The Written Peace:
Open Forum of March 17, 2005
But other and more parochial matters should draw some attention this evening, too.
The news wire service, blogScream, went through a day of testing on two other blogs: Shakespeare's Sister and Big Brass Blog, both of whose host bloggers are to be thanked profusely for putting up with the calibration nonsense that went on. Unfortunately, as of this evening, the framing is still not perfect, so the announcement of subscription availability will have to wait until tomorrow morning. It is, as the old saying goes, enough to make a preacher cuss.
And speaking of which, as those of you who regularly read the articles and threads know, although The Dark Wraith Forums moved to a nice, big, professionally run Web hosting service, the publishing interface offered by Blogger was retained to give users the same visual look and feel when posting comments. Unfortunately, that same look and feel has included ridiculous hang times when trying to go to the "Leave a comment" screen. Today, the Dark Wraith clocked an eleven minute wait to post a comment to a thread, at the end of which wait a screen came up saying that the attempt to get there had failed. The mixture of emotions that attended seeing that screen is not quite adequately captured by any Indo-European language known to the Wraith.
Two requests for assistance registered with Blogger over the past three days have been answered to date only by an autoresponder that indicated the Blogger support staff reads and responds to every issue submitted. Apparently, the autoresponder did indeed read the complaints filed, and its messages were the responses. Should the problems not be resolved by the beginning of next week, The Dark Wraith Forums will make one last major passage and abandon Blogger all together in favor of a service that actually works. That does not mean you will ever see HaloScan on this site. Alternatives are available, althought the transition could be more painful than the one for the blog, itself. Given the importance of preserving the comments already posted here over the past three months, and given the priority of having no limit on how many words a person can write in a given comment, the selection is narrow and the transition would be taxing.
It would not be as trying, however, as maintaining a certain level of decorum in posting in this site a final farewell to Blogger.
At some point, these technical aspects of blogging will diminish in importance and noticeability. That will be nice. Until then, the Dark Wraith asks your forebearance.
And for the evening, the topics for comments are many. Mr. Bush's nomination of Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz to head the World Bank has been met by the planet outside of Washington, D.C., with something approaching "you are joking, right?" from much of the civilized (and even uncivilized) world. In all fairness, though, the Japanese expressed something rather like genuine excitement about Mr. Wolfowitz's nomination. It is possible, given the diffiulties in translation, that the Japanese believed that they heard of Mr. Wolfowitz's marination and believed his head was to be served on a platter with sauce Bernaise.
Gasoline prices have hit an all-time high, now. This means you should watch the most recent month's consumer price index, which will be published shortly. Watch for two things: first, the government will do everything it can to focus on the "core" CPI, which excludes food and energy; and second, watch for a complete CPI that looks suspiciously—perhaps even laughably—low. Anecdotally, people around the country have seen prices on many consumer items going up quite noticeably for months, now; but the Bureau of Labor Statistics keeps grinding out monthly CPIs that generally make it look like inflation is just as tame as it can be. Only time will tell if the BLS wishes to continue to present numerical evidence contrary to both consumers' sense of what is going on and how the Federal Reserve is reacting to the threat of inflation, despite Greenspan's claims that inflation remains under control.
Tonight, kick back, click on the "Comment" tag, then take a nap while Blogger decides whether it's going to service your request before or after the next ice age. But just to be on the safe side, you might want to keep your coat at your side; it could get mighty cold before you make it to that "Leave a comment" screen.
Naw, don't worry: it'll work just fine this evening. Really. It will.
The Dark Wraith will say anything to get a good thread started.
Published 3/18/2005 01:23:00 AM
<< 19 Comments Total
When it comes down to it, I really think there are people who'd rather be lied to and have a reason to smile mindlessly than be faced with the truth and experience "negative" emotions such as anger and sadness.
If Bush says he is going to do this or that, as long as the poor chap is smiling and joking around, embarrassingly clumsy as he is, people who identify with his accent and cannot look objectively past it will believe his every word.
So, when he plunges the country into bankrupcy, the people think he really is "going for broke," a scenario in which a person denies himself in one area or more in order to shoulder more of the weight to a pressing, immediate matter that has a minute chance of surviving if all resources were allocated toward it. The war could be used as the example in this scenario.
However, what the people don't realize is the means and the end are one and the same for him. Bush has no intention whatsoever to pull us out of this mess. He isn't "going for broke" for the sake of saving the system. He is driving the nation into the ground as the means and as the purpose.
People are simply not paying attention because the president and his message are hidden in plain sight.
wiseguy
Good morning, Wise Guy.
