Single Issue: Doing Nonsense Better

What with all the heavy topics I've been doing lately - I think the adjective most used to describe me is "intense" - I thought it might be time to lighten up a little with a soft topic I've been thinking about for a few months: Horoscopes.

I don't believe in horoscopes at all, but I always wonder how newspapers get theirs. I've always thought somebody just makes them all up right before they go to press, but they might have some sort of psychic astrologer or something consulting who makes them up for them.

The thing is, astrology was once a respected field. There wouldn't be any such study as astronomy if not for it. There are old manuals on reading the stars and making predictions that go all the way back to Ancient Greece when people used to lie out at night and try to see things in them. It's a little like medicine in that they got most of it wrong, but an actual study came out of it.

My idea is for a syndicated horoscope column that various newspapers could use, but the thing is my team of astrologers would - in no sort of serious way - actually sit up all night and look at the stars and then look at some of these existing guides for reading the stars and give predictions based on what was once considered evidence. I'd want three or four of them so there's going to be some disagreement on what things mean. One of the disclaimers they always have to give for astrology is that it's for "entertainment purposes only" and it's bound to be more entertaining reading a column of three people disagreeing about the horoscope than it is now. It's also probably going to be more accurate giving three or four predictions for every sign as well. What's more every now and then the column will have to say something like "It was cloudy last night, so we couldn't see anything. Here are last year's results. See if they're any use."

If my three full-time stargazers could sell the column to enough papers, they could do that for a living. They only need to do the five-day version too. For Saturday and Sunday I'd have readers write in with some predictions of their own which the 'professionals' would run with their thoughts and criticisms. Maybe even have a celebrity edition - Stars watching the Stars - for Sundays where this week's actor or singer takes a stab at it.

Here's an example of how my horoscope column would look:

Pisces (Feb 18-Mar 20): MERLIN: Well, I saw a meteor go through your constellation not long after sunset last night. According to my reference book, you've probably had some sort of change in your life lately, and you ought to take the opportunity to use some of your free time to take up a new hobby. CASSANDRA: Merlin would be right about that except he missed the fact that Mars is in opposition right now, so my book says you've probably had a new person enter your life. Watch out for them. They're going to be trouble. NOSTRADAMUS: You two really need to update your references. Of course that's what you'd think if you're reading the ancient Greek books, but according to mine from the Middle Ages meteors are trying to call attention to something, so there's something Pisces have been ignoring that they should pay attention to.

 

Aries (Mar 20-April 20): CASSANDRA: Things don't look good for you today. Your constellation was nearly obscured by clouds, so your future is dark and fuzzy. MERLIN: Well listen to miss gloom-and-doom! Clouds don't necessarily mean bad news. Maybe we're just not meant to know what's going to happen today. NOSTRADAMUS: Guys, I'm pretty sure clouds don't mean anything. According the computer images of the sky from the other side of the clouds, nothing happened in Aries tonight, so they will probably have a nice stable day like any other.

 

Taurus (April 20-May 21): NOSTRADAMUS: Good old Taurus. That's my sign. We're in for a nice financial windfall today, I think. Check the sidewalks for twenty-dollar bills. MERLIN: What's that based on? I didn't see anything in the sky that indicated money. Where's your proof? CASSANDRA: You didn't see anything? You didn't see that Pluto, the god of wealth, was moving towards Taurus today? I think Nostradamus is right.

 

Gemini (May 21-June 21): MERLIN: First of all, Pluto was god of the underworld; Plutus was the god of wealth. Didn't you ever read Dante? Secondly, Gemini is probably the one who's going to come into some money today because the Pleiades were close to Gemini and they represent the Muses, who inspire people. So Gemini might be getting a new job or something, and get some money from that. CASSANDRA: The Pleiades are always close to Gemini, Merle. They're on Taurus's shoulder. You can't really draw any conclusions from that. The fact that Saturn was in Gemini indicates some sort of change. NOSTRADAMUS: Hey, earlier you two agreed that meteors meant change. Now Saturn does too? Saturn was specifically the god of time and death, not just change. Maybe Geminis are going to have a death in their life. Or maybe just now's a good time for them to buy a new watch.

