The Normalcy Bias is defined by left-leaning Wikipedia as a mental state that “causes people to underestimate both the possibility of a disaster occurring and its possible effects.” Patrice Lewis cited that below in her look back at 2023 and the look ahead at 2024. Lewis also cited a range of professionals that span the left-right American divide. Then Lewis also mentions what Ayn Rand so memorably expressed: “You can ignore reality, but you can’t ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.” Among those realities are some of the headline remarks paraphrased above which are quoted in context in what follows. In the past three years, the international and national picture includes more armed conflicts in the world, not fewer. Inflation has roared to troubling levels that cause thinkers to point to the Jimmy Carter Presidency (D) years. As Lewis said: “If the prospect of a third world war doesn’t bother you, then rising costs, stagnant wages and urban decay do.” So, some think matters may be worse now in what has been branded by Democrats and Republicans alike as “Bidenomics.” In manufactured housing, one year ago, a Bloomberg editorial was reminding Americans that manufactured housing was an obvious and proven hopeful method for solving the U.S. affordable housing crisis. What happened to that thinking? What is it that allowed manufactured housing production to plunge to levels not seen since circa 2016-2017? MHProNews explored those issues and more in our role as the most fact- and evidence-based reporting with expert analysis news site in all of manufactured housing trade media.
With that brief tee up, in Part I of today’s article, let’s look at the “exclusive” commentary by Patrice Lewis from the WND News Center to MHProNews.
Part I
REAL AMERICA
Welcome to 2024 – now brace yourself
Exclusive: Patrice Lewis urges readers to repudiate their Normalcy Bias and prepare for the future
By Patrice Lewis
Published December 29, 2023 at 6:08pm
Here in the waning days of 2023, we’re seeing a series of dire predictions for 2024. Cheery news to greet the New Year, isn’t it?
One such prediction came from economist Harry Dent of the HS Dent Investment Management firm. In an interview with Fox New, he said: “Since 2009, this has been 100% artificial, unprecedented money printing and deficits; $27 trillion over 15 years, to be exact. This is off the charts, 100% artificial, which means we’re in a dangerous state. I think 2024 is going to be the biggest single crash year we’ll see in our lifetimes.”
Dent remains firm that an “everything bubble” will burst in this upcoming year. He further predicts the results will not be an economic recession, but a full-blown depression.
Dent isn’t the only one. “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” author Robert Kiyosaki offers similar warnings on how the Biden administration is sinking the U.S. into unrecoverable debt. “All you do is look at history. Every time they printed money, the empire went down.”
Historian Victor Davis Hanson is calling 2024 “The Year of our Reckoning.” “In some sense, the country for recent years has been cruising on the fumes from prior and likely better, wiser generations and institutions,” he writes. “In 2024, the tab for our current apathy, toxic politics, and incompetence will come due.”
Then there’s CBS News investigative reporter Catherine Herridge, who made a dark prediction that 2024 will produce a “Black Swan Event” that will shock the world. Her concerns focus on international affairs and how they will impact America.
And, of course, I hardly need to remind you that 2024 is an election year, with all the political and societal chaos that implies.
Most people are feeling some sort of unease about the future. Many have a nagging feeling in the gut that something wicked this way comes. If the prospect of a third world war doesn’t bother you, then rising costs, stagnant wages and urban decay do.
But not everyone agrees. Looking at some of the comments on these articles confirm how many people believe everything is just ducky, thanks. There will always be those people who suffer from the delusion that nothing could ever disrupt the comfortable and dependable world in which we live. As my husband is fond of pointing out, the greatest conceit of mankind is, “It can’t happen to me.”
This is a typical Normalcy Bias, which Wikipedia defines as a mental state that “causes people to underestimate both the possibility of a disaster occurring and its possible effects.” It’s sometimes called the “It can’t happen here” syndrome. The assumption is that since a particular disaster has never occurred before, it never will. Any disturbing indications that something bad may happen are dismissed or trivialized.
When we hear the mainstream media assuring us in soothing, condescending tones that we’re in an economic “recovery” – despite all evidence to the contrary – we want desperately to believe them. We don’t want anything to disrupt our ordinary, comfortable lives. We genuinely believe that if we cling to our normal way of life and habitual methods of doing things – despite overwhelming proof that something dangerous is looming – then everything will be OK. It can’t happen here.
But as Ayn Rand so memorably put it, “You can ignore reality, but you can’t ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.”
The fact is, very little happens that doesn’t give some sort of advanced warning. All it takes is vigilance and a determination not to depend wholly on the mainstream media, which tend to filter world and national events to support their agenda.
