Farewell to Mike Ruppert

Farewell Michael Ruppert, and Thank You

“The path you're supposed to follow is the only one that is open in front of you”

---Michael C Ruppert

Shift Magazine,

May, 2014

Michael C. Ruppert was a peak oil analyst, investigative journalist, and activist. Many readers may know Mike as author of Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil, or as the subject of the 2009 documentary Collapse, based on his book A Presidential Energy Policy.

After a long battle with his personal demons, for reasons known only to him Michael C. Ruppert took his own life on April 13th 2014. A public memorial service/Celebration of Life was held in Portland, Oregon, on Saturday 17th May 2014. Among the speeches given by Mike’s nearest and dearest were a eulogy written by his close friend and business partner, Wesley T. Miller, and sections of a speech written by his friend and colleague, Jenna Orkin. Along with some parting words from Guy McPherson, these speeches are published in the pages that follow.

In solidarity with Mike’s nearest and dearest, and all those who connected with his message, we would like to bid farewell to Mike, and encourage folks to help him rest in peace by living life as he would have wanted: downshift, connect with your community, and prepare for a precarious future.

Goodbye Mike, and thank you so much for having the courage to take the path you took in life.

#1 from Jenna Orkin

Jenna Orkin, a colleague and friend of Michael Ruppert, is the author of The Moron’s Guide to Global Collapse. Portions of the speech below were read out at Mike’s public memorial on Saturday 17th May 2014. 

Mike Ruppert was a complex, brilliant, infuriating, funny, impossible, honest (usually), never boring, enraged, musical, competitive, generous, contradictory, dog-loving, horse-whispering, childlike giant who happened to be right about the most important problems facing the world today.

A psychologist once said, “You can’t have just a baby’s foot,” meaning, “You can’t have the cute parts of a baby without the sleepless nights and dirty diapers.”  Similarly, you can’t have Mike’s unique gifts to the world without the upheaval he generated around him.

To lionize him does not do him justice; he doesn’t need it.  He had his demons, both internal and external.  In fact, he epitomized the old saw, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not following you.”

He once said, “There is a deep flaw in me and that is the source of everything I’ve done.”  Driven to flee his own devils, he fought far greater ones on the global stage.  And although he didn’t succeed in single-handedly shifting the paradigm of the global economy, he got further than just about anyone else.

You don’t have to perform the mind-bending feat of accepting death by self-inflicted gunshot wound as a peace offering in order to show him respect.  To paraphrase Mike’s own eulogy to Gary Webb who also killed himself, only Mike knows why he finally did it after threatening for at least eight years.

Some of Mike’s accomplishments: From uncovering CIA drug-dealing, he went on to found fromthewilderness.com which revealed how the US banking system looted Russia after the fall of the USSR.  FTW also published documents which helped secure the release of CIA spy Edwin Wilson who had been convicted on the basis of perjured testimony by a CIA Executive Director.

But one of his greatest achievements occurred around 9/11. At FTW and in his book, Crossing the Rubicon, Mike showed that four months before the attacks, Vice President Dick Cheney had been put in charge of war game exercises; and that in spite of the multiple warnings from foreign intelligence agencies to the White House concerning a terrorist attack the week of September 9, at least five war games had been scheduled for that morning which drew planes away from the East Coast, where they would have been able to intercept the hijacked planes, to Alaska, Northern Canada, Greenland and Iceland.  FTW also revealed insider trading – exorbitant numbers of put options on the airlines involved in the attacks; a sure red flag that a major disaster was about to take place.

The best way to honor Mike is to understand and educate others on the fundamental lessons he taught. First, his favorite line:  “Until you change the way money works, you change nothing.” An economy based on infinite growth cannot continue indefinitely on a finite planet. Resources are being depleted as population growth marches on.  The population currently stands at seven times what it was when oil started being used to fuel the economy. No matter how smart our technology becomes, as easy oil inevitably wanes, the replacements cannot fill in at the same rate, certainly not without poisoning the air, water and soil as well as huge swaths of people.

If we don’t deal with this now, it will deal with us later and at far greater cost. That’s what Mike’s been trying to tell everyone for ten years. Relocalize. Grow food not lawns. And end our current economic system of fiat currency, fractional reserve banking and interest. Do that and Mike will be able to rest in peace.

Jenna Orkin

  

#2 – from Guy McPherson

Guy McPherson, a supporter and friend of Michael Ruppert, is a professor emeritus, writer and public speaker, and author of Walking Away from Empire and Going Dark, among other publications. Below are Guy’s heartfelt parting words for Mike.     

Michael C. Ruppert discovered my work in April 2012. He contacted me via email that month while I was on a speaking tour, and we connected via Skype the following day. I was interviewed by Michael on the Lifeboat Hour four times between mid-April 2012 and late December 2013. We corresponded occasionally between radio interviews, generally via online, electronic communication.

Michael became a huge supporter of my work shortly after making contact. By that time, I had read Crossing the Rubicon and had been following Michael’s work for nearly a decade. I was particularly impressed with his commitment to, and aptitude at, pursuing and synthesizing evidence. We were drawn to each other in large part because of our shared pursuit of evidence regardless of personal cost.

In supporting my work, Michael increased my reach and credibility. He was an unflagging colleague and friend. By the time he died, I was closer to Michael — even though we never met in person — than to my own blood relatives.

Michael’s pursuit of reliable information made him an enemy of the state, an outcome that undoubtedly shortened his life. He pulled the trigger, but he didn’t load the gun. He was disparaged for a long time and attempts to discredit him and his work surely took their toll.

In the end, the state did not need to assassinate Michael Ruppert because they successfully turned public opinion about him in a strongly negative direction. He was viewed as insane because of his radical views, thus reminding me of a line from Jiddu Krishnamurti: “It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.”

I miss Mike and his clear, strong voice. I am inspired by his work and his life, and I will strive to reach his high standards with my own work. And I will continue to grieve.

Guy McPherson