By By 2021 Quotes

I was suffering the easily foreseeable consequences. Addiction is the hallmark of every infatuation-based love story. It all begins when the object of your adoration bestows upon you a heady, hallucinogenic dose of something you never dared to admit you wanted-an emotional speedball, perhaps, of thunderous love and roiling excitement. Soon you start craving that intense attention, with a hungry obsession of any junkie. When the drug is witheld, you promptly turn sick, crazy, and depleted (not to mention resentful of the dealer who encouraged this addiction in the first place but now refuses to pony up the good stuff anymore-- despite the fact that you know he has it hidden somewhere, goddamn it, because he used to give it to you for free). Next stage finds you skinny and shaking in a corner, certain only that you would sell your soul or rob your neighbors just to have 'that thing' even one more time. Meanwhile, the object of your adoration has now become repulsed by you. He looks at you like you're someone he's never met before, much less someone he once loved with high passion. The irony is,you can hardly blame him. I mean, check yourself out. You're a pathetic mess,unrecognizable even to your own eyes. So that's it. You have now reached infatuation's final destination-- the complete and merciless devaluation of self." - pg 20-21

There is no law so obscene that the police would not be willing to enforce it, up to and including the mass execution of innocent children." - Michael Malice on The Waco Siege, Twitter, 2021

Early this morning, 1 January 2021, three minutes after midnight, the last human being to be born on earth was killed in a pub brawl in a suburb of Buenos Aires, aged twenty-five years, two months and twelve days.

Sometimes a year has been so disastrous and so terrible that entering a new year will automatically mean entering a wonderful year!

Death doesn't rid of us of our feelings. It just stops us from changing the narrative.

Each new year is another chance to get love right.

Think solutions — is the mantra for success.

When a leader was once asked how to develop the skill of quick decision-making, he answered, “Be around people who are not afraid of making mistakes.

سأكون أوّل كاتب عربي يدعو الوطن العربي إلى الكتابة باللغة الإنكليزية لأنها لغة عالمية مشتركة، لن تقرّبنا فقط من العالم الناطق بالإنكليزية، بل أيضا من بقية العالم بحكم تقبّل شعوب الدنيا الإنكليزية لغة مشتركة للتواصل. وعبد الرزاق غورناه الفائز بنوبل 2021 خير نموذج. فمع أنه كاتب مزدوج اللغة، فإنه لم يحقق العالمية بلغته الأصلية السواحلية وإنما باللغة الإنكليزية العالمية.

فشلُ الأدب العربي في تحقيق العالمية دفعني لأن أكون أوّل كاتب عربي يدعو الوطن العربي إلى الكتابة باللغة الإنكليزية لأنها لغة عالمية مشتركة. لن تقرّبنا هذه اللغة من العالم الناطق بالإنكليزية فحسب، بل أيضا من بقية العالم بحكم تقبّل شعوب الدنيا الإنكليزية لغة مشتركة للتواصل. وعبد الرزاق غورناه الفائز بنوبل 2021 خير نموذج. فمع أنه كاتب مزدوج اللغة، إلاَّ أنه لم يحقق العالمية بلغته الأصلية السواحلية وإنما باللغة الإنكليزية العالمية.

At cocktail parties, I played the part of a successful businessman's wife to perfection. I smiled, I made polite chit-chat, and I dressed the part. Denial and rationalization were two of my most effective tools in working my way through our social obligations. I believed that playing the roles of wife and mother were the least I could do to help support Tom's career. During the day, I was a puzzle with innumerable pieces. One piece made my family a nourishing breakfast. Another piece ferried the kids to school and to soccer practice. A third piece managed to trip to the grocery store. There was also a piece that wanted to sleep for eighteen hours a day and the piece that woke up shaking from yet another nightmare. And there was the piece that attended business functions and actually fooled people into thinking I might have something constructive to offer. I was a circus performer traversing the tightwire, and I could fall off into a vortex devoid of reality at any moment. There was, and had been for a very long time, an intense sense of despair. A self-deprecating voice inside told me I had no chance of getting better. I lived in an emotional black hole. p20-21, talking about dissociative identity disorder (formerly multiple personality disorder).

December is... by Stewart Stafford December is all that we give, And whatever we receive, It is those who surround us, And those who have taken leave. December is celebrating light, Where only darkness dwells, It is the ripping of wrapping paper, And tempting culinary smells. December is letting go, Of all the past year's fails, And starting anew in January, As time again chases its tail. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

When the going gets tough, the tough gets going. We all start on a journey, but only a few adapt to the changes and overcome problems.

As Swami Chinmayananda said, “The youth are not useless — they are used less. The youth are not careless — they are cared for less.

The only thing we knew for certain was the American Civil War was not a prelude to a kiss.

If Dewey gets the most votes, then where does that leave me and Louie

There’s our nation with its cult of meritocracy that judges your worth by your IQ and your number of degrees. A nation that spews bilge about equal economic potential while, as of 2021, the top 1 percent has 32 percent of the wealth, and the bottom half less than 3 percent, where you can find an advice column headlined “It’s Not Your Fault if You Are Born Poor, but It’s Your Fault if You Die Poor,” which goes on to say that if that was your lamentable outcome, “I’ll say you’re a wasted sperm.”[18

By having the sun rise every day, the earth and the sky are renewing their commitment to work together. And we in turn honor that relationship and directly benefit from it.

The beauty of their silence was in everything that they heard around them.

Every breath we inhale comes from nature; kill it and we kill ourselves.

Remus se ríe con ganas y se da cuenta de que no importa lo que sean. Amigos, amantes, novios u otra cosa. Sean lo que sean, se llame como se llame, siempre serán eso. Remus y Sirius. Nada más y nada menos.

