Dear friends,
In the following words, I will often speak in the first person, but please know that is for clarity only. I am only one of a great many who lost friends, jobs, family members, simply because I was able to see what was outside of the light we sat in.
There are a many here I would call 'friend'. Others that I'd call 'peers,' that is the reason I feel it necessary to divulge the following information.
Some of my personal problems, which are expensive and purely related to my health, have came to a head, today.
I have been surviving off of the income I earn from various tasks I perform on the side of technical writing, such as editing, proofreading, consulting in relation to writing, publishing, developing, structure, Artificial Intelligence, blockchains, music, art, creativity, poetry, and growth as a writer/artist/musician, and quite literally countless other hats. My client list dropped slowly, then quickly, because I refused to give this administration "a chance. they can't be worse than any who had the job before them."
Over the last few years, this kind of freelancing off the cuff has been devalued, demonized, blamed, and disregarded.
While my press pass, general willingness to suspend my own beliefs and needs, noticeable intelligence and insightful questions, meant that most treated me as though we were of a like mind.
Finding my press credentials rendered invalid without notice, it I became undeniable that I'd been burned, or blacklisted by most of the people who had handed me those credentials. Clients stopped returning my calls, only a few journalists, all old school, most dying of sclerosis, remained. They were retired, and really couldn't have more tarnish on their reputations. Having been forced into retirement long ago, by a new type of journalist. the kind that never left the office, mostly just rewriting AP articles and press conference summaries of others.
In the view from manhattan penthouses, I'm unimportant, now that those top floors realized I'd always been an ocelot; too loud and bothersome.
As I turn on flashing arrows above the problems caused by inequality, based more on wealth, than anything else. This mass hysteria scoffed when we said things like the First Amendment was in real danger than it had ever had to face.
“I don't think free speech is going anywhere."
That is an exact quote from someone who I'd known for over a decade. It was 2019 when they chided me with labels like 'hyperbolic,' 'without clear view,' or simply 'misinformed.'
Be without worry, the fall of the Military Industrial Complex is at hand.
Journalist and author, Edward Abbey. The first Environmentalist. He coined the term.
This country has become openly hostile and resentful of my demographic. This is because the working class only values what comes from money, and just as capitalism has programmed them, any with a nickel less that hit hard times are considered acceptable losses.
The powerful say I am an annoyance because I won't kiss their ass and leave. I am physically what they can never buy: authenticity.
So many of you are out there, politically active, fighting the filth that has been forced upon us as 'politics,' and 'leadership.' I've never been more proud. Keep it up. I won't be around to stir the pot when things slow down.
At the same time, if only a fraction of those of current outrage had listened to me, and others like me, in 2015, 2016, 2017, all of the current fight wouldn't have been a fight. we'd have paved over the words of oligarchs, and idiots with eyes shaped like crowns and crosses. Not a single day of this authoritarian kleptocracy would've continued past 2018. I was not alone. everything that was disgraceful and anti-American was published, every single day. I merely shared the information, and pointed to how much it said about our future, or lack there of, really.
I'm Jack Lhasa.
You are amazing.
I'll love you til my lungs give out. I ain’t lyin.
👊🏼👊🏼Solidarity👊🏼👊🏼
