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“Squirting included!”
My BF and I get off filming ourselves having sex (yes, BJ, facials, anal, squirting included!) and we also get off watching the movies of other COUPLES that we can email or chat with!
Me: 20, Slim, CUTE, small bewbs, dark hair!
Him: 22, fit, nice cock, dark hair!
In “Paper Versus Pixel,” Nicholas Carr’s excellent new Nautilus essay, he argues that print won’t be disappeared by 0s and 1s. The opening:
“Gutenberg we know. But what of the eunuch Cai Lun?
A well-educated, studious young man, a close aide to the Emperor Hedi in the Chinese imperial court of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Cai invented paper one fateful day in the year 105 A.D. At the time, writing and drawing were done primarily on silk, which was elegant but expensive, or on bamboo, which was sturdy but cumbersome. Seeking a more practical alternative, Cai came up with the idea of mashing bits of tree bark and hemp fiber together in a little water, pounding the resulting paste flat with a stone mortar, and then letting it dry into sheets in the sun. The experiment was a success. Allowing for a few industrial tweaks, Cai’s method is still pretty much the way paper gets made today.
Cai killed himself some years later, having become entangled in a palace scandal from which he saw no exit. But his invention took on a life of its own. The craft of papermaking spread quickly throughout China and then, following the Silk Road westward, made its way into Persia, Arabia, and Europe. Within a few centuries, paper had replaced animal skins, papyrus mats, and wooden tablets as the world’s preferred medium for writing and reading. The goldsmith Gutenberg would, with his creation of the printing press around 1450, mechanize the work of the scribe, replacing inky fingers with inky machines, but it was Cai Lun who gave us our reading material and, some would say, our world.
Paper may be the single most versatile invention in history, its uses extending from the artistic to the bureaucratic to the hygienic. Rarely, though, do we give it its due. The ubiquity and disposability of the stuff—the average American goes through a quarter ton of it every year—lead us to take it for granted, or even to resent it. It’s hard to respect something that you’re forever throwing in the trash or flushing down the john or blowing your nose into. But modern life is inconceivable without paper. If paper were to disappear, writes Ian Sansom in his recent book Paper: An Elegy, ‘Everything would be lost.’
But wait. ‘An elegy’? Sansom’s subtitle is half joking, but it’s also half serious. For while paper will be around as long as we’re around, with the digital computer we have at last come up with an invention to rival Cai Lun’s.” (Thanks Browser.)
Tags: Nicholas Carr
Piers Morgan: Even now, David Frost is a better interviewer.
The Top 5 foreign countries sending the most traffic to Afflictor last month:
As far as domestic atrocities in America can be measured, I would think that the conduct at Fort Sumter, the Civil War military prison in Georgia, ranks with anything after slavery and the treatment of Native Americans. The open-air stockade prison (nicknamed Andersonville by inmates) held 45,000 prisoners during its 14-month existence, with nearly a third succumbing to starvation, lack of drinking water and disease. Swiss-born Confederate officer Henry Wirz commanded the camp and was known for his brutality and severity. Even though the lack of supplies and pen-type jail weren’t his fault alone, Wirz was the one executed for the crimes against humanity. The classic photograph above shows him as he’s about to have his sentence carried out. From the story of his hanging in the November 10, 1865 New York Times:
“WIRZ was executed this morning at 10:30 o’clock. Nobody who saw him die to-day will think any the less of him. He disappointed all those who expected to see him quiver at the brink of death. He met his fate, not with bravado, or defiance, but with a quiet, cheerful indifference. Smiles even played upon his countenance until the black coat shut out from his eyes the sunlight and the world forever. His physical misery, whatever it may have been, was completely hidden in his last and successful effort to die bravely and without any exhibition of trepidation or fear, so his step was steady, his demeanor calm, his tongue silent, except as he offered up his last prayer, and all his bearing evinced more of the man than at any time since his first incarceration. The crowd said he was a braver man than PAYNE, or HERROLD, or ATZEROTH. Perhaps it was the bravery of a desperate man, who knows mercy is beyond his hope. Nevertheless, he met his fate with unblanched eye, unmoving feature, and a calm, deliberate prayer for all those whom he has deemed his persecutors. He seemed to have convinced himself of his own innocence, and his last principal conversation was full of protestations that he died unjustly, and that others were just as guilty as he.
