You're Not Gonna Beat the System

"I'm breakin' rocks in the hot sun / I fought the law and the law won..."
- "I Fought The Law"
 
Over the weekend, I watched Oliver Stone's JFK.  I'll probably always have nightmares about the physical appearances of Joe Pesci and Tommy Lee Jones, but it certainly drives home an important point: you're not gonna beat the system. You can LARP and play games if you want to, but when it all boils down, you're not gonna beat the system. 

Links:

https://causeyconsultingllc.com/2023/05/24/a-cautionary-tale/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JFK_(film)

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/01/12/fbi-satan-mobplot-kill-ted-kennedy-097180

https://vault.fbi.gov/anton-lavey-part-01-of-01/anton-lavey-part-01-of-01

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_11110

https://www.linkedin.com/news/story/battle-of-wills-over-rto-5301905/

https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/everyone-wrong-future-remote-141709381.html


Links where I can be found: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/2023/01/30/updates-housekeeping/

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/ 

Transcript

Welcome to the Causey Consulting Podcast. You can find us online anytime at CauseyConsultingLLC.com. And now, here's your host, Sara Causey.

Hello, Hello, and thanks for tuning in. I'm back. I'm in the saddle. The hiatus is over. I was sure glad that I did it though, let me tell you. In today's episode I want to talk about you're not going to beat the system. Over the weekend, I watched Oliver Stone's monumental film, JFK. And that was one of the thoughts that occurred to me multiple times upon viewing the film, you're not going to beat the system. If the powers that be can get to somebody as powerful as a sitting president, what hope do average people actually have? I'm not trying to sound super pessimistic in recording this. What I'm actually trying to do is to be a realist and to wake people up to reality as I see it because there are a lot of LARPers and a lot of people in the hot air and hopium crowd that I think are putting out complete and utter nonsense. And I don't know if some of them are paid corporate shills, I don't know if some of them are bots, they're not even real people, they're just a fake AI generated photo and a fake name putting out nonsense on social media, I don't know. But I'm telling you, if you listen to their nonsense, you are really and truly doing so at your own risk. The person who will suffer for that will be you. A week or two ago, I wrote a blog post called A Cautionary Tale, where I talked about a news article that was published and an interviewee was talking about how he was laid off even though he had been a good performer at work. And he struggled to find something else. He had been on all these interviews, he had been ghosted by recruiters, and it was really astonishing that he was having that much of a struggle. And I'm like, Well, I'm sorry, but it's not that astonishing to me. This is the reality of the job market and if somebody is not prepared, if somebody doesn't really know what rough shape the labor market actually is in, they are going to get steamrolled. And they're going to be in for one hell of a nasty surprise if a layoff or a firing or a company closure visits them. And there was some respondent who wrote to me on one of my platforms saying this is harsh, but it's true. And I thought, buddy, you got no idea. If this is harsh to you, if my simply saying you need to wake up and pay attention to reality, you need to get away from sunshine, roses and lollipops, if you think that is harsh, fella, you got no clue the amount of information that lives inside my head. The things I could say, but I won't say. Wow. But people have just gotten too soft, in my opinion. They want the hot air and the hopium. They want the silly nonsense. They don't want somebody to grab them by the lapels and say you better wake up because the life you save could be your own. The career you save could be your own. The finances you save could be your own. Now people just want to watch nonsense on TikTok and listen to the hot air and hopium crowd and have this big LARP, this big dream, this big imagination of a nationwide strike against RTO. Somehow John and Jane Q Public, even as their kids are suffering, hey we need school clothes, we need food. We're hungry. We need to go to the doctor. But somehow John and Jane Q Public are going to just simply ignore all of that and become great idealogues for work from home. Really? I almost can't even say that with a straight face. How many people do you really know that are great ideologues about anything anymore? Добро пожаловать в Америку, right? I mean, let's get real. I don't see it happening. And frankly, it would be an act of cruelty. I mean, I can't imagine just simply telling my household, I don't care if you eat. I don't care if you go to the dentist. I don't care if you go to the doctor, I don't care if you have clean clothes, screw you. I am going to sit at home and by God, I am going to just draw firm line in the sand about no RTO. As I've said before, I've already war-gamed out what it would look like worst case scenario I can no longer work for myself from home, I don't get to call my own shots anymore, I have to go back to being a desk jockey. What would that look like? What would our game plan be? But I would never let my family starve. It's hard for me to even imagine what kind of parent, what