On Marriage
Or at least, on my marriage. Yesterday was a special day for me. January 7th wasn't a birthday, or anniversary, or indeed any particular date of note in and of itself. But January 7th, 2020 marked the day where I had been married to my wife longer than I had ever been single. Yes, I counted.
And while on one hand it represents just a statistical oddity, and was marked by no great fanfare, it was nonetheless important to me. And it struck me as the sort of thing that Cass would have marked on VC back in the day. And moreso, she would have some valuable insight into the institution of marriage, or time, or the relationship between men and women that would have sparked an interesting discussion. As I said, I've been reading my way through the archives (currently I'm on September of 2013), and I decided that since she's not posting about this sort of thing at the moment, I'll do my best to channel the inner Cassandra and find something interesting to observe. I can't promise I'll be successful.
And while on one hand it represents just a statistical oddity, and was marked by no great fanfare, it was nonetheless important to me. And it struck me as the sort of thing that Cass would have marked on VC back in the day. And moreso, she would have some valuable insight into the institution of marriage, or time, or the relationship between men and women that would have sparked an interesting discussion. As I said, I've been reading my way through the archives (currently I'm on September of 2013), and I decided that since she's not posting about this sort of thing at the moment, I'll do my best to channel the inner Cassandra and find something interesting to observe. I can't promise I'll be successful.
Official fictions
I am as usual very confused about international military strategy; the American people can count themselves lucky that I'm not their chief executive. Still, I've been impressed with Lee Smith's reporting on the appalling Russian collusion story to have some confidence in his ability to sift through propaganda and outright lies, so I thought I'd give his Iranian analysis a try:
The Iranian revolution was evidence to our ruling class of how much their fathers had gotten wrong—and thus proof of their own virtue.
* * *
U.S. policymakers preferred the fiction that Hezbollah was a homegrown product because it supported both their emotional needs and their policy goals: The West had earned the righteous anger of the natives, and there was nothing to be done except atone by way of offering human sacrifices.
* * *
Six U.S. administrations were complicit in turning Iran into a regional power. In that context, the Obama administration’s decision to flood Iranian war chests with cash and recognize its right to build a nuclear bomb was the logical culmination of the rot eating away at the Beltway for four decades. It was perhaps to be expected that an outsider who often doesn’t know when to keep quiet, and can’t stay off Twitter, would be the one to sing out like the boy in the fairy tale. It’s true, the emperor has no clothes. The rules have changed but that doesn’t mean the Iranians won’t be looking for revenge.
BB: Methodists Split Over Remaining Christian
Apparently a tough choice.
“There was just no way to reconcile differences,” said Rev. Lloyd Patrick, one of those dismayed by the recent push by traditionalists to follow the Bible instead of each person’s own heart. “A lot of people still want to follow Jesus -- a person from 2000 years ago who made no statements about pronouns and thus has no relevance today -- which is just silly since we all know so much more now and have a better grasp on morality than a bunch of ancient people.”
A Carol to Celebrate the Epiphany
Just thought a carol would be appropriate to celebrate today, the Epiphany. Allison Kraus and Yo-Yo Ma doing the Wexford Carol, for your enjoyment:
Hibernation
I almost thought it was Spring, with all the anti-war Democrats emerging. It's seems like only yesterday, that Smilin' Joe Biden went on record saying that if Iran attacked any American facility it would be considered an act of war and warrant "any" retaliation. I think Iran is way past due.
Something else to investigate
From the Spectator:
Why, you may ask, is the Obama shadow government continuing its efforts to resurrect the atrocious and inexplicably deleterious Iran nuclear deal? The answer to that question may lie in the following May 8, 2018 Tweet by one Raman Ghavami (@Raman_Ghavami) which was made following Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal and imposition of trading sanctions. Citing the senior adviser to Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif, Ghavami’s Tweet reads in full as follows:
H.J. Ansari Zarif’s senior advisor: ‘If Europeans stop trading with Iran and don’t put pressure on US then we will reveal which western politicians and how much money they had received during nuclear negotiations to make #IranDeal happen.’ That would be interesting.
Can this be true? Were western politicians — including members of the Obama administration — paid by Iran to enter into the idiotic and dangerous Iran nuclear deal? Could this also explain why, as found by the Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations, the Obama administration lied to Congress to gain approval of the deal while it worked behind the scenes to allow Iran access to U.S. financial markets? Could it be that officials of the Obama administration were and continue to be motivated by Iranian payoffs to sell out America?
