Don't Banana My Republic!
The Maui fire last month took many lives and destroyed considerable property. Since then, governments at multiple levels have demonstrated a stilted communication response that increasingly appears inauthentic and politically motivated.
Many children are missing and presumed burned to death. How many? Nobody seems to know. Electronic geofencing prevents private drones from looking at the scene; a tall, opaque fence has been erected around the site. Official government spokespersons do not appear competent or even in the loop.
Censorship has returned to social media with a vengeance as the government demands posts mentioning or discussing the fires be shut down. The immediate question is, why? Why do government agents believe aggressive, centralized narrative control is their best option? Perhaps because we are in election season? Perhaps another reason?
Public relations experts, ministers of propaganda, or whatever they shall be called, did not conceptualize the cause and progression of events effectively. They used poor graphics and messaging filled with blanks and gaps that shredded their credibility.
The official cause of the fire was downed electrical lines into fields of bone-dry grass. Videos of the fire's ignition exist.
But…Many know that directed energy weapons are being researched and that a Chinese satellite operating a LIDAR unit, a laser version of radar, overflew the site. Rumors have expanded to fill the gap without effective official messaging and in light of aggressive censorship.
The fire was a crisis, yet the mismanagement of official communication continues. This begs the question, when faced with crisis communication, why is the first impulse of government to hide, block, and censor? Are government communication teams so thoroughly woke that they cannot perform their jobs? No wonder faith in institutions is collapsing.
Much is being written about expanding the economic zone called the BRICS. Are we supposed to be afraid? And afraid of what exactly? A collection of global extraction-based economies has joined a geographic and political zone centered on China. Most are middle to low-income, low-productivity, low-innovation economies with a collectivist bent. Sure, they can engineer a famine or crisis to promote the debtor/creditor international perspective. At best, they are trying to build a cargo-cult version of the old USSR. In the end, economics are more powerful than political systems. It has been thus throughout all of history,
If the United States stops patrolling the trade routes between the BRICS, pirates and scoundrels will prey on the ships. Even with China as a central member, the BRICS do not have an effective blue-water navy.
We return to the second part of the discussion of Beautiful Trouble, the left's new playbook for revolution in light of modern social media and mobile phones. Today's conversation covers the conceptual framework behind leftist dogma. We will wrap up the conceptual framework next week before moving on to their tactics and logistics, training, and organization over the following weeks.
Troublemakers, as they call themselves, want to remove individuals' right to think and discuss important topics. What is most annoying is the government action in Maui is in synch with the philosophy behind Beautiful Trouble.
Please click over to this week's HFR and join the forum conversation. They want to silence your voice. Don't let them.
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The inner city of the ancient Silk Road oasis of Khiva has been unchanged for centuries. Surrounding 40ft-high snake walls that writhe around the city have protected it for centuries, enabling defenders to shoot, spear, and pour burning hot oil on attackers from three sides.
