Dystopia Now, Part 3: Surviving & Thriving Are Time-Sensitive

The ability to thrive—and in some circumstances, the ability to survive at all—are almost always based on time-sensitive information, choices, and most of all, ACTIONS. People who take action early almost always have options that won’t exist later on for the folks who waited to take action. This is a timeless pattern that usually marks the difference between those who live and those who suffer and die during times of turmoil and crisis. 

I’ve talked about this before in the comment section of various blog posts over the years:

. . . But the warning that I'm giving with this post goes beyond Pres. Obama's failings. It's about AAs' overall TOTAL lack of preparation. Most of us are complacent in our Obama-delerium. I'm not going to talk politics at the new site, so this post is one of my last public warnings about these issues.

Throughout history, no matter what the negative event, there have always been the smaller group of people who were relatively safe and comfortable while the masses of their group suffered and often died. 

The European Jews who fled various European countries EARLIER in the rise of the German Nazi regime survived. The Bosnians and others who left Yugoslavia EARLY in the civil war fared better than those who hung around long enough to end up in mass graves.

Preparation versus a lack of preparation is what usually separates the two groups. The key to survival is to respond at the first hint of a serious problem. And not wait until the problem is fully developed before you take it seriously. Right now, AAs have lulled themselves into an even deeper coma than usual with the Obama-ssiah delirium. Most of us are in denial, and won't perceive a serious problem brewing until we see the equivalent of a mushroom cloud exploding over our heads.

The AA collective is in a state that is comparable to that of Haiti's physical infrastructure---the foundations of AAs' economic survival are so flimsy and fragile that the slighest disruption will lead to many of us being out in the streets. And unlike the earlier Great Depression, modern AAs DON'T have stable family ties that we can depend on for help in a time of crisis. Especially not during a time of prolonged crisis.

There are some problems looming on the horizon that AAs as a collective are totally unprepared for. 

Close-knit, FAMILY-ORIENTED, prepared collectives like the Mormons and the Amish will make it no matter what happens. For those who don't know, the Mormon Church REQUIRES each Mormon household to stockpile a year's supply of food, water, and other essentials. Just in case.

To all who are reading: If you choose not to prepare, and choose not to respond to the warning signals about various situations, rest assured that there WON'T be any particular mercy or concern for you once the "flood waters" rise above your heads. 

Think quick: Before the Haiti earthquake, when was the last time YOU thought about the still-suffering people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast? Yeah, that's what I thought.

In the modern-day US where AAs are NO LONGER the largest minority population: Ain't nobody else thinkin' about AAs or our problems! 

Do you think Telemundo or the other Spanish-language stations broadcasting in the US will be talking about AAs' problems/concerns? Especially during a prolonged crisis? NO, and neither will the "mainstream" so-called news outlets.

People, Get Ready.

Peace, blessings and solidarity.

While replying to a comment by Evia (blog host of Black Female Interracial Marriage Ezine), I said:

Khadija said...

Hello there, Evia!

I 100% co-sign your latest comment. It's been disturbing to see the level of resistance to the various alarms that have been shouted. It has also been disturbing to realize that many BW are reading our essays as a form of recreation. Meanwhile, the things we've been talking about are a matter of LIFE & DEATH.

Right now, I'm reading a book called Defiance. I think the movie version is coming out this month. It's about Polish Jews who run away from their homes & hide from the Nazis in the forests of their country.

Over the years, I've read several books by & about Holocaust survivors and people who lived through the communal slaughter in the former Yugoslavia. I've noticed a pattern in both categories of accounts.

Most people wait until it's too late to acknowledge reality. The survivors interviewed in Defiance mention many cases where, even AFTER hearing about how the Jews living in a neighboring city were rounded up & murdered, other Jews refused to believe that the same thing would be done to them!

The people who were in denial stayed in place. They were killed.

