The Coronavirus

[pbrower2a]

(01-11-2022, 05:45 PM)nguyenivy Wrote:

(01-11-2022, 01:11 AM)TatteredGenX Wrote:

(12-29-2021, 03:55 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: "Survival of the fittest" is now as much a philosophical position as a scientific one. It can extend to institutions, firms, and political entities. As businesses Sears and K-Mart, both once-impressive entities are moribund. They failed to adapt to a changing environment. I'm not certain that business entities (unless mom-and-pop outfits that die when the heirs find some easier way of making a living) have a set lifetime. Political entities? The United States is one of the oldest of the existing ones, and if I am to make a guess of what political system now intact will still be much the same a thousand years from now, the USA should be one of the most likely. The USA has proved as flexible as it is imposing.

But be at the wrong place at the wrong time, and you will be struck down. Become old and inflexible, and you become irrelevant fast. "Earth" itself was the wrong place to be when the asteroid hit at Chixculub. Size is usually good for winning fights with other creatures (elephants, hippos, and rhinos are rarely on some predator's menu), but not with facing hurricane-force winds of extreme heat. The seas were not safe havens. No large dinosaur had the stability to avoid dying when tossed into a tree.  We wouldn't, either.

Hi Pbrower. Sorry for the very late reply. 
Neither Safari or Chrome likes this forum on my phone, for replying. I gave it one shot then decided I'd best be on a computer, then plum forgot about it. 

Good point on the world of business. 
I was thinking more of the 6th extinction, the way we have destroyed earth, that the world seems more and more primed for war, and that the seeming majority of people seem to not care. 

It seems to me that we need to start caring, or this will not end well. Our ecosystems and the cycles that support them are a pretty complex piece of machinery. We have tampered with the mechanism without a clue as to what will happen. Even our scientists have stated they do not know what all is involved, or what will happen. 

I keep hanging onto the hope that the masses can convince the few that action needs to happen. 
The Fourth Turning book was most interesting in this aspect--with the same archetypes showing up again and again. 

I have high hopes for the Homeland Generation, and the one yet to be born. 
My own generation needs to buck up and come to grips with that we aren't in the 1920's Speakeasies any longer, the fun of robbing merchants and cooking booze has come to an end and it is 1939 now.

What is (was?) this century's analogue of the 1920s Speakeasies, etc?

To avoid confusing the decade with the century I am calling the first decade of the twenty-first century the "Double-Zero Decade". Some moniker is appropriate, and I so far know of no other. If I were in media or academia I would push it, and I might be successful. 

1. The ultimately-failed war on marijuana was a good analogue to the war against alcoholic beverages. It failed for loss of support. To be sure, the anti-drug crusade continues against other drugs far more dangerous and destructive (heroin, cocaine, meth, fentanyl). People as hostile as I am to drugs recognize that law enforcement is wiser to set priorities other than marijuana. I recognize that the War on Drugs has practically become a War on Addicts who are as much victims as offenders. 

2. The celebrity circus of the 1920's has an obvious parallel in the Double-Zero decade. To be sure, the entertainment business has been replete with flagrant narcissists who strut their ability to live better than the rest of us despite making money at something that does not seem like numbing drudgery.  When inequality peaks, they may be the only ones who get away with lavish spending on frivolity.

3. A generally pro-business political life with weak political leaders predominating on the conservative side. Dubya was a weak President whose ideal was to let the plutocrats do whatever they want with no resistance. See also the dreadful Warren Gamaliel Harding and President Calvin Coolidge who fostered a climate of greed. 

4. Religiosity was strengthening in influence among the middle-aged (Boomers were middle-aged  throughout the Double-Zero Decade) but losing influence among youth and young adults. 

5. Economic inequality intensified in a social order that saw speculation as one of the more honorable and effective ways of enriching oneself. Labor Unions were at their weakest since the 1920's as more people ended up in jobs in which a union could do little good.  But as many prominent people lionized the speculative frenzy the financial markets became increasingly corrupt and reckless, creating rip-offs that would prove catastrophic by the end of the decade.

