I am afraid that even though I love classical literature I can't relate to classical music at all. The closest I get to classical is prog rock. But on the subject of collapse, I do think that the remaining record shops are likely to collapse, which will be a great shame. It is not just a matter of being able to buy records though, as record shops are also a whole cultural or countercultural experience.

I can't relate to classical music at all — Jack Cummins

I can't relate to pop music and never listened to the music of my youth (mid 1970's and 1980's). I generally find rock to be aesthetically unpleasant (but I do know the Doors and Tom Waits and Leonard Cohen, Nick Cave) I prefer Muddy Waters, Howling Wolf, Little Walter. Mainly I listen to classical - Mahler, Bruckner, Beethoven, Schoenberg, Bach, Shostakovich.

I do have some Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen, and they are extremely dark. I listen to jazz, but more alternative jazz and acid jazz. I think that music has to be chosen carefully according to mood. That can be complicated because in darker moods, sometimes somber music can help and other times make it worse. I know that some people think Leonard Cohen is music to commit suicide to. I think that in some ways, it can work in the opposite, and be a way of transmuting despair, but it is so subjective.

I know that some people think Leonard Cohen is music to commit suicide to. — Jack Cummins

I have never understood that. I can't think of an artist more life affirming than him. I don't generally accept a dark versus light view of music. It either is enjoyable or it is not. If I had to listen to U2 or Elton John, say, self-harm might be an option...

It either is enjoyable or it is not. — Tom Storm

That's my view. I often have a hard time hearing what is being said in the lyrics. Sometimes when I find the lyrics to read, I'm disappointed. Sometimes I'm pleased. But either way, if I enjoy the music, that's enough for me. Also, I don't care if the person who wrote it likes it or not. And I don't care if what I take from it is what they meant. If I find meaning they did not have, that's the meaning it has for me. If I find it enjoyable, that enough for me. I think that is what art is all about.

If I were god looking down on this mess and asking myself what humans have to contribute that is worth a shit, I'd shrug and say:

"Well, there is always art. What was in the heart of the artist as the art was created? And what was in the heart of the person who appreciated it? That's all that matters. And that's really all these turds have to contribute to my legacy. Everything else I can get from a dog. Nothing against dogs, mind you. Just saying."

:up:

And yet their hitch their wagon to a star like Trump. They keep talking Jesus and then they slap Jesus and then they get to say that's okay, because they are forgiven. Okay. :roll: — James Riley

Tens of millions of people had their jobs outsourced over the past decades and nobody cared...until Trump came along. Trump is a complete dufus in many, many ways, but you have to be able to see why he appealed to so many people. If you cannot understand this, you are not seeing the entire picture.

And keep in mind that the number one reason the establishment hated him so much is that they could not blackmail him liked they could all the career pols whose hands are so dirty at this point that they can do nothing but join in on the feast that is the dissolution of this democracy.

How about Frank Zappa & Thelonius Monk ... Pink Floyd & Return to Forever ...

It is hard to know what is going to happen long term, but I think that all the events of the last year are going to be very far from a 'blip', and, potentially the pandemic could go on for a very long time with many waves and countless new variants. — Jack Cummins

Let's compare COVID to several events of the 20th century. WWI, the Spanish flu, WWII, the Soviet Union, and Communist China. Each of these events makes COVID look like not much of anything.

Each of those events caused 10's of millions of deaths. And also keep in mind that the vast majority of people who died from COVID were over 80 and had concomitant health issues and were going to die relatively soon anyway (statistically).

The biggest problem with this entire episode was the lockdowns and the incredible economic damage sustained by individuals and small businesses. Jack, life goes on. We live in an age where some pretty amazing things are possible, but the most important thing to deal with is global debt and how the elite have completely screwed-up the economic and monetary systems, but this too will pass.

We got through the craziness of the 20th century, we'll get through this too. If you want to feel better about things, volunteer your time for some worthy cause and you'll see that (relatively speaking) things could be a hell of a lot worse. After all, look at all the amazing things we take for granted in our lives. Just taking a shower every day is reason enough to celebrate! :)

I pretty much agree with all of that. I know someone who is way left, and they were against the south-east Asia trade deal that Hillary and Obama were backing. Trump trashed the deal and this person would not even throw Trump a bone. I'm "left" and could not bring myself to vote for Hillary because, well, Goldman Sachs. I wanted to read the transcripts. No Joy. (I also hate the two party system, so there's that, too). But yeah, I get what you are saying.

The establishment may not have been able to blackmail Trump but I have a strong suspicion that Putin could. And I think it was more than pee tapes. After all, Trumptettes would over look a consenting adult's peccadilloes. I would. I think it has something to do with development projects, money, and/or kids. But I have no evidence.

