recently we had been bashing some ny times columnist, was it Krugman or someone else?
no matter, playing chess, and despite the computer having a (black) bishop plus two pauns (both on the same file) and me having nothing but the king, the computer cannot win, it's a draw... unless he tried bringing his king around to a different part of board and giving up one of those pauns maybe -- probably not though, as the computer keeps repeating the same style of move, just adjusting where his bishop sits on its file, unfortunately the program was not written by some kind of technocrat in such a way that the computer would just come out and offer a draw and tabulate it as such
on to Krugman... one of his recent articles: Boring Cruel Euro Romantics
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/21/opinion/boring-cruel-euro-romantics.html?_r=2&ref=opinion
seems to titillate, with its title... but then falls short on knowledge anyway... besides, who is there that can even talk about Europe? i profess my own ignorance and that is after spending almost 3 years in spain, half a year in paris and another 2 hellish years in bulgaria
Krugman doesn't touch on world war ii or world war i or the historic precedent for europe to avoid continual warring against numerous principalities within her borders
just studying approx. 2000 years of spanish history, in spain, as a sixteen year old, what was impressive amongst all the maps with shifting border lines and kingdoms was the fact that they were never united (even just in spain).... of course this has been the case of europe for thousands of years, although of course, we all know some big empires and players came along now and then and made some pretty big borders....
Krugman does seem to hit some nail on the head though, about Boring Cruel Euro Romantics.... why not even say 'wannabe romantics'? or just 'eurotrash' as they say - even better.......
there is definitely a trend in europe to cede all kinds of freedoms to technocrats and functionaries, unlike in america where even local deputies and all kinds of local level auxiliary staff are elected.... in fact, most europeans probably do not even know this is the case in america (and it's not really the case any where else) -- is it the best way to be? most likely, but noone else follows this model
furthermore, america has alot of positive thinkers and positive people with a profound sense of love and patriotism for their nation, even if they do not like various elements and people within it.... in europe, if we first look at the broad partition put in by the russians, for forty years, if my 2 year experience in bulgaria is anything to go by, then the eastern europeans are not positive thinkers, while they are patriotic, it's a patriotism of a small nation (you name it: lithuania, latvia, wherever) that would tend to see their country in a perverted sense as all-important, all-great....
too often the europeans take so many fruits from the america tree like movies and culture and technology and then delude themselves into thinking americans are stupid and useless -- total hypocrisy -- this is really a trashy element to the european culture....
where the americans have marching bands and pledges of allegiance and all manner of community building, healthy self-esteem building RITES... the europeans only have their own personal cultures to fall back on: their own language, and history which they will never tire of embellishing as almight - despite no-one outside of slovakia even really caring about it at all -- or really believing that at some point slovakia ruled the world -- even the spaniards do not sit around boasting about how great their empire was -- maybe the slovakians don't either, but the bulgarians do and they never really had an empire anyway
why should the europeans unite? why shouldn't they? it makes sense for europeans to drop border tariffs and compete economically in a free market... likewise having a shared currency makes sense too....
so what's the problem? it's always the same crap lately: greek crisis this, italy crisis that, spain's real estate is owned by banks that would only be able to sell it at 30% of what it was worth......
some people are predicting a massive collapse....... if so, how would that look?
let's go back to Nietzsche... Nietzsche predicted that 'Europe wants to unite'... he was right.... he said that the next century (the 20th) would see a battle for the mastery of the world, again, he was right... incidentally, yesterday we saw an old u.s. defense dept. black and white movie shot shortly after world war ii showing the damage in hiroshima and nagasaki and also how to survive nuclear attacks in general (fallout and such).... well, just to be scary, one of those big evil empire russian generals came out recently saying that the likelihood of nuclear war with neighbours will be higher (than ever?) in coming years.... maybe he was just trying to put a scare on people
Nietzsche also signaled that neverending warring amongst principalities in europe was hamstringing europe
but let's stop there with Nietzsche, because Benji would like to say: if only that fucker Nietzsche lived in Bulgaria for a couple of years, that would have shut his fucking mouth up once and for all
in fact, we are inclined to say that Europe is so BIG (500 million people and 27 Nations) and so diverse (it's REALLY diverse), that anything her unity would produce would be nothing short of a monster
in fact, don't you already want to crawl on your hands and knees, whimpering lamely already, to Krugman's lap and stick your head there and hope for a pat and a reassuring 'there, there,' and hopefully a doggy-snack to munch on; just thinking about it?
is this where we are headed? neverending war in the islamic countries, a global slowdown including a slowdown in china and neverending irregular floods and storms here and there as we have been having lately, coupled with sea-levels rising, a growing sub-saharan population living in poverty... why some economists are predicting 50% unemployment in america!
even if these things were to play out, could you even blame europe for that? what if you were to vaporize the whole place living it empty of inhabitants and free for whoever to move in... would that solve the problem?
what's the problem? diminishing resources and over-population is the problem.... how are you going to cull those numbers? start a divorce your wife before you have a kid movement and just travel around and wear a condom movement? maybe a one child policy for the world?
recently a policewoman from queensland state in australia... good old australia, the richest country in the world in terms of wealth spread and money with socialism and wealth for all, was telling me how suicides and depression were on the rise in queensland state as people grappled with losing their entire life's earnings (their house, belongings) in a big storm
look at the thailanders... flooded......... the northeast of america has taken a battering recently too
Nietzsche, who never spent 2 years in post-communist Bulgaria, and maybe never imagined how the Russians (who he recognized as the strongest willed people in the world) would poison eastern europe; also predicted that in the future, it would be too hard to get rich and that people would just give up and hand themselves into a mental hospital... in fact, anti-depressant medications and anti-psychotic medications have never been higher
Nietzsche predicted a united Europe that could impose a 'terrible will' to project itself a thousand years into the future....
if you're american, where there are plenty enough terrible actions for you to occasionally marvel at in your own nation, you might think, what could be 'terrible' that the europeans could impose apart from techno music and cocaine usage... in fact, europeans are spending less on porn and cocaine now that a decade ago...
it's hard to see, but what looks terrible is the future: over-population, diminishing resources, failure of marriage/family unit...
even americans sometimes say that they are 'all crazy'... if you watch movies like 'Pleasantville' that juxtapose the good old wholesome 1950s with the Billy Joel 'we didn't start the fire' craziness of modern times... it seems like americans will keep giving us dumb crazy shit to play with (like i-pods and sitcom tv shows)...
it's hard to see how the future will play out, but if no plans are laid for a different energy source, like thorium nuclear electricity or engines that run on water through hydrolisis or whatever it's going to be, then the future will be terrible enough maybe
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