The Post-Partisan Emporium

  TEOTWAWKI And I feel fine RADIO FAR SIDE On the 6th of June 1974, the Watergate scandal was in full bloom, the global economy was in the crapper, and I was anxiously awaiting my 13th birthday to become a full-fledged teenager. President Nixon had instituted a national 55mph speed limit, which essentially pissed off everyone who lived west of the Mississippi River. Japan was the China of the day and the Vietnam war was nearing the end of its decade-long stranglehold on Merkin culture. At that moment, Prince Fahd ibn Abdel Aziz and US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger were  sitting down to change the world  and create an empire. The Petrodollar Pact, among other things, forced the world to buy oil and gas in US dollars, and created Saudi Aramco, the single most powerful energy company ever. At the same time, Nixon had ended  the Bretton Woods agreement  and closed the gold window at the Federal Reserve Bank, thus severing US currency from its Constitutional lin...

  Dancing on the Brink John Michael Greer Back when I was sketching out posts for the first half of this year, I planned to go on this week to talk further about enchantment, exploring the way that the ebb and flow of enchantment seems to track the rise and fall of civilizations and sketching out a tentative hypothesis about why that is. The core project of this blog, like its predecessor  The Archdruid Report,  is the quest for ways to lead a meaningful human life in harmony with nature during the decline and fall of a vast and profoundly unnatural civilization. Our discussion of enchantment in recent months has a great deal to offer that project.  Just at the moment, though, it’s necessary to set that aside and glance at current events, because the decline and fall looks as though it’s nearing an inflection point of considerable importance. “All empires fall eventually. It is the way of things.” – Erin Morgenstern I covered the background to the impending mess back...

The Big Stiff: Russia-Iran dump the dollar and bust US sanctions News of Russian banks connecting to Iran’s financial messaging system strengthens the resistance against US-imposed sanctions on both countries and accelerates global de-dollarization. By Pepe Escobar February 09 2023 The agreement between the Central Banks of Russia and Iran formally signed on 29 January connecting their interbank transfer systems is a game-changer in more ways than one. Technically, from now on 52 Iranian banks already using  SEPAM , Iran’s interbank telecom system, are connecting with 106 banks using  SPFS , Russia’s equivalent to the western banking messaging system SWIFT. Less than a week before the deal, State Duma Chairman Vyachslav Volodin was in Tehran overseeing the last-minute details, part of a meeting of the Russia-Iran Inter-Parliamentary Commission on Cooperation: he was adamant both nations should quickly increase trade in their own currencies. Ruble-rial trade Confirming that the...