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I am starting a series of what I am calling Gentle Realizations with this post. They are things that I come up with when I ask myself what I would like to tell my children and grandchildren concerning the important things in life and the spirit. Some of these are paradoxes at the heart of human being. And this one is one of . . . → Read More: Gentle realizations: The mind is used to investigate the mind Fukushima is out of the news mostly but the problem has NOT gone away. The spent fuel in Unit 4 continues to be housed in a perilous state. The building seems to be sinking, due to seismic damage, about 80 cm – 2.5 feet – so far. The situation is not stable and should be condiered to be deteriorating. The damage of another . . . → Read More: Fukushima Unit 4 Problems Eric Hobsbawm passed away. I remember reading some of his work in University. Timothy Snyder wrote a eulogy at CNN which had a clear regard for the power of the narrative of communism for the subject of history. He puts an interesting spin on it by comparing it to a contemporary capitalist narrative: Private property must stay, not be abolished. The state must . . . → Read More: Eric Hobsbawn – RIP Every once in a while I get just a glimpse of the sublime. Walking down Madison Ave. in Midtown one is surrounded by luxury goods shops, upscale boutiques, antiques and well dressed men and women going about their business. Among them I walked too, and thoughts of Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse’s exposition of the “four seals” of Buddhism in “What Makes You NOT a Buddhist” resonating in my mind. . . . → Read More: Madison Boddhisattva Greed is good Gordon Gekko is alive and well. His paean to greed is being echoed in the values and narratives of the people and the politicians and the economists that support a particular class in the US. Well, ladies and gentlemen, we’re not here to indulge in fantasy, but in political and economic reality. America, America has become a second-rate power. Its . . . → Read More: Greed and power narratives The poisoning of the political discourse continues apace in America. Arguments are shouted down, Red-baiting is back. This from the Guardian: Cheryl and her co-workers learned that the Honeywell division they had been working for had been sold to Sensata Technologies. They researched Sensata. she said: “We found out this summer that it was owned by Bain [Capital]. Then we found the connection . . . → Read More: Poisoning the discourse If one arrogates something to oneself one takes it as a right, and claims it over and above the claims of others. Arrogance is a claim for precedence. Putting oneself ahead of others, or as its defenders might say ahead of the pack. It is interesting etymologically that rogation comes from the act of stretching one’s hand out, or, in today’s parlance, panhandling. The beggar is asking for something the arrogant one is taking it for themselves. It is my worry that the world I am bequeathing to my children is a world in which they will need to confront and resist a new rise of this type of thinking. . . . → Read More: History and Arrogance New Deal 2.0 One of the critiques that comes out of these arguments is that the picture of property rights as a vertical relationship between a person and an object, one where the issue at play is whether the person’s right over the object is “deserved all the way down,” is flawed, or at least insufficient. Property is really a horizontal set of . . . → Read More: Thinking more deeply about property rights While not condoning the hiding of accounts by dictators and criminals, I have to say that the US trying to stake out a moral high ground in this is laughable. Attempting to influence the US to pursue the dictators’ money through somehow attacking their accounts is naive. . . . → Read More: Africa and the War on Offshore Finance I have been mulling over writing a new manifesto for today, something that will capture my thoughts as a political platform. This piece by Thorten Parker called What do you want for America opens with a good statement of the background of the case for a new American manifesto thusly: People who understand how this country’s financial system works know the American dream . . . → Read More: Towards an new American Manifesto |
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