Ominous Signs

The USAF "flying saucer" that is set to "bomb Russia."

How sad is it when a newspaper that posts a picture like the above gives you more objective and better articles on global warming than the free press? Yeah, you saw it right; Pravda gets it right while the New York Times keeps sounding the warning bell and saying idiotic things like that the current cooling and record cold levels are proving global warming. While you're at it, do check out the apparent winner of Best Science Weblog of 2008, WattsUpWithThat? This way you can keep current on your coming Ice Age climatology, stun your friends and be a hit at parties. Oh, wait, that's physicists.

Have you been paying attention to the posts about the now obviously prophetic Ayn Rand book Atlas Shrugs? If not, here are a couple posts to get you started. Just watch it unfold, and keep watching. Rand, Orwell - there is nothing in those books that is not happening now, this very day.

One thing that kind of bugged me today was Rush making a prediction and telling us to write down the date, when the prediction was actually something that has been covered in Animal Farm and is just plain obvious to most of us. However I'm gonna include the transcript of the segment because there are some good things in it anyway. Predicting that the media will lie about the economy - as though they've ever done anything else - just isn't anything to brag about. Just lies and stupidity, because they don't know anything about it and the people reading/watching don't know anything about it, so whatever they say just gets taken as read. (Yes, both left and right apply there - I'll have to go back and cover the Townhall economic letter I got recently - tooo horrid.) It's pretty tragic when people don't even look at their own LIVES and see what is going on there - they just listen to the newsman and the papers and say "Yeah! Yeah, the economy, that thing! It's like THAT now!" I'm sorry, but that's about the level of intelligence displayed on this particular topic. It never rises above idiot level as a general principle. Paul Krugman? Really? Now he's got the word "Nobel" before his name, you think he knows something? (Actually, I suspect he does; he is one of the few genuine liars, who likes to manipulate the public - as opposed to just not knowing what he's talking about, like most of them.) May I just remind you that Arafat has a Nobel prize too. For PEACE. Doesn't mean a fucking thing.

Just go back and read about Squealer the pig in Orwell's book. Squealer was the media, and he was constantly telling the animals whatever was most useful to the rulers at that moment. They may have been starving, but he would tell them they were really doing very very well! Yay! We're doing it! Yes we can! and they bought it. As they were stealing the eggs out from under the chickens, "Yay! We're doing it! We're prospering more than ever now! Yes we can!" The chickens suspected something wasn't quite right, but they never wised up because, you know, they're fucking chickens. So are most people, unfortunately. Then when times had been good they were told that times were really hideous and they were really all in bad bad shape! Ooooh that horrible MAN, look what he's doing to us! We're all poor and in rags (oh wait, we're not, but never mind, listen to Squealer!) It's genuinely infuriating but what else is new? When I get sick of the nonsense I go to an Austrian site, curl up with a few good pieces and ignore the clamor for a while.

Transcript of Rush segment below:

RUSH: Now, Snerdley has asked a good question. Rare, but good question. When it doesn't work, aren't the American people going to blame the guy in charge? Well, who's that going to be? Obama? I am surprised at this question. I'm surprised that you would ask this question. Do you think the American people are going to blame Obama?

Let me tell you what's going to happen. Mark this date down, January 9th, 2009. Within a week -- 'cause it's already actually started -- within a week of the Immaculate Inauguration, we're going to start seeing stories that will feature those man-on-the-street interviews with people whose lives are starting to get a little bit better and they see the light at the end of the tunnel now. They go on more job interviews and they are doing a little bit better. The Drive-Bys will start setting the stage to create the impression in the minds of people that we're coming back, when we're not. Just as they try to set up this mood that we're going to hell in a handbasket when we're not, notice how that works. That convinces people, the old sawbuck, "Well, I'm doing fine, but I'm hearing on the news my neighbor is about to lose his job, we're in trouble here." So how does it play when you're outta work, but you hear that other people are getting jobs? If you are an Obama voter, you think your time is just around the corner, you gotta be patient because he's already working, his plan is already working.

Snerdley, why would people who voted for Obama on the basis of vibes, good feelings, and all this meaninglessness, all of a sudden turn substantive? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. They're not going to lose their homes. There was a piece of legislation being debated now to keep 'em in there. They're not going to lose their homes. The only people that are going to lose their homes are people that can afford to pay for it, but for some reason don't. There will be people out of work, but there will be hope, because there's change. And this attitude of hope will sustain people through the bad times 'cause Obama is there. You've gotta understand how the media is going to portray this, and then to the extent that that doesn't work on everybody, there's always, "It was much worse than we knew because of Bush." Remember, Bush is going to be a whipping boy. I would love to say that you're right, that the American people, not going to take 'em too long to figure out that this is bogus, this guy sold them a bill of goods, that their economic situation is in the toilet, somebody's about to hit the flusher, and they're gonna want change and so forth again, but it took four years for that to materialize with Jimmy Carter, and Jimmy Carter ain't no Barack Obama in terms of being able to hypnotize people while he speaks.

RUSH: Perhaps if there are people in the audience... Those of you out there who happen to agree with Snerdley and disagree with me, who believe that the American people will not put up with economic failure for very long and will get mad at Obama, may I remind you of the reputation Franklin Delano Roosevelt has to this day among people who voted for him? Franklin Delano Roosevelt did an Obama and prolonged the Great Depression by seven years. He won two terms and nearly got away with packing the Supreme Court. The war came along, but there were seven years, there were seven years of abject misery before the war came along during the Great Depression, when the New Deal was put into place. As my buddy Steve Gilbert reminds me, people were singing songs of joy back then. "We're in the money now. We're in the money now," and unemployment was at 25%.

It was much higher than what we have today. And if you think, if you think a demagogic, flowery-spoken candidate or president with an accomplice media can't convince people things are great when they're bad, you've got another think coming. If they can convince 'em things are horrible when they're good, the opposite's also possible. To this day people who were alive and voted for Roosevelt think he's the greatest president we ever had, and not because of World War II. It's because of Social Security, because of Medicaid, because of the New Deal. So don't doubt me. Don't think the American people that voted for this guy are going to turn on him in two years. I'm sorry to be depressing, but it's realistic. It gives you an idea. There's good in everything that happens. This is a profound opportunity we have here. It will all unfold as we lead our way back to prominence here.