Signs Of The Times

by St. Funogas
SurvivalBlog Contributor May 5, 2022

Since we’re as close as we’ve been in the past 50 years to the possibility of not only WW III, but the nuclear war we’ve all feared since Hiroshima and the Cuban Missile Crisis, the time seems urgent for all Americans to get out of our normalcy bias and start prepping, and for current preppers to kick it up a notch or two. Or three.

This article has been edited many times and has been in and out of my “Do Not Submit” folder at least seven times. While many SurvivalBlog articles are preaching to the choir of us like-minded ones who already understand the prudence of prepping, some of my thoughts and comments over the past few years have been preaching to the duet in the little-used Sunday School room tucked away in the church basement between the furnace and the storage room. I can only hope it finds a wider audience in these most perilous of times in May, 2022 as we stand on the probable brink of WW III.

Tribalism

As I’ve studied and thought about tribalism over the years, I finally concluded that tribalism is biggest cause of Mankind’s woes in the world today and throughout history.

The effect of tribalism is that the more groups (“tribes”) we align ourselves with, the more we subconsciously conform our opinions to those groups in order to maintain our good standing within the tribe. In mankind’s early days, we’d gladly help toss virgins into volcanoes to appease the lava gods even if we thought it was pure bravo sierra. Going along with the tribe was far more important to our survival than verbalizing the truth that virgins can’t stop volcanoes from erupting. Throughout Mankind’s history, tribe has trumped truth.

Our brains have advanced very little since cavemen/Adam. We’re not any smarter, we just have more technology that has accumulated piece by piece building upon what previous generations had discovered. Today’s technological improvements all began with the ancients learning how to make and harness the power of fire, the same fire without which our society could never have progressed to this point and which all our current technologies are dependent upon whether directly or indirectly.

We’re basically Neanderthals with technology and Walmart. Unfortunately, our brains are still hard-wired for tribalism, subconsciously and falsely telling us we can only survive as part of a group. We get into trouble with that thinking when we believe our opponent’s tribe can do no good, our tribe can do no bad, and we refuse to listen to any negative comments about our tribes even when the evidence is overwhelming. This tribalism is what “leaders” take advantage of in order to manipulate us into doing things we otherwise wouldn’t normally do.

We the People, Divided – The US today is more divided than we’ve ever been thanks mostly 24/7 “news,” which far too few realize is a biased and censored propaganda machine. The Internet contributes to the division by allowing us to pick and choose even more tribes to associate with, and provides a platform for beating up on our opponents more than we’ve ever been able to do in history. This great polarization in our country today is a major cause of our so-called leaders’ ability to drive us, both liberals and conservatives, over the cliff like a bunch of stampeding bison, to our own detriment. As we stand at the brink of WW III, it’s imperative to clear our minds and be prepared for what lies ahead with our eyes wide open. Prepping has never been more important in our generation than it is today in May of 2022.

Ironically, this harmful tribalism will be the trigger that causes the need to revert back to the beneficial tribalism that will ensure our survival after TEOTWAWKI is upon us. For the first time in my life, I believe it can possibly happen in the not-so-distant future.

History

I’ve enjoyed reading history throughout my life, mostly military and political history, and the events of colonial America up to the industrial age when life was simpler, the nation more unified, and people lived a lifestyle very different from our own. I’ve also studied the events behind the things we “learn” in school, which as often as not leave out the important details. I’ve studied the workings of politicians who are only rarely ever interested in the welfare of those who elected them to office, and the lengths the wealthy and powerful will go to increase their wealth, power, and influence. But history is written by the victors, both military victors and societal-change victors, so the truth is generally hidden or manipulated to fit their agendas and for the most part, We the People basically just don’t care.

Some of the major world-changing events in my father’s lifetime happened overnight like the Great Depression, while others such as WW II began more slowly. With WW II, the masses were aware of current events with most Americans hoping and praying they’d remain news stories taking place in far-off lands and not something that would affect them at home. The Powers That Be (PTB) made sure they’d eventually hit us at home and the average family was caught totally unprepared. As with the Great Depression, they had no food, money, or tangibles stored up. Normalcy bias was their biggest enemy just as it is for us today.

