I had it in my head that creativity expands to fill the available time – that if I could just manage to get enough free time, I could sit down and start writing properly.
But what if that’s wrong? Maybe it is, instead, like the fuel-air mixture in an internal combustion engine, that must be compressed before it can ignite.
https://olis.oregonlegislature.gov/liz/2023R1/Downloads/MeasureDocument/HB2004/Enrolled
An election is by nature competitive: the citizen is called to choose one candidate while rejecting others. Casting one’s vote is a clarifying process.
HB 2004 seeks to replace transparency with opacity. Under this bill, the voter considering a list of candidates would be called on to rank ALL of the candidates on the list, in order of preference. Thus, for a slate of three, four, five, or six candidates, there would be 6, 24, 120, or 720 possible rankings, exponentially increasing the time and mental effort involved in filling out a ballot. This is a deterrent to voting.
Under this vote-counting system, “votes that had been counted for the defeated candidate are transferred to each ballot’s next highest-ranked candidate”. This process makes vote-counting exponentially more complex and time consuming, and renders hand-counting impracticable. This is a blow to transparency.
The creation of a system where votes are routinely “transferred” from one candidate to another invites abuse and manipulation by shadowy groups intent on thwarting the will of the people. It is not hard to foresee that a group of candidates, each unable to gain significant support from the public, could run as ostensible “opponents” to one another while in fact colluding. This is an invitation to rule by cartels.
The existing electoral process already provides ample opportunities for Oregon voters to winnow the field of candidates to those few they deem most desirable. Tampering with that process is courting disaster.
ISRAEL: CDR SALAMANDER, CAROLINE GLICK, AND THE IDF’S FAILED DOCTRINES.
https://cdrsalamander.substack.com/p/caroline-glicks-failed-doctrines
The title of CDR Salamander’s blog post is a little confusing; the article is an endorsement of Caroline Glick, sharing her critiques of the “failed doctrines” of the IDF. [EDIT: CDR Salamander has fixed the title.] Quoting from Glick:
Two underlying assumptions guided Israel’s security establishment for the past generation. The first asserted that with the end of the Cold War, the era of conventional wars had ended. In the present age, brains, rather than brawn, would rule the roost.
…the second underlying assumption that guided Israel’s security establishment for the past generation. This assumption, also championed by Barak, asserted that Israel’s most important strategic asset was the United States.
Salamander adds:
The Smartest People in the Room™ assured them all was well.
When this war ends – or at least this stage of a “war” that may never really end – this reality will have to be addressed, and probably looks like it already is.
The failure of the second assumption should ring loudly in Europe as well. The Russians have made this apparent.
Glick’s original article – titled ‘Rising from the Ruins of a Generation of Failed Doctrines’ – is here:
Glick notes that the IDF is already starting to learn some hard lessons, and moving back towards domestically-produced weapons and munitions in a program called the “Independence Project”.
COMMENTARY. I have little to add to the knowledgeable analyses of Caroline Glick and CDR Salamander, but I do want to point out one thing. The IDF was not wrong in its estimation of the American people’s support for the Jewish state, but it made the mistake of confusing the American people with the American government.
Every American patriot understands that while our own Nation’s security is entrusted to our government and our armed forces, ultimately it is the American citizenry – We The People – who are responsible for our Nation’s safety and our own. Our Bill of Rights enshrines the individual citizen’s right to keep and bear the tools of his or her own defense, and of the Nation’s. This is every American’s last line of defense against enemies foreign and domestic, and it is our protection in the event of an ineffectual or hostile government regime.
The defense of Israel is Israel’s responsibility. The Israeli people have paid a terrible price for their government’s over-reliance on technology, intellect, and a friendly regime in Washington. As Americans prepare to celebrate our Independence Day, Israelis are looking for a way forward in the wake of last October’s bloodshed. May they do so in a renewed spirit of independence.
As human beings, we orient ourselves in the world through society. Our social networks are built from the bottom up, from our day-to-day interactions with other individuals and our exchanges of courtesies, knowledge, and goods with other people. We use the reactions of others to keep us sane and rational, and through the systemic process of negotiating our relationship with society, we tap into the wisdom and experience of our neighbors and our ancestors.