Yesterday afternoon, LOUIS SCHADE, WIRZ junior counsel, communicated to him the result of his last appeal to the President. WIRZ said he had no hope. He was ready to die. He had sought and received religious consolation, and it mattered little whether he died now or was spared to die a natural death, for die soon he must. An attache of the Swiss Consulate also called to ascertain the residence of his relatives, that they might be officially apprised of his death. WIRZ said he had been greatly wronged by the refusal of the Swiss Consul to receive money to enable him to conduct his defence.
WIRZ ate his supper as usual, and retiring, slept soundly the best part of the night. This morning he arose early and partook of a moderate breakfast. Soon after, R.B. WINDER, who was associated with WIRZ in the command at Andersonville, was allowed to visit him, and the two had a long conversation, devoted to a review of their career at the stockade, a review of the evidence, and mutual assertions that they were equally guilty, or rather, equally innocent, and that if WIRZ deserved hanging, so did WINDER. WINDER then bade WIRZ an emotional farewell at half-past eight o’clock. Mr. SCHADE was admitted for a farewell interview, during which the prisoner reiterated his thanks for his counsel’s efforts, and expressed himself as to his innocence, much as he had done before. It is due to Mr. SCHADE to say that he has been indefatigable in seeking to prolong the life of his client. He left the prison at the close of the interview, and went to the President’s, where at ten thirty-five he made his last appeal. WIRZ was hung at ten thirty-two.
After Mr. SCHADE left WIRZ, his spiritual advisers, Fathers BOYLE and WIGET entered and remained with him until he was led forth to the scaffold.
…
At thirty minutes past ten, his hands and legs having been pinioned by straps, the noose was adjusted by L.J. RICHARDSON, Military Detective, and the doomed man shook hands with the priests and officers. At exactly thirty-two minutes past ten, SYLVESTER BALLOU, another detective, at the signal of the Provost-Marshal, put his foot upon the fatal spring, the trap fell with a heavy noise, and the Andersonville jailor was dangling in the air. There were a few spasmodic convulsions of the chest, a slight movement of the extremities, and all was over. When it was known in the street that WIRZ was hung, the soldiers sent up a loud ringing cheer, just such as I have heard scores of times on the battle-field after a successful charge. The sufferings at Andersonville were too great to cause the soldiers to do otherwise than rejoice at such a death of such a man.
After hanging fourteen minutes the body was examined by Post-Surgeon FORD, and life pronounced to be extinct. It was then taken down, placed upon a stretcher, and carried to the hospital, where the surgeons took charge of it.
No sooner had the scaffold and the rope done its work, and become historically famous, than relic seekers began their work. Splinters from the scaffold were cut off like kindling wood, and a dozen feet of rope disappeared almost instantly. The interposition of the guard only saved the whole thing from being carried off in this manner.
The surgeons held a post-mortem, and an examination of the neck showed the vertebrae to be dislocated. His right arm, which has been the chief cause of his physical misery, was in a very bad condition, in consequence of an old wound having broken out afresh. His body also showed severe scrofulitic cruptions.
Agreeably to a request from WIRZ, Father BOYLE received the body to-day, and delivered it to an undertaker, who will inter it, to await the arrival of Mrs. WIRZ, who is expected soon. WIRZ left few or no earthly effects. The only things in his room after the execution were a few articles of clothing, some tobacco, a little whisky, a Testament, a copy of Cummings on the Apocalypse, and a cat, which was WIRZ’s pet companion. This is all there is left of him.”
Andersonville survivor, May 1865.
Tags: Henry Wirz
David Frost was a jester until he was a king. After that, he was somewhere in between but always closer to royalty than risible. The Frost-Nixon interview saw to that. The storied journalist just passed away from a heart attack at 74. Here’s a collection of all the posts on the site about him.
