• “THE NATURE OF BUREAUCRATS IS TO REGULATE CONTROL with a singular goal in mind that outweighs any other consideration.” Latest is a new ‘Climate Plan’ cooked up by EPA/ Energy/ Transportation/ Housing Departments which effectively would launch an ‘Emissions Lockdown’ – some sort of a commuting miles limit. The premise of these brilliant central planners is that “developing telework and other components of a digital economy can improve convenience by reducing travel demand, along with long-term reduction in vehicle miles travelled… All in the name of Saving the Planet,” ignoring any unintended consequences (as learned from covid lockdown) on small businesses (including some 100K known to have permanently closed) and on education. [PATRIOT POST – 2/6/23]
  • ChatGPT IS THE FASTEST-GROWING GLOBAL USER APP EVER, and considered now state-of-art Artificial Intelligence. This ‘Generative Pre-training Transformer’ model was developed to “generate human-like text by predicting the next word in a given sentence, and is now used in multiple industries including customer service, language translation, and preparation of essays or test answers by students & varying applicants for whatever.” The app even responds to ‘unanswerable’ questions, for example: “Why are humans so fallible?… A variety of reasons including limited access to information and understanding of the world around them, which can lead to errors in judgement & decision-making; Emotions and Biases which can lead to irrational or illogical thinking; Complexity leading to misinterpretations & misunderstandings; Evolutionary, Societal and Environmental factors which shape beliefs, values & understanding… Fallibility can be overcome and mitigated through education, self-awareness, and critical thinking.”   [THOMAS FREY – 2/2/23]
  • MEANWHILE, SOCIAL MEDIA COMPANIES ARE BRACING FOR LEGAL CHALLENGES that “could soon rival the massive claims over tobacco and opioids.” Along with Seattle public schools district, hundreds of individual suits have been filed over “alleged harm to children and teenagers from the effects of social media.” Additionally, the majority of state legislators have introduced or already passed bills “attempting to reform how social media giants moderate their content and increase security measures for users… and the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear several high-profile cases ranging from liability in terrorist attacks to alleged censorship on their platforms… The concerns are not unfounded. Leaked Facebook internal documents show teens who used Instagram experience harm as a result of ‘social comparison, social pressure, and negative interactions with other people’.” [GUARDIAN – 1/31 and COURTHOUSE NEWS SERVICE – 2/1/23]
  • JUST FYI – A PARTICULARLY PESSIMISTIC PERSPECTIVE OF AMERICA’S FUTURE (from a British historian) after pretty universal scorn of the Davos ‘World Economic Summit: “(1) That U.S., along with Western, business leaders are just beginning to recognize the pitiful projection of corporate self-confidence, driven by the reality – failures of competence, public hostility, and loss of historical bearings – that global triumph was only a dream; (2) A recognition so unpleasant they prefer the nightmare of ‘climate crisis’ (a peculiarly Western perversion)… (3) Facing a steep curve of Asian competition and debt, that their solution – digitally enhanced economies of scale through artificial intelligence especially – will accelerate the unmaking of the Middle Classes, which (as Karl Marx foretold) are the West’s true radicals, having built the liberal democratic capitalist system… (4) That the ‘World Economic Forum,’ like the dollar-denominated narrative it was designed to serve, is an international body designed to suit Asian, rather than Western powers.”  [WASHINGTON EXAMINER – 1/31/23]
  • THOUGHTS FOR THE WEEK:

Limits of an All-Electric future were demonstrated this month by complete shutdown of LAX when power went out for only one hour. While gas-powered generators maintained essential resources, the airport was without terminal-to-tower or TSA communications, and jet bridges to planes. The latest California Air Resources Board mandate, that 35% of new 2026 model cars must be zero-emission, was followed one week later by a ’10-day Emergency Alert’ for residents to cut electricity usage or face outages, stemming from a heat-wave taxing the current power grid. To achieve ARB’s 100% emission-free dictate by 2035, new solar & wind energy sources would need to be deployed at a pace five times that of the last decade.  [RED STATE]

Chinese investors with ties to the Chinese Communist Party have been increasingly acquiring U.S. farmland, residential properties, companies, and Military Academies – which are the backbone of the nation’s future military leaders, including New York Military Academy near West Point, and Florida Preparatory Academy located on Space Coast which houses an Air Force ROTC program.

Gradually over the past couple decades, “the three engines of cultural cohesion education/ politicians/ newspapers, those evolved to air and help adjudicate difference, are upon their death couch – all having transmuted into organs in collusion with whatever most promises gain, and unashamed merchants of hatred and panic… evolving into a culture so fatigued and dispirited it is unable even to celebrate hate with a full heart; it is waiting to die.”  [DAVID MAMET ]   “You see, of course, if you’re not a dunce, how it went to pieces all at once. All at once, and nothing first, just as bubbles do when they burst.” [OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES]