The Gracchi Principle

Note: This is the time of year to be generous to those in need, so if you are looking for a place to give, here is an option. Most certainly know the story, but for those who do not, here is the background.


A feature of a ruling elite in decline is that they no longer respect the rules they have in place to govern their own behavior. Every society has a ruling class and within that ruling class there is competition. Despite what the natural rights proponents argue, there is a natural desire for hierarchy. Some people want to be at the top, while others aim a bit lower. Humans will compete for positions on the status tree in every form of human organization.

That is why ruling elites need rules. These rules are about governing the natural competition that will exist inside the ruling class. These rules also govern how one can enter the ruling class and how one can be expelled. As is true of all human organizations, the first question every ruling class must answer is “who are we?” and the answer to that question is a set of rules that define who is in, how you get in and how you remain in the ruling class.

In a healthy ruling class, as with any healthy human organization, the rules are more of a state of mind than a written set of laws. The early Roman republic had rules and those rules were the spirit that animated the republic. Brutus did not have to be told the rules, with regards to his sons actions in the Tarquinian conspiracy. He stood and watched stoically as his sons were executed for their crimes against the republic, thus making Brutus the ever lasting symbol of republican virtue.

Over time of course, human nature takes over and people begin to nibble away at the spirit of those rules, which inevitably results in some sort of formal codification of the rules, if for nothing else than to make it easier to handle disputes. The spirit of the law gives way to the letter of the law and the enforcement of the rules by the people benefitting from the present interpretation of the rules. It is that last bit that leads to the final phase of every ruling elite.

When the rules are first written down, everyone agrees on the meaning of the text, but over time that comes into dispute. On the one hand, people at the lower end of the status tree seek advantage in any ambiguity. If they can get everyone to agree on some new meaning of a word or phrase, they can maybe arbitrage that ambiguity to their advantage and move up the status tree. On the other hand, the people at the top want to stay at the top, so they soon engage in the same practice.

The fact is, once the ruling elite begins to question their own rules, the ruling elite is dead in spirit, because there is no turning back from this phase. The reason is they no longer have a shared spirit of the rules. The written rules were an effort to recapture that spirit by throwing a net of words over the hole, but that inevitably leads to people looking for holes in the net. Outsiders use the holes to sneak into the elite and insiders use the holes to oust competitors from the elite.

We have a real world example of this happening. The House has dumped Donald Trump’s tax returns into the public. This is probably their final act of spite against Trump, as the Republicans take over next month. Spite is the correct word here. The reason for doing it is they hope something in it will embarrass Trump. This is a remarkable thing in that these people have obsessed over Trump for going on a decade and they have yet to learn that you cannot embarrass Donald Trump.

Putting that aside, it has been a rule in America since the 16th Amendment was passed that a citizen’s relationship with the federal state with regards to his taxes is a private matter, unless a dispute arises about taxes owed. At that point, the matter goes into a court where the necessary evidence is presented. The IRS does not distribute personal tax data and the individual is under no obligation to publish his tax data. In fact, anyone publishing someone’s tax data is breaking the law.

This issue of privacy with regards to tax data is mostly a ruling class privilege, but like all elite privileges, it has been turned into a moral principle. You see, the rich people gaming the tax system do not have to make this public because it is a sacred principle of America that your taxes remain private. Whether this is a good idea is debatable, but for over a century, everyone in power agreed it was a good idea. So much so they ran Nixon off for merely questioning it.

Now, the people releasing Trump’s tax data are not worried about this happening to them if Trump wins the White House in 2024. First of all, the key states have been fortified for democracy, so everyone knows the 2024 result. What they should be concerned with is someone in the system now using this new loophole to leverage their way up the ladder. Normalizing the release of private tax data is a high price to pay for exacting revenge against Trump.

That is the danger of exceptions. They have knock on effects that are not always easy to assess, but they also do something else. Normalizing this sort of gainsaying erodes trust in the rules. If every comma in the law is now up for interpretation, what is the point of having rules? History tells us that the answer to that question is a man on a horse choosing to cross a river. In other words, the rules based society collapses and something or someone replaces it.

In the fullness of time, the historians will look at the Trump business as an example of the steady decline of the American empire. Trump may be cast as the Gracchi brothers, not for what he did but for what he came to represent. The murder of Tiberius Gracchus normalized the use of violence by the elite in defense of power. The grotesque abuse of power by the regime to counter the populist surge represented by Trump has yet to go that far, but there is still time until the next “election.”


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PeriheliusLux
PeriheliusLux
1 year ago

The apparatus and methods created and legitimized by tyrants to take power nearly always have them turned against them later on. It happened to the Conned Inc. voter base with the War On Terror. Will the tables turn again?

At some point people won’t be able to tolerate the gynoligarchy. They farther it goes the deeper the enmity is bred.

