dennis – Page 5 – Dennis C Merritt

Diversity & Contra

I can’t imagine a more open and accepting group of people than those in the contra dance community. At any contra dance there are young people and old, rich and poor, conservative and liberal, blue collar and white collar, all sorts of different people from different walks of life.

And almost all of Northern European descent. It’s rare to see anyone of African descent, or Latin American, or Asian, or even Southern European.

Is this a non-welcoming community then? Are we in contra not as open as we like to think?

I don’t think so. Even the Republicans in the contra community have a lot of ‘Snow Flake’ in them.

I think it’s the music. A music that resonates with our shared cultural roots. A music that speaks to us at a level deep below the diversity-loving part of us that yearns for a society that is fair and equitable for all.

We’d love to see all those other cultures at our dances. We’d love to interact with them, share a do-si-do down the line, a smile, eye contact, talk during the break, get to know and understand each other. But I just don’t think the music speaks to them like it does to us.

Them and us.

This is a problem in a country as culturally diverse as ours. It’s what we wrestle with, trying to establish the boundaries, the interconnections, the ways to preserve one culture while still being able to live and work in harmony with others.

E.B. White understood all of this in 1949. Here’s his essay on how all the myriad cultures in New York get along each day. And the dangers that lurked ahead.

Quotes from This is New York by E.B. White

The full essay, but definitely a book that should be bought as well.

Women Characters in Fiction

I read an article a while back, where a woman author was making the claim that a man couldn’t write a character who was a woman. This was similar to other comments I’d seen about writing characters of a particular race, or culture.

I didn’t think too much about it until I’d seen another thread where women authors were making fun of a young man who, to prove that a man can write a realistic woman, gave a sample of his writing about a woman and how and why she wriggled into her oh-so-tight jeans. Seems he wound up proving the opposite.

This led a man on the thread to challenge the women to describe themselves as a man might. The results were sometimes funny, sometimes sad.

The funny answers included bits like: “Her breasts entered the room before her…”. The sad ones didn’t write anything, instead noting that no man would include a woman like herself in a book.

I first took serious note of this idea while listening to an audio book of “The Girl on the Train” by Paula Hawkins. The story is told in first person through three different women characters.

I was surprised by the depth and complexity of those women. The nuances of the descriptions, the insights into the women’s thoughts and feelings, well, had I been writing it they would have never occurred to me. (Full disclosure — I’m a man.)

I’m not sure I can even describe it well, still being trapped in my male mindset, but it was the smooth co-existence of various thoughts and feelings that stuck out for me. For example, I could see myself writing a professional, competent woman character (I’ve known plenty to use as role models). Or I could see myself writing a flirtatious captivating woman character (I’ve known them as well).

But I would never think to meld the two ideas as seamlessly as Paula Hawkins did. In one scene, the main character is going to talk to the investigating detective at the police station, very serious, very focused on what she wants to accomplish, and as she’s walking through the offices, notes the men that have taken notice of her looks, the one she cultivated with her choice of clothing.

The flirtatious and the serious both there, intertwined, yet without either affecting the other. Like two different threads going on in her mind at the same time. It would have never occurred to me to capture the complexity of her mind like that. And it was jarring, for me, to read it.

After listening to the audio book (on a long road trip) I was curious if the movie captured those nuances. It didn’t.

Maybe it’s simply too hard to portray psychological insights in film? Or maybe it’s that, despite a woman-authored screenplay, the male directors thought it better to focus on the action of the plot.

And what about the men in the book? Well they are shallow, almost caricatures of men. I was a bit offended, we’re not like that.

Most recently, I’ve been enjoying the TV series, “Scott & Bailey.” The primary characters are women detectives, and the show was written by women. And directed.

Just as in “The Girl on the Train,” the complexity and depth of the lead women make this show stand out.

The main characters are talented, focused, professional women detectives. But they are also women with relationships, and ups and downs with mates and lovers and children and parents. Yet the two are intertwined in a way that I just don’t think a man would write.

