We’re spending the summer in France, as we always do. We are in the ‘France profonde’…the deep countryside with few tourists or tourist attractions.
Our grandson, 15, is with us. He is bright and alert. But he gets his information mostly from the internet. The result: his mind is like his bedroom. There is a lot of stuff in there…but it needs to be tidied up.
As it is, he gives equal weight to a sighting of a UFO over Nevada in 1957…as to the arrival of the Allied armada off the coast of Normandy in 1944.
‘Grandad, did you know that a man has invented a robot that can do anything? It has AI so it’s smarter than we are. It’s supposed to take over and do all our jobs.
‘And in the future…these robots will be our soldiers. Wars will be fought between robots. Did you see that in the news?
‘No…I didn’t. And I don’t believe it.
‘No kidding…it was in the news. It’s a fact.
‘You can’t believe everything you read. I don’t believe any fact unless I make it up myself.’
‘Strategic windfall’
Meanwhile, the war in the Ukraine continues…a war fought by real people. Approximately 380,000 of them have been killed since Putin invaded. That is a ‘fact.’ More or less verifiable. It is probably more or less true.
As near as we can tell, the result of the war so far was to move the border of the Russian Federation a few miles south and west to encompass the Russian-speaking areas of the Ukraine. That is the current status. Most likely, that is where it will remain.
Was it worth it? Did the dead men and women give Putin what he wanted? Or did they give the US a ‘strategic windfall’ as The Washington Post columnist, David Ignatius claims? What would the ghosts have to say about it?
And why do US elites care so much about the border between Russia and Ukraine?
Of course, there’s a lot of money at stake. The US Empire costs US$1.5 trillion per year, according to Winslow Wheeler. That money doesn’t all sink into the earth like a corpse. Most of it ends up with living Ukrainians or Americans. And there, it whispers from its Northern Virginia mansions and Swiss bank accounts — ‘keep the war going as long as possible.’
Money can be persuasive. It convinces many people that a fact (a few hundred thousand stiffs) is a small price to pay for an idea (making the world safe for democracy, protecting the sovereignty of Ukraine…delivering a ‘strategic windfall’ to NATO, etc.).
Thinking tanks
But there’s more to the story, isn’t there? If money were the motivation behind the war in Ukraine, what drove the COVID Hysteria? Yes, a few pharmaceutical companies reaped billions in profits, but was that enough to shut down much of the world economy, at a loss of some US$16 trillion in lost output and related costs? And how about the campaign to dispense with fossil fuels? How does money explain that?
Practically the entire elite establishment — the great and the good…the think tanks…the press…the universities, all are lined up in favour of the Green agenda. It is, after all, just an idea…not a fact. But it is an alarming one.
AlterNet: ‘Meteorologist: Humanity has reached “a point we cannot return from” as ocean temperatures soar’:
‘Emmy-Award-winning veteran NBC Miami meteorologist Steve MacLaughlin sounded his loudest-ever alarm on Saturday about the state of Earth’s oceans amid record temperatures that were recorded off of Florida’s coast this past week.
“This is the first time that I have been overly concerned that we have reached a point we cannot return from, and that’s because of those 101-degree ocean temperatures,” MacLaughlin said. “…right here in South Florida.”’
Now, there’s an idea!
Facts verses fiction
Still, in order to favour the ‘Energy Transition,’ you have to believe a number of things…
…that temperatures are rising (and will continue to rise)
…that our use of fossil fuel is to blame
…that lower temperatures are better than higher ones
…that if we stop using fossil fuel, disaster will be avoided
…that we can replace fossil fuel with other forms of energy, conservation and doing without
…that we can afford the cost of the transition and that it will be managed successfully
…that we don’t have better uses for the money
…that it is not too late; that we can return from whatever point Mr MacLaughlin thinks we’ve reached
…and that the world will be a better place if we make the effort.
None of these things are facts!
Dead bodies are facts.
‘Lebensraum’ and the ‘ubermensch’ were just ideas…liberating the Holy Land from the infidel…witch trials…Prohibition…making steel in backyard furnaces…the ‘domino theory’…the ‘axis of evil’…protecting the sovereignty of the Ukraine…
…the ideas always sound pleasantly appealing.
But the facts stink.
Regards,
 |
Bill Bonner,
For The Daily Reckoning Australia
