Time For A Little Assistance

…or, as some might call it, benign colonialism.  Looks like somebody’s about to get rich, real quickly:

On the coast of South America, just north of Brazil, lies the obscure and impoverished former British colony of Guyana, distantly remembered for a bizarre mass suicide four decades ago that begot the term “drinking the Kool-Aid.”
But today, the discovery of a massive trove of oil off its shores, including two finds just this week, put Guyana on the cusp of becoming one of the world’s wealthiest nations, in the league of petro-states like Qatar.

How big a trove?

Since 2016, Exxon has made a dozen discoveries in Guyana that now total more than 5 billion barrels of recoverable reserves. This is enormous — for perspective, the industry calls a 1-billion-barrel field a “supergiant.”

Needless to say, the Guyanese are totally unprepared for this:

Guyana has barely gotten organized for what, in other countries, has triggered a free-for-all of chaos, corruption and war.
The country has been in political turmoil since last year. In December, the Parliament ousted the government of President David Granger in a vote of no confidence. That set in motion new elections within 90 days, but the government is challenging the move in court.
No plan has been devised for how to begin to build and upgrade the country’s roads, communications and institutions. Neither is there a plan for building up the capital of Georgetown.
No one has determined how to both husband the wealth, and to share it.
Insanally said the reaction in Guyana runs the gamut: “There are people who are excited, people who are apprehensive, and people who think oil should be avoided as a curse altogether.”

Ordinarily, I’d suggest that as Exxon/Mobil is an American company, that they (or the U.S. or even British governments) should step in and lend a helping hand in the organization.  But that would lead to loud cries of “Colonialissssssss!” from the Usual Suspects.

My modest proposal, therefore, is a little different:  let Norway  step up to the plate and show Guyana what they did with, I should point out, a relatively much smaller income stream than the one under discussion.  After all, nobody associates Norway with eeeevil colonialism, and indeed, the “Scandinavian model” is applauded by all the neo- and actual socialists out there.  And let’s be honest, if nobody on the West gets involved, then the Venezuelans will.

It may fail, of course, because nobody can fuck up a Good Thing better than the socialists — except of course for the Third World, who could fuck up Paradise in an afternoon without any effort at all.

But it’s worth a try.  Come on, Norway:  uff da, or whatever.

Alternative Path

I have often ruminated that young men need to evaluate their career choices very carefully before picking the one they think will work best for them.

Increasingly, it’s become apparent that going to college is not a worthwhile option for them — unless they want to be hounded, harassed and vilified just for the “crime” of being a man, that is.  (10,000 instances of false accusations, man-hating professors and the courses they teach have been omitted on grounds of brevity.)

Now, we’ve seen in other spheres what men do when they feel that the game rules are loaded against them, or that participation leads not only to inevitable failure, but even to a compromised future.  The dating game is one such activity, where men have either deliberately turned the rules of the game against women and used them to their own benefit — or have simply eschewed all participation in the face of assured failure (going their own way — MGTOW) and simply created a parallel life outside the game.

I’m suggesting an alternative to the career game.

Don’t go to college, at least until the rotten system has collapsed under the weight of its own prejudice and misogyny misandry, and been replaced with a better deal.  Ignore the vested interests of people and institutions who preach the lie that you can only be successful with a college degree.

If you’re super-smart and driven like Michael Dell or Bill Gates, of course, you don’t need to be told this.  But only a very few men, in any  activity, are in that rare 0.00001% of super-achievers.

But for the vast remainder, there is an option:  work in industries where the vast majority of women can’t or won’t participate.  I’m talking about the heavy, dirty and sometimes thankless jobs (Mike Rowe-type Dirty Jobs) which not only don’t require a college degree, but where a college degree might even be a hindrance and not a qualifier.

Just last week I came across a guy who was an oil field worker.  He’d fled from Venezuela right after that thug Hugo Chávez came to power, and in the eighteen years since had worked his way up the ladder, in oilfields all over the world.  Now, at age 45, he’d finally reached the point where he didn’t have to work  the oil rigs, just visit them and see how things were going.  Along the way he’d acquired a wife, two preteen kids, and a $750k house in Plano where I picked him up to take him to the airport.  He’d completely lost his Hispanic accent (when he left Venezuela he couldn’t speak a word of English) and was also fluent in Arabic and (ahem) German.  When I asked him if he had a university degree he just laughed and said, “What for?”