Maxda
Maxda
1 year ago

When Gaius Marius ran for Consul for a third time (the rules has a 2 term limit) and nobody stopped him, the Roman Republic was done. Caesar crossing the Rubicon years later was the inevitable result.

We’ve been done a long time. Maybe the Kennedy assassination, maybe FDR ended it. Historians will decide when the U.S.’s denouement began. Feels like it all be done soon.

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  Maxda
1 year ago

Publication of the Port Huron Statement signaled the beginning of the end. Biden’s inauguration punctuated America’s death and marked the beginning of AINO.

Hemid
Hemid
Reply to  Maxda
1 year ago

Wilson was the end of America (and Europe) as an “Enlightenment project.” Lenin, Stalin, Mao et al. don’t remotely approach his level of destructiveness.

I’ve said it before and I understand the doubt, but—

Merrick Garland will surpass him. And also the rest of them. No worse man has ever lived.

David
David
Reply to  Maxda
1 year ago

Id say it ended when the violence skyrocketed and math and reading skills dropped, about 1965-1969.

Eloi
Eloi
1 year ago

True story, just happened minutes ago, from the front lines of the downfall of society:

Grammar test.
Question: One of the football players injured (his/their) foot.
[Student raises hands. Teacher walks over]
[Student]: Is this “their” the singular or plural “their”?

ArthurinCali
Reply to  Eloi
1 year ago

War is peace, slavery is freedom. It seems Covid presented a golden opportunity to fast-track the dumbing down of students to get us to the promised land: Idiocracy.

Alzaebo
1 year ago

I know why this piece is so remarkable.

This is what the Zman means when he says Whites must break away to forge their own philosophies. To create a Greek moment in thought.

Today’s begins with a universal in politics; none have mapped the human nature of rule so well.

The primate mechanics of our groups have been ignored, placing too much emphasis on individual sins or material economics.

Eloi
Eloi
1 year ago

Sorry, but I do not agree with your assertion that this may jeopardize our overlords’ private tax returns. A committee released the taxes. A committee is simply a small group of the cabal that has a specialized interest. No one is going to release Nancy’s taxes, and this ‘precedent’ will not jeopardize that. Even if they are released, no major network would cover it, so it will be unknown. And, even if it is known, no one will care (present company excepted, of course). If the Twitter Files didn’t even provoke a single eyebrow raise in normie, how can one… Read more »

ArthurinCali
Reply to  Eloi
1 year ago

The Twitter files come after a long line of disclosures that should have raised the public’s ire: The Panama Papers, Wikileaks, the list is long.

Until the grocery shelves are bare, and the electricity becomes intermittent, most Americans will stay entranced with entertainment from streaming channels and sportsball.

Oh they will rail against the Ds, or the Rs depending on which political team jersey they wear, but a true realization on how far the decline and rot has set in will not occur until then.

Alzaebo
1 year ago

What this remarkably profound piece told me was that we’ve always had a Blackrock. Did the plebs ever get their land, or did it take a Black Plague to make that happen?

Bourbon
Bourbon
Reply to  Alzaebo
1 year ago

Z: “…human nature takes over and people begin to nibble away at the spirit of those rules, which inevitably results in some sort of formal codification of the rules, if for nothing else than to make it easier to handle disputes. The spirit of the law gives way to the letter of the law and the enforcement of the rules by the people benefitting from the present interpretation of the rules…” Alzaebo: “…we’ve always had a Blackrock.” What worries me is that we are now selectively BREEDING for Blackrocks. My guess would be that, as recently as about 1875 AD,… Read more »

RealityRules
RealityRules
Reply to  Bourbon
1 year ago

There is something to the modernism and escaping the home town. I don’t think these people breed this way for genetic purposes. They are doing it for status. Being from a rural area originally and coming to Mordor was a massive shock. It is all social climbing and insecurity. It is like how people behave at court except there is no court. The leaving of the home town is a great point in terms of major factors that destroyed the fabric of the nation. If you are not loyal to your hometown are you loyal to your nation? Then the… Read more »

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
1 year ago

It’s fashionable, especially among dissidents, to say that there is no difference between D and R, that they are the same uniparty. But when it comes to regime retribution for transgressions against the ruling class, you’ll note that they definitely come down harder on the Rs.

About the worst that has happened to a prominent D in recent memory is the way they pushed out Cuomo the Younger in NY, quite likely just to scuttle his presidential aspirations in favor of someone else.

Bourbon
Bourbon
Reply to  Jeffrey Zoar
1 year ago

Jeffrey Zoar: “likely just to scuttle his presidential aspirations in favor of someone else”

That would imply either:

1) The Tater Mafia is more powerful*** than the Eggplant Mafia, or

2) The Puppet Masters judged Tater Joe to be vastly more pliable & compliant than Andrew Eggplant WhoseNameEndsInAVowel.

===============

***Given the sudden surge in the apparent power of Jesuitism within greater Roman Legalism, it might ackshually be the case that the Tater Mafia is now indeed much moar powerful than the Eggplant Mafia.

