Martial law requires Congress

But don't rule out them begging the God-Emperor to accept it:

Recently, a rumor that President Trump would impose martial law in response to the COVID-19 pandemic went viral. The story gained enough traction that the National Security Council stepped in to reassure the public it was fake. But Americans, used to dystopian films featuring government takeovers of quiet civilian life, still wonder: Could it happen here?

The answer is probably no — at least under circumstances as they now stand.

The president’s power to declare martial law is not nearly as broad as rumors suggest. The states’ powers are greater, but they too are subject to important restrictions. Nonetheless, uncertainties in the law show the need for Congress and state legislatures to clarify the scope and limits of martial law.

The concept of “martial law” is not well understood, let alone defined, in American law. It usually refers to military forces taking over the functions of ordinary civilian government. The key words are “taking over.” Although the military often provides support and assistance for certain activities performed by civilian authorities — such as carrying out search-and-rescue missions in the aftermath of a natural disaster — actual displacement of civilian government represents a dramatic departure from normal practice.

But it has happened.

There was a period in American history when martial law was relatively common. Between 1857 and 1945, martial law was declared 70 times in the United States. In most cases, a state governor imposed it on a city, county or group of counties. This was sometimes in response to violent civil unrest but more often to break strikes on behalf of business interests. These declarations lasted anywhere from days to years. Martial law was last declared in the United States in 1966, when the governor of California imposed it to suppress unrest in the Hunters Point neighborhood of San Francisco after a white police officer shot a black teenager.

The federal government has declared martial law too, though far less frequently. Most recently, Hawaii was placed under martial law for the majority of World War II. The U.S. Army controlled every aspect of civilian life on the islands, from criminal justice to curbside trash removal.

We'll see. It would certainly be remarkable to see the House of Representatives shift from impeaching the President to passing a law declaring martial law and asking him to sign it. But, at this point, would it really be all that surprising?

In the meantime, this picture on Google from March 31 is intriguing.

She's not necessarily wrong

A woman recommends staying away from sigma males:

He’s not your usual type, so you have no plans to fall in love.

You discover: he’s interesting, he’s fascinating, he might very well be a genius. When he talks about data sets, somehow it’s poetry to your ears. His hobbies are unexpected and wide-ranging: philosophy, fishing, tango.

He was a terrible student in high school, yet highly accomplished outside of it. Maybe he traveled across Europe for chess tournaments, or around the U.S. for tennis championships, or spent long hours sketching art in a black sketch book.

There was one teacher in particular that believed in him, and that made all the difference.

He’s extraordinarily successful, astonishingly well-connected. If he was bored in school, he’s been challenged like no other in his career. He has driven an original idea or ambition to completion, with a discipline and willpower you can only imagine, achieved what most humans could only dream of.

And yet the more successful and brilliant he is in a particular area, the more awkward and incompetent he is in the most basic of others: he forgets to eat, he can’t pick out his own clothes, he can’t boil an egg.

But you smile when you learn of these quirks. You find them endearing.

She's probably right, on average, although it is clear that she seriously underestimates the sigma's appeal to other women. As a general rule, most women simply don't believe, at least not initially, how attractive sigmas are to other women because they find it difficult to believe it of any man who is not a conventional alpha. And, of course, being solipsistic by nature, the average woman has absolutely no idea how utterly average her inclinations are.

On a tangential note, I don't think I'll ever forget the time an attractive woman said, in all seriousness, that she was different because she was really only attracted to tall, good-looking alpha males, who had a little bit, although not too much, of an an edge to them. Yeah, that's totally different from every other woman on the planet....

But the one thing the writer is missing, naturally, is that the sigma doesn't necessarily follow any particular pattern with regards to women. He's not an alpha, so he's just as likely to be faithful as unfaithful, and being iconoclastic by nature, is equally capable of going off and joining a monastery, a blues band, or the French Foreign Legion. He's not a gamma, so he's not going to put any woman on a pedestal. And even the sigma is seldom able to predict his own path with any degree of reliability; I certainly didn't. But it is true that whatever the sigma's decision might be, she's not going to get a vote unless that happens to be an element of his individual code.

And just in case you're harboring any suspicions, I am reliably informed that Spacebunny did not write this....

PS: Note to the gammas reading this: this does not apply to you. Yes, you're smarter than the norm and your social life is less than active. Doesn't matter. Remember how obsessed you were with that one girl? Right.

Mailvox: Q objectives

A reader sends a list of 10 objectives that were compiled on December 14, 2018. It is fascinating to observe how much the ground has shifted since then:

Objective #1: Stop the Human Trafficking.
This goal has been underway full speed since day 1. With deadly efficiency, no mercy and special forces. Under the radar and below the public news cycle.

Objective #2: Weaponize MIL-INTEL Against Them. 
This plan has been underway since Inauguration Day. Trump visited CIA HQ on his first full day in office. Obama's secret pardons require post-2016 crimes.