 

Cancer (June 21-July 23): CASSANDRA: It looks like a lucky day for Cancers. I'm not sure if it was just a clear sky or something on my telescope, but those stars seemed to be glowing extra bright tonight. NOSTRADAMUS: For once I agree with Cassie, but I couldn't really tell if it means good luck or bad luck. My books didn't agree. They might just stand out from the crowd today. MERLIN: I couldn't tell from that either, but I did check my crystal ball as well and it looks like a good day for them. Gee, we all agree. I hope we get this one right!

 

Leo (July 23-Aug 23): MERLIN: Now, with Mars in opposition to Pisces of course means it's in Leo. We've never agreed on what Mars indicates. According to letters from past readers, we've been quite wrong to insist it means some sort of personal conflict. On the other hand, that is what it says in the book. CASSANDRA: It could also mean someone else is going to have a conflict with a Leo, but I guess you can't have a conflict with a Leo without the Leo having conflict as well. NOSTRADAMUS: Guy, guys - Remember that meteor? Maybe Pisces and Leos ought to pay attention to each other. This might be a good time to resolve a conflict rather than watch for one.

 

Virgo (Aug 23-Sep 23): CASSANDRA: Always looking on the bright side, huh Nos? Well things don't always turn out so nice and rosy. On the other hand, Virgos look like they're going to have a nice day. With all the stuff going on in the rest of the sky, they don't look any different from yesterday. NOSTRADAMUS: Look, you read your own signs and I'll read mine. I did notice a change from yesterday, because Virgo wasn't visible until a few hours later. Maybe Virgos are going to oversleep. MERLIN: How is that helpful? By the time they read this, they're going to know whether they overslept or not.

 

Libra (Sep 23-Oct 23): MERLIN: All right, I didn't really have anything to offer on Virgo, but boy have I on Libra! Venus set in Libra so it looks like it might be the end of a relationship soon. Let's hope all goes well there. Maybe it won't be an important relationship. CASSANDRA: Merle you dope, that wasn't Venus; it was Jupiter. How can you get them mixed up? Jupiter setting is like the sun setting. It doesn't mean anything. I don't think Libras are going to have anything special happen. NOSTRADAMUS: Cassie's right; it was Jupiter. Sometimes Jupiter means happiness or freedom, though, so it could mean something's going to change their. Libras, lets hope you're not about to "become free" by losing your job, or you might lose a relationship along with it.

 

Scorpio (Oct 23-Nov 22): NOSTRADAMUS: Cassie, I know Scorpio's your sign, so watch out. There wasn't anything special in it last night, but there's something big coming next week. I can't tell what it is yet. I'll give you more details as they develop. MERLIN: Are you sure it was Jupiter? Venus is usually the one you see right after sunset. CASSANDRA: Yes, it was. Venus is brighter and whiter, and it was in Capricorn. For my fellow Scorpios, I didn't see anything big coming. Cite your evidence more, Nos. I didn't see anything in Scorpio myself, so let's hope it's an ordinary day.

 

Sagittarius (Nov 22-Dec 22): MERLIN: Late in the night I saw a second meteor in Sagittarius, so same as Pisces, you've probably had some sort of change in your life lately, and you ought to take the opportunity to use some of your free time to take up a new hobby. CASSANDRA: Really? I must have missed it. I was going to say Sagittarius has been stable for a few days now so if you're bored you might try to do something to get out of your rut. NOSTRADAMUS: Like take up a new hobby? They would both work. Bottom line, Sagittarius, you need to get out more.

 

Capricorn (Dec 22-Jan 20): CASSANDRA: Venus, known to Merlin as Jupiter, set in Capricorn, not Libra. As Merle said, this might signify the end of a relationship. I hope you're not afraid of loneliness. MERLIN: That's it? Off you go into the lonely bleak future? Geez you're a bring-down. If you do lose a relationship, maybe it won't be an important one, and even if it is, maybe it's because it wasn't right for you in the first place. Don't give up hope! NOSTRADAMUS: You know, Venus was goddess of other things besides love. Maybe something beautiful is about to come into your life. Don't panic about your relationships.