Sadly, the human pattern is the same when it comes to genocide-level problems. Most people cling to the facade of normal life until things are so drastic that there's no room to pretend anymore. At which point, it's usually too late.

And so it is with many of the Black women who are reading our essays.

Evia, you & I (and some others) can clearly see what's coming next for most BW in this country. As you put it, "the demise." I know it sounds hysterical to say it out loud in public, but I have to. That way my conscience will be clear in the future. I will know that I did all that I could to save as many BW's lives as possible.

The survival pattern is also the same: Regarding the Jewish Holocaust, and ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia and Iraq, those people who took heed of early warning signals had a better chance of surviving. Those who clung to denial had worse odds of surviving.

The South Vietnamese who were trying to scramble onto the American military helicopters waited too long to get out. Evia, I would urge folks to watch some YouTube videos of this evacuation & then re-read some of your essays about getting out NOW.

This is how it went for the South Vietnamese who waited until the last days of the Vietnam War to evacuate Saigon:

Here's a street scene in Sarajevo during the break-up of Yugoslavia. I wonder about people like the gentleman in the trenchcoat who's strolling around as shots ring out at around 0:29 into the video. It's impossible to tell if that semi-casual stroll was the result of bravery or trauma (or both).

Here's another street scene from that era in Sarajevo, this time while they're putting up barricades to provide cover for the civilians. At 0:19, you see why they needed the barricades.

From the Wikipedia entry about Sniper Alley:

"Sniper Alley" (Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian: Snajperska aleja / Снајперска алеја) was the informal name primarily forUlica Zmaja od Bosne (Улица Змаја од Босне; Dragon of Bosnia Street), the main boulevard in Sarajevo which during theBosnian War was lined with snipers' posts, and became infamous as a dangerous place for civilians to traverse. The road connects the industrial part of the city (and further on, Sarajevo Airport) to the Old Town's cultural and historic sites. The boulevard itself has many high-rise buildings giving sniper shooters extensive fields of fire.^[1]

Mountains surrounding the city were also used for sniper positions, providing a safe distance and giving an excellent view on the city and its traffic. Although the city was under constant Serb siege, its people still had to move about the city in order to survive, thus routinely risking their lives. Signs reading "Pazi – Snajper!" ("Watch out – Sniper!") became common. People would either run fast across the street or would wait for United Nations armored vehicles and walk behind them, using them as shields. According to data gathered in 1995, the snipers wounded 1,030 people and killed 225 - 60 of whom were children.

Here are the sniper screens the city put up (to block the snipers' view of the pedestrians), and civilians walking behind UN armored vehicles in order to cross the street:

I've posted these videos so you can see that this is not an abstract or theoretical topic. Things got really R-E-A-L for the people who waited too long to try to leave Saigon and Sarajevo. 

As Homestead Glamour Girl (blog host of My Place In The Sun) mentioned in reference to WWII Germany during a recent email conversation we had about current events, “It wasn't peace and happiness one day and gas chambers the next.” 

She's right. These horrific situations build up over time. Those folks who assume that problems will solve themselves or simply blow over usually “get got,” and they also go through a LOT of suffering along the way.

Today's Get Back To Basics Suggestion

As I’ve said throughout this series of posts, I’m not saying all of the above to scare you. I’m saying this to reiterate the core message of my book and two blogs:

You can thrive (and not just survive) during this time of collapse if you GET BACK TO BASICS.

Do what you can to position yourself to live well regardless of who is in office.

Today's Get Back To Basics Suggestion—Read “When You Should Not Adapt In Place” by Sharon Astyk.

 

As I said in THIS post,

For many African-American women and their children, where they are living and what they’re doing is not viable in any long-term sense.

