Yesterday, I went to use the ATM at Bank of America. A poster on their door caught my eye. The background was the American flag. The text read "Show your pride. Show your stripes. Military Banking."
Hmmm, I thought. The bank must be in financial trouble and is making a patriotic pitch to obscure that.
This morning, I googled the bank and found the link below:
http://www.sgvtribune.com/ci_13573239
B of A is only a bank and their posters are not so important. My fear is what will happen when the government goes bust. Will they make the military appeal--and not just on posters but in real life?
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Forebodings
The military and economic news have combined to create a mood of overwhelming pessimism. Two important forecasters of economic trends, Marc Faber and Gerald Celente, have argued that the "recovery" is nothing more than a stimulus bubble that will burst with devastating consequences. The latest news from Antiwar.com has a story from the McClatchy papers that General McChrystal, who heads the war in Afghanistan, would actually like 80,000 troops . The U.S. cannot send more than 30,000 troops without seriously straining military resources.
Noam Chomsky doubts that the draft will return because the draft did not work very well for the military during the Vietnam War. People who are in the military against their will are less compliant and more likely to create difficulties. Nasty colonial wars need volunteers and mercenaries. It is worth noting that while the U.S. does indeed have fewer troops in Iraq since Obama took office, the decrease has been more than offset by contractors. Some are from desperately poor countries like Kenya. What are they being promised? Money only or the chance to come to the U.S. later on?
Still, I fear a draft. I have a niece and a nephew who are military age (and two who are already in their teens and who will be military age if the war continues, which seems likely)and even the recession is not producing enough recruits to meet the demand.
Ruminating on this fear brings me back to the economy and Marc Faber. He predicts that there will be a war--another one and perhaps a bigger one--in a few years as the stimulus bubble bursts, the economy worsens, and Americans become disaffected. Gore Vidal is predicting a military dictatorship because Americans will become so fragmented that this will be the only way to hold the country together.
It seems to me that all the signs are there of an impending catastrophe. I am going back and forth with this: Yes, the situaton really is this bad (a stimulus bubble sure to pop, no manufactorig base, huge government debt, two no-win wars, no political solution that doesn't really hurt) vs. No, it can't be that bad, I am exaggerating and giving into anxiety and panic.
It seems to me that this is the time to think about leaving the country, going somewhere, but where? I don't speak any foreign languages and have no skills that don't rely on English.
America is a dying empire and will not fall without death throes that will embroil the entire world. Remaining here makes me complicit but I AM an American. I no longer have any regard for my government but I love my land--the Everglades, the forests, the oceans. To leave the land I love would destroy me but if my forebodings are correct, remaining here might be worse.
Noam Chomsky doubts that the draft will return because the draft did not work very well for the military during the Vietnam War. People who are in the military against their will are less compliant and more likely to create difficulties. Nasty colonial wars need volunteers and mercenaries. It is worth noting that while the U.S. does indeed have fewer troops in Iraq since Obama took office, the decrease has been more than offset by contractors. Some are from desperately poor countries like Kenya. What are they being promised? Money only or the chance to come to the U.S. later on?
Still, I fear a draft. I have a niece and a nephew who are military age (and two who are already in their teens and who will be military age if the war continues, which seems likely)and even the recession is not producing enough recruits to meet the demand.
Ruminating on this fear brings me back to the economy and Marc Faber. He predicts that there will be a war--another one and perhaps a bigger one--in a few years as the stimulus bubble bursts, the economy worsens, and Americans become disaffected. Gore Vidal is predicting a military dictatorship because Americans will become so fragmented that this will be the only way to hold the country together.
It seems to me that all the signs are there of an impending catastrophe. I am going back and forth with this: Yes, the situaton really is this bad (a stimulus bubble sure to pop, no manufactorig base, huge government debt, two no-win wars, no political solution that doesn't really hurt) vs. No, it can't be that bad, I am exaggerating and giving into anxiety and panic.