Some say we’re already in a Silent Depression. Consider this short video comparing the costs of homes, rent and income between 1930 and 2023.
In 1930, during the Great Depression, the average home in America was $3,900. The average car was $600. The average monthly rent was $18, or $216 a year, and the average salary was $1,300 a year. Fast forward to today. It is $436,000 for the average home, $48,000 for the average car, and the average rent is $2,000 a month or $24,000 a year, and we have a $56,000 income for the average American right now.
“So if you look back to the Great Depression,” says the narrator, “the house was only three times the average salary. Now it is eight times the average salary. The car was 46% of the salary. The car today is 85% of the salary. And here’s the craziest part. The rent was 16% of the average salary. It is now 42% of the average salary.”
So yeah, in light of these numbers, 2024 could be a very interesting year indeed.
So what can be done about all these dire things? Well the first thing to do is strip away your Normalcy Bias and acknowledge that the smoke on the horizon means a fire is coming. Awareness, as they say, is half the battle.
But most people won’t. They’ll have endless excuses why it’s not necessary, at least not yet. They’ll remain in denial. They won’t do anything. Then they’ll be shocked – shocked! – when something happens that affects them personally.
As I see it, it never hurts to lend half an ear to such predictions and take sensible precautions. The Great Depression started with a dramatic bang – the stock market crash – but not every incident of economic turmoil begins like that. Many traumatic events begin with a whisper, which seems to be the case here. Whispers don’t make it any less painful for those affected, but it does make it more deniable by those with a political ax to grind.
In short, 2024 is shaping up to be a very interesting year. I don’t know if it will be a year of sunshine and roses, or of darkest despair. All I know is a lot of high-ranking national and international people are acting increasingly desperate to control the masses. Where that ends is anyone’s guess.
But there is a silver lining: Forewarned is forearmed. Even hard times can be weathered if you’re ready for them. Brace yourself. ##
MHProNews Note: the video Lewis linked above is an X-post, provided below.
Great Depression vs Silent Depression 🚨🚨🚨
Comparing costs of homes, cars, rent and income between 1930 and 2023.
These numbers are incredible.
What went wrong?🔊 … sound on pic.twitter.com/TneVTHEUVC
— Wall Street Silver (@WallStreetSilv) September 3, 2023
Part II – Additional Information, Analysis and Commentary in Brief, Including the Sunday Weekly MHVille Headlines in Review
For those who got hooked on the latest who bought which land-lease manufactured home community, or what “Frank and Dave” like to call “trailer parks” or “mobile home parks,” there may have been better sources than MHProNews. That said, when it comes to reporting on the broader facts, trends, implications and consequences of those and other acquisitions and consolidation efforts in manufactured home communities (MHCs), among manufactured home builders, street retailers, finance, and other big picture as well as specific insights, there is simply no source in MHVille that has done a more accurate job of reporting on that in 2023 (or before) than MHProNews. Who says? Ironically virtually all of our rivals, researchers, and industry leaders – some of whom doubtlessly wish we would just disappear. Because many don’t want you to know and understand the proverbial ‘what the devil is going on.’
This platform has evolved in several ways since we launched in October 2009.
- We are currently the oldest, biggest, and apparently most read trade media serving the manufactured home industry’s professionals.
- We are the first and still only “Daily Business News” publisher in manufactured housing.
- We have invited rivals and those we critique to discuss and debate the issues publicly, either in person or online. They and their attorneys have ducked that offer for months on end.
- Thus, our often contrarian, facts- and evidence-inspired reports with analysis are not directly challenged.
For those readers who have been with us at MHProNews from the start, you know that we have been – and remain – true believers in the potential for manufactured housing as the demonstrable premier and most proven solution for the affordable housing crisis. Oddly, who else in our profession even bothers to report periodic looks into other potential challengers for manufactured housing? Yet, there are billions of dollars being invested in just recent years into just such efforts to unseat manufactured housing as the number one provider of new homes that can be affordably purchased by the working and lower-middle class. Those notions ought to be part of the wakeup call for our industry both in terms of our profession’s authentic potential, but also in terms of understanding that the industry can’t afford to sit on its diminished laurels.
In an era when the majority of the country thinks that the ‘system is rigged,’ our platforms reported on and examined those concerns years before it became so mainstream.
In an era when now most Americans reportedly believe that monopoly power is a threat, MHProNews has been leading the charge on that daunting topic for years, looking at issues inside MHVille and beyond for insights. While others cheerlead for themselves and/or the agenda they are paid to plug, MHProNews has led the charge for reality-based reporting and analytical news that pulls back the curtain to see what’s actually occurring.