That explains it
Presidential candidate Joe Biden makes a hash of answering the question whether he was lying when he claimed people could keep their plans under Obamacare, or simply didn't understand the legislation he was advocating.
No, look, the fact is that what I’m talking about now is that when – because I get asked the question – since, what I do is I’d add a public option to the existence of Obamacare, meaning that a Medicare-like option is available if in fact you – but there’s 160 million people out there who’ve negotiated a health care plan with their employer that they like and they don’t want to have to give up like Medicare for All requires. It says you have to give it up. You cannot have any private insurance.
* * *
But the fact is that when something’s taken away, when you – people didn’t know. I used to say to President Obama, “Mr. President, why don’t you take a victory lap? You got this passed. Let people know exactly what’s happened.”
…And he’d say, “We don’t have time to take a victory lap. We have too many things we have to do.” So people didn’t know, and we lost the House of Representatives after that passed. And people attributed to the fact that Obamacare passed and that was one of the arguments made, whether it’s true or not.
Continental drift
One of the best things about YouTube is its animated timelines for human or geological history. This one shows the movement of continents from the beginnings of large, organized life almost 550 million years ago. (Simpler life apparently started billions of years earlier, but left much more ambiguous traces.)
One of my favorite parts is the subcontinent of India shooting off towards Asia like something shot out of a sling. That's some impact. It started about 50 million years ago, which was before people, but after dinosaurs. India was hanging around down near Madagascar when it got caught on a fast conveyor belt that was getting sucked under Asia. It looks like a floating raft headed for a storm drain, but too big to fit. Australia is still on a collision path with Asia, though a much slower one.
This video was embedded in an interesting article from Watts up with That, summarizing the hot and ice ages over the last 550 million years, the point being that Earth's heating and cooling during geological eras is affected by the predominance or scarcity of continents in the tropical zones. We are currently in a 30-million-year-old ice age, a condition encountered only about a tenth of the time over geological timescales, but because we evolved during it, it strikes us as the way things ought to be for "life." In fact, however, we're in a geological brief interglacial period within a much more severe ice age. Humans wouldn't care for the more severe manifestations of a typical ice age.
Why are there ice ages? There is an interesting, but far from settled, link between the Sun's orbit through the Milky Way Galaxy and the typical 150-million-yearish cycle of ice ages.
One of my favorite parts is the subcontinent of India shooting off towards Asia like something shot out of a sling. That's some impact. It started about 50 million years ago, which was before people, but after dinosaurs. India was hanging around down near Madagascar when it got caught on a fast conveyor belt that was getting sucked under Asia. It looks like a floating raft headed for a storm drain, but too big to fit. Australia is still on a collision path with Asia, though a much slower one.
This video was embedded in an interesting article from Watts up with That, summarizing the hot and ice ages over the last 550 million years, the point being that Earth's heating and cooling during geological eras is affected by the predominance or scarcity of continents in the tropical zones. We are currently in a 30-million-year-old ice age, a condition encountered only about a tenth of the time over geological timescales, but because we evolved during it, it strikes us as the way things ought to be for "life." In fact, however, we're in a geological brief interglacial period within a much more severe ice age. Humans wouldn't care for the more severe manifestations of a typical ice age.
Why are there ice ages? There is an interesting, but far from settled, link between the Sun's orbit through the Milky Way Galaxy and the typical 150-million-yearish cycle of ice ages.
Food on the vine
This was fun. I'd seen some of these crops growing, like pineapples and brussels sprouts, but not others.
Sex Differences in America: A Partial List
It’s one-sided but it’s also AEI. The data is thus probably accurate, even if it is cherry-picked to make their point.
Cass asked a very important question
"Do chickens have lips."
Well, much like with the question for the ages answered over at Villainous Company (do cats have elbows), I posed this question to my veterinarian friends. And one of them has kindly answered:
"As a doctor of veterinary medicine as well as a proud Avian Biology degree holder...
..... Nah."
So there you have it, Cassandra. From as expert a source as I personally know.
