The Amazing Resilience of Nature

The green movement has been taken over by corporate interests. This should be clear to everyone by now, with trillions of dollars earmarked for green projects. However, tribal thinking is such that even the obvious is hard to see. We cannot fight this with arguments. Rather, we must be the change we want to see. Instead of talking about the sad disappearance of insects, and bees in particular, plant some flowers, and use micro-composts rather than chemical fertilizers on anything grown outside. That way, we can put a positive spin on all arguments pertaining to disappearing insects.

The most amazing aspect of the micro-composts we have put into flowerpots on our balcony is the sheer diversity of insects that have been attracted. We have at least ten different species of flying insects, and there's at least as many crawling ones in the composts themselves. Most of these are fairly uninteresting. But we have at least two different kinds of hoverflies, which are positively serene to look at. There's also the occasional bee and dragonfly.

A happy discovery related to this is that the insects don't invade our house. They stay around the bins. There's also very little in the way of unpleasant smells. I just emptied the content of a micro-composter this morning, and the dump had no smell at all. When there is a smell, it's easily mitigated with a spray of water, or by simply letting the dump dry out in the sun.

Our plants love the micro-composts. They grow bigger flowers and leaves than they used to, and they have a generally improved appearance. They look healthy and clean. Leaves are not covered in dust, but kept clean, presumably by flies that lick off resin or similarly sticky stuff that has a tendency to make dust stick.

I can safely say that I've transformed our balcony from a desert with flowers that were barely able to survive on their diet of dusty soil and chemical fertilizers, into a thriving garden full of life. I'm not only growing flowers, I'm also cultivating insects, and the fantastic part of this is that it has been done without buying anything for this purpose. Everything came about on its own. All I did was to put finely cut kitchen refuse into micro-composters that I made out of plastic bins that used to contain Greek yoghurt.

We even have earth worms in our composts, and God only knows how they got there. We live one floor up from the street in a big European city. Clearly, the worms didn't crawl up the wall to get into our little plastic bins of goodies.

Another observation that's impossible to ignore is the great impulse to life that's present everywhere. Not only do we get a great abundance of insects, every little seed that goes into a compost will sprout. I've put a few sprouts into separate flower pots, just to see what comes of them, but for the most part, I pull the sprouts out when I see them. However, no-one can honestly say that the planet is too small to feed its population after having played around with micro-composts. Life is so abundant and insistent that our planet can feed many more people with ease, provided we stop doing stupid stuff.

Micro-composts demonstrate that our planet is doing just fine. The absence of insects and eco-diversity is not due to anything inherently wrong. We don't need trillions of dollars poured into green projects. We don't need to worry about the disappearance of insects. All we need to do is to stop turning everything into a corporate venture, and we can all make a real difference in this respect. The total number of insects on our balcony is in the hundreds, if not thousands. Imagine every little household with access to a garden or a balcony starting a small farm of micro-composts. We'd see the much wanted return of insects, and it wouldn't cost us a penny.

Contemplating a hoverfly over a cup of coffee

Diminishing Search Interest for Bitcoin

Nine days have passed since I pointed out a negative trend for Bitcoin. While the price of Bitcoin was setting a new all time high, search interest had been falling since January. Based on this, I was sceptical to Bitcoin's ability to hang on to its all time high.

As it turns out, Bitcoin has yet to top its all time high of $60,000 set nine days ago. Furthermore, search interest has not picked up significantly since then, and it looks set to fall further, breaking below gold for the first time since mid-December when Bitcoin caught everybody's attention by going from $20,000 to $30,000 in a matter of days.

Going further back in time, we see that search interest for Bitcoin went above search interest for gold from late October 2017 to mid-February 2018. Back then, its price peaked out at just below $20,000 in early January. What followed was a bear market that bottomed out one year later at $3,000. Meanwhile, gold went up by 50%, and may well be set for a new leg up given the current inflationary environment of the world economy.

Brass token currently priced at about $55,000

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

How Freedoms are Lost

Freedom and liberty are not the same thing. Freedom is agency, the degree to which we can do what we want, while liberty is merely the degree of freedom we have in the political space. Liberty in itself doesn't give us a whole lot of freedom, and loss of liberty doesn't automatically translate into a great reduction in freedom.

Our day to day activities are limited by all sorts of factors that have nothing to do with liberty. These factors include the laws of physics, the weather, the economy, technology, our friends and family, our personal health and so on. Laws and regulations, although intrusive, are rarely the main factors limiting the scope of things we can do. In fact, they are a great deal less intrusive than most people believe.

What is often forgotten about laws and regulations is that they are rarely fully enforced. The current mask mandate in Porto, where I live, is only enforced sporadically, and never against people who wear their masks sloppily. Wearing our masks correctly is therefore a choice. Our freedom to breathe fresh air as we walk outside is not limited by a lack of liberty, but by our willingness to comply 100% with the law. Nobody will be fined or punished in Porto for wearing their mask below their nose, so there's no excuse for covering our noses if that makes us feel uncomfortable. We can't blame the law. The law never prevented us from sticking our noses out to breathe freely.

This principle holds true for all sorts of things, including taxation which can be evaded to a far greater extent than most people realize. Considering that taxation is the most intrusive of all regulations, as far as our freedoms are concerned, it's worth our whiles spending some time figuring out ways to avoid them as much as possible. The guiding principle is the same as with the mask mandate. First, we establish the degree to which some law can be enforced. Then, we reduce our exposure according to what we consider safe. Important in this respect is the likelihood and cost of being caught. It's a simple cost benefit analysis.

I've internalized this principle so much that I've come to find it completely natural. I consider myself a sovereign citizen operating inside a hostile environment. I never accept a law as valid unless it's a natural extension to the golden rule. I'm therefore genuinely puzzled when I come across people with a firm belief in political authority, especially when this is expressed by family and friends. I also notice a great degree of unease and discomfort among authority abiding family and friends when I express ideas that question authority.

The other day, I asked my brothers through Facebook messenger if they were going to take the vaccine when called upon to do so, and their reactions were quite telling. My older brother, who is as libertarian as I am, said that he wouldn't take it, and he argued for his decision out of simple logic relating to the low mortality rate of the Covid plague. Then he ended his argument with a defeatist statement about the inevitable introduction of vaccine passports that would force him to take it anyway.

My younger brother, who's very much a patriotic socialist, always happy to pay taxes for the greater good, and never in doubt about the accuracy and honesty of news stories on TV, expressed dismay at my older brother. My younger brother was genuinely frightened by the level of conspiracy thinking. He was more prepared to believe the propaganda from TV than the simple facts presented by his older brother.

Equally telling was the reaction of my twin brother who sees himself very much as a level headed middle ground kind of a guy. He's a consultant, advising people on all sorts of stuff, including climate change mitigation and organisational changes necessary for preventing the spread of the plague. He stayed quiet. Then, a few days later, he wrote about the wonderful return of freedoms that my parents had experienced as a result of having taken the vaccine. With most of our freedoms returned to us, wasn't it time for some kind of celebration?

Both my younger brother and my twin brother had accepted the propaganda at face value, and so had my parents. Apparently, they've been following every rule and regulation to the letter. They've skipped the normal celebrations of birthdays and Christmas. They've been social distancing. They've been doing all the things that they were told to do by their elected leaders.

Now it was my turn to be appalled. However, I refrained from making any comments as it would have upset them if I told them that none of those freedoms were ever taken away from anyone. My parents and two brothers gave them up willingly. They could have continued pretty much as normal, but they chose not to, at a tremendous cost to their own freedoms and general well being.

Sadly, all too many people think and act the way my parents and two brothers did, and that's how they loose their freedoms.

Reeve and serfs

By anonymous (Queen Mary Master) - this file: scan dated 2009, uploaded (without identification of the source) 12 May 2010 by Ann Scott (medievalminds.comReeve-and-Serfs.original1.jpg), Public Domain, Link

Plague Related Predictions

My stepdaughter is pleased with herself for having predicted the advent of a third wave of plague related lockdowns in Paris. She's following my recipe for making predictions, stating them cautiously and without too much personal pride attached to them.

Her reasoning back when she made her prediction was twofold. First of all, she noted the repeated mention of a possible third wave of the plague in the daily propaganda. The narrative for a third lockdown was set by the usual spin doctors. Adding to this the constant need in France to suppress the yellow vest movement, it was easy to make the call for a third lockdown.

It remains to be seen if this latest wave of lockdowns will be implemented in other European countries as well. My guess is that they won't. But I was wrong about Paris, so I might be proven wrong again. Time will tell who's right. However, this has not deterred me from making a completely new prediction based on some news footage I saw yesterday, combined with some data I picked up a few months ago.

The news footage was about the greatly accelerated rollout of the vaccine here in Portugal. Thousands upon thousands of old people are being inoculated at a brisk pace, and it was clear from the images presented that they were not merely making stuff up. There were huge lines of old people, all eager to get their shot. My mother in law was clearly not the only one they called upon the other day to come over and join the party. My wife, who followed her mother up to the local health station could attest to the long lines and general upbeat mood.

The only problem in this is that if it's true what I've heard, that about 5% of all vaccine recipients develop an adverse reaction requiring medical attention, emergency care units will soon be overflowing with old people, sick and miserable from their shots.

Such an event would be hard to conceal. It may not be mentioned in the daily propaganda updates. But people talk. My wife has friends who know people who work in hospitals. My prediction is therefore that there will be a general chatter about old people, sick and miserable, being treated for adverse effects. It may even get so bad that it gets a mention on TV, a little like they now cover youth suicides and sky rocketing mental health issues among children as an unfortunate but acceptable side effect of the epic battle currently being waged against the plague.

Great plague of London

By unknwn - http://theloveforhistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/plague_380x529_712060a.jpg, Public Domain, Link

The Futility of Large Scale Protests

I wouldn't have known this if it wasn't for Zerohedge, but there were some large scale protests against lockdowns and mask wearing in Europe this Saturday. While encouraging to see, I can't help feeling its a lost cause to protest in this way. For starters, such protests take the power of the state as a given. They are petitions to the elite, and as such they legitimize them. Furthermore, they are inherently limited in scope. There is a specific problem that people rally around, but there's no coherent philosophy out of which we can build a movement. There's little real momentum. Large scale protests are largely feel good gatherings with little to no actual impact.

Another problem is the ease with which such protests can be controlled. If they are limited to one or two days, they can be ignored. All that's required is a police force that keeps the gathering from doing too much damage. If the protests persist, they can be infiltrated and subverted by the controlled opposition. What starts off as a protest against too much government control ends up as a petition for more government control, usually in the form of subsidies and taxation.

This is why we should seek other ways to change the world. First of all, we're better off not organizing into groups. Groups have leaders and hierarchical structures that are easily targeted by the state. They also demand conformity which goes against the principles of liberty. Much better then to be the change we want to see. That gives results of immediate benefit to us, even if rather limited to start with. It also has the benefit of influencing people through example rather than argument. As a private rather than public struggle, it can be sustained over time.

This makes the private approach superior to any large scale gathering. It also makes for a movement that is impossible to infiltrate and control by the state. The lack of any central organizing body means that there's only individuals in a network, not a hierarchy that can be neutralized. While hierarchies can be neutralized through isolation or replacement of top nodes, networks continue to function even when large swaths of them are taken out or replaced. Network structures self correct. If nodes are neutralized, corrupted or replaced, networks find ways around the bad nodes.

Furthermore, network movement seem trivial at first. There's no direct threats anywhere, only people minding their own business. There are no mass gatherings or rallies. But the network effect is such that the movement can go from a handful of people to millions in a very short time. Once its core ideas start gaining momentum there's very little that can be done to stop it. Suddenly, over a time span of a few weeks, everybody stops following certain rules. They start doing things differently, and the authorities are helpless to stop it.

Liberty

A Sock Too Far

It appears that something snapped back in February when politicians here in Portugal started seriously debating the need for a second mask to be worn on top of the one already mandated by law. While the immediate reaction to the debate was one of fear due to the apparent seriousness of the situation, it quickly turned to exasperation and ridicule.

The result of this is that the number of people wearing their masks correctly has dropped from a peak of about 80% in February to about 50% today, only a month later. The number of individuals who don't wear their masks at all are up from about 5% to 10%, and the number of people wearing their masks under their chin or below their noses is up from about 15% to 40%.

This is a massive move considering the timespan. Adding to this that mask wearing is mandated by law, we can safely say that there is real resistance in the population. Lifting the mask mandate at this point would send the compliancy rate tumbling below the 30% that I registered back in September when mask wearing was still merely recommended.

Predictably, the politicians have reacted to this defiance by extending the current mask mandate into June. This will keep the number of openly defiant people down, especially when combined with stiffer penalties and sporadic police actions, which have also been enacted. However, the number of compliant people may nevertheless drop below 50% relatively soon. The police cannot very well fine people for accidentally lowering their masks below their noses, or putting their mask under their chin in order to have a smoke or pick their teeth.

What we are witnessing is a trend reversal that will be hard for politicians to do much about, because they now come across as either evil, stupid or controlled. There's a growing sense that something is seriously wrong with the narrative. Trust, already worn thin by years of abuse, has finally been broken. The Overton Window has been closed. There's hardly a thing the politicians can do, and liberty minded people should take advantage of this because big changes can now be wrought with little effort.

People are at the moment open to suggestions related to the inept and corrupt nature of the elite. Casually remarking on such observations is no longer considered extreme. Such ideas are going mainstream. All we need to do is to state the obvious every now and again when the opportunity arises.

There's no need to push this very hard. In fact, a low intensity approach is likely to have a bigger impact than a more forceful one. The network effect is going to snowball this for us. I see this in the way my wife and my stepdaughter talk about current affairs with friends and relatives. There's more openness about the inept character of the elite. All that's required is a gentle push to sustain the momentum.

Going all in for that second sock was a huge political mistake. There's also no lack of further callus and evil idiocy for us to comment on. Politicians dismissing deaths due to botched vaccines as something acceptable in the bigger scheme of things is positively repulsive. Describing sky rocketing mental health problems and suicides among young people as a price worth paying for the ultimate goal of saving grandma is pure insanity. Everybody know this. All it takes for us to give the currently established trend momentum is to mention this from time to time.

It would be a shame to waste this opportunity, because a failure to act now will see a further enslavement of the population. There will be vaccine passports and a need to get a shot every few months in order to exercise even the most basic of liberties. The elite have shown their true colours. They will not rest before we're all cattle to be exploited and messed around with as they please. Considering the great opportunity currently open for us, it would be tragic to remain silent, especially considering the minimal effort currently required in order to push things into a sustainable long term trend towards liberty.  

The mask of the beast

The Problem With Insistent Advise

My mother in law is going to get her vaccine shot. She had initially decided against it, but her oldest son talked her into getting it anyway, so my wife will take her mother up to the local health centre tomorrow. Neither my wife nor I are getting into any arguments. We know that only about 5% get any adverse reactions. More likely than not, nothing bad will happen.

This is the same attitude I had to my parents' decision to get their shots, and the fact that my mother had an unpleasant experience has not changed my mind. The reason for this is not indifference. Rather, it's based on a simple insight: If we promote our preferences too forcefully, we get tied to the outcome in an unfavourable way.

Let's say we talked my mother in law out of taking the vaccine. It would no longer be her original decision made on her own, nor would it be the decision made under pressure from her son. It would be our decision imposed on her. If she subsequently gets a bad case of modern day plague, it would be partially our fault. Insistence on our part translates in this way into responsibility, and it has a lopsided effect. If nothing bad happens, no praise is earned. However, if something bad happens, we get the blame, and we blame ourselves.

On a more sinister level, our insistence can be used against us in a passive aggressive manner. It allows the person in question to push responsibility over on us. My mother in law is notorious for her indecisions, likely out of a desire to avoid responsibilities for her own actions. She prefers to have others make decisions for her, and we simply don't want to get dragged into this type of mind game.

As things stand, it's my brother in law who'll take the brunt of any blame if something bad happens. I think he was foolish in insisting on her taking the vaccine, but I won't blame him if things go wrong. However, this is not up to me alone. Others may see things differently, including himself.

Smallpox vaccine

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