It is past due time for understanding who those are who are pulling the strings behind the curtains, to see why these things are so.
It is past time for accountability for those in corporate and association leadership who may ‘talk a good talk,’ but have delivered the industry into its biggest downturn in years. Those corporate and association leaders can’t have it both ways. They can’t be giving each other awards, and then turn, smile at their audiences, in the hopes of trying to convince you that they are the solutions to your future hopes, dreams, and aspirations. If they were at the helm before and during the crash, don’t they bear some responsibility for what followed?
To Lewis point, there is a yearning for a return to normalcy. It is entirely understandable. But the powers that be know that people yearn for what’s normal. They know that someone has to be blamed for what’s gone wrong, and they don’t want to be the target of your scrutiny, much less those of the tens of millions like you who are watching their part of the American Dream slip away.
Don’t miss today’s postscript.
For a better understanding of why our once more prosperous and less debt-ridden nation is as it is, or why affordable manufactured housing is struggling in the 21st century even though the need for more affordable housing is growing, buckle up. See the reports from the week that was from 12.24.2023 to 12.31.2023.
What’s New on MHLivingNews
What’s New in Washington, D.C. from MHARR
What’s New on the Masthead
What’s New on the Daily Business News on MHProNews
Saturday 12.30.2023
Friday 12.29.2023
Thursday 12.28.2023
Wednesday 12.27.2023
Tuesday 12.26.2023
Monday 12.25.2023
Sunday 12.24.2023
Postscript
Part of the nature of making propaganda successful is repetition. If even a false statement is repeated enough, and is amplified enough, then large numbers of souls will begin to believe that some half-truth or utter falsehood is in fact “true.” That’s been called the “Big Lie.” The often-used example of that Big Lie propaganda method is Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. But as researcher, author, and film maker Dinesh Joseph D’Souza aptly noted in one of his documentary movies, the Nazis studied the use of the media in the United States as part of their planning and inspiration.
More specifically, members of the National German Socialist Workers Party (i.e.: the name that is contracted as NAZI) looked at the history of the Woodrow Wilson Administration (D), their troubled handling of blacks, and how they manipulated the U.S. population into World War I. After all, Wilson campaigned for re-election on the slogan, “he kept us out of war.” As left-leaning Wikipedia said: “Wilson’s campaign used the popular slogans “He kept us out of war”…to appeal to those voters who wanted to avoid a war in Europe or with Mexico.” That anti-war group in the U.S. then was the majority, yet America after Wilson’s campaign was led into the European war anyway. The working class, middle class, and certainly the wealthy do not want to risk fighting and dying in a war if it can be avoided. Consider what one of Hitler’s henchmen had to say about war and how the masses can be manipulated into a war.
Through repetition of twisted or demonstrably false statements, people can be conditioned into believing things that are upon further reflection are obviously not true. Another example is the following. Despite the experiences of virtually every soul in the so-called ‘dark ages’ of Europe, it is said that most believed that the earth was flat instead of an orb or great globe traveling through space. Many thought the sun went around the Earth, instead of the Earth being in orbit around the Sun.
In fairness, back in that era, they didn’t have satellites, supercomputers, or electricity. So much of the advantages that we have were not available then. But as any sailor knew, you could watch a ship that was ahead of you, or another vessel traveling the other way, suddenly disappear over the horizon. Something similar happened on land, people could walk or ride far enough where they would seem to ‘disappear’ over the horizon. Yet, those same people who ‘disappeared’ over the horizon would later return. Obviously, they did not fall off the supposed-by-some ends of the earth.
Yet flat earthers became a maxim for those who believed something that was later shown to be demonstrably untrue.
How can that flat earth effect be occurring today? How can we have millions believe things that are demonstrably untrue in our information age? When we do have satellites, and smart cell phones that double as a computer more powerful than any available 50 years ago?
As during other periods of history, it is accomplished in part through mass repetition of seemingly believable falsehoods, half-truths, or paltering. In Hitler’s era, the radio was the ‘advanced technology’ for communications with the masses of humanity, with the film industry coming up rapidly.
During the Revolutionary War, it was printed flyers, churches, and meetings that were used to rouse the people.
Many today may not realize that a large part of the population of what later became the U.S. didn’t want war with England. One must keep in mind that the population pre-Revolution in America was broadly split three ways.
- There was the pro-Independence camp, but there was also the pro-British camp as one of three big groups that existed in the then 13 colonies.
- The broad group or camp that favored the British Crown, the royal monopolies, and lesser nobility that existed with them were labeled, as politicians label their opponents today. As left-leaning Wikipedia says: “Colonists who supported the British cause in the American Revolution were Loyalists, often called Tories, or, occasionally, Royalists or King’s Men.”