This applies on many different levels. For example, I know that with each year that passes, I’m becoming less tolerant of subzero Midwestern winters (even though I’m originally from Chicago). I also know that heating and other subzero weather-related costs will continue to rise. I won’t want to spend that kind of money on staying warm when I’m a senior citizen. So, I know I need to make some adjustments to my lifestyle—such as moving to an area that’s more livable year-round—while: (1) I’m still young enough to do so fairly easily; (2) before anything happens that forces me to make those kind of major adjustments; and (3) before anything happens that makes these desired adjustments impossible. The point is to get as optimally situated as possible for the long run.

ASK YOURSELF: ARE WHERE AND HOW YOU’RE LIVING RIGHT NOW VIABLE FOR THE LONG RUN?

Let me give some climate change-related examples. From The Archdruid Report:

Rising seas? You can watch that in action in low-lying coastal regions anywhere in the world, but for a convenient close-up, pay a visit to Miami Beach, Florida. You’ll want to do that quickly, though, while it’s still there. Sea levels off Florida have been rising about an inch a year, and southern Florida, Miami Beach included, is built on porous limestone.  These days, as a result, whenever an unusually high tide combines with a strong onshore wind, salt water comes bubbling up from the storm sewers and seeping right out of the ground, and the streets of Miami Beach end up hubcap-deep in it. Further inland,seawater is infiltrating the aquifer from which southern Florida gets drinking water, and killing plants in low-lying areas near the coast.

See the article cited, “The Siege of Miami.” A commenter to another Archdruid Report post said the following:

Pinku-Sensei said...

"According to recent reports, state government officials in Florida are being forbidden from using the phrase “climate change” when discussing the effects of, whisper it, climate change."

That reminds me of a story from three years ago when a group of legislators in North Carolina tried to essentially outlaw honest estimates of sea level rise because they would be bad for real estate values. My response to that was I didn't know Canute was the King of North Carolina. The difference is that the real King Canute knew better; he just wanted to make a point about the limits of his power. A better analog would be Xerxes, who ordered the sea be given 300 lashes, fettered, and branded after a boat bridge across the Hellespont was destroyed by a storm.

As for the irony of Florida doing this when the state has been warned it needs to prepare for climate change, I've seen signs of climate chaos there first-hand. When my wife and I went to Florida to see our daughter for Thanksgiving a couple of years ago, we drive down Route A1A, the coastal highway between Fort Lauderdale and Miami. The northbound lanes were closed because they were covered by sea water, as the waves had eaten away the beach and the seawall. The odd part was there was no onshore wind and no storms offshore. I knew that climate change had a part in it, but it took months for me to find out that the sea had risen about a foot because the Gulf Stream had slowed down. That's exactly the kind of thing that could happen as the temperature gradient flattens out.

Which leads me to another point I've repeatedly discussed at my blogs: 

The importance of developing location-independent/portable income streams. It's best to have a way to earn money that's not dependent on you living in any particular place.

I would strongly urge you to check out the portable income course that Mrs. Dee Dee Lefrak of Black Women With Other Brothers recommends in THIS Facebook post.

Surviving and thriving are time-sensitive. Don't sleep on any of this.

Dystopia Now, Part 2: Reaping The Whirlwind Of Symbol Over Substance & Lesser Evilism Politics

". . . their gains will be snares."

Most African-Americans (AAs) Will Reap The Whirlwind Once President Obama Is Out Of Office

I'm quoting a number of earlier posts and conversations in this post because the circumstances that we're collectively facing didn't come into existence overnight. These issues have been building for decades; they've come to a head over the past decade; and BWE bloggers have been discussing ways of prospering despite these trend lines since the very beginning of the BWE movement. 

I would strongly urge readers to browse the archives and comment sections of the first wave BWE blogs, because a number of life-saving and life-enhancing ideas were discussed (often in detail) during these earlier conversations. 

In terms of my writing, I've been discussing the problems and liabilities inherent in Crossover Black Politicians like Pres. Obama from the very beginning of his first presidential campaign. I discussed these matters even though doing so angered a significant portion of my readership (who are Obama-stans):

I believe that AAs have started to reap the whirlwind that we've collectively sown as described in Hosea 8:7 of the Bible. [I'm Muslim, but I recognize that most of the readership is Christian.]