In the end, though, if you want to tip over the apple cart, surely you can find someone better than Trump. Bernie would have tipped it but he doesn't appeal to the testosterone sense of the Trumpettes. Couldn't the "right" find someone who actually had some convictions whereupon he could demonstrate the courage of?

Tens of millions of people had their jobs outsourced over the past decades and nobody cared...until Trump came along. — synthesis

I think that is a critical point. I'm not sure Trump cared either but he said he did. No one had heard that before.

Tens of millions of people had their jobs outsourced over the past decades and nobody cared...until Trump came along. — synthesis

I think many did care. This isn't a thing that is new as globalization, which outsourcing is part of, and technological advancement are phenomena that are quite old. Have started in earnest in the 19th Century.

Globalization creates winners and also losers. The majority of people have been winners and that's why globalization has endured. Trump or populism in general is a logical outcome when far too little emphasis is given to those who have not prospered from globalization.

The unfortunate truth is that putting up trade barriers doesn't make us better, it makes things worse in the long run. Post-colonial Africa is an example of that.

Globalization creates winners and also losers. — ssu

The winners were the (corporate) elite and the politicians, the losers, regular folks. Seems pretty interesting that Germany and Japan still kept robust high quality manufacturing in their countries.

Because of the way that capitalism works, you have to manage labor flows so you don't completely screw-over your own citizens. The Democrats certainly showed how much they cared for the working class and especially for the working poor over the past decades (so much so that they voted for Trump by the tens of millions).

Globalization creates winners and also losers. The majority of people have been winners and that's why globalization has endured. — ssu

I think of all the polite debates where that phrase is inevitably trotted out (on NPR and everywhere). It's usually followed by some quick platitude about money for jobs training and whatnot; you know, for all the losers. And then it's swept under the rug while conversation moves on to the winners and the upside.

But I find it interesting the debate is occurring at all. It seems to me that an idea has to be sold to the losers (or their champions) in order for the idea to come to fruition. So, those "buyers" have some negotiating power. Rather than settling for jobs training and some other bone, they should demand a cut of the profits to be made by the winners. But they don't get it. And I suspect the reason they don't get it is because their champions get bought off. But the losers don't get bought off.

A rising tide may lift all boats, but why should I lift someone's boat in China? Humans are a resource (human resources) and they are labor and labor is subject to supply and demand and China got a shit ton of supply and it's cheap. Well, we dam sure lifted their boat all right. They are part of the majority you talk about when you say the majority have been winners. And who bore the externalized costs? What did they get for it? A cheap piece of plastic crap from Walmart? Gee, thanks.

No, the real winners are the top 1% who rake it in without paying taxes and laughing all the way to some off shore bank. Their boat that got lifted is a giant ass yacht.

I will stipulate to globalization being good when the losers get to take their boat out now and again.

I think that is a critical point. I'm not sure Trump cared either but he said he did. No one had heard that before. — Tom Storm

The guy is a billionaire. The fact that he took the time and went through the Hell that he did to do the whole presidency thing is telling. Who would bring such a thing on themselves if they didn't care?

I will stipulate to globalization being good when the losers get to take their boat out now and again. — James Riley

Globalization is about two things and two things only, access to cheap(er) labor and new markets. If your neighbor across is having to eat cockroach stew for dinner because if it, so be it.

I think it all went to shit when Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus and shut down the press, arrested editors and banned journalists during the Civil War. — Tom Storm

You know, this morning I remembered that Australia is a member of the Five Eyes. From Wiki:

As the Cold War deepened, the intelligence sharing arrangement became formalised under the ECHELON surveillance system in the 1960s.[7] This was initially developed by the FVEY to monitor the communications of the former Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc, although it is now used to monitor communications worldwide.[8][9]

In the late 1990s, the existence of ECHELON was disclosed to the public, triggering a major debate in the European Parliament and, to a lesser extent, the United States Congress. The FVEY further expanded their surveillance capabilities during the course of the "war on terror", with much emphasis placed on monitoring the World Wide Web. The former NSA contractor Edward Snowden described the Five Eyes as a "supra-national intelligence organisation that does not answer to the known laws of its own countries".[10] Documents leaked by Snowden in 2013 revealed that the FVEY has been spying on one another's citizens and sharing the collected information with each other in order to circumvent restrictive domestic regulations on surveillance of citizens.[11][12][13][14]

In spite of continued controversy over its methods, the Five Eyes relationship remains one of the most comprehensive known espionage alliances in history.

As an Australian, your every online activity, your phone calls, and your physical movements (if you carry a smartphone) are tracked by the intelligence agencies of five countries, including the US's NSA and CIA. In light of this, I wonder if you would care to revise your claim that you don't feel any restrictions on your freedoms. Of course you look out your window and see no Roman centurions or Star Wars storm troopers, so you "think you're free." Which is exactly the point I made, and which you dismissed by calling me a paranoid nutball or whatever phrase you used.

