Positive Changes That Are Occurring

[Jeff]

The irony here for me is how Ukraine, a country known for being a hotbed of malicious hacking, is now also a hub for tools that help American farmers run their own tractors how they see fit and not remain dependent on the makers of their vehicles

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/why-american-farmers-are-hacking-their-tractors-with-ukrainian-firmware

Why American Farmers Are Hacking Their Tractors With Ukrainian Firmware

JASON KOEBLER

Mar 21 2017, 8:17pm

A dive into the thriving black market of John Deere tractor hacking.

To avoid the draconian locks that John Deere puts on the tractors they buy, farmers throughout America’s heartland have started hacking their equipment with firmware that’s cracked in Eastern Europe and traded on invite-only, paid online forums.

Tractor hacking is growing increasingly popular because John Deere and other manufacturers have made it impossible to perform “unauthorized” repair on farm equipment, which farmers see as an attack on their sovereignty and quite possibly an existential threat to their livelihood if their tractor breaks at an inopportune time.

“When crunch time comes and we break down, chances are we don’t have time to wait for a dealership employee to show up and fix it,” Danny Kluthe, a hog farmer in Nebraska, told his state legislature earlier this month. “Most all the new equipment [requires] a download [to fix].”

The nightmare scenario, and a fear I heard expressed over and over again in talking with farmers, is that John Deere could remotely shut down a tractor and there wouldn’t be anything a farmer could do about it.

A license agreement John Deere required farmers to sign in October forbids nearly all repair and modification to farming equipment, and prevents farmers from suing for “crop loss, lost profits, loss of goodwill, loss of use of equipment … arising from the performance or non-performance of any aspect of the software.” The agreement applies to anyone who turns the key or otherwise uses a John Deere tractor with embedded software. It means that only John Deere dealerships and “authorized” repair shops can work on newer tractors.

“If a farmer bought the tractor, he should be able to do whatever he wants with it,” Kevin Kenney, a farmer and right-to-repair advocate in Nebraska, told me. “You want to replace a transmission and you take it to an independent mechanic—he can put in the new transmission but the tractor can’t drive out of the shop. Deere charges $230, plus $130 an hour for a technician to drive out and plug a connector into their USB port to authorize the part.”

“What you’ve got is technicians running around here with cracked Ukrainian John Deere software that they bought off the black market,” he added.

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Image: Cartec-Systems

Kenney and Kluthe have been pushing for right-to-repair legislation in Nebraska that would invalidate John Deere’s license agreement (seven other states are considering similar bills). In the meantime, farmers have started hacking their machines because even simple repairs are made impossible by the embedded software within the tractor. John Deere is one of the staunchest opponents of this legislation.

“There’s software out there a guy can get his hands on if he looks for it,” one farmer and repair mechanic in Nebraska who uses cracked John Deere software told me. “I’m not a big business or anything, but let’s say you’ve got a guy here who has a tractor and something goes wrong with it—the nearest dealership is 40 miles away, but you’ve got me or a diesel shop a mile away. The only way we can fix things is illegally, which is what’s holding back free enterprise more than anything and hampers a farmer’s ability to get stuff done, too.”

I went searching for one of the forums where pirated John Deere firmware is sold. After I found it, I couldn’t do much of anything without joining. I was sent an email with instructions, which required me to buy a $25 dummy diagnostic part from a third-party website. Instead of the part, I was sent a code to join the forum.

Once I was on it, I found dozens of threads from farmers desperate to fix and modify their own tractors. According to people on the forums and the farmers who use it, much of the software is cracked in Eastern European countries such as Poland and Ukraine and then sold back to farmers in the United States.

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Among the programs I saw being traded:

John Deere Service Advisor: A diagnostic program used by John Deere technicians that recalibrate tractors and can diagnose broken parts. “It can program payloads into different controllers. It can calibrate injectors, turbo, engine hours and all kinds of fun stuff,” someone familiar with the software told me.
John Deere Payload files: These are files that specifically program certain parts of the vehicle. There are files that can customize and fine-tune the performance of the chassis, engine, and cab, for instance.
John Deere Electronic Data Link drivers: This is software that allows a computer to talk to the tractor. “The EDL is the required interface which allows the Service Advisor laptop to actually communicate with the tractor controllers,” the source told me.

A reverse engineer who goes by Decryptor Tuning, who I met on a forum, told me they distribute programs that are “usually OEM software that is freely available but must be licensed.”

[](javascript:void(null))

Image: AlienTechUK

“If things could get better, [companies like John Deere] should be forced to freely distribute the same software dealers have,” they said. “And stop locking down [Engine Control Module] reading functionality. They do this to force you to use their services, which they have a 100 percent monopoly on.”

Also for sale (or free download) on the forums are license key generators, speed-limit modifiers, and reverse-engineered cables that allow you to connect a tractor to a computer. These programs are also for sale on several sketchy-looking websites that are hosted in Europe, and on YouTube there are demos of the software in operation.

On its face, pirating such software would seem to be illegal. But in 2015, the Librarian of Congress approved an exemption to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for land vehicles, which includes tractors. The exemption allows modification of “computer programs that are contained in and control the functioning of a motorized land vehicle such as a personal automobile, commercial motor vehicle or mechanized agricultural vehicle … when circumvention is a necessary step undertaken by the authorized owner of the vehicle to allow the diagnosis, repair, or lawful modification of a vehicle function.”

This means modification of embedded software is legal long as it can still meet emission requirements. Whether the exemption allows for the downloading of cracked software is an unanswered question.

It’s no surprise, then, that John Deere started requiring farmers to sign licensing agreements around the time the exemption went into effect. Violation of the agreement would be considered a breach of contract rather than a federal copyright violation, meaning John Deere would have to sue its own customers if it wants the contract to be enforced. I asked John Deere specifically about the fact that a software black market has cropped up for its tractors, but the company instead said that there are no repair problems for John Deere customers.

“When a customer buys John Deere equipment, he or she owns the equipment,” the company said. “As the owner, he or she has the ability to maintain and repair the equipment. The customer also has the ability through operator and service manuals and other resources to enable operational, maintenance, service and diagnostics activities to repair and maintain equipment.”

“Software modifications increase the risk that equipment will not function as designed,” the company continued. “As a result, allowing unqualified individuals to modify equipment software can endanger machine performance, in addition to Deere customers, dealers and others, resulting in equipment that no longer complies with industry and safety/environmental regulations.”

Gay Gordon-Byrne, executive director of Repair.org, a trade organization fighting for right-to-repair legislation, told me that John Deere’s statement is “total crap,” and noted that “some of our members have repeatedly attempted to buy the diagnostics that are referenced [from John Deere] and been rebuffed.”

“They require buyers to accept an End User License Agreement that disallows all of the activities they say are allowed in their statement,” she said. “Deere is a monopolist and has systematically taken over the role of equipment owner, despite having been paid fairly and fully for equipment. Their claims to control equipment post-purchase are inconsistent with all aspects of ownership including accounting, taxation, and transfer of products into the secondary market.”

It’s quite simple, really. John Deere sold farmers their tractors, but has used software to maintain control of every aspect of its use after the sale. Kluthe, for example, uses pig manure to power his tractor, which requires engine modifications that would likely violate John Deere’s terms of service on newer machines.

“I take the hog waste and run it through an anaerobic digester and I’ve learned to compress the methane,” he said. “I run an 80 percent methane in my Chevy Diesel Pickup and I run 90 percent methane in my tractor. And they both purr. I take a lot of pride in working on my equipment.”

Farmers worry what will happen if John Deere is bought by another company, or what will happen if the company decides to stop servicing its tractors. And so they have taken matters into their own hands by taking control of the software themselves.

“What happens in 20 years when there’s a new tractor out and John Deere doesn’t want to fix these anymore?” the farmer using Ukrainian software told me. “Are we supposed to throw the tractor in the garbage, or what?”

[Jeff]

Carlos, thanks for this great addition - and what nice work on the graphics!

Are they supposed to throw the tractors away in 20 years when Deere no longer supports the model? Why, yes, of course! Just like with cars. Anyone who thinks something software-related is going to be working in 20 years without their having to pay continuously to make it do so, there’s a bridge in Brooklyn for sale I’d like to show them.

The next step in evolution, here, is to realize you don’t need software anywhere near your machinery, at least not this sort of machinery. But I’m glad they’re side-stepping the planned obsolescence in this way.

The words " mystery ", " baffled " and " puzzled " are memes, used, among numerous similar variants, whenever anyone in the wholly-controlled-and-coopted Poltical, Academic, Scientific and Media establishments wants to lie about, well, basically anything. One of those variants is " unexpected ".

That’s why a story below says " And marijuana use is down, too, from 19 percent to 16 percent. That decline was unexpected among local health officials, given the vote to legalize recreational marijuana in November 2012 and the opening of retail stores in summer 2014 ."

Did you notice how they said “down from 19 percent to 16 percent”, to avoid saying the more-impactful “down three percent”? That’s called " careful hedging ."

Anyone studying teen marijauna use for four to seven minutes would already know that drug use among teens in the U.S. has been dropping significantly for some years, now. Mapping against drops in alcohol consumption and cigarette smoking among the same specific population, and against the same trends in wider society. Certainly " local health officials " could be expected to have studied up on the matter.

They have, of course - it’s just that the Mouthpiece of the State writing the story is trying to cover for them by lying, as another great positive change exemplifies itself, to their consternation and ultimate ruin.

In addition to being in the same, er, social club, the reporter, and those local health officials have names, addresses, put their pants on one leg at a time like the rest of us. I used the most general term possible, “social club”, so you could get your head around the concept without triggering programming cues.

Oh, wow, did you notice the reporter took care not to mention their names ? It puts the matter one step further away from inquiry - you’re just supposed to suck up What To Think, you know, listen to your betters .

Hey, look, another mapping data point, re: three years, the three years featured by this thread, since we’ve turned the corner, made the bottom turn:

" Restaurant liquor sales fall for 3rd straight year "

It’s hard not to get excited about what we’re going to see in two years, or six, or ten.

I’m personally really excited about what’s going on right now .

February 26, 2016 - India - 25% drop in liquor sales in Kerala - Khaleej Times

July 13, 2016 - Boo(ze)-hoo! Restaurant liquor sales fall for 3rd straight year

A new industry report shows that on-premises alcohol sales have dropped again, and the cause might just surprise you.

Restaurateurs whose establishments count on alcohol sales for some portion of their income are probably quite literally crying in their beer these days. A new report from the Beverage Information Group shows that despite the improving economy, patrons just aren’t drinking in restaurants like they used to. In fact, the report finds that for the third consecutive year, on-premises sales of alcoholic beverages declined again.

According to a news release announcing the 2016 study, on-premises sales of spirits, wine, and beer were all down in 2015. In fact, last year marked the largest decline to date in these sales, at 2.6 percent.

December 26, 2016 - Illinois - SIU leaders plan to begin alcohol sales by next fall -

January 7, 2017 - Is this the year Sunday liquor sales ban ends? Minnesota House …

March 10, 2017 - Brewers herald 60% drop in under-age hazardous drinking

March 18, 2017 - Clark County, WA - County youth health report shows reduction in drug, alcohol use

The analysis comes with the release of the 2016 Healthy Youth Survey results. The survey is administered statewide every two years to students in sixth, eighth, 10th and 12th grades. Survey answers are voluntary and anonymous. The fall 2016 survey results were released Wednesday afternoon.

With the release of the latest data, county public health staff looked at the 10-year trends among local youth. Tobacco rates have been coming down steadily over the last six to eight years. Among Clark County 10th-graders, for example, 16 percent used cigarettes in 2008 compared to 8 percent in 2016.

And marijuana use is down, too, from 19 percent to 16 percent. That decline was unexpected among local health officials, given the vote to legalize recreational marijuana in November 2012 and the opening of retail stores in summer 2014.

March 24, 2017 - Government policies lead to fall in alcohol consumption - BBC News

March 25, 2017 - Utah - Bill seeking to drop legal alcohol limit to .05 clears first hurdle

March 25, 2017 - Michigan agency drops half-mile rule between alcohol sellers

[Jeff]

“In rode the Lord of the Nazgûl. A great black shape against the fires beyond he loomed up, grown to a vast menace of despair. In rode the Lord of the Nazgûl, under the archway that no enemy ever yet had passed, and all fled before his face.

All save one. There waiting, silent and still in the space before the Gate, sat Gandalf upon Shadowfax: Shadowfax who alone among the free horses of the earth endured the terror, unmoving, steadfast as a graven image in Rath Dínen.

“You cannot enter here,” said Gandalf, and the huge shadow halted. “Go back to the abyss prepared for you! Go back! Fall into the nothingness that awaits you and your Master. Go!”

The Black Rider flung back his hood, and behold! he had a kingly crown; and yet upon no head visible was it set. The red fires shone between it and the mantled shoulders vast and dark. From a mouth unseen there came a deadly laughter.

“Old fool!” he said. “Old fool! This is my hour. Do you not know Death when you see it? Die now and curse in vain!” And with that he lifted high his sword and flames ran down the blade.

And in that very moment, away behind in some courtyard of the city, a cock crowed. Shrill and clear he crowed, recking nothing of war nor of wizardry, welcoming only the morning that in the sky far above the shadows of death was coming with the dawn.