6. Inflation was low. People thought the time prosperous, but it was prosperous largely to those well connected. The economic activity did not lead to pay increases that might have gotten more people out of poverty. If people made more real income than in the prior two decades, then it was because people had to work two or more jobs to make ends meet. Low inflation depends heavily upon super-cheap labor that creates or serves wealth without participation in the bounty of the consumer society. 

7. Productivity was rising due to the adoption technological innovations. In the 1920's such was the electrification of manufacturing processes; in the Double-Zero decade, the internet made much of the economic activity more efficient. Productivity rose, but wages didn't.

8. The system generally pushed entertainment (which included gambling) at the expense of learning. Maybe it is easier to numb people with cakes and circuses than to encourage people to use their minds and think between the lines. Although there are measures to promote new forms of gambling because it is profitable, gambling is a dumb way to spend time and money. 

9. Minority groups intensified their participation in American culture. The 1920's were the time of the Harlem Renaissance and the rise of Jewish influence upon American cultural, academic, and political life. The Negro (the polite word in that time) occasionally entered the lucrative realm of entertainment and did well. Jewish influence, almost entirely benign, became so pervasive that in 1925 a hack writer and cult leader in Germany lamented the "Jewification" and "Ni88erization" of American life. I hate using such bastardized, vile language, but that is exactly what one gets from this purported masterpiece -- at least to cranky people full of hate:  

 

an image of the original dust-jacket whence came such observations that I attribute to their author. (Oh come on! The Harlem Renaissance sounds like great fun, and as someone about half German and Swiss I recognize the Ashkenazim as my cultural brethren and as a nominal Christian I recognize Christian morality as Jewish morality with a dish of mindless prudery on the side.  

10. The novel Babbitt (Sinclair Lewis) that so well described the 1920's became an absurdity after the Great Stock Market Crash and a period piece until it became all-too-relevant in the Double-Zero Decade. 

11. The generational constellations were much alike, which is extremely important to this site. Picking the end of a near-middle year of both decades (the "4's") one gets:
 
The Gilded (born Reactive, but acting much like a Civic Generation after the end of the Civil War) were quite old (82-101)  compare at the end of 1924 to the GI's, aged 80-103 at the end of 2004. Oliver Wendell Holmes, William Rehnquist. We are speaking of the end of the year in all cases. 

The Progressive generation, clearly Adaptive, was 65 to 81 in 1924 and generally passing retirement age. They still had influence over the culture, journalism, and politics. The Silent were much the same, aged 63 to 79. To be sure, people have been living longer due to better habits of the elderly, which includes people staying active and participating fully in public life since the GI Generation set that pattern that holds at the least for the Silent and so far Boomers. Generational theory suggests the same for the Millennial Generation, and we shall see whether Generation X follows the same pattern. Watch Obama as one of the most prominent and influential to see if the pattern holds. Yes, Obama is approaching old age. But I digress here. Theodore Roosevelt, Joe Biden. 

The Missionary Generation was becoming dominant in 1924, having taken over the Presidency. Not very well with their first President -- you know who. They were then 44 to 64. In 2004 Boomers ranged from  44 to 61. This is the usual peak for political life, membership in the executive elite of Big Business, and peak presence in media and entertainment. Depending on your taste, Warren "Mister Corruption" Harding and Donald Quisling Trump. (Obviously I can't get over my abomination of Donald Trump. The man is rich in vices and short in virtues.  For a brighter side I can't yet pick an analogue for Franklin Delano Roosevelt as no late-wave Boomer has yet become President, but Amy Klobuchar looks like the most-likely last expression of Boomer politics as President. I can imagine her, like FDR, being the Gray Champion of this time.

