Graduate Oregon State University and Northern Illinois University,
Former City Manager, Corporate Vice President, General Contractor, Non-Profit Project Manager, occasional free lance writer and photographer for the Las Vegas Review Journal.
“Little Failure” may seem humorous to some but it is really about the angst and hardship of immigration. Immigration is a particularly difficult subject in today’s America. After all, President Trump claims “our country is full”.
At the age of 38, a memoir of one’s life seems hubris-tic. “Little Failure” might be a case in point, but the author, Gary Shteyngart, shows more self-loathing than excessive self-pride in his story of coming from Russia to New York at the age of six.
Shteyngart has the good fortune of going to a Jewish grade school (Solomon Schechter) to help him transition from being a Russian speaking immigrant to an English speaking writer.
Solomon Schechter, more than many American schools, appreciates and works on transitioning children from one culture to another. Shteyngart seems to devalue Solomon Schechter’s help in his immigrant transition. Helping a child transition from a smaller culture to a different and larger culture is a big challenge for both school and immigrant.
Shteyngart writes a great deal about his relationship with his father and mother that resonate in some ways with all boys growing into manhood. Both parents love their son.
In Shteyngart’s memoir, his father tells imaginative stories, but also physically punishes him for perceived insubordination and bad behavior. Shteyngart remembers passive/aggressive actions by his mother; e.g. a habit of not talking to him as a way of punishing perceived transgressions.
As with some maturing male children, Shteyngart is obsessed with sex. He covets attention of older men as father figures. He desires women that never give him a serious look until he is 20 years old. He compensates for inattention by being a class clown; which is one of many coping mechanisms used by adolescents with low self-esteem.
Sthteyngart writes that he is the apple of his grandmother’s eye and his parents have high expectations for him. Sthteyngart is expected to excel in school to become a doctor or lawyer. However, he finds he does not have enough interest or ability to achieve those goals and turns to writing.
He goes to Oberlin College, partly because of a girl, but primarily because it offers escape from home and the potential for meeting his parent’s expectation. He takes two majors, the first is political science and, presumably, the second is English or literature. The political science is for his parent’s push for law school. His other major is to feed his natural interest.
Sthteyngart becomes something of a hippie; i.e. smoking dope, drinking, and generally goofing off, but he manages to keep his grades high enough to satisfy his parents and feed his ambition to be a writer. (This is not a picture of Sthteyngart but and example of hippies of his day.)
He actively supports the first Bush’s election campaign as a confirmed Republican. He covets a financial patron, a father figure, to support his vices and the pursuit of writing. He turns to psychoanalysis for better understanding of his inner-life. He believes psychoanalysis helps him cope with his insecurities.
The valuable part of the story is about being an immigrant in a strange land. From the time of George Washington, many American Presidents have discouraged immigration. The grounds for their opinions range from fear of cultural contamination to national security threat–to today–when our President says America is full.
Immigration fear is not a partisan issue; it is a human issue. In 1939, President Roosevelt turned away an estimated 900 Jews on the M.S. St. Louis. Roosevelt turned them away because they were a national security risk. (Over 200 of those 900 immigrants were executed in Nazi extermination camps during WWII.)
Of course, today’s national security risk is religious affiliation or gang membership. Trump does not care if you are escaping poverty, violence, or death because America is full.
Mr. Trump implies every Muslim is a terrorist and every Latino south of the border is a gang member.
Shteyngart’s first book is published with good reviews. The best that can be said about “Little Failure” is that it tells a story of growing to manhood in 20th century America; before Donald Trump.
“Little Failure” is as its title says, a memoir, but it seems more like displaced hubris in the light of today’s American government. Aside from the immigrant parts of Shteyngart’s life, little new coming-of-age’ ground is broken. Few teaching-moments are harvested to lead listeners out of the lacuna of President Trump’s mind.
Max Hastings’ book reports the tragedy of the Korean War (1950-1953) fought by United Nations forces against North Korea and China. The end of the Korean War is a return to its beginning with no winners and mostly losers at the 38th parallel.
Hastings begins by suggesting that South Korea ultimately benefited from the war but one wonders if the cost of human blood and treasure is worth today’s North and South Korean reality.
Karl Marx said that “History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce”.
Syngman Rhee (Last Head of State of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea)
Hastings characterizes Syngman Rhee, the Republic of Korea’s leader (1948-1960), as corrupt, though less corrupt and venal than his North Korean counterpart, Kim il sung (1945-1994).
What is of concern to some Americans is President Trump’s relationship with North Korea’s new leader, the son of Kim il sung. Is the stage set for history to repeat itself?
Koje-do POW Camp
Hastings reports overcrowding, abuse, and neglect of North Korean, and Chinese P.O.W.s on Koje-do Island during the Korean war.
