News, Politics
27
Jul 08

Doomsday cookout

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Doomsday cookout

He’s no wacko. This friend of a friend is rational, educated, and well read. Personable, too. Yet his vision of the world’s immediate future, though short of apocalyptic, is bleak.

We’ve met several times in small social settings. At the first I learned he was an avid proponent of the Peak Oil school of thought and liberally shared his views: the world is beginning to run out and we’ll soon see the effects, not just in soaring fuel prices but food shortages and, eventually, economic collapse. He spoke not grimly but with the determination of someone certain of the road ahead. That was three years ago.

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Atticus, News, Outrages, Suzame
19
Jun 08

Iraq: What have we done?

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Unlike past wars, the Iraq war is an abstraction. We rarely glimpse the unspeakable suffering. Most of the media have lost interest. Some stalwarts remain, chronicling events beyond our comprehension. As much as I hate this war, I’ve never let what happens there penetrate my comfortable life here. Until now.

Reality intruded last night when Suzame, my wife, showed me this photograph:

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News
03
May 08

Rippling over time

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News flash: A Civil War cannonball kills a relic collector 140 years after it was fired near Richmond, Virginia.

Analysis: Wars don’t end when peace is declared; the weapons fight on.

Would the soldier who lit the cannon’s fuse done so had he recognized the potential consequences rippling out over Time . . . consequences (collector’s son fatherless, wife widowed) that have triggered yet more ripples with effects unknown?

Votes cast in elections create ripples, too.