It’s popular today to have male detectives that have home issues to deal with as well. But the two are more cleanly separated. The detective is fighting the bad guy, then worrying about his kid, then solving, then worrying. Neither gets in the way of the other, it’s like two separate stories, until the bad guys kidnap his kid.

Not so with the women of Scott and Bailey, who have a fascinating blend of strength and weakness, of being vulnerable and fully in charge, of being professional and flirtatious, all seamlessly, realistically intertwined.

Scott and Bailey get the bad guys using their analytical intelligence, figuring out exactly what went on in the crimes and who was lying about what. They often solve the case through their ability to use psychological insights to get suspects to crack under interrogation.

Contrast this to man-oriented detectives who often have to have physical combat with the bad guys, and run around with guns blazing, and, even in interview rooms, have to deal with people jumping over tables and trying to fight.

I’ve often had what is probably an unpopular idea, and that is that men and women are equally matched gladiators in the battle of sexes, but where each is given different weapons.

Men are armed with fists that do physical harm, and women are armed with psychological insights that do emotional harm.

Scott and Bailey use their weapons as effectively as Dirty Harry uses his gun.

And the men in Scott and Bailey? They’re all shallowly drawn caricatures of men. Their cluelessness enters the room before them.

Seeing the reality of the Scott & Bailey characters gives a different insight into other detective/thriller type movies with strong women characters written by men.

Those women are to be admired because of their no-nonsense self-confidence, their easy banter with their colleagues, their courage and coolness under fire, and, often most important of all, their martial arts ability.

And when they do discuss their feelings, it might be like this dialog I recently heard — He asked, “do you know what it’s like to have someone you care for die?” “Yes, “ she said stoically, “I had a comrade die in battle.”

In other words, they’re just male characters being acted out by women. And not just any women, but beautiful young women.

I suspect this difficulty of creating characters of the opposite gender is part of a larger issue. No author can create a realistic character that doesn’t resonate with his or her gut. But maybe this isn’t really a problem.

What an author can do is accurately portray his or her impressions of, a woman, a man, a black, a Muslim, a Southerner, a… And for those readers with a similar world view, the author’s work will be entertaining.

I just wish someone would get computer geeks right for a change.

Horror, Nazis, Fragrance

I remember reading a while back a fictionalized account of some Austrian town during the Nazi occupation. It was based on real events.

The main character was a young boy who had watched his parents get murdered in the street. There was a secret group of Jewish leaders in the town who did their best to survive, to make sure, in this case, the boy survived in the face of the horror of that genocidal occupation.

The story expressed that horror as best words could.

Shortly thereafter I was reading an article in a paper about an issue in a wealthy suburb of Boston. It turns out there were people who attended town meetings wearing too much fragranace, and that offended others.

The anger, the vitriol, the expressions of horror at this were every bit as strong as the expressions of horror in that Austrian village. The outrage, the call to arms, the fight, the struggle to get a town meeting where fragrances were banned…

Will Shortz, the NY Times puzzle geek, recently published a puzzle with a clue about a baseball being thrown at the head, and the answer was beaner, a variation of bean ball. Turns out he didn’t know beaner was a derogatory word for Hispanics.

Social media exploded with vitriol, the anger, the downright hatred aimed at this man for including that answer. How it symbolized everything that was wrong in this racist society, how intolerable it was that people like him did the things that they did.

It was no different from the horror and anger I remember reading about after the torture and murder of the young Emmett Till.

First Man – An Extra’s Story

I’d always said I wanted to be an extra in a movie, to be able to say at so many minutes into such and such a movie that was me walking across the street. Last February I finally had my chance.

First Man, about Neil Armstrong’s trip to the moon, was shooting a scene at the Kennedy Space Center, near our home in Florida. They were looking for men to be boring old geeky white guy NASA executives. I could do that!

I was amazed by the amount of energy and attention to detail that went into what I’m sure will only be a few seconds of the final movie. They were shooting the scene where the astronauts were leaving the space center for a shuttle van to take them to the rocket. Here’s a photo from the actual 1969 event that they were using in setting the scene.