Hastings notes the use of the least competent military personnel as guards while the more competent soldiers were fighting the war. Hastings tells of prisoners at Koje-do being hung by their testicles and drowned by water hoses secured to their mouths. How different is that to a naked prisoner at Abu Ghraib or reported water boarding of enemy combatants?
Abu Ghraib prison treatment.
How similar is Koje-do Island’s P.O.W. camp in the Republic of Korea to Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison?
America repeats many of Korea’s mistakes in Vietnam and Iraq. The question is–are military interventions new history or the second coming of a repeat tragedy?
How similar is America’s support of Vietnam’s Ngo Dinh Diem (1955-1963), and Iraq’s Saddam Hussein (1979-2003)?
Summary execution of a Vietcong in Saigon (Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan shoots Nguyen Van Lem)
Vietnam’s Ngo Dinh Diem history is one of corruption as totalitarian and politically repressive as Rhee’s Republic of Korea’ government. The wars in Korea and Vietnam are over. Are Korea and Vietnam safer or better today than before outside military intervention? Vietnam re-unified after the war; Korea did not.
America supported Hussein because he opposed Iran. America’s relationship to Rhee is similar in that Vietnam historically opposed communist China.
Hussein gassed Kurds in northern Iraq and terrorized his country’s Shiite majority. Rhee declared martial law in the Republic of Korea and murdered an estimated 14 to 30,000 Koreans.
The question one may ask themselves, with Hussein dead, is Iraq safer or better today than before intervention?
Are South and North Korea safer or better as a result of the Korean war? From an economic standpoint South Korea is better and safer. That is not true in North Korea.
Francis Fukuyama, in a book titled “Political Order and Political Decay”, argues that violation of sovereign borders violates one of three pillars of a modern state. America’s invasion of Iraq destroyed the government’s ability to exercise power. The United Nations invasion of Korea results in a two state solution. That solution seems good for only some Korean citizens.
Whenever one thinks they know what is good for another there is a cognitive dissonance between what one wants and what one gets.
Hussein was a horrid ruler by American standards, but he was the head of a sovereign state. North Korea’s Kim Jong Un demonstrates the same qualities of leadership as Hussein.
Where will Trump lead America on the question of Kim’s reign? To paraphrase Samuel Clemens–history may not repeat itself, but it does rhyme.
When did human beings become “Gooks”, “Charlies”, and “Towel
Heads”? War brings out the worst in
human beings by demonizing and animalizing the enemy making killing more
socially acceptable.
Hastings shines a bright light on the ugliness and heroism of war. Hastings immortalizes the Irish 1st Battalion RUR (Royal Ulster Rifles’) battles in Imjin and Kapyong in 1951 with a heart rending and inspiring story of determination and bravery. However, his stories of fighting in subzero weather, being captured by the enemy, suffering from dysentery, seeing friends mutilated and killed, and fighting to the death for meaningless plots of ground are stomach turning episodes of despair.
After the 65th Chinese Army had exhausted itself attempting to smash through the defensive positions on the River Imjin held by the British 29 Brigade, the Brigade withdrew to a new line south of the River Han where, on 26 and 27 April, it rested and refitted for future operations. The Brigade had sustained over one thousand casualties at Imjin.
The glaring hubris of General MacArthur and his replacement with General Ridgeway by President Truman reinforces belief in the importance of good leadership.
A recurring theme in Hastings’ Korean history is the importance of ground forces’ confidence and spirit in the success of individual battles. (This is a theme portrayed in Leo Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” which is equally well narrated by Frederick Davidson.)
Was the Korean War worth it? Hastings fails to give a definitive answer but he provides an interesting historical background for one to consider its value.
Audio-book Review By Chet Yarbrough (Blog:awalkingdelight) Website: chetyarbrough.blog
Stein on
Writing By Sol Stein Narrated by Christopher Lane
Sol Stein (Author, Publisher, and Editor-in-Chief for Stein and Day Publishers)
Sol Stein’s book offers a road map to readers and writers. In reviewing books, one begins to understand what makes one better than another. One also realizes how much easier it is to be critical than objective about those who write..
Stein’s book is a writer’s road map. Stein’s map reveals where a story begins, which roads to follow, and where a story ends. He explains how to write action-ably.
Writers that follow Stein’s map see the highways and streets of writing a good story. An interpretation of what Stein explains would be: Do not write “he was upset”, write, “He hurled an ash tray through a living room window, sprinkling wet shards of glass across a brown patch of grass”.
The first line, “he was upset” is vague. It tells the reader what to think. The second line, “He hurled an ashtray…”, lets a reader come to their own conclusion. It makes the reader decide about a character’s mood. It offers a scene that stimulates a reader’s imagination.
