From the May 2005 Idaho Observer:

The signs are everywhere

Pretending won't make them go away

"Act as if nothings wrong" by artist Nicolas Lampert is a timeless depiction of how common people behave while signs that their world is changing for the worse are all around them. More of Lampert's insightful work can be found at

What is happening in the minds of Americans today is no different than what always happens in the minds of people in times of uncertainty: They shut down. As events unfolded prior to every cataclysm in history, the masses just continued living their lives as best they could while pretending to each other that nothing was wrong. Conditions inevitably worsened until suddenly, the people's lives were thrown into chaos-war, death, famine, pestilence, upheaval-forced to survive a storm for which they were wholly unprepared.

All the indicators are in place to suggest that Americans are about to be blindsided by a storm on the scale of the ones that enveloped Europe twice in the last century. But this time it will be different: Big Brother has come of age and pretending won't make him go away.

Though dedicated and knowledgeable activists have been fighting it for years, the national ID has become law. We will now be expected to carry a super smart card that carries a lot of information and can be used by the "authorities" to access databases that know everything about us. Another development that has met principled, yet futile, opposition for years is the emplacement of surveillance cameras and microwave transmission towers seemingly everywhere.

Our mostly foreign creditors will not continue raising our debt ceiling forever-and a $7.7 trillion debt is destructively high by any standard. Plus, our debts are increasing to pay for a war machine that is causing the community of nations to become very angry at America.

On top of all this, increasing numbers of Americans are becoming chronically ill from many factors, most notably due to the toxic burden their modern bodies are carrying and the stress of living in these interesting times.

The purpose of this entire edition of The Idaho Observer is to use history as our guide so we can anticipate the next development through examples in history. We are only doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past if we fail to recognize them for what they are. Pretending won't make our current state of affairs go away. Ultimately, its just a handful of little men behind the curtain pulling the strings of this world. As a nation of 295 million, we should be able to pull back the curtain and expose a few little men.