Tag Archives: The Fourth Turning

Fourth Turning Detonation, by Jim Quinn

Posted on January 26, 2021 | Leave a comment

Jim Quinn takes a look at 2021 and doesn’t like what he sees. From Quinn at theburningplatform.com:

“Americans today fear that linearism (alias the American Dream) has run its course. Many would welcome some enlightenment about history’s patterns and rhythms, but today’s intellectual elites offer little that’s useful. Caught between the entropy of the chaoticists and the hubris of the linearists, the American people have lost their moorings.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

This is not freedom': militarized US Capitol a sign of forever wars coming home | US Capitol breach | The Guardian

“The ancients believed that each cyclical extreme, mirroring the hopes and fears of the other, helps generate the other. The night longs for the day, the day for night. In war, people yearn for relief from strife, leading to peace. In peace, people yearn to champion what they love, leading to war.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

When I started thinking about my annual beginning of the year article in early January, I tried to formulate a catchy title. Knowing we have entered the thirteenth year of this Fourth Turning, with the intensity of the crisis reaching an unparalleled level since November 4, I decided upon Fourth Turning Detonation. I immediately thought that might be too dire and figured I would change it later. After the first few weeks of the new year, I now think it might be grossly inadequate to describe what is coming in 2021.

It is easy to get distracted by the daily gyrations, ceaseless media propaganda, political theater, false narratives, and delusional beliefs of both the left and right, as this military empire built on debt and deceit spirals towards its fiery cataclysmic climax. Opposing forces have gathered themselves into position focusing on defeating their domestic enemies, with the left seeming to have strategic advantage but led by hubristic dullards, while numerous foreign adversaries circle like hungry vultures ready to pounce on the dying beast of an empire.

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Dark Years and Fourth Turning, by Egon von Greyerz

Posted on September 24, 2020 | 1 comment

Hard times are here. From Egon von Greyerz  at goldswitzerland.com:

In an ephemeral world, few things survive. I am not talking about species or human beings whose existence on earth is also transitory. Instead I am referring to social and financial systems which are now coming to an end.

In July 2009 I wrote an article called The Dark Years Are Here. It was reprinted again in September 2018.

Here is an extract from my original article:

“The Dark Years will be extremely severe for most countries both financially and socially. In many countries in the Western world there will be a severe depression and it will be the end of the welfare state. Most private and state pension schemes are also likely to collapse. It will be a worldwide depression but some countries may only have a deep recession. There will be famine, homelessness and misery resulting in social as well as political unrest. Different type of government leaders and regimes are likely to result from this.
How long will the Dark Years last? There is a book called ”The Fourth Turning” written by Neil Howe. He has identified a pattern that repeats itself every 80 years. The pattern has been extremely accurate in the Anglophile world. We have recently entered the Fourth Turning which is the final 20 years of the cycle. According to Howe we are in the early stages of a 20 year period of economic and institutional upheaval. This is a period of Crisis when the fabric of society will change dramatically. Previous Fourth Turnings have been the American Revolution, Great Depression and World War II. According to Howe the Crisis will be substantially worse before it is over and it will last for another circa 20 years.
All of this is not good news and we hope that we and Howe are wrong regarding the severity and length of this crisis. But we fear that we are both right. We must stress again that never previously has the whole world entered a downturn simultaneously in such a fragile state both financially and economically which is why the Dark Years are likely to be so devastating and long lasting.”

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Winter Is Coming (Part Three), by Jim Quinn

Posted on April 22, 2018 | Leave a comment

Part Three of Jim Quinn’s series on the Fourth Turning, at theburningplatform.com:

“The very survival of the nation will feel at stake. Sometime before the year 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history, commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and twin emergencies of the Great Depression and World War II.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning 

Image result for swirling fog game of thrones

In Part One of this article I laid out the reasons for Gray Champions arising to meet challenges during crisis periods in history. In Part Two of this article I assessed the configuration of Gray Champions throughout the world and the potential impact on the course of this Fourth Turning.