What for, indeed.

Here’s the point.  I know it’s going to be difficult for Millennials and their successors to handle this, but working dirty jobs is hard.  It requires dedication, stubbornness and of course a willingness to get one’s hands dirty, and sadly, because of the education industry’s indoctrination of kids, this choice is often dismissed or demeaned.

It shouldn’t be.  If you weigh the eventual benefits of dirty work — where, by the way, your exposure to militant feminism is going to be minimal to nonexistent — against a useless degree coupled with crippling debt, this should not be a difficult decision.

Is this risky?  Not as much as you’d think.  Just the other day, our local community college broke ground on a campus which apparently is going to be dedicated almost exclusively to the “hard” careers — automotive service and repair, construction, welding, plumbing, electrical work, manufacturing and so on — but I’m not going to suggest you look to such an institution for your education / training;  what’s important is simply to realize that for such an event to have taken place, there must be a crippling shortage of young men willing to get into those fields, and this is the Establishment’s attempt to address it.  (It’s complete bollocks, of course — you’d do better by getting an apprenticeship at a real place of work.)

So, in the paraphrased words of Ayn Rand, go “Galt” and make your own way in the world.  You may not succeed, of course, but remember that failure is equally (or, in these times, more) likely with a freshly-printed college diploma clutched in your hand.

Become a watchmaker, if you’re mechanically inclined.  Work in construction, if you’re strong in body.  Get an apprenticeship in a trade, preferably an ugly, dirty and tough one where just by virtue of being a man you face no competition from women.  I guarantee you, there’s a tough job out there for any man if he’s prepared to go for it.  And if your first one (or several) choices don’t work out, find another one that does.

Let women take over non-jobs like human resources, clerical jobs at the DMV, cubicle management, bank tellers or benefits administration at Global MegaCorp Inc., and laugh as the life force is drained from them.

Here’s the challenge:  be a man.  Not today’s version of “male” figures who argue over craft beers and fashion accessories.  I’m talking about real  men, who do things for themselves, push aside barriers with confidence and, eventually, end up with women (like my friend Raul, above) who appreciate them for their qualities and for the security and families they can provide.

When I asked Raul if his wife worked, he looked at me in puzzlement and said, “What for?”

If this guy taught a class, he’d create a generation of achievers.  He would never do such a thing, of course, although he would (and does) train other men to succeed as he has.

Now get out there and make something of your life that does not include words like “curriculum”, “term paper” and “Diversity Studies”.  You’ll be a world better for it.


Postscript:  there was a time when enlisting in our nation’s Armed Forces would have been a viable career choice for a young man.  Not today, unless you try out for Special Forces, SEALs or similar.

Back To Butter

So now butter and lard are good for you again, and vegetable oils (except olive) are bad:

The World Health Organization has faced fierce backlash after telling people to replace butter and lard with ‘healthier’ oils in the New Year.
A leading cardiologist today said he was ‘shocked and disturbed’ by the advice, which the UN agency listed as a tip to prolong people’s lives.
Butter has been demonised for decades over its saturated fat content – but an array of evidence is beginning to prove it can be healthy.

Plus ça change, plus la même chose.

This announcement could have had some impact on my life, except that I never stopped using butter and I’ve always looked suspiciously at all cooking oils anyway.

Never mind:  next week some other cardiologist will warn us that butter causes (or, more likely, “may” cause) aggravated syphilis or something.

In the meantime, any report from a large government- or international agency (CDC, WHO, etc.) should be treated with the utmost skepticism if not outright rejection.  In fact, if Agency A warns that X is bad for you, a rule of thumb would be to increase the intake of X.

I don’t see that the above advice can be any worse than the bullshit we’ve been fed for the past fifty-odd years.

“Dear Dr. Kim”

“Dear Dr. Kim,
“My daughter, a former TV actress, married very well — in fact, she married into Britain’s Royal Family.  Since her wedding, I’ve been texting her every day but she ignores my texts (I believe it’s called “ghosting” nowadays).
What can I do to get her to respond to me?”

—  Shunned In California

Dear Shunned:
Missing from your letter is how often you texted her before she “married well”.  If the answer is “every day”, then you have a legitimate gripe, and the callous little bitch is a social climber of the worst kind.
If, however, the answer is “never” or “hardly ever” or “only to beg her for money”, then you’re the dickhead and she’s well rid of you.