That would be a strange, strange state of affairs.

Taters >>>>>>> Eggplants.

Who’da thunk it?

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Bourbon
1 year ago

Obama mafia vs Clinton mafia. Cuomo of the latter.

Paintersforms
Paintersforms
Reply to  Bourbon
1 year ago

Getting close to things I can’t bring myself to say, Bourbon. But since you mention it, we’re reaping Ellis Island’s harvest. Don’t forget the rye!

3g4me
3g4me
1 year ago

My gem for the day: These Daily Mail stories, to me, epitomize AINO and muh democracy today: A fat, homely, screeching yenta – a Kentucky state rep no less – bewailing her equally fat and homely trannie spawn’s suicide, and blaming it on evil and intolerant traditionalists. A Hindu ‘millionaire tech entrepreneur’ who moved to Texas (Texas is riddled with H1-bs) is killed by Austin cops. And yes, they are coming for ‘your’ 401ks. Meanwhile El Paso streets (far from lovely at the best of times) are awash with Nicaraguan and Guatemalan newmurricans. And to cap it all off, the… Read more »

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

“And to cap it all off, the penis-piano-player-patriot prodigy of (((Kolomoisky))) prepares to address AINO’s perverts and preeners in their capital palace.”

Hahahahahahahaha…..this raises the question of how much trash can be compacted into the Capitol.

Lucius Sulla
Lucius Sulla
Reply to  Jack Dobson
1 year ago

The fact that he shows up to meet the “leader of the free world” dressed like a slob shows he’s just playing an act

Mike
Mike
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

The top two items are good news as far as I’m concerned, anything bad happening to the freaks and aliens here is great. Fewer to be dealt with later.

As far as that dipshit Zelinsky goes, when he gets his due it will be a great day. He’s one of those people who you can see right through and it makes you crazy that everyone can’t see what you see in him. His downfall will be spectacular ans well deserved.

Bourbon
Bourbon
Reply to  Mike
1 year ago

Mike: “it makes you crazy that everyone can’t see what you see in him” This is the great conundrum of our time: Why do some folks’ Amygdalae not light up properly [into Code Red status] when pondering the countenance of an obvious psychopath [and a sadistic psychopath, at that]? For a while now, I’ve been wondering whether it’s the SSRIs. From the statistics I’ve seen, SSRI prescriptions seem to mirror COVID-19 v@xxination rates: Something like 65% to 75% of all Amurrikkkunz are v@xxinated, and something like 65% to 75% of all Amurrikkkunz are [or at least are claimed to be]… Read more »

La-Z-Man
La-Z-Man
Reply to  Bourbon
1 year ago

That percentage of SSRI takers is rubbish. I wouldn’t put it at even 10%.

Ploppy
Ploppy
Reply to  Bourbon
1 year ago

Normies can’t detect psychopaths. They only think with the gooey eusocial ape parts of their brains and are easily manipulated by predators, which composes all of the ruling class.

Evil Sandmich
Evil Sandmich
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

Wow that 401k story, requiring people to pay into the things. I have a (very modest, and getting more modest by the day) 401k but it’s seeming more and more like just a tax going right to the bankers.

The Wild Geese Howard
The Wild Geese Howard
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

Giant Meteor comments on Zero Hedge a lot.

I keep telling him Mrs. Meteor and Meteor Jr. are more than welcome to join him on his trip to Earth!

KGB
KGB
Reply to  The Wild Geese Howard
1 year ago

I was heartened today that ZH readers were nearly unanimous in wishing for the Ukrainian Clip Tip to meet an untimely demise during his visit to the Imperial Capital.

Jack Boniface
Jack Boniface
Member
1 year ago

Joe Sobran once quipped, “President Clinton carries a Bible because he’s looking for loopholes.”

The real Bill
The real Bill
1 year ago

Humans not only naturally compete for positions in the inevitable hierarchy; due to the differential distribution of natural abilities, individuals within a society will naturally end up occupying different levels in the hierarchy. Perhaps without strong protections, societies naturally devolve: from ones in which people honestly examine the nature of the spirit of the law, so that they can better adhere to it; to ones run by lawyers looking for a loopholes which will allow them to evade the spirit of the law without repercussion. The opposite of Brutus condoning the execution of his sons, is Joe Biden protecting his… Read more »

trackback
1 year ago

[…] The Gracchi Principle […]

TomA
TomA
1 year ago

When the Soviet Union collapsed, it was fast and unexpected. And that can happen here too. The Congress is about to approve another $1.7 trillion of boondoogle spending, so the likelihood of “muddle through” is becoming a pipe dream of the befuddled masses that just want to stay on the comfy couch, eat Doritos, and watch sportsball. As I have written previously, I wish we could avoid a hard collapse, but wishing won’t alter reality and an early bottom is far less deadly than a long slide into a much lower bottom. So, what to do given the circumstances? First,… Read more »

The real Bill
The real Bill
Reply to  TomA
1 year ago

“….wishing won’t alter reality…” Or, as a friend of mine, used to put it: ‘wish in one hand, and shit in the other, and see which fills up first’. “…. understand that the elites will work very hard to foster a mutual genocide between patriots and LEOs. They want the alphas to kill each off and pave the way for the arrival of the Jackboots to impose the “New World Order.”” Agreed: so one characteristic of a good place to live— in order to escape the coming chaos— is the nature of local LEOs. Here in western Colorado, when the… Read more »

Hoagie
Hoagie
Reply to  The real Bill
1 year ago

They lied. People like that always do just look at the entire lying demofascist party.

