Homesteading Independence

Practically speaking, I can't pull oil out of the ground, and things like mineral rights are a convention of our government's interpretation of property rights. The homesteading concept of property rights seems to suggest the property is what is homesteaded. In most cases, that means the surface of the land, wells, etc... When air travel became the rage, the courts sort of rudely decided upon some arbitrary rules so that airlines wouldn't have to deal with individual land owners. This is considered a violation of the homesteading principles, since particular farmers, for instance, could prove the planes flying overhead were causing damage to their livestock. So this is the government saying some damages against others are acceptable, if they like your sort of business enough. People don't like corporations being considered people in this country, but what we should be upset about is how often they are considered better than people.

Anyway, the flip side of this argument is that you can very reasonably assume that, despite the grand tradition of mineral rights and such, that one could assume that as long as the current homesteaded properties of the people aren't damaged in any way, whoever can do so has the right to do so.

So, I can see a framework for understanding property that would allow a people looking for independence to sweet talk the multinationals and let them take a lot of oil out of the ground while also allowing for the local shop owner's property rights to be protected. The danger is that once a deal is in place, if the multinationals do damage someone else's property, will appropriate restitution be made, or will excuses, like the excuses made for the airline industry become law?

Thoughts on Kurdistan

In 2007 I figured that the Kurds ought to have their own country, but nobody was particularly interested. Ostensibly the game was to keep Iraq together, but underneath there were concerns. Turkey has it's own Kurdish population, and the multinationals had their interests. Instead of a declaration of independence these days, what the prospective young country needs to do is court the multinationals.

The Official Website of the Kurdistan Board of Investment

The Kurds may make out as the smartest kids in the Middle Eastern room. They appear to have managed to present themselves as partners with the Turkish government, eliminating a major threat on their border. There already are many multinationals in Kurdistan, with assets Baghdad can't secure. It is doubtful ISIS will play nice with the multinationals either.

There are even rumors that the Israelis are all for a free Kurdistan, which would make some sense. The Israelis need oil and a convenient way to do deals with Muslim neighbors who need to maintain a public attitude of hatred for appearances sake in their particular countries. Obviously these ties would need to be vigorously denied. But, if it were true, it means a higher likelihood that Kurdistan ends up looking like a functioning country, rather than the raw deal that the Palestinians get.

But in all of this work apparently being done to set the stage for an independent Kurdistan, well I worry about how independent it will be exactly. The diplomatic work with Turkey, the business deals with multinationals, etc- will Kurdistan be free? Can they act like a modern socialist country with the multinationals (and other countries) on oil matters while simultaneously dealing with their own people in a manner conducive to freedom?

Technically, they will probably be freer than Americans by default because their politicians aren't used to scheming quite as well as ours are, but is the principle of the thing- the idea that a nation ought to be able to come into being without all these foreign interests having such a say in it. Maybe that principle never really existed- the French did appear to tilt the odd in America's favor, though the Atlantic Ocean probably had more to do with it than anything else.

McBorders: Bringing Gaza To A Border Near You

Once you give up the left/right party politics, it is amazing who you find yourself agreeing with, at least on occasion.
So, I listen to a podcast called unauthorized disclosure. These are leftists. You will have to suffer through some weirdness if you listen to them, but they are actually discussing something that I think is real and happening. First, obviously they are talking about Israel and Gaza, because some nasty stuff has been going down recently, but they were also talking about the World Cup and those children just sort of showing up on the U.S. Mexico border recently.

Dave Zirin on the world cup: FIFA, the sporting shock doctrine in Brazil

and

What is missing in discussions about crisis with child refugees at U.S. Mexico border.

These sort of function as part one and two. Essentially, FIFA demands a high level of surveillance around the World Cup, and the corporations that get these high security contracts have ties back to Israel. Similar things are true with borders, with the U.S. government often taking Israeli behavior as a model and there is also, no doubt, a lot of corporate cooperation back and forth. Tod Miller even pointed out the new so-called American border is the one between Mexico and Guatemala, because the U.S. exports this militarized border idea to other countries.

I believe the people in charge of these militarized borders control the borders pretty well, and, just like in Gaza, these crises are used for political advantage. Neither Hamas nor the Israeli government protect private property rights. Instead they encourage a sensation of some sort of ethnic property right. The collective property right creates a sort of segfault in the minds of most people, especially if you've been educated in government schools, through which politicians can set up pretexts to control their own populations.

The border with Mexico gives U.S. politicians plenty of pretexts to ignore private property as well, with private property owners along the border being an unwilling host to both immigrants and agents of the state.

The World Cup provides some of the context for this usurpation of private property- Dave Zirin mentions that in the London World Cup, McDonald's got the exclusive right to make french fries in the FIFA exclusion zone around the arena in which the World Cup was played- that means that all the fish&chip shops, as well as every other restaurant in that area of London was not able to serve french fries (they are called chips in the U.K) while the World Cup was going on.