I have seen and commented on an aspect upon which you comment: a number of Bush supporters during the Presidential Election conveyed this sense to me that they believed there was this burden they must bear in order for the country to move forward, and Mr. Bush was the one to lay upon them—upon all of us—that burden. It's almost as if they saw our time as one in which a trial of hardship must be endured, almost like a cleansing ritual must be engaged.
I couldn't help but wonder how long into the trial it would be before the pain brought clarity to the possibility that this was so unnecessary, that life can be lived without volitional suffering.
It appears that the time of clarity is now upon us. As the fire of the inevitable consequences to the neo-conservatives' policies begins to consume our nation, those who wanted this may now be wondering why they ever asked for it.
But the pyre is now ablaze, and we are upon it without escape. It remains to be seen if we shall emerge one day even recognizable as a nation, as a people, as a society.
The Dark Wraith watches the fire rise.
I saw this magnificent article on Rook's Rant (tried posting it last night, but I just couldn't wait long enough for Blogger to decide if it was going to let me; today seems ok). I think in a way it connects quite well to wiseguy's observation.
- oddjob
1) Bliss on the Pogger commenting interface; it has become a real problem. Several times I've thought to leave a comment, but eventually gave up and went back to work (yeah, I know, fewer Goat comments could be a good thing). It sounds though, as if you have asked yourself the key question; is Blogger a friend or enemy?
2) I would be interested to hear anyone's read (from an economic perspective) on the implications of this article: New Undeclared Arms Race: America's Agenda for Global Military Domination
Good afternoon, Mr. Goat. First, a hang time of 20 minutes getting to the comment screen gave me an opportunity to grade a nice little stack of homework. Blogger is to be commended for giving us such free time. I also had the time to decide that, should Blogger not even bother to respond to me by the end of today, I'll start the search in earnest this weekend for an acceptable alternative publishing format.
Now, I have read that article to which you provided a link, and I am grateful to you for doing so. I need some time to run over to the school to drop off midterm grades, but there are some issues upon which I want to comment. In general, many of the pieces of that article have been swirling around, but that was the first comprehensive gloss I had seen, other than some pretty thorough topical material in The Wall Street Journal, which I should note has some fine journalists if one can put up with the bile that comes out of the editorial page.
Suffice for right now to say that the article to which you provided the link is thorough, but I find the entire aspect about the coming arms race between the EU and the United States inappropriate in its assumption that the EU will follow the American route of a more-or-less dollar-for-dollar exchange of social and domestic programs for military expenditures. The Europeans don't have to do it this way. in part because they do not have the rabid obsession (yet, anyway) with tax rates that are too low to support a high-level, civil society.
There's more to be said; but right now, I need to get grades submitted so students will know just how much they're going to have to work to make the grade they want by the end of the semester.
The Dark Wraith heads out the door to hand out the heartache.
I confess I don't follow the EU side of things well enough to comment too deeply on the spending issue you note.
I would ask the rhetorical question of why would they have to, or why would they want to do so? It seems to me that the battlefield of spending will be with China, and that the EU can tag along without much of a change in major commitment one way or the other.
Speaking of China, we should collaborate on a cookbook with an emphasis on woking with Spam. We could market it as a necessary item for the homeland survival pack.
(Sounds to me like he's still eyeing your stash.)
- oddjob
Good afternoon, OddJob. This is where proper Goat management practices come to bear. Adequately monitored, Mr. Goat can come up with practical business ideas that have good marketing potential.
The fact of the matter is that I have on many occasions made fried rice with diced Spam or Treet. It is absolutely DEE-lish-ious.
I must admit that, although often thinking about it, I've never made other Chinese dishes with Spam; but you must admit, the very names whet the appetite:
Wor Su Spam
Sweet and Sour Treet
Moo Goo Gai Spam
General Tso's Treet
are but a few of the taste-tempting sensations.
Perhaps I should stop by the local Chinese take-out place, the Golden Possum, and see if the owner would be interested in some kind of royalties deal for my ideas.
Yeah. I think I'll do that.
The Dark Wraith prepares for the flood of offers.
[HAH! Here's the first one! ...Huh. 'Ten bucks if you don't tell the Chinese fellow about your ideas'. Cool.]
My outrage of the day is the whole Terri Schivo case. I mean let the woman die in peace already.
The republicans have just gone insane on this one. Having Congress issue a subpena to get a woman who is in a persistent vegetative state for 15 years to come testify. Not really much she can do....
Also how does this look with their sanctity of marriage argument where they are trying to override the wishes of the husband. It's just insane. It really does seem the republicans want to control everything.
-Gary A
I wonder if people think of our manmade trials as the natural order of things that cannot possibly be stopped.
