so mind-numbingly irritating that we quickly long back to the office where conversations were slightly less stupid. The urge to go back to work becomes strong. However, the office was no haven either. There was a reason why we longed for retirement in the first place. The problem was that we never reflected much on what to do once we finally had enough capital to retire.

This is why we should not only make a plan for how to reach retirement early, we need to have a vision of what we'll do once we're there. To help my readers come up with such a plan, I'd like to relay my own experiences, and what I've ended up doing as an early retiree.

When I first retired at the age of 47, I had the idea that I should learn a new trade. In my particular case, I saw myself writing novels. However, that proved much more difficult and tiring than I imagined. In the end, it proved a gigantic waste of time. I started instead to focus on things that truly interested me, and that proved much more fruitful. One thing led to another, and pretty soon I had a whole range of things to focus on. But the great break-through came when I discovered the pleasures of gardening.

Growing stuff, even if it's only on a balcony, can be fascinating. This I found especially true once I started experimenting with micro-composts. Suddenly, I was dealing not only with plants, but with an entire eco-system. The wellbeing of our plants became an integral part of our household.

Another thing that brings meaning to our lives is family and friends. Home-schooling our boy is an interesting activity. Talking to family and friends, thinking about their lives, and sometimes suggesting things that can be done, are all things that add meaning. The key word being love.

It's love that gives meaning to our lives, and love is closely connected to life. This s why we love gardening, we love being with people, and we love going for walks. There is also love in following a passion of some kind, discussing things with an intention to learn, and not merely to come across as noble and wise.

My life has greatly improved since I retired, and the way to this newfound happiness has been through love of the kind described above. Every day is a small adventure of little pleasures and experiences. We have pleasant little routines where we come together to have breakfast, lunch and dinner. We find ways to make the perfect meal, the perfect cup of tea, and the perfect cup of coffee.

I have my plants and micro-composts to tend to. There's always something interesting to learn related to science. There's home-schooling, trips to the beach, walks in the park, and all sorts of other little things. None of them very important, but all of them interesting and full of love. My life may seem insignificant to the casual observer, but it has an important place in the life of my nearest and dearest. Some of my stepdaughter's recent success has no doubt been due in part to my support.

There is happiness and love everywhere around me, and that is in the end all that matters. Focus on love, and everything else will follow. Life will be pleasant and full of success stories. The more we focus on love, the better things get.

It follows from this that it's a good idea to keep politics at a distance. Politics is mainly about ego and the will to subjugate others. It's the opposite of love and a sure way to become a grumpy old guy rather than the happy go lucky one that we all want to be. Focus on love, and everything will follow. Even ego will get its treat, because no success is greater than the sort of happiness and freedom that can be found through love.

Early retirement

Don't Organize into Groups

Freedom is a network. It follows from this that anyone interested in being free should pay careful attention to their network. We need to know who our friends and relatives are, and the best way to find out about that is by being our friendly old selves. The more healthy our network, the freer we can be, and the healthier everything becomes.

Another important, but less obvious, conclusion we can draw is that we should not organize into groups. We should tend our network, and leave it at that. The reason for this is that groups are hierarchical structures, easily targeted by those who might want to limit our freedoms. They also require a great deal of conformity, which goes contrary to the idea of freedom.

One of the great strengths of a network is that every node has its own qualities. There is no conformity and hence no simple template to use in order to identify nodes of a special kind. We are all different as individuals. This is the strength of the network.

I'm personally equipped with a quirky sense of humour and a rebellious contrarian view of the world. That's part of my uniqueness. It's my strength precisely because it's unusual and a little eccentric. For me to give up on this in order to conform to a group would reduce my personal sense of liberty while doing nothing to increase the strength of my network. It would likewise be a mistake to encourage people to do exactly as I'm doing. My style is personal to me. It should only be emulated by those who like to do so, and there's no point in me promoting this in any way. Far better is a situation where people are triggered into doing their own little thing to enhance their own autonomy and uniqueness.

Rather than organizing into groups, we should encourage everyone to be as true to themselves as possible, and the best way to do this is to lead by example. It's not our job to give everyone a template to fill in. It's our job to live our lives in liberty, and when this is picked up by others, freedom spreads through the network. If every liberty loving person manages to help two people in their network find liberty in their own lives, and each of these people manage to help two more, the network effect kicks in with autonomy and liberty popping up all over the place. The idea of liberty will spread without us ever organizing into any formal group.

