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News Briefs 14-08-07

A very interesting mix today. Post your thoughts.

Quote of the Day:


Time is the greatest of all cover-ups.

Jameske

  1. Rothschilds
    do-dee-doo-dee-doo … now that we are suitably “informed” about the financial state of the world, may I be so bold as to ask: WHAT THE HECK DO WE DO ABOUT IT? I’ll need to close my bank account, at the very least and never accept another penny of my pension payout because both my bank and my investment companies must surely be somehow “owned” and controlled by the nefarious families.

    Newton

    1. good question
      Mexico, my country, is a very rich nation filled with natural resources. But here, unlike many other countries, it is more evident that the wealth is owned by a very, very small group of people.

      As of this month, Fortune magazine has named mexican businessman Carlos Slim as the richest man in the world. To some mexicans it is a somewthat cause of pride, but I personally find it disgusting.

      But, like you stated, it would be almost impossible for me to escape Slim’s “grip” since his hand is in pretty much everything down here: in the telephone companies (both landine and cel), in the entertainment business, in restaurants, hotels, etc, etc, etc.

      So what is the answer? Do we emmulate the essenes and seek refuge in the desert mountains waiting Kingdom Come?

      Do we become terrorists and actively seek the destruction of this unfair economic pyramid through violence?

      Do we tell ourselves there’s nothing we can do anyway and oblige to serve the system and try to climb the ladder of power as high as we can?

      Or do we stay in society, but open our minds to the fact that the values these people impose on us are but an illusion to distract us from the things that really matter?

      —–
      It’s not the depth of the rabbit hole that bugs me…
      It’s all the rabbit SH*T you stumble over on your way down!!!

      Red Pill Junkie

  2. holocaust denial
    I say that making holocaust denial illegal is counter-productive. It only drives the deniers underground, and reinforces their beliefs.

    Instead, we should counter their arguments, and expose them as the frauds that they are.

    If we limit free speech about historical events, we will never learn.

    There are other “deniers”. People who say that East Germany never really killed people who just wanted to leave the country. People who say that Pol Pot was not such a bad guy – after all he was never convicted in a court of law.

    We should let all these people talk, so that they reveal themselves. We need to know who the idiots are.

    —-
    You can observe a lot, just by watching. (Yogi Berra)

    1. H. Denial: BLAME THE HIPPIES!!
      (Pheeew!) Man, that article is one tough bone to chew, but it is definitely worth the read.

      Ok, there are a lot of things worth commenting here, but allow me to start by transcribing some of the first comments made by Roger Kimball, which I think you’ll find stimulating for debate:

      “What is particularly troubling is the way in which such trifling with the historical record is proliferating. It is not simply that there are more and more crackpots declaring that the Holocaust was (in David Duke’s phrase) a historical hoax. That, to be sure, is troubling enough. Yet even more worrisome is the legitimacy conferred upon such declarations by the actions of the media and the academy. This is not to say that the media or the academy grant the idea credence; denying the Holocaust has not–not yet–won respectability. But it has managed to win an audience. That itself is extraordinary. Instead of being instantly dismissed as pernicious nonsense, denying the Holocaust is increasingly accorded the status of a “different perspective,” a “dissenting point of view,” “another opinion.”

      In this context, it is important to understand that denying the Holocaust is only one of many efforts to undermine the authority of historical truth. The phenomenon of Afrocentricism (which, incidentally, often indulges in a bit of Holocaust denial as a sideline) belongs here, as do many varieties of academic literary “theory” that now reign in the academy: deconstruction, extreme examples of “reader-response” theory, new historicism, etc. For all of them, facts are fluid and historical truth is a species of fiction: what actually happened in the past, or what a given text actually means, are for them ridiculous questions. Nor are these attitudes confined to the cloistered purlieus of the academy: in watered-down versions they have become standard-issue liberal sentiment: Rather than risk having to make an unpleasant judgment about the facts, deny that there are any such things as facts.
      When we ask how this state of affairs came about, the first answer is the widespread acceptance of cultural relativism. As Professor Lipstadt points out, part of the success of the Holocaust deniers “can be traced to an intellectual climate that has made its mark in the scholarly world during the past two decades. The deniers are plying their trade at a time when much of history seems up for grabs and attacks on the Western rationalist tradition have become commonplace.” This tendency, she notes, can in turn be traced to intellectual currents that have their origin in the emancipationist ideology of~l the late Sixties. ”

