monitoring the abyss

Ultimately, I guess we have to face the fact that we live in a global society of irrational madmen. Well, I should be more inclusive and mention the madwomen, as well.

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I don't suppose there are any exceptions -- though our conceit is otherwise, human beings are irrational beings who merely happen to have the capability of applying logic to a problem. Which, in a sense, merely makes us dangerous as a species. We can use logic to assist us in carrying out completely irrational goals.

So, the headline of my local newspaper today was that, "Iran launch elevates fears."

What? Next the news propagandists will be claiming that we should fear Iran because its agricultural production is up and so they have the potential of feeding more military recruits.

So, in any event, the irrational fear in the minds of lunatics has been elevated by an entirely peaceful technological achievement. The same sort that lets us call OnStar and use a GPS to find Grandma's house.

Who are these loons? Why, "the U.S. and other nations." Personally, I suspect that adding the "s" on the end of "nation" is a bit of hyperbole.

In any event, there is no "elevation of fear" at my house, especially as there was no fear to elevate in the first place. Readers of my blog (if there were some) would be well aware that I have lots of rational fears -- ones tied to the collapsing world economy. I do not have any time or energy to waste being fearful of a country that never attacks anyone. My fear of nations attacking is (somewhat rationally) related to the historical proclivity to attack, combined with the size of the nation's GDP and the percentage of that GDP allocated to war.

The ADL claims that 71% of a well-known ethnic group supports the Israeli carnage in Gaza. It's unlikely one should trust ADL polling, but if true you have the ironic situation of a people known for their logical skills -- who were intimately involved in fashioning the post-WII international rules of war -- fully supporting war crimes, genocide and ethnic cleansing of epic proportions as defined by the very laws they championed a generation or so earlier.

But, of course, such a course of action is fully consistent with the human characteristic of being irrational mad-persons.