The wonderful thing about this is that we don't have to sacrifice anything in order to spread liberty. The network does the job for us while we live our lives as freely as we possibly can.

Café de Flore

By Arnaud 25 - Own work, Public Domain, Link

The Myth of Modernity

Throughout history, there has been a persistent myth about modernity. Impressed by our ability to control nature and create progress through engineering, many fall into the trap of thinking that all things can be made better through careful planning, that there's no limit to what can be achieved centrally.

However, most things cannot in fact be made better in this way. The usefulness of central planning is very limited. That's why experiments in extensive central planning always fail. The complexity of our world is simply too great for anyone to fully comprehend, let alone control.

The first mention of this kind of failure can be found in the Bible where the tower of Babel is doomed due to the complexity of the project. No amount of central planning managed to keep the project together, and so it collapsed into chaos.

However, this ancient wisdom has not kept people from trying the same failed project over and over again. The Romans were convinced that they had conquered the world both physically and logistically. Old principles of sound money and balanced budgets were no longer needed, so they started debasing their currency while running up huge debts on extravagant projects. A few hundred years later, the city of Rome lay in ruins.

18th century France is another notable example of this type of delusion. The French king thought it possible to cement the social fabric by creating a vast leisure class to uphold his popularity. To finance this, he let clever economists such as John Law and Richard Cantillon play around with paper money and speculative bubbles. When this charade came to an end, there was revolution, but the first French republic was even more convinced of their ability to suspend the laws of economy than the king had been. France decayed into total madness, opening the way for Napoleon who restored some sanity to the economy at the expense of going to war with just about everybody.

Today, we have all these elements of delusion again on full display, with the Great Reset Hoax as a prime example of hubris. The idea is that we are so modern that we can conquer mother nature herself through clever engineering. A brave new world can be created where diseases and even death are a thing of the past. No desires will be unmet and there's no lack of anything.

What all these delusions have in common is that they assume that centrally controlled computations can replace networks of individuals working together. They assume that all wants and all needs can be known centrally and provided for centrally. However, this can never be know and never be computed, except by the network itself. Lone individuals do not know what they want. The data is not available, even to them. Our needs, wants and desires appear spontaneously as we progress through our daily routines. Life is a real time calculation. No amount of science and computing can ever replace this. Any attempt to create a brave new world is therefore doomed. There is no way to circumnavigate mother nature, no matter how modern and advanced we become.

Rome

By Canaletto - Web Gallery of Art:   Image  Info about artwork, Public Domain, Link

Freedom is a Network

Truth travels a different path from falsehoods. That's why truth needs very little repetition. So much so that it suffices to state a truth clearly once, and it will propagate far and wide. Falsehoods on the other hand, require constant repetition.

The reason for this is that a truth is immediately understood. It has a light in it that attracts the attention of others who will spontaneously use it and repeat it to others. This is opposite to falsehood which is confusing and dark. It contains no useful information, and it's difficult and unappealing to repeat. The repetition of falsehoods must therefore come from above, in a hierarchy. Truth on the other hand spreads through a network, with every node repeating it.

Truth is also closely associated with freedom, while tyranny is associated with falsehoods. That's because tyranny has its root in a falsehood. Tyranny places some people above others, not out of merit, but out of power and force. For tyranny to get a foothold, a never ending stream of falsehoods must first be propagated to the masses, because it's only when falsehood is properly established that tyranny can spread.

This leads to several interesting conclusions. One of them is that we can be fairly sure that anything constantly repeated from above is in fact a falsehood. The more persistent and overwhelming the repetition is, the more likely we'll see tyranny appear out of the woodwork. Another conclusion we can draw is that we need no big organization in order to fight tyranny. Truth travels through a network. As long as we state truth clearly in the presence of others, it will propagate far and wide.

The idea that freedom can only be achieved through centrally organized resistance is false. Freedom does not exist in hierarchies. It exists in networks. What makes us free is our associations in society. I'm free because I'm with people that let me be free. These people are in turn associated with people beyond my circle, many of whom are receptive to truth. This means that I need only have a handful of good contacts in my personal network to propagate truth and freedom.