Tags: David Frost
Woody Allen’s first talk-show appearance was with Merv Griffin. In this clip, the two men reconvene in 1969, the comic now a grizzled veteran of the format. By the middle of the next decade, Allen was a serious filmmaker who had given up dishing out great ad-libs into American living rooms.
Tags: Merv Griffin, Woody Allen
In Tyler Cowen’s smart New York Times editorial “Who Will Prosper in the New World,” the economist tries to identify the victors and the victims in a highly automated society. In one passage that I don’t excerpt, he suggests that the studious who take advantage of online learning will do best, but some of the most studious people I know are struggling the most right now. And I wonder if an ageist culture like ours will respond to older folks who continue to educate themselves. We’ll see. Here’s an excerpt about some of those he believes Big Data will diminish:
“Who will be most likely to suffer from this technological revolution?
PEOPLE WITH DELICATE FEELINGS Computing and software will make it easier to measure performance and productivity.
It will be harder to gloss over our failings and maintain self-deception. In essence everyone will suffer the fate of professional chess players, who always know when they have lost a game, have an exact numerical rating for their overall performance, and find excuses for failure hard to come by.
Individuals will have many measures of their proficiency. They will have an incentive to disclose that information to get the better job or social opportunity. You’ll assume the worst about those who keep secrets, and so openness will reign. Many of us will start to hate the idea of Big Data.
PEOPLE UNLUCKY IN HEALTH CARE Quality surgery and cancer treatment cannot be automated very easily. They will be highly expensive, and unlucky health breaks will be all the more tragic because not everyone will be able to afford the best treatments.
With marvelous diagnosis available online, some people will get the right treatments early on, whereas others will know exactly what they are dying from.”
Tags: Tyler Cowen
10 search-engine keyphrases bringing traffic to Afflictor this week:
Afflictor: Hoping Anthony Weiner won’t be in charge of the food at his Labor Day barbecue.
From the February 6, 1908 New York Times:
“Asheville, N.C.–News was received here to-day of the death at his home in Yancey County of Big Tom Wilson, the noted bear trapper, who found the body of Prof. Elisha Mitchell of Yale, for whom Mount Mitchell, the highest peak east of the Rockies, was named.
Dr. Mitchell lost his life in trying to ascend Mount Mitchell alone. A party of 500, led by United States Senator Zebulon Vance, continued the search for two weeks, but Dr. Mitchell’s body was found by Big Tom at the foot of a deep precipice.
Big Tom was one of the pioneer settlers of the mountains and held the record for having killed more bears than any one else. He had 110 to his credit, and his son Adolph ninety. He was known as the guide of the Black Mountains. He was seven feet tall and weighed 250 pounds. He was 85 years old.
Tags: Adolph Wilson, Elisha Mitchell, Thomas "Big Tom" Wilson, Zebulon Vance
The NFL wants to be global, hoping to ultimately establish its brand with a franchise in London, but Grantland‘s Bill Barnwell has his doubts about the enterprise. From “London Calling,” his new article on the topic:
“London is obviously an internationally renowned city, and Wembley is easy to get to, which helps make the International Series games played there a success, but there’s a gap worth noting in the makeup of the people who go to those games. I went to the Wembley tilt between the 49ers and Broncos in October 2010 and found that the crowd wasn’t by any means full of Londoners. Instead, it was a crowd consisting almost entirely of fans from around Europe who had traveled to London for the game.
That experience initially raised my suspicions about a London team. The fans I spoke to and rode the train with that day were mostly close observers of the NFL, hard-core fans who kept impossible hours (and/or built intense spoiler-free torrent communities) to see as much of the game they loved as possible. It was a no-brainer for them to travel from Germany or Ireland or Slovenia to England to see a meaningful NFL game once per year while taking a short vacation in London and spending a few hundred euros altogether. Doing that once a year is feasible for most people. If a team were based full-time in London, though, would a fan in Germany shell out those same few hundred euros eight times per year to travel to London and see that team play every other week? I’m very skeptical that they would be inclined to do so. And if they’re not coming, I don’t think the NFL would sell out Wembley eight times a year, year-after-year, or come particularly close. That’s why it’s very important to see how the European market responds to this second game; if the league can gets fans around Europe to make two trips to England, they might have more faith in turning them into regular repeat customers.