— Dr. Kim

Screw The Ignorant Vote

It always pains me when people encourage others to vote “even when they aren’t familiar with the issues”.  Here’s my take on that opinion:

Ummm no.  If you don’t know why you’re voting and what you’re voting for, then stay the fuck at home.  Some ignoramus showing up at the polling booth and voting for the first name on the ballot, or voting for the woman just because “it’s her turn”, or voting for the person who looked good on the campaign poster outside the polling station — any or all of these maggots’ votes are negating the votes of people who actually took the time to study the candidates, evaluate their positions, foresee the likely consequences of the policies they support, and in short, who know what the hell the election is all about.

It is no surprise that it’s largely the Democrats who send buses around poorer areas to “help the underprivileged to vote”, when in fact it’s precisely these people who are pig-ignorant and most likely to be swayed by empty promises, free stuff and unaffordable giveaways (i.e. most positions on the Democrat party platform).

So if you don’t know what’s going on at these mid-term elections, stay at home and watch soap operas or Real Housewives Of Cook County, and leave the voting to people who can be entrusted to make decisions.

Don’t Vote If You’re Ignorant.


And by the way, I also don’t subscribe to the line that if you don’t vote, you don’t get to complain about what happens afterwards.  In the first place, your vote may mean diddly — e.g. mine when I lived in Chicago, and my “representative” Jan “Commie Bitch” Schakowski would get reelected year after year with about 70% of the vote.  My not voting did not disqualify me from complaining afterwards, as my several emails to her office would attest.  (I know, beginning them with “Dear Commie Bitch” may have been counterproductive, but that salutation in and of itself at least may have given her office a clue that not all of her constituents kept a well-thumbed copy of Das Kapital  next to the bed.)  In the second place, the First Amendment guarantees your right to complain no matter what happened before.  But far be it for me to use a mere Constitutional precept to buttress my case.

Open Letter To The Republican Party

Dear Idiots:

I know you feel you have a desperate need for more and yet more money which you somehow think will further your cause in next week’s midterm election, and therefore the reason why I get several emails from you each day imploring me for same, using terms like “We’re out of time!” and “We face disaster!” when in fact neither statement is true.  What is true is that in reliably-conservative districts (e.g. most of Texas), the conservative guy is in no trouble at all — Ted Cruz is going to wallop “Skateboard Jesus” O’Rourke by more than 8 (and more likely more than ten) percentage points, so why does Ted need more campaign money when most Texan conservatives would rather sell their favorite gun than vote for any Democrat?

And by the way:  using Frequent Quisling Senator Susan Collins in your emails to appeal to me for money is a massive slap in the face.  This MDTR (more Democrat than Republican) bitch has been the proverbial turd in the soupbowl more often than I can count, so just because she did the right thing ONCE (in voting to seat Brett Kavanaugh) does not give you the go-ahead to use her as a figurehead for your fundraising.

The simple fact of the matter is that the Republicans are in little danger of losing in reliably-conservative districts except where they’ve allowed a total fuckhead to make it through the primaries (e.g. Roy Moore in Georgia Alabama* passim).  Where the Republicans are in danger is in marginal districts (e.g. in the aforementioned MDTR’s state of Maine) or where a few thousand illegal votes will have the effect of sending a Democrat to Congress (do I have to remind you of Senator Stuart Smalley’s victory in Minnesota?).  That is where the Republican Party needs to concentrate its efforts, but let’s be honest here:  most people have already made up their minds whom they will vote for, so any campaign money should be directed towards enlisting more poll watchers and oversight (i.e. to prevent voter intimidation and fraud) than on splashy TV ads which most people will ignore.

Yes, you will have my vote, as always;  in fact, voting for me seldom takes more than a few seconds while I punch the “straight Republican ticket” button.  (Primaries, of course, are a different matter:  there, I spend literally hours researching which Republican I think will be the best conservative and vote accordingly.  But the generals?  My voting choice is no longer an issue, by that point.)

So set your fundraising appeals accordingly, because I suspect that among conservative Republicans, I am probably part of the majority.  It may be too late for this election, but it may help you to do a better job with the money in future.

Sincerely,

Kim du Toit


*Sorry, they all look alike to me.