Tuesday´s Photo of the Week!

I have worked in Restaurants as a cook for several years now. It’s an experience that gives me a strong sense of what is and what isn’t good, quality food. Something I have learned while living in Europe, both as a consumer and as a cook, is that restaurants located on tourist shopping streets tend not to have good food. Instead they sell something more like an idea and you just happen to get food along with that idea or concept. Now of course there may be exceptions to every rule, however I don’t think this is one of them:

Add to this that they specialize in schnitzel and then also have pizza. I don’t get how the two fit together so well.

Taking a train ride for ten hours (to and return) gave me plenty of time to read so here is the reading list as it stands:

1. Der Kleine Brüder by Sven Regener (finished)

2. The Witches of Eastwick by John Updike (finished)

3. The Handmaid´s Tale by Margaret Atwood (finished)

4. Freedom by Jonathan Franzen (considering buying this after all the reviews it got)

5. Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer (non-fiction)

6. The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick (orig. Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said)

7. The 158-Pound Marriage by John Irving (finished)

8. Going After Cacciato by Tim O´Brien

9. The Green House by Mario Vargas Lhosa

10. Grimms Wörter by Günter Grass

11. Wait Until Spring, Bandini by John Fante (finished)

12. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick

13. Ubik by Philip K. Dick

14. The Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Philip K. Dick (finished)

I am currently on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Dick, which will be followed by Ubik. The Handmaid’s Tale by Atwood was so good that it’s going to get a review in this blog tomorrow so watch for it.

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Cologne

Its been snowing softly all day. Its cold outside and on the surfaces elevated above the ground, on parked car roofs and other inanimate objects, it’s staying. It’s still too warm to stay on the paved streets or sidewalks that are still busy. The minute the sun pokes its head through the overcast, grey skies is the moment that it will be gone even from those places. Its only November, there will still be plenty of time for blizzards and freezing weather.

Cologne is on the list of things to do tomorrow. It’s going to be a quick little weekend. The train rolls out around eight in the morning and then we arrive sometime after noon. There will be some time spent with friends and family. On Sunday there is mass and Clara’s cousin will go through some Catholic ceremony-not one that I am familiar with. Cologne is a place that I don’t care to live in but love to visit. It’s a small city yet it retains a feeling of its own steadily eroding self-importance. It was once one of the greatest cities in Europe. My how the mighty have fallen.

Sometimes, when living in foreign countries, we learn to make the most out of the small things. For instance: we learn to laugh at the signs that incorporate two languages at once. Sometimes it’s done to be cool, as if the native word wouldn’t suffice, a pattern all to common in Sweden, and others it’s done just for humor. This is probably one of the latter:

I am more than halfway through The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. It’s been fantastic this far and once I finish with it, I will write a post or two reviewing it. Have a lovely weekend.

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Thursday´s Nameless Post

I finished the novel The Man in the High Castle last night. It’s a chilling reminder of what life might have been like, had there been a different ending to the Second World War. Of course the problem with a book like that is that while the scenario suggested is plausible, so are an endless number of other outcomes. Sometimes history turns and pivots on such small moments of time and singular events, while at others there is more than meets the eye, and sometimes we never know exactly what lead to today.

Earlier, I was sitting on the bus on my way home from the unemployment office, which wasn’t so bad when you consider the horror stories that some people tell about the bureaucracy here. In any case, I was still thinking about the future and the various shapes that the future is capable of taking and I realized that most of them, when we sit and imagine them, come out as being dystopias. Especially in this day and age of cynicism: every future is a dystopia of some sort waiting to happen, every utopia we can imagine must have some dark side to it. Why is that? Is it possible that the future is always unpredictable, meaning beyond our control, and therefore to be feared? Or is it the unknown part of the future that leads to the fear of it? This kind of thinking is what I imagine is responsible for the conservative movements continuous worship of the past. The notion that it was better before and so we should return to that is ingrained together with a fear of the future. It also seems like it has some kind of control elements to it: when everything is defined and understood; then it is safe. Isn’t that why we often dislike new art or new music? Because we haven’t fully been able to make sense of or understand it yet?

Perhaps it’s simpler than all of the above reasoning. We know too much about our past, we have seen what humans are capable of toward one another and toward nature; therefore we assume we will not get any better than we already are (and the idea that we are somehow doing better than before is dependant on what measurements are being taken and by whom).

Here is the reading list as it currently stands:

1. Der Kleine Brüder by Sven Regener (finished)

2. The Witches of Eastwick by John Updike (finished)

3. The Handmaid´s Tale by Margaret Atwood (currently reading)

4. Freedom by Jonathan Franzen (considering buying this after all the reviews it got)

5. Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer (non-fiction)

6. The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick (orig. Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said)

7. The 158-Pound Marriage by John Irving

8. Going After Cacciato by Tim O´Brien

9. The Green House by Mario Vargas Lhosa

10. Grimms Wörter by Günter Grass

11. Wait Until Spring, Bandini by John Fante

12. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick

13. Ubik by Philip K. Dick

14. The Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Philip K. Dick

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A Wild World or a post about international issues...

When I think of international affairs, I try to view the subject in terms of rational thinking. It would be wiser to say that I think of the areas of soft power, hard power, and diplomacy as areas where there is room for a lot of negotiation. This unfortunately leads to me thinking that every state actor is looking to achieve something that to them is logical and will increase their trade, security, etc. The problem with this thinking is when certain state actors seem to be insane. Take Russia for instance, whenever they are playing hardball about something its because their desires aren’t being realized enough to compromise on something with the US and usually when something decent is offered they are willing to work with it (the new Start treaty, though now its congress that is irrational).

This little monologue was designed to bring the topic to the state actor known globally as North Korea. For every day that goes by, it seems like the leaders of that country are more and more determined to blow themselves up and take the world with them. There has been a lot of talk about there being a new leader in the works and all, but that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t still be acting rationally. The whole idea behind having the nuclear option is so that you don’t have to use it. Essentially: the threat of the best possible offense is really a defense. So why are they suddenly shelling South Korea? Why did they sink that ship a few months ago? What are they hoping to achieve?

Is it possible that they live in an imaginative world where they can shell the South, take pictures of the smoke, and show it all to their citizens, suggesting that they are winning the fifty-year old conflict (date check please!)? Whatever it is that they are up to, it doesn’t look very positive for anyone involved.

Now, try translating this international view of rationality to the people involved with terrorism. Sure they have made their pleas pretty clear (every time we get a video from a cave somewhere), but there is no way that those demands are going to be met. This suggests that they are no longer operating under the guise of logic. In fact I am going to go ahead and say that they aren’t. They are operating under the guise of a religious dogma. I am not going to sit here and condemn religion, I am not a fan, but I don’t have a problem with people who chose to believe what they want to about the universe. What I do have a problem with however is when that belief threatens the lives of others. Perhaps what is most comical about the century we live in, is that a bunch of bearded men in a cave, somewhere in a desert, have the power to affect how we go to work some mornings-and all because they seem to think their god gave them a right to interfere. It’s a wild world.

Speaking of wild: when I moved back to Europe from the United States, Ireland was hailed as the prime example of how the free market could change a country and put it on a course to greatness. Well the bubble has popped, and to be honest I can see how it can be fun to watch a meltdown like this up close.

Jonathan Chait really enjoys the way that the right wing economists had written about Ireland then and now. I am a fan as well, especially since the joke is now on them.

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Monday Update

The weekend was a mix of work and pleasure and now that Monday is here, I find myself stuck with something like a cold/cough and the fact that I am expected to work a short shift tomorrow. That means I am going to have to hope for a good night´s rest and dream myself well. To put it another, more truthfull way: I am going to have to work while sick. The reality of that is that billions of people around the world do that daily. In many jobs or countries there are no sick absences allowed. Why, are you sick? Well we´ll just get someone else. Luckily for me that isn´t my case, but I still need the money.

The Germany-Sweden game ended a 0-0 draw. To put it another way: it was really boring, but because of its tight defensive strategy, it was exactly what Sweden needed after that 4-1 drubbing by the Netherlands. There will be no more Internationals untill January something. Until then, there will be the local leagues and Champions league to look forward too. Champions league is on tomorrow by the way.

The reading is slow this week, but maybe if I stay sick long enough I can saw through a few books here before December rears its ugly head. Christmas is looming as well, and I have no money whatsoever. Its looking like its going to have to be a very creative Christmas when it comes to gifts.

Ideas anyone?

As someone who bicycles daily (or did till my bike bit the big one) I found this article quite worth the read. Its always amusing to hear the types of negative responses that bicycling causes with car drivers.

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Imminent Friendly

Today, at 20:30 CET, the Swedish National Team is taking on the German National Team. I want to say a few things and make a prediction. Starting with the prediction seems like a good idea: 3-1 to Germany. Its true that Germany may be down a few superstars, but their replacements are, to say the least, more than adequate. Sweden will get a late goal and it will come from a cheap corner that Germany let them have when the game was over anyway. This is the last international of the year, the Germans don’t want to lose and the Swedes need to prove that they still have some fight left in them. I would love it if Sweden were able to eek out a draw. Denmark tied Germany 2-2 this year in Copenhagen, so it’s far from impossible.

From the Sweden squad, I am hoping that Oscar Wendt shows he can dominate at this level and that Ola Toivonen, Pontus Wernbloom, and Rasmus Elm also show it. Hamren, the Sweden coach has said he wants to see some attitude. I would like to see that as well. Too bad attitude won’t be enough.

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Let a Conservative tell you how it is...

There are times that I feel like I just sit here and harp on and on about the current conservative movement in the United States. I´m pretty sure I´ve covered every angle. Of course to be sure that my dear readers don´t just think that I am the only one seeing things this way, I bring you David Frum, former speech writer of President Bush, and I quote...

"Too often, conservatives dupe themselves. They wrap themselves in closed information systems based upon pretend information. In this closed information system, banks can collapse without injuring the rest of the economy, tax cuts always pay for themselves and Congressional earmarks cause the federal budget deficit. Even the market collapse has not shaken some conservatives out of their closed information system. It enfolded them more closely within it. This is how to understand the Glenn Beck phenomenon. Every day, Beck offers alternative knowledge — an alternative history of the United States and the world, an alternative system of economics, an alternative reality. As corporate profits soar, the closed information system insists that the free-enterprise system is under assault. As prices slump, we are warned of imminent hyperinflation. As black Americans are crushed under Depression-level unemployment, the administration’s policies are condemned by some conservatives as an outburst of Kenyan racial revenge against the white overlord."

Want more? Read it right from the horses mouth. I have to conclude I am impressed. Of course in no way do I agree with everything he is saying, but still its damn well written and has a good point.

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It’s going to be one of those weekends that contains a bit of work, a bit of play, and some of those in between things. Clara has an exhibition at a fair for green products and companies so I am going to help out with that. Then on Saturday I have to work from 15-19 or something like that. This evening I am helping set up the exhibition for starters. I am thinking about calling up a couple of friends for a beer or two, but we’ll see what happens.

I am planning on getting a lot of reading done this weekend and last night I managed to finish The 158 Pound Marriage by John Irving. I put that one down and began, this morning, to read Wait Until Spring, Bandini by John Fante (I am a growing fan of his work).

On to the reading list update:

1. Der Kleine Brüder by Sven Regener (finished)

2. The Witches of Eastwick by John Updike (finished)

3. The Handmaid´s Tale by Margaret Atwood (on order from the library)

4. Freedom by Jonathan Franzen (considering buying this after all the reviews it got)

5. Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer (non-fiction)

6. Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said by Philip K. Dick

7. The 158-Pound Marriage by John Irving

8. Going After Cacciato by Tim O´Brien

9. The Green House by Mario Vargas Lhosa

10. Grimms Wörter by Günter Grass

11. Wait Until Spring, Bandini by John Fante

The list is starting to grow, but the newest addition shouldn’t take more than a weekend to saw through.

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A free-market policy proposal for Alliansen

For those who read this blog, you are probably aware that I am not one of the bigger fans of the current Swedish government. While the respective parties have certainly come center to get the current majority that they have, and add to this that the left of center parties did a particularly pathetic job of selling their reasoning as to why they should be running the country, I am still not sold on a lot of the ideas. That having been said, I have a proposal for Alliansen, one that I think that even they should like: privatize the selling of alcohol in Sweden. To put it in other words: get rid of Systembolaget.

Now I do appreciate that the Systembolaget has a perfectly good selection of wine, hell its even better than most stores I have visited in Germany or the United States, but I don’t think the government has any business selling alcohol. Now if the pharmacies were sold off (which I was against for the sole reason that they would end up becoming chains and not do a whit of good for small business owners), and the company that produced Absolut Vodka (a company which made a profit no less), then I don’t see a good reason for holding onto Systemet. There would likely be a big kafuffle in the Riksdag about how all Swedes are natural born alcoholics and how they wouldn’t be able to handle buying beer past 20:00 on a Friday night. I just don’t buy this argument. I believe that behavioral patterns would change according to the situation and rules that would be put in place. Take the case of Germany: they love to drink but they also know how to work. One final note: regulate the market so that supermarket chains can´t buy up the market. Make it a small business thing.

Now to other things, namely the reading list. This is what it looks like as of this moment:

1. Der Kleine Brüder by Sven Regener (finished)

2. The Witches of Eastwick by John Updike (finished)

3. The Handmaid´s Tale by Margaret Atwood

4. Freedom by Jonathan Franzen (considering buying this after all the reviews it got)

5. Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer (non-fiction)

6. Flow my Tears, the Policeman Said by Philip K. Dick

7. A Widow for One Year by John Irving (switched to The 158 Pound Marriage)

8. Going After Cacciato by Tim O´Brien

9. The Green House by Mario Vargas Lhosa

10. Grimms Wörter by Günter Grass

Of course as I said I may or may not be able to read all these books before Christmas.

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Name-calling

I am in the midst of some form of political debate on Facebook, which is a really bad idea in the best of times. I won’t give all the details here but let me say that the debater has suggested that the President is a socialist. I would like to mention before going any further that the President before was called a fascist. Neither is correct. To use such terms out of context and without proper background is to cheapen the arguments made by either side (and to cheapen the suffering of those who were oppressed in such systems). In the case of Obama he bailed out Wall Street and kept the automotive industry alive (something that his predecessor was quite happy to do as well as I recall). Now when he enacted a health care reform that was eerily similar to the Republican suggestion in 1994 and also to that of former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney he is a socialist? That is weak tea by any standards.

This is all before we go into definitions of what Socialist really means: the political ideology that the means of production should be owned publicly (or common owned) and regulated as such. What I continuously fail to see in the United States is this actually taking place. The case of General Motors could be used here, but that is also being put back on the market because the government doesn’t want to be involved in things like running a business. The democrat idea then is to regulate private industry (like all governments have always done) through laws and/or taxes (carrots and sticks). The degree of the regulation required is the difference between the parties and not that they are massively opposed sides in a war for the American soul (as the radio show hosts would like to paint the whole thing). Both sides want what’s best for America. Is this really so hard to understand?

To add to the healthcare question, if the insurance companies had done such a good job, then there wouldn’t have been a need for government interference. However as the health care system in the United States affects the government, it was therefore the government’s job to act to reduce its deficit and to better the ways that American citizens are treated. The Obama plan did that really well on paper so lets give it time to work in reality. There was no public option because a. it would have been impossible to get in the senate and b. I don’t think Obama believes in that because he as he himself has demonstrated in other policy: he is a capitalist.

Can we stop name-calling as a way to disagree over policy? Lets talk about numbers instead of listening to blowhards tell us who is good and who is evil. I think the American people are smart enough to decide these things by themselves.

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Musings of a Thursday

Unbelievable I just managed to lose an entire post just as I finished it. The main point of the post that should be here is that the Republican Party should really thank their chief strategist for his work this election cycle. The Democrats should start demanding that the President illustrate why the choices made were necessary and stop letting the Republicans control that debate in the media.

I also wanted to recommend the book I am currently reading: The Witches of Eastwick by John Updike. It has been pure magic so far (pun intended).

Also, today, I have been musing over why American Evangelicals are so entwined with the Republican and conservative movements. It is something that I completely fail to understand. How does Ayn Rand mix with the Bible? I am at a loss.

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P.S. Great read for today: by Gail Collins at the NY Times

P.P.S. Another thing to check out: by Paul Krugman at the NY Times

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Welcome to the Flood

Lets dig a bit deeper into the results of election night. The Republican Tsunami was there all right and yet it didn’t get the Senate. That means that we are in some kind of a deadlock. Somebody is going to have to play ball to make things happen. Who that someone is remains to be seen, as does what the offers and ideas are that are to be played over.

Remember that when any party (in the US only two are really represented on paper) gains a majority, it means that a significant proportion of its members are part of what could be called true party supporters and the rest are some form of loose coalition members (the Blue Dog Democrats are this to the Democratic Party). So now the Republicans have to deal with a bunch of people that they might not have to during their time in the opposition. In other words they have added to their majority by opening their arms to people who are not the usual Republican fit. The Tea Party fits this role.

For those Democratic supporters who were bitter because they hadn’t been given a cake that they could have and eat as well by Obama, and therefore didn’t vote I say this: shame on you. You have put back the chance to make real change once again. I had a lot of hope in 2008, in 2010 not as much, but I still voted because a Republican future is not something that I have any interest in being a part of.

To belabor a point that needs to be exhausted beyond anything else in the circus that is America: fear, ignorance, and hate won an election. To those who voted based on those things it’s really sad that you call yourselves Americans. In a century where information and knowledge seems to be just the click of a mouse away, we seem to be turning to garbage more and more often. Europe is laughing, and while the typical Republican thing would be to ask snidely who are they, I find myself thinking that they have every reason to laugh. A country that takes Tea Partiers and their queen Sarah Palin this seriously deserves to be laughed at.

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The Big Day

At this point it’s too late to start wondering what could have been. The elections are upon us and the predictions are only pointing one way. The Democrats might as well go ahead and put a disaster stamp in the party’s history book for this chapter. I for one have been impressed with what they have accomplished, and I am not some person who believes that change happens overnight. The Republican Party will at best take the House and the Senate today and at worst only takes the House. That will be enough to bring a gloom to my hope for further progressive change. We will see stagnation in American politics as the Republicans bask in their conquest and then realize that it won’t be as easy as they had thought all this time. The Tea Party will be frothing at the mouth like zombies over their shoulders and when they misstep they will pay for it.

I wonder how long it takes before they go centrist? Will they compromise? What will compromise cost them? How long before the coalition they have built frays? It’s going to be a very interesting two years to say the least.

I am ashamed of my country. I had big hopes after the cowboy was gone that we were going in the right direction, that reason and intellect might even be something to admire once again. I was wrong. People like Glenn Beck, Limbaugh, and Hannity exist on the airwaves because people are willing to listen to that garbage. They want their politicians and policies to be as simple as a two hour-long radio show. They want to know who to hate. Hate is something that is growing in America. Its strange how instead of moving forward and trying to improve our lives we have turned to hating our neighbors, to blaming them for our bad choices, and hating on anyone and anything that comes from outside our own limited spheres of knowledge. Der Spiegel has an article today about the end of the American Dream. Its one of the most frank and forthright articles I have read about America in a long time. I recommend it to everyone who reads this blog. The gist of it is this: Americans have lived beyond their means for decades now. They used to brag about it to the rest of the world. Now economic reality has finally caught up with them and instead of change they are just going to get mad and vote for the same party that encouraged the bad behavior from the beginning.

I hope everyone who is reading this is voting today.

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A Tsunami, a reading list, and the great adventure

Its Monday today. Tomorrow is Tuesday any which way you want to turn it. Tomorrow is also election day in the US. According to most reports (thus began a sentence that would be frowned on by most high school teachers) the Democrats are heading for a pounding at the bottom of a Tsunami like wave of Republican resurgence. Time is the lesson that American politicians and strategists aren´t learning very well from. In a two party system you can beat your opponent to a pulp. To use another boxing metaphor: you can even have the luxury of having him out on his feet. The problem is there is no way to deliver a real knock-out blow. Leaving the boxing metaphors aside, its worth remembering that both parties are known to come back strong from what is about to happen tomorrow. The Democrats had a good run and while I personally felt they got a lot done (though I would have preferred more) a lot of people don´t share my sentiment. Now let the Republican resurgence take on the arrogant tone of the winner and may they be like that famous wolf who huffed and puffed but couldn´t blow the brick house down.

On a side note, we are now going to hear a never ending stream about how they are going to really cut government spending and how its really going to make America more free and richer and so on etc etc. Now we turn to a former governor of Florida Jeb Bush for the most idiotic quote of the day: "The only privilege that I was born with was to be a citizen of the greatest nation in human history." I wonder if he came up with that himself or if he had some speech writer do it for him. Either way its about the most preposterous thing I have heard someone like that say in a while. The man was born with a silver spoon in his mouth to say the least. This is the dumbest thing I have heard in a long time.

I finished Der Kleine Brüder by Sven Regener and have since moved on to Cannery Row by Steinbeck in German. After/during that I have Updike´s The Witches of Eastwick to look forward to and honestly I think I will start it pretty soon (as in tonight).

In other news that might be interesting I am no longer a pizza baker. Due to disagreements between employer and employee I now find myself in a search for a new job. Any clues or hints or flat out great ideas would be kindly appreciated.

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P. S. I also picked up an old classic: For a Few Dollars More. Little did I know that it was starring the legendary/infamous Klaus Kinski. Hell, had I not seen that I might not have checked it out.

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