Category: ranting

So it’s official. Roe is no more. The next phase of this long running culture war starts. There will be reams of analysis and plans and emails filled with both righteous indignation and celebratory zeal… and, of course, pleas to donate money to the fights to come.

The court is supposed to rule on constitutionality of things. But both sides of this fight know that this was pure politics. The result of years of political maneuvering, scheming and massive spending by a minority over years to win a verdict that does not reflect will of the American public. The fact is, most Americas wanted the status quo to remain the law of the land. Fivethrityeigtht [fivethirtyeight.com] has a good summary of where people actually stand, it’s a nuanced topic, as most things are but the headline is clear; a large majority of Americans wanted things to stay as they were. The will of the majority lost to the zeal of the minority. The tyranny of a minority restricting the rights of all. Why? How?

Two things that people should learn from this:

1. The opinions of the majority matter little to those fighting the culture wars
2. Long term planning and focus pays off

So many Americans believe in conspiracy theories; Q-anon, Lizard people, satan worshiping pedophiles, the illuminati and much more. The truly bazaar thing is that there is a clear cabal of shady types running the US right in front of us, no conspiracy theories required: lobbyist, PACs, special interests.

These groups rely on the fact that you and I are too busy putting food on the table, working for a that promotion, helping the kids with their homework, living our life. They are laser focused on their issue, full time.

These group, and the power they have have over politics, have destroyed democracy in America. Our government does not reflect what people actually think and want. They have learned to game the systems through the time and money they put into pursuing their chosen cause; their crusade, their jihad. They have corrupted the system.

The pro-gun and anti-abortion fanatics have pushed there agenda for so long, and they have become so effective at it, that they managed to shift laws away from the view of the majority and to the extremists. They turned congress into a waste of time, the presidency into a sad reality show and the courts into… something.

Their goals are not supported by a majority of Americas and yet they have been so effective for so long at crushing anyone who opposes them they have eliminated cooperation and compromise and left obstruction and intransigence in their place.

They succeed with long term planning and focus. Special interest groups holding extreme views are not unique to the conservative side of politics —the liberal side has it’s own extreme views that are only supported by small vocal minorities— but they have been at it longer and playing a long game. Anti-abortionists started the work to overturn Roe immediately after it became the law of the land. For most of the past 50 years. While of America thought of abortion as a settled issue, they planned, they maneuvered and they fought to get their way with single-minded focus. No doubt opportunistic politicians “used” the causes and their supporters to advance their careers, but in the end they were only thinking short term, the anti-abortionists were in it for the long term. They remember and they call in their favors.

The gun nuts perfected the art of political assassination, how appropriate. Taking out any politician who crossed them. Breeding spineless politicians who won’t stand up to them for fear of it ending their career in the next primary.

The anti-abortionists and the pro-gun cabals captured the politics, gaming the system of primaries and caucuses to push their extreme positions. My mobilizing their one-issue voters in the primaries, before the majority of people were even involved in an election, they shifted the whole field to the extremes. After the primaries the winners “pivot to the center” to win votes but they were still beholden, for re-election to the extremists, who watch and remember. Extremists on the left learned from this and have used the same tactic to push their party further from the center, but they lack the longevity of the conservatives.

The end result is we are all fucked, the long term planning and laser focus of the extremist minorities on the left and right have eviscerated American democracy. There is no more room for politics, no compromise or common ground. The parties have been pushed so far apart that they have become unable of governing.

The extremists have built an unassailable position; they have burned system down on their way to success. By gaming the system they have broken the system, we have fallen into their trap, electing politicians who are so far to the extremes that all they can do in Washington is scream insults back and forth across the aisles.

They destroyed congress, they destroyed the presidency and they have destroyed the supreme court.

I don’t see how we will fix the system from within the broken system. How do you ever overcome the gerrymandering, lobbying, career politicians, PACs, and the apathy? I’d say vote, but I can’t see how voting will fix it… the extremist will kill any candidates who want to work with the other side, it to big a risk to their agenda. Its a zero sum game that only leads to more and more extreme positions.

