America See You On The Dark Side Of The Moon - Part2
Politics / Social Issues Dec 18, 2019 - 12:55 PM GMTBy: James_Quinn
In Part 1 of this article I tried to link the greed and depravity of those pulling the strings behind the curtain of the Deep State with perpetual warfare being waged by the military industrial complex and the purposeful dumbing down of the populace so propaganda spewed by the Deep State’s media mouthpieces finds fertile ground. Pink Floyd’s lyrics from their existential album – Dark Side of the Moon – continue to resonate today, even more than they did in 1973.
Breathe
Breathe, breathe in the air Don’t be afraid to care Leave, don’t leave me Look around, choose your own ground
Long you live and high you fly Smiles you’ll give and tears you’ll cry And all you touch and all you see Is all your life will ever be
I knew Part 1 of this article would be easier to write than Part 2 because I’m more comfortable writing about financial issues and expounding upon the political and economic degradation of our empire of debt. Pondering my life and choices I’ve made or haven’t made is something I’d rather not think about. But, as I was driving home from getting blood work done last Saturday morning, the haunting chords of Breathe emanated from my car radio, urging me to tackle the rest of my article. Breathe is a very short instrumental piece of less than 3 minutes.
It is the first song on the album, setting the melancholy tone for the rest of the album. To me, Waters’ lyrics are addressing how we all have a choice on how we live our lives. We take our first breath and if we are lucky have about eighty years on this planet. The song seems to be from the perspective of a father, who has the wisdom gained from a long life, giving advice to their child.
It’s the relationships we form and the way we live our lives that matter. Our existence is full of joy and pain; work and play; thinking or believing; leading or following; living and dying. We need to choose our ground. Are we going to live a life worthy of esteem or will we just go with the flow, believing what we are told, and working ourselves into an early grave?
The corporate fascist Deep State controllers want rabbits to run faster and ditch diggers to keep digging ditches. They want you to be propagandized to buy the shit they are willing to sell you, utilizing plentiful amounts of debt, so you are forever beholden to them as debt serfs paying 17% on your credit card balances. George Carlin summed it up well many years ago:
“We know what they want, more for themselves and less for everyone else… and they don’t want an educated citizenry…. they want obedient workers… people who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paper work and just dumb enough to passively accept the increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime, and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it.”
Let’s face it, “THEY” don’t want the masses to think. They don’t want them to make choices which will free them from working from sun up until sundown until they die. The corporate fascists want you to die at your desk or, even better, develop a disease the sickcare complex can milk for hundreds of thousands of dollars. It’s all about the dollars. They want it all and we are just the dupes, following their directives, and working ourselves to death trying to keep up with the Joneses. Striving to make the most money, own the biggest house, driving the most expensive automobile, and riding the biggest wave is a recipe for an early grave. What’s the point, as we are all dust in the end.
Run, rabbit, run Dig that hole, forget the sun When at last the work is done Don’t sit down, it’s time to dig another one
Long you live and high you fly But only if you ride the tide Balanced on the biggest wave Race towards an early grave
For most of my life I’ve felt disconnected from what is considered important in this society. For the first forty years of my life I strove to climb the corporate ladder, getting the proper degrees and doing whatever it took to get ahead. I believed what I saw on TV and didn’t question the official narratives. There were about five years out of my first twenty years in the working world where I loved what I was doing.
My view of the world changed with 9/11 and the Neo-Con fabricated Iraq War. The Patriot Act and the subsequent expansion of the un-Constitutional illegal surveillance of American citizens changed my understanding of the world. What I thought was important in my life was really inconsequential in comparison to what the government/Wall Street/Federal Reserve/Deep State were doing to the people of our nation.
Like many Americans, with a family to support, I’ve had to dig my holes in increasingly distant destinations. This has been detrimental to my physical and mental health, but sacrificing for our children’s future is the duty of a father. I’ve long since abandoned any ambitions to achieve the success this world declares to be imperative. For over a decade I’ve realized my purpose is to try and influence the direction of our country through writing on my blog, providing a forum for other writers, and trying to live a life which will make my children proud of my efforts.
The decisions we make in the next few years will impact future generations in a profound way. How we touch the lives of others is all our lives will ever be. We are all headed for the grave, so how much money we accumulate, power we wield, or positions we hold are ultimately meaningless. A life lived without positively impacting the lives of others is a life unfulfilled. We can’t let darkness win.
Time
Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day Fritter and waste the hours in an off-hand way Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town Waiting for someone or something to show you the way
Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today And then one day you find ten years have got behind you No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun
Time has always been my favorite Pink Floyd song because it connects with me no matter what life stage I’m living. It’s about finding purpose in life. I think most people can relate to wasting time in our home towns when we were young, waiting for a parent or teacher to point us in the right direction.
Some driven individuals know exactly what they want at a young age and pursue their dreams with reckless abandon. I often think they are being driven by overbearing parents trying to compensate for their failures in life by forcing their off-spring succeed. These are the people who end up running corporations, becoming politicians, and holding positions of power, where they can boss others around.
I was still living in my hometown until the age of 25. I had a college degree, passed the CPA exam, and had a job as a divisional controller for a major corporation. I had met my future wife down the shore in Avalon. I still lived at home with my parents. I still spent my weeknights playing basketball with my friends from the neighborhood. I played on Tony’s Bar softball team with the same guys. I knew most of these guys would never leave our hometown. They didn’t care about education and seemed content just kicking around on the same piece of ground. I think most of those guys never left that town.
Some became alcoholics. Some died far too young. And a couple made it out. Twenty years later when I would come back to visit my parents, I drove through the town to show my kids where I grew up and nothing had changed. It was exactly the same as when I had left. It was kind of sad and still gives me a feeling of melancholy. There are millions of people who have wasted their lives, never daring to leave their home towns, never taking a risk, never reaching their potential and living unhappy unfulfilled lives. They missed the starting gun.
No one showed me the way, but I did know I needed to move on with my life. I got a new job, bought a house, got married, went back to school at night for my MBA, moved up the ladder at work, had three kids, and got fired at 40 years old because truthful analysis was not what the vapid low IQ female CEO (diversity hire) wanted from her underlings. More than ten years had got behind me, when I was left dazed and confused.
This was less than three years after 9/11 and the Patriot Act. Bush, Cheney and Powell had lied us into the Iraq War disaster in 2003. My eyes began to open, as my trust in government, financial institutions, the Federal Reserve, and the media dissipated. Time continued to move relentlessly onward. I was no longer young and foolish. I was drawn to the message being put forth by Ron Paul and will be forever grateful to a true patriot for opening my mind to the truth.
And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it’s sinking Racing around to come up behind you again The sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older Shorter of breath and one day closer to death
Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time. Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way The time is gone, the song is over, Thought I’d something more to say.
Since 2008 when I started writing and running my blog, I’ve felt like I’ve been running and running to catch up with the sun, but it’s sinking. As I approach my sixth decade on this earth, the last two stanzas of Time have more and more meaning to me. I’m still slogging away at a job from when I get up at 5:30 am until I get home at 6:00 pm. It has a respectable title, but as has been true for most of my working life, it’s just a job. I’ve had bills to pay, children to raise, parents to care for, and duties to carry out.
I’ve always had a stoic attitude towards life, doing whatever needed to be done, taking care of my family, and deferring my gratification to some unspecified future time. I live inside my head most of the time, pondering, questioning, needlessly worrying, and trying to figure out my purpose on this earth.
Writing, reading, and encouraging others to find their voice on my blog is what sustains me on a daily basis. I look forward to the day when I can trade in my long daily commute and uninspiring job, to just write and run my blog. That day seems far off with the need for decent health coverage beyond the resources of a self-employed person. The fatalist in me latches onto the concept of being shorter of breath and one day closer to death.
Every year is getting shorter and I have so much left to do. I started the blog as a response to the lies and evil perpetrated by those running the show, whether you call them the ruling class, oligarchs, or Deep State. I don’t want my boys to grow up to be debt serfs in a corporate fascist surveillance state. After ten years of imagining myself as some sort of Paul Revere/Thomas Paine, reality set in.
My youth is long gone. My enthusiasm for promoting the kind of change needed to save this country has waned. Time is running out. I’ve given up predicting the timing of the collapse. The controllers manage to keep the Ponzi scheme going, despite the reality of our situation. My pessimistic nature makes me think my future plans of retiring from the rat race world will come to naught. My decade of scribbled lines has had little impact on the course we are on as a society. Most of the people I now consider my friends, I’ve never met in person. Dark Side of the Moon addresses insanity on a personal level and the loneliness of not fitting in.
Without The Burning Platform, I would probably lose what level of sanity I have left. I don’t feel as alone because I am able to read the thoughts of others just like myself. I’m inspired by the common sense, wisdom, intelligence and fortitude of the men and women who frequent my website. We are all living lives of quiet desperation, seeking truth and preparing for an uncertain future. As this Fourth Turning enters its terminal phase, I believe it will be people like those on my website who offer the hope of a better tomorrow. Before my time is gone and my song over, I think I have more to say. Fighting for my sons will be my driving force until my dying breath, whenever that should be.
Eclipse
All that you touch And all that you see All that you taste All you feel
And all that you love And all that you hate All you distrust All you save
And all that you give And all that you deal And all that you buy, Beg, borrow or steal
And all you create And all you destroy And all that you do And all that you say
And all that you eat And everyone you meet And all that you slight And everyone you fight
And all that is now And all that is gone And all that’s to come And everything under the sun is in tune But the sun is eclipsed by the moon.
There is no dark side of the moon, really. Matter of fact, it’s all dark.
Eclipse, which follows and intersects with Brain Damage, is only two minutes long, but perfectly captures the symbolism of the album: light and dark; good and evil; life and death. Musically it is a colossal cascading climax with beautiful harmonies and haunting lyrics. The song represents the lives of all humankind. The use of the words “All” and “You” captures the essence of a human life in relation to all mankind.
To summarize a human life with vivid lyrics in two minutes is an extraordinary feat of musical magic. The song features a loud, repetitive melody that builds up, then ends with a very quiet outro. When the main instrumentation ends, the sound of a heartbeat, which began on the first track, gradually fades to silence. The album represents a long life, from birth through death, encompassing the battle between goodness and dark forces which we all confront during our short time on this earth.
Looking back to the period in which this album was constructed, you can understand why darkness was the theme. The early 70’s was a dark time. The Vietnam War lingered on, while violent protests filled our streets. Nixon had closed the gold window and set in motion the raging inflation for the decade. Political turmoil was about to be unleashed with the impeachment of Nixon.
Oil embargoes resulted in surging gas prices and shortages. Labor and management clashed, with strikes across the land. The Cold War was at its coldest. It simply was not a happy time. Roger Waters’ lyrics reflected the darkness of the time. Ironically, it was the most cohesive and creative period for the band. The album’s success made them rich and famous, which ultimately led to their breakup.
Waters describes the album as “a very simple statement saying that all the good things life can offer are there for us to grasp, but that the influence of some dark force in our natures prevents us from seizing them”. The darkness of the moon is a symbolic representation of our dark side and the brightness of the sun is a symbolic representation of all that is good.
We all have both good and evil within our hearts and have the choice to let one or the other dominate our thoughts and actions. Each person on this earth has the option of following an ideology of evil or an ideology of good. When enough people choose to believe in the messages coming from dark forces, the result is tragedy and the loss of millions of lives, as we have seen in the last century under the rule of Stalin and Mao.
As I was again procrastinating on writing the 2nd part of this article because thinking about my mortality is not something I enjoy, I was flipping through the 600 cable channels on my propaganda machine and as a kick in the ass to finalize this article, AXS TV had one of their Classic Album shows on where they delve deeply into the making of the greatest albums of all-time. They were exploring the making of Dark Side by interviewing the band members, Alan Parsons the engineer, record executives, and music critics.
