Problem:
In 2018, we have the opportunity to flip red states (and the House) blue — over 6,000 state seats up for election! So if you have some money to give, which organization, or candidate, would be the most effective investment?
Solution:
Flippable and Swing Left will help you maximize your impact per dollar.
I knew (and contributed) to Swing Left, but did not know about Flippable.
I really did not know much about Jordan Petersen, other than the recently-learned fact that people apparently have strong feelings about him – the few things that I saw that he said himself did not appear particularly radical or controversial, if careful, well-thought-out and somewhat unexciting. I saw some admirer compare him to a dangerous russian-american radical, Ayn Rand (a major turnoff), and I thought the person doing the comparison was out of their mind – which is why today’s writeup from Canadaland podcast host in the Times looked interesting.
And now I see why Canada looks so appealing – I do want to live in a country where someone like him is considered a conservative . I don’t have to agree with either those who love him (for undeserved reasons), or hate him (for the same undeserved reasons), but I could live with someone like that.
Maybe it is my ultimately socialist, good-of-the-commons-balanced-against-individualism instincts, but “peace, order and good government” does sound better than our “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
“This one is only for big boys”, says the mother of a Georgian boy named George, pointing to a large curved ladder, too big and dangerous for either George or L, who is both older and smaller than his new friend, to climb, and, surprisingly, she (or physics)succeeds in dissuading them.
I wait for her to be out of earshot, and whisper in L’s ear, “this one is only for big boys, AND BIG GIRLS”. He doesn’t object, hopefully takes it in, and runs to the small and more toddler-accessible stairs.
A guy at the coop shift is going on a bike trip across Jordan with his wife, and I am so envious…
I’ve heard from people who have been how amazing the desert is at night. It feels like it’s one of those things that might still be possible today, but not tomorrow.
“The global city is not London, New York, Tokyo or Jo’berg — it is the part of each which is connected to an analogous part in each of the others. The global city is a distributed phenomenon. There is only one global city, and it floats on top of the others like lace.”
— Manuel Castells
In Japan, they said that there is only one Gaijin Bank. Just like you join Nomura or Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, you join Gaijin Bank when you graduate, and stay employed there for life.
Gaijin Bank has departments – Gorudoman Saksu, Doitsu, Morugan Stanri, BĪ-En-Pī, ShitiBank – and you transfer between them. If you are a woman, and want to be treated like an intelligent human and not an O-eru, and want a career with a chance of advancement, you join Gaijin Bank. But once you are employed by Gaijin Bank, just like if you are employed by Mizuho or Sumitomo Mitsui, there is no way out.
“April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.”— T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land
Putinism, like Trumpism, is based on a cynicism. It’s based on the idea that one should have no illusions, be wise to the ways of the world. People are, as Machiavelli put it, ungrateful and deceitful, timid of danger and avid for profit. Rivalry is inevitable. Everything is partisan. Anybody or any institution that claims to be objective and above the fray is a liar.
In this world, everything is public relations, and the more shameless the charade the better because people will believe whatever is in their interest to believe.
In times of anxiety and distrust, it’s much easier to sell cynicism than idealism.
| David Brooks, Vladimir Putin, the Most Influential Man in the World
Must not give in to it
Took a roundabout way today and walked by a place where a lifetime or two ago I saw a play with my friend in it, about young Jews in 1930s Berlin and how one of them inadvertently ended up in the same room with a gun and unsuspected Hitler, considered what it would have been to kill him, and didn’t.
For the past year or so ago I keep asking myself – are we living in 1930s Berlin?
Take me away?
Commonwealth of Boshka is my favorite country name.
tinfoilparachute 