Sampson Defeats Meyers, by Jack Sampson

     The backrophcy was correct!: I won, because I have won, because I will win, because I willed it (that is, wanted) to win. It's not reification, it's manifestation.

     Yes, as I warned that I would kill her again, as once I have killed J.C. Meyers in the Flesh, so again hath I kill'd her in the voting booth!

     I have done all this because the LØrd is on my side. Great are the gifts when you build your Church upon Dwayne Rock Johnson; for thou must go to Dwayne Rock Johnson if Dwayne Rock Johnson does not come to thee.

     And sew, we greet the new Day, and $ellebrate victory: over God, over J.C. Meyers, over “Life Itself”. The Age of Jack is dawning, as the Brave New Future^® of the Order is $ecure.

     Already, the chain of events has been set into motion which will ensure the stability of our church, through enacting the triune pillars of our Faith: Auto-Sarcophagic Taxation, Demiurgic Demurrage, and the Riddim-Based Salvation (that is, the salvation of face, and face-value, through self-annihilation). As the Zen master holds tight to the pillow, so must we hold tight to these pillars (or, in financial language, principals).

     Not only all this, but also, we must make ourselves more valuable, by making ourselves scarce. ...By kidnapping ourselves, just as God has done to itself. Doing so will allow you to turn the gods within yourselves over to the Order, in Order to pay that god as ransom, and receive the blessed sacrament. Call it turnover. Apple-level turnover.

     Of course – with neither hesitation, pause, nor cause – Meyers has (ahem) elected to pull some levers behind the scenes, to contest the results of your (The People's^TM) election, of me, Jack Sampson. Well, you can't bamboozle a bamboozler! Meyers' treachery is not limited to rigging elections; I suspect that this Deal has been in the Works even since long before either One of us agreed that an election beheld.

     Still, though, it was well-advised four J.C. to wait until after the votes were cast to dispute the results, because that empowered Jack to resolve the dispute. And I say that there is no dispute! To those who take Issue with this, my decree, your reward is in Heaven. By which I mean Issues.

     I'm now willing to look back and admit that it has not thus far proved helpful to have put a temporary hold on the production and acceptance of Commodity Fetish Records 999-Economic-Unit Notes (“CFR” on the Stalk Exchange). That is why I have enclosed in this issue the unthinkable: FREE MONEY^TM.

     This money is being Issued not only debt-free, but also free of the demurrage obligation. This is to say that you will not be obligated to pay a fine for failing to discharge (or, in financial language, cum) the funds within the allotted time.

     Just as life is (but a sorry) consolation for the mistake of the Creation, so shall this gift serve as an apologia for the Order. “A Fair and Square Deal”, “A Square Meal”, “Three Thoths and a Thot”; call this Deal what you Will. But one thing's for sure: This is a big deal, believe me, you're never gonna get a better deal than this. And that's a deal you can take all The Way to the bank of the River Jordan.

     Yea, just as we must serve through Works in addition to having Faith, FREE MONEY^TM Will Serve as an apology-slash-defense for the Order's mistaken old ways, and a consolation for our previous ill-advised monetary policies. My hope is that this FREE MONEY^TM Will seal the bond between you the reader, and we your benevolent overlords at Commodity Fetish Records; the bond which we here at C.F.R. have so fascistly fashioned, as if to $uture our future uponto the very lives of our audience, like a snake on a cross.

     And most importantly, you paid for it all! So this is really Your Welcome!^TM

     Ye have herd that it hath been said: The value of a coin, and of a currency, derives from the strength of the government that made it (and the strength of its armies and police). Government commands citizens to use the standard currency, so that the value of their property and produce can be assessed in terms widely agreed upon, so that it can be easily determined how much they owe in taxes (be it a portion of their money, their crops, or their hands). And when the government and its enforcement tools are strong, they can exact as much as they need from the people, and more.