kind of spouse, what kind of farm owner or pet owner would just be like, nope, everybody in the house can just go without food. You go without electricity. You go without water, you go without clean clothes, because I am this committed to going against RTO. What planet are these freakin people on? Good grief. You know, maybe I'm just too practical for my own good. I don't know, but I can't get there in my mind. I can't get there. And as I was watching JFK, again, I just kept thinking like, if the powers that be can take down a sitting president, there's no hope for anybody else. I mean, I hate to break it to you, but you know you may not live in the sunshine and roses reality that you think that you do. If you're not familiar with the film, I recommend it. I thought it was very interesting, whether you believe any of the theories that are posited in the film or you think it's just weird frivolity, that's up to you, you have to make your own decisions. But it's interesting. It is an interesting story if nothing else, even if everything in the film is pure fiction. It's an interesting story. If you're not familiar, I want to zoom over for a second to Wikipedia and read the entry about the film. JFK released under the subtitle the story that won't go away is a 1991 American epic political thriller film written and directed by Oliver Stone. The film examines the investigation into the X of John F. Kennedy by District Attorney Jim Garrison, who came to believe there was a conspiracy to X Kennedy and that Lee Harvey Oswald did not act alone. The film screenplay was adapted by stone and Zachary Sklar from the books on the trail of X 1988 by Jim Garrison, and crossfire the plot that X Kennedy 1989 by Jim Marrs, I'm gonna butt in and say, if you read Jim Marrs’ material and I'm not just talking about Crossfire, if you read his material, I'm just going to have to become unnecessarily vague here, if you read his material, you're not going to sleep so well at night. Can't really say anything more than that. Stone described this account as a counter myth to the Warren Commission's fictional myth. JFK has been considered controversial due to its embrace of conspiracy theories. Oh, well. Everything now is conspiracy theory. God, they thought this was just so wackadoodle back in 91. And again, I feel like the Joker wait till they get a load of me like everything now is a conspiracy theory. Many major American newspapers ran editorials accusing stone of taking liberties with historical facts, including the film's implication that Kennedy's vice president and eventual successor Lyndon B Johnson was part of a coup d'etat to X Kennedy. Despite the controversy JFK received critical praise for the performances of its cast, Stone’s directing score, editing and cinematography. The film gradually picked up momentum at the box office after a slow start earning over 205 million in worldwide gross, making it the sixth highest grossing film of 1991 worldwide. JFK was nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture, and one two for Best Cinematography and Best Editing. Now let's zoom down a little bit to their little synopsis of the plot. During his farewell address in 1961, outgoing President Dwight D Eisenhower warned about the buildup of the military industrial complex. He is succeeded by John F. Kennedy is president, whose time in office is marked by the Bay of Pigs invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis until his X in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas on November 22 1963. Former US Marine and suspected Soviet defector Lee Harvey Oswald is arrested for the murder of police officer Tibbett and arraigned with both murders but is killed by nightclub owner Jack Ruby. New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison and his team investigate potential New Orleans links to the JFK X including private pilot David Ferrie, but their investigation is publicly rebuked by the federal government and Garrison closes the investigation end quote. Interesting stuff again, whether you believe any of the theories that they posit or you think it's all just cuckoo bird and crazy. It's an interesting film. I'm gonna scroll down just a little bit more because I also want to talk about Mr. X who is in the film and played I think by Donald Sutherland. Some key witnesses become scared and refuse to testify while others such as Ruby and Ferrie die in suspicious circumstances before his death Ferrie tells Garrison that there was a conspiracy to X Kennedy. Garrison meets a high level figure in Washington DC who identifies himself as X. He suggests a coup d'etat at the highest levels of government, implicating members of the - redacted here - as either co conspirators or as having motives to cover up the truth of the X. X suggests that Kennedy was X because he wanted to pull the United States out of the Vietnam War, and dismantle the CIA. X encourages Garrison to keep digging and prosecute Shaw. Soon afterward, Garrison indicts Shaw with conspiring to X Kennedy end quote. Interesting stuff there. I mean, even though Donald Sutherland’s character Mr. X doesn't have a lot of screen time, he really is like the linchpin that brings all of these conspiracy theories together. The why, the who, the how, the why, like, what was the motive to do this? Again, okay, disclaimer, we are talking about the realm of conspiracy theory. And I'm not trying to suggest anything other than these being conspiracy theories. I was not there and I don't know. This