By a stroke of good luck, my friend Theresa worked at the Space Center and got some pictures from the offices across the way. Here’s what the scene in the movie looked like.

We must have shot the scene 20 or 30 times. It took most of a day. That poor guy playing the kneeling photographer on the right, he kept trying to get a more comfortable position and they kept telling him, no, look at the picture, you need to be kneeling, with your arm up like so.

Where am I? Well you can’t see me in the picture above, and there’s a good chance only my right arm will get in the movie because the main camera was set up on the left (looking at the picture). In the historic photo I’m the guy in the suit up on the ramp to the astronaut’s right and I walk down the ramp following them. Here’s one of Theresa’s shots that shows me waiting between takes.

The other extra people are NASA techs, security people, and a gaggle of photographers.

We spent time a few days earlier getting dressed for our roles. I didn’t find out until afterwards that the person doing our costumes, Mary Zophres, the one who fitted me for my suit, had been nominated for an academy award for her work on La La Land. She clearly enjoyed her work, taking pride in the period authenticity she brought to movies. I came out with a greater appreciation for that aspect of movies and now finding myself enjoying the scenes and costumes in movies I watch, even if the story line is dumb.

They insisted we wear suspenders. Why? Nobody today is willing to hitch their pants up to the height they were worn then, so we had suspenders, under the jacket, to hold our trousers to the correct period height.

I had hoped to be the exec in the primo position by a post on the right of the picture, and I was, for a little bit. But James Hansen, the author of the book on which the film is based, wanted a cameo in the film and took my spot. So, before I wound up on the ramp, they moved me to behind him, which was interesting because I got to talk to him for a while.

He made the observation that we didn’t have the technology to fake a moon landing back in 1969, but we do now. He said the images in the movie are amazing, and were mostly shot with physical models, rather than computer graphics, in Atlanta.

Well look for my right arm in that scene when you see the movie. Although… if they use some of the footage they shot from behind as the astronauts were leaving the building I’ll be very visible.

In summary, it was a very long boring day, but I’m glad to have had the chance. It was especially fun for me because in 1969 I was actually working on Apollo. (I was doing computer support for the backup navigation system, which, maybe interestingly to some, was an optical sextant.)

For those who don’t know the history, here, from America’s most reliable news source, is the headlines from the day.

Here’s James Hanson’s book that inspired the movie:

First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong

White Privilege & Property Taxes

The action item on most of what I read about white privilege is to “be aware.” OK. But then what?

The institution that most effectively continues to support white privilege is our public school system and the way it is funded. By property taxes.

This has two effects. One, it means people pick where they live based on the school district, thus creating de facto segregation by economic class. Two, it means kids in the poorer neighborhoods get inferior education.

Here’s my story. Back around 1969 my wife, son and I moved to a racially mixed, working class neighborhood around Boston. Our son was in a nursery school where he was one of only two white kids.

We were happy with the schools, with the staff, we were happy with our neighbors, we were happy with our neighborhood.

Then it came time for him to enroll in the public school. We learned it had the highest rate of heroin addition in the state. In the sixth grade. Sixth grade. Heroin.

And thus we became part of white flight. Moved to a white suburb we didn’t particularly fit in with. But it had good schools.

Had schools been funded on the state level instead…

Schwarzenegger & Pumping Iron

We watched The Long Goodbye (1973) last night, in which Arnold Schwarzenegger was in one short scene where he took his shirt off. Amazing. It reminded me of one of my favorite movie viewings, seeing Pumping Iron at a pre-release showing in Boston.

When Pumping Iron (1977), a pseudo documentary on body building starring Schwarzenegger and Ferrigno, came out the sport was still relatively misunderstood and looked down upon. (Note the physiques of the male heroes back then compared to now.)

The producers decided to market the film as an art film (it is, after all, about sculpting the human body), and did advanced publicity to both artists and body builders in various markets. A friend of ours, who was an artist, got tickets for the pre-opening night showing of the film in Boston.