Perhaps I'm not paranoid, but rather someone who follows the news that they don't blare in the MSM.

I wonder if you would care to reiterate or retract your remark. Did you know that everything you do is tracked illegally by your government? Now that you do know, do you stand by or reject your earlier claim?

In other news, this morning I ran across an article on the US's no fly list entitled, "The No-Fly List is a Civil Liberties Nightmare."

This is not the first time politicians have touted the no-fly list as a solution to the crisis du jour. A common refrain during the Obama administration, echoed by both major-party presidential nominees in 2016, was that people in the FBI's Terrorist Screening Database, which includes the no-fly list, should not be allowed to buy guns.

Using the list to abridge civil liberties was a bad idea then, and it's a bad idea now. The no-fly list is a civil liberties nightmare: secretive and nearly impossible to challenge.

Although it existed prior to 9/11, the list ballooned afterward, from a total of 16 people to about 4,600 U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents as of 2017. A 2014 investigation by The Intercept found that 40 percent of the nearly 700,000 names in the broader Terrorist Screening Database were not linked to any specific terrorist group.

Because of government secrecy, false positives and other mistakes were absurdly hard to fix. Such was the case with Rahinah Ibrahim, a doctoral candidate attending Stanford University on a student visa. She ended up on the no-fly list in 2004 after an FBI agent checked the wrong box on some paperwork. At the time, the government had a policy of refusing to confirm or deny a person's watch-list status, putting Ibrahim in the position of trying to challenge a program that she could not prove affected her.

It took Ibrahim a decade to get off the no-fly list. In 2014, she became the first person to mount a successful challenge. Around the same time, the American Civil Liberties Union won a lawsuit challenging the list, which resulted in several concessions. The government now informs people of their status and gives them a summary of why they were added.

The legal challenges keep coming. In December 2020, the Supreme Court ruled that three Muslim men could sue several FBI agents for putting them on the no-fly list in retaliation for refusing to become informants. As Ramzi Kassem, the lawyer representing the three men, told NPR, the problem with the no-fly list is that it combines "tremendous power with a near-total lack of transparency."

The point being that one need not see storm troopers out the window to wake up one morning living in a police state. The process is invisible to the eye. You have to read the news and apply critical thinking skills. It's a subtle process.

In the US, the Patriot act was passed in the panic after 9/11. But the original draft legislation of the Patriot act was written by none other than Joe Biden following the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing of a federal building in the US.

Sure, you can still jump in your car and go to the grocery store. But much has been lost in the way of freedom. To deny it is to be in denial.

The fact that he took the time and went through the Hell that he did to do the whole presidency thing is telling. — synthesis

It ain't hell for one who craves center stage. It's the limelight, and heaven, and he loved it. He is in hell now, where no one is listening except losers and suckers.

Who would bring such a thing on themselves if they didn't care? — synthesis

Trump.

Globalization is about two things and two things only, access to cheap(er) labor and new markets. If your neighbor across is having to eat cockroach stew for dinner because if it, so be it. — synthesis

:100:

One thing that I fear may happen is a gradual spread into widespread poverty, in the aftermath of the pandemic, alongside a general move towards totalitarianism. The two could almost exist alongside one another. But, it is hard to know what is going to happen, because life is so unpredictable and we don't want what other events are going to take place in the world. We can fear one thing, and something else entirely happens. — Jack Cummins

Contemporary - Western - society has reached a point, through the use of mass freedom, of wealth, that this same prosperity is hurt by the freedom of the individuals.

As I said and continue to say:

"Contemporary Western society does not need a thriving and growing economy with a pluralistic and individualistic population; it needs a stratified and economically stable society for the Status Quo to remain indefinitely."

The mistake of most "intellectuals" is to believe that the "collapse" will be characterized by "darkness", "explicit totalitarianism", and "perpetual wars".

Remember: - People living during the collapse of Roman society characterized it as being "democratic", "evolved" and "civilized". The "Rex" - King - was the head of the "Res publica" - Republic - even if it contradicts itself. Perpetual war was called "Restoratio" - Restorarion - and even though Rome had fallen from a metropolis with almost 2 million people in 117 AD to a mere village of 50.000 in 600 AD, and although its urban landscape was 80% destroyed, its population miserable, public rape was normal, barbarians walked in its streets fully armed, etc..., it was still called "Civitatis et Cultura" - The City of Culture -.

"Bad times" are made worse because those who create it believe - doublethink - that they are making the world better.

How great does the arrogance of a current individual have to be, to believe that his society, which has been the same system for more than 4,000 years, will not collapse in the same way that it had previously fallen?

