The Clark Art Institute is wonderful. It’s always worth a visit. They have an exhibit of Abelardo Morrell’s work up through February 17. Watch the video below for an introduction to his work. I first saw his work ca. 2002. He was working in camera obscura then too but in black and white. I really liked what he was doing then and this looks amazing.
Identity Politics
As much as left-wing identity politics are counterproductive and annoying, right-wing identity politics are vile. Trump and co are right-wing identity politics 24/7/365.
Michael Ignatieff, I was born liberal. The ‘adults in the room’ still have a lot to learn:
By the late 1990s, the conservatives began to gain power by playing to the resentments of the ignored. The authoritarian right, especially, understood that it could build an entire politics on mocking the blindness of the liberal elite. It didn’t need solutions; stoking the rage was enough. We are now the embattled object of that rage. What will it take to earn the trust of those whose discontent we ignored? Liberalism in the next generation will need to save social solidarity from the “creative destruction” of the market by rebuilding the fiscal capacity of the liberal state and investing in the public goods that underpin a common life for all. Saying this, at a high level of generality, is easy enough: The tougher part will be finding the language and the cunning to convert a radical liberalism into a politics that wins elections and a governing strategy that pushes change through the veto-rich thicket of interests waiting to derail our best-laid plans.
On Strong and Weak Nations
A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful and restrained. It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It’s a weak nation, like a weak person, that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity.
Music for Inauguration Day
Thought for the Day – January 18, 2025
Be patient with your grief.
Thought for the Day – January 14, 2025
We have been so desensitized by a hundred and fifty years of ceaselessly expanding technical prowess that we think nothing less complex and showy than a computer or a jet bomber deserves to be called “technology” at all. As if linen were the same thing as flax — as if paper, ink, wheels, knives, clocks, chairs, aspirin pills, were natural objects, born with us like our teeth and fingers — as if steel saucepans with copper bottoms and fleece vests spun from recycled glass grew on trees, and we just picked them when they were ripe…
One way to illustrate that most technologies are, in fact, pretty “hi,” is to ask yourself of any manmade object, Do I know how to make one?
Los Angeles
It’s been almost 30 years since I spent time in Los Angeles. I contemplated a move. It would’ve been a different life. Seeing places I remember burned to the ground is surreal and too on the nose.
The Laken Riley Act
The Laken Riley Act passed 84-9 in the Senate and 251-170 in the House.
What problems will the Laken Riley Act help fix?
The acute issues at the US-Mexico border are:
- Insufficient government capacity to process asylum applications and other requests to enter the country;
- Limited housing, school capacity, and medical services for migrants.
The first issue could be addressed by adding staff to process applications; the second by helping would-be Americans settle in areas where there is adequate housing supply, school capacity, etc. The latter is a real issue. Even if money were no object, there are material limits on the goods and services that can be provided to people seeking them. There are finite number of homes, schools, doctors and nurses, etc. and additional ones can’t be created immediately on demand. Infrastructure takes time to build. It takes time for people to learn the skills that make them capable professionals. Exceed the capacity of the system and it breaks down. With that in mind, fewer people might seek to immigrate if the quality of life in their home country was more favorable, e.g., better economic and educational opportunities, less authoritarian government and/or social environment, lower crime. Towards that end, foreign aid to the countries that people are leaving might be helpful.
The Laken Riley Act addresses none of these things. One thing it will do however is deprive some people of due process based on their immigration status. Nothing good will come of that. Overall, it is a cynical, hateful piece of legislation. I thanked my Senators and Congressman for voting No. (The motivation for this post were the Yes votes from craven Senate Democrats.)
Our community welcomes new neighbors and most of us are fine with some change, but communities have a finite capacity for growth before growth becomes disruptive. Most of us are also quite willing to provide resources to other communities when they’re trying to lift themselves up, but our resources are finite. Acknowledging preferences and limitations doesn’t prevent us from doing good. We have goodwill and the capacity to help people who fear for their and their families’ well-being in their home community. Let’s figure out how best to help them and get about doing so.
References:
- Text of the bill
- Time, What’s in the Laken Riley Act?
- Nicole Narea, America’s misunderstood border crisis, in 8 charts
- RAND Corporation, The Crisis at the Border: A Primer for Confused Americans
Thought for the Day – January 10, 2025
2025 Word of the Year will “quisling”. Language Innovation of the Year will be its adoption as an adjective. Use it in a sentence:
“Wow, why is Fetterman turning into a quisling shitstain?”
Thought for the Day – January 8, 2025
Overheard:
We’re not all in the same boat. But we’re in the same storm. And all boats sink.
We survive the storm together or not at all.
“The System Failed”
From Dan Drezner’s, My Extremely Brief Take on January 6th:
Folks are going to point out that today marked a peaceful transfer of power, overseen by the loser of the last presidential election, and isn’t that a great thing for democracy?! Usually, it is. But the fact remains that the only reason for the peace is because the guy who has threatened or fomented political violence for the last ten years won the election this time around. America’s political elite appeased a bully, the American people endorsed that strategy, and now America’s economic elite is falling all over itself to appease the bully some more.
And when you think about that dynamic for more than half a second, you realize how pathetic it makes this country sound.