Nelson Lowhim's Blog, page 79

Read up on English Civil War

Now it's on my to do list because this news seems pretty big to me.  On power switches (and the power of certain polities and institutions) it seems like one that could spark something bigger. Of course I'm not in England so I don't know the mood, but I imagine this won't be taken so lightly. I'll ask a few people what they think. You?

Over the past couple of weeks, a series of concerted leaks have made it clear that Johnson’s government is actively planning for food, fuel and medicine shortages after October 31, and for cascading chaos at the country’s ports as new import and export controls kick in. Those same leaks suggest that the government has concluded that even when the short-term chaos dissipates, it is still only anticipating a flow through the U.K.’s ports of 50-70 percent of the goods that circulated through them pre-Brexit. The leaks also indicate the government thinks it likely there will be civil unrest in response to the shortages. That’s hardly an indication that Britain’s bureaucracy and much of its elected leadership believes this can be anything other than a devastatingly painful, self-destructive, impoverishing process — one that will significantly reduce the economic and political clout of one of the world’s largest economies.

That's something that could easily make a nation that has already suffered one section of the Tory-inflicted austerity just break.

All of this — from the unprecedented assault on parliamentary democracy now underway, to the willingness to jeopardize the Irish peace process, to the recalibrating of the “special relationship” between the U.S. and U.K. in a way that gives Trump staggering authority over British politics and economic prospects — adds urgency to the efforts by MPs from across the political spectrum to craft a coalition to block Johnson’s government over the coming days. After all, when members of Parliament return from their summer recess early next week, they will have only a few days to sit before the legislative body is suspended. 

That's what it is, right? Like this side of the Atlantic, it's something else to live through the Chinese curse of "interesting times" but the ape-ability of our species to fling feces and bring its own destruction rather than stop and think is really something else. 
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Ah, man.

Arendt has talked about fascist governments making citizenship a kind of right they can give to only certain people before they go for some full-on ethnic cleansing (or worse, of course). So the moves in the Trump admin for the latest seem in line with that kind of attitude. Of course this is a range, but one must be wary of these ranges (especially given the attitude of the worst of the right wingers in our country). Sure they won't be Nazis per say, but a Bible (whether held by someone who bangs out porn stars or otherwise doesn't matter either) doesn't make people better. It's that tidy-mindedness that matters. 



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Napoli

You come to Naples, but what do you know about this place, about the ways in which it breathes, the ways in which it will accept you as a person with whom you must adjust to it—rather than it adjusting to you.  

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What's in a Hike?

A collage as summation of my experience hiking. In all actuality it would have a hundred people all over it. No hate, just facts.  You wake up early to beat the crowds, cross bone-rattling gravel roads and hit the peak to try and catch a glimpse of Rainier. 

No lie.


It's not inherently bad, you know, for a hike to have so many people. Still, I've always found it ironic that we as a culture use the very machines helping destroy our natural habitats to go to them (nevermind our footprints on those places).
 So what's in a hike?
Everything, according to the hiking fundies here in and around Seattle. Not to say it can't provide some respite from our cities, but it's our attitude towards our cities (where the vehicles we use to drive away from them are destroying the cities in terms of human-living or walking) that is surprisingly similar to the attitude of hiking as some moment to be enjoyed or consumed. 
And I'm not saying I'm not guilty either of this, because I am pretty superficial, but I am saying it's indicative of a sickness still infecting our society (run away from the problems, don't fix them).
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Iceland

I wrote about Iceland some time ago (not to mention a short story). It was during a cheap trip provided by WOW. Now WOW has collapsed, sending that entire country into a recession. Come to figure, I was part of that excess (though helpful) flow of tourists. 
Who would have thought?

Thing is, there were lots of tourists, and I would have said it was almost too many. This was near winter too. 
People there also complained about how rents and costs of living in the capital were rising and young people couldn't really get a start on buying a house. They also claimed all the places they enjoyed visiting were now crowded year-round. Problems of the age of mass tourism. With things like Airbnb only further hurting (but also helping in a way) the nation. Of course, I'm not saying it has to be binary.
This leads me to wonder what solutions there will be for a more carbon neutral world? What kind of economic system would actually replace one that seems to need cancerous levels of growth to work? Your thoughts?
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The Code is Mightier Than The Pen

And probably the sword too.




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Cat Lady

This essay is pretty damn good and looks at a story that goes "viral". Not something that's ever happened to me, but this description seems beyond true.

I think too, the article speaks to how people react to things or consume them: not in the old way of personal introspection but in a kind of public opera where people are the Greek Chorus. Obviously using emails means something more personal, but it's still part of a theatrical display. Perhaps everything, to include the writing of a story, is that.

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Lions

 This gif is pretty crazy. Buffalo is lucky to be alive:

https://i.imgur.com/HifVwH6.gifv

Probably reshape and say "me when life decides to spare me" or "family reunions"

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The Economists are Killing Us.

They almost always were and seem to be intent on finishing the job. 
If the 2008 Financial Meltdown and Great Recession  didn't defeat your trust in a lot of economists [1] then you should just skip all this. That being said, when an economist wins the Nobel [2] for econ then says Climate Chaos (CC) won't be so bad on the economy, well people need to call that shit out.



[1]  the loudest ones, of course. And mainly on the right. Krugman  et al did well. Though I'm sometimes suspect on his stances (for example what he said when the Sanders-Hillary wars heated up was not in line with his usual clear-headed analysis).

[2] So I spoke of conspiracies the other day, well this isn't on that level but points to the overall mendacity of our elites. How many people actually knew that the Nobel Econ Prize is not part of the usual Nobel Prizes but something the Swedish bank gives out (it's some branding thing they pay for, essentially)? Yeah, no one. Yet it still garners the same prestige as the other ones, and is mentioned in the same breath as them. Still, there are people who have won one but shouldn't be considered so great.
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Naples, Napoli. Greek Hearts in Italy.

For a Greek city that's stuck in Italy, it's pretty sweet. I was suppose to write an essay on it, but I've yet to do so. I will soon. But I read a book about it that reminded me of how the city one experiences is rarely one that other people experience. And if you're a tourist reading a book or website or SM that's telling you where to go (who really knows how people pick these places... aesthetics are the main thing, I suppose), then there's a certain well-traveled trail you stick to. 
I think the biggest thing is that people don't meet that many locals and even then it's not that real conversation you can have with a friend (airbnb used to have this element. It's really changed since then) to know a place, right? And even that isn't reality of the machine that is the city.

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