Are undocumented immigrants the "Jews" and "Gypsies" of our time

[Gary Childress]

I'm not saying their anger isn't justified. I'm saying it's probably misdirected.

I can go along with that — as a possibility.

If you want to find causes of today's cultural malaise, I think if you look closely enough, you'll probably find that we shouldn't have gone to war over the 9/11 Crisis. That's been the elephant in the room for the past 20+ years.

[Alexis Jacobi]

If you want to find causes of today's cultural malaise, I think if you look closely enough, you'll probably find that we shouldn't have gone to war over the 9/11 Crisis. That's been the elephant in the room for the past 20+ years.

You often initiate threads, bringing up issues that often provoke both inane bickering and interesting conversation. Generally speaking I personally feel you deserve an award for generally positive and productive contributions.

Here, you have brought up what could be a super-interesting topic: the roots and origin of general malaise. Obviously, as Americans, we tend to dominate such questions with our own America-focus, as the resident Kiwi points out. I guess that cannot be helped.

I can say that I have spent about a decade, longer even, researching that question both directly and indirectly. What I will say is that I am of the opinion that though the topic “What are the causes of today's cultural malaise” is highly important, there is no one on this forum very capable, nor actually interested, in pursuing the topic. Or, if some opinion is offered it will be of a partisan type. I.e. defending some pet, personal theory.

What has produced and is producing the MAGA Movement is such a hot topic really that no one (that I am aware of) can really talk about it in a fair and open way. Why? To be honest about it requires taking seriously some views and notions that must necessarily be condemned as wrongthink right out of the gate.

I can cite a few examples. Here is one (I have posted it before) by Wilmot Robertson, an ur-MAGA patriot and populist, but condemned absolutely today. He wrote in the early 70s. See for yourself:

Is it not incredible that the largest American population group, the group with the deepest roots, the most orderly and most technically proficient group, the nuclear population group of American culture and of the American gene pool, should have lost its preeminence to weaker, less established, less numerous, culturally heterogeneous, and often mutually hostile minorities?
With all due allowance for minority dynamism ... this miraculous shift of power could never have taken place without a Majority "split in the ranks" - without the active assistance and participation of Majority members themselves. It has already been pointed out that race consciousness is one of mankind's greatest binding forces. From this it follows that when the racial gravitational pull slackens people tend to spin off from the group nucleus. Some drift aimlessly through life as human isolates. Others look for a substitute nucleus in an intensified religious or political life, or in an expanded class consciousness. Still others, out of idealism, romanticism, inertia, or perversity, attach themselves to another race in an attempt to find the solidarity they miss in their own.

(Do you need exegesis of what Robertson is saying here? And can you connect his complaint to what is now occurring today as Trump and his political power-base are gaining power? Can you see it and talk about it without condemnation of the stance?)

And speaking of 9/11 I can assure you (I have followed the controversial theories as to who did it, how, and why (in their view) the ENTIRE conventional view is false through-and-through) that if the entire topic were allowed to be investigated and discussed without repression, that it would explode faith in our own government, which hangs by a thread in any case.

So — malaise. Such an interesting topic. You are soaked, constantly, in malaise but (here is my opinion) you do not have any sense of what an interpretive model and method should be. But “you” are actually a multitude today. You just happen to be over-sensitive, like the canary in the coal mine.

Who interprets correctly here? Promethean? Immanuel Can? The very dangerous panted one? Wilbur Boneman? Phyllo? Alexiev? You?

Interpretation is really a topic unto itself. It’s what we see, what we are allowed to see, what we both select and deselect.

[FlashDangerpants]

I'm not saying their anger isn't justified. I'm saying it's probably misdirected.

I can go along with that — as a possibility.

If you want to find causes of today's cultural malaise, I think if you look closely enough, you'll probably find that we shouldn't have gone to war over the 9/11 Crisis. That's been the elephant in the room for the past 20+ years.