It seems to me that this is the time to think about leaving the country, going somewhere, but where? I don't speak any foreign languages and have no skills that don't rely on English.
America is a dying empire and will not fall without death throes that will embroil the entire world. Remaining here makes me complicit but I AM an American. I no longer have any regard for my government but I love my land--the Everglades, the forests, the oceans. To leave the land I love would destroy me but if my forebodings are correct, remaining here might be worse.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Purse Seine by Robinson Jeffers
Today, I am posting one of my favorite poems, entitled Purse-Seine by Robinson Jeffers. It compares the flailing of sardines in a net as they know they are caught and try to escape with the helplessness of modern man, trapped in cities, totally dependent on each other. Consider the lines "We have geared the machines and locked all together into inter-dependence; we have built the great cities; now There is no escape. We have gathered vast populations incapable of free survival, insulated.
Jeffers was not a popular man during his lifetime. He was an isolationist when that was unfashionable. Yet, reading this poem, he seems like a prophet. After all, we are watching the collapse of the western economy and the American empire. The bailout will buy us time but not fix the problem.
==========================================================================
Our sardine fishermen work at night in the dark
of the moon; daylight or moonlight
They could not tell where to spread the net,
unable to see the phosphorescence of the
shoals of fish.
They work northward from Monterey, coasting
Santa Cruz; off New Year's Point or off
Pigeon Point
The look-out man will see some lakes of milk-color
light on the sea's night-purple; he points,
and the helmsman
Turns the dark prow, the motorboat circles the
gleaming shoal and drifts out her seine-net.
They close the circle
And purse the bottom of the net, then with great
labor haul it in.
I cannot tell you
How beautiful the scene is, and a little terrible,
then, when the crowded fish
Know they are caught, and wildly beat from one wall
to the other of their closing destiny the
phosphorescent
Water to a pool of flame, each beautiful slender body
sheeted with flame, like a live rocket
A comet's tail wake of clear yellow flame; while outside
the narrowing
Floats and cordage of the net great sea-lions come up
to watch, sighing in the dark; the vast walls
of night
Stand erect to the stars.
Lately I was looking from a night mountain-top
On a wide city, the colored splendor, galaxies of light:
how could I help but recall the seine-net
Gathering the luminous fish? I cannot tell you how
beautiful the city appeared, and a little terrible.
I thought, We have geared the machines and locked all together
into inter-dependence; we have built the great cities; now
There is no escape. We have gathered vast populations incapable
of free survival, insulated
From the strong earth, each person in himself helpless, on all
dependent. The circle is closed, and the net
Is being hauled in. They hardly feel the cords drawing, yet
they shine already. The inevitable mass-disasters
Will not come in our time nor in our children's, but we
and our children
Must watch the net draw narrower, government take all
powers--or revolution, and the new government
Take more than all, add to kept bodies kept souls--or anarchy,
the mass-disasters.
These things are Progress;
Do you marvel our verse is troubled or frowning, while it keeps
its reason? Or it lets go, lets the mood flow
In the manner of the recent young men into mere hysteria,
splintered gleams, crackled laughter. But they are
quite wrong.
There is no reason for amazement: surely one always knew
that cultures decay, and life's end is death.
Jeffers was not a popular man during his lifetime. He was an isolationist when that was unfashionable. Yet, reading this poem, he seems like a prophet. After all, we are watching the collapse of the western economy and the American empire. The bailout will buy us time but not fix the problem.
==========================================================================
Our sardine fishermen work at night in the dark
of the moon; daylight or moonlight
They could not tell where to spread the net,
unable to see the phosphorescence of the
shoals of fish.
They work northward from Monterey, coasting
Santa Cruz; off New Year's Point or off
Pigeon Point
The look-out man will see some lakes of milk-color
light on the sea's night-purple; he points,
and the helmsman
Turns the dark prow, the motorboat circles the
gleaming shoal and drifts out her seine-net.