This is why an idea who's time has come, cannot be stopped. This is also why we need not organize in order to spread freedom, and why tyranny is always doomed. Truth simply can't be hidden for long, and with truth comes freedom.

The social contract

Zombies and the Golden Rule

One of the great misconceptions about love is that it is a synonym for being nice. However, loving people are not necessarily nice people to be with. Loving people live by the golden rule, which means that they may be abrasive, unlikable or even violent in certain circumstances. They are honest and direct, but that's not necessarily nice. Honesty is often uncomfortable because truth sometimes hurt.

Loving people are orderly and predictable when in company with people they love. But there is no way of saying how they will behave in the company of people with sinister motives. They may turn the other cheek when slapped, but they may also blow our brains out. It depends very much on context.

This becomes clear once we analyse the golden rule, which states that we should do to others that which we want them to do onto us. There's no mention of being nice in this statement. It merely states that we should look into our own desires and wishes in order to discover what is reasonable to do to others. We must therefore start by making it clear in our own minds what we want for ourselves, and very few of us will conclude through this kind of introspection that we want nothing but niceness in our lives. I certainly don't want people to be nice to me should I act unprovoked in a selfish, irresponsible or aggressive manner.

If I start nosing around in other people's lives, I expect to be smacked in the face. If I should go mad, please restrain me so that I don't do any harm. This aspect of the golden rule is often brought up in zombie horror movies. Surrounded by zombies, friends agree that if anyone gets infected by the zombie virus, the others blow their heads off. The loving response to a zombie is to blow it to pieces.

We do not turn the other cheek to zombies, nor do we do this to people who put us or our family in danger. We only turn the other cheek when de-escalation is rational. Most squabbles are petty, and deserve no attention, so we turn the other cheek. But that's not because we're nice. We do so because we're rational beings, and there's nothing gained in squabbling endlessly over petty details.

Zombies

By Direction and cinematography both by George A. Romero - Screenshot from timeinc.net, Public Domain, Link

The Great Reset Hoax

It's becoming increasingly evident that we are under siege by propagandists determined to break our will to be free, and to defraud us of our possessions. The latest entry into the propagandist's arsenal of fake and bewildering stories is the Great Reset, promoted by Klaus Schwab and his World Economic Forum.

The vision pushed forward is that of a future in which no-one will own anything and where everyone has a remote control chip implanted in their brain. This preposterous vision is nothing but a dystopian fiction, yet taken seriously by a great number of people who should know better. The effect of this is in turn great tribulations among the masses who can't separate their facts from fiction.

The purpose of this is to cloak what's really going on in a confused mess of scary imagery that makes our future seem sealed with no way out. False alternatives are presented to us, and we're left with a feeling that things will become dystopian no matter what. Faced with the spectre of a chip implant in our brain, forced vaccinations seem positively benign, even desirable.

Klaus Schwab plays his role as Dr. Strangelove with perfection. Talking with a straight face about chip implants in our brains, he scares everyone witless. However, a great reset already happened, and what's presented is merely a bogeyman for people to focus on. Central banks have already shifted most wealth away from ordinary people and into the hands of a small well connected elite. There's hardly anything left to steal. It is therefore time for the elite to throw a spanner into the workings of society so that people are left fighting among themselves while the elite retires to their well defended hideouts.

But, as is always the case, there's a rather glaring and obvious alternative available to us all. We can stop taking these clowns seriously and start focusing on our own lives. We can refuse to play along with all their nonsense. Those of us with savings can disappear more or less completely from the politically controlled system and enter the parallel economy instead. Those of us with useful skills and a will to get out of the system can follow suit. We can seek to do thing differently, and let the dystopian fiction collapse under its own weight. Because the only thing keeping the fiction alive is our willingness to believe in it.

Klaus Schwab

By Copyright World Economic Forum (www.weforum.org) swiss-image.ch/Photo by Remy Steinegger - https://www.flickr.com/photos/worldeconomicforum/2296517249/, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link

Why Bitcoin is Unlikely to Hold Current Gains

Bitcoin is back in the news after briefly pushing above $18,000 this morning. However, the current gains are unlikely to hold. The reason for this is that the gains have not translated into much enthusiasm among people outside the Bitcoin community. Google trends has not picked up on any increased interest of note. The price is therefore driven up largely by people already owning Bitcoin.

