Political Change and Personal Lives
I sent in my vote for the US elections today. Yesterday, I went to vote in a British Columbia by-election for the provincial legislature. 70 years before yesterday, October 29, 1938, we had been woken up by loud banging on our door at 5 a.m. A group of brownshirts (SA) came in, commanded by a non-uniformed man (Gestapo?). We were made to dress and taken away. It was the last time I saw the Dortmund house where I had been born 13 years earlier. It was destroyed by bombs during the war they started 10 months later.
The day before that had been pretty normal, starting with school at the Ludendorff Schule, formerly Oberrealschule, then playing football (soccer) and such. The day after, we woke up on the ground opposite the railroad station of Zbaszyn, a Polish border town, among dozens of other Jewish families from all over Germany. We were not allowed to leave the small town for the Polish interior for many months, some until just before the war started. There had been no political changes we knew of that could have been responsible for the abrupt change in our personal fortunes. The takeover of Austria ("Anschluss") had happened half a year earlier and hadn't affected our lives. But there had been things happening that we weren't aware of; and much more to come.
(Continued November 3.)
The US presidential elections tomorrow are to lead to major real change affecting people's life regardless of which of the two candidates allowed in practice wins; if you believe their campaign speeches. If you know how little those tend to mean after the election is over, you discount them now, even though both probably meant it honestly, at least in part and in principle. Most polls predict an Obama victory, which would mean I voted for the winners in all three elections this month.
Even if he ends up with a majority in both houses of Congress, I doubt that he will be permitted to advance substantially toward the only real solution to recurring energy crises and climate change: reliance on our continuous energy income from the sun, the wind it powers, the water cycle it drives, etc, last not least its direct radiant energy. The anti-solar interests made so much money from the oil bubble while most others lost that their corruptive powers may be greater than ever. To John McCain's credit, he was unusual for a major politician in using the word corruption for such corruption. It would be interesting if he could be put in charge of countering it; e.g. as Attorney General. But don't bet on it.
On foreign policy. prospects seem similar; some improvement, but limited in relation to need. If that is all that will happen in the Israeli- Arab/Palestinian conflict the net result could be catastrophic; with effects on many personal lives comparable to those with which this posting got started.
The day before that had been pretty normal, starting with school at the Ludendorff Schule, formerly Oberrealschule, then playing football (soccer) and such. The day after, we woke up on the ground opposite the railroad station of Zbaszyn, a Polish border town, among dozens of other Jewish families from all over Germany. We were not allowed to leave the small town for the Polish interior for many months, some until just before the war started. There had been no political changes we knew of that could have been responsible for the abrupt change in our personal fortunes. The takeover of Austria ("Anschluss") had happened half a year earlier and hadn't affected our lives. But there had been things happening that we weren't aware of; and much more to come.
(Continued November 3.)
The US presidential elections tomorrow are to lead to major real change affecting people's life regardless of which of the two candidates allowed in practice wins; if you believe their campaign speeches. If you know how little those tend to mean after the election is over, you discount them now, even though both probably meant it honestly, at least in part and in principle. Most polls predict an Obama victory, which would mean I voted for the winners in all three elections this month.
Even if he ends up with a majority in both houses of Congress, I doubt that he will be permitted to advance substantially toward the only real solution to recurring energy crises and climate change: reliance on our continuous energy income from the sun, the wind it powers, the water cycle it drives, etc, last not least its direct radiant energy. The anti-solar interests made so much money from the oil bubble while most others lost that their corruptive powers may be greater than ever. To John McCain's credit, he was unusual for a major politician in using the word corruption for such corruption. It would be interesting if he could be put in charge of countering it; e.g. as Attorney General. But don't bet on it.
On foreign policy. prospects seem similar; some improvement, but limited in relation to need. If that is all that will happen in the Israeli- Arab/Palestinian conflict the net result could be catastrophic; with effects on many personal lives comparable to those with which this posting got started.
posted by solar_sol | 10:27 PM
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