Why is America Intentionally Destroying its Global Influence?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0f0vuCycOTE&t=322s
Paul Warburg, creator behind The Icarus Project illustrating the ignorance, wrong path forward and wrong decisions the current Trump administration are taking with their current policy. America in decline by weak leadership with no vision... erratic and plain wrong, estranging long term allies...
How long does Musk have as Trump's henchman and when will Trump take a leaf out of Putin's playbook and Musk will have an unfortunate accident?
A comment piece that considers the increasing vulnerability of Musk in a Trump world. One in which there is only room for one king 
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The #UnitedStates has been added to the Civicus Monitor #Watchlist, which identifies countries that the global #CivilRights watchdog believes are currently experiencing a rapid #decline in civic freedoms.
US added to international watc...
Manjaro Is Losing Ground Very Fast as A Linux Gaming Distro: https://boilingsteam.com/manjaro-is-losing-ground-very-fast-as-a-linux-gaming-distro/#linux #linuxgaming #update #gaming #distro #manjaro #decline #endeavourOS
TLDR: Cassandra letting you know to expect lean years ahead, if you live in an information economy.
I don't know if it's the SARS2. Maybe it's the attention economy; maybe it's accumulated exposure to heavy metals, plastics (equivalent to "an unused crayon" in each brain[1]), PFAS, etc.; maybe it's permanently elevated baseline CO2 levels; maybe it's something else.
But it's REALLY depressing to talk to people in their 30s and older who, in 2019, were clever.
Nurses, accountants, business leaders. Folks who were quite sharp!
Now it's a struggle to convey simple ideas, let alone to analyze. Inference, working memory set size and retention time, linguistic expressivity, even simple math (division by 2 kind of thing) - some of these folks have regressed back into early grade school, in terms of cognitive competence.
It's gonna be hard as this plays out, as these people will be cognitively disabled in place and won't want to leave jobs they are no longer able to perform. Institutions too perforated will collapse. These folks aren't going to want to do physical labour, and in many cases aren't healthy enough to now (THAT one IS the COVID, though, folks).
I see some of these institutions failing in real time right now. It burns more resources to slow fail but many of these folks will be unemployable.
And employment isn't everything! But labour IS how we survive as individuals and as a species, and this drastic reduction in summed output means lean years are ahead.
That's barring unlikely techno-miracles. Treatment that cures Long COVID cognitive disruption WOULD take a miracle though, because neurons don't really grow back much at all. Treatment that cures Long COVID fatigue and PEM would soften the fall.
If you're reading this, the info is not likely news, but sometimes it's hard to make out the forest for all the trees. You've heard Cassandra; sorry that you are cursed* to be unable to change it, but maybe you'll be able to suffer less as it happens.
[1] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-00405-8
[*] (unless you're a medical researcher, in which case, THANK YOU and may your work bear fruit!!!)
Thus it was that with the shadows deepening about him, with his hopes fading one after another, Monsieur Mabeuf had remained serene, rather childishly but profoundly so. His spiritual states resembled the swing of a pendulum. Once set in motion by an illusion, the swing continued for a long time, even after the illusion had vanished. A clock does not stop the moment one loses the key.
[C’est ainsi qu’à travers cet obscurcissement qui se faisait autour de lui, toutes ses espérances s’éteignant l’une après l’autre, M. Mabeuf était resté serein, un peu puérilement, mais très profondément. Ses habitudes d’esprit avaient le va-et-vient d’un pendule. Une fois monté par une illusion, il allait très longtemps, même quand l’illusion avait disparu. Une horloge ne s’arrête pas court au moment précis où l’on en perd la clef.]
Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French writer
Les Misérables, Part 3 “Marius,” Book 5 “The Excellence of Misfortune,” ch. 4 (3.5.4) (1862) [tr. Denny (1976)]
Sourcing, notes, alternate translations: wist.info/hugo-victor/75017/
However, as we have just pointed out, brains which are absorbed in some bit of wisdom, or folly, or, as it often happens, in both at once, are but slowly accessible to the things of actual life. Their own destiny is a far-off thing to them. There results from such concentration a passivity, which, if it were the outcome of reasoning, would resemble philosophy. One declines, descends, trickles away, even crumbles away, and yet is hardly conscious of it one’s self. It always ends, it is true, in an awakening, but the awakening is tardy. In the meantime, it seems as though we held ourselves neutral in the game which is going on between our happiness and our unhappiness. We are the stake, and we look on at the game with indifference.