The swirling fog of confusion enveloping the globe as the high lords of the universe play their game of thrones has even the most critical thinking individuals baffled by the course of events. The desperation and blatant lawlessness of the Deep State players in their endeavor to preserve their hegemony over the course of global affairs is palpable with every attack, false flag, accusation, and ratcheting up of their propaganda media machine.

Like Game of Thrones, the behind the scenes machinations, subterfuge, and deceptions taking place outside the purview of the common folk are designed to only benefit the rich and powerful players undertaking these traitorous actions. Open warfare will not happen until it is thought to be in the best interests of those manipulating the levers of society and the narrative produced by their perpetual propaganda media machine. But, in the end, it will be the innocent common people who will suffer the consequences, while the lords reap the riches, glory and power.

“Why is it always the innocents who suffer most, when you high lords play your game of thrones?” – Lord Varys – George R.R. Martin, Game of Thrones

The common people have always been blind to the next turning until after it fully arrives. Even now, the average person has no idea we are in the midst of a crisis period which will change the course of history. The overwhelming majority of the 325 million Americans, and billions around the globe, go about their daily lives oblivious to the intrigues, conspiracies, and treachery playing out at the highest levels of government and in smoky backrooms, where deals are made, wars plotted, and billions dispersed to the oligarchical lords running our world.

To continue reading: Winter Is Coming (Part Three)

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Winter is Coming (Part Two), Jim Quinn

Posted on April 17, 2018 | 2 comments

Part Two of Jim Quinn’s series on the arrival of the Fourth Turning. From Quinn at theburningplatform.com:

“Don’t think you can escape the Fourth Turning the way you might today distance yourself from news, national politics, or even taxes you don’t feel like paying. History warns that a Crisis will reshape the basic social and economic environment that you now take for granted. The Fourth Turning necessitates the death and rebirth of the social order. It is the ultimate rite of passage for an entire people, requiring a luminal state of sheer chaos whose nature and duration no one can predict in advance.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

In Part One of this article I laid out the reasons for Gray Champions arising to meet challenges during crisis periods in history. We are ten years into this Crisis and I have been pondering where we go from here. The plot line of the Game of Thrones has opened my eyes to the fact there isn’t just one Gray Champion during a Fourth Turning. During the Civil War, Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee were Transcendental prophet generation representatives of the Confederacy. Abraham Lincoln and William Tecumseh Sherman were Gray Champions of the Union.

These were men who would do anything to further their cause, from ordering thousands of men to their deaths on Cemetery Ridge, to burning down cities, to suspending the writ of Habeas Corpus, and seceding from the Union. They were destined to brandish their terrible swift swords in achieving total indisputable victory. But, we know only one side could win.

During the World War II/Great Depression crisis FDR is known as the Gray Champion who took drastic measures on the economic front with his New Deal and sent 16 million young men into battle on a scale never seen in history. Douglass MacArthur commanded many of those men in battles to the death across the Pacific. What is less discussed is the fact Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin were also members of the Missionary prophet generation and were the Gray Champions of their nations.

To continue reading: Winter is Coming (Part Two)

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Winter is Coming, by Jim Quinn

Posted on April 16, 2018 | 1 comment

Jim Quinn, basing his outlook on Strauss and Howe’s The Fourth Turning, sees an immediate  future of turmoil and strife. From Quinn, at theburningplatform.com:

“Summer will end soon enough, and childhood as well.” – George R.R. Martin, Game of Thrones

Image result for winter is coming game of thrones

“Reflect on what happens when a terrible winter blizzard strikes. You hear the weather warning but probably fail to act on it. The sky darkens. Then the storm hits with full fury, and the air is a howling whiteness. One by one, your links to the machine age break down. Electricity flickers out, cutting off the TV. Batteries fade, cutting off the radio. Phones go dead. Roads become impassible, and cars get stuck. Food supplies dwindle. Day to day vestiges of modern civilization – bank machines, mutual funds, mass retailers, computers, satellites, airplanes, governments – all recede into irrelevance.