      Ok, there is loads more worth taking into account. But what I found interesting here is that, in some ways, it is talking about some of the things we discuss in TDG. I mean it in the sense that we like to read about what we label “alternative historical theories” such as the search for Atlantis for instace, or advance technologies in ancient civilizations, or Roswell. But what it is said in the article is, that, in some ways, we as ascribers of different opinions regarding historical claims, are in fact more dangerous than anti-semitic hate-speechers that thrive in the so-called cultural relativism we have fostered with our naive liberal ideas of free speech.

      Let me put it this way: I have a lot of doubts concerning 9/11. I have read many theories from the ones thay say the buildings collapse not because of the planes but because of internal explosions. I have read that some people think several high ranking officers in the Government received info that a terrorist plot concerning planes was being developed, but despite that nothing was done. Many things I find interesting… many pure paranoia! But the internet offers plenty of choices for any particular taste of ideas.

      So the question is this: Am I with my queries and doubts about 9/11, in some ways HELPING the islamists by indirectly giving some credibility to their cause? Should I be put in jail for my “anti-american” ideas, the same way some law-makers in the EU are aiming to jail Holocaust deniers in Europe?

      Holocaust denial is clearly anti-semitic and by that alone smeared with hatred. Is it the same thing with 9/11?

      Am I guilty of cultural relativism for not finding some historical orthodoxy thoroughly convincing?

      Your thoughts?

      —–
      It’s not the depth of the rabbit hole that bugs me…
      It’s all the rabbit SH*T you stumble over on your way down!!!

      Red Pill Junkie

      1. Denial
        Denial is what separates us from reality.

        In the case of 9-11, there is much denial geared rather against any and all troubling evidence.

        So, by that logic, denying the holocaust is rather like denying something fishy happened on that fateful day of September 2001.

        Human psychology is in a permanent state of denial, it is no surprise then that we can’t even know ourselves and feel totally lost in this Petri dish.

      2. note the difference
        Note that nobody is shutting up the 9/11 doubters, even inside the USA.

        In the meantime, I heard that the communists are again in power in Cambodia. I’m sorry, but how stupid are these people?

        —-
        You can observe a lot, just by watching. (Yogi Berra)

        1. True…
          It is even possible in the US to open a museum devoted to propagate the idea of Creationism.

          http://www.creationmuseum.org/

          Is this the other side of the spectrum from putting holocaust deniers in jail?

          Please note that the only ground where I’m comparing creationist to holocaust deniers is SOLELY on the fact that both groups oppose historical and scientific facts.

          But even in stating that we encounter more problems, don’t we? 😉 What passes as FACT nowadays?

          —–
          It’s not the depth of the rabbit hole that bugs me…
          It’s all the rabbit SH*T you stumble over on your way down!!!

          Red Pill Junkie

  3. bankrupt germany
    Saying that Hitler’s government fixed Germany’s bankruptcy is not correct. Yes that government did improve the infrastructure and many parts of the economy, but the country was even more bankrupt at the start of the war. That was one of the reasons they had to start the war.

    An old Nazi era joke:

    Goebbels, Goering and Hjalmar Schacht (the Reichsbank president), were sitting outside at a Berlin sidewalk cafe all afternoon. Nobody recognized them. Here is how:

    Goebbels did not say anything the whole afternoon.

    Goering was in civilian clothes.

    Schacht paid the bill.

    —-
    You can observe a lot, just by watching. (Yogi Berra)

    1. Denial and history
      An interesting thread. Certainly, the only bars on free speech should be libel and a commonly accepted view of decency. To try to shut up deniars, etc, is ridiculous AND dangerous.
      Similarly, I’m against much of political correctness – first of all because most freedoms for minorities were won before the concept arose (a major reason for trying to shut people up is to hide this fact); and second, driving racists, etc, underground stifles debate as to proper solutions.
      But on the counter argument, we must also remember that history is not set in stone. In the first instance, it is written by the ‘victors’, and in the second, contemporary historians always subvert history by placing our present values upon it.
      Baudrillard got it right when he argued fact and fiction is now merging.