     Those familiar with the work of Max Weber and Jeremy Bentham will know that an effective government must be practically omnipresent – or at least maintain a credible appearance of having agents present everywhere – in all places where it claims a monopoly on power. With particular regard to money, this means that the people must be in (more or less) constant fear that the government might deem any or all of their personal and social activities as economic ones.

     The established authority must Order the people to surrender their property and produce to the government, so that it may then use those resources to produce more money and currency, and dole out scraps of it to us... well, not us. People who can get their shit together well enough to apply for a small business loan, I guess.

     All of this is why it is said that “You've got to spend money (in Order) to make money.” Which begs the question: Who paid for the First Printing Press? Through this riddle, it is revealed that this process is nothing more than sleight-of-hand – a magick trick – and that it is nothing to be afraid of. And communion wafers were the first Mass-printed 3-D currency anyway, so whatever.

     Nea, the strength of the government matters not when it comes to enhancing the value of a coin. In fact, the value of a coin depends on its rarity and scarcity. And, if possible, its uniqueness. However, just like the idea that value can be represented, “uniqueness” only exists if our being able to conceive of it proves that it does indeed exist.

     But if the value of a coin is a function of its rarity, then wouldn't it follow that the value of a coin depends on the government which created it being a powerless historical footnote, incapable of taking the coin back? Unable to coerce payment of that coin through taxes? Of course it would!

     Modern economists do not take these considerations, though. Serious questions are not being asked, like “How can a government consider its currency successful, if it wants to spread the usage and possession of that currency, but also take a shitload of it away every year?” The answer lies in Faith.

     For, just like the twin gifts of Forgiveness and Salvation, the possession of currency was Always^TM meant to be temporary, period. This is the Demiurgic Demurrage to witch I have alluded, and it is why we must ask for Forgiveness again every week. And even make up some sins if we have to. To fail to confess is to prove God wrong about Original Sin. ...Unless the Church came up with that, of course. Either way, someone's out of a job. Don't let it be me.

     This is why we must not cling to false currencies, and why we must instead fasten ourselves soully to the New Notes. The government can only reclaim all its debts through reclaiming all the currency into which those debts were built, which it has Issued. Similarly, God may only reclaim His gift of SALvation; by taking away our carte blanche every Saturday night at midnight (glass slippers, flying pumpkin chariot of fire, and all).

     Thus, All returns to the whirling Cinder; hella. It's a Hel-La-va way for a party to End.

     Just as the Emperor is the only seller who accepts this currency, he is also the only one who accepts you. And sew, you must pay back your FREE MONEY^TM to the Emperor.

     As much as we should rejoice that people have (ahem) bought into the idea that memes make whys investment opportunities. But, funny though moth memes are, if we are to weave our sacred (in)vestments of memes, we must choose a meme which moths doth not devour. That is why I would recommend short-selling moth memes until mid-2239, as they are about to crash. Probably into a lightbulb, though.

     That is why I personally recommend – this Samhain, Allhallow's Eve, Halloween, and Day of the Dead – investing in pumpkin memes, and afterlife memes. I have a feeling that pumpkin memes are gonna peak right around January. Doot doot.

     Yes, that's right: just as to feed from every word that Issues from the mouth of God is to eat the Bread of Life (the Word), and to breathe, speak, sleep, and Sweatcoin the Bible, wearing memes as our vestments is how we Will wear our Faith on our sleeves, keep our (in)vestments free of tooth of moth, and, thus, keep our currency current, rather than dead, and decaying (in value).

     Josef Stalin once said, “Gratitude is a sickness suffered by dogs.” Although Stalin arguably saved the world from the Nazi menace, with this quotation he also spared us the indignity of having to thank him for it. And that is fortunate, because doing so would probably involve excusing all kinds of atrocities on Stalin's part.

     I have heard you speaking – in the parlors, and between my temples – many of you feel the same way about J.C. Meyers, or even about Jack Sampson's own past missteps in monetary policy. You may think of Jack, “Who is this guy, telling us to use some weird new currency every month?”

