Christmas Day I wrote about my appreciation for O Come, Emmanuel, because I think it captures the biblical story better than most Advent songs. Jeffrey Barbeau has some good thoughts in is humorously titled Don’t Let N. T. Wright Steal Christmas!
Peter Leithart, remarking on the trendsetting biblical criticism of N.
T. Wright, has questioned the way that many (presumably English)
Christmas hymns fail to capture the political and social context of the
birth of Jesus Christ. Leithart claims that Advent hymns (unlike
Christmas hymns) capture the here and now. Advent hymns declare, in this
way, a crisp, prophetic vision towards a world gone astray: “They are
deeply and thoroughly and thrillingly political. Advent hymns look
forward not to heaven but the redemption of Israel and of the nations, the coming of God’s kingdom on earth.”
For
Leithart, we would all be better off ridding ourselves of hymns that
fail to include the deeply political and social aspects of the original
Christmas story. “Wright is no Grinch,” he claims. “He didn’t steal
Christmas. What he stole was a false Christmas, a de-contextualized and
apolitical Christmas. But we shouldn’t have bought that Christmas in the
first place, and should have been embarrassed to display it so proudly
on the mantle. Good riddance, and Bah humbug.”
As one who studies
the literature of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Christianity (the
period that gave us so many of our great English hymns), I must admit
that some of Leithart’s critique rings true. Indeed, some of our most
beloved hymns contain precisely the kind of otherworldly message that
Leithart deplores.
Before we call for a moratorium on Christmas
hymns, however, let’s remember that these hymns often contain powerful
reminders of profound and, I daresay, eschatological change. We would be
wise to listen. ...
If you look behind the often dire headlines and examine the long-term trends, you'll see that crime is falling, lifespans are increasing, and poverty is ebbing. In other words, there's solid evidence for hope.
There's much more good news than bad news. But bad news travels fast and
commands attention. Good news is like water carving a valley or a tree
gradually extending its branches. Good news is a child learning a little
more each day or a business quietly prospering. We hardly notice it.
Examine the data over time, and you'l find irrefutable evidence of
progress: the decline of war and violent crime, the increase in life
spans; the spread of literacy, democracy, and equal rights; the waning
of privilege based on race, gender, heredity, beliefs (Jina Moore and a
team of Monitor writers say this much more specifically in our cover
story: "Progress Watch 2012").
Every so often there are vivid scenes of good news -- Neil Armstrong bouncing onto the moon, revelers atop the Berlin Wall, Nelson Mandela walking out of Robben Island prison. But most of the time good news is incremental, which causes it to be taken for granted.
Not
bad news. When we hear it, we sit up and ask, "What just happened?"...
... And
when there's a shortage of bad news in the present, we can always turn
to the future. Welcome to worry, dread, and pessimism. Sure, things seem
OK now, but just over the horizon a disaster is brewing. Don't be a
sap. Bad things are on the way.
They probably are. And they'll
shock us and again make us wonder if life is out of control. But in this
last issue of our news magazine for 2012, we're looking in the rearview
mirror to see how things are going, and we're finding plenty of reason
for hope. ...
"... The first kind of Christianity avoids reactionary authoritarianism
but is often a therapeutic or vanilla mush that fails to ask anything of
anybody out of fear of giving offense. The second kind of Christianity
offers stern, clear moral directives that attract people seeking the
“specific instruction, even confrontation that calls us to grow in
discipleship” (p. 6), but disastrously embraces right-wing ideology and
baptizes that as the content of Christianity.
Both of these versions of Christianity are so deeply flawed, says
Stassen, that both are contributing to the alarming spread of secularism
in the U.S. The first version of Christianity is so thin as to lack any
particular reason why one would want to get out of bed on Sunday and go
to church; the second is so reactionary as to drive thoughtful people
into an anti-religious posture if they conclude that religion equals
right-wing authoritarianism.
I believe this is a stark but actually quite accurate depiction of
the primary problems afflicting the Protestantisms of the left and of
the right in the current U.S. setting. ..."
"While not exclusive to Latin America, the culture of family, support,
and living a life to spend time with your family, I think, is an
important part of Latin American culture that keeps people positive.
Being with those close to you and finding other friends and partners
that value that way of life is a key part of Latin American culture.
That might be the main reason why people remain positive: they are never
truly alone. Interestingly, many discussions and documentaries about
immigrant groups in the United States
show an internal conflict among many who move to the US and who do not
wish to lose their support systems in a new culture rooted in
individualism. While being motivated and entrepreneurial is valued, a
life being with your family, where you are never truly alone, is the
basis for many cultures in many parts of the world. Many new Americans
frown on the thought that children can detach themselves from their
family at 18 years of age. They believe people can only truly thrive as a
family."
"A Pew Internet Research Center survey released Thursday found that the
percentage of Americans aged 16 and older who read an e-book grew from
16 percent in 2011 to 23 percent this year. Readers of traditional books
dropped from 72 percent to 67 percent. Overall, those reading books of
any kind dropped from 78 percent to 75 percent, a shift Pew called
statistically insignificant."
Puerto Rico, Vermont, and Rhode Island are the only states (and territory) that saw a net decrease in population over the year.
The fastest growing region was the South (1.06% population growth) followed by the West (1.03% population growth).
North Dakota and the District of Columbia had the highest population growth, with 2.5% and 2.3% population growth, respectively. Texas, Wyoming, and Utah also saw major growth.
West Virginia and Maine are the only two states where people are dying faster than they are being born, with 0.93 and 0.99 births for each death.
Utah (3.44) and Alaska (3.33) had the highest birth to death ratio in 2012. That means 3.44 babies were born for each death in Utah.
Domestic migration determines the rate that people leave and enter states to and from other states. Per capita, more natives left New York, Illinois, New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode Island to move somewhere else than any other states.
On the other hand, people flocked to North Dakota, D.C., Wyoming and South Carolina.
The states that had the highest rates of international migration — that is, the rate of immigrants coming in — were Hawaii, New Jersey, Florida, New York and D.C.
Puerto Rico is seeing a massive exodus — 1% of their population left last year.
15. When we think of transportation in the United States, few of us think about river and costal water transportation. Yet a great many goods and commodities are shipped on our rivers. The Midwest drought is having an impact on a major artery of that transportation network. The Mississippi River's Water Levels Are Dropping, And Could Shut Down Trade Next Week
"In other words, Americans are increasingly likely to have to purchase
and replace these goods some time soon as they get more and more worn
out. That's bullish for spending, jobs, and the economy as a whole."
"... Yet a few differences between the sexes do seem to hold up to scrutiny. One is spatial abilities. If men look at an object, for example, they are slightly faster at guessing what it would look like if it were rotated 180 degrees. There are plenty of women who do better than individual men. But overall there’s a stasticially significant difference in their average performance. This kind of difference carries over from one culture to another. It’s even detectable in babies. ...
... Whenever we reflect on human evolution, it pays to compare our species to other animals. And in the case of spatial abilities, the comparison is fascinating. Almost a century ago, the psychologist Helen Hubbet found that male rats could get through a maze faster than females. The difference can also be found in a number of other species. ...
... Clint and his colleagues propose a different explanation: male spatial ability is not an adaptation so much as a side effect. Males produce testosterone as they develop, and the hormone has a clear benefit in terms of reproduction, increasing male fertility. But testosterone also happens to produce a lot of side effects, including male pattern baldness and an increased chance of developing acne. It would be absurd to say acne was an adaptation favored by natural selection. The same goes for the male edge in spatial ability, Clint and his colleagues argue. They note that when male rats are castrated, they do worse at navigating a maze; when they are given shots of testosterone, they regain their skill. ..."
"... Is this a catastrophe of the sort that took place a generation ago,
when mass famines in the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s killed hundreds of
thousands of people at a time? No. This time around, the cause is much
simpler, and the solution much more readily at hand. We’re experiencing a
basic crisis of undersupply: After three decades of worldwide food
surpluses, starting in 2008, the world’s farms have not produced enough
food to meet demand.
People no longer doubt, as they did 40 years
ago, that the world is capable of producing enough food for all of
humanity, even if our numbers grow to nine billion. We know it can, and
we know how to make it happen. Farms in Africa and the Indian
subcontinent – where the land is fertile and the growing season long –
should be producing much more food than their European counterparts.
Instead, India produces half as much per hectare, and Africa hardly
anything. They could easily feed the world.
This isn’t hard to
solve, and farmers know what’s needed: better transport and market
infrastructure, new seeds engineered for their climates and needs, an
end to subsidies and trade barriers, a shift from survival-based to
commercial farming practices. And these things are being done (in part
because farming is suddenly profitable), albeit too slowly. This decade
may well be remembered as the unfortunate gap between the first Green
Revolution (which ended mass famines and widespread Asian starvation in
the 1970s) and the second (which is poised to make even bigger changes
in Africa and Asia). Until supply catches up to demand, we have a
crisis.
What stands in the way, this time as last time, is
misunderstanding. Aid organizations in the West and governments in the
developing world, motivated by myths of village tranquillity, pay people
to stay rural rather than to consolidate their holdings and modernize
their farming. Too many people believe, falsely, that a shift to
commercial agriculture means a shift to big or exploitative farms,
rather than more income for small farmers. We allow superstitions about
engineered crops to become progress-blocking policies. We let
meaningless middle-class fetishes for “organic” or “local” foods pollute
the debate, when what’s needed is more protein, now. ..."
In a new report from the McKinsey Global Institute, we learn that the manufacturing sector's share of employment rises and then falls as GDP per capita rises. The decline is associated with the rise in service sector hiring as people demand more services.
"This pattern holds across advanced economies and will hold for today’s developing economies as they become wealthier," write the authors.
... Moreover, there are sound reasons why a conservative would support a welfare state. Historically, it has been conservatives like the 19th century chancellor of Germany, Otto von Bismarck, who established the welfare state in Europe. They did so because masses of poor people create social instability and become breeding grounds for radical movements.
In postwar Europe, conservative parties were the principal supporters of welfare-state policies in order to counter efforts by socialists and communists to abolish capitalism altogether. The welfare state was devised to shave off the rough edges of capitalism and make it sustainable. Indeed, the conservative icon Winston Churchill was among the founders of the British welfare state.
American conservatives, being far more libertarian than their continental counterparts, reject the welfare state for both moral and efficiency reasons. It creates unhappiness, they believe, and inevitably becomes bloated, undermining incentives and economic growth.
One problem with this conservative view is its lack of an empirical foundation. Research by Peter H. Lindert of the University of California, Davis, shows clearly that the welfare state is not incompatible with growth while providing a superior quality of life to many of those left to sink or swim in America.
In a new paper for the New America Foundation, Professor Lindert summarizes his findings. He points out that there are huge efficiencies in providing pensions and health care publicly rather than privately. A main reason is that in a properly run welfare state, benefits are nearly universal, which eliminates vast amounts of administrative overhead necessary to decide who is entitled to benefits and who isn’t, as is the case in America, and eliminates the disincentives to work resulting from benefit phase-outs. ...
