Yesterday, I purchased the new hearing aids I ordered 2 weeks ago. My first pair, 10 years old, were top-of-the-line ReSound (4200/pair). As I have a mid-range (called “cookie bite”) loss, it is particularly difficult for me to understand speech; most speech is in the mid-frequency range. In terms of understanding speech, the original aids were a disappointment. As well, the left one never fit quite right. Bottom line, I didn’t wear them as often as others thought I should have. They got tired of me saying “what”? The new ones at $2600/pair, are Phonak, "entry level"made in Switzerland. So far, they seem to be a great improvement.
Now, the story gets interesting because I arranged in advance to pay for these in cash. Interesting, isn’t it that one must ask permission to do so. Legal tender laws notwithstanding, many enterprises refuse to accept cash, or are required send in forms to tell the apparat they received cash from you. This office did insist I provide exact change. Not a problem.
Now, I must digress. Back in 2008, a trusted friend who understands the financial world far better than I, suggested I get some cash to keep on hand, lest there be bank closures. As I had previously arranged safe storage outside the banking system (they can deny access to safety deposit boxes and/or inventory them by fiat as well), I did so. So, I had this cash on hand for 14 years. Naturally, its buying power diminished. I was prepared to accept this at price inflation rates back then. No longer. Having sufficient savings protected by gold (safely in a vault in CH) as a substantial portion of the portfolio of a private equity holding company I trust and have been with for 25 years, I had thought it OK to accept some loss from inflation. Current inflation rates, though, have caused me to spend down a considerable part of this cash recently. As a practical alternative, I also have access to a bag of “junk silver” (pre- 1965 90% silver coins), which serves as a means of small purchases should the SHTF. So, to pick up my new hearing aids I had to drive about 10 miles to the audiologist’s office in an adjacent town.
Enter “civil asset forfeiture”. In the US, the “land of the free”, with “consent of the governed”, where Superman used to fight for “truth, justice and the American way”, you see, the police can legally steal any cash they may find you carrying! The highway patrol now do double-duty and act as the highwaymen of old! If, say, on some false pretext, I were stopped and searched, my friendly local police officer can simply assume that the cash was illegally obtained and legally seize it for benefit of… the police department!! I need never be even charged with any crime whatsoever. Much has been written on this abomination and there are many horror stories along the lines of cash wedding gifts of $10K being stolen by police and it costing more than that in legal fees (and several years) to attempt to retrieve one’s own legal cash. Small cash business owners on the way to the bank to deposit the day’s proceeds, have been especially victimized.
With this knowledge in mind and fear in my heart, I set out to drive to the ENT office housing my audiologist. I drove the speed limit. I stopped completely at every stop sign. I was prepared to record any conversation (surreptitiously, as this while likely legal, is a ‘trigger’ to authorities) with any police.
In short, here is one mundane example of the nature of neo-fearful life in the formerly civil, formerly-united states. Since I am retired, I needn’t fear losing my job, my license or my home by virtue of some verbal transgression (pun intended) (a teacher was just fired because she addressed her class - in an all-girls school - by saying “good morning, girls”!). It was not inclusive to say that, you see, and the class decided - in a cost-free signal of ‘equity & inclusion’ - they were ‘offended’.
In sum, as I am aware of the reigning complete absence of (or equality under the) law. In its place, we have the raw exercise of power, barely requiring even a pretext any longer for authorities to act as they please. I was, thus, afraid. The road to the audiologist is a well-known series of speed traps. Police sit in hidden cars where they can observe stop signs and give tickets for not coming completely to a stop. The fines are confiscatory. The threshold for an illegal search - which may mystically become legal later in a corrupt courtroom. BTW, civil asset forfeiture is so well-established that there are formal agreements among police and other “law enforcement” agencies for “profit sharing” of seized cash and proceeds from sales of seized property as well, like vehicles, guns, homes, boats.
This is, then, a tidbit of welcome to mundane life in modern America. Also, BTW, since “equity” (definition: radical leftists’ idea du jour, of what is “fair”), not equality, reigns here, it might be safer for caucasians to not appear in public while white; they are subject to both official sanctions as legal theft of cash. Unofficially, of course, whites are in season all year round. They may be beaten to the ground and stomped (an unconscious head, you see, is an irresistible sporting target for well-placed kicks in what the media calls “the knockout game”). The results of these not rarely lethal “games” are usually unreported by the MSM - if its occurrence is even noted at all. If so, the perpetrators are inevitably referred to as “gangs of youths”). My level of apprehension was somewhat reduced by the fact that my adventure did not require any walking in the city. I was thus only exposed to legal theft by authorities, as opposed to illegal assault by the “Biden Youth”.
It is thus apparent that in today’s US, the former repository of productivity and civic virtue and source of tax revenue - the caucasian male, unless granted an exemption by virtue of “identifying” as an oppressed subsegment of the demographic, has been functionally transitioned from a milker to a steer (definition: neutered bull) - who may be merely milked as heretofore, or whose flesh may now be taken officially by the state or unofficially - under color of “equity” - by the state’s newest accomplices, “gangs of youths”. Their brown shirts are on backorder from China.