is way, way above my paygrade. It's an interesting movie, if nothing else, but I will say to you, if the powers that be can get to a sitting president, do you really think John and Jane Q Public are gonna have Mutiny on the Bounty against the job market, against corporate America, against Wall Street? Really? We do know that JFK was X. We know that Bobby Kennedy was X. Again, what motives? What forces may have been behind those things? We don't know. Could it have just simply been the stereotypical lone wolf nut bag that just decided to go crazy. You'll have to decide that for yourself. But let's also don't forget that there was a plot to X Ted Kennedy. There's this crazy story, I will drop a link to the story in Politico, as well as to the heavily redacted FBI documents that you can find. And please read all this for yourself because I'm not making this up. I know it's gonna sound wacko, believe me. But there was a plot, supposedly, let's say, to have Ted Kennedy X. And as the story goes, the Chicago mob did not want another Kennedy getting into the highest office and so they wanted Anton LaVey, who was leading the Church of Satan, to take care of the problem. Just when you think truth can't get any stranger it definitely does. And in case that sounds really super bizarre, and why would they even go after Ted Kennedy? Well, don't forget what happened in the 1980 election. Jimmy Carter was not highly popular. I think everybody knew his time was coming to a close - pardon the dryer. And Ted Kennedy was trying to sort of usurp the Democratic nomination from him. And it looked like he was probably going to be successful. So let's take a look at this Politico article. A day earlier, Senator Ted Kennedy had left San Francisco after campaigning for president Jimmy Carter, whose general election showdown with Ronald Reagan was inching closer. It had been a long tumultuous year for Kennedy, who was then in his late 40s, he tried to rest the Democratic presidential nomination from Carter. When that bid failed, Kennedy resorted to playing the role of a good party soldier summoning the remnants of his family's old Camelot magic, as he criss crossed the country to win over voters for Carter, running for president and also awakened to fear that Kennedy had tried to hide even from his closest confidants that he would be X, just like his brothers, President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Anonymous tormentors had been sending Ted Kennedy handwritten threats since the late 1960s. So in this, we learned that an informant had gone to the FBI to tell the story about the Chicago mob and Anton LaVey. And this plot against Ted Kennedy, again, read it all for yourself because it is crazy, but I'm like there definitely seems to be some powerful individuals that are not big fans of the Kennedy family. And think if nothing else, we can sort of agree that that that seems to be the case here. It just seems a little bit too farfetched in my mind for all of this to simply be coincidental. I could be wrong, I don't know. But it seems like there's a connection here. In the film, the character Mr. X talks about Kennedy's desire to get America out of the Vietnam War, to cut the defense budget and to splinter or disintegrate the Charlie India Alpha. And as you can probably imagine, within those circles that was not going over very well. He also talks about very specific companies, I'm not going to mention them on the air, watch the movie if you want to see it, but very specific companies who profiteered because they were manufacturing aircraft and weapons used in the Vietnam War. And if we were to pull out of that war, there would be a lot of money that they would not make. The same thing is true, obviously, for the entire military industrial complex. They don't really care about the loss of life that's involved in warfare, they care about the amount of money that they're going to make. And when you think about how many conflicts and wars that we've been pulled into in the years since Kennedy's X it is pretty astounding, and how big the military industrial complex has gotten. It's really not a wonder that Oliver Stone chooses to open the film with a clip of Eisenhower saying we need to be careful of the military industrial complex. Something that is not mentioned in Oliver Stone's film, but I think is worth mentioning. Just you know, again, conspiracy theory wackadoodle stuff, tinfoil hat. Jim Marrs, who was one of the contributing authors to Oliver Stone's film, also wrote a book called The Trillion Dollar Conspiracy, and in that book he mentions, however, it might be worth noting that in two successful presidential X, those of Abraham Lincoln and John F Kennedy, both men were attempting to force the international bankers Lincoln by issuing his own money, greenbacks and Kennedy in bypassing the fed with us notes in 1963, end quote. That definitely gives new meaning to the phrase you can't fight the Fed. Again, we're in the land of conspiracy theory. We've gone off the beaten path. Are any of these things true? I don't claim to know the answer to that. I don't know, you have to make up your own mind. The reason why I'm talking about this today is exactly what I've said. I just don't think that John and Jane Q Public are going to have this big battle royale against corporate America and come out the winner. I'm sorry, I don't. Remember that old song, I fought the law? Breaking rocks in the hot sun. I fought the law and the law won, Yeah, you fixin to find out. Because