- And there was the third group that didn’t necessarily want to pick either side.
People in the American colonies had to be mobilized for the cause of war against the British crown and its allies in business and among the ‘elite classes.’ Let’s note in passing that it is also doubtful that the colonies would have gained their independence if not for support from the French, who opposed the interests of England for their own reasons. As the U.S. State Department website says: “Between 1778 and 1782 the French provided supplies, arms and ammunition, uniforms, and, most importantly, troops and naval support to the beleaguered [American] Continental Army.”
Fast forward to our era. There are also three political camps. Politicians often demean or smear their opponents by labeling them, not unlike what occurred in the 1770s and 1780s. Then or now, one could drill deeper and find numbers of subgroups too.
But broadly in the U.S. today, there are Democrats, there are Republicans, and then there are independents or minor party supporters.
- The Democrats for decades were portrayed as the party of the working class and later minorities.
- The Republicans were for long periods viewed as the party of the elites or the Establishment.
But a more nuanced and precise view would be to say that Democrats often billed themselves as progressives, as Woodrow Wilson did. That’s pretty smart marketing. Who wants to be against progress?
Yet Wilson was a racist, a fact air-brushed out of too many histories and commentaries. Democrats today want to portray themselves as the party of minorities of all kinds, and they want to project onto Republicans the label of the party of those rascally rich people. But if that were all true, then why is it that Democrats today have by far more support among the wealthy ‘ruling class’ “Establishment” than Republicans do? Even lifelong Democrat and leftist, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., pointed to what he called the corruption of Democratic party, falling under “corporate” influence and embracing “censorship.” Kennedy has been warning for years that there is a “corrupt” merger of corporate and state power, and he was willing to point the finger at members of both major parties engaged in that behavior.
Hitler and the Nazis are often portrayed as being on the far right. But that’s utter nonsense! The very name of their party was the National Socialist German Workers Party (NAZI). Even some in the right in the U.S. have bought into that propaganda, because it has been successfully repeated time and again.
Hitler and the Nazis were national socialists AND they were fascists. And what did Hitler’s ally in Italy, Benito Mussolini, purportedly say? ‘Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power.’ That is what has been rising in the U.S. today, and much of the impetuous for it is coming from the political left. While those who run down the question if a quote was really said by the person it is attributed to say that they can’t find Mussolini saying those precise words, they routinely admit that Mussolini said similarly. Mussolini, before he became a fascist was a socialist, just as Hitler was.
And like RFK Jr. or not, he has an obvious point that there is a new feudalism rising in America. But similar patterns have been true for much of human history. Slavery wasn’t new. Slavery and serfdom were the rule for most of world history, as even left-leaning Wikipedia obliquely acknowledges in presenting this graphic.
To get the support of the working and middle class, the wealthy, nobility, and ‘rulers’ have often resorted to deception.
That’s why propaganda, using modern technologies, is so important to them.
They have to manufacture the illusion that they are ‘for the people’ when they are demonstrably for themselves. This is not only often true in much of the U.S. society, but it is also often true in manufactured housing too.
At times, someone stands up and briefly speaks part of the truth. In our industry’s case, it was Warren Buffett who spilled those beans on two memorable occasions in the following words, but there have been others too.
Not only is there an effort to change, obscure, or erase manufactured housing industry history, but there is a similar and larger effort to change the history of our country. From time to time, this platform sheds a more accurate light on aspects of each of those topics – U.S. history, and the broad march of factory-built housing from trailer houses, into mobile homes, into the early HUD Code manufactured home era, and then finally the manufactured home industry after the Manufactured Housing Improvement Act of 2000 (MHIA). But just as some hijack economic and political forces for their benefit in decades past, something similar – and on an obviously smaller scale – has occurred in manufactured housing. By grasping that hijacking various aspects and branches of government are hardly new, it becomes easier to grasp how the most-proven solution to the affordable housing crisis – HUD Code manufactured homes – could so readily be kept from achieving its great purpose and capabilities too. When wars and military action can be wage for corporate reasons, as Marine General Smedley Bulter expressed (see below), why should we be surprised that corporate interests can hijack manufactured housing in our days?
Manipulation of the masses is seemingly as old as the hills. The founders strived to give us a system of checks and balanced to limit the ways that the American system could be manipulated. But when there is widespread ignorance of U.S. civics, U.S. history – or for that matter, mobile-manufactured housing and affordable housing U.S. history – then is it any surprise that bold lies can exist and often go by unquestioned?
We began this as a review of 2023 and a look ahead at 2024. To understand the present, we must better understand the past. You can disagree with Democrat James “Jim” Clyburn’s politics, but still agree with his keen point on history.