The current push higher in the price of Bitcoin is most likely due to windfall money in the form of stimulus checks and the like. The lock down has also spurred speculation. But, as Google trends indicate, this has all been happening within a relatively small group of people. Once their windfall is fully invested, there will be no-one else ready to put more money into Bitcoin. Those forced to sell at that point will discover that the buyers are no longer there.

While it's possible that Bitcoin will surpass its peak of 2017, it's unlikely to go much higher unless there's a sudden and renewed interest in Bitcoin from newcomers. However, with gold having added 50% to its price since late 2017, Bitcoin must reach $30,000 to come out equal to gold's performance since then.

It's also worth noting that those currently selling Bitcoin are unlikely to stay with the dollars they receive. They are going to put their dollars into something else, and gold and silver are likely to be high on their list of things to buy due to the monetary nature of these metals. This will push the price of gold and silver higher. Higher Bitcoin prices will therefore at some point translate into higher gold and silver prices, and this push higher for the metals will continue irrespective of which direction the price of Bitcoin goes. This is due to the sellers' hard money preference. Once out of Bitcoin they will turn to gold and silver for further wealth preservation regardless of which direction Bitcoin is headed.

From this it's clear that Bitcoin remains a speculative bet while gold and silver remain sound money for wealth preservation.

Brass token currently priced at about $18,000

By Steve Jurvetson - https://secure.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/8410385932/in/photostream/, CC BY 2.0, Link

Nobody Cares

Beyond an immediate circle of friends and relatives, nobody cares about anybody. This may sound depressing, but is actually a good thing. Imagine how terribly oppressive the world would be if bureaucrats truly cared about us.

As Clive  Lewis once said: “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”

Luckily for us, bureaucrats have no special interest in us. They soon tire of us unless we do something to make things personal. This extends to all sorts of rules and regulations. Nobody really cares whether we follow all the rules. The appearance of compliance is as good as real compliance. What matters to bureaucrats are the aggregate numbers. Boxes need to be checked, and papers need to be signed. They have absolute no interest in us as individuals.

This is good to in mind when reading scary Orwellian news about surveillance and forced vaccinations. A complete lack of genuine passion in the stuffy offices of bureaucrats gives us plenty of opportunity to do whatever we please. All we have to be careful of is that we're not too candid about our non-compliance.

C. S. Lewis

By Keresaspa - Own work, CC BY 3.0, Link

Protesting Impolitely

Back when masks were optional, I made a point of protesting politely. Not wearing a mask myself, I made excessive manoeuvres in order to avoid those voluntarily wearing a mask. However, now that masks have been made mandatory, in large part due to the tacit approval of the weak and fearful, I've started protesting impolitely. I wear my mask under my chin, and I don't go out of my way for anyone.

The result of this is interesting. Others who protest like me walk past me, sometimes with the customary Portuguese greeting of "bon dia", "boa tarde" or "boa noite", depending on the time of day. There's a sense of community in this, and it gives strong associations to pre-covid normality. The civility of the past is being remembered and carried forward by us.

However, those genuinely frightened by the scare mongers look at me and my fellow protesters with fear. They see us as lepers to be avoided at all cost. They make the same wide circles that I did back when masks were optional, and I can honestly say I enjoy the reversal of roles. Me and my fellow lepers walk tall and unhindered down the side walk. We greet each other and exchange knowing looks of approval while the weak and fearful scurry to the side, afraid of looking their fellow men in the eye.

My guess is that it won't take long before the tide again goes out for the mask wearers. Who wants to be a scared little rat when they just as well can be among the living?

The mask of the beast

How Cities Collapse

Cities have several natural advantages on villages and the countryside, all deriving from their high population densities. With many people living in close proximity to each other, cities are ideal for trade, industry and commerce. Cities also provide services and luxury goods for capitalists and land owners to enjoy. This makes cities dynamic wealth generating, as well as wealth consuming, entities.