It is on this level that we work out the details of interpersonal protocol: knowing when someone prefers to be addressed by their full name or a nickname, or by an honorific title such as Doctor. Disregarding the other party’s expressed preference is a breach of etiquette, and may carry a penalty in the form of a verbal rebuke or simply a harsh look from the offended party. Except in the military (where correct use of rank titles is enforced by regulations and by military law), there is no legal consequence to such a social offense because it does not belong to the realm of the State.
And that’s as it should be. The social penalty for a violation of etiquette is incremental (that is, you can dial it up and down) and not categorical (a one-size-fits-all mandatory punishment). This is the social market.
But in today’s world, the elites and technocrats want to impose a top-down model. “Hate speech” laws and “preferred pronouns” give the State power to police and control personal interactions. This is central planning applied to the social market.
זְכֹר֙ יְמ֣וֹת עוֹלָ֔ם בִּ֖ינוּ שְׁנ֣וֹת דֹּֽר וָדֹ֑ר שְׁאַ֤ל אָבִ֨יךָ֙ וְיַגֵּ֔דְךָ זְקֵנֶ֖יךָ וְיֹֽאמְרוּ־לָֽךְ:
Remember the days of old; reflect upon the years of generations. Ask your father, and he will tell you; your elders, and they will inform you.
– Deuteronomy 32:7
In the story ‘The Slows’ by Gail HarEven (first published in Hebrew in 1999, and in English in 2009), the Slows are a population of humans who have resisted adopting AOG (Accelerated Offspring Growth) – a technology that produces fully-grown humans in a matter of months – and insist on bearing and raising children the old-fashioned way. The male narrator, who has taken an interest in the Slows, expresses revulsion at their way of life (which is presumably typical of his world) but also betrays suppressed feelings of attraction towards the Slow women, despite the “swollen protrusions on their chests and the general swelling of their bodies.”
In a world where nearly all living humans are the products of this “accelerated” growth, the legacy of the past seems something superfluous. The Slows, a dwindling population of holdouts against this technology, have become a relic no longer needed.
… “Those treaties were signed many generations ago. Things change,” I said, though I knew it was silly to get into an argument with one of them.
“My grandmother signed them.” …
In the dialog above, both parties are telling the truth: in the world of the story, the narrator has seen “many generations” elapse due to the advent of Accelerated Offspring Growth; but for the Slow woman and her ancestors who eschewed such technology, the same timespan connected grandmother and granddaughter.
It’s not accidental that this accelerated pace makes it easier for the narrator’s character to justify abrogating the old treaties – because after all, “things change”. The faster pace of life – and of the life cycle itself – makes the moral claim of the past on the present seem tenuous.
The short film adaptation differs from the print original in a few details (the “outsider” journalist is a woman in the screen version) but it is very good, and it’s faithful to the essentials of the story. There’s a wonderful scene (at 10:24) where the Slow woman playfully tosses an apple to the journalist – knowing that the other woman will be unable to catch it, never having developed those reflexes from playing catch as a child, since she never had a childhood.
There are some things we learn only by touch, or from experience, or from forming and sustaining an intimate bond with another human being – a parent, a child, a mate.
Most of what we know about the world, we learn from other people; and this includes the structures within which we organize our experience. These organizing structures include not only language (itself a collaborative and cumulative project), but also the nonverbal skills and processes that we learn from being around others.
It is the individual’s experience of living in a human body, with its sensations and passions and weaknesses; and it is the experience of having been born to humans, raised by humans, and challenged by humans. It is also the collective experience of humanity encoded in our cells, our relationships, and our culture.
The dystopian future of yesterday’s science fiction is the terrible reality of today’s news. We are living in a world where a clique of socially stunted psychopaths have used their control of technology and infrastructure to brainwash us into hating the very things that make us human: our childhoods, our sensations, our passions, our bodies with their swellings and their protrusions, our very lives.
We reclaim our humanity when we refuse the demands of the technocrats, embracing the humanity of our bodies and the continuity that connects us with our elders.
Police go undercover to thwart protesters against globlization. Meetings of IMF and NATO renew fears of violence from radical groups. ‘D.C. is not going to burn.’
