I want people to know that peace is possible even in this stupid day and age. Prem Rawat, June 8, 2008
You've had opportunities to come to DC....
They are predicting more snow starting tomorrow afternoon, through Wednesday. Up to 10 inches!!!!
Linda will be off school again tomorrow, and amazingly, the Federal Government is will be shut down again.
I went out driving today, doing some errands. The roads, even the main ones, were pretty rough, with slush patches and missing lanes (covered by snow banks). I can see why everything will be closed still tomorrow.
I want people to know that peace is possible even in this stupid day and age. Prem Rawat, June 8, 2008
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King
I want people to know that peace is possible even in this stupid day and age. Prem Rawat, June 8, 2008
Interesting Senate Testimony by Simon Johnson, former Chief Economist for the IMF. In brief, he warns about the implications of several weak European countries defaulting in the coming months, causing serious impact to the European financial system and potentially double-dipping the US economy - though not by much. He also talks about tightening US credit; another possible 'bubble' (my words) in emerging countries; and the inability of countries to rescue another financial crisis.
Its a long post.
Could be some serious mess ahead.
Posted on Baseline Scenario
http://baselinescenario.com/2010/02/...201/#more-6335
with a tip to HuffingtonPost
Not much time to comment on the linked article (which was definitely thought-provoking), but I wanted to supplement it with another link, concentrating on the unemployment/human side of the equation, at least domestically:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/20100...america-future
I'll try to make some comments later on all of this. Overall, the picture being painted both on the ground and at 35,000 feet is grim.
And then there's Richard Branson, jumping on Peak Oil...
March 2010..Generational information/ psychology of unemployment/ gender roles/ historical prospective/ and more.
How a New Jobless Era Will Transform America:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/20100...ce=patrick.net
"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." -- Theodore Roosevelt
While I had stated in an earlier post that I believe we have reached the 4T, and one of the signs was that many communities around me have already announced the cancelling of some of their traditional summer music festivals, I still have some doubts as to whether we are fully absorbed in it as of yet. It has often been stated here that a 4T singals saceular endings and new beginnings. Yet there is a strong effort to maintain as much of the status quo as possible; a prime example being the ongoing debate over health care reform. And also a time to put the focus on efforts and attention on the domestic arena in whatever way seems practical and effective. And yet we seem to be just as focus on the global world view as ever. It has also been stated that this is not the time to be selfish or personally preoccupied, and yet many of us seem to be even more preoccupied with personal concerns than ever. You might not hare the phrase "me generation" bandied about so much anymore, but I doubt we have come too far away from that mentality. It may have shifted from the partying mentality to overemphasis on work, but it's still with us nonetheless.
This is something I was thinking about in my micro-turnings post here. And I came to the conclusion that we're in a Crisis-high. Where the Crisis society/culture is crystallizing and beginning to form. By the end of the forumlated Crisis-high society will completely refute the previous Unraveling culture and see that things can't go back to the way they were. It matches up with the period of 1929 - 1933; where people thought that the GD would end quickly and that they could return to their Roaring 20's lifestyles.
I'd say we're about halfway (or somewhere around there) within this Crisis-high. The Crisis-awakening is next, where two NEW ideologies will overtake the MS culture & begin battling for control of the Turning. The Crisis-unraveling is where the battling for control of the Crisis starts destroying the Crisis society/culture. The Crisis-crisis... well that'll be the most transformative part of this Crisis. Last time it was WWII, this time... well we can postulate.
~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."
I can believe all of it.
I experienced a taste of what may be coming back in the early 2000s when I left my government job in Seattle, was then riffed from three Ohio engineering firms in a row, and my career came within a hair's-breadth of being permanently derailed. Psychologically I haven't exactly recovered from that experience, either....and that took place in a mere recession. In the Little Depression, I am FAR more reluctant to take risks with my employment situation, even regarding in-agency promotions and relocations, as there would likely be no second chance should things go horribly wrong this time around.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King
At times I have the distressing fear that America might be headed to a new form of feudalism, one in which one's prospects depend upon being born into the right family, in which all marriages in what passes for the middle class (let alone an aristocratic elite in all but name) are made to protect assets, in which people achieve economic security only at the price of freedom. For the proles the mark of compliance is pain behind the forced "Happy to serve you!" smile. Economic elites who got burned during the financial crisis of 2007 will, like Shylock, demand their pounds of flesh, although the pounds of flesh will be more intangible, as in hereditary serfdom.
Such is possible if this Crisis still goes badly. It would be wise for elites and good for humanity for those elites to cut their losses.
