By Anna Von Reitz We have grown up in a world that preaches about "the global community", and in a sense, yes, we are all part of a global community of people trying to live and better our situations according to the lights we see. We also constantly hear about "global interdependence" and how one country is dependent on other countries and how we all have to make a good faith effort to get along. That's true, too --- as far as it goes, and on a large scale. What has been lost sight of in all these high-minded and large scale discussions, is the relationship between self-determination, independence, and self-sufficiency. You can't be independent if you are depending on others for things vital to your survival. And if you are not independent, you can't chart your own course as an individual nor as a country. By becoming dependent, you give up your ability to self-determine and self-govern. You are reduced down to the lowest common denominator of need. Let's use an urgent and immediate example--- the new cars coming out this year have dozens of computers installed in them, working every possible function. All those computers have circuit boards and memory chips and "modules" that can fail and render the car useless. And guess where most of those modules are manufactured? China. All it takes is one little glitch, and your brand new $85,000.00 wonder car can be reduced to a safety hazard, or parked, for an indefinite period of time, waiting for parts from a foreign country. It doesn't really matter if we lose access to French champagne, but in many ways the "Global Village" concept has undermined our security and our independence, left our work force unprepared to step into gaps, and exposed us to very real hazards. Whatever we have gained in terms of performance, we have given up in terms of security--- the kind of security that comes from doing things yourself, maintaining your own skills, and living life on your own terms. Being independent, in other words. Americans tend to cherish words like "independence" and some even believe that they are independent, though in a practical sense, very few of us are. If the lights went out tomorrow, most of our population wouldn't know what to do, and our dependence on electricity would become rapidly and painfully apparent. Most American homes don't have emergency candles or oil lamps or back-up heating systems or access to independent water wells --- and those Americans would be literally left in the dark and the cold, without water, and, if this went on too long, without food, too. The Biden Administration came into office and promptly destroyed the energy independence that Trump had established. They shut down American oil production. They closed off pipeline projects. All in the name of a cleaner environment. But what actually happened? Instead of burning oil, power plants have been forced to burn coal instead --- and all the coal reserves have been reduced to near nothing. The coal mines have already sold their entire 2022 supply, and there is no end of the political and economic insanity in sight. Here in Alaska we are being told to brace for $1100 to 1500 a month to heat an average home this winter. Suck in your breath and tell me, how'd you feel about that kind of increase in home heating costs? --- because, adjusted for local conditions and fuel transportation costs, everyone in this country is facing a huge jolt in the cost of energy thanks to Mr. Biden et alia, and we are all facing crazy spikes in gas prices, food prices, and food shortages, too. This is all the predictable result of "political policies" that have nothing to do with reality. The Biden Administration's answer? To distribute packets of cash, $3000 each, in hundred dollar bills, marked "Covid 19". But this doesn't have anything to do with "Covid 19" and sooner or later, with inflation spiraling out of control, someone is going to notice that throwing cash at the problem isn't working. Many years ago, the Amish Community looked at the electrical grid and realized that if they went with the flow of "progress", they'd become dependent on someone else for electricity, and once they became dependent on electricity, they would lose the independence needed to self-govern. And once you lose the ability to self-govern, as a result of becoming dependent, everything else can be taken from you. So, they said -- basically-- thanks but no thanks. We'll keep our horses and tend our fields. You all just go willy-nilly into the dark. We know how to grow our own food and tend our own house. Don't need someone else's electricity to do that. Have enough bills as it is. All these years the Amish have been viewed with curiosity and sometimes derision. People sped by in their faster and faster cars, honking at the patient Amish horses, ogling at the Amish farmers' homemade clothes, thinking of the Amish as some odd, possibly sinister anachronism in the midst of all the glitz and biz of the modern world....but the Amish have it straight. They knew and we should all know that when we become dependent, we lose our freedom, and to the extent that we are dependent, we become enslaved. We lose our ability to say no. It all comes down to this simple fact: whatever is necessary that we don't do for ourselves, we have to pay someone else to do it for us. When those purveyors of goods and services decide to go out of business or we can't afford to pay them anymore or there's no more coal to replace the oil and the electrical power generators shut down, or the truckers go on strike over runaway gas prices or the unions strike for higher wages, or the longshore men say, nah, not worth it anymore... there we are --- stuck, freezing and starving in the dark. Unless a helluva lot of people wake up with a jolt and start prodding the Biden Administration and the members of Congress and the CEO's of Big Business and the phony State of State Governors where it hurts, a lot of clueless Americans are going to be suffering this winter, and all the "Helicopter Money" in the world won't change that. As they turn their thermostats down to 55 and huddle around the one space heater glowing dimly in the dark, and gnaw on stale crackers, and wonder what in the hell happened? --- they will need to look hard at the 2020 election, but they will also need to look harder at more fundamental choices that have been made. The Amish, like the ants in the tale of The Grasshopper and the Ants, have been chopping their wood and mining their coal, loading their wagons, repairing their barn roofs, stitching their quilts, harvesting their wheat and their apples, making their cider and pickles, digging up their potatoes. When the lights go out, they will light their oil lamps. When the snow comes, they will throw another log in their woodstove. They will wonder, no doubt, what odd delusion overtook the rest of the world?
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AuthorAnna Von Reitz Archives
December 2022
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