The action of the line above uses what Stein calls “particularity” to focus a reader’s attention. The scene offers clues about a character’s life (an ashtray and a brown patch of grass). The value of using “particularity” sparks interest in knowing more about the ash tray thrower.
Sol notes that a good writer is emoting readers. A good writer wants the reader to feel a character’s emotion. To Stein, a good writer does not tell the reader what to think. Stein wants the writer to make the reader feel what the character feels. On Stein’s map, this is the beginning of good story telling.
Think about Charles Dickens and “David Copperfield” and how a reader becomes invested in David’s life; i.e. how David’s sad and happy feelings invest in the reader’s emotions.
Stein acknowledges some writing details may be lost in commercially successful books but no highways and few streets are lost by a great writer. Interestingly, Stein suggests the techniques of commercially successful and literary writers are the same.
A cohesive theme ties a story together.
The use of particularity provides a trail of clues to a story’s theme.
The use of suspense draws a reader deeper into a story.
Stein notes differences between commercial and literary writing appear in accurate use of language, in universal emotive qualities of story, and in insight to human nature. However, Stein argues that a commercially successful book can miss many of these characteristics; while a classic misses few.
Stein explains the craft of writing is a store owner’s job; always there because he/she owns the business.
Write every day.
Rewrite every day.
Use the dictionary.
Use the thesaurus.
Look for the perfect word that precisely defines the meaning of the idea.
Strive for perfection by finding the right hook to begin a report, a book, or story; keep striving with each paragraph.
Stein offers more and says it better. This is a book for the reference shelf; to be
read; to be listened to; again and again.
“The Three Musketeers” is a character driven story loaded with romantic heroes and riven with specters of evil. In the context of today’s “me to” movement, it is a female bashing and debasing tale wrapped in a male chauvinist delusion.
“The Three Musketeers” reinforces histories’ misshapen view of women’s rightful place as hero and/or villain.
In “The Three Musketeers” women are the cause of war, heart ache, and most maladies of humankind. In that view, Dumas joins the pantheon of writers that demean women.
On the other hand, Dumas creates a female character that is an equal to diabolical protagonists in other famous novels. There is no villain more devious, complicated, and scarily drawn than Milady de Winter.
Alexandre Dumas is one of France’s most well-known writers. At the risk of being identified as a fellow misogynist, “The Three Musketeers” is a fiction writer’s tour de force and a joy to listen to when narrated by a master story teller.
Meeting d’Artagnan for the first time and learning about Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, his three gallant and inseparable friends, is a guilty pleasure. There are no male heroes more brilliantly defined than Athos, Porthos, Aramis, and d’Artagnan.
Dumas writes the story of d’Artagnan, a 19 year old romantic that leaves his homeland with a letter of introduction to Monsieur de Treville, the Captain of the Musketeers. The hero, d’Artagnan is unknowingly pitched into the middle of a jealous rivalry between the French King’s Musketeers and Cardinal Richelieu’s competing cadre of French protectors.
Dumas cleverly interlaces facts of history with stories of Musketeer bravery, hi-jinks, and romance that reminds humans of their best and worst qualities.
Cardinal Richelieu (1585-1642).
England and France are on the verge of war in the early 1600s. The jealous rivalry of the King’s Musketeers and Cardinal Richelieu’s nationalists roil the relationship between the King of France and its Cardinal.
The Musketeers walk a fine line between their support of the King and Queen and Richelieu’s defense of the country.
Queen Anne of Austria (1615-1643, Louis XIII’s wife).
Richelieu is painted as a powerful French nationalist and a venal schemer who lusts for Queen Anne.
Duke of Buckingham (1592-1628).
The dastardly Cardinal goes to great lengths to expose the Queen’s affection for the English Duke of Buckingham; partly to save France from England’s covetousness, but also (in Dumas’s fiction) to break the relationship between King and Queen.
Dumas suggests Richelieu’s plan is to soil the Queen’s reputation with an already jealous King.
King Louis XIII (1601-1643).
A principal cause for the war between England and France is purported to be the Duke of Buckingham’s immoral advances toward France’s Queen Anne and Queen Anne’s suspected cuckolding of King Louis the XIII.
Women are unceasingly characterized as fickle, conniving, gullible, or duplicitous.
Dumas describes d’Artagnan’s infatuation with the married Constance Bonacieux. It is not unlike Richelieu’s alleged lust for Queen Anne. Dumas adds d’Artagnan’s dalliance with Milady de Winter, a wily protagonist, and her sometimes associate Richelieu. Neither men nor women seem entirely chaste in Dumas’s tale, but women are characterized less gallantly.
Listening to Vance’s narration of “The Three Musketeers” is an addictive pleasure in spite of Dumas’s fickle characterization of women.
