Fall and the waning crescent Harvest Moon
This Week
Category Archives: Politics
Lives of Quiet Desperation
Lughnasa and the Harvest Moon
Caveat: Got carried away here. Stuff that’s important to me, but long.
Alienation is killing Americans and Japanese. The age of American despair. American life expectancy has dropped again. This is what life without retirement savings looks like.
Nope, not me. Headlines from articles I noticed over the last couple of weeks. Part of the story is told in the three factors most related to American decline in life expectancy: obesity, suicide, and drug overdoses. Summed up: living lives of quiet desperation.
In Japan the kids have disappeared and left the country to the old folks. People die alone. Unnoticed. Unseen. Unknown.
Ross Douthat, NYT conservative columnist and a voice I listen to, has this paragraph in his article, The Age of American Despair:
“…the simultaneity of the different self-destroying trends is a brute fact of American life. And that simultaneity does not feel like just a coincidence, just correlation without entanglement — especially when you include other indicators, collapsing birthrates and declining marriage rates and decaying social trust, that all suggest a society suffering a meaning deficit, a loss of purpose and optimism and direction, a gently dehumanizing drift.” Douthat, NYT, Sept. 7, 2019
Douthat also says, and I agree with him, that: “Despair as a sociological phenomenon is rarely permanent: Some force, or forces, will supply new forms of meaning eventually.” op cit
He’s a Roman Catholic and a conservative so his hope will be that religion and traditional institutions like the family can reassert their culture shaping roles, provide forms of meaning relevant to this crisis.
Another conservative writer, David Byler, wrote in a Washington Post opinion piece that conservatives have already won the culture war. His argument rests on the positive opinion Americans have of the police, the military, and the continued strength of marriage, the family, and religion. These core institutions, beloved of conservatives, are ok, he says, and prove that conservatives have “the winning hand” in the next election.
Can this despair can be handled by leaning into the familiar, the tried, the true? Seems unlikely to me since marriage and the family, religious institutions exist now, are readily available, and yet the despair rises. And, neither the military nor the police can answer because their roles are defensive, reactive to social forces. They’re not shapers or builders. They’re enforcers after the fact.
I see this despair as a disturbing inflection point created by a world in dramatic transformation. Interlocked global economies. Populations shifting locations, putting immigrant pressure on receiving societies and draining resources from the sending ones. A planet shifting from one climate regime to a less forgiving one for humans. Nativist and xenophobic politics which express the despair through anger, rage at the other upsetting democratic institutions worldwide.
I appreciated Douthat’s reminder that despair is rarely permanent. New forms of meaning will arise, as he projects. But from where? Not sure I know.
Scott Nearing, economist and author of a favorite book of mine, Living the Good Life, proposes a mixed economy. The issue is not one, Nearing argues, of a single economic model to rule them all. Rather, we should be making decisions about what aspects of culture belong to which economic model. Roads and infrastructure, schooling, law enforcement, the military, the legal system operate within a socialist model where we all chip in to assure ourselves of educated children, decent roads and bridges, protection against criminals and foreign enemies. Selling cars, fast food, jewelry, books, bicycles and the like operate within a capitalist model. But what about affordable housing and medical care? What about support for the unemployed or the victims of Schumpeter’s creative destruction?
As in Nearing’s approach to economics, I believe the answer to the despair engendered by a transforming global culture lies in a mixed political response. That is, we need to support some institutions conservatives love: marriage, the family, law enforcement, and the military because they are core to a sense of social security, a feeling of safety. Let’s set aside religion for now. We don’t have to support those institutions in the same way conservatives would. That is, we can favor marriage between persons who love each other while recognizing the non-binary nature of human sexuality. Similar thoughts can apply to the other three.
But, these institutions exist in political and economic contexts that have profound effects on their well-being. Is housing affordable? Is there work for you that pays a living wage? Can you get the medical care you need when you need it? What it will be like for you when you retire? Can you retool yourself for a new career? Are your children receiving the sort of education they need to thrive?
Let’s return now to religion. And, the arts. Bread and roses. “The worker must have bread, but she must have roses, too.” Rose Schneiderman, an organizer for the Women’s Trade Union of New York. Bread and Roses wiki
Positive changes to the economic and social conditions of oppression are, said another way, critical and necessary; but, they are not sufficient. The spirit must be fed, too. Everyone has a right to realize and live out their ikigai.