To be a problem solver, one must understand the nature of the problem. Positive thinker Zig Ziglar said as much.
But Divine authority ought to be the highest form of authority. All three of the so-called ‘world religions’ of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam (Muslim beliefs) encourage their followers not to be deceived by lies and not to engage in falsehoods. That means that people must understand what is true in order to avoid falling into the traps of those who manipulate the masses with half-truths, head-fakes, and other forms of “deception and misdirection.” In the Orient, Sun Tzu aptly explained how deception is a key to success in warfare. Keep in mind Buffett’s quote above, about class warfare. Without deception, do you think that the ruling, donor, and wealthy classes in the U.S. could ‘rule’ given that the masses outnumber them by huge margins?
The correct answer is, of course not. Deception is near the heart of manipulation in America and every other nation on earth. To rule successfully in a Constitutional Republic, the rulers must convince the masses that we live in a Democracy. Then they have to convince the masses that one party is looking out for their interests, while the other party is not. Divide and rule. Or divide and conquer, take your pick.
The motivations of millions of Democrats are fine, and the motivations of millions of Republics are fine too. But those motivations can be twisted to suit the smallest minority of all, the wealthiest Americans and their corporate, media, and nonprofit interests.
To discern where the truth lies, people need facts and evidence. It is easier to say, Hey! MHI is peddling fake news! MHI is the tool of the monopolists in manufactured housing! That’s easy. It takes far more effort, time, and thought to do an article like this.
Yesterday, we featured a report on censorship. Public officials in nearly two dozen states and D.C. are fighting at the Supreme Court for the right to censor you and others. Is your state on that list of states fighting for the right to censor you?
2023 is coming to a close. Some will read this and it will already be 2024 (or 2025, 2026…etc.). But we strive to provide timeless content. Covering current events properly – using facts, evidence, and reason – is a way of helping others navigate a world where flat-earth style deception is peddled as reality.
You don’t have to be a fan of Ayn Rand to recognize the importance of what Patrice Lewis was trying to say in Part I, above.
“You can ignore reality, but you can’t ignore the
consequences of ignoring reality.”
You can cling to some falsehood or half-truth for any number of reasons, which often amount to habit. But in so doing, you play into the hands of those like Buffett who obviously count on the masses staying largely ignorant.
It isn’t enough to recognize that the Democrats are routinely deceiving their own followers and supporters in favoring the wealthy while claiming to be working against them. The ‘donor class.’ The elites. The “Establishment.” They have gone by many titles (Democrats in the below are blue, Republicans are in the red). The big bucks in 2020 flowed to Democrats far more than the GOP. Who said? Left-leaning (George Soros funded) OpenSecrets.org.
It isn’t that every Republican is some white knight. Republicans have their pro-Establishment characters too, like Chris Christe, Nikki Hailey, Liz Cheney (daughter of George W. Bush VP Dick Cheney), or Adam Kinzinger, to name but a few of the RINOs who are in the pockets of the donor class or Establishment. But the fact that the wealthy pour billions of dollars into defeating Donald Trump ought to speak volumes. The fact that they have tried one election rigging technique after another to keep Trump out of the White House ought to be clear to everyone.
Only the truth, and acting on the truth, can set us free. That is a truism in our society at large and manufactured housing more specifically.
Programming notice. While circumstances can always cause a shift in our plans, there is a special report planned for New Year’s Day. Don’t miss it. It will be ‘must see’ reading and viewing. Together, let’s make the new year brighter by avoiding the manipulations that have for too long kept large parts of our society at odds with each other. ###
Again, our thanks to free email subscribers and all readers like you, as well as our tipsters/sources, sponsors and God for making and keeping us the runaway number one source for authentic “News through the lens of manufactured homes and factory-built housing” © where “We Provide, You Decide.” © ## (Affordable housing, manufactured homes, reports, fact-checks, analysis, and commentary. Third-party images or content are provided under fair use guidelines for media.) See Related Reports, further below. Text/image boxes often are hot-linked to other reports that can be access by clicking on them.)
By L.A. “Tony” Kovach – for MHProNews.com.
Tony earned a journalism scholarship and earned numerous awards in history and in manufactured housing.
For example, he earned the prestigious Lottinville Award in history from the University of Oklahoma, where he studied history and business management. He’s a managing member and co-founder of LifeStyle Factory Homes, LLC, the parent company to MHProNews, and MHLivingNews.com.
This article reflects the LLC’s and/or the writer’s position and may or may not reflect the views of sponsors or supporters.
Connect on LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/latonykovach
Related References:
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