In September 2021, in a statement justifying COVID vaccine mandates to school children, Dr. Fauci dreamily recounted his own grade school measles and mumps vaccines—an unlikely memory, since those vaccines weren’t available until 1963 and 1967, and Dr. Fauci attended grade school in the 1940s.

For three nights he hadn't known how to touch my mother or what to say. Before, they had never found themselves broken together. Usually, it was one needing the other but not both needing each other, and so there had been a way, by touching, to borrow the stronger one's strength. And they had never understood, as they did now, what the word horror meant. ~pgs 20-21

What the world needs today are alliances that improve the lives of people by creating opportunities and not cheap public relations stunts. Where I come from we say 'kwa ground vitu ni different'. [G7 Summit, June 12, 2021]

To anyone I've offended, I just want to say 'I reinvented electric cars and I'm sending people to Mars in a rocket ship, did you also think I was going to be a chill, normal dude?” ~ Elon Musk, Saturday Night Live, 8th May 2021.

I was well into my research on the saga of Fort Sumter and the advent of the American Civil War when the events of January 6, 2021, took place. As I watched the Capitol assault unfold on camera, I had the eerie feeling that present and past had merged. It is unsettling that in 1861 two of the greatest moments of national dread centered on the certification of the Electoral College vote and the presidential inauguration.

It's voting rights or it's the filibuster. It's LGBTQ+ rights or it's the filibuster. It's union rights or it's the filibuster. It's civil rights or it's the filibuster. It's our rights or it's the filibuster. The choice is easy. (3/18/2021 on Twitter)

I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.

murdered,

On January 6th, America openly and decisively turned in the direction of fascism with the censorship of President Trump’s Twitter account.

It snows metal on planet Venus! There are two types that have been found, galena and bismuthinite.

The quietest room in the world in Minnesota is measured in negative decibels – so quiet that you can hear your own heartbeat and your bones moving.

Plácido, enloquecido, lleno de melancolía. Le gusta cómo suena “lunático”. Sonríe en la oscuridad. Le acaban de bautizar. –Llámame como quieras, Sirius. Como tú quieras.

The king severe with rod (punishment) becomes a terror. A king with a mild rod is despised. The king just with the rod is honoured.

The strength of an artist lies in how much of themselves they are prepared to reveal in their art.' Iain Cameron Williams, 2021, 'Other People's Dreams' to be published in 2022.

Kautilya advises, “Just as an elephant, blinded by intoxication and mounted by an intoxicated driver, crushes whatever it finds (on the way), so the king, not possessed of the eye of science, and (hence) blind, has risen to destroy the citizens and the country people.” (1.14.7)

How is your life with that other one? Simpler, is it? A stroke of the oars and a long coastline— and the memory of me is soon a drifting island (not in the ocean—in the sky!) — Marina Tsvetaeva, from “An Attempt at Jealousy,” transl. Ilya Kkaminsky and Jean Valentine, Poetry (March 2021)

... the neuro- in neurodiversity is most usefully understood as referring not just to the brain but to the entire nervous system–and, by extension, to the full complexity of human cognition and the central role the nervous system plays in the embodied dance of consciousness”(Walke2021, p. 55).

Let your new energy, new thoughts, new attitude, new routine & new outlook make this time most sacred, memorable & beautiful for you & others. Let you also begin to see greater in everything & believe in unexplainable possibilities. Let you grow in ways which you never knew was possible. Darling listen – Don’t let the magic in the air get swallowed up by someone’s nonsensical thoughts, words, comments & by any kind of pressure in the air. I wish & pray that these last few days of this year be the best part of this year for you & everyone! Stay Healthy, Happy & Meaningful! Blessings!

In 2023, as I write this, librarians in America are on the front lines of the culture war. Censorship is at an all-time high. According to the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, “a record 2,571 unique titles were targeted for censorship in 2022, a 38% increase from the 1,858 unique titles targeted for censorship in 2021.” This is the highest number of attempted book bans since ALA began compiling data about censorship in libraries more than twenty years ago.

I was built to protect those who cannot protect themselves." -Zane Julien "A Ninja never admits defeat. A Ninja always picks himself up when he's down." -Kai Smith "Some of us may look a little different, but like our team; some things never change." -Cole Brookstone "It's important to be yourself." -Jay Walker "We're friends. Good Friends. But, that's all we're ever gonna be . . ." -Nya Smith "We are not so different . . Are we? We are . . . Compatible?" -Pixel "The best way to defeat your enemy, is to make them your friend." -Sensei Wu "The only way to defeat an Oni is with another Oni. You need me." -Garmadon

All I ask the new year for is to fall silently into the spaces that the last one left empty. Filling them with a hope that tells me gently at dawn that my simple love can cure even the most extraordinary heart and that my broken past is enough for each tomorrow that follows. Maybe it will even remind me that all the mistakes I will collect over the next year are not as bad as the chances I missed in the last one.

Oh, my friends, the first wish I have for the new year is to change the worn-out greeting: 'happy new year'. There is no happiness, only fleeting moments of joy. There is nothing new under the sun, only new ways of looking at the same eternal challenges and unresolved questions. There is no point in wishing for a perfect health in a profoundly sick world – the view is much clearer and more interesting when living on the edge. And so, I wish you all endurance as we go through another difficult year. I wish you courage to snatch a few more days (or moments) of joy as another year slips through the fingers of Time. I wish you much strength to maintain your equilibrium as we face new earthquakes of uncertainty in the coming year. Most of all, I wish we never give up on the possibility of doing things otherwise. And, of course, I wish you much love.

