All there is

 

I very much enjoy Peggy Lee's wonderful voice, which I get to hear occasionally in a Saturday retro program broadcast on FM. One of her most evocative refrains asks "Is that all there is?" in shades of disappointment and wonder. Many women are disappointed, and Peggy muses prettily in song and narrative vignettes. Her reaction as a child, witnessing a circus start to finish: "Is that all there is?" The thrill of adult romance, then parting, no longer in love. "Is that all there is?" she sighs.

 

So... is that all there is, for me? I don't think I can write anything until after the Olympics, with two war threats locked and loaded in Europe and Taiwan. I should expand it to three, to acknowledge a Middle East theater of war, Iran and Syria versus U.A.E., Israel, and our 5th Fleet. If a tidal wave of global trade and infectious prosperity allowed us to escape suicidal war among nuclear powers, then I could write a new novel. I would certainly like to. But the specter of World War III won't be defused by Happy Days that are not going to happen. All three players, U.S., China, and Russia are mired in economic weakness, a traditional impetus to saber rattling and unwitting accidents that trigger combat. With confused sock puppet Biden in office, no one believes a word of his foreign policy, if there is one. He will be challenged on three fronts simultaneously, not including terror attacks and uncontrollable urban crime.

 

Is that all there is? — I wrote Escape. Partners. A theory of justice.

 

I very much want to explore Steam Punk. I believe I can find a theme, but it can't be wartime hysteria and suffering. No point in writing about death and disaster. Someone else will cover it. I don't want war in my consciousness, corrosive of creativity. I don't want to weep "Is that all there is?" about life.

 

Another sorrow. No more travel. I wanted to see Victorville.

 

I hope folks realize that the problem is not people, it's governments, theirs, ours, every government in human history worldwide. Civilians are in favor of work, savings, feeding their children and their elderly kin. Civilians are okay with trade, depending on price. Governments constantly drain civilians of their liberty, their market opportunities, and the value of their paltry savings. Governments can jail anyone with or without due process. They have armies, navies, missiles, police, easily bribed allies, and multiple enemies. None of it does any good, as far as civilians are concerned. The young men who volunteer to become vigorously trained war fighters are doomed to suffer, as will their extended families, many of them robbed of future happiness after losing a valiant son for no reason, because the war was lost and tens of millions were made homeless starving war refugees. It happened in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Somalia, and Yemen. U.S. warships and troops were involved, hundreds of thousands of young American soldiers maimed, millions of women, children, troops, tribesmen, and jihadis murdered.

 

All the death and destitution was inflicted by governments unconcerned with the welfare of its civilians and tolerant of crime. There are brutal criminal gangs in every nation, especially in democracies like the U.S. and its client states who flounder endlessly with parliamentary squabbles and are supported by U.S. military spending. Governments in Asia and Eastern Europe are little better than feudal autocracies. In Africa it's worse, ruthless thugs dressed up in a lie of liberation, or a hereditary oil sheik with the power of secret assassination and prison without trial. Our government treats all dictators as equally sovereign because they hold their civilians by the throat, just like the United States does.

 

The distinguishing characteristic of America was our wealth. We were spared destruction and death in World War II because we were insulated by two big oceans, and our industrialists and factories had the power to outproduce the rest of the world combined, an infinity of ships, planes, tanks, trucks, fuel, and food supplies to support Russia, Britain, China, and anyone else who wished to wage war, including the defeated Germans, Italians, and Japanese who we fed after destroying their societies. Our government gave Russia half of Europe, half of Korea, and atomic secrets leaked by public servants. At the time, we were all public servants. Food and fuel rations were sold and swapped. Things fell off the back of trucks, and mobsters ruled the waterfront. Governments are indifferent to crime, remember? It's a stream of unreported slush funds and reliable union votes. Governments like poverty and hardship. It gives them an excuse to tax and puff up their chests like heroes, expanding their sovereign cohort of government dependents, whether dope addict, defense contractor, media tycoon, or patriotic pawn in uniform.

 

Is that all there is?

 

In a previous post I said that there is no higher office in human history than propounding a new idea. I'd like to ignore it, but once known the only way to dispose of a truth is to watch TV. I don't have a TV and I hate watching TV anywhere at any time. I joke occasionally that I worked in television and had enough of it, thanks. I know what happens behind the scenes, every set-up, every story beat, every advertiser, every newsroom, every agent. Not one person in show business is doing original work. Taking what the world offers you — past, present, and future — limits other professions and trades. People like it, follow along, well worn paths and options recited by smiling maidens. Would you like fries with that?

 

My job is to discover a new idea.