What religion does, at its best, is help folks develop a coherent view of life’s meaning and create a support system to help them realize it. At its worst religion pretends to have found the only meaning and creates a phalanx of enforcers for that view.
The arts also feed the soul. But they are often kept behind an elite curtain wall of high ticket prices, imposing museum corridors, and a presumed sine qua non of education to appreciate.
If we’re looking for areas outside the rough and tumble of politics for dealing with despair, both religion and the arts can play significant roles. It is here, I believe, that new meaning will arise, will begin to integrate world economies, help us adapt to climate change even as we fight its worsening, enable us to see the other not as a threat, but as a potential new friend, fellow worker, marriage partner.
Well. Take that Trump.
If you can’t stand the heat
Lughnasa and the Harvest Moon
Yesterday the fire danger was very high. Good thing we got a deluge in the afternoon. Rain fell like a waterfall, gushing over the roof and the solar panels, covering the driveway in an inch or so of water. Since this is Colorado weather, we also had some hail. Not very big, but abundant.
Had an early breakfast with friend Rich Levine. Muddy Buck in Evergreen. We discussed introspection, family, the true meaning of Trump. Rich thinks, and I agree, Trump has exposed our true nature as a country. He mentioned the 1619 project, the first date slaves came to our shores. Oh, yeah, I said. And the 3/5ths compromise. Who could vote? White, male, property owners.
Rich teaches constitutional law and intellectual property rights law at the Colorado School of Mines in addition to his practice. It’s his feeling that we can solve the carbon emissions problem, especially with available or not too distant technology. But, he said, we may not be able to solve the warming problem.
He’s right. The question now is not whether the climate will change drastically, but by how much. A 2 degree temperature rise is baked in with current carbon levels in the atmosphere. We can still hold down the damage, but we need to act now.
Later in the day our dryer stopped working. We bought appliances after our move and chose Samsung. Bad idea. Great phones. Bad dishwashers, clothes dryers and washers. The fridge seems ok. Over to the Grimebusters Laundromat to finish drying clothes, then to Best Buy to order a new dryer.
Life doesn’t stop for illness or exhaustion. Clothes get dirty. Food needs to be cooked. Cars require gas and oil changes. Seems merciless, but it’s not.
Dueling Hats
Lughnasa and the crescent Moon of the First Harvest
New ways to do old things change habits. Example: I drove to King Sooper to pick up our grocery order. In my pajama bottoms. The button on the dash raised the back door and closed it when the ClickIt employee finished loading. Never had to get out.
But. At the gas station I had to get out to fill the tank. I had on my pajama bottoms and my Make Orwell Fiction Again blue hat. On the other side of the pump was a blue Subaru and a guy with a red hat. Yep. Make America Great Again. So, there we were, dueling hats.
Plus my doggy decorated pajama bottoms. Morning in the mountains.
Failure
Lughnasa and the Moon of the First Harvest
Had breakfast with Alan yesterday at the Lakeshore Cafe. Told him about the interesting failure of the bank we tried to create for the poorest of the poor. This was after a 1989 trip to Bogota where we spent a week with staff of the Fundacion Grupo Social.
This group, now a huge corporation, began with Jesuit inspired credit circles for citizens of barrio Jerusalem. In order to give small loans when these folks had no assets the Jesuits conceived of co-signing. If I wanted money to start a small business or build a home (a shack, really), you could co-sign as my guarantor. The default rate on these loans was minimal. Social cohesion is as good as a down payment. This was the start of the micro-credit idea.
We worked hard for a year to put together a Minnesota version, but a recession forced the bank that was working with us to withdraw their generous offer of two million dollars for capitalization.
Alan asked last week over breakfast what I’d done. When I told him a few things: West Bank Community Development Corporation work, Jobs Now, MICAH (Metropolitan Interfaith Affordable Housing Coalition), Minnesota Council of Non-Profits, I surprised myself by being eager to talk about it. Realized that with the exception of Kate and Jon a little bit, no one here in Colorado knew my Minnesota story, my second phase of family and work.
Life is so different here. No contacts. No friends of decades. Only a few places with memories, most tied to the grandkids.
The West has always been a place to start over for Americans from the humid east, guess I’m no exception. No expectations based on prior achievements or prior failures. A new person rising where the sun sets.