They close the circle
And purse the bottom of the net, then with great
labor haul it in.
I cannot tell you
How beautiful the scene is, and a little terrible,
then, when the crowded fish
Know they are caught, and wildly beat from one wall
to the other of their closing destiny the
phosphorescent
Water to a pool of flame, each beautiful slender body
sheeted with flame, like a live rocket
A comet's tail wake of clear yellow flame; while outside
the narrowing
Floats and cordage of the net great sea-lions come up
to watch, sighing in the dark; the vast walls
of night
Stand erect to the stars.
Lately I was looking from a night mountain-top
On a wide city, the colored splendor, galaxies of light:
how could I help but recall the seine-net
Gathering the luminous fish? I cannot tell you how
beautiful the city appeared, and a little terrible.
I thought, We have geared the machines and locked all together
into inter-dependence; we have built the great cities; now
There is no escape. We have gathered vast populations incapable
of free survival, insulated
From the strong earth, each person in himself helpless, on all
dependent. The circle is closed, and the net
Is being hauled in. They hardly feel the cords drawing, yet
they shine already. The inevitable mass-disasters
Will not come in our time nor in our children's, but we
and our children
Must watch the net draw narrower, government take all
powers--or revolution, and the new government
Take more than all, add to kept bodies kept souls--or anarchy,
the mass-disasters.
These things are Progress;
Do you marvel our verse is troubled or frowning, while it keeps
its reason? Or it lets go, lets the mood flow
In the manner of the recent young men into mere hysteria,
splintered gleams, crackled laughter. But they are
quite wrong.
There is no reason for amazement: surely one always knew
that cultures decay, and life's end is death.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
American Individualism
Before James Webb was elected as a Democratic senator from Virginia, he wrote a book entitled Born Fighting about the history of the Scots-Irish in America. I was particularly interested in the book because my maternal grandmother was Scots-Irish although her personal story was different than those described by Webb. Instead of settling in Appalachia, my grandmother's ancestors settled in Nova Scotia and came to the United States only after the Civil War. No one in my family spoke much about the Scots-Irish part of our ancestry. We were more interested in an ancestor who immigrated from Sweden.
Still, as I read Webb's descriptions of Scots-Irish culture--execrable housekeeping, academic underachievement, distrust of authority, individualism, fractiousness, and the tendency to swing between sensuality and religiosity--I had an epiphany. This is me. I have found my cultural identity.
Perhaps the most politically relevant of Scots-Irish cultural traits is individualism. Foreign observers of the American scene nearly always comment on the weight given to individualism rather than community and are puzzled by the fact that it is often the poorest and least-educated of Americans who espouse these values even though, theoretically, they would benefit from a more communitarian emphasis if that emphasis led to, for example, national health insurance. The Israeli sociologist, Baruch Kimmerling, in personal correspondence with me, commented that the hyper-patriotism of American culture was possibly intended to offset America's "wild individualism" and a writer in Ha'aretz, whose name I forget, expressed the wish that Israel would not become as individualistic as America.
The wonderful Noam Chomsky commented that American society is atomized and that this is a result of deliberate policies to keep the masses from uniting and pressing for real change. A series of videos of Chomsky discussing class warfare is available on youtube and is very much worth watching. Click here for an audiocast of Chomsky on class warChomsky is right about this, as he nearly always is, but it occurs to me that there is something in American culture that makes it easy for the elites to keep the masses atomized. This policy does not go against the grain of American culture. In fact, it exploits a pre-existing tendency in the culture.
Kimmerling, in his book on Zionism and economics, cited the American historian Frederick Jackson Turner, and argued that the availablity of cheap land is the source of American individualism. Early in American history, vast tracts of land were available practically for the taking. People could stake a claim and were responsible for improving and defending the land themselves, without the assistance of the government. When this most valuable resource could be acquired without going through the government, people were free to develop a more individualistic culture.
