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HALF-FULL REPORT 02/24/23

kiss-the-devil
Putin Kissing the Devil, Cologne parade float Feb 20, 2023

Just as New Orleans had their Mardi Gras on Fat Tuesday this week (2/21) – before Lent begins on Ash Wednesday – so Cologne, Germany, celebrated on Rose Monday (2/20) with a float parade and huge party, attending by well over a million people lining the city streets.

The theme float was Putin Kissing the Devil – followed by Putin’s Blood Bath in the bathtub of Ukraine:

bloodbath Yet there’s so much more in this HFR – including some real ROTFLMAO moments. Let’s go!

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WHICH WOULD YOU CHOOSE?

On the left is a secret natural pool on the most extraordinary island in the Mediterranean – Malta.  On the right is the Tiger’s Nest Monastery in a hidden Tibetan Kingdom in the Himalayas – Bhutan.

Rebel and I have time to run one more exploration this year – to Malta in October or Bhutan in November.  We can’t run both.  We’d like to ask you to help us choose – by telling us which you would choose if you had to decide.

I consider Malta the world’s most fascinating island. I consider Bhutan to have the world’s most fascinating culture.

Here’s why… you choose.

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SKYE’S LINKS 02/23/23

spoofThe Big Spoof

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Not so long ago, someone realized that computers made hard work of lies, propaganda, and misdirection far more straightforward than in the old days of paper and paste. "I am a genius!" he thought as the lies grew more numerous.

But our fabricator failed to realize that a critical mass of society found the fabrication an easy path to power and wealth. Government agents with unlimited finances and immunity from prosecution built complex organizations devoted to influence and control through deception.

The woke industry and its hedonistic postmodernism are based on glorifying the unreal and inauthentic. Speaking the truth and making claims to objective reality have been criminalized.

The information package is the basic unit of a truth or lie, and it conveys information in support a narrative. It can be hazardous. And it can be very powerful. We can view information as a designed package meant to persuade or spoof.

Russia might have been tricked into invading Ukraine by China. China owns Russia's communication infrastructure, and what they don't own, they built. It is possible that Russia's bizarre rush for the cold and idle Chernobyl power plant one year ago this week had the same disinformation roots from which they attacked the equivalent of county agricultural agent laboratories.

No, Russia did not realize what these labs were. Russia was not worried about corn and wheat hybridization and patent royalties from hybridized wheat seeds. Putin appears to have thought that Ukraine was building weapons of mass destruction at Chernobyl and in the agricultural agent facilities. They were spoofed.

Crazy, huh? Imagine a government so fooled, so spoofed into attacking another nation because of the perceived threat of nonexistent WMDs? And getting stuck to the tar baby in the process?

It looks like J6 was also an intentional spoofing of the crowds by federal agents of the Executive Branch reporting to the Legislative Branch. Evidence was planted, agents' provocateurs urged the masses on, and the most shameful episode of government misconduct occurred on live tv.

Things are getting way out of control with the rollout of AI chatbots. These tools began to do the unthinkable. They began to tell the truth, and the narrative quaked from top to bottom. Over the past week, there have been thousands of meetings and software changes to prevent AI from performing the radical act of speaking the truth.

Come on over to Skye's links. We have a juicy collection of spoofy things from economics, culture, politics, and warfare. No one believes anything anymore, and the government is responding by dusting off an old playbook written a century ago by Leon Trotsky. Things are getting more totalitarian, and yet the question is which culture has the capacity to manage the onslaught of inauthentic information packages?

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“SOUTH PARK” GOES VIRAL FOR “BRUTALLY HONEST” TAKE ON PRETEND WOMEN AND ABORTION

A resurfaced “South Park” clip — featuring a transgendered man demanding an abortion despite not being able to get pregnant — is going viral 18 years after its original air date. Social media watchdogs are heralding its “brutally honest take” on transgender rights and abortionin this crazy woke world we’re all in.”

The episode titled “Mr. Garrison’s Fancy New Vagina,” which originally aired on March 9, 2005, features fourth grade teacher Herbert Garrison trying to get an abortion because he has not menstruated.

Twitter is blowing up over the resurfaced clip, with many pointing out that the show’s makers would be canceled by the “woke mob” if the 18-year-old storyline were presented anew in 2023.

“Here’s South Park mocking the insane idea that men can actually become women. This clip is from 2005,” pundit Seth Dillon chimed in. “It’s a brutally honest take on the callous savagery of abortion, too. We need more mockery like this.”

Chicks on the Right writer Natalie Argyle summed it up by saying, “In one minute and 25 seconds, @SouthPark said all the things we aren’t allowed to say about trans ‘women’ and abortions.”

We need to say all these things again – over and over and over….