 

Aquarius (Jan 20-Feb 18): NOSTRADAMUS: Finally we get to your sign, Merlin. Are you feeling sick? If so, it looks like better health is on the way! If not, well, maybe you're just going to feel a little better than usual. MERLIN: Yes, I have had a cold, but then it is winter. I hope it gets better soon. I couldn't see Aquarius last night because my neighbor left the porch light on and the light washed it out, so I'll rely on your observation. I guess they don't care that my job requires me to be able to see the sky at night. CASSANDRA: Depending on how often your telescope is pointed near their house, they might have done it on purpose. I didn't see anything affecting health, but I did read some good fortune for Aquarius in my own crystal ball, so maybe everything's going to be all right.

 

That's all for today! Keep those telescopes focused and your crystals clear!

Political: Buying Our Way Out

I had at one time planned to do an entire post where I laid out all of my political opinions on every subject, all the way through the spectrum, and it might be 100 pages long but it would save me ever having to explain a political opinion again unless I changed my mind on something (and more importantly, defuse any temptation to jump into a political discussion if I knew my views were already out there). In laying the groundwork, I started compiling a list of terms that I would need to define before I ever started trying to explain anything, and that list was going to be longer than any post I've done to date without taking in any of the other factors I'd like to discuss.

So, what's going to happen instead is that when I have a political idea (and the time, with my now 65+ hour workweek) I'm just going to have to put them up one at a time. I will try to label my posts whether they're political, or religious, or personal, or what have you from now on. I don't have a regular following so I can't imagine there are a lot of people who care. You'll never find me apologizing for not writing anything. I haven't had time and I've not been pressured with requests or comments.

That said, one of the political topics I get discussing more than anything right now is how we ought to implement the sort of changes people think ought to be made. I've said before, I think, that one of our biggest obstacles right now is that there is NO consensus at all about what our country ought to do, or ought to stand for, or ought to adopt as policies. I blame some of that on the government - a) they're not doing anything about that complete lack of direction because it means they can do whatever they want, and b) most of us have had so little control or choice for so long that it's no surprise people aren't thinking like voters and aren't voting like it matters. I blame even more of it on the population in general, though, because we're the ones who got so distracted by the "bread and circuses" that we turned into the metaphorical population of sheep that begets its government of wolves.

It's a good thing, in my opinion, that people are starting to wake up to just how powerless we are. A lot of it has to do with the degree that our government is doing things in our name that are so far removed from what we want. Even the most overstimulated entertainment junkie (and I include myself in that group) can't help but notice that our representative system hasn't represented us for a long time now. Even though we aren't really sure what we'd like them to do, we have identified a few problems that are stopping us from doing anything at the moment. One of them I don't see a way around is our absentee president. I voted for Obama the first time, although I learned my lesson pretty quickly. My line on him is that he promised change, and we thought he meant turning the steering wheel but it turns out he meant stepping on the gas. The continued selling out of the government to special interests has gone so fast the veneer has torn away, and they can't even try to hide it anymore.

I recognize that our system is nearing the corruption tipping point, but I see a glimmer of hope that might get us back to a working model again. The thing is, counter intuitively, we need to legitimize and endorse some of this corruption in order to contain it. Let me explain:

We can't get out of the Middle East in particular but a lot of foreign countries the US people have no interest in because US businesses have a lot of interest in them. We can't stop drilling for oil and find something more efficient because the oil industry has a century of profits tied up in it. We can't stop interfering in other countries politically and militarily because Eisenhower's "military industrial complex" has way too much tied up in it. We're bogged down in three wars, of dubious justification, that we'll admit to and at least two more we won't because there's no national justification. And because there are some very powerful people who are making a lot of money on them.