And as if in answer there came from far away another note. Horns, horns, horns, in dark Mindolluin’s sides they dimly echoed. Great horns of the north wildly blowing. Rohan had come at last.”

J.R.R. Tolkien, from “The Return of the King”

Yesterday, several of my compatriots from this forum helped me out in chat, in a really major way, and I’m saying thanks to them here for it.

At one point, a group of ill-intended human others entered our etheric space, and were quickly repulsed. The details of which would make an enjoyable two-part TV episode, but I’m bringing it up here because the consensus amongst the physics was that this whole very-numerous group of ill-intended agents, couple dozen of them, was unified in trying to hold the spell together that I’m trying to break each day here in this thread.

And that they’re trying to hide something. My response was “good luck hiding something from me.”

I’m going to find it, and break the spell. If it occurs to anyone in the readership just what they are trying to hide, please contact me through Don Croft.

At one point during the chat, one of the psychics said (sic) “tons of elementals, operators, wingmakers, cetaceans, all rushing to help!”

We’re all going to break the spell.

To the ill-intended I command:

“Go back to the abyss prepared for you! Go back! Fall into the nothingness that awaits you and your Master. Go!”

[Jeff]

It’s March, 2017, and the great artificial drought has been broken by the slow, steady, widespread and ever-increasing distribution of simple, inexpensive Orgonite devices in the vicinity of the weather warfare infrastructure that many still mistakenly presume only carries cell phone traffic and weather radar data.

I’ve appended three current accounts below to support that assertion.

Data below includes breaking of the drought in both So Cal and Las Vegas, two mighty negative energy bastions and about-to-be-former artificial-desert success stories.

The third story is from New Zealand, which underscores how the great positive transformation that’s underway is global in nature.

February 18, 2017 - Big storm helps Las Vegas Valley break Feb. 18 rainfall record

Saturday’s steady rain brought more than slick roads and flooding to the Las Vegas Valley . It also narrowly delivered a new rainfall record for the date, the National Weather Service said.

March 8, 2017 - California storms: Wettest water year, so far, in 122 years of records

Between October 2016 and February 2017, California averaged 27.81 inches of precipitation, the highest average since such records began being kept in 1895, according to data released Wednesday by the National Centers for Environmental Information, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

This current water season slightly outpaced 1968-69 (27.34 inches average), when a series of powerful storms in January and February of that rainy season resulted in widespread flooding in Central and Southern California, resulting in at least 60 deaths, according to a federal report.

“We’ve had well above normal precipitation throughout California,” Oakley said. “What’s really been a help, atmospheric events have gotten into Southern California, where the drought had really been entrenched.

March 10, 2017 - New Zealand - Record rain causes slips and power outages

Heavy rain is continuing to pummel the upper North Island tonight, with hundreds of Auckland homes without power.

[Jeff]

Most pleasing to me, this just in from a reader, to Don, to me…if you are reading this forum and see something you’d like to add, please send it in to Don.

Years and years ago, I said to someone “there should be a Positive News Network, 24x7. You could fill it. It would totally sell.” If a bunch of people work their beats as reporters, well, there you have it.

I mean, shouldn’t it be that way? Let’s turn on the positive news channel, read through the positive news weekly magazine, or daily newspaper? Why is that currently an impossibility, something that literally doesn’t exist, except of course here on this obscure internet forum? Oh, well, everything’s got to start somewhere.

In conversation, it’s rude, not accepted, for someone to always talk about negative things. They’re not going to do well, socially. You go to weddings and funerals, and the etiquette is to “discuss pleasantries”. So what’s with everyone mainlining the negativity? We’re pretty programmed, when you think about it.

Maybe THAT’s the secret - the folks who are for this moment still in charge of things on this globe are afraid of everyone suddenly realizing that they’ve been misled, that they’ve been programmed in a devious way to collectively have an incorrect point of view . And that realigning one’s point of view is what allows one to figure out a riddle .

Once you figure out a riddle, it’s never mysterious again. It’s like seeing through a sleight-of-hand illusion, which of course always involves misdirection.

Poor Mother Gaia, not dying - tons of fish, and most of them big and fat:

(Alaska) " halibut fishing is said to be “fantastic” and the fish are robust and big. One major buyer said nearly half of their halibut landings were in the most popular 20- to 40-pound weight class and just 31 percent were smaller size s."

But rather booming and burgeoning to a level not seen your, the fishermen or my lifetimes: " Some fishermen maintain this is the most herring they had ever seen ."

Thanks again to the reader who sent this in…

Halibut: “The best fish story comes from Southeast, where halibut fishing is said to be “fantastic” and the fish are robust and big.”

Herring: “…the most herring they had ever seen.”

https://www.adn.com/business-economy/2017/03/25/alaska-fisherman-lobby-navy-to-delay-training-exercises-scheduled-for-may/

High halibut prices

Catches of Alaska halibut have picked up after wild weather got the fishery that opened March 11 off to a slow start. Catches by Friday topped 800,000 pounds from 137 landings, with Sitka leading all ports, followed by Seward, Kodiak and Homer.

The prized flatfish was fetching big prices, up 30 cents a pound on average, compared to the early weeks of the fishery last year.

Halibut prices usually are broken into three weight categories. Kodiak prices were said to be fluctuating quite a bit, with reports at $6.45 a pound for 10- to 20-pounders; $6.75 for 20- to 40’s and $7 a pound for “40 ups.”

Juneau and Homer were reporting a straight $7 per pound, and halibut deliveries in Southeast were paying fishermen $6.70, $6.90 and $7 per pound.

Buyers weren’t beating down the doors, said several major buyers, and there are reports of halibut holdovers in cold storage. It remains to be seen if the prices will remain this high throughout the eight-month season.

The best fish story comes from Southeast, where halibut fishing is said to be “fantastic” and the fish are robust and big. One major buyer said nearly half of their halibut landings were in the most popular 20- to 40-pound weight class and just 31 percent were smaller sizes.

Nearly 2,000 hook-and-line fishermen hold quota shares of Alaska halibut. Alaska’s share of the coastwide catch this year is just over 18 million pounds. The Pacific halibut fishery remains open through Nov. 7.

Herring hauls

Sitka Sound traditionally kicks off Alaska’s roe herring circuit and this year’s harvest may be a good one.

Some fishermen maintain this is the most herring they had ever seen. A three-hour and 20-minute opener March 19, followed by a 15-minute opener March 22, brought the total catch to about half of the 14,647-ton quota. Fishermen were awaiting word of another opener while processors were hustling to handle the herring hauls.

Female herring are valued by Asian buyers for their roe as a percentage of body weight, and the Sitka fish were averaging good roe counts of 11 percent to 12 percent. Fishermen averaged $250 a ton last year and market reports suggest a good chance of higher prices this season.

A herring pound fishery near Craig and Klawock could be next. Fishermen there can catch 349 tons this year and place them in enclosures that contain blades of kelp that hold the sticky herring spawn, prized by buyers.

Kodiak’s herring season begins in mid-April, with the harvest set at a conservative 1,645 tons.

“We expect an increase in the herring biomass but it will be mostly younger 3-5-year-old fish. Thus, the smaller quota,” said area manager James Jackson at the local Alaska Department of Fish and Game office.

Alaska’s biggest herring fishery occurs in May at Togiak in Bristol Bay. The harvest this year is pegged at about 30,000 tons, based on estimates by state managers.

[Jeff]

“Hedging is a rhetorical strategy employed to make statements less definitive (Hübler 233), qualify the scope the scope of a position, limit the rhetor’s commitment to a position (Lukka and Markkanen; Prince, Fader, and Bosk), or minimize potential controversy in order to render a statement more appealing or appropriate to audiences(Fetzer; see also Clemens; Fraser).”

Ryan Omizo, University of Rhode Island
Bill Hart-Davidson, Michigan State University, May, 2016

February 5, 2017 - Brunswick, GA - City crime rate dropped in 2016, but gangs persist
March 1, 2017 - NYC Crime Stats Drop Again, But Hate Crimes Are Up
March 9, 2017 - Chico, CA - Chico State “Orion” - Crime Crates drop, but is it enough?

The quote at the top is from a software program called “Hedge-O-Matic” - the guys who designed it made it so you could enter the text of a document - academic, scientific - hit “enter”, and it will rate the document on an index, fingering those which are heavy with hedging.

How hilarious is that? Hilarious, and serious as a heart attack, because it allows someone to say "your paper has an extremely high 86% rating on the Hedge-O-Matic…your rebuttal?

Harder and harder to be a scoundrel, these days.

That quote is followed by three examples of a wholly-controlled-and-coopted Media establishment using precisely the same hedging tactics and verbiage in disparate cities in the U.S. to hedge against the great news of dropping crime rates in disparate cities in the U.S.

That’s because there are Fight Club cells in every city of every nation on Earth, and the first rule of Fight Club is you don’t talk about Fight Club.

Not everyone’s in Fight Club, quite the contrary. There’s a small number of them, relatively speaking, and they’re all genetically-related. They usually occupy positions of control, and are the ones who get quoted in newspaper articles - by reporters who are also in the club:

" Chief of Police Michael O’ Brien said that during his tenure in the department he has not seen a decrease in homicide for a long time.
“This is the first year in a two year period that we haven’t had a homicide,” O’Brien said. In 2015 there were only two homicides, but in the meeting, members of the council noted that this was still a high number of crimes."

Running things, down through time, all the way back to Babylon, and before.

Actually, the Chief might be legit, in that what he was quoted as saying is accurate. It’s the notably-unnamed " members of the council " and the reporter who are in on it, for sure.

That same story says “The number of total crimes in Chico decreased by five percent in 2016 compared to 2015, according to the Police Community Advisory Board meeting. Violence and property crimes decreased by more than 220 from 2015 to 2016.”

The reporter let you know total crimes were down five percent, but carefully omitted the percentage drop for violent crimes, rather just giving you the number. They were even more careful to not give you last year’s number, so you, or I, couldnt do the math.

So even with crime at historic lows, these people keep their jobs, and say " that’s still a high number of crimes ". Kind of irrational, isn’t it?

I guess it’s shame-on-us if we buy the newspapers and keep employing them and don’t push back. They don’t feel very, well… relevant though, do they?

It must be stunning for them to see themselves not only outed in print but also documented honestly as irrelevant has-been’s.

And it’s not going to get any better for them, going forward. In fact it’s going to get much worse, and quickly.

That’s what rapidly-rising awareness will do to a con artist.

February 5, 2017 - Brunswick, GA - City crime rate dropped in 2016 , but gangs persist

February 6, 2017 - Georgia - CRIME RATES DROP IN MACON-BIBB

Crime rates have dropped in Macon-Bibb county over the last year. Bibb County Sheriff’s Office Crime Analysis Unit says robberies have decreased by 7% in comparison to 2015.

Other major crimes such as rape, aggravated assault, arson, burglary, larceny and auto theft also dropped by 7%.

Homicides also decreased by 28% and out of the twenty homicides investigated in 2016, eighteen (90%) of those were solved.

Sheriff David Davis gives credit to the investigators, as well as the community, who has come forth with information in helping solve cases.

March 1, 2017 - NYC Crime Stats Drop Again , But Hate Crimes Are Up

March 9, 2017 - Chico, CA - Chico State “Orion” - Crime Crates drop , but is it enough?

The number of total crimes in Chico decreased by five percent in 2016 compared to 2015, according to the Police Community Advisory Board meeting.

Violence and property crimes decreased by more than 220 from 2015 to 2016.

Chief of Police Michael O’ Brien said that during his tenure in the department he has not seen a decrease in homicide for a long time.

“This is the first year in a two year period that we haven’t had a homicide,” O’Brien said.

In 2015 there were only two homicides, but in the meeting, members of the council noted that this was still a high number of crimes.

March 15, 2017 - Milwaukee, WI - Residents Help Spur Significant Drop In Crime Rates In Milwaukee Neighborhood

Local Community Leaders Say Activating Community Residents Has Been Key

The Amani neighborhood, tucked in the city’s 53206 area code where 47 percent of residents live in poverty, has seen a significant drop in crime, even though the surrounding areas are home to the highest police presence.

Since 2005, class A offenses — which include assault, burglary, vehicle theft and homicide — have dropped more than 32 percent in Amani, compared to a decrease of 23 percent citywide , according to Milwaukee Police Department statistics.

March 21, 2017 - California - Crime is down 4% in Orange County , but burglaries are on the rise

March 25, 2017 - Malaysia - SHAH ALAM: The crime rate in Selangor has decreased over the first three months of 2017, thanks to ongoing cooperation between the police and community.

Selangor police chief Comm Datuk Seri Abdul Samah Mat (pic) said 5,847 violent and property crimes were reported in the state between Jan 1 and March 23 this year.

This was a 30.85% decrease compared to last year, which saw 8,455 crimes committed in the two categories during the same period.

Meanwhile, t he number of street crimes decreased by 36.7% from 1,641 in 2016 to 1,038 this year.

[Jeff]

The transformation is global, and and is not going to stop, but is rather increasing in speed and magnitude:

September 16, 2016 - Number of smokers in England drops to all-time low

December 6, 2016 - US cigarette smoking rates drop to new low

November 26, 2014 - Adult cigarette smoking rate overall hits all-time low

The cigarette smoking rate among adults in the U.S. dropped from 20.9 percent in 2005 to 17.8 percent in 2013

March 26, 2015 - Why Cigarette Usage Is At Record Lows And Dropping

Cigarettes used to be everywhere in American society. Fifty years ago, 42.4 percent of U.S. adults smoked.