Objective #3: Remove Rogue Nukes & Comms.
Think North Korea nuke mountain collapse 2017. Think Iran. Syria. Ukraine. Venezuela. Pakistan. Think Subs. Missiles. CERN. EMP & SATCOMs.

Objective #4: Secure Senate & Supreme Court.
McCain. Flake. Corker = no real GOP majority. Kennedy. Roberts = no real conservative court. Senate and SC solved with real majority 11.18.

Objective #5: Form a Trusted Global Alliance
Think fall of Saudi Arabia in Oct 2017. Think Xi. Abe. Moon & Kim in Nov 2017. Think Putin. Brazil. Italy. Mexico, etc... 2018.

Objective #6: Strengthen US Military/Economy
Military completely funded through all of 2019. Tax cuts and low interest puts normies at ease. Caravans. Gangs. Antifa pretext for Martial Law. [Note: Corona-chan will serve much better and has already been implemented in Hungary - VD]

Objective #7: Expose Media & Social Giants
Think advent of QAnon and Trump's Twitter. Showcase media hypocrisy day after day. Showcase social media censorship daily.

Objective #8: Voter Fraud & Voter ID.
Let "them" repeat crimes in 2018 midterms. Build iron-clad cases with obvious verified fraud. Use fraud evidence as pretext for 2020 voter ID.

Objective #9: Control Financial System.
Force Queen. Macron. May. Merkel to submit. Force alliance to hand over SWIFT encryption keys. Force FED restructure & pardon all intra-gov debt. [Note: again, Corona-chan has proven useful in this regard. - VD]

Objective #10: Remove & Arrest Cabalists.
Pick off 1 or 2 "old guard" each month with "deaths". Pick off 100-200 "CEO's" each month with "MeToo". Pick off 10K-20K "suddenly" when "Storm is Upon Us."

It's clear from this review that the Q narrative has provided a considerably more reliable map with which to anticipate future events than the establishment news narrative has. The one thing that is obviously missing is Corona-chan, which has proven to be a much more useful tool than any of those that were previously conceived.

I was asked earlier today about the negativity being expressed by some otherwise reliable individuals whom I respect, and my response was to note that a) they are not Americans, and therefore b) are unfamiliar with how the God-Emperor customarily operates. Their analysis is not necessarily incorrect, it is merely incomplete in that it fails to take into account President Trump's unparalleled ability to anticipate and ju-jitsu the enemy's actions.

The long pause

Marvel is cutting up to one-third of its production:

Marvel Entertainment is immediately "pausing" work on - and the release of - approximately one-third of its May and June comic book issues, a spokesperson confirmed for Newsarama. Marvel's representative said 15 to 20% of its solicited titles would be affected, as some of them are twice-monthly in May and June.

The decision to pause work on the affected titles, according to the spokesperson, is "to help spread the amount of publishing product over the coming weeks and months."

Asked when the publisher intends to resume publishing the issues not affected by the pause, the Marvel spokesperson said "as soon as more information is available, we will outline our longer-term plans."

IDW has also put GI JOE on hiatus:

G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero will be going on hiatus at IDW. Larry Hama has been told to stop pencils on the series as more and more creators are being told to stop work. The Coronavirus has wreaked havoc on the comics industry as a whole for weeks now, and G.I. Joe is just the latest series that will see delays. No word on if this is a permanent end, as Hama was not told anything other than to put "pencils down", as stated in a Facebook post today. 

As well as TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES:

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ongoing artist Sophie Campbell to stop production on the series as of issue #105 by IDW. The artist/writer posted to Twitter that once the art is done on the issue, that is it.  

In the meantime, some of Arkhaven's newest creations are just taking shape. You've heard about A THRONE OF BONES and SHADE. But those are not the only new series being created; there are four more in the works. The challenge that we're facing on the subscription side is that the payment processors take such a big chunk of a $1 charge that the only way we can even think about having a $1/monthly subscription is to offer them annually.

We estimate that we need to have at least $3k in monthly subscriptions to make the project worth launching. This probably means waiting until we get the Junior Classics out to do a crowdfunding campaign that is not for a single comic, but for the subscription itself. We do not believe it would be wise to do any more crowdfunding until we deliver the Junior Classics, an issue or two of Swan Knight, and the Rebel figurine.

An unfortunate mishap

Or going to ground? The timing is interesting, to be sure:

BREAKING: Daughter and grandson of former Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend have drowned in a canoeing accident - ABC News

I expect there are going to be a lot of very strange mishaps being reported in the next week or two.

CORRECTION: Maryland authorities say daughter, grandson of Kathleen Kennedy Townsend are missing following a canoeing incident. A previous tweet indicated authorities believed they had drowned. We deeply regret the error. - ABC News

Meanwhile, Henry Kissinger, who on the one hand would appear to be Mr. Deep State himself, and on the other hand was personally acquainted with Donald Trump dating back to at least 1988, recently published an article in the Wall Street Journal entitled "The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever Alter the World Order."