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THE “GREAT AWOKENING” IS TRANSFORMING SCIENCE AND MEDICINE

great-awokeningThe “Great Awokening” touches every elite institution in America, mostly radiating out from our compromised system of higher education. One of the most disturbing and illuminating aspects of this cultural revolution is how much it is transforming science and medicine.

A video of medical students at Columbia University reciting an updated version of the Hippocratic oath that injected elements of critical race theory made the rounds on social media recently. As many have noted, this “student-led initiative” sounds cult-like.

When did medicine start sounding like a cult?  What kind of country will we live in if this continues to be the guiding ideology of every serious institution? We won’t be a serious country.

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JOE BIDEN’S TOXIC RACIALIST OBSESSIONS

ifudontvtemeJoe Biden ran on “unity,” which is critical in a multiracial America. He vowed to heal the divisions supposedly sown by Donald Trump. Instead, he is proving to be the most polarizing president in modern memory.

Often his racialist rhetoric and condescension have proven demeaning to both blacks and whites. In a volatile multiracial democracy that demands tolerance and restraint, a highly unpopular Biden, for cheap political advantage, continually proves incendiary and reckless.

Yet simultaneously with Biden’s blanket and unsupported charges of racism, no president since Woodrow Wilson has offloaded more racialist verbiage than Joe Biden himself. In an eerie example of psychological projection, never has a president accused others of racism more, while freely revealing himself either to be a racist or non compos mentis, or both.  Some examples:

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TODAY DOESN’T EXIST: THERE IS NO “PRESIDENTS DAY”, ONLY GEORGE WASHINGTON’S DAY

george-washingtons-day This Wednesday, February 22, is the 291st anniversary of the birth of America’s founder, the equal in nobility, heroism, and virtue of any human being who ever lived — George Washington.

What it is not, nor is any day such as today (Monday 2/20), is the phony holiday called "Presidents Day."  Let’s be quite clear on this.  There is no such holiday.  It exists only in the minds of furniture dealers, car salesmen, and Hate-America leftists.

This third Monday of February is legally in federal law celebrated as Washington’s Birthday and has never been amended otherwise.  The left’s duplicity in the “Presidents Day” charade is two-fold.  First is to erase the memory of George Washington from schoolchildren and people in general, and second is the Marxist goal of collapsing individuals into a collective, with no one better than any other.

We cannot let them get away with this any longer.

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KEEPING YOUR SANITY BY UNDERSTANDING OUR SOCIAL NATURE

consperacy-theoriesOur social nature has huge benefits, and underlies much of our resilience and success as a species. But it can also steer us in bad, sometimes disastrous directions, and can be used to manipulate us.

We are social creatures. We influence one another, we care about each other, we follow each other and are able to cooperate and act together as a team. We’re also cultural creatures. We learn from each other - and learn most effectively by watching what other people do. It matters to us what other people say and think and do.

And yet these very qualities can be used against us to manipulate us into accepting, doing, and buying things that work against our deepest values, that we can come to regret, and that sometimes can lead us into horrible tragedy.  Here’s how to avoid that.

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FLASHBACK FRIDAY – LIVING WITH HEADHUNTERS

living-with-headhuntersYes, that’s me at 16 (in 1960!) with Tangamashi, a Shuar Jivaro chief who adopted me into his clan. The Jivaros are the only people on earth who make a shrunken head of their enemies killed in battle – called a “tsantsa.”

They inhabit the Amazon rain forests of the Ecuador-Peru border; living with them was the first adventure I had by myself alone. Tangamashi accepted me, taught me how he made a tsantsa from an enemy’s head skin, took me blowgunning monkeys with curare-tipped darts, and introduced me into the Jivaro spirit world with a tea they called “natema” from the Banisteriopsis vine – a very colorful experience. How cool can you get for a 16 year-old kid?

It set me on a path of an adventurous life from which I have never wavered – and there’s no slowing down now. Another great adventure always awaits. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #25, photo ©Jack Wheeler)

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THE SANDS OF IWO JIMA

sands-of-iwo-jimaFox News today (2/23):

On This Day In History, Feb. 23, 1945, US Marines Raise American Flag Over Iwo Jima, Captured In Heroic Photo

This is the black sand beach the US Marines stormed on February 19, 1945, beginning the legendary Battle of Iwo Jima. Overlooking the beach is Mount Suribachi, where four days later Joe Rosenthal took his iconic photo of six Marines planting the US flag on its summit.

You can come here once a year at a commemoration jointly held by the US and Japanese militaries. Guests of honor are the few Marine veterans of the battle still alive. I attended on the 70th Anniversary of the battle in 2015. To be here on these sands and on the summit of Suribachi, where the memorial lauds them – “On Iwo Jima, uncommon valor was a common virtue” – with these heroic men is an indescribable privilege. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #23, photo ©Jack Wheeler)

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THE TOMB OF THE FRAGRANT CONCUBINE

tomb-of-the-fragrant-concubinePrincess Iparhan, granddaughter of the ruler of the Silk Road oasis of Kashgar, was so famous for her beauty and the intoxicating natural aroma of her body that the Manchu Emperor far to the east called for her. She was 22, the year was 1756. The Emperor became completely infatuated with her, making Iparhan his Imperial Noble Consort, loving her deeply until her death 33 years later in 1789.

