This just in: Wall Street A-Listers Fled to Florida. Many Now Eye a Return, Bloomberg News reported. For the record, “USPS data shows few New Yorkers moved to Miami, Palm Beach; New Jersey, California and Connecticut were most popular moves.”

Looks like things are about to return to normal, right?

In case you missed it, Google will invest $250 million this year in building out New York City office presence, while Facebook Bets Big on Future of N.Y.C., and Offices, With New Lease, and note to self, “With the 730,000-square-foot lease, Facebook has acquired more than 2.2 million square feet of office space in the city for thousands of employees in less than a year, all of it on Manhattan’s West Side,” the New York Times reported. Meanwhile, we saw Amazon buying Lord & Taylor building for $1.15 billion, “While Facebook has been in talks to lease the 700,000-square-foot Farley Building, Apple last month inked a lease on 220,000 square feet at 11 Penn Plaza,” said the New York Post. Why Is Jeff Bezos Buying Up Apartments in the Coronavirus Capital?, Realtor.com queried during the height of the pandemic.

Why indeed and lest we forget, all of these companies already had a considerable footprint in NYC even prior to the pandemic. While many formerly NY-based companies, shops and restaurants pulled up stakes – or were driven out due to high rents and property damage – seems that the various members of the tech cabal didn’t bat an eyelash, and rather, waited for real estate prices to drop, even though it seems some will still pay top dollar.

We’ve long referred to the various members of the tech cabal as nation states, considering that they have dominion over more people than any government on the planet, with the possible exception of China, in some cases. And considering the amount of censorship they’ve been practicing – including Google/YouTube, Apple, Facebook and Twitter – they do have the means and more than enough opportunity to control the conversation, especially at a time when the entire planet was locked down and social gathering strictly prohibited.

As for the lockdowns themselves, while most stores (larger chains such as Walmart being the exceptions) were shuttered, and moms-and-pops driven out of business, Amazon became the purveyor of goods and groceries to the world. For some reason, and never mind the number of handlers that came between delivery to the warehouses, packing into boxes, movement onto trucks and then on to the final destinations, Amazon products were immune from spreading the corona virus, and to say that the company flourished is an understatement.

Now, with these companies more or less taking over large swaths of property in Manhattan (which is also Amazon’s second headquarters), who are they exactly and what is going on?

Let’s defer to one of our very favorite books: George Orwell’s 1984 and the ministries that basically controlled the population, and their modern-day equivalents:

Ministry of Thought: Google – they control search, and you see what they want you to see

Ministry of Plenty: Amazon (and you must have noticed the price increases, too: surge pricing, baby)

Ministry of Truth: Facebook (with their army of ‘fact checkers;’ media-driven and commoditized discourse only, and thanks for sharing)

Ministry of Peace: Twitter (think culture mobs and the attacks on anyone who may move you to think differently: war is declared on people – and products – not in line with the talking points, to bring about peace, of course)

Ministry of Love: Tinder, where love has been reduced to swipe right/swipe left. Love has become a mechanical event.

 

Still believe that Big Tech can or will be broken up? They have been consolidating their power for years, devouring or crippling potential competitors (Parler, whose user base was soaring until they were removed from the app store), and who was it who decided that Amazon would receive a get out of jail free card while other retailers were forced to close? It’s all pure theater.

In fact, the Biden Administration Ramping Up For New Battle Over Net Neutrality, and we will remind you how the cabal flourished the last time around under Net Neutrality (Was Net Neutrality Truly Neutral? Here’s the Score Card). The ISPs never blocked content, as the cabal claimed they would, although the cabal does, via censorship and deplatforming. Under Net Neutrality, 2016 IPOs Hit Lowest Count Since 2009.  The number of acquisitions Google made was much higher than after it was reversed. Facebook also made many more acquisitions than there were IPOs during that period. Same with Amazon, especially in sectors where the company looked to expand its footprint, including hardware, home services, financial services and the cloud. 2013 – pre Net Neutrality – was a Blockbuster Year For IPOs: 218 IPOs And Beyond, according to Seeking Alpha, while Only 13 Venture Capital-Backed Tech IPOs in 2016, before it was reversed.

Net Neutrality is little more than doublethink.

We also hear a lot about the New Normal and how people will continue to work remotely, including office workers. If that’s what’s truly in the cards, why did the cabal buy up all of that NYC real estate? We’re sure that the buying spree is not over, and that they don’t plan on having those offices remain empty.

We once had a tee shirt that read, “New York, New York – the city so nice, they named it twice.” In case you’re wondering where Big Brother’s new global headquarters will be? Well, that would be New York, New York, which we said twice, just in case you missed it the first time. Onward and forward.