America’s Cultural Meltdown
423: Blackstone Shooter, Ethereum Bid, Social Tension
Morning all.
Hope the week is off to a good start.
Reception to the Gender Wars post Friday was overwhelmingly positive with a handful of angry trolls, but I was fully expecting that.
I talk about everything in Arb Letter — there’s nothing I really consider off limits. Reason being, everything I cover here — from markets to crypto to politics to society to global affairs, is in one way or another related.
We all want to be more informed, wealthier, and more successful.
We want to live lives of purpose and tune out the noise that the masses eagerly gobble up to fuel their average existence and endless cope about the true nature of the world.
The world’s unraveling faster than the media and normies will admit — from racially charged attacks and censorship laws to institutions racing into crypto while cities see mass shootings. But in that chaos, there’s clarity and today’s Arb Letter walks you through both the danger and the upside we see before us.
It’s one of those Arb Letter posts that covers so much it should likely be two separate posts, but for the sake of making sure you guys can keep up with everything relevant we’re going to put it all into one today.
We’re starting off with this week’s major news stories including:
The active shooter attack in Midtown New York City yesterday at the NFL and Blackstone building
Claims that Sydney Sweeney’s American eagle ad is a Nazi dogwhistle (lmao)
Racially motivated attacks at a Jazz Festival in Ohio
The stabbing at a Walmart in Michigan
New Censorship in the United Kingdom
Some of the bullish catalysts and market trends we will discuss in today’s post include:
The S&P 500 hitting over 6,400 for the first time in history yesterday
President Trump striking an insane trade agreement with the EU
Institutions continuing to accumulate Ethereum at a rapid rate
There is a significant amount I want to cover today so let’s get right into it. A new episode of Risk On will be dropping either tomorrow or Thursday morning. If you want a recap of the last crypto episode you can find it on Spotify.
Racial, Cultural, and Societal Tension Growing In the United States
The Cultural and societal crisis I describe often in Arb Letter continues to get worse by the week. Even the second Trump Administration wasn’t enough to fully stop this degenerate shit from continuing to occur.
This is by far the most taboo topic out there that people shy away from discussing even with the relative easing up we’ve seen on political discourse in the US in the past 8 months or so.
The conflict we are seeing takes many forms — in the example below, it’s non violent and merely a social reaction. But as you’ll see later on, other developments are very much violent and kinetic in nature, the next extension of when ideology moves past a boiling point of discussion or slogans.
If you missed it, blonde bombshell and smoke-show of the hour Sydney Sweeney, starred in a recent American Eagle denim campaign with the tagline “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans.”
The ad plays on the sound-alike phrase “great genes” which was obviously a pun intended to be a pun for denim but far left lunatic critics are saying it has echoes of eugenics-era language praising “perfect genetics.”
Let’s cut to the chase.
Sydney Sweeney does have good genes lol regardless of what race she is, the joke is funny.
She is objectively attractive.
The main problem?
She’s white and in shape.
It’s a major departure from the absurd Nike ads of the last 5 years.
Far left lunatics in the media all the way to the dreaded pits of Linkedin are taking to the internet to launch theories that American Eagle was scheming up some sort of bizarre Nazi dog whistle operation or white supremacy op with this ad.
That’s where we are people.
Everything can be celebrated EXCEPT whiteness.
If whiteness is celebrated OR in this case just present in a humorous ad — it has to be Nazism and white supremacy.
It’s getting impossible to deny the proliferation and rise of this attitude in the US and it’s disturbing.
Despite the maniacal outrage, the campaign has helped lift American Eagle’s stock by up to 12–18% lmao.
Cry more.
Midtown Manhattan Shooting
A gunman opened fire Monday evening inside a high-rise office building at 345 Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, home to major firms like Blackstone, the NFL, and Deutsche Bank.
The shooter, identified as a 27-year-old man from Las Vegas wearing body armor and armed with a rifle, entered the building around 6:30 p.m. and began firing near the lobby.
He shot five people, including a NYPD officer who was killed while working a private security detail, and he wounded several others before barricading himself on an upper floor and dying from a self-inflicted gunshot.
Police and federal agents responded within minutes, clearing the tower floor by floor and securing the scene. Eyewitnesses described scenes of chaos as workers hid in offices, locked bathrooms, and evacuated in panic.
Authorities say the attack appeared planned and footage showed the shooter simply walking into the office with his AR-15 by his side in one of America’s most strictly controlled gun zones. The event stunned the city and raised new concerns about urban security vulnerabilities in major commercial corridors.
Officials and law enforcement reported later last night that the shooter has been ID'ed as Shane Tamura, 27, from Las Vegas. Officials said last night that it is confirmed he drove across the country to NYC from Las Vegas over the last several days and they found “medication” in his vehicle, suggesting some history of mental illness.
Contrary to CNN’s classic immediate call that this guy was "possibly white” Tamura is apparently half Black and half Japanese. There is no clear motive but Tamura was reportedly a gifted football player in high school (maybe he was out to target the NFL?).
There’s also the possibility this was some anti capitalism or anti Trump attack given Blackstone’s CEO supported Trump in the last election.
It could even be related to Palestine x Israel as well. There were some reports of two others arrested, both of which were said to be chanting “Free Palestine”.
I suspect we will know a bit more tomorrow but do not be surprised if this story gets buried. Whether it’s the Trump assassination attempts, Luigi the UNH killer, and other recent examples — these things tend to fade into the wind.
Makes you wonder what is actually going on with these lone wolf shooters.
My prayers and thoughts are with anyone impacted yesterday in Midtown including the NYPD officer whose wife was apparently pregnant.
Attacks in Ohio
There’s a disturbing trend happening more and more lately across the US — race charged crimes and assaults.