The themes of conflict, greed, war, wasted time, and misplaced priorities were worrisome to Waters and his bandmates. They were trying to reach the listeners with the message we all have doubts, misgivings, failures, and moments of weakness, when the darker forces of our nature eclipse our better intentions. We are just human, with the same weaknesses and faults as those who lived centuries ago.
The video made to accompany Eclipse is haunting, disturbing and clear in its message. We live our lives as individuals within a society of other individuals, living a mostly mundane existence, striving for what we are told is important by those controlling the levers of society. They push materialism and constant conflict upon good decent people who wouldn’t choose such a path without being pushed in that direction through propaganda and social engineering by evil men with evil intentions.
In the video, all that is good is overwhelmed by explosions, scenes of greed, and dictators, while the bright light in the human eye is extinguished, the moon overshadows the sun, and the human heartbeat stops. You are left with an empty feeling of a life wasted.
The voice at the end of the song is that of Gerry O’Driscoll, the doorman at Abbey Road Studios, answering the question: “What is ‘the dark side of the moon’?” with: “There is no dark side in the moon, really. Matter of fact, it’s all dark. The only thing that makes it look light is the sun.” As with all music, it means different things to different people. To me, Eclipse and the video of the moon slowly approaching the sun and ultimately shrouding the light in darkness symbolizes a Fourth Turning. Like an eclipse, Fourth Turnings arrive at predictable times and darken the landscape for a period of time, before yielding to the light once again.
We are currently in the midst of a Fourth Turning and the darkness deepens by the day, with the ongoing coup attempt against a sitting president; a debt crisis being covered up by the Federal Reserve; ongoing wars in the Middle East; a new cold war against Russia and China; an overbearing dangerous surveillance state; climate change hoax used to increase government power; socialists gaining acceptance among the dumbed down masses; gun grabbers trying to overturn the 2nd Amendment; celebration of decadence; rewarding diversity over accomplishment; trillion dollar deficits; and half the country despising the other half.
Darkness is descending across the land as this empire of debt enters its terminal phase. Its heartbeat is weakening and the light of liberty is fading to black
The exploration of individual insanity and societal insanity is as relevant today as it was in 1973 and as relevant as it was when addressed by Aldous Huxley in 1958. If Huxley thought we were a profoundly abnormal society in the 1950s, his head would explode if he were alive today. I always feel like an outcast in this world. I don’t fit in. I don’t value what most people in this profoundly abnormal society value.
The only place where I don’t feel like an outcast is among like minded people who frequent my website. Are we insane in believing our government should be limited, budgets balanced, the Constitution honored, welfare/warfare state restrained, the Fed ended, and the liberties of Americans restored?
If refusing to adjust to what passes for being normal in this abnormal society makes me a pariah, I will gladly inhabit my exile on Main Street. I will not bow to peer pressure, propaganda, or threats. I will keep publishing the truth on my website until THEY shut me down. The real resistance is those who refuse to adapt to this insane culture of debt, delusion, discord, decadence and degradation. I will stay close to home and family, and when I arrive home cold and tired, I’ll warm my bones beside the fire. I hope to see you on the dark side of the moon.
“The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be most normal. Many of them are normal because they are so well adjusted to our mode of existence, because their human voice has been silenced so early in their lives, that they do not even struggle or suffer or develop symptoms as the neurotic does. They are normal not in what may be called the absolute sense of the word; they are normal only in relation to a profoundly abnormal society. Their perfect adjustment to that abnormal society is a measure of their mental sickness. These millions of abnormally normal people, living without fuss in a society to which, if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted.” ― Aldous Huxley, Brave New World Revisited
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By James Quinn
James Quinn is a senior director of strategic planning for a major university. James has held financial positions with a retailer, homebuilder and university in his 22-year career. Those positions included treasurer, controller, and head of strategic planning. He is married with three boys and is writing these articles because he cares about their future. He earned a BS in accounting from Drexel University and an MBA from Villanova University. He is a certified public accountant and a certified cash manager.
These articles reflect the personal views of James Quinn. They do not necessarily represent the views of his employer, and are not sponsored or endorsed by his employer.
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