Occupation of Independence

Just think of all the chaos in North Africa. It used to be a part of the Roman Empire. It was the home of St. Augustine, essentially the founder of medieval Christendom. Perhaps il Mar Mediterraneo is not as wide as we think. Libyan jets have defected to the island of Malta, just a short flight away. That is one of the places I would love to travel to; what a fascinating history they have had. Peruse the article in Wikipedia on that chain of islands and you will be reminded of how close ancient Carthage was to Sicily, Italy, and Europe. What if Hannibal had finally beaten Rome? Would the Christian/Islam split even exist today? By the way there is an excellent movie, starring Anthony Quinn, called Lion of the Desert . It was the story of Omar Mukhtar, the Libyan hero who fought Italian imperialists before and after Mussolini. These days, they say that there are more (active and used) mosques in Europe than cathedrals or churches. The numbers of Muslims in Europe is astonishing. I ha

This weekend the violence has increased against protesters in Middle Eastern countries. On the internet we can watch American "allies" murder their own people. Is it starting to sink in, with Americans in particular, what a sham these Arab protesters are making of our own self-flattering mythology? The Arab protesters have no weapons. They are just waving flags or sometimes throwing rocks. Throwing rocks. The goons and mercenaries firing back at them have all the high-tech gadgets, shields, helmets, and organization. The Arab protesters might have a metal bucket on their head, if they are lucky. When the Americans had their own successful war of secession from the United Kingdom, most Americans had muskets that were basically the same as what King George's troops had. We lacked the pretty red coats. But the technological mismatch wasn't that great. The French no doubt look back at their Revolution as full of heroes, at least initially. What did it take to start a

Oh no! Is it going to be the 1970s all over again? Every time I go to the store I see rising prices.  The inflationists have been predicting this for a couple years now. But the deflationists have counter-argued that an economy-wide wage-price spiral can't get going like in the 1970s because unions are too weak, too many of our goods come from China, and the housing industry is too weak. The lessons of the 1970s have been forgotten, I fear. The American people are too sheep-like to protest rising inflation. They'll meekly submit, or be fooled by packaging gimmicks or phony statistics from the government. They'll simply have less to spend on many things, since a bigger fraction of their stagnant incomes is gobbled up by gasoline, home heating and cooling, food, medical care, college, and perhaps state income taxes in states like Illinois. The result will be stagflation. Not only have oldsters forgotten the lessons of the 1970s, but an entire generation has grown up that h

Since I was falsely accused of misogyny the other day, I have gone looking for allies to prove my innocence. At first I thought of Schopenhauer or Nietzsche. Too intellectual perhaps. How about Professor Henry Higgins of My Fair Lady ? Hmm...maybe not. Wait a minute, I've got it: look up the biography of legendary movie director, Joseph Mankiewicz, ( The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, All About Eve , etc.) on imdb dotcom or Wikipedia. Nobody ever accused him of being a misogynist, that's for sure. In the justly honored All About Eve , Anne Baxter (who was Frank Lloyd Wright's granddaughter) played a pretty and young stage-actress-wannabee who "showed up on the doorstep" of Betty Davis, who played a famous, but aging, actress on the New York stage. Eve started off humbly, but quickly, to displace Betty Davis. Eve used manipulation and cunning to trick everybody into helping her in her ambition. Naturally, the other women in the movie were first to catch on to Eve's tr