... The Times articles, part of a larger series,
are well written and informative and no doubt they have prodded some
changes at certain companies. China, however, is a very big place and
the real story of better working conditions is a story of supply and
demand.
Wages in Chinese factories have been low because wages in China’s
agricultural interior were even lower and the great migration from the
country to the city, one of the largest migrations in human history,
meant that there was a ready supply of workers desperate for work and
the more work the better. Even today many workers want longer hours:
In March, when Foxconn announced that workers’ hours
would be reduced to China’s legal limits, employees began complaining.
“Absolutely I’d like to do overtime to work more than 60 hours, but now
there’s a ceiling on it,” said Ma Changqiao, a 23-year-old at Foxconn’s
Chongqing factory.
As the great migration leveled off, however, wages began to rise. At
first, workers wanted all of the increase in wages in money but as the
more basic needs of workers and their families have been met the demand
for better working conditions and more leisure has increased and this
has made it profitable for firms to supply better working conditions.
Thus, the real story of better working conditions is not a spate of
negative publicity, a mere blip in the face of much larger forces, but
rising wages with a touch of Maslow’s hierarchy. ...
In short, economic development happened. Given relatively stable social institutions, this is what happen with expanded trade and improvement in productivity.
In PurItan New England, Protestant and Catholic churches are declining while evangelical and Pentecostal groups are rising. Why the nation's most secular region may hint at the future of religion.
This is a lengthy article that is hard to summarize. Here are a few interesting excerpts:
... The recent changes in New England have been significant:
•Between 2000 and 2010, the
Catholic church has lost 28 percent of its members in New Hampshire and
33 percent in Maine. It has closed at least 69 parishes (25 percent) in
greater Boston.
•Over the same period, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) established 118 new churches in northern New England, according to the 2010 Religion Census. About 50 of them inhabit buildings once owned by mainline churches.
•Other denominations are growing, too, including Pentecostals: Assemblies of God (11 new churches in Massachusetts) and International Church of the Foursquare
Gospel (13 new churches in Massachusetts and Maine). The Seventh-day
Adventists, an evangelical group, opened 55 new churches in
Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine between 2000 and 2010, according
to the Religion Census. Muslims and Mormons are experiencing membership
gains as well.
More change looms on the horizon.
In 2013, northern New England will lose its only mainline Protestant
seminary and accredited graduate school of religion when the Bangor Theological Seminary closes in May. Three months later, Southern Baptists
will open Northeastern Baptist College – the first SBC-affiliated
pastor-training college in northern New England – in Bennington, Vt. ...
... Much of the church growth in secular New England
stems from immigrants and the cultures they create in pursuit of
spiritual grounding. Researchers at the Emmanuel Gospel Center (EGC), a
Boston-based Christian organization that studies urban ministries, call
it a "quiet revival." It is often overlooked because the Religion Census
tracks only denominations, yet nondenominational churches account for
some of the fastest-filling pews, or folding chairs, as the case may
more often be. ...
And ...
... In Westbrook, Maine, the
Seventh-day Adventists last year acquired a new regional headquarters – a
14,500-square-foot library. In Northfield, Mass., near the Vermont
border, a 217-acre campus will be handed to a Christian institution in
2013 as a gift from Oklahoma's Green family, billionaire owners of a craft store chain, who bought and renovated the property in order to give it away.
Some churches that offer an
alternative to prevailing regional values, in both New England and
around the country, are attracting new disciples. Liberal Unitarian
Universalists have seen some of their fastest growth in recent years in
Oklahoma, Tennessee, and other conservative Southern states.
In New England, the converse is
true. Churches that echo the prevailing culture's moral relativism and
liberal sensibilities sometimes struggle to differentiate themselves.
Yet when a doctrine-minded pastor like Joey Marshall unpacks the Bible,
verse by verse, many people yearn for his unflinching message. To
accommodate growing numbers, Mr. Marshall's Living Stone Community
Church in Standish, Maine, moved from a traditional 50-seat structure to
a former paintball facility. ...
And ...
... Churches that have equated faith
with political activism, in fact, are watching their ranks thin. Lewis,
the Bangor Seminary dean, sees emphasis on politics as one reason some
mainline denominations have seen their membership decline accelerate in
the past 10 years.
"In the mainline denominations,
liberalism is dead, but they just don't know it yet," says [Steve] Lewis, an
ordained Methodist elder. "Liberalism has moved so far toward the social
consciousness [agenda] that it's lost its spiritual roots. What they
need [in the mainlines] is a passionate spirituality." ...
I know. You own a slim titanium ultrabook computer, an eye popping
LCD 3D HD television, an iPhone with a custom-designed carbon fiber
cover, and a sports car with 360 horsepower under the hood. You don’t
have anything in common with the Amish.
It’s possible. But there are a lot of us who are beginning to adopt
some practices that are pretty close to the Amish. No, I’m not talking
about the Amish belief in adult baptism or the importance of farming in
daily life. I’m talking about the decisions the Amish make about
technology. More and more of us have begun to think about the impact
that technology has on our relationships with others and we’ve begun to
alter our practices.
Contrary to many stereotypes, the Amish actually use a lot of
technology. I’ve seen Amish ride in cars, use power tools, and fire up a
600 horsepower Rolls-Royce generator. But the Amish won’t use just any
technology that is developed. And they don’t allow technologies to be
used by anybody whenever they want. They have developed a complex set of
unwritten rules that guide their daily decisions.
I recently interviewed more than twenty pastors who had been in ministry for at least 25 years. All of these men were over 55 years old. A few of them were retired, but most of them were still active in full-time vocational ministry. ...
Lack of practical training for local church ministry. "I was not prepared for 80 percent of my day-to-day ministry after I graduated from seminary. ...
Overly concerned about critics. ...
Failure to exercise faith. ...
Not enough time with family. ...
Failure to understand basic business and finance issues. ...
Failure to share ministry. "Let me shoot straight. I had two complexes. The first was the Superman complex. ... My second complex was the conflict avoider complex. ...
Failure to make friends. ...
I'm certain that #8 was failing to spend enough time reading blog posts. ;-) What else should be on the list?
My 2nd Great Grandfather was William Cotton Holmes (1837-1932). He signed up with Union forces in 1862 and served until the end of the war in 1865. Late in 1862 he was stationed in Washington, DC, where he remained for the rest of the war. His brother Hoarce Holmes (1840-1864) (pictured) also served in the Civil War.
Below is a letter written by Horace to William on December 26, 1862, 150 years ago today. It includes a description of being shot and his experience in a hospital. He died less than two years later of smallpox in a DC hospital. I think the orginal is gone but I've transcribed this from a copy my grandmother typed up from the original years ago. Enjoy.
Foster’s General Hospital.
Newbern, N.C., Dec. 26, 1862
My Dear Brother William:
I think I see you start as you read the heading above. Well I am now
in the hospital with a ball through my left shoulder received at the
battle of Kinston, an account of which and the march prior to it, I will
give briefly. First saying, that I have great cause of thankfulness
that my live was spared. The ball struck the top of my shoulder hitting
the bone and glancing, came out of my back about 6 inches below. So
although you may not think much of a wound in the back, I have one and
in the front too. It is luck that the ball went clear through and
providential that it did not go nearer my neck, for if it had gone one
half inch nearer, it would have shattered my shoulder.
So while you have been sitting in the associations and guarding
depots, I have endured long marches, slept on the soft ground at night,
waded through swaps, drank stagnant water by the road and called it
good, ate hard tack and salt horse with a decided relish. Have seen the
time when I would have paid for a hard bread. Have been in the thickest
of the fight and felt the sting of a rebel bullet, heard the whistling
of 10,000 bullets, the shrieking of shells and the crashing of trees by
solid shot, witnessed the inhumanity of shoulder doctors, enjoyed the
beauty of jolting in a baggage wagon, with a swearing driver, after
being wounded, etc. etc.
Your letters of the 6th and the 18th I am much pleased to
acknowledge, and then state that it was about four o’clock in the
morning of Thursday December 11, when the drums of the 45th aroused the
regiment to prepare for new and untried scenes, securing a cup of coffee
so hastily as to burn our tongues, we stood in line in light marching
order. You know what that is, after a few miles. The moon was looking
kindly down bur soon all nature was warped in a dense fog. The sunrise
gun belched forth its grim welcome, just as we reached the City of
Newbern, the streets of which were filled with baggage wagons and
battery on battery of artillery, showing that the expedition was a big
one. We were delayed sometime near Fort Foster and then the word was
forward and on we went. The sun had now got up and shown pretty hot. The
road led us through swaps and creeks, at one of which we were so long
passing that the right of the regiment got far ahead and the left
straggled all the forenoon. This was very hard marching, as we had to
hurry to try to catch up, and the sun was so hot that it started the
sweat. At noon, the regiment halted for an hour, when we all got
together and ate our dinner, after which the colonel formed us in
sections, with orders to go through everything, and through we went, mud
and water, giving our extremities the benefit of a water bath. I liked
this marching better than in the morning, as it was more regular. Just
after sunset, we caught the first glimpse of the glimmering camp fire of
the advanced and it rejoiced our eyes. We soon filed in, stacked arms,
and after tearing the fence down for our fires, we prepared to rest. We
were tied, I tell you, 20 miles they say. I dried and exchanged my
stockings, soaked my feet, spread my blankets and dropped to sleep quick
and slept well too. Our cavalry had a skirmish here, taking a few
prisoners. In a ravine ahead, the rebels felled large tress to obstruct
our passage, and we can now hear the ring of the axes of the pioneers as
they remove them. The immense filed looks fine with its numerous fires.
The next morning, Friday, at four, we were called up and after
breakfast we were soon in line loading and capping our rifles, which the
boys thought indicated work. At sunrise we started and soon passed
through the swamp where the rebs tried but failed to stop us. There is
not scenery here. It is all swap and pines. This morning we passed a few
houses bearing the white flag. Nothing like a village through the whole
march. The houses are near a mile apart. Towards noon we passed a few
rebels prisoners, and further on one dead. They are cadaverous looking
fellows in gray. Our cavalry had a skirmish with the rebs ahead routing
them. At noon we stopped for dinner, where it occurred, and where lay a
dead horse. We had a fine rest here and I turned swapped my socks and
greased my feet and then fell in and marched along. Skirmishes are
thrown out on either side, and we passed [Page 2] through prisoners and
houses. The roads are bad and the artillery gets stuck giving us
frequent rests, sometimes stopping us in the middle of a huge mud
puddle. But when we march we go fast through the blackest swap. At night
we were stopped for an hour in the midst of a huge swap. It was a place
where we might have been slaughtered like sheep, but no foe was near
and soon we heard the welcome forward and we went at an astonishing
pace. It was dark as Eqypt and we splashed along through the mire, tired
Oh! It was near ten o’clock when we got to camp, and just as we entered
we heard several picket shots and feared we should be disturbed, but
no. I was glad to make my bed and sleep.