Well, much like with the question for the ages answered over at Villainous Company (do cats have elbows), I posed this question to my veterinarian friends. And one of them has kindly answered:
"As a doctor of veterinary medicine as well as a proud Avian Biology degree holder...
..... Nah."
So there you have it, Cassandra. From as expert a source as I personally know.
A Study in Adjectives
Reason is worried about the spread of populism, which one of its sources defines as 'autocratization.' ("Autocratization" is defined by V-Dem as: "any substantial and significant worsening on the scale of liberal democracy. It is a matter of degree and a phenomenon that can occur both in democracies and autocracies….Semantically, it signals the opposite of democratization, describing any move away from [full] democracy.")
But wait a minute. "Populism" has its root in the Latin for 'people' just as "Democracy" has its roots in "Demos," Greek for 'people.' The first "populist" party in the United States was a late 19th century party of farmers and workers, just as the Democratic party transitioned into being during the 20th century. The article specifies that populists divide 'the true people' from another group who is exploiting or oppressing them, but just tune into one of the innumerable Democratic debates: they're all about how 'the people' are being exploited by various enemy groups -- the rich, billionaires, Republicans, white people or male people or privileged people of whatever sort. The rhetoric of the Democratic party has long been that it is the party of the honest, hard-working underdogs unfairly oppressed by the powerful; it only differs from moment to moment as to whether the system of power is racism, capitalism, sexism, or whatever else. Aside from the fact that one uses a Latin root and the other a Greek root, what's the difference?
Reason itself goes on to state that these populists aren't likely to go away soon because "People feel locked out of decision-making, and until that sense of democratic responsibility is restored, there's going to be one messy Brexit after another." If that's true, though, why would you describe "people" successfully contesting "being locked out of decision-making" as autocratization rather than democratizing? The Demos is capturing power; the system is becoming more responsive to the people who make it up, rather than whatever powers that had ruled it heretofore.
It may be that we are witnessing in America and Brazil a division of a nation into two "peoples," each of which has a democratic/populist mode of organizing. If so, both here and there it may be that division of the single nation into at least two nations is the only way to enable a democratic system to function in the healthy way, i.e., defending the interests of the people rather than imposing the will of one people onto another. Failing that, what you have isn't autocracy -- autocracy is what is ending. What you have are two different demos engaged in a struggle for dominance.
That's a serious problem, but it's not the problem these think tanks believe that they're experiencing. They are trapped in their adjectives, and unable to see the truth beyond their words.
But wait a minute. "Populism" has its root in the Latin for 'people' just as "Democracy" has its roots in "Demos," Greek for 'people.' The first "populist" party in the United States was a late 19th century party of farmers and workers, just as the Democratic party transitioned into being during the 20th century. The article specifies that populists divide 'the true people' from another group who is exploiting or oppressing them, but just tune into one of the innumerable Democratic debates: they're all about how 'the people' are being exploited by various enemy groups -- the rich, billionaires, Republicans, white people or male people or privileged people of whatever sort. The rhetoric of the Democratic party has long been that it is the party of the honest, hard-working underdogs unfairly oppressed by the powerful; it only differs from moment to moment as to whether the system of power is racism, capitalism, sexism, or whatever else. Aside from the fact that one uses a Latin root and the other a Greek root, what's the difference?
Reason itself goes on to state that these populists aren't likely to go away soon because "People feel locked out of decision-making, and until that sense of democratic responsibility is restored, there's going to be one messy Brexit after another." If that's true, though, why would you describe "people" successfully contesting "being locked out of decision-making" as autocratization rather than democratizing? The Demos is capturing power; the system is becoming more responsive to the people who make it up, rather than whatever powers that had ruled it heretofore.
It may be that we are witnessing in America and Brazil a division of a nation into two "peoples," each of which has a democratic/populist mode of organizing. If so, both here and there it may be that division of the single nation into at least two nations is the only way to enable a democratic system to function in the healthy way, i.e., defending the interests of the people rather than imposing the will of one people onto another. Failing that, what you have isn't autocracy -- autocracy is what is ending. What you have are two different demos engaged in a struggle for dominance.
That's a serious problem, but it's not the problem these think tanks believe that they're experiencing. They are trapped in their adjectives, and unable to see the truth beyond their words.
Fake News Today
BB: Hillary Clinton Slams Trump for not Taking a More “Hands-Off” Approach to Embassy Attack
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)