Israel, on the other hand, had a high percentage of its land owned by the Jewish National Fund, a quasi-official government agency and Israelis had to go through it to buy land or a house. This dependence on government for this necessary commodity helped shape Israel into a more collective and communally oriented society.
I can't help but wonder whether these land policies are not only the cause of different attitudes about individualism but are also the result of underlying cultural differences. To my non-Jewish way of thinking, the most absolutely startling aspect of Jewish culture is its greater emphasis on community. Protestants almost never talk about community and when they do, it is with a sense of duty and annoyance rather than a sense of belonging or satisfaction.
As a Protestant child, there were two songs I learned while still in pre-school. The first, of course, was "Jesus Loves Me." The second song was "The B-I-B-L-E." It contained the line "I stand alone on the Word of God." Then there is the famous Easter hymn "In the Garden": "I come to the garden alone." Catholic hymns, on the other hand, sing of the Church, the Holy Family, and other themes that emphasize family, society, and community. To a Protestant, the greatest sin is lack of faith, a sin that is necessarily highly personal and individual. To a Catholic, the greatest sin is selfishness, a sin against the community. The Scots-Irish are, of course, among the most strongly Protestant of people.
If these aspects of American society are, as I suspect, deeply rooted in ethnic and cultural traits, reformers who want to establish a more collective society are doomed to fail. Two groups of do-gooders who are going against the grain of American culture are the global warming activists and the national service advocates.
The global warming people lament the existence of suburbia--where people have far more space, privacy, and freedom to pursue individual interests and lives than in the city--because it leads to greater energy usage. Thomas Friedman wants to institute an additional fifty cent per gallon gas tax, a policy that punishes the rural poor ,who must travel longer distances for everything, far more than wealthy New Yorkers. He advocates this because, in my judgement, he wants to stick it to the Arabs by reducing oil imports. Sales taxes are among the most regressive of taxes because the poor spend a disproportionately large share of their income compared to the rich. (Friedman, as you will recall, also was a big proponent of the Iraq war, another policy that affected the poor more than the affluent as young people from rural areas and the inner cities were far more likely to enlist than other kids.)
National Service is another idea going against the grain of American culture. It is one thing to be drafted to defend the country during wartime. It is quite another to lose a substantial portion of your liberty to work for low pay on projects important to politicians. Besides, I can't help but suspect that national service plans are backdoor ways of increasing the pool of military recruits.
The usual argument is that young people should give back to their societies that have raised them. No one can disagree with that but they can give back to society far more effectively by working in economically productive jobs, raising healthy kids, taking care of aging parents, and volunteering for causes close to their hearts.
Proponents of national service argue that this is done in Europe, or Israel, or some other place. So what? We are Americans, not Europeans or Israelis. It is time to cling fiercely to our American identity, an identity that values freedom and individuality and that looks askance on government coercion.
One of the earliest American flags depicted a rattlesnake with the words "Don't Tread on Me" written above it. Advocates of a more collective--and necessarily coercive--society will find a deep-rooted, culturally based resistance. They will be treading on a serpent.
Still, as I read Webb's descriptions of Scots-Irish culture--execrable housekeeping, academic underachievement, distrust of authority, individualism, fractiousness, and the tendency to swing between sensuality and religiosity--I had an epiphany. This is me. I have found my cultural identity.
Perhaps the most politically relevant of Scots-Irish cultural traits is individualism. Foreign observers of the American scene nearly always comment on the weight given to individualism rather than community and are puzzled by the fact that it is often the poorest and least-educated of Americans who espouse these values even though, theoretically, they would benefit from a more communitarian emphasis if that emphasis led to, for example, national health insurance. The Israeli sociologist, Baruch Kimmerling, in personal correspondence with me, commented that the hyper-patriotism of American culture was possibly intended to offset America's "wild individualism" and a writer in Ha'aretz, whose name I forget, expressed the wish that Israel would not become as individualistic as America.