Xman
Xman
1 year ago

My own personal experience with “the rules” is that they are used to protect the elites and to screw you. The elites can flaunt the rules if it suits them to do so, but they can use the most arcane, picayune interpretation of those same rules to fuck you over.

If you were geofenced by the FBI as a Jan. 6 guy and it turned out that you lied about your drug use on a Form 4473, you’re doing ten years.

If your name is “Hunter Biden”… meh.

As Leona Helmsley said, “Taxes are for little people.”

So are “rules.”

Evil Sandmich
Evil Sandmich
Reply to  Xman
1 year ago

While certainly the case, the overarching point here is that the elites are also ignoring the rules that they impose on themselves. If releasing tax info on each other is now (ahem) kosher then it can be expected that, say, AOC would release tax info on someone trying to primary her (and/or vice-versa). Such a winner-take-all mindset can go sideways real fast when there’s schism.

KGB
KGB
Reply to  Evil Sandmich
1 year ago

It smacks of the lack of future-orientation that Negroes display. As noted, Trump probably doesn’t give a toss about his tax returns being released. If they find something crooked in them, well, did anyone expect anything different? But when it’s the financially virginal AOC getting hers released, she’s gonna have some ‘splaining to do.

She’ll always have the content creators of the fourth estate to cover for her, but does she really want the trouble? Her left flank has already nipped at her heels more than once.

ArthurinCali
1 year ago

Regarding Trump, the ruling class appears to have the wrong take on his ascension to the presidency, and what that represented for the country as a whole. They viewed him as an aberration in the programming. A glitch in the matrix, not a sign of how far the country has declined. When almost a third of the country puts their faith and confidence in a former reality show real estate agent, that should have been a sign that things were a little off. For all his pomp and personal aggrandizing, Trump brought up the issues that stay mostly ignored by… Read more »

Chet Rollins
Chet Rollins
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

You only need a generation or two before what was once unconscionable becomes just the way things are. In the 1960’s people frowned upon interracial marriage, looked in horror as cities descended into decadence, and still had reasonable family law. Now young people look at these topics with a shrug at best, and will personally attack you for being a dissident at worst for simply bringing it up. The same is going to happen with the gender madness. As technology makes more and more of life safe and mundane, you might start to see a humanity that truly is a… Read more »

ArthurinCali
Reply to  Chet Rollins
1 year ago

A recent post from Steve Sailer brings attention to this article from 1958. Just one example of how long things have been noticed, and papered over with excuses.

National Affairs: THE NEGRO CRIME RATE: A FAILURE IN INTEGRATION

Monday, Apr. 21, 1958

https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,810262-1,00.html

“They are afraid to say so in public, but many of the North’s big-city mayors groan in private that their biggest and most worrisome problem is the crime rate among Negroes.”

The real Billl
The real Billl
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

Whereas nowadays, you not only get canceled for noticing disproportionate Black crime, you get extra penalties for using the word “Negroes”; which the criminals find unbearably offensive.

Things have changed

usNthem
usNthem
Reply to  The real Billl
1 year ago

I guess “negro” is now the new, big, bad N-word

Ostei Kozelskii
Member
Reply to  The real Billl
1 year ago

Things have deteriorated. Cataclysmically.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

AthurinCali: Oh, but I’m constantly assured by earnest and well-meaning people – even here – that prior to LBJ the negro family was solid as rock and they were all economically upwardly mobile. All those studies and statistics since their famed emancipation after ‘murrica’s “second founding” demonstrating otherwise? Mere chaff. As usual, I try to direct others to the fairly exhaustive studies done by the site ThoseWhoCanSee blogspot. Many of the posts are long and dense (and years’ old) but they include extensive links to studies and statistics. tl;dr: Blacks have never approached the White mean – degraded as it… Read more »

Tars Tarkas
Tars Tarkas
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

The whole ‘welfare causes all these problems’ is just the Republican version of ‘white supremacy causes all these problems’

The whole refusal to see the problem and simultaneously blame the problem on us means actually solving the problem is impossible.

1) It’s not happening.
2) White people do it too.
3) If it happens to White people, we deserve it.

Two wrongs make a who cares.

