Nov 1 This week's topics: the International Criminal Court (ICC); democracy, Hong Kong style; World series and Nov 8th; undermining/overturning empires; Malheur and Standing Rock; last thoughts on Election 2016; Halloween, 2016.
The ICC. Gambia, Africa's smallest mainland nation, has joined Burundi and South Africa in beginning the process of leaving the ICC. Gambia's Information Minister accused the Hague-based tribunal of "persecution and humiliation of people of colour, especially Africans...while ignoring crimes committed by the West." Though western nations may dispute this claim, objective evidence of ostensible war crimes have not been taken under consideration. " 'There are many Western countries, at least 30, that have committed
heinous war crimes against independent sovereign states and their
citizens since the creation of the ICC and not a single Western war
criminal has been indicted,' [Information Minister] Bojang said."
Hong Kong democracy. Officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, is an autonomous territory on the Pearl River Delta in South China. More than 100,000 pro-Beijing demonstrators gathered outside the Hong Kong parliament to protest against the swearing-in of pro-democracy legislators. The extent of democratic measures and candidates in this enclave has been at issue ever since the former British territory was returned to the mainland's control in 1997.
Baseball and politics. Thomas Boswell, writing in the Washington Post on the world series and November 8th: "Perhaps I am not alone in feeling that America deserves the temporary
balm of this particular World Series, one which is preordained by the
nature of its protagonists to have a fabulous, satisfying ending, and a
loser deserving of praise, just as clearly as we don’t deserve an
election that feels like a personal humiliation and a national
embarrassment." The entire column is worth reading.
Also among the "good news" stories in this World Series, there is the business owner, a long-time Cleveland Indians fan, who gave up his seat on a red-eye Los Angeles to Cleveland flight so that Kenny Lofton, a former Indians star, could get to Cleveland to throw out the ceremonial first pitch in Game 1. A capitalist with a heart.
Go Cubs!
Undermining an empire. In his latest book, The Price of Posterity, author Todd Buchholtz lays out what empires -- ancient and modern -- do to undermine themselves. Though today's globally connected world is different, the American empire appears to be no exception. We seem to be on Buchholtz's track to follow history's earlier examples. It is uncertain if ancint Rome or 20th century Britain are the more likely models.
Malheur and Standing Rock. Many (most?) readers may not be familiar with the take-over of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in OR by Ammon and Ryan Bundy and their followers; you may, however, have seen recent TV coverage of the demonstrations at Standing Rock, ND, by Native Americans protesting the construction of the pipeline between the ND oil shale fields and southern IL.
In OR, after a fall-long trial the Bundys were found not guilty. In ND, many Native Americans and their supports were roughly corralled and then arrested for trespass. One significant difference in the authority's reactions may have to do with the fact that in OR, even though the charges were more serioud, the protesters were white; in ND they were mostly Native American. ¿Quien sabe?
Election 2016. Like hundreds of thousands of my fellow Americans, I will be voting early via a mail-in ballot. Going to the public polls should be, among other things, a joyous occasion, a community celebration of democracy. However, this November my options for president are far from joyful. There are two pathetic major party choices and, here in CO, a myriad of minor, no-chance, third party candidates. The Republican choice is a misogynist, racist, blowhard, who gives new substance to the 1840s Know-Nothing party. The Democratic candidate has a penchant for admitted major screw ups, shady deals, and secrecy that make her more than eligible for a legal middle name change to Milhous.
Halloween, 2016. It was blessedly clear and mild for the neighborhood goblins. While it is often clear here in Denver, it can be cold and a costume just looses something when it is under a ski parka.
Thank you for reading. Enjoy the week ahead.
Monday, October 31, 2016
Tuesday, October 25, 2016
The sole topic for this week's blog is Paris.
The Voyage. My wife and I took a 7-day round trip cruise from Paris to Normandy along the Seine River with Viking River Cruises. We were accompanied by my nice and her husband who live in Longwood, FL (near Orlando). It was my niece's first trip to Europe. The good ship, Rolf, is one of Viking's new, so called "Longships." Like all modern cruising vessels, these Longships are a wonder of compact engineering.