The words from Milady de Winter vividly portray human nature at its worst. Both the Cardinal’s, d’Artagnan’s, and Milady de Winter’s virtues leave much to be desired. Generally, women in “The Three Musketeers” are characterized as objects, more than equals to men. How much has changed since the 19th century?
Nevertheless, “The Three Musketeers” ending is thrilling and satisfying to many deluded misogynists among us.
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man By James Joyce
Narrated by John Lee
James Joyce (1882-1941, Irish novelist, poet, teacher, and literary critic.)
James Joyce gives us a picture of Catholic Ireland in the early 20th century. He describes an Irish home; i.e. riven with Catholic guilt and ambivalent beliefs about God and Ireland’s place in the Gaelic world.
Joyce’s main character, Stephen Dedalus, is born into an upper middle class Irish family that falls on hard times. Dedalus graduates from a Jesuit school and moves on to college but his life steers away from God and Ireland in his journey to manhood.
Stephen chooses his own path in life but like all humankind he carries the genetics of family and circumstance that compel life’s decisions. Like his father, Stephen is drawn to agnosticism, bordering on atheism, because of worldly pleasures and pains. The pleasures of sexual adventure and the pains of Irish conflict (about religion and statehood) drive Stephen’s escape from Catholicism and his father’s fall from grace.
The fragility of the Catholic Church is evident in James Joyce’s “…Portrait…” Dedalus is portrayed as a top of his class student that is coveted by the Church hierarchy that wants Stephen to become a Jesuit priest.
The strength and allure of the Church at that time is clearly evident in Joyce’s description of the Catholic Priesthood’s power to attract the best and the brightest of its brethren. However, Dedalus, after a day contemplating the Church’s offer, chooses to pursue a broader life.
Even though the Church offers a vocation of prominence and security, Stephen rejects it. The irony of the rejection is that Stephen’s Catholic guilt propels him away from a life of Catholicism. Stephen realizes that he cannot resist worldly temptation.
To Stephen, the mechanism of Catholic forgiveness of sins seems formulaic and inadequate for the purpose of cleansing one’s soul.
The prescience of Joyce’s insight is fully realized in today’s Catholic Priesthood and its failure to protect Catholicism’s children.
Theodore McCarrick (Former cardinal and bishop of the Catholic Church–disgraced after found to be a pedophile after being appointed by Jean Paul II, ignored by Benedict, and finally revealed by today’s Pope Francis.
And so,
Stephen Dedalus is cast adrift. He is a
teacher and poet; highly regarded by most of his peers and recognized by many
as an intellectual superior. He wishes
to escape Ireland;
to see the world. This is “A Portrait of
the Artist as a Young Man”.
At best,
one sees Stephen Dedalus as a burgeoning Humanist; at worst, a hedonistic life
traveler. A great read; well told by John Lee.
Audio-book Review
By Chet Yarbrough
(Blog:awalkingdelight)
Website: chetyarbrough.com
Life of Pi
By Yann Martel
Narrated by Jeff Woodman
Yann Martel (Author, Spanish-born Canadian)
News of Irrfan Khan’s passing reminds all who saw “Life of Pi” or “Slumdog Millionaire” of his gifts as an actor. He died at the age of 53 from a neuroendocrine tumor on April 29, 2020.
Symbolism is a part of “Life of Pi” but it makes little difference to a reader or listener who is looking for an enjoyable fictional adventure. Most listeners will be fascinated and absorbed by Yann Martel’s writing and Jeff Woodman’s narration.
Pi’s father sells his business. He owns a zoo in Mumbai. By ship, he is transporting his family and the zoo animals to North America when disaster strikes.
Martel successfully suspends disbelief in a story about a boy from India who survives a ship wreck in a life boat with a tiger, a zebra, a hyena and an orange orangutan.
As with all ship wreck and life boat stories, the immediate concern is food and water for survivors, of which there is only Pi and four zoo animals.
Survival of the fittest becomes a suspenseful part of the story. The orangutan’s name is Orange Juice. Names for the hyena and zebra fall into the fog of a listener’s memory. The tiger’s name is Richard Parker.
This odd menagerie winnows down to the boy and the tiger but, along the way, one learns something about truth and relationship.
Martel describes Pi’s early life as the son of a zoo keeper and owner in Mumbai, India before a fateful voyage to Canada. By telling of Pi’s early life, Martel creates a background that makes Pi’s successful management of his crowded life boat believable.
Pi is born a Hindu but becomes interested in Christianity and Islam to the extent that each allows him to love God.
Pi’s concatenation of faiths is a foretelling of how Pi handles the loss of his family, survival in a hostile environment, and tolerance for life’s ambiguities.
Fascinating tales of survival of the fittest are followed by an equally interesting story of how Pi gains respect and control of an increasingly hungry and thirsty tiger.