When cities generate more wealth than they consume, cities grow. With more wealth generating individuals, cities grow even more. However, when cities turn increasingly to consumption, growth become difficult and eventually impossible. What happened in Rome is a good example of this. It started out as a liberal haven, with industry and commerce free of interference from the state. But Rome's ability to produce laws and soldier rather than goods and services meant that Rome had a shortcut to wealth. They could simply steal whatever they wanted through conquest and taxation. In doing this, Rome went from being a dynamic hub of trade to a decadent cesspool of entitlement and consumption. Two hundred years after its peak, with a population of one million people, Rome was reduced to a provincial town of a few thousand.

This pattern of growth followed by decay happens repeatedly through history. Currently, the city of Detroit has been in decline for decades. Chicago and New York look like they will follow shortly. The reason being that these cities have stopped being production hubs for goods and services. Consumption financed through money printing and empire has replaced their productive capacities.

The mechanism at play is that of evasion. When producers see that they are no longer being properly paid for their goods and services, they stop sending their production to the cities. Egypt was an important provider of goods to Rome. When Egypt stopped sending goods to Rome, that spelled the end of Rome. Whenever there is a great imbalance between production and consumption, production dries up, forcing people to leave the cities in order to find productive work for which they can trade with other producers. Those who fail to make this transition suffer greatly.

With consumption now increasing dramatically relative to production in the US, large US cities are likely to see social unrest as goods and services dry up. Productive people will disappear into a parallel economy with little to no taxation, and foreign producers will demand dramatically more US dollars for their production. Those on welfare will soon see their purchasing power decimated. That will prompt them to riot and loot whatever stores remain open. Then they will head for the country sides like swarms of locusts. Those not out of harms way by then are unlikely to get through the upheavals unscathed.

Locust

By Charles J Sharp - Own work, from Sharp Photography, sharpphotography, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

Own Nothing And Be Happy

The World Economic Forum has a vision of our future. We'll own nothing, and we'll be happy for owning nothing. The idea is that everything will be owned by a tiny elite, and that everyone else will have to pay rent. How that is different from our current arrangement, where everyone has to pay taxes, is not clear. Most people don't own anything anyway, their debt is about as big as their assets, and assets in the form of pension funds are most likely overvalued. Yet, this expansion of Status Quo is touted as some kind of futuristic utopia.

The idea must be that the few who still own stuff are to be dispossessed. Only the tiny elite at the very top of our neo-feudal system are go to own anything. But this strategy will never work. The whole idea is based on a confusion of terms. Ownership is not the same as possession and control. Ownership is merely a formal registration. In a world where a handful of people own everything, everything will be controlled by others than the elite. The elite is not going to control anything directly. It will all be done through agents, and it's these agents who will be the people in control.

Imagine a plot of land out in the countryside of Portugal. Assume now that this land is owned by someone in Berlin, and that this someone owns thousands upon thousands of similar properties. What is the chances that this person will have any inkling of what's going on in Portugal. His whole scheme hinges on the assumption that his agent in Portugal will act on his behalf. But history is clear on this point. Agents will always act primarily for themselves. They will edge out an autonomous corner where they have full control. This corner will escape accounting. It may even be subsidized from Berlin.

However, the fact that this scheme to dispossess us is doomed to failure doesn't mean that it won't be tried. We should therefore take note, and act in anticipation of a power grab that's likely to happen fairly soon. My recommendation is to sell everything, pay down debt and stash all remaining wealth into gold and silver. That way, we'll be perfectly positioned for the power grab. Gold and silver is so easy to hide that hostile agents are very unlikely to find it. We will look as poor as anyone else so the agents will pass us by.

Then, as the elite extends their ownership, we either take employment as their agents, carving out an autonomous domain for ourselves in the process, or we start trading with the agents who will be happy to lease capital to us for a low fee if paid in gold or silver.

Gold eagle

Public Domain, Link

Surviving Tumultuous Years

It appears that we have entered a tumultuous period in history. There are riots and lockdowns. There are spend thrift politicians and limitless money printing. The gap between the rich and poor is growing. Things are not looking good for our short to medium term future.

Luckily for us, this is hardly the first time in history with this kind of unrest. There is no lack of examples to pick from for those wondering what a good strategy might be going forward, and they all point to a single strategy that always works. When things get weird, we unwind our businesses, pay down debt and save in gold. We keep our economic activity at an absolute minimum until things again look stable and relatively sane.