I believe that a lot of AAs' collective problems were set in motion decades (actually, over a century) ago: by our individual and collective refusal to "do for self" and our refusal to "support self." There are a handful of exceptions (I'm an exception, some of you readers are exceptions, there are other exceptions), but I'm talking about the vast majority of AAs.

In terms of AAs reaping what we've collectively sown, I feel the last straw was AAs' collective choice to worship a false idol called Barack Obama.:

Parallel Commentaries

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary
8:5-10 They promised themselves plenty, peace, and victory, by worshipping idols, but their expectations came to nothing. What they sow has no stalk, no blade, or, if it have, the bud shall yield no fruit, there was nothing in them. The works of darkness are unfruitful; nay, the end of those things is death. The hopes of sinners will deceive them, and their gains will be snares. 

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 7. - For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind. The harvest corresponds to the seed-time; their foolish and vain idolatries shall have corresponding results. This proverbial expression imports more than merely labor in vain; it denotes labor that has an injurious and destructive result. It has more than a negative significancy of lost labor; it conveys the idea of positive detriment. 

". . . their gains will be snares." During the very first blog post I ever wrote dated September 5, 2008, I warned y'all how this was going to play out:

Those of you who know me already know that I've been yelling the alarm about the coming financial collapse. And about how most Black folks (due to Obama-related-mania) are not doing anything to prepare. Here's a recap:

1. This economy is going to crash around our heads. This process has already begun. I strongly urge everyone to develop as many income streams as possible. ASAP. Depending on a single paycheck is courting disaster.

2. We haven't seen the full extent of the damage because the powers that be (PTB) have been hiding much of the damage. The PTB have done this to protect the image of the boy-prince, George W. Bush. The PTB won't extend the same service to Sen. Obama if he is elected president. In fact, if Obama is elected, they'll let it all fall apart to ensure that he gets the blame for the past 8 years of fiscal mismanagement.

3. In the midst of frolicking in our Obama-mania, most Black people haven't thought through the repercussions of having Sen. Obama elected.

4. For example, if Sen. Obama is elected president this means that the days of crying to Whites about racism are OVER. For real. They won't entertain that noise anymore. They will say that racism can't be that bad---after all, a Black (sort-of) man was elected president.

[For the purposes of this discussion, I won't go into detail about how in order to be the first viable "Black" presidential candidate, it seems that the candidate must be half-Other and half-foreign origin. In order to have a serious chance to be the first Black president, it helps that Sen. Obama is half-White and half-something-other-than-African-American. Politically, this is a a new "paper bag test" in operation.]

5. Black leadership (such as it is) does not have any other strategy beyond protesting racism. Collectively, Black folks don't have a back-up plan. This is a problem.

6. If elected, a Pres. Obama will feel the need to prove to Whites that he's not partial to us. He will do this by ignoring our issues and problems. There won't be any help coming from an Obama Administration. Not specifically for Black folks.

7. Because Black folks are addicted to symbol over substance, most of us will continue to support a Pres. Obama no matter what he does. Even while he literally ignores us to death. After all, we "gotta support a brother." We love seeing Black faces in high places. Even when these Black-skinned folks do a great deal of damage to our interests. [For examples, see Black folks' continued expressions of support and admiration for Colin Powell, Condoleeza Rice, etc.]

On February 8, 2009, during the For Your Own Survival, You Must Become a Sovereign Individual Instead of a “Typical” Employee post, I told folks how this would go down:

Don’t Stake Your Survival on Pres. Obama

Don’t stake your (and your loved ones’) survival on anything that Pres. Obama might do. First of all, there’s no way of knowing whether or not his economic proposals will actually work. Second, there are MANY other parties that don’t want any of his proposals to succeed. Including many individuals that are nominally on his “side.”

