Americans have become increasingly aware of the addictive effects that Facebook and its subsidiary Instagram have on young people. But we should all be even more concerned about Tik Tok, the English-language version of the signature app owned by China’s ByteDance company. TikTok consists solely of catchy, fast-moving short videos– 60 seconds is considered a … Continue reading How Tik Tok hooks (very) young people
Some quick takeaways from this past week’s election news here in the USA. 1. Though Biden won, it’s still true that more than 70 million Americans cast a vote for Donald Trump. That, after four years of seeing him in action: racism, misogyny, crass cutting of health care and other vital social programs; “White” entitled-ism, … Continue reading Takeaways from an election
Twenty months ago, Bill the spouse and I moved back to live in Washington DC fulltime after living in “bucolic” Charlottesville, VA for 21 years. Three months ago, the Covid-19 crisis found us here; and since then I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about how starkly the three braided strands of this crisis expose … Continue reading Notes from the heart of this collapsing empire
Americans are well-known for their ingenuity and many of them (including Pres. Donald J. Trump) love to crow about being “Number One!” Now, the whole world is seeing the United States achieving a nearly unprecedented record: The country that was this planet’s unchallenged hegemon for the past 28 years is undergoing a collapse of its … Continue reading Another American first: A self-collapsing empire!
Here is the half-hour interview the tireless peace activist David Swanson conducted with me earlier this week.
A large part of the international-affairs commentatoriat in the United States is opining on the issue of a possible “Cold War 2.0” with China. Some are warning it may come unless we do X, Y, or Z. Some are saying it is already here. Some are cheering it on. Some are “judiciously” saying it may … Continue reading Not Cold War 2.0. More like imperial collapse.
Ten days ago, I wrote: the world may thus soon become divided into two zones “Covid-safe” and “Covid-unsafe.” And those of us living in “Covid-unsafe” countries may find it extremely difficult to travel to many other countries… but especially to the “Covid-safe” ones. On May 13, the tireless Covid-chronicler/statistician Tomas Pueyo– who was the originator … Continue reading Pueyo and Haque on the effects of Covid-19
I’m working a few new ideas for big pieces of writing. But then, I remembered how good it felt, back when I was blogging in the aughts, sometimes just to write informal or small things. I’ve been thinking about the concept of “warp speed”, which is the childish, popular-culture-derived name that Trump has given to … Continue reading US hegemony evaporates at “Warp Speed”
(This is Part 4 in my series “Covid chronicles.” Click here for the earlier parts. Note that on that portal-page the blog-posts are presented in reverse-chronological order. The image above is Wuhan, February 2020, by Yihya Alali.) The coronavirus has affected just about every country in the world, though it has affected them all very … Continue reading Covid crisis brings new global influence for China?
(This is Part 3 in my series “Covid chronicles.” Click here for the earlier parts. Also: The image above is from a video released yesterday by the Chinese TV network CGTN. I’m displaying it not because I approve of its racist depiction of Americans as babies but because it’s an interesting– probably not very effective– … Continue reading “Recovery” of nations from Covid-19