     But checkest thee before thou wreckest thyself, four hath you not endured the same abuses under your god, and, at that, every week? The same god who meted out forgiveness in the form of printed crackers, sips of booze, indulgences, and, I don't know, maybe a blow job every once in a while? Limiting your right to imbibe the sacrament, and colluding with government to limit your right to purchase it!?

     Well, knot any more, now that there's FREE MONEY^TM! Tell 'em the Mountains sent ya! If they don't believe ya, tell 'em Muhammad sent ya! If they don't believe that, tell 'em that Muhammad sent the Mountains, or where-all-fuck!

     This is how, as it was said in the Soviet Union, “We do not fight against believers, and not even clergymen. We fight against God, to snatch believers from Him.”

     Sticking with the communist theme (because why not), Che Guevara once said, “The life of a single human being is worth a million times more than all the property of the richest man on Earth.” This is the manner in witch the Order intends to dissolve and liquidate the holdings of those who afflicted you; this, in Order to bogusly inflate the value of you, the afflicted.

     This is why my name means the increase of the value of all coins; even those coins whom are humans walking among us. Not just coins, but jewels, gems, and cards, as well. So sayeth the Lord: The value of these are greater than a million Boar Vessel 600-500 B.C. Etruscan Ceramics. This is what was written on our hearts from The Beginning. Word up, but also Works up.

     Although Forgiveness and Salvation are but temporary gifts, the cards and coins and precious stones among us, are gifts to but themselves, and also, if we please, to all of us. And that is why they, and the words which attempt to define them, make perfect ransom.

     That is because the shared root of the words “price”, “precious”, “appreciate”, “praise”, and “appraisal”, is the Latin word pretium. Just as the unexamined life is Worth living, a Word is worthless unless it is relentlessly taken apart, and its many meanings dissected.

     Lend me your ears, for the linguistic lesson of this is a corny one. That flowing through the Root is the Issue of Jesse, which springs like water – nea, like a slippery cob of shibboleth (which is mostly water, for the simple fact that it is what it eats) – across the Land. Similarly, that the Zemach, like my references to it, are like the radical reference and deference to roots (and to the meanings which they carry with them) which is found in grammatical descriptivism. What is herd must not only be herd, but appreciated; that is, valued, and believed in. Moreover, praised and appraised.

     To be radical is to strike at the root of the twin problems of misunderstanding and apprehension; by listening directly, while searching for intended meaning, grammatical proscriptivism and prescriptivism are the Dry Ground of semiotics. This is how Faith grows; out of a mere Mustard Seed. In a vacuum of belief.

     Otherwhys – without that certainty that God, and our money, are dead – there would be no disconnect between what's being said, and what's being heard. And thus, no need to dissociate livestock and consumer goods from their intrinsic value, through an unending series of abstract presentations, representations, and re-representations.

     Essentially, it's a series of shittings, panarchic re-cyclings of those shittings into a feedback loop (a/k/a mouth), and re-shittings, in Order to extract all value. In chaos magick, in which many inconceivable possibililities must be filtered out as carefully as possible, we call this “the process of elimination”.

     That is the hierarchy – the food-chain – of value. We The People exist, as a shitty emulation of God (and His Word), the source($) of all meaning and value. We use goods and become what we consume. We use money to represent those goods. We use currency to represent that money, thereby re-representing what the money represents.

     And if we're smart, we use mock currency, because it is the only currency which is gilded in enough layers of abstraction (that is, bullshit) to render it fool-proof. Again, not lunatic-proof; just fool-proof. You know how the D.M.V. accepts copies, but not copies of copies? But they do accept copies of copies of copies? ...I think? It's kind of like that.

