 Picture from Click Americana, 2021 Before mass financialization killed American prosperity, say back in 1969, the federal minimum wage was $1.30 per hour. Today it’s $7.25 per hour. As I have calculated before, it would be around $45.00 had wages kept pace with housing costs. It would be $37.75 if adjusted to match the (2750%) increase in drugstore cigar prices since 1969. Look at the picture. A Gray Drug façade in some American mall in 1969. The look from the days of Peak America: clean, modern, and without so much gaudy flash as developed near the end of the century. In the center of the photo, one can plainly see the large “Tobacco—Cigars” awning hanging over an aisle shelf and display case. A closer inspection reveals that the cigars, cigarettes, pipes, and accessories are open and available on the shelf. One could just walk right up, select some cigars—El Producto, Dutch Masters, Garcia y Vega, King Edward, Muriels—and buy them like any other product. One could smoke in the mall, there were no idiotic identification checks, and prices were affordable (10 to 25 cents in most cases). This was, kids, before Americans gave away their freedoms. Pa, my maternal grandfather, loved Muriel Magnums. He could have probably purchased a box of them in that picture for five dollars or less. If he were still around, I think he’d agree that I should declare victory, hang up all this socio-political-economic bullshit, and just concentrate on writing fiction. He and I would then smoke some Muriels. Well, okay, Muriels are a little hard to come by these sad days; I suppose we’d have to make do with Cubans Rounds or something. Come to think of it, I’m going to go make do right now! (If one just has to have another thousand words, then go back to the Gray photo.) Fumi vindice! This piece was published at Perrin Lovett on Oct. 17 2025.
2 Comments
 Fall, my favorite season, has arrived in the Northern Hemisphere. Hurray! The weather is pleasant, there are football games, the cigars taste better, and my brain reactivates after the usual summer slumber. In the wider world, the new polycentric order moves forward. China actively formulates the 15th Five-Year Plan. Vladimir Putin just held his annual upbeat discussion with the Valdai Club. Yet Russia, China, Iran, and the rest must still pay close attention to that odd nation-shaped kind of place between Mexico and Canada. Amerika continues to be as strange and threatening as ever. The U.S. Department of Defense (aka, the Department of War) (aka, the Department of Incompetence) appears to have largely abandoned plans for a splendid new war with China—for now. One defeat at a time, right? As for NATO’s war against Russia, who really knows at this point? Perhaps the U.S. will leave the assorted chihuahuas of Europe to their demise. Or, maybe some combination of Tomahawks won’t do the trick. Nothing will work, and even the dunderheads in D.C. seem to accept the truth begrudgingly. Still, something tells me they’ll hang around and do as much damage as possible before taking an eventual exit ramp. Meanwhile, Iran, Venezuela, and maybe even Afghanistan should look forward to a little more old-fashioned Yankee gunpoint meddling. The way the Department of Incompetence is positioning hardware and personnel, it very much looks like destabilization strikes are imminent against Caracas and Tehran. The U.S. national interests in both countries are clear: oil and energy with the former, and whatever “Israel” wants with the latter. Amerikans, this is what you get when you surrender your country to usurious con artists and Zionist lunatics. Something tells me that the adventurism won’t work out in D.C.’s favor, but still, friends in Iran and Venezuela, please stay vigilant and defiant. There’s also the endless Yankee support for the Zionists’ genocide of the Palestinians and the pursuit of “Greater Israel.” Sixty-six thousand Palestinians, most of them women and children, are already officially dead. It’s seventy-five thousand if the “missing” are included. And that’s probably a terrible undercount; the current estimates now include an upper bound of 680,000 dead. This will go down in history as one of the most horrible slaughters ever. History will not look kindly on the satanic perpetrators and enablers of the Gazacaust. Future chronicles will favorably remember the Resistance, both in West Asia and in the larger multipolar order. The Palestinians will be remembered kindly, lionized even. God forbid, if they are literally exterminated, then they will become eternal legends to overshadow the Spartans at Thermopylae, the holdouts at Masada, and the doomed denizens of Melos. Future annals will also likely carve out a special study of those most gullible and insouciant of all peoples, the Amerikans. Few will understand how such seemingly intelligent, well-armed, and allegedly Christian folks just sat idly, stupidly by and did nothing. And that leads me to a quick take on the nearly incomprehensible happenings on the Amerikan homefront. For the life of me, I still haven’t figured out exactly what rules over Amerika. I know it’s a “what” and not a “who.” Whatever it is, and it’s probably demonic, has no use for free and happy Amerikans. They will be its final victims once all of the overseas madness fails. Donald Trump is no more in charge than his brainless predecessor, Sleepy Jo-- Wait a second! I just remembered that I have been reliably and repeatedly informed that “things have changed” in Amerika following the alleged assassination of a secular saint, diversionary gatekeeper, and hardcore Judeo-satanic apologist known as the “Man of Steel.” I think it was his Freemasonic circus ceremony, er, excuse me, his “funeral” that did it. Good thing too as it saves me from discussing the fate of the Amerikan people. I had suspected that they were being set up for permanent slavery or worse, but there’s no point in rehashing any of that. Few Amerikans care much about their future, and even fewer care abroad. Lastly, and ending on a high note, there’s the usual fall literature. For those who caught it, I hope you enjoyed my review of The Thorn and the Carnation by Martyr Yahya Sinwar. I’m in the middle of The Water Dancer, an unusually good novel by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Bodaciously True & Totally Awesome, Episode I: Bad Boy by the base master of English novelization, Chris Orcutt, is coming early next year. I’ve already written my review of Bad Boy, so stay tuned. I’ll have a new novel out before too long, so there’s that. All of these books, by the way, carry important messages and lessons about life, death, hope, and endurance. When all else fails, there are always books. Deo vindice. |