The Lost were barely getting out of childhood (ages 24 to 41) and at that point not very impressively. Much was the same rap about Generation X (ages 23 to 43). Some were starting some impressive political careers that few could yet figure out, like Harry Truman and Barack Obama. They exemplify what I call the "Mature Reactive", someone who sees political power solely as a great trust to be used for the general good and not for enriching themselves or settling scores. The contrast must be to the "Immature Reactive" who uses power for corrupt gain, self-indulgence, settling scores, bloating their egos like Hitler, Beria, Quisling, Mao Zedong, Szalasi or Rakosi (fascist or Commie it is much the same), or a raft of capi di tutti capi  of the Sicilian and Jewish Mafias or drug kingpins today 

 As Reactive/Nomad types they got the rap for much that older generations saw wrong among themselves. I'm not going to go into the mobsters and drug kingpins. Maybe the best of them learn quickly enough that they can do much good by turning against the rogues in their own midst. That is itself a great service to Humanity. 

Just starting to enter adulthood, but most still children, were the GI generation (just being born to 23) and the  Millennial Generation (last date of birth unclear, but the oldest  also 23). The youngest to get early recognition include the pro athletes. As a long-time fan (although lapsed in recent seasons) of the Detroit Tigers  I can name Charlie Gehringer and Justin Verlander. They let their bats and their fielding or their excellent pitching do the talking. Justin Verlander will likely be the first Millennial enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame. 

The political figures have yet to really show themselves. 


11. The Big One: The Crashes of 1929 and 2008. History repeats itself to a large extent because the people who learned the lessons the hardest way  and shape the political debate in a way that precludes much the same behavior that those geezers associate rightly and wisely with dreadful consequences. The arch-conservative economist Friedrich Hayek (1898-1992) recognized the cause of much of the boom-and-bust cycle: the bubble economy in which people fall for the illusion of easy gain from speculative activities that underpin the bubble. People are speculating instead of investing. The tax system fails to take a bite from paper profits, so speculative activity is an excellent way of creating illusory wealth that one gets without starting a small business, investing in job-creating plant and equipment, doing valuable innovation, creating 'intellectual property', or developing vocational skills or professional qualifications -- all of these are more difficult and require dedication or investment. Speculative booms devour capital without creating it. At some point such a bromide as "Invest in real estate; the Good Lord isn't making any more land" gives way to the reality that anything can be priced out of reach so that there is no new buyer. The speculative boom requires new buyers paying more for what is out there, and when there are no new buyers, the object of speculation collapses. All of a sudden people realize that investing in a speculative boom has transformed capital into $#!+. It's like feeding lobster to a dog and expecting what comes from the other side of the dog to be precious because it was lobster because your dog is precious. 

Now what was different?

There have been many political, cultural, institutional, and technological changes since the 1920's and those have their roles in shaping life. America is much more prosperous than it was in the 1920's, and the only thing that I could imagine being better for most people in the 1920's was much-cheaper real estate. One could work on the waterfront and live in a place with a view of the river, lake, bay, or ocean. Today one has a long commute from a place with a view, most likely of some other slum that the promoters call a "luxury apartment home". Of course you may already know that I see the word "luxury" as one of the most common Orwellian lies in American economic and political life (the valid meaning is "waste", "ostentation", or "excess"), and the word "home" to describe a dwelling being sold as a commodity. Other than that, both poverty and ethnic or religious discrimination are much less severe now than then. Such is technological, commercial, social, and moral progress. 

1. Minorities are far better off. Catholics and Jews are now part of the Establishment instead of being on the outside looking in. Give credit where it is due to other minorities for formal education, dedicated work, skill-development,  avoidance of crime, and establishment of businesses.  I need not be black to find Donald Trump taking credit for "black progress" when such is mostly the result of personal achievement that depends little upon political decisions. Interracial marriage, once a violation of criminal statute in some states, is lawful.  

