Year: 2022

One More Sign of a Global ‘Loss of Faith’

The UN is toothless as ever, but it’s seen as a symbol by and of the global elite. They recently deleted an article heralding the economic “Benefits Of World Hunger” from their website in response to public disbelief. (The text in question must be read to be appreciated.)

The official excuse is that it was overdone satire.

Was it? I don’t know. And is mainstream economic theory quite so abysmal? I’m such a cynic, I can’t judge.

But what is clear is that the viral outrage was not sincere hurt due to insensitive if-clearly-satirical sentiments. No! Tired umbrage was taken at an article read simply and literally, at an article which let the elite’s true feelings be known.

So, I regard this episode as yet another sign of global “loss of faith” in the current establishment and an indication these unnatural elites are on their way out (to be replaced by… who knows exactly?).

Read more at the Gateway Pundit here…

DEBATE: Which Diaspora Is Going Down *First*?

We once quoted mainstream, technically-Jewish journalist Jeffrey Goldberg asking (in the year 5775\2015), Is It Time for the Jews to Leave Europe?

To which we appended the more relevant question in the title: “How Long Until the Following Question Is Asked About AMERICA?”

“America” being the local Titanic deck Mr. Out-of-touch Goldberg finds himself…

Of course, that question already is being asked.

Anyway, I found a response to the original article by another ostrichian amnesiac in The New Republic.

And the response boils down to… you’ll never guess: ‘Why do you think America is any better?’

So, yes indeed. Thank you very much for making my point, lady!

She makes a good rhetorical stab:

To the question “Can one trust Europe?,” American Jews will instinctively say “no.” Most of Europe’s Jews will say “yes,” for non-Jewish Europeans are our neighbors, colleagues, friends, partners and even family members. American Jews might make exceptions for France and Britain, noting their military courage, counter-terrorism capabilities, and the high social status of their Jewish populations. Yet these countries are the two most affected by anti-Semitism, as well as being the source of the terrorists who have answered the siren song of ISIS. Can one have one’s cake and eat it too?

Read the rest here…

What Makes You Think Jews Usually Kept the Torah?!

390) A History of Torah Observance: The widespread rejection of Judaism is certainly tragic. But is it unusual?

Sunday, 10 July 2022

A Guest post by Rabbi Boruch Clinton

Some appear to assume that the current state of Jewish observance – where only a small minority of Jews are Torah-loyal – is an historical anomaly. The centuries and millennia preceding the European Enlightenment, so the thinking goes, saw more or less universal halachic compliance, and it was only through a combination of hostile external and internal 18th Century forces that we lost most of our population.

But I’m not sure that’s true. First of all, mass defections seem to have been common through most periods of Jewish history. And second, Jewish life could hardly be considered “settled” during the early modern period (c. 1450-1800) that preceded the Enlightenment. In other words, while things may not be great right now, I’m not sure they were ever all that much better. There has always been free will and bad choices have always been an option.

Whichever way you define observance, there have been so many halachically-deviant historical movements through the ages that it’s hard to imagine any time when observance was the overwhelming norm. From our very birth as a nation, as predicted by Deut. 31:16, religious rebellion has been a real force in our history.

Let’s explore using generally available information. While we can’t be sure exactly how widespread each of these problems was, I think you’ll agree that it’s impossible to claim that they were negligible.

Just a few centuries after receiving the Torah – and immediately following our Golden Age under Solomon – ten of the twelve tribes broke away from Judah and the House of David. They rejected the status of the Temple and, for the next two centuries, ceased attending the three annual pilgrimage festivals (see 1 Kings 12). In time, most of the Northern Kingdom slipped into idolatry (see 1 Kings 19:18). Even the Jews of Judah were persistently unable or unwilling to fully observe all related Torah laws (see 1 Kings 22:44).

There seems to have been significant neglect of fundamental marriage laws in the exile during the period before the Second Temple was built. So much so, that Ezra was forced to directly intervene to keep things under control (Kiddushin 69b). Parallel problems existed among the contemporary Jewish community in Jerusalem (Ezra 10:2).

It’s unclear which era(s) Shabbos 139a (based on Isaiah 14:5) refers to, but the Jewish governing class has seen frightening periodic descent into official corruption. Note the criticism of Jewish judges who allow themselves (מקל לחזניהם) to be used by their staff and handlers in order to facilitate corrupt schemes. And note, too, how prominent Torah scholars strengthened and provided cover for the crimes of their corrupt relatives serving as judges (שבט מושלים). From Pesachim 57a (“אוי לי מבית ישמעאל בן פיאבי אוי לי מאגרופן”), it seems this kind of corruption was a recurring problem.

Continue reading…

From Kotzk Blog, here.