[Du reste, comme nous venons de l’indiquer, les cerveaux absorbés dans une sagesse, ou dans une folie, ou, ce qui arrive souvent, dans les deux à la fois, ne sont que très lentement perméables aux choses de la vie. Leur propre destin leur est lointain. Il résulte de ces concentrations-là une passivité qui, si elle était raisonnée, ressemblerait à la philosophie. On décline, on descend, on s’écoule, on s’écroule même, sans trop s’en apercevoir. Cela finit toujours, il est vrai, par un réveil, mais tardif. En attendant, il semble qu’on soit neutre dans le jeu qui se joue entre notre bonheur et notre malheur. On est l’enjeu, et l’on regarde la partie avec indifférence.]
Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French writer
Les Misérables, Part 3 “Marius,” Book 5 “The Excellence of Misfortune,” ch. 4 (3.5.4) (1862) [tr. Hapgood (1887)]
Sourcing, notes, alternate translations: wist.info/hugo-victor/74854/
Had this article shared with me today: https://fortune.com/2025/02/11/ai-impact-brain-critical-thinking-microsoft-study/
I went through an array of #emotions. At first, I found it #awkward and #discomforting. I made jokes:
Wait, you mean people aren't thinking #critically and growing #cognitively because the #digitalization of the world is doing it for them....and it's making them (gasps) #dumber!!?? #AI is making it worse?? Is this #Idiocracy? 
Am I being #punked right now!? Where's Ashton and the cameras! 
Then, I had a deep #selfrealization:
Jokes aside - This is a #sensitive topic for me. I talk about it in my closest circle too often. Unfortunately, I have a front seat to the steep cognitive #decline of some close #friends and #family members for years now, and it makes me sad - not because of disease or "old age", simply because of too much screen time and no new cognitive #stimulation. I see too many people purposefully avoiding nearly anything #cerebral, if they even approach them at all. I have many days where I wish the #Internet didn't exist - for a multitude of reasons, but this is a big one. I'm not trying to be "old fashioned" or #sarcastic, I'm just #disappointed in how we #humanz have grown to depend on #technology as a #crutch, rather than using it as the #tool it was invented to be. As the article eludes to, these technologies are supposed to #complement human #evolution, not #supplement it.
(part 1)
We recently had a documentary series on television about former advanced #civilisations that disappeared into nothingness quite suddenly. Some were unlucky with a volcanic eruptions or nature disasters, but many sledded down a shit run on a cascade of wrong decisions and ideologies. I missed the episode about the 21th century USA.
But the series was comforting: other civilisations always step in. And a lush green jungle grows over the ruins.
This is probably worth posting again - Cunk and The Rise of Anti-Intellectualism https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdrbF-PhWRM #Decline #Society #Philosophy #Education #AntiIntellectualism #DumbDownTheMasses #Control
'Royal' Mail may (will) cut deliveries for 2nd class post.
I see it now, this is Beeching for 2025. Capacity will go, the equivalent of feeder lines will wither and we will be left with nothing - a Tory and Lib Dem dream, enabled by Labour. I am sure the new owner will have asset stripped before the final closure.
The #RepublicanParty #GOP is #Rotten and #Stinking. The USA, as a country, is in #Decline. China and Russia are in decline. It's not good when the mottos of the USA changes from #EPluribsUnum and #InGodWeTrust to #WeSuckLess. #ChaosIsComing
#Political Logic of #Trump’s International #Threats. Renaming Gulf of #Mexico is a lot simpler than building the wall. Since winning 2nd term #Trump has made curious pivot to a kind of performative #imperialism..acquiring #Greenland.. #taunting #Canada by referring to its prime minister [who resigned] as a “governor” and vaguely threatening a#nnexation. He began demanding a return of #PanamaCanal, which US ceded more than 4 decades ago. #cognitive #decline #dementia https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/01/trump-performative-imperialism-greenland-panama-canal/681232/
3. Fixation with perceived #national #decline, #humiliation, or victimhood.
– The Trump platform is fixated on national decline and #victimhood. Elon agrees and has made comments about how #China has better workers than the US, etc. #MAGA as a slogan is focused on this point.
@alienghic @rustoleumlove @douglaspynn @gerrymcgovern
Ultimately, #capitalism demands ever-decreasing #efficiency -
to reach the same goals (stuff to work, people to be somewhat #happy and alive) with ever-increasing number of #transactions and #resource #consumption.
It is just not being presented that way.
#Growth is in reality an ever-accelerating #shrinkage,
#decline made to look like #progress.
After a few hours of reflection I realize that "Hang on to your asses, comrades. And learn to whittle" actually works as pretty good general advice for this wild handbasket ride we're all signed up for.
@flexghost Yet *another* reason not to vote for #DirtbagDon and #jdvance. Vance has zero qualms about pushing these baseless and bizarre claims. Trump's #cognitive #decline and #dementia will only worsen. If he is elected, we can expect Vance to assume more control.
The #unitedstates is on the verge of violently tearing away from the fabric of #reality.