Our refusal to acknowledge or try to solve the problem is the root cause of so many of our problems. Maybe we can get some midnight basketball and solve all of our problems.

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

@Tars:

Brilliant comment. Republicans know their audience, and often use solicitations that start with “(A)s a black man…” It is to laugh.

Xman
Xman
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

The plan for achieving racial equality is not to uplift the Negro to the white mean, it is to lower the white mean to the level of the Negro mean.

karl von hungus
karl von hungus
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

call it a silver lining, but whites losing majority status means their pets the nigs will be (and are being) exposed to the tender mercies of latins and asians. i don’t expect there to be many negroes roaming free – or left alive – once that process gets going in earnest.

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

@kvh:

When will Normie drop ’em, though? When the Tribe insists on it?

Tars Tarkas
Tars Tarkas
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

Z linked to that article yesterday. That was a fascinating read. All the same excuses.

The first chapter of “White Power” by George Lincoln Rockwell has a series of headlines taken from newspapers from the time of the writing and every single one of them could have been printed last week.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

The worst part is that these excuses and lies help exactly nobody. It’s pretty much all downside.

RealityRules
RealityRules
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

It was the conclusion of the article that is most interesting. It is inclusion they argue for. Diversity and Equity have been added as bonus booster words in recent times. Of course, AA, government jobs, special loan programs, untold trillions on education after 1958 and black crime as a percentage of overall crime has actually gotten worse. Truly staggering. What has changed is that Time could never run this article today say point blank that it is the NAACP and black leadership that looks the other way at black crime and dysfunction. Of course, R.J. Reynold gets the last word.… Read more »

Mr C
Mr C
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

Trump was several things, but only one thing depending on who you are. 1. He was a clown and a middle finger to the system if you were intelligent. 2. He was the savior of democracy if you were a simp who feels intelligent because you can follow along with Fox News. 3. He was the pure expression of racist America if you were a simp who can follow along with non Fox News media. 4. He was literally Hitler if you were a moron who can only consume orders. 5. He was a sign that the system is illegitimate… Read more »

The real Bill
The real Bill
Reply to  Mr C
1 year ago

To which I would add:

6. He was a severe disappointment to those of us who believed that he truly was the conservative he pretended to be in his campaign.

KB_TX
KB_TX
Reply to  The real Bill
1 year ago

See number 2 above…

jpb
jpb
Reply to  Mr C
1 year ago

6. Trump is a sheep dog.

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

“Now they seem to want to keep the sinking ship of our country afloat with the same tricks and illusions that have been used before.” I guess that their highest goal is to dispossess the descendants of Europe. All other goals are subservient to this. They are willing to incur lots of collapse in our country in pursuit of that imperative. All they have to do is keep the border open. I believe that it is hard for white, non-chosen people to imagine this kind of single minded hatred. I’ve got a good friend who is a liberal but the… Read more »

The real Bill
The real Bill
Reply to  LineInTheSand
1 year ago

Indeed! It’s all about crushing traditional Whites.

Gregory Johnson nailed it in the second part of his essay based on his talk at AmRen:

https://www.amren.com/features/2022/12/the-challenge-ahead-part-ii/

Valley Lurker
Valley Lurker
Reply to  The real Bill
1 year ago

*Gregory Hood. I point this out not as a scold but rather because Greg Johnson embarrasses himself on the Ukraine.

Tars Tarkas
Tars Tarkas
Reply to  ArthurinCali
1 year ago

One of the main things that enabled Trump was Hilary Clinton. The fact that the best the system could come up with was Hilary Clinton was also a sign of the decline.

Imagine if Betty Ford had run in 1988. It’s on that level. Betty never met a bottle she didn’t like and Hilary never met a scheme she didn’t like. Bill at least had charisma.

Personally, I’m hoping for Hunter for President 2028. He slogan can be, Give me a crack at it.

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Tars Tarkas
1 year ago

I have always said that Trump winning had more to do with Hillary than it did with Trump.

usNthem
usNthem
1 year ago

Written rules, written law, the observable truth – nothing is sacred anymore – everything is open to interpretation now. Thus men can categorically be women and vis versa. It’s just getting embarrassing now, but the real problem is the power these turds hold and their increasing desire and willingness to wield it. 95% of the population couldn’t give two s**** over Trump’s tax returns. The insane obsession of the elites and average lefty with Trump is something to behold. The only other thing that seems to comes close is Ukraine – again which probably 99% couldn’t give two s**** about,… Read more »

theRussians
theRussians
Member
Reply to  usNthem
1 year ago

today, we are fortunate to have passed the $1.7T spending bill in time to worship the visit from hero zalensky with his favourite tribute…CASH. With any luck, his wife will go shopping and drop $100k in local shops.

Evil Sandmich
Evil Sandmich
Reply to  usNthem
1 year ago

That was something Z alluded to: they keep dumping what little legitimacy they still have for nothing in return. Someone intentionally trying to cast doubt on the regime would have trouble doing better than the people running it now.