      I’m fanatical about moderation

      Anthony North

      1. victors
        There are many complaints about victors writing history and making the losers look bad.

        But in some cases, the losers really were really bad.

        I said this before – we owe everything we have today, all out freedoms and luxuries, to people speaking freely. When they were not allowed to but spoke freely anyway. Everything.

        —-
        You can observe a lot, just by watching. (Yogi Berra)

        1. History
          I don’t dispute that in many cases the losers were bad, but that’s not the point I was making. Whether the victors were good or bad, history is still distorted by virtue of not having both sides.
          That said, I totally agree with you about free speech. Indeed, it’s interesting that the less free speech we have, the more dictatorial an administration, and vice versa.

          I’m fanatical about moderation

          Anthony North

        2. Freedom…
          Freedom is indeed a double-edged sword. It seems that a society that truly defends an permits free speech must be prepared to accept the consequences of living forever on the verge of anihilation.

          That was also discussed in the article, by Mr. Dershowitz:

          “Since freedom and security are often in tension, we note that balancing them presents legislators with the grand temptation to subordinate freedom to security, capitulation to which, perhaps, is Europe’s perennial tragic flaw.”

          And Roger Kimball also wrote:

          “As Hannah Arendt observed in an essay called “Truth and Politics,” opinion remains opinion only so long as it is grounded in, and can be corrected by, fact. “Facts,” she wrote, “inform opinions, and opinions, inspired by different interests and passions, can differ widely and still be legitimate as long as they respect factual truth. Freedom of opinion is a farce unless factual information is guaranteed and the facts themselves are not in dispute.” What is at stake, Arendt concluded, is nothing less than the common world of factual reality and historical truth.”

          —–
          It’s not the depth of the rabbit hole that bugs me…
          It’s all the rabbit SH*T you stumble over on your way down!!!

          Red Pill Junkie

          1. Set in stone?
            Hi Red,
            The problem here is that ‘factual reality and historical truth’ are both fairy tales, for the reasons stated above. And in one sense, so is ‘freedom’.
            Total freedom, in one sense, is direct democracy, but that always satisfies only a majority.
            It’s all to do with a fine balance – and this only succeeds with freedom of speech, and moderation of action.

            Reality, like time, is relative to the observer

            Anthony North

          2. Now you know…
            why I could never. EVER! have gone to Law School 😀

            —–
            It’s not the depth of the rabbit hole that bugs me…
            It’s all the rabbit SH*T you stumble over on your way down!!!

            Red Pill Junkie

    2. Bankrupt morality
      Hi Earthling,

      I guess the article was all hogwash then, considering the mentioned fact there were no banking inbetween leeches in those days how could it be bankrupt ? I think the article is insightfull and shows a way out of the coming financial disaster the US is manouvered into by the same people and basicly the same way as happened to the Weimar Republic.

      On Holocaust deniers , until 1960 there was little about that, but then the relentless propaganda started and now people are just repeating in an agitated way what they’ve been led to believe. 6 million yes…ehh no . That figure included 4 million from Auswitsch a number that has been officially readjusted to 1 million. Even so it never fails to amaze me the number of survivors that are testifying to this date. Many billions were paid out to the victims, but last week there was a protest in Jerusalem, from these survivors because they couldnt scape by anymore…

      A matter of choice;
      Intimidation, corruption and lies, or serenity, sharing and sincerity.

      1. yes
        The part of the article that says Germany fixed their economic problems under the Nazi government is hogwash. You think the article shows promising solutions, and I don’t.

        This has nothing to do with holocaust or no holocaust.

        Of course during the war, things got easier for Germany by importation of slave labour. But none of the measures taken could have any long lasting effect. Perhaps if Germany had won the war. Perhaps.

        —-
        You can observe a lot, just by watching. (Yogi Berra)

        1. I agree
          If the Nazi Germany was in such good economical shape, why the need to collect golden TEETH from the bodies of the people murdered in the gas chambers?

          I agree. If you begin to make a lot of tanks and a lot of planes and a lot of machine guns, you create jobs and people are happy,but eventually you need capital to balance your accounts. Where that was going to come from?