Pres. Obama Does NOT Have His Own Posse. Nobody is Watching His Back. This Means That Anything He Does WILL Be Sabotaged. From the Inside-Out.

I can see that the masses of our people will be devastated (in many different ways) when various factions from within as well as outside the Democratic Party finally pull down the Obama-ssiah.

It doesn’t matter how much Pres. Obama tries to appease these factions. The problem is that these various factions cannot be appeased. This is because they don’t want to be appeased. What they want is to make sure that whatever efforts the Obama-ssiah makes fail, and he gets ALL of the blame, while they position themselves to reign. . . err, rule. . . err, govern. . . once he’s been politically destroyed.

This illustrates another problem with most Black folks’ concept of politics. We don’t understand that the “ruler” is only as strong as his infrastructure (aka “posse”). In Chicago terms, his political “machine.” Does Pres. Obama actually have a loyal, faithful, strong posse of his own? Or is he somebody who was loaned the use of other people’s posses? We know the answer to this.

It looks like he didn’t understand that these various “retainers” are only loyal to the people who actually own and created them. They are loyal to the individuals who loaned them to him. NOT to him. He didn’t create any of these people. This is one of the unspoken consequences of Pres. Obama being a crossover candidate who did not come from any sort of organized Black movement or infrastructure.

Black voters simply hopped on the Obama-ssiah bandwagon after they saw that Whites in Iowa were willing to vote for him. Pres. Obama did not come from us. Not that our infrastructure or organizations are particularly solid, but Pres. Obama has NOTHING but thin air under his feet.

Pres. Obama’s recent blindsided stumbles with several cabinet nominees should be a signal to you. The manner in which all of that went down made it quite apparent to me that he doesn’t have anybody who is actually watching his back. He doesn’t even have an old-school, Chicago political “machine” to watch his back. That’s his own fault for being naive.

Machiavelli warned about the dangers of a prince being dependent upon mercenaries. Especially foreign ones. They have a nasty habit of abruptly abandoning the prince (at the worst possible moment) in favor of the highest bidder, and/or their previous employers.

For the love of God, don’t rely on this one (naive) man for your survival.

I said the following in the comments to a November 2010 post:

Khadija Nassif says:

Hodan and Geekgrl,

I lay all of this at the feet of the extremely gullible, naive, and most of all WEAK Pres. Obama. I did several posts discussing in detail Pres. Obama’s naivete and weakness at the previous blog.

To quickly sum up, Pres. Obama should have done what Bush II did: governed like someone who had won a landslide, and pushed through a bold agenda. Which is what Bush II did—even though he never won anything remotely resembling a landslide.

Pres. Obama also should have taken every opportunity to remind folks that it was Bush and the other Republicans that drove the economy into the toilet during their 8-year reign. Instead of trying to reach out to Republicans who consistently and correctly interpret the Democrats’ attempts at bipartisan cooperation as a sign of their weakness.

Bush II and his crew were also quite ruthless at slapping back at their opponents. And doing everything they could to delegitimize anybody who objected to their policies. Pres. Obama should have done the same thing—starting with the Republican-operative-controlled Fox News. But no, Boo-Boo The Fool-Obama allows Fox News to have continued access to White House press briefings. He should have been looking to have some of those Fox folks exposed, harassed and indicted like the Wiki-Leaks man is currently being hounded internationally by the US government.

By being a weakling who foolishly sought to placate implacable opponents, Pres. Obama missed the opportunity to keep his base energized in support of him. He sold out every constituent group that was part of his base in attempts to win over people who CAN’T be won over by any Democratic politician. And certainly not by a Black(-ish) Democratic politician. Unlike silly AAs who will cling to their false Obama-ssiah to the bitter end—no matter how much he ignores our issues—other groups (such as the gays) are not going to put up with being betrayed and thrown under the bus.

