my jab's better than your jab

as if we didn't have enough identities to divide us into various sects, tribes, associations, nations, parties, and dilettante tweeters this cropped up in today's covid obsessed new york times...

if you have paid any attention you have a fair idea of which vaccine i received for my first injection and, presumably, will for my second ( which i will get in a couple of weeks even though i am more than a bit skeptical about its effectiveness and have some thought that this may be a gigantic misallocation of resources ) but i will be damned ( and there are no doubt evangelicals who think i will...they may think what they like ) if i am getting a fucking t-shirt to advertize yet another branding opportunity, this time for big pharma...corporate tentacles are so intertwined with what passes for culture here that even though the article says it started as "fun" the hegemons are cackling at the thought of pfizer or morderna shirts and coffee mugs out there as a profitable addtion to all the qanon ones...the social engineering has been going on a long time...it just isn't the "liberal conspiracy" the trumpists think it is...they have a right to be angry...you may have noticed i can be as well...i haven't disputed that...their anger is seriously misdirected.

collaborative

“if the American democracy finally decides to try to solve its obvious societal problems in a collaborative manner, the u s investment capacity is huge and the problems solvable. i think the latter sentence contains the essence of the u s fate over the next forty years. the united states could maintain its hegemony if it decided to do so. but i don’t think the american system of governance will be capable. quick, bipartisan decision making is not a u s strength. and i see little that will change this fact on the forty-year horizon.” jorgen randers____________________ so many things to define in that statement and the arguments that will torpedo bipartisan anything will begin with defining “societal problems”…we are all lexicographers…and we all have a world-view paradigm that continually defies escape into realistic vision…the squabbles continue…the conservatives want a consensus, monochromatic definition of what it is to be “american” ( and that monochromatic desire is a large step towards ethnic cleansing…i will not be part of creating a jasenovac here…historical wisdom should indicate that you should not either )…liberals continue to press for both “identity” and “inclusiveness” without seeming to realize the two stand in opposition…we all need space to be who we are and we should probably be tolerant of others and their identity/viewpoints unless they are manifestly sociopathic ( definitions of sociopathy are as wide ranging as there are people one suspects…this will need serious work…more lexicographical squabbles )…however we tend to define ourselves as much by what we are not as what we are …identity = exclusion…too much identity is a pharmakon…”we are not that” can lead to “we are not the other”…jasenovac again…this does tend to impede inclusiveness…it might be better to look for universals that define us as human as opposed to all the labels we are burdened with ( who creates all those labels? )…those universal exist… https://condor.depaul.edu/~mfiddler/hyphen/humunivers.htm we all have them despite what social science may say ( or want to believe is fact )…instead we are caught up in habitual world views that allow scant room for compromise which isn’t helping any…jorgen is correct…we could fix things…or, at least make them more tolerable for everyone…there seems to be a dearth of political will…that is, one supposes, reflective of the wider social divisions…we might be better served by trying to think beyond shared biases that passes for objective thought and making the politicians irrelevant…have a look at the scenarios the director of national intelligence presents…and ponder where you might like the planet ( and so your children and grandchildren…i have both i get to be concerned ) to end up https://www.dni.gov/index.php/gt2040-home

it hasn't been an "impossible year"

let me start with this disclaimer: my sympathies are with those who have lost people they loved in this pandemic...i have lost people i love...i know what that is like...it is not an easy thing...my comments are not aimed at any of them...there is a hierarchy making money from all this...they merit caustic assessment...and that is where we are headed...

so...what is "culture"?...i was always under the impression it consited of geographical adaptation and problem solving...my good friends at the new york times seem to disagree...for them "culture would seem to be...

at least one part celberity...elton john graces the cover of the version i recieved today ( therre were other celebrity covers )...brad pitt is in there somewhere hawking some damn merchandise or other...there are other musicians and artists and chefs and other luminariesd i imagine they think everyone should be familiat with...sadly i am not...

obviously consumerism has a fair input to culture out east as well...i do consume...i just ate dinner ( the first sitting, in the kitchen ) and the ingredients had to be purchased...high end baubles and status symbol purses don't fall into what is consumed here...then again i am not of the east coast elite...the times is their mouthpiece so upscale luxury is the byword...even if they claim not to be elitist...the media lie a lot

alcohol and ( surprise! ) the celebrities who drink it seem to be a factor in "culture" as well...i am surely uncultured since i gave that nonsense up decades ago ( that is not an editorial...you may consume as much as you like without comment from me )...left behind again...i can't help but think that the times is confusing "culture" with engineered desires, status seeking, and "fine arts" ( is elton john "fine art"? depends on who you ask i suppose...he and i parted ways at "honky [honkey?] chateau )...i also am inclined to think this is an expression of the times elitism and its obsession with covid-19...it is narcissistic crap as far as i am concerned...it's good to know what the elite wants me to believe is important...it's why i continue to subscribe.

a band-aid addendum

just into the n y times today...take a look at boris's london sometime... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/03/health/coronavirus-variants-vaccines.html

immunization or social band-aid?

am i an anti-vaxer? no...got a flu shot in october...the childern were immunized as children...i have been know to see a physician on occasion...do i think covid is a hoax? no...even though the numbers seem a bit odd at times...like oops! when the state forgets to count 1200 deaths...still i have no time for conspiracy theories...distractions...sleight of hand...misdierections designed to point you away from actual events into never never land while someone either gets away with something or makes a pile of cash...or both...no patience for patent bullshit...