There’s also the distinct possibility that fans in Europe wouldn’t back a London team.”
Tags: Bill Barnwell
As the telephone first became popular in America, rural communities were often left behind. The expense of putting up lines that would serve so few just wasn’t cost-effective initially, similar to the high-speed broadband problem today. So some farming villages formed collectives and put up their own lines and improvised mini-companies dotted the countryside. Some small Mexican villages are in a similar situation now with mobile. Carlos Slim seems to have forgotten them so they’ve created their own service, which is far cheaper than his. From Subodh Varmathe of the Times of India:
“After being ignored by a company owned by the world’s richest man Carlos Slim, a tiny Mexican village has developed its own mobile network with international connections. The local service costs 15 pesos ($1.2) per month-13 times cheaper than a big firm’s basic plan in Mexico City, AFP reports.
The village of Villa Talea de Castro, dotted with small pink and yellow homes, has a population of 2,500 indigenous people. Tucked away in a lush forest in the southern state of Oaxaca, it was not seen as a profitable market for companies such as Slim’s America Movil. The company wanted at least 10,000 subscribers to bring the village into its mobile coverage, AFP said.
So the village, under an initiative launched by indigenous groups, civil organizations and universities, put up an antenna on a rooftop, installed radio and computer equipment, and created its own micro provider called Red Celular de Talea (RCT) this year.
Calls to the United States, where many of the indigenous Zapoteco resident have migrated, charge a few pennies per minute.”
Tags: Carlos Slim, Subodh Varmathe
“You can abuse me as much as you want.”
Hello ladies,
Are you angry, frustrated, tired of the male dominated world?
Are you feeling like slapping, punching or beating up someone?
I am Bill and I am here to resolve your emotional dilemma.
You can abuse me as much as you want.
I am one spoiled, unbehaving, condescending nerd whom you will enjoy slapping, punching and humiliating with no consequences.
Don’t miss the opportunity to abuse and destroy your opposite sex.
Reply me at my e-mail to know the rate.
A report from a 1990s Tomorrow’s World about the advent of neuromarketing. Everyone in the piece is far too chipper about this development.
Innocent men executed by hanging with Donald Trump neckties.
Available at Macy’s and other fine dealers of nooses.
Frank Zappa visits Mike Douglas in 1976 for an interview, a performance and to present a clip from the Mothers of Invention documentary, A Token of His Extreme, which features clay animation by Bruce Bickford. Thankfully, Jimmie Walker and Kenny Rogers were on hand.
Tags: Bruce Bickford, Frank Zappa, Mike Douglas
“He proposed at first to have an auction, and to sell them to the highest bidder.”
You can’t sell your husband and raffling off your daughters probably isn’t a great idea, either. But that was the plan carried out by a struggling Wisconsin farmer featured in an article in the September 15, 1897 New York Times. The story:
“Maple, Wis.–During the past few days the Finnish settlement, a few miles south of Maple, has been in a state of great excitement over a remarkable succession of events. There are about two hundred residents in the settlement–all farmers, thrifty and nearly all in comfortable circumstances. There is a large surplus of unmarried young men in the community and a scarcity of marriageable young women, so that every female old enough to be courted receives the attentions of from one to a dozen rival lovers. A widower named Hanes Dorfkle is one of the settlers, and has been living, since the death of his wife, with three pretty daughters in a little log house somewhat removed from the main settlement. Lately Dorfkle met with a number of reverses which crippled him financially. He had accumulated enough money since his residence there to pay for a forty-acre tract of farming land and to equip the farm with stock and the necessary implements for tilling the soil and harvesting the crops, but this year his crops were poor, his oxen died, and his poultry was carried away by hawks, so that while his neighbors saw plenty on hand to carry them through the coming long Winter, the old man saw starvation looking into the faces of himself and three daughters. Something must be done, and the wary old Finlander set to thinking out a scheme for replenishing his depleted exchequer. At last an idea came to him, and he lost no time in shaping it into a lucrative scheme. He loved his three daughters and they loved him dearly, but they had dozens of young men lovers, and sooner or later they would leave him to live the remainder of his days in poverty and loneliness. Why not realize something on his daughters? It was a good scheme, and he proceeded at once to carry it out.
