 G'day mate 40 here so after you get your immediate needs met for for food for air for water for housing for clothing I think most of us spend much of our time our biggest drive is to increase in social status to increase in power to reduce the chances of getting humiliated and And I was just reading this 2008 book boys will be boys the glory days and party nights of the Dallas Cowboys Dynasty by Jeff Pullman and he talks here about the first Cowboys Buffalo Bills a Super Bowl and There's an incident here before the Super Bowl so it was played in February of 1993 Bill's linebacker Darrell Talley Had gone to a Sunset Boulevard nightclub called Rocksbury found himself face-to-face with Magic Johnson's bodyguard so Talley and Bill's quarterback Jim Kelly were quite drunk and they were teasing Magic Johnson who'd recently tested HIV positive about his nightclubbing ways and the teasing went too far so Johnson's bodyguard Ended up punching punching Talley in the face And and took him to the floor now now the Cowboys found this all hilarious, but They're encouraged in the heat of the action not one teammate came to Talley's defense There was he sat bloodied bloodied and humiliated on the Rocksbury floor teammates failed to gather around him So that happened to the Dallas Cowboys this past year their quarterback was knocked out by a dirty hit in the Washington Redskins game and The Cowboys did nothing to retaliate right they didn't they didn't come to the aid of their fallen quarterback So it indicated a certain lack of a spree to core a certain lack of group cohesion And so if you don't have your don't have your tribe behind you or your team behind you You're gonna feel a distinct lack of power now In the in the preparation for that Super Bowl the Cowboys quarterback Jimmy Johnson Was imploring his team to smack the Bill's quarterback Jim Kelly around even when there was no reason to do so Make sure he knows you're there Jimmy Johnson said touches uniform tap his helmet step on his foot Make him feel us make him scared So unless you're willing to do these kind of dirty tricks you don't really belong in the NFL Unless you're willing to hurt people you don't really get to play in the National Football League now a Lot of a lot of life is just like a full contact sport like like the the National Football League and Sometimes life is zero some like either you win or or the other person wins and The power in journalism for example This is Hamilton Nolan writing in Columbia journalism review October 20th, and he notes that Journalism at its rawest level is about power a lot of things in life is simply about power so You prove your importance as a journalist by humiliating important people so I have one friend who Just wanted to devote his life to journalism, but he just realized it was It was about doing interviews with people and then trying to select those quotes That would make the person look bad that you were like looking for human weakness and to magnify it and To draw attention to it because that's how you got status by taking down other people So journalism in many ways is like the National Football League you win by hurting other people so Journalism to show that you're important Yeah, that's like the the TV show and billions I win you lose that's how the world works To prove your worth as a journalist you have to bring important people to heal right in effect You have to you have to put there That heads of powerful people on pikes Journalism at its highest level is about raw power. There's only one way the press maintains its power in society by metaphorically putting the heads of powerful people on pikes so that people realize that it makes more sense to talk to you than to ignore you and If if the Washington Post the New York Times CBS news lose their power to do that lose the ability to put the heads of powerful people metaphorically on pikes then Powerful people in general will stop caring about what the press says does All right, so We've got we've got the Donald Trump example where he simply bypassed the press he was basically impervious to all the usual blows from the press and There was a guy at Gorka who got so exasperated with Ted Cruz's accusations the media were sitting on secret Trump scandals during the Republican primary that in 2016 he wrote a story listing the many scandals That the press had published about Donald Trump with absolutely no effect and he used the headline Ted Cruz Please help us. We have no idea how to stop Donald Trump Turns out that being utterly shameless and uttering the words fake news non-stop while having an entire right-wing media ecosystem Amplify your message really works Trump a pure creation of New York's tabloids is too vain and dumb to realize he could probably ignore the normal elite press altogether He is incredible accumulation of power In the face of countless well-documented scandals in the Washington Post the New York Times and elsewhere stories that would have brought down earlier residents is Proof of a concept that will be used by a smarter people in the future people no longer Need to pay as much attention to the prestige press. So what's the prestige press going to do now that? politicians and other powerful people no longer need to fear it I mean that no matter how meticulous they're reporting. It's not going to move the needle on entrenched public opinion when In the social media age Like the Washington Post the New York Times No struggle to catch up to the to the reach of Dan Bongino That right-wing commentator is so popular on Facebook Yeah, but definitely yummy So we've we've got a real shift in power like Tesla Shut down its media relations department powerful people no longer think they need The the news media. They don't need critical outlets