Since Pres. Obama was too stupid and weak to make the necessary bold moves (which are described in detail by the video I posted) at the point when he could have done so—at the very beginning of his term—he’s sealed the fate of the Demopublican party. I predict a bloodbath tomorrow for the Demopublicans. What the Demopublicans like Obama don’t understand is that whenever given a choice between real and CRAZY Republicans and Republican-Lite Democrats, these deranged White voters their chasing always pick the genuine Republican lunatics.

In any event, any AA who wants to survive and thrive must immediately detach their personal abundance plan from anything that might depend on Pres. Obama and the other fools in the Demopublican Party. And also refrain from hoping or planning on sympathy OR sanity from the Republicans and their Tea Bag Lunatic contingent.

Expect Success!

Khadija Nassif says: 

Neecy,

A response before I come back to this conversation later tonight…

I’m sitting out this particular election. I’m sitting this one out because I’m not going to run up into the voting booth to spend my votes on people that I haven’t thoroughly researched. Instead, I’m going to take my time researching various Green Party and other 3rd party platforms and candidates.

In my research, I’m going to be on the lookout for specific 3rd party candidates throughout the country that I’ll give small, but regular financial contributions to their campaigns. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) taught that it’s better to do small good deeds on a regular, consistent basis than rare, grand gestures.

It’s going to take time and patience for those who are displeased by Tweedle Dee-Tweedle Dum politics in the US to build a viable alternative for ourselves. It’s not the sort of thing that one can run out and do on the spur of the moment.

I will also add that voting is simply the final step in building a viable alternative. The Republican Juggernaut didn’t appear out of thin air. It was created by a slew of supporting infrastructures:

1-the Republican-owned and operated media noise machine of countless AM talk radio shows and cable tv show;

2-the Republican-owned and operated fake think tanks that churn out reams of educated-sounding books, articles, essays, op ed pieces, and policy papers in support of insanity;

3-lunatic Republican candidates mobilizing at the local level who stood for election for local school boards, and so on.

At its beginning, Air America was a good step toward prong #1. There are relatively small things that all of us could do help establish prongs #2 and 3.

It doesn’t take that much energy to write a letter to the editor every once in a while. For those who are more energetic, they can use the new technology to do their own podcasts that they disseminate—this is a step forward toward prong #1. In her latest post, Gina at WAOD is calling for some WAOD readers to run for election in the future. This would be part of prong #3.

For another example in the American Muslim context, I plan to join an AA Muslim think tank that I hope will be formed in the near future. The overall purpose would be to take back the Muslim American narrative AWAY from the Immigrant Muslim Syndicate that wants to tie American Muslims and our issues to various unsavory foreign-based agendas. I firmly believe that immigrant Muslims and their foreign-based agendas are endangering the safety of naive, gullible AA Muslims. I don’t want naive, gullible AA Muslims to end up in a concentration camp just like the Japanese-Americans during WWII because of immigrant Muslims.

As things stand, foolish AA Muslims are passively sitting around. They don’t have passports. They’re not creating emergency relocation options for themselves. And they’re not doing anything to counteract immigrant Muslims from being the ONLY voice of Muslims in the US. Basically, AA Muslims are a group of sitting ducks. That’s not me.

Right now, I’m feverishly busy creating relocation options for myself, if things develop to that point in this country. But I also try to do what I can to help prevent things from getting to that point. I never signed on to the things said by CAIR or any of these other immigrant-dominated Muslim groups in the US. They DON’T speak for me. And I want the sane members of the overall American public to clearly understand that these immigrants don’t speak for me, or for other AA Muslims who feel as I do.

Part of creating relocation options for myself is building my various income streams. Right now, I’m totally preoccupied with furthering my income streams so that I’ll be okay no matter who gets in, no matter who controls the Congress, no matter who controls the Senate…no matter any of that.

I DON’T advocate that AA women take on the burdens of any sort of crusades. I’m talking about doing the small, comfortable things that help build viable options for ourselves.

Expect Success!

