SAVAGE MEMES Episode 8: Pharma
SOMETHING BIG Episode 7: Things Can Always Get Worse
MIDNIGHT’S WAR Episode 18: Ticket to Ride
Wednesday PM Arktoons
Category: Uncategorized
The Next Domino
The failure in The Graveyard of Empires doesn’t necessarily mean the Imperial USA is going to collapse. However, once it becomes clear that the failure is merely one in a series, the conclusion becomes a little more obvious:
No single event no matter how photogenic it is, is not going to be a sign of the grand demise of the “Sole Hyperpower”. It really took from the beginning of WWI till the end of WWII for the British to truly fall apart as a geopolitical force. The Soviet Union fell much quicker, but it is very widely believed that Perestroika (or the The Reykjavik Summit) was the real first white flag that devolved into the breakup of the union years later. The Roman Empire was a vastly slower burn than either of these two modern behemoths.
This means we should not be debating if Afghanistan is the first “domino” to fall, but instead we should really take a look at what the rest of the dominos falling would look like. At this point we can surely put together a rough picture of what the next tiles to fall would look like, i.e. what other major failures/events would really be signs of the Monopolar World meeting its demise? The following are a few humble offerings as to what these dominos could be…
Abandoning the Maidan Regime in the Ukraine
The unexpected surrender and soon to be total fall of Kabul has certainly resonated in another city that starts with the letter K. If Washington is finding it necessary to abandon a twenty-year Nation-Building project that they have invested vast sums of money and manpower into, that means that back-burner Kiev could be cut loose in the near future, putting the fate of the region in the hands of the Russians.
Image: We all know who secures Ukrainian “independence”.
The Maidan has been a major roadblock for Russia. As Brzeziński wrote, “It cannot be stressed enough that without Ukraine, Russia ceases to be an empire, but with Ukraine suborned and then subordinated, Russia automatically becomes an empire” and Washington has done an absolutely fantastic job of turning the region into an “anti-Russia” as Putin recently called it.
If the Maidan project were to be abandoned, it would become another quite massive domino. Washington giving up on Kiev, resulting in that current political entity probably being divided up, mostly going to Moscow, would symbolize either the USA’s inability to stop the rise of the Russians or their begrudging acceptance of it.
I observe that the failures in Syria and Crimea already preceded the retreat from Afghanistan. That being said, I’m still of the opinion that the collapse will take place in the 2030s rather than the 2020s, even though it only took two years for the Soviet retreat from Afghanistan to turn into the fall of the Soviet empire.
Bindery Update 22
Wednesday AM Arktoons
Confucius Condemns Neoliberalism
A philosophical experts on Aquinas considers the applicability of The Analects to today’s catastrophically atomized society.
What is essential to a well-functioning society? In a famous passage from The Great Learning traditionally attributed to Confucius (551-479 B.C.), the philosopher says:
The ancients who wished to illustrate illustrious virtue throughout the kingdom, first ordered well their own states. Wishing to order well their states, they first regulated their families. Wishing to regulate their families, they first cultivated their persons. Wishing to cultivate their persons, they first rectified their hearts. Wishing to rectify their hearts, they first sought to be sincere in their thoughts. Wishing to be sincere in their thoughts, they first extended to the utmost their knowledge. Such extension of knowledge lay in the investigation of things.
Things being investigated, knowledge became complete. Their knowledge being complete, their thoughts were sincere. Their thoughts being sincere, their hearts were then rectified. Their hearts being rectified, their persons were cultivated. Their persons being cultivated, their families were regulated. Their families being regulated, their states were rightly governed. Their states being rightly governed, the whole kingdom was made tranquil and happy.
From the Son of Heaven down to the mass of the people, all must consider the cultivation of the person the root of everything besides. It cannot be, when the root is neglected, that what should spring from it will be well ordered.
These words from the great man of the East would be warmly endorsed in the West by ancient thinkers like Plato and Aristotle and medieval thinkers like Thomas Aquinas. But they run counter to the modern West’s liberalism, including the libertarian brand of liberalism that too often passes for “conservatism.” The liberal attitude is that the moral character of individuals does not matter for social order so long as the right rules and institutions are in place. Part of Confucius’s point, and that of any conservatism worthy of the name, is that rules and institutions are ineffectual without individuals willing to subordinate their desires to them. And individuals who do not seek the good (so as to “rectify their hearts”) and the true (thus pursuing the “investigation of things”) can neither curb bad desires nor cultivate good ones. The brute force of legal coercion cannot substitute for this missing moral fiber. As we read in chapter 2 of The Analects:
The Master said: “Lead them by political maneuvers, restrain them with punishments: the people will become cunning and shameless. Lead them by virtue, restrain them with ritual: they will develop a sense of shame and a sense of participation.”
And again:
Someone said to Confucius: “Master, why don’t you join the government?” The Master said: “In the Documents it is said: ‘Only cultivate filial piety and be kind to your brothers, and you will be contributing to the body politic.’ This is also a form of political action; one need not necessarily join the government.”
And in chapter 12:
The Master said: “I could adjudicate lawsuits as well as anyone. But I would prefer to make lawsuits unnecessary.”