It’s a headline right out of a near-furture dystopian sci-fi novel:

Worlds Largest Vats for Growing No Kill Meat to be Built in US

Using the word “vats” makes it sound distinctly unappetizing. Like they are trying to make it sound bad, to make it dystopian. But, as a non-religious vegetarian I see this as a good thing.

I don’t miss meat, I don’t crave it but there are things that you can’t make without meat that it would be nice to eat again, fake meat only goes so far. If we can make meat without the cruelty, without the environmental damage and all the other objectionable things that factory farming methods of raising livestock for food cause… then I’m all for it. My Hindu friends may disagree but I don’t think there would be any issue for me to eat this, being vegetarian for ethical and not religious reasons.

The company building the vats, Good Meat [goodmeat.co], has been selling it’s cultured chicken in Singapore since 2020. I have not tried it, as it has only been available at one restaurant. But I will try it when I can. The article also notes Good is building a new, bigger, reactor in Singapore to expand.

The quality of plant based meats has gotten so good in the past few years, with Beyond and Impossible that it will be interesting to see if cultured meat has a niche. Veggies or people looking for limit their “real meat” intake can use these plant based meats for burgers, sauces and much more, but you can’t make a stake, it only comes in a faux minced form. So maybe if Good Meat can make t-bones and fillets then they will have a market. We’ll see.

One day I’ll get around to trying the cultured meat. And according to the article, most of us will in our not to distant dystopian future where, I guess, only the rich will be able to afford real meat:

Most of the meat people eat in 2040 will not come from slaughtered animals [theguardian.com], according to a 2019 report from the consultancy Kearney that predicts 60% will be either grown in vats or replaced with plant-based alternatives.

Worlds Largest Vats for Growing No Kill Meat to be Built in US [theguardian.com] published by The Guardian.

One thing I do wonder is what this will lead to… If we can grow meats in a vat what types of vat-meat would there be a market for? Beef, chicken, pork for sure. Vat grown bacon will be a hit if it tastes like the “real” deal. Mutton and lamb? Or venison? What about fish and shellfish? Can they grow scallops and crab legs?

And how deep does the rabbit hole go? Can we grow things like whale and dolphin? More exotic? Bush meat? Gorillas and Chimpanzees? Rare and endangered species? And the ultimate: human meat?

I mean if no one is harmed (beyond a few cells taken from volunteers), what would be wrong with vat grown human meat? This will happen, people will go there and there will be controversy. But if there is no law against it there will be people who will do it. Volumes might be small, not many will demand to dine on humans, but that just means it will be expensive and exclusive. That is a truly dystopian thought, rich people sitting in exclusive restaurants, or even more exclusive closed door gatherings dining on vat gown human flesh. Maybe they will even pay to grow meat from specific people, celebrities. Soylent Green won’t be forced on the masses but indulged in by the rich. So no “Eat the rich”, the rich will eat the famous. Is it cannibalism?

A few weeks ago I came across this graphic on social media sites and in messages a few times:

I’m not sure I’ve ever had any of these dreams… at least not that I remember… Teeth falling out? What happened to being in school with no cloths on? Never had that dream either, but I thought that was the dream everyone had. Snakes I can understand, snakes are creepy, snake can be dangerous, lots of people are afraid of snakes. Makes sense that people living in South America and Southeast Asia are having dreams, or nightmares about very large snakes.

For myself, I rarely remember dreams more than a few minutes after waking up and even then they are broken and disjointed. I can’t piece them together. They sometimes includes people I know or have known, but things are always all kinds of fucked up. Funny that I remember that but not clearly what was fucked up. One period of my life including people who are anachronistic; walking through doors into unconnected buildings continents away. That kind of thing.

There is, however, one dream that has reoccured many times over the years, though it’s getting less and less as times goes on. I remember this dream, or at least the theme, the details are different each time but the basic story is the same and I aways wake up in a panic. And the disorientation can last a few minutes, sometimes I even have mini flashbacks to the dream in the first hour or so of the morning while I’m going about my morning routine.