Saturday stiff and tired, I joined the line (Ah, you imagine me at
the rear of the company, do you?) No sir, not an inch have I lost
through the whole march. The road was ever wet and muddy. About ten, we
were resting, when we were started by the report of the cannon, which
brought every man to his feet and we pushed on rapidly. Soon after the
orders came "Open right and left", and the heavy artillery of the rear
came thundering by. We could still hear the firing. It was splendid to
see the rush of the artillery as they dashed along. At last the firing
ceased, and about noon, we were file in battle array in a large open
filed. My heart jumped as I was certain of a fight. We remained sometime
and I got a nap. We were very tired as we had marched rapidly. Soon the
order came for us to camp and we were glad. The firing was occasioned
by the rebs placing a battery in one corner of the field, and our folks
shelled them out, capturing their guns. We rested here all the P.M. and
Eve. Our rations were low but soon the quartermaster came up and we here
supplied with three days rations of hard tack and coffee and I made a
very good pot of the latter and it relished well. We were furnished with
20 extra pounds of ammunition to lighten us, you know. There has been a
great deal of straggling in the march, more from the old regiments,
however, than the new. Sunday morning found us in line. Sad scenes that
sun will look upon and today usually so quite is to be disturbed by the
roar of battle. We were soon on the march with roads bas as ever and
marched very rapidly. We passed a cannon taken from the rebs and the
dead by the road side. It was sad. Along side of the road there was
large quantities of brush out as though the Rebs intended to plant
batteries, but had no time.
After a rapid and fatiguing march we were resting in a huge puddle of
water, when at 10 of 10 we heard the first gun of the battle of
Kingston. The boys were speaking and comparing the scenes with that at
home. It was a most peaceful morning and all nature seemed in repose.
The firing still continued and we were pushed rapidly forward, and were
halted about a mile from the battle field near a house which was
afterwards used as a hospital and where I spent some weary hours. While
here, the firing in the front kept up vigorously and the artillery from
the rear came thundering by while squads of prisoners were carried to
the side. Soon we were ordered forward and soon we were to see what
stuff we were made of. No one flinched but on we went to find the enemy,
who were posted in a large house and entrechments in the rear of the
thickest of swaps in which they had some troops, but when we drove out,
we, the 45th, were filed from the road into the open field where our
batteries were posted, then through the wood, thence into the swamp, and
such a swamp, so thick with briars, and mud, up to our middle every
step. The shot and shell were flying thick around us killing some poor
fellows at the first entrance. We marched to the right flank, our
company being the third from the left. As soon as we got in, we deployed
as well as possible to the left. The bullets now fell like hail, but we
could not see a Reb as we were in a hollow in the water. Often we were
ordered to lie down in the face of the Rebs’ fire where the woods were
not quite so thick. The bullets whistled fearfully above, around and
over us every where. I had fired several times and was just raising my
rifle for another when I felt a sensation in my shoulder and my rifle
and myself [Page 3] went earthward. I fell to the rear in doing which I
was a little fearful of a shot in the back. I had one bullet hit the top
of my cap, leaving a dent. Hailing one of my comrades, helped me out
without any casualty. Our boys fought well and drove the rebels from
their position and across the bridge which they tried to burn, but we
were too quick and stopped them. The 10th Co. charged upon them and
drove them like sheep. We occupied Kinston that night and recrossed the
river, burning the bridge and going on to Goldsboro I limped away
towards the hospital which I at last reached. It was already quite full
with sufferers and a number were constantly arriving. It was painful to
hear their groans. After waiting about 2 hours, the doctor came and
cutting away my clothes, found that the ball had entered the top of my
shoulder and come out of my back about six inches below. It was a very
narrow escape and the Dr. assured me that I had just saved my bacon. I
have a great cause to be thankful that it is no worse. Wet and weary I
waited until night fall, when I was conducted to a bed of corn husks on
the floor of the chamber. There were 12 of us in the room, and there was
pain there. I was glad to get my wet things off and try to sleep and
think of home. The house is owned by an old Reb who is bitter against
the use of his home. We stayed there until Friday noon as comfortable as
could be expected. The Dr. Mason was very kind and did much for our
comfort. Friday noon we were put aboard a baggage wagon and jolted six
miles to take the gun boat. Our army had done its work and was returning
and the boat was to take the wounded. When we got there, they wouldn’t
let us go aboard because we could use our legs. We were told to join the
column in the baggage wagon. We were put aboard with a swearing kind of
a fellow, who cared not for God or man. This was tough and I was heart
sick, but there was no help and on I went. Till far into the eve we
drove and not very slow and every rough place going through me. At last
we reached camp and no place to sleep. The driver swore that we should
not sleep in the wagon, and those that were only sore on foot get out,
and I and another with a ball in his arm made special pleading and
remained, but it was a hard cold bed with nothing under us and a light
quilt over us. Oh, so cold. At four o’clock next morning, we commenced
our ride and all day we jolted until 8½ in the evening, when I arrived
at Newbern. Arriving I searched for a hospital and lighted on this one,
where I was well taken care of. Beds were good that night. This is a
very good hospital and I am getting on first rate and can thank God that
I have been preserved. In battle I felt no fear. I put my trust in God,
and was calm. You will see from accounts what our forces did, being all
victories. I shall never spoil for a fight and do not wish to see
another one. I am sorry for Mother. How she will worry! I sent a letter
by the first mail and one since. Strange rumors reach us from
Washington. Is it strange that soldiers are discouraged? But pluck it. I
remain your brother, Horace.
This past year I read Scot McKnight's The
King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited and the N. T. Wright's How
God Became King: The Forgotten Story of the Gospels. Both scholars have
reminded us once again how disconnected we have become from the world of Jesus
and the early church. For us, Christianity goes from creation straight to Jesus’s
birth, then to the crucifixion and resurrection, after which we get the
"real" theology of Paul, talking about individual sin and salvation.
The Hebrew Testament is seen as peripheral background information and Jesus's
life and ministry are compressed into moralistic teachings about personal piety
and personal salvation. The biblical witness is so much bigger than this.
To be honest, I'm not a big fan of Christmas music. I don’t care for many of
the hymns. But one carol that has stuck with me over the years is O Come Emmanuel. It is believed that the
lyrics may date back to at least the 8th Century, well before the Reformation
and the framing of the gospel that came from with those events. Of all the
hymns, it seems to me that this one comes closest to capturing the sentiments
that people in Jesus's day must have felt.
O Come Emmanuel
O come, O come, Emmanuel
And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, Thou Rod of Jesse, free
Thine own from Satan's tyranny
From depths of Hell Thy people save
And give them victory o'er the grave
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, Thou Day-Spring, come and cheer
Our spirits by Thine advent here
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
And death's dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, Thou Key of David, come,
And open wide our heavenly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high,
And close the path to misery.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
O come, O come, Thou Lord of might,
Who to Thy tribes, on Sinai's height,
In ancient times did'st give the Law, In cloud, and majesty and awe.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
"... Though it's become a tradition for many households and congregations to
fulfill a child's wish list for families who can't do it on their own, a
growing number of ministries are replacing that charity model with what
they believe can be a more uplifting approach. From Rogers Park to
Garfield Park, ministries in Chicago have opened pop-up Christmas stores
where families can afford to check off their child's list thanks to
donated merchandise offered at drastically reduced prices, if not for
free.
Though many Christians bemoan the retail industry's hold on the
holidays, some ministries have found that enabling parents to put gifts
under their own trees, in many cases, restores a sense of dignity that's
often lost when families are in need.
"Everybody gets to work together to make something wonderful happen,"
Williams said as volunteers wrapped Christmas and birthday presents for
her youngest daughter last weekend. "It helps me feel good about
myself."
The shopping opportunity also pushes patrons to take steps toward
improving their lives. At Bethel, a Lutheran ministry in Garfield Park,
more than 700 families earned additional currency called Bethel Bucks by
attending seminars on parenting, financial management and renters'
rights. ..."
3. Four Harvard and MIT grads are experimenting with direct aid to the poor. "GiveDirectly, the brainchild of four Harvard and MIT graduate students, is so simple, it's genius. Give poor Kenyan families $1,000 -- and let them do whatever they want with it." Can 4 Economists Build the Most Economically Efficient Charity Ever?
"... Despite
its reputation as a leftwing utopia, Sweden is now a laboratory for
rightwing radicalism. Over the past 15 years a coalition of liberals and
conservatives has brought in for-profit free schools in education, has
sliced welfare to pay off the deficit and has privatised large parts of
the health service.
Their success is envied by the centre right
in Britain. Despite predictions of doom, Sweden's economy continues to
grow and its pro-business coalition has remained in power since 2006.
The last election was the first time since the war that a centre-right
government had been re-elected after serving a full term.
As the
state has been shrunk, the private sector has moved in. Göran Dahlgren, a
former head civil servant at the Swedish department of health and a
visiting professor at the University of Liverpool, says that "almost all
welfare services are now owned by private equity firms". ..."
"... We
have reached a point in our economy where it is becoming increasingly
clear that businesses are being measured not just for their profit, but
also for their impact. And I’m not just talking about writing a check or
funding a charity; I’m referring to business models for which community
involvement and inspirational brand building are the profit centers.
(Think Warby Parker, TOMS, and startups such as SOMA.) I recently went
to a conference where the founders of a startup posited a powerful idea:
the future of marketing is philanthropy. But I think the even bigger
idea is the future of business is morality. My grandfather saw this
early on.
At a time when the moral framework of America appears
to be fractured – or at the very least confused – businesses are in the
propitious position to espouse cultural standards that can help restore
values that our youth can use to build the next generation of positive
enterprise. In fact, whether businesses succeed in creating and
promoting positive cultures might determine whether they stay in
business at all. The future of business is morality, and the future is
now.
Whether it’s the job of the corporation or not to set the
moral tone for society, the expectation is trending towards companies
setting the right example for others to follow. With the sharp rise in
entrepreneurship, young companies have the opportunity to establish
strong cultures early on and share them with their communities. Money
must have a moral center, and from greater consciousness in business,
greater profit will follow. ..."
"New data show an increasing contribution of mental and behavioral disorders to deterioration in the health-related quality of life among teens in the U.S. and Canada over the past two decades, and increases elsewhere around the globe."
More people moved out of California in 2011 than moved in, according to the latest report from the U.S. Census Bureau, signaling that the Democrat-run state’s economic woes continue to drive residents away.
Most statisticians attribute California’s net loss of 100,000 people last year to its high cost of living, increased population density and troubling unemployment rate.
The widening middle class in Mexico is also encouraging some immigrants to remain in that country instead of moving to California.
Texas — home to lower taxes, less regulation and what the Manhattan Institute calls a “labor pool with the right skills at the right price” — is one of the most attractive destinations for companies departing from California, according to the Census Bureau. ...
"The country reported 85 executions in 2000 but only 43 in 2012, according to a new report released by the Death Penalty Information Center. Plus, far fewer people are being sentenced to death row in the first place. The year 2000 saw 224 new inmates sentenced to death, while 2012 saw only 78, according to the report."
