Tag: stoneleigh

Notes on Stoneleigh

(listen to her actual interview here; obviously, this is nowhere near an accurate transcript; it’s merely “what I heard.”)

The song is in your body,

The song is in the world

The giant scheme of things

Unfolding faster than alarm bells

Global dimming, global warming

Flipping quasi-stable states

Feedback loops, uncertainties,

artificially inflated carrying capacity,

One giant Haiti, one fell schmoop.

Elbow room?  Undershoot.  

Absolutely horrible thing to say.

Energy, finance, and preparation

Not much people can do about it,

Enormous forces overwhelm;

Don’t dwell on Mental paralysis.

Nitrogen availability.   Soil fertility.  

Hard walls to hit.  

Industrial agriculture eats Seed capital.  

Permaculture is not optional.

Forces aligned against decentralization.

Wealth conveyance to the centers

preserving the unpreservable,

Non-existent Ponzi wealth disappearing overnight

Too many claims on too little wealth

Infinite re-hypothecation (whut?)

Squeeze the periphery for drops of blood.

Everyone reaching for the same chair

Peripheral pockets are being picked.  More to come.

The music stops.

Liquidity is pile of un-made choices

Trust horizon contracts

Rules favor the few

no longer in our interest

Adolf America Obama

Coercion, surveillance, kettling

Occupied heads cracked

from here to Tunisia

Occupy locales, locally

Trailers in driveways,

Homegrown food arrest warrants.

Existing central powers fight tooth and nail.

Living off-grid.  Raw milk.  Unprocessed

Human food.  Oppo research.  

We must do it, cross the river, all at once.

To get to the other side.

Crocodile infested waters.

the government holds you

while corporations rip your flesh.

Letting the first wildebeest die alone

Hurts us all.  

Animosity.  Right-wing hate radio.

Divisive political divides.

Unfocussed, vague, angry.

Misdirected blame, straw men.

Ponzi, ponzi, ponzi,

Predators and willing victims.

misdirected emotions make it harder,

rather than easier.

Forget top down solutions.

Demagogues, all.  Hitler, hitler.

Fear anger and fear.

unfocussed passion works against you.

Think.  Do.

Don’t let them take your money.

Navigate the appropriate challenge first.

Children, grandchildren.

The threat of the internet to hegemony

Survey from the highest mountain now.

Oh, yes, they will.  Shut down.  The net.

Knowledge.  Like-minded people.

The wealth of the world.

Get hold of it, download while you can.

Mega-upload of wealth:

Mordor picking-up steam

Stoneleigh’s take on Obama.

I personally find it difficult to restrain my criticism of Obama, as he appears to be a recidivist lickspittle to the plutocracy, completely unfit for duty to the nation, the most non-hopiest, non-change-iest fucker ever born.  Nevertheless, I found these admittedly grim comments by Stoneleigh on Obama’s “historical context” worth taking into account, as well.

Replying to Erltonsquire (first quote, all emphases mine), she writes:

Erltonsquire,

I don’t want America’s first black president to be blamed for the next depression. He means too much as a symbol.

I don’t want to see that happen either, as the consequences for racial harmony could be catastrophic. Unfortunately, however, circumstance dictates that is exactly what will happen. Anyone elected at such a time takes the blame, whether or not it can plausibly be construed as his fault. Look what happened to Hoover’s reputation.

The two candidates at the last election were fighting over the poisoned chalice. I think it’s very unfortunate that Mr Obama won at this particular time and is now in the line of fire. I actually feel very sorry for him and especially his family. I don’t think he has any idea what is about to hit him politically. Unfortunately he encouraged people to believe he had the power to change things, which he doesn’t. It is very dangerous for politicians to believe their own propaganda and willingly step up on to a pedestal. It just means they have further to fall.

Whatever one may think of current events, it actually makes little sense to focus on blaming the president, as his actions are so constrained, and events are so dependent on long term socieconomic moves that precede his term. The system is larger than any man and it is simply broken. A blame game won’t help anyone. Sadly nastier and nastier blame-games are exactly what increasingly angry people engage in in such times. I always suggest that people save their energies for more constructive purposes that can actually benefit their loved ones.

Mr Obama is in the wrong place at the wrong time. All he can do is cheerlead while presiding over a sclerotic and dysfunctional system that is completely unresponsive to the needs of the populace. Such a system can no longer do anything constructive. Sadly the destructive power that remains is still being deployed, and probably will continue to be so on a wider and wider scale. Tragically, this will be Mr Obama’s legacy, whatever he personally does or does not do.

June 1, 2010 8:24 AM

Hard to gainsay much of anything said above, and what a mouthful!  I do think Stoneleigh’s acuteness reaches its vanishing when she says,

I always suggest that people save their energies for more constructive purposes that can actually benefit their loved ones.

One last question: Can Wall Street create catastrophe bonds for politicians?  Because I want in!

When yesterday had a future.

Buhdy is probably going to ban me sooner or later for lazy blogolalia (like echolalia, only blog-centric).  Peter Schiff, who predicted much of the economic whirlwind that Obama is intending to put back in Pandora’s box, showed up in comments asking WTF the proprietors at The Automatic Earth, Ilargi and Stoneleigh, ever predicted.  After all, he is Peter Schiff!

Stoneleigh responded, and because the TAE feel free to post articles whole, this will be one of the few times that I re-produce Stoneleigh’s part of the post in its entirety, fair use be damned (They can feel free to sue me for all my debt obligations, then put me to work as an indentured slave milking goats).  As a one-time practicing scientist, I would consider the predictions made to be of the “strong” variety.