May 25, 2016 - US|Cigarette Smoking by Adults Dropped in 2015 , CDC Survey Says

The C.D.C. report also said the percentage of current cigarette smokers was higher among men (16.7 percent) than women (13.6 percent).

November 10, 2016 - Smoking Declines As Cigarette Taxes Rise : Shots - Health News : NPR

September 16, 2016 - Number of smokers in England drops to all-time low

December 6, 2016 - US cigarette smoking rates drop to new low

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently announced that the number of Americans who smoke cigarettes dropped to a record low of 15 percent of the population – about 35.6 million Americans. According to the data, there were significant reductions in smoking across all ages and ethnicities, socioeconomic levels and regions of the country.

[Jeff]

March 27, 2017 - Wolf spotted in Nevada is first in nearly a century

The Nevada Department of Wildlife has confirmed the first sighting of a wolf in the state in nearly 100 years.

Chief State Game Warden Brian Wakeling said Friday the wolf was spotted in northwest Nevada in early November near Fox Mountain just west of the Black Rock Desert and about 20 miles from the California line.

Wakeling says wildlife officials recovered scat from the animal. A conservation lab at the University of Idaho confirmed the droppings were from a male offspring of a seven-member pack of wolves known as the “Shasta Pack” in Northern California.

Wakeling says the department occasionally receives reports of wolf sightings, but this is the first time one’s presence has been verified since 1922.

He says the observation of a lone animal does not mean wolves have established territories in Nevada.

[Jeff]

"And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed – if all records told the same tale – then the lie passed into history and became truth. “Who controls the past,” ran the Party slogan, “controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” And yet the past, though of its nature alterable, never had been altered. Whatever was true now was true from everlasting to everlasting. It was quite simple. All that was needed was an unending series of victories over your own memory. “Reality control,” they called it: in Newspeak, “doublethink.”

George Orwell, from “1984”

October 22, 2009 - India Set for Record Cotton Harvest - India Briefing News

April 16, 2010 - India to see r ecord 2010/11 cotton crop - attache | Reuters

April 15, 2011 - NEW DELHI: India is likely to achieve a record cotton output in the 2011-12 season at 35 million bales

July 18, 2012 - Record India Production of Rice, Wheat, Cotton and Sugarcane

February 22, 2013 - Miracle grow: Indian farmers smash crop yield records without GMOs …

Aug 8, 2013 - Cotton production in India, the world’s second-biggest exporter, will climb to a record as above-average monsoon rainfall increased planting

September 22, 2014 - India sees a record cotton harvest

May 23, 2015 - Mumbai: Farmers in India may plant fewer acres of cotton as slumping demand from China cuts exports to the lowest level in six years.

The area is set to drop as much as 10% in the 12 months starting 1 October from a record 12.97 million hectares a year earlier , said Dhiren Sheth, president of the cotton association of India. The harvest was a near-record 39 million bales of 170 kilograms this season, cotton advisory board data show.

December 9, 2015 - Historic Rainfall Floods Southeast India : Image of the Day

September 15, 2016 - India Set for Record Harvest as Timely Rainfall Boosts Crops …

September 19, 2016 - India leads global cotton production in 2016-2017

March 28, 2017 - After hitting a record high in 2014, cotton yields and output in India have declined due to a pest attack and two straight droughts.

As you can see, the folks in charge are lying to you about basically everything, including cotton harvests and drought in India.

The quote with all the lies, the last one, is from the article below, which is way longer than the Declaration of Independence. It’s tortuously, horribly long, which is an example of a Propaganda technique called “tap-dancing” . They’re trying to blunt the impact of Monsanto getting is ass kicked in (or out of?) India.

I found the documentation to refute the lies in about ten minutes - maybe five - in an exercise called “fact checking”. They say " after hitting a record high in 2014 ", but don’t note the chain of records coming before - so the false impression of “one big harvest” is, well, planted. They blame 2015’s lower crop on a drought that didn’t happen and neglect to mention India planted deliberately planted less cotton, that year, because of dropping China demand.

In addition to lying baldfacedly about cotton and droughts, the author of the article paints a picture of the people rising up against Monsanto in a way that makes it look like the rise of the Nazi party in Germany before WWII. At least that’s the impression I got, you can come to you own conclusions on that.

Cheeringly, this will get added to a growing subsection within this thread of " stories that lie about droughts that didn’t actually happen ." It’s particularly compelling when you see that they lied about a drought that didn’t happen while telling you about a crop failure that didn’t actually happen, which is also something we’ve seen numerous times, especially of late.

“If there was Some Big Conspiracy, someone would notice, someone would say something…you couldn’t keep it a secret…” Yes!

I’m going to start compiling that sub-document.

In the meantime, enjoy " Seed giant Monsanto meets its match as Hindu nationalists assert power in Modi’s India "

March 28, 2017 - Seed giant Monsanto meets its match as Hindu nationalists assert power in Modi’s India

A little-known cotton seed company has taken on Monsanto, with the aid of a right-wing Hindu group that helped propel the Indian prime minister to power. The dispute threatens to upend the world’s largest cotton-producing market.

NEW DELHI – Tens of millions of dollars were within reach for M. Prabhakara Rao as he prepared in April 2015 to take his Indian cotton seed company public.

The Indian businessman already had $54 million in initial funding from an American private equity investor. Rao had also locked in a long-term licensing agreement with Monsanto Co, the world’s largest seed company, for the technology used in genetically modified cotton seeds that made up the majority of his annual sales.

Two months after publishing his initial public offering plan, Rao gambled . He sent one of his executives to negotiate a 10 percent cut in royalties with Monsanto. The multinational said no.

The outcome of that meeting ignited a corporate battle that has left Rao’s IPO plans in tatters and drawn in the Indian and U.S. governments. More ominously, the fight has disrupted India’s $1.8 billion-a-year seed industry , with Monsanto saying it may abandon the market.

Monsanto’s Indian joint venture last July withdrew its application to introduce a new generation of cotton seed technology to India. The existing version, in India for a decade, is losing effectiveness against bollworms, which can wipe out crops. If another company doesn’t step into the breach, agricultural economists warn the dispute could damage India’s cotton-growing sector - which recently surpassed China’s as the world’s biggest and last year accounted for more than a quarter of global output, with a value of over $8.5 billion.

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Cotton pest: The bollworm threat

Timeline: How Monsanto got outplayed

Monsanto pulls new GM cotton seed in protest

To an outsider, Rao’s decision to take on Monsanto in a David-and-Goliath battle may seem hard to fathom. But the rules of doing business in India have changed. With the rise to power of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014 on a groundswell of Hindu nationalism, newly assertive right-wing groups, suspicious of foreign influence and particularly outspoken against large multinationals like Monsanto, now hold sway in the government.

The leaders of these groups operate under the umbrella of the powerful Hindu nationalist group known as the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, or RSS, Hindi for “national volunteer organization.” They speak of returning India to an ancient, Hindu glory that was ravaged by foreign imperial powers. More pragmatically, they’re amassing power.

Modi himself first attended RSS meetings at the age of 8 and was propelled to power with the group’s help. A series of crucial ministries, including agriculture, are now run by ministers who are members of the RSS and its affiliates. Members of these Hindu nationalist groups also form a network of influential mandarins who seldom surface in public. They have the ear of the prime minister and those around him.

A lean, moustachioed man, Rao denies seeking the support of the RSS or working in tandem with the group, which wants indigenous varieties of cotton seed to replace Monsanto’s products. But RSS powerbrokers - including the agriculture minister himself - told Reuters that Rao approached them for help in his battle with Monsanto. And they say they were happy to weigh in.

The agriculture minister, longtime RSS member Radha Mohan Singh, says his decision to intervene in the dispute was driven by the need to serve the interests of all Indian farmers, not just Rao.

The timing of Singh’s actions, though, was telling. In the months after the meeting between Monsanto and Rao’s man in Mumbai, the agriculture ministry first challenged and then slashed the royalties Monsanto is able to charge in India. The ministry called for an antitrust investigation into alleged monopolistic practices by the company. It also floated the idea of a compulsory licensing regime that would all but force Monsanto and other firms to hand over their proprietary technology to major Indian seed companies that applied for licenses.

Prime Minister Modi hasn’t publicly commented on the matter. After the U.S. ambassador intervened last year, according to two people familiar with the dispute, the Indian government suspended the compulsory licensing proposal. The other measures remain in place.

After years of seeking more leverage with Monsanto, Rao found in the rise of Modi and the RSS an opportunity to challenge the company’s domination of the Indian market. It was against this backdrop that he dispatched senior company executive P. Sateesh Kumar, a Ph.D. in agricultural genetics, to Monsanto’s Mumbai headquarters in 2015.

At the time, Rao’s company, Nuziveedu Seeds Ltd, was behind on royalty payments to Monsanto and on its way to racking up, by Monsanto’s calculations, more than $20 million in debt. And its American investor, Blackstone Group LP, was waiting for the IPO to go through. Nonetheless, Kumar sat down in a corner conference room on the fifth floor and conveyed Rao’s demand for a reduction in royalties. Monsanto delivered its answer there and then: That wasn’t going to happen.

RSS rising

1. Founded in 1925 as an anti-colonial group , the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) is a Hindu nationalist, cultural organization.

2. Wants to restore India to its past glory, which the group says ended after it was invaded by Muslims and then Christians beginning in the 8th century.

3. The ideological parent of the country’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the RSS counts among its members Prime Minister Narendra Modi; the president of the BJP; and the ministers in charge of agriculture, highways and internal security.

4. Has dozens of affiliated organizations, including a farmers’ union with about 2 million members that is seeking a ban on seeds manufactured by foreign companies such as Monsanto.

5. Umbrella body for a range of right-wing Hindu groups that have pushed against multinationals and spearheaded, among other things, sometimes violent opposition to the slaughter of cows , which are sacred in Hinduism.

6. Volunteers meet at local shakhas, or branches, which numbered 63,000 in 2016, up from 42,000 in 2010.

7. Has been banned four times , once after a former RSS member assassinated Mahatma Gandhi in 1948; ban was later lifted in the absence of evidence the group planned the attack.

Sources: RSS; Reuters reporting

Before Kumar left the meeting on that hot June day, he paused. He told the executives from Monsanto and its Indian joint venture that there would be “consequences” for refusing Rao a discount, according to a letter Monsanto sent to the government and which was reviewed by Reuters. Kumar says he did not use such language.

In an interview in which he let loose peals of laughter , Rao pointed out that the first item under “Risk Factors” in the IPO prospectus for his company, of which he controls more than 80 percent of shares, was the possibility of his contract with Monsanto being disrupted. Still, he said, Monsanto made a mistake in thinking it had the upper hand.

Monsanto declined to answer questions on the role of the RSS in Rao’s campaign. “We conduct our business in an honest, transparent and respectful manner and continue to engage with stakeholders across the spectrum,” the company said.

Monsanto is backed in the dispute by chemical giant Bayer AG, which is in the process of buying the seed company for $66 billion. It also has the support of the local units of other seed heavyweights, including Dow Chemical Co and Syngenta AG. In August, these multinationals held a news conference in which they called for transparency in government regulation and licensing. Failure to do so, they warned, would endanger future investment in India.

An RSS spokesman referred queries about Rao and Monsanto to the RSS farmers’ union, the Bharatiya Kisan Sangh. Its vice president, a man named Prabhakar Kelkar, said the union was working with Rao, who had approached it to complain about Monsanto’s seed pricing.

“It is important for all of us to unite to wage a war against Monsanto. No one can do it alone, be it Rao or the” farmers’ union, Kelkar told Reuters. “We are cooperating with him because he is fighting a battle that is meant for greater good.”

Monsanto and Rao are now locked in a series of government complaints, litigation and arbitration.

Citing an Indian law that excludes seeds from being patented, Rao says Monsanto should never have been allowed to collect royalties after an initial payment to use its technology. Or, at the very least, he adds, prices should have been set by the government.

The bollworm threat

After hitting a record high in 2014, cotton yields and output in India have declined due to a pest attack and two straight droughts. Farming experts say that yields from the current strain of Monsanto’s modified cotton seed (Bollgard II) have hit a plateau as the seeds lose effectiveness against crop-eating bollworms. To maintain its position as the world’s top cotton producer, say the experts, India needs to introduce Monsanto’s next-generation Bollgard III. India’s agriculture minister and the RSS say they prefer a homegrown alternative to Monsanto’s seed technology.

The technology currently licensed out by Monsanto is known as Bollgard II. The company received a patent in 2009 in India for Bollgard II’s ability to modify cotton seeds to include a microbe called Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt), which fortifies cotton plants against bollworms.

Monsanto says Rao and a small group of other seed companies demanding a reduction in royalties are simply trying to renege on contracts and money owed. Dhiraj Pant, who oversees tech development for Monsanto across Asia, said it would have been preferable if the Indian seed companies had not pushed for the government to step in. “It is unfortunate that these disputing companies sought policy interventions to address a bilateral matter,” said Pant.