Girls Agree to a Raffle
The old man, Dorfkle, held a conference with his three daughters, and unfolded to them his plan for making money. He proposed at first to have an auction, and to sell them, one by one, to the highest bidder, but the young women shrank from such a barbarous suggestion, though they signified their willingness to acquiesce in any legitimate scheme of money making that the father might devise. At last the old gent thought it might be a good scheme to have a raffle, and so informed the three dutiful young women. They objected at first, on the ground that they might be obliged to accept men as their husbands who were unsatisfactory to them, but when the father promised that the tickets should be sold to persons only who were acceptable in all respects, there was nothing left for the girls to do but to assent, and this they readily did.
“Every man in the village, married or single, rich or poor, homely or handsome, had possessed himself of one or more chances for the hand of one of the fair daughters.”
So it was whispered about the neighborhood one day last week that Farmer Dorfkle had decided to raffle off his daughters, and the day later the whisperings were confirmed, for Mr. Dorfkle himself appeared among the people with a basketful of pasteboard cards, upon each of which the information was contained that the holder thereof was entitled to one chance on one or another of the three maidens fair. The tickets went like hot cakes at $1 apiece, and within a few days the loving father had exchanged his basketful of pasteboards for a like measure of shining silver and gold. In his anxiety to dispose of all the tickets. Mr. Dorfkle forgot his promise to discriminate in favor of the best-looking and most prosperous suitors in the settlement. He took everybody’s dollar in exchange for a ticket, and the consequence was that every man in the village, married or single, rich or poor, homely or handsome, had possessed himself of one or more chances for the hand of one of the fair daughters long before the time set for the raffle.
Prizes Drawn at the Schoolhouse
The day came for the great event, and the schoolhouse was packed to the outer door with men, women, and children. People in neighboring towns had heard of the novel affair, and came from all directions to witness the final proceedings. Two hundred and fifty tickets upon each girl had been sold, and the arrangement was that each prize should be disposed of separately under the auspices of a committee selected out of the audience. Tickets numbered to correspond with those sold were placed in one box, and another box contained 240 blanks and one number marked ‘Prize.’ Two young girls were then selected to preside over the boxes, and the drawing commenced, the tickets being removed from both boxes simultaneously until the lucky number drew the prize. For half an hour the audience sat in suspense, while the two girls slowly withdrew the numbers and compared them under the vigilant eyes of the committeemen, but at last the number 115 was responded to by the exclamation ‘Prize!’ and the first raffle was over. Then followed a wild skirmish for the owner of the lucky ticket, and when found he was carried to the front over the heads of a good-natured crowd. The holder of the winning ticket proved to be a thrifty young man of the settlement, who had long sought for the hand of the eldest daughter, Hulda, whose husband he was now to become.
A Married Man Gets No. 2
Next came the raffle for the second daughter, a rosy-cheeked lass of twenty-two Summers. This time the winning ticket was held by one of the richest men in the town, but, unfortunately, he was a married man with a large family. This caused a long delay in the proceedings, during which the entire audience entered into a heated discussion as to what the disposition should be made of the ticket, but it was finally agreed that the lucky number should be sold at auction then and there. This was done, and, after considerable spirited bidding, Miss Minnie, the second daughter, became the prospective bride of a middle-aged widower, who paid $50 for the prize.
Then came the raffle for the youngest daughter, and things were progressing smoothly enough, when an error was discovered which caused a bitter altercation between two ticket holders, and came near precipitating a free-for-all fight among the spectators. Through carelessness the winning number had been duplicated, and there were two claimants for the hand of daughter No. 3. At length a general row was averted, however, by the adoption of a happy suggestion. These two claimants resorted to a game of ‘freeze out’ for a determination of the matter, and for two hours they sat at a card table, surrounded by an excited crowd of friends, manipulating the pasteboards for a bride. Slowly the stack of chips in front of the unlucky player dwindled to a paltry few, and at last his opponent swept the board, and the game was decided in favor of a young man named Gustav Johnson, who labors by the day on the farm of his father.
