monuments to failure

Today, the world's largest building -828 meters- opened in Dubai. It is supposed to be a bold statement and a testament to the achievement of Dubai, a small nation that many think is showing the way to the future. (It surely is but not the future these people envision)

Visitors to Dubai will tell you how advanced and futuristic the country looks. They will tell how America has lost its edge and how all the new gadgets -if gadgets are not a sign of progress what is?- are in Dubai. Some friends have urged me to visit Dubai to get a glimpse of what is to come.

Face it skeptics around the globe, isn't Dubai's latest phallic symbol the ultimate proof of success? And isn't it a great way to forget all about that nasty little default?

When Jared Diamond argues how the people on Easter island kept on hewing statues in the face of habitat destruction, some of us would tend to wonder. Are people really that stupid? Would they really go on with their silly quests when everything around them is falling apart? Would they not stop and try to fix the problems instead? The short answer is no.

It is customary in the West to look upon civilizations through the lens of buildings and monuments. The great civilizations of the past are those that have left behind stone or steel ornaments. The more imposing the monument, the more advanced the society, is our mantra. So it is good to see when history in the making highlights the fallacy of that argument. Monuments are better seen as illustrations of failure. Sorry Parthenon!

It has been argued before that collapse nearly always comes at the pinnacle of success. And there are a a couple of reasons why this counter-intuitive idea is so plausible. First, there is the inherent lag time. The tower in Dubai was started when all was going great. It continued to grow while Dubai was falling apart. It had already been set in motion. Much like the continued housing construction in 2008-9 when the bubble burst. These projects were already financed and what were builders to do but to keep going?

Second, collapses are abrupt events that happen when human societies -which have even larger lag times due to the life expectancy of individuals- overextend themselves. This is far more likely to happen when populations are near a max. At the max, consumption and waste is near its peak too. Dubai is a fake economy built on oil. When oil runs out, so will Dubai. It is an inhospitable place made to look good by energy. Like a patient on a respirator. When you pull the plug it is over.

Third, when primates are idle -and I say primates because the following applies to monkeys and apes too- the arts flourish. Zoos have shown that bored apes start painting when given the opportunity. When people are idle they find something to do. And what is there to do other than build and decorate useless and imposing structures? Leave a legacy.

more ocean trash

It seems quite a few people misunderstood my posting about ocean trash. My concern is not so much with the trash being in the ocean, as opposed to say it being in "its proper place," whatever that might be -the landfill?- My qualm is with the trash itself. Its very existence.

I do agree that it is nicer to live in a community where people put their trash in trash cans and where they don't leave stuff lying around. However that is not my worry with ocean trash. To be quite blunt, the trash in the ocean does not bother me directly. I never see it and I never run across it.

What is worrisome is that we produce so much trash, not where we put it. That is what makes our lifestyle unsustainable. And that is what we need to change if we are going to survive on this planet.

What is deeply worrying is the fact that we produce and throw away perfectly good stuff at alarming rates. The fact that we seem to need a new car every three to five years -and why you could ask? What makes those new cars any better than the car we have? And why do we need a 400 hp car to drive 55 mph -and 25 mph during rush hour?

It is these old cars and other stuff that end up in the oceans.

Like the computer that we need to replace every two years, or a new cellphone that we can'd do without, or a new TV, or new kitchen appliances, or what have you. The fact that our society makes it so that we are forced to throw out good items and buy the latest gadget. In the case of computing that is a direct statement, the older machines simply won't work with today's software, even though today's software is only very marginally more capable (and often less useful) than yesterday's version. In other cases, the "must have" is more indirect and we are told we "need" to buy the latest gadget lest we be seen as failures by our peers.

Those "must have" gadgets have become so unappealing and so uninspiring because the designers can't possibly think any more significant changes to make. Yet Madison Avenue knows how to package them so we feel we can't possibly do without them. Call it peer pressure.

Designers vary the color, or the "style" or some other unimportant but very visible attribute on a regular basis. The technical term for these unnecessary changes is fashion. Fashion has high visibility so your neighbors will know if you refuse to play along. They will know that you are "falling behind," and are no longer "in their league." They will know when to shun you and treat you like the outcast that you are.

limbaugh logic

I saw the infamous Rush on CSPAN the other day. His speech to Republican faithful. In it he said, no whining. He is a real man. He doesn't whine and he doesn't think his followers should either. Maybe they use opioids for the pain?

In any case, not too long after his famous no whining statement, which he repeated several times for emphasis, he explained what he really wanted and why he had said he wanted Obama to fail. Why? Simple, because he wanted America back. He wanted to have the America that he grew up in, back. 

Mommy! I want my America back! I want things to go back to the way they were! I want to be a baby again and have you take care of me!

How's that for not whining?

afraid to face the music

I heard another economist talk on KQED last night. This one was from Harvard -I forget his name, not that it really matters in the scheme of things. 

Once again the story was the same: the administration is not doing enough to mitigate the crisis. It is afraid to "grab the bull by the horns." The monster bailout is too little, too late. And then there was more talk about "toxic assets" and possible bank failures. It appears nobody wants to admit these toxic assets are not toxic as in, "of questionable value," they are simply worthless. Totally and completely worthless. There are no "toxic" assets because there are no assets to begin with.

Anyone who talks about selling toxic assets or setting up a clearinghouse to sell toxic assets is yet another scam artist trying to fool the public into buying worthless paper. No wonder savvy investors are not interested in the Geitner plan. They've learned their lessons.

Unless and until we face these facts, the crisis will not get resolved. Not only that, the longer we wait, the more serious the problem will become and the more damage will ensue. It is one pill the Obama administration does not want to swallow. It is one danger they are not prepared to tackle. 

The reality is that all of the nation's major banks are de facto bankrupt and will have to go through bankruptcy procedures of some sort to be salvaged. Since everyone seems to agree that we need those banks, we cannot simply let them go out of business. That would be an even greater disaster and might cause a profound lack of trust in our currency. If that happens all bets are off. That is why I think you should own real gold. Real, as in tangible metal.

Even though Obama does not want to admit to it, the solution is simple: the US has to nationalize its major banks. At the very least it has to nationalize these banks for some short period of time. In essence much of it has already happened. We the tax payers are keeping these businesses alive. We are the de facto owners.

What is truly shameful however, is that the government did not want to get legal ownership in return for its cash. It did not want to become a shareholder with shareholder rights in return for the money it donated. Therefore its bailout money is nothing more than a donation to the rich. No wonder people are getting upset!

And why did that happen, you may ask? Because the folks in Washington are simply too chicken or too stubborn to admit that the great capitalist Reaganomics system has failed. That there is no other way out than to nationalize the financial system in order to avoid total disaster.

If stubbornness is the cause then we are seeing something that is eerily reminiscent of the previous administration's stubbornness to admitting failure in Iraq. If that is true, then change was just another empty campaign promise. If stubbornness is not to blame then there is only one alternative: weakness. I am not sure which is preferable.