The RSS, which has its own farmer and labor unions, was formed in 1925 to campaign against British colonial rule. It seeks to instill a nationalist vision of India as a Hindu nation, despite large minority populations that include Muslims and Christians.

The group nurtured Modi’s rise – in his early days in the RSS he cleaned floors at a local chapter office. And the RSS helped form the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

But Modi and his RSS backers have differing views about the role of foreign multinationals. In his 13 years as chief minister of the western state of Gujarat, Modi was an early supporter of genetically modified cotton. His administration there allowed farmers to plant Monsanto-modified seeds, known as Bt cotton, before the technology received official approval in New Delhi.

NEW RULES: Under Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh (above), Monsanto’s royalties have been cut. Monsanto’s Dhiraj Pant (below) says it’s “unfortunate” that local Indian seed companies pushed the government to intervene in a corporate dispute. REUTERS/Anindito Mukherjee and Adnan Abidi.

His approach contradicted the RSS stance against multinationals operating in the agricultural sector, particularly when it comes to genetically modified crops.

The tension simmered for years. After Modi’s election in 2014, the RSS began its push.

A senior leader in the RSS farmers’ union, a man named Mohini Mohan Mishra, began holding study sessions with leaders in the ruling party and the Modi administration to argue against genetically modified crops. One of Mishra’s presentation slides pointed to the rise in popularity of organic food in the West.

Another slide said of Monsanto: “It created seed monopoly, a threat to seed sovereignty.”

Monsanto’s mistake was that it did not approach the RSS to plead its case, said Mishra in an interview at his office in central Delhi, which has peeling paint, dirty rugs and, in summer months, mosquitoes buzzing inside.

“It was the overconfidence of Monsanto that has destroyed their chances to do business in India,” said Mishra. “They failed to study and understand the RSS.”

Rao, meanwhile, was lobbying Modi’s government. Sometime in 2015, he met with Singh, the agriculture minister and RSS member.

The powerbrokers and officials of the Congress party that ruled India for most of its independent history tended to espouse secular ideology in clipped English accents that hinted at elite schooling at home and abroad. The RSS leadership speaks of rural roots and the virtues of the homegrown.

Singh is cut from that cloth. At the beginning of one interview he paused to fold a small wad of snuff in his left cheek as an attendant brought a metal spittoon.

He was not hard to convince that Monsanto was in the wrong, said Rao.

“The truth is that Monsanto was dominating the market, and that is not good for India’s farming practices,” said Singh. “We should have our own seeds to compete with them.”

After Monsanto declared Rao’s company in breach of payment obligations and terminated its contract in November 2015, Singh’s agriculture ministry moved swiftly.

The next month, the ministry established a panel to fix the price of genetically modified cotton seeds and the royalties Monsanto was allowed to collect.

Less than two weeks later, a junior minister under Singh’s command told parliament that the ministry had asked India’s antitrust regulator to consider investigating whether Monsanto abused its dominance in the marketplace. He said the National Seed Association of India, of which Rao is the president, had asked his ministry to intervene in the dispute. An antitrust investigation was formally launched in February last year.

On March 4, 2016, Monsanto’s chief executive for India put out a statement threatening to leave the country. Four days later, Singh’s ministry slashed the royalty paid by local firms to sellers of genetically modified cotton seed technology, a market dominated by Monsanto, by about 70 percent.

Two months later, the agriculture ministry proposed compulsory licensing for Monsanto’s technology. It was this move that prompted the U.S. ambassador to India at the time, Richard Verma, to approach Modi’s office. People familiar with the matter said Verma wrote to Modi’s principal secretary, Nripendra Misra, after the agriculture ministry did not respond to two previous letters. After the ambassador and Misra met, the government suspended the licensing measure.

During a visit to India last year, the U.S. commerce secretary, Penny Pritzker, said she had raised the Monsanto dispute with the government. “Companies will look to see how this is resolved because it sends a message about the seriousness of the current government to protect intellectual property,” said Pritzker, who stepped down this January.

An aide close to Modi declined to discuss whether the prime minister had personally intervened in the licensing dispute. He said the issue would “remain open” for the foreseeable future. “Sometimes the best decision is not to take a decision,” the aide said. The prime minister’s office did not answer questions from Reuters.

Asked about Rao and his fight with Monsanto, Singh denied granting the businessman any favors.

Kelkar, from the RSS farmers’ union, said the RSS had pushed for Singh to act against Monsanto. “In the previous regime we had to stand on the streets to launch anti-Monsanto protests,” Kelkar said. “But with this government we can sit and talk in a room – it’s because we all believe in the same agenda.”

The impact of the dispute on Monsanto’s bottom line became clear late last year when the company released its results: Sales of seeds and genetic traits for cotton dropped 16 percent, or $83 million, in the fiscal year ending August. That was “primarily due to lower average net selling price in India as a result of new government pricing policies,” the report said.

MONSANTO OUT: Farmers call for the multinational seed company to leave India at a protest in New Delhi in 2013.

Other seed giants have warned that the moves against Monsanto could threaten investment in India. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi
The dispute’s fallout could have grave implications, says Ashok Gulati, an agricultural economist who has advised the government on crop support prices in the past.

“The whole fiasco will dissuade global seed or technology companies from investing in India,” Gulati said. In the short term, he said, India might get by with a local alternative to genetically modified cotton. “But in the long-term, say beyond five years or so, we need a technology that can propel India’s cotton output. But then, political masters don’t look beyond immediate gains.”

Rao says that Monsanto and others deserve a return on their investment. But he wants royalty rates to be determined by government rules. In an interview, he pointed to the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights Act, which gives the regulator the power to fix royalty rates. The government fails, however, to exercise that authority, enabling Monsanto to dictate terms, says Rao.

In October, the government announced a change in the board that oversees the plant varieties act. A new member had been added: M. Prabhakara Rao.

Timeline: How Monsanto got outplayed

The fight led by M. Prabhakara Rao, the head of Nuziveedu Seeds Ltd, against global seed giant Monsanto Co erupted in 2015. What at first looked like a David-and-Goliath showdown – Monsanto’s $15 billion of sales that year were roughly 80 times that of the firm headquartered in the south India city of Hyderabad – quickly became an example of how the rules of doing business have changed under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

[Jeff]

It’s March, 2017, and Nature is booming and burgeoning to a level not seen in my lifetime:

“The extraordinary rebound of eastern Thailand’s tigers is nothing short of miraculous ,” said John Goodrich, tiger programme director at Panthera.

March 28, 2017 - New population of rare tigers found in eastern Thailand

A new breeding population of the critically endangered Indochinese tiger has been found in a national park in eastern Thailand, conservationists say.

Camera traps discovered a small population with at least six cubs in the jungle.

Poaching and the loss of habitat has reduced the global population of the sub-species to under 250.

Conservationists said the success was due to the stepping-up of anti-poaching efforts in Thailand.

Counter-trafficking organisation Freeland and Panthera, the wild cat conservation group, conducted the survey with the support of the Thai park authorities.

Until this find, only one other breeding population of Indochinese tigers - also in a Thai national park - was known of.

World tiger numbers show increase

Hunting Thailand’s farm tiger traffickers

"The extraordinary rebound of eastern Thailand’s tigers is nothing short of miraculous," said John Goodrich, tiger programme director at Panthera.

The director of Thailand’s national parks, Songtam Suksawang, said: "The stepping up of anti-poaching patrols and law enforcement efforts in this area have played a pivotal role in conserving the tiger population by ensuring a safe environment for them to breed.

“However, we must remain vigilant and continue these efforts, because well-armed poachers still pose a major threat.”

Numbers of tigers in the wild have dwindled from 100,000 a century ago to 3,900 today, the groups said in a joint statement.
Last stronghold: By Jonathan Head, BBC South-East Asia correspondent, Bangkok

Thailand was the first country in this region to deplete its forests, to such an extent that by the 1980s it had banned logging. It was also among the first to establish national parks, but initially these were also badly stressed by illegal logging and hunting.

At the time, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and even Vietnam had a lot of pristine forests left, with healthy populations of tigers. Tigers had declined in Thailand to the point where in the early 2000s it was thought they were very small and fragmented.

But since then, massive illegal exploitation has badly depleted the forests and tiger populations in the other countries - even Myanmar - to the point where Indochinese tigers are believed to be extinct in Cambodia, down to just a handful in Laos and Vietnam and with unknown, but almost certainly greatly reduced numbers in eastern Myanmar.

Meanwhile, improved conservation strategies have allowed the tiny population of Indochinese tigers in Thailand to recover in some areas, although they have disappeared in others. So, with its reasonably well-run national parks, Thailand finds itself unexpectedly the last stronghold of the Indochinese tiger.

[Jeff]

It’s March, 2017, and Nature is booming and burgeoning to a level not seen in my lifetime. Since that statement directly refutes our State Religion, which holds that " Poor Mother Gaia is Dying, Crushed by the Virus-Like Burden of Mankind ", I’ve appended multiple recent examples below to support it.

In the first, you’ll see that fish production is up in Cambodia. Although you’ll have to scroll down through one, two, three, four paragraphs to get to the numbers on fish production increase. In journalistic terms, that’s called burying it. You’ll also note that they give you the numbers, but carefully avoid publishing the percentage of the increase, as doing so would be more impactful, so they hedged by omitting it. I had to do the math.

Freshwater fish yields up 38%, in one year. Marine fish yields up 4%. It would go very badly off-message re: Poor Mother Gaia dying, and all, to say “Freshwater field yields rise 38%”. They could have fallen back to “Fish yields rise”, but that didn’t hedge aggressively enough, so they went with "Fish yields rise, exports fall ".

In Pakistan, right now, seafood exports were up 12.48% in January, versus January of the previous year. While, in the last seven months, they’re up 10.6% over the same seven month period last year. Can you see how the number is getting bigger? That’s because the great positive changes I’m documenting here in this thread are increasing in speed and magnitude.

The story from Pakistan does the same thing the Cambodia story did. Uses the hedging " Pakistan Seafood Exports Register Increase ", versus the more-accurate and impactful “Pakistan Seafood Exports Register 12% Increase.” Using the percentage in the headline would have been more impactful, so they carefully hedged by omitting it.

Complete control of the media in every city of every nation on Earth doesn’t change the facts that I’m documenting here. Rather, it serves them up in a way where it’s possible for a significant subset of the populace to remain unaware of the larger trends under discussion.

However, I think you’d agree that assiduous spin and framing of the data will only hold off, but cannot stop, the awareness of the larger trends.

And then it’s game-over for these guys. They bet it all on the " us-vs.-Nature " con, killing Poor Mother Gaia on the down-low with Death-energy-based machineries, and blaming it you, and your car, and farting cows, and such and such. Making sure you believe " there’s no such thing as the Ether! " so that you have no frame of reference for the whole, well, Operation .

Now that the slow, steady, widespread and ever-increasing distribution of simple, inexpensive Orgonite devices has shifted the energy balance back to the positive, we’ve seen three straight years of amazing positive changes in the larger environment, whilst Poor Mother Gaia still ostensibly broils, and collapses, from the perspective of the folks assiduously burying the good news as far down in the story as possible.

And, at the very end of this game, when the folks running the con try to switch the story, it’s not going to work. They went with too-broad an attack. There’s no place to retreat to, tactically, from here.

They are going to be found out and deposed.

We’re going to awaken collectively as a species, realize, collectively, that we have a problem, that we’ve been in serious denial about it, and get off the sauce.

And live happily forever after, without them. They’ll still be here, but they’ll just be random people muttering at the bus station, versus wearing a natty suit, making carefully choreographed faces and reading a teleprompter.

January 24, 2017 - Cambodia - Fish yields rise , exports fall

The total export of fish products decreased in 2016 even though fish yields rose, causing income from the fisheries sector to drop by nearly a half compared with a year earlier.

An Agriculture Ministry report showed that income from the fisheries sector in 2016 was $565,284, a dramatic decline of about $465,000 from 2015.

The total export of fresh fish products was 9,100 metric tons and export of processed fish products was 5,200 metric tons, a decrease of 1,400 metric tons and 300 metric tons respectively, the report read.

However, fish yields increased compared with 2015. Freshwater fish yields reached 70,200 metric tons, up 19,600 metric tons from 2015, while marine fish yields were 10,525 metric tons, up 425 metric tons.

Hong Hy, director of the Fishery Administration’s administration and legislation department, said high local demand for fresh fish reduced the amount of exported fish products, adding that the high fish yields would help reduce fish imports from abroad.

March 2, 2017 - Pakistan Seafood exports register increase

ISLAMABAD (APP): Seafood exports from the country during month of January, 2017 registered 12.48 percent increase as compared the corresponding month of last year.

According the data of Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, 10,254 metric tons of fish and fish preparations worth US$ 27.214 million exported as against 8, 707 metric tons valuing US$ 24.194 million of same month of last year.

Meanwhile, in last 7 months of current financial year, fish and fish preparation exports grew by 10.60 percent as compared the same period of last year.

March 6, 2017 - Norwegian seafood exports grow by 6% in Feb 2017

March 24, 2017 - Polish fish exporters’ revenue up 7% in 2016 | Customs Today …

[Jeff]

The words " mystery ", " baffled " and " puzzled " are memes, used, among numerous similar variants, whenever anyone in the wholly-controlled-and-coopted Political, Academic, Scientific and Media establishments wants to lie about, well, basically anything. One of those variants is " unclear “. That’s why an article below about historically-low teen drug and alcohol use says " the trend has been building for a decade, with no clear understanding as to why .”