15. Conor Friedersdorf at the Atlantic had a great piece Why 'If We Can Just Save One Child ...' Is a Bad Argument, referring to a statement President Obama made at Newtown, CT. When we deal with complex topics like gun control, we are always
talking about tradeoffs. For instance, I know how we can save more
than 30,000 lives. The were 32,367 traffic fatalities last
year. Let's set the speed limit to 5 miles per hour. Nearly all those lives would be saved. Should we do this "if we can save just
one more life"? I, like Friedersforf, am not advocating any particular
policy. I'm just pointing out the absurdity of making statements like this, as politicians often do.
"I found that the structural supports of evangelicalism are quivering as a
result of ground-shaking changes in American culture. Strategies that
served evangelicals well just 15 years ago are now self- destructive.
The more that evangelicals attempt to correct course, the more they
splinter their movement. In coming years we will see the old
evangelicalism whimper and wane."
He speaks of an Evangelical "collapse" having happened. That may be a bit premature but I think his articulation of trends is right.
The Atlantic Cities has a piece about ten interesting maps from 2012. Year in Review: 2012's Year in Maps The map below is just one of them.
"Mayor Bloomberg's insistent support for the NYPD's Stop and Frisk
policy has been the single most contentious policy of his tenure, and
WNYC's illustration of where the stops occur makes clear why. For one
thing, it gives a geographic base to the racially biased search data. As
I wrote in August, the mix of those subjected to the humiliating
procedure sometimes varies from population data by a factor of nine:
"last year, black and Hispanic men between the ages of 14 and 24
accounted for 41.6 percent of stops, though they make up only 4.7
percent of the city's population." According to the same ACLU report from which that data comes,
"the number of stops of young black men exceeded the entire city
population of young black men (168,126 as compared to 158,406)."
Most importantly, though, the map shows that blocks with large numbers
of searches don't yield more guns than blocks with fewer searches."
Many denominations wonder if they are reflecting subtle devaluation of males in secular culture.
... Many applaud the advance of women within certain wings of
Christianity, such as the United, Anglican, Presbyterian, Methodist and
Lutheran denominations.
U.S. studies have found 37 per cent of
liberal congregations, representing more than 17 million Christians, are
now led by women. And a recent survey by Faith Matters found wide
approval; with more than three in four of all Americans convinced
females should be permitted to be clergy.
At the same time, however, many worry about the so-called "feminization" of the Christian church.
Both
genders are concerned that somehow, for reasons no one seems able to
clearly explain, the rise of women in the church is not working for a
huge number of men. ...
The article then looks as some specific denominations before offering this summary:
Here is a rundown of some of the overlapping theories:
The relative dearth of men in church is an age-old issue that's just grown worse. The traditional image of the church and its adherents as the "bride of Christ," for instance, is a turn off to men.
Religion is typically less important to men than women, and nowhere more so than in Canada. Polls show Canadian women are 70 per cent more likely than men to say religion is "very important."
Churches tend to focus on "soft" feminine qualities, such as sharing, family and feelings. Bibby found 83 per cent of women believe "concern for others" is highly important, compared to only 67 per cent of men.
Many men are avoiding the diminished status associated with an increasingly countercultural and aging institution such as the church, particularly one in which women predominate.
Men, many say, tend to value rationality more than women. In Canada, men are 2.5 times more likely to follow atheism, which often pits reason against faith. In addition, critics say churches, since the 1970s, have become less "intellectual" as they have increasingly emphasized spiritual "experience."
While liberal Christians are careful to avoid stereotyping women, homosexuals or ethnic minorities, John Giuliano, a former moderator of the United Church, said churches too-often reflect the secular culture in which the mass media and advertising often portray men, especially fathers, as Homer Simpson-style buffoons.
Main line churches that allow females to be clergy are generally not attractive to immigrants, most of whom have grown up in patriarchal cultures. Asian immigrants to Canada are much more drawn to male-led evangelical or Catholic congregations.
Then these observations:
... A fledgling men's Christian spirituality movement is underway across
North America, says Grayston - with the Franciscan monk Richard Rohr,
author of From Wild Men to Wise Men, being one of its most mature
figures.
However, in addition to the church developing
men-friendly programs, Grayston says men, as individuals, also have to
find the courage to step up to the spiritual plate.
"The women's movement has left many men not knowing how to engage women, so they've backed off.
Whether in secular careers or the church, many men's confidence has been undermined," Grayston says.
At
Mount Seymour United, Talbot wants to find additional ways to draw
males into her congregation's life. As she puts it, the health of the
church is at stake. ...
My recollection is that more Evangelical churches, at least the large ones, there something less than a 60-40 split in favor of women. In small congregations, especially Mainline small congreations, the imballance is much greater. But the question is whether or not this that much different than historical balances. Some research data suggests that women are more "religious" or "spiritual" than men in religions all around the world.
... In short: We can now estimate, based on observations, how sensitive the temperature is to carbon dioxide. We do not need to rely heavily on unproven models. Comparing the trend in global temperature over the past 100-150 years with the change in "radiative forcing" (heating or cooling power) from carbon dioxide, aerosols and other sources, minus ocean heat uptake, can now give a good estimate of climate sensitivity.
The conclusion—taking the best observational estimates of the change in decadal-average global temperature between 1871-80 and 2002-11, and of the corresponding changes in forcing and ocean heat uptake—is this: A doubling of CO2 will lead to a warming of 1.6°-1.7°C (2.9°-3.1°F).
This is much lower than the IPCC's current best estimate, 3°C (5.4°F).
Mr. Lewis is an expert reviewer of the recently leaked draft of the IPCC's WG1 Scientific Report. The IPCC forbids him to quote from it, but he is privy to all the observational best estimates and uncertainty ranges the draft report gives. What he has told me is dynamite.
... That is an extraordinary claim and clearly requires extraordinary
evidence to support it. Much as I like Ridley (we swap stories and
information regularly) I’m not going to accept it on the basis of one
newspaper column. And Ridley wouldn’t expect me or you to either.
But if it is true then climate change stops being a looming diaster
threatening all we hold dear and becomes instead just a minor background
effect. One that we really don’t have to do anything particularly
active about at all: the advancing technologies of low or non-carbon
energy generation will take care of it all for us. ...
I share Worstall's caution but I also think that to
acknowledge that the earth is warming and humans play a contributing role,
something for which there seems to be strong agreement, doesn't tell you the
magnitude of the impact or what policy options are optimal. As I've pointed out
in early posts, the global average temperature has plateaued for more than a
decade. Violent hurricane activity has not increased. Arctic ice is melting,
although, as I understand it, it is summer ice not winter ice where the change
is being observed. Dueling scientists publish studies with partisans
cherry-picking the elements that are most supportive of their narrative. I do
not doubt that human behavior is having impact on the climate. But I am uncertain
of how robust climate models are and how serious the challenges are likely to
be.
... But Kloor isn’t really talking about politics. Rather, I think, it’s how
we conceive of the environment and environmentalism. The message of the
modernist greens is: in a world of 7 billion plus people, all of
whom want (and deserve) to live modern, consuming lives, we need to be
pragmatic about how we use—and how much we protect—nature. We don’t have any other choice, so we’d better start dealing with the realities on the ground.
The realist in me thinks the modernist greens are right. There are simply too many of us,
and we want too much, for our footprint on the Earth to get anything
but bigger. And I’m cheered by the scientists and thinkers who suggest
that we might be able to have it all—a huge, thriving human population,
and an environment that can support it—as long as we plan right. What’s
more, I’m very conscious that industrialization and globalization have
largely been forces for good, expanding human access to wealth, health
and longevity. There’s no better time in history to be human being.
Industrialization is not going to be rolled back—and it shouldn’t be.
There’s also a larger social shift at work that’s altering our concept of nature. Today more human beings live in cities
than live in the countryside, and that proportion will only grow in the
future: by 2050, as many as three-quarters of the estimated 10 billion
people on Earth will live in urban areas. This is a historic change—as
recently as 1800 just 2% of the world’s population lived in cities—and
it’s a sign that humanity, inevitably, is decoupling from nature. I
suspect that’s true even of environmentalists, who are just as likely as
anyone else to come into contact with what passes for wilderness these
days more in a managed park than untrammeled rainforest or woodland.
For a lot of us, “environmental issues” increasingly have to do with
improving urban life—think cleaner mass transit or access to organic
food in farmer’s markets. As the writer Emma Marris argued in her book Rambunctious Garden,
environmentalism needs to stop drawing simplistic lines between what’s
natural and what’s manmade—with the former always good and the latter
always bad—and learn to celebrate the biodiversity that’s in our
backyards. ...
"... The chart [below] shows how much more time women spend than men on
unpaid work (light blue bars); how much less time women spend than men
on paid work (medium blue bars); and how much time over all women spend
compared to men on paid and unpaid work combined (dark blue diamonds).
As
you can see, across the member countries of the Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Development, women spend 21 minutes more time,
on average, in total work per day than men do. ..."
A global study of religious adherence released on Tuesday by the Pew Research Center
found that about one of every six people worldwide has no religious
affiliation. This makes the “unaffiliated,” as the study calls them, the
third-largest group worldwide, with 16 percent of the global population
— about equal to Catholics. ...
A mass shooting is four or more people murdered in 24 hours. A mass public shooting occurs in a public place like a business or a school, but excludes events like domestic killings, gang violence, and robbery attempts. Brad Plummer at The Washington Post has a chart today that shows the instances of all mass shootings (Graph of the day: Perhaps mass shootings aren’t becoming more common.)
Consistent with the thesis of my post, this graph does not show a society spiraling out of control with violence. It shows a remarkably stable pattern, altough a pattern that is well above the rates for other OECD nations.
This month's Atlantic magazine predicts that we are on the verge ofa U.S.-based manufacturing renaissance,
as companies see the advantages to making more goods at home, such as
more control over the final product, lower energy costs from moving
goods across an ocean, and a falling "wage gap."
Simply put, U.S. factory workers are a much better deal than they were just ten years ago. ...
(Reuters) - The amount of land needed to grow crops worldwide is at a peak, and a geographical area more than twice the size of France will be able to return to its natural state by 2060 as a result of rising yields and slower population growth, a group of experts said on Monday.
Their report, conflicting with United Nations
studies that say more cropland will be needed in coming decades to
avert hunger and price spikes as the world population rises above 7
billion, said humanity had reached what it called "Peak Farmland".
More crops for use as biofuels and increased meat consumption in emerging economies such as China and India, demanding more cropland to feed livestock, would not offset a fall from the peak driven by improved yields, it calculated.
If the report is accurate, the land freed up from crop farming would be some 10 percent of what is currently in use - equivalent to 2.5 times the size of France, Europe's biggest country bar Russia, or more than all the arable land now utilized in China.
"We
believe that humanity has reached Peak Farmland, and that a large net
global restoration of land to nature is ready to begin," said Jesse
Ausubel, director of the Program for the Human Environment at the
Rockefeller University in New York.