The Shadow Waltz by Stewart Stafford She lays with me by night, Hewn from dark solitude, Without malice aforethought. Creaking springs as she crawls to me, In a frantic state, Babbling desperately about her pain. Nails caress my abdomen and chest, Strange warmth emanates from her, Then she rises. And is gone, Melting with the corner darkness again, Watching my slumber from the shadows. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

Dear Public Health Officials: With 68% of the world’s population vaccinated and 13-billion doses administered, if the vaccines are safe and effective, how do you explain that the overwhelming number of COVID deaths –and all the highest peaks in deaths– occurred after commencement of mass vaccination?

In 1996, there were no tech companies among the five most valuable traded on U.S. exchanges; in 2021 the entire top five consisted of U.S. tech companies. Today, the most prolific Hollywood studio is Netflix. More Americans get their news from social media, primarily Facebook, than from cable television.

One would think that the adverse effects of, say, low socioeconomic status in childhood would occur as a result of brain development being delayed. Instead, the problem is that the early-life stress accelerates maturation of the brain, meaning that the window for brain construction being sculpted by experience closes earlier: U. Tooley, D. Bassett, and P. Mackay, “Environmental Influences on the Pace of Brain Development,” Nature Reviews Neuroscience 22 (2021): 372.

To the man who was hustling to sell facemasks for years before Covid, living rough on the streets and warning us of the nightmare to come. May your cardboard doomsday signs be framed and celebrated. May we always heed your warnings in future, no matter if the next plague requires wearing glittering buttplugs 24/7 to ward off the Coronass virus of 2021. May we never take you and your wild ramblings for granted again. We will buy your buttplugs, good sir. Just name your price.

While it did not break down the data by religious affiliation, an NPR analysis in December 2021 found that counties that voted heavily for Trump experienced COVID death rates nearly three times higher than those that voted heavily for Joe Biden32—a grim illustration of the dangers of making decisions based on a set of “alternative facts.

Isn't it true that the world's entertainment scene is looking towards Africa? Now that the world loves African music genres like #Kalpop, Afrobeats, Benga, Bongo Flava, Kwaito, Lingala, Gengetone, among others, let's embrace being who we are. The cradle of life! A cradle of life blesses more than it curses. It LOVES and never HATES because it's understanding. But how can I LOVE you if I don't know how to LOVE myself? How can we be ONE if I still believe that my TRIBE is better than yours? [Africa Day Statement, May 25, 2021.]

It means he’s read a lot of books.’ ‘Listen to that, a doctor of books! What use is that to this village?

i've always known the truth, i simply choose to ignore it as i do with everything in my life." - human, January 16, 2021

2020 was bad. 2021 is worse.

2021: Happy New Year! Me: ... 2021: What's wrong? Me: I'm not sure I'm going to be happy this year. 2021: You will. Me:

I’ll dial what’s on my schedule for today.” Examining the schedule for January 3, 2021, he saw that a businesslike professional attitude was called for.

The attacks on the US capitol on January 6th, 2021 will have ripple effects for years to come. We’re no longer in the September 11th era. We’re now in the January 6th era.

So on the night of June 22, 2021, from my home in California, I called 911 to report my father for conservatorship abuse.

AI Day,” which he scheduled for Tesla’s Palo Alto headquarters on August 19, 2021.

Baby Zeke 15   ​ ​​Friday, May 28, 2021 (tentative) Glitch Guardians 3    ​​Friday, June 18, 2021 (tentative) Surfer Villager 31 ​​TBA (Late June or early July)

An estimated 42,915 people died in traffic accidents on US roads in 2021. While there is ongoing debate about how much of this should be attributed to human error, it is clear that the overwhelming majority of crashes have human error as a key component—likely somewhere between 90 and 99 percent. Autonomous vehicles controlled by capable enough AI could eliminate almost all of these.

The Scientist (2019) “Quantum Biology May Help Solve Some of Life’s Greatest Mysteries.” Nature (2021) “Birds Have a Mysterious ‘Quantum Sense’. For The First Time, Scientists Saw It in Action.

A report by the IHME, released in late October 2020, estimated that 130k lives could be saved in the United States between the fall of that year and spring 2021 if people universally wore masks.

Perhaps the best statistical evidence for this shift lies in the 2021 Pew Research Center survey that found a growing tendency among white supporters of Donald Trump to newly adopt an evangelical identity. “In the end, their own movement was redefined as a reactionary, angry, white Christian, storm-the-Capitol movement,” Gushee said. “People who don’t have any idea about classical evangelical doctrines, but by God, they like Trump and they’re white, so therefore they’re evangelical. That is a complete collapse of moral and religious identity that evangelicals brought on themselves.

1. A deep question asks about someone’s values, beliefs, judgments, or experiences—rather than just facts. Don’t ask “Where do you work?” Instead, draw out feelings or experiences: “What’s the best part of your job?” (One 2021 study found a simple approach to generating deep questions: Before speaking, imagine you’re talking to a close friend. What question would you ask?) 2. A deep question asks people to talk about how they feel. Sometimes this is easy: “How do you feel about …?” Or, we can prompt people to describe specific emotions: “Did it make you happy when …?” Or ask someone to analyze a situation’s emotions: “Why do you think he got angry?” Or empathize: “How would you feel if that happened to you?” 3. Asking a deep question should feel like sharing. It should feel, a bit, like we’re revealing something about ourselves when we ask a deep question. This feeling might give us pause. But studies show people are nearly always happy to have been asked, and to have answered, a deep question.