The story panders that Ssmartphone addiction has replaced drugs, alcohol and cigarettes, which is just, well, plausible enough to be floated as a plausible-deniability excuse, here. Since drug and alcohol use are dropping worldwide, among most age groups, why no investigation of that wider populace, and their phone addiction, or lack thereof? Because it’s a micro-level plausible-deniability excuse, floated in the hope it will keep your eye off that larger trend.

Ssmart phones are common, and pervasive, but not universal. It would be childishly easy to track phone ownership vs. non-phone-ownership and addiction rates, but this is not a scientific endeavor, despite the use of yet another meme-word, intriguing : " But researchers are starting to ponder an intriguing question: Are teenagers using drugs less in part because they are constantly stimulated and entertained by their computers and phones? "

Yet another meme variant is " curious ." That’s why another sentence in the article says " a curious bright spot has emerged in the youth drug culture: American teenagers are growing less likely to try or regularly use drugs, including alcohol ."

Curious has a companion meme-word, " odd ", which has seen a tremendous increase in the media of late. One clickbait example that comes to mind is " Try this odd trick to lose 20 pounds ", that sort of thing. Tricks and triggers to get the subconscious to bite - like a fish bites an alluring fishing lure.

You could file this theory in along with the " crime dropped with increase in Hip Hop music " thesis, but both are instructive in that they show that a continuous offering of plausible-deniability excuses will get some large subset of the populace to bite, without engaging their critical thinking skills. The Propagandists know concretely that the subconscious wants no part of personal responsibility and taking action, and that these bon mot’s will be gobbled down like bon bon’s, and then it’s time for a little nap.

“Bon mot - a witty remark or comment; clever saying; witticism .”

The programme has worked for a very long time, but I think things are changing, very quickly, for the better.

March 13, 2017 - Are Teenagers Replacing Drugs With Smartphones?

Alexandra Elliott, a high school senior, says she is a heavy phone user and that using it for social media “really feels good.” Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

Amid an opioid epidemic, the rise of deadly synthetic drugs and the widening legalization of marijuana, a curious bright spot has emerged in the youth drug culture: American teenagers are growing less likely to try or regularly use drugs, including alcohol.

With minor fits and starts , the trend has been building for a decade, with no clear understanding as to why . Some experts theorize that falling cigarette-smoking rates are cutting into a key gateway to drugs, or that antidrug education campaigns, long a largely failed enterprise, have finally taken hold.

But researchers are starting to ponder an intriguing question: Are teenagers using drugs less in part because they are constantly stimulated and entertained by their computers and phones?

The possibility is worth exploring, they say, because use of smartphones and tablets has exploded over the same period that drug use has declined. This correlation does not mean that one phenomenon is causing the other, but scientists say interactive media appears to play to similar impulses as drug experimentation, including sensation-seeking and the desire for independence.

[Jeff]

The story that follows, from just two months ago, supports the thesis that Nature is booming and burgeoning to a level not seen in my lifetime.

The headline reads “ Record-breaking catfish caught on Lake LBJ ”. As you probably know, “ record ” means “most ever, in history”. So it’s surprising on its face to read of the biggest fish ever caught, in history, when Poor Mother Gaia is dying, and all, and we’re suffering through the hottest year in the history of planet Earth.

But let’s put that aside. As you know, such records are usually broken by tiny margins.

“When Webb took the fish to Inks Lake State Park for an official weigh-in, the monster catfish came in at a whopping 71.4 pounds! The fish was also 51.75 inches long and had a 33-inch girth. “Big blue” crushed the previous lake record of 40 pounds.”

Just look at the sumbitch:

While I credit them for correctly stating that this fish “ crushed ” the previous record, I must take them to task for carefully avoiding printing the percentage of the new record over the old, because it would have been more impactful, and gone off-message re: Poor Mother Gaia dying, and all.

So I had to do the math. It’s 78% higher than the previous record.

That’s impactful to read, isn’t it? That’s why the percentage was carefully omitted, as part of a larger pattern that you read about literally daily here on this thread.

Do you think that hedging and downplaying is a very effective long-term strategy against the epochal positive changes that we’re seeing and experiencing across the globe at this time?

I don’t, either – it’s just that it’s all they’ve got . So enjoy with me as we watch them falter, and wither, and blow away.

We’re awakening to the reality that Nature’s ills have been, at their basis, Death-energy-based, vs. the more mechanistic theses put forth by the folks distributing the Death energy. With those plausible-deniability theses accepted by everyone, including myself, up until quite recently.

Mechanistic, 3-D impactors of course exist, and are at play. It’s just the big driver, the main driver, is ETHERIC, which is why the folks doing the down-low destroying wanted to make sure you’d keep affirming “ tut-tut, there’s no such thing as the Ether! ”, and donating to Greenpeace, and such and such.

Greenpeace, you know, as in green , as in “ In this Egyptian painting, Osiris is painted green. In ancient Egypt, green represented protection and Osiris was called "the great green .

“ In ancient Egypt Orion was actually the giant green-skinned god Osiris .”

Green, you know, the devil’s color:

“ In the 15th century, the devil was green, as depicted by Michael Pacher in this Saint Wolfgang panel (1471-1475, Alte Pinakothek, Munich). Medieval poets such as Chaucer also drew connections between the color green and the devil. In his Friar’s tale, the devil came dressed in green .”

You’ve been had once again, I’m afraid, by the Osiris Cult, the barely-closeted, genetically-related cult of human-sacrificing, cannibal Death-worshippers who’ve been running things on this globe all the way back to Babylon, and before. The “jolly green giant” on your package of vegetables is Osiris. They figured the rubes would never notice.

And don’t you think the green shoe with his name on it is aggressive, and demeaning?

It’s not like these guys aren’t right up front about what they’re doing. It’s our sleepy ensheepledness that’s the problem, which is why I’m here turning the Klieg lights on every day, several times per day.

My job search is going well. You’d think these guys would let me get back to work as me with too much time on my hands is a problem for them, as you can see. I’ve had the extra time to put cool pictures in, and work on fonts, and stuff - things that make the White Magic I’m making that much more powerful.

It’s the power of Truth, the power of Utterance.

January 3, 2017 - Record-breaking catfish caught on Lake LBJ

LAKE LBJ, Texas (KXAN) — An avid Hill Country angler caught one for the record books last week.

On Dec. 22, Tim Webb was fishing from the bank of Lake LBJ when he caught what appeared to be a catfish, but this catfish was like none other. Using his rod and reel, Webb was able to get the big fish out of the water.

Since the sun was already setting, Webb tied the fish up along the boat dock with a rope and fish stringer. He jokingly says he spent the night with “big blue.” The following morning, the stringer hook was broken and the rope was barely hanging on, but the fish was still alive.

When Webb took the fish to Inks Lake State Park for an official weigh-in, the monster catfish came in at a whopping 71.4 pounds! The fish was also 51.75 inches long and had a 33-inch girth. “Big blue” crushed the previous lake record of 40 pounds.

For some perspective, the fish was almost as long as Webb is tall (he’s 6 feet 3 inches tall).

After the fish was thoroughly documented, it was released back into Lake LBJ. If you’re out swimming at Lake LBJ and see this guy next to you, it is no Loch Ness.

The following users say thank you to Jeff for this useful post:

KSD22, Carlos Silva, Edward

[Jeff]

“He walked on, energy in his stride, a grim smile on his face. Alone in the dark. Invincible."

Lee Child, from “ The Hard Way ”, 2006

Child is referring to Jack Reacher, the protagonist of the novel. In the recent movie (filmed in Pittsburgh!), the character James Barr says, of Reacher, " There’s this guy. He’s a kind of cop, at least he used to be. He doesn’t care about proof, he doesn’t care about the law, he only cares about what’s right. He knows what I did. You can’t protect me. No one can .” And he weeps while he’s saying it - not realizing that Reacher has already returned, and exonerated him, because Barr, unbeknownst to himself, had been framed .

Please don’t consider that I think myself the equal of the characters I quote in my threads. It’s more like a child with sports heroes. They are role models, inspirations, exemplars . And they are thought forms, which have power. The name of this forum is Etheric Warriors .

I’m trying to keep myself pumped up to keep bringing it against these guys, forever . I’ve experienced a lot of attacks, a lot of assaults since I took up this, er, line of work. But, happily, most of them have been Etheric. And the physical ones had no effect whatsoever, dumbfounding both the people who executed them, and myself.

It only took me about twenty minutes to collect the eight stories below, all of which support my thesis that Nature is booming and burgeoning to a level not seen in my lifetime.

Casting aside the possibility that I’m some sort of superhuman (Reacher-esque!) researcher, I think it’s easy to see that an expansion of this investigative effort to other countries, other languages would support, versus detract from my thesis. Which thesis refutes our State Religion, which holds that “ Poor Mother Gaia is Dying, Crushed By the Virus-Like Burden of Mankind .”

What’s causing the revival, the resurgence? Certainly, the breaking of the great artificial drought by the slow, steady, widespread and ever-increasing distribution of simple, inexpensive Orgonite devices in the vicinity of the weather warfare infrastructure that many still mistakenly presume only carry cell phone traffic and weather radar data is playing a significant role.

And, yes, mechanical, 3D drivers such as habitat conservation, endangered species protections, and the like, are having real, actual positive impacts.

But I think there’s another factor at play, bringing a Gyrfalcon to New Jersey for the first time in 27 years. “ Boyle characterized the dynamic raptor, roughly the size of a female red-tailed hawk, as “an Arctic rarity that seldom comes this far south anymore .”

Wait, I thought the arctic was a warm, watery, collapsing mess, and that we were in the middle of the hottest year in the history of planet Earth? To maintain current programming levels, use the meme term “ global weirding! ” and stop reading immediately.

“ Rare November snow in Tokyo, the first since 1962 .”

Wait, I thought we were in the middle of the hottest year in the history of planet Earth? To maintain current programming levels, narrow your eyes and affirm bitterly “yeah, but that’s there, ” and stop reading immediately.

I think there’s another factor at play, bringing an animal called the Fisher back to Iowa after an absence of 150 years. Let’s check in with the guys who supposedly love Nature, nay, are on the Nature payroll , and who study it way more than I do:

“ The Minnesota DNR reports that fishers are expanding into southeast Minnesota, which is likely where this one came from,” the DNR said on Facebook. “We don’t know right now if fishers will reestablish themselves in Iowa, but it’s certainly interesting!”

Posturing, ridiculously, As if the fisher had run to Iowa from Minnesota, and was about to run back - versus living in Iowa. He says “ interesting ”, which is what you say when you hear something you don’t like, but are trying to be polite. And he’s hedging: “ we don’t know right now if fishers will reestablish themselves in Iowa ”. Wouldn’t you think someone who loves them some Nature would say something like “this is just a great inspiration, seeing species return like this. And it’s taking place all over the globe, I read seven other accounts like it just this morning, over coffee”?

I’m drinking my coffee, by the way.

And I think it’s just a great inspiration, seeing species return like this. And it’s taking place all over the globe, I read seven other accounts like it just this morning, over coffee.

He can’t swerve from the Fight Club party line, you see.

Here are some other professionally-employed Nature lovers, talking about a Jaguar sighting in Arizona:

“ Officials say they can’t tell the jaguar’s gender or age from the photo. The two other jaguars that have been recently spotted were both male, and Arizona Game and Fish officials have said a female jaguar hasn’t been spotted in decades. ”

Lotta downplaying and pessimism, there. You’d think he’d say “this is just a great inspiration, seeing species return like this. And it’s taking place all over the globe, I read seven other accounts like it just this morning, over coffee.” On the side, bet you ten bucks that an actual Jaguar lover will later confirm it’s a female.

He can’t swerve from the Fight Club party line, you see.

“ If there was Some Big Conspiracy, you couldn’t keep it a secret - someone would notice, someone would speak up .”

Yes, that’s true! Feel free to post this on a cork board at work, if you like.

There are physical, 3D drivers to species degradation, and diminution, and also to their revival and recovery. But I believe there’s an Etheric element to it, as well, and that the discovery and nailing down of that truth is going to be what at last and forever undoes the foul parasites who’ve ruled us from the shadows on this globe all the way back to Babylon and before.

With everyone (except for the parasites, of course) collectively agreeing that surreptitiously collecting, concentrating and distributing Death energy for the purpose of the general degredation of life on Earth is a very bad thing, and shouldn’t be allowed, anymore. In the same way we all agreed one should not and will not be allowed to own slaves.

We’re discussing the same perpetrators in both cases, by the way.

How do you think they feel, reading these posts in their secret meeting rooms, right now? There aren’t that many of them. But they’re sick . Bumming. Boiling mad. Hysterical. Desperate. Like the losers that they are.

And that’s healthy, because the hardest part of solving a problem is realizing that you have one.

We’ve made the bottom turn, these guys are done.

But don’t you dare stop gifting! And spreading the word.

November 21, 2016 – Rare November snow in Tokyo, the first since 1962

January 31, 2017 – Rare sighting in North Jersey: world’s largest falcon

For New Jersey birders, it was the biggest news since a pink-footed goose made its Garden State debut in Washington Township six years ago. Since Jan. 21, a rare gyrfalcon – the largest falcon in the world – has been appearing almost daily at the State Line Lookout in Alpine.