If you would care to take a look at the Rolf, here is a link. Ours was a modest cabin with a French balcony, a sliding glass door opening to a protective railing. Spaciousness is limited and movement for two often required mindful orchestration. Having previously traveled on Viking's older, shorter ships, as well as its venerable ships in Russia and Ukraine, we found the Rolf a step up.
The City. We rented a Paris apartment for two days prior to the cruise, giving us a total of 5 days in the City of Light. We always leave something undone, something to see/do when we return. In this case, we took the "kids" to dinner on the second level of the Eiffel tower. The drizzly evening gave us an entirely new view of Paris. Sure enough, the following morning dawned clear and bright.
The Seine. The passing scene along the banks of the Seine is a microcosm of river banks everywhere. Verdant country side, villages, towns, and cities. Industrial complexes, large developments, open air markets and touristy locations. Modest tract homes and multi-story apartment towers interspersed among wealthier small estates with ample green space. You do not see many truly slum buildings from the Seine.
My niece was amazed at the European penchant for daily grocery shopping. She kept saying, "so fresh, green, and yummy."
"I never saw the good side of a city, until I hitched a ride on a river boat queen." Credence Clearwater, "Proud Mary."
Animal life. Myriads of birds; occasional fish jumping, eagerly sought by local fishermen; farms, large and small, with animals of all sorts, some recognizable, others unknown, obviously indigenous to France.
Monet's garden was one of the highlights of the trip, the one my wife, the gardener, was most anxious to visit. Despite the late fall date, there were many flowers still in bloom. The usual fall "flaming" bushes and vines were vivid. The intricate design of the gardens was especially noteworthy. The docent related that Monet was troubled by the road dust that dulled the vibrant colors of his roses, so he simply had the offending road paved.
Normandy. The day spent along the various landing beaches, the local museum, and the cemeteries was sobering, to say the least. It was a cloudy, blustery day, just the kind that the landing invasion forces did not want. Each member of our group was given a rose to place on a grave of their choosing. The film at the Omaha Beach museum told the story of the temporary harbor constructed to provide a landing site for the thousands of men and hundreds of tons of supplies that had to be landed while the Allies moved on to capture the nearby French, Belgian, and Dutch ports.
My wife had been to Normandy previously, on one of those rare days when it had snowed. We both agreed that the cemeteries are more moving when the grass is green.
On my previous visit, I had a moving encounter with a young French woman. I was an obvious American visitor and this young mademoiselle came up, took my hands, and tearfully thanked " 'us' for coming to save 'them' ." She echoed those famous words of General John J. Pershing. When the men of the Allied Expeditionary Forces marched into Paris in 1918, Pershing, who was a man of few words and abhorred public speaking, was expected to make some remarks. Paying tribute to a Frenchman who had helped win the American Revolution, Pershing simply said, "Lafayette, we have returned."
The Louvre. One never tires of visiting great museums, though spending an undue amount of time "at one sitting" there can take its toll. I had not been to the Louvre since the famed glass pyramids had been added. As the docent said, like changes everywhere to national landmarks, the new entrance was both hated and admired. We used Rick Steeves' audio tour. We enjoy his concise directions and tongue-in-cheek commentaries.
A trip to London calls out, to explore yet other places and visit with my wife's nephew, stationed nearby with the USAF.
Thank you for reading.
The Voyage. My wife and I took a 7-day round trip cruise from Paris to Normandy along the Seine River with Viking River Cruises. We were accompanied by my nice and her husband who live in Longwood, FL (near Orlando). It was my niece's first trip to Europe. The good ship, Rolf, is one of Viking's new, so called "Longships." Like all modern cruising vessels, these Longships are a wonder of compact engineering.
If you would care to take a look at the Rolf, here is a link. Ours was a modest cabin with a French balcony, a sliding glass door opening to a protective railing. Spaciousness is limited and movement for two often required mindful orchestration. Having previously traveled on Viking's older, shorter ships, as well as its venerable ships in Russia and Ukraine, we found the Rolf a step up.
The City. We rented a Paris apartment for two days prior to the cruise, giving us a total of 5 days in the City of Light. We always leave something undone, something to see/do when we return. In this case, we took the "kids" to dinner on the second level of the Eiffel tower. The drizzly evening gave us an entirely new view of Paris. Sure enough, the following morning dawned clear and bright.