 The Whirlwind Has Already Begun

This whirlwind has already begun. In places like Flint, Michigan as discussed HERE. Even the so-called "mainstream," White-owned media are phasing out their few tokens of color (who have reached the end of their usefulness as window dressing now that Pres. Obama's time in office is coming to an end). See HERE, HERE and HERE.

And, really now, that's what ultimately happens to people who choose to be sharecroppers working at somebody ELSE'S job instead of creating things of their own. As discussed in the post Full Circle—Back to Sharecropping:

“FULL CIRCLE”

During a recent email conversation, a friend said (she’s graciously given me permission to quote her):

At the end of slavery, our former people had nothing and due to not addressing the issues stated above, our former people have managed to arrive right back where they started – to have nothing of their own.

I said I wasn’t going to publish new blog posts that directly touch on these sorts of issues, but I’m making an exception in this case. The recent Wall Street Journal news story that a friend and I have been discussing, Much Ado About Straightening: Old Black Salons Face New Rivals marks the end of an era for African-Americans. This news story represents one of the last few surviving canaries dropping dead in the coal mine.

The African-American (mis)leadership class is feckless and foolish. The masses of African-Americans are deluded. They’ve been riding a merry-go-round for over a century. They think they’re getting somewhere, but they’re not. They’re going around in circles. And, without realizing it, the entire merry-go-round platform is descending and moving backwards as they ride. Even as African-Americans continue our free fall into permanent underclass status, many of us believe that we’re doing just fine because there’s a Black face and family in the White House. As the Black Agenda Report story Living a Black Fantasy: The Obama Delirium Effect noted, “Majorities of African Americans told Pew pollsters Blacks were better off in 2009 than five years before, when by all economic measurements the opposite was true.”

We’ve gone backwards in terms of racial and ethnic self-respect. The “paper bag test” has escalated into a “manila folder and lighter” test. The only thing that has changed is the terminology we use to describe our escalating colorism. In the modern era, we tell lies about our internal, self-imposed racial discrimination against darker-skinned Blacks. We lie and say that we’re only celebrating “all of who we are,” and so on. Nobody is fooled by this. Other people just don’t say anything to our faces about what they see us doing.

The Political End Of The Road For African-Americans

There are many prices to pay for a refusal to "do for self." One price is the collective experience of always living in fear politically. All of which leads to African-American voters being taken for granted by the political party they pray will protect them from the more rabid racists in American society. As noted in the Black Agenda Report article Vector of Fear: Blacks and the Democratic Party,

In practice, it is institutionalized group panic, a stampede every four years. Blacks are drawn into the jaws of the Democratic Party, not by ideological affinity, but in search of protection from the Republicans. This is an entirely different dynamic than an alignment based on thoughtful examination of political platforms. It’s not about picking a candidate or party that sees the world as most Black people do, from the left side of the spectrum, on matters of social justice and peace. Rather, the overarching objective is to choose a candidate from the Democratic wing of the Rich Man’s duopoly who is best equipped to defeat his or her Republican counterpart. Under these stilted circumstances, the Democratic candidate’s actual political positions become near-irrelevant to the Black primary voter, compared to the candidate’s perceived ability to win a national election. The question becomes, is the Democrat strong enough to beat back the latest offensive from the GOP? – which Black people perceive as an existential threat. In the grip of that mindset, the contestant that is richer, better connected to the party apparatus and more acceptable to masses of white voters is the better Black choice.

This is in stark contrast to collectives who "do for self" and thereby position themselves to be okay no matter who gets into office, such as the Mormons, the Jews, and the Cubans in Miami.

I agree with the general gist of the BAR article listed above—that African-Americans vote in accordance with emotional arousal in general and panic-based stampedes in particular. I disagree with the notion that AAs engage in value- or ideology-based politics. AAs' mass support of Pres. Obama's choice to (1) keep Bush nominees in top posts and (2) continue most of George W. Bush's foreign policies shows that AAs will support almost any policy if it's promoted by a Black Face In A High Place.