I wonder if you would care to revise your claim that you don't feel any restrictions on your freedoms. — fishfry

I am aware of this. I'm not overly concerned.

The guy is a billionaire. The fact that he took the time and went through the Hell that he did to do the whole presidency thing is telling. Who would bring such a thing on themselves if they didn't care? — synthesis

For the power, connections, fame. It's the ultimate prize. I doubt he knew what he was getting into for starters. But I don't want to debate DT.

I am aware of this. I'm not overly concerned. — Tom Storm

Hence the salience of my point. "They thought they were free." You're the classic example. You brag of your freedom but it turns out you don't care about it all that much.

Yeah, that's right, Fishfry. I am deluded and don't understand the issues like you do.

Yeah, that's right, Fishfry. I am deluded and don't understand the issues like you do. — Tom Storm

It's even worse that you do understand your loss of freedom but pretended not to. Why exactly did you do that? After all you could have just as easily said, "I live in a Five Eyes country so my every electronic communication and physical movement is monitored by intelligence agencies of five countries, but I'm fine with it because such information is never abused by the authorities, and I haven't done anything wrong so I have nothing to fear." But you didn't say that. Why?

The winners were the (corporate) elite and the politicians, the losers, regular folks. — synthesis

If I can get in the winter a fresh banana here in Finland, that basically makes us here "winners" thanks to globalization. I even have the option to buy a fair trade banana, actually. Without globalization, that wouldn't simply be a possibility. Sure, I could eat canned food as my grandparents when they were young in the winter, it's not such a big difference, yet it still is a difference.

Hence I object to the populism that the only winners are the (corporate) elite and the politicians and the (only?) losers are the regular folks. Sorry, but anybody talking about the benign "regular folks", the "common people" as these people who are the suffering losers uses populist rhetoric. You and I know that in the West the majority of the people have it OK. They are not starving. They have it reasonably well. It is a minority, the underclass, who really are poor. In the US or in Western Europe, they don't make up a majority.

The real problem is that far too many things that globalization has given us we take for granted, while we are too eager to focus on the downsides. Perhaps it's just a matter of rhetoric: we simply don't want make an argument like this and that is good, but here we have problem. Far better to say only that here we have a problem.

Seems pretty interesting that Germany and Japan still kept robust high quality manufacturing in their countries. — synthesis

They have been far more better export oriented countries than many. And here we get onto thin ice, if we really want to look at why some countries have been more successful than others. Some can argue about a worse starting point, poverty or war or having been colonies, but sometimes, as in the case of Argentina, the real reason why they have been failures is quite puzzling, when they have had all the cards stacked for them.

Agree it is far from simple. And many of our problems today will require more globalization, not less.

Epidemics, attacks, disasters, etc. can be the occasion to ratchet up social control. 9/11 resulted in security measures at airports which have been in place now 20 years. Does it produce safety? Who the hell knows.

We do know that the public health measures instituted in many countries to control C19 are effective IF the public cooperates. If the public doesn't, then the measures are ineffective.

500,000+ people dead in the US from Covid-19 is a significant loss, and without suppression measures, it would be much worse.

On the plus-side of control measures... a lot of operations tend to become sloppy. Without regular intrusive surveillance, public transportation companies would cut safety corners. Without syphilis investigators asking you for a list of who you had sex with, syphilis would be a lot more common -- ditto other sexually transmitted diseases.

During WWII there were many restrictions on activity -- some of them draconian. New and different restrictions were put into place during the Cold War.

Look, tyranny is always a possibility: one of the slogans of the American Revolution: Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. One has to keep an eye on what the government and corporations are up to, and resist if they are brewing tyranny.

Look, tyranny is always a possibility: one of the slogans of the American Revolution: Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. One has to keep an eye on what the government and corporations are up to, and resist if they are brewing tyranny. — Bitter Crank

So true. I agree with all you said (and would add the Patriot Act and the subsequent NDAAs). Your last paragraph is exactly what the insurrectionists of January 6th thought they were up to. They thought they were resisting tyranny. Somehow I think they were over-reacting. Liberals and more government services and taxes does not equate to Pol Pot or even China, but everything is a slippery slope to some folks. Hell, the days they pine for (1950s) were way more taxy and government-programmy than we are today. Somebody has been drinking Kool Aid. Vigilance is good. But vigilance without education is paranoia (Q).

Vigilance is good. But vigilance without education is paranoia (Q). — James Riley

Absolutely.

They thought they were resisting tyranny. Somehow I think they were over-reacting. — James Riley

I would have thought that if they were resisting actual tyranny they would have been trying to throw Trump out of office. Goes to show that terrible cliché is true. One man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter.