If you thought that things could not become even more weird:
Trump's (64-Day) Post-Election Endgame (Or, Can A Criminal Like Biden Be Inaugurated President?)
Could this be the best Skye’s Links so far?
I showed this picture to my mother after my latest sojourn with the Afghan Mujahaddin fighting the Soviet Union and she didn’t see anything unusual. She didn’t recognize her own son standing in the middle. Good thing – if I had been caught by the KGB or Spetsnaz, it would have been, ahh… unpleasant. I was there with the “Muj” at least a dozen times until they defeated the Soviet Red Army in early 1989 – which led to the Fall of the Berlin Wall eight months later and the extinction of the Soviet Union itself by the end of 1991. It was one of the most thrilling – and consequential – adventures of modern times. ( Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #80 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
The best place to see Roman ruins is not in Rome or anywhere in Italy. It’s in Africa – specifically on the Mediterranean coast of Libya. This is the Roman theatre at Sabratha built in the 1st century BC. Over 2,000 years old, it’s still mostly intact. Starting as a Berber village, the Phoenicians founded the city as Sabrat by 500 BC. Then came the Greeks, then the Carthaginians, and after the Punic Wars came Rome.
The Libyan coast was a lush fertile place back then. So much so that Sabratha and the other major Roman city nearby, Leptis Magna, produced several million pounds of olive oil per year – sale of which to Rome enabled them to achieve great wealth. It’s a shame that Libya remains today in chaotic civil war. Hopefully the day is not off when experiencing Rome’s most magnificent remains will be possible here again. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #79 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
Our Glimpse 77 yesterday (11/03) was of the Wakhan Corridor – a skinny finger of northeast Afghanistan separating Tajikistan and Pakistan extending all the way to China. Click on the link to get the photo. Note the large alluvial fan in the center on the Afghan side of the Amu Darya. Now look closely and you’ll see a tiny white dot on the edge of the fan next to the green of the river bank.
What could that be? Well, here’s my photo of it close up. Certainly no Afghan village. It’s a modern windowless compound completely isolated with no roads, trails, or any other habitation for many miles in any direction, reachable only by helicopter. Any guesses? It’s a CIA interrogation center, where captured Taliban are brought for rather intense debriefings. That’s the Wakhan Surprise. I’ll bet many of you canny old TTPers, however, aren’t surprised at all. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #78 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
This is the Wakhan Corridor traversed by Marco Polo on his way to China in 1273. The river is the Amu Darya, known to Alexander the Great and the ancient Greeks as the Oxus. The Wakhan is the finger of northeast Afghanistan designed in the late 19th century to prevent the Russian Empire in Central Asia from touching the British Empire in India. It now separates Tajikistan from Pakistan with its fingertip the only border Afghanistan has with China.
Thus you’re looking at four countries. The river forms the Tajik-Afghan border – Tajikistan is on the left, Afghanistan on the right, in the center distance are the Hindu Kush mountains of Pakistan, while in the far distance are the Karakorum mountains of China. This is a fabulously exotic remote part of our world with people living here tracing their ancestry to the troops of Alexander. Oh – and the surprise? I’ll tell you tomorrow. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #77 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
On a mountain top on the island of Corfu in 1890, Empress Elizabeth of Austria built a magnificent marble palace called the Achilleion, dedicated to her hero, the legendary Achilles of Homer’s Iliad. Here she retreated from the world, amidst the palace’s gorgeous gardens overlooking the Mediterranean abundant with larger-than-life statues of her ideal man, “who despised all mortals and did not fear even the gods."
All of Europe knew her as Sisi. Adored by her husband Emperor Franz Joseph I, renowned as the most beautiful – and most beloved -- woman of her time, she was Austria’s Empress for 44 years. Her life ended tragically, murdered at random by an anarchist who wanted to “kill a royal.”