This is what the successful have done all through history. They get out of harm's way early, hunker down for as long as it takes, only to bounce back with wealth and health intact. Those who catch on to growing insanity at an early stage end up better off, especially if they are equally good at catching onto the new up wave.

So far, I've done very well following this strategy. After a gradual dismantling of my business activities over several years since 2006, I went all in on this strategy back in 2016. I sold my house in Norway, settled all debts, and distributed my remaining wealth among my children. I'm now living off a modest fixed income. Savings are in gold. I've secured a great deal of liberty for myself, and my savings are up by an impressive 80% since 2017.

It's important in this to keep a realistic perspective on politics. Putting too much trust in the ability of politicians to sort things out can seriously damage our ability to time things right. What's important is the general attitude in society at large, not what some politician may promise. What made me decide to go all in back in 2016, was not the politicians, but the sense that hardly anyone was concerned about the trend towards tyranny which was clear to see even back then. People saw no problem in taxing people more than 50%. They were not at all concerned about increasing deficits and out of control public spending.

As things stand, nothing has improved since 2016. We're still traveling down the same road to ruin. At some point, this will go off a cliff, and there will be great suffering. Only those well out of harms way by then are likely to fare relatively well.

Gold eagle

Public Domain, Link

Complicity Theorists

I recently came across the term "complicity theory", meaning a wilfully ignorant opinion in support of a true conspiracy. Those eagerly parroting or concocting "complicity theory" are "complicity theorists", who can in turn be divided into experts and parrots.

Experts are intellectuals who concoct stories intended to bamboozle the general public, and parrots are mindless consumers and distributors of this kind of expert opinion. The experts are at best wilfully ignorant about the conspiracy they support, driven by a desire to be liked by their peers. The parrots are mindless, emotionally driven individuals with little to no capacity for independent thought.

Together, the ignorant parrots and evil experts become a considerable force. A constant onslaught of clownish and overly emotional cartoons, combined with loud shout down of independent thought, constantly labelling opponents silly, subversive and evil, has the effect of silencing dissent. People become reluctant to speak their minds. Many start agreeing with complicity theorists to get them off their backs. No one wants to be on the side of those destroying the environment or killing grandma, so we nod in agreement with whatever Non Sequitur is presented by the complicity theorists.

However, complicity theory is never very hard to dissect. No expert insight is required in order to unmask the fraud. Reliable facts are easy to find, often in sources as main stream as Wikipedia. All it takes is a bit of independent thinking and some calculations to make it clear that CO2 is of no danger to the environment, that Covid is a fairly harmless disease, and that widespread fraud was committed during this year's presidential elections. But to point this out is immediately labelled ignorant by complicity theorists. Only expert opinion is to be believed.

Arguing with a complicity theorist is a hopeless waste of time. The best we can do is to mock them with facts, reminding people that are willing to think independently that dissent still exist, even if it's shouted down by loud parrots, everywhere present in droves.

Parrots

By Jan Smith from Brisbane, Australia - Hello, hello! Uploaded by Snowmanradio, CC BY 2.0, Link

Shock and Awe by the Wicked

Shock and awe is a strategy frequently used by the wicked. By coming out swinging, the impression is created that they are more powerful than they actually are. The hope is that their adversaries submit to this, and that victory is thus ensured. However, if the adversaries hunker down and dig in, the shock and awe becomes increasingly impotent. Unprepared for a long and tenuous fight, the wicked exhaust themselves. Their allies, all exposed by the initial onslaught, becomes correspondingly easy to neutralize. Little by little, territory is won back and often added to by the virtuous.

An example of this scenario is currently playing out in the Caucasus, with Azeri forces battling Armenians. The Azeri came out swinging, but failed to take any major strategic positions. The Armenians dug in during the initial onslaught. Then, as the dust cleared, they first won back control of the skies, before rolling out heavy artillery. Little by little, lost territory is regained.

Similarly, we have a legal battle going on in the US. Through trickery and fraud, Biden was declared victorious by the media and multiple corporate entities. The pressure on Trump to declare defeat was enormous. However, he refused to do so, and the tide in Biden's favour appears to have already peaked. Little by little, shenanigans is being exposed and presented to the public.