He had a special fondness for the moving parts of women, their wrists, their butterfly-shaped ankles, their shoulder blades like a swan’s folded wings. In particular he treasured their knees, especially the back of them, where the skin was pale, milk-blue, with delicate fissures, little fine cracks, as in the most fragile old pieces of bone china. — John Banville, April in Spain (Hanover Square Press, 2021)

I glance at Mom. She looks pained. I know she doesn't care what I wear to lunch, but she doesn't want to contradict her mother. Actually, that's not quite true. Mom will go against Nana's wisheds where big enormous things are concerned, like who she marries and what kind of house she lives in. But when it comes to these smaller things- my appearance at lunch when Nana comes over- Mom often gives in. I do not understand this. I think these little things are supposed to be peace offerings, but for what? For running a boardinghouse or for something else, some adult thing I am not part of? ~pgs 20-21; Hattie on growing up and mothers

The blame lies with the perpetrators—not with the millions of overwhelmingly unarmed activists who tried to stop these juggernauts. Yet Alaa’s model here should remind us, wherever we reside, that though it may not be our fault, it is our duty to make time in our organizing and theorizing to confront our defeats. Not to wallow, but because such confrontations are our only hope of seeing the new terrain of struggle clearly.

23 Emotions people feel, but can’t explain 1.    Sonder: The realization that each passerby has a life as vivid and complex as your own. 2.    Opia: The ambiguous intensity of Looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable. 3.    Monachopsis: The subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place. 4.    Énouement: The bittersweetness of having arrived in the future, seeing how things turn out, but not being able to tell your past self. 5.    Vellichor: The strange wistfulness of used bookshops. 6.    Rubatosis: The unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat. 7.    Kenopsia: The eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that is usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet. 8.    Mauerbauertraurigkeit: The inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends who you really like. 9.    Jouska: A hypothetical conversation that you compulsively play out in your head. 10.    Chrysalism: The amniotic tranquility of being indoors during a thunderstorm. 11.    Vemödalen: The frustration of photographic something amazing when thousands of identical photos already exist. 12.    Anecdoche: A conversation in which everyone is talking, but nobody is listening 13.    Ellipsism: A sadness that you’ll never be able to know how history will turn out. 14.    Kuebiko: A state of exhaustion inspired by acts of senseless violence. 15.    Lachesism: The desire to be struck by disaster – to survive a plane crash, or to lose everything in a fire. 16.    Exulansis: The tendency to give up trying to talk about an experience because people are unable to relate to it. 17.    Adronitis: Frustration with how long it takes to get to know someone. 18.    Rückkehrunruhe: The feeling of returning home after an immersive trip only to find it fading rapidly from your awareness. 19.    Nodus Tollens: The realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore. 20.    Onism: The frustration of being stuck in just one body, that inhabits only one place at a time. 21.    Liberosis: The desire to care less about things. 22.    Altschmerz: Weariness with the same old issues that you’ve always had – the same boring flaws and anxieties that you’ve been gnawing on for years. 23.    Occhiolism: The awareness of the smallness of your perspective. John Koenig, The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows (Simon & Schuster, November 16, 2021)

Esa sonrisa que Lily contenía, florece en un instante. Bajo el techo desnudo del Gran Comedor, su expresión se ilumina y cuando se muerde el labio inferior, James avanza, inclina la cabeza, contiene el aliento y prueba un beso suave. Se rozan despacio, los labios juntos y nada más. Los rizos de Lily le hacen cosquillas en la cara y por un momento piensa que está volando y que es el viento el que le hace sentirse así, flotando a varios pies del suelo.

The Lighthouse by Stewart Stafford Apart and alone, From where the ships dock, Stands the white sentinel edifice on a promontory rock. Like the land's index finger, At the extent of the sea, Warning passing vessels where it's safe to be. It's one luminous eye, Swivels around its clear head, To keep lucky sailors off the seabed. It seeks no credit, And needs no thanks, Saluting proudly from above the fog banks. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

Do you as a writer expand the meanings of words, or are you merely their tool? Is your own language programming you like a computer, or are you wielding it like Prospero’s magic charms, and is there in fact a difference? Small children, when asked by Jean Piaget what part of their body they thought with, said, “My mouth”. Is thought possible without words? Do words determine what we can think, and if so, can we think some thoughts in one language that are impossible to articulate in another? (Translationland)

He has betrayed our national security and he will do so again. He has compromised our elections and he will do so again. You will not change him, you cannot constrain him. He is who he is. Truth matters little to him. What’s right matters even less, and decency matters not at all. I do not ask you to convict him because truth or right or decency matters nothing to him, but because we have proven our case and it matters to you. Truth matters to you. Right matters to you. You are decent. He is not who you are.[36]

The Green Rose by Stewart Stafford Through fractured eyes, I see the rose I once plucked, In another man's hands. And mistakes that cannot be unmade, Sins that must go unforgiven, A resigned reluctance to surrender all hope. Those fingers enwrapping, The slender stem, That only holds spiky thorns for me now. I watch and reminisce, So close and familiar, Yet so alien and barren. I turn and walk away, Leaving the green rose, In place on the grave of what once was. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

Calamity-peddling journalism also sets up perverse incentives for terrorists and rampage shooters, who can game the system and win instant notoriety.37 And a special place in Journalist Hell is reserved for the scribes who in 2021, during the rollout of Covid vaccines known to have a 95 percent efficacy rate, wrote stories on the vaccinated people who came down with the disease—by definition not news (since it was always certain there would be some) and guaranteed to scare thousands from this lifesaving treatment.

In light of reports of more demonstrations, I urge that there must be NO violence, NO lawbreaking and NO vandalism of any kind. That is not what I stand for, and it is not what America stands for. I call on ALL Americans to help ease tensions and calm tempers. Thank You.

New years will keep coming in our lives as long as we live, but how do we manage to live with prosperity in that every new year and help others around us do the same. Isn’t that what we should plan and celebrate? So, let’s celebrate the inception of improved us, not the new year.