Don’t let a good crisis go to waste — Most of us would agree that since the onset of the covid “opportunity” politicians have changed the world more in the past two years than in almost any other time period in our lifetimes, mostly to our personal detriment.

When covid first broke out and China started locking down the citizenry, I was certain it would spread much more quickly here since the PTB would never lock us down in the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave. How wrong I was. I stood in amazement at how quickly the masses were scared into submission, gladly giving up their “freedom” to controlling governments at all levels for the illusion of safety.

Wokeism, LGBTQXYZ, 1491, BLM riots, gender being a choice, horrendous things being taught to our children in the public schools, etc., are further evidence of the waterfall we’re headed towards.

Checking Our Premises

It’s safe to say we when things just don’t make sense to us, we only rarely check our premises. A premise says that if A is true, then B must also be true. We’re confused at those times when A doesn’t equal B.

Walking on water — When I say I can walk on water, nearly everybody scoffs. Their premise is that liquid cannot support a man’s weight. The fact is true but the premise is false since they’re only considering water as a liquid. When considering that water can also exist as a solid, it’s obvious we can walk on water when a pond freezes over. We call it ice but it’s still 100% water. Looking at the statement using a true premise, it now makes sense. Anytime we say “it just doesn’t make sense,” we need to check our premises until we find the premise under which it does make sense. If we do that with an open mind and in the words of Thomas Jefferson “unafraid to follow the truth wherever it leads,” we can generally discover the correct premise. Many times however, our tribalism doesn’t allow us to accept it.

Illegal aliens — We gripe continuously that politicians aren’t doing anything so solve the illegal immigrant problem. It just doesn’t make sense that they can’t fix it like they promised in their campaign speeches. When we look at it using the correct premise, that politicians don’t want to fix the “problem,” then the truth is readily apparent. Texas agriculture alone is a $30 billion per year industry, much of the labor done by illegals who are paid above board using fake green cards. If the problem is easily fixed by adding a magnetic strip to green cards, then it becomes obvious that politicians don’t want it fixed.

Leaving military supplies in Afghanistan — We can’t understand why the US government left billions of dollars in military supplies in Afghanistan when we left. We have the mightiest military that’s ever existed so it doesn’t make sense why, after 20 years of fighting a bunch of goat herders with BB guns, we were unable to pull off a victory in Afghanistan. Our incorrect premise is that politicians want to win those wars and want to bring equipment home. The correct premise? The PTB didn’t want to win those wars or bring any equipment home. The third-largest lobbyist group in Washington DC represents defense contractors who provide all the armaments and ammunition for those wars. They’re in business to make money, two trillion dollars off Afghanistan alone, so they need wars to drag on as long as possible and to leave equipment behind so they can sell new equipment for the next war. Another incorrect premise is that our politicians serve We the People, not special interests who donate billions of dollars to their campaigns and provide them with cushy sinecures after they leave Congress. Have you noticed that when one war ends we find a way to get into the next one as quickly as possible?

Are we checking our premises when things don’t make sense? Generally not.

Ukraine Sanctions

Most worrisome of all right now isn’t the war in Ukraine but the sanctions imposed on Russia by western nations. Nearly every news story blames upcoming inflation and shortages on “the war in Ukraine,” when in fact, they’re brought on by sanctions, not war. The blowback from these sanctions will soon manifest itself even more once products already in supply chains are diminished. This blowback will soon affect all of mankind. Sanctions, not war, are to blame. The US attacked Afghanistan and Iraq for lesser reasons and yet, luckily for all of us, there were no sanctions from anyone.

Russia at least had good reasons for attacking Ukraine and yet they’ve been hit with the worst sanctions in history. Whether anyone agrees about the reasons for the Afghanistan/Iraq/Ukraine wars isn’t what’s relevant. What’s relevant is that wars don’t cause sanctions, governments impose sanctions. Relatively few of us peons have stopped to think about how far-reaching those will turn out to be, or the possibility there may be other reasons for the sanctions.