"Happily,
the cause is not exhaustion of arable land, as many had feared, but
rather moderation of population and tastes and ingenuity of farmers," he
wrote in a speech about the study he led in the journal Population and
Development Review. ...
The chart above shows the 30 occupations that are expected to experience the largest job growth between 2010 and 2020, according to employment forecasts from the BLS.
Between 2010 and 2020, the BLS estimates that the total number of U.S.
jobs will increase by 20.4 million, from 143 million in 2010 to 163.5
million by 2020. The number of jobs created this decade in the top 30
fastest growing occupations – 9.3 million – will represent almost half
of all of the new jobs created by 2020.
What’s really interesting is that only five of the top 30 occupations
expected to create the most jobs by 2020 require a college degree or
more (nursing, post-secondary teachers, elementary school teachers,
accountants and physicians), and ten of the fastest growing occupations
don’t even require a high school diploma. Moreover, of the top nine
occupations expected to create the most jobs this decade, only one
(nursing) requires a 4-year college degree. ...
There has been a substantial reduction in both the extreme poverty rate
and the number of people living in extreme poverty since the early
1980s, according to information from the World Bank poverty database.
The World Bank maintains data on developing world nations, which
include both low income and middle income nations. The analysis below
summarizes developing world (low and middle income nations) poverty
trends from 1981 to the latest available year, 2008 (Table and Figure
1).
The article also includes this graph:
Go to the article for a number of interesting nuances in how poverty has changed.
WASHINGTON
(AP) -- A growing majority of Americans think global warming is occurring, that
it will become a serious problem and that the U.S. government should do
something about it, a new Associated Press-GfK poll finds. …
… The poll found 4 out of every 5 Americans said climate
change will be a serious problem for the United States if nothing is done about
it. That's up from 73 percent when the same question was asked in 2009. …
“Good
news! People are finally coming around to believing what scientists have been
telling us all along!” I can just hear some folks declaring. Hold that thought
for a moment. The article goes on to say:
…
The biggest change in the polling is among people who trust scientists only a
little or not at all. About 1 in 3 of the people surveyed fell into that
category. …
…
[John] Krosnick [Stanford social psychologist],
who consulted with The Associated Press on the poll questions, said the changes
the poll shows aren't in the hard-core "anti-warming" deniers, but in
the next group, who had serious doubts.
"They don't believe
what the scientists say, they believe what the thermometers say," Krosnick
said. "Events are helping these people see what scientists thought they
had been seeing all along." …
The rise in belief in global
warming does not stem from science, but inductive reasoning based on heuristics
… relying on personal experience as evidence of a broader reality. It is possible this
will be the warmest year on record in the United States but more moderate
globally. People in the United States look at their thermometers and see warmer
temperatures. The news shows super-storm Sandy. Therefore, from experience in our
particular context it is reasoned that
there is a global trend.
The irony is that average
global temperatures haven’t changed much for more than a decade. Global hurricanes
and cyclones that make landfall are not more prevalent, as has been predicted. In fact, the last four
years have been quite mild. I’m not making the case that climate change isn’t
happening. Climate models don’t necessarily preclude plateaus in change. Rather
I’m saying that if you are a skeptic, then recent trends should bolster
skeptical interpretations. Yet, because of personal experience, some science
skeptics are extrapolating from their narrow context to global realities. Furthermore,
another survey finds that One
in three Americans see extreme weather as a sign of biblical end times. This
is not good news for science.
But I want to suggest that
there is more to the story than this. Many true believers in climate change
insist that the science is settled on this matter and no further dissent may be
tolerated. Yet, as I have written about earlier, some of these folks are
staunch skeptics about the safety of genetically modified crops and nuclear
power, despite what the scientific community says. (see Why
Are Environmentalists Taking Anti-Science Positions? and The
Anti-Science Left) The issue is not so much that they are persuaded by
science, as it is that claiming scientific authority for conclusions reached by
other means (heuristics? ideology?) is rhetorically useful. This is not good
news for science either.
Any number of futurists
have written about this challenge. For our entire human history, individual lives were
consumed with challenges that were immediately present to us … like shelter from
the elements and not becoming prey for some animal. But with the recent explosion
in knowledge, technology, and economics, many of the imminent threats we face
have been tamed and the new challenges we face are vastly more complex. Over
reliance on heuristic models and rigid ideological sense-making strategies,
once essential, can become obstacles to good decisions. The challenge for the next several
generations is going to be learning how to develop social institutions that
effectively reflect on and address complex challenges.
... Across the nation, conservation groups in partnership with ranchers
are using cattle to restore native plant species by grazing invasive
grasses. Other groups are working with fishermen to fish sustainably,
and using logging and mining profits to pave way for forest and salmon
restoration.
"There's been a shift to working more with
industries," said Lynn Huntsinger, professor of rangeland ecology at the
University of California, Berkeley. "This is a human landscape. We need
food, we need wood, people are crazy about eating salmon. Working
closely with those who produce on the land offers opportunities for ...
teaching them about conservation."
In the past, conservationists
relied on purchasing land and setting it aside, away from human
activity. Logging, ranching or mining were seen as harmful and
incompatible with preservation.
But in recent years, the use of
conservation easements to retire development rights on private land has
exploded. The easements, which cost a fraction of what it would cost to
buy the property, allow landowners to continue working the land. ...
ead more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/12/15/3967248/conservationists-team-up-with.html#storylink=cpy
The
horrific massacre in Newton, Connecticut, is to sparking debate about
guns and violence, as well it should. As the discussion gets underway, I
think it is helpful to get a sense of where we stand in the flow of history as
it relates to violence in the United States. Here are a few
things to consider.
Below is data
from the most recent FBI Uniform Crime Report (UCR). The annual report compiles
reported crimes. It strength is the use of hard data. Its biggest weakness is the
absence of unreported crime. The willingness of people to report crime varies
by type of crime and their willingness to report may change over time. Also, law enforcement’s diligence with
different types of crime may change over time. Tougher enforcement can lead to fewer
incidents of actual crime, even as incidents
of reported crime rise. Nevertheless,
the UCR is an important measure.
Crimes
are grouped in two categories:
Violent - murder and non-negligent manslaughter,
forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault.
Property - burglary,
larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson.
Violent
crime is at a forty year low.
A second
measure is the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS). Twice a year, surveys ask members of households if they have been victims of particular crimes, reported or
not. The strength of the survey is that it captures unreported crime. A
weakness may be that some crimes, like domestic violence, are underreported.
The NCVS
is also broken into two categories:
Violent - rape, robbery, and assault.
Property
- burglary, larceny, and motor vehicle theft.
(A
different methodology was used in 2006 that makes it incomparable with other
years. Also, 2011 data has been published and shows an uptick in crime.
However, the 2002 and 2010 data in the recent report, used as comparison points, do
not match earlier publications and I have yet to determine why. I chose not to
include it here until I have a better understanding.)
An
interesting question: Was there truly less crime fifty years ago or were people
simply less likely to report crimes? I doubt there is a definitive answer. Murder
is sometimes used as a proxy for overall violence in society. Here is the United States murder
rate per 100,000 population:
Additionally,
there is this estimation of the murder rate over the last 300 years. (Source: The Public
Intellectual)
The
lowest murder rate ever was 4.6 in 1963. It was 4.7 in 2011.
It can conclusively
be said that that violence in American society is not spiraling out of control.
We are living in one of the least violent eras in
American history. But this is not the
whole story.
(Go to
the source linked above for info about individual countries.)
The 4.7
homicide rate for the United States is a near record low but it is still two or
three times the rate of other Organization for Economic Co-operation and
Development nations. Guns are a big part of this difference. The good news is
the precipitous decline in aggravated deaths. The bad news is how much more violence there is in
the United States compared to other nations, even at all-time lows.
… And
yet those who study mass shootings say they are not becoming more common.
"There
is no pattern, there is no increase," says criminologist James Allen Fox
of Boston's Northeastern University, who has been studying the subject since
the 1980s, spurred by a rash of mass shootings in post offices.
The
random mass shootings that get the most media attention are the rarest, Fox
says. Most people who die of bullet wounds knew the identity of their killer. …
… Grant
Duwe, a criminologist with the Minnesota Department of Corrections who has
written a history of mass murders in America, said that while mass shootings
rose between the 1960s and the 1990s, they actually dropped in the 2000s. And
mass killings actually reached their peak in 1929, according to his data. He
estimates that there were 32 in the 1980s, 42 in the 1990s and 26 in the first
decade of the century.
Chances
of being killed in a mass shooting, he says, are probably no greater than being
struck by lightning.
Still,
he understands the public perception - and extensive media coverage - when mass
shootings occur in places like malls and schools. "There is this feeling
that could have been me. It makes it so much more frightening." …
(I realize
that does not seem to square with the statement about mass shootings peaking in 1929. I suspect a typo and "1999" was what was intended.)
This
data was reported in March of 2010. According to a recent Los Angeles Times
article, Deadliest
U.S. mass shootings, there have been nine mass shootings in the United
States in the first three years of this decade. That projects out to thirty for this decade. But there have been five mass shootings in the last five months.
There clearly has been an uptick in mass shootings over the past year.
On
a final note, the Sandy Hook massacre involved young children at school. Over
the past twenty years, the number of children 5-18 years old murdered at school
has ranged from a low of 14 (school years ending in 2000 and in 2001) and a
high of 34 (schools years ending 1993 and in 1998.) (Source: Indicators of School Safety: 2011) According to an article in the Guardian, Mass
shootings at schools and universities in the US – timeline, over the last fifty years there have been
six school mass shootings (including Sandy Hook) that have taken the lives of
children 5-18. Three of the mass shootings were at primary schools (Stockton, CA,
in 1989; Nickel Mines, PA, 2006; and now Sandy Hook.)
So
here are a few observations and comments:
The United States has an excessively violent culture.
Violence has lessened significantly in recent years. We are not spiraling into
chaos.
Guns are an important factor in the excessive homicide rates. I don't know why citizens need to own semi-automatic weapons. But there is more
than access to these guns that needs to be addressed here.
While a case can be made that mass murders have been declining in the long run,
the sudden frequency of them in recent months is alarming (five in five months).
Nothing that is said above should take away from our outrage at the senseless
death of innocent children and their teachers. But Friday’s shooting should not
send us into despair that things are spiraling out of control. Friday’s
shooting should motivate us to ask anew how we can accelerate our march toward
becoming a less violent society.
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1. Pray for Egypt Today!
More than 50 million Egyptians are voting today on a constitution that would be a giant step backward for Egypt and much of the Middle East, marginalizing women and religious minorities. A nation that has historically been a voice of moderation, the largest Muslim nation in the region, will likely move toward becoming an Islamist state. Remember to pray for Egypt. (See the Economist'sThe Founding Brothers)
2. Our prayers are with families of the victims at the Sandy Hook elementary school. Grace and peace to the entire community.
Traffic deaths in the USA continued their historic decline last year,
falling to the lowest level since 1949, the government announced
Monday.