Now, consider the possibility that the virus is also a metaphor. What would that signify?

Is there nothing she can't do?

Corona-chan is believed to have the potential to break up the Fourth Reich:

European leaders warn coronavirus could lead to the breakup of their union. The coronavirus pandemic, with its simultaneous health and economic crises, is deepening fault lines within Europe in a way some leaders fear could prove to be a final reckoning.

The cohesion of the European Union had been battered by Brexit, bruised by the political fallout from the 2015 migration surge and the 2008 financial crisis, and challenged by rising autocracy in the east that runs contrary to the professed ideals of the European project.

Now, if Europe’s leaders cannot chart a more united course, the project lies in what one of its architects described this week as “mortal danger.”

This pandemic is best pandemic! Thank you, Corona-chan!

The repatriations begin

Sending home the British backpackers on their gap years is a positive, but very small first step. Now do the migrants, the H1-B-equivalents, and the refugees:

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has urged all foreign visitors and students to leave the country now as the coronavirus pandemic worsens.

Mr Morrison said that while those with essential skills - such as visiting doctors and nurses - will be encouraged to stay, everyone else should 'make their way home'.

There were more than 1million people in Australia on visitor and student visas on December 31 - thought to include tens of thousands of UK and US tourists - though it is unclear how many remain in the country.

It is also unclear how visitors are expected to leave the country - with huge numbers of flights cancelled and ticket costs for the remaining seats spiralling.

Never forget, the Open Society is a disease-ridden society living day-to-day on the edge of catastrophe.

The filth flees and spreads disease

Disease-ridden New Yorkers carry their diseases with them when they belatedly flee from their city dwellings to their rental residences on the coast:

Small coastal towns that have taken in an influx of NYC’s elite fleeing the coronavirus epidemic are now reeling from a spike in COVID-19 cases as the prices of Hamptons rental homes soar from $5,000 per month to over $30,000 for just two weeks.

The exodus of the Big Apple's residents has caused some town populations to burgeon and practically double and rentals to skyrocket - but locals in these 'refugee' towns are becoming hostile and demanding city dwellers stay away from their vulnerable towns for fear they may bring the deadly infection.

Suffolk County, home to the Hamptons, is seeing the biggest outbreak with 7,605 cases reported as of Wednesday, a 892 jump from the day prior with 897 people hospitalized and 69 deaths. However, the region only has 2,710 total hospital beds. As of Monday only 575 beds and 85 of 322 ICU beds were available.

This is why you don't ever want to live in a fashionable retreat for the urban elite. The narcissistic bastards don't hesitate to destroy everything they touch; the irony is that since they were too stupid to even consider modifying their behavior and leaving their urban hellholes when it mattered, they're taking their diseases with them to a place that is considerably less able to treat them when they fall ill.

Of course, this is also the fault of the towns themselves. If they had been willing to declare a quarantine earlier, they could have kept out the city dwellers. But they were too stupid to foresee the obvious and the inevitable in order to defend the interests of the locals.

Shade is coming

Day spoke to Bounding Into Comics about the upcoming series describing it as “Arkhaven’s first individual superhero series.”

The series will be written by Chuck Dixon and illustrated by Cliff Cosmic. It will focus on Shade, who appeared in the first volume of Alt-Hero.

As described by Day, “Shade is a member of of the Global Justice Initiative and can be considered something akin to a European Batman, if Batman was not an incestuous Chinese catamite who is afraid of flying mammals and would rather slaughter all his friends than execute justice.”

He added, “Shade is an Austrian aristocrat of the ancien regime, who recoils in disgust at the lack of taste and culture in modern society and believes wholeheartedly in the concept of European Union.”

Read the rest of the article at Bounding Into Comics.

The Great Boomer Plague

Adam Piggott is less than impressed by the irony of Boomers appealing to the younger generations they previously aborted, scorned, and ignored:

I am stunned at the amount of gall required to write that society is treating the Boomers as medically expendable, this the generation that pushed and advocated for abortion on demand, also known as baby murdering. The Boomers have had it their own way for their entire lives. But this virus couldn’t have come at a worse time for them. They react in outraged horror at the very idea that medical help in this crisis will be reserved for people under 65, when they themselves are the over 65s who will be left out. How can this possibly be happening? It wasn’t supposed to be like this. They are the anointed ones, the Woodstock-worshiping free love sex kittens without a care in the world, baby, hot damn, and it’s all gonna be groovy, man, except the grooviness has to be paid sometime and we may as well make it at your expense.

As always, it’s always about the Boomers. They demand the continuation of the free ride at the expense of everyone else which they have been enjoying their entire lives. The gravy train cannot be allowed to end, no matter what the circumstances. Oh the horror that somewhere a Boomer might be inconvenienced to the benefit of someone from an earlier generation.