The covid scamdemic — Most commenters on SurvivalBlog agree that covid was a “scamdemic.” The response by governments all over the world was inappropriate and most of it just didn’t make sense to a lot of us. After checking our premises we quickly realized it was just another big opportunity for politicians to never let a good crisis go to waste. This time they wanted to see exactly how far we could be pushed and what freedom-quashing acts they could pull off. They were amazingly successful. The masses ignorantly lined up to have their children, who had almost zero chance of dying from covid, vaccinated with an experimental vaccine which nobody knows what the long-term effects will be. Since it makes absolutely no sense to do that, some believe this is further evidence of the agenda of the PTB who are trying to bring about the Big Reset.

The PTB’s ultimate goals — I’ve never dug too deeply into the details of the Soros/Gates/Bildeberger types of conspiracy theories, mostly because of the high probability they’re true based on what I know of history and the PTB. Regardless of what the masses believe, the fact remains that the rich and powerful PTB have always controlled things here on Planet Earth, much more so than our elected officials. Any concepts we have of Freedom, Liberty, and We the People are just illusions they need us to believe if they’re going to keep us sheep in line, unwittingly helping to carry out their agendas. Instead of facts to support our feelings about Freedom, Liberty, and We the People, our beliefs are based on emotions which are by definition irrational. We want to believe them because they feel so good, so we believe them. Who wouldn’t? As Orwell, Marx, and others have pointed out, if you want to control the masses a good place to start is by changing the definitions of words. Today we can’t even agree on what constitutes a male and a female because the definitions have been so corrupted by people with an agenda.

Ukraine corruption — When it comes to the Russia sanctions the only conclusion I can come to is that things, as always, are not as they appear and we’re all being played by the PTB who run the world. The one certainty is that the sanctions have nothing to do with world leaders feeling sorry for Ukraine, but rather, they’re not letting a good crisis go to waste or an opportunity to punish Russia. Only six months ago they were calling Ukraine’s government corrupt and evil, ranking in the bottom third of the corruption scale compiled by Transparency International due to things like genocide between 2014 and 2021. Now, premises based on the Gates/Soros/Bilderberger theories start making a lot more sense. The uber-wealthy are conspirators by nature and with their billions have far more influence over world events and pushing their agenda that doesn’t bode well for any of us. They also have the means and the patience to pull off that agenda and the Ukraine “crisis” is no exception.

If we believe that Soros/Gates and the Bilderberger crowd are intent on bringing about a New World Order, a Big Reset, or any other freedom-quashing agenda, why would the war in Ukraine be anything more than the most current crisis they’re taking advantage of in order to achieve their ends by appealing to our emotions?

Pearl Harbor – We’ve heard the war slogan “Remember Pearl Harbor!” all our lives. How many of us have asked ourselves why a tiny country like Japan came 4,000 miles across the Pacific to pick on a huge country like the United States who had a much superior military? What about that could possibly make sense? We see ourselves as the victims, 3,000 of our boys died there for no good reason. Why would Japan do that? Very few have checked our premises by digging into the details. The PTB excel at taking advantage of our ignorance of history.

Japan felt at that point, they had nothing to lose and possibly something to gain by striking a blow to the US’s Pacific Fleet. Prior to Pearl Harbor the US had imposed all kinds of sanctions on Japan. How did those sanctions turn out for We the People? How did we benefit? The US had frozen or outright stolen Japan’s financial assets in US banks just as they’ve done with Russia. The US sanctioned oil imports to Japan just as they’ve sanctioned oil exports from Russia. The US sanctioned iron and other metals going to Japan trying to stifle their war effort, just as they’ve sanctioned metals coming out of Russia, metals which are technologically important to the rest of the world including lithium and other rare metals which they’re the leading exporters of. What about that makes sense? Our servicemen were the victims at Pearl Harbor, victims of their own government’s bad choices which none of us benefitted from. Many researchers have arrived at the conclusion that Roosevelt and the Joint Chiefs knew it was coming after we broke Japan’s military codes, but did nothing to stop it in order to get We the People behind their efforts to get us into the war.