such as the New York Times and the Washington Post Like we're living in a historic technology fueled shift in the balance of power between the media and its subjects the subjects of The media are winning the internet in general social media in particular destroyed one of the media's most important sources of power Being the only place that offers access to an audience So Alon Musk and say what everyone's to 40 million Twitter followers with no filter So therefore he does not feel compelled to listen to unpleasant questions from some reporter so Journalists experience this as a horrifying assault on the public's right to know and Their own special status as brave defenders of the public good. Well, they've been living in a world of delusion Because there's no necessary connection between what is news and what is true There's there's no special Quality to the to news it's simply a Vehicle for attracting eyeballs to sell advertising. It doesn't make democracy stronger It doesn't hold powerful people accountable. It doesn't hold money accountable None of that is inherent in in journalism so People are realizing that they no longer need to hold themselves accountable to unpleasant questions from journalists a Powerful people have long not wanted to talk to the press because they didn't want to The possibility of looking bad, but they did it because they felt they had no choice So the Washington Post New York Times 60 minutes would offer the carrot of great exposure to those who needed it But then they also had the carrot of great exposure and then the stick of You know, we can make you look horrible So Negotiating, you know, these contentious interviews with famous people Like it was it was treacherous, but you have to understand when the balance of power is shifting and power is constantly shifting all around us and You may not have the stomach to play the game, right in the NFL. Remember what they said about Jim Kelly, you know hit him step on his foot make him feel scared and in the second quarter Cowboys linebacker Ken Norton hit Jim Kelly in the knee and he just crumpled and knocked him out of the game So if you're not willing to do that, you can't play in the NFL If you're not willing to put metaphorically speaking people's heads on spikes, you're not going to succeed in the journalism industry Now, what do you do? When you're out of power, right? So it's fun to pay attention to power when you're gaining it But what about when you're steadily losing it? What do you do when you have no power? Well, then you turn inward So when Jews were in particularly desperate straits in history, they turned to Kabbalah Jewish mysticism So people turned to tend to turn inward. So I had about six years of my life where I was so sick I could I could only read maybe an hour a day and Otherwise, I could just kind of lie there and listen to classical music or just lie there in the silence And so I would turn inward for about six years of my life from about age 21 to 27 Because I'd essentially lost all power so Yeah, turn inward cultivate skills become worthy So philosopher Isaiah Berlin talked about this that when you lack power, of course, you have to retreat and When natural paths towards human fulfillment are blocked, so I couldn't at a hard time attracting women I couldn't accomplish anything academically. I couldn't work I couldn't didn't have the mental power to develop new skills. I was lonely isolated didn't have the energy to be around many people So what happens when the natural road towards human fulfillment is blocked? People tend to retreat into themselves become involved in themselves and try to create in inside the world that Evil fate had denied them externally So when ancient Greece Suffered under the onslaught of Alexander the Great He just began to destroy the city-states of Athens The Stoics and the Epicureans he preached this new morality of personal salvation And that's the same with Christianity the essence of Christianity is personal salvation from this fallen world to a much much better world So if you're totally failing in this life, if you feel like you have no power in this life a message of Individual salvation assured individual salvation to the next world. It's going to be very appealing If you're losing power in this life a message of stoicism, it's going to be very appealing. So this is the It's today a holiday for me. Not that I'm aware. Is it a national holiday? so When you're losing power like okay, Trump Trump was not reelected. So then you can turn to Personal salvation you can say oh politics is not important Right, so to deal with the pain of losing power in politics. You can say oh politics is not important Civil life. Oh, it's president's day. Oh, wow. How exciting president's day Is that it? Is that a holiday anymore? Like? do like Post post office workers there the day after day the courts closed today and banks closed today. Oh, it's a bank holiday blessings So if you're losing in politics, you're going to be tempted to say politics is not important if you have no no sway over Civic life, then you're going to say oh civil life. It's not important So all the great ideals held up by Pericles and Demosthenes and Plato and Aristotle well, they're now regarded as trivial and They're just essentially nothing before the imperative need for personal individual salvation so When you have no power in this world, you're going to be very tempted to you know Find power within yourself or within your beliefs or faith or fantasies about power in in another world So it's a very grand form of sale greats. You cannot obtain from the world that which you really desire You must teach yourself not to want what you really desire So if you cannot get what you want much you must teach yourself to