To conspiracy theorists, it all fits together

Despite the fact that the messy pro-democracy upheaval in the Middle East will actually make the world safer by ridding the region of the dictators driving the hoi polloi into the arms of Al Qaeda, to right-wing conspiracy nuts It's All Part of the New World Order's Master (and they do mean master) Plan -- so says the latest post from the Shit Hits The Fan blog, Turning Off the Tap: Population Reduction Through Designed Economic Collapse.

According to their conspiracy theory, the rebellions in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and other lands are all part of a plan by "banksters [sic], the oil cartel and ... Wall Street" to "(drive) up prices for essentials like food and energy to the breaking point, ... shaking every nation on earth to its core. The effect of such manipulation seems destined to lead toward a severe reduction in numbers of the human population, and a tightening of control over those who remain."

Yes, depopulation! That's all part of it! Of course, this prophecy depends on the vast majority of the population losing its mind and reducing itself through riots and unrest to a fragment. Or as they put it:

The oil and Wall Street powers seem satisfied to allow the civil unrest to spread in order to feed their greed for higher oil prices and resulting control. Surely they recognize that higher oil prices will suck the remaining wealth out of the poor and middle classes around the world. This scenario will obviously cause starvation, illness, and other life-shortening effects, as increasing numbers join the ranks of the poor... and the poor have no where [sic] else to go.

Obviously. Of course, there's no evidence that the events of the last couple of months are the result of outside influence from anyone other than democracy-minded people themselves. Secondly, it seems odd for a cabal of "banksters" and other members of a shadowy financial oligarchy -- of course "Wall Street" is simply modern crypto-fascist code for "the Jews" -- to launch a global takeover by means of increased democracy. Thirdly, if there are "Jews" behind countless democratic Arab movements, that would be very strange. And finally, there is no evidence that anyone is losing their minds as a result of the turmoil, except maybe Moammar Gadhafi. In fact, newly-freed zones seem to be taking up the challenge of self-governance with optimism and a reasonable amount of decorum.

But an essential part of the conspiracy theorist's practice is to ignore everything that doesn't fit the theory's template. For them, the conspiracy is constantly in the process of proving itself true.

Warren Buffett also a collapsitarian?

Financial guru Warren Buffett, who in this generation fills the same niche as Billy Graham did in the 1960s and 1970s, this week issued an annual letter to shareholders of his company in which he said:

The prophets of doom have overlooked the all-important factor that is certain: Human potential is far from exhausted, and the American system for unleashing that potential -- a system that has worked wonders for over two centuries despite frequent interruptions for recessions and even a Civil War -- remains alive and effective. Now, as in 1776, 1861, 1932 and 1941, America's best day's lie ahead."

Oh, great. It's like he thinks everyone wiped their forehead in 1865 at the end of the Civil Way and said, "All right -- the system worked!" People in 1932 -- "The Dust Bowl and 40% unemployment? Is that all you got!? Happy days are here again!"

(Indeed, the song Happy Days Are Here Again -- written in 1929 -- appeared in no fewer than 19 films from 1930 to 1932, and was the theme for FDR's first presidential campaign. No doubt Buffett remembers it from that -- oh, he was only 2 at the time. But it's interesting to think that this happy little song, which is associated with American optimism in the depths of the Depression, might summarize Buffett's thinking.)

Does this make you feel optimistic about investing in the stock market? The company you invest in might be burned to the ground. And it isn't that far from what the dystopian collapsitarians are saying. (See my post from November, 'End Is Near' warning just as timely as it was a year ago!)

Books I read: "Red Lights" by Georges Simenon; "Let the Great World Spin" by Column McCann

I spent the weekend reading one of Georges Simenon's American novels, Red Lights (Feux Rouges, 1953). The book is about a couple who quarrel on a road trip and are separated, each of them encountering, at different times, an escaped convict. As usual for Simenon's romans durs (or "hard" novels, a phrase he used to distinguish them from lighter genre fare, particularly his endless series of Maigret detective novels), the story is a tense psychological thriller, bearing down on the spirit of an ordinary man until he breaks.

Filled with mid-century period detail -- the casual practice (if not exactly acceptance) of drunken driving, the difficulty of interstate travel before the interstate highway system, the insanely manual nature of a long-distance telephone call, and the utterly strange mixture of casualness and strictness of the hospitals of the time -- the book is also a curiously off look at American culture. The Belgian author composed the book while living in the U.S. for several years between 1945 and 1955*, and he gets many things right, but there are also many other details which receive a weird emphasis or which are simply wrong. (Adding to the strangeness was the fact that the copy I procured was a British edition and contained an occasional British spelling, such as tyre.) But even though these missteps occasionally were jarring, I didn't really mind them because the pacing and plotting were so effective. A Simenon book is a universe unto itself, rendered in complete detail (and not a detail more than necessary); once inside, the reader surrenders all disbelief.

Just before this, I read another novel of American life by a foreigner, "Let the Great World Spin" by Column McCann, an Irish writer. While the book uses as its centerpiece the World Trade Center tightrope walk by Philippe Petit, none of the characters in the book, except for the judge in whose court he appears after the escapade, ever meets the acrobat. Instead they are people who watched it, or more often merely heard about it. Their lives, ranging from Bronx street hookers to a Park Avenue matron, are decidedly earthbound; the transcendence of Petit's feat is a major contrast.