< so i got vaccinated today and if it supplies any sort of immunization i would be, at the very least, mildly surprised...given the relatve speeds at which viruses and vaccines evolve i am going to assume the virus is well ahead...been reading about variants and "a new surge"? find the right media source and it is all you hear...then again there is the conspiracy thoery network that has the opposing position...you can read any damned thing you want...someone will be happy to sell a news product that panders to your world-view...you can spend your time fact checking the fact checkers...or you can look around your own environment and compare what you see with what you read and hear...this entails thought and some logical assessment...never an easy gig...or just tune in cnbc or fox and let the thinking be done elsewhere...your call...i am sticking with doubt ( although not quite the cartesian solipsistic sort ) and a fair dose of empiricism...to go along with the one they jabbed in my arm this morning ( and thanked me for coming )...so? maybe a road back to "normal" like the nyt says...or, perhaps, a massive misallocation of resources that could have been better spent...we'll see.

negentropy is denial in five easy steps

https://daily.jstor.org/could-negentropy-help-your-life-run-smoother/

Five easy step? 1.) “find the entropy”...where do you lose energy? in living. finite energy (mental and physical) = finite issues you can address. not a difficult task to identify futility. 2.) “prioritize the losses.”...in other words define “externals” (a handy economists term for unfortunate facts they do not want cluttering their tidy theories that defines a lot of human behavior) and ignore them....letting the chaos go doesn’t mean it goes away. 3.) “come up with a plan.”...planning would seem to be a human necessity....however, the farther out you put your event horizon the more likely you are to be blindsided by unseen variables (despite the enlightenment life is not linear and human cognition isn’t what it is cracked up to be.) 4.) “try it out and pay attention.”...praxis, everybody does praxis to varying degrees of success...again, unseen variables will cause major restructuring of the plan and, hopefully, impart a better understanding of inertia. 5.) “go beyond fixing and maintenance.”...junk what doesn’t work for you? “spending time improving an orientation to introduce new workers to a company culture may not be very useful if the culture itself needs to change.”...most corporate cultures are designed to the benefit of those who control them, not those who work for them....some things are not inclined to minor change, much less radical streamlining....entropy has inertia on its side and “big picture” paradigms are chock full of inertia....have a look at donella meadows leverage points: places to intervene in a system for a more realistic look at what and how to change and joseph tainter for how social entropy actually works.

sclerotic or just B(usiness)A(s)U(susal)?

my friends at the internasl revenue service in austin texas...

have found it necessary to invest fifty-five cents of taxpayer ( that would, among others, be me ) money in sending me a letter telling me i should have recieved "a second economic impact paymenr (EP2) as provided by the covid related taxrelief act of 2020" in a bilingual ( which i favor by the way ) notice...it also include the helpful tip that the cash isn't considered taxable income for 2020 taxes...since it landed at my institution on 1 january 2021 it wasn't going to be taxable in 2020 anyway but clearly the irs has no knowledge of the exact moment i recieved it and so the bureaucracy churned out a letter for me ( and, one supposes, for every other taxpayer they have information on...which must have cost a mint in postage ) telling me what i , and presumably the accountant who does my taxes ( after screwing them up more than once i retired from form 1040-A ) already know or, had the spirit moved me, found out on my own...it was simply something that had to be done...bureaucracy militates towards rigid behaviors, duplication of effort, and tautological language...no anarchist i have no desire to rid myself of the government...since there are always those who are wiling to take whatever they can from their contemporaries i would like a government in place that at least makes some pretense of keeping that under control despite the criminal class in congress ( one segment of the governmnet that merits the lake of fire )that continually undermines that by making what once was illegal legislatively, if not actualy, ethical...still, at some point this sort of behavior becomes, if not an index of entropy, a wasteful exercise...a misallocation of resources that could have been better spent elsewhere on a more meaningful project...a stupid, sclerotic, almost mindless repetition of the obvious

so EP2 is in the bank...so, for that matter, is EP3...i didn't reflexively run out to macy's and blow the whole lot on ralph lauren polo underwear and tommy hilfiger t-shirts...i am sitting tight...any bureaucracy that is so conformed to automatic behaviors and "by the book" thinking may just, at some future point, decide it was all a horrible mistake and could they please have it back..i want to be able to give it to them.