if you want to LARP and play games, you are doing that at your own risk. It's interesting because over the weekend, as I was watching the JFK movie and going down these rabbit holes, and just really like, Wow, holy crap, an article was published on LinkedIn titled battle of wills over RTO. Here we go. A battle of wills is brewing over remote work, The Wall Street Journal reports, with office occupancy stalled at 50% of pre pandemic levels. Many companies are expected to mandate in person work later this year, I'm going to butt in and slightly go off track to say, please pay attention to that. They're telling you what's coming. They're telegraphing it to you ahead of time. Now, if you ignore that and go off in la la land that's on you. Many companies are expected to mandate in person work later this year. Cockadoodledoo. Here's your wake up call. But more than a dozen hybrid and remote workers interviewed by the journal, okay, more than a dozen. Is that a good cross section of everybody working remote or hybrid? I don't know, Judge for yourself. But more than a dozen hybrid and remote workers interviewed by the journal are adamant. They won't go back to five days in the office, even if that puts them at risk of being laid off. Of course. Why the opposition? For some it's the hassle of commuting, for others the price of childcare, or the sheer emotional stress of daily office life. Now I'm going to say, I am not a Malcolm Gladwell. I don't sit here and work from home and then say, well, it's fine for me but not for you. I don't believe that at all. One of the reasons why it's so important for me if I can to continue being a solopreneur is because I don't want to go back to the office. I mean, the exact things that they're talking about the hassle of commuting, the price of childcare and the sheer emotional stress of daily office life. Yeah, hell yeah. I don't miss any of it. No, thanks. I don't miss it. I don't want to go back to it. I would if I had to. I would not let my family starve. I would not let the house go into foreclosure. If I had to go back and sit at a desk in the cube farm, I would. And I think a lot of people are going to come to that same conclusion. I think corporate America and their cronies at the Fed are going to drive this already crappy economic jalopy right off the cliff. And if you don't believe me, then just watch. Just wait and just watch and see whose predictions bear out to be correct. I stand by my track record, I really do. I invite the scrutiny. Because whenever I have a prediction alert, guess what? It turns out to be on point. I don't get on here and give you hot air hopium nonsense. I try as best as possible to give you the truth as I see it. Even if that puts them at risk of being laid off. Well, let's think about that. It's really easy to say that when you're working, I had a friend in school who was short and thin. But boy, did he have a mouth. And he would pop off and threaten to get in fistfights with people that were much bigger than him. He kind of reminded me of a banty rooster. And one day, his luck ran out because somebody that was a lot bigger than him and a lot heavier than him gave him a massive beating. But he had gone around, just cluck cluck clucking and threatening people. And he acted like he was so tough, even though he was a shrimp. That's what this reminds me of. It’s easy to make that comment when you're working. well, even if it means I got laid off, I'm gonna draw this line in the sand! And then when they get laid off, they want everybody to feel sorry for them. And it's like, Don't be that guy. Don't be like my shrimpy friend with a big mouth who finally got his clock cleaned by somebody that was probably a foot taller and 150 pounds heavier. You don't want to do that. The other facet to this is it's easy to say I'll cope with the layoff because you think that we have some bullshit 3.7% unemployment rate. And they're all of these jobs. They're just beautiful apples on the tree just waiting to be picked by you. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, we're not in 2021. We're not in 21 in terms of the housing market, and we're not in 21 in terms of the job market. You are not going to be able to hippity hop across the market and make tons of money and just say, well, if I get laid off screw them anyway. You are going to be in for a rude awakening. You're not going to fight the law and then have the law not win. It's just not going to happen for you. It's just not going to happen. You know, oh, people come in and they think they're going to implement all these changes, and it's gonna be so different. Right? And then it never is. It never is. We get to pick between the elephant and the donkey, but it doesn't matter. Because no matter who you pick, you're gonna get poop. I mean, come on. I want to also revisit an article called Everyone is wrong about the future of remote work that was published on September 17 of last year. And I'm pretty sure I talked about this whenever it was published. But in this article we find looming over the RTO battle of wills is the economy. No duh! A recession could change the power equation and force more workers back to the office. Employees will recognize as we go into a recession or as things get a little tighter, that you have to do what it takes to keep your job and to earn a living real estate developer Stephen Ross predicted in June. Yeah. Hello. Hi. That is one of the reasons why I have committed myself to getting on this podcast consistently