I think the roots of that malaise you are looking for were already spread before 9/11. The kind of person who today uses phrases such as "deep state", "Globohomo" and "uniparty" was in the 90s using the phrases "New World Order" to describe some sort of conspiracy to take over the United States using United Nations soldiers of some sort. Many of them believed that internment camps had already been built in the early 90s. The phrase "Black helicopters" used to describe something very similar goes back further still. There are definitely people on this forum who believed in the NWO conspiracy back in the day, but who don't want to remember that now.

Far-left politics has been mired in conspiracy theory since day one, ever since the French Revolution imposed price controls and caused inflation which was blamed on imaginary hoarders leading to la Terreur. Meanwhile far-right politics has been mired in conspiracy for longer still with everyone from Torquemada to Titus Oates getting in on the act, and obviously all those naughty fascists more recently. A crucial cause for your modern ills is the encroachment of the conspiracy theory into everyday political belief. Today the absolute maddest shit about a secret cabal* of Jews importing brown people to replace white voters is accepted very widely as plausible.

You can maybe pin the blame for that on shock jocks of 80s or 90s radio, especially that guy who used to have a segment reserved for making fun of everyone who died of AIDS that week. Certainly that stuff helped convince Murdoch that a cable news station which featured nothing but right wing propaganda could be a commercial reality. And from there the astro-turfed "tea party" movement they sponsored was the puppet that took control of the master, importing right wing conspiracy theories and then forcing Fox News to broadcast a diet of that shit or else lose ratings to whoever would.

But you can push it further back than that, to the end of the 70s when the Evangelical vote suddenly went monolithic in support of the GOP. Prior to that Christians voted according to conscience and pastors in most states stayed largely out of politics....

But that came down to the sudden change in attitudes to abortion. Previously abortion, along with birth control, had been purely Catholic concerns and the protestant churches left them to it. But in the mid 70s when the baptists lost their battle for racially segregated schools, they needed a new banner to assemble under and abortion became the topic. That was when the deep south's political churches spread their influence nationwide and the whole of Christian America became nothing but a right wing social conservatism factory.

So yeah ... the roots of today's malaise lie in the reconstruction of the South in the 1870s when racial segregation and domination was allowed to re-establish itself. Disentangling that mess in the 60s and 70s kicked a pebble down the slope that dislodged another in the fight over Roe v Wade and from there the rockfall of bullshit was released until you ended up with Fox News and Marjorie Taylor Greene.






* yes, I do know the origins of the word Cabal, I don't need that essay thanks.

[Gary Childress]

And speaking of 9/11 I can assure you (I have followed the controversial theories as to who did it, how, and why (in their view) the ENTIRE conventional view is false through-and-through) that if the entire topic were allowed to be investigated and discussed without repression, that it would explode faith in our own government, which hangs by a thread in any case.

Are you alluding to the "truther" movement that believes the WTC was a "false flag" operation? And if so, is that what you believe also?

[Alexis Jacobi]

You can always count on Mr Flash to come up with a broad interpretive model, but one that is skewed to his pet perspective, which involves, obviously, contempt for a specific set of views (value-sets basically) which he does not like.

Again, my suggestion is to step back from his interpretive model and to see the degree to which it is a partisan perspective.

Those who use the term “globohomo” and “deep state” are certainly attempting to define broad interpretive models. But it is not that their views are, let’s say, incorrect or inaccurate, but rather that those who oppose them (those specific elements) oppose them for their own reasons, grounded also in ideological perspectives.

Sorting through these things becomes as difficult in trying to explain to ‘normies’ why the Nazi Salute, properly executed, actually brings vibrant health, alignment with the Cosmic Currents, and even gets one the hottest chicks. I go into this of course you-know-where …

But, I admit, that is another topic.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Are you alluding to the "truther" movement that believes the WTC was a "false flag" operation? And if so, is that what you believe also?