So, despite the leftists annoyingly calling this capitalism, we can see it is not- it is corporatism. All of those little shop owners were capitalists- in the sense that they had saved up their hard earned money, and bought the capital goods necessary to produce french fries. It is only in our latter days of zombie socialism that such foolishness is countenanced.

FIFA's demands have resulted in worse in Brazil, because it was apparently necessary to invade the favelas, tear gas people, and generally be quite heavy handed so that all the people rich enough to go to the World Cup could have a good time.

Once FIFA's preferred level of surveillance is in place, it usually stays put. No doubt the corporations responsible for things like drones insist on long term contracts. Similar things are true of the borders. The politicians have incentives to keep these kind of issues alive and grinding on for lifetimes. Wrapped around these issues are corporate welfare, job programs, convenient scapegoats, and political propaganda that can be played by both the Democrats and Republicans, depending on which way they think the wind is blowing. They do not serve any sort of purpose for the people, as the demographic changes hitting my particular neighborhood make increasingly clear.

It is worth it to remember the Israeli government created Gaza. They actually showed up one day and forcibly removed all the Jews living there. They voluntarily gave Hamas a better place to launch rockets at their own people. If you see children showing up at the Mexico border, it is probably a good idea to assume that our government has something do with it. It may be inadvertent or purposeful, I don't know.

The 'Safe' Food Game

A recent interveiw at body.io with Dr. Steven Gundry had me thinking how nice it would be if milk from cows with A2 casein, rather than the more predominant and novel (as these things go) A1 casein turned out to be something I could depend on as part of my regular food supply.

At first I thought this was a bit like gnosticism, since it is like finding secret knowledge, but then I realized it is more like the clean/unclean dichotomy.

But then again, this stuff is important. You can improve your life in measurable ways. I already have, so I know it. Meanwhile, I've seen guys go right down the tank while ostensibly doing all the right 'Christian' stuff. I suspect it is because it is no longer a religion but a brand brought to you by multimedia outlets, so there's no way anyone mainstream is going to tell you to put down the wheat, soy, etc...

Not that I think A2 milk is going to be spectacularly healing or anything, I just look forward to eating ice cream that is less likely to derail me than regular ice cream. I wonder, do Jews think they'll actually get healthier by eating kosher, or do Muslims think Halal meat is more nutritious? I doubt it. It is probably more to do with a spiritual sense of purity, and besides, I've heard Israelis have actually gotten into trouble because a lot of heavily processed foods high in Omega-6 oils are blessed with the designation of kosher. More heart attacks ensued. I wish I could remember where I read that.

Anyway. It's true people. Phytoesterol is the plant form of cholesterol and it is much more atherosclerotic than anything we produce naturally or get in animal products.

Ghost Dog Was Prophetic & Insurance Cannot Pay For Known Monthly Expenses

The movie Ghost Dog was about as prophetic as any movie ever made.

The rise of feminism leads to the death of the principled man.

The principles, in Ghost Dog's case, are from the Way of the Samurai, but he doesn't work for a Japanese lord; instead he's a black man working for a Mafia guy who once stuck his neck out and saved Ghost Dog as a kid, and things are changing even for the Mafia.

The Mafia don has a daughter. The plot line has her as troubled, and sleeping with one of Mafia guys, so they put out a hit on the guy she is sleeping with. Ghost Dog does the hit, and she sees him. He doesn't kill her.

Now that he's seen, the Mafia don appears to feel compelled to kill Ghost Dog. Ghost Dog isn't really killable, but he does have these principles. Principles turn out to be his weakness, and his lord turns out to be one of these unprincipled men who aren't really that much different from the average man, who scuttle around trying to make sure the women in his life are happy.

This is why people are pretending contraception can be insured against. Contraception is a known monthly expense. Insurance also happens to be a known monthly expense, so why not just ask the insurance company to pay your premium? I suppose it might dawn on you that they could, but then they wouldn't have any money when something unforeseen happens. In other words, you don't want your insurance company paying for known monthly expenses because you want it to have revenue for those other events, the one's you aren't planning for, like a car wreck, emergency surgery, etc...

People think this Hobby Lobby thing is a win; I think it is ludicrous it had to go in this direction at all, and this ruling probably has more to do with making some woman happy- there are women who don't like contraception you know, and Christian men are usually being just as unprincipled trying to keep their women happy as anybody else- than it does with keeping us free. It is still treated, and people are actually being taught, that these known monthly expenses are part of insurance. How many known monthly expenses may I insure for? Perhaps I can get an actual living wage through insurance, and just forego working altogether?

