Paul Thomas Anderson made this when he was 28. So did Richard and Will.

A celebration of the greatest movie of our greatest living director. Hats off to you, man.

advisory: child abuse, self-harm, suicide.

“Ever since happiness heard your name, it has been running through the streets trying to find you.”
―Hafez

Music Credits:

Violin version of Habañera by Katy Adelson

Aria version of Habañera by Deutsch Opera Berlin

Tom Cruise Leaked Scientology Interview

Everything becomes its opposite.

cw: animal harm, general doom.

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"All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace" (1967) by Richard Brautigan

I like to think (and
the sooner the better!)
of a cybernetic meadow
where mammals and computers
live together in mutually
programming harmony
like pure water
touching clear sky. 
I like to think
(right now, please!)
of a cybernetic forest
filled with pines and electronics
where deer stroll peacefully
past computers
as if they were flowers
with spinning blossoms. 
I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.

Poem: Batter my heart, three-person'd God by John Donne

Credits:

Richard Brautigan Reading "All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace"

Palantir CEO Alex Karp Speaking in February 2025 in New York (End of Episode)

Rachmaninoff, Prelude Op. 3 No. 2 in C-sharp Minor performed by Mr. Forte (Creative Commons)

George Kennan, Memo PPS23, February 24th 1948. Declassified in June 1974.

Books:

The Assassination Complex by Jeremy Scahill and the Staff of The Intercept

The Power Elite by C. Wright Mills

Times are tough for everyone, but if you can spare $5 per month to support the History of Philosophy, my political writing, open source audiobooks, and simple intellectual entertainment, please consider joining my Patreon and helping me escape my day job.

YouTube original video credit (Plum Village). Apparently first delivered in the "late 1980s".

Read more about Thích Nhất Hạnh here.

Music Credit: Schubert, Impromptu No. 3 in G-flat Major, performed by Max John.

The great Michael Parenti returns to HoPAA to enlighten us about capitalism's leading myths and legends. As the man says, 'brothers and sisters, WE own the airwaves'.

Times are tough for everyone, but if you can pitch in $5 per month to support this project - a humanity and humanities-focused ad and spook-free education platform since 2023 - it would mean the world to me over on Patreon.

This talk was uploaded in 2013, but the date of the lecture itself is unknown.

Music Credit: Schubert, Impromptu No. 3 in G-flat Major, performed by Max John.

Summary (Bot Generated):

This podcast episode, featuring political scientist Michael Parenti, offers a critical deconstruction of the self-legitimating myths propagated by "the one percent" and giant corporate capitalism. The central thesis is that no ruling class rules nakedly, and the powerful actively take "strenuous efforts to justify their rule" through themes like the rags-to-riches mythology, fair play, and equal opportunity. The discussion focuses on two core capitalist myths: that the system creates general material prosperity and that it bolsters democracy. Parenti challenges the prosperity myth by citing "consumer realities" such as the corporate-driven replacement of public rail transit with polluting auto systems and the industrialization of food supplies. He concludes that the history of capitalism is one of great wealth and great poverty, which exist in a "dynamic interrelationship," with the wealth of the few resting on the poverty of the masses.

Michael John Parenti (born September 30, 1933) is an American political scientist, academic historian, and cultural critic who writes on a wide range of scholarly and popular subjects. Known as a leading intellectual of the American Left, he has taught at numerous universities and is the author of over twenty books, including Democracy for the Few and Blackshirts and Reds. You can find more information about him on his Wikipedia page or his official website: The Michael Parenti Political Archive.

Keywords: Corporate Capitalism, Ruling Class, The One Percent, Myths, Prosperity, Democracy, Wealth Inequality, Poverty, Horatio Alger, Transnational Corporations, Public Transit, Pollution, General Motors, Tobacco Industry, Nicotine, Perjury, Corporate Crime, Consumer Realities, Third World.

This text was generated from a transcript by Gemini.

Keep this work free for everyone and unlock my entire corpus for $5 per month on Patreon!⁠

Samuel Mathers is Bane, not Wolverine.