“The last time you had a chance of seeing a gyrfalcon in New Jersey was 27 years ago in Sandy Hook, so this is a pretty big deal,” said Bill Boyle, author of “The Birds of New Jersey” and a leading expert on state birds. “The last one seen in Bergen County was in March 1950, in East Rutherford.”

According to Boyle, there have only been 19 previous confirmed sightings of a gyrfalcon ever in New Jersey, and half of those were in the 1970s and 1980s. Although one was seen two years ago at Sandy Hook, it was a brief fly-by.

Boyle characterized the dynamic raptor, roughly the size of a female red-tailed hawk, as “an Arctic rarity that seldom comes this far south anymore.”

Judy Cinquina of Upper Saddle River saw the gyrfalcon fly across the Hudson on Friday but returned Monday in hopes of a better look: “You usually have to go to Alaska to see it – or Siberia or the top of the world.”

February 5, 2017 – Rare frog, not seen since 1962, discovered in Zimbabwe

Robert Hopkins, a researcher at the natural history museum in Bulawayo city, said his team had found four specimens of the frog in its known habitat of Chimanimani, a mountainous area in the east.

The team found the first male specimen on Dec. 3 after following an animal call that they had not heard before, Hopkins said. They then discovered another two males and a female. Hopkins said he been looking for the cave squeaker for eight years.

February 13, 2017 – U.K. - A rare sight: Otter spotted in Brayford Pool in Lincoln

Once on the brink of extinction, otters have reappeared in places where they have not been seen since the industrial revolution.

February 14, 2017 – Rare snake seen alive for the first time in over six decades

When scientists in Brazil came face to face with a Cropan’s boa recently, it wasn’t just any old snake sighting. That’s because this species hasn’t been caught alive since 1953.

February 15, 2017 – SPOTTED: Rare carnivorous mammal not seen since 1800s caught on camera

Iowa’s department of natural resources confirms the sighting of a mammal not seen in about 150 years

The Iowa Department of Natural Resources is confirming the sighting of a mammal not seen in Iowa in about 150 years.

DNR officials said a trail camera photo of a fisher was taken by Ryan Cross in November in Allamakee County.

“The Minnesota DNR reports that fishers are expanding into southeast Minnesota, which is likely where this one came from,” the DNR said on Facebook. “We don’t know right now if fishers will reestablish themselves in Iowa, but it’s certainly interesting!”

The fisher is a carnivore and a cousin to the weasel, otter and mink, and they are known for their fierceness.

March 2, 2017 – Agency reports rare jaguar sighting in mountains of Arizona

PHOENIX (AP) — Wildlife officials say they have evidence of a rare jaguar sighting in the United States, giving conservationists hope that the endangered cat is re-establishing itself here.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a photo Thursday from a trail camera that was taken in November and recently retrieved.

It shows the spotted cat wandering through the Dos Cabezas Mountains in Arizona about 60 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. Fish and Wildlife spokesman Jeff Humphrey says it’s the farthest north of the border that a jaguar has been seen in decades.

“The significance is that we’re getting a clearer understanding of where jaguars occur in the borderline area,” Humphrey said. It’s been decades since a jaguar was spotted in that mountain range, he said.

Officials say they can’t tell the jaguar’s gender or age from the photo. The two other jaguars that have been recently spotted were both male, and Arizona Game and Fish officials have said a female jaguar hasn’t been spotted in decades.

The following users say thank you to Jeff for this useful post:

Carlos Silva

“O ye that love mankind! Ye that dare oppose, not only the tyranny, but the tyrant, stand forth!” Thomas Paine

[Jeff]

This just in from Correspondent Carlos – thanks, Carlos – it’s right up my alley, an article headlined “ This American-Made Washing Machine Is So Good It’s Got a Cult Following ”. He said “it may be an ad, but if it is, it’s a good one.”

It appears to be Amazon-filler, but, whatever, it’s a good one.

The great thing that the informercial tells us is that “ people who have discovered the brand are big fans of the durability and cost-effectiveness of its washing machines… Millennial homeowners in particular have shown a willingness to pay more for what they perceive as better-quality products… ”

Despite the hedging qualifier that is the word “ perceive ”, that statement documents an awakened and awakening populace. Perceive? No…difference in quality levels is not a matter of opinion , nor is it a point-of-view. it’s a matter of fact. Here, you can see Consumer Reports - who purports to study such things for a living - saying “ Speed Queen top-loaders are among the more reliable washer brands .” So, hey, their perception agrees with the Millenials!

But why didn’t they, or the article state which brand was, in fact, the most reliable, or let the reader know where Speed Queen stands in that list? Probably because the sentence “i s among the more reliable ” is the author’s diabolical, Left Hand Path way to invert it, to hide the fact that they won it all. Because the ranking “number one” would be, technically, “ among the more reliable ”. Before you call me crazy, let me note that, in a survey of more than 115,000 Consumer Reports subscribers, "Readers gave both models nearly perfect reviews.” And why, if the author is not hedging, didn’t they say “among the most reliable?”

“ have shown a willingness to pay more" is another hedging layer. They either, A: paid more, or, B: showed a willingness to pay more…stopping just short of paying more. Why the bizarre hedging? Followed immediately by the second hedge, “ perceive ”? “ Have shown a willingness" means they did it in the past, but might not do it in the future.

Let’s look at them in order from greatest directness, to greatest hedging (the latter being the one they ran with):

Millennials are paying more for quality. Millennials are showing a willingness to pay more for quality. Millennials have shown a willingness to pay more for quality. Millennials have shown a willingness to pay more for what they perceive to be quality.

Here’s more: " Speed Queen spokesman Randy Radtke says sales of the company’s home washing machines have been growing lately, partly due to people’s discontent with the way other brands grow mold or conk out after a few years. ” It’s important to note that it’s not a quote, but is rather a paraphrasing of what Randy said. And “ partly ” hedges, as if there are other drivers than the two that are listed. And a chaff-driver, “ the way other brands grow mold ”, is thrown before the actual driver, “ conk out after a few years ”, is listed. "Yeah, Speed Queen sales are through the roof because of our fifty year old anti mold technology . That’s our number-one sales driver!” And “ conk out ” is cute, and playful, the softest way humanly possible to say saying something like “lower-quality machines purpose-built not to last.” My statement is very strong, but I’m exaggerating so you get the point.

I didn’t even catch this stuff in the first pass. And it’s beyond tiresome to wade through it. However it’s importance lies in the fact that it’s demonstrably careful, and studious, part of a Black art practiced in a methodological way down over time. But let’s get back to the good news, the super-awesome Speed Queen, which Millenials have shown a willingness to pay more for, because they perceive it to be of higher quality:

“ You’re paying for metal instead of plastic. We could build a cheaper machine, but you’re buying a metal product with a metal tub, metal transmission and a lot of engineering behind it ,”

The whole world was basically sane, or certainly much saner, not even two, or three generations ago. Quality products, quality clothing, quality cars, produced, expected, by everyone.

Somehow my parent’s generation got swindled into the “new car every year” insanity. Where, every year, it looked a little different, was a little flashier, had some new geegaw or gimcrack - and was of slightly lower quality than the year before. I recently bought a New Old Stock fuel pump for my 1965 Buick, and it was $35. Mint in original box. It’s remarkably heavy, and simple, and the metal is of a quality you don’t see anymore, and it’s painted beautifully. I just opened a search engine and looked for “2017 Buick Fuel Pump.” $250 to $400. Ten times the expense, for wildly inferior quality.

I inherited my late stepdad’s stereo equipment, that he bought new in 1962. It was as good as you could get, then. It’s refurbishment cost me significantly less than you’d pay for a new unit with similar fidelity, and it will now run for me for another fifty years, or the rest of my life. And it’s incredibly beautiful - web pic of the receiver is attached. And it’s got established worth, value, which the new unit does not.

The article says “ Best washer I have bought in 50 years, ” Notice the 50-years data point?

When I was very young, I remember we got rid of his system’s funny-looking turntable for a new, fashionable one. Now that I know what’s up, I know that what we gave to Goodwill was an incredible gold-tone Empire turntable, worth five hundred dollars or more today. I’ve attached a picture of one - would you take it to Goodwill because it looked weird, so you could "Keep Up with the Joneses?” So that’s another data point about people waking up, who were previously asleep, myself included. In my defense, I was nine.

Once I heard the old equipment running on all cylinders, I pitched a musician friend of mine on the vintage Hi-Fi thing. He said “you are being sentimental, you are being played, it’s not possible, it’s not Correct.” I said “come to my house.” He listened, for less than one minute, and said “get me one of those.” And I did. And it will last him the rest of his life.

You know how they say “screw me twice, shame on me”? We can buy whatever we want, whenever we want. They can lead us to the trough, but they can’t make us drink. We’re recovering out wits, coming to our senses. Wal-Mart’s having trouble because people are realizing that paying forty cents less to buy underwear gets you underwear with the thickness of tissue paper made out of spun petroleum, and might not be worth destroying your Civil War-era downtown over. People are realizing that Wal-Mart’s motto, “Save Money, Live Better”, is a brazen, baldfaced lie. One doesn’t save money by cheaping out on the basics. One saves money by tightening one’s belt, by fixing the washer one has, by not by buying a shiny new pressed-petroleum belt when the old one got a little tatty. And buying cheaper, crappier stuff in no way will ever make you feel like you are “living better”.

So, in addition to drinking less, smoking less, using fewer drugs and killing one another less, the Millenials have discovered “buy right, or buy twice.” How long before they realize that a new belt, gasket and motor for that completely-mechanical 1950’s washer their neighbor is literally giving away, whose enamel is still perfect, is a hundred bucks, or call it two hundred? Remember, they’re forking over $1,500 for the admittedly-sweet new washer. It’s twenty grand, or forty, for the disposable plastic car - the one that literally looks like a turd, and, as a secret bonus, whose front and rear fascia integrate fearsome Death-tiki images. Or five or ten grand for the sweet Buick everyone smiles at and gives the thumb’s up to.

I think you can see how the Bad Guys’ stack is getting smaller and smaller, every hand of cards that goes around. And who’s going to win this poker game, much sooner than later.

March 2, 2017 - This American-Made Washing Machine Is So Good It’s Got a Cult Following

Washing machines probably aren’t what come to mind when you think of products with devoted cult followings. But one company that cranks out highly praised industrial machines for laundromats, apartment buildings and hospitals also makes units designed to go in your laundry room — and many owners can’t stop raving about them.

Speed Queen is a Wisconsin-based brand — and yes, they build all of their washers here in the U.S. of A. — that’s been around for 100 years, but don’t feel bad if you’ve never heard of them. They don’t run any national advertisements, and you won’t catch one of their washers in a big-box store.

But people who have discovered the brand are big fans of the durability and cost-effectiveness of its washing machines. Speed Queen spokesman Randy Radtke says sales of the company’s home washing machines have been growing lately , partly due to people’s discontent with the way other brands grow mold or conk out after a few years. Millennial homeowners in particular have shown a willingness to pay more for what they perceive as better-quality products , including household appliances. Speed Queen buyers also like that the machines don’t have a lot of complicated parts.

Radtke says Speed Queen’s most popular in-home model is the mechanical-control AWN432. Like all Speed Queen products, this one isn’t available in big-box home-improvement or electronics stores; the brand uses independent dealers (often, mom-and-pop shops) to sell their washers and dryers instead. It can also be purchased through Amazon, starting at a little under $900 . “People just like that built-to-last mechanical control,” Radtke says. “We’re seeing that people gravitate to our brand of late after going through one or two sets of laundry equipment.

But don’t just take his word for it. “ This is the only way to go. A manual dial commercial Speed Queen will outlast any of the fancy computerized pieces of imported junk on the market,” one Amazon customer wrote in a recent review. “I’ve gone through 3 American and foreign brand name units in the last 10 years and all failed. ”

According to the Consumer Reports, “Speed Queen top-loaders are among the more reliable washer brands.” The observation came from a review of washing machines two years ago that drew on a survey of more than 115,000 subscribers.

Consumer Reports tested both a top-loading and a front-loading machine, both with electronic controls; it found that the washers could handle a load of dirty clothes in 35 minutes and 55 minutes, respectively.

Readers gave both models nearly perfect reviews. “ You want this washer!” one reviewer wrote about the top-load model. “This washer is a tank … Before purchasing this machine I called several appliance repairmen and they all recommended Speed Queen hands down.” Based on more than 200 Amazon reviews, the AWN432 gets an overall rating of 4.5 out of five stars, and more than three-quarters of reviewers gave it five stars.

“Best washer I have bought in 50 years,” one verified user wrote.

Here’s the asterisk: They’re not cheap. The two models Consumer Reports looked at cost $1,000 and $1,900 at the time, respectively. (You can now buy the front-loader for about $400 less, but still — that’s a lot of money given that one of Best Buy’s top-selling washers is a top-loading Whirlpool model you can pick up for less than $500.) The AWN432 now rings in at just under $900.

Radtke says the significant price difference is due to the quality of materials used and the engineering that goes into Speed Queen machines. “You’re paying for metal instead of plastic. We could build a cheaper machine, but you’re buying a metal product with a metal tub, metal transmission and a lot of engineering behind it,” he says.

