Every time I set foot in the First World, I feel like the Last Man. It starts, as if filmed by a student of Kusturica’s, with the guards by the X-ray machine at the airport checking the shoes of my two-year-old for plastic explosive. That, and the ritual command to “remove the belt,” is the great propylaea to the world beyond Palermo. They are afraid the traveler will hang himself with the belt while they screen him.
Or at least col aereo. After 13 days of wasting hours –and money–on renewing my passport, it arrived this morning in time to proceed with plans to fly to Munich for a ridiculously long layover…….
A friend and reader writes in to ask what is going in Texas, where Governor Abbott is trying to control the border with Mexico. Isn’t this unconstitutional, he asks, since the Federal government is responsible for maintaining the border?
I remember reading somewhere that the Japanese, whose diet in historically rich in soy, have a preternaturally high level of estrogen in their bodies. Soybeans have a high concentration of isoflavones, plant estrogens known as phytoestrogens and similar in function to the human hormone. Soy isoflavones, notably genistein, bind to estrogen receptors in the body.
The immediate burdens of empire are born by the conquered subjects, but in the long run it has the people of the imperial nation that find themselves overtaxed to support the endless wars and swamped by subject peoples, allies, or just about anyone who can get to the frontier.
The Republican Establishment has been jumping on the Trumpwagon as his nomination by the party becomes inevitable. Any early scheming to push him off because of the lawsuits mostly has evaporated. Nikki still is howling she’ll keep her campaign going. Even as she lost last night in New Hampshire.
Once upon a time, when working class people had skills and practical wisdom and the educated classes actually studied subjects closer to reality than the race and gender fantasies that give college presidencies to people like Claudine Gray….
You could read FOX News or Tucker Carlson for the rest of your life, and while you might hear echoes of any number of conspiracy theories—Carlson sounds more like Glen Beck and Alex Jones every day—but never hint that the country’s problems cannot be reduced to the machinations of evil Democrats and weak-spined Rinos.
In this episode, Dr. Fleming critiques the Denis Villeneuve-directed, Taylor Sheridan-written film Sicario, which he characterizes as a comic book take on some of the themes of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian. Homework for the next episode: Wind River.