How 'Revolution' Makes You Dumb

From Cato:

ISIS’s public declaration that it has restored the caliphate has been noted as a bold move, potentially changing some elements of their revolutionary calculus.

One does not have a restoration and some sort of revolutionary calculus. What restorations do is try to put things back to rights. What revolutionaries do is steal and claim it is moral, usually by suggesting whoever it is they are stealing from stole it 'from the people.' Of course, 'the people' generally like to go to the casinos and bars on Friday and blow most of their paychecks rather than doing any saving, capital formation, etc... The assiduous are outnumbered, so democracy inevitably fails.

ISIS is essentially anti-revolutionary. They want to restore the caliphate, which is a little weird if they really are this extremist strain of Muslim, because the caliphates weren't particularly hardcore. I am quite suspicious that a caliphate would calm the Muslim world down, because the caliph would have an interest in his realm, and would want to pass on something healthy to his children. Such a person would be civil to his nuclear armed neighbor and generally have an interest in the sort of behavior conducive to trade, which means these ghastly videos of people being murdered should end.

Violence would also end because the Caliphate does not have to keep up the pretext of the revolutionaries. See, inevitably, the revolutionaries run out of whatever they have stolen and then they have to steal more. They have to create imaginary enemies or elaborate scams through which to fleece the people.
In Egypt they were told pretty much the same thing they tell us here- go to school, work hard, get a degree, and there will be a nice fulfilling job for you when you get out. They were lying. The old communist state, not really that ideological anymore, but full of bureaucrats and their relations who don't want to stop their own gravy train, were choking out the economic forces necessary for 'the people' to get jobs. Any new job the government created actually caused a negative impact on Egypt overall, because that's even less resources available for real economic growth.

So people started protesting. They've been taught revolution too, and have less of an economic sense than CATO does, so they essentially tried to start a revolution. They are attracted to the machinery the state has in place, and tend to assume it is the evil people in charge that is the problem. The Egyptian school system, for instance, is deeply awful and corrupt. Now obviously, I have this principle that say, hey, we need a free market in schools, but even an unprincipled person should, at some point, see that having nothing is better than having something so pernicious.

The quote above is indicative of how revolutionary thinking has permeated our thinking so completely that we can make statements that are completely nonsensical. There is no 'revolutionary' restoration. Similar drivel is found among Christians, who appear to think the King of Kings, who incarnated for the ultimate act of restoration, is a revolutionary. This kind of thinking is stupid, dangerous, and will never lead to the sort of life people actually want to live- well, unless you want to be a thief that is, and then I can say you are doing very well with this retarded line of thinking.

All Diets Are Plant Based Diets

The propagandists for the 'plant based diet' have been bothering my subconscious lately, until it finally percolated up into my consciousness. Cows ranging across a field, eating grass consolidate PLANTS into to highly nutritious beef. If you buy good butter, you can actually taste flavor variations that depend on what grasses were eaten and when. Spring butter tastes different from fall butter.

The problem with a 'plant based diet' is that all diets are 'plant based diets.' This sort of nonsense leads people to make critical errors. If you are on a budget, stop buying lettuce, and buy meat instead. Lettuce is a luxury good. It is superfluous to your diet because anything that may be contained in is easily and more cheaply obtained elsewhere.

The real problem lies, not a plant versus animal argument, but in what humans used to eat, versus what the U.S. government has heavily subsidized since the post-WWII era. Soybean, corn, wheat, canola, etc... You can avoid a multitude of evils just by avoiding wheat, soy, casein, and vegetable oils that come from crops grown in fields.

What did humans used to eat? Meat (including organs- 4 ounces of liver equals about 5lbs of fruit), eggs (especially the yolks), seafood. They would cook in natural (i.e. not hydrogenated) lard, or butter from grass fed cows. Olive oil, coconut oil, and palm oil are pretty good too. These foods take care of the bulk of your nutrition and calories.

Tubers, preferably the ones with beta-carotenes and other bright coloring agents, which tend to be antioxidants, are the next on the list.

Fruits and vegetables are third. Vitamin C. More bright colors.

Then there is the green stuff, and the best green stuff is not kale, but the stuff we now normally think of as spices or garnishes. Parsley, cilantro, rosemary, basil, etc...

Of all the grains, white rice doesn't seem to be too bad, assuming you can handle starch. I would assume these are 'empty calories' and pair rice with very nutrient dense foods and spices.

At the end of the list is lettuce. This is what you eat if you are rich and you need a novel salt and fat delivery device. If I remember correctly, even the word salad derives from the Latin name for salt. And, yes, even salt is more important than lettuce. Especially if you sweat. This is really important to remember if you get away from processed foods and try to eat healthy, because you need to be sprinkling salt on your food to taste or else you will find yourself going quite wobbly.