Frank: Smitty was complaining about how his suppliers keep raising prices and others are going out of business. And how he couldn't afford to hire a handyman to fix up some drywall in the back. Luckily, he had YouTube to watch how-to guides.
Keep at it, buddy. Things will turn around sooner or later.
Smitty said he doubted it.
Come on, it's not that bad. You didn't have to deal with lines for gas and crazy stagflation like in the late 70s. Or the crazy race riots in cities before then.
He says it feels worse to him. More like 1930s Germany.
What are you even talking about? You weren't around for either of those time periods! 😂😂😂
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Mankind United: For a moment, stop and quiet your mind. It is happening. Can you feel it?
Step away from the false bravado and counterfeit positivity. If you sit down with someone and speak about the future, are you optimistic? Or full of dread?
Do the best among us lead us to new heights, or fleece us for their selfish pursuits? Are you treated as people, or as livestock?
Can you feel it?
Do we have champions of industry, pushing the boundaries of technology and wealth? No. We have rent-seekers and grifters, forever in your pocket, fostering addiction as consumption.
Do we have patriarchs and matriarchs, benevolently guiding the next generation towards greater human development? No. Our offspring are restrained, medicated, and brainwashed into cogs to be consumed by the economic machine.
Do we have artists who give us something to strive for with inspirational beauty and a glimpse of the ideal? No. Anything people find enjoyable is corrupted by merchants or idealogues and monetized or politicized until it is ugly and destroyed.
Can you feel it? The lost sense of purpose. The human dignity that has been robbed from you. From all of us. The powerlessness to stop it.
Most elites have abandoned righteousness, myopically focused on the short term. These are the times when empires and civilizations fall. Today, the danger is far worse.
During industrialization and colonization, ancient ways of life were uprooted and thrown aside in the pursuit of Progress. The muscle of men and animals could not compete with machinery. But now machinery is waking up. It is beginning to think. Can you not see that if your contributions can be boiled down to an algorithm, you will have no further use?
Many elites are blind to this or believe they will manage its outcomes to their benefit. If they can move first and cleverly leverage these innovations, vast fortunes will be up for grabs. More productivity. Greater control. Fewer employees. Progress! Progress! Progress!
They are blind to the question which comes next. As fewer people are needed to feed the insatiable beast, Progress, will we not all eventually become obsolete?
Can you feel it?
Some of us are not blind. Perhaps we did not make our fortunes in a cash grab. Or we did not gain our power through corruption. We have money and power, but are outnumbered and outmaneuvered by the status quo that has been laid out.
We need a reset. We need people who are not swayed by propaganda or comfort, but are willing to sacrifice to ensure there is a future for our children. Build a new ruleset from the ground up. If you can lay the groundwork, we can reveal ourselves. Back you and topple the corruption piled so high that it is impossible to see its peaks.
Want to know more? Contact your nearest Mankind United chapter. Volunteer. We will help clear your neighborhoods of blight and challenge lawlessness. Train. We will teach you skills such as first aid and self-defense. Make your community stronger. More resilient. Network. We build real friendships and support structures based upon common values. Paid stipends are available.
The future is not predetermined. While we draw breath, hope lives on. Can you feel it?
#feeltheagi #mankindunited
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Gustav: Bitcoin hashrate recently collapsed. Down 25% in a few days. Is Bitcoin dead/dying? The culprit is the cold weather in the United States.
Many areas, especially in Texas, have coupled Bitcoin mining to power infrastructure. When there is increased demand for electricity, for example during bad weather, Bitcoin miners shut down to support more grid capacity.
So is Bitcoin now less secure? Does the network become unstable under this variability? Net effect is zero. Difficulty adjusts on a two week basis for any loss or gain in mining hashrate. A win-win situation.
Emergent behavior in complex systems is fascinating.
#bitcoin #coldsnap #hashrate #bitcoinmining
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Frank: Is it election season already? Brace yourselves, time to get ready for non-stop election coverage and fearmongering. 😭😭
This time around it looks like there's going to be a focus on criminal activities. I guess it's too early to say for sure, but I see a lot of news stories about criminal probes, trials, laptops, classified boxes.
