War

Was it George S. Patton who said “Next to war, all other human endeavours pale to insignificance”?  It’s hard to argue with him. When bombs start falling, bullets start flying, lives, and sometimes civilizations themselves are at stake, it’s difficult to care about anything else.

 

          There’s a war on now. Basically the start of every Cold-War doomsday scenario. The Russian tanks have crossed their frontiers and are streaming west. . .

 https://www.theguardian.com/international

https://youtu.be/kbdkbzh0AW0

          I was in the middle of a blog about some super-obscure Canadian rock band. Who’d care about it now? I like to go on Twitter and bitch about Doctor Who. How can I now? People are dying. By this time next week, a country might erased. Forty-four million people may be enslaved. A Democracy – a flawed one to be sure, but one all the same, might vanish. A very big country is swallowing a smaller one. I had been naive enough to hope that we as a civilization might be past this. As the resident of a small country neighbouring a much larger one, I have a vested interest in such developments. these things do keep me up at night.

          There has been a lot of hand wringing in the West, but there will be no serious efforts to stop the Russians.

          China is cheering them on. They think it’s perfectly swell, and are slobbering over Taiwan as we speak.

          Trump has been cheering them on. He described the invasion as  “genius” and ,“wonderful”, and referred to the Russian army as a “peace force”.  He spoke longingly of employing such a “peace force” on the Mexican border. Yup, the guy who won the second most votes in American history openly wants to invade Mexico.

 

Pals for life

             Boris Johnson’s been talking tough, but who can take him seriously? There’s as much Russian money in London as in Moscow, and the Tory party of British Billionaires has done well by them. There’s probably a sweet deal waiting for them afterwards.

Fearless leader

          The Germans have cancelled a pipeline. That’s not nothing, but the winter’s not over yet. . . 

The "Freedom" Convoy

And over here, Canadian truckers are still bitching that they’ve got no freedom.

This stuff is keeping me up at night. 

I’m feeling ill.

 

A great comfort I used to get from reading history is – was – putting the book down and knowing it’s all safely in the past. “Thank God THAT’s over! We’re so much smarter now, we’d never do THAT again.” I miss living in the post-historical era.

          Meanwhile, thousands of brave Russians have taken to the streets to protest their dictator. They haven't been taken in by nationalistic bullshit. They know right from wrong. They know how Putin treats protestors; they’ve got guts. Things like this happen. Even in the darkest times, little flashes of courage, decency, and humanity find a way. Vassily Grossman argued in Life and Fate that the great struggles of history were not between good and evil, but kindness and cruelty. And that however powerful cruelty gets, it can never quite stamp out kindness.

Was it Trotsky (of all people) or one of his biographers (Tony Cliff?) who said “The darker the night, the brighter the star.”