August Catchup

Mark Wylie

I’m overwhelmed. What to write about first? What to say? In the meantime, the balls bouncing around in my head

• Humanity’s efforts to slow down climate change have been a complete fail. We’re in free fall. Richard Crim explains the data. Civilizations in the past have fallen because people try to get to places where they won’t die from heat/cold and/or starvation. We’re used to kids washing up on the shores of Europe as their families try to get them to safety. Every Western nation is surrounded by people desperate to get in. What happens when it’s that x10? x100? What if World War is as certain as ant colonies fighting? It’s hard to write about anything else when it seems trivial next to this.
• The Chinese dream of home ownership has ended. The Chinese dream of becoming the next Jack Ma seems to have ended. Can the CCP bring it back? A total unknown.
• Democracies like the United States have not died to defend democracy in Ukraine. Why would they do so in Asia?
• Women have not boycotted anti-abortion forces which says what?
• Chinese lockdowns are wrong. So are Western free-for-alls. Both sides are trying to get the other to pay for the downsides of their choices. Diplomacy gets worse.
• Debt (and its kissing-cousin, wealth inequality) from the pandemic has not been resolved. If we’re the Titanic. That’s the ice-berg.
• I don’t see an end to inflation any time soon therefore I do not see an end to rising interest rates. Most believe weakening demand will lead to lower prices but I see that as a weak force against the demographics of supply (productivity). If I have to write all these sentences in one bullet point I can’t possibly know what the f_ is going on.
• Ukraine has desensitized the West to the atrocities of war. Rising U.S. domestic violence from individuals doesn’t help. Like many, I fear an out-of-control feedback loop between the two.
• If religious cults have reached into the U.S. Supreme Court think what must be happening in the rest of the world.
• War is acceptable.
• Babies born of rape is acceptable.
• Starvation is acceptable.

Just another Tuesday for humanity?

Mark Wylie