Stepping out: A smaller share of Americans seeks work.
An illicit posting reminds companies of the need for internal security. On Aug. 31, somebody posted a link on the jobs-related Web site Vault.com to a site with the employee evaluations of more than 300 PricewaterhouseCoopers consultants.
Political cover. Major business lobby wins back its clout by dispensing favors. Some members can hide behind chamber’s name to pursue private ends.
Turning videocams into weapons. Antiglobalization activists find they can spread message via web using cheap gear.
So much of what we need to know about life, we learn from other people, who learned from other people. How to live with courage and dignity; how to deal with conflict and adversity; how to find and keep a mate, and how to raise the young.
From these small pieces, which we often overlook, we build a life. If the pieces are missing, life will not be whole. To live rightly and bravely and to meet its challenges, to build and sustain a family, or to prosper in any worthwhile undertaking, will elude our grasp.
It is up to us to put life back together, one piece at a time.
The riots were never about a police killing, and the lockdowns were never about a virus.
Man often presents lies. The world presented to us by Almighty G-d is full of secrets and mysteries. We know and serve G-d by finding out the truth, and by acting rightly upon it.
Your body is made of bones and flesh; a robust system includes a rigid component and a flexible component.
Time is an economic good: a scarce commodity with alternative uses. Use it wisely.
Nuance: the recognition that a statement may be true in general, and still admit of exceptions.
The right to assess our own needs is, in itself, one of our most important needs.
Establish good habits – it’s easier than breaking bad ones.
The social market is an analog of the economic market, and it follows similar principles.
The “new normal” needs to be a Big Government that has been de-fanged, de-clawed, and neutered.
Do not disdain fear; fear is to be confronted and overcome through courage. Fear, correctly located, helps you to see the shape of the battlefield. Fear points you in the direction of the enemy.
A conspiracy is a secret agreement by a group of people to do something bad. Conspiracies have existed since time began. The opposite of a “conspiracy theorist” is a complacency theorist.
They say history is written by the victors. I say history is written by people who can write.
“You don’t own your children – WE DO” is what the left is really saying.
It is the logical conclusion of the collectivism that starts with economics and ends with all aspects of society and human relationships. It is rewarding incompetence, mediocrity, and failure at the expense of those who are successful.
The left cannot defend their ideas and values in open discourse, and they know it. They cannot tolerate competition. Their only solution is to eliminate the competing model that shows up their socialist agenda for the monstrous failure that it is.
Raising a child – or caring for any family member or close relationship – requires commitment, time, and experience. It takes investment, direct knowledge, and accountability. You need to learn the individual’s needs, and how to meet those needs, over time, with a great deal of trial and error. There is no shortcut. This is what you get in a familial relationship, and it is what no institution can ever provide.
Conversely, blurring or erasing those lines of commitment and accountability serves only the interests of those who wish to hide their own failures and frauds. It is all about obfuscation.
Is is not racial or ethnic distinctions as such which have proven to be momentous but cultural distinctions, whether associated with race, with geographical origins, or with other factors. The particular culture or “human capital” available to people has often had more influence on their economic level than their existing material wealth, natural resources, or individual geniuses. … [Differences] between groups themselves have been the rule, not the exception, in countries around the world and down through history. These groups differ in specific skills – whether in optics, winemaking, engineering, medicine, or numerous other fields – and in attitudes toward work, toward education, toward violence, and toward life. …
[Following the fall of the Roman Empire, the] elaborate institutions needed for the continued transmission of a complex civilized culture simply disintegrated, along with the state apparatus that had supported it, because the invaders who were capable of destroying the Roman Empire were not capable of taking it over and running it themselves or of preserving its cultural achievements.
– Thomas Sowell, ‘Conquests and Cultures’, p. 355
The real wealth of a people is in its ability to retain, transmit, and capitalize upon knowledge. This includes practical skills of agriculture and industry, the basics of literacy and arithmetic, and (no less important) working knowledge of the social landscape and of how to negotiate financial and personal transactions. Capitalizing upon this knowledge means willingness to work hard to achieve results, and willingness to acquire new knowledge and skills when these will prove beneficial. Human society has never not been an information economy.
Freedom and Power 