Control the World? Fuggedaboutit!

The virus punctured political pretensions... [Gilder's Daily Prophecy] June 25, 2021 [UNSUBSCRIBE]( | [ARCHIVES]( External Advertisement [Should You Buy Bitcoin at $50,000?]( [Red shirt]( that's too rich for your blood... and you've got $30... [Get the details on a better play than Bitcoin (no complicated digital wallet required).]( [Warning] Do you enjoy receiving Gilder's Daily Prophecy? Please [Click Here Now]( so we know to continue sending you Gilder's Daily Prophecy for free! Control the World? Fuggedaboutit! [Jeffrey Tucker]Dear Daily Prophecy Reader, We’ve searched for some larger meaning – some useful takeaway, some lasting lesson – from the astonishing carnage of this last year, during which time many core freedoms were abolished. The virus was bad enough; the lockdowns made it much worse. And I don’t only mean to speak in the past tense because many areas of the country are suffering deeply from the effects of Covid lockdowns. Canadians still live under Covid despotism, and the UK too. They are far from over, and the arguments around them will go on for years. That said, I’m ever more realizing something important. The virus is a metaphor. It is a living symbol of the completely incorrect view that governments can control the world. It is a further embodiment of the pretensions of elite opinion-makers that their wishes alone could control reality. The scientific elite too indulged in this pretense of control. The virus shattered all this, in an oddly similar way to H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds. Humanity tried everything to stop the invaders. It was finally a virus that disabled them. It’s a lesson for the ages: there are some forces of nature that are more powerful than badges, belligerence, and bullets. [This New Technology is about to reach “Critical Mass”]( The Virus Eludes Control I would never describe the coronavirus as a gift. Human history has been a dangerous dance with pathogens. That said, humanity’s pretensions of control need to be taken down a peg from time to time. This “invisible enemy” was just the force to make it happen. It has exposed the political and medical elite in ways that no literary treatise ever could have. No speech or article could have achieved so much in terms of sheer humiliation. Think of it. When news of SARS-CoV-2 hit the world in January 2020, there were several stages of thinking that took place. First, it’s not that serious. Second, it’s only over there and not here, so let’s keep it out. Third, it’s not a problem because we’ll crush it before it spreads. The third point was where everything went nuts. It wasn’t possible, not under any existing system of government, no matter how draconian the enforcement. The worst among these virus controllers were the modelers. These people have been extant for 15 years. It was President George W. Bush who first gave them a platform. He wanted to control the coming pathogen the same way he tried to control terrorism, with shock and awe and your tax dollars. He put together a plan. We are fortunate that he left office before he could implement it. A decade and a half went by, during which time the modeling sector of the disease mitigators grew (thanks to large infusions of cash from the Gates Foundations and others). It was a new theory of how to control viruses and the tech titans of the time swooned at the possibility of attempting the new strategy of treating a pathogen the same way they treated malware on hard drives. They would invent a system of control. The system is now exposed as a fiction (here’s the [latest study]( showing no relationship between government efforts and virus mitigation). Trump’s Final Gift To America [Trump Flag]( a little-known way Trump could – one day – have his revenge. It involves a Federal Ruling he oversaw in the final year of his Presidency that could change America forever… unleash an estimated $15.1 trillion in new wealth… and create countless ways for everyday Americans to benefit. What is this little understood decision? And how will it impact you? [All the important facts are here.]( [Why Google, Apple, Facebook are teaming up?]( Trump Meets His Match Tragically, Donald Trump initially fell under the sway of the modelers. Now, in saying so, don’t think I’m being partisan. I have friends who think he was the greatest president ever and others who believe he was the worst. That’s not the point. The real mystery to resolve here is his phases of thought on the topic that seemingly lack a constant thread. Initially, he didn’t believe that SARS-CoV-2 was the real deal. In his lived memory, viruses come and go. We have immunities and vaccines to deal with them. Whereas such pathogens once vexed humanity, they are a minor cause of illnesses today in the scheme of things. There was no particular reason to think that would change. He also smelled a rat, understandably. His political enemies had already tried to pin on him some Russian collusion myth. The New York Times hounded him daily with 10,000-word stories that actually said very little. In the end, it didn’t work. Then they tried again with a concocted scandal involving a phone call he made to Ukraine. That line of attack also failed. He