Welcome to Episode 22 of the Crackpot Podcast. LaFond and Lockhart welcome our first guest in this episode, Baruch, an Israeli settler who was born in Russia, grew up in the US, served in the Army in Iraq, worked as a contractor in Afghanistan, found his faith and moved to Israel. Along the way he became a reader, commenter and correspondent in the LaFondiverse.
The Crackpot Podcast features prolific author and urban survival expert James LaFond, and Lynn Lockhart, a mysterious woman.
Audio:
0:00:30 Introducing our first guest Baruch
0:00:50 Baruch's Russian Israeli boxing gym
0:02:30 How did Baruch start reading James LaFond?
0:04:27 A little about Baruch's background
0:06:10 Early days in the war in Afghanistan was "like a big game hunting preserve"
0:07:14
0:08:56 Baruch's animals, including James LaFond the cat
0:12:30 Details on Baruch's time in the Army, contrast with time as a private military contractor
0:17:10 The slow but continuous trickle of action in the post-9/11 wars, the rarity of firefights, parallels to the North American frontier
0:19:15 The Yazidis in Iraq
0:21:35 Baruch's caveat on his combat experience
0:22:58 James wants to know about the Kurds
0:24:00 What does Baruch really think about Arabs?
0:26:00 Kurds and other groups, phenotypes found in the area
0:30:18 Ibn Khaldun
0:31:24 Redhead Thracian slaves and other genetic introgressions
0:33:05 Empires of the Silk Road, Beckwith
0:34:30 Bacon's Rebellion Weissman
0:36:15 Baruch's bike trip
0:38:36 Baruch describes his home in Israel, convergent evolution with rednecks
0:40:30 Government treatment of settlers
0:41:55 Fences, the philosophy and tactical implications
0:46:00 How to deal with razor wire, the body breach
0:48:00 The time Baruch had to manage a mob of underpaid Afghanis
0:54:00 ISIS and the history of Islamic conquest
0:56:04 President Frothy Latte & the CIA
0:59:35 Saudi Arabia, Israel, the glowing orb, what's going on?
1:01:55 Wahabi, Salafi, Sufi, Shia, etc., does it make a difference to the West?
1:03:28 Apocalyptic prophesy in Islam
1:05:20 The role of Israel according to the Torah
1:06:15 How Baruch found his faith
1:07:50 Marcus Aurelius
1:08:30 Stoicism and Buddhism
1:08:55 The guy that lived in a barrel
1:12:18 Bottle and potty break (its the Crackpot and baby care podcast)
1:12:30 The legitimacy of the Sultanate
1:13:50 Maimonides, the Law of Kings and Wars
1:14:45 Principles in Islam which are borrowed from Judaism, how Muslims set up a Caliph and Caliphate, Emirs, involvement of kidnapped and forcibly converted Europeans, colonialism.
1:20:33 The Crusade Through Arab Eyes
1:21:20 The story of Joseph's slavery in Egypt
1:22:45 The parallel to the American political system
1:25:30 Trump in the election was like James LaFond in a WWF match
1:28:30 Pizzagate speculation
1:35:07 Hanukkah greeting from Baruch
Lynn and I have spoken of doing a guest once a month. On deck are Ishmael, Big Ron, Mescaline Franklin and Smitty the Crack Head across the street, if I can convince him I'm not a NARC.
I'm completely opposed to Baruch's view of flouridation and Christianity but agree with him on just about everything else. I'm happy the Jews now have an old-fashioned nation-state.
When I served in the IDF I sometimes helped guard settlements, not the isolated hilltops like where Baruch lives, but I've definitely had my brush with that culture, what's referred to broadly over there as the national-religious camp (the ultra-orthos are anti-nationalist, thus the distinction.) Personally, my hackles rise when someone says they've bought into anything hook, line and sinker, when someone has a dogma they've hit upon as the be-all, end-all. The whole idea of faith is that you can't know God's prerogatives. I think the chosen people concept lends itself to unwarranted expectations. In this sense the settlers have the same problem as liberals, conservatives and many other Jews, Christians and Muslims—-they want their machiavellianism with a heaping side of moralism, of rights and protections. I'm not a peacenik, and it takes balls to live where Baruch does, but you need a fuckton of public resources working behind you to be able to do that. And in my opinion it ain't right to raise kids out there if you can avoid it, if you have a safer alternative. But I can also see how it would be good for them.