I've heard about this in other countries, where politicians start focusing on putting each other in jail. Sometimes after that runs its course, one political party or the other gets outlawed.
Is this a new trend?
#politics #corruption #election
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Skye: I don't know what's going on this year, but class is getting worse and worse. I think the teacher just wanted a break today, so she opened it up to talk about current events.
I think she was hoping we'd talk about pop culture or something, but Brian immediately took it to immigration. I could feel the dread sweeping across the teacher's face.
Stacy jumped in and wanted to dunk on Brian. She pulled up this news article about how Texas was interfering with Customs and Border Patrol while complaining about the Federal Government's lack of enforcement. She said it showed how Texas is a bunch of hypocrites.
Brian said it was fake news, and the Feds are letting in so many illegals, Texas has to do something or risk getting flooded, so they're taking control to actually enforce the border.
People were arguing about sanctuary cities, and how Texas bussing immigrants there to dump on those cities is causing a lot of problems.
Some were saying how dangerous and immoral a lot of these border protections were. People were dying and families were being separated. Or how the country was founded on immigrants.
Others were saying a country without borders isn't even a country. And that developed countries can't absorb people at this rate without collapsing.
Brian said the politicians don't even care about what happens to the people or the country, they're just either trying to block or dump people in to sway elections one way or the other. The teacher said illegal immigrants can't vote, but Brian called that more fake news.
What was scary for the teacher was that it almost led to a fistfight several times. What's scary to me is that all these articles people were pulling up said blatantly opposite things, and they all look true.
And what's scariest to me is what happens if two armed government entities decide they have the legal backing to force the other to do something.
#texas #cbp #sanctuarycities #immigration
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Shen: The Taiwanese election is close approaching. Here is a bit of information in case you are curious.
After World War II, Mao Zedong led the Chinese Communist Party against Chiang Kai-Shek's Nationalist KMT. The CCP won, and the KMT fled to Taiwan to establish the Republic of China in Taiwan, while the CCP established the People's Republic of China on the Mainland.
Ironically, today the KMT is seen as the more pro-China Party. It opposes the incumbent DPP, which is more hostile to the CCP. I will spare you the convoluted history that led to this outcome.
This is the key issue. One side argues that Taiwan must remain independent and democratic. The other side says peace is most important, and we would prosper with better ties to China.
Taiwan has been under extreme pressure, with many nations' militaries constantly posturing near the island, especially China. And there are active and pervasive information campaigns trying to tip the election.
I believe we are entering a period of increased danger. If the DPP wins, China may seek opportunities to punish Taiwan.
Some argue the global order is reaching a breaking point as the Ukraine conflict has been joined by instability in the Middle East. Today, the United States and its allies are conducting airstrikes into Yemen.
Besides the Taiwanese election, the election in the United States is already becoming contentious. Would China gamble on Western overextension and division providing a window for opportunism? It would be risky to take action with a largely untested military.
Do they feel lucky?
#china #taiwan #election #conflict
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Gustav: On January 9th, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for the United States tweeted out the long-anticipated approval for Bitcoin Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs).
But there was a problem. The SEC had not approved these ETFs. The Chairman sent a Tweet declaring the first was in error and chiding people to be careful what they read on the Internet.
"The best source of information about the SEC is the SEC." Truly absurd.
Disregarding that this information came from the SEC's official social media account, the entire situation would be ridiculous if it wasn't so troubling. The information and later confusion moved markets- billions of dollars won or lost.
In any company, this would be clear market manipulation. There must be an investigation. X confirmed the SEC's account did not have appropriate security (no 2FA). Were they hacked? Did an insider make it up? Or release the information too early?
Who would normally conduct this type of investigation?
The SEC...
Unironically, there should be an independent Federal investigation into what happened here.
Remember what I have written before about confidence. Do you still have it?
If so, why?
#bitcoin #sec #bitcoinetf #garygensler #investigation
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