Grief was the counterpoint of love. The more a person loves something, the more painful sorrow became when that something disappeared. She loved Nash with every ounce of her being, so when he went away he took her entire soul with him." ~Lydia Michaels WAKE MY HEART (Jasper Falls 1)

QUEEN OF 339 SOLDIERS The Scorpion Queen. Oh great Queen of the Desert. Amidst your throne are 339 Soldiers Your smiles are like lightning, piercing through the soul of men. How your enemies are crushed. You are love. You are danger in the lock. Let your enemies feel your wrath for beauty is your throne. The water that flourishes in the desert. Intelligent like the sun and proud like the moon. Sex is only for the pleasure your soul and those who betray you will feel the sting of your venom. Oh daughter of desert, may your reign be long. Poem by Victor Vote for Peace Obot ©️2021 by VVF

The Cavalier Servente by Stewart Stafford Her lover creeps On stairs that creak To where the mistress sleeps To wet his beak. Affairs in the dark When matrimony is parked A disloyal lark Starts the carnal spark. At break of day The cuckolder creeps away From naughty play He’s had his way. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

On June 23, 2021, I was finally due to address a Los Angeles probate court on the subject of the conservatorship. And I knew the world was listening. I had been practicing this for days, but now that the moment was here, the stakes felt overwhelming. Not least because I knew, since I’d asked for this hearing to be open to the public, that millions of people would be listening to my voice as soon as I was done speaking.

BLACK AND WHITE Oh Princess of the Sun. Daughter of nature. Love of the trees. Your eyes are with tears but love only flows through its canal You who defeated death with a kiss and old age was given as a crown. You walk in the streets of fate with hope as a sceptre. Olawaremilekun, the goodness that expresses grace. Your beauty still marvels the sons of men. Poem by Victor Vote for Princess Abisoye Oluwaremilekun Atinuadewa ©️2021 by VVF

BEE QUEEN Be not scared oh beetles of the earth Be at peace for the Queen Bee flaps for the preys. Your safety abide oh Queen of the Bee for your grace is only for the bees. The earth cry for empathy and your smiles brightened her fate When darkness whispers, your glow splashes Your beauty is like a thorn, it penetrates even the hardest feelings Your nest awaits your grace oh Queen mother Poem by Victor Vote for Yetunde Kayode ©️2021 by VVF

OKU NMA, THE PRINCESS OF LIGHT "And behold, all I see is mercy and grace" cried out the King over the Crown of the Princess of Light. As a bearer of good tidings, I turned to the King and cried out "Behold the peace of the Kingdom of Light". Ada Di Oma, the beauty from the land of the Kings. Oh Princess of Light, the bird through which goodness is spat into the hearts of men. The Bride to the perfect Groom. Let your reigning be heard across the Greenland. Poem by Victor Vote for Philomena Ndu Ezechukwu @©️2021 by VVF

Neptune’s Lost Banana by Stewart Stafford O lost banana of Neptune, Do you wonder why you’ve washed ashore? Do people see a yellow fruit in the water? Or a Portuguese Man O’War? You were so near the fingertips of power, Did fortune peel away your chances too quick? Or do you see yourself in an ivory tower? Of a split-away banana republic? You could have been top banana, Now you’re potential poetic justice, For someone with bad karma to slip on, And go skidding as you go squish. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

The name of the lesson is “Look What We Can Do to You Any Time We Fucking Want.” The point of the lesson is self-explanatory.The USA taught the world this lesson when it nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki. GloboCap (and the US military) taught it again when they invaded Iraq and destabilized the entire Greater Middle East. It is regularly taught in penitentiaries when the prisoners start to get a little too unruly and remember that they outnumber the guards. That’s where the “lockdown” concept originated. It isn’t medical terminology. It is penal institution terminology.

The conservative policies and principles that had once defined what it meant to be a Republican were being replaced by complete allegiance to one man—who wasn’t actually a conservative. One of the clearest manifestations of this was the lack of any platform for the Republican Party in 2020. In place of the extensive policy document that each party normally adopts every four years, the Republican Party adopted a resolution that simply affirmed, “The Republican Party has and will continue to enthusiastically support the President’s America-first agenda.” I talked to Condoleezza Rice in the spring of 2021. I had served as deputy assistant secretary of state for the Near East when Condi was secretary of state, and I’d known her since she served on the National Security Council staff during George H. W. Bush’s administration. She was an expert on the Soviet Union and a student of history. We discussed the cult of personality that had captured our party. This was something America had never experienced before. I asked Condi if she could think of any historic examples of countries successfully throwing off cults of personality. “Not without great violence and upheaval,” she said.

The Night Watchman by Stewart Stafford Does the night watchman watch the night or does the night watch him? Is there anything in the darkness or is his eyesight growing dim? Does a beast growl in the shadows or is his stomach requesting food? Is his pay adequate compensation or is his boss just being rude? As he prays for the sunrise, does anyone hear his prayers? When he clocks out for breakfast, is anyone standing there? Does he creep home to his bed to count the hours down? Until he sits staring at the darkness once more with a quizzical and resigned frown? © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

THE SEA QUEEN Hmm, he exclaim "I do not know grace can so be found in the rumour of the great Sea Queen" Those were my words when I met the Great Lynda of Ariaposa Sea. Your grace is without boundaries. Oh daughter who who ensnare the sons of men with grace, devouring every soul that stands her way. The Queen of Ariaposa, land of the Great Votite King. The Queen without which mercy is flaws. Great daughter of the Benin Empire. The daughter of the Red Sand Kingdom, across the forest of the Yorubas and Waters of Deltas. May your beautiful convey mercy. Poem by Victor Vote for Lynda Akhigbe Okoeguale ©️2021 by VVF