The Seine. The passing scene along the banks of the Seine is a microcosm of river banks everywhere. Verdant country side, villages, towns, and cities. Industrial complexes, large developments, open air markets and touristy locations. Modest tract homes and multi-story apartment towers interspersed among wealthier small estates with ample green space. You do not see many truly slum buildings from the Seine.
My niece was amazed at the European penchant for daily grocery shopping. She kept saying, "so fresh, green, and yummy."
"I never saw the good side of a city, until I hitched a ride on a river boat queen." Credence Clearwater, "Proud Mary."
Animal life. Myriads of birds; occasional fish jumping, eagerly sought by local fishermen; farms, large and small, with animals of all sorts, some recognizable, others unknown, obviously indigenous to France.
Monet's garden was one of the highlights of the trip, the one my wife, the gardener, was most anxious to visit. Despite the late fall date, there were many flowers still in bloom. The usual fall "flaming" bushes and vines were vivid. The intricate design of the gardens was especially noteworthy. The docent related that Monet was troubled by the road dust that dulled the vibrant colors of his roses, so he simply had the offending road paved.
Normandy. The day spent along the various landing beaches, the local museum, and the cemeteries was sobering, to say the least. It was a cloudy, blustery day, just the kind that the landing invasion forces did not want. Each member of our group was given a rose to place on a grave of their choosing. The film at the Omaha Beach museum told the story of the temporary harbor constructed to provide a landing site for the thousands of men and hundreds of tons of supplies that had to be landed while the Allies moved on to capture the nearby French, Belgian, and Dutch ports.
My wife had been to Normandy previously, on one of those rare days when it had snowed. We both agreed that the cemeteries are more moving when the grass is green.
On my previous visit, I had a moving encounter with a young French woman. I was an obvious American visitor and this young mademoiselle came up, took my hands, and tearfully thanked " 'us' for coming to save 'them' ." She echoed those famous words of General John J. Pershing. When the men of the Allied Expeditionary Forces marched into Paris in 1918, Pershing, who was a man of few words and abhorred public speaking, was expected to make some remarks. Paying tribute to a Frenchman who had helped win the American Revolution, Pershing simply said, "Lafayette, we have returned."
The Louvre. One never tires of visiting great museums, though spending an undue amount of time "at one sitting" there can take its toll. I had not been to the Louvre since the famed glass pyramids had been added. As the docent said, like changes everywhere to national landmarks, the new entrance was both hated and admired. We used Rick Steeves' audio tour. We enjoy his concise directions and tongue-in-cheek commentaries.
A trip to London calls out, to explore yet other places and visit with my wife's nephew, stationed nearby with the USAF.
Thank you for reading.
Tuesday, October 11, 2016
Topics for this posting: Columnist George Will on Vladimir Putin; presidential debate #2; reactionary politics; George Will and Michael Gerson on Donald Trump.
Putin. George Will writes, "Undermining the West’s confident sense of itself is important to Putin’s implementation of his ideology of Eurasianism. It holds that Russia’s security and greatness depend on what [British journalist and author] Ben Judah calls a 'geographically ordained empire' that 'looks east to Tashkent, not west to Paris.' " Interestingly, Tashkent is the capital of Uzbekistan, one of the various eastern "-stans," peopled by non-Russians, people held in low esteem in the old USSR.
Eurasianism, a new -ism to add to your 21st century vocabulary. Owen Matthews writes in The Spectator about Putin's new Russian exceptionalism and its war on western decadence, where Putin’s Russia is fast becoming a very puritan place, a moral fortress against western excesses.
Owens notes, "The influence of the Russian Orthodox church on public life is growing fast, thanks to Kremlin patronage. In the very dark days of the Great Patriotic War (WW II), Stalin, too, called upon the church for its still ancient ties for the Russian people. The church’s preferred instrument of control is a draconian law criminalising [sic] offending the feeling of religious believers’." Puritans in the Kremlin? Who would have guessed.
Presidential Debate #2. For me, long-time CBS newsman and presidential debate monitor, Bob Schieffer, said it best: "How have we come to this?" Indeed! For those who follow the news, the evening was an amazing display of incredibly poor public behavior and uninformative, to boot.
