
What’s Going On-Marvin Gaye
THIS SIDE OF PARADISE
“We have entered, as I see it, a spiritual limbo. Our educational institutions are no longer the bearers of high culture, and public life has been deliberately moronised. But here and there, sheltered from the noise and glare of the media, the old spiritual forces are at work” Roger Scruton
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“When a common culture declines, the ethical life can be sustained and renewed only by a work of the imagination.”-Roger Scruton
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“Jesus prayed, “This is eternal life, that they may know You . . .” (John 17:3). The real meaning of eternal life is a life that can face anything it has to face without wavering. If we will take this view, life will become one great romance— a glorious opportunity of seeing wonderful things all the time. God is disciplining us to get us into this central place of power.” Oswald Chambers
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“No power on earth or in hell can conquer the Spirit of God in a human spirit, it is an inner unconquerableness.” Oswald Chambers
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To those who have had no agony Jesus says, “I have nothing for you; stand on your own feet, square your own shoulders. I have come for the man who knows he has a bigger handful than he can cope with, who knows there are forces he cannot touch; I will do everything for him if he will let Me. Only let a man grant he needs it, and I will do it for him.” The Shadow of an Agony,Oswald Chambers
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“If we wish to erect new structures, we must have a definite knowledge of the old foundations.” John Calvin Coolidge
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Atheism is a post-Christian phenomenon.
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If social justice looks like your hand in someone else’s pocket then you are stealing.
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“In Sweden, giving to charity, absurdly, came to be considered a lack of solidarity, since it undermined the need for the welfare state.” – Roland Martinsson
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“…to love democracy well, it is necessary to love it moderately.” Alexis de Tocqueville
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Capitalism seeks to help others through a servce or product it provides. Free Market Capitalism is the most moral and fair economic system available to man. Capitalism augments personal growth, responsibility and ownership. Charity flourishes under capitalism. Charity dies under subjective “fair share” government confiscatory policies. Socialism redistributes ambivalence and greed.
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“We are to regard existence as a raid or great adventure; it is to be judged, therefore, not by what calamities it encounters, but by what flag it follows and what high town it assaults. The most dangerous thing in the world is to be alive; one is always in danger of one’s life. But anyone who shrinks from that is a traitor to the great scheme and experiment of being.” G.K. Chesterton
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Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent.
It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction. Albert Einstein
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“You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you odd.” Flannery O’Connor
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“There is but one good; that is God. Everything else is good when it looks to Him and bad when it turns from Him.” C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce
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“Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him” (Job 13:15).
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God’s grace is not about the allowance for sin. God’s grace is about the conversation God allows regarding sin.
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From the book of Proverbs: We are not to favor the rich or the poor. We are to pursue justice.
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“Always keep in contact with those books and those people that enlarge your horizon and make it possible for you to stretch yourself mentally.” Oswald Chambers
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One goldfish says to another, “If there is no God who keeps changing the water?”
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“The truth is always there in the morning.”
From Cat On A Hot Tin Roof script – playwright Tennessee Williams
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God blesses those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they will be satisfied.
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“America’s greatness has been the greatness of a free people who shared certain moral commitments. Freedom without moral commitment is aimless and promptly self-destructive.” John W. Gardner
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“Men of integrity, by their very existence, rekindle the belief that as a people we can live above the level of moral squalor. We need that belief; a cynical community is a corrupt community.” John W. Gardner
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“In the world it is called Tolerance, but in hell it is called Despair, the sin that believes in nothing, cares for nothing, seeks to know nothing, interferes with nothing, enjoys nothing, hates nothing, finds purpose in nothing, lives for nothing, and remains alive because there is nothing for which it will die.” Dorothy L. Sayers
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“Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere.”
G. K. Chesterton
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“The battle line between good and evil runs through the heart of every man.” Alexander Solzhenitsyn
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This is what the LORD says:
“Stand at the crossroads and look;
ask for the ancient paths,
ask where the good way is, and walk in it,
and you will find rest for your souls.
But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’
-The prophet Jeremiah, 6:16
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“…our common task is not so much discovering a truth hiding among contrary viewpoints as it is coming to possess a selfhood that no longer evades and eludes the truth with which it is importunately confronted.” James McClendon, Ethics: Systematic Theology, Vol. 1
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Existential This!
May 18, 2025 Leave a comment
For a long while now the main stream media has been staging professional wrestling matches with day-of-reckoning plots. The scrappers include Hurricane Climate Change, Mysterio Misinformation, Equalizer Inequality, Undertaker Pandemic, and The Hammer “Democracy!” Opponents will take the fall.