War cries and cannon fodder — Once our government convinced us that we were innocent victims, We the People rallied behind the PTB who wanted us to go to war. The purpose of war slogans are to touch our emotions and spur us to give our consent. Remember the Maine! Remember the Lusitania! Remember Pearl Harbor! They’re nearly always based on false flag operations and similar deceptions to deceive We the People. After Pearl Harbor, the US was finally able to overthrow and occupy Japan, the ultimate goal of the Spanish American War in 1898. The PTB always have the patience to carry out their goals even if it takes 42 years in the case of Japan. What did We the People gain from all that? More cannon fodder helping the PTB to achieve their goals. Funeral homes gained but not We the People. Our servicemen fought bravely as they always do, but only after We the People had been manipulated into sending them off to the trenches. This should be a loud wake-up call to those currently foaming at the mouth to go to go kick some Russian butt.

Sanctions never work — Sanctions never work and they won’t this time. Just like the Japan sanctions, the blowback will result in us being dragged into war, again, so we can sacrifice thousands of our boys, again, as the cannon fodder the PTB needs to carry out their goals, again, of a Big Reset and our further march toward a New World Order. When are we going to learn?

Shooting Ourselves in the Foot

When I look at the results of the sanctions against Russia they just don’t make any sense if their purpose is to end the war. So before swallowing the official storyline, I have to check my premises to try to figure out a more sensible explanation for what’s going on.

Does it make sense that Europe is on the brink of banning Russian natural gas when it accounts for 40% of what they use or are they just shooting themselves in the foot? The amount of oil other exporters can supply them with is minimal, much more expensive, and can only cause higher prices for We the People not just for oil, but for the thousands of other products which use petroleum derivatives. OPEC has started moving in a different direction as evidenced by the fact that the Saudis wouldn’t even accept Biden’s phone call to beg for more oil.

We the People, not our “leaders” who are forcing sanctions on Russia, will suffer the most via inflation at a time when inflation is already killing us. Increased oil prices will lessen the effects of the oil embargo: Russia doesn’t need to sell so many barrels per month, they only need to generate a certain income each month. When world prices go up, selling fewer barrels for a much higher price will still give them the income they need. The two largest countries in the world, Chain and India, are not boycotting Russian oil. Who’s really benefitting from these sanctions that can only drive gasoline and other prices up for We the People? What’s the true premise here? Who’s really driving these sanctions? Who benefits?

Environmental “Crisis” — We generally agree the climate change movement is another manufactured “crisis.” The Greenies who are forcing countries to stupidly shut down most of their nuclear reactors are almost certainly backed by the Soros gang to hasten their Big Reset plans to fruition. Why would shutting down reactors make any sense to politicians who are already so heavily dependent on foreign oil, or to Greenies when nuclear provides the most carbon-free electricity possible? What’s the true premise here that would make sense to us? Are Greenies acting as useful idiots for the PTB or is climate change really an issue we need to worry about?

Effects of diminished fertilizer supplies — Russia is also the leading producer of potash in the world, an essential ingredient for fertilizer production and we again have to ask ourselves, who is benefitting from the boycott on essential fertilizer ingredients? The three most important crops grown in the US and many other countries as well, wheat, corn and soybeans, are all dependent on fertilizer to produce necessary harvests. How does it make any sense that the US and the West would put fertilizer export sanctions on Russia when it’s going to seriously diminish harvests everywhere on the planet? The sanctions have already caused fertilizer to go from $220 a ton to $1,700/ton. Who’s going to absorb that price increase? We’ll be paying much higher prices for everything since the majority of our food products come from those grains including all of our beef, chicken, milk and eggs which are fed almost entirely on corn and soybean-based feeds. What makes sense about banning Russian wheat when they’re the largest wheat exporter in the world? What’s the true premise and how can We the People possibly benefit? Government number crunchers are all too aware of the consequences so it seems obvious that something bigger is at play here. Do the wealthy PTB who can pay any price for anything care about the inflation the rest of us peons are having difficulty dealing with?