In such passages, Confucius reminds us that the personal is the political, not in the totalitarian sense that absorbs the personal up into the political and tries to mold attitudes and actions via state coercion, but on the contrary in the humane sense that devolves the political down to the personal level, in the recognition that social order depends more fundamentally on prevailing morals and mores than on legislation.
Wisdom comes in many forms. And it is remarkable how often wisdom from wildly disparate sources ultimately direct us toward the same conclusion.
Tuesday PM Arktoons
STONETOSS Episode 11: Cannibalism
THE AWAKENER Episode 15: The Final Journey
Bounding Into Comics breaks the news with details on some of the new series that will debut on Arktoons in the near future:
Chuck Dixon and Arkhaven Comics publisher Vox Day continue their partnership as Dixon will be bringing a brand new western to Arktoons, Arkhaven’s webcomic platform.
Dixon’s partnership with Day and Arkhaven runs deep as he’s currently penning new Midnight’s War stories. He also has Chuck Dixon’s Avalon, Alt-Hero Q, Something Big, Go Monster Go!, and more on the webcomic platform.
Not to mention, Dixon has also been curating a number of classic comics to incorporate on the platform that include a number of different genres such as mystery and war.
The new western is titled Snakehand and sees Dixon team with artist John Neal to tell the story of Texas lawman Joe Wiley as he attempts to bring law and order to the hive of scum and villainy known as Mercury Wells….
Arktoons will also be launching a new science fiction series called Faraway Wars. No details on the creative team or what the story is about were revealed, but Vox Day did share a sample page revealing what looks to be three heroes being celebrated in a futuristic world that includes flying cruise ships.
Bindery Campaign Update 21
Status: 88.4 percent of goal.
The Iliad: 303/500
The Odyssey: 290/500
As requested, we have also added an additional support option for those who wish to support the creation of the Castalia Bindery but a) don’t want the actual books, b) can’t afford them, or c) prefer a pure support option that doesn’t impose any production costs.
So, we’ve added the Leather Ebook option for the final week of the campaign. For $50, buyers will receive both ebook editions of THE ILIAD and THE ODYSSEY, as well as an SG Bindery badge. Please note that it is NOT necessary for those who have already bought one of the books – or the German HEIDI, for that matter – to buy this option, as they will also receive the ebooks and the badge when they become available.
It’s a Mystery
It’s like watching a super-detective team of Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, and Sherlock Holmes in action:
A New York resident died on Sunday morning shortly after receiving the COVID vaccine, but state health officials maintain that “the vaccine is safe,” the New York Post reported.
The elderly man, who was in his 70s, collapsed about 25 minutes after being administered the COVID vaccine as he left the Jacob Javits Convention Center vaccination site in Manhattan, Dr. Howard Zucker, the New York state health commissioner, said in a statement obtained by the Post.
The statement from Zucker also suggested “the man did not have any allergic reaction to the vaccine,” as no adverse effects or signs of distress were observed during the 15-minute observation period following his inoculation.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention maintains that severe adverse reactions to the COVID vaccine occur “rarely,” saying the chance of this happening is 10 cases in over 4 million first doses of the drug.
Zucker said in the statement to the New York Post that first responders assisted the man “within seconds,” but he later died at a nearby hospital. The cause of death has not yet been determined.
In related news, 85 people in Chicago were shot last weekend. 24 of those people died of unknown causes that have not yet been determined.
Tuesday AM Arktoons
China Shows Up for the Future
Unlike Americans since 1965, China actually pays serious attention to its demographics because its leaders understand that the makeup of the population is what determines the health and capabilities of the country.
China on Friday passed a law amendment which allows each couple to have three children and stipulates supportive policies for childbearing, with observers believing it indicates China has officially moved from restricting births to encouraging births, paving the way for not only the third-child policy’s full implementation across the country, but also potentially encouraging even more births.
It took less than three months for the policy to be made into law after it was first announced on May 31 at a meeting of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, revealing the urgency and gravity of China’s population development beset by falling fertility rates, a shrinking workforce and increasing aging population, Chinese observers said.
The comprehensive supportive measures for the shift of the population policy – which were not highlighted in the last revision – show China’s strong determination in actively tackling its population challenges and building a fertility-friendly society, and more detailed measures are expected to be introduced soon, they said.
The amendment to the Population and Family Planning Law was passed at a session of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee on Friday.
The amendment says one couple can have three children, and it cancels relevant restrictive measures, including social maintenance fees and fines on couples who violate the law to have more children than permitted.
Twenty-one provisions were amended, deleted or added to the law, and the amendment took effect immediately after its announcement on Friday, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
One can always tell that a China skeptic is totally clueless if they mention “the one-child policy” or make the ridiculous assertion that China is somehow demographically doomed. The Chinese birth rate was much higher than the US or any of the European states until 1992. It’s now marginally lower due to the one-child policy established in 1979, but that was eliminated in 2015. And between the aggressive pro-family policies now being instituted and the strong nationalist restrictions on immigration, imports, investment, and business ownership, the Chinese are already in a vastly stronger position for the future than beleaguered Americans, who are on the verge of being outnumbered in what used to be their own country.
Remember, the future belongs to those who show up for it.