Open thread

I'm working on revisions to the manuscript of the new David Mapstone Mystery, The Night Detectives. So I leave things in your capable hands.

 

Comments

[cal Lash]

I repeat:
Here are some folks that may never heard the two words "climate Change" but they are probably the smartest folks on the planet when it comes to sustainable living. Until the get hunted done by an Arab Prince with to much oil money.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/21/tanzanian-hadza-tribe_n_2171563.html?utm_hp_ref=world#slide=1788692

[Petro]

Open thread! :)

Using Chris Hedges' article as a jumping-off point, I had a few things to say about climate change today:

Climate Change Nihilism, Dominionist Hubris, And A Word About Radicalism

Also - Emil extracted an inference from Talton's climate change article in the prior thread - that higher prices will slow growth, otherwise known as "demand reduction." Two things jump to mind.

First, I doubt that such economics will be an effective governor in and of itself in the mitigation of climate destruction, unfortunately. There's going to have to be a more proactive pushback against using the (economically available) fossil-fuel cache of the planet to make a difference, I think.

Secondly - I am in no way willing to concede energy resources to the remaining elite who can "afford" to keep living the high life at the expense of the rest of us. There will be a metaphorical slashing-of-the-tires if that sort of thing becomes acceptable. This is more than just a transportation thing, my unfortunate metaphor aside. There is the extension of "gated living:" Prosperous city/towns surrounded by favela communities to process the refuse and provide the exploited labor. There's already plans afoot in Honduras for a "private city" that's at least suffering some roadblocks from the courts.

The entire project we like to call "Dubai" is one of those abominations as well (the popping of the real estate bubble has thankfully thrown a bit of a wrench into that.) Dick Cheney bought a condo there - I wonder how that's turning out...

[Judith Lindenau]

Nose to the grindstone, Jon! I'm ready for a new Mapstone!

[Suzanne]

Cal, your suggested investigation into the “spooky” cast of Michael Ruppert and Chris Impey were interesting. I had not heard of either of them.

At first glance, these “private cities” in Honduras remind me of the Amish/Mennonite community in Belize. When this religious collective first settled, they paid no property tax. Now they are wealthy and pay plenty of property tax, to add, BP found oil right in the middle of their settlement. The natives and mestizos in the surrounding villages (I do not know the local name for the Amish town but it is just outside of San Ignacio) admire the cooperatives of the Amish and have tried to develop co-ops of their own. They are not as successful with the idea.

[eclecticdog]

How convienent that a group of white settlers managed to find a plot of land with oil underneath it! Joe Bageant mentioned a few times how all the beach property in Belize was being scooped up too by the Norte Americanos.

How did Black Friday break all previous records? Americans now carry more credit card debt than ever before! Get ready for round two of the economic meltdown.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/11/22/1163582/-Bill-O-Reilly-s-Leave-It-to-Beaver-nightmare

[cal Lash]

Petro, good post, I liked the looks and the content of your site.

eclecticdog, that was really good, I sent it to all my old red necked republican friends.

[cal Lash]

Camus on Climate change. Try this.

http://chronicle.com/article/Camuss-Restless-Ghost/135874/

[cal Lash]

Suzanne, we are seeking to have a more gender balanced gathering in our actual human encounter coffee meetings. So if U R interested here is my E-mail and i put you on the list.

[email protected]

[cal Lash]

This AM I had my cup of black liquid and a small slice of Mama Bear bread (much better than Manna from Heaven). Checked my E-mail, read a little Camus, Petro’s and Jons blogs. I reminisced about Charles Bowden’s, “Killing the Hidden Waters:” and Marc Reisners, Cadillac Desert.
Sipping at my coffee I wondered if I really cared that the planet Earth is going to die. Should I care?
So how fast is the planet going to arrive at that point when the species that inhabit it are gone?
I guess I have been an idealistic fool advocating for a reduction in humans and an increase in wilderness.
But it’s hard to let Malthus go. And should I not send my 35 bucks to The Sierra Club. What do I say to Kieran Suckling and the folks at Southwest Biodiversity. Maybe I should go back to work, move out of my 320 foot space and blade off a mountain top and build a new 5000 square foot man cave.
Or maybe I’ll just accept gods promise of some really cool digs off planet.

"pity this busy monster, manunkind,

not. Progress is a comfortable disease:
your victim (death and life safely beyond)

plays with the bigness of his littleness
--- electrons deify one razorblade
into a mountainrange; lenses extend
unwish through curving wherewhen till unwish
returns on its unself.
A world of made
is not a world of born --- pity poor flesh

and trees, poor stars and stones, but never this
fine specimen of hypermagical

ultraomnipotence. We doctors know

a hopeless case if --- listen: there's a hell
of a good universe next door; let's go"

E. E. Cummings

[Petro]

My point about Malthus is that population is an effect, not a cause. Less humans? This is the end result of balanced living - so the result is the same as cal's wish.

Humans themselves trying to engineer less humans? This is where the paradoxes of morality beset us, and we become distracted from the cause, which is unbalanced living.

We are looking at the same mountaintop, in any case.

[cal Lash]

So cause does not = effect
as stimulus = response.

Regarding parodoxical morality and population I surmise you are suggesting that the continuing centuries of ethnic cleansing are unbalanced living?

and speaking of mountains, repression and moral hypocrisy. That reminds me of James Baldwins "go tell it on a Mountain."

[Petro]

:) More like M.L. King's "mountaintop."

"Unbalanced living," in my view, can be simplified with one word: "Agriculture."

More generally, the manipulation of the natural food supply. I prefer the Hadza's approach, myself.

As to "cause and effect" (why I'm responding to these in reverse order is a mystery to me): Overpopulation did not cause agriculture. Agriculture caused overpopulation. As long as agriculture continues, we will wrestle with overpopulation. I prefer the Hadza's approach, myself. But I repeat myself.

[eclecticdog]

In the link above (right), "Revenge of the Reality-Based Community", it is by Bruce Bartlett (not Frum).

Has Bartlett ever changed his mind about supply-side economics? I thinking he has, but my memory isn't what it used to be. I won't go so far as thinking he's apologized for Reagan.

[eclecticdog]

Ugh! He has pulled back from supply-side econ. I should have keep reading.

[Rogue Columnist]

Sorry for the Bartlett typo.

[cal Lash]

Developers gotta be happy with Warren Buffets announcement that Housing is going to come back with a roar.

[eclecticdog]

It's all good Rogue!

Surfed across this during lunch:

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/sibel-edmondss-secrets/

It looks to blend nicely with the book "Triple Cross". The American Conservative looks like it might be interesting, as it is not in lockstep with the Kooks.

[cal Lash]

triple cross
a good read

[eclecticdog]

"And just to give the cause the imprimatur of elected office, a favorite congressman of the Christian Right, John Conlan of Arizona (“He’s never been honest,” Barry Goldwater once said about him), was drafted to explain that the high overhead of direct-mail campaigns was a boon to the charity-customers: it represented start-up—“prospecting”—costs that would permit organizations to raise yet more money down the line. (“Defends charities against Big Government,” read the caption beneath a picture of Conlan in Conservative Digest—the magazine Richard Viguerie published.)" From:

http://www.thebaffler.com/past/the_long_con/