2. Sexism is far weaker. Women have shown competence at much that used to be nearly male-only areas such as law, medicine (in contrast to nursing, and many of those nurses would have been better used as physicians), politics, engineering, and research science. Women at the lower levels of the economic order still have things rough. Poverty has never been easy, and the high level of poverty in America despite all the investment, technological progress, and formal education seems to be the consequence of political decisions to impose poverty as a means of keeping people more scared and helpless so that they will do unpleasant work for low wages  under despotic management. 

3. We obviously have technologies unimaginable in the 1920's. These allow more freedom for creating and disseminating new stuff, and putting ideas into public view. Even what looks like an aging and even moribund technology such as the automobile is far safer, more durable, and more reliable. Human nature as it is, people are doing much the same things as they did in the 1920's, if with more sophistication. E-mail and telegraphy are obvious parallels, and much of what is on the Internet is basically either television or radio recapitulated.

4. We have easier access to culture, high and low... and with the Internet, such applies even to the high culture (maybe not so much the low culture) of a century ago. It is far easier to get an Internet download of images from great art and veritable  concerts of music from the 1920's (this was so in the Double-Zero Decade, so that has not changed). It is far easier to listen to what I consider the most important musical work of the twentieth century, Igor Stravinsky's Le sacre du printemps (1913) today off YouTube than it was to attend a live concert in the 1920's. A live performance in the concert hall is still usually superior to listening to a recording (barring an inept performance), but I can assure you that even regular subscribers to the symphony listen to more recorded than live classical music. I can say the same of folk and pop. 

5. We have more formal education. Obviously much of what passes for education is "pearls before swine", but one must offer it to anyone who seems ready for it  -- and some who seem unlikely to get anything out of it. It's hard to see diminishing returns to genuine learning. In our time and soon afterward we will need more educational sophistication just to deal with the plethora of choices in life. More productivity and more creation means more stuff that can hurt one or damage vulnerable people exploited in their creation. We are not richer for more IED's, WMD's, street fentanyl, or child pornography. If the Bad guys are getting more sophisticated, then so must we.

6. Lifespans are now longer. Malnutrition used to shorten the lives of poor people in even the most advanced countries well into the 1920's. Medical miracles fend off diseases that until a century ago killed off millions in epidemics. We have antibiotics to fight infections beginning with a laboratory curiosity called penicillin. Because of Social Security and some generous pensions many old people can stay healthy and active until their bodies literally wear out. This allows us Americans, for good or ill, to have octogenarian politicians that may keep some pols in their 30's from bringing their agendas to the fore. The Progressive generation was off the scene well before the Pearl Harbor attack, and the Silent Generation has the likes of Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi, and President Joe Biden at analogous times in a Crisis. This said, there are limits; the GI's were largely off the political scene as the destructive frauds of the real-estate hustle of the Double-Zero  went on.

7. By 2024, the world had eighty more years of historical example. Ideas within the dust-jacket of vile tome shown above led to the most destructive war in history and some of the most heinous treatment of people ever. One can be ten years old today and see the images of bodies stacked like cordwood or ditches full of people who had recently been alive but who had just been raked with machine-gun fire. Bad ideas when carried to their conclusion get horrible results. History happens. 

8. In the 1920's the USA had a dangerous fascist clique, one bigger and for a time more promising of pure evil than the contemporaries in Germany. That was the second (1915) Klan. I have much cause to believe that had it achieved total power that it would have done large scale genocide much like the Nazis did in reality. Instead the Klan disintegrated due to a scandal involving one of its leaders. America got (under FDR) what Abraham Lincoln called "a new birth of freedom" and generously gave that new birth of freedom to nations that thought the United Statees damned of its degeneracy. Such a threat still exists, but it can now operate only on a small (but still unconscionable) level -- like mowing down the congregants in a synagogue. Such a threat says such garbage as "Jews will not replace us!". I can understand why many of them have no wives or children. I'd be delighted to see any ethnic or religious minority replace those fascists.   

9. Gay rights. Need i say more? Homosexuals were once seen as unalloyed evil, and now they are accepted.