Pick Your Dystopia

We are at a unique juncture in human history. We are at the end of the hydrocarbon era and our current energy intensive infrastructure is non-viable. Worse, our elite driven society has created such massive environmental problems that disaster appears unavoidable, particularly involving anthropogenic global warming which is speeding up and likely has passed the tipping point, catastrophic runaway warming probably unstoppable. Now, along comes the COVID-19 pandemic which appears to be primarily a pretext for restructuring the global political economy as a way to deal with the looming problems in such a way that preserves and strengthens elite power. The 99% seem to be facing the alternative of an elite controlled totalitarian neofeudal dystopia or resisting and facing the likely chaotic collapse leading to a survivalist dystopia. In either case, death and famine will be massive, the survival of the species in doubt.

The institutions of empire, particularly the mainstream media and the Deep State, are solidly behind the the corona virus lockdown meme used to justify the ongoing restructuring of the global political economy now taking place. The actions taken and the restructuring occurring are wildly disproportionate to the wildly exaggerated threat from COVID-19. Most Americans seem unaware of this and are genuinely afraid, trusting in those who have consistently lied to them in the past in pursuit of elite objectives. Apparently, the elites feel that it is necessary to instill fear in the 99% in order to rapidly bring about changes, some of which are necessitated by extremely serious problems involving the financial system, non-sustainable hydrocarbon fuel dependency and huge environmental problems. The tactic employed is an increasingly draconian version of medical martial law with governmental executives ruling by decree. So far, these elite efforts have been wildly successful, most folks panicked by an invisible virus and seemingly oblivious to the massive changes to the political economy underway.

An interesting counterpoint is the counter-meme message of small numbers of people who, by and large, seem to be of libertarian ideology. Prone to view the government with ongoing suspicion and hostility, these folks have provided oases of sanity in the midst of the overwhelming government/media propaganda barrage. Unfortunately, due to their libertarian beliefs, many (most?) of these critics think that global warming/environmental catastrophe is a hoax and that massive changes to the political economy are unnecessary. In other words, their resistance to the COVID-19 pretext for social restructuring is based upon fealty to libertarian dogma, not an objective analysis of empirical reality. It is a fact that greenhouse gases trap solar radiation, life as we know it not possible without moderate amounts of these gases in the atmosphere. It is also a fact that increased concentrations of these gases trap increased amounts of solar radiation proportional to the increased concentration. Logic tells us that the dramatic recent increase in greenhouse gases (primarily carbon dioxide and methane) caused by the massive burning of fossil fuels will warm the planet. Scientific measurement of the global temperature indicates that this is the case. The rapid increase in greenhouse gas concentration suggests that the increase in temperature will accelerate as the planet attempts to "catch up" to greenhouse gas levels wildly excessive compared to the current temperature. Once again, scientific measurement of the global temperature supports this logical conclusion. Unfortunately, libertarians, like most folks wedded to dogma, will defend the dogma against empirical reality.

In other words, the 1% is currently restructuring the global political economy in ways favorable to them based upon a corona virus pretext. Opposition to this restructuring is primarily by those who deny the underlying problems bringing about this restructuring, apparently unaware that the "old normal" is no longer viable and that some form of restructuring is both necessary and inevitable. At this point in time, the choice seems to be to go along with elite desire for a totalitarian neofeudal dystopia or trying to continue with business as usual until there is a chaotic collapse of the political economy and anarchy ensues. Since the real problems aren't being discussed, alternative solutions aren't being discussed. Not that there are any "good" options at this stage of the game. Perhaps the best we can hope for is to slightly modify the elite agenda of totalitarian neofeudalism to create some slack for individuals in regards to ubiquitous surveillance and mandatory vaccination with an mRNA gene altering "vaccine." But how does one go about getting the "Great Reset" modified when one's allies appear not to see that we are at the end of the hydrocarbon era and that change is necessary? Or that whatever happens the current environmental problems have reached a point where species extinction is a distinct possibility? How many are even aware that even as I type this we are in the midst of the 6th great extinction? And that things are about to get a lot worse?

COVID Propaganda

In today's Seattle Times (8/14/20), an article was reprinted from the Washington Post claiming that the COVID-19 pandemic was comparable to the 1918 Flu pandemic which killed an estimated 50 million people. The article focused on New York City's brief high monthly death rate, switching to "excess deaths" to distort reality. New York was unusual in that elderly COVID patients were sent to care facilities from hospitals and, as a consequence, entire care facilities housing elderly patients with comorbidities were infected resulting in wildly excessive deaths for New York. Furthermore, the numbers just don't add up. As of 8/14/20, there were 760,000 reported COVID deaths globally for a death rate of 97 deaths per million population. And indications are that changes in reporting the cause of death have inflated the COVID-19 death rate. The 1918 flu caused an estimated 50 million deaths in a global population of 1.8 billion people for a death rate of 27,778 deaths per million population. The COVID-19 death rate is not even remotely comparable to the 1918 flu death rate and claiming so is pure propaganda. It should be further noted that COVID-19 deaths are significantly centered on the elderly with existing conditions whereas the flu effects all age groups including school age children.

This ongoing media propaganda campaign seems intended to justify and distract from the current restructuring of the global political economy from consumer capitalism to a form of totalitarian neofeudalism. This is in response to the end of the hydrocarbon era, the non-viability of our current financial system, and to the looming environmental catastrophe. COVID-19 is being wildly exaggerated, however, the underlying social and environmental conditions are extraordinarily serious, much more serious than the virus itself.

COVID-19  (8/14/20)      Deaths         Population        Deaths/mm
  US                                      167K               328mm              509/mm
  Global                                 760K                7.8B                   97/mm

Hong Kong Flu (1970)
   US                                      100K              205mm              488/mm
   Global                                  1mm              3.7B                  270/mm

Asian Flu (1958)
   US                                       116K             175mm               663/mm
   Global                                1.1mm             2.9B                 380/mm

1918 "Spanish" Flu
    US                                      675K             103mm            6,553/mm
    Global                               50mm               1.8B            27,778/mm