True to their promises the three daughters will allow themselves to be led to the altar by the three lucky winners, and the three weddings will take place within a month, upon which occasion a grand dance will be given in the schoolhouse to all the people of the settlement.”
Tags: Gustav Johnson, Hanes Dorfkle, Hulda Dorfkle, Minnie Dorfkle
The oppressive cable-television industry makes wonderful Netflix possible, as Derek Thompson points out in an Atlantic post. An excerpt:
“The 100 million households paying for cable are subsidizing the entertainment on Netflix. This subsidy allows Netflix to charge an affordable-enough monthly rate so that they can attract a truly mass audience. Just about everything that you love about Netflix (its affordability, its variety, its ability to take risks) is made possible because of just about everything you hate about cable, whose high cost and refusal to offer a la carte creates high margins for entertainment companies, who auction the scraps to Netflix, Amazon and other Internet video companies.
The instinct among some tech writers to implicitly root for Netflix over the traditional cable industry is understandable. Netflix is cheap and easy to use. Cable is expensive and remote controls are terrible. Netflix’s affordability and its willingness to take risks are both made possible by the same traditional TV business they’re threatening.”
Tags: Derek Thompson
Following up on this week’s post about Google perhaps getting into the driverless-taxi business, here’s the opening of a Matthew Yglesias Slate piece warning that regulation might stymie the emergence of this autonomous sector:
“Google’s eye-popping $258 million investment in the car-hailing app company Uber made headlines last week. It’s the search giant’s biggest-ever venture capital investment, and it gives a much-discussed but rather small-scale company a delirious $3.5 billion valuation. But so far, the commentary on the deal—which has been mostly focused on bubble speculation and startup mania—has missed the real story.
Google’s interest in Uber is likely connected to their ongoing investments in driverless or autonomous cars, and it shows that the potential of this technology is much greater than is commonly realized. By the same token, however, the stakes in ongoing regulatory battles between tech startups and taxi regulators are higher than most people know. This is not just the future of yuppies getting a ride home from the bar. It’s a set of issues that has the potential to radically remake the American landscape.
But to get there, regulators would have to want cheaper and better taxi service. Current trends make it unclear that they do.”
Tags: Matthew Yglesias
Here’s the first trailer from the new Errol Morris doc about Donald Rumsfeld.
Tags: Donald Rumsfeld, Errol Morris
At the VMAs, Miley Cyrus turned the entire nation into the high school principal from Footloose. And that’s sort of strange since people the same age as her can be seen performing every manner of sex act on every computer and phone on the dominant media of our age, the Internet. You know, the medium kids actually care about. So why is a higher value placed on Miley Cyrus’ chastity than young adults doing a lot more obscene things online than twerking? Is it because she’s a former Disney princess and some people had projected dreams of their own onto her? In addition to getting as much attention as possible, Cyrus acted out the way she did because she doesn’t want to live inside anyone else’s dreams, yours or Walt Disney’s. She wants to live her own dreams, which may be even worse, but at least they’re hers. In some ways, that’s healthier than people who play the game, maintain the facade, their whole lives.
So while I seem to be the rare person to think Miley backing her ass up isn’t akin morally to Assad using chemical weapons, I did have one great concern: What if one of those gigantic, drugged-out bears on the stage ate her? That would truly be horrible. But it turns out they were only people in bear costumes. Whew! Artist Todd James, who created the grizzly-on-molly designs, is profiled in a short piece by Stephanie Chan in the Hollywood Reporter. The opening:
“It’s clear that people were, uh, unhappy with Miley Cyrus‘ performance during MTV’s VMAs this year. However, one of the more memorable aspects of her shock-and-awe-inducing performance was the crew of massive, cartoonish teddy bears on stage.
The man behind the sleepy-eyed beasts is New York-based contemporary artist Todd James, who began his career with graffiti, a 17-year-old tagging in the New York City subway system under the moniker REAS. His past work includes designing the Beastie Boys’ Brooklyn Dust Elephant emblem, as well as creating The Source magazine’s logo.