Now this is where the conservatives start complaining about government waste and pork and where the liberals start screaming about corporate greed and profiteering, and they've both got good arguments but they're both missing one thing: the guys with the gold are friends with the guys who make the rules. My hero Henry Kissinger can definitely see that there's no way even an overwhelming majority are going to separate those groups, because they're the ones who control that ability. He's got his own consulting business in it as much as anyone else, and you can't blame him. Free markets and free societies have a hard time telling people, even bad people, what not to do. I really don't think the people running things are all that bad either. They're at the top because they're the best at playing the game and most of the people who are complaining about how crooked that game is wouldn't be if they had a better score.

We really don't want to change that system, either (a few extremists aside) because the ability to gain money and power and influence is the hallmark of every social and economic institution in history. Ours is really much better than most of the previous versions because no one's stuck in the box they're born in. Look at how rare that idea was prior to the 1720s when the social contract philosophers first starting writing down their ideas. But that system has gone a little awry in the past 60 years in this country because it turns out that when business and government work together they can tie up that invisible hand of the market and make it do whatever they want.

Really, what seems to be the best solution is the most elusive, and it's the title of the post. We are going to have to buy our way out. The only way we're going to divest oil companies of their billions in overseas interests is to give them billions to let them go. That's true almost across the board - we need to give the military contractors a few billion to stop picking fights; give the financial companies a few billion to stop trying to figure out how to squeeze every last decimal point of interest out of everything; give the pharmaceutical companies a few billions so they can stop producing their pointless meds and focus on the real ones.

Why would we do that? That really just sounds like it's making the problem worse, doesn't it? I don't support just writing them a blank check, because that certainly would, but I propose a few thoughtful and active measures to get the forces that are holding us in place to let go. It has to be done or we're never going to move forward, and there are both real and idealistic reasons to do so.

Let's start with why we as the people ought to give the money to the industries in question: They earned the money we're trying to get them to leave. People have different opinions about what a prescription ought to cost or what a barrel of oil should cost, but remember that the systems didn't just spring out of the ground like that. Businesses built things and made things and manufactured and refined and did a full century worth of work to get the money they have. They don't want to let that go because they built and earned their ability to continue to make money doing what they're doing. We ought to vote them at least some of the money that they would have to give up because, let's face it, we have been swimming in oil, and coal, and steel, and glass, and security, and food, and medication, and everything else those giants produce for years. They're going to keep making those things because we demand it and it's the only way they have to sustain themselves. So changing that dynamic means saying "Thanks for providing us with everything we could ever want for the past 100 years; here's 10 years' worth of income as our way of saying thank you for that, but we need you to stop now."

We are definitely going to have to put some severe measures in there to make sure they do stop, though, or they really will just pocket the money and keep going. Again, that's not such a bad thing. If your job accidentally gave you two paychecks one week, would you come clean and give one back? If you can't say for certain that you would, don't be so quick to condemn people as greedy when they take something they think they've earned. I've not really addressed the topic of "entitlement" because I just can't do it without losing my temper, but I can quote you a citizen during the healthcare debate a few years ago who said "I don't know a thing about healthcare, but I know it ought to be a right, and available for free to everyone." If that's the attitude we the common people have, what makes you think the people who do know all about healthcare (or any other industry) are going to be any less selfish?

The first safeguard we need is an expiration date. The details need to be worked out by the lawyers and the industry insiders and, yes, even the lobbyists, but the law needs to read like "the government agrees to pay [controversial dollar amount] to [list of controversial companies] every year until [controversial expiration date]. That date needs to be unalterable and strictly enforced. In fact, anyone in business or government who succeeds in getting it extended should be arrested for treason because they are deliberately gaining personally at the expense of the nation. There's nothing more treasonous than that.

The second safeguard is the ironclad guarantee, again with penalty of treason, for businesses who take the money and don't alter their operations in the specified ways. If the people vote that one of the conditions is we drop what we're doing in military involvement in other countries and bring our troops home, then the paramilitary groups don't get to stay over there on patrol at public expense. If we're writing you a check to get out, then get out. If you want to stay on your armed vacation in a dirt poor country, then do it without the USA's official endorsement.