In the course of the story, Richard Parker and Pi find an island populated with meerkats and flesh eating plants. They eventually escape the island, and–well, you have to read the story.
Pi is obviously rescued–after all, he is telling the story.
The Japanese government interviews Pi to determine what happened to the ship that was lost and how Pi survived 227 days on the high seas. Pi tells an incredible story. Naturally, the government officials disbelieve him.
Pi creates another less interesting story. This new story becomes the official record.
A listener is left to believe the unbelievable, in the “Life of Pi” story. Like Trump’s lie about a stolen election–Pi’s report is given by one person when there is no proof and no witnesses.
“Life of Pi” is a fun ticket to entertainment. Many are entranced by Trump for the same reason; however, governing is not about entertainment.
Jerry Z. Muller (Author, professor of history at the Catholic University of America)
Professor
Muller offers an interesting and insightful defense of capitalism. Jerry Muller’s “Thinking about Capitalism” is
an historical account of economic theory.
Muller explores three economic systems: 1) market, 2) command, and 3) mixed. In his journey through the history of economic systems, market (aka capitalism) shines brightest.
Muller notes that capitalism is pummeled by many anecdotes of history. Muller does not deny the excesses of market economies, but Muller suggests capitalism’s benefits far exceed its detriments.
There is nothing new in Joe Manchin’s self-interest in coal investment or representation of a state dependent on the coal industry. The question is whether he is representing his personal interest in wealth and re-election or the common good of the nation.
Adam Smith (1723-1790, Scottish economist)
Muller argues capitalism’s storied failures distort its multifaceted values. In the “Wealth of Nations”, a seminal work on capitalism, Adam Smith clearly explains the value of a capitalist (market) economic system based on self-interest. Muller notes Smith’s term “self-interest” is often misinterpreted by the public as greed.
Smith’s definition of self-interest is founded on virtue, i.e., behavior based on high moral values. However, Self-interest comes in many forms.
One person’s self-interest may be altruistic in helping others to feel better about themselves. Another person’s self-interest may be to increase personal wealth to improve their family’s standard of living. And, self-interest may be associated with greed. The fundamental point is that everyone’s self-interest is a motivation that is ungoverned by an outside force. Self-interest is a part of human nature.
In a broader sense, there is some truth in the economic cliché of “a rising tide lifts all boats”. It reflects Adam Smith’s belief in the “invisible hand” that guides one’s life in a market driven economy. Every individual strives for their own self-interest which offers charity to some, employment to others, and individuated incentive to all.
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
Thomas Hobbes notes that human nature is both good and bad. He tempers Smith’s argument for capitalism by suggesting government is necessary to mitigate self-interest that is harmful to the public.
Smith and Thomas Hobbes (author of “The Leviathan) believe self-interest is a universal human characteristic. Smith addresses self-interest as an enlightened Socratic understanding of virtue. Hobbes is less doctrinaire and implies Socratic virtue is not common in the general population.
Smith argues that capitalism takes the essence of human nature’s natural self-interest to advance civilization. This advance is not a smooth upward curve but an improving trend. Bad things do happen in a capitalist society. Hobbes might agree with Smith but only in the context of “rule of law” that mitigates non-virtuous self-interest.
Edmund Burke (1729-1797, Irish statesman)
Muller does not ignore critics of Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations”. Edmund Burke is a noted critic who argues that too many social conventions are sacrificed by disparate self-interests. He argues that the French revolution is a potential consequence of an economy driven by self-interest.
The social structure of France is decimated in the 1789 revolution. History shows “the terror” of the French revolution murdered innocents. On the other hand, it reformed an economy that left many behind. Prior to 1789, only the rich owned land, never went hungry, and inherited wealth. In the 18th century, France’s poor are mired in poverty, often hungry, with little chance for advancement.
Justus Möser (1720-1794, German social theorist)
Muller also cites criticism from Justus Möser , a contemporary of Burke, who believed the rise of capitalism (mercantilism) destroys craftsmanship in local economies. With trade from other parts of the country and world, Möser argues insular communities are harmed by prices of similar products replacing local artisan’s goods.
Möser argues mercantilism destroys the fabric of local communities; foments insecurity and social unrest. Muller, in part, agrees with Möser’s argument. However, Muller notes Möser’s argument is right and wrong.
With less money being spent for one thing, more money is available to buy or invest in other things. What Möser ignores is mercantilism’s benefit to consumers and the local economy. Consumers who buy a product for less money have more money to spend or invest in the local economy.
An amendment to criticism of Möser is that the consumers must have enough money to buy product being produced, whether in America or somewhere else.