A total of 32,367 motorists, bicyclists and pedestrians died in 2011,
a 1.9% decrease from 2010. Last year’s toll represents a 26% decline
from 2005, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
said. ...
... The trend has emerged in big cities like New York and Los Angeles, as
well as smaller places like Anchorage, Alaska, and Kearney, Neb. The
state of Mississippi has also registered a drop, but only among white
students.
“It’s been nothing but bad news for 30 years, so the fact that we have
any good news is a big story,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, the health
commissioner in New York City, which reported a 5.5 percent decline in
the number of obese schoolchildren from 2007 to 2011....
....The experiment, in April, used a disabled form of the virus that causes AIDS to reprogram Emma’s immune system genetically to kill cancer cells. ...
... The research is still in its early stages, and many questions remain.
The researchers are not entirely sure why the treatment works, or why it
sometimes fails. One patient had a remission after being treated only
twice, and even then the reaction was so delayed that it took the
researchers by surprise. For the patients who had no response
whatsoever, the team suspects a flawed batch of T-cells. The child who
had a temporary remission apparently relapsed because not all of her
leukemic cells had the marker that was targeted by the altered T-cells. ...
....In 2011, 1.4 million chlamydia infections were reported to the CDC.
The rate of cases per 100,000 people increased 8%, to 457.6 in 2011 from
423.6 in 2010.
The CDC reported 321,849 gonorrhea infections. The
rate increased 4% to 104.2 cases per 100,000 in 2011 from 100.2 in
2010. Like chlamydia, gonorrhea can lead to pelvic inflammatory disease,
a major cause of infertility in women.
Last year, 13,970 primary and secondary syphilis cases were reported. The rate of 4.5 cases per 100,000 was unchanged from 2010. ...
7. You may be bilingual but can you write in two languages, one with each hand, at the same time?!
10. Kevin Drum of Mother Jones speculates on why liberals have more exaggerated perceptions of political differences. We Are More Alike Than We Think
11. A surprising "right to work" bill was signed into law in Michigan, of all places. That has spurred a lot of debate about unions and the right to work. Michael Kinsley wrote a thoughtful piece opposing RTW, The Liberal Case Against Right-to-Work Laws. David Henderson has piece in support of RTW, The Economics of "Right to Work".
12. Slate has a piece about The Great Schism in the Environmental Movement.
Keith Kloor opines on the division between mondernist environmentalists
(or eco-pragmatists) and conservation traditionalists.
...
Modernist greens don't dispute the ecological tumult associated with the
Anthropocene. But this is the world as it is, they say, so we might as
well reconcile the needs of people with the needs of nature. To this
end, Kareiva advises conservationists to craft "a new vision of a planet
in which nature—forests, wetlands, diverse species, and other ancient
ecosystems—exists amid a wide variety of modern, human landscapes."
This
shift in thinking is already under way. For example, ecologists
increasingly appreciate (and study) the diversity of species and
importance of ecosystem services in cities, giving rise to the
discipline of urban ecology. That was unthinkable at the dawn of the
modern environmental movement 50 years ago, when greens loathed cities
as the antithesis of wilderness. ...
13. One of the creepiest Twilight Zone episodes I remember from my
childhood was when this woman ends up trapped in a department store at
night. The mannequins begin calling to her. She discovers she is actually a mannequin who
has over stayed her time out in the world and it is time for the next
mannequin to spend some time outside the store. This story confirms my worst nightmares: In Some Stores, the Mannequins Are Watching You
15. One of the biggest concerns about fracking technology is the enormous amount of water it uses. A company has figured out how to recycle water so that far less water is used in the fracking process. Solving fracking's biggest problem
... 3D printing represents the latest version of what industry experts call
"additive manufacturing" — a way to turn practically any computer
designs into real objects by building them up layer-by-layer using
plastics, metals or other materials. The technology could end up
affecting every major industry — aerospace, defense, medicine, transportation, food, fashion — and have an even bigger impact on U.S. manufacturing than the robot revolution. ...
20. Michael Cheshire has a great piece in Leadership Journal on "What I learned about grace and redemption through my friendship with a Christian pariah." Going To Hell with Ted Haggard
".... A while back I was having a business lunch at a sports bar in the
Denver area with a close atheist friend. He's a great guy and a very
deep thinker. During lunch, he pointed at the large TV screen on the
wall. It was set to a channel recapping Ted's fall. He pointed his
finger at the HD and said, "That is the reason I will not become a
Christian. Many of the things you say make sense, Mike, but that's what
keeps me away."
It was well after the story had died down, so I had to study the screen
to see what my friend was talking about. I assumed he was referring to
Ted's hypocrisy. "Hey man, not all of us do things like that," I
responded. He laughed and said, "Michael, you just proved my point. See,
that guy said sorry a long time ago. Even his wife and kids stayed and
forgave him, but all you Christians still seem to hate him. You guys
can't forgive him and let him back into your good graces. Every time you
talk to me about God, you explain that he will take me as I am. You say
he forgives all my failures and will restore my hope, and as long as I
stay outside the church, you say God wants to forgive me. But that guy
failed while he was one of you, and most of you are still vicious to
him." Then he uttered words that left me reeling: "You Christians eat
your own. Always have. Always will."
He was running late for a meeting and had to take off. I, however, could
barely move. I studied the TV and read the caption as a well-known
religious leader kept shoveling dirt on a man who had admitted he was
unclean. And at that moment, my heart started to change. I began to
distance myself from my previously harsh statements and tried to
understand what Ted and his family must have been through. When I
brought up the topic to other men and women I love and respect, the very
mention of Haggard's name made our conversations toxic. Their reactions
were visceral."
21. Leonardo Bonucci got a yellow card for faking collision during a
soccer game. It should have been a red card. No one deserves to be a professional soccer player with acting skills
this bad!
Despite fears of so-called showrooming, some stores are opening up to wireless internet.
FORTUNE -- For years, retailers frowned on shoppers visiting their
stores merely to scope out products before returning home and buying
them online for less. The phenomenon became so common that it earned a
name -- showrooming.
The practice has only expanded with the proliferation of smartphones.
Shoppers can use them to quickly compare the price of a Fossil handbag,
for example, with the same version on Amazon.com (AMZN). There's
nothing store managers can do to stop them. The shoppers have won the
war.
Recognizing their defeat, many retailers have made a u-turn and are now helping shoppers get online. ...
... To connect to a network, shoppers must first agree to a terms of
service that appears on their smartphone screens. The agreement
generally spells out that the network is not secure and that the stores
will track the Web sites customers visit and the type of devices they
use.
Such data could eventually be used to help stores offer personalized
coupons and identify merchandise to add to their shelves, said Bryan
Wargo, chief executive of Nearbuy Systems, a start-up that helps stores
monitor customer behavior on Wi-Fi networks and dissect the data.
Customers frequently using the Wi-Fi network to search a rival's Web
site for red cashmere sweaters, for instance, could signal that the
store should start stocking them. ...
When the economy became unreliable, people decided to rely on themselves to propel their careers.
“We see the labor market itself following the trend that we call ‘the individualization of work' — people working for themselves,” says Iain MacDonald, CEO of SkillPages. “People are increasingly either moving jobs more often, doing what they love, or doing what they really like to do, rather than what they have to do.”
Nearly one in three workers in America are freelancers, contractors, or contingent workers, according to the Freelancers Union, and 19 percent of them say that they've doubled their income within the past year.
According to a survey by Elance, the average freelancer expects to earn 43 percent more in 2013 than they did in 2012. Furthermore, 70 percent claim they're happier and 79 percent say they're more productive working as a freelancer than a full-time employee. ...
My friend Victor Claar wrote a great monograph two years ago, Fair Trade? Its Prospects as a Poverty Solution. It cost $3.00 in Kindle format. You can read my review posted here at Kruse Kronicle. Some aspects of fair trade initiatives may be helpful. But while fair trade coffee sounds noble on the service, it does not help intended targets, and may in fact harm them (and I expect this is true with most fair trade agricultural commodities.) The linked article highlights some of the same problems Claar does. It is just interesting to see the points being made by an outlet that I expect does not identify as an economic conservative. ;-) He is a little more polemic than I like but you'll get the point.
Coffee is the second most valuable resource exported from poor and/or
developing countries (Angelina Jolie's children being the first). Thus
the Fair Trade model was established, which is supposed to pay coffee
growers a set "fair trade" price if they meet labor and production
standards. The idea was to prevent them from being exploited, but the
reality is that in practice, Fair Trade just makes exploitation easier.
#4. Growers Are Paid Very Little for Fair Trade Coffee ...
#3. Consumers Are Charged Much More for Fair Trade Coffee ...
#2. Fair Trade Is Essentially a Marketing Organization ...
#1. Growers Receive a Higher Percentage from Non-Fair Trade Coffee Sales ...
A sharp decline in deaths from malnutrition and diseases like measles and tuberculosis has caused a shift in global mortality patterns over the past 20 years, according to a new report, with far more of the world’s population now living into old age and dying from diseases more associated with rich countries, like cancer and heart disease.
The shift reflects improvements in sanitation, medical services and access to food throughout the developing world, as well as the success of broad public health efforts like vaccine programs. The results are dramatic: infant mortality has declined by more than half between 1990 and 2010, and malnutrition, the No. 1 risk factor for death and years of life lost in 1990, has fallen to No. 8.
At the same time, chronic diseases like cancer now account for about two out of every three deaths worldwide, up from just over half in 1990. Eight million people died of cancer in 2010, 38 percent more than in 1990. Diabetes claimed 1.3 million lives in 2010, double the number in 1990.
But while developing countries made big strides – the average age of death in Brazil and Paraguay, for example, jumped to 63 in 2010, up from 28 in 1970 – the United States stagnated. American women registered the smallest gains in life expectancy of all high-income countries between 1990 and 2010. The two years of life they gained was less than in Cyprus, where women gained 2.3 years of life, and Canada, where women gained 2.4 years. The slow increase caused American women to fall to 36th place in the report’s global ranking of life expectancy, down from 22nd in 1990. ...
... The World Health Organization issued a statement Thursday saying that some of the estimates in the report differ substantially from those done by United Nations agencies, though others are similar. All comprehensive estimates of global mortality rely heavily on statistical modeling because only 34 countries – representing about 15 percent of the world’s population – produce quality cause-of-death data. ...
Infant mortality and life expectancy at birth are probably the two best indicators of human well-being. So many interconnected factors must be present for improvement in these numbers to be realized. The reality is that human flourishing is getting better. Better does not mean utopia or the consummated Kingdom of God. Better means better. The challenge is to learn from what is going right and strengthen it.
... From 2009 to 2013, key changes in the AEO [Annual Energy Outlook] include:
Downward revisions in the economic growth outlook, which dampens energy demand growth
Lower transportation sector consumption of conventional fuels based on updated fuel economy standards, increased penetration of alternative fuels, and more modest growth in light-duty vehicle miles traveled
Generally higher energy prices, with the notable exception of natural gas, where recent and projected prices reflect the development of shale gas resources
Slower growth in electricity demand and increased use of low-carbon fuels for generation
Increased use of natural gas
Power sector transformation, based on decarbonization of the generation mix, occurs because natural gas and renewables gain market share at the expense of coal, reflecting:
Resource economics—high domestic production of natural gas at historically low prices, reflecting increased production of shale gas
Regulation—updated state renewable portfolio standards and efficiency standards, and cap-and-trade provisions of California Assembly Bill 32, as well as implementation of federal policies to reduce sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions, the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards and other policies and measures at local, state, and federal levels
Ruling elder and corporate attorney, noted for her non-anxious presence, intelligence, and humor, succumbs to cancer.
Cynthia (Cindy) Bolbach, Moderator of the 219th General Assembly
(2010), died peacefully on December 12, 2012, after fighting a brave,
nearly yearlong battle with cancer.She would have turned 65 on December 27.
A ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Bolbach was
elected Moderator on the fourth ballot as the only ruling elder in a
field of six candidates. In a July 4, 2010, news release, Jerry Van
Marter of the Presbyterian News Service (PNS) said that Bolbach’s brief
answers and her “winsome sense of humor” won over the General Assembly
commissioners. ...
Cindy served on the General Assembly Mission Council in her capacity
as moderator for the denomination beginning in July, 2010. I got to know
Cindy through our joint participation in a variety of meetings, as well as serendipitous
conversations in shuttles, airports, and hotel lobbies. Non-anxious presence,
sharp mind, humility, and wry humor are the qualities I most think of when I
think of her.
Every so often in life you encounter people that manifest noble
qualities so well that you are inspired to develop those qualities in yourself.
Cindy was one of those people for me. The world would be a whole lot brighter
with more Cindy Bolbachs in the world. While she has entered the Church Triumphant,
our world is little darker. Grace and Peace to her family and friends.
The digitisation of the world’s books reveals how the popularity of English words and phrases has evolved since the 16th century. And the Top 100 lists for each year are now free to browse online.
The digitisation of the world’s books reveals how the popularity of
English words and phrases has evolved since the 16th century. And the
database is now freely browsable online.
Last year, the
Google Books team released some 4 per cent of all the books ever written
as a corpus of digitised text, an event that has triggered something of
a revolution in the study of trends in human thought. The corpus
consists of 5 million books and over 500 billion words (361 billion in
English) dating from the 1500s to the present day.
In a single
stroke, this data gives researchers a way to examine a whole range of
hitherto inaccessible phenomena. Since then a steady stream of new
results has emerged on everything from the evolution of grammar and the
adoption of technology to the pursuit of fame and the role of
censorship. ...
Doc Holiday uses an expression "I'm your Huckleberry," in the movie Tombstone. Basically he was saying, "I'm game." I had never heard that expression befor the movie. I entered that term at the first mention in the books appears to be in 1880. The events depicted in the movie were in 1881. Interesting!
I expect I may end up wasting too much time at this site. ;-)
All-natural domesticity has adherents on both sides of the political spectrum.
The current cultural mania for DIY domesticity—backyard chickens,
urban knitting circles, the rise of homeschooling, the sudden ubiquity
of homemade jam—shows no sign of abating. Across the country,
progressives are embracing home and hearth with new vigor under the
guise of environmental sustainability, anti-consumerism, and better
health.
The movement has made for some very odd attitudes, especially when it
comes to gender. The terms "liberal" and "conservative" barely seem to
apply. The new progressive morality about food sometimes feels as retro
and conservative as anything dreamed up during the 1950s. In many
well-educated, well-heeled quarters, what you cook determines your worth
as a mother (Is it organic? Local? BPA-free?), laziness in the kitchen
is understood to doom your children to lives of obesity and menial
labor, and the very idea of convenience is slatternly and shameful. In this culture, we have Berkeley heroes like Michael Pollan writing scoldingly about how feminism killed home cooking. Michelle Obama, every Democrat's favorite organic gardener, has been criticized for saying she doesn't like to cook. And not by Fox News, but by food writer and noted latte-apologist Amanda Hesser in the New York Times....
... It's hard to know what to make of all this. Crunchy progressives are
arguing that quitting your job to become a homemaker is a radical
feminist act, far-right evangelicals are talking about "women's
empowerment" via Etsy, lefty liberal writers are excoriating the First
Lady for hating to cook, and dyed-in-the-wool conservatives are giving
birth in their bathtubs with midwives and self-hypnosis tapes.
Both sides of the political spectrum turn to domesticity for many of
the same reasons: distrust in government and institutions from the EPA
to the public schools to hospital maternity wards, worries about the
safety of the food supply, disappointment with the working world, the
desire to connect with a simpler, less consumerist way of life.
The fact that domesticity is so appealing speaks to the failure of
these systems. Until these things are fixed, I predict we'll see an
increasing number of people from all parts of the political spectrum
deciding to go the DIY route with their food, their homes, their
children. And yes, this will mean more progressive people opting for
lifestyles that seem uncomfortably retro. But maybe too we'll see Rush
Limbaugh at the farmer's market.
AP has a story summarizing Global Trends 2030, a report put out by the U.S. Intelligence community.
... The study said that in
a best-case scenario, Americans, together with nearly two-thirds of the
world's population, will be middle class, mostly living in cities,
connected by advanced technology, protected by advanced health care and
linked by countries that work together, perhaps with the United States
and China cooperating to lead the way.
Violent
acts of terrorism will also be less frequent as the U.S. drawdown in
troops from Iraq and Afghanistan robs extremist ideologies of a rallying
cry to spur attacks. But that will likely be replaced by acts like
cyber-terrorism, wreaking havoc on an economy with a keystroke, the
study's authors say.
In countries where there are declining birth rates and an aging population like the U.S., economic growth may slow.
"Aging
countries will face an uphill battle in maintaining living standards,"
Kojm said. "So too will China, because its median age will be higher
than the U.S. by 2030."
The rising populations
of disenfranchised youth in places like Nigeria and Pakistan may lead
to conflict over water and food, with "nearly half of the world's
population ... experiencing severe water stress," the report said.
Africa and the Middle East will be most at risk, but China and India are
also vulnerable.
That instability could lead
to conflict and contribute to global economic collapse, especially if
combined with rapid climate change that could make it harder for
governments to feed global populations, the authors warn.
That's
the grimmest among the "Potential Worlds" the report sketches for 2030.
Under the heading "Stalled Engines," in the "most plausible worst-case
scenario, the risks of interstate conflict increase," the report said.
"The U.S. draws inward and globalization stalls." ...
Here is the overview from the report:
Over the next two decades, the relative power of major international
actors will shift markedly. Around 2030, after nearly a century as the
preeminent global economic power, the United States will be surpassed
by China as the world’s largest economy. With its trade in goods
expected to nearly double that of the U.S. and Europe, China’s
international economic clout will reach new heights. By 2030, India
will become the world’s most populous country and third-largest economy,
while Brazil’s economy will rank fourth in size. India and Brazil will
join China at the high table of 21st century international
politics alongside the United States, even as the relative weight of
Russia and Japan diminishes. The European economy will remain in the
top tier, but it is not clear whether Europe will be able to act with
common purpose to leverage this source of strength.
With its enhanced economic base, Beijing could rival Washington in
overall military spending, even as a slowing Chinese economy and
internal political conflict complicate China’s ability to lead
internationally. The United States will remain primus inter pares
in light of its continued advantages across the full spectrum of
national power and the legacy benefits of its leadership. It will,
however, be operating in a post-Western world in which the bulk of
global economic power is held by countries whose per capita incomes are
far below those of the traditional great powers. This reality will
leave China, India, Brazil, and other players focused on internal
development and domestic challenges, torn between their desire to be
global powers and their interest in free-riding on Western management of
the international system.
How will the rise of the rest impact the international system? The National Intelligence Council’s draft Global Trends 2030: Alternative Worlds maps out three broad scenarios:
Reverse Engines. Under this scenario, the
international system would consist of several powerful countries — but
no single state or bloc of states would have the political or economic
leverage to drive the international community toward collective action.
Such a world, characterized by a global vacuum of power, assumes that
the United States will no longer be willing or capable of sustaining the
predominant leadership role it has assumed since 1945. With no other
country able to step in to replace the U.S. as a global leader, the
resulting divergence of interests would lead to fragmentation and the
inability of great powers to work cooperatively to solve global issues.
Mercantilism and protectionism could lead economic globalization to go
into reverse, constraining technological breakthroughs required to
manage scarce global resources. Conflict and disorder would follow.
Great Power Convergence. An alternative scenario is
what the NIC calls a “fusion” world, in which major powers work
together to adopt and enforce a set of globally accepted rules and
norms. As U.S. predominance over the international system recedes, other
emerging powers would step in to assume greater responsibility for the
management of international affairs commensurate with their swelling
economic might. Emerging powers emerge as full stakeholders in a global
order that is transformed by power shifts but remains liberal and
pluralistic. Great power concert (perhaps enabled by democratization in
China) to meet global challenges increases the stability of the
international system even as power is diffused within it. U.S.
resilience enables it to create enduring partnerships with rising powers
to sustain the basis of liberal order. Technological advances create
new possibilities for joint management of key global challenges,
rewarding positive-sum behavior by the great powers.
Multipolar Divergence—U.S. Primacy. A third
scenario, one the NIC calls “fragmentation,” involves a multipolar
system characterized by a divergence of views among great powers that
challenges global governance. The United States would continue to
maintain disproportionate global influence and leverage that influence
to address global challenges by working through coalitions of
like-minded states. A multispeed global economy accelerates the
diffusion of power but an alternative coalition to the West does not
form, with developing giants consumed by their domestic challenges –
even as the global middle class explodes in ways that transform politics
within the rising powers. With inclusive global institutions
effectively stalemated, the United States instead turns to its old and
new allies in Europe and Asia, who would continue to see Washington as
their partner of choice in advancing the norms and rules of a liberal
order. The risk of conflict increases with the continued rise of new
powers like China and the rapid pace of technological change.
One key conclusion of the NIC study is that the future role of the
United States in the international system is a decisive variable in
determining what kind of “alternative world” will exist in 2030. The
choices U.S. leaders make – about how to marshal (and preserve) domestic
resources, how vigorously to assert U.S. military and economic
leadership overseas, and how much to invest in alliances old and new –
will be central to determining which of the above pathways the
international system will follow over the coming 20 years. To a certain
extent, the answer to the question of how the “rise of the rest”
impacts the U.S.-led international system is that it is not up to them…
so much as it is up to us.
"... I didn’t know it then but my world, my social world, was changing. Today, my 1,500 Facebook
friends — 1,300 of whom I have never actually met—have already seen the
best of the year’s haul of pictures of my kids. They also know where
I’ve gone on vacation and sometimes, what I cooked for dinner or what I
thought of a movie on a Saturday night in May. There’s little point to
writing a Christmas update now, with boasts about grades and athletic
prowess, hospitalizations and holidays, and the dog’s mishaps, when we
have already posted these events and so much more of our minutiae all
year long. The urge to share has already been well sated. ...