Now, I would recommend medical triage and treating the at-risk over-65s last on purely logical, medical, and utilitarian grounds. It's obvious that they will consume more medical resources to less avail than any other group. But the fact that doing the right thing upsets and outrages so many Boomers is not only entirely typical, it is also more than a little amusing.

Just as we salute and offer our respects to the aged victims of the virus who understand that they have already lived their lives and decline treatment in favor of it going to their younger counterparts, we should mercilessly mock those elderly who refuse to accept that their day is done and insist on clinging to the idea that they are as important to society as those upon whom the future depends.

The even greater irony here is that it is the Boomers who are apparently some of the worst culprits when it comes to refusing to stay at home. Every generation expects the youth to be foolish, stupid, and convinced of their own immortality, but Generation X may be the first generation to have learned to expect it of their elders.

UPDATE: An observation from Boomerville:

A firsthand account from Boomerville. Here in Florida, ground-zero for Boomerville, the Boomers are out in swarms. I briefly had to go out yesterday, and they're everywhere, walking around, for no reason at all. Looking in empty shop windows, strolling down the beach, etc. It's almost outrageous to see them acting so carefree.

#pencilsdown

Independent comics creators and their supporters are less than entirely mournful over the implosion of the establishment comics industry in response to the #pencilsdown announcement at Marvel, Valiant, and other publishers.

A group calling its fans Nazis, misogynists, homophobes, transphobes, pedophiles, neck beards, virgins, incels, terrorists, racists, and more now think the fans should have

*checks notes*

Been more "kind to pros"

This is why I don't care that you had to put your #pencilsdown

Given the way that we were treated by BleedingCool and the rest of the mainstream comics media, I can't say that I am any more sympathetic. Meanwhile, at Arkhaven, Chuck Dixon's Avalon has just seen issues 5 and 6 released, and the illustrations through issue 10 are already done. Quantum Mortis: A Man Disrupted #5 will be out next week and we just need a cover in order to get Alt-Hero:Q #3 done.

And the colors for A Throne of Bones #1 are almost ready for lettering.

Desperate Deep State

But what is it about the hospital ships that has them freaking out?

An engineer in Los Angeles was charged after attempting to ram a train at full speed into a Navy hospital ship sent to assist with the Covid-19 pandemic, in a bizarre effort to “wake up” Americans to a vague government conspiracy.

San Pedro resident Eduardo Moreno was charged with one count of train wrecking on Wednesday after admitting to authorities that he deliberately derailed a locomotive in an attempt to crash it into the USNS Mercy, a Navy medical vessel docked near LA to take pressure off the city’s crowded hospitals amid the coronavirus outbreak.

A train engineer at the Port of Los Angeles was arrested this morning on federal charges for allegedly running a locomotive at full speed off the end of rail tracks near the USNS Mercy. The train smashed through several steel and concrete barriers but failed to collide with the ship, being stopped by a chain link fence, according to a highway patrol officer who witnessed the attempted ramming.

That's not weird at all.... Meanwhile, in Michigan, the governor abruptly, and inexplicably, reverses course:

On Friday March 27th Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer threatened to revoke the medical licenses of doctors and pharmacists who prescribe hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus in Michigan.  Four days later, March 31st, the same governor asks the federal government to send her hydroxychloroquine to treat coronavirus patients. 

An Arkhaven subscription

Given the chaos in the comics industry, Team Arkhaven has been brainstorming about the best way to build up the comics offensive in the culture war and we've returned to the oft-suggested idea of the monthly Arkhaven subscription.

While I have been very negative about this from the start, the combination of a) the success of The Replatforming, both in terms of support and our ability to meet the production demands, and, b) the ongoing collapse of the establishment comics industry, has caused me to rethink my previous position.

Which leads us to the question: what should that monthly subscription look like? At the most basic level, we know there will be a $1 subscription for some form of monthly digital comic. But what else? Note that the basic subscription would be entirely NEW comics, although there might be tiers that allow people to get caught up on Alt-Hero or whatever.

Share your thoughts, please.

UPDATE: Here are my first thoughts in response to the suggestions.

1. The comics need to be standard length. 20-page stories instead of the 24-pages we've been doing.
2. The $1 subscription will get you the digital comic of the month. This could be anything except material produced specifically for the AH or AHQ campaigns. The Caligan campaign material would be included because it has far fewer backers. Could be Big Bear, Shade, A Throne of Bones, Chicago Typewriter, etc. Essentially, it's a robust monthly sampler.
3. A $3 subscription will get you the digital comic of the month + whatever series to which you want to receive whenever a new one comes out. This could be anything from AH to QM:AMD. Add $2 for each additional series subscription.

Question: how to handle getting new subscribers caught up on existing series. Starting each series subscription from first issue is a logistical nightmare. Still working on the numbers for the various print options. Anyhow, please continue to share your thoughts. At the moment, it looks complicated and not necessarily worthwhile, but probably not impossible.