Much of Möser’s argument is the same concern raised by those who support today’s trade war. Trump ignorantly pursues a trade war that weakens Adam Smith’s view of capitalist competition. America needs to adapt to a world economy that is increasingly intertwined.
Möser is right in suggesting free trade creates insecurity in local markets. It also demands adjustments in labor that harm local artisans, but Muller argues there is a net gain in public good and general welfare with free trade.
Max Weber (1864-1920, German sociologist, philosopher, and political economist)
Muller goes on to explain how a confluence of religion and capitalism benefits society with Max Weber’s melding of Protestant Ethic with the Spirit of Capitalism. Weber makes the idea of living aesthetically and putting aside savings as a prudent way of living life in an uncertain environment. Creating wealth became a religious calling to some.
Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950, Austrian political economist)
Muller reviews Joseph Schumpeter’s contribution to the theory of capitalism. As a 20th century Harvard Business School professor, Schumpeter lectures on the value of “the invisible hand”. Schumpeter advances the idea of “creative destruction” as a characteristic of capitalism.
Schumpeter outlines the value of entrepreneurs who pursue new ideas, new products, and innovation that replaces dying industries. He trumpets the growth of capitalism as an engine that perpetuates societal benefit. Some argue that today’s American governance discourages new ideas by dwelling on manufacturing at the expense of technological innovation and change.
Muller examines the other two economic systems, i.e., 2) command, and 3) mixed systems. Muller implies they fail to meet the historical successes of market capitalism. A command economic system is autocratic with primary economic decisions made by one ruling agency—like Mao’s communist party, Hitler’s Third Reich, and Stalin’s Great Turn.
Short term economic benefit of a command system economy hugely disrupts society. Economic improvement is evident in the short term, but momentum is lost as the gap between haves and have-nots grows.
In a command economy, the cult of personality takes over and image becomes more important than substance; i.e. who you know becomes more important than productivity.
Muller implies mixed economic systems are a work in progress. They are represented by leaders like President Xi in China, and President Putin in Russia.
Xi and Putin retain the concept of communist control of the economy but combine command economics with “Smithian” capitalist ideals. However, Putin takes a wrong turn by waging war on an independent country with its own mixed economy ambition.
China’s mixed economic policy began with Deng Xiaoping, but Xi expands its reach.
Both China and Russia have shown economic improvement in the late 20th and early 21st century. Xi’s “Road and Belt” plan is part of a command economy, but it relies on the capitalist market principle of influencing trade between nation-states. China’s long-term success remains to be seen. Whether it will be a more effective form of economic improvement than Adam Smith’s market-based formula is left to history.
Russia, like Xi, uses capitalist influence to grow its economy. Russia, in contrast to China, uses its natural resources (oil distribution), rather than a “Road and Belt” policy to expand its influence. Unfortunately, Putin chooses to waste Russia’s oil wealth on war.
Fundamentally, Muller infers no modern economic system is better than capitalism. One draws that inference by Muller’s cogent explanation of the value of capitalist self-interest. Because Adam Smith’s concept of self-interest is an inborn characteristic of human nature, it will prevail over any known economic system that requires command control.
America has been a successful capitalist country in great part because of checks and balances that mitigate command control qualities of mixed economies. Hobbes assessment of human nature demands some level of command control, even in a capitalist economy.
One might argue that America’s avoidance of near economic collapse in 2008 is evidence of the importance of a mixed economic theory. (Interestingly, a December 18, 2018 “…Economist” article, published under the Schumpeter byline, notes that China’s communist party’s mixed economic system during Trump’s trade war fared better than America’s government regulated free enterprise economy.)
American history shows lower taxes encourage higher production and job creation. What is missed by tax reduction is that it exacerbates income inequality. Tax reduction incentivizes corporate leaders to devalue worker wages to increase profitability. Human self-interest leads to higher income for corporate owners and executives. The consequence magnifies the wealth gap between have and have-nots.
One does not come away from Tim Weiner’s book knowing where the line is drawn between value and scorn for government intrusion in the lives of Americans. This seems particularly relevant today when veracity, political bias, and honesty of the FBI is being seriously questioned
J. Edgar Hoover (1895-1972. 1st Director of the FBI from 1924 to 1972).
“Enemies…” is about the rise of the F.B.I. and J. Edgar Hoover’s role in the growth of American domestic intelligence.
Weiner reports on questionable FBI tactics employed by Hoover. Hoover sets the table for violation of human rights with a power that defies the intent of the American Constitution.
Even though overt American legislation denies the right of the government to arbitrarily investigate private citizens, Hoover throws “habeas corpus” into the trash.
(Habeas corpus is a writ requiring a person under arrest to be brought before a judge or into court, especially to secure the person’s release unless lawful grounds are shown for his/her detention.)