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Evil Sandmich
1 year ago

I wouldn’t call it for nothing. They are at the epicenter of all the wealth, power, and privilege in the world, and they partake.

Marko
Marko
1 year ago

I suspect that if we were to set our timeline against the Roman one, we are in the Gracchi reforms era. Trump is the Elder and…God help us, Don Jr. is the Younger.

‘Tis the time of year for predictions, so if this does in fact set us up for a Red Caesar (Marius) then a Blue Caesar (Sulla) and back to Red (Julius) then at least we’ll get a return of the proscriptions list.

Chet Rollins
Chet Rollins
Reply to  Marko
1 year ago

The only possible hereditary successor to Trump is Barron, and that’s if meme magic can turn him into the man 4-chan wishes him to be. Only the Trump/Melania genes can hope to create the Kwisatz Haderach.

The rest have the resolve of a limp dish rag.

Citizen of a Silly Country
Citizen of a Silly Country
1 year ago

If we haven’t had our “Gracchus” moment, we’ve come right up to that line. And it’s not just Trump. Over the past several years, the elite have shown that they will destroy (or, at least, do their best) the life or business of anyone who even mildly opposes them. They’ve absolutely proven that they will destroy the life of any normal person. The Jan. 6 demonstrators are proof of that. But they’ve also moved up the ladder to attack politicians and business people. They destroyed the career of Steve King. They have done their best to destroy Trump, a billionaire.… Read more »

Vizzini
Member
Reply to  Citizen of a Silly Country
1 year ago

The only line that the elite haven’t crossed for the wealthy and/or public figures is violence and arrest.

Roger Stone might disagree.

As for violence, well, only for the inconvenient, so far. There are an awful lot of “suicides” going around.

B125
B125
Reply to  Citizen of a Silly Country
1 year ago

Sort like what happened to Jack Ma in China. You don’t hear much about him anymore, after the CCP decided that he got too big for his britches. The difference of course is that the CCP is run by Han Chinese – for the party members benefit of course but also the benefit of the Han Chinese people. The Han Chinese people have greatly benefitted, at least materially, from CCP rule, and are willing to overlook the police state, at least for now. Our Western elite either believe they have no people, or are part of an alien people that… Read more »

Alzaebo
Reply to  B125
1 year ago

3% of children in the world are White.

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  Citizen of a Silly Country
1 year ago

I have a comment awaiting moderation about this, but it is highly likely that Cloud on Cloud violence will happen in the near future. It is the natural arc of these things as has been repeated throughout history. We are seeing some of the outlines of this now, particularly in regard to the Ukraine war and the on-again, off-again contractions of energy and food supplies. State muscle answers to those who pick up the tab, and there is a great deal of uncertainty as to who will be in that position when all shakes out. Again, and this also is… Read more »

The real Bill
The real Bill
Reply to  Jack Dobson
1 year ago

One could argue that “Cloud on Cloud violence” has already begun:

The “suicide” of Vince Foster

The murder of Seth Rich, the DNC worker who leaked Hillary’s emails, during a “robbery gone bad” where nothing was stolen

The “suicide” of Jeffrey Epstein

All messages for Cloud People who might be tempted to transgress the rules of the tribe.

Mr C
Mr C
Reply to  Citizen of a Silly Country
1 year ago

What the empire is doing to the “J6ers” is wrong, but they weren’t right to begin with.

These were people so infatuated with Trump and so delusional as to think going into the Capitol illegally would solve any of our problems.

These people aren’t martyrs. They are morons. Sometimes morons get locked up by bad people.

The real Bill
The real Bill
Reply to  Mr C
1 year ago

Agreed: they were morons to think that their invasion of the Capital would have any practical effect; and doubly, so to not have realized that it would likely have a negative effect.

But it’s still terribly wrong the way they’re being treated.

Both can be true:

Being a moron doesn’t or shouldn’t lose a person their constitutional rights.

Mr C
Mr C
Reply to  The real Bill
1 year ago

Agreed. More text

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Mr C
1 year ago

Mr C: That you believe there is such a thing as entering the Capitol ‘illegally’ says it all. We regularly wandered through the hallways and empty congress chambers with visiting relatives when I was a child.

Were the protesters ‘morons’? Quite possibly. Are you a cretin? Indubitably.

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  3g4me
1 year ago

The propaganda organs told him these folks were criminals, hence they are. Odds on he still has a mask at ready.

Valley Lurker
Valley Lurker
Reply to  Jack Dobson
1 year ago

We have Michael Anton to thank for these new deep thinkers it seems.

joeyjünger
joeyjünger
1 year ago

At this point, I think all normal people are not even enraged, or surprised by what the people in charge are doing with Trump. It’s starting to edge into creepy/obsessional territory. Adam Schiff parading around with Trump’s personal information comes off now more like some rebuffed stalker who’s built a shrine to the girl who refused to go out on a date with him. The bug eyes don’t help the impression, either. I wouldn’t be surprised if tomorrow Schiff announced his intention to aloe up Trump’s skin so he can wear his orange carcass as a suit, a la Buffalo… Read more »

Hoagie
Hoagie
Reply to  joeyjünger
1 year ago

I have my fingers crossed for mass assassinations.