The two most important lessons

A 40-year Wall Street veteran imparts the most important lessons he has learned from swimming in the swamp of fake capitalist corruption:

The same players who were bailed out then went back to what they do best. Too big to fail is now bigger, but with one crucial difference – the concentration of toxic risk remains in fewer hands and is enabled by Washington’s pay-to-play swamp. As corporate debt hits new all-time highs, balance sheets remain riddled with accounting fraud and enforcement hits all-time lows; we will soon see who is naked and it won’t be pretty.

Last autumn, I warned investors that Germany’s economy was falling off a cliff and was either in a recession or would be very soon. I cautioned that Italy’s debt is a huge problem and other member states and the rest of the world are not far behind Germany. Now in March, you can expect and will need to prepare for a full-blown economic depression.

Banks, politicians and governments will scapegoat Covid-19 to shift the blame for over 30 years of fiscal profligacy, loose monetary policies, fraud, and the lack of any proper regulatory enforcement away from themselves and onto anything or anyone else. Eventually, taxes will skyrocket to pay for these opaque bailouts, reckless spending policies, and record low interest rates during the past three decades.

Covid-19 presents an easy way to assign blame while forcing through “emergency legislation” allowing big government to implement 1984-style draconian social controls that will impinge and dismantle personal freedoms, liberties and democratic principles as they fleece taxpayers – again. If you think the 2008 recession and bailouts were bad, wait until you see how the greatest economic depression in history plays out.

This bubble has only begun to pop, and there are many more shoes to drop from this centipede before prices hit bottom. The downside will be significantly worse than the upside. Until leverage, valuations and corporate debt return to reasonable levels, stay clear. When these events do happen, we will see once-in-a-lifetime opportunities to create wealth. 

The two most important lessons I learned from my 40 years in international financial markets, lessons that can also be applied to politics and to life in general, are to never make any decision based on emotion or ideology and to never, ever trust the news. Today’s media are exponentially worse than they were in the 1980s and 1990s. They no longer provide news. What they provide are stories that are around 80 percent ideology and opinion,10 percent lies and spin, and 10 percent fact.

Keep your powder dry. Exploit the opportunities as they present themselves. And always, Always, ALWAYS critically examine every piece of so-called "news" with a highly skeptical eye.

Never trust the banks

As in 2008, the banks are taking the money the government has given them to help small businesses and are refusing to loan it out:

Nearly a fifth of small British businesses could be forced to close in the next four weeks after running out of cash amid complaints banks are refusing to give them government-backed coronavirus loans.

Many bosses said banks had declined them emergency payments over claims they had not met the required criteria while others could not get through on the phone or were told the money would take weeks to arrive.

Mark Fuller, who owns popular celebrity haunt Karma Sanctum in Soho, said he was unable to apply for funds because he could not guarantee his businesses would be able to start paying it back after six months in the event of a lengthy shutdown.

'The loan is under normal business conditions, which is fine but then don't suggest otherwise,' he told MailOnline. 'I have already been told by the government and Barclays that the only way to receive a loan is by cutting my staff.'

Other bosses were declined payments for having significant cash reserves, despite fears these would not be enough to last out a lengthy lockdown, or because they owned properties that could be used as collateral for a regular commercial loan.

Scott Littlefield, from SPL Management, a property company based in Poole, told MailOnline: "This scheme is not really fit for purpose. Our bank, Nat West, is virtually non-contactable at the best of times and the staff in branch can only deal with personal banking issues, not business. They always say to approach your relationship manager although all relationship managers were done away with in 2010."

If you think the US banks are bad, you should try dealing with a UK bank. They make it almost impossible for a UK-based company to even get a bank account. And, as in the US, they refuse to play what is supposed to be their part in crisis-amelioration efforts.

The governments need to stop looking to the banks to help solve the problem. They ARE the root of the problem, and therefore cannot be part of the solution.

Snicker-snack!

The already-teetering comics industry is about to come crashing down... hard.

Dear Diamond Vendor:

As the world responds to the outbreak of COVID-19, our focus is on protecting employees, understanding the risks to our business, evaluating the risks to our industry and examining the Federal Government resources available. While the full impact of this epidemic is still unknown, one thing is certain: supply chain disruptions have cash flow implications across the extended industry that can’t be underestimated.

While we work to understand the current industry landscape, the unfortunate truth is that we are no longer receiving consistent payments from our customers. This requires that at this time, we hold payments to vendors previously scheduled to release this week. This is a difficult decision and not one we make lightly. As this situation continues to evolve, we are committed to building out a plan for payment and will have more information to share later this week.

Thank you for your patience and understanding during these difficult times.

Translation: Marvel, DC, and all the various other publishers who sell through Diamond are not getting paid.

But never fear, both the Arkhaven Comics digital store and the Castalia Direct print edition store are running at full steam. In fact, we even expect to have the gold-logo limited edition of Chuck Dixon's Avalon #6 available in the latter tomorrow.