want what you can get So this is spiritual retreat in depth Into a kind of inner citadel of the soul in which you try to lock yourself up install the fearful Hills of the world so I Was thinking about lying on your resume or lying about your credentials I don't believe I ever did that except when I was in Hollywood So in Hollywood this kind of lying is expected if you're not lying you're not trying So generally speaking lying about your credentials and your resume is a very bad idea But in certain circumstances such as in Hollywood, it's expected David Geffen Lied to get a job at the William Morris talent agency by claiming he had a degree from UCLA when he didn't but he worked in the mailroom and so when When a letter came back from UCLA saying that He he didn't have a degree. He just confiscated it so that there was no threat to his lie Now on the other hand you may think that you're reading your situation correctly and that you can get away with lying in your situation and Then there's like the Riley Weston story So Riley Weston was writing for a teenage focused TV show and claiming to be 18 when she was really 28 And then when she got exposed it was like this huge deal. So your thing when lying in Hollywood is just it's just like Expected right if you're not if you're not lying you're not trying but But then some sometimes reality can surprise you so she got absolutely humiliated So about 20 years ago, Disney thought that they had, you know, this very up-and-coming star And she was a perfect fit I don't know could she write and act but she held a strong appeal for teenagers because she was a teenager her name was Riley Weston and She when she embarked on a career as a writer actress She soon a little white lie about taking 10 years off her age wouldn't hurt. I mean because plenty of people lie well Somehow she ended up playing for them pretty high stakes. She worked for the famous JJ Abrams. He was not impressed Now a lot of people of course in Hollywood lie about their ages Yeah, so Elliot notes I got my start my vastly overstating my qualifications. So generally speaking not a good idea, but In some circumstance it can work. So Mila Kunis on that 70s show she claimed to be 18 when she was 14 So a lot of people in Hollywood have lied about their age And but then it can all come Tumbling tumbling down So you may think you're at your reading reality correctly But then boom Really love this quote. I kept referencing over the weekend about the advantages of fame You make yourself widely known and famous because you increase your chances of getting lucky Some way you can't predict it in advance one point of fame is simply to increase your surface area exposure to lucky accidents So that's the benefit of fame and also the downside of fame because you increase your exposure to bad things happening as well So on the same podcast where I where I heard that remark It was some author in the United Kingdom and he talked about the advantages Fame is the devil. Well as many advantages Yeah, many people think that people care about a college degree or that they even check. Yeah, so Sometimes you have to be be honest that you put yourself at a disadvantage by being honest In in the job market, so I was listening to this podcast with the UK author and he just made the point the constitutional monarchy Statistically speaking of showing to be a superior form of political organization Then Republics like the United States of America So it's just starting to think you hear this all the time when you talk to Canadians Australians New Zealanders the English That they they often find Ways to work into the conversation So how their people or their system of government in some way is is Superior to to America's so when I talk to Americans they never remark Oh, by the way, the American system or the American people are superior to Canadians in this way or superior to the English or to Australians like Americans don't care. They don't I never hear Americans talking about how that their system in Political system is superior to that of constitutional monarchy and it's very similar to the dynamic Would you rather live in the Wild West or a pod in San Francisco it all depend on the quality of my relationships so if you live in a pod in San Francisco, right if you live in a high High real estate price area your living room. It's not your living room. You don't have a living room You're living rooms local coffee shop So if you have great friends in the great community and an exciting job Then living in a pod in San Francisco is fine If if you have no friends then then it'll be miserable. So everything depends upon the quality of your friendships so people in In big cities their living room is the local coffee shop or restaurant or public park So I was thinking this is very similar to the difference between Northern California and Southern California So Northern California people are talking all the time about how they hate Southern California and what's wrong with Southern California Technological progress is not alienated us from other people Right, so most people are still married and have kids and are happy Only a very tiny percentage of the the population, you know gets into trouble on The Wild West had less medicine but more meaningful. I'm not not so sure Plenty of people have meaningful relationships today. If you're in a church or a synagogue community If you're established in your profession and your workplace if you have hobbies and interests Most normal people have a lot of meaningful relationships So I think social media is only problem for a tiny tiny percentage of the population and that problem is purely a symptom of a much greater problem, which is people are hooked on the dopamine fix of social media because Because