Accident of persons

The low-carbon future of building materials and the revival of building with stone led me back to now by going through then. Then is, of course, the firmament of Nietzsche:

The Imperium Romanum which we know, which the history of the Roman province teaches us to know better and better, this most admirable of al works of art in grand style, was a beginning, its structure was calculated to prove itself by millennia – to this day there has never been such building, to build in such a manner sub specie aerterni has never been so much as dreamed of! – This organization was firm enough to endure bad emperors: the accident of persons must have no effect on such things – first principle of all grand architecture. But it was not firm enough to endure the corruptest form of corruption…

To our now, and the beginning of a magnificent awakening for which all must limber for increased heavy lifting. Among those unable and unfit for limbering is the one most rebuked in the voices made heard. He spent the Blue Wednesday leading reporters around the construction site of the monument to his incompetence commitment to the bit:

“Watch the beam go up,” he said as he walked away to another point inside the construction site. He then pointed at the ceiling, and said to no one in particular, “now envision chandeliers.”

I wish one of the credulous would ask him what kind of leaves are represented in the Corinthian columns he so adores. But make no mistake: ignoring the electoral failure as if nothing happened in favor of concern for lighting fixtures and split pediments is straight fash. Complete contempt for reality.

Image: Imperial Forum

Special Ops

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With these guys on patrol all over Afghanistan, and not a few of them coming back to Dover in the middle of the night, it’s good to remember that to many people, green has nothing to do with eco-anything or money and the parts it fools fools it parts from, except within the idea of protecting the liberty inherent to those conceits.

Their official motto, De Oppresso Liber, to liberate the oppressed, is truly something to contemplate. It gets complicated when you begin to unravel all of the absolutes necessary to project force with the tender skin and bones of actual men across the globe. Belief goes beyond believing, and into the land reserved for religion and reverence. And craven beings that we are, we can’t help but corrupt the selflessness of the display with all manner of politics and nationalism, righteousness and relativism that surely crushes most missions to liberate the oppressed. It’s almost impossible, but our war-making sanction, which we mistake for nature, animates so many elements of public policy that we put ourselves at the mercy of our warrior impulses. Oppressed by these very tendencies, how might we be liberated?

So while I can revel in the fact that our mighty militaristic capabilities may indeed build some bridges out of the energy morass, we shouldn’t forget those young guys, bearded against regulation but for their own protection, walking around villages and laying wait in poppy fields – scared, nervous, confident, well-armed, lost, found, known, unsure, fit, tired and certain in the face of but one of our every-present, shadowy enemies. Go ahead and try harder than them to do something impossible.