About five or six of us, sort of artsy kind of people, were sitting in a row. Behind us were seated a number of guys with no necks, some of whom had trouble fitting into movie seats.

The movie opened with one man standing on an empty stage. His body was oiled and he was wearing a posing suit, but he looked pretty much like an ordinary guy, nothing really special.

Then the music started. Thus Spake Zarathustra. The music builds and builds and finally hits that awesome crescendo – tah DAH!

At that moment the guy on stage in the movie flexed every muscle in his body and BAM! every tendon and vein popped out. UGH! those of us in the artsy row reeled back in disgust.

At the same time, the guys behind us started hooting and hollering, ALL RIGHT!!!

From there the movie was fascinating, providing all sorts of insights into the sport. Like Schwarzenegger could add another inch to his bicep easy, but he’d have to also add an inch to two other muscles along his arm and shoulder, which I’m not sure I even have, in order to maintain the symmetry required to be at the top of the game.

What made the movie especially enjoyable was Schwarzenegger’s personality. There was a captivating edginess about him, a sense of humor, and a bit of a mean streak. Like the left handed complements he gave to his competitors, sowing doubt, and the young German body builder who asked him for hints and was told that the latest trend was to make low pitched grunts when posing low, and high pitched squeaks when posing high.

Armed with this gem, the young German did just that in a competition.

Schwarzenegger is also shown smoking dope at one point in the film, as I said, a likable sort of character.

Here’s the sad news. Seeing that movie with the artists and body builders was one of the memorable movie experiences of my life. Years later I was telling some people about it and of course had to find a place to rent and play it. In anticipation I waited for that opening scene to see the reaction of the people I was with.

It opened with shots of Schwarzenegger working out in Gold’s Gym. Wait a second… That’s not right, it wasn’t Schwarzenegger and the guy was on stage with Stauss setting the scene…

So I researched it, and it turns out that as Schwarzenegger’s political aspirations were growing he bought the rights to the film, edited it so it started with him instead of that other guy, and took out all those edgy bits and the dope smoking. Sigh.

–Dennis

Kavanaugh, EPA, Authoritarian Presidents

I was reading about the devastating effect Supreme Court nominee Kavanaugh could have on the environment. He is against the EPA policies enacted to fight global warming under the Obama administration. At first glance this seems bad to an environmentalist like myself, but when I read his reasoning I understood that he was exposing the whole problem with American politics today. This one example illustrates exactly why we are moving towards an authoritarian state.

Kavanaugh’s reasoning was that the EPA had over stepped it’s bounds, and that the courts shouldn’t approve, or disapprove, the EPA’s decisions without any guidance from Congress.

First, review how it’s supposed to work. Congress makes the laws of the land, the President enforces those laws (does not make them), and the Court decides whether the laws fit within the Constitution and legal framework of our country.

So Obama got elected (he promised change from business-as-usual politics) and part of his charter was to fight global warming. He went to Congress asking for laws to help slow down carbon emissions. But Congress wouldn’t do it. So what was he to do?

He used his power to go to the EPA, which reports to him, and asked them to put in place policies to reduce carbon emissions, which they did.

Well this made him a hero to all the environmentalists who were happy to have a strong executive willing to make things happen, bypassing our dysfunctional Congress.

It also made him the enemy of those whose livelihoods depended on oil and gas.

The strength of Obama as President made him the hero of the left, but the fact that he could use his power like that made the right hate him. They felt had, that Obama had bypassed the normal political process to ram environmental regulations down corporate throats. So they gave a lot of money to the next campaign.

Trump got elected (he promised change from business-as-usual politics) and part of what he promised was to stimulate economic growth by loosening the environmental constraints on oil and gas companies. (It is too easy to slam this as all corporate greed. What is often not pointed out is that a large number of normal people are employed by the oil and gas companies, and many others indirectly benefit, such as truck drivers, the people working at the corner gas station and Northerners heating their homes in winter.)

He wanted Congress to act. But guess what? They didn’t.