It's really strange. When a natural disaster strikes such as a hurricane, people ask "Why?" but when the stock market crashes, people think that's the natural order of business and it was meant to happen.
My head hurts. I'm going to stop now before my eyes permanently stick in my head after rolling them so much.
wiseguy
While reading the article that My Pet Goat kindly provided the link to, I was struck by the parallels that seem to be emerging between The United States at the beginning of the 21st century and the situation Great Britain was facing at the start of the 20th.
As the 20th century began, Britain was the world's sole super power, and like America is today, it was losing its superiority in manufacturing to younger, more vibrant powers; in Britian's case, the most dangerous upstarts were Germnay and The United States. While there are a number of reasons why this decline in its manufacturing edge occurred, Britian made two very important mistakes that contributed to its own demise as a great power.
The first of these was wrapped up in the arrogance of the ruling classes, who looked down on new money and so scorned the scientific and engineering disciplines that had made the emergence of a new industial upper class possible. As a consequence, the syllabi at the country's top schools continued to have a large classical bias, and so Britain ended up with fewer scientists and engineers than Germany and America.
The second big mistake was that Britain began to confuse the trappings of power: the geographical area under its control, and the military power it was able to project with the manufacturing dominance that was the real reason for its success. As a result, resources were continually diverted to military purposes, rather than towards the types of educational and other social programs that its competitors were beginning to invest in.
This culminated in the the naval arms race it conducted with Germany in the lead up to WWI, during which its technological inferiority first became apparent. The main weapon system that this race hinged upon was the dreadnought - giant battleships that were never used to any great effect and that were soon made obsolete by the advent of the aircraft carrier.
It seems to me that America is committing very similar errors. The stubborn refusal to invest in renewable energy; the irrational prejudice against stem cell research; the huge amounts of money being poured into military projects such as missile defense (which will become obolete as soon as foreign powers figure out how to make missiles zig-zag - something the Russians claim to be capable of already) - all of these and more indicate that the U.S is in danger of following Britain's recipe for failure.
Hey, it went quite quickly for me. So, I am here and leaving a comment because I was asked to by DW. Now, though, I must go finish making supper.
Mr. Shakes, I must say, an excellent comment on comparing Great Briton at the start of the 20 Century, and the US now.
Can anyone help out? There is a libertarian (I think) troll on Ms. Julien's list who wants online proof that a graduated income tax associates with a higher standard of living for the industrialized countries. I'm trying to find an up to date reference that lists the world's countries by a reasonably widely accepted standard of living (I realize said term may be fraught with perils).
Unfortunately I'm not having much success. Can anyone suggest a website? I will be much obliged!
- oddjob
Good evening, Mr. Shakes.
I agree with Guy Andrew Hall that your comparison was well crafted. In this vein, though, I wonder if the differences between the culture of Great Britain and that of the United States will play any sort of role in the economy and society that emerges from this time in which we, here in the States, now find ourselves.
Although we share deep roots in Anglo-Saxon ways, the U.S. has drifted considerably, as has Australia, from certain modes if not means. In one important respect, the British were gladly cleansed of certain obsessive religious cults, the most notable of them being what came to be called "Puritanism," which had a brief run of power in England that ensured it would never again be tolerated there as either a political or social force.
In contrast, the United States was essentially, in its early days as a collection of colonies, virtually cut from the whole cloth of this harsh, joyless, and in some ways mean way of organizing social structures.
That is not, by the way, to wholly condemn the Puritans: setting aside (if that is possible) their harshness, they contributed greatly to our country, especially in areas like the importance and methodologies of educating our young and in the ideal of austerity in consumption, areas where we finally and to our general detriment abandoned much of what they had passed down.
Returning, though, to the point, the British were able to rise again, perhaps considerably lessened in some ways, but nonetheless capable of going on without much of a degradation of their civil society. It is almost as if Empire, for all of its allure, for all of its rewards, was not as essential to the character of the people as it would have appeared, given the Anglo history of open, expressed, and publicized hegemony.
For us, it's just the opposite. Few people within this country would even imagine America as Empire, despite the enormous rewards we have garnered throughout the 20th Century. It strikes me that, by not seeing our rewards as flowing from the materiality of economic, military, and cultural hegemony, we have been free to see those rewards as flowing from a god who favors us above all others.
The above are merely some random thoughts brought to you by your friendly global-neighborhood wraith.
The Dark Wraith returns to preparing blogScream for general subscriptions tonight.
Good evening, OddJob.
The first thing I want you to do is look at this document, and forget about the fact that the information is woefully out of date. What I need you to see is what the question being posed entails. Look carefully at the tables, then think about why the information is being presented in the way that it is.