People Mentioned:

• ⁠Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers⁠

• ⁠H. P. Blavatsky⁠

• ⁠William Wynn Westcott⁠

• Aleister Crowley

• ⁠John Dee⁠

• Edward Kelly

• ⁠A. E. Waite⁠

• ⁠Erich Fromm⁠ and ⁠Wilhelm Reich⁠

References:

• ⁠Douglas Haig, the Battle of the Somme, and Séances⁠

"On 20th September 1906, Haig attended a séance with his sister Henrietta where he sought advice as to whether the expansion of the Territorial Army would be more satisfactory on a company or battalions basis. He was advised by the spiritualist a Miss McCreadie to adopt the former rather than the latter. Apparently, when Ms McCreadie gave this advice she was under the control of a native girl called ‘Sunshine’, who had Napoleon by her side. Haig must have found this circumstance most reassuring."

• ⁠Kant's Hilariously Stupid Anthropology of Blackness⁠

• ⁠Crowley Getting Kicked Down the Stairs by W. B. Yeats⁠

• ⁠Victorian Mummy Powder⁠

• ⁠Mahayana Buddhism⁠

• ⁠Lawrence v. Texas (2003) Last Repeal of Anti-Sodomy Law in America⁠

• ⁠The "Lost" Language of Senzar (Blavatsky)⁠

• ⁠Master Hilarion (Also Blavatsky)⁠

• ⁠Nazis Using Pendulums to (Not) Find British Ships⁠

Out of their depth. By 1942, British Navy vessels had begun to shift the tide in the Atlantic battlefront, sinking more German U-boats than Hitler’s army could Allied submarines. Scientific progress proved a major factor in Allied dominance, with the development of Radar and Sonar technology significantly upping the odds of locating German vessels in deep water. But Germany Navy officials had a different strategy in mind: U-boat captain Hans Roeder convinced colleagues in arms the British were using pendulums to predict their boats’ location underwater. As an amateur pendulum dowser himself, the enterprising captain established the Pendulum Institute to pinpoint British ships, enlisting pendulum dowsers and occultists from across the country and tasking them with applying their clairvoyant powers to search for British vessels. Results were, unsurprisingly, not altogether successful.

Books Mentioned:

• ⁠Perdurabo by Richard Kaczynski⁠

• ⁠The Mystical Qabalah by Dion Fortune⁠

• ⁠The Key to Theosophy by H. P. Blavatsky⁠

• ⁠John Dee and the Empire of Angels by Jason Louv⁠

• ⁠The Golden Dawn by Israel Regardie⁠

• ⁠A New Encyclopaedia of Freemasonry By A. E. Waite⁠

• ⁠Escape From Freedom by Erich Fromm⁠

• ⁠The Mass Psychology of Fascism by Wilhelm Reich⁠

• ⁠The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, with a Commentary by Sri Swami Satchidanada⁠

• Aleister Crowley:

  • ⁠Liber 777⁠

  • ⁠Eight Lectures on Yoga⁠

  • ⁠Konx Om Pax - Light in Extension

The gates of hell are open night and day;

Smooth the descent, and easy is the way:

But to return, and view the cheerful skies,

In this the task and mighty labor lies.

-Vergil, Aeneid

You can support the continuation of this effort, and get unlimited access to my entire body of work for$5 per month on Patreon.

My favorite translation of the Aeneid is the Modern Library edition by Shadi Bartsch, which is richly introduced and essayed/footnoted, although the Fitzgerald and Dryden translations are also classic for their poetry.

Read more about the late, great Hubert "Bert" Dreyfus here.

Music Credit: (Intro and Outro): Max John, Schubert, Impromptu No. 3 in G-flat Major, Creative Commons (YouTube). Interlude is Peter Bradley-Fulgoni, from Beethoven, Piano Sonata No. 4, Movement 2 (IMSLP).

This series will have X parts:

1. The Odyssey and the Archaic Greece (Done)

2. Aeschylus and Greek Tragedy (Done)

3. Aeneas and the Roman Tradition (This)

4. Catholic Christianity: The Gospel of John, Dante's Comedy (Upcoming)

5. Protestantism: Pascal's Pensées and Moby Dick (Upcoming)

Stay tuned...

Kick in on Patreon to support the both of us!

This is the new work.

Movies:

• The Master (2012)

• There Will Be Blood (2007)

• Magnolia (1999)

• Boogie Nights (1997)

Music:

Violin Concerto in D Major, Movement III Allegro Giocoso by Johannes Brahms

Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) by Wu-Tang Clan

Etude Op 10 No 3 in E Major "Tristesse"
Composed by Frederic Chopin,
(Best) Performed by Maurizio Pollini

Song: "No Other Love" by Jo Stafford

-//-
No other love can warm my heart
Now that I've known the comfort of your arms
No other love, oh the sweet contentment
That I find with you everytime, everytime
No other lips could want you more
For I was born to glory in your kiss,
forever yours
I was blessed with love to love you
Till the stars burn out above you
Till the moon is but a silver shell
No other love, let no other love

know the wonder of your spell
-//-

References

For the general conversation of " God wants me to destroy you, obviously" see especially the Melian Dialogue.