So he used his power to go to the EPA, which reports to him, and asked them to abandon regulations on emissions and open up more public lands for drilling.

This made him a hero to all the leaders and followers of corporate America. And an enemy of anyone who cares about the climate and the planet we live on.

So again, authoritarian moves by the President are loved by all those who agree with his/her agenda, who are glad to see the circumvention of Congress to get something done, and hated by those who see an authoritarian figure bypassing the proper legislative channels.

So is it legal for the president to use his/her power like that? Well that’s often sent up to the Supreme Court to decide. And the politics of the issue, such as EPA climate change regulations, often overshadows the general legality which is really all the Court should be considering. If the courts don’t support the EPA actions, does that mean the courts don’t support the issue, be it emission controls or expanded drilling? Or that they don’t support the way the issue was handled?

You can expect the Supreme Court nominee to be grilled on opinions on climate change, when in reality, that should never be what’s on the Court’s mind. That’s not their job. Whether regulations were done within the framework of our Constitution is what the Court should be concerned with.

The only reason it’s not is because Congress doesn’t do its job. If Congress passed laws regarding global warming and oil and gas exploration, then the President wouldn’t have to go around Congress, and the Supreme Court wouldn’t have to decide on the most contentious issues of the day.

If Congress did its job, senators and representatives from different states, with different priorities would work together to come up with legislation that balanced the needs for environmental protection with the need for corporate growth.

If Congress would do it’s job, the people wouldn’t be so frustrated with the government, and wouldn’t elect presidents who they expect to act in authoritarian ways to get things done.

If Congress was doing it’s job, the political fights would all be at the state and local level as people elected those to represent them in Congress. There wouldn’t be one winner-take-all battle for the presidency.

But Congress isn’t, and the populace is going to keep leaning towards more and more authoritarian leaders. And you can be sure, those leaders are going to do everything in their power to solidify their hold on government, like make sure they get Supreme Court justices that won’t overturn their actions.

Black Panther & Obama

In my lifetime I’ve seen the polite word for people of African descent go from “colored” to “negro” to “black” to “African American.”

I have a real problem with the last one. There is culturally a huge difference between an individual whose ancestors were brought over in slave ships 200 years ago, and someone who has recently entered the country from Africa.

The descendents of slaves, the people we commonly refer to as blacks, have grown up with all of the history of racism in this country, with what their parents lived through, and their grandparents, and… They will have a cultural attitude that reflects that background. And that attitude will include an edginess about racial relations brought on by that history, as well as the current climate in the country.

By contrast, someone who grew up in Africa, or is a second generation immigrant, does not have that family history. Does not have that edginess. Such a person comes to this country with the same optimism as any immigrant group–Irish, Italian, Hispanic, Asian…

Such a person has grown up in a country where, as Richard Pryor once described, the drunk is black, the shopkeeper is black, the policeman is black, the crook is black, the judge is black, the mayor is black…

I have known a few Africans in my life, and there is nothing about their attitude, their composure, their view of life that fits into a stereotypical view of American Blacks. There has been a freshness to them, a sereneness, a can-do attitude. They have that optimistic America-is-a-land-of-opportunity attitude that immigrants often have.

It’s said Obama was our first black president. I don’t think that’s quite accurate. He is of Kenyan descent, a second generation immigrant. He didn’t exhibit any of the edginess that exists between American Blacks and Whites. He was able to look at issues of racism from a more detached, intellectual place. A more innocent and idealistic, less threatening place.

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe using the term African American to unify the image of American Blacks with their ancestors is brilliant, and the best way to get both Blacks and Whites in this country to finally let our racial history slip into the past.

African Life & Technology

I’m from America. Over the last year or so I’ve been discussing technological innovation in Africa with Abel Viageiro of Mozambique. (Read his blog at www.abelviageiro.com.)

Key to these discussions is an understanding of what is different, and what is the same between situations in Africa and in the Western world. Understanding that is critical for understanding which technologies might work, and which won’t.

This short exchange with Abel introduces some of the fundamental differences between African society and ours that affect the impact of various technologies.

After reading an article in National Geographic, I asked this of Abel:

“I have such difficulties with understanding Africa. There’s a picture in the latest National Geographic of “subsistance fishermen” on the shores of Lake Tankanyika. The article talks of the poverty, but yet, the people look well fed, and have decent clothing. Not like pictures of people living through a famine. Are they desperate people? Or happy? Are their basic needs met? Do they really need all the stuff of modern life? It’s hard to get a grasp from here, I’m guessing it’s different in different places, and different for different individuals.”

Abel, who often explains the relationship between African reality and technical possibilities made these comments:

Quite interesting…

Subsistance Fishermen

The “subsistance fishermen” do have income …. they are productive people … when you do have income in Africa ….you have more probability of finding a partner and supporting a larger family, which can provide support in old age – in rural or impoverished settings

Income doesn’t come just from “regular job as you know it from the western world” — some have “assets, land, cattle, remittances – which set them apart from their peers —

For “subsistance fishermen” – some have boats, others work for those who own the fishing boat – at the end of the day they have a “some income” – on a day-to-day basis, irregular or erratic – but it is some kind of income that makes a difference in their lives.

Desperate People? Happy?

Desperate, No. it is hard life, but it is human nature – to feel “like worth doing something” to contribute to society — fishing for them – is a way to bring protein, food, fish to their community – they probably feel proud and respected – for they feel their community depends on their hard work, effort and sacrifice at sea …

Happy? It depends – happiness is relative — and momentaneous. The gap between one’s reference point and one’s perceived reality determines happiness

Basic Needs

Are their basic needs met? => Well, that is where the challenge is …

They can go to sea, work hard, make some money — (actually little money a day) — but their basic needs can not be met effectively because “the Government and Western donors and system have set the rules of the game.”

To the greatest extent, all services are based on Western models. This includes water services, sanitation services, energy services, health services, and transportation services.

Where This Fails

The “subsistance fishermen,” for example, don’t have monthly salaries. They earn on a day-to-day basis – and yet billing for water services is based on the Western “monthly, quarterly, early bill pay” system.

Worse, even if they set aside the money to pay the bill – Government controlled or delegated management by companies belonging to elite or westerners – multi-national companies – fail to even deliver high quality water services to the poor, both rural and urban.

Why? Because they try to run a large water supply and distribution network – in the same manner like back 150 years ago.

Accessories are still produced the old way – not leveraging on 3D printing, for example …..

There is no online monitoring, intelligent monitoring & control, quality testing, hydraulic models, information systems…

Western Mentality

Saying that these advanced technologies are needed is often criticized with the statement it is necessary to “walk before you run.”

I disagree, and see an opportunity for massive technological leapfrogging.

To pretend you can just lay pipes in the ground, connect a pump and fittings, and connect clients at service connections points – and there you have the water grids extended to serve the “subsistance fishermen” community simply doesn’t work.

This is what is being done and the result is ….no effective supply and demand management — and payments not appropriate for the “subsistance fishermen” community.

They would be better served by “shorter billing cycles and smaller payments towards bill – and water running all day – “a remote controled, connect valves- with sensor based metering or “sensor data fusion or smart metering” – would do the job for – consumer monitoring usage and payments – saving water, etc

Stuff

What stuff you mean?

TV – Yes they probably need – after all that a way you can get informed, and source of life long learning these days —

Radio – yes, they probably need – that is way to get informed in local languages – radio is cheaper

An electric kettle THAT can help heat their water faster. Yes, they need that one too — they can use wood or charcoal – smoky

A third of all premature deaths were the result of using smoky fuels such as wood and coal for heating homes or cooking and using dirty diesel generators for electricity, all well-known hazards.