Once you get a sense of the enormous complexity of making comparisons, you then need look at this document for some up-to-date information.
Be sure to keep your mind on how the exchange rates and the global power of a nation's currency affect its "standard of living."
Once you've gotten through that, go to a search engine and type in "Pareto index" to get another perspective.
Finally, look at the so-called
"United Nations System of National Accouts" by having a search engine chew on it. I do not know the extent to which that information is available on the Internet, but I cannot imagine that it wouldn't be available in one form or another.
That should keep you busy for a while; but I warn you that someone who is looking for some kind of "proof" in that kind of issue is baiting a disagreement that he already knows he can win if the data is looked at in a simplistic way. That's why you need to look at how the comparisons are really done using purchasing power parity, and how that is affected by exchange rates, and how those exchange rates have been historically tilted massively in favor of the United States as the world's banker.
But of course, that was then, and this is now.
The data hasn't come in on the "now" part, quite yet, but it will in the next couple of years.
The Dark Wraith goes back to whatever it was that he was doing... provided he can remember what it was he was doing before he was doing what it was he was doing after he was doing the thing before.
(Didn't whatever that was have something to do with the new "co-op" website?)
- oddjob (just trying to be helpful)
Gary A.:
You Blogged:
My outrage of the day is the whole Terri Schivo case. I mean let the woman die in peace already.
The republicans have just gone insane on this one. Having Congress issue a subpena to get a woman who is in a persistent vegetative state for 15 years to come testify. Not really much she can do....
I agree. I remember the Karen Ann Quinlan affair back in the '70's where her parents had to beg courts for years to allow their daughter to die. Now, the courts all agree that someone whose brain has mostly turned to liquid can be allowed to die, the wingnuts want to preserve this "life". Yet a Texas judge allowed a hospital to overrule a mother on the removal of breathing support for her 5+ month old...her apparently responsive, very much alive baby, who died in his mother's arms....THAT case in juxaposition to this makes my heart ache, and my innards roil with pure outrage.
As to what the wingnuts hoped to accomplish via the subpaena is that anyone who interferes with required testimony(like removing a feeding tube so the witness dies)is in violation of federal law. They were hoping the judge would back down. He didn't.
I really, really don't get the priority of keeping alive the braindead, using massive medical intervention, yet healthcare for the average Joe is apparently not their concern. They are rabidly anti-abortion, yet would allow the murder(and from what little the article indicated, the baby was not a vegetable)of a living child. Where was the Federal government when that activist judge ruled in favor of the hospital?
'Course, a Bush ain't guvner of Texas no more, and (from the amount of legal wrangling, I'd say the families in Terry's case are at least well off) the baby was just a little black who migt've needed a respirator his whole life and was on medicare(I think), so the two cases are certainly different, yessir.
I want to physically POUND some of these fools and hypocrites, starting with Chimp the Sanctimonious. AAAAARRRRGGGHHHH.
(ps-no problems with slow blogger tonight)
Wow! I'm on!
Congress sure outdid itself this week: Shiavo, baseball.... But I think good ol' Bernie Sanders of Vermont (beat Syracuse last nite!!) said it correctly with:
"But, I do want to say that I am overwhelmed by the kind of media attention that this has gotten.
I have counted dozens of TV cameras and I think some of the American people wonder, is this all we do, because this is what they see on television. So, I want to say to our media friends, that when some of us talk about the collapse of our health care system and millions of people not having any health insurance, come and join us. And we talk about the United States having the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world at a time when the rich are growing richer, come on down. Now, maybe we may have to bring great baseball players to help us talk about childhood poverty, I don't know. I would hope not. I would hope we could have some of the great experts and I would hope you would come."
I think I've figured out what the Repug's want with Schiavo: Issue a subpoena to appear, when she fails to appear or does not respond to questioning, hold her in contempt and then issue the death penalty. See? Neat and clean. They really have gone insane.
On the subject of the MSM, I saw Tom Fenton on The Daily Show earlier this week and wonder if anyone has taken a look at his book, Bad News? Worth a read? He certainly took the news media across the board to task.
--Lymond
Couldn't resist sharing this, sent to me by my sister:
"I used to think there was nothing worse than imagining your own parents having sex. I was wrong. You know what's worse? Learning your parents' sex life is more interesting than your own."
- CNN's ANDERSON COOPER, son of Gloria Vanderbilt, writes in the April issue of Details magazine. Vanderbilt, 81, published a kiss-and-tell memoir last fall detailing her liaisons and romances with famous figures such as Marlon Brando, Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra and Howard Hughes. "By the time she was 18, she'd had romances with some of the most well-known people in the world."
- oddjob