The basic plot of my dream is that I have skipped or missed most of the lessons of a college math class and I am going to fail the exam, which I’m rushing to get to class to take because I forgot it was today because I usually skip class because I didn’t do the homework or studying because I skipped the previous class… and so on and so forth.

There is some logic to this dream. I was not strong in math coming out of high school and into college. And the first two years of college I goofed around, a lot. I was not studious, most of the classes I took were basic, general requirements that I didn’t need to put much effort into. And towards the end of my second year I got worse as I started to work more and more at the fish store till I eventually dropped out to work full time. I even audited a couple of classes my last semester, having to come up with good excuses for my teachers to get their permission. It was during that last full semester that I took calculus 1. I passed but didn’t score great. And I promptly forgot everything. I was more focused on fish and coral.

When I went back to school full time, after almost two years and transferring to George Mason to get out of my hometown. I had to start over on math. As an Computer Science major, I was in the engineering school and they had serious math class requirements. Based on my transcript I went directly into Calculus 2 my first semester at Mason. And it quickly became apparent that I knew nothing about calculus.

When I was at Mason I was determined to do well. From the start. And there were a lot of math to come so I had to get my shit in order. It was either audit Calculus 2 and go back to Calculus 1 the next semester or find some other way to dig my way out. Repeating Calc 1 the next semester was going to put me even further behind than I already was having transferred in. As it was I was going to have to take some summer classes to catch up to where I should be as a third year engineering student.

So… I went to the book shop and purchased the companion books to the text book. There were two book; one with worked solutions to all the problems in the textbook (I think it covered the first half of the book only, but given that that textbook —Calculus, 5th Edition by James Stewart, I still have it!— was used for Calc 1, Calc 2, Calc 3 and DiffEq 1 and DiffEq 2 the first half was enough to start with…) and one with extra problems, with solutions, for studying or practice.

I spent night after night over the rest of the semester sitting in the library working my way though every page and problem, starting with chapter 1. Working the examples, homework and extra problems out of the additional book. I made it through all the chapters covered in Calc 1 and then continued on with the chapters covered in Calc 2 until I finally caught up with my class just in time for end-of-semester exams. I passed, in fact I got a good grade, a B I think, somewhere I have my transcript.

I kept it up all the way through Calc 3 and in many other math classes beyond. I managed to keep all my grades up, I graduated with a GPA of 3.8 (transfer credits from my first couple of years don’t count in the official GPA thankfully).

I think it was this first semester of Mason, and how many hours I spent sitting, by myself, struggling to catch up on my math. Racing against the coming exam, that seared into my brain a panic of not being ready for my exam. My mind somehow combined that with the stress, and shame for auditing so many classes, from that last semester before I dropped out back in Charlottesville, too cook up this reoccurring dream —this nightmare— of not being ready, having skipped too many classes and unable to audit the class because it’s too late…

So other people are having nightmares about loosing their teeth or snakes while I awake in a panic about not being ready for my math exam.

The other day I was walking to the local coffee shop about 7:30 AM, which has become my routine since lockdowns ended but I amd still working for home, just to get out of the house before the full day of meeting in front of the camera starts. As I walked along the Park Connector (Singapore’s name for it’s extensive, and growing, network of walking/biking paths) that parallels the Sungai Simpang Kiri drainage canal I was lucky enough to see a family of otters playing and hunting fish in the canal:

My older daughter said she saw a single otter here a few months ago; this time I have seen any, and a whole family of them.

Otters have been an increasingly common sight in Singapore over the past decade. Based on several articles online I understand that otters went “extinct” in Singapore in the early 1970’s driven out by pollution and urbanization. Otters were once again spotted in Singapore in 1998 but became a big deal in 2014 when a family moved in to the Bishan-Ang Mo Kio area. Today there are some 10 families living around Singapore, many in densely populated areas and even downtown amid the skyscrapers. Singapore’s policy of greening the city, to achieve Lee Quan Yew’s vision of a “city in a garden” is, apparently, working.

