Smithereens

This past Sunday a couple of holographic metaphors for our common predicament appeared - In true American fashion - on TV. The first was on Meet The Press, where the entire hour was spent covering the opioid crisis. It was mostly a handwringing session, with some analysis of causes, suggesting the deindustrialization of Midwestern states left millions of people without employment or hope for the future. 

Sherrod Brown, senator from Ohio, put the blame squarely on the pharmaceutical companies and their cooperating doctors. This was meaningful, but was treated as political contention, a different view from Ohio’s other senator, J.D. Vance, who had nothing to say about corporate and individual greed. Job losses to China are where he places blame.  One side says this, the other side says that. We'll be right back after this message from our sponsor, Acme Pharmaceuticals.

The other metaphor was provided later in the day by CBS’s 60 Minutes. A double segment explored the readiness of the U.S. Navy for World War III. They didn’t come out and say World War III, but euphemized the topic into talk about "readiness" for confrontation, comparing the size and technological capacity of our navy versus that of China. Theirs is bigger than ours, but we have bigger and better guns. The implied conclusion was we need to do more. We need to spend much more to be prepared for World War III, the end of life on this planet. We'll be right back after this message from our sponsor, Acme Pharmaceuticals.

I can imply more. We don’t have just an opioid crisis. We are a nation of addicts. Alcohol, opioids, heroin, cocaine, food, TV, the Internet, texting, guns, violence, crackpot religion, crackpot politics, bigotry, rancor, narcissism, shopping, accumulation of goods, power, money, wealth, sex, and various escapist recreational activities.

This is the society that is supposed to be ready to wage World War III, the end of life on this planet. We may be ready in one sense. It would take a civilization of omni-addicts and otherwise impaired people to be stupid enough to think it could win a major nuclear war. If we could be dumb enough to accept the candidacy of Donald Trump for president, and then elect him, then we are dumb enough to have a go at thermonuclear holocaust. 

Our corporate news media are already propping Trump up as the "front-runner" for the "Republican" nomination in 2024. This, after it has been made abundantly clear that Trump is a malevolent and deranged criminal sociopath who cares NOTHING about the country, its well-being, its people, and least of all its natural environment of air, water, plants and animals. That is, least of all, compared to the nothing he cares about everything else, so it is less-than-nothing. Trump, a diseased narcissist, cares only about himself.

But, as media know-it-alls are wont to say, Trump is "good copy." He attracts attention. Attention is worth money – advertising dollars, the lifeblood of media existence. No attention, no advertising. No advertising, no jobs, no profits, no careers, no self-attention. The streets beckon.

So, let's talk it up for World War III. We can reinstitute the draft, conscripting our nation of addicts into military service, all the better to fight the Chinese, who do whatever they are told, or else.

We of course are screwed anyway, thanks to global climate change. World War III will just speed up the process. From the corporate standpoint, at least ginning-up a world war will be a boon for profits. Our weapons industry will be drunk with profits. Fitting for a nation of addicts.

Or, we could take another approach. Tone down the rhetoric. We can start by questioning the arbitrary distinctions of nation states. Both the U.S. and China are empires, determined in their own ways to dominate the world. We have done it with bogus wars, assassinations, overthrows of governments, and alliances, such as NATO, in which I served many years ago. "Play your part on the NATO team!" We also have commandeered an entire portion of another country, Cuba, for an illegal torture and kidnapping facility. Our morality and ethics have no bottom, so why not World War III?

But if there is no "we" to attack "them," or a "they" to attack "us," then there is no mass of people as an identity to kill another mass of people – and, of course, all life on this planet. "China" is a figment of the imagination, as is the "U.S." They are both temporary impositions of humans upon land masses, and have no more claim on these lands than they would "claiming" the moon, or Mars, Jupiter or the myriad of galaxies in the Universe. The air, water, land, animals and plants of "China" do not call themselves "China." The air, water, land, animals and plants of the "U.S." do not call themselves the "U.S." This should be self-evident by simply imagining what both these lands will be like after World War III. Both will be wastelands, and likely will have few or no people to call either region by any name other than Hell on Earth.

This is what the human species has progressed to. I would say we have a choice, but that would be assuming that a nation of addicts could make a rational or sane choice about anything, and especially about calling off World War III. It will take an intervention. Tough love. A higher power. There is one. Both "China" and the "U.S." are infinite-growth, unsustainable state Capitalist systems. Both have to grow forever to survive. Man-made institutions are not forever. Both will fail, and likely very soon. We can only destroy the planet so much before it finally has had enough of us, empire or no empire. Gaia, the force of interrelationships of life on this planet, is intervening already, and our fragile economy is next.

So the end of Capitalism is our only hope. If we are lucky it will happen before we blow the planet to smithereens.

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Here's an update about climate change.  

I worked on the stage crew for a concert by this band in 1988. We had to wait in the loading area, so we didn't hear a note. One thing I learned from this is that every square inch of a band's equipment truck is used, all planned out.

Here's a song. Here's another. And another. Jefferson Airplane. David Bowie. Bob Dylan. Barry McGuire. Another from Bob Dylan. The Doors. Iris DeMent. John Prine. Another from John Prine. Still another from John Prine. The Steve Miller Band. Another song from Steve Miller. And this.

R.I.P. Daniel Ellsberg. I was still in the Army when the Pentagon Papers were published in the New York Times in 1971. Words cannot express the great sense of gratitude and reassurance I felt. I was "short," felt even shorter. 

R.I.P. Alan Arkin. We need good examples of how to be in life. He was a great one.

R.I.P. Tina Turner. She made this song her own. Nam Myoho Renge Kyo.

In addition to his other crimes, Trump is also a traitor.

Paul Fanlund of Madison's Cap Times has a pretty good take on why Trump supporters are so accepting of his lies.

This movie is getting some renewed attention. Here's the Wikipedia entry about it.