While it's still possible that Biden's fraud will land him victory, it seems increasingly unlikely. Having come out swinging behind Biden, media has lost a lot of credibility. People are becoming increasingly sceptical to anything coming from them, further eroding their power. The dust is about to blow to the side, exposing a deeply flawed system.

It appears that the beast is losing to the lion, and that some kind of new order may set in. Super-national organizations and corporations, including media houses, are being exposed as integral parts of the beast. The illusion of independence has been shattered, and hence their power. If Biden nevertheless wins, his presidency will go down in history as seriously flawed and impotent.

The beast

By Albrecht Dürer - Web Gallery of Art:   Image  Info about artwork, Public Domain, Link

The Nature of the Beast

The beast is the state. It's a terrible monster with enormous powers. However, it's a horribly deformed thing, incoherent and confused. Most of its energy is wasted on internal squabbles where one organ lashes out at another. Only those directly in its path get killed and maimed as it wobbles around with little to no direction. Once we understand the beast, we find that there are all sorts of ways to avoid it.

Our fear and awe of the beast is misplaced. It's anything but intelligent, and there is no way for it to actually do the things it claims itself capable of. The idea that it can surveillance every single individual is complete nonsense. There's simply no way to do that, regardless of how much equipment and technology is thrown into such a project. The reason for this is complexity.

We all know the complexity involved in keeping a family unit together. All sorts of things happen. The head of the family doesn't know half the things going on. The unit is kept together solely due to trust, love and convenience. Raw power has very little to do with it.

Now, imagine two families acting together. The complexity goes from high to enormous. With three families and more, no amount of surveillance and data processing can tell anybody what's going on beyond the obvious and superficial. So we know with certainty that the beast knows close to nothing, and that it cannot in any way predict the future. When we read articles about "predictive programming" and "draconian surveillance", we know that it cannot possibly work. At most, there will be a few individuals caught in its web, and those will be mostly among people internal to the beast itself.

This fact is constantly being suppressed and ignored, often by those supposedly opposed to the beast. But the beast itself knows full well of its limitations. It knows that it only has power as long as people fear it, and act in compliance with its rules. It also knows that fear and admiration are closely connected in the psyche of the public. Many find comfort in the thought that the beast is keeping certain neighbours hostage to its will. They speak fondly of the will of the people, which in reality is the will of the beast. That is, until the boot is on the other foot. Then, suddenly they fear the beast.

The beast thrives in chaos. It comes up with grand schemes that appeal to some, and revolt others. These schemes unfold in grand cycles with four parts, corresponding to the four horsemen of the apocalypse. First, there's a grand idea. Second, there's strife and war as the idea is pushed onto those reluctant to accept it. Third, terrible imbalances appear, with some people becoming extremely rich while most people struggle to get by. Forth, there is collapse, and death to those hopelessly tied to the system.

The grand idea of our times is the welfare state which has given rise to perpetual war, financed through central banking. This has in turn created enormous inequalities that will soon usher in the final horseman. We are in the late cycle stage. Those still in awe of the beast will soon discover how empty and toothless it is. All its promises will be broken. Anyone betting their old age and good health on the benevolent nature of the beast will be sorely disappointed.

Conversely, those who've left the system will discover how harmless the beast is for all who stay away from it. Three years into my escape, I'm more prosperous than ever. The beast has allotted itself more resources and new powers in order to fight tax evasion, but I can't say I'm worried. All this power and money will be wasted internally. The reorganization will take years to complete. There's still plenty of room to escape for those who'd like to free themselves from their shackles of compliance and obedience to the beast.

Our first step to liberty is simple, and involves no risk. All it entails is a conscious decision to seek liberty, rather than obedience to the beast. Once that decision has been properly interiorized, the rest follows naturally. We find likeminded people. We trade with them, and we prosper. We welcome every opportunity to distance ourselves from the system. We save in gold and silver. Paper money is for slaves, not for free citizens. While practical in everyday life, paper money is nothing to covet. It has no lasting value and must therefore be kept only as a short to medium term resource.