Last day for Ascendant

Ascendant is a superhero RPG system that provides the mechanical basis for the upcoming Alt-Hero RPG. I backed its Kickstarter campaign, and if you're into RPGs, you will probably want to do so as well.

Comic book RPGs tend to be sub-divided into “descriptor-based” and “effect-based” games. “Bolt of Fire” is a descriptor, while “Ranged Attack that deals 50 points of damage to one target” is an effect. A descriptor-based game prioritizes the descriptor over the effects. An effect-based game prioritizes the effects over the descriptor.

Ascendant strives to be neither a descriptor-based nor effect-based game. It is, rather, a physics-based game. The game mechanics are intended to be the physics engine of the game world. Powers have both descriptors and effects. Some effects are precluded by the logic of the descriptor, and some descriptors inevitably entail certain effects. The mechanics are elaborate and detailed (as in an effect-based game) but they are also broad and universalized (as in a descriptor-based game). Players are expected and encouraged to use their powers in whatever manner makes sense within the physics of a comic-book world, but not in ways that don’t make sense.

If a descriptor-based system aims to let players experience a comic-book story, and an effect-based system aims to let players play a superhero game, our physics-based system aims to let players simulate a comic book world. To do so, we have created logarithmic chart-based universal mechanics, a style of design that has not been widely used in the last two decades.

The designer is not only a personal friend, he is one of the best in the role-playing business. Which, of course, is why I asked him to design the Alt-Hero RPG.

Mailvox: the king of all secret kings

BB believes he has discovered the King of all Secret Kings of fiction:

I believe I've found the most Gamma book in existence. It's called Ready Player One. It's about a guy who has to play retro games and recite lines of dialogue from movies to win a fortune. In one scene it describes him perfectly reciting every line from Monty Python's The Holy Grail, and how the people listening to him were cracking up and bursting into uncontrollable laughter as he did so.

The conversations between the protagonist and their friends are some of the worst examples of gamma behaviour I've ever seen unwittingly put on paper. Every scene displays the worst aspects of a Gamma.

I find it very hard to believe this character could top Kvoth from The Name of the Wind, but he definitely sounds like a serious candidate. And note that both of these books were successful and very warmly received by the tattered remnants of SF fandom.

Of course, the characters tell us so much more about the authors than we ever wanted to know....

The humility of genius

Martin van Creveld writes about the limits of human knowledge:

At the heart of relativity lies the belief that, in the entire physical universe, the only absolute is the speed of light apart. Taken separately, both quantum mechanics and relativity are marvels of human wisdom and ingenuity. The problem is that, since they directly contradict one another, in some ways they leave us less certain of the way the world works than we were before they were first put on paper. The uncertainty principle means that, even as we do our best to observe nature as closely as we can, we inevitably cause some of the observed things to change. And even that time and space are themselves illusions, mental constructs we have created in an effort to impose order on our surroundings but having no reality outside our own minds. The incompleteness theorem put an end to the age-old dream—it goes back at least as far as Pythagoras in the sixth century BCE—of one day building an unassailable mathematical foundation on which to base our understanding of reality. Finally, chaos theory explains why, even if we assume the universe to be deterministic, predicting its future development may not be possible in a great many cases. Including, to cite but one well-known example, whether a butterfly flapping wings in Beijing will or will not cause a hurricane in Texas.

So far, the tendency of post-1900 science to become, not more deterministic but less so. As a result, no longer do we ask the responsible person(s) to tell us what the future will bring and whether to go ahead and follow this or that course. Instead, all they can do is calculate the probability of X taking place and, by turning the equation around, the risk we take in doing (or not doing) so. However, knowledge also presents additional problems of its own. Like a robe that is too long for us, the more of it we have the greater the likelihood that it will trip us up....

Furthermore, surely no one in his right mind, looking around, would suggest that the number of glitches we all experience in everyday life has been declining. Nor is this simply a minor matter, e.g. a punctured tire that causes us to arrive late at a meeting. Some glitches, known as black swans, are so huge that they can have a catastrophic effect not just on individuals but on entire societies: as, for example, happened in 2008, when the world was struck by the worst economic crisis in eighty years, and as coronavirus is causing right now. All this reminds me of the time when, as a university professor, my young students repeatedly asked me how they could ever hope to match my knowledge of the fields we were studying. In response, I used to point to the blackboard, quite a large one, and say: “imagine this is the sum of all available knowledge. In that case, your knowledge could be represented by this tiny little square I’ve drawn here in the corner. And mine, by this slightly—but only slightly—larger one right next to it.” “My job,” I would add, “is to help you first to assimilate my square and then to transcend it.” They got the message.

Read the whole thing. It is a master class on the importance of understanding that what you know, and what you think you know, are merely a momentary glimpse of a fragment of the whole.

Chuck Dixon's Avalon - two new issues!