they lack meaningful relationships So social media is not the cause of the lack of meaningful relationships People get into trouble with social media because they lack meaningful Relationships and they are addicted to the dopamine hits of social media to try to fill the hole that comes from not connecting normally to other people but most people I know have a lot of meaningful relationships I go to synagogue and I've known people there for 10 15 20 20 years It's chicken or the egg. No, I don't think it's chicken or the egg. Most people don't have a problem with social media Some of your small proportion of people most people do have substantial relationships is the problem the drugs or the drug user answer both not necessarily some people could like Ritalin is a form of methamphetamine and Some people a lot of people can use it without ill effect The people who have a problem with with drugs, right? They have a certain addictive personality that comes from lacking normal human connection So it's not the porn. It's not the drugs. It's not the social media. It's not the tech. These are just symptoms When these things become problems, these are just symptoms of a lack of ordinary human connection So I think in Northern California lived in Northern California for about 15 years and people are often talking about Southern California and what's wrong with Southern California and how much they hate Southern California, but the reversal is not true I'd never hit people in Southern California talk about how they love Northern California and what's wrong with Northern California Solution to amphetamine problem is to eradicate those users who can't handle it or to show them If you've got an amphetamine problem, it's just a wake-up call Right, it could be the greatest thing that ever happened to you. You should be grateful for your amphetamine problem because it means that you need to get help and work the 12 steps and restore a Healthy sense of relationship with yourself and with other people So if you've got an under-earning problem or a dating problem or a drinking problem or a drug problem Or a porn problem You should be grateful for that problem because it forces you to wake up and to get help Because the problem is not the problem. The problem is just a symptom of a much deeper problem Which is a lack of normal human connection Porn isn't the problem point is used by millions of people in a responsible way So there are people who have Looked upon and have not seemed to suffer any You know concrete empirical deleterious effects So So one of the things I like about living in Los Angeles is you never hear any need by Los Angelinos to run down any other city There's no other city that people in Los Angeles hate And that's kind of nice But why is it that Americans in general don't feel a need to proclaim how their political system or their people are superior to other people's? But people in smaller countries are constantly doing their best to help them out But people in smaller countries are constantly doing that vis-a-vis America I think it's because America's got such a big imprint on the rest of the world that the people to Maintain their own unique identity. They have to constantly compare and contrast themselves with you know the big empire So Jews a majority of Jews have lived in the diaspora for about 2,600 years So how did Jews maintain a separate identity living in the diaspora for 2,600 years? and that was by constantly comparing themselves to the majority culture and Usually with an eye of comparison about how what was Jewish was superior to that which was non-Jewish So in Jewish life, you'll often hear. Oh, that's Goyish, you know, meaning that's silly. That's nonsensical That's unintelligent, right? And so all the the goyim do this, but we do this the goyim see things this way or We you know, we see things You know in a superior more more profound way and so I think that's what's going on with say Australians and the English and Kiwis You talk to them and with it when they find out you're from America that they need to tell you how you know Their way their people are superior to Americans in this way or Their political system is superior to the American system in this way because when you're a minority or when you got when you're dealing with some You know major dominating sense of identity and you want to maintain your smaller separate identity the only way you can do that is by constantly comparing and contrasting yourself with the outgroup in a way that Your group is superior. So I think Jews do this people in Northern California do this Now when you have the dominant power, so in the state of California Southern California is more powerful than Northern California You don't need to do this. So Americans feel no need to proclaim how the American system of politics is, you know Superior say to constitutional monarchy Americans have any Reaction to say, you know the British system. It's it's either mild or oh, that's kind of cool Now you're doing things somewhat differently. Good on your mate so But in Australia, Canada England Ireland Australia New Zealand like I noticed people constantly pointing out how their system their country their people are better than Americans in this or that way Okay, you can see Northern California is dominant, but But for example if you're running for the United States Center from California, most votes are in Southern California now Northern California is economically per person is Much more successful than Southern California But more people meaning more votes are in Southern California Why did Jews not get a territory like Mormons were they to non sedentary? I don't think it was a realistic option so Jews are an urban people and So they made their money by money lending by medicine the world resents American power US dollar buying power Right, so when you're number one, you don't care. You're not threatened by smaller groups When you're a smaller group the only way that you can feel good about your identity is constantly comparing and contrasting yourself with With the major group and think about oh, we're superior in this way So if you've got a strong in-group identity You're constantly in all likelihood be looking at the world through different lenses trying to look for how your group is superior So pretty much every every group does this Like Tom Wolf gave the author Tom Wolf who died about a year ago. He gave a famous talk in something like 2000 and in 2006 lecture he said each individual Adopts a set of values which if truly absolute in the world So ordained by some almighty force would make not that individual But his group the best of all possible groups the best of all inner circles So yeah, every group every person tends to look at the world whereby their group is absolutely superior and So you just keep looking for lens like oh, we're superior athletically or we're superior economically We are superior spiritually or we're superior at dance And so we we adopt We adopt values That that help us to think that you know our way is better So Tom Wolf said I think every living moment of a human being's life Unless the person is starving an immediate danger of death in some way is controlled by a concern for status Is restless leg syndrome a real condition or has it been made up to the need of pharmaceutical companies? Well, I think if you talk to someone who has it It's real to them. So I Think remember words are just metaphors for reality. So there's restless leg syndrome. Is that a metaphor for reality? Is that an effective? Metaphor for reality. So that's what I would say. And yeah, I think rest restless leg syndrome is an effective metaphor for for reality All right, something's going on that people have Have trouble and and so and so that that metaphor Right that they have trouble sleeping and they toss and turn right you you've heard about people tossing and turning so I Would use that same with like sex addiction or porn addiction or love addiction. Is it a real disease like cancer? It's a useful metaphor for people who tend not to make good decisions in those areas and have some problems in those areas So Tom Wolf said There's 2006 speech even before I left graduate school. So he did a PhD in American history I come to the conclusion that virtually all people live by what I think of as fiction absolute Meaning each individual adopts a set of values, which if truly absolute in the world So ordained by some almighty force would make not that individual but his group the best of all possible groups the best of all inner circles Politicians the rich the celebrated become mere types Does this apply to intellectuals also? Yes? So the human being's belief in his own fiction absolute accounts One of the most puzzling and in many cases irrational phenomena of our time So it's hinted at in the 2004 book what's the matter with Kansas Thomas Frank wrote that book wondering why doesn't Kansas vote Democrat and Tom Wolf said he was at a subject at a conference on the subject of Latin American writing and it quickly got into topic of immigration and Tom Wolf arrived believing that Mexicans who had gone to the trouble of coming to the United States Legally going through all the prescribed steps would resent the fact that millions of Mexicans were now coming to the United States Illegally across the desert border, but he was completely mistaken I Discovered that everyone who thought of himself as Latin even people who'd been in the country for three generations were whole-heartedly in favor of Immediate amnesty and immediate citizenship for all Americans who happened now to be in the United States And this feeling had nothing to do with immigration policy itself Nothing to do with law. Nothing to do with politics. There's not a debate about immigration The very existence of the debate was to them a besmirching of their fiction absolute of their conception of themselves as Latinos Somehow the debate cast an aspersion upon all Latinos implying Doubt about their fitness to be within the border of such a superior nation And this this accounts for the extraordinary emotions of sports fans, you know what earthly connection to the Citizens of New York City have to the New York Yankees And how can such a team get such a strong grip on local emotion? So we see Championism in its most elemental form as far back as a story of David and Goliath in the Bible Human beasts has become excited by those who represent them in what at that stage of history was known as single combat So before battle each side would send forth its champion. So Goliath was awesome and Then there was a young warrior named David who volunteered to take on Goliath And he proceeded to slay Goliath with a slingshot and the Philistine army panicked and fled So the defeat of its great champion was seen as a sign from the gods They fled the Israelites pursued and slaughtered them So this notion of a surrogate a champion who can represent an entire city Entire people give them an exaltation of victory when they triumph and plunge them into depression or defeat when they lose This has been going on for millennia So consider the toxic power of humiliation right It's a it's a very deep wound it's a it destroys your picture of yourself and Destroys what you see as your own social standing So there was in New York City a drug dealer named Pappy Mason He was out of prison on parole standing on a sidewalk in front of a bar with a group of his buddies drinking a beer police detective drove by and recognized him he stopped and said Mason You know what stupid is stupid is what you're doing right now drinking in public You get your ass back in that building or I'm taking your ass in Now here was Mason in front of his buddies. He had a terrible decision to make you could take his ass inside meant You know going to the precinct station and being booked so drinking on the sidewalk was a misdemeanor But it was enough to violate his parole and put him right back in prison On the other hand just caving in to the cop in front of his friends and slinking back inside the bar was unthinkable So he had to go back and forth, you know, which form of humiliation and so finally decided, you know We need to go kill a cop and so three three of his friends decided they'd go out and kill a killer cop Or to try to take back You know that that feeling of humiliation So a wound to one social status not to one's body not to one's bank account Not to one's general fortunes, but a wound to one status can have such a severe effect Upon a psyche that will often cause people to go out commit murder It's a much primal pain. Even the most trivial the most unlikely of circumstances Can give rise to humiliation? Let's have a look at the chat here ADHD isn't just energetic boys. It's people who can't concentrate have short attention span or easily distracted. Yeah, so Apparently about five percent of boys benefit from medication for You know, it's this this thing. So if people's lives are benefited Without much harm, then I think the diagnosis of ADHD is a metaphor for something real is The disgust reflex that causes people is it the disgust disgust reflex that causes people to ostracize the humiliated Yeah, we have certain We have certain innate tendencies to to back away from the humiliated or the sick or the dying So remember no one wanted to go to Hillary Clinton's rallies in 2016 because she looked like she was dying That's why it helps to belong to a small tight-knit community because if a member of your own community is suffering You're much more likely to overcome those disgust feelings to to go visit someone Is ADHD a real condition or is it a label applied to boys to pathologize the natural energy of young boys? Well Sometimes it's a useful metaphor for reality that helps Some boys lead or some adults lead a superior life I talked about Madafino on Saturday night and how it helps a lot of people who kind of borderline ADHD They take Madafino as a Attacks for them as a massive force multiplier and improves the quality of their lives now can ADHD Be misused as a diagnosis. I can sometimes a metaphor for reality not accurately fit sure So sometimes ADHD is a useful metaphor for reality that enables some people to get help that they need and sometimes it's pathologization of the natural energy of young boys A B says people from the Northern Territory in Australia see that about people from New South Wales, right? Because the Northern Territory is small New South Wales has you know, 40 times the power of Northern Territory So the the things that we will do to try to avoid humiliation right People agonize over how much of a tip they should give Because they they don't want to be humiliated Undergraduate life in universities involves a status system in which sexual activity can be summed up It's our eyes met our lips met our bodies met and then we were introduced So the attitude of young women towards sex It made about a hundred and eighty degree turn between say 1959 and 1972 there was a time when the very worst word you could say about a young woman was slut now Many young women in in university. They want to at least create a facade of sexual experience so Tom Wolf heard a conversation between a Boy and girl at college and the boy was saying how could we you know have sex? We've known each other since high school would be like incest and then the girl says please I can't stand the thought of having to do it with somebody I hardly know and can't trust So she was beseeching her old platonic friend of many years standing to please relieve her of her virginity That way she could honestly maintain the proper social stance as an experienced young woman in college Is getting young boys to sit sit still necessarily an improvement Sitting can can deform the body and and the spirit So I guess their advantages to sitting and their advantages to not sitting complicated ADHD describes the mismatch between masculinity and the modern world well For some people who suffer from it and found a solution for it it the solution massively improved their lives Other people are being wrongly diagnosed So I don't think and I think it's one thing or the other Little boys can't channel their natural aggression in healthy ways or turn inwards Yeah, you want to be able to channel your natural So the educational system does seem to be quite anti-male For example boys would love classes in military history or military strategy, but you know, they get denied that So education tends to be highly feminist Young boys with ADHD should be training in combat sports all day instead of being lectured to about the history of progress Yeah, so yeah boys need Need exercise and ways to channel their aggression ADHD medication has emotionally blunted them, okay, maybe but If for some people whether they're boys or men or women or girls medication There's on the one hand some kind of emotional blunting but overall they've experienced a massive increase in the quality of their life and in their ability to cope and perhaps at extreme levels as Reduce the chances of them self-harming or harming other people Right. So sometimes these diagnoses and medications can be useful and sometimes they can be harmful hypersexualizing young girls for 60-plus years was a plan really planned by Who to be continued?