Two factors that help offset the price, according to owners, are the speedy wash cycle times and heavy-duty spin cycle that means less time in the dryer. Both help homeowners cut down on energy usage, translating to lower monthly utility bills.

Then there’s the longevity factor. Radtke says Speed Queen’s units are tested for 25 years — that’s a total of 10,400 loads if you’re running the eight loads a week typical for many families. And there are plenty of anecdotes in product-review listings and online forums of machines that have kept on truckin’ for 40 years. “It sounds like a cliche, but the equipment I have in my house is from the mid-to-late 1980s,” Radtke says.

[Jeff]

“…that was the ultimate subtlety; consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word ‘doublethink’ involved the use of doublethink.”

George Orwell, from “ 1984 ”

September 15, 2015 – Legal Weed In Colorado Doesn’t Curb Alcohol Sales

December 9, 2016 - Legalized Marijuana Sales Cause Drop in Alcohol Sales

Using article upon article to prove that alcohol consumption is dropping all over the globe seems a bit redundant, don’t you think?

It is. I’m proving, rather, that a small, barely-closeted cabal of genetically-related Death worshippers controls the Media around the globe. And I’m proving it by showing identical tactics and verbiage used in a formulaic, methodological way down over time.

In the many examples of falling alcohol consumption below, you’ll see the hand-wringing first line of defense, which is feigned befuddlement:

(U.K., 2011) “ Why is alcohol consumption falling?”

(U.S., 2016) “ What’s To Blame For Declining Retail Beer Sales?”

From there, in the second line of defense, you’ll be studiously told What To Think - in every language, in every nation - with a chain of hand-waving, smoke-blowing plausible-deniability excuses designed to keep your eye off the larger picture we’re discussing here:

(Florida, USA, 2010) “ Florida Alcohol Sales Drop With Temperatures

(India, 2016) – “ demonetisation of currency: Liquor, beer sales on the decline ”

Whatever nation you may live in, as a paid Fight Club propagandist, you have to lie aggressively:

December 9, 2016 - Legalized Marijuana Sales Cause Drop in Alcohol Sales

(September 15, 2015 – Legal Weed In Colorado Doesn’t Curb Alcohol Sales)

Since that latter quote looks so bad for them, they had to get one of their own to blow smoke in the article it’s featured in:

“ However, it’s far too soon to say how marijuana legalization has affected adults’ behavior when it comes to consuming intoxicating substances. A University of Colorado-Denver economist who has studied how marijuana availability impacts alcohol consumption said the Colorado numbers don’t show much. ‘I wouldn’t read too much into one state’s experience,’ Rees said .”

That’s Satanist-speak for “pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.” That three-times repetition of the underlined themes is a spell, a Black Magic spell. They call them ‘yes sets’.

Oh, and check out the people-paying-more-for-quality societal-mprovement I mentioned in the last post, on Speed Queen appliances, shows again here:

December 7, 2016 – 2017 alcohol sales: No new drinkers , but more people paying for quality

I think it’s great that I get to report not only on all of the great, epochal Positive Changes that are going on around the globe, but also the tiresome, threadbare repetitive tactics used by the folks who are for this moment still in charge of things in every nation on Earth. And thereby speed their already-assured demise.

The positive changes are increasing in speed and magnitude, and the methodology of the folks I just mentioned isn’t changing, at all. What do you think is going to happen to them, going forward, as awareness of all of this rises?

Please consider sending them highest love energy as you read this.

December 28, 2010 - Florida Alcohol Sales Drop With Temperatures

February 15, 20111 – Why is alcohol consumption falling? - BBC News

September 15, 2015 – Legal Weed In Colorado Doesn’t Curb Alcohol Sales « CBS Denver

Colorado saw a sales increase last year in all three tax classes of alcohol. Beer was up 1.1 percent, liquor was up 3 percent, and wine was up 1.3 percent.

However, it’s far too soon to say how marijuana legalization has affected adults’ behavior when it comes to consuming intoxicating substances .

A University of Colorado-Denver economist who has studied how marijuana availability impacts alcohol consumption said the Colorado numbers don’t show much.

Economist Daniel Rees pointed out that beer sales growth didn’t even keep up with population growth in the last year, estimated at about 1.7 percent between 2014 and 2015.

“I wouldn’t read too much into one state’s experience,” Rees said.

April 11, 2016 – Alcohol sales dropped after Maryland raised liquor tax - UPI.com

May 13, 2016 – Alcohol sales fall for first time in nearly 20 years

Global sales of alcohol fell in 2015 for the first time since market research firm Euromonitor International started keeping records in 2001.

September 28, 2016 – What’s To Blame For Declining Retail Beer Sales? - Forbes

Beer sales by volume at bars and restaurants have dropped for the third year in a row

December 7, 2016 – 2017 alcohol sales: No new drinkers , but more people paying for quality

December 9, 2016 - Legalized Marijuana Sales Cause Drop in Alcohol Sales

December 19, 2016 – India - demonetisation of currency: Liquor, beer sales on the decline

January 17 ,2017 - Is this the year Sunday liquor sales ban ends? Minnesota House

January 19, 2017 – Norway - Alcohol sales are down to the same level as 1980

February 10, 2017 – Alabama - Carmike drops effort to sell alcohol in area theaters

February 13, 2017 – Alcohol sales to underage buyers drop 5 percent in Chapel Hill

[Jeff]

This is from wattsupwiththat.com, which is a little confusing, in that I consider THEM to be a Controlled Opposition, Fox-in-the-Henhouse organ-of-the-state.

But successful Propaganda, successful Disinformation requires hard kernels of real Truth to be effective…and the burden is upon the reader to discern Truth from Fiction.

This supports my “ Greenpeace ” lambasting from a few days ago. Remember, the few control the many via pyramidally-constructed organizations in which fair-seeming, duplicitous, sociopathic con artists at the top of those pyramids fleece wholly-credulous rubes down below. And I’ve subjectively concluded that Greenpeace is one of those organizations. Greenpeace, as in Green, as in Osiris, who was known as “ the Great Green ."

But don’t take my word for it, ask the guy who co-founded the organization:

“The organization I co-founded has become a monster…Now Greenpeace has knowingly made itself the sworn enemy of all life on Earth.”

Perhaps that should be amended to “War is Peace. Green is Death. Ignorance is Strength.”

"Dr. Patrick Moore was right: @Greenpeace IS full of sh*t
Anthony Watts / 3 days ago March 3, 2017
I’ve never had a headline like this, but Greenpeace deserves it for their mind-bending defense in a defamation lawsuit: basically their defense is “we publish hyperbole, therefore it isn’t actionable because it isn’t factual”. GMAFB!

Dr. Patrick Moore, one of the co-founders of Greenpeace , whom they have tried to erase from their website , resigned from the organization becaus e:

The organization I co-founded has become a monster. When I was a member of its central committee in the early days, we campaigned – usually with success – on genuine environmental issues such as atmospheric nuclear tests, whaling and seal-clubbing.

When Greenpeace turned anti-science by campaigning against chlorine (imagine the sheer stupidity of campaigning against one of the elements in the periodic table), I decided that it had lost its purpose and that, having achieved its original objectives, had turned to extremism to try to justify its continued existence.

Now Greenpeace has knowingly made itself the sworn enemy of all life on Earth. By opposing capitalism, it stands against the one system of economics that has been most successful in regulating and restoring the environment.

[Jeff]

The story that follows is headlined “ Census 2017: Bird population rises in Delhi stretch of Yamuna despite ‘degraded habitat’ .”

Where “ despite degraded habitat ” is a negative, hedging qualifier.

The subhead says “ Around 590 birds belonging to 23 species were spotted in 2016, while in 2015, 641 birds belonging to 19 species were seen, it says. ” How come it says “ around 590 ” for 2016 - which is inexact, but “641 birds” for 2015 - which is exact?

And why, in the first paragraph of the story, do we read “ Around 2,641 birds belonging to 24 species have been spotted this year”? There, “ around 2,641 ” is again inexact, but is also, oh, four times as many as “ around 590 ”, tabled just a few sentences previously. And what’s with “ 23 species in 2016 ” in the subhead, and “24 species" in the first paragraph?

That would be repetitive instances of baldfaced lying in support of a failing, wholly-fraudulent agenda, I’m afraid. With the made-up, smaller numbers positioned higher in the article, and the actual, larger numbers buried farther down below, as part of a larger, methodological pattern deconstructed in this thread for a period of over three years, now.

The words “ mystery ”, “ baffled ” and “ puzzled ” are memes, used, among numerous similar variants, whenever anyone in the wholly-controlled-and-coopted Political, Academic, Scientific and Media establishments wants to lie about, well, basically anything.

That’s why the Fight Club talking head quoted in the article says the “ increase in numbers has come as a surprise ”. If you read this mind-numbingly boring and repetitive thread with any regularity, you are not, personally, surprised. This is why I usually append as many ‘lots of birds’ stories together at one time, so the reader can see that anyone who lifts a finger knows that birds are booming and burgeoning all over the globe to levels not seen in our lifetimes.

But not ecologist TK Roy, Asian Waterbird Census Delhi state coordinator ! If I had even more time on my hands, I’d reach out to him, and get to include “Roy could not be reached for comment at presstime.”

The author of the article - also a two-bit member of a bloodline Illuminist family, who has an address, and puts his pants on one leg at a time, like the rest of us - tells you a variety of numbers – fabricated, false ones up higher, and larger, correct ones down lower – and takes special care not to present the percentage of the increase, year over year, as printing it would be much more impactful, and go seriously off-message re: Poor Mother Gaia dying, and all. So I had to do the math.

641 to 2641 is a 312% increase. That’s impressive to read, don’t you think?

And they counted 3,113 birds at Okhla last year, and 6,183, this year. That’s a 98.6% increase, so they admitted, correctly, that the numbers doubled at Okhla, but hedged and omitted that they more than tripled on the Delhi stretch of the Yamuna. And they used the phrase “bird population rises ” to describe a bird population that tripled .

In the future, schoolchildren will not be able to conceive that the citizenry at this time did not rush to the offices of these publications and string up or tar-and-feather these people. Or, pulling back, that they believed them with utter credulity, that they wouldn’t even do the math . So we’re lying in the bed we made, right now, I reckon.

The baldfacedly-lying Roy bravely goes on to say “ the spurt in the numbers this year has been despite declining habitats . ‘ The number at Yamuna has increased due to shortage of wetland habitats in Delhi region. Many wetlands have already vanished due to rapid urbanisation and global climate change impact. The Yamuna also provides feeding ground for these birds,’ he said .”

What’s particularly funny about that is that his blathering has this link, right in the middle of it: “Read | Good rain brings winter migratory birds early to Delhi’s Okhla bird sanctuary.”

We’ve got to go to the super-slo-mo instant replay, here.

Quoted Expert : ‘ The number at Yamuna has increased due to shortage of wetland habitats in Delhi region .”

Link in same story : “Good rain brings winter migratory birds early to Delhi’s Okhla bird sanctuary.”

I guess " global climate change impact ” translates to “plentiful rain in the region and doubling and tripling of local bird populations”. Black is White, Ignorance is Strength.

You’d think these guys would let me get back to work, wouldn’t you? Because, having just been laid off, I’ve got, literally, ALL DAY.

And I own them.

Just later, in this same story: “The Asian Waterbird Census earlier had also revealed that bird population has doubled in Okhla in the past one year. “

And so, thus, we’ve learned that “Good rains brought double the number of migratory birds to Delhi’s Okhla sanctuary”, while the Quoted Expert says “ there’s a shortage of wetland habitats in the Delhi region ” And “ Many wetlands have already vanished due to rapid urbanisation and global climate change impact .”

I’m afraid you’re going to have to use your personal discernment.

I have sincere, well-intentioned, hard-working close friends who work at bird sanctuaries. And I can’t share things like this with them, because they’re going to be so angry when they find out how badly they’ve been had, been conned, their Confidence having being gained by fair-seeming, duplicitous Con Artists, in what they call a “ Confidence Game ”. Well, my friends will be Angry, but that’s only after they leave Denial, which is not just a well-gifted river in Egypt. Etcetera.

But everyone is going through their process, and processes don’t last forever.

And be of good cheer, in that the good news, the great news is sitting here at the base of it all, and will remain after the cloud of human emotion surrounding it has subsided.

February 12, 2017 – Census 2017: Bird population rises in Delhi stretch of Yamuna despite ‘degraded habitat’

Around 590 birds belonging to 23 species were spotted in 2016 , while in 2015, 641 birds belonging to 19 species were seen, it says. (HT Photo)

The findings from Asian Waterbird Census 2017 have revealed an increase in bird population in the Delhi stretch of Yamuna . Around 2,641 birds belonging to 24 species have been spotted this year.

Around 590 birds belonging to 23 species were spotted in 2016 , while in 2015, 641 birds belonging to 19 species were seen, it says.

“ Yamuna in Delhi passes through the most polluted, shrinking and degraded habitat for aquatic wildlife, including waterbirds. Therefore, the increase in numbers has come as a surprise ,” said ecologist TK Roy, Asian Waterbird Census Delhi state coordinator, Wetlands International South Asia.