          First from the confiscation of all the goods of the rich jewish families, which was greatly aproved by the majority of the german people.

          Afterward Froom the looting of other countries.

          But we must remember that anti-semitism was very much alive even before the nazis took power. The view of the people back then in many european countries were that jews were leeches sucking on the rest of the hard-working population. They were money-lenders, and why was that? because in many countries they weren’t allowed to do anything else!

          My dad had a german friend who lived in Germany during WWII. One time my dad asked him: why did they ever permit a monster like Hitler to rise to power? The answer of my dad’s friend was that he simply didn’t know how unfair things were back in those days. He told him that if a german boy riding a bike was run down by a jewish driving his car, the law would find the boy guilty and the jewish innocent. And that they always had to lend the rich jewish the sidewalk and things like that. Frankly I’m in no position to say how much of this man’s explanations were based on true facts and how much was urban legends. But I think it is pretty clear how something like the holocaust was nothing but a modern approach of how the jewish people were slaughtered in Europe hundreds of years earlier.

          Also, to the millions of jews that died during the holocaust, we must remember that Hitler also killed gypsies, communists, homosexuals, mentally retarded, ukranians, etc, etc. Then the generally accepted figure of 6 millions turns into 9-11 millions!

          Holocaust was NOT a crime to the jewish people, but a crime against all of humanity.

          At least that’s how I see it.

          This reminds me of something Whitley Strieber wrote in his book The Key. In it he tells that during a strange conversation he had with a very “wise old man”, the old man assured him that the Holocaust had been the most important human event in modern history. The reason of this is that, because of the loss of invaluable minds by the hands of the SS -there are studies that seem to point some members of the jewish race as the most intelligent of humans, think of dear Alber Einstein for example- man would not be able to decipher the secret of space travel in time to escape the terrible catastrophies that will strike our planet. So according to these, if the holocaust hand’t happened, we would have achieved antigravity and faster-by-light speed by now… So basically the old man told him the death of 6 million would end up deciding the death of 6 billion… in the years to come 🙁

          —–
          It’s not the depth of the rabbit hole that bugs me…
          It’s all the rabbit SH*T you stumble over on your way down!!!

          Red Pill Junkie

  4. The Chosen People
    Ok I will tell you how I feel about the holocaust. It is an industry, its a product, it makes lots of money. Its all insane. 60 million people died during WWII, and we hear the Jewish story again and again. In Israel they don’t even take care of holocaust survivors, their pension check is 20$ a month! Also more insanity because of a book, written by people, but claimed to be written by god, we today have Israel. And these chosen people have only stomped on, killed and destroyed the Palestinian people. Day after day we are told about the horrors inflicted on the Jewish people through the ages. And they turn around and do many of these same horrible acts on a race they look on as subhuman, because they are not Jewish. Because they are not the “Chosen People”. What a nasty, evil little country that never should of been created. And my country gives billions of dollars in aid and weapons to this nasty, evil country every year. Because it serves the needs of our nasty, evil country. There are no chosen people. Only people. The holocaust does not need to be protected, people need to be protected.

    1. Chosen People
      Good morning Bladerunner,
      I understand there is one interpretation of the ‘Chosen People’ that they are chosen to suffer. Takes the edge off the arrogance a bit.

      ‘What a nasty, evil little country that never should of been created.’

      I’m afraid I could never say this about ANY country.

      I’m fanatical about moderation

      Anthony North

      1. one would think
        that they (Jews) are the chosen people because the “bible” says so.
        When are we all going to purge the programing.

        Forget what we have been indocrinated into believing. People are people. It is “govenments” that make a country look bad or good. Internal policy and global policy. The people know very little of all facts when they vote. But after they vote the winning power is able to do what they wish. Considering it is a democracy, if not then the same result.

        Remember the past, as bad as it is, so it will not happen again.

        “Life can be whatever you want it to be, as long as you do what your told.”
        LRF.

        1. An initiatic people
          That is what they are unknowingly.

          They have not yet fulfilled their function as many races on this planet, as well as humanity as a whole, has a heavy debt to pay before human consciousness can be rebalanced.

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