Looked at from this perspective in 2011, these two books -- one set in the early 1950s, the other in the mid 1970s -- are both set in the long-ago past, and drew my attention to the amount of change that has occurred in the years since. Aside from McCann's excellent writing, which in its way is just as intense and insightful about the human spirit as the dark work of Simenon, I was very much struck by how much New York changed from 1974 -- during the depths of its gritty decay, pre-Saturday Night Live, pre-Times Square cleanup, pre-Yankees resurgence, pre-almost everything we associate with New York these days -- to today. Of course, the subtext is that it is also pre-Nine Eleven, but in drawing attention to the World Trade Center itself, not to mention hinting at the amount of planning and subterfuge that went into staging the tightrope walk between the Twin Towers, it foreshadows their identity as a backdrop for world historical events.

Finally, what struck me was the complete lack of reluctance of non-American authors to take on the American landscape. It makes me feel better about my portrait of Bangalore in my unpublished novel Mango Rain.

* This 1953 Paris Match article sets a profile of Simenon in the house where he lived when writing "Red Lights."

We infest the planet

Why exactly do all the aliens seem to come to Earth? Or, more specifically, superheroes of Earth or invasions of Earth? I'm not entirely sure about this but I think there are two reasons. One, we infest the planet. There are billions of us all over the planet and we keep reproducing. Very big harvest for aliens! Also, according to these comics, there is a ridiculously large amount of superpowered people here. Something that confuses me is why aliens would come to these people -- seeing as there are probably other people who could do the same sorts of tasks?

So saith a friend's child. Hell of a good question, really. Since aliens by definition can travel through space, and thus can choose to go anywhere, why do they all come here?

Not much remains

As my friends know, for a few years last decade I had the honor of being represented by a real literary agent. However, my novel Make Nice failed to sell; then my agent quit the agency and the business, leaving me high and dry without an agent -- a state in which I still find myself. (I recount the tale at greater length here.) A little while after that, the agency's most famous client, David Foster Wallace, killed himself.

Now comes the news that the founder of the agency, whom I recall having met very briefly in my one and only visit to the office, has died.

I was so dumb when I was a client of the agency that I didn't even know Wallace was a client. And I had to read the founder's obit today to know about other well-known clients. I'm not sure what to do with this fact -- that the agency was better known than I realized at the time. It didn't do me much good in the end, though my agent was successful in getting my book looked at by major publishing houses. Maybe they recognized the name of the agency, maybe that's the reason they looked at it. Anyway, realizing all this years later just makes me feel stupid.

All you need to know about the early 21st Century bourgeoisie

There's a piece on the Bay Citizen website this morning, Meet Your (Sustainable) Chocolate Farmers. The author, Tara Duggan, opens with this unappetizing lede:

When I hear that chocolate is produced in an unethical manner, I'd rather swallow knives than hear reasons why I shouldn't enjoy one of my favorite foods. But with Valentine's Day approaching, I thought it was time to face up to the labor issues around cocoa farming.

If I may unpack that:

1. She occasionally hears that one of her favorite foods, chocolate, is sometimes "produced in an unethical manner."
2. In order to keep from hearing this discouraging news, she'd "rather swallow knives."
   
   Actually it seems strange that to keep from hearing something one would swallow knives; it would be more logical to stick those knives into one's ears. But I guess that if one swallowed them, the discomfort might be so distracting that one couldn't pay attention to bad news about candy. Anyway:
    
   
3. Valentine's Day is approaching, and as a journalist, she's hard put to come up with a piece linked to the holiday.
4. What better time to face her fears about the conditions under which chocolate is produced?

Here we have the ingredients of the perfect Bay Area foodie post: transgressiveness (chocolate is bad for you), trendiness (chocolate is looked upon by foodies as a gourmet item, at least potentially), liberal guilt, and pop psychology (let's face our fears!). That the fears in question have not to do with facing the rubber truncheons of the Egyptian secret police, or the dank cells of Chinese prisons, or even the comparatively comfortable but difficult decision to, say, put your mother in a "care facility," doesn't make them easier to bear. They are fears nonetheless.

Right, then. How wonderful that the writer is able to assuage her consternation by discovering a free trade grower's cooperative in Ghana, owned and operated by colorfully dressed women (a close examination of the picture reveals they are wearing dresses imprinted with the logo of their co-op). And what's more, they are not wasting their profits on skin-lightening cream or anything Westerners might disapprove of; they are practicing democratic socialism at its finest:

Their fair trade agreement allows them extra money to create additional income generation projects for the villages, such as making soap.

Soap for the villages! It's a win-win for everyone.

As for the internal conflict of eating candy, that's taken care of by the fact that it's a holiday anyway. On Valentine's Day you may eat chocolate, while reading the inevitable newspaper and magazine features that assure you it's good for you in small quantities. And at the prices we pay for gourmet chocolate, small quantities are all we can afford anyway.

Now don't you feel bad about eating those M&Ms in the break room? For shame.