Read | Good rain brings winter migratory birds early to Delhi’s Okhla bird sanctuary

The census on the part of Yamuna between Wazirabad Barrage and Nizamuddin Bridge was carried out by a team led by Roy. Out of 2,641 birds spotted this year, the largest (2,010) has been that of mixed flock of brown-headed and black-headed gulls. Even red lapwing, which falls under the IUCN red-list of threatened species, was sighted. Out of the 24 species, nine are resident waterbirds, while 15 are winter migratory water birds. They migrate from Central and North Asian region.

According to Roy, the spurt in the numbers this year has been despite declining habitats. “The number at Yamuna has increased due to shortage of wetland habitats in Delhi region. Many wetlands have already vanished due to rapid urbanisation and global climate change impact. The Yamuna also provides feeding ground for these birds,” he said.

According to the ecologist , the presence of black-winged stilt shows the foul quality of the river in the city. “Black-winged stilt is known to be a wetland quality indicator as it resides mostly on the polluted wetlands,” he said.

However, not all think the number of birds spotted is too big. According to birdwatcher Vijay Sethi, if one leaves out the gulls, the number of birds is not too much.

“Out of the birds spotted, over 2,000 are gulls. The number of the rest is not too much. Now these gulls can be found at the Wazirabad stretch, where the Yamuna is much cleaner with no sewage going in. Lot of people feed the birds here. There is also a lot of fish in this stretch,” Sethi said.

The Asian Waterbird Census earlier had also revealed that bird population has doubled in Okhla in the past one year . Nearly 53 species with a total of 6,183 birds were counted at the Okhla Bird Sanctuary compared to last year’s 3,113 with 46 species.

[Jeff]

Contrary to what you’ve been told your whole life, one person can make a difference. The story that follows is headlined “Chance the Rapper Announces $1 Million Donation to Chicago Public Schools.” He’s given people a physical lift, and shown them, young and old alike, how to be .

The more people with money who put it in the right places, the harder it is for the few to control the many.

How long until someone with some with some real money reads this forum, gets with the program, starts producing Orgonite on a large scale?

Speaking of money, as you read this, our friend Christine is languishing in prison in Southern Sudan, for distributing freaking Orgonite, for trying to help everyone out, including yourself. She’s got kids . And some thousands of dollars are needed to get her out. I think the number currently is $5K.

You don’t have to walk the front line and pound in Earth pipes to make a difference, here. If you check in on this thread regularly, I’d say look at it like a donation to your local Public Radio station.

I see two, four, five, seven people reading this thread all the time, and twenty-some guests on the forum, all the time. There’s no charge to come to this forum. I’d say get active gifting and petition Don for membership, or throw some money in the guitar case, be upright about this situation. This isn’t panhandling. We’re trying to get a wrongly-imprisoned mother out of jail.

Please consider doing what you can to help, Dancan’s paypal address is [email protected].

March 6, 2017 - Chance the Rapper Announces $1 Million Donation to Chicago Public Schools

“Our kids should not be held hostage because of political positions”

Chance the Rapper held a press conference today at Westcott Elementary School in Chicago to announce that he is donating $1 million to Chicago Public Schools. “Our kids should not be held hostage because of political positions,” he said. He later revealed that he and Common will speak on the phone to discuss further funding.

The announcement follows his meeting with Illinois governor Bruce Rauner last week, where they discussed public education and other “important issues affecting” the city of Chicago and Illinois as a whole.

Immediately following the meeting, Chance expressed his frustration, saying, “It went a little different than it should have,” and that he was given vague answers when speaking with the governor. At the press conference, he reiterated that Gov. Rauner gave him “vague” answers , and shouted, “Gov. Rauner, do your job!” Watch the press conference below.

Chance has also updated his website with a link to support Chicago Public Schools. Learn more here. Read “Charting Chance the Rapper’s Unsigned Success,” as well as Chance’s foreword to Kevin Coval’s A People’s History of Chicago on the Pitch.

[Jeff]

“Now your daddy’s in the den, shooting up the evening news"

Jackson Browne, from “ Redneck Friend ”, 1973

The story that follows is headlined “ A Record-High Number of Plovers: What Does It Mean ?”

Well, “ record ” means “ most ever, in history .” Which means that Nature is booming and burgeoning to a level not seen in my lifetime.

“ On January 26, our colleagues at the National Park Service observed 104 plovers at Ocean Beach, a record number since they began monitoring populations in 1994 .”

See? “ Most ever .”

There’s a post just above this one, from yesterday, which tells all about how birds are doing great in Delhi, India, as well as here in San Francisco. They’re booming to historically-unprecedented levels in both places. In Delhi, the numbers were double, or triple what they saw last year.

While they’ve quadrupled in San Francisco: “[ Spotting] 104 birds is four times what we’ve normally seen over the last 20 or so years,” he says .

Fight Club has cells in every city in every nation on Earth. They’re the people who write the newspaper articles, and who get quoted in the newspaper articles. In Delhi, the bird-expert guy bravely said “ loss of wetland habitat due to climate change ” caused a doubling and tripling of birds.

Well, what’s the bird-expert in San Francisco have to say? “ There are also the increasing storm surges and sea level rise with climate change that are eroding their habitats at places like Ocean Beach .”

Same shit, different nation. The first rule of Fight Club is you don’t talk about Fight Club.

Here’s the San Francisco explanation for the quadrupling of birds:

“ Merkle hypothesizes the surge in sightings this year might be attributed to the El Niño storms washing out most of Ocean Beach—and driving the birds to move to other areas of the shoreline. This is the third year in a row where, according to Merkle, “the numbers have been particularly strong and building .”

I’m sorry, Mr. Merkle – who, in addition to having a name, also has an address, and puts his pants on one leg at the time like the rest of us – El Nino didn’t last three years, so “El Nino storms washing away most of Ocean Beach” is illogical, irrational, as an explanation for three straight years of building plover populations. Remember, he loves him some Nature, and studies birds for a living .

He goes on, branzely pushing the agenda: “ Merkle mentions one more possible weather-related explanation for this spike in sightings: Mild winters in previous years could be causing plovers to survive in larger numbers, and that’s why we see more.”

Could be causing? This is science, or is supposed to be. It is, or it is not causing plovers to survive in larger numbers. Can you see how he refuses to mention the improved rainfall of the last three years as any sort of driver, at all? He’s forbidden to mention it.

The repugnant, jarring meme word spike is used, to imply numbers have shot up, but will shoot right back down again, forming a spike on the graph.

After all that bullshitting, we finally get to:

“ He doesn’t dismiss other, non-weather-related possibilities, though .” Having shaken and shaken the climate change dolly, and danced around, they’ve buried this at the end:

“ At least last year [2015], we heard some rumors that Oregon had a really strong breeding year ,”

Rumors . It’s fun, being incredibly stupid, like in the middle ages!

If those rumors are true, Mr. Merkle, how did the serial, multi-year degradation of Ocean Beach by El Nino storms (with “El Nino” being a phenomenon that does not occur every year) drive a really strong breeding year for plovers in Oregon, hundreds of miles away?

“That erosion might explain the recent spike in plover numbers.”

Where “ Might ” shows it is not science, but rather a plausible-deniabilty trial balloon, floated to keep your eye off the larger picture we’re discussing here. The repugnant, jarring meme word spike is used, to imply numbers have shot up, but will shoot right back down again, forming a spike on the graph. Remember, plover numbers have been building for three straight years, so the word spike is wildly incorrect, an obvious ruse, deployed by a Propagandist, a Disinformation Artist .

See how it was repeated, twice in the article? It lays in the programming, spike. spike. spike.

And so, day after day, I document booming, burgeoning wildlife populations, across the globe, in every nation.

And, day after day, I document the same tired, repetitive story lines and verbiage deployed to hedge and defray against that great news, repeated in different languages, in every nation on Earth.

I think it’s easy to see that, when bird populations double again, the flimsy Propaganda wall will be washed away by the obvious truth of what’s going on.

What do you think will happen, then, to the Nature-loving and so-quotable bird experts, Mr. Roy, and Mr. Merkle? And to the careful, thorough, repetitive, like-minded authors of these articles, Curran White and Ritam Halder?

Look at the little Death-prayer Mr. White closes the article with:

“Even with robust Western snowy plover numbers this year, these birds still have a ways to go before they bounce back from their imperiled status .”

Please consider sending him highest love energy as you read this.

March, 2016 - A Record-High Number of Plovers: What Does It Mean?

From Park E-ventures, March 2016

By Curran White

Among the dunes and the wide, sandy shores of Ocean Beach and the Crissy Field Wildlife Protection Area lies the overwintering grounds for one of the 37 federally endangered or threatened species in the Golden Gate National Parks—a six-inch shorebird called the Western snowy plover (Charadrius nivosus nivosus).

On January 26, our colleagues at the National Park Service observed 104 plovers at Ocean Beach, a record number since they began monitoring populations in 1994 (one year after the species was listed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as federally threatened).

According to Dr. Bill Merkle, wildlife ecologist for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, the average count at Ocean Beach is in the low- to mid-20s per survey. “[Spotting] 104 birds is four times what we’ve normally seen over the last 20 or so years,” he says.

At the Crissy Field Wildlife Protection Area (west end of Crissy Field Beach), the population is much smaller than that at Ocean Beach, with averages hovering between one and six birds per surveying season (early July until the end of April or early May).

Habitat Loss

Once abundant on the West Coast (from Washington in the north to Baja California and Mexico in the south), the Western snowy plover has a total nesting population around 2,100 birds. According to Taylor Ellis, wildlife technician for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, the plover’s threatened status is linked to development, human population growth, and human activity that has caused a decline in its nesting habitat.

“Encroachment of exotic European beachgrass into nesting areas and predation by other animals, like ravens, are also threats,” Ellis adds. “There are also the increasing storm surges and sea level rise with climate change that are eroding their habitats at places like Ocean Beach.”

That erosion might explain the recent spike in plover numbers. Merkle hypothesizes the surge in sightings this year might be attributed to the El Niño storms washing out most of Ocean Beach—and driving the birds to move to other areas of the shoreline.

This is the third year in a row where, according to Merkle, “the numbers have been particularly strong and building.”

“This year, we had one other count with 99 [birds seen on Ocean Beach],” he notes. “We’ve had lots of plovers on the beach in 2015 (fall and winter). Our previous high count was in 1994 when we first started the monitoring, and that was 85 birds. We hadn’t really come close to that until this year, and we’ve surpassed that on several accounts.”

Contributing Environmental Forces

Merkle mentions one more possible weather-related explanation for this spike in sightings: Mild winters in previous years could be causing plovers to survive in larger numbers , and that’s why we see more. He doesn’t dismiss other, non-weather-related possibilities, though.

“ At least last year [2015], we heard some rumors that Oregon had a really strong breeding yea r,” Merkle says. “And that’s why they saw a lot of the banded birds from Oregon, and maybe some of these other birds were coming further south.”

The ideal habitat for Western snowy plovers consists primarily of coastal beaches, sandbars, sand dunes, and river-mouths, above the high tide line—making Ocean Beach and Crissy Field prime real estate for overwintering and finding their food source (small insects and beach invertebrates).

“They like this wide, sort of flat sandy beaches so Ocean Beach [from stairwell 21 to Sloat Blvd.], especially on the outer coast, is one of the primary beaches in the Bay Area,” Merkle explains. “The next big, sandy beach you would find is up at Point Reyes [National Seashore], and to the south is somewhere around Half Moon Bay. We think Ocean Beach, in between Point Reyes and Half Moon Bay, has high ecological value for shorebirds.”

Plovers usually land in Northern California (from Point Reyes to Half Moon Bay), starting in April for their breeding and nesting season, but, as Ellis clarifies, he and Merkle haven’t documented any plovers nesting or breeding in the Golden Gate National Parks. They’ve only seen the shorebird use the parklands as overwintering grounds.

“There’s likely too much disturbance from people, dogs, and ravens for their vulnerable eggs and chicks to survive,” Ellis explains.

How to Spot a Plover

Merkle and his team (two interns and a wildlife technician) perform their seasonal monitoring of Ocean Beach and the Crissy Field Wildlife Protection Area every Wednesday and Saturday almost year-round.

The observers walk the entire length of Ocean Beach (3.5 miles), armed with binoculars, and scout the sand-covered horizon for any signs of the diminutive and elusive shorebird.

“We also collect a little bit of data on how high on the beach they are,” Merkle adds. “Are they down on the water line? Are they in the old tide line, or are they above the old tide line? Are they foraging or not foraging?”

Ellis notes that it’s important to note the various locations on the beach that the Western snowy plover populations are consistently occupying. These observations guide park management to make informed decisions on how to best protect the threatened shorebird and its sensitive habitat.

Despite seeing only a fraction of the sightings compared to Ocean Beach, the Crissy Field Wildlife Protection Area and the surrounding dune habitat, through restoration efforts, has become prime, bridge-side Western snowy plover habitat. Merkle believes the “dunes look really nice [to the bird].”

“At Crissy [Field Wildlife Protection Area], we’ll see the plovers out on the open beach by the water sometimes, and other times they are in the vegetated dunes,” Merkle says. “We had sporadic sightings of one or two birds every so often [at Crissy Field] in 2005, and then we had birds that came and started hanging out in the Wildlife Protection Area, and we think it was related to that beach starting to accumulate sand and growing much wider.”

Even with robust Western snowy plover numbers this year , these birds still have a ways to go before they bounce back from their imperiled status.