If you want to watch a Scientology documentary I would recommend Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief by Alex Gibney (2015).

Come join the Patreon!

https://patreon.com/c/hemlockpatreon

The best version of Musashi in English that I have found is the book The Complete Musashi translated by Alexander Bennett, which is available in audiobook form and is quite short and scholarly to boot. Goodreads link.

Books and Movies:

Silence, Martin Scorsese

Pi, Darren Aronofsky

Introduction to Zen Buddhism - D. T. Suzuki

Links:

Eleusinian Mysteries

Ergotamine (LSD)

Sekiro (From Software Game)

Music Credit (Drums, Intro/Outro) by RelaxMusicPro on YouTube:

https://youtu.be/M3cJs_m351A

Edit: removed the part where Shogun Richard and I discussed the YouTube parody AI Am a Jedi, which you should look up just in case:

https://youtu.be/v6So-4uvruU

Documentaries:

• Fahrenheit 9/11 (Michael Moore)

• Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror (Netflix)

• Citizenfour (Laura Poitras)

• Hollywoodgate (Ibrahim Nah'at)

• The Mauritanian (Kevin Macdonald)

Books:

• Jason Burke, Al-Qaeda: The True Story of Radical Islam

• Alfred W. McCoy: The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade

• Joseph E. Stiglitz and Linda J. Blimes, The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict

• Peter Dale Scott, Drugs, Oil & War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina

• Russ Baker, Family of Secrets: The Bush Dynasty, the Powerful Forces That Put it in the White House & What Their Influence Means for America

• Valerie Kaur, See No Stranger (Link)

• Barton Gellman: Angler: The Dick Cheney Vice Presidency and Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden and the American Surveillance State

• Robert Fisk, Night of Power: The Betrayal of the Middle East

• Michael C. Ruppert: Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil (Note to reader: serious conspiracy/crank material is found mixed quite freely with fact herein, read with due hazard in mind)

• Mohamedou Ould Slahi, Guantánmo Diary

Follow Sabrina Jennings on Bluesky or Patreon:

⁠Note To Self // Patreon⁠

Sabrina Jennings // Bluesky

Follow William Engels on Bluesky or Patreon

Bluesky

Patreon

Fundraisers, Palestine Support, and Good Programs:

⁠⁠Amjad Hamad and his Family⁠⁠

⁠⁠Rulin and Family⁠⁠

⁠⁠Sammar and her Husband⁠⁠

⁠⁠MSF (Doctors Without Borders)⁠⁠

⁠⁠Palestinian Youth Movement⁠⁠

Further References:

The Carlyle Group (US-Saudi Investment Firm of Bush Family Provenance)

Clinton Destroys Pharmaceutical Factory in Sudan as Distraction

US Military Attacks on Journalists in Iraq War / Gulf War 2 (Wikipedia)

False Intel on Iraqi Buildup at Saudi Border in 1990 (Christian Science Monitor)

FDR and Abdul Aziz Meeting in 1945

The Onion Router (Tor) Web Anonymization Tool

PEGASUS - Zero Day iPhone Exploit

A truly decadent and indulgent episode for the genuinely twisted wordheads and storyfreaks still crawling on all fives. Cheers, you beautiful bastards.

⁠Music by Anapse⁠, track Bisector off Streamsafe Essentials

Books

Hells Angels by Hunter S Thompson

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S Thompson

Screwjack by Hunter S. Thompson

Better Than Sex: The Gonzo Papers Vol 4 by Hunter S Thompson

Freak Power: Hunter S. Thompson's Campaign for Sheriff by Daniel Joseph Watkins

Dark Alliance by Gary Webb

Goebbels by Peter Longerich

HST's Best Audiobook Narrator: Scott Sower

Film

⁠Freak Power: The Ballot or the Bomb⁠

⁠Fear and Loathing in Aspen⁠

⁠Inherent Vice⁠

⁠Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas⁠

⁠The Rum Diary⁠

Sundry Fed, Spook, and Military Initiatives

COINTELPRO (FBI)

MHCHAOS (CIA)

Project Plowshare (DARPA)