My position is actually more complex. I do not believe it possible to get to *the truth* because there are too many layers that have been laid over. The real issue is “a cloud of uncertainty” that rises, like miasma, and surround and complicates important issues and questions. I am not a 9/11 Truther in any sense. What I did try to do was to familiarize myself with their detailed presentations.

The point is actually this: It is rendered impossible to arrive at conclusions. Or if one does, one does because one has set one’s will to believe something. Thus *the will* is actually a significant element.

I can mention just one thing, it is a visual thing that all have seen and it seems to be irrefutable evidence of something undeniable. It is the image, the video, of Building 7 going down in an unquestionable planned implosion. It really does disturb the entire official narrative. It takes days and weeks to wire a building of that scale with explosives. And it is impossible (according to engineers) that mere fires on various floors could lead to such a perfect implosion. Building 7 is, in my experience, the lead-in to the entire conversation around all conspiracies.

But again, even seeing Building 7 with our own eyes, we both see it, and block what it must mean and potentially can only mean.

Now, here is a question for you, Gary: How does your mind go to work as you interpret the image, and what I have said about it? Offer me an interpretation.

[phyllo]

With all due allowance for minority dynamism ... this miraculous shift of power could never have taken place without a Majority "split in the ranks" - without the active assistance and participation of Majority members themselves. It has already been pointed out that race consciousness is one of mankind's greatest binding forces. From this it follows that when the racial gravitational pull slackens people tend to spin off from the group nucleus. Some drift aimlessly through life as human isolates. Others look for a substitute nucleus in an intensified religious or political life, or in an expanded class consciousness. Still others, out of idealism, romanticism, inertia, or perversity, attach themselves to another race in an attempt to find the solidarity they miss in their own.

If you have a constitution that says that "all men are created equal" but you see bias based on race both in individuals and institutions, then you may "split" and attempt to eliminate that bias.

That seems reasonable and fair. Maintaining the bias means living with a lie.

Do you believe in the principle of equality?

[Alexis Jacobi]

If you have a constitution that says that "all men are created equal" but you see bias based on race both in individuals and institutions, then you may "split" and attempt to eliminate that bias.

That seems reasonable and fair. Maintaining the bias means living with a lie.

Do you believe in the principle of equality?

I presented Robertson as one way to illustrate, and potentially to talk about, what the MAGA Movement is, from what it developed, and why it is so controversial.

I think that you assume because I am aware of Wilmot Robertson, and posted an excerpt from his book (The Dispossessed Majority) that I am advocating for his position?

Do you believe in the principle of equality?

Is that the question you wish to discuss and to debate?

[Gary Childress]

You can always count on Mr Flash to come up with a broad interpretive model, but one that is skewed to his pet perspective, which involves, obviously, contempt for a specific set of views (value-sets basically) which he does not like.

Again, my suggestion is to step back from his interpretive model and to see the degree to which it is a partisan perspective.

Those who use the term “globohomo” and “deep state” are certainly attempting to define broad interpretive models. But it is not that their views are, let’s say, incorrect or inaccurate, but rather that those who oppose them (those specific elements) oppose them for their own reasons, grounded also in ideological perspectives.

Sorting through these things becomes as difficult in trying to explain to ‘normies’ why the Nazi Salute, properly executed, actually brings vibrant health, alignment with the Cosmic Currents, and even gets one the hottest chicks. I go into this of course you-know-where …

But, I admit, that is another topic.

OK. Are you suggesting in the existence of what might be called a political, economic or intellectual "elite" also known in some parlances as the "power elite"? That seems pretty obviously to be the case in many ways.

If you are suggesting that views like the "truther" movement have an accurate account of what happened on 9/11, then I'm skeptical but I will listen to any evidence you have. Or if you don't believe their view is accurate, then what is meant by "not inaccurate"? I mean, they seem to hold the view that the WTC disaster was planned and executed by people involved in some sort of deception or "false flag" operation in order to initiate an invasion of Iraq. Such a statement can have a truth value. Events either happened that way or they didn't.

