FUTURE PERFECT: Vintage Futuristic Graphics, ed. Jim Heimann (Taschen, 2002, unpaginated)
DRIVING THROUGH FUTURES PAST: Mid-20th Century Automotive Design, by Hampton C. Wayt (Kythe Publishing, Feb. 206, 59pp)
Here are two more books that I read the same couple days I read the Asimov, posted about earlier.
The first one is a small though heavy-weight trade paperback book from a publisher famous for expensive coffee table books. Continue reading
Many of these topics can be considered in the broad terms of, what kind of society do Americans want to live in? A selfish and authoritarian one, or one in which people help each other because such help benefits *everyone*? Republicans, busy slashing funds for “benefits” they think are give-aways to free-loaders, seem not to understand that those funds are *investments* toward making society beneficial for everyone, including themselves. The distinction carries along several dimensions, as I’ve explored via various books and links in recent years. Here’s Heather Cox Richardson, who captures it this way, in reaction to the question of how the US should raise money, and spend money.
Heather Cox Richardson, February 25, 2025
Subtitled: “A Nineteenth-Century Vision of the Year 2000”
(Henry Holt, trade paperback, 1986, 96pp)
This is a thin little book I’ve had for nearly 40 years, since it was published. It’s ostensibly about a set of “cigarette cards” (presumably included with packs of cigarettes) designed to promote the end-of-century festivities in France in 1900. They were never distributed, but one pack survived and was brought to Asimov’s attention. So the book shows about 40 of these cards, along with Asimov’s comments about what each depicted, and how accurate or plausible those visions of the future were.
The earlier homepage title, about how Trump has abandoned 75 years of America as leader of the fee world, is there in the fourth paragraph.
NY Times, Fred Kaplan, 25 Feb 2025: Trump’s Foreign Policy Has Completely Departed From Reality, subtitled “And the geopolitical stakes are high.”
I’m thinking this piece aligns with Tom Nichols and James Marriot, whose comments I’ve noted recently. Is there something vaguely or not so vaguely discontent with the ease of the modern world? A yearning for conflict and autocracy that aligns with base human nature?
Washington Post, Shadi Hamid, 25 Feb 2025: Why half of America is cheering for chaos, subtitle “The fight isn’t between the left and right anymore. It’s a clash over the system.”
Trump’s lying reaches new levels; and Musk’s DARVO strategy. (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender)
NY Times, Peter Baker, 23 Feb 2025: In Trump’s Alternate Reality, Lies and Distortions Drive Change, subtitle “Condoms for Gaza? Ukraine started the war with Russia? The president’s manipulations of the truth lay the groundwork for radical change.’ [gift link]
It gets worse and worse.
For example, this makes a kind of sense.
AP, 22 Feb 2025: Musk’s cost-cutting team is laying off workers at the auto safety agency overseeing his car company (via)
Wired, Brian Barrett, 20 Feb 2025: The Incompetence of DOGE Is a Feature, Not a Bug, subitled “A series of mistakes by DOGE shows just how arbitrary and destructive this slash-and-burn strategy can get.”
Heather Cox Richardson, February 19, 2025
The past week has solidified a sea change in American—and global—history.
A week ago, on Wednesday, February 12, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth announced at a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group in Brussels, Belgium, that President Donald Trump intended to back away from support for Ukraine in its fight to push back Russia’s invasions of 2014 and 2022.
Today’s outrageous statement by Trump, made so casually it’s hard to believe it was a red herring meant to distract the media for a news cycle so they would not notice how Musk continues to dismantle the government; more likely it’s Trump gaslighting the world, sure that whatever he says will be believed by his followers. We’re in Orwell territory, again.
Politico, 19 Feb 2025: Trump blaming Ukraine for Putin’s war leaves Europe reeling subtitled “The U.S. president called out Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a diatribe against Kyiv.”