I see the same behavior patterns at play during this election season: Many AA voters are fervently supporting Hillary Clinton primarily because they're afraid of the various Pandering To Racists And/Or Personally Racist Republican candidates. Despite the heavy damage that 1990s era Clintonism did to the AA collective. I remember how Pres. Bill Clinton used and then discarded AA voters. I remember the many "triangulations" Pres. Clinton engaged in that betrayed the AA voters who had overwhelmingly supported him.

Another set of AA voters are fervently supporting Sen. Bernie Sanders. Here's why I can't support him either: He's been in politics and elected office for decades and yet I literally had never heard of him before now. Meanwhile, during the same period of time that he's been in various offices, I had heard of other liberal or progressive politicians from other parts of the country such as Barney Frank. To me, that means that either (1) Sen. Sanders has previously never really addressed AA concerns and issues or (2) he's been utterly ineffective in doing so to the point that most of the other politically aware AAs I know had never heard of him before now.

Get Ready For The Election of Donald Trump As President

And finally, there's the Mad Cow American Sheeple Voters—who are totally irrational. Including the growing number of Black ones, like these two fools:

When I first saw a video of these two deranged colored women, I was half-expecting to hear an announcer say, "Live from New York, it's Saturday night!" [the intro to Saturday Night Live at the end of the opening skit].

On one level, it's been amusing watching the Republican establishment lose control of the ignorant, enraged and now-deranged White American sheeple that they've been pimping for decades. It's been hilarious watching the National Review devote an entire issue to ragging on Trump. It's been downright delicious watching Trump and his right-wing supporters denigrate right-wing Fox News. All three of these entities have spent decades encouraging and exploiting White American sheeple racism for their own purposes. It serves them all right that it's finally blown up in their faces, and the same racist White sheeple have turned on them.

It's a mirror image of how the Democratic establishment has been pimping its various captive constituencies for decades. There's a similar anti-establishment resentment among White Democrats. Which is why Hillary Clinton is faced with a serious fight for the nomination instead of the shoo-in coronation that she expected.

The difference for AAs is that the bulk of AA sheeple will never turn on the Democratic establishment. They're too afraid to do so (for the reasons discussed above).

No other constituency feels as trapped as AAs. Other people feel free to jump ship. Many White and other nonblack Sanders supporters will stay home or even vote for Donald Trump if Hillary Clinton wins the Democratic nomination. 

All of which is why I believe Donald Trump will be elected the next U.S. President.

Like many other Americans, I want the Mexican illegal aliens and other illegal aliens OUT of this country. Like many other Americans, I don't support ANY of the modern-era immigrants who have come to this country—and I would prefer that most of them leave and go home—because their presence here brings NO benefit to me or mine. See the Christian Science Monitor article Americans are losing jobs to a visa program. Can it be fixed?

So, yes, it'd be best to get the illegal aliens OUT of this country. But that doesn't mean it makes any sense for me to ignore the rest of Trust Fund Baby Donald Trump's stated policies (the bulk of which I find abhorrent).

The experience of voting for Pres. Obama has cured me of voting for the purported “lesser evil.” I will never do that again. Lesser evilism is a large part of what has gotten the AA collective to this politically powerless point. Rabbi Michael Lerner was quite correct about the immorality and long-term effects of lesser evilism in his essay that I republished, The Immorality of Lesser Evilism. These days, I only vote for those candidates that I actively support. 

As I said in Part 1 of this series of posts, I’m not saying all of the above to scare you. I’m saying this to reiterate the core message of my book and two blogs: 

You can thrive (and not just survive) during this time of collapse if you GET BACK TO BASICS. 

Do what you can to position yourself to live well regardless of who is in office.

Today's Get Back To Basics Suggestion—Read the comment section and post titled “Early Retirement Extreme.”