For The Times They Are A’Changing a blast from the past from August 2016

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

For The Times They Are A’Changing a blast from the past from August 2016

Blame this on the head cold I’m almost over (truly) and the mild fever that accompanied it.  Blame it on the change of weather, that had me getting up in the middle of the night to close windows that had, sudden and inexplicably, become openings to the arctic.

Blame it on my dad giving me all the books of legends of the region that he could gather on short notice.  Yes, I also got books on the history of the City of Porto and surroundings, but when it comes to Fantasy it is easiest to dip into the legends.  And these legends are full of changing times and changing circumstances, of the tumultuous succession of Romans and Swabians, Moors and Christian crusaders, absolutist and parliamentary monarchists, republicans, French invaders and British liberators.

Most of the legends are just that, legends, though I suspect a lot of what the guys writing these books ignored is that that type of popular memory might be wrong in the particulars (So it wasn’t that particular Caliph, but something happened here, perhaps a hundred years before or since.  I know from my own experience it’s very easy to confuse stories your grandmother told you for things that happened in her life time and that you find, once you look into it, had to have happened in the time of her grandmother’s grandmother, and which she told me as had been told to her.  — Confusing how many grandmothers ago is particularly easy since her introduction was always “My grandmother told me that once upon a time, this street–“) but is often right in the details, particularly when various local legends chain on each other to form a coherent whole.  (A Moorish defeat in one place, leading to a Moorish route passing through the next village, leading to–)

Anyway, legends seem to cluster around times of great change, times in which lots of things were happening, times of turmoil and movement.  As did, I’ll admit, my grandmother’s stories.  Humans seem to have an innate predilection for stories in which stuff happens.  (I know.  It’s astounding, right?  It’s almost like there’s a difference between stories and sermons.)

My favorite — I’ve been crashing early, but having trouble sleeping, so chain-reading these little one to two page stories, until I physically can’t hold the book up — was the story of Wellington taking the city of Porto and eating the lunch originally cooked for Soult.  While Soult wasn’t waiting around to eat it, and had prepared to leave the city in the morning, it is easy to believe the servants of the house he was occupying went around preparing lunch, as they would have done, anyway.  And of course Wellington would have eaten it, and probably toasted his victory, as befits the gallant spirit of the age where being seen to do something with flare was even better than “just” doing it.

Then this morning, I woke up and caught up with Mad Genius Club, where Dave Freer has written a post about the changing state of our field. (Last Monday.) Changing Spots.

In it he notes many things I have myself realized, including that it’s d*mn hard to plan for the future in this time of turmoil we’re entering.

And it’s not just in publishing, of course.  If it were just in publishing it would be easy.  One could after all fall back on the rest of the “stable world.”

It’s not just in publishing.

It’s everywhere we look, and part of this is that we’re in the middle of one of those macro conceptual changes the human race goes through now and then.  You know, nomadic to agriculture, agriculture to cottage industry trade/cottage industry-trade to industrial/ industrial to mass production/mass production to personal-individual-small scale.

All of those are accompanied by equivalent turmoil: political, scientific (as the conceptual change spreads), territorial.

All of them.

So, things to remember:

-It is only beginning.  Someone on Facebook said we’re living through the period of history summarized under “causes leading to” before the map gets all arrowy and scary.  And they’re not wrong.  What I have a feeling though, is that we’re living through “Factors contributing to” the “causes leading to.”
Things are still working themselves out, and the economic fall out of what seemed like the relatively simple innovation of instant communication around the world and portability of data hasn’t fully worked itself through yet.  When will it work itself through?  When you see land in “states with no jobs” pick up on sales.  You’ll know we’re halfway through the transformation when pay scales start to balance between KS and NYC. (Not quite.  Very large cities will always have a pull of their own.  It’s the mid range cities that will balance and empty. But you know what I mean.)  You’ll now we’re almost done when telecommuting is the ASSUMPTION for any job that can be done this way.  I don’t expect it in my lifetime.

-The very beginning is enough for craziness and dislocation, war and rumors of war.  Trust me.  So, we’re living through that.

-The Future won’t look anything like those people who think history comes with an arrow think it will look.  It also won’t look like the dreams of those who wish to hurtle back intot he beginning of the 20th century.  (No, seriously.  They’re the romantics of the present day, wearing their retro chic opinions like people who built “ruins” on their estates.)  It’s an hysterical reaction of scared children in either case.

-It is entirely possible that the future won’t look like anything any of us CAN conceptualize.  Start working through the consequences of a truly decentralized, not-space-attached workforce.  Real estate? Dating? Family structure? Education?  If you really think it through it will make your head spin, particularly as you get into the consequences of the consequences.

So, what to do?  Try not to get too excited.  Stay flexible.  Be able and ready to jump.  Don’t try to define the present based on the past: it’s likely not to work too well.

In practical terms: take care of yourself.  Make connections. Teach your children well.  Don’t let yourself be gaslighted. Learn.  The more options you have the better.  And stay awake. Falling asleep is to fall behind and lose touch with what’s happening.

Most of all don’t give up.  There is a good chance the future will be better than the past (though some disgusting interludes do occur.) and if we don’t live to see it, other humans will.

May you thrive in interesting times.

158 thoughts on “For The Times They Are A’Changing a blast from the past from August 2016”

  1. After the election results last night, it’s obvious that the country as a whole wants to commit suicide.

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    1. Yeah. The Reader was pretty dismayed at the legislative outcome here in the Commonwealth. Apparently the large amount of last minute money that came in from outside to run pro abortion ads had an impact. In addition, the Democratic majority in the House of Delegates looks a bit crazier than the 2019 group, and they were bad enough. We have 2 years of government by veto, and then who knows what is going to happen.

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      1. Democrats have had a “revenge for perceived slights” attitude for a while now. And the voters rejecting them certainly qualifies. As has been noted, smacking them down merely causes them to double-down.

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        1. Sorry Sarah, but the Reader acknowledges that. He should have noted that the last ‘redistricting’ in the Commonwealth was done in the same key as voter fraud.

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        2. This! There’s no reason to think that the methods that worked in 2020 wouldn’t also work in 2023. (I figure that they’ve been refined to be harder to catch, too.)

          One of the VRWC blogs (Gateway, I think) had a snippet about machine “errors” that was flipping votes from one candidate to the other. Pennsylvania, and while the machines were shut down, a judge insisted they get restarted. “Error by the coder”, TPTB said. “Bullshit”, say I. Not sure if they were “fixed” before restarting.

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            1. Here’s the thing, who is going to fix them and how?

              The Democrats? It works for them.

              Most elected Republicans? It works for them too, or at least they think so. It provides another way for them to freeze out the voters they are embarrassed to have and who had the gall to turn to Trump after endless rounds of promises followed by excuses followed by surrender.

              Yes, eventually they’ll realize it doesn’t work for them when the Dems fraud them out too (I suspect they are already frauding certain Republicans in during primaries) but by then it will be too late for them to institute change because they’ll be out of office. I wonder how many have cut deals to look the other way as long as they get to choose when they retire.

              So, next up, the general public? Most don’t vote and thus don’t care and a good deal who did vote don’t seem that concerned. I suspect most are swallowing it’s to stop Trump. Of course, having accepted it for stopping one literally Hitler it’s easier to accept it for the next literally Hitler, especially when you’re more worried about “can I afford to eat two eggs for breakfast everyday instead of one?”

              I used to joke I was willing to spend more for the good eggs with those bright yokes that tasted great (ie, from hens that got to go outside and eat bugs, worms, feed, and other hens that pissed them off). Now buying regular mass produced supermarket eggs is a luxury and yeah, some days I only eat two if the carton and cash are low.

              So, that leaves us who see the fraud, assuming we’re not silenced by, in order of severity, Facebook to the FBI.

              That’s why I’ve come around agree with Claire Wolfe from 30 years ago.

              It’s why I think the wise thing is to take Honorius’s command to the Britons.

              And to be honest isn’t “build over; build under; build around” just a variant, or at least a cousin, of his instruction?

              PS. I noticed you thought MrBeast’s wells wouldn’t do much and, leaving the maintenance issues in Africa aside, are his wells and how he got them drilled BO;BU;BA?

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              1. I’d feel better about Trump (and if he’s the nominee I will be voting for him) if he’d
                say he had any plans for countering fraud. Again, Twitter is its own warped little world, but trusting that hordes of secret voters will rise up in their wrath and vote him in, which seems to be the plan put forth by “influencers,” doesn’t fill me with confidence.

                Actually, preventing fraud ought to be on all the cadidates’ platforms.

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                1. I like Trump for three reasons:

                  He makes the right people crazy, something only W did at all in my adult lifetime and even then not to the same degree. Trump does it as much if not more than Nixon.
                  As a consequence of #1 he’s gotten the other side to slip the mask more than all other Republicans my adult life combined. This is important when things come to a head.
                  Trump at least realizes it’s a fight and not a gentlemanly dispute.

                  Find me someone polite who has those properties and I’ll take a look, but to be honest I don’t see how you can do all three, especially #1, without being abrasive.

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                  1. I dunno, we were all gonna be dead by 1983 in the nuclear war Reagan was going to start, if you went by the liberal pundits of the time . . .

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                    1. True, but I’m just young enough by four days to not be able to vote in the 1984 presidential election much less the 1980 one.

                      And even then, he didn’t drive them as deranged as Nixon did. Leftists gave up UBI and probably universal government health to get rid of Tricky Dicky. The former was being negotiated by no less a leftist icon than Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

                      But getting Nixon was more important.

                      I will agree Reagan drove them as nuts as W, but I don’t think he reached Nixon or Trump levels.

                      What’s interesting is those two are arguably the most New Deal Democrat type Republican presidents ever.

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              2. The Donks didn’t have to fraud Adam Kinzinger out of office after he carried their water on the Get Trump committee. Redistricting him out of office was an interesting show of “gratitude”, but the slime deserved it.

                The lesson to be learned is that it’s unwise to be a frog to the Dems’ scorpion. But then, there are a lot of politicians who are incapable of learning.

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    3. For most Democrat voters that’s not an issue, them being already dead and all. :-P
      ———————————
      Grandpa voted Republican until the day he died — but he’s been voting Democrat ever since.

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    4. Steve, what part of the whole thing is fraud now, using a system pioneered by Hugo Chavez evaded you?
      Are you out of your mind? Or amnesiac?
      We know the only point of voting now is to make them fraud higher.
      BTW Kentucky was apparently redistricting. BUT fraud. FRAUD damn it.

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      1. Sarah, and what’s the cure for fraud on that scale? Vote harder?

        I know how much fraud there is, probably better than you do. But the only reason to participate in our current election process is to hope it makes enough people angry enough to have the Battle of Athens nationwide. I don’t think either of us will live to see it.

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        1. Well, I’m voting harder because I’m hoping they fraud more than is possible to be in the US.
          But the cure? You know it. I know it.
          Looks up at the suspended shoe.
          You know it. I know it. My gut says no more than a year and a half.
          I don’t like it. Particularly since I suspect we’re in for something like what 10/7 was for Israel.
          G-d have mercy on our souls.

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          1. they fraud more than is possible to be in the US.

            I think they would try it and think they could get away with it.

            I’ve put this marker down elsewhere, but I’m not sure about here.
            – Biden will be the first president reported to get 100,000,000+ votes.
            – If Trump is on the ballot he will be reported as receiving less than 39,148,634 votes. Yes, that is a very specific number that will be used as a symbol: it is the number of votes Gerald Ford got in 1976. Trump will “get less” that “Ford got after pardoning Nixon” because he’ll be a convicted felon by that point. That will be the spin and the networks will make sure it is tame Republicans and conservatives who spin it (after Kansas and now Ohio all the “it’s abortion that’s destroyed the GOP” talking heads “on the right” who are auditioning to give that excuse).

            If it’s not Biden v. Trump the second part is out, but I suspect even a Biden replacement will have more than 81,000,000 votes reported.

            They would try to report more votes than US residents (not citizens of voting age but residents) if they had to do so to win (ie, 100% turnout that was 4:1 GOP).

            And at that point you’re at what you don’t like.

            If they don’t and Trump wins they’ll do what you fear to stop it. They’ll do what they claim we did on Jan. 6.

            That’s why mostly avoiding political news is viable. The torpedo is in the water and you heard it. You’re already dead*, you’re just waiting for the physics to catch up.

            “already dead” = violence or autocracy are the only choices left, not any of us are specifically going to die over politics not matter what.

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    1. Apparently the pro-abortion activists ran non-stop, “MAGA extremists are going to ban abortion if we don’t stop them! They will take control of your body and not let you make your own decisions!” ads. Plus ads featuring young girls who were victims of incest and implying, “Hearless Republicans will make her have that baby! Think of the mental anguish!”
      Add in candidates who (I’m told) ran on, “Vote for me, Trump endorsed me!” and nothing else.
      I find myself agreeing with Kurt Schlicter more and more. His take: yeah, Trump’s getting a raw deal. Yes, it’s not fair. But if we want to win (and indirectly help Trump out), we’d better run someone who doesn’t stir up visceral, knee-jerk hatred from a significant portion of the populace. And the online “experts,” need to stop this crap of “the pols are great, trust the polls!” when the polls are favorable and, “The polls are rigged, don’t believe them!” when they aren’t.

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      1. And which potential “literally Hitler” would that be and, supposing they won, how long before they rolled over like every Republican since 1990?

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        1. Trump comes across as personally abrasive to many. I know this through my conversations with a number of people, including conservatives. And it’s based off of Trump’s speech habits and mannerisms, so it’s an unavoidable part of who he is.

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            1. I think he has possibilities. He’s not flashy, but I can deal with a tortoise. And frankly, the adolescent crap the pro-Trump folks online are doing annoys me. A lot. If you keep trying to gin up a “scandal,” about someone’s shoes, it suggests you don’t have anything real to work with.

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              1. All of Trump’s scandals are ginned up at best (the appraisal thing…only requires you not understand a damn thing about collateral and real estate to think it was deliberate fraud. Hell, if lying about square footage is fraud every rental company I’ve dealt with plus Zillow are fraudsters) to outright made up at worst (Russia, Russia, Russia…and besides, didn’t the 80s call and want their foreign policy back?).

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                1. Heck we’re waiting (they can take forever, FWIW) for the county (city, since they now administer not incorporated county properties within the urban growth boundary) to suddenly realize we have 600 sq ft more than what is on the tax rolls. Us? The response will be “Heck if we know. It is why we bought the house, 35 years ago.” Yes, the permits are on file (we have copies), the ones filed by prior owners who had the add on built (1978), and us who have had changes made, 4 times,(electrical, twice) since we bought the house. I saw the house plans the inspectors had with them. The plans had the additions (closed in the covered porch minimum sq ft, room over garage – 30 x 20 feet). Not like the adjusters (who are suppose to inspect properties every 3 – 5 years, by a drive by at minimum, guessing now they can use google street views) can’t miss the big addition. It is over the garage!

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                  1. You may wait a long time. The Reader was in his last house for 20 years and the county never added the finished space in the basement or the room we finished over the garage despite permits, plans and inspections.

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                    1. You may wait a long time.
                      ………………

                      Fine by me. Not that it’ll help the county (city doesn’t get any, yet), should they take exception, as valuation for taxes is based on 3% compounded increases since 1990 valuation, which was essentially what we paid for it late ’88. Not $/sq ft * total sq ft. Real value is based on sq ft, plus layout (bedrooms, bathrooms, etc.) Which means the estimated real value, as of Jan. 1, of tax bill year (Jan 2023, for bill year 2023, for property taxes 2024), is always low. Don’t care as long as, when/if, we ever decide to sell, the property is marketed accurately (or when we get a loan, property sq ft listed properly, which is why we have the permit copies … Last loan required them. None before that. All the house appraisals noted the permits on all loans, but this one required physical proof. But this loan was after the 2008 housing crash. 3% interest. Required a whole lot of extra documentation.)

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            2. Nope, the press has been making him as Hilterian as Trump in case he gets the nod and is effective.

              Any GOP candidate will be “Literally Hitler”. The choice is between someone the establishment approves of so only the Press and the Dems (birm) call him “Literally Hitler” or someone the establishment doesn’t approve of so they’ll do their own “Literally Hitler” turns.

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            4. Again, it’s TRUMP HIMSELF that rubs these people the wrong way. The way that he talks, the way that he presents himself, his personality in public. It bugs a number of people that I know.

              It’s not the media’s depiction of the man. It’s the man himself.

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                1. Trump is very distinctive in certain elements of his public personality and mannerisms. We all know it. Biden sniffs hair. Trump is bombastic. There’s no argument about either.

                  That rubs some the wrong way.

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                    1. But you are. A lot of people don’t like bombastic individuals, which is what Trump is. Ergo, there are a lot of people who are rubbed the wrong way by Trump, and would be that way even without the media’s influence.

                      Is the media assisting on this? Sure. There are likely many who were looking for an excuse to dislike Trump, and jumped on his public personality. But there are also a lot of people who are going to be repelled by his public personality even without the media’s influence simply because there are many who naturally have a negative view of bombastic personalities.

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                    2. Sigh. I’m just saying I know how it’s been for…. 50 years?
                      There’s always something. W was weird and didn’t connect. Oh, Reagan was dumb. And and and.
                      You’re not going to get someone EVERYONE loves. There was one perfect man — at least if you’re Christian — they crucified him.
                      I’ve said, a while back, that Trump’s name recognition means he’ll be the nominee.
                      Fraud means he won’t win.
                      will I vote for him? Sure. But I’d prefer SMOD

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                    3. He’ll clearly get the nomination, barring something really weird out of left field – which is why he’s skipping the Republican debates. The only thing they represent for him is a chance to accidentally screw up (and since people are claiming this gives his opponent an opportunity to refuse to debate him in the General, I’ll note that Newsome has already done exactly that in California). And I have every reason to believe that he’ll make a good president. Again.

                      I just get tired of hearing the refrain over and over again that the only reason a person won’t like him is because of the media’s influence (or things like “member of the Deep State”, etc…, obviously).

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                    4. No. Note I didn’t say that. I’m not particularly fond of his presentation/person. That’s neither here nor there. And not the problem we have.
                      I said that the media can make anyone else just as unpalatable. Which they can. They’ve proven it.

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                    5. The reason Trump is skipping the debates is so that moderators can’t ask questions that are designed to be weaponized by the persecutors running the kangaroo courts that are conducting Soviet show trials to destroy him.

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                1. I remember “nukular”. I remember Steve Schmidt sabotaging Sarah Palin. I remember, “But what about your gaffes?”. And I could go on and on and on.

                  There are a number of people that I know who weren’t affected by any of the above, and who don’t like Trump. That’s the fact of the matter. You can insist that it:s the media’s fault. But as the individual who’s reporting on the spot, that’s not what I’m seeing.

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                  1. So, you’re dealing with GOP voters who care less about actually fighting for the platform they ran on than surrendering to be liked.

                    I’ve voted for plenty of that and what has it gotten us.

                    “I agree with his platform but Trump is icky” are the very problem, even more than Democrats. Their principles last until the second they might have to defend them.

                    And as sick as you are of “hearing the refrain over and over again that the only reason a person won’t like him is because of the media’s influence” I’m sick of hearing “we must nominate another Romney” (who was literally Hitler and abused dogs and engaged in homophobic hazing and caused women to die of cancer) so people who openly hate us and lie about us will like us and not try to sabotage us advancing our agenda.

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              3. Which is why I say this country has decided to commit suicide. When “Orange Man Bad” wins over horrible policy, this country is done until enough dying happens.

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                1. Steve, the idiots shall always be with us. There were “republicans” who wouldn’t vote for Reagan, too. Or W. Or….

                  Ignore it. it’s not the country. It’s idiots.

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                  1. Sarah, we have about 10% of the population that are destructive parasites, who not only take without giving, but actively damage us. A host body can only tolerate a given number of parasites before it can’t sustain itself. Same thing applies to a body politic. And our parasite load is over the top, with no will to check it.

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        2. Agreed anyone is going to get the Hitler treatment, and the only way to know if someone can hold is watch.

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          1. Observing both Bushes in the WH and McCain and Romney in the Senate the people who get approved as “not Trump” will not hold.

            If they had held, Trump would not have happened.

            That is what the GOP leadership and “thought” leaders can’t get through their heads. Trump only happened because they were surrendering so much French people told them to stand up and fight. The failure on Obamacare repeal (yes, yes, I know…blame McCain, all the other wanted it) and the utter failure of the GOP to back Trump after years of the rank and file sucking up their choice and then their failure to back Trump’s signature initiates and the last GOP control of the elective branches doing nothing more than creating a new cabinet department (which worked as well as you’d expect) and fund big pharma   the first new entitlement since LBJ  Medicare Part D means any one they propose as “acceptable” will be seen as yet another surrender sloth.

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      2. You also need to limit the potential for election fraud by the Democrats so that they can’t simply take seats by manipulating elections through fraud by mail and the other tools they have created. This, along with the lawfare that has forced in many cases pro-Democratic Party districting maps, essentially eviscerate the ability for their to be genuine free and fair elections.

        New York’s Republican House seats will all be lost in 2024, because the Hochulmander will be approved the second time around by a now radical leftist packed state high court, which is already allowing redistricting for 2024 even though new districts are supposed to be done only once every 10 years and were done in 2022.

        The fact that the majority of people oppose the Democrats and their policies is not considered by the Democrats to be a factor in both pushing their policies and in retaining and expanding their power “by any means necessary”.

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      4. You’re not wrong.

        Save this:

        we’d better run someone who doesn’t stir up visceral, knee-jerk hatred from a significant portion of the populace.

        Sorry, but the fact is – there isn’t one. The brand “republican” and/or “right-wing” has been set to stir up visceral, knee-jerk hatred from the populace. It literally does not matter who you pick, they will generate the same reaction. Romney proved it. Mike Johnson is proving it now. We could have a Mr. Rogers/Bob Ross ticket going into 2024 and half the nation will be convinced they’re nazis before the end of January.

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          1. I was told that once upon a time there was a fellow of one party in Wausau, WI or Marathon Co. WI (Wausau is in Marathon Co.) that held his particular office for ages and ages. Anyone running against him lost, as they weren’t him. When he died, the opposing party managed to find someone with the same name to run. He won. And that, right there, says it’s ALL about name-recognition and/or “brand loyalty.”

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          2. It’s been that way for a while. It’s how both parties get their voting blocks out. Look at the black community and ask “why do they still vote 9:1 Democrat?” Look at small government conservatives and ask “why do they still vote Republican?”

            Because the party’s have branded themselves as “champions of blacks who freed the slaves” and “champions of small government who will eliminate government programs and whole departments” despite actions proving the lie of both.

            I bought that branding until about 2014 and Ted Cruz’s shutdown and how the rest of the GOP couldn’t wait to cave and claim he cost them the Senate, only for the GOP to win the Senate later that year.

            I only voted Trump in 2016 as a middle finger not to the Democrats (I didn’t vote for him in the primary and like everyone I “knew” Hillary had it locked up) but as a middle finger to the GOP.

            And once he was in office they saw my finger and returned it.

            But that destroyed the last credibility their brand had with me.

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  3. My only consoling thought this morning is perhaps it is ALL fraud. Since abortion is their holy sacrament, it therefore has to be virtuous to enshrine it in the law. And how hard is it to nudge the numbers your way ? If you believe they have done it before….
    Or the other choice is so ugly I can’t comprehend.May He have mercy on us.

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  4. I Still don’t care if Demoncrats live or die, so nothing has really changed. I don’t care about their cities, nor do I care about their lies. I won’t lift a finger to hurt any of them, but I won’t lift a finger to save them either. You Demoncrats want to live as slaves to Communism, fine by me. You are free to chose your own path to destruction. If you want to rush head long to hell, so be it. I will be over here trying to survive as best I can, and when you destroy your cities, and murder your own children, I will remember and tell the tale of your woe. Adding it to humanity’s book of knowledge.

    I Am The Democrat Party, look on me and Despair….

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  5. “…causes leading to.”

    Was there -ever- a time in history that couldn’t be considered “causes leading to” the bad part that came next?

    J. Robert Oppenheimer has a history that includes more than just that quote about Shiva, but nobody knows any of it. He and Einstein, all the Fathers of the Bomb, were famous for almost a generation before the Beatniks morphed into the Hippies, and suddenly everything in the world was backwards. An now, 2023, nobody knows nothing about Oppenheimer except that friggin’ quote. Thanks, hippies.

    Who is to say that Tim Berners-Lee, a guy one year older than me and justly famous for inventing the Web, won’t be reviled as Death, the destroyer of worlds in 25 years?

    Did anyone in the 1980s predict cell phones and the Internet? I was there, I do not recall any such prediction. L. Neil Smith was about the closest of anyone. Did anyone in the 1960s predict the personal computer? No. Computers were the size of a car, only big companies could afford them. What were the killer applications on the personal computer? Lotus 123 and Wordstar. Did anyone predict that the most useful things a PC could be would be typing and accounting?

    2023, my phone is faster than a Cray supercomputer, and it is connected to more raw compute power and storage than IBM, Sperry and Burroughs together had available until the 1970s. Just inside my house there’s that much. What do I use all that for? Photo album, home movies, posting on bulletin boards, reading the news, watching TV, writing books, making book-cover art, phone calls. Did anyone predict all that? No.

    You can’t predict something that no one thought of yet. Thanks to the ever-increasing stash of tools, techniques and INQUIRING MINDS we have these days, the stuff that no one thought of before is coming thick and fast.

    So yeah, some Ivory Tower nitwit with too much time on his hands is going to play Connect The Dots sometime in the future, and say, in that snotty British accent that history show narrators always seem to have, “of course the outcome of the BlahBlah War as it was known at the time was foreshadowed by the Sad Puppies Campaigns of the 2010s, presaging as it did the GetOffMyLawn movement and the Great Boog. Once those things occurred, the BlahBlah were doomed.”

    Or it’ll be the Pocket Nuclear Accelerator that will change the world, and then doom it, and then some other sh1t will come along and the PNA will be a footnote.

    Whatever. I’m making a rice box today, history can f- off until later.

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    1. Ender’s Game had personal tablets and an Internet (that wasn’t a DARPAnet but much closer to what we have.) Heinlein had personal mobile phones way back in… Space Cadet? Heck, he had car key fobs in The Number of the Beast.

      And because of the recent movie, people at least know Oppneheimer’s name.

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            1. Gotta play the memory tapes, but the local paper carried the Dick Tracy strip, and to the best of my knowledge, got video in the early 1960s. As further memory serves, that was when AT&T did demonstrations of video phones. Black and white…

              The other paper in town carried L’il Abner, and Fearless Fosdick was a decent spoof of DT.

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              1. It may be they added video in the 60s (the Reader remembers seeing it in the paper as a kid), but the original 2 way wrist radio does date to 1946. The Reader’s dad, who was a radio engineer, used to laugh about it. I don’t know what he’d make of an Apple Watch.

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                1. The wrist radio dating to 1946 sounds plausible. I don’t think we got Dick Tracy strips until we moved in 1960 when I was 8. After that, I followed that strip. (There was also an animated version that played on a lunchtime kiddie’s show.)

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          1. The Reader notes that Star Trek did not combine comms and other handheld computer functions and that it had no notion of anything like Bluetooth.

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            2. Star Wars was the first example of computer networking in a major movie, when R2-D2 hooked into the Death Star’s computers to locate Luke et. al and get them out of the trash compactor. Arguably, it was also the first major media example of hacking — by a robot’s operating AI, no less.

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    2. An now, 2023, nobody knows nothing about Oppenheimer except that friggin’ quote. Thanks, hippies.

      Not no one. I know he originally wanted to do work on the nature of electrons and electron shells and was permanently side tracked by the drive to the bomb.

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    3. Did anyone in the 1980s predict cell phones and the Internet? I was there, I do not recall any such prediction.

      Yes, many, many people. Heinlein even predicted computer based dating would be as radical change to courtship since the automobile in Universe in 1980.

      2023, my phone is faster than a Cray supercomputer,

      Uhm, no. It’s not. I do work that in 1980 would have required a Cray. It still requires 20,000 cores across multiple racks with more storage probably all the commenters here combined own.

      Cell phones are impressive, but they are not close to that powerful.

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      1. 1975, Cray 1, single 64 bit processor with one core running at 80mhz. 8 megs of ram, 300 megs of storage,

        My phone, 8 core 64 bit processor running 3.36GHz, 12 gigs of ram, 500 gigs of storage.

        Just sayin’. ~:D

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          1. I am quite certain that Phantom’s phone – or even my cheap as I could get it phone – could run all of the problems that the Cray 1 did. You would have to code it completely from scratch, though.

            OTOH, the Cray 1 might be able to run the things that a modern smart phone can (optimizing signal strength, geolocation, photo and video processing, NSA reporting, etc.) – but it would also require coding completely from scratch – and take several years to produce output.

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            1. Now, now, I’m sure the Cray would produce results in mere days.

              It would be like trying to play an MP3 on an old IBM XT — it’s capable of running the codec algorithm, but not nearly fast enough to produce the correct sound.

              I have thought about the fact that those old 1980’s computers could run hugely computation-intensive algorithms, but they would still be grinding away, years from delivering the results, when newer computers were introduced that could run the same computations in minutes.

              Have you seen the new Raspberry Pi 5? 64-bit 4-core 2.4 GHz ARM76 processor, $80.00 for the 8 GB RAM version. I’ve got some Pi 4’s. One is hooked up to a 62″ 4K HDTV and it’s great.

              I’m using that Pi 4 to organize and consolidate 2 copies of my music collection on a couple of 256 GB USB FLASH drives. I paid $23 for both drives. The advance of technology is amazing.

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        1. I disagree.

          Knowing when to quit is just as important as knowing when not to quit. Quitting endeavors that will fail frees up reasons of all kinds (physical, fiscal, time, energy, emotion) to be put into things that will.

          The question is “is it time to give up and on what”?

          Is it time to rollover and die? I don’t think so.
          Is it time to give up on electoral politics? Yes, I think so. We have third world elections (actually, several third world nations would be embarrassed to have our elections) and no mechanism in the system to change it because both the fraudsters and their “opposition” benefit from the fraud.

          So take the resources you’d use for electoral politics and work on things you’ll need when the wheels come off…yes, there is a lot of ruin in a nation but how do things fail? Slowly, then all at once. I don’t know where the “all at once cliff is” but I’ll see it in my lifetime (and this from someone who voted GOP to 2014 on the “sure, they’re driving to the cliff at 30 but the Dems are at 90 and I’ll die before we get there at 30).

          I had more about what I think you need to do for “over the cliff”, but this is already a text wall.

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  8. I flatly do not believe Ohio’s results on 1 and 2. Literally nobody had Yes signs in their yards or on their cars, including the person with the giant “Abortion Is Health Care” sticker.

    And the numbers just make no sense, and did not affect any race except 1 and 2. Not a single race.

    So it is fraud, of course. Probably the same old Dominion crud.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. It may be fraud, but I saw lots of Yes on Issue One signs in yards. Actually, in public areas, there was at least one Yes for every No by the end. Lots of Yes signs in the wealthier suburbs. Can’t let your daughter ruin her future high profile career by being punished with a baby.

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        1. The Reader suspects that Issue 2 (marijuana legalization) helped galvanize a lot of turnout as well.

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        1. It is -remarkably- difficult to get real numbers regarding MAiD. I do recall there was a report last month, but I don’t know who produced it and I have my doubts the government willing gave them the full story.

          National Post says 13,241 in 2022. By comparison, there were 1,768 traffic fatalities in all of Canada in 2021. Seven times more.

          Retirement in Florida is looking like a life saver. They haven’t started dragging people out of the nursing home and whacking them yet, but one gets the feeling it won’t be long. Socialists, you know. The uniforms change, but the men never do.

          Liked by 2 people

          2. That’s more deaths in Canuckistan than are ‘killed by Gun Violence’ in the entire U.S. — where we have 8 times the population.

            If our oh-so-benevolent government enacted the same policies (even though none of us voted for them) that would translate to more than 110,000 ‘assisted’ deaths per year.

            But the Leftroids would still be screeching at us to ban guns.
            ———————————
            There is but one greater sin than to be right when those in power are wrong — proving it.

            Liked by 2 people

  9. The cartoon series from the 80’s, Inspector Gadget, that my kids watched had a character, Penny, who had a computer disguised as a book, a video watch, a laptop computer, and a holographic tablet computer.

    Liked by 1 person

      1. Hoytco needs to get on that. It’s just RIGHT NOW HOytco is me and my overworked assistant. And I’ve been trying to paint our deck before snow comes.
        (Yes, I HAVE IN FACT tried to hire someone. we finally after 2 years found someone to fix the chimney and someone to landscape. So, that’s off my plate. Now if I could find someone to clean the gutters….)

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  14. I have family in Ohio. They went out together to vote for the Abortiin Ame dment and to legalize pot. While I hate abortion I am fine with it being legal. Granted this amendment is a door to drive through just about any med8cal related law they want….I expect enforced abortion at a minimum within 10 years plus psychiatric laws….but it was voted in not cheated in.
    As for pot….drugs and alcohol should never have been made illegal. A look at the r8se and fall of demon rum in the 19th century is a snapshot of intense miceoevolution. By the time Progressives passed Prohibition the ones who rewloy had no way to handle high alcohol levels were mostly dead and gone.
    This by the way is why relgions are all in on LGB trans etc. Part of Progressivism grew out of the soft focus churches that flourished in the late 19th century.
    We have to wait for all the bad to burn out to get another hundred yewrs 9f being left alone.

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    1. Sorry for the typos….phone and hurried. Keyboard not much better. To clarify on abortion…personally I think its morally wrong. Every woman I know who had one is messed up, after if not before. The ones who told their kids about it, the kids are messed up….because they think mom is not loving and absolute. So far all the kids who know have elected to not have children or get married. So like legal drugs, it helps society long term because marginal psychological cases weed themselves out. Harsh? Painful? Tragic? yes and since there are several of both types in my family, I get to see and experience it all. It is hard.

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      1. I know about mom’s abortions. I wanted 11 kids. I still think it’s wrong, not even in a religious but in a psychological sense. If you’re only human when mommy says you are…. It twists you inside.
        Now, drugs: like immigration, they can’t co-exist with a therapeutic and welfare state. i saw what it did to Colorado.
        Other than that? You’re entitled to go to hell any way you want.

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        1. So much of current culture is being built on women’s selfishness. I find the argument that a lot of support for abortion comes from the Democrats’ framing of the issue as one of personal choice (“Nobody’s going to tell me what I can and can’t with to my own body!”) sadly persuasive. That framing will push women who would never think of having an abortion and hate the idea to vote for it as a “civil rights issue.” Just as a few years ago we had friends buying the idea that pronoun/trans issues were, “the great civil rights issue of our day.”
          And of course, the backlash, when it comes, will be horrifying.

          Liked by 1 person

            1. They never frame it as male selfishness, though. Just radical individualism.

              So it’ll snap back on women, first, and only after that is a horrific mess will it snap back on men being selfish– and probably in a manner that manages to be even more horrific, by attacking free will and choices.

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  15. Almost half the country will reject the 2024 election as fraudulent. (Any way it lands.) That is the whole point of all the prior decades of fuss. It was intended all along to end that very rare “peaceful transfer of power” and to sow discord in our camp.

    War is the inevitable result. Fratricidal civil war, possibly genocidal.

    Not sure which is more horrifying, the folks saying “anything but war” or the folks saying “bring it”.

    Remaining hopeful we again make those foreign agitators look stupid. We do tend to pull unexpected things out of our hat. Smiling with fangs at “you should not have wished us to war. For we won’t stop at our shores.”

    Heh.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Half the population might start out saying the election was fraudulent. But if there’s a concerted effort to investigate possible claims of fraud – like what happened with the Russian Influence hoax – then the number will drop by quite a lot. Sure, there are a lot of people who still believe that Trump won because of Russian influence. But there are a lot less than there used to be.

      Notably, the Biden administration’s efforts to investigate the possibility of electoral irregularities was to threaten Arizona with legal consequences when the Arizona legislature decided to audit Maricopa County’s ballot counting processes.

      Liked by 2 people

  16. OT, but does anyone know what the latest crud is? We just crossed the country, and a few days after getting home I’ve got a tight chest, sniffles and a low-grade fever. This is day 2 and it seems to be getting very slowly worse. Even so it’s as much a nuisance as anything.

    This after spending two months in an area the locals told me was full of wuflu – but also saying it was easy to catch, but mild.

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    1. Sounds like what’s been going through Day Job. Upper respiratory, feel like an elephant stood on you, recover but drag for a few days more. That’s the local variant among the younger set. I’ve escaped thus far. touches wood vehemently

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    1. At first I was bemused at the panic such finds bring over yonder, but then the mentioned “shells” and realised some boomenstuff was involved and who knows how some of the old stuff will react.

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      1. I suspect that fresh out of the water isn’t a problem. I’m not too sure how badly explosives will decompose over the years while submerged. As soon as any of it starts to dry out, then that might be a big problem.

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  18. Thumper would fit in perfectly with most of our Presidents prior to Kennedy. Opinionated, abrasive, and putting any two of them in the same room would be two bulls in a china shop.

    We just got used to electing pretty-boys with the right credentials

    Liked by 1 person

  19. Alex Comfort was a leftist (and the author of The Joy of Sex), but he had a good description:
    “…a tall, handsome, earnest young man whom I took at first glance for a senatorial candidate. He had the slightly unreal, varnished look which marks out the office-seeker on any political platform….but the charisma was like bad aftershave lotion. He made me think of the ghost of John F. Kennedy in fancy dress.”
    From, “Techrarch,” which is actually not a bad fantasy novel (aside from the myriad leftist assumptions). The earnest young man he describes is being used by wannabe authoritarians.

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  20. People seem to think that “things that cannot go on, won’t” means that there will be a rational discussion and some alternate path will be chosen. Um, no.

    The status quo will keep on quo-ing until people start dying in droves.

    The welfare state will not contract because we’re spending too much for too little gain. It will grind to a halt when the money stops. The riots will be epic.

    The government will not get smaller because that’s a good idea. The government will get smaller when people start killing the bureaucrats who are taking “their” welfare dollars.

    (People who pay taxes are generally not the type to lynch bureaucrats. Just as the people who walk on the grass are generally not the type to pay attention to “keep off the grass” signs. The personality types are not the same.)

    The budget will not get balanced because that’s a good idea. The budget will get balanced when the seemingly inexhaustible supply of capital buying the debt dries up as all those boomers spend through their retirement savings and capital flight to the US as a “safe haven” runs out. Or we default on debt and stop being “safe”.

    We’re not there, yet. The day is getting closer, but it’s still some years off.

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    1. I’ve never before wondered what a “drove” is and wondered if other things happened to them, aside from dying (much as “havoc” is the only thing that is “wreaked”). In case anyone else is curious:

      drove (n): A flock or herd being driven in a body.

      As long as I’m side-tracking myself: I have to re-login with every comment, despite being logged into my WordPress blog, in an adjacent tab. The “remember me” checkbox does nothing.

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  21. Guy reporting unrest in Spain after an apparent assassination. I’d like to know what’s really going on; he’s claiming massive nationalist demonstrations. But the same guy is a firm member of the, “Ukraine is corrupt! Neocons! Putin has nukes! We’re in WWIII! We’re all gonna DIIEEEEEEE!” camp, so I’d really like a more reliable and less overheated source.

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