"Fascism For Dummkopfs" book by G.E. Nordell - cover

Copyright 2024 by G.E. Nordell, all rights reserved

THE EXISTENTIAL SEASON [est. 2023]

December 22nd is the first day of the Existential Season which occurs on the day after Winter Solstice; the celebration is intended to increase awareness of the existential nature of the Universe and to remind existentialists, practitioners of zen & mental yoga, objectivists, and stoics to refresh their commitment to objective reality.
Existentialism • Existentialist Film Festival

December 2023 Quotations (52)

"I choose bold. I choose action. I choose what’s right for the people. I choose to make a difference.”
~~ American politician & diplomatWilliam Blaine 'Bill' Richardson III [1947-2023]

"Myth: Climate change will lead to human extinction. Fact: [Artificial intelligence] will get us first."
~~ television writer Jay Katsir

"That which can be destroyed by the truth should be."
~~ fantasy author P.C. Hodgell

"No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another."
~~ British author Charles Dickens [1812-70]

"Record profits are unpaid wages."
~~ recent internet meme

"Don't forget to be awesome."
~~ podcaster William Henry 'Hank' Green II

"There is no illusion greater than fear."
~~ Chinese philosopher Lao-Tzu [IVth Century BCE]

"Research shows that 6 out of 7 dwarfs aren't Happy."
~~ Seb O'Driscoll, in 2009

"The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you."
~~ astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson

"So often the case with modern Republicans [is that] every accusation is a confession, and every assertion is projection."
~~ Tom Nichols, staff writer at The Atlantic Magazine

"If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, help somebody."
~~ Chinese proverb

"How beautifully leaves grow old. How full of light and color are their last days."
~~ John Burroughs [1837-1921]

"You don’t need to be smarter than others to outperform them if you can out-position them."
~~ blogger Shane Parrish - in his new book "Clear Thinking" [10/2023]

"Facebook gnomes are good; Facebook trolls are bad. Progressives and Democrats are gnomes; fascist Republicans are trolls. Be a gnome."
~~ philosopher G.E. Nordell

"Today's technology was yesterday's science fiction."
~~ college professor Rodrigue Rizk

"The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less."
~~ Ancient Greek philosopher Socrates [470?-399 B.C.E.]

"The principle of self-defense, even involving weapons and bloodshed, has never been condemned, even by Gandhi."
~~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. [1929-68]

"Come the rewolution you will eat stromberries and cream - and like it!"
~~ Willie Howard [1883-1949], in vaudeville act with Al Kelly [1896-1966]

"The GOP ... [is] a party that is clearly more comfortable with performance art centered on imaginary grievances than with actual governing."
~~ Tom Nichols, staff writer at The Atlantic Magazine

Hofstadter's Law is "It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law."
~~ Douglas Hofstadter - in "Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" [1979]

"Speech is conveniently located midway between thought and action, where it often substitutes for both."
~~ Dr. John Andrew Holmes [1904-62] - in "Wisdom In Small Doses" [1941]

"To be silent the whole day long, see no newspaper, hear no radio, listen to no gossip, be thoroughly and completely lazy, thoroughly and completely indifferent to the fate of the world is the finest medicine [that] a man can give himself."
~~ Henry Miller [1891-1980]

"I hope it is true that a man can die and yet not only live in others but give them life, and not only life, but that great consciousness of life."
~~ Beat writer Jack Kerouac [1922-69]

"Life is the art of drawing without an eraser."
~~ John W. Gardner [1912-2002]

"You know, we don't live in a democracy [but a] Biblical republic."
~~ MAGA Republican Cong. Mike Johnson [GOP LA-04] after being elected as the new House Speaker in October 2023

"When a mystery is too overpowering, one dare not disobey."
~~ aviator & author Antoine de Saint-Exupéry [1900-44]

"Everything [that] you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."
~~ French philosopher Voltaire [1694-1778]

"Normality is a paved road: It's comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow."
~~ Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh [1853-90]

"The lust for power is not rooted in strength but in weakness."
~~ Erich Fromm [1900-80]

"Beware of being too rational. In the country of the insane, the integrated man doesn't become king. He gets lynched."
~~ Aldous Leonard Huxley [1894-1963]

"Reading . . . it's like a holiday in your head . . ."
~~ title character "Matilda" in the musical movie [2022]

"The GOP's descent into fascism, led by Trump, is not [amusing]. There should be a big red flashing light and clanging bells going off in the brains of every right-thinking American. Our country is in real danger, and there's less than a year left to marshal democratic forces to save it." ~~ Teresa Hanafin, staff writer at The Boston Globe

"We will be known forever by the tracks [that] we leave."
~~ Dakota Nation {Native American} proverb

"The first G.O.P. primary debate confirmed the end of the old Republican Party and squelched any hope for a normal presidential election in 2024 . . . Beyond the scorekeeping, what the G.O.P. debate showed is that the Republicans, as a party, don’t care very much about policy, that the G.O.P. contenders remain in the grip of moral cowardice, and that Fox News is just as bad, if not worse, than it’s ever been."
~~ Tom Nichols, staff writer at The Atlantic Magazine

"Every man dies. Not every man really lives."
~~ Scottish philosopher William Wallace [1844-97]

"We are always changing, sometimes even for the better."
~~ Ross Andersen writes in The Atlantic Magazine

"Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate and wine in one hand, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming 'WOO HOO - what a ride!'."
~~ Hunter S. Thompson [1937-2005]

"Religion is for people who are afraid of hell, spirituality is for people who have already been there."
~~ Running Hawk, Lakota Nation {Native American}

"Loneliness does not come from having no people around you, but from being unable to communicate the things that you think are important to you."
~~ Carl Jung [1875-1961]

"It hurts Trump to hear the truth about himself."
~~ Daily Kos independent news site [est. 2002]

"Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very’; your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be."
~~ writing advice from Mark Twain [1835-1910]

"The Republicans [backing] Trump are driven by two factors: ambition and delusion."
~~ Tom Nichols, staff writer at The Atlantic Magazine

"I am not ashamed to confess that I am ignorant of what I do not know."
~~ Marcus Tullius Cicero [106-43 B.C.E.]

"Trump and his supporters ... are deadly serious about their intentions to take power and destroy democracy."
~~ Tom Nichols, staff writer at The Atlantic Magazine

"But better to get hurt by the truth than comforted with a lie."
~~ novelist Khaled Hosseini

"It's the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.”
~~ Brasilian author Paulo Coelho - in "The Alchemist" [1988]

"Art is a kind of innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument. The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its purpose through him."
~~ Carl Jung [1875-1961]

"We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same.”
~~ sociologost Carlos Castañeda [1925-98]

"When you have possessed a book with mind and spirit, you are enriched. But when you pass it on you are enriched three fold."
~~ Henry Miller [1891-1980] - in "The Books In My Life" [1952]

"When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love . . ."
~~ Marcus Aurelius [121-180 C.E.] - in "Meditations" [circa IInd Century]

"Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes."
~~ Carl Jung [1875-1961]

"You meet saints everywhere. They can be anywhere. They are people behaving decently in an indecent society."
~~ Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. [1922-2007]

{each set of posted quotations are then posted at the Working Minds website, alphabetical by author}

THE GAZA WAR EXPLAINED

Golda Mabovitch Meir [1898-1978] was Prime Minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974. She often complained that the God of the Hebrews assigned His 'chosen people' to the only real estate in the Middle East without fossil fuel deposits underground. That territory includes Palestine's Gaza Strip and West Bank.

That is, until natural gas fields were discovered off the coast of Isreal and the Gaza Strip in 2000. The Palestinian fields are rather small - only 35 billion cubic meters - compared to about 200 BCMs off the Isreali coast. The issue has not been about the amount, but that Israel believes all such resources belong to them. On top of that, Isreal is determined to prevent either the Palestine government or the radical Hamas group in control of Gaza from receiving any revenue, both for general purposes or for possible purchase of weaponry for attacking Israel.

The diplomatic balance was skewed further when Shell/British Gas pulled out in 2018, leaving exploration of Palestine's natural gas fields contracted solely to Gazprom, the large Russian natural gas company.

After the 11-day Isreal-Hamas clash in May 2021, Israel tightened economic and geographic blockades against Palestine, causing great hardship. The military wing of Hamas, the Al-Aqsa Brigades, began to plan an attack on Isreal; Israel intelligence learned of the plan in 2022 but did nothing - best guess: Israel chose to let Hamas attack, which would then justify obliteration of Gaza, essentially the genocide taking place since October 7th.

This whole hazarai is about control of oil revenue.
And of course, the entire history of the area is explained by the observation that "There are no adults in Middle East politics."

Copyright 2023 by G.E. Nordell, all rights reserved