Weiner shows Hoover to lie about wire-tapping and gathering information on private citizens without warrant or judicial review. This is the head of the FBI orchestrating the violation of American law. Hoover creates files that give the F.B.I. secret information about the personal sex lives of elected and government appointed bureaucrats and uses that information to influence elected officials and the American public.
Wiener suggests Hoover’s perception is that communism infiltrates all anarchist’ and most American government-opposition’ movements. Hoover crosses the line between free society and tyranny. He gathers information on individual citizens, union movements, civil rights, and accused domestic terrorists with an unshakable belief in his own perception of reality.
The historical facts of Weiner’s presentation gives context to the American communist beliefs of the 40s, 50’s, and 60’s. Hoover feeds the hysteria of his time.
A reader/listener is intellectually and emotionally torn by recounted beliefs held by some American and British citizens of Marxian communism. Some were willing to foment a social revolution by any means necessary.
Others were simply expressing a personal opinion among friends of the same opinion; not to foment revolution, but to explain what they believe denies equal protection, and/or equal rights in America.
Wiener shows that some actions by the FBI warranted investigation. He notes Klaus Fuchs who gave the Soviet Union secrets of the atomic and hydrogen bombs in the 50s, and the British agent, Kim Philby, who betrays American and British agents of the F.B.I., C.I.A. and British MI-5. (Agents were murdered because of Philby’s betrayal.)
The unfortunate consequence of Hoover’s domination of the F.B.I. is that it evolves into a vehicle of suppression, subject to the whims of one human being’s prejudices. This is particularly apparent in the rise and fall of McCarthyism.
America is a government of checks and balances and when any American agency abandons those criteria of governance, it compromises public freedom.
Every human being is flawed; every human being is subject to the good and bad qualities of human nature. When the F.B.I. or any government agency is dominated by one person, it fails the test of good government. That seems a justifiable critique of Hoover’s career in the FBI.
The American Constitution’s checks and balances are being used to address the FBI’s role in America.
One comes away from Weiner’s book to believe it is unfair to conflate the era of Hoover with the current administration of the FBI.
Serious questions are raised about the veracity, political bias and honesty of today’s FBI. There is the Clinton email investigation, the Trump collusion investigation, the firing of James Comey, and the Andrew McCabe and Peter Strzok dismissals.
“Enemies: A History of the FBI” is a relevant subject for the 21st century because of technology’s potential for exponentially invading personal privacy. Checks and balances through rule of law are a free society’s only protection against human nature’s fallibility.
Michael Horowitz (American Attorney, DOJ Inspector General who is tasked with reporting FBI political bias.)
Though Horowitz’s investigative report is not to everyone’s satisfaction, there is little evidence of FBI’ political bias. There is ample evidence of human nature’s fallibility, but it only reminds us of ourselves. Individual FBI careers have been tarnished but there is no institutional political bias.
Turing’s Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe
By
George Dyson
Narrated by Arthur Morey
George Dyson (American author, historian of technology.)
The beginning of one of many Faustian bargains between government and science is revealed in George Dyson’s book, “Turing’s Cathedral”. Dyson reveals the genius of Alan Turing and other contributors to the computer age.
Alan Turing (Mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, and theoretical biologist.)
John von Neumann (1903-1957) A Hungarian-American mathematician, physicist, computer scientist, and polymath, joins the American military/industrial complex before it became known as the “complex”.
Calculations for ordinance trajectory and explosive impact became increasingly important during WWII.
George Dyson’s book recounts the confluence of military might and computer invention. The military wants more accurate estimates of ordinance trajectory and damage to improve murder rate. Manual calculation was too slow and prone to error.
With government backing, von Neumann is midwife to the birth of the computer generation. Presuming von Neumann knew of Alan Turing’s 1936 paper on mathematical logic, he wrote a paper about a universal computing machine. Hired by the government to improve the accuracy of military ordinance, von Neumann works with Oswald Veblen at the Moore School of Engineering in Philadelphia. Von Neumann, and Veblen expand a math and engineering department that changes the world.
To the right is the Moore School of Engineering in Philadelphia–The fruit of the new department’s labor is a vacuum-tube, wire bound, contraption called ENIAC.
Before Eniac, human calculations could not efficiently or effectively determine the course of a flying howitzer shell, or the measured impact of a flying-fortress’ bomb. What the military needed was a better calculating tool than the single human brain.
John Mauchly (left) J. Presper Eckert (right)–Mauchly and Eckert were the inventors of the first universal computing machine at the Moore School of Engineering.
(There is a controversy over who created the architecture for this machine because von Neumann came to the Moore School of Engineering after Mauchly and Eckert had already begun work on ENIAC.)
Though this is an historical account of the invention and consequence of computer manufacture, listening to “Turing’s Cathedral” seduces one into seeing war and the military as a primary source of technological advance. Science is shown to advance from growth of the military/industrial complex and the destruction of war.