There is a lot of green in Singapore, many streets are lined with trees and bushes and though these are manicured they do provide a home for many small animals. If you keep your eyes open you can spot changing lizards among the flowers. The drainage canal and the green around it is where I see the most wildlife when I’m on my way for a cuppa or to the train stop or out for a walk to get some exercise.

Over the years I have seen a lot of wildlife along the canal. There is a family of parakeets that I see some mornings, a big kingfisher, and lots of other long necked fishing birds hunt in the canal. I’ve even seen an owl at night sitting on the railing by the canal. On several occasions I have seen a large monitor lizard swimming in the canal or walking in the grass along the side of the canal opposite the Park Connector. I once saw a horseshoe crab in the canal.

When I walk at night further along the Park Connector there is a small open field that is filled with the chorus of crocking frogs and buzzing cicadas. So loud you can hear them over the nearby traffic:

It’s one of the benefits of living in Singapore, despite it being one of the most densely packed places on earth and a modern city (or maybe because it’s “modern”) there is a lot of green. There is significant money put into planting and maintaining green spaces. That means they are all groomed spaces, plant trimming along the roads is a major cause of traffic jams on a weekly basis. A few years ago there was a factoid that Singapore spent over $50 million on maintaining the trees and other pants along the roads every year, almost a million dollars a week. But it does make for a much more pleasant city.

Supporting wildlife does occasionally lead to some conflict though. The otters do get some negative press as they have grown to be a larger presence. Also a woman was gored by a wild boar a few years ago in the same park that the otters first became famous in. The boar most likely wandered into the park from the larger central catchment area which is mostly unmanaged jungle in the heart of the island. I’ve only ever seen a boar on Pulau Ubin, one of the small, mostly wild islands around the main island of Singapore.

The central catchment is also famous for it’s long tailed or crab eating macaques. I’ve taken a few photos [flickr.com] of them.

During the COVID19 lockdowns the people who do this work, foreign workers from China, Thailand and South Asia mostly, were locked away in their dormitories and all work stopped. The suffering of these migrants is another story, but… as far as the green spaces and the wildlife they support the months of no maintenance was a boom time. Plants that are normally trimmed or mowed down every month were left to flourish on their own. In some places along the Park Connectors near my house the foliage grew to such a height that it formed a wall on both sides. grasses and bushes grew over my head, more than 2 meters tall.

Insects and birds took full advantage of the growth. Butterflies and bees became a much more common site. The smell of booming flowers was heavy along many paths. Swarms of caterpillars and millipedes covered the sidewalks in the late summer of 2020; crunching under foot if you were not paying attention.

When the workers did return it was a shock to walk down the Park Connectors again. I had become used to the wall of green that separated me from the roads, blocking more of the light and sound. When the pants were cut, from two meters down to half a meter it was jarring.

Today the plants are cut back regularly once again in most places, but the government seems to have decided to leave some of the medians along the road and less populace areas to grow, allowing the small grasses and wild flowers to boom and support the bees and butterflies which in turn support the birds.

I wish the government would find some way to remove some of the concrete that lines all the waterways in Singapore. Since seemingly every waterway is a concrete lined canal there are no fireflies in Singapore. I heard that 50 years ago they were a regular part of the hot humid nights and I would love to see them again.

Overall Singapore has done a good job. It’s greener than most any city I have ever been to. And even if on going construction leads to many large trees along the roads being cut down there is a concerted effort to provide open and green spaces, and not just in parks, but along the roads and smaller plots of government land. Being able to see green plants and wildlife every day make life in the city much more pleasant.

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Featured image includes screenshot of Singapore from Openstreetmap.org [openstreetmap.org], a photo of the downtown Singapore showing the Marina Bay Sands and Gardens by the Bay from Adobe Stock and various icons from Adobe.