Britain’s fish and chip shops, just now recovering from the covid lockdowns, are predicting that a third of them will be out of business by the end of the year due to inflated vegetable oil prices as well as shortages and rationing of the same. Much of that oil comes from Russia in the form of sunflower oil. What are fish and chip shops, their customers, and fishermen gaining from the sanctions?

Propaganda

Most of us probably saw the recent news stories where the CIA, for once, came right out and said the Ukraine news they feed to the mainstream media is propaganda, designed to “get inside Putin’s head” and to gain American’s support for getting into the war. A recent survey shows 35% of Americans think we should be involved already. What could that 35% possibly be thinking We the People have to gain? We’re as close to WW III as we’ve ever been yet 35% want to push us and the rest of the world over the edge into the waiting arms of world catastrophe. We talk about the Soros/Gates/etc. group wanting to decrease the surplus population and yet we can’t put two and two together on Ukraine. Is it really going to be worth a decreased standard of living for We the People just for the satisfaction of grinding Russia’s face into the dirt?

Zelesnskyy’s propaganda campaign — Ukraine’s Zelenskyy has spouted so many lies and propaganda to the news outlets they’re obvious to anyone with critical thinking skills. Some of his false accusations use knee-jerk words like “genocide.” Time and time again he’s telling us what Russia is going to do, mostly likely to prime us for the nest false flag attack he’s getting ready to pull off so when they happen everyone will believe it was the Russians.

I can understand why he’s using propaganda: if your country was being overrun by your neighbor who had superior military capabilities, what wouldn’t you personally say to try to get the rest of the world to help you? The photos of dead civilians laying in the streets was almost certainly a false flag event, again to get the sympathy of the world so they’d come to the rescue. Would you kill 100 of your own people to get the world’s attention and help? It’s the old Ethics 101 “trolley car problem,” should you kill one to save the ten?

But understanding that he’s spouting propaganda in desperation doesn’t change the fact that it’s still lies for the sole purpose of manipulating us and the rest of the world, and part of what’s influencing the 35% of Americans who are ready to rush off to war. We’re fed a lot of propaganda about the war, not just from Zelenskyy but our own CIA who admits to being part of the equation and by default, the US media outlets. Is it all “good” propaganda or could some of it possibly be working against We the People in order to further some agenda we’re not even considering in our premises? What can We the People possibly gain from it?

Six months ago Zelenskyy was a thug despised by the rest of the world (except Hunter Biden) and now he’s a hero everyone empathizes with. It doesn’t make sense or change the fact that he’s still a propagandizing anti-freedom thug.

Elon Musk and Twitter Censorship — When Elon Musk was first trying to buy Twitter to show the world how far we’ve fallen from the concept of free speech, CNBC derided him for trying to do such a thing saying, [in effect] “It not his job to tell people what to think, that’s our job!” Propaganda is as rampant as ever and though we fail to admit it, our tribalism makes us just as susceptible as the next guy.

Due to successful propaganda at the outset of the Ukraine war, We the People jumped on board and we’re now headed ever closer to the waterfall more quickly than anyone could have predicted six months ago. Why do we decry propaganda and censorship on all the major outlets in the US, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, who have an obvious agenda, but then fail to recognize it when the war in Ukraine is also a huge pile of steaming propaganda to further a hidden agenda and work against the best interests of We the People? Read up on Operation Mockingbird to get a better idea of the CIA’s secret campaign to influence the media.

Soros & Co. Agenda — Many believe the Soros/Gates/Bildeberger/Council on Foreign Relations /Fabian Society/ Trilateral Commission/Jekyll Island plans and events are true, yet we don’t even consider that the war in Ukraine is almost certainly one more crisis, one more sham the PTB are taking advantage of to bring about their Great Reset. We sit in front of our televisions as spectators, cheering the war on while never questioning what needs to be questioned. None of it makes sense so again, I’m checking my premises.


"The time for war has not yet come, but it will come and that soon, and when it does come, my advice is to draw the sword and throw away the scabbard." Gen. T.J. Jackson, March 1861