Rocket science grows from Hitler’s pummeling of London during WWII. Nuclear science grows from Truman’s bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Space exploration grows from a moon shot heavily subsidized by the Kennedy administration. In the foreseeable future, government’ satellite and cyber research grows from late twentieth century advances in software development.
What strikes one’s imagination is how critical government expenditure, particularly the military, is to R and D (research and development) in science.
Interestingly, the requested budget for R and D in 2019 is reduced to $131 billion.
(President Trump is intent on building a wall between Mexico and the U.S.; i.e. not unlike Hadrian’s wall, a first century method of defense. Not what one would call a technological advance.)
One wonders if the computer would ever have been invented without the advance of a horrendously destructive war. At the very least, war accelerated the invention of the computer generation.
The innate brilliance of Philadelphia’s Moore School mathematicians creates more efficient and effective methods of mass murder. One might argue that the Moore School opened a Pandora’s box. Turing’s, von Neumann’s, Mauchly’s, and Eckert’s theories and inventions open a door to artificial intelligence; i.e. an intelligence beyond human understanding that may improve or destroy humanity.
The first hydrogen bomb explodes in 1952. According to Dyson, one person is killed while monitoring the explosion. He is the first victim of the hydrogen bomb that is 50 times more destructive than the bombs that fell on Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
One wonders, without government, without the military, and sadly, without war, would humankind have reached into the universe in the 1960s?
This is an important book, somewhat difficult to track because of its non-linear presentation, but a valuable insight to a giant step in the history of science.
A monumental gap in George Dyson’s presentation of “Touring’s Cathedral” is the effect of the internet and its ability to disseminate information throughout the world with a click.
Instant communication changes the dynamics of society. The computer age and internet offer a platform to rally the best and worst of society.
One cannot help but be troubled by the source of mankind’s twentieth century leaps in scientific discovery. So many scientific advances seem closely tied to perfection and invention of potential weapons of mass destruction. Dyson inadvertently makes a case for war and the military’s efficacy as an engine of science.
“Turing’s Cathedral” opens a door to artificial intelligence, a two edged sword that can defend or destroy humanity. With the internet, the sword is sharpened.
Audio-book Review By Chet Yarbrough (Blog:awalkingdelight) Website: chetyarbrough.blog
Operation
Mincemeat By Ben Macintyre Narrated
by John Lee
Ben Macintyre (British historian, author, and columist for The Times newspaper)
“Operation Mincemeat” is an historical account of “The Man Who Never Was”. It is about the early days of the British Secret Service. It covers a specific operation to mislead the German Axis powers on the planned invasion of Italy in WWII.
Though this history is enlightening, Macintyre’s account makes the early British Secret Service look like an upper-class boy’s club. The master minds of early British Secret Service espionage, MI5, are pictured as aspiring novelists from privileged, wealthy English families playing a game of war.
The mission is to drop a dead body in the Mediterranean off the Spanish coast. The body is to carry false documents to mislead the Axis powers.
Ian Fleming (1908-1964, English author, former naval intelligence officer, creator of the James Bond series.
The idea came from a novel written in the 1930s. One of Mi5’s agents, Ian Fleming (author of the James Bond series) recalls the novel and suggests the idea to the “boys club” in 1939.
The details for execution of the plan are fascinating. The difficulty of acquiring a dead body, the creation of forged documents, the personal approval of Winston Churchill, and the bureaucratic arguments over minutiae before the plan could be executed beggar belief.
With all that preparation, it is surprising to hear of fundamental mistakes made on planted documents. The picture on the military ID to identify the dead body did not have the right hair line. One of the personal letters placed on the body incorrectly refers to a field commander as though he had knowledge of plans that he could not have had.
In spite of these mistakes, the plan works perfectly and saves hundreds, probably thousands of Allied personnel by convincing Germany to build their defensive forces in Greece rather than Italy where the Allied invasion actually occurs.
Ewen Montagu (1901-1985) There are stories of patriotism and hard work by the British Secret Service but they are diminished by characterization of the early agents. An office dalliance between the prime mover of the Mincemeat operation, agent Montagu, and an office secretary seems tawdry. The book concludes with Montagu’s battle over government declassification of the operation and his fight for publishing rights to the story of the deception.
The author’s characterization of the early days of the British Secret Service is not heroic in the sense one gets from deciphering the enigma code by the Turing team. There are pictures of real heroes in this history but they are soldiers in a real war.
Much of MI5’s depiction in “Operation Mincemeat” is of upper-class rich boys playing war in blacked out offices near Piccadilly; while soldiers and civilians are losing their lives in England and the mainland.
REVIEWS AND VIEWS OF LIFE 