[Gary Childress]

Are you alluding to the "truther" movement that believes the WTC was a "false flag" operation? And if so, is that what you believe also?

My position is actually more complex. I do not believe it possible to get to *the truth* because there are too many layers that have been laid over. The real issue is “a cloud of uncertainty” that rises, like miasma, and surround and complicates important issues and questions. I am not a 9/11 Truther in any sense. What I did try to do was to familiarize myself with their detailed presentations.

The point is actually this: It is rendered impossible to arrive at conclusions. Or if one does, one does because one has set one’s will to believe something. Thus *the will* is actually a significant element.

I can mention just one thing, it is a visual thing that all have seen and it seems to be irrefutable evidence of something undeniable. It is the image, the video, of Building 7 going down in an unquestionable planned implosion. It really does disturb the entire official narrative. It takes days and weeks to wire a building of that scale with explosives. And it is impossible (according to engineers) that mere fires on various floors could lead to such a perfect implosion. Building 7 is, in my experience, the lead-in to the entire conversation around all conspiracies.

But again, even seeing Building 7 with our own eyes, we both see it, and block what it must mean and potentially can only mean.

Now, here is a question for you, Gary: How does your mind go to work as you interpret the image, and what I have said about it? Offer me an interpretation.

Sorry, I saw this after my reply to your prior post.

My interpretation is that not all engineers are in agreement. There are indeed some engineers who believe the building going down was the result of some kind of orchestrated detonation. I've seen other experts explain the phenomenon differently that it was indeed the result of the airliners that brought the building down.

[Alexis Jacobi]

If you are suggesting that views like the "truther" movement have an accurate account of what happened on 9/11, then I'm skeptical but I will listen to any evidence you have.

It would be a waste of time. The most important point is that the issue gets — has gotten — obscured by so many different interpretations that it cannot be resolved. So it is shunted off to an odd territory of the mind and, usually, not thought about more. It is a murky territory of uncertainty.

[Gary Childress]

If you are suggesting that views like the "truther" movement have an accurate account of what happened on 9/11, then I'm skeptical but I will listen to any evidence you have.

It would be a waste of time. The most important point is that the issue gets — has gotten — obscured by so many different interpretations that it cannot be resolved. So it is shunted off to an odd territory of the mind and, usually, not thought about more. It is a murky territory of uncertainty.

I think your brain has been infected by all the stuff you've been reading. IMO you're far too engrossed in stuff that is probably not worth the calories burned in your brain over it. It's like worrying that the Kennedy assassination wasn't just the work of a lone gunman. It's probably not that important at this point to find the "truth" if it's some kind of conspiracy. It's probably more important to consider reconciliation over what was done. The Iraq war was unwarranted regardless of whether the WTC was an "inside job". The invasion of Afghanistan could perhaps have been avoided if we had been patient and pushed diplomatic avenues more. No. Everyone was in a hurry to retaliate. Now look where we are.

[FlashDangerpants]

You can always count on Mr Flash to come up with a broad interpretive model, but one that is skewed to his pet perspective, which involves, obviously, contempt for a specific set of views (value-sets basically) which he does not like.

Just as we can always count on mister Jacobi to spout conspiratorial theorisings while furiously trying to deny that they are conspiracy theories.

[Gary Childress]

Here you go, AJ. Peer reviewed science is in cahoots with the conspiracy as well. They're claiming it wasn't an inside job. But they haven't fooled you.

You said:
Is there evidence that the World Trade Center was destroyed in 2001 by a planned detonation coinciding with the aircraft striking the buildings? And if so what is that evidence is it supported by engineering and science as we know it?