knew of the enormous efforts designed to upend his presidency, and he naturally assumed that virus news was a brouhaha constructed to freak him out and injure his agenda to make America great again. That said, he also came to regard the Coronavirus as a kind of foreign import (“the China virus”). He decided to deal with it the same way he dealt with imports of steel and microchips. He set up barriers, thus blocking all travel from the mainline. That should have been the first hint that something had gone wrong in his thinking. A virus is not like a product. It does not respond to political muscle. You can track and trace all you want, but viruses have proven more clever than politicians for the whole of recorded history. The best we can do in the face of them is to use humble intelligence, sheltering the vulnerable and doing as little damage to the social order as possible. Americans in Guantanamo According to a new [book]( Trump even suggested sending infected Americans to an island off-shore. “Don’t we have an island that we own?” he reportedly asked his staff. “What about Guantánamo?” That stage lasted from January through early March, when it became clear that the virus was everywhere. He turned on the testing system finally cobbled together by the CDC. He was furious about rising case numbers, believing them to be mocking his attempts to keep the virus out. We know now that this was entirely futile; the virus had been circulating in the US since December 2019. Trump then found himself in a vulnerable position. He listened to the acknowledged experts within government, not knowing that they were partisans and certainly not fans. He took them at their word that they were only speaking for science. Anthony Fauci suggested locking down. On March 12, 2020, Trump blocked travel from Europe, and the next day he authorized the HHS to release — what amounted to — a nationwide advisory to close schools and businesses, even push stay-at-home orders. It was supposed to last two weeks, but the spread evidently worsened, as shown by the case numbers. Trump must have suspected he had been given bad advice but it took him months to come around to this position. Finally, by late summer, he had had enough and tapped Scott Atlas of Hoover and Stanford for guidance. That’s when he finally got his head screwed on straight. Now he argued for opening the economy once again. The whole experience was such a trauma for Trump personally and also for the country that in the last month of the campaign, he resorted to the most implausible position of all: he decided not to mention it much at all in the campaign. That contributed to the perception that he was out of touch with a country that had been traumatized by policies that he himself had initially approved. Lacking the willingness or even ability to admit error, Trump slipped into denial. His own pollsters later [said]( that this was the major reason for his defeat. Going Viral I said earlier that the virus is a metaphor for the lack of control we can successfully have over the world. It’s a hard lesson. But everyone involved in information economics knows this truth. We use the funny expression “going viral” for what every maker of websites or videos desires, but that is not really possible to cause. Even geniuses are at the mercy of the mysterious choices of users themselves. The system is not gameable. There are no guarantees. This realization affects everyone, not just governments but enterprises too. The people at the top might imagine they will stay that way forever. In fact, there is a daily and enterprising hunt to unseat incumbent elites. Their positions of strength will not last, as George Gilder has rightly foretold. Knowing what’s next is not easy either, but some people will get it right. Don’t forget: The entire Gilder team is preparing for a big announcement coming next week. More to come soon! Regards, [Jeffrey Tucker] Jeffrey Tucker America’s Death Spiral Begins July 14th? [American flag fractured]( you’re like most folks, you’re probably wondering how we got here... America’s institutions are rotten to the core. Common sense and human decency are relics of the past. And Americans at each other’s throats. Well, it wasn’t by accident. The prophetic analyst who predicted the subprime mortgage meltdown… the financial crisis of 2008… and Brexit… Says a grand experiment has been conducted on the American people without our consent. And the horrifying endgame is set to arrive on July 14th, 2021… Will you be ready? [Click here for the full details.]( [Three founders Publishing]( To end your Gilder's Daily Prophecy e-mail subscription and associated external offers sent from Gilder's Daily Prophecy, feel free to [click here](. If you are having trouble receiving your Gilder's Daily Prophecy subscription, you can ensure its arrival in your mailbox by [whitelisting Gilder's Daily Prophecy](. Gilder's Daily Prophecy is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy. Please read [our Privacy Statement.]( For any further comments or concerns please email us at GildersDailyProphecy@threefounderspublishing.com. Nothing in this e-mail should be considered personalized financial advice. 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