I am not a pundit. But I play one on YouTube. Dean Walker, of the website livingresilience.net and the YouTube podcast The Poetry of Predicament — sites that try to help people deal with the angst of awareness of the impending crash of the Industrial Age — discusses our shared awareness of the nastiness to come.
Interview With the Poetry of Predicament
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“They’ve incinerated borrowed money for 10 straight years, and snowballed the entire world, that this is some kind of technological marvel; what this is scraping with your bloody fingers the last drops of oil out of rock.”
You know when you write that shit I don’t laugh. Not out loud, anyway (only happened with DeLillo and Heller so far, sorry). But goddamn if I wasn’t chuckling my ass off by the time you finished that sentence.
Reminded me a bit of George Carlin in his immortal “Last Phase,” but dare I say it, funnier. Better delivery! Must be a familiarity issue, or something. More than 40 years with Carlin, and less than one hour with Lewis. That has to be it.
Either way, I believe you got a second career if you need one. Probing the Heart of Darkness for laughs, and profits, in front of American audiences! Toughest action there is, toughest action conceivable! But if Carlin could do it, I think so can you.
Hell of a thought, and I thank you for it, but I do not believe I could do it.
Thanks, enjoyed your podcast
We live in strange times
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“Stargazer”
Song by Rainbow
from the album Rising
Released 17 May 1976
Recorded February 1976
Genre
Heavy metalsymphonic rockpower metal[1]
Length 8:26
Label Polydor/Oyster
Songwriter(s) Ritchie Blackmore
Ronnie James Dio
Producer(s) Martin Birch
“Stargazer” is the fifth track from British rock band Rainbow’s 1976 album Rising. An epic song narrating the story of a wizard whose attempt to fly by constructing a tower to the stars led to the enslavement of vast numbers of people, it is notable for its musical qualities as well, with the guitar and drum solos cited as important examples of the qualities of guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, singer Ronnie James Dio, and drummer Cozy Powell.
The long, epic track with symphonic influences starts with a short drum solo by Cozy Powell, a “great drumming moment”[2] frequently cited as an example of his skills.[3][4] It features the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, a Vako Orchestron, and what Ritchie Blackmore called “a string thing all playing this half-Turkish Scale”.[5] Blackmore’s solo, after the second verse, is in B Phrygian dominant scale, and is cited as “one of his best”.[6]
The song has been called a “morality tale”,[7] and its lyrics are written from the standpoint of a “slave in Egyptian times”, according to lyricist Ronnie James Dio. They relate the story of the Wizard, an astronomer who becomes “obsessed with the idea of flying” and enslaves a vast army of people to build him a tower from which he can take off and fly.[5]:70 The people hope for the day when their misery comes to an end, building the tower in harsh conditions (“In the heat and rain, with whips and chains; /just to see him fly, too many died”). In the end, the wizard climbs to the top of the tower but, instead of flying, falls down and dies: “no sound as he falls instead of rising. / Time standing still, then there’s blood on the sand”. The next song, “A Light in the Black”, continues the story of the people who have lost all purpose after the Wizard’s death “until they see the Light in the Dark”, according to Dio.[5]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVXy1OhaERY
Great interview but I have to chip in about prepping. Like it’s a great hobby and all but if one is serious about it within a collapse context the only way to survive is convincing large numbers of people to permanently live and work on, and defend land held in common. Anything else is fantasy, again not as something to do but as a survival strategy during what will be the most destructive and chaotic period of our species’ history by a very large margin indeed.
Most of these prepper folk, especially the ultra-rich hardened bunker types really want personal “castles” and that is key to understanding how ad hoc this sort of thinking really is.
Even if you take firearms out of the picture (lol), what was required to maintain a mediaeval castle against siege by the locals? What was always a constant accompaniment to those castles from, at the very least, the point their builders replaced wood with stonemasonry? What key system had to be maintained to prevent a large peasant uprising genuinely threatening a fortified estate?
A ban on the common man keeping martial weapons in his home.
Whoops…
Meanwhile…
Coronavirus modelers factor in new public health risk: Accusations their work is a hoax
In recent days, a growing contingent of Trump supporters have pushed the narrative that health experts are part of a deep-state plot to hurt Trump’s reelection efforts by damaging the economy and keeping the United States shut down as long as possible
Mississippi’s governor issued an order defining almost all businesses as “essential” — including auto repair, bars and restaurants
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/03/27/coronavirus-models-politized-trump/
It’s not everyday one reads the dumbest thing one has ever read.
“It’s not everyday one reads the dumbest thing one has ever read.”
If you include ties then it happens to me two or three times a week.
You mentioned that demographic that voted for Trump as a second choice to Sanders. I’m one of those guys. A lifelong Democrat*, I nonetheless voted against Hillary, with her ultra feminism and idiotic foreign policy (don’t get me started).
Like many in that demographic I’ve remained largely silent about my vote – for reasons that are obvious. For this reason, I believe that this group is bigger than one might imagine. We may well be the silent minority that sinks Trump’s chances for a second term.
*I was a foot soldier in George McGovern’s campaign. I went door to door in working class east Baltimore trying to convince those folks to cast their votes for the radical from what might easily have been Mars – at least to them…Ah the idealism of youth!
Interesting. I have heard anecdotally that there is such a group, but have seen no data estimating its size.
12% of Sander’s voters ended up voting for Trump in the general, according to post mortem analysis done by the Cooperative Congressional Election Study.
Great interview Tom! I found the last five minutes particularly powerful for those of who also write and find ourselves in the “why bother” mode from time to time.
Thank you.
Hey Tom,
The room is never empty. We are here listening to you (reading). Enjoying what you write and your sense of humour. Keep it up, it’s what you do.
Thanks and all best
Richard
Thank you Richard. Means more than you know….