A realm of intimate, personal power is developing — power of the individual to conduct his own education, find his own inspiration, shape his own environment, and share his adventure with whoever is interested.
Stewart Brand, Whole Earth Catalog (1968).
On July 12, 1917, vigilantes kidnapped and deported nearly 1,300 striking miners and others from Bisbee, Arizona. This came to be known as the Bisbee Deportation.
On the same day in 1948, Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion ordered the expulsion of Palestinians from the towns of Lod and Ramla.
“It was the first assassination attempt since 1981 to wound a current or former president — a bullet grazed Mr. Trump’s ear.” Such a close miss! No wonder Trump now suggests he’s on a mission from God.
The Times’s Washington reporter says the agency has, since the shooting, endured “intense” scrutiny, but that’s not what it looks like from here in the bleachers. The Butler, Pennsylvania, assassination attempt was dropped by the media like a hot rock, after the first week or so, receiving very little public scrutiny . . . considering its grave implications. (Pun intended.)
“Multiple inquiries, including from Congress,” the Times goes on, “into the security lapses at Butler had some overlapping conclusions, in particular that there was a significant breakdown in communications between agents themselves, and between Secret Service agents and the local law enforcement helping to secure the rally site.”
By Hanlon’s razor, we are supposed to avoid using malice and conspiracy as explanations for when things go wrong . . . if at all possible. And incompetence — if not exactly Hanlon’s chosen word, stupidity — is indeed the official determination.
And now it has been dealt with. Officially. A few agents were suspended without pay from ten to 42 days.
Is that enough?
Such gross incompetence deserves an outright termination of employment. Everybody knows this.
Is it really that impossible to fire a government employee?
Some will speculate that they were treated lightly to keep their mouths shut.
You know, about a conspiracy.
But the undoubted proliferation of stupidity in government always makes Hanlon’s razor easy to apply.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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I am trying to do two things: dare to be a radical and not be a fool, which, if I may judge by the exhibitions around me, is a matter of no small difficulty.
James A. Garfield, in a letter to Burke Aaron Hinsdale (January 1, 1867); quoted in The Life of Gen. James A. Garfield (1880) by Jonas Mills Bundy, p. 77.
On July 11, 1804, General Alexander Hamilton, first Secretary of the Treasury, and Colonel Aaron Burr, third (and sitting) Vice President of the United States, took part in a duel at a site known as the Weehawken Dueling Grounds, a narrow ledge about 20 feet above the river, which, at the time, offered a secluded spot with a clear view of Manhattan.
Hamilton, less than 50 years of age, died the next day of complications from a bullet wound; Burr, who was not hit, died on September 14, 32 years later at age 80.
Now, billionaire Musk appears to be serious about his proposed “third party,” the “America Party.” A name perfectly designed to ruffle Trumpian feathers. It might steal some of the thunder of “America First” and “Make America Great Again.”
The president mocks the notion, saying that third parties “have never succeeded in the United States.”
Well, that is not exactly true. For a long time, it was second parties that had problems.
The first party, the Federalists, basically lost for a generation, finally withering away against the onslaught of that most American party of all, the Democratic-Republican.
When the victorious party reformed under the leadership of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren to become the Democratic Party, the Whig Party emerged to counter-act Jackson’s imperial presidency. The Whigs had some success — if with a string of presidents almost no one remembers — only to lose ground to Democrats and then a whiggish replacement, the Republican Party.
Yes, Trump’s own party was a “third” party once.
And it achieved power largely because the Democrats split into two for the 1860 election, leaving a sectional plurality candidate (Abraham Lincoln) to win the Electoral College as a Republican.
In modern times, Republicans and Democrats have ably squelched challenger parties.
So Trump’s right — in spirit.
Now enter Andrew Yang, enthusiastic for the upstart. But how can his Universal Basic Income agenda fit with Elon’s fight against over-spending?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* Though, some wonder if the Trump-Musk feud isn’t all an act.
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In the ideal socialist state, power will not attract power freaks. People who make decisions will show no slightest bias towards their own interests. There will be no way for a clever man to bend the institutions to serve his own ends. And the rivers will run uphill.
David Director Friedman, The Machinery of Freedom (1973), p. 108.
On July 10, 1832, U.S. President Andrew Jackson vetoed a bill to re-charter the Second Bank of the United States, in effect ending formal central banking in the United States until the establishment of the Federal Reserve in 1913.
Or both.
So when Axios scooped everybody, Monday, with the story that the FBI had closed the Epstein case, most rolled their eyes. Not that they didn’t believe Axios. They didn’t believe the aptness of judgment in closing the case.
Even if Epstein did actually commit suicide, it was still a huge criminal justice failure for that act to not have been prevented. And for the notorious Epstein files (remember that the Attorney General had said she had them on her desk) to suddenly go poof! . . . does not inspire confidence.
Frankly, there’s no reason to trust the government. Especially on this.
Why? We all pretty much believe the initial reports. We remember the image of Bill Clinton — it is surely seared into many a brain, alas for those brains — posing in a blue dress, portrait hung up prominently in Epstein’s trap, I mean, townhouse.
The ties to Israeli intelligence and politics and U.S. spymasters has been fairly well established — at least Whitney Webb’s readers seem certain — and that brings us to the bottom line:
Donald Trump is not shining light upon the Stygian Deep State here, nor “draining the swamp.”
“I can’t believe you’re asking a question on Epstein,” the president said, interposing himself between a reporter and Attorney General Pam Bondi. Trump eagerly added context: all the “successes” and “tragedies” of the current day. Videos? Computer files? Victims? Lolita Island? Brushed aside.
As if unimportant.
Thus America’s unexpected encounter with the dark, Deep State. They insist we blithely accept that there is nothing to see here.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Science is the only news. When you scan through a newspaper or magazine, all the human interest stuff is the same old he-said-she-said, the politics and economics the same sorry cyclic dramas, the fashions a pathetic illusion of newness, and even the technology is predictable if you know the science. Human nature doesn’t change much; science does, and the change accrues, altering the world irreversibly.
Stewart Brand, Whole Earth Discipline (2009), p. 216.