Echoes

Rent-seeking is the act of growing one's existing wealth by manipulating the social or political environment without creating new wealth.[1] Rent-seeking activities have negative effects on the rest of society. They result in reduced economic efficiency through misallocation of resources, reduced wealth creation, lost government revenue, heightened income inequality,[2][3] risk of growing political bribery, and potential national decline.

And now some of them have the audacity to be like "lulz well we all said crazy things during Woke 1." Even aside from that further contributing to the bastardization of the term "woke"--which originated with black Americans and was used to talk about being socially aware of racial injustice--it shows that they merely see political movements as fads. And they've done the same thing with I/P, spending years talking about an issue they still refuse to read any real information about (from actual sources, not tiktok) because it's a popular hashtag, makes them feel cool among their friends, and is a replacement for an actual hobby and personality. A lot of college students in particular treated I/P as a fucking after school club in 2024. So at a time when people could have listened to Palestinians advocating for peace, such as Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, they just saw a bunch of privileged poseurs celebrating in the streets after Jews were raped and massacred.

Our world map today looks completely different from how it looked a thousand years ago. Nations and empires have risen and collapsed. Wars have been waged over petty bullshit that changed names and borders. Empires that were once thought invincible and perpetual crumbled to dust within a peasant's lifetime as they tilled their fields and worried about crop failure. The invention of flight, motion pictures, and the automobile chased the coattails of WWI and the great depression. Children played mischief games and elders complained about kids these days being too soft and sensitive during the fall of the Roman empire.

I know this, because when I was nineteen and despairing I broke down crying in her arms one day, and I asked her what the point was. Why carry on, when there’s so much wrong in the world? Why keep going, keep trying, when it feels like every battle is insurmountable, and that even when, by some miracle, you win, you don’t get to rest, you just get to fight again? What’s the point, when everything just gets worse all the time?

And she told me, yes, it’s hard. I never thought I’d be forty, let alone fifty. I never thought I’d see retirement. I thought the world would have ended by now. And I thought I had two choices. I could spend whatever time I had despairing, or I could choose to live, in whatever time I had. So I fought, and I lost more battles than I won. But I’ve been happy, too. I’ve had two careers, two children, and a husband I love. I’ve had friends and adventures. I’ve seen the pyramids the coliseum and the place where two oceans meet. I’ve lived. And it was worth it. It’ll be worth it for you, too.

And I thought about that, and what I know about my mum — and you need to know, my mum is cool. She is. She’s a stone cold badass — she protested Thatcher. She went to Pride when it was still a riot because she understood the solidarity even if she didn’t understand the people she was marching with. She went door to door for the Brexit remain campaign.

And, sure. We left the EU. But when she had a daughter who turned out to be a son she showed up for me every time. She toasted Thatcher’s death with a glass of milk and stayed up late telling me stories of her protesting days.

She retired three years ago. She’s in France right now, sending me pictures of hikes she’s taking with my father, and the patisserie she’s going to eat after.

tl;dr: There's no evidence the interview that this was mentioned in even exists, no evidence the route of the cable has ever changed, and the whole story seems to originate from one dude's podcast.

Enemy of my enemy is NOT friend

Peoples in the news: the Jews control the media