I keep up with the news but more and more, I don't much want to comment on the news. Too much of it is too awful, and divisions over what it all means and where we're headed are too deep, even before you get to the "Unless we do..." part.
Writing that practically guarantees I will see or read something between now and tomorrow morning that I will want to share my opinion about -- saber rattling* from Vladimir Putin and the North Korean government, natural disasters in Turkey and New Zealand, yammerheads and nitwits everywhere. The older I get, the less convinced I am that it does any good to talk about it, whether to praise constructive responses or point with alarm at danger and destruction.
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* A "buckler" is a small shield; to "swash" is to swagger or wave a sword about. And now you know what a "swashbuckler" does, sometimes going so far as to to slap the flat of his sword against his buckler. Presumably this causes considerable rattling. It's 2023 and our metaphorical language is still dressed like a hoplite or a hussar, with the occasional dragoon carefully keeping his powder dry and not going off half-cocked.
I will say that Plutarch's "Parallel Lives" is more contemporary than I thought it would be.
ReplyDeleteBanging one's sword on buckler was a challenge IIRC. Much like assuming a fighting stance today and yelling "Bring it!"
ReplyDeleteThe big worry with both Kim and Putin is that they'll slip the last of their moorings and start throwing nukes around. I'd like to think there are saner people around them that wouldn't let that happen; but people seem to fall out of windows in Russia lately, and literally feeds people to hungry dogs. The good thing about the Cold War was that the leaders on both sides weren't crazy.
At home we have to keep remembering there is more that unites us than divides us, and that we can disagree without being disagreeable.
I think that the reason why the leaders during the Cold War were saner was that they had first-hand experience with the devastation of a general war.
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