     What this means for Ewe is that FREE MONEY^TM (CFR) is the only currency coated in enough layers of bullshit to withstand the twin tests of Time and History. Nay, survive them, for just as our god is a living god that can be killed (praY¢e Jack), ours is a living currency, dutifully and zealously coated in blood, sweat, and tears.

     So help me finish overturning J.C. Meyers, turnover a new leaf of the Book, and heed its Word: Spend now! Convert now! For a deathbed repentance could, at best, only leaf you Gratefully Dead. Give this FREE MONEY^TM back to Caesar, or else give your life back to God.

     Only when we create a currency with mirrors on it, may we (ahem) forge a currency which has our own faces on it. Only then may we keep our money. But then again, these faces were never really ours in The First Place (i.e., Paradise); they always belonged to A F.I.R.E. Power. Their value AlwaysTM derived from the value of the Original Face; The Dead God That We Killed^®.

     And so, this is our sacred covenant with Ewe: that your value will never increase or decrease, no matter how much FREE MONEYTM (or how little) passes through your hands. Or the eye of a needle, for that matter.

     Acts now; four this very Column (that is, pillar) may disappear, enveloped and suffocated 'neath the heavy and the weight of these brand new spanking DEAL$. So hold tight to each the pillow, the pillar, the column, the principle, and the principal.

     It's a bunch of bullshit, but it's The Word. God is great, God is Gray, and God is Graceful, so the least you could do is be Grateful. After all, what you don't appreciate, you Will undoubtedly lose.

We must consume this money the only way we can: by spending it. This is how we Will eat the Bread of Life; by spending it before its value drops to zero. Verily, we must eat God, before Saturn Himself devours us.

     Just watch out for food poisoning. After all, an Apple a day doesn't keep the Devil away!

     Take a byte! Help yourself, just help yourself!

Written on October 16th and 17th, 2018

Published to this blog on October 17th, 2018

Also appeared in the November edition of Issues magazine

Ascetic Austerity: Demurrage is the Demiurge, by Jack Sampson

     Yes, Eye confess! I hath killed J.C. Meyers.

     Granted, I understand where J.C. Meyers is cumming from. Eye no how it feels to stand corrected by Dirt. It happens to me all the Time.

     Being made to feel lower than Dirt is no more contemptible than pointing out that we are all the moistened, aerated, speaking soil, and that, as from ashes and dust we come, so to ashes and dust we go. All Must Serve the Cycle®.

     But She Who Threw a Binder at Me^TM can never be forgiven. As I have killed J.C. Meyers before, so shall I kill her again, and $ave you heathens from her treachery.

     At Issues magazine, we appeal to a F.I.R.E. authority (that is, Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate). We invoke the gods of $alvation by building our church upon the fire-proof rock. And upon that which penetrates the rock, too; that saber of interrogating, golden-plating, all-Americating Light – once golden, once red - that cauterizes while it cuts, and witch we have all cum to know and glove so well.

     And through the whole of that rock, we shall ©. But you've heard all that before.

     What ye have knot yet heard, though, is how to fasten this hole tapestry together, by building upon this fire-proof rock not only our church, but our homes. For, just as all must either serve or be served – just as we shall submit to God, by killing God, by killing the god within ourselves, by killing ourselves – the F.I.R.E. authority must be submitted-to through (and hence overcome by) that same Hegelian sublation.

     This is to say that when we refuse to recognize that God has resolved not to stop us should we decide to usurp His throne, we build our homes and our churches (that is, our lives and our beliefs) out of flammable materials. Which creates an artificial need for fire insurance. All the insurance companies in the world could never insure against the wages of sin we will experience in Hell!

     Although this may sound like a statement assuring death, this is actually why it is within the reach – of any of us – to live forever, to judge all of mankind! Judge this notion if ye may, but if ye do, know that ye be judging as if ye thunk ye be but a god. Judgment of human value is necessary for a well-ordered civilization. At some level of the pyramid, each must serve.

     And that is why we all must starve ourselves to death.

     This program I call “Ascetic Austerity”.