ChatGPT said:
ChatGPT
The destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, has been extensively investigated by multiple independent and governmental agencies, including the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The overwhelming consensus among experts in structural engineering, physics, and forensic analysis is that the collapse of the Twin Towers and World Trade Center 7 was the result of the aircraft impacts and the subsequent fires, not a controlled demolition. Here’s a breakdown of the evidence and the engineering and scientific perspectives:

Official Explanation
Aircraft Impact and Fires:

The planes severed critical structural columns, dislodged fireproofing insulation, and ignited extensive fires fueled by jet fuel and building materials.
The fires weakened the steel framework, causing it to lose about 50% of its strength at 1,100°F (593°C) and 90% at 1,800°F (982°C).
Progressive Collapse:

The failure of steel trusses and floors led to a progressive collapse. Once the upper portions of the towers began to fall, the weight and kinetic energy caused the lower sections to collapse rapidly.
World Trade Center 7 (WTC 7):

WTC 7 collapsed later in the day due to fires ignited by debris from the North Tower’s collapse. NIST concluded that thermal expansion of steel beams caused a critical column to fail, initiating the collapse.
Claims of Controlled Demolition
Some conspiracy theories suggest the buildings were brought down by pre-planted explosives. Proponents of this theory often point to the following claims:

Appearance of Explosions:

Videos show dust and debris ejections that some interpret as explosions. Experts explain this as air pressure from collapsing floors, known as "pancaking."
Free-Fall Speeds:

Claims that the towers fell at free-fall speeds are inaccurate. Detailed analysis shows that the collapse was slower than free-fall, consistent with resistance from the structure below.
Molten Metal:

Reports of molten metal at Ground Zero are cited, but this could be explained by aluminum from the planes mixed with other materials and burning fires.
Nano-Thermite Residue:

Some researchers have claimed to find traces of nano-thermite, a high-tech explosive. However, these findings are highly contested and not recognized by the broader scientific community.
Scientific and Engineering Rebuttals
Controlled Demolition Patterns:

Controlled demolitions start from the bottom of a building, not the top, as seen with the Twin Towers. No evidence of demolition charges or detonation sounds consistent with controlled demolition was observed.
Collapse Dynamics:

The collapse mechanism, including the initiation and progression, aligns with the damage from the aircraft impacts and fires. The "top-down" collapse matches what was observed.
NIST Reports:

NIST conducted detailed investigations and simulations, which accounted for the structural damage, fire dynamics, and collapse. Their findings have been peer-reviewed and widely supported.
Independent Reviews:

Organizations like the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and other engineering bodies have reviewed the evidence and support the conclusion that the destruction was due to the aircraft impacts and fires.
Summary
The evidence overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that the World Trade Center buildings collapsed due to the aircraft impacts and resulting fires, not a planned detonation. The scientific and engineering analysis provided by NIST and other reputable organizations has been thoroughly vetted and aligns with the laws of physics and structural engineering. While conspiracy theories persist, they are not supported by credible evidence or expert consensus.

[Alexis Jacobi]

I think your brain has been infected by all the stuff you've been reading. IMO you're far too engrossed in stuff that is probably not worth the calories burned in your brain over it. It's like worrying that the Kennedy assassination wasn't just the work of a lone gunman. It's probably not that important at this point to find the "truth" if it's some kind of conspiracy. It's probably more important to consider reconciliation over what was done. The Iraq war was unwarranted regardless of whether the WTC was an "inside job". The invasion of Afghanistan could perhaps have been avoided if we had been patient and pushed diplomatic avenues more. No. Everyone was in a hurry to retaliate. Now look where we are.

Interesting theory. Duly noted. I’ll take it under consideration.

My own opinion is somewhat different. What I have exposed myself to — from Chomsky to Greg Johnson, really a wide range of views — has not necessarily helped my to establish one solid, operative position (this could be a negative) but has definitely improved my cocktail chatter! You should hear me holding forth! Harold Bloom, Anthony Burgess, Hjalmar Soderberg, Jonathan Bowden, Kierkegaard, even the Baal Shem Tov: I’ve at last integrated them all into a fascinating singsong that always nets me the hotties!