The WHO ranks the problem as one of the worst health risks facing the poor. In low-income countries, such as those in Africa and Asia, indoor smoke from cooking has become the sixth biggest killer. Between now and 2020, the adoption of new, low-emission advanced biomass stove technologies, or a mix of clean fuel and biomass stoves, could avert 600,000 child pneumonia deaths in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, said the WHO

“Just hard to get a grasp from here, I’m guessing it’s different in different places, and different for different individuals.”

It’s simple. To say “walk before one runs” is to say Africa should aspire to be where America was, say 100 years ago.

Time has changed, globalization is a reality – there is no point in claiming that “Africa is better off living the way the American or European rich people lived back 100 years ago…

No running water, no toilet that uses water for flushing (off-side sanitation or clean toilets)

America as it was 100 years ago, when technology was meager, financial ruin was one downturn away, war was ongoing in Europe, and the choices that Americans have come to expect—in their cars, clothes, food, and homes—were preceded by a monotonous consumer economy. In 1915, Americans walked everywhere (or took a streetcar, if they lived in cities), lived in three-generation homes that they rarely owned, ate almost as much lard as chicken, and spent Friday nights dancing to player pianos. In short: Everything was worse, except for the commute.

I would ask the same question for America 100 years ago: Were they desperate people? Or happy? were their basic needs met? Did they really need all the stuff of modern life?

Africa Today

What happens is that the riches of natural resources of Africa, capitalism, multi-national, NGOs, have pushed a lot of Africans into the sitution of “elderly Americans 100 years ago” – at adult age or very young age

For the elderly in America 100 years ago: For those who did make it to old age (something of a feat back then), Social Security didn’t exist, and in bad times, poverty among the old was so bad that contemporaries wrote of growing old as if it were a dystopia—the “haunting fear in the winter of life.” In 1938 a writer with the American Association for Old-Age Security said “our modern system of industrial production has rendered our lives insecure to the point of despair.” The industrializing economy was no country for old men or women. As families moved off farms into cities and suburbs, it became harder for some old people to find work in factories, which ran on limber sinews and sweat.

A Better Approach

==> To change that scenario for Africa “massive technological leapfrogging and technological empowerment has to happen”

Digitization of key sectors: Water, Sanitation, health, energy, agriculture, transportation & logistics, m-commerce ….

But few understand what I am thriving for, except you ..that helped me visualize http://www.abelviageiro.com/intelligent-water-for-developing-countries /

Hope I have shed some light on my perpective – though biased to my own stubborness – on “high tech, hybrid AI SYNDROME” AND DREAMING MENTALITY…

But I SEE no viable future without “massive technological leapfrogging” to solve the basic biggest problems!

Democrats Better?

Let me say up front that I despise everything about the way Trump is running his presidency, and most vehemently how he divides the country. Even more than him, though, is the contempt I have for the Republicans in Congress who back him up.

But was it better when the Democrats had the White House and Congress?

Let’s look at the signature legislation, the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Obama said he was in favor of nationalized health care for all.

Congress said, that’s not the way we roll.

Here’s the main issue, if you want to subsidize health care for some portion of the population, then some other portion of the population has to bear the cost. This is a very reasonable issue to debate, who benefits, and who pays.

One way is to fairly distribute the costs over everybody, like with Social Security, or Medicare. A tax pays for health care for all. But that’s not what they did.

The cost falls on companies, most painful for the small ones, and self-employed healthy individuals, mostly in the building trades maybe? Just think about that for a second. Who are those people? Well, most likely they’re Republicans. Great! Get Republicans to pay for it!

Who benefits? Low income people without jobs that cover them. Who are those people? Well betcha that’s mostly Democrats. Yay!

So instead of national health, that’s what they did. And guess what. The people paying for it were bullshit. It totally divided the country. And the corporations brought all their money to bear to fight it. And recruited all the angry young men who were suddenly asked to subsidize health care. And we got Trump. And a Republican Congress.

I’d really love to see some way to break up our two party system, or, maybe more practically, get enough people behind Bernie’s agenda, which is to forget the Democrat vs. Republican thing, go Independent, and campaign on two issues — universal health care and free college education. Issues that would benefit people on all sides of the political spectrum.