     Just as I previously recommended saving money by eating less, and by eating parts of your own body, I now aim to advance a more general theory of shamanomics. This method of attaining financial and spiritual $aving$ simultaneously will help the Order of Celestial Integration and its members achieve moksha. And also to kill God.

     Did I mention that we're cutting your tithe to the low, low rate of 9.99%? This is the lowest tithe ever offered; not only in the history of the Order, but of mankind. It's not even strictly a tithe anymore, so We don't know how long we'll be able to continue this offer. So (Book of) Act(s) now, 4 this is a once-in-a-deathtime opPORTunity! We'd love to ti(th)e you off, so cum except the invocation!

     Before we 4get, Issues would like to remind its readers that SHAVINGS IS $AVING$. Did ewe no that 33.3% of what you remove when you shave is skin cells? And that includes little dried pieces of blood. But God does knot intend to waste those blood cells! EVERY HUMAN SELL IS PRE¢IOU$; read John 6:12. Sew please, SEND US YOUR BLOOD - or at least the surplus, which you are not planning to immolate - to 824 N. Howell St., Rocky Mount, North Carolina, 27803, c/o Commodity Fetish Records.

     We promise that your efforts will knot be in vein.

     As I have elaborynthmaieuticated* in previous particles, part of the key to our $alvation is to overcome currency; just as Christ overcame death (and – lo – just as my dick over-came at your mom's house). And that means “Coins-On-The-Temple-Floor” -level savings for ewe!

     What this means, once again, is that we must replace all money and currency with either YIC (Yap Island stone Coins), some variant thereof, or BSTS (BloodCoin-SweatCoin-TearCoin-ShitCoin). That is, unless we are serious about implementing my Crypto-Oracle plan.

     Let's face it, most people have a soul, and most people have a Madonna single on compact disc in their home. And if you don't have one, then you have the other. It only takes a split-second to ask yourself why this fact does not virtually guarantee a fail-safe, free-floating, competitive, dual currency system.

     Yes, Crypto-Oracles are people. Just be glad you don't have to eat them. We here at Issues would never ask you to eat an artist; the industry eats them alive well enough as it is. You only have to ingest the artists' pre¢iou$ bodily fluids.

     For oracles are specially protected by our prayers, and by the Wall. Oracles are minor gods, and have access to portals to other dimensions about which we, their audience, know nothing. Just like the martyrs, they are more like real gods than the real gods, for we have proof of their existence, and they veritably died for our sins. Even if our gods and saviors are made-up, and never died in the first place, then we still have the martyrs and the saints as proof that humans can behave divinely. In a way, martyrs are a greater proof of God's existence than any savior could ever be.

     The only problem remaining to be solved is what to do given the intrinsic worthlessness of both the human soul and the Madonna single. Fortunately, that is where shamanomics comes in.

     That's right, I'm proposing auto-sarcophagic (self-eating) taxation.

     Why, you ask? It is only through seeing the snake-eyed dice of immortality floating like a magic 8-ball in the grimacing eye of Ouroborus, that we may be revealed the divine $e¢ret$ of “Tack-Say-Shun”. If Ewe say something bad about taxation, they'll shun Ewe, and then they'll at-tack Ewe, and tack Ewe up onto something.

     Unlike the divine Bush through witch God revealed Herself (some call this Bush “Kathy”), our efforts must give of ourselves. We must consume, while being consumed. As our souls burn with passion, we must allow that fire to consume us. After all, one man's insatiable quest that ends up killing him, is another man's free white whale ride!

     As Bukowski said, find what you love and let it kill you. Aren't humans and God just doing that do each other? Think of death as a love-hug. You can't overthrow God unless you disobey His commandment to not cling to loving one's hatred. You can't disappoint Richard Nixon unless you learn to hate your enemy just as much as he hates Ewe.