... Still, the demise of the Christmas photo card saddens me. It portends
the end of the U.S. Postal Service. It signals the day is near when
writing on paper is non-existent. Finally, it is part of a decline of a
certain quality of communication, one that involved delay and
anticipation, forethought and reflection. Opening these cards, the
satisfaction wasn’t just in the Peace on Earth greeting, but in the
recognition that a distant friend or relative you hadn’t heard from in a
year was still thinking about you, and maybe sharing news about major
events of the past 12 months...."
Is she right? Do you send cards and Christmas letters? Has social media changed how you communicate around the holidays?
A National Bureau of Economic Research paper by Edward N. Wolff, a New
York University professor and one of the leading U.S. experts on wealth
shares, shows that in 1998, the richest one percent of Americans owned
38.1 percent of the nation's wealth. It has fallen fairly steadily since
then to the current level of 35.4 percent.
And then shows this graph:
The preceding sentence doesn't match the data. The percentage dropped nearly five points between 1998 and 2001, and then began to slowly rise again, though it is true that it has not risen to all-time highs.
I find that median wealth plummeted over the years 2007 to 2010, and by
2010 was at its lowest level since 1969. The inequality of net worth,
after almost two decades of little movement, was up sharply from 2007 to
2010. Relative indebtedness continued to expand from 2007 to 2010,
particularly for the middle class, though the proximate causes were
declining net worth and income rather than an increase in absolute
indebtedness. In fact, the average debt of the middle class actually
fell in real terms by 25 percent. The sharp fall in median wealth and
the rise in inequality in the late 2000s are traceable to the high
leverage of middle class families in 2007 and the high share of homes in
their portfolio. The racial and ethnic disparity in wealth holdings,
after remaining more or less stable from 1983 to 2007, widened
considerably between 2007 and 2010. Hispanics, in particular, got
hammered by the Great Recession in terms of net worth and net equity in
their homes. Households under age 45 also got pummeled by the Great
Recession, as their relative and absolute wealth declined sharply from
2007 to 2010.
I'm having trouble with my SSRN account so I haven't yet been able to look at the article. Lots of interesting facts that need to be reconciled.
... Here’s what I bet goes on when this question is posed—and I want to
say up front that I think this way myself. I do not like long lines and
traffic jams. I do not like that I have to drive 60 minutes to get to a
decent natural area or that when I get to the Cascades for my hike, I’m
likely to run into dozens of others on the same trail. I do not like how
built up our coastline has become and how hard it is to get access to
beaches. And so on.
In other words, I do not like the impact of “too many people” on my
personal happiness. Rarely do we admit that this is the basis of our
concerns about human population. Instead, we couch them in terms of
“exceeding the Earth’s carrying capacity” or “causing the extinction of
species.” ...
... And when we so easily jump to the conclusion there are too many
people on the planet, what solutions does it suggest? Who should be
eliminated? Who should not be allowed to have children? And who gets to
decide? Is it really that there are too many people on the planet? Or is
it more about the kinds of settlements and economies we have built?
Lastly, the entire notion of too many people neglects those studies
showing that large numbers of people, especially concentrations of
people in cities, are engines for innovation and cultural advances. (4)
For example, new patents and inventions overwhelmingly come from
cities—and the larger the city, the more patents and inventions are
produced. ...
... More importantly, the question of whether there are too many people
is the wrong one for conservationists to ask. The right questions are:
What quality of life do we want all people on the planet to share? And
how can we achieve that quality of life while preserving as many species
and ecosystems as possible?
Conservation of nature has a lot to contribute to answering those
questions and to enhancing that quality of life. So don’t automatically
nod in agreement when a colleague says: “The problem is, there are too
many people on the planet.” People can be the solution as well as the
problem.
It is popular these days to decry consumerism ... and rightly so. Voices in our world tell us that our life consists of the
products we buy and the things we own. It is materialism.
But the irony is that many consumerism critics fall prey to is their own form
of materialism. They see human beings primarily as subtracting from a fixed
stock of resources. Human beings are parasitic, adding nothing. Reduce the number of humans and you save the planet.
Human beings do not just consume, though that is part of our reality. All forms of life consume. But human beings also add to the world in a way that other beings in the
created order do not. They add creativity and intelligence to the world. With
creativity and intelligence come beauty, ingenuity, community, and flourishing.
There are challenges. Through
unlocking powers of productivity and exchange we have found we can radically
improve the material status of people around the world. But we find we have to
adapt our methods and perspectives to sustain the changes we have made ... doing more and more
with less and less, as we minimize our destructive impact. We have to find ways to be stewards of the world that recognize more than just our material quality of life. As Christians, we
know that sin often twists our creativity and intelligence toward destructive behavior. The answer to these challenges is not to dehumanize people by framing them in materialistic terms as consumption units. Rather it is to work
toward unlocking and unleashing the creativity and intelligence of everyone as
we work for a flourishing shalom-filled world.
"... Drawing on data from the [Harvard] university's library collections, the animation
below maps the number and location of printed works by year. Watch it
full screen in HD to see cities light up as the years scroll by in the
lower left corner. ..."
4. There is a U-shaped happiness curve, consistent across cultures, that shows happiness declines from childhood until about our mid-forties and then begins to improve as me grow old. It appears it may hold true in primates as well. Our ability to discount bad news, even when we shouldn't, follows the same U-shaped curve. Our brains and experience are optimal for discerning bad news in middle-age. Turns out that ignorance (or maybe denial) truly is bliss. Viewpoint: How happiness changes with age. On a related note, it appears that Elderly Brains Have Trouble Recognizing Untrustworthy Faces.
5. The holiday season is in full swing and many people falsely believe this a time of elevated suicide rates. Actually, spring and summer have the highest rates and Nov - Jan have the lowest. In 2010, July was highest and December was lowest. Holiday suicide myth persists, research says
"Michael" was in the top 3 names for boys from 1953-2010. It dropped to sixth last year. Want to know how your name ranks for each year since 1880? Go to the Social Security Online's Popular Baby Names. The Baby Name Wizard is also pretty cool.
"For the first time in Barbie’s more than 50-year history, Mattel
is introducing a Barbie construction set that underscores a huge shift
in the marketplace. Fathers are doing more of the family shopping just
as girls are being encouraged more than ever by hypervigilant parents to
play with toys (as boys already do) that develop math and science
skills early on.
It’s a combination that not only has Barbie building luxury mansions —
they are pink, of course — but Lego promoting a line of pastel
construction toys called Friends that is an early Christmas season hit.
The Mega Bloks Barbie Build ’n Style line, available next week, has both
girls — and their fathers — in mind.
“Once it’s in the home, dads would very much be able to join in this
play that otherwise they might feel is not their territory,” said Dr.
Maureen O’Brien, a psychologist who consulted on the new Barbie set...."
And this reminds me of last year, or the year before, when cooking sets were becoming big with boys. They've been watching Emeril Lagasse on the Food Network. "Bam!" New merchandising angle.
11. Love them or hate them, the Koch brothers are intriguing. Many political junkies know of them but few others seem to know about them. Forbes has an interesting feature article in the most recent issue on the Koch empire and its influence: Inside The Koch Empire: How The Brothers Plan To Reshape America
14. "Data-driven healthcare won't replace physicians entirely, but it will help those receptive to technology perform their jobs better." Technology will replace 80% of what doctors do
"Scientists have designed an energy-efficient light of plastic packed with nanomaterials that glow. The shatterproof FIPEL technology can be molded into almost any shape, but still needs to prove it's commercially viable."
"... Last month, at the first ever conference of the Sustainable
Nanotechnology Organization in Washington DC, Michail Roco of the
National Science Foundation, and architect of the U.S. National
Nanotechnology Initiative provided a response. He said, “every
industrial sector is unsustainable…and nanotechnology holds the promise
of making every one of them sustainable.”
It’s my belief that that is true: nanotechnology, or the ability to
manipulate matter at a scale of one billionth of a meter, has
far-reaching implications for the improvement of sustainable technology,
industry and society.
Already, it is being used widely to enable more sustainable
practices. Safer manufacturing, less waste generation, reusable
materials, more efficient energy technologies, better water
purification, lower toxicity and environmental impacts from chemotherapy
agents to marine paints are all current applications of nanotechnology.
There is no reason for this technology to develop in an unsustainable
manner.
In the past, a lack of foresight has resulted in costs to society – people, businesses, and governments, and—
that could have been avoided by proactive efforts to manage risks.
Today, the tools to develop safer technologies and less harmful products
exist. Let us not miss this opportunity. ..."
"It used be that news of death spread through phone calls, and before
that, letters and house calls. The departed were publicly remembered via
memorials on street corners, newspaper obituaries and flowers at grave
sites. To some degree, this is still the case. But increasingly, the
announcements and subsequent mourning occur on social media. Facebook,
with 1 billion detailed, self-submitted user profiles, was created to
connect the living. But it has become the world's largest site of
memorials for the dead."
20. From the "That's just not right!" file. Harvard Economics Department does their version of "Call me maybe."
Last year, I had the privilege of visiting the leaders of
the Synod of Syria and Lebanon and the Synod of the Nile (Egypt) a year ago,
partner denominations to the Presbyterian Church USA. I heard firsthand about
the struggles of Christians in these countries. It was made apparent to me that
a central component to any lasting peace in the region is for moderate Muslims,
Christians, and religious minorities to form a healthy civil society. Dedicated
Christians from our partner denominations in these regions have worked diligently toward that end.
We are hearing a great deal about the violence in Syria, and
with good reason. The immediacy of the suffering is tragic. But I sense that
Egypt may be the bigger story in the long run. There are more than eighty million
Egyptians, dwarfing the size of other nations in the region. There is also a
history of stronger, more tolerant, societal institutions. If Egypt is transformed
into an Islamist state, then I think the implications well be tragic and far
reaching for much of the rest of the region.
As I recall, about 90% of Egyptians are Muslim. About 9% are
Coptic Orthodox Christians. About 1% are Protestant. Moderate Muslims
and Christians alike were part of the protests that ousted Mubarak. Moderate Muslims
and Christians are leading the protests against Morsi’s power grab and against
the troubling new constitution that is being proposed.
While in Egypt, I had the privilege of dining in the home of
a young family who also acted as our tour guides for a day. The wife and mother of this family has been posting
articles and pictures relating to the protests on Facebook, like this picture
of brave women taking the front row of a march towards
the presidential palace carrying their own shrouds (coffin cloth) in their
arms.
And this picture of a Christian
doctor treating an injured member of the Muslim Brotherhood on the grounds of a
church in Cairo.
Three hours ago my friend posted that the
referendum on the constitution has now been delayed until the 12th. The
pressure has been to get this constitution passed as quickly as possible and
there is some hope this delay may lead good things.
Let us all remember to keep Egypt in our prayers. Let us
pray that moderate Muslims and Christians will be able to influence events
toward the creation of a healthy civil society, delivering Egypt from the
bondage of extremist elements, even was we continue to pray for an end to the horrific suffering in Syria.
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