While James’ work is typically focused on colorful paintings and installations with a slight Japanese street-art bent, he told The Hollywood Reporter how his moment of grizzly VMA greatness came about — and how the 20-foot-tall background bear, 12 bubble-gum pink dancing bears and six twerking bear suits came to life.”
Tags: Miley Cyrus, Stephanie Chan, Todd James
A student-teacher relationship at Trump University.
Teach me how to be a job creator just like you, Mr. Trump.
You have to kiss me first.
!n 1968, Judy Garland visited Dick Cavett for the first time. The picture is very shaky and so, sadly, is she.
Tags: Dick Cavett, Judy Garland
For much of the 1960s, Lewis Lapham was a Saturday Evening Post correspondent who had the entire world as his beat, covering of-the-moment stories like the Beatles’ ill-fated 1968 visit to the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Two years after that fascinating debacle, Lapham was in Alaska, now for Harper’s, to file a report about the black-gold rush, as oil money was remaking the frontier state, for better or worse. The opening of “Alaska: Politicians and Natives, Money and Oil“:
“Sunday evening, January 18, 1970. I arrived in Juneau yesterday afternoon, and already I’ve met twenty-seven people with twenty-seven contradictory visions of paradise regained. The confusion begins with the money.
Last September, at an auction in Anchorage, the state of Alaska raffled off oil concessions on the Arctic Ocean for $900 million. Which, in Alaska, is more money than princes find in fairy tales. Although two and one-half times the size of Texas, the state has a population of 280,000 (equivalent to the population of Des Moines, Iowa). For years the state has been poorer than Appalachia, dependent on federal grants to rescue it from annual bankruptcy; now that it is rich nobody knows how to distribute the largess.
I envy none of the politicians convened in this shambling, wooden town for the present meeting of the State Legislature. Almost all of them must stand for election later in the year (not only the Governor but also the entire Senate and half the House), and the more ambitious among them no doubt look upon the money with the gratitude of a crowd of Eskimos gathered around the body of a beached whale. I suspect, however, that the majority, more timid and mindful of the extravagant public expectations, will prefer to do nothing.
That is too bad only because they have a chance to do so much. In many ways Alaska resembles the American frontier one hundred years ago; like California before the freeways or Lake Erie before the fish died. Conceivably, the Alaskans could learn from the mistakes so evident elsewhere in the landscape; conceivably, they could come up with an alternative to the habit of mind (much admired by local chambers of commerce) that plunders the available resources and divides the spoils among the surviving interests. In the beginning there is the frontier; one hundred years later, given the genius of technology and the arithmetic of population, you end up with the crowds, and the bad air, and the fish floating in the rivers. The transformation is commonly called progress, and some of the people here fear it.
I remember that in Anchorage last autumn the women’s voices were the most wistful. The Legislature, in hopes of providing a rationale for its subsequent laws and distributions, summoned a preliminary conference to which it invited people from everywhere in the state. For three days I listened to teachers, Eskimos, bankers, Tlingit Indians, fishermen, petroleum engineers, guides, housewives, newspaper editors, and bush pilots. It was as if they were afraid of the consequences of the money. They kept talking about ‘Alaska the way it is now’ and ‘all those things we came up here to get away from.’ The politicians assured them that their fears were irrational, that Alaska must take its place in the twentieth century.
At the end of the conference I remember a woman standing uncertainly in the lobby of the Captain Cook Hotel; she was holding a sheaf of government papers of which she seemed suspicious, as if the pretentious language (‘parameters,’ ‘time-frames,’ ‘infrastructure,’ etc.) somehow announced impending ruin.
‘I listen to them talk,’ she said, ‘and I hear the trees falling in the forest.’
Tonight it is snowing, and perhaps I’m giving way to the pessimism of the weather; tomorrow I begin with debate in the State Senate.”
Tags: Lewis Lapham
Stevie Wonder visits Dick Cavett in 1970, chatting with the host and performing the song which was used nearly 40 years later by Barack Obama to celebrate becoming the first African-American President.
Tags: Stevie Wonder