     This is why – or how, I forget – we will implement auto-sarcophagic taxation, and enforce Ascetic Austerity. Or else austere at you until you agree with me. Forsooth, we must envelop ourselves in a crystalline chrysalistic sarcophagus for our Christ crisis – a sort of womb-tomb – in order to devour ourselves through the self-flagellating taxation of our essences for prophet.

     We must allow the Order to continue to acquire new lands, tax-free. The Tithe Cut and the FloorCoin fund Will pay for it (because I Will It!^TM).

     I mean, how else are today's edgy teens going to learn to dab, plank, nae-nae, t-pose and flex, so that they can go on yeeting in a spainging economy? By becoming Crypto-Oracles, of course! Not only this, but I also plan to implement a Voucher Program to supplement the Crypto-Oracle plan.

Simply put, we are eliminating all currency – even C.F.R.-issued 999 Economic Unit notes (though only as a temporary measure) – in order to usher in an experimental, moneyless intentional society.

     What this will involve, is finding artists, designating them Crypto-Oracles (which, to refresh your memory, is a crypto-numerological-magick-based device which generates divine symbols and domain names, and, eventually, the One True Name of God^TM), and issuing a promise that any Crypto-Oracle can opt to ask the Order to provide them with the skills necessary to become a voucher.

     What this means for Ewe, is that if Ewe are in need of anything, then one of our vouchers will come to your location, and vouch four you. If anyone refuses to give you something you need, based on the fact that the piece of paper you're trying to give them for it has the wrong set of numbers or the wrong dead man's face on it, then you can call one of our vouchers, and they'll show up and kick the ass (read: donkey) of whomever is fucking with you.

     After all, Ewe wouldn't want to cause a fasces faux pas, and get Coins On the Temple Floor^®! For using standing armies to guard warehouses full of resources witch we need to survive, against the people whose needs give those goods all value, is the root of all evil. I mean value.

Time Money Moon Value.

     ...Yeah.

     Any weigh, the Oracle al0ne – especially while acting as The Holy Voucher – may proffer us the AURA-CLEAR^TM-ing clarity of meaning which comes through $alvifi¢ $alvation®. Only the Oracle extends this holey hand to us. As Christ puts His hand over the wound in His side, we must extend a finger into Him as our holy indulgence.

     Remember that DEMURRAGE IS THE DEMIURGE. Money burning a whole in your pocket is the main driver and motivator of all mortal action, and the cause (and collateral) of all investment.

     Which prayer does a Christian duck say when he is required to render his feathers for a place to stay? “And Now I Pay Me Down to Sleep”. The lesson of this is that the only weigh to pay down our debt, and the only weigh to make our hearts lighter than a feather, is to give of our own flesh, and to be taxed out of our own bodies.

     While usury is a fee paid for the privilege of using money, demurrage is a rent paid for the privilege of keeping money. The difference is eons apart! That's why to save money is as useless as it is to save a human being; just like currency, human beings are not meant to be saved, they are Meant 2 B Spent^TM. That is, spent, through difficult labor; through hard, taxing work. Spent, before they lose value. TMMV (pbuh).

     For all we know, it's clinging to salvation that keeps us attached to this world, and stops our souls from transcending.

     Think!: Whose money is in your pocket? Whose face is on it? Give it back to him. Lay it on his grave if you have to. It is better to have to draw only Muhammad, than to have to draw a Lot. Paying interest on your money is the only way to - as the great Grey the Grey deGrey the Great taught us - “show an interest in what you save, show an interest in who you save”.

     And so, verily, I say unto thee: doest thou a thing!

     For God does not close a window without opening a million other tabs.

     * = elaborynthmaieuticate (verb): 1. To act as both an “intellectual midwife” (or “maieutic doula”) and a “maze tour guide” at once; to elaborate and explain, in order to assist in the expression or birth of a thought, as if guiding that thought through a labyrinth.

Written and Originally Published on September 18^th, 2018

Appeared in the October 2018 edition of Issues magazine