The wonderful Noam Chomsky commented that American society is atomized and that this is a result of deliberate policies to keep the masses from uniting and pressing for real change. A series of videos of Chomsky discussing class warfare is available on youtube and is very much worth watching. Click here for an audiocast of Chomsky on class warChomsky is right about this, as he nearly always is, but it occurs to me that there is something in American culture that makes it easy for the elites to keep the masses atomized. This policy does not go against the grain of American culture. In fact, it exploits a pre-existing tendency in the culture.
Kimmerling, in his book on Zionism and economics, cited the American historian Frederick Jackson Turner, and argued that the availablity of cheap land is the source of American individualism. Early in American history, vast tracts of land were available practically for the taking. People could stake a claim and were responsible for improving and defending the land themselves, without the assistance of the government. When this most valuable resource could be acquired without going through the government, people were free to develop a more individualistic culture.
Israel, on the other hand, had a high percentage of its land owned by the Jewish National Fund, a quasi-official government agency and Israelis had to go through it to buy land or a house. This dependence on government for this necessary commodity helped shape Israel into a more collective and communally oriented society.
I can't help but wonder whether these land policies are not only the cause of different attitudes about individualism but are also the result of underlying cultural differences. To my non-Jewish way of thinking, the most absolutely startling aspect of Jewish culture is its greater emphasis on community. Protestants almost never talk about community and when they do, it is with a sense of duty and annoyance rather than a sense of belonging or satisfaction.
As a Protestant child, there were two songs I learned while still in pre-school. The first, of course, was "Jesus Loves Me." The second song was "The B-I-B-L-E." It contained the line "I stand alone on the Word of God." Then there is the famous Easter hymn "In the Garden": "I come to the garden alone." Catholic hymns, on the other hand, sing of the Church, the Holy Family, and other themes that emphasize family, society, and community. To a Protestant, the greatest sin is lack of faith, a sin that is necessarily highly personal and individual. To a Catholic, the greatest sin is selfishness, a sin against the community. The Scots-Irish are, of course, among the most strongly Protestant of people.
If these aspects of American society are, as I suspect, deeply rooted in ethnic and cultural traits, reformers who want to establish a more collective society are doomed to fail. Two groups of do-gooders who are going against the grain of American culture are the global warming activists and the national service advocates.
The global warming people lament the existence of suburbia--where people have far more space, privacy, and freedom to pursue individual interests and lives than in the city--because it leads to greater energy usage. Thomas Friedman wants to institute an additional fifty cent per gallon gas tax, a policy that punishes the rural poor ,who must travel longer distances for everything, far more than wealthy New Yorkers. He advocates this because, in my judgement, he wants to stick it to the Arabs by reducing oil imports. Sales taxes are among the most regressive of taxes because the poor spend a disproportionately large share of their income compared to the rich. (Friedman, as you will recall, also was a big proponent of the Iraq war, another policy that affected the poor more than the affluent as young people from rural areas and the inner cities were far more likely to enlist than other kids.)
National Service is another idea going against the grain of American culture. It is one thing to be drafted to defend the country during wartime. It is quite another to lose a substantial portion of your liberty to work for low pay on projects important to politicians. Besides, I can't help but suspect that national service plans are backdoor ways of increasing the pool of military recruits.
The usual argument is that young people should give back to their societies that have raised them. No one can disagree with that but they can give back to society far more effectively by working in economically productive jobs, raising healthy kids, taking care of aging parents, and volunteering for causes close to their hearts.
Proponents of national service argue that this is done in Europe, or Israel, or some other place. So what? We are Americans, not Europeans or Israelis. It is time to cling fiercely to our American identity, an identity that values freedom and individuality and that looks askance on government coercion.
One of the earliest American flags depicted a rattlesnake with the words "Don't Tread on Me" written above it. Advocates of a more collective--and necessarily coercive--society will find a deep-rooted, culturally based resistance. They will be treading on a serpent.
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