We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
My pic is from the mirador a good hike down and up from Alhambra, longer due to getting lost wandering through the old Muslim quarter - everybody gets lost trying to get to the mirador. Part of the fun. We linked up with a charming Turkish gal, and a German couple who were equally confused. There is always a jolly party of mostly young people up there at the mirador in the evening.
In the 700s and 800s, Spain was invaded by Moslem immigration partly from Damascus (then the center of the caliphate before it moved to Baghdad) but especially by newly-Muslim Berbers from North Africa. That immigration wave brought civilization to post-Roman Visigoth-ruled Iberian peninsula, Christian in a Visigoth way, which was a dying place where the term "Dark Ages" accurately applied. That immigration/invasion produced the first Golden Age for Spain. The Muslims brought modern irrigation, agricultural wealth, architecture, art, landscape design, education, medical knowledge, enlightened governance, and poetry to a god-forsaken corner of Europe.
The only other place where something similar happened, as far as I know, was in Sicily where the Normans kept the Muslims on the job because they knew how to run things properly and were well-educated. Those were not the Muslims who grab the news these days.
Note to all history teachers and profs: My problem with your courses is that you never seem to locate the details in the Big Picture, into the Big Timeline. Please do it - it's for the kids!
If you think of America in terms of The American Nations model or maybe the Nine Nations model, the last 200 years can be looked at as a long hegemony of Yankeedom over the rest of the country. Following the Civil War, the South was excluded from having a say in how the nation was governed. The Midwest and Mid-Atlantic were subordinate to the Yankee ruling class, while the West was simply not a factor. This remained the case into the 20th century, as America went from provincial backwater to an industrial power.
The 20th century should have been when this post Civil War arrangement began to fall apart as the South rebuilt and the West joined the Union. Instead, the Great Depression, two world wars and the Cold War locked everything more or less in place.
The destruction in Washington DC and other cities this past weekend was not unnoticed. The violence in the name of moral superiority is hard to overlook. The demands to be heard, the demands to force all others to see their narrow viewpoint, these are hard to see without cringing. It’s the same very uncivilized, quite grotesque, and yes, banal attitudes from years before. When Madonna and Ashley Judd can get up in front of thousands with their message of F-ombs and tampon inanity broadcast to millions of people without an adult from the left standing up to say, “Stop! You are making fools of us all,” you know they are in trouble.
If Trump unleashes American know-how and strengthens the economy, then his cultural and domestic agendas, as well as his personal demeanor and language, however radical and jarring, will probably be accepted. In contrast, if he blows up the deficit and sees interest rates spike at Carter levels and the cost of debt service soar, if he allows unemployment to grow — while never exceeding Obama’s dismal economic growth rates — then the Trump agenda will stall and the media will be liberated to obsess over the tweets, gaffes, and bombast of every nanosecond of his presidency.
But even more notable, was the dramatic pivot by the US labor unions, historically stalwart democrat supporters, who have suddenly emerged as big supporters of Trump policies, and perhaps no one more so than AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka who said TPP withdrawal is "a good first step toward building trade policies that benefit workers."
As a reminder, nearly all major unions endorsed Trump's rival, Hillary Clinton, during the presidential election campaign: they now appear to be shifting their allegiance.
I spent quite a bit of time in NY, some with Mrs. BD, last week. Some random pics and observations follow.
Whenever I expect to spend a few days in the city, I bring a bag of my shoes that need polishing, new laces, or new soles, to Eddy's in Grand Central Station and pick them up later. If I have a spare 15 minutes, I like to sit in those chairs and get a shine. Like a guy's version of a pedicure. Feels luxurious. Spit shine, better than I can do myself. $10 including $2 tip.
It's demanding that the government get very involved in women's bodies:
We do not accept any federal, state or local rollbacks, cuts or restrictions on our ability to access quality reproductive healthcare services, birth control, HIV/AIDS care and prevention, or medically accurate sexuality education. This means open access to safe, legal, affordable abortion and birth control for all people, regardless of income, location or education.
It's more of a "hi" than a "bye" — more of a hi, get in here and never go away. If that's your message, that Fallopian tube ought to be waving furiously.
The post-war era was an unusual time for the United States that was never destined to last indefinitely, with the rebuilt and modernized economies of Western Europe and East Asia cutting into the commanding industrial position we enjoyed in the 1950s; Indians and Chinese turn out to be pretty good at making things and providing services, and the reforms in their political systems and economies, halting and partial though they may be, revolutionized the world economy; the end of the Cold War cleared the way for an expanded global trade regime, which developed more quickly than many had expected as the Internet and other technological progress turbocharged globalization. There’s much more, of course, but the short answer to the implicit question behind so much of today’s economic-policy debate — “Why can’t we have the growth, mobility, and broad consensus of the Eisenhower years?” — is: This isn’t 1958.
The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?
2 When the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and fell.
3 Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear: though war should rise against me, in this will I be confident.
4 One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to enquire in his temple.
5 For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock.
6 And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me: therefore will I offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy; I will sing, yea, I will sing praises unto the Lord.
7 Hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me, and answer me.
8 When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek.
9 Hide not thy face far from me; put not thy servant away in anger: thou hast been my help; leave me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation.
10 When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.
11 Teach me thy way, O Lord, and lead me in a plain path, because of mine enemies.
12 Deliver me not over unto the will of mine enemies: for false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as breathe out cruelty.
13 I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
14 Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.
A pal is skiing Targhee (Wyoming) this week and sent me the pic below.
My kids and I would love to be there, but Mrs. BD not so much anymore.
The place has cool webcams.
The Met's new production knocked our socks off. I am not a music reviewer, so I can't even try other than to say that Diane Damrau sings like a bird and has a bell-like clarity which I did not think was possible. A New Take on Romeo and Juliet’s Ball, Balcony, Bed and Tomb
(I was reminded that people who do not go to operas are not aware that live opera performances use no vocal amplification. Voice alone must fill the hall, above the music. The vocal power is always remarkable to me. The vocal precision is assumed.)
I think people are expecting too much from a new administration, too much good and/or too much bad. My hope is for a return to simple common sense. I am all nuanced-out.
Libertarianism works fine as long as your society is composed of high IQ sociopaths, who can manage on their own. Once you have people like those working for the state, and getting services from the state, libertarianism collapses. The people in the waiting area not only need rules, they need help following the rules. That’s not going to happen through voluntary association. Unless you have genocide in your heart, libertarianism cannot survive outside the lab.
After a quarter century of chanting about health care, most everyone seems to buy into the belief that it is a fountain high up on Magic Mountain. It is guarded by the twin dragons of Big Pharma and Big Insurance. The keepers of the faith sent their paladin, Barak Obama, to slay the dragons so that the people could dip their cup into the fountain of health care, getting all they need. His failure to accomplish this is proof that the dragons are mighty and therefore the most extreme weapons must be deployed.
It’s all ridiculous nonsense, of course, but that’s where we are with the topic.
What I want to say is that Jesus (by which I mean the whole tradition that flows from him) saved my mind. From what? Well, for starters, from mountains of bullshit.
Sublimation is the process by which a solid goes directly to a vapor. Snow does that, even when it's below freezing. It evaporates. It's finally above freezing during the daytime here, at least for a day or two.
Americans have tried the kinder, gentler, let-me-be-your-friend approach to parenting for the last several decades. If the behavior problems in schools and the heightened level of sensitivity on college campuses are any indication, this parenting approach hasn’t produced the positive outcomes we were hoping for. Is it time for today’s parents to reverse course and begin teaching their children to respect others first instead of their own little selves?
...private insurance was also responding to ObamaCare’s impact by squeezing physician payments, as well as by reducing the number of doctors and hospitals covered through their networks. Some insurers were dropping many of the best — and therefore most costly — doctors and hospitals altogether. With consumers having more choices and more control over their health care spending under Republican proposals, they may well demand more provider options as well.
Still, one shouldn’t get too excited. US health-care spending, the world’s highest, is not sustainable over the long run. Medicare is roughly $58 trillion in the red going forward. Changes, probably including reimbursement cuts, are inevitable. And if consumers are spending more of their own money for health care, they are likely to demand lower costs (and higher quality) the way they do for other goods and services. Not every physician will appreciate a more involved — and questioning — customer.
Does David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, really believe (as he wrote in the immediate aftermath of Trump’s victory) that “the election of Donald Trump to the Presidency is nothing less than a tragedy for the American republic, a tragedy for the Constitution, and a triumph for the forces, at home and abroad, of nativism, authoritarianism, misogyny, and racism”?
I can "get" popular music fairly quickly, but with "classical" music - hate that term - it takes me longer. My basic music education was unfortunately interrupted and it is difficult to understand adult music without some guidance. That's why we love Bob Greenberg.
One of our Christmas presents this year were Metropolitan Opera tix with dinner.
Being musically retarded as I am sure some of our readers are, I need to listen to a piece several times before I have the privilege of hearing it live. There is no way that I can get the music or the singing the first time around and I have not enlisted the help of weed for that in many, many moons.
We have Gounod's Romeo et Juliette tix coming up soon, so we are both listening to various productions on YouTube and on the Met's site. A daughter said "Don't listen to the end or you won't be surprised."
Ridicule Didn't Work - 
Z-man: Essential knowledge includes 
Pic via 
Ringling Bros. circus