DESANTIS GOES TO WAR ON WOKEISM
On election night, I was half-watching Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’s victory remarks when something quite extraordinary and encouraging caught my attention.
DeSantis evoked Churchill’s “fighting on the beaches” speech, in which Churchill stirred the resolve and patriotism of the British people in anticipation of the invasion of their homeland by the Nazis. DeSantis, of course, was not warning against Nazism: he was warning against wokeism, which he was implicitly equating with Nazism.
I had never heard a national political figure treat wokeism with such (deserved) gravity. Here’s what he needs to do to help America get rid of it.
THE EUROPE THATS STILL THERE
It’s found here – the fishing port of the ancient village of Sesimbra in Portugal. 3,000 years ago it was called Sempsibriga – high place or briga of the Sempsi Celts. So much of Europe is gone now, steamrollered by modernity. Not here, where Portuguese fishermen sail out in their tiny boats for their daily catch as they have for countless generations. The best fish you’ve ever had is in Sesimbra’s local restaurants – wow, is the swordfish good.
While Portugal is a First World country with all the modernity you could ask for, it is unique not only for the charm of its history, preservation of its culture, and post-card picturesqueness, but the sweetness of its people. They are simply nice in a way that’s so captivating. Their traditional family values are part of their nature. The country resonates with peacefulness, an at ease serenity. It’s the Europe that’s still there.
You can be captivated yourself by joining our WX Exploration of Portugal next month, June 17-26. (Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
Jack Wheeler is Escape Artist’s World Exploration Expert. He is the founder of Wheeler Expeditions at WheelerExpeditions.com.
TURNING 80
Jack and Rebel, New Year’s Day, 2023
I turn 80 years old this year of 2023. It’s a sobering milestone.
I have almost infinitely more to be grateful for than not. I have had an incredible life, lucky beyond belief. I have the two most wonderful sons a father could ask for. As Rebel and I are in our fourth decade of marriage, we love each other more than ever.
And I am in superb health – albeit with that infamous qualifier, “for my age.” I work out several days a week so hard and extensively that a friend recently told me he’s seen fit 40 year-olds in the gym that couldn’t keep up with me. I don’t have an ache or pain in my body.
However… as 80 looms before me, I realize I can’t keep this up. At some point, I’m going to have to call it a day. So I’ve decided that I’m going to give it my all for another year – that year being this one, 2023.
I’m always saying, Carpe Diem – the Time for a Great Adventure Is Now. Well, that time has come. If you’ve always wanted to have a great adventure with me in some awesomely cool place in the world – or have another! – carpe diem, seize the day.
To entice you, I’ve made another decision: to make you a deal I hope you can’t resist.
RESOLUTIONS 2023
Rebel and I received the best Christmas present we could ask for. Jackson and his wife Raya came to spend Christmas-New Year’s with us, and to deliver the news: Rebel and I are going to be grandparents! At last!
The picture you see is Rebel, Jackson, and me standing in front of our Christmas tree, with Rebel holding a 1992 photo of Jackson being held by us on his first Christmas at six months old. He’s now 30, six-foot-two, and soon to be a father himself.
The years pass by so quickly. You look back on them and they seem to have gone by at light speed. That’s why I always advise parents of young children to treasure every day with them – for the day will come so fast when they will be grown and gone.
That’s why each one of us no matter how old should treasure every day we are still alive on this Earth – for the day will come when we will be gone, and that day can come at any moment.
That’s why every January 1st, I renew my two most fundamental Resolutions for the coming year. Here they are – and I’d like to suggest they be yours too.
KEEPING YOUR SANITY BY USING HOPE EFFECTIVELY
Hope lies at the heart of our aspirations and ambitions; our dreams and wishes. It fuels us to strive for goals and achievements.
It can also lead us to wish for things we cannot have, aspire to achievements we cannot reach, and fantasize dreams that we cannot fulfill.
To the degree that hope is integrated with reality, it can serve our greatest potential. To the degree that it is disconnected from reality, it can undermine that potential; keeping us floating helplessly in fantasy, unable to find traction and gain fulfillment in our lives.