The final safeguard that will have to be written into the law is perfect transparency. Nothing gets hidden; no backroom deals or under-the-counter-payments. We're effectively paying you not to work because we need that type of work to stop. It's a small concession on your part that your money is publicly visible. The amount, date, time, etc. of every payment needs to be on the public record. The companies involved need to list the details of each one on their corporate tax returns. The corporate officers who get any of that money personally need to have all of that visible as well. Just for good measure, I would say all the banks handling the transfers need to have those records publicly visible as well, even if it's just a weekly newsletter or something that's published specifically for that purpose. If you're getting free money from the taxpayers, you don't have any right or need to hide where any of it is going, and again anyone who hides some of it or takes it when they're not supposed to should be arrested for treason.

If this plan were put into action tomorrow, our financial problems would be pretty much solved.
Look at this infographic: 2013 Billions
That info is a few years old but still quite relevant. If we took a giant bite out of that tax haven block, foreign debt block, military spending block, and war on terror block, just look how much money that's basically being wasted would be put back into the economy. The fact that businesses wouldn't have to keep doing the things they've been doing would mean they could focus on entirely different areas, and the global economic crisis would melt away. Nations could stop hemorrhaging trillions at the cost of a few billion in stitches. The money to do what I'm proposing is already there.

Who loses? The government doesn't have to stop propping up business, and the businesses don't suffer any losses. The people are paying substantially less to support government/business activity, and other countries don't have Americans wandering around looking for things to exploit. There's absolutely no reason we can't do this. We just haven't yet.

If only our president (and others) would get back in their offices and do their jobs. Don't blame me this time; I voted Libertarian.

Personal, Philosophical, and Religious: The Morality of Death

“In this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes” - Benjamin Franklin

“There are, aren't there, only three things we can do about death: to desire it, to fear it, or to ignore it.” - C. S. Lewis

“Death solves all problems – no man, no problem.” - Joseph Stalin

“The goal of all life is death.” - Sigmund Freud

Death is a particularly uncomfortable subject, and not one I've written on in any detail lately. In fact, this isn't an entry about death, but my attitudes toward it, and how they've changed lately. I touched the topic briefly when I covered abortion and the death penalty a while ago, when I said that souls are sacred but lives are frequently a waste of good material. That about summarizes what I've thought for at least ten years at this point: death is inevitable, and in the objective sense it's good. It's sad for the people who are personally affected by the loss, but it's good news for everyone else because it's one fewer mouth to feed and the available resources to the rest of us just got that much more available.


Someone shared a link to Dan Carlin's Hardcore History podcast recently.




@HardcoreHistory
DanCarlin.com

Dan talked about the Mongol conquests at length and he opened the first episode with two thoughts. One was about the his ethnic Chinese history professor insisting that you can't write about that level of death and destruction without including the human cost of it. You can't just focus on weapons systems and politics and tactics and just ignore the fact that between 20 and 80 million people died as a result of the Mongols' expansion. The second idea, the first thing he says in the first episode, is how controversial it would be to write about the good aspects of the Nazi regime and what benefit came of it. In fact, it's probably controversial to even mention that idea out of context, and I'd like to explain that I'm not a Nazi sympathizer, or admirer of Hitler, or think that they did the right thing at all. But where Dan brought the ideas together, his quasi-rhetorical point was about our ability to dismiss everyone the Mongols killed in analysis of what they did, while being unable to separate out everyone the Nazis killed from what they did.

This sort of brings me to my point: it doesn't matter so much how many people the Mongols killed because everyone they didn't kill still died. In fact, so did the Mongols involved. It's much harder to feel sympathy for someone who died a horrible death in the 1300s because no matter how it happened or how old they were at the time or what they did with their lives, every last person living then died anyway. And when you take that idea along with the Nazi comparison, the reason we still feel so strongly about their holocaust is because there are still people alive who survived it. It's worth taking a minute to think about the fact that the last veterans of World War I and the last survivors of the Titanic have all died recently. On one level, there are now no survivors of either event. You might ask yourself what was the point of surviving something if you're going to die anyway.