Many aspects of how the Chinese political class manages its economy are antithetical to the Western values of democracy and free markets. But this stance has not put off foreign investors, who are attracted to the government’s willingness to prioritize physical infrastructure, political security, and stability over the health of the population, transparency in decision making, and transparency in the rule of law (if not necessarily the system of governance). In essence, the pursuit of economic growth overrides any views on the political system they invest in. Currently China’s political class has a strategy to evolve from an investment-led exporting economy to one more in line with Western economies, relying on domestic consumption. The transition to this new economic equilibrium will not be linear. China will likely experience significant economic volatility and market gyrations as the structure of its economy shifts. There is also mounting skepticism about China’s ability to manage its debt levels, and the country’s lack of individual political freedoms will continue to hamper its growth prospects. But Chinese policymakers will, no doubt, be focused on continuing to show economic progress in advance of two target dates: 2021—one hundred years after the formation of the Communist Party—and 2049, one hundred years after the formation of the People’s Republic of China.

There is a wide gap between the hostile attitude toward Israel of those in the political class, who had become more radical, and the general sentiment of Democratic voters, whose favorable attitude remained stable. This stability of Democratic favorability toward Israel is often misunderstood because it is overshadowed by Republican favorability, which has skyrocketed in the last decade. While Israel faces a serious problem of vilification and slander on America’s college campuses, which have veered sharply to the far left, it’s worth noting that its favorability among the overall American public went up from 63 percent to a robust 75 percent during the twelve years I served in office from 2009 to 2021.

I like to say the idea of Phantasma came to me all at once, hitting me like a ton of bricks one cloudy afternoon in November 2021, but truly, my experience with obsessive-compulsive disorder has been building to this story for a very long time. During the process of brainstorming the sort of adult romance I wanted to debut with, I was going through a period where my obsessive-compulsive tendencies were flaring up more than usual and the voices in my head were getting a little too bold. To my friends, these compulsions were alarming little anecdotes over lunch—‘that sounds like a horror movie’ one of them said (affectionately)—which is funny because, to me, someone who has lived with OCD my entire life, it was just another day of being unfazed by the increasingly creative scenarios my mind likes to conjure. OCD has such a wide range of symptoms that it makes every person’s experience with it different. Unfortunately, it has also become a commonly misused term conflated with the idea of being overly neat and clean, when in reality a lot of people with OCD have much darker symptoms. In my experience this has made explaining the real effects of OCD very hard as well as making it more difficult for people to regard the condition seriously. It’s so important to me to convey, with the utmost sincerity, that I know people are not doing this to be malicious! Because of the misuse of the term, however, some of the ways this disorder is shown in this book may come off as exaggerated or dramatic—but the details of Ophelia’s OCD are drawn directly from experiences that I, or someone I know who shares my condition, have had first-hand. And it’s still only a fraction of the symptoms we live with daily. Ophelia’s story is a love letter to my journey of getting comfortable being in my own head (as well as my adoration for Gothic aesthetics and hot ghosts). And while her experience with OCD, my experience with OCD, might look a lot different to someone else’s, I hope that the same message rings clear: struggling with your mental health does not make you unworthy of love. And I hope the people you surround yourself with are the sort of people who know that, too.

1:261-262 THROW IT TO THE THIEVES The fear of the Lord is different from other trepidation. You need a healthy fear of what is dangerous before you can reach to the fear of the Lord. Many never reach. You may be like a very slight, limber branch. You look weak, but the wet center connects with a taproot. Hold there and fear not (20:21). Moses trembled, but he was sound to the core. They said to the people, A great army has gathered against you. You should be afraid. But that increased their faith. They repied, God is our sufficient guardian (3:173). Overly cautious merchants do not prosper because of their fear of loss. Brave merchants get broken ten times in a row, then rise at the end. Whatever you fear losing, throw it to the thieves following your caravan, especially if it's your faith. Whatever you deeply love, give time to that, and if you're drawn away, come back as soon as you can. There may even be a conflict sometime between what you love, your faith, and protecting your children. Stay with what is most in harmony with the love, and the other will fade. Fear has two forms. One is a worry about whether the effort is worth it. People caught in this bottleneck between yes and no stay tortured and confused. The second form of fear is for whether you will ever be able to make it to what you love. Let that one dissolve. Keep moving in the adored direction, and unless you're shown it is absolutely impossible, continue going there.

The Enemy Within by Stewart Stafford There is more to a smile than the baring of teeth, His grin had all the warmth of daggers unsheathed, The lips did part but the eyes remained staring, The skin was pocked and trust was badly faring. The lips quivered at every imagined slight, The eyes glittered like a serpent's at twilight, Arms crossed in constant defence, The foot tapping, waiting to take offence. Who knows or cares of his jealousy's genesis, He strove beyond measure to become my nemesis, Seeking to frustrate me at every turn, And put me prematurely in a cremation urn. The hero can fend off any attack, Except for the knife that's plunged in the back, They may not even know the weapon's in far, Until the assailant's coup de grâce. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