The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid "dens of crime" (or) even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered... in clean, carpeted, warmed and well-lighted offices, by (those) who do not need to raise their voices. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the office of a thoroughly nasty business concern."
― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters
I just saw in today's paper that Albuquerque's new Republican mayor has canceled the race down the Rio Grande, or at least canceled funding for it, and canceled the downtown Summerfest series. Instead he's downsizing the festivals in the series to the size that would fit in neighborhood parks and sending them out there. I didn't vote for him, but I totally approve this measure. It's part of his set of adjustments to the recession and I think it's not only financially prudent, I'd be far more likely to go to a Summerfest in my own neighborhood than to bother going to a mob scene downtown! For what that's worth.
How to spot a shill, by John Michael Greer: "What you watch for is (a) a brand new commenter who (b) has nothing to say about the topic under discussion but (c) trots out a smoothly written opinion piece that (d) hits all the standard talking points currently being used by a specific political or corporate interest, while (e) avoiding any other points anyone else has made on that subject."
"If the shoe fits..." The Grey Badger.
Chicago took the same type of action that ABQ did with their summer fireworks. For many years they have had a massive display downtown the night of July 3, which drew some two million people. I went one year and it took two hours or so just to get out of the loop. One of those things I had to do once just to say I did it. This year there are going to be three separate displays on July 4. I am not a big fan of Chicago's Mayor Daley anyway, and since I live in the suburbs it doesn't affect me directly. But was disappointed to learn that my former hometown of Downers Grove scrapped their three day long Heritage Festival, one of the largest blowouts in the suburban area. I would have suggested trimming it from three days to two instead.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King
Gettysburg used to have Ghost Trains around Halloween, when the touring season of the summer had wound down & thus the scenic railroad trains could get some extra money. On the Ghost Trains they would hire those people who give ghost tours to tell some of the stories while riding through some of the prettiest scenery in South-Central PA. This year there were no Ghost Trains... and this was the only year I had the time & the money to go on them...
~Chas'88
"There have always been people who say: "The war will be over someday." I say there's no guarantee the war will ever be over. Naturally a brief intermission is conceivable. Maybe the war needs a breather, a war can even break its neck, so to speak. But the kings and emperors, not to mention the pope, will always come to its help in adversity. ON the whole, I'd say this war has very little to worry about, it'll live to a ripe old age."
To move from the tread I created to an extisting one:
11-10-10
England
Students protest turn into a riot because of tuition hikes. England's Y is demanding its future and is upset over obsticals to it. Their generation is showing engagement to problems instead of being turned off.
November 2010:
Chinese fishing boat rams Japanese Coast Guard ship in disputed waters.
The fact that old issues must be resolved in 4T are comming to ahead. Not saying that it breaks down into conflict or not. Just that the disputed waters is an issue and must come to a close in any way in 4T.
Ireland's young flee abroad as economic meltdown looms
So much for the "Irish Tiger" the Neo-Liberals pimped so much.
To recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque and insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less.
-Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man under Socialism
"If you touch my junk, I'm going to have you arrested," John Tyner.
This maybe a sign of things in the turning. It depends on how society views it. It does not matter regardless if they should or should not do a body search. What I am bringing up is society's view of the situation. He is getting a high rate of positive feedback from the public and that is what I am bringing up here instead of "if" or "if not" to the search. Could the climax be a revolt against the system that US society operatates in?
Initially, the questions I ask when reviewing any saeculur event: What did the decision makers know about the cyclical time, when did they know it, and how did they act on that knowledge? Then I can ask the question, "what was their purpose?" I take extra special notice when reviewing events before Generations was released by Strauss-Howe.
Update: In 2010 the traditional fireworks in Vancouver was back on. What seemed different was the people, who were more subdued than the previous five celebrations I attended. It seemed they appreciated it more for what it was... aside from the obvious, as a way of reconnecting with family and friends, rather than to get drunk at the beer garden.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King
I myself wouldn't have any problem with the body scanner. Heck-- I'd probably do something off-the-wall, like grab my b*lls in mid-scan, just to lighten things up in a comedically obnoxious way. But there's no way I'd ever allow anyone other than a woman I'm romantically involved with to give me an "enhanced" pat-down. Before that would ever happen, I would fu**ing take the train... or not travel at all.
"Better hurry. There's a storm coming. His storm!!!" :-O -Abigail Freemantle, "The Stand" by Stephen King
"My generation, we were the generation that was going to change the world: somehow we were going to make it a little less lonely, a little less hungry, a little more just place. But it seems that when that promise slipped through our hands we didnīt replace it with nothing but lost faith."
Bruce Springsteen, 1987
http://brucebase.wikispaces.com/1987...+YORK+CITY,+NY