Going Nuclear
Summer and the Radiation Moon
Debra came by yesterday with chicken, couscous, cucumber, and a swiss chard topping. We ate the meal with her. I’ve not seen Debra in some time, wanted to catch up. The mitzvah committee at CBE has gotten traction with the meals. Gratitude.
In other news. Trump still occupies the Whitehouse. I think occupies is a good word here, since it feels like an unfriendly invasion. With Boris Johnson becoming Britain’s Prime Minister, Trump will have competition for xenophobic, racist, generally clueless utterances. Must be that special relationship?
On the downward slope with the radiation. Twenty-four fractions given, eleven more to go. Since the bed bug incident moved my finish date to August seventh, I will now complete my treatment between the anniversaries of the atomic bombs: Hiroshima on August sixth and Nagasaki on August 9th.
Consider atomic bombs, nuclear tipped missiles, the “club” of nations with nuclear weapons, nuclear power plants generating electricity, axumin and other radio isotope scans, radiation treatments for cancer. Nuclear engineering has had a big impact on the world though its negatives often (usually?) overshadow its positives.
Malignant uses multiplied after WWII. Most nations tacitly agreed nuclear weapons should never be used again after the horrors of Japan, yet nuclear weapons themselves became the apex of military power. There are uneasy, even dangerous situations right now that involve nuclear weapons: North Korea, Iran, India/Pakistan. Those old enough to remember the Cold War know, too, that whenever relations with Russia sour, the world’s two largest nuclear arsenals have humanity ending power.
The peaceful uses of nuclear power seemed to hold a lot of promise. Nuclear power plants generate electricity without the burden of adding carbon emissions to the sky. Yet Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and Fukushima proved that potential problems with nuclear power can become awful reality.
In my own opinion nuclear power should still be a part of the transition to renewable sources of energy. Nuclear power plants built with adequate safeguards can help move us beyond fossil fuels. Yes, there’s the question of nuclear waste, but it’s a solvable problem, at least in the short term. Nuclear power and renewables can be a bridge to a world where nuclear fusion is our dominant energy source.
The medical and industrial uses of nuclear engineering have proven themselves over the decades since WWII. I’m glowing proof of that.
One small step
Summer and the Radiation Moon
Let’s see. Heat waves. Bad ones. The moon landing at 50. 50? And, of course, Send them back! Send them back! I really tried to stop it in the biggest way. Nobody could have tried to stop it harder. Nobody.
Consequential. Each of them. I still remember the first time I was in Phoenix. 107. Might have been August or September. Walking from the motel a few blocks to experience the heat I could feel the sidewalk through the soles of my shoes. The air was still.
Downtown Phoenix had several places that had misters, spraying a sheen of water out and over sidewalks, open air cafes. Fans aided the cooling effect. It was delicious. A revelation. But. It was still hot.
On a CME venture with Kate early in our marriage we went to Mexico City where Kate saw Rigoberta Menchu. Afterward we went to Oaxaca and Merida. We stayed at Casa de Balam, the House of the Leopard, in Merida. Our bodies have conditionings of which we are unaware until they are challenged.
It was hot. And, humid, unlike Phoenix. In the afternoon rain clouds gathered over Merida. Rain fell. And the heat and humidity got worse. It was like an open air steam bath. Rain washes away heat. After the rain comes a cool breeze, a sigh of relief. Nope. Not in Merida. Not that day. It shocked my body before I even realized what was odd.
Both of those times stick in my mind (plus that trek across Singapore’s Botanical Garden in 2016) as outliers, extreme situations occurring in places I visited infrequently. Now, Merida is coming to a city near you.
The moon landing. July 20, 1969. College was done. Judy and I had a small apartment in Muncie. It was hot. No AC. No misting water. Just sweat. I put aluminum foil on the rabbit ears of our tiny television, waved them through the air to find our best reception. The most complicated electric appliance in our apartment was my Selectric typewriter, the one with the ball.
We wore as little as possible. The moon was new that night, so the sky was starry. I remember the scratchy voice of Walter Cronkite saying something. The scene, like a set from a 1950’s sci fi movie, had a strange desolation, Buzz Aldrin would the call the moonscape, “Magnificent desolation.”
Cold beer. A joint. As night fell, we began to wonder if the astronauts would ever come out. The Eagle had landed at 3:17 pm and now it was nearing ten. Then, the hatch opened, a bulky white suit emerged and went slowly down the metal ladder. A human about to touch a surface other than earth’s. “One small step for a man, one giant step for mankind.” (btw: correct quote according to NASA and Armstrong.)