In her book The Government-Citizen Disconnect, the political scientist Suzanne Mettler reports that 96 percent of American adults have relied on a major government program at some point in their lives. Rich, middle-class, and poor families depend on different kinds of programs, but the average rich and middle-class family draws on the same number of government benefits as the average poor family. Student loans look like they were issued from a bank, but the only reason banks hand out money to eighteen-year-olds with no jobs, no credit, and no collateral is because the federal government guarantees the loans and pays half their interest. Financial advisers at Edward Jones or Prudential can help you sign up for 529 college savings plans, but those plans' generous tax benefits will cost the federal government an estimated $28.5 billion between 2017 and 2026. For most Americans under the age of sixty-five, health insurance appears to come from their jobs, but supporting this arrangement is one of the single largest tax breaks issued by the federal government, one that exempts the cost of employer-sponsored health insurance from taxable incomes. In 2022, this benefit is estimated to have cost the government $316 billion for those under sixty-five. By 2032, its price tag is projected to exceed $6oo billion. Almost half of all Americans receive government-subsidized health benefits through their employers, and over a third are enrolled in government-subsidized retirement benefits. These participation rates, driven primarily by rich and middle-class Americans, far exceed those of even the largest programs directed at low income families, such as food stamps (14 percent of Americans) and the Earned Income Tax Credit (19 percent). Altogether, the United States spent $1.8 trillion on tax breaks in 2021. That amount exceeded total spending on law enforcement, education, housing, healthcare, diplomacy, and everything else that makes up our discretionary budget. Roughly half the benefits of the thirteen largest individual tax breaks accrue to the richest families, those with incomes that put them in the top 20 percent. The top I percent of income earners take home more than all middle-class families and double that of families in the bottom 20 percent. I can't tell you how many times someone has informed me that we should reduce military spending and redirect the savings to the poor. When this suggestion is made in a public venue, it always garners applause. I've met far fewer people who have suggested we boost aid to the poor by reducing tax breaks that mostly benefit the upper class, even though we spend over twice as much on them as on the military and national defense.

You Are What You Eat Take food for example. We all assume that our craving or disgust is due to something about the food itself - as opposed to being an often arbitrary response preprogrammed by our culture. We understand that Australians prefer cricket to baseball, or that the French somehow find Gerard Depardieu sexy, but how hungry would you have to be before you would consider plucking a moth from the night air and popping it, frantic and dusty, into your mouth? Flap, crunch, ooze. You could wash it down with some saliva beer.How does a plate of sheep brain's sound? Broiled puppy with gravy? May we interest you in pig ears or shrimp heads? Perhaps a deep-fried songbird that you chew up, bones, beak, and all? A game of cricket on a field of grass is one thing, but pan-fried crickets over lemongrass? That's revolting. Or is it? If lamb chops are fine, what makes lamb brains horrible? A pig's shoulder, haunch, and belly are damn fine eatin', but the ears, snout, and feet are gross? How is lobster so different from grasshopper? Who distinguishes delectable from disgusting, and what's their rationale? And what about all the expectations? Grind up those leftover pig parts, stuff 'em in an intestine, and you've got yourself respectable sausage or hot dogs. You may think bacon and eggs just go together, like French fries and ketchup or salt and pepper. But the combination of bacon and eggs for breakfast was dreamed up about a hundred years aqo by an advertising hired to sell more bacon, and the Dutch eat their fries with mayonnaise, not ketchup. Think it's rational to be grossed out by eating bugs? Think again. A hundred grams of dehydrated cricket contains 1,550 milligrams of iron, 340 milligrams of calcium, and 25 milligrams of zinc - three minerals often missing in the diets of the chronic poor. Insects are richer in minerals and healthy fats than beef or pork. Freaked out by the exoskeleton, antennae, and the way too many legs? Then stick to the Turf and forget the Surf because shrimps, crabs, and lobsters are all anthropods, just like grasshoppers. And they eat the nastiest of what sinks to the bottom of the ocean, so don't talk about bugs' disgusting diets. Anyway, you may have bug parts stuck between your teeth right now. The Food and Drug Administration tells its inspectors to ignore insect parts in black pepper unless they find more than 475 of them per 50 grams, on average. A fact sheet from Ohio State University estimates that Americans unknowingly eat an average of between one and two pounds of insects per year. An Italian professor recently published Ecological Implications of Mini-livestock: Potential of Insects, Rodents, Frogs and Snails. (Minicowpokes sold separately.) Writing in Slate.com, William Saletan tells us about a company by the name of Sunrise Land Shrimp. The company's logo: "Mmm. That's good Land Shrimp!" Three guesses what Land Shrimp is. (20-21)

Dr. Kary Mullis, who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for inventing PCR, stated publicly numerous times that his invention should never be used for the diagnosis of infectious diseases. In July of 1997, during an event called Corporate Greed and AIDS in Santa Monica CA, Dr. Mullis explained on video, “With PCR you can find almost anything in anybody. It starts making you believe in the sort of Buddhist notion that everything is contained in everything else, right? I mean, because if you can model amplify one single molecule up to something that you can really measure, which PCR can do, then there’s just very few molecules that you don’t have at least one single one of them in your body. Okay? So that could be thought of as a misuse of it, just to claim that it’s meaningful.” Mikki explained, “The major issue with PCR is that it’s easily manipulated. It functions through a cyclical process whereby each revolution amplifies magnification. On a molecular level, most of us already have trace amounts of genetic fragments similar to coronavirus within us. By simply over-cycling the process, a negative result can be flipped to a positive. Governing bodies such as the CDC and the WHO can control the number of cases by simply advising the medical industry to increase or decrease the cycle threshold (CT).” In August of 2020, the New York Times reported that “a CT beyond 34 revolutions very rarely detect live virus, but most often, dead nucleotides that are not even contagious. In compliance with guidance from the CDC and the WHO, many top US labs have been conducting tests at cycle thresholds of 40 or more. NYT examined data from Massachusetts, New York, and Nevada and determined that up to 90 percent of the individuals who tested positive carried barely any virus.”17 90 percent! In May of 2021, CDC changed the PCR cycle threshold from 40 to 28 or lower for those who have been vaccinated. This one adjustment of the numbers allowed the vaccine pushers to praise the vaccines as a big success.

