Introduction: Frank (aka Dove):
I was born 7 days after FDR died and got my name from him. I’m retired after 4 different careers in motion picture film (16 & 35mm) editing of educational films; as a machinist, labor activist and shop steward in a major GE factory; as a manager of QA and software development organizations; and finally as a social worker in public schools and private practice.
My anti-authoritarian perspective brought me into productive conflict with various governmental, corporate, non-profit, and political entities. I was a member and activist in several labor unions and ad hoc groups in each career. I can point with pride to several conflicts which helped improve peoples’ lives.
While I calculated the surplus value produced by labor, I did not appreciate the theft of labor committed at the government level through currency manipulation, money printing, selective taxation, and corporate bailouts. It is the corporate control of the government that gets us corrupt government.
Since retiring, I have been an advocate of democracy through various organizations, and see the Digital Democracy of Taiwan as a model for rebuilding public trust and creating a participatory democratic world. I reject the call for a new king!
I see bitcoin, lightning, and Nostr as tools to enable human freedom and cooperation. To this end, I support the Human Rights Foundation in its work. I look forward to participating in this platform.
The UFOs/UAP‘s that have been visiting us display a level of energy unknown to us. Maybe if we are nice to them, and not try to exploit them for military or commercial gain, they will share it with us. How would almost free energy affect bitcoin mining?
#justice #politics #freedom #democracy #ruleoflaw
From #DianeRavitch
The far-right forces behind Trump have been planning their assault on democracy and the rule of law for years. Decades even, if you consider ALEC and other rightwing groups, like the Heritage Foundation. Project 2025 was the plan, and one of its author is now director of the powerful Office of Management and Budget.
A central part of their plan was to overwhelm the public and the media with a flurry of executive orders. They call it "flooding the zone." It's nearly impossible to react to three or four outrages a day. Who can even catalogue all of them?
Heather Cox Richardson tries to pull it together for her readers. Yesterday there were multiple court orders, more than she has room to report. And multiple executive orders, including one suspending enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits U.S. firms from bribing foreign officials; Trump thinks it puts American businesses at a disadvantage if they can't bribe foreign officials as their competitors do.
Published here first!
Are We Free?
The most effective chains are the ones we choose to wear.
The oil and plastics industries have now cemented their grip on the United States, aided and abetted by big tech, big agriculture, the weapons industry, big pharma, banks, Wall Street, and the rest of them. With Musk and Trump as willing enactors and beneficiaries, Heritage’s Project 2025 has become the plan of the land.
The playbook is simple: cripple the government agencies meant to protect us, then use their failure as justification to dismantle them entirely. Rotten meat, polluted rivers, failing banks bailed out by taxpayers, alienated allies, screwed workers, looting of the middle class, and ferocious, unpredictable storms—this is the future we’re being led into.
Meanwhile, the hapless and complicit Democrats (Nancy Pelosi’s stock portfolio, anyone?) wring their hands, feigning concern while accepting the same corporate campaign contributions and lobbyist directives that have allowed these industries to capture the very agencies meant to regulate them.
And what of our chains? Look closely. The corporations always win—no matter who is in power. Both parties use the tech giants to engage in mass brainwashing, shaping media narratives to control public discourse. Both engage in censorship and demonizing the others. Book bans. COVID origins. Control over women’s bodies. The presence of UFOs. Demonizing immigrants. Have you noticed?
The Obama administration perfected social media campaign PsyOps—psychological operations designed to shape public perception. The Clinton campaign, by contrast, was technologically inept. Libertarian Republicans sang “the government is the problem” while ignoring who actually controlled the government. And Trump? His campaign weaponized the Koch-backed i360 data network with Facebook-fed social media to manipulate public sentiment. I experienced it first hand.
Now, the controllers no longer hide behind the curtain of democracy. They are tearing it down.
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“It’s time for a return to monarchy,” declare the Curtis Yarvin-inspired Peter Thiel disciples—Musk, Vance, and the rest. And why stop there? Why not a One True Religion led by white men who, by definition, are the smartest?
At the 2024 Bitcoin Conference in Nashville, I witnessed the opportunistic, self-serving adoration of Trump firsthand. Bitcoin represents freedom? Freedom for whom? For you? Today?
What about tomorrow? Are you listening to what they are saying? Watching what they are doing?
Do you have daughters? Sisters? Nieces? A mother? Is your family history free of immigrants? Do you care about what Jesus actually taught?
For years, the Human Rights Foundation has championed getting Bitcoin into dictatorships to help dissidents. But what of our own slow descent into authoritarian rule?
Property rights? Notice how fewer and fewer people in Russia and China can hold onto their property.
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And Musk & Trump? They see Putin and Xi not as warnings, but as role models.