Our chests flew open, all of us, that night. We saw the unimaginable. We were alive when the first human walked on the moon. I was 22, drunk and stoned. But high, too. Up there. With Buzz and Neil.
No visa required. No passport control. No detention centers in the Sea of Tranquility.
Our current sadness. The smallness of the fearful white person. Fed by the orange would be Julius. On July 20, 1969, the federal government gave us a moment of wonder, of awe, a moment shared with the world. On the 50th anniversary of this remarkable human accomplishment this once great country now separates families at detention centers. Its President tells four U.S. citizens to go home. He encourages the cries of his base base, Send them back. Send them back.
And that heat. Study shows opening up Federal lands to oil and gas exploitation will increase climate change. Huh? Really? The administration has silenced scientific analysis, by government scientists, on the risks posed by climate change. Including the military, which sees climate change as a national security issue.
Oh to slide back into the wonder of the moon landing. To imagine a world where feats of human innovation still wow us. Where government fights racism instead of propogating it. That’s a backward look though. Let’s look forward instead. To a new, cooler time with awesome moments still ahead.
Fireworks
Summer and the Radiation Moon
The Radiation Moon will take me all the way to August 1st, within 5 days of the finish. The Algonquin’s called it the Thunder Moon. In the traditional Chinese calendar the July moon is the Ghost Moon. The Hungry Ghost festival follows in August, now the month of the Ghost Moon. Thundering ghosts radiating from the heavens. Or, hells.
Last radiation day this week. July 4th long weekend ahead. Breakfast with Alan at Dandelion.
Not sure what we’re going to do for the 4th although we have never gone to fireworks. Crowds and up too late. In Andover we could see the fireworks the city put on from our house. Later, we could hear the fireworks loving neighbors displaying what they’d found. Meanwhile the dogs would cower in their crates or up against our legs.
In the fire prone foothills fireworks displays are often called off. This would be the year for them, since the fire danger is much less than usual. The monsoon season is here already with afternoon storms. You’d think the added water would get the fire danger back down to low, but it’s been stuck at moderate for the last week.
Trump’s very big, biggest ever, best ever fourth of July celebration. With tanks! You can see his mind turning over television news clips of military parades in Hitler’s Germany, North Korea, Russia, even some European countries. Oh, boy. Look at us. Big missiles! Big tanks! Lots of soldiers! Flags. We’re patriotic. We love America. Enough to put on a big fancy beautiful wonderful moment. When will it ever end?
Sigh
Leave in an hour for the mythical imaging services of Littleton Adventist. I’ll begin to believe in them when they put me on the slide and move me into the magnets. An unhappy yesterday. It had me reaching for distractions, not from the cancer, but from the American health care system.
I know it’s a cliche and I know the comparison is overblown, but I’m going to say it anyway. One of the three young women from Centura Health benefits said, when I asked to pay what my insurance company would have paid: “I don’t make the policy, I just abide by it.” Cindy and Vanessa, too. All of those I talked to except Amanda. I’m just following orders.
A fascinating book on the Holocaust dispelled the myth that the Germans who served as its agents were psychopaths or ideologues. No, they were just ordinary people who chose, over and over again, to do what they’d been told. These agents of denial are all following the arcane and often invisible dictats of bureaucracies built to serve themselves. In the case of United Health Care it’s about the bottom line. In the case of Medicare it’s about the rules. In both instances the clerks, the phone callers and phone answerers, the case managers, (I find myself wanting to put quotation marks around a lot of these words.), the administrators all sleep because they don’t make the policy, they just abide by it.
In neither case is the patient’s health the prime objective. The prime objective is what sustains the organization. You may say, what’s the alternative? I would say single payer health care. Why? Because in that situation it is the patient’s health that drives the system, it is the rule. Would it be perfect, without self-serving bureaucracy? No. Certainly not. But it would have as its raison d’etre the health of the country’s populace. That would make these frustrations much, much different. At least to me.
In the meantime we have a system that, not all the time, but frequently enough, puts people like me, desperate for some answers, in between dollars and health care. It also serves to dehumanize its agents who must again and again say, no, that’s not been approved. No, sorry, I don’t make policy, I just abide by it.