A great and mostly unknown prophet of our time is Michael Young, whose book “The Rise of the Meritocracy,” published way back in 1958, popularized the term in its title and predicted, in its fictional vision of the 21st century, meritocracy’s unhappy destination: not the serene rule of the deserving and talented, but a society where a ruling class selected for intelligence but defined by arrogance and insularity faces a roiling populism whose grievances shift but whose anger at the new class order is a constant.
This is surreal.
I mean I remember the Iraq war. The first one, the Bush I one. Where you turned on the TV and saw the SCUD missiles and the explosions. But that was before America took its right turn, before the multiple truths, when we still believed that the U.S. was an unbeatable paradise/power.
And before that we had Tiananmen Square. But this was before they built MacBooks in China. We still saw China as being backward, thought most of the country was still working in rice paddies. Today China is on course to supersede the U.S., by virtue of the number of people if nothing else. That’s a huge market. And those people have money.
But war…
We didn’t used to start them. But then Bush II went into Iraq, to change the regime, and now regime change is an issue in the United States.
I’ve got to ask. Would Tucker Carlson be for Ukraine if Biden was not? Is that what it’s come down to, you say black, so I say white?
As for truth…
For the first 15 years of my life, I never heard the word “homosexuality” in my home or school. I only knew about sex at all because in my Catholic primary school, we had a class on the immaculate conception, and I was the smart-ass who asked what a maculate one would mean.
In the end, the Ottawa occupiers were left literally waving white flags.
Over the last few months, a conversation I had 30 years ago keeps popping into my consciousness. It was the end of the Cold War, and a post-Soviet Russian state was on the horizon. I remember talking with a journalist friend about the astonishing potential of that turn of events: the return of Russia as a great power, returning to its ancient nationhood and old religion, moving away from communism, and resuming a major role in world and European affairs. Probably not a democracy, but no longer totalitarian, and worth engaging with as an authoritarian power.
Someone out there really, really wants to help me avoid expensive car problems.
Their recorded voice tells me that they’ve been trying to reach me about an extended warranty my car doesn’t have, yet which is somehow about to expire. I just have to press 1 to learn more. They’re persistent: I get multiple calls a day from multiple phone numbers across the country.
The Boeing Documentary
“Downfall: The Case Against Boeing”: https://bit.ly/3gZx6hC
You want to watch this. On Netflix.
I’ve had a fascination with aircraft ever since my first jet flight on a Boeing 720B. We all knew the 707, it substituted for “jet” the same way “Kleenex” substitutes for “tissue.” Hell, ultimately Steve Miller sang a song about it. So what was a 720B?
A New York attorney representing a wealthy art collector called his client."I have some good news, and I have some bad news."The art collector replied, "I've had an awful day. Give me the good news first."The lawyer said, "Well, I met with your wife today, and she informed me that she just invested $5,000 in two pictures that she thinks will bring a minimum of $15 million to $20 million, and I think she could be right."Saul replied enthusiastically, "Well done! My wife is a brilliant businesswoman! You've just made my day. Now I know I can handle the bad news. What is it?"The lawyer replied, "The pictures are of you and your secretary."
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