Let’s talk about how we get to the first and avoid the second…
HALF-FULL REPORT 12/30/22
Three Megatrends to Watch in 2023
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A lot happened during 2022, from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to political shenanigans, even worse economic shenanigans, and the nationwide breakdown of law and order.
Each is connected to a widespread loss of trust in governments, businesses, schools, and the neighbor down the street. We are rapidly changing from a high-trust society to something else.
Three megatrends are emerging. The first is the sudden step-like change in chatbot sophistication that threatens to replace the great libraries of free and open-source information with machine-curated global narratives. Drag shows in public libraries intended to withdraw public support and the destruction of monuments are features of the shift to the singular narrative.
Loss of trust in commercial institutions is everywhere. We long suspected and compiled evidence of the collaboration of big tech with big government. Now that Elon Musk is telling the world what has been happening behind the curtain, everything is suspect. Musk is a crack in the narrative; he is the point of failure exposing the massive effort devoted to information control.
The problem for the government is apparent: Propaganda ceases to work once it is known to be propaganda.
All over the world and within most corporations, technology has been used to centralize decision-making at the expense of decision quality. The current trend is to replace the mind with a computer algo. The consequence is a dramatic decline in innovation.
Without innovation, there is nothing to prevent entropy from expanding.
Breaking trust with the current systems creates a foundation for the future. Those that understand this will prosper. Others, including entire corporations and governments, will fail.
Come to the HFR, and most of all, Happy New Year!
FLASHBACK FRIDAY: THE SKY CAVES OF MUSTANG
Yes, that’s me, waving from one of the cave openings on the cliff face honeycombed with 2,000 year-old Sky Caves in a remote region of the Himalayas called Upper Mustang. The photo was taken by one of your fellow TTPers on our most recent Himalaya Helicopter Expedition last May.
Upper Mustang is ruled by the Tibetan Kingdom of Lo, created by Tibetan warrior-king Amne Pal in 1380, with its sovereignty protected today by Nepal from the Chicoms right across the border in Chinese-Occupied Tibet. Lo, with its capital the medieval walled city of Lo Manthang, is where you will find the most traditional Tibetan culture left on our planet.
You can experience it yourself on our Himalaya Helicopter Expedition this spring. If not now, when? Carpe diem.
(Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #250 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
WHO WOULD SLAUGHTER INNOCENT CIVILIANS ON CHRISTMAS DAY?
THE CASTLE PRISON OF RICHARD THE LIONHEART
This is Durnstein Castle, perched on a precipice high above the Danube River in Austria some 60 miles upriver from Vienna. Built in the early 1100s, here is where King of England Richard the Lionheart was imprisoned, having been captured by his enemy Leopold V of Austria on his return from the Third Crusade in the Holy Land.
The story is well known of how Richard’s brother John had usurped the throne and impeded paying Richard’s ransom – and the legend of Robin Hood raising the money pilfering it from thieving nobles. The ransom was finally paid in 1194, with Richard returning to be crowned King of England once again. The castle fell into disrepair, uninhabitable since the late 1600s. It is an eerie journey back into history to explore it today. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #197 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
SKYE’S LINKS 12/29/22
Welcome to the final 2022 edition of Skye’s Links! After all the downers of this year, there’s plenty of good news to report at year’s end. We start with something written by a man known as The Sea Gypsy Philosopher, who strives to be The Three Ps – Powerful, Provocative and Poetic. I think you’ll agree he succeeds.
Here is a lovely Christmas message to Greta Thunberg. Her puppet masters will never allow her to see it, but you should do so. It is a message of hope. It is also a message that the oligopoly of censorship can no longer control. And that is very good news:
Good news! Honest liberal Tabbi, the man that Musk chose to release and explain the Twitter Files, is optimistic that we are finally moving in the right direction for information freedom. It isn't just Deep State/Twitter cooperation; there are far more quislings, and they will soon be exposed:
Matt Taibbi Reflects On "Repulsive, Horrifying, Dystopian" World Run By 'Anti-People'
Come on in! There’s lots more!