Picture yourself and your loved ones in the midst of a howling blizzard that lasts several years. Think about what you would need, who could help you, and why your fate might matter to anybody other than yourself. That is how to plan for a saecular winter. Don’t think you can escape the Fourth Turning. History warns that a Crisis will reshape the basic social and economic environment that you now take for granted.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

I’m always a little behind when it comes to popular TV, especially when the shows are on premium cable channels. Being cheap, I’ve refused to pay for any premium cable channels, plus I’ve spent much of my life on baseball fields and in hockey rinks, rather than watching TV. When my kids recently signed up for HBO Now, I finally got to watch The Sopranos, eleven years after its final episode aired. Now I’m finally able to watch Game of Thrones, after it has been on the air for seven seasons. In the opening episodes I was impressed by the theme which permeates the series. Numerous characters stated “Winter is Coming”. I was immediately struck by the parallels with the Fourth Turning theory about the cyclical nature of our world.

 To continue reading: Winter is Coming

 

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Keep Going. This Too Shall Pass. by Doug “Uncola” Lynn

Posted on March 29, 2018 | Leave a comment

Notwithstanding the horrible $1.3 trillion dollar ominbus spending bill Trump just signed into law, Doug “Uncola” Lynn is not giving up on him. What’s the alternative, especially with a Fourth Turning upon us? From Lynn at theburningplatform.com:

Like the weather when a storm approaches, or as the seasons turn, or waves pounding on a shoreline, any deviations are measured and compared by speed and intensity.  The same can be said for headlines:  Omnibus, discouraged Deplorables, rumors of war, prospects of peace, economic bubbles, fluctuating markets, and political intrigue.  Round and round it goes; when it ends, nobody knows. It’s a time of transition; and when traveling over mountaintops, through valleys, and on rough seas, no one has all of the answers.

Even when looking at maps.

The books, “Generations” (1992) and “The Fourth Turning“ (1997), were written by the historians William Strauss and Neil Howe. These recent explorers identified recorded cycles of history and categorized them across multiple cultures and eras.  In both books, historical timelines were analyzed and populations were correlated to specific life-cycles labeled as generational types.  Strauss and Howe additionally addressed the concept of time in the context of both circular and linear perspectives and defined what is called a “saeculum” as a “long human life” measuring roughly 80 to 90 years.  Every saeculum is comprised of four turnings, each lasting around 20 years.

Just as there are four seasons consisting of spring, summer, fall and winter, there are also four phases of a human life represented in childhood, young adulthood, middle age and elderhood.  As each phase of human life represents approximately 20 years, so is each generational archetype identified within the historical cycles, or turnings, as follows.

The generations experience each turning according their life stage; and the Seasons (i.e. order of Turnings # 1 -4) are identified by each generation as they reach middle-age.  Amazingly, history shows a consistent pattern in how the generations both cause and affect historical events.  The patterns develop based upon how each generation interacts with the other and documented consistencies are delineated by the authors.

To continue reading: Keep Going. This Too Shall Pass.

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Place Your Bets, Hedge Your Bets, Winner Takes All, by Doug “Uncola” Lynn

Posted on January 23, 2018 | Leave a comment

Doug “Uncola” Lynn doubts that establishment power will be defeated, no matter how well-intentioned Trump might be. From Lynn at theburningplatform.com:

We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now you begin to understand me.

― George Orwell, “1984”, part 3, chapter 3

In the eight days following Donald Trump’s 2016 Presidential Election win, I wrote a series of three (3) articles based upon Charles Dicken’s literary classic, “A Tale of Two Cities”.  The first piece entitled “Best of Times Worst of Times” was a play-by-play of my own election night experience.  The second installment, entitled “A Tale of Two Cities” drew some comparisons between our modern times with Dickens’ major themes of “duality, revolution, and resurrection” against the backdrop of the burgeoning warfare between the aristocratic class and those of the peasants during the French Revolution.  And the third and final article concluded with these words:

 If Trump ushers in a return to constitutionalism, liberty and renewed nationalist vigor across the world; then let us tip our hats, drink wine and dance in the streets.