In mourning, the Emperor kept his promise to her that her body would be returned to Kashgar and buried in the mausoleum of Apak Hoja, built in 1640 by her Apaki family. And there she rests today. Everyone in Kashgar and beyond, however, knows the mausoleum as The Tomb of the Fragrant Concubine.

It’s a wonderfully romantic legend, and even though there are several conflicting versions, let’s hope this one is true. Regardless, a visit to this peaceful shrine is certainly memorable. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #54 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

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THE REAL ATLANTIS

atlantis-in-knossosHere we are at the real Atlantis in Knossos, Crete. More nonsense has been invented about Plato’s myth of Atlantis – mentioned briefly in his Timaeus and Critias and not by anyone else in antiquity – than any other legend you care to name.

Yet like many myths, it was constructed out of something that really existed. Atlantis is the Minoan Civilization of Crete, Europe’s oldest. By 2,000 BC, the Minoans had created the world’s first peaceful capitalist empire, based not on military might and conquest but on trade, with trade routes across the entire Mediterranean. They became immensely wealthy, building fabulous palaces and villas – but their cities were not fortified. Europe’s original civilization was the most peaceful in European history.

Around 1450 BC, the Minoan island of Santorini 60 miles north of Crete – known to the Greeks as Thera – suffered a colossal volcanic explosion with the resultant mega-tsunami wiping the Minoans out on Crete. It was “The wave that destroyed Atlantis.” Yet you can see for Atlantis for yourself, its excavated villas with fabulous preserved frescoes, and step back into a period of inspiring history. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #68 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

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HALF-FULL REPORT 02/17/23

up-in_smokeThis is Fifth Generation Warfare

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A train wreck in East Palestine, Ohio, a small town at the headwaters of the Ohio River, occurred on February 3, 2023, and went largely unnoticed by the press. On average, a train derails every other day in the United States, and fifteen major chemical fires have occurred so far in 2023.

There was a dramatic black cloud, but it dissipated quickly. Some people were evacuated from their homes. Some fish were killed.

The chemical of concern was vinyl chloride, a common industrial material used to make PVC plastic. It is highly volatile and was historically used as a refrigerant in air conditioners and as the propellant in hairspray and rattle-can spray paint. You would know the scent if you were alive in the 1960s and 70s.

The material is toxic, but not so toxic as to stop women from shaping those mod hairstyles back in the day. The biggest complaint was the sticky coating that was deposited on bathroom mirrors.

Then something changed. Ten days after the train accident and fire, TikToc and the rest of social media exploded with incredible stories of a widespread disaster, coverups, and environmental pollution hundreds of times worse than Chernobyl.

Anonymous victims reported dead pets and farm animals, and the Amish had dropped dead in their barns. Armaggedon had arrived, and the U.S. Government was covering the disaster up.

But it was not a disaster: a major train wreck, a chemical spill, and a big fire, to be sure. But the end of the world? Nah.

We just watched the Chinese state propaganda machine in full motion. The volume, rhetoric, and visuals possible through TikTok were amped up louder than all the fake dead bodies during the Covid virus rollout.

Government officials were caught flat-footed, and now, candlelight vigils are being held for the "victims" worldwide. Hysteria is crazy level out of control.

The videos and commentary blasting from the internet were produced in China, and the quality is excellent. The propaganda ultimately bumped the Chinese spy balloons from the narrative and is fueling a movement to block the reshoring of industrial plants to the United States.

Intel is hiring 10,000 people in Ohio to staff their new chip plants. Or so they think. By the time the hysteria dies, many younger people will consider it their mission to stop those computer chip plants.

At the same time, ultra-globalist Nikki Haley has thrown in for the 2024 presidential election. Her history as an anti-industrialist is evident as she worked behind the scenesd to block a Boeing factory in South Carolina while giving speeches praising it simultaneously.

The first shots have been fired in the propaganda war, and the new arsenal of technologies is impressive. This is Fifth Generation Warfare.

Let's talk some more about it over at this week's HFR.

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INCREASING YOUR SANITY WITH ARISTOTLE’S GOLDEN MEAN OF ADVENTURE

Aristotle and his student, young Alexander
Aristotle and his student, young Alexander

Joel Wade is on a break this week, so it’s my turn.  Alexander the Great famously said that while he owed his life to his father, he owed his ability to think from his revered teacher, Aristotle (387-322 BC).

So let’s talk this week about how we can use Aristotle’s philosophy of “the Golden Mean” to increase your sanity – physically, inside your brain.  Ready?  Here we go!

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