Old, unworkable solutions. Columnist Robert Samuelson writes, "A reactionary is someone who wishes to return, usually unrealistically, to an earlier and more appealing era. We have two reactionaries running for president. Both peddle agendas that promise to re-create a reassuring past. We are being fed different varieties of nostalgia. Neither will work."
Both candidates are trying to appeal to their diminishing constituent-pool, while ignoring today's economic and demographic realities. Could the problem be that both candidates are simply elderly, too tied to a bygone era? Is American democracy too mired in the past? Burdened with an aging population demanding more and more from a government that is willing to face its rapidly mounting public debt? Was there no JFK to whom to pass the torch?
Lawrence Summers follows with an op-ed, "The global economy has entered unexplored, dangerous territory." He notes, "The specter of secular stagnation and inadequate economic growth on the one hand, and ascendant populism and global disintegration on the other, has caused widespread apprehension.
Trump. In their Tuesday columns, Will and Gerson look at Trump as the "just desserts" for a failing Republican party.
Those Cubs. My dearly departed mother-in-law was born near Wrigley Field, roller skated on the ramps of the yet unfinished field, played with the daughter of the field's grounds keeper as the real life bear cub romped around in the outfield on away-days. Her spirit reminds me to end with "GO CUBS!" Hope springs eternal!
Thank you for reading. Take comfort, there are only 28 more days of this ongoing political non-sense. Vote your conscience, but do vote!
Putin. George Will writes, "Undermining the West’s confident sense of itself is important to Putin’s implementation of his ideology of Eurasianism. It holds that Russia’s security and greatness depend on what [British journalist and author] Ben Judah calls a 'geographically ordained empire' that 'looks east to Tashkent, not west to Paris.' " Interestingly, Tashkent is the capital of Uzbekistan, one of the various eastern "-stans," peopled by non-Russians, people held in low esteem in the old USSR.
Eurasianism, a new -ism to add to your 21st century vocabulary. Owen Matthews writes in The Spectator about Putin's new Russian exceptionalism and its war on western decadence, where Putin’s Russia is fast becoming a very puritan place, a moral fortress against western excesses.
Owens notes, "The influence of the Russian Orthodox church on public life is growing fast, thanks to Kremlin patronage. In the very dark days of the Great Patriotic War (WW II), Stalin, too, called upon the church for its still ancient ties for the Russian people. The church’s preferred instrument of control is a draconian law criminalising [sic] offending the feeling of religious believers’." Puritans in the Kremlin? Who would have guessed.
Presidential Debate #2. For me, long-time CBS newsman and presidential debate monitor, Bob Schieffer, said it best: "How have we come to this?" Indeed! For those who follow the news, the evening was an amazing display of incredibly poor public behavior and uninformative, to boot.
Old, unworkable solutions. Columnist Robert Samuelson writes, "A reactionary is someone who wishes to return, usually unrealistically, to an earlier and more appealing era. We have two reactionaries running for president. Both peddle agendas that promise to re-create a reassuring past. We are being fed different varieties of nostalgia. Neither will work."
Both candidates are trying to appeal to their diminishing constituent-pool, while ignoring today's economic and demographic realities. Could the problem be that both candidates are simply elderly, too tied to a bygone era? Is American democracy too mired in the past? Burdened with an aging population demanding more and more from a government that is willing to face its rapidly mounting public debt? Was there no JFK to whom to pass the torch?
Lawrence Summers follows with an op-ed, "The global economy has entered unexplored, dangerous territory." He notes, "The specter of secular stagnation and inadequate economic growth on the one hand, and ascendant populism and global disintegration on the other, has caused widespread apprehension.
Trump. In their Tuesday columns, Will and Gerson look at Trump as the "just desserts" for a failing Republican party.
Those Cubs. My dearly departed mother-in-law was born near Wrigley Field, roller skated on the ramps of the yet unfinished field, played with the daughter of the field's grounds keeper as the real life bear cub romped around in the outfield on away-days. Her spirit reminds me to end with "GO CUBS!" Hope springs eternal!
Thank you for reading. Take comfort, there are only 28 more days of this ongoing political non-sense. Vote your conscience, but do vote!
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