JOMO:
The Trump Event
by Not Sure
21 July 2024
In February, former President Donald Trump announced the
launch of Trump Sneakers. The styles on
offer included the $399 gold Never Surrender high-tops, a limited edition of
1,000 pairs which sold out within a day.
Pairs were listed for sale on eBay for thousands of dollars. One pair sold for $9,000. There was a possibility that some people
purchased knockoffs. Another style was
the $199 POTUS 45 (President of the United States, the 45th, but it
sounds a bit like a handgun.)
Last week, his tennis shoe company offered a $399 Fight Fight Fight high-top with the
iconic photo of a bloodied Trump, fist in the air, resolute. This sold out immediately and orders are
being processed for September delivery.
***
Nothing here reminds me of The Hunger Games. Nothing resembles Land of the Blind. Donald Sutherland played the president in
both. Typecasting or part of the
predictive programming technique? In Land
of the Blind, they also threw in a coup, so we had the pleasure of seeing
two actors play demented, power-hungry autocrats.
Autocrats are a good cinematic device. It keeps the story simple, and the audience doesn’t
have to think too hard. In our real
life, we do not have autocrats. We have
an ancient, well-greased system, where attention-seeking narcissists play the
role of autocrats. For the real-life
producers, it keeps the story simple, and the audience doesn’t have to think
too hard, and most importantly, doesn’t have a chance of thinking about
anything that matters.
***
A few weeks ago, I went to a big box store with my
brother who is a member, to purchase cat food and toilet paper. We ran into a woman we “knew”. Story goes like this: her sister was married
for some years to one of our uncles and evidently when we were young, there was
lots of interaction with our families, though I only know that because she said
so. I could not remember her name. She knew mine. I had one of those socially awkward moments
of telling myself it would be too embarrassing to ask hers. My brother didn’t seem to recall her name
either, since he didn’t use it. In the
end, it didn’t matter because she was with her work friend and both ladies
talked without much pause.
Lady-once-related-by-marriage was talking about the
co-worker she was with, how she’s always on the go. She said, “She was just on a cruise, and she
texted me about every 10 minutes to keep up on work gossip. She’s FOMO.”
My brother had the blank look of non-comprehension, but I was quite
chuffed since I had just learned the meaning of FOMO. I said to my brother, “That’s Fear of Missing
Out. I just learned that recently.” We laughed and then I said, “I am the total
opposite of FOMO. JOMO is me. Joy of Missing Out.” That was about it, and we were on our
way. As we walked out the door of the
store, my brother and I remarked that neither one of us could remember our
sort-of-relative’s name. Then half a
minute later, we simultaneously said, “Rhonda!”
***
Updates to our programming depend upon us being
FOMO. While this is a newish term/acronym,
our “producers” have studied us for eons and they know how to engage us in
their fictional productions. Multiple
versions of the same event are released in quick succession. Each version has hundreds, even thousands of
presentations and dissections, with media and social media authorized talkers
or influencers doing “rants” and presenting compelling, persuasive “evidence”. One can get lost forever in a series of
events and the “investigation” which follows.
In
this Redux from August 13, 2017, “Oh Brave New World, Are We Surprised? Governments, Nations, Armies, All Privatized”,
this is how Alan Watt describes our response to the various versions of “reality”/history
that we’re presented:
“But as I say, you really got all
these different versions of reality and people do choose which ones they want
to believe in.”
What
we believe is a choice. Where we focus
our attention is a choice. In this
recent event, what strikes me as attention-worthy is Peter Thiel, Palantir, big
tech and the military industrial complex, data mining, and Total Information
Awareness.
For
a recent Redux (#160, May 12, 2024), I chose Alan’s talk from May 22,
2016. Here is the title:
“Chasing Truth? Be Like the Terrier,
Never Lose Sight of Your Quarry's Derriere”
© Alan Watt
May 22, 2016
© Not Sure
Additional reading:
Donald
Trump’s New Sneaker Features a Photo of His Assassination Attempt—and It's
Already Selling Out
https://www.gq.com/story/donald-trump-fight-fight-fight-sneakers
Absolutely
Everything We Know About the Trump Sneakers
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/absolutely-everything-we-know-about-the-trump-sneakers.html
Palantir,
Mass Surveillance and Pre-Crime - Whitney Webb (July 19, 2024)
https://theamericanclassroom.substack.com/p/palantir-mass-surveillance-and-pre
America!
The Movie (Screenplay by JD Vance) - Miri's Massive Missives (July 17, 2024)
https://miri.substack.com/p/america-the-movie-screenplay-by-jd?
How
A 'Deviant' Philosopher Built Palantir, A CIA-Funded Data-Mining Juggernaut
(2013)
The
Man Behind Trump’s VP Pick: It’s Worse Than You Think - Whitney Webb (July 18,
2024)
How
Peter Thiel-Linked Tech is Fueling the Ukraine War - Stavroula Pabst (Oct. 13,
2023)