Conversely, if violent revolution consumes the nations, including America; the ensuing societal breakdown will lead to starvation, mob mentality, war, death, destruction and blood flowing in the streets of cities like wine from a broken cask.  Out of the complete chaos a new world order might then arise as a phoenix from the ashes of the old system still burning.

Will liberty be resurrected? Or tyranny?

There is no middle ground.

– Me, “The Good, the Guilty and the Guillotine”, TheTollOnline.com, 11/16/2016

 

I am not linking these articles here because they are beside the point right now; other than, perhaps, my comparison of Trump in the third article to the biblical Samson tearing down the twin pillars of left and right in today’s American political system. Beyond that, however, I want to discuss specific Fourth Turning revolutions in relation to their cataclysmic dynamics of power.

To continue reading: Place Your Bets, Hedge Your Bets, Winner Takes All

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The Unbearable Slowness of Fourth Turnings, Part Two, by Jim Quinn

Posted on November 14, 2017 | Leave a comment

The second of Jim Quinn’s two-part article on waiting for the Fourth Turning. From Quinn at theburningplatform.com:

In Part 1 of this article I provided the background regarding the phases of Fourth Turnings and where we stand nine years into this period of crisis. I will now ponder what could happen during the remainder of this Fourth Turning.

“History offers no guarantees. Obviously, things could go horribly wrong – the possibilities ranging from a nuclear exchange to incurable plagues, from terrorist anarchy to high-tech dictatorship. We should not assume that Providence will always exempt our nation from the irreversible tragedies that have overtaken so many others: not just temporary hardship, but debasement and total ruin. Losing in the next Fourth Turning could mean something incomparably worse. It could mean a lasting defeat from which our national innocence – perhaps even our nation – might never recover.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning

The most important point to comprehend is the death of the existing social order always occurs during the course of a Fourth Turning. Thus far, those constituting the Deep State hierarchy have fended off their demise. They are utilizing every tool at their disposal to retain their wealth, power and control. As their mass media propaganda machine falters, they have redoubled their rigging of financial markets to promote a narrative of economic recovery, while further enriching themselves and their cronies.

It is clear they have reached the peak of financial manipulation, money printing, and artificial interest rate suppression. The narrative is faltering. Their last and final option to retain power is war. As their “everything bubble” (stocks, bonds, real estate) inevitably implodes, civil and/or global military conflict will be utilized to distract the populace from their Deep State domestic disasters.

The time for compromise is long past. There are no moderates left in the political spectrum. The mood of the country is clearly trending towards conflict. Trump, as the grey champion of this Fourth Turning, has proven to be a lightning rod of hate. He infuriates his political opponents, the left wing media, many in his own party, foreign leaders, billionaires and most worrisome to his well-being – the shadowy surveillance state intel operatives.

To continue reading: The Unbearable Slowness of Fourth Turnings, Part Two

 

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The Unbearable Slowness of Fourth Turnings, Part One, by Jim Quinn

Posted on November 14, 2017 | Leave a comment

You know there’s a train wreck coming, you just don’t know when. From Jim Quinn at theburningplatform.com:

“The next Fourth Turning is due to begin shortly after the new millennium, midway through the Oh-Oh decade. Around the year 2005, a sudden spark will catalyze a Crisis mood. Remnants of the old social order will disintegrate. Political and economic trust will implode. Real hardship will beset the land, with severe distress that could involve questions of class, race, nation and empire. The very survival of the nation will feel at stake. Sometime before the year 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history, commensurate with the American Revolution, Civil War, and twin emergencies of the Great Depression and World War II.” – Strauss & Howe – The Fourth Turning 

This Fourth Turning was ignited suddenly in September 2008 as the housing bubble, created by the Federal Reserve and their criminal puppeteer owners on Wall Street, collapsed, revealing the greatest control fraud in world history. A crisis mood was catalyzed as the stock market dropped 50%, unemployment surged to highs not seen since 1981, foreclosures exploded, and captured politicians bailed out the criminal bankers with the tax dollars of the victims.