The Achilleion today is maintained immaculately in all its original glory as a museum you can visit. Don’t pass the chance to see it for yourself. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #76 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
Welcome to the Halloween “Will America Live or Die in Four Days?” HFR.
I’m so in Terminal Anxiety that I have to tell you a story about the highest lake in the world, Lake Tilicho at 16,247ft in the Annapurna Range of the Himalayas in Nepal.
We landed our helicopters on the shore you see to the right about 10am on November 9, 2016 – meaning it was midnight east coast time in the US and we hadn’t heard a word on the results of Election Day, November 8. I was in a state of unglued panic. My traveling buddy and fellow TTPer Jerry Finn tried to calm me down to no avail.
The first draft of Part I: Envy is now finished. Your insightful Forum comments have been so helpful and I will have to assimilate them to complete the final draft. I’m anxious to begin Part II: The Fear of Being Envied, and the concluding Part III: The Key of Freedom, Peace, and Prosperity – but the results of next week’s momentous election how they are framed.
You all know how America’s very existence is at stake next week. Pray that Good triumphs over Evil. Whatever the outcome, once known, the weekly installments will resume. Thanks for understanding. --JW
Author Disclaimer: none of the following is meant to be political analysis. I am not endorsing nor disparaging any candidate. I’m simply outlining my framework for how I see this election and what the markets are suggesting the outcome will be.
The markets are in a holding pattern until election day.
Retail investors are small fish in a big pond. The real price action occurs when financial institutions make a move. And NO financial institution is going to put capital to work this week with the election looming.
However, some items are clear. Key market sectors are increasingly pointing to a Trump win.
If you pay attention only to the polls and the mainstream media narrative, you’ll believe that, even though the presidential race is tightening, Biden still maintains a lead and can handily win the upcoming election.
However, if you look at the information on the Twitter feed of Ronna McDaniel, @GOPChairwoman, you’ll see an entirely different story and one that is more in sync with Trump’s well-attended rallies compared to Biden’s anemic afternoon teas. It’s the story of record numbers of Trump Democrats.
Her arrival is likely to have the most profound effect on the nation’s highest court since simultaneous appointments of William Rehnquist and Lewis Powell in the 1970s and the replacement of Thurgood Marshall by Clarence Thomas in the early 1990s.
Perhaps more so. Here are the dynamics.
Amy Coney Barrett’s ascension to the Supreme Court marks the first time in 81 years – in three generations – that the Republicans will have a majority on the Supreme Court.
The Democrats, rather than accepting gracefully that the regularly-applied constitutional rules finally stopped favoring them, have responded with a complete meltdown. They’ve resorted to apocalyptic predictions, hysterical rants, and threats, lots and lots of threats.
The last time the Democrats behaved this disgracefully was in 1860, a temper tantrum that ended in a Civil War that left over 650,000 Americans dead.
Before enjoying the Democrats’ psychological collapse, it’s essential to understand the Barrett confirmation was constitutionally correct and had historical precedent. But when have Dems cared about that?
Obama administration officials committed crimes against the constitution. They engaged in a seditious conspiracy to overthrow the government of the United States.
Will they really get away with it?
Forty government officials were indicted or jailed as a result of Watergate. White House staffers H.R. Haldeman and John Erlichman went to jail. White House counsel John Dean went to jail. Attorney General John Mitchell went to jail. Howard Hunt, G. Gordon Liddy, Charles Colson and James McCord – all jailed.
"Obamagate," or the "Russia Hoax" is a political and criminal scandal exponentially more serious and damaging to the constitution. Like the Richter Scale measurements of earthquakes, Obamagate can be measured in "orders of magnitude" greater seriousness than the third-rate Watergate burglary.
The plan to steal the election:
How To Steal An Election, Part 1: The Left's Plan
How To Steal An Election, Part 2: The Right's Response
How To Steal An Election, Part 3: The Offensive Information Suppression Endgame
Biden accidentally tells the truth:
There’s lots more, folks!