Marko
Marko
Reply to  joeyjünger
1 year ago

Our political and media classes are filled with second- or third-rate people: attention whores, status chasers, Hooters girls, and welfare queens. All the intelligent people are in other fields. So we get the Adam Schiffs and Lindsay Grahams. I suspect anyone who runs for office is some kind of psycho. I hate to say that about Blake Masters or Matt Gaetz or Ron DeSantis, but maybe it’s true. We are a long way from the Serious Men in Charge we saw in The Hunt for Red October or Thirteen Days. People should look at our political class like Venezuelans or… Read more »

Marko
Marko
Reply to  Marko
1 year ago

I should have written “better” rather than “intelligent” people

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  Marko
1 year ago

The garbage tier filth in these positions is off-the-charts. One of the reasons Trump set these types off so much is he didn’t conceal his uncouthness and it caused people to notice what rank scum has floated to the top elsewhere.

Anti-Gnostic
Anti-Gnostic
Reply to  Marko
1 year ago

The Reagan Administration was probably the last time the grown-ups were in charge. Or maybe the Eisenhower Administration. And I could never figure out the popularity for Jorge W. Arbusto among conservatives. From the beginning, I thought he was a petulant midwit who made terrible decisions. Where are the big-brained elites? My impression is they’re hunkered down in lucrative, highly technical roles in companies and firms. Some are still in the federal bureaucracy. They keep their heads down and retire to mountain or waterfront communities behind big stacks of money. They perceive democratic politics as demeaning and hopeless. Ron DeSantis… Read more »

Alzaebo
Reply to  Anti-Gnostic
1 year ago

We’re going to have another civil war, aren’t we?

The DeSantis Red governors to prep secession, since we far-travellers don’t have an empty continent to run to.

Like last time, the vengeful zealots will keep our conquered lands in a hundred-year depression.

One future green shoot is that the subdued South, through sheer technical and military mastery, made itself indispensable and began to rise again.
As did their factory wage-slave brothers in the North.

Like the Moon shots, only White people could kickstart a middle class. From nothing, I add.

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  Marko
1 year ago

That Tom Clancy stuff was some Grade A agitprop. Got a whole generation or two believing in the selfless patriotic CIA agent, right at the same time the intel establishment was taking over the government. And it seemed to be well targeted at the military/patriotic set, when I was in the military it seemed like half the folks were reading that garbage. Hypothetically that’s the demographic that would have been most likely to do something about it if they knew their country was being subverted.

The Wild Geese Howard
The Wild Geese Howard
Reply to  joeyjünger
1 year ago

“Here’s another $45 billion for Ukraine and Patriot missiles crewed by US, ‘trainers,’!”

JerseyJeffersonian
JerseyJeffersonian
Reply to  The Wild Geese Howard
1 year ago

And for those “trainers”, a box to send the parts home to mama in.

H/T Frank Zappa, Dumb All Over…

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  joeyjünger
1 year ago

” things can’t keep going like this without something really, really bad happening, and soon” Correct. I think this has been the brake on the outright assassination of Trump, but after political violence has been normalized, and it certainly has been, that horse has left the barn. I’ll reup my prediction a Cloud gets whacked this year or the next, likely by an insider such as a disgruntled pilot. This is what happens periodically in Latin America; even extraordinary wealth only can buy so much protection. And like the normal case in Latin America, this will be one Cloud moving… Read more »

Member
1 year ago

The term “elite” only makes sense in the narrow definition of those at the top of the hierarchy. In the sense of being better suited for rule, our “elites” are anything but. Arnold Toynbee’s observation that creative minorities (true elites) become replaced by dominant minorities (elites in name only) applies here

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  Raymond R
1 year ago

The contrast between the titans of the Gilded Age and the current iteration is enormous.

Hemid
Hemid
Reply to  Jack Dobson
1 year ago

I have a ludicrously complete complete works of James Joyce, born 1882, that includes what survives of his school work, most notably a theological essay he wrote when he was nine years old.

There is no living billionaire intelligent enough to *summarize* it.