and warning you. A poop storm is coming. We're already in a recession. By the time you're officially told, how bad will it really be? And as you know, I don't get into Mad Max, the Thunderdome, World War Z, zombies are going to eat your brains. The Apocalypse is going to happen tomorrow. I don't get into all that. I feel like we need to deal in the realm of actual possibilities. Because that's all we're doing. We're taking educated guesses. We're trying to predict what these power brokers are going to do to us next. That's it. We're just, we're trying the best we can with limited data. That's all we're doing at any given time. I personally don't worry about zombies eating my brains out in the street and I don't think that we're going to be in Mad Max Thunderdome either. And I think that some of the so called preppers who tell you that crap are doing it either to get likes and comments and shares on their content, they're doing it for fear porn so that you'll come back to their channel over and over again, or they want to LARP, they want to pretend that they're going to be some kind of massive overlord when society collapses. Like the overlords that already actually are in charge are gonna somehow go away. And Charlie Nobody living in the middle of the desert with a bunch of canned goods is going to become some kind of warlord. It's just Oh, God. It's crazy to me. So I like to deal with real, tangible possibilities. Is it possible that we could have another great recession slash global financial crisis? Yes. Is it possible that we could have a rehash of the 1982 Recession? Yes. Is it possible that we could have a Great Depression 2.0? Yes. I hope not. I pray not. But I think that those are viable possibilities. And I also think that if you're ever told, here's how bad the job market really is, by that point in time is going to be way to hell too late for you to do anything to be ready for it. Do you have an RTO survival plan? Do you have a job loss survival plan? Do you know that you would survive a job market crash if that happened? I think instead of LARPing and playing pretend about zombies and Mad Max, it would be a lot smarter, in my opinion, I don't give you advice, and I don't tell you what to do, but you know, if it were me, it would be a lot smarter to think about these practical real world possibilities. Would you be prepared to survive another great recession or worse yet a Great Depression? Because to bring this all home, to tie it back into where I started, if your grand plan is a nationwide strike against RTO, letting your kids starve, letting your house go into foreclosure, just not paying your bills, you're gonna be screwed. That is not a viable game plan, in my opinion. It's not. If these power brokers, if we assume that, I don't know, even 10% of the theories that get posited out there, whether we're talking about Oliver Stone's film, or whether we're talking about Jim Marrs’ books. If we assume that only 10% of it actually bears any resemblance to accuracy, even that's scary. Even that is scary. Even that tells me that if the power brokers and the people that really pull the strings can get to a sitting president, John and Jane Q Public having some battle of wills over RTO is a freaking joke. It's a joke. That's all it is. It's somebody playing a game and having a laugh. Do you have your survival plans roughed out? If you have to go back to the office, do you have those plans around child care, pet care, elder care? Are you ready to commute again? Do you have appropriate clothing for the office? Because they're probably not going to let you wear a t shirt and boxer shorts to the office every day. If you lose your job, are you prepared for that? Or are you going to be like my buddy from school that was like the banty rooster that threatened everybody and wanted to get in everybody's face until he finally got his clock cleaned? Because in my mind, these people that are out here like, even if I'm at risk for being laid off, I don't care. I don’t give AF. Let them lay me off. It's whatever. Yeah, you'll say that until it really happens and then you realize we don't have a 3.7% unemployment rate. Talk is cheap. It's easy to play the hard role and to talk and to act tough, but then when you're really going through it, and all of these past due bills are piling up, then what? Please think about these things in advance. Don't LARP, don't listen to the hot air and hopium of crowd, in my opinion. You would be better off making a survival plan than playing games. These power brokers are not going away. They're not. They're not just, like I said about us getting pulled into wars and battles. Since Kennedy X, look at how far down the country has gone in terms of needless wars and battles, the control that the central bankers have, the control the military industrial complex has, it's just it's crazy to me but yet you think there's going to be this nationwide strike against corporate America, this nationwide strike against RTO? Give me a break. You're not going to beat the system. You're not. We're so far past the point where that's a reality. You better wake the hell up. You need to quit playing on TikTok in my opinion. Okay, in my opinion, which could be wrong, you need to quit playing on TikTok, you need to quit LARPing and you need to get real. The life you save, the finances you save, the career you save might be your own. Stay safe, stay sane, and I will see you in the next episode.

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