The mood of the country darkened immediately as average Americans flooded their congressmen’s websites and phone lines with a demand not to bailout the felonious Wall Street banks with $700 billion of TARP. But they ignored their supposed constituents and revealed who they are truly beholden to.

Trust in the political and financial system disintegrated and has further deteriorated as the ruling elite continue to loot and pillage as if the 2008/2009 global financial meltdown never happened. From the perspective of the archaic social order there is no longer a crisis. The recovery narrative, flogged ceaselessly by the crooked establishment and their propaganda fake news corporate media mouthpieces, has convinced millions of willfully ignorant Americans progress is occurring.

To continue reading: The Unbearable Slowness of Fourth Turnings

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Grey Champion Assumes Command (Part Two), by Jim Quinn

Posted on November 21, 2016 | Leave a comment

The second part of Jim Quinn’s delineation of the impending Fourth Turning and the emergence of a Grey Champion. From Quinn at theburningplatform.com:

In Part One of this article I discussed the arrival of Grey Champions in previous Fourth Turnings; their attributes, deficiencies, and leadership skills; and why Donald Trump is the Grey Champion of this Fourth Turning – whether you like it or not. Now I will try to make sense of what could happen next.

“Our movement is about replacing a failed and corrupt political establishment with a new government controlled by you, the American people. The establishment has trillions of dollars at stake in this election. For those who control the levers of power in Washington and for the global special interests, they partner with these people that don’t have your good in mind. The political establishment that is trying to stop us is the same group responsible for our disastrous trade deals, massive illegal immigration and economic and foreign policies that have bled our country dry.

It’s a global power structure that is responsible for the economic decisions that have robbed our working class, stripped our country of its wealth and put that money into the pockets of a handful of large corporations and political entities. The only thing that can stop this corrupt machine is you. The only force strong enough to save our country is us. The only people brave enough to vote out this corrupt establishment is you, the American people.” – Donald Trump

Seventy year old Donald Trump has assumed the Grey Champion flagstaff. In an increasingly chaotic world, normal working class Americans in flyover country were seeking a leader who could bring order, defeat the corrupt establishment, make tough decisions, and capture the zeitgeist of this moment in history. The ruling elite oligarchs and their fawning minions, occupying their strongholds in New York, California, Illinois, and D.C., are infuriated the peasants have dared to resist. In their secretive secure spaces, the elites are plotting with one purpose in mind – this uprising must be quelled.

They are now fanning the flames of discontent, funding professional protestors, and convincing the useful idiot college student millennials, Trump is dangerous to their future. It seems these mathematically challenged snowflakes have already forgotten about the $10 trillion of national debt and $1 trillion of student loan debt loaded on their backs by the Obama administration in the last 8 years. This is not to mention the $200 trillion of unfunded welfare liabilities awaiting them as they graduate with degrees in LGBT Studies and great jobs at TGI Fridays in their future.

As the legacy corporate mainstream media outlets hyperventilate over Trump going to dinner without informing them, while scorning and ridiculing his cabinet selections (even when he hasn’t made them yet), this Fourth Turning chaotically churns towards its inevitable bloody climax. The current violence in the streets may be Soros funded domestic terrorism, but it still creates more anger, bitterness, and further unwillingness to compromise or meet in the middle.

This country is manifestly divided between red and blue, with the red geographically occupying 85% of the country and blue centered in the liberal urban bastions of corruption. There are multiple civil wars brewing below the surface, between the establishment and the people; left versus right; rural versus urban; Wall Street and Main Street; and the haves versus the have nots. It hasn’t turned particularly bloody – YET.

To continue reading: Grey Champion Assumes Command (Part Two)

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