PrimiPilus
PrimiPilus
Reply to  Raymond R
1 year ago

I’ve always had difficulty with using the word “elite” in the context of the discussions attending our BIG PROBLEM in western civilization. Aside from the obvious fact that their now-obvious goals, character and record do in no way qualify them for this label, there is another confusion that arises involving what the word represents. The problem, it seems, is that the term “elite” confuses just what or who we’re talking about — at least it does in my internal dialogue. The issues is that there are many elites: elite athletes, elite military forces, local social elites, state political elites, academic… Read more »

Jeffrey Zoar
Jeffrey Zoar
Reply to  PrimiPilus
1 year ago

All clouds and aspiring clouds know who they are and are self conscious of the fact

PrimiPilus
PrimiPilus
Reply to  Jeffrey Zoar
1 year ago

I understand that they are acutely conscious of who they are and who is not them. I had to work with the Aspirants for about a decade and a half. I just think that’s something WE need to have a clear grasp of …. a thing about we have to have and use clearly understood and meaningful terms. Interestingly, it’s also something that those true Cloud People like to keep us from knowing or thinking about too much. For the first four and a half decades of my now six-decade plus life, I thought those in the political class were… Read more »

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  PrimiPilus
1 year ago

“Is it the US political class that’s the cause? (I think not …); are they a class at all? Is class the right term? How about Cadre, or Caste, or some other term?”

No. The politicians are The Help. But/for luck and perhaps a little skill, they would be grounds keepers. As for your other questions, they are very important and I don’t have a ready answer. Sometimes I use “Ruling Class” as well but that implies a more public face than is the case.

Barnard
Barnard
1 year ago

I can’t wait for all the hot takes from journalists and pundits who have no understanding of the real estate business or business law for that matter on Trump’s tax return. They will probably be outraged he took depreciation. The only thing we will learn is that Trump exaggerates his wealth which any thinking person who has observed his career already knew.

ProZNoV
ProZNoV
Reply to  Barnard
1 year ago

Exactly.

Taxes are so ridiculously complex, not one person in a million could possibly hope to understand Trump’s taxes.

Que the “experts”, who’ll tell the hoi polloi what to think. Half will think “nothing burger”; half will think “this is just as bad as the Big H’s Tax return!”.

Why do this besides pure spite?

It’s a warning to populists, particularly wealthy ones: “Don’t play in our pool, or we will destroy you, and everyone you care about.”

Compsci
Compsci
Reply to  ProZNoV
1 year ago

I agree, no one could understand Trump’s taxes. However, no one understands most of the laws passed either. Releasing tax info will allow those duplicitous types to “analyze” and “summarize” the salient points for us dirt people. In there Trump can be slandered. Trump’s tax records should provide detrimental sound bites from now until the end of time for the opposition.

The Wild Geese Howard
The Wild Geese Howard
Reply to  Barnard
1 year ago

Trump also has a team of professional accountants and attorneys tasked with managing his taxes and ensuring they are accepted by the IRS.

This is an unbelievable nothingburger.

anonymous
anonymous
1 year ago

Why exactly are the (((elites))) so spiteful and vicious? For example, why is it necessary for (((them))) not only to destroy Confederate monuments, but give them to “black history” museums for further humiliation and desecration?

The (((elites))) can plunder, but they completely incapable of ruling.

Exalted Cyclops
Reply to  anonymous
1 year ago

((( They ))) dont care for confederate statues one way or another. Those statues are removed because local people dont care anymore to protect them. It is not John Wayne country anymore.

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  Exalted Cyclops
1 year ago

Correct. Like the Floyd riots, the locations are selected carefully. There are still quite a few Confederate monuments and statues, but they are where removal would not be met with disinterest. During the Floyd riots, the very few times mistakes were made as to location the street thugs left immediately. As you note, areas where such cannot happen are decreasing.

Vizzini
Member
Reply to  Jack Dobson
1 year ago

Back during the summer of Floyd, one Antifa/BLM group got the bright idea to march on the home of a high-ranking KKK official somewhere deep in the rural South. I think it might have been Arkansas, can’t remember.

Anyway, when they showed up, armed White people were lining the roads and had blocked access to the road leading to the guy’s property.

It was the quietest, politest Antifa/BLM protest ever.

Vizzini
Member
Reply to  Vizzini
1 year ago

I should add that such a thing is only possible, because they weren’t undermined by the local Sheriff. In the big cities, the cops protect the protestors.

Jack Dobson
Jack Dobson
Reply to  Vizzini
1 year ago

I think I caught a video of that subdued protest. The truth is these types fold the moment they are punched, and that’s when the State thugs from the various three-letter agencies get deployed. I’ve got a suspicion that even some areas that knelt down during the BLM riots would have a pretty high rioter body count if the same happened again. The State-sponsors of terror would respond, of course, but that would mark the end of it.

3g4me
3g4me
Reply to  Vizzini
1 year ago

Vizzini: I think the protest you’re referring to was in Zinc, Arkansas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiy7ZVwLgCM

Although no mention of the KKK, the blacks encountered a similar lineup of armed Whites in Crown Point, Indiana:

https://headtopics.com/us/armed-white-residents-stare-down-blm-protesters-in-indiana-13509346

Anon
Anon
Reply to  Vizzini
1 year ago

“The truth is these types fold the moment they are punched”

Funny how all the BLM protests petered out when Kyle perforated three “blacks”.