The intolerance and cancel culture have spread to outright discrimination in hiring, promotion, grants, and publication of professors and graduate students who do not abide the ideology demanded by the campus revolutionaries. A March 1, 2021, study by Eric Kaufmann of the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology found, among other things: “Over 4 in 10 US and Canadian academics would not hire a Trump supporter… ; only 1 in 10 academics support firing controversial professors, nonetheless, while most do not back cancellation, many are not opposed to it, remaining non-committal; right-leaning academics experience a high level of institutional authoritarianism and peer pressure; in the US, over a third of conservative academics and PhD students have been threatened with disciplinary action for their views, while 70% of conservative academics report a hostile departmental climate for their beliefs; in the social sciences and humanities, over 9 in 10 Trump-supporting academics… say they would not feel comfortable expressing their views to a colleague; more than half of North American and British conservative academics admit self-censoring in research and teaching; younger academics and PhD students, especially in the United States, are significantly more willing than older academics to support dismissing controversial scholars from their posts, indicating that the problem of progressive authoritarianism is likely to get worse in the coming years; [and] a hostile climate plays a part in deterring conservative graduate students from pursuing careers in academia….

The median age in Gaza is very young. Earlier you spoke of asking your father for stories about your grandfather, and how important that was for you. But there are fewer and fewer people who have memories of life outside of Gaza. I’m wondering if you can say something about this. Unfortunately, it’s not only about memories of our grandparents, but it’s also their memories that are being lost, those are what we need to hear and memorize and then transmit to our children and grandchildren. But I’m also so saddened to think about my generation, our memories, being required or expected to tell our own stories of what happened to us in Gaza. I mean, for example, in 2021, 2014, 2009, or 2008. All the massacres and attacks on Gaza. Maybe our grandchildren will not ask us about Jaffa and Acre and Haifa. No, they will ask us about the 2014 war. What happened to you? What did you eat, which of your friends was wounded, did you leave your home, where did you go? This is a prolonged state of exile and estrangement and expulsion and ethnic cleansing. Our grandparents were driven from their homes and their cities, and any trace of them has been erased and replaced by something else, which is now called Israel. But we, their descendants, were also robbed of our right to dream and think about those places—no, instead, we are forced to live in the nightmares of our own current life. And they are creating more misery for us, wounding us again and again, so that we forget those earlier wounds in the face of the fresher wounds. The more the Israelis attack us, the more they are trying to erase the older memories. So it also becomes a matter of exhaustion.

called in Boogie Yaalon, whom I had recently appointed as defense minister, to hear the American proposal with me. Allen laid out a presentation of US technological monitors that would be placed along the border. He said this would obviate the need for permanently stationed Israeli forces along the Jordan. As for the internal policing against terrorism within the Palestinian areas, the US would train the Palestinian security forces to do the job. I responded that shortly after Israel left Gaza, those same Palestinian Authority security forces caved to Hamas terrorists. “This is different,” Kerry said. “These forces would be trained by us.” He then made an extraordinary proposal. “Bibi, I want to arrange a clandestine visit for you to Afghanistan. You’ll see with your own eyes what a great job we did there to prepare the Afghan army to take over the country once we leave.” Yaalon and I looked at each other. Our glances said everything. “John,” I said, “the minute you leave Afghanistan the Taliban will mop up the force you trained in no time.” Boogie concurred completely. In 2021, that is exactly what happened. Once the US withdrew its last forces, the US-trained Afghan military crumbled into dust in a matter of days. I remembered a similar discussion with another secretary of state, George Shultz, who made the same argument to encourage our withdrawal from Lebanon. The US was training the Lebanese Army to take over the country. I argued that once we left Lebanon, radical forces would grab control. Lacking the cohesive zealotry of the radicals, the American-trained forces would collapse or become irrelevant. That’s exactly what happened when we withdrew from Lebanon in May 2000. Hezbollah took over the country in no time.

Some of these bots are already arriving in 2021 in more primitive forms. Recently, when I was in quarantine at home in Beijing, all of my e-commerce packages and food were delivered by a robot in my apartment complex. The package would be placed on a sturdy, wheeled creature resembling R2-D2. It could wirelessly summon the elevator, navigate autonomously to my door, and then call my phone to announce its arrival, so I could take the package, after which it would return to reception. Fully autonomous door-to-door delivery vans are also being tested in Silicon Valley. By 2041, end-to-end delivery should be pervasive, with autonomous forklifts moving items in the warehouse, drones and autonomous vehicles delivering the boxes to the apartment complex, and the R2-D2 bot delivering the package to each home. Similarly, some restaurants now use robotic waiters to reduce human contact. These are not humanoid robots, but autonomous trays-on-wheels that deliver your order to your table. Robot servers today are both gimmicks and safety measures, but tomorrow they may be a normal part of table service for many restaurants, apart from the highest-end establishments or places that cater to tourists, where the human service is integral to the restaurant’s charm. Robots can be used in hotels (to clean and to deliver laundry, suitcases, and room service), offices (as receptionists, guards, and cleaning staff), stores (to clean floors and organize shelves), and information outlets (to answer questions and give directions at airports, hotels, and offices). In-home robots will go beyond the Roomba. Robots can wash dishes (not like a dishwasher, but as an autonomous machine in which you can pile all the greasy pots, utensils, and plates without removing leftover food, with all of them emerging cleaned, disinfected, dried, and organized). Robots can cook—not like a humanoid chef, but like an automated food processor connected to a self-cooking pot. Ingredients go in and the cooked dish comes out. All of these technology components exist now—and will be fine-tuned and integrated in the decade to come. So be patient. Wait for robotics to be perfected and for costs to go down. The commercial and subsequently personal applications will follow. By 2041, it’s not far-fetched to say that you may be living a lot more like the Jetsons!