The beast

By Albrecht Dürer - Web Gallery of Art:   Image  Info about artwork, Public Domain, Link

How to Profit from an Asset Bubble

In order to profit from an asset bubble, we have to first identify it. Only then can we take the necessary actions to profit from it. We must also understand that the market can act irrationally longer than we expect, so we mustn't resort to leverage that require us to cover our bets within a given time frame. We must place our bets for the long term.

To identify an asset bubble, we rely on historic data. When prices are close to historic highs, measured in gold, we know that the asset is in a bubble. We can also identify bubbles in real-estate by calculating the number of years it will take typical buyers to pay down their loans, given no debasement of the currency. When typical houses correspond to decades of savings, we know real-estate is in a bubble.

A useful metric for stocks is the price/earnings ratio, which indicates how long it will take for earnings to cover the cost of investing. This ratio should not exceed 15, because we cannot expect to be be gainfully employed for more than 45 years, and we don't want to be forced to sell our stocks during our retirement. At price/earning ratios above 15, we'll be unable to comfortably retire without selling our stocks, even after 45 years of saving.

The problem in the case of overvalued stocks is that there will be selling pressure when the typical retiree is forced to sell, either directly, or indirectly through pension fund liquidation. The problem with overpriced real estate, is that it reduces the pool of buyers so that prices have to come down in real  terms, measured against everyday consumer goods as well as gold. That's why such overvaluations are called bubbles. The day eventually arrives when there is a lot of selling pressure and hardly any buyers, and the price implodes. Asset bubbles are precarious delusions that we have to avoid.

Once we've identified a bubble, we need to get out of them it much as possible. We sell the overpriced assets, and we buy gold instead. The reason for our move into precious metal is that asset bubbles tend to spur monetary debasement. We don't want to be victims of central banks largesse. When central banks print currency in order to help debtors at the expense of creditors, we want to be out of reach.

Buying gold during times of asset bubbles locks in profits that cannot be eroded by central banks. When I realized that it would take the average person some three decades to pay down on a loan for my house in Norway, I sold it, and moved into gold. While the person who bought my house has benefitted from easy credit and a general debasement of the Norwegian currency, I've done far better. I still have about 30 years of savings locked away in gold. The house I sold is nominally more expensive, but the time required to save up for it has fallen by half when measured in gold.

The big loser in all of this is not the house buyer, but the dupe saving in Norwegian currency. I'm better off with my gold. The house buyer is also well off. The bag holders are the ones believing that Norwegian currency in a bank is a safe way to save.

With asset bubbles everywhere, it's time to secure profits. It's time to sell all that isn't of immediate use, buy gold, and hunker down for a decade or two. Only when the asset bubbles are fully deflated is there any reason for us to come back into the market. That time will come, and we can be sure that it will be reflected in historic data, measured against gold. That's when we reappear with our gold to buy assets on the cheap.

Gold eagle

Public Domain, Link

Creditors and Debtors

It has long puzzled me that people think that their pensions are secure in face of all the facts to the contrary. Not only are pension funds underfunded at current asset valuations, their assets are greatly inflated in value as well. Yet, no-one seems to care.

All pension funds, private or public, are heavily invested in sovereign debt, which means that future pay-outs are tied directly to the ability of the state to deliver on its promises. However, a state that's trillions of dollars in debt will never pay back what it owes. No sophisticated maths is required to figure that out. Yet, many counter this argument with the proposition that sovereign debt is money that we owe to ourselves, and therefore not a problem. But this argument is lame for at least two reasons:

1. It assumes that the state and the people invested in pension funds are the same individuals.
2. It fails to recognize that money is not in itself savings.

The state is not equivalent to future pensioners, and money is merely an alias for real savings. Sovereign debt is tied to future tax revenues, which are not going to increase as long as there's no real savings in terms of durable goods and productive manufacturing capacity.

This means that the state will soon default on its promise to pay their debt. Pensioners will feel this either directly through smaller pay-outs or indirectly through monetary inflation. Either way, future pensioners will be sorely disappointed. Their promise of a comfortable retirement will be broken. Only those with savings in gold or silver will coast through this coming crisis with their purchasing power intact. The reason for this is that gold and silver are real savings. They are not tied to the state's ability to pay their debt. Rather, they are a part of the economy of the physical world. They are commodities that will always retain a relatively stable position in the price hierarchy of things.

Gold eagle

Public Domain, Link