A lot of sponsor money is backing the theater. So, a team of writers pen the storylines. And though the plots are predetermined and the moves choreographed, the staged spectacle must appear real to wrest control of the public’s interest. The rigged and scripted matches must provide the illusion of legitimacy of an actual unprecedented threat.
The wrestlers’ character and in-ring actions must look authentic and connect with the audience. Even so, Joe Blow is not watching as a critical thinker. He’s partaking in the bloodlust.
The nature of the high-stakes fiction captures his full attention. He is soon whipped into a state of frenzy. Animal spirits, “the spontaneous urge to action rather than inaction” (M. Keynes), are released. He can barely contain himself.
What’s this! In tonight’s audience is another professional wrestler. The Snake! wants in on the action:
Former FBI Director James Comey posted a photo of sea shells arranged into the numbers “86 47” on his Instagram account today, before shortly deleting the post.
“86 47” – Former FBI Director Comey Posts-Then-Deletes Creepy Threat Aimed At Trump
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OK. The pro wrestling imagery is not perfect, but here’s the thing . . .
High-stakes fiction – existential threats posed by climate change, misinformation, inequality, democracy, and who knows what’s next – is meant not only to capture the full attention of Joe Blow but also to overwhelm and exhaust his resolve. Such is the nature of psychological oppression. To wit:
“A gleeful, self-satisfied Mr Punch was often heard to remark: “That’s the way to do it.” Today we examine how Mark Poynting, one of the BBC’s top doom-mongering Net Zero activists, uses the trusted ‘scientists say’ message to turn a centennial sea level rise of around 30 cm into prose stating: “The world could see hugely damaging sea-level rises of several metres or more over the coming centuries””
Per Chris Morrison at the Daily Sceptic; The BBC’s Mark Poynting Shows How to Spread Climate Alarm
The constant messaging of threats – “It creates a state of utter helplessness, a state in which you are far more pliant.” So writes Thomas Buckley, of the Brownstone Institute in the web article The Existential Threat of the Existential Threat. Why do this? Buckley continues:
And those invoking that dread are waiting nearby to do just that – take society by the shoulder, offer it comfort on the form of entertainment, medication, and basic sustenance, and lead it away.
The real existential threat, as Buckley notes, is that which denies our individual human agency and seeks to combine us into communitarian compliancy with “the ethereal economy of government agencies, civil society actors, non-governmental organizations, foundations, and academia, all aided by the information cabal. Together they do, in fact, currently have the power to foist something upon civilization that truly is transgenerational, global, and terminal.
The benefit of a pliant public is all theirs, as Buckley writes:
The democracy being threatened is “their” democracy, not “our” democracy.
The climate being threatened is their silver sheened scrubbed personal environment – the actual environmental destruction that is occurring is out of sight, the denigrating of the sub-Deltas who inhabit other places, is immaterial.
The information being threatened are the lies being told to prop up the societal transformation.
The equality being threatened is their right to be more equal than others forever.
And the pandemic being threatened is the right to declare a pandemic on a whim, terrifying the public into ceding basic rights in the name of safety.
Be aware of the conditioners of society! They want to put you into a permanent headlock!
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Climate Realism
A new paper by Dr. Judith Curry, one of the world’s most prominent scientists skeptical of a looming human-caused climate catastrophe, and economist Harry DeAngelo cautions investors and the public that “the apocalyptic climate narrative is a seriously flawed guide for public policy.” Why? “Because it radically overstates the risks to humanity from continued global warming.” Wide-scale suppression of fossil fuel use will not measurably change future temperatures, but “a sharp decline in quality of life would surely ensue.”
You can download the podcast here:
A Critique of the Climate Apocalypse with Dr. Judith Curry — The Climate Realism Show #156 – The Heartland Institute
About Climate Etc.
A Critique of the Apocalyptic Climate Narrative
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Josh Blackman:
SCOTUS to CASA to A.A.R.P.: In Case Of (Perceived) Emergency, Ignore The Rules, And Make Stuff Up
“The past 24 hours have been something of a Rorschach Test for the Supreme Court. In the birthright citizenship case, the Court made clear that in emergencies, the judiciary must retain the power to enter universal injunctions, even if Article III does not otherwise permit such injunctions. And in A.A.R.P. v. Trump, the Court made clear that in emergencies, the court should certify a class without going through Rule 23, and grant an ex parte tro without considering any of the usual TRO factors.
“What lesson should lower court judges take away? In cases of perceived emergencies, forget all the rules and make stuff up. When the executive branch takes such actions we call it an autocracy. When the courts do it, they call it the “rule of law.””
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Filed under 2025 Current Events, central planning, Climate change, Democracy, Political Commentary, Politics, social commentary, social engineering Tagged with Climate change, Democracy, inequality, misinformation, politics, social engineering