Some Recent Samples of CIA Twitterbot Agitprop

What Does It Really Mean For Twitter To Be Full Of Bots?

By 

July 13, 2022

I have had the joy of working in the tech space for about a decade now. 

You build, you find a customer, you build some more, and find a customer. 

Great ideas sometimes get led astray by this process. 

Google was a great idea — give the user exactly what he wants to find. 

That has turned into “Give the user exactly what Google wants him to find.”  

Twitter too was a great idea — let the user communicate succinctly with anyone he wants to communicate with.

It has turned into, “let the user be communicated with by anyone Twitter wants him to communicate with.” 

In this, we have a problem. Twitter, the home of influencers, appears to be filled with bots. Bots are a programmed account intended to behave in a predictable way. It could be a human behind an army of accounts, all behaving predictably. It could also be a machine behind the army of accounts. Often it is some combination of the two. 

 It comes down to this though — a bot is a reliable way to circulate information out into the world, while making that information seem way more “organic” than it actually is.  

If you have a Twitter account, you may have “people” you have never met who communicate with you and like and retweet a lot of your stuff. That may be a real person interested in you authentically, or it may be a bot. The bot will communicate in a way that seems authentic. And that bot does its job when it fools you into thinking that communication is authentic. 

You see, many people long ago became savvy around the fake news media. They came to understand that the media was manipulated and that truth was hard to find in its pages. 

As the media, which has turned into little more than propaganda and programming, has lost its impact on the public, a new tool — social media — emerged to help supplement that. 

Social media can be a powerful tool for communicating with those you know in a relatively relaxed and trustworthy environment. It can be far more effective at communicating propaganda to you. You are relaxed, you are having a good conversation with a friend, perhaps about something lighthearted, and then that friend retweets something from a friend of a friend. 

You perk up. You are not sure about what is written there. So instead of thoughtlessly recirculating it, you take it a step further and click on the original poster’s account profile first. Their account is anonymous, but it looks like someone you could follow. Maybe they wear a mask if you are on the left or have a virtue tag such as a Ukrainian flag or BLM symbolism. If you are on the right, maybe they have a Pepe profile photo, or a screen name that mentions “Trump” or “45.” Maybe they support a cause you support — such as the environment, breast cancer, veterans, or caring for stray animals. 

Maybe they have the words “MD” or “RN,” in their bio, along with a name and photo that seems real. It lends an air of credibility — someone you could be a friend with, maybe even someone you could trust. 

Let me share with you some tweets posted verbatim by many automated accounts recently on Twitter. 

“I just left the ER.

We are officially back to getting

crushed by COVID-19.

Delta Variant is running rampant

and it’s MUCH more transmissible

than the original virus.

99% of our ICU admits did NOT receive a vaccine”

What would it mean if millions of people began to believe and repeat that narrative? 

Imagine the power in the hands of someone who could make that a reality. 

Social media is an effective way to make that happen. 

Here is another Tweet that appeared verbatim across numerous accounts. 

“You have been the softest, most reassuring voice of reason I’ve felt in years. Thank you, PRESIDENT Joseph R. Biden for taking us all on, when you never, ever had to. Thank you for the respite of peace. I speak for everyone when i say we love you.”

Or this one:

“I speak for the whole of America when I say we need a hard 6-month lockdown, none of this essential work or exercise garbage from last time. Masks to be worn at all times, even at home. Strictly enforced. We can then begin a gradual easing but letting folks out a year after booster!”

Or this one:

“Honest US citizen here, I don’t get why many people hate Biden. I think he’s one of the best presidents in the country right now. He needs time to do this. We should back him and trust the process. We can do this! Let’s go US!”

If you do not believe that these are repeated by accounts on Twitter, just search a unique portion of the phrases above on Twitter or even in an internet search. You will find those tweets. Soon, Snopes may even run an article calling this misinformation to claim that the Twitter platform is home to bots used to influence public opinion.  

Almost everyone is missing the Elon Musk story. It isn’t about shareholder value if the number of fake Twitter accounts are high. It isn’t about advertising revenue. It isn’t about the morality of lying on financial statements. 

All those statements, of course, may be calm and sober and may play well in traditional media and open up the doors to judicial deliberation of this disagreement, but the bot argument is about so much more. 

This is why that really matters: If Musk removes the bots from Twitter, he has denied the CIA one of its most useful propaganda tools on this planet. 

—

Project Pureblood launched last week and is off to a successful start. Its cousin project, “The Converts,” is now open for those who see the evil of the vaccine and mask mandates refuse to comply with them. Have a look here (https://realstevo.com/convertslrc) to learn more about The Converts. Devoid of bots and full of brave warriors like those who read the esteemed pages of LRC, The Converts is the exact opposite of the CIA spin machine that Twitter has become. 

From LRC, here.