The idea that the nature of a person's death matters more than whether they died is not new. If you look up quotations about death, sort of like the ones I started with, you can find lots of conflicting and even contradictory philosophies about it. Of course, most people would say it was indeed worth surviving World War I or the Titanic, and that it made a huge difference to the people in question, and that's right. Everyone's life and death means a lot to them and to the people around them. But to the rest of us? Can you name any of the last survivors of the Titanic? Is your life any different because they didn't die in 1912 with the rest? Or if that one does personally affect you, how about the Civil War? There's nobody left from that either, and the nature of those who lived and died in that conflict carried on long after it was over. The last “Civil War Widow” died within the past 20 years, so law on the books was affected by whether people survived that war or not. Did it matter to you?

Why don't people think Stalin was as evil as Hitler when he killed more people? Why don't people think Genghis Khan was as evil as either when he killed more than both of them put together? The thing is, we don't consider death to be as evil as deliberate killing, and deliberate killing takes a back seat to the deliberate targeting and cruel treatment of specific portions of the population. In other words, what Hitler did wasn't wrong because people died, but because of who died and how. Stalin targeted Jews as well, just not as much. And Genghis didn't target anybody. He and his successors killed whoever they ran into, from Genghis's older brother to the last Shah of the Abassid Caliphate.

Of course, all of those examples are war deaths, and all of them arguably murders. But how should we feel about death as a whole? This is what I have been thinking about lately, and I'm on the edge of undecided territory. As I said, my general opinion is that death is good for the survivors. For Christians, death is good for everybody. Philippians 1:21 says “to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” If you're a faithful Christian, how could you not desire your own death, and the death of every Christian you know and care about? The sooner we die, the sooner we leave this world of pain and suffering and go on to our reward. I know this seems a tad unusual, and I'm not suicidal or homicidal, but that doesn't mean I'm sad to hear when a fellow Christian, especially one who's been sick and in pain for a while, finally gets released. It's hard on their families of course, just like it was hard on us when my grandmother died, but I'm still glad she's not sick anymore.

My opinions over the past five years have been even further down that road, though. If it's a good thing to let people go, and to let ourselves go so we don't have to bother with this anymore, then is it a bad thing to save lives? Is curing fatal diseases and preventing accidents only making things worse? I'm not arguing we shouldn't be feeding the hungry: if people are going to live, it only makes sense that their lives should be as painless as possible. But if people are dying anyway, is it sensible, or even good, to keep as many people alive as we can?


Until recently, I would have said no, that saving lives and taking lives were equally wrong morally, even if they weren't the same thing socially. I also have had a strong condemnation of giving birth. That's just making things worse for everybody. There aren't any problems that couldn't be solved by a reduced population. Lives were much shorter and fewer in number two hundred years ago, and while we might argue that those people didn't have the same quality of life we do today I think there's a serious case to be made that they were happier in their short and supposedly worse lives than we are with ours. My generation is going to be the first in American history that isn't going to live as long as the one before it, and it's largely because we don't want to.


I'm not so sure anymore if that's really the right way to think. I'm not sure what is the right attitude to have towards death now. I know “the more, the better” isn't exactly the most common anyway, but now I'm questioning it objectively. Is it really better to let people die and reduce the strain on resources rather than look for ways to increase those resources? If I could see a friend of mine about to fall to his death, and I could save him, would it be better for all of us, not just for me, to save him than let him go?


I don't think I can answer those questions just yet. Obviously I'd be saddened at the loss of my family and friends, but I certainly wouldn't hold them back, or even myself, if our deaths could benefit the larger species as a whole. I'm still opposed to procreation except for about once in every ten couples, and really for the next 20 years we don't need any at all, but does that mean that every pregnancy is as bad as I've thought of it? If life is for the living, are we better off with more or fewer? What would God want? The Bible is clear that we're not to murder, but there's nothing in there about saving lives. God doesn't care whether we live or die as long as we live obediently and die obediently. So with God's opinion being neutral, how are we to determine the morality of death?

If you know, you may be worth saving.