Normally we'd spread these out a bit, but since it's been a while and because publishing the sixth issue means we can start putting the omnibus together, we decided to release issues #5 and #6 at the same time. And besides, if you're on lockdown, what better way to spend the day than in Avalon City with The Legend Chuck Dixon? If you're an Alt-Hero backer, please check your email, as links to the .CBZ and .mobi versions have been sent to you!

Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #5: Forced Entry

The hunter has become the hunted. As the mysterious vigilante continues to stalk her prey, the crack international superhero team is on her trail and is determined to bring her down before she can accomplish her deadly mission.

But is there another way to find her? What is the connection between the vigilante and the unknown coma patient she was once observed visiting in the hospital? The Avalon police, too, are patiently trying to track her down before she adds to her body count.

If you weren't an original Alt-Hero backer, Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #5: Forced Entry is available for $2.99 in two digital formats at Arkhaven Comics and in Kindle format on Amazon. It is also available in a gold-logo print edition for #3.99 at Castalia Direct.

Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #6: Unforced Error

Vengeance is the order of the day in Avalon. But when King Ace and his new team finally manage to track down the murderous vigilante and interrupt her latest hit, he learns that it is a lot easier to take on an unwilling villain than to take her in to face justice. And he also learns a much more difficult lesson about betrayal.

In the meantime, King Ace’s old friend and former not-sidekick has also fallen in with some new friends who do not hesitate to use their superpowers in some very illegal ways and towards some very questionable ends.

Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #6: Unforced Error is available for $2.99 in two digital formats at Arkhaven Comics and in Kindle format on Amazon.

MComix and ComicRack are both reliable free CBZ readers for Windows. I prefer MComix. SimpleComic is recommended for Mac. There are many free CBZ readers for Android and iOS available on the Play and Apple stores.


UPDATE: It's interesting to note that, by contrast, that the industry's primary distributor Diamond will stop shipping new comics on April 1, and that with the exception of DC, many of the establishment comics publishers are no longer releasing digital comics.

UPDATE: Batman is now Chinese. And in high school. With the Joker. He lives with an older gay gentleman named Alfred.

After admitting she has no clue about Batman, De La Cruz then details her lack of knowledge doesn’t matter because she’s radically altering the character anyways. She explains, “Bruce Wayne is the billionaire. He’s the richest man alive. So I thought, wouldn’t it be fun if his family was Chinese and from Hong Kong? That made it feel real.”

De La Cruz then details she’s basically telling an autobiography of her own life using a DC Comics character, “There’s been a big influx of wealthy Chinese people who moved from Hong Kong to Arcadia in Los Angeles, and that’s where my mom lives, I’m part-Chinese, my brother lives in Hong Kong, so I thought it would be great to put what I know into Bruce Wayne. I just wanted him to be a little bit more representative of my background and giving him an authentic family.”

Meanwhile, our upcoming Shade comic, written by The Legend Chuck Dixon, is going to crush.

UPDATE: Chuck Dixon’s Avalon #5: Forced Entry  is the #1 New Release in Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Graphic Novels

Hungary leads the way

Viktor Orban has learned not to let a crisis go to waste:

The nationalist government in Hungary passed a law Monday granting sweeping emergency powers that Prime Minister Viktor Orban says are necessary to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

Those powers include sidelining parliament and giving Orban the power to rule by decree indefinitely. The law would punish those who spread false information about the pandemic with up to five years in prison.

"Changing our lives is now unavoidable," Orban told lawmakers last week. "Everyone has to leave their comfort zone. This law gives the government the power and means to defend Hungary."

During Monday's vote, he said: "When this emergency ends, we will give back all powers, without exception."

But critics insist that Orban is using the pandemic to grab power.

I should certainly hope so. By the time the pandemic is over, George Soros's agglomeration of Satanic Society organs should be no more. Now the God-Emperor should do likewise, declare martial law, and take the opportunity given to drain the damn Swamp dry.

How money is created

Earlier today, I banned the commenter "map" for his ignorant attempt to "correct" those who actually understand how money is created. And on that note, if, at this point, you are going to try to argue with me on core economic concepts, you simply will not be permitted to comment here. The fact that I have correctly predicted two out of the last two serious economic crises - and done so in a timely manner - is sufficient justification for not putting up with idiots opining in ignorance on the basis of their outdated college textbooks. I am perfectly familiar with their beliefs about everything from comparative advantage to the money supply to the woefully inaccurate belief that banks keep 10 percent of their deposits in reserve.

In any event, back in 2014, the Bank of England helpfully explained how modern money is actually created in an article entitled Money Creation in the Modern Economy (pdf). If you don't understand that money is debt, read the whole thing. And if you still don't understand that after reading the article, read it again.

One common misconception is that banks act simply as intermediaries, lending out the deposits that savers place with them.  In this view deposits are typically ‘created’ by the saving decisions of households, and banks then ‘lend out’ those existing deposits to borrowers, for example to companies looking to finance investment or individuals wanting to purchase houses.... Another common misconception is that the central bank determines the quantity of loans and deposits in the economy by controlling the quantity of central bank money — the so-called ‘money multiplier’ approach....

Lending creates deposits — broad money determination at the aggregate level

As explained in ‘Money in the modern economy:  an introduction’, broad money is a measure of the total amount of money held by households and companies in the economy.

Broad money is made up of bank deposits — which are essentially IOUs from commercial banks to households and companies — and currency — mostly IOUs from the central bank. Of the two types of broad money, bank deposits make up the vast majority — 97% of the amount currently in circulation. And in the modern economy, those bank deposits are mostly created by commercial banks themselves.

Commercial banks create money, in the form of bank deposits, by making new loans.  When a bank makes a loan, for example to someone taking out a mortgage to buy a house, it does not typically do so by giving them thousands of pounds worth of banknotes.  Instead, it credits their bank account with a bank deposit of the size of the mortgage.  At that moment, new money is created. For this reason, some economists have referred to bank deposits as ‘fountain pen money’, created at the stroke of bankers’ pens when they approve loans.

Just as taking out a new loan creates money, the repayment of bank loans destroys money. For example, suppose a consumer has spent money in the supermarket throughout the month by using a credit card.  Each purchase made using the credit card will have increased the outstanding loans on the consumer’s balance sheet and the deposits on the supermarket’s balance sheet. If the consumer were then to pay their credit car bill in full at the end of the month, its bank would reduce the amount of deposits in the consumer’s account by the value of the credit card bill, thus destroying all of the newly created money.

Banks making loans and consumers repaying them are the most significant ways in which bank deposits are created and destroyed in the modern economy.

Now, perhaps you will understand why I am a deflationista. And so are you, if you believe that any of the current outstanding debt will be written off or otherwise go unpaid, even if you don't realize that you are. Debt forgiveness and bankruptcy-related debt write-offs are the literal destruction of money, and since deflation is a reduction in the money supply, any reduction in the amount of debt must necessarily be deflationary.

Seems likely....

Another high-ranking government death in Germany:

The finance minister in the German state of Hesse, Thomas Schaefer, has taken his own life. His colleagues said he was pushed over the edge by an inability to cope with the harsh economic fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic.

Schaefer’s body was discovered near the speed railway track line in the town of Hochheim am Main on Saturday. Prosecutors said that the cause of his death was most likely suicide.

“We are in shock; we are in disbelief and above all we are immensely sad,” Volker Bouffier, head of the Hesse regional government, said of the passing of his close associate and fellow member of Angela Merkel’s CDU party.

Perhaps it was suicide. But have a look at that face. Whatever the inspiration may have been, I very much doubt it had anything to do with Corona-chan or the economic fallout thereof. That face all but screams "horrific hobbies and interests" that almost certainly included Star Trek.

Let them go bust

NN Taleb is right about letting the airlines fail:

"Planes will fly with new owners."

Famed author and statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb has trained his sights on billionaire Richard Branson, urging the UK government to let the airline owned by the “tax refugee” to go bankrupt. Branson has had a torrid fortnight, drawing the ire of politicians of all stripes for putting all Virgin Atlantic staff on unpaid leave because the carrier has been walloped by the Covid-19 pandemic.

The tycoon has led the calls for a state-sponsored bailout of the aviation sector, but plans to use the funds to cover fixed costs, rather than pay its staff.

That goes for the banks too.

The definition of unnecessary

Some are worrying unneccessarily about the inevitably inefficient state of the Indian lockdown:

My God! Delhi-UP border live. What have we done?

Given what I've observed about the average Indian immune system, Corona-chan is going to take one look at her competitors and flee for the hills. Every single Westerner I've known who has visited there has fallen ill, in many cases, violently so. There aren't many benefits to living in overpopulated disease-ridden filth, but an immune system that laughs at bacteria and viruses alike is one of them.

It tends to remind me of the Chuck Norris joke: Chuck Norris came in contact with the corona virus. Corona-chan is now in quarantine for 14 days.

Gamma, guaranteed

Then again, it was a moment that was beautiful in its own way:

Italy has been through hell and that moment was magical and raw and so very human.

However, the reason it was all of those beautiful things is that it happened organically, it came from the heart at a moment of desperation and maybe even some hopelessness. Those moments that come from such raw emotions are hard to recreate, even when the circumstances are similar.

A quarantined man in New York City discovered that the hard way when he tried to recreate that very magical moment by singing out his window.

However, instead of inspiring others to sing along, he was told to “shut the f*ck up!”

That New Yorker is like the little kid at the wedding who goes up to the microphone and repeats the same thing that someone else just said that got a laugh. Neither the kid nor the New Yorker has any understanding of why his predecessors inspired a response, he just sees the opportunity to try to make himself the center of attention.

It may sound strange to higher-ranking individuals, but gammas are constantly thinking about how they can somehow impress everyone, when they're not plotting revenge on